The latch-key kid generation was a game of cat and mouse
The latch-key kid generation I was a part of was like serving a little mouse up on a platter to a cunning cat. Mindful, of course, that cats don’t like to eat their prey; they prefer to stalk and play with them a little first. There was plenty of time for the cunning cat to play with his little mouse in the hours after school and before a parent arrived home by around five or six pm.
Alice Perle (2023) Resolve, Chapter One, Young Alice’s Story.
Easy access to siblings makes it more likely that an adolescent abuser (who can be just as predatory as adult abusers) will choose someone within the household. Their abuse is often well-planned and thought out.
Morin, A. (2022). Sibling sexual abuse facts parents should know. https://www.verywellmind.com/facts-about-sibling-sexual-abuse-2610456.
Like so many other kids in the 1970s, at times, we were latch-key kids after school.
In those days, Dad and Mum both needed to work to support the family. In the earlier years, Mum ran a business from home, and Dad had a full-time office job in the city. Mostly Mum would work as a secretary in the suburbs or the city and get home later in the afternoon.
Latch-key kids are children between the ages of five and thirteen. Kids who come home (usually from school) to an empty house. Young children, unsupervised, fend for themselves for a few hours until a parent returns home from work. It was usual for kids like me in the Generation X era. Mums were expected to join the workforce and contribute to the household finances.
As the eldest son in the family, Darryl had the ultimate responsibility or privilege to hold the front door key to our house.
According to a report from Darkness to Light (2017):
One in seven incidents of sexual assault committed by adolescents occurs on school days between three and seven pm. Within this time frame, the peak of assaults occurs between three and four pm.
Darkness to Light. (2017). Child Sexual Abuse Statistics Report. Retrieved from http://www.d2l.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/all_statistics_20150619.pdf
As a latch-key kid, I dreaded coming home from school.
Our house offered no sanctuary, no safety. It didn’t occur to me then that it wasn’t normal for a child to feel that way about their home. I have since learnt that this sense of ‘home being unsafe’ is related to an overactive trauma response. Getting stuck in fight, flight, fawn or freeze is common among survivors who experienced long-term abuse.
The important right to feel safe in my home was taken from me during those childhood years.
As an adult, gaining clarity about that made me feel the loss of childhood. I should have run happily through the front door, got a snack and relaxed. Perhaps I would have fought about which afternoon TV show we would watch or begrudgingly got on with my afternoon chores and homework.
But no, it wasn’t like that for me.
Thankfully, the latch-key kids became a bygone era after my generation.
A few decades of children were saved from being required to be independent before they were ready.
It was a relief to read that with the increase in after-school care programs, by 2011, the number of kids left alone dropped by forty (40) percent.
What troubled me throughout the time of writing Resolve was the effect that Covid-19 lockdowns and changes to how organisations operated may have on school-aged children.
One news report in the United States shared that millions of children had become latch-key kids in 2020, as after-school programs shut their doors. The remaining programs raised the prices or reduced available spaces.
Dr Lynette Fraga, CEO of Child Care Aware, told the TODAY show that:
7.7 million children in 2020 who don’t have access to care and are left alone and unsupervised is undoubtedly a concern.
Source: Kait Hanson, TODAY, 15 Nov 2021.
The kids are our responsibility as adults. They’re not mini-adults.
Adults should not presume readiness and capability to be responsible for younger siblings. Leaving children to be independent before they are ready, must be actively discussed, planned and agreed upon by parents. If it does become necessary, there are so many new resources available now. Books, information sites and resources are available to help parents have open conversations. Conversations about what is appropriate and what is inappropriate behaviour can’t be shied away from. Siblings need to know they have an avenue to speak about anything. If something is not feeling right, when they are left alone at home, parents need to express that it’s ok to speak.
Conversations must be had for sibling sexual abuse not to continue in our homes.
Alice Perle
Resolve: A Story of Courage, Healthy Inquiry and Recovery from Sibling Sexual Abuse is now available globally. Libraries and bookstores can order copies. Please follow me on Instagram and Facebook as @resolvebyaliceperle. The audiobook is now also available via over 50 audiobook sites. If you live in Australia, I parcel up copies here, if you’d like to purchase it directly.
