By Dave Battagello and Trevor Wilhelm
Windsor Star
July 23, 2011
http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Abuse+victims+struggle+with+mental+health+problems/5148483/story.html
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| Rev. Charles Sylvestre's photo hangs in the halls of St. Peter's Seminary in London as part of a group graduation photo from the class of 1948. Victim Lou Ann Soontiens says she is haunted by memories of abuse at the hands of Sylvestre. |
Drug addiction, alcoholism and male prostitution.
For John Swales, a sex abuse victim of Barry Glendinning, the fallout was almost instant after the priest was arrested.
"It was immediate - the lifestyle change from being a 10-year-old boy ringing the bell as an altar boy, to having absolutely no spiritual or emotional or mental values," said Swales, 52, who was abused in the 1970s. "And yet plagued with the guilt of God.
"I shot off the charts. Immediately I was uncontrollable. The rules didn't apply."
The impact of sexual abuse by clergy is "profound" and almost always lasts a lifetime, says Carol Mayer, a Toronto therapist who has worked with hundreds of victims of predator priests.
"Their lives can never be something as if they were never abused," she said. "Their lives are always influenced greatly by the events that happened."
Mayer, formerly of Windsor, said the lives which victims describe to therapists decades after the abuse follow a depressing pattern of failed relationships, chaotic living circumstances, substance abuse and mental health problems.
"The research is really clear - the impact of sustained sexual abuse of a child results in significant mental health problems," she said. "On top of that is being abused by a priest."
Many victims remain at the same maturity level as the age when they were abused.
"Twelve-year-olds don't do relationships or handle responsibility very well," Mayer said.
As children, the victims were not mature enough to handle sexual interaction with adults or were psychologically overwhelmed because of the circumstances of being abused by a priest, she said.
The longer victims go without treatment, "the more likely and more grievously they are harmed."
For the longest time, as his life spiralled out of control, Swales said it didn't occur to him his troubles might be tied to the abuse he suffered.
He was so troubled following his abuse that he turned to sexually abusing his own siblings, some of whom had also suffered at the hands of Glendinning.
He also fell hard into a world of drugs and booze. Glendinning had introduced Swales to alcohol and tobacco. After the abuse ended, he embraced those crutches. He started hanging out with gang members. There was pot, hard drugs and prostitution.
The substance abuse - and an arrest for drug trafficking - continued through a marriage which eventually failed.
"Pretty much the same kind of stuff right until I got into recovery at around 33," said Swales. "Really, from 15 to 33 was a writeoff."
Lou Ann Soontiens, abused by Charles Sylvestre during the mid-60s at St. Ursula's parish in Chatham, said she's plagued by more than a loss of her faith.
Soontiens said she endured abuse including rape that began when she was about 11 and ended around age 17 with a forced abortion.
She's still haunted by nightmares and needs sleeping pills.
"It's hard for me to get to sleep because I know once I go to sleep I'm going to dream that he's coming to get me," said Soontiens.
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