With the holidays approaching in the next couple of months, many children will be spending time with extended family members they might not see on a regular basis. Naturally, aunts, uncles, grandmothers and grandfathers might expect displays of affection from your little ones.
Although it might seem impolite to decline a hug or a kiss from an Aunt Sue, if your child isn’t comfortable with hugging someone, should you force the issue?
According to materials from FamilyHelpCenter.net, one important step to teaching children about improper touch — and possibly shielding them from sexual abuse — is making it known that kids are in charge of their bodies. They are the boss of who touches their body and how.
For this reason, forcing a child to kiss or hug a relative could be sending the wrong message. By teaching kids that it’s completely fine to say no to unwanted touches from family members and other people they know, they will be able to stand up for themselves if ever put in a situation of sexual abuse — or at the very least, they will be able to know what happened was wrong and can tell a trusted adult about it.
A widely read and shared article from CNN titled “I Don’t Own My Child’s Body” also provides many expert-backed reasons why children should never be forced to show affection. The sad reality of sexual abuse is that more times than not, the abuser is a relative or close friend of the family
“When we force children to submit to unwanted affection in order not to offend a relative or hurt a friend’s feelings, we teach them that their bodies do not really belong to them because they have to push aside their own feelings about what feels right to them.”
said Irene van der Zande, co-founder and executive director of Kidpower Teenpower Fullpower International, in the CNN article.
“This leads to children getting sexually abused, teen girls submitting to sexual behavior so ‘he’ll like me’ and kids enduring bullying because everyone is ‘having fun.’ “
On the flip side, many parents might argue that “a hug is just a hug,” and the polite thing to do is reciprocate great-grandma’s hug. Ultimately, moms and dads choose the physical boundaries while kids are very young. It’s up to parents to instill respect for others into their children. But it’s also up to parents to help children learn respect for their own bodies and wishes.