FRESH EPISODE: School behaviour, and what we parents can do to get the best out of teachers.
Dec. 6, 2023

Online grooming and sextortion: protecting our teens and tweens. How to spot if your child has fallen prey, and what to do next.

Online grooming and sextortion: protecting our teens and tweens. How to spot if your child has fallen prey, and what to do next.

66: The pandemic saw thousands of children moving online to learn, socialise, and play. Unfortunately, internet predators have followed them there, using highly sophisticated tactics to reach children and coerce them into sexual activities.

We were recently contacted by our listener therapist, Frances, who says that she's been dealing with cases of grooming online and thinks it's vital that we discuss the topic.

She's right to highlight it. I've been contacted by parents who have confided in me that their teen has fallen victim; both boys and girls. 

The disturbing nature of their activity has been exposed by Internet Watch Foundation analysts whose job it is to track down and view some of the very worst child sexual abuse material on the internet so it can be removed and blocked. They've seen a massive increase in abuse since lockdown.  

The one thing I've learned from all of the research I've been doing is that we are pretty much the only gatekeepers online; the apps constantly duck responsibility. The key watershed is 13, because the internet companies aren't allowed to collect data on people below that age. But that's still incredibly young for most kids to be accessing the sort of things that are online, and often they lie about their age to get apps they aren't legally allowed. 

We cover how to keep our teens safe, how to spot grooming, and what to do if your kid's a victim.

https://www.victimsupport.org.uk/you-co/types-crime/sex-crimes/grooming/#:~:text=It's%20important%20to%20think%20carefully,that%20you%20can%20get%20help.

https://www.ceop.police.uk/safety-centre/should-i-make-a-report-to-ceop-yp/

The story of Breck, who was lured to his death by a groomer https://www.breckfoundation.org/

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/03/14/us/north-carolina-missing-teen-dallas-found/
Documentary series: Undercover Underage

https://www.nspcc.org.uk/about-us/news-opinion/2023/2023-08-14-82-rise-in-online-grooming-crimes-against-children-in-the-last-5-years/#

https://legaljobs.io/blog/online-predators-statistics/#:~:text=66.7%25%20of%20online%20predators'%

 

Report abuse
Contact our Helpline by calling 0808 800 5000 or emailing help@NSPCC.org.uk 

Call our new NSPCC

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Thanks for listening.

Neither of us has medical training so please seek the advice of a specialist if you're not coping.

Please hit the follow button if you like our podcast, and share it with anyone who might benefit. You can review us on Apple podcasts by going to the show page, scrolling down to the bottom where you can click on a star then you can leave your message.

Our website has a blog, searchable episodes, and ways to contact us:
www.teenagersuntangled.com

Susie is available for a free 15 minute consultation, and has a great blog:
www.amindful-life.co.uk

Transcript
WEBVTT

00:00:02.638 --> 00:00:12.300
Hello and welcome to Teenagers Untangled the audio hug for parents going through the teenage years. I'm Rachel Richards parenting coach a mother of two teenagers and two bonus daughters.

00:00:12.300 --> 00:00:19.920
Hi there. I'm Susie Asli, mindfulness coach, mindful therapist, musician and mother of three teenagers two of them are twins.

00:00:19.920 --> 00:00:28.589
Now, Susie, I know you weren't keen to talk about grooming, because it's really an unpleasant subject. I don't really want to talk about either,

00:00:29.940 --> 00:00:32.939
okay, that's fine.

00:00:32.939 --> 00:00:35.478
Just look it up, guys. Just look it up. Okay.

00:00:35.533 --> 00:00:48.000
One of our listeners is a therapist who's been tackling these issues with clients. She says parents really need to be more aware. And to make their kids more aware of the patterns involved. So they can protect themselves.

00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:52.020
Ya know, it's super important. Up for attempting it?

00:00:52.020 --> 00:01:09.680
Yes, let's try it. In this episode, we'll talk about what grooming is how it can happen to your kid, what to look out for and to say to them and how to support them. If they're victims. I'm not going to look at on in real life grooming because this happens.

00:01:06.085 --> 00:01:13.335
For sure. I'm going to look mainly at online grooming. And there are reasons for that.

00:01:13.397 --> 00:01:17.549
Anyway, let's talk happy stuff like nugget nugget for us this week.

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I have it's a bit of a vague one. But it's it's this idea that I don't know, maybe it's just me. But sometimes when things are going really well, and everything's imbalanced you think, Oh, great. cracked it.

00:01:27.540 --> 00:01:30.569
And then stuff comes up again.

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Yes, yeah. And then life. And

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it's just a really nice reminder. And I mean, the details of what those particular things were don't really matter.

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But, you know, to get definitely two out of three of my kids have been things this this week. And I just go, oh. To do that again.

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Yes, God. And it's just a great reminder, you know, nothing, nothing lasts forever think everything's passing. And here we go again, and tweaking and it's a dance, it was reminded myself it was it's almost feels like a dance of you know, it's a recurring dance of moving and tweaking and being flexible. So yes, that was my little reminder.

00:02:11.459 --> 00:02:20.068
Let's talk about the wheel of life and the circle. And that, you know, when you're up at the top, and everything's great, it's going to be there. And that's okay.

00:02:20.098 --> 00:02:22.019
That's just part of how it is.

00:02:20.098 --> 00:02:33.058
And I remember when the kids were really, really little, and you think this is amazing, they're sorted. And then they go through another fussy stage, because that's what development is. It's never linear, it just goes out right? Now we've got to do something,

00:02:33.180 --> 00:02:51.210
and a reminder to stay exactly in that mindset of everything passes, everything changes. And it's it's non attachment, isn't it? That's just thing of not clinging on to the good or the bad. Or sorry, not clinging on to the good and pushing away the bad, but with all of it, and it will, you know, comes around again. Yeah,

00:02:51.270 --> 00:03:26.280
absolutely. My nugget is about a word that I saw another podcaster using, and it was punishment. And she was talking about she'd actually was asking people what they thought about taking away phones as a means of punishment. And I responded to her saying, I just don't like that word, I don't think that should really be in our vocabulary as parents because punishment is so disconnecting it so it's not actually getting you or your kids to where you want to be.

00:03:26.639 --> 00:04:08.370
And I'm much more particularly and we'll talk about this in this episode, particularly when you're trying to talk about online life, whether it's your phone, whether it's media, social media on a computer, when we seek to punish for behavior, what we're not doing is securing the boundaries and talk and opening up that discussion with them. So I would much rather talk about learning and and and that they've done something and so we don't want them to do that again. How do we get them to that position because punishment people just people cower, wait for it to pass. And then they just go back to whatever they were doing is behavior

00:04:08.370 --> 00:04:11.789
control punishment.

00:04:08.370 --> 00:04:15.389
Sometimes it works depending on the punishment. When you lose the contact, you lose the connection, and then you can have a

00:04:15.389 --> 00:04:17.968
conversation.

00:04:15.389 --> 00:04:28.619
Yes. And and the conversations are absolutely vital, which we'll talk about shortly. Let's talk about reviews. Now I've been digging around because I didn't realize it was Spotify.

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You can see when people have you know each episode there'll be a question, what did you think?

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And I have noticed a few which is lovely. Thank you so much, guys. Yes.

00:04:36.209 --> 00:04:38.639
Amazing. I've got a couple here. Yeah, from Kirsty.

00:04:38.639 --> 00:05:01.680
Thank you, Kirsty. Very helpful first parenting podcast I have listened to and will definitely listen to more. And one from Louise who says firstly, I love your podcast. One helpful tip I use for her at school between your daughter is to pin a piece of fabric with my perfume inside her jumper. So when she gets overwhelmed, it helps her calm and feel feel reassured Oh, that's such a lovely that's

00:05:01.680 --> 00:05:03.720
a great tip.

00:05:01.680 --> 00:05:08.339
And my daughter loves my perfume. Yeah, my daughter so she would find that very competent. Very good tip. I like that

00:05:08.370 --> 00:05:16.560
I used to give my kids when they were little like my scarf with perfume on and only had one perfume deliberately so that there was yes, my smell. Yes. Really good.

00:05:16.560 --> 00:05:21.720
Thanks for your scent, scent smell a stinky

00:05:22.649 --> 00:05:40.829
smell. Farm Animals my granny used to say that. Here's here's one from Karianne, who listened to the trans and gender confusion interview, she said, Thank you for a truly educational insight into something that I've been trying to understand better.

00:05:38.160 --> 00:06:03.360
I've learned so much in that short episode. It's a very complex subject, we just basically touched on it in regards to how we can talk to our teenagers. But there is that it's a very, very deep, wide topic. And this stellar has lots of stuff. Yeah, lots and lots of stuff about it. And Helen, Greenland, listened to what is a gap year? And should our teens take one and she said loved it.

00:06:04.019 --> 00:06:17.339
It can be as simple as that. We don't need lots of lots of words, we just need a little bit of a thumbs up. And it makes us very happy. So thank you. Right back to grooming are really sorry, sorry. Have you had to tackle this with any of your clients?

00:06:17.939 --> 00:06:20.430
No, not specifically. I haven't No, yeah,

00:06:20.459 --> 00:06:26.310
I've been contacted by a number of parents whose kids have been victims.

00:06:23.399 --> 00:08:01.470
And one of the reasons for that is because I regularly post stuff on social media. And it's just, I just repost things I see without comment, so that it can give people ways to think about stuff. And they can also then respond to it. So I have had a few parents contacting me. And some of them have involved the police. And for others, it was difficult to track the person down. So they just took the approach of learning from it and moving on. But it's very upsetting when it happens. And so it's much better if we can be forewarned about and these these kids, boys, girls, you know, it's actually, very often it is more girls who tend to be targeted, but boys are equally vulnerable. So grooming What is it, it's when someone builds a relationship of trust or emotional connection with a child or young person, so then can manipulate, exploit and abuse them. And we're talking about young people here, but it does actually happen. Just generally. The the abuse is usually sexual or financial. But it can also include other illegal acts like county lines drug running, which is where people groom people to carry drugs down these rail lines to your country villages, from the cities. Yeah. And it can be even more sinister. There's a local foundation very close to us, which was set up in 2014, after a local boy Breck was murdered by his online groomer. And over the course of a year, an 18 year old man who was doing this, and he ran an Internet gaming server, and Breck and his school friends were using it every day.

00:07:56.819 --> 00:08:21.180
And they he, he basically zoned in on Breck isolated him use lies, manipulation and false promises to gain his trust. And his parents even tried, they just realized what was going on and tried to stop contact. But this groomer actually sent burner phones and you know, it was really difficult situation.

00:08:17.069 --> 00:08:32.549
And eventually he was lured to the grimace black where he was killed. So it's very upsetting that it that's I will put a link to that online, because you can use that to educate your team.

00:08:28.620 --> 00:09:11.700
Yeah, that's the parents have been brilliant about sharing their story to try and educate people to try it. So what is the process basically, the groom identifies a victim gives them special allowances or privileges, or finds a way to share secrets, so they feel special, or tells them how wonderful they are, and makes them feel like this. They're different. They then isolate the child, take them offline. So if they want a game, they'll take them off the game and start talking, they'll create secrecy, and then they will start desensitizing them to the grooming behavior. So it doesn't always take all those steps. But that's the sort of framework Yeah, and the types of grooming.

00:09:12.690 --> 00:09:57.929
The thing about online grooming is that they can hide Of course, they can send photos or videos of other people. They can target a child online, or like one or lots of them. Sometimes they just choose to send lots and lots of things, just fishing to see if anybody will respond. And they use the same sights, games and apps as young people they know where these people are. And they will spend time trying to learn about the person's interests. So one of the people who was affected was a sports person, this this teenager, and they realized that it was an important thing for this person and started complimenting them and then the grooming started, and that was sexual grooming.

00:09:58.980 --> 00:10:03.870
Its power and control. Lesson is power and control. Yes, power getting control over the person.

00:10:03.899 --> 00:10:17.549
Yes. It's important to remember that the children and young people, often they don't understand they're being groomed. No, no, because it's so sophisticated. They may have very complicated feelings like loyalty, admiration, love.

00:10:17.580 --> 00:10:26.070
I mean, if you have been loved, bombed by someone, and feel amazing is going to be very hard to then step back and say, Actually, this is sinister. And

00:10:26.070 --> 00:10:33.809
especially I don't want it anymore. I'm gonna because if I say anything, it'll stop. You're emotionally immature, it feels really nice.

00:10:31.139 --> 00:10:36.240
That's, that's really, really, really challenging. And

00:10:36.240 --> 00:11:07.470
it's a really fast moving area. So in the UK, the offence of sexual communication with a child was only introduced in 2017. I didn't know that. That's really recent, isn't it? And so that's just six years ago. And there was some research released in the Sydney Morning Morning Herald, just maybe a couple of weeks ago, maybe even a week ago, which published a shocking number of Australian men who are sexually attracted to children.

00:11:04.230 --> 00:11:27.210
So what they read down, did you read it all survey, more than just under 2000 men was really grim. Yeah. And these men were 18 to 65. Almost one in six men have sexual feelings towards children and teens, and almost one in 20 acknowledged having committed child sexual sexual offences. What is

00:11:27.210 --> 00:11:36.210
chilling? And it'd be great to know a few more details about the surveys, because my mind goes well, what does that actually mean? The big statistics are horrible. The

00:11:36.210 --> 00:11:42.990
big statistic and to me, I'm looking at that thinking that probably a lot of that will have happened online.

00:11:43.049 --> 00:12:50.399
Yeah. And the more the ones they found that admitted these things were more likely to be married and higher incomes and work with children, which is very concerning. Yes. So the NSPCC, which is the charity in the UK for protection of children, recently requested data on offenses from all UK police forces since this kind of offense in the UK was introduced in 2017. The data shows that over 6000 offences were recorded in 2223, which is an 82% increase since the year the offense came into force, under 12, are affected and a quarter of those cases. And were the gender was known to twirl under 12, under twelves. And this is the problem. And we'll come on to why that does happen. Where the gender was known 83% of online grooming offenses were against girls. Okay, so it is skewed toward towards girls, but boys are vulnerable. Where does it happen? Well, then where the means of communication was known. 150 different apps, games and websites were being used.

00:12:51.149 --> 00:13:25.289
26% of online grooming offenses against children took place on Snapchat 47% of online grooming offences took place on meta owned products such as Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. And this is why there have been cases being brought in the US and places where they're trying to put more controls in and trying to just protect kids more. But the more and more Susy that I look at these things, whether it's Snapchat, whether it's Instagram, whether it whatever, whatever online, bone use. We are the gatekeepers.

00:13:20.610 --> 00:13:25.289
That's it. We

00:13:25.289 --> 00:13:30.330
are and I don't think the companies are that interested in they don't care.

00:13:27.629 --> 00:13:32.129
They don't care because it makes them money. And it's just grotesque.

00:13:32.159 --> 00:13:41.190
Yes. And every time they have to put in place a control, yeah, that means that they could because they are trying to collect information.

00:13:37.710 --> 00:13:46.889
So one of the laws is that they're not allowed to collect information on children under the age of 13, which is why some of these barriers are put up.

00:13:46.919 --> 00:13:55.799
It's got nothing to do with child green grooming. It's just to do with, you know, data protection. But how many kids actually lie about their age loads of them do?

00:13:56.789 --> 00:13:57.299
Yes,

00:13:57.389 --> 00:14:15.269
so then they're not they're not safe. So the truth is, these numbers are probably the tip of the iceberg because a lot of kids don't admit to things happening. Or parents find out and they don't, you know, it's not something you can get any help with when the police are not going to what you're going to do.

00:14:16.769 --> 00:14:18.809
And there's a lot of shame involved in it as well.

00:14:18.809 --> 00:14:19.830
Isn't it embarrassment.

00:14:20.399 --> 00:14:39.720
So the main area of target is 12 to 15 year old girls, they're very vulnerable. And we saw this with his ex teen as well. Sexting as well. These girls are very vulnerable. teen boys are the next primary target for online predators. They say that boys are more comfortable talking about their sexuality online with strangers.

00:14:40.259 --> 00:14:43.769
So the boys is that the same age, as the girl didn't say

00:14:43.769 --> 00:15:04.860
didn't say didn't say one of the big problems, which we just mentioned is that 31% of children aged 12 to 18. In the surveys lied about their age for website access, and 75% were even willing to share their personal information for goods and services. So it's an easy one, isn't it? Yeah. You put something up that a teenager wants, and they go, Oh, well, like, Yeah, I'll give you my details for that.

00:15:05.279 --> 00:15:17.399
And also, when the kids have lied about their age to get into these different platforms, then the platform thinks, oh, now they're 18. And then they start getting new information. And they're not 18.

00:15:14.820 --> 00:15:17.399
Yes. And they're

00:15:17.399 --> 00:15:20.009
forming a profile constantly, you're suddenly

00:15:20.009 --> 00:15:21.809
allowed access to a whole load of stuff.

00:15:23.009 --> 00:15:34.559
Yeah. And the Internet Watch foundation reported that 2021 was the worst year for online sexual abuse, what was happening then? COVID.

00:15:29.519 --> 00:16:22.769
And it notably increased in the first months of the pandemic, online predator reports increased by 106%. Wow, early, early in the pandemic. And that's McAfee. Yeah. That's how you pronounce it. Okay, so what do they want? They want that mostly they want explicit images of children, other purposes, physical meetings. They just enjoy sexual conversations, or roleplay. Online. And only 2% It said was financial motivation. I was contacted by a parent where their child was, had shared a photo or photos. And they demanded money that the teenager gave money. And, and then they said, No, we want more now. And we'll go so that they wouldn't show Yeah, yeah. Oh, we're going to send this to all your contact because they find it once they know who all your contacts are.

00:16:22.799 --> 00:16:34.529
That's how they work. And that's happened to another person, where they said, right, unless you show us more, give us more extreme pictures. I'm going to send these photos to everyone on your list. And

00:16:34.529 --> 00:16:37.830
I have 14 years old how on earth do you navigate that? Yes. Well,

00:16:37.980 --> 00:17:08.279
luckily this I know about this because the parents contacted me and they called the police. Yeah, so when they found out hold Luckily, this child didn't have enough money to pay up and came to them panicking in the middle of the night, but nothing Yeah, horrific for everybody. Just and we'll talk about what you do if you find out your child has been groomed. online chatting with strangers is another big problem because 40% of children from grades four to eight experienced online chatting with strangers.

00:17:05.970 --> 00:17:13.799
This is according to the Center for Cyber Safety and education.

00:17:08.279 --> 00:17:23.609
And the NSPCC said 46% of children share personal information online. So these are the key things are that who are they chatting to? Who are they sharing their information with?

00:17:20.369 --> 00:17:27.240
Do they really understand how critically important it is not to share private information?

00:17:27.240 --> 00:17:27.509
Yeah,

00:17:27.509 --> 00:17:50.308
and I think sometimes I mean, I've experienced with with my daughter, like on Snapchat, that they have this thing called like, they have friends. And they have this them they have loads they can see they have loads of mutual friends. And there was somebody she was chatting with. And I was like, Well, you know, how do you know them? Well, then we've got loads of mutual friends. Okay, well, that sounds that sounds really a little bit reassuring, you know, that? know each other's friends.

00:17:47.189 --> 00:17:52.469
That's a good thing, right? Who do they know? You know, which friends of yours? Do they know?

00:17:52.798 --> 00:18:06.209
Or don't know? You can't see. It just says mutual. So there's this kind of fake reassurance that this person is okay, because they know lots of people, but you have no idea who and they could be you know, very likely we completely random.

00:18:06.298 --> 00:18:15.388
Yes. So it's it's, you know, it's really dodgy. Yes. Yes. She was like, Oh, it's fine. It's fine. We have Mutual's but you don't know who they are?

00:18:16.019 --> 00:18:18.599
Absolutely.

00:18:16.019 --> 00:18:50.460
Absolutely. And and and you know, on that also with on with multiplayer games, where there are lots of people playing this game, everybody's enjoying themselves because a lot of boys talk on they use this as a means of communicating with their friends, as we know already that can become theirs, they can get in. They use chat boxes and rooms that are being used by children, Roblox Minecraft, Clash of the clans Well, World of Warcraft. I saw this Roblox story online, which really horrified me and it was Twitter.

00:18:50.490 --> 00:19:03.630
And this mother said her little boy, he was nowhere near tween had decided to go online and have a look on Roblox because this is for little ones. Yes.

00:19:00.509 --> 00:19:53.910
She wanted to know, you know, she said, Okay, I'm gonna have a look at it, and see what sorts of things and she was horrified by some of the things that he would be able to access. And she went on Twitter and said, this is this is horrific. You know, anybody seen this? And she and they said, I hate to break it to you, but that's nothing compared to what's on there. And she said, Well, I know but I can't share those other things on Twitter. And so for example, the Turkish said, there are little little porn games on this website that sometimes get advertised to kids. ROBLOX has only recently begun to do stuff about them. This other developer Dobby said it's a really complex problem to discuss, but in their opinion, don't uninstall Roblox, but the whole thing is you have to assume that every single new game needs to be investigated.

00:19:54.269 --> 00:20:17.519
Every single time a child downloads another new game from Roblox as a parent You need to be in there looking at what they're looking at. And and this is why it's so important that we have an open dialogue with our teenagers. Because if we start out with the premise that they do something wrong, we're going to take their stuff away from them. They'll never tell you.

00:20:17.579 --> 00:20:23.069
I think that's really key. That's a really good point. Yeah, it has to be open.

00:20:19.650 --> 00:20:28.529
Yeah. If like you said in your nugget, if it's a punishment, taking away then that shuts the whole conversation. Yes.

00:20:28.829 --> 00:20:42.480
And I saw one mother, who was a she was amazing. She said, My son was on a game. And we have an open conversation all the time about what he's doing. And she said, Oh, there's this great guy made really good friends with him.

00:20:42.720 --> 00:20:59.069
We've come off the game, he wants to chat to me offline, because we've kind of really getting on. Is that okay? And she said, Would you mind if I just check things? Can you give me his phone number? And, and she said, I won't go into any detail. But we discovered things where he blocked that person.

00:20:59.880 --> 00:21:09.930
But imagine was we've not said exactly, but that's because they had this really good relationship where she said, and she said, I didn't hide it from him. I just said, Look, this is why this is not someone you want to talk right lesson

00:21:09.930 --> 00:21:39.900
for him. Amazing lesson. Yeah. And I think I've often and I'm just sitting here thinking crikey, been lulled into a false sense of security that, you know, we've, we've had these conversations before, my kids seem quite aware of, you know, things you don't and to be fair, their school was great when they were at the age where they needed it to be hammered home. And they did a talk for them. That terrified them. But it needs updating doesn't like because things change. And I think I'm like, I'm thinking I need to go home and rehab, this conversation.

00:21:41.009 --> 00:21:49.559
I think all of these things, it's the same with every single one of these issues. And it's exhausting. And I totally understand us parents go really

00:21:50.368 --> 00:21:55.828
out of balance as well, isn't it because I know, I know, my boys. My eldest particularly, I mean, he's 18.

00:21:55.828 --> 00:22:22.648
He plays games, and they play with other people, they play in teams, and it's really fun. And you can hear them talking to him, and he's half Danish. So he's, he's really enjoyed, you know, talking to other Danes, you know, that's become really fun and interesting, as long as it stays online. And as long as it's alright. But I guess these predators are stalking these groups, finding the vulnerable ones in those games, and, you know, doing this awful thing that they do. And I

00:22:22.650 --> 00:22:41.519
think the tip there is that if your kids playing Yeah, you just say, Hey, can I just come in? Listen it like every now and then I'm just gonna come and join in and just, you know, how does it work? What are you doing there that looks so cool, and just be a fly on their shoulder from time to time. And then you'll notice behavior changing, you'll notice things that aren't quite

00:22:41.519 --> 00:22:53.910
right. Yeah, I've asked mine, you know, well, who did you chat to today, then? And are the Danes back or that kind of thing when that was happening? I didn't know what he's doing now, because he's not at home anymore. But yeah, no, that's absolutely right. And

00:22:53.910 --> 00:23:20.130
just on that, that Snapchat thing, I saw a recent story in the times where a police officer groomed more than 200 girls online, it's a police officer, repeatedly asked them to take sexual images in their school uniforms. This police officer was 24 in the US, and he used fake Snapchat accounts and posed as a young boy to contact girls aged 10 to 16. I mean, come on. Oh, right.

00:23:13.890 --> 00:23:22.559
This is yeah, anyway, what can we do rather than rather than panic? Well,

00:23:23.368 --> 00:23:50.519
it's kind of stories. I've had conversations with my kids not over this but other issues where their their view of the police force is really bad. Because of stories like that, which rightly get put in the media and that's all for them. It's that's dreadful, and other things, and they kind of it was no point going to the police because they're all the films they watch about the police. And that's a whole other story, but and worth mentioning me. And

00:23:50.519 --> 00:24:22.589
on that note, the people I've spoken to who have gone to the police have had support. Yeah, uh, yeah. But, for example, one of them were this child, that the police were brought in by the school. All phones that had any images on or had potentially had images on were confiscated. So you know, this the one of the children who had not instantly deleted the photo, because these photos were disseminated around the entire school. Lost their iPhone for eight months. Gosh, because the police it was evidence.

00:24:23.670 --> 00:24:28.710
I think So Lisa, amazing. They can some of the teams have got a funny view of them. Of course,

00:24:28.829 --> 00:24:43.230
of course. So what can we do? Okay, so we we we need to teach our kids social media responsibility and Internet safety. It's not a one and done conversation. It's a regular checking in with them.

00:24:39.269 --> 00:24:47.609
Teach your kids not to share information. Just don't know phone numbers, no addresses.

00:24:48.000 --> 00:25:09.960
Don't talk to people you haven't met in real life and no sexual photos. Because that's the big one. Once you've sent one that's gone, and now you don't have control. Right? I check on your games and apps regularly. It's just about keeping them safe. So you don't have to be, you know, over their shoulder. Just say what, you know, can we check what game to on? Do you mind?

00:25:09.960 --> 00:25:21.509
Just have a quick look? And if they know that you're only there to support them, and that you're not going to punish them, or make them feel terrible for making a mistake, they're much more likely to have conversations with you about it.

00:25:21.569 --> 00:25:25.589
Yeah, cuz it freaks them out, too. They want to be safe. Yes. And they don't

00:25:25.589 --> 00:25:27.240
want them.

00:25:25.589 --> 00:25:29.309
They're stupid. I mean, these, like I said, these people are so sophisticated,

00:25:30.328 --> 00:25:37.048
is, ya know, that's really valid? Because they will feel silly for it. But they they're not. It's not their fault. Yes.

00:25:37.378 --> 00:25:58.469
And if they do decide they want to talk to somebody offline, or meet somebody offline, you need phone numbers, you need to talk to them, you need to talk to their parents, you know, this is a matter of keeping your child safe. If they've, if they're defensive about it, you just say, Well, why why, you know, we need to be open and careful about this. And you need to understand why this is an issue.

00:25:59.578 --> 00:26:20.969
Yeah, and, and it's a funny balance, isn't it, because that's really valid, and really, really important. And we also don't want to terrify our teenagers in the world. No, we want them to be cautious. We want them to, you know, take really good precaution. But we don't want them to be frightened of doing anything and think that everybody is a big bad groomer.

00:26:21.628 --> 00:26:27.628
That's a terrible message to give them as well. So it does have to be done with with balance. And with, you know, with that in mind,

00:26:27.690 --> 00:26:53.609
because a lot of our teens are not meeting people face to face. That's one of the biggest problems we've got. Now that's happened with COVID. And the lack of skill in meeting up with people. And it's a lot of it's gone online, and they meet wonderful people. And actually, you can reach people who share your interests in a way you can't in your own community. So there are some amazing benefits, but you need to be sitting next to them saying, so how's this? You know, yes, this person, okay, I'm fine with that. Good. Yeah. Because

00:26:53.609 --> 00:27:01.950
we want them to be in the world open and trusting and loving rather than terrified and wondering if everyone's going to do something horrible to them. We don't want that.

00:27:02.369 --> 00:27:22.079
Signs of grooming. It can be difficult to tell. But some of the signs you might see they're being very secretive about how they're spending their time. They haven't new money, or they have phones, they have things that you haven't bought for them.

00:27:15.809 --> 00:27:31.740
They're spending less time with other people, they become a lot more withdrawn, sexualized behavior, or language and an understanding of sex that's inappropriate for their age.

00:27:28.319 --> 00:27:44.940
Because that would always be a flag for me. And spending more time away from home going missing, things like that are really big flags. Like I said, they're very often unlikely to know they've been groomed, yeah.

00:27:45.240 --> 00:28:49.230
If a child reveals abuse of any type, what do we do? So listen carefully to what they're saying. Pause and we need to calm ourselves inside. Because they may come to us in a panic and say, Ah, this has just happened. And we're going to feel very upset. So once again, listen to our how not to overreact episode. Let them know immediately that they've done the right thing by telling you so thank them, and tell them it's not their fault. Because as soon as you say you're stupid, why did you do that's ridiculous, which is what we will be thinking. Because we will also be thinking, Oh, my goodness, I've told you to tell you this. I've told him that right? Say you're going to take them seriously. And explain what you'll do. Next report what the child has told you as soon as possible. I have put I will put in the podcast links, the episode links, lots of means of reporting things getting pictures taken down. So don't panic. Have a look at the website links, the episode links and see if there's something that we're just reach out for some

00:28:49.230 --> 00:28:54.720
support. And yeah, like you said, it's not their fault. It's so not their fault.

00:28:51.509 --> 00:28:59.789
They're so vulnerable. And you know what teenager doesn't like a bit of attention? What adult doesn't like a bit of a tantrum?

00:28:57.269 --> 00:29:00.299
So literally, it's just a minefield.

00:29:00.298 --> 00:29:20.999
Absolutely. And that's the thing is understanding why this has happened. What what internal drivers there are for wanting that kind of attention, and then giving them a chance to just heal from it because they may need counseling. Yeah, that's the other thing because some of this can be so traumatizing that you may need to follow it up with with some unpacking of it.

00:29:21.000 --> 00:29:25.079
Yeah. And they may really, really question their own ability to judge anything.

00:29:25.078 --> 00:29:37.949
Yes, yes. And the fear one of the big fears is it getting out? Yes. You know, one of the situations it did get out everyone in the school no knew. And that was very, very hard. Very hard.

00:29:38.009 --> 00:29:39.660
So that's a trust people again.

00:29:39.839 --> 00:29:45.509
Yes, absolutely. So obviously, it's a very troubling area of parenting. It's super important.

00:29:45.509 --> 00:30:04.109
I hope this has helped give you an opportunity to think about this topic and how you might approach it at home and ways to protect your kids. I just really it is it's constantly reminding ourselves that we are the gatekeepers. There is Nothing else, unfortunately. And we need to be on it. It's

00:30:04.109 --> 00:30:05.640
a good reminder.

00:30:04.109 --> 00:30:09.329
Thank you for the reminder, Rachel. Yeah. And I have another conversation with my kids. We had a few.

00:30:10.858 --> 00:30:43.019
I did, I stopped one of my daughters and said, Can I just ask you to knew how to spot a groomer? And she gave me verbatim, and I thought, okay, okay, we've had the audio, we have had this. Yeah, but I keep going back to the same. Do you know, what the havior to look out for? Do you know, you know, what have you shared online, and I have had kids, one of my kids share my phone number, because she can never remember her phone number for some competition. And I pulled it to one side and said, Okay, I'm going to explain to you why this is such a massive problem.

00:30:40.378 --> 00:30:44.278
Yeah. I'm glad you didn't share your phone number. But no,

00:30:44.548 --> 00:30:46.019
yeah. And did I when

00:30:47.068 --> 00:30:58.949
I clearly I wasn't going to, because it was clearly a way of getting my phone number. Anyway, that's so dodgy. Yes. I put some links to those helplines and podcast notes. Yes, and it's not something we like talking about.

00:30:58.949 --> 00:31:00.088
Let's do this. Let's just

00:31:00.089 --> 00:31:08.579
brilliant to have those links. So thank you for doing that. Because I think in the situation, you know, we would all be panicking, wouldn't we? What do we do? Where do we go and so to know where to go to find those things is really held

00:31:08.579 --> 00:31:18.359
nightmare. And just you just being able to talk to someone who'll say, Okay, here's how we're going to do this. Yeah. Let's do something lighter in ONYX. Yeah, we

00:31:21.480 --> 00:31:23.519
got some great ones.

00:31:21.480 --> 00:31:23.519
Oh,

00:31:23.640 --> 00:31:30.690
oh, one I had today. Floor job. Throw joke floor job. So it's basically a wardrobe on the floor, which is what most teenagers like it.

00:31:31.138 --> 00:31:33.898
Not all, but I have one of those. Yeah.

00:31:34.289 --> 00:31:37.619
And the other one. This all came from my yoga class. Joma

00:31:38.189 --> 00:31:41.068
Joma. Oh, the joy of missing out missing out. Yeah.

00:31:41.068 --> 00:31:41.429
So

00:31:41.459 --> 00:32:00.659
with with Christmas, all these, you know, she was she was saying how nature is trying to tell us to slow down hibernate during the winter. And our society is telling us to ramp things up and go out and have parties and go and see people and that that disconnect is hard. So that's the

00:32:00.659 --> 00:32:09.058
new trendy thing in the world of wellbeing. I think wintering and we can have a balance in it as well. You know, it's also fun to go out. But as Jean is tuning in, isn't it?

00:32:09.058 --> 00:32:13.828
What do I need today? Yeah, yeah. It was good. Well done. We ended up in a different way.

00:32:15.779 --> 00:32:33.240
Well, if you have any questions, teenagers untangled@gmail.com Keep the questions coming. Keep the ideas coming. We love hearing from you. The website is www.teenagersuntangled.com You can leave a nugget on there. If you just you know the recording.

00:32:29.250 --> 00:32:34.619
We'll put it on. You can be on our show. Oh,

00:32:36.029 --> 00:32:36.809
yeah, that'd be great.

00:32:37.558 --> 00:32:38.909
Susie, you can be reached

00:32:38.910 --> 00:32:48.509
on www.amindful-life.co.uk. And you can book a free chat. If you can't

00:32:48.509 --> 00:32:50.559
see free chats.

00:32:48.509 --> 00:32:50.559
You don't have to go to parties.

00:32:50.603 --> 00:32:52.440
You can just sit at home and chat to Susie.

00:32:52.440 --> 00:32:56.130
And you don't have to you know, I'm not being weird on it. No, she's

00:32:56.130 --> 00:32:59.160
not. She just keeps all her weirdness for this particular podcast.

00:32:59.160 --> 00:33:00.930
Yeah, exactly. Oh, no, there's more of it.

00:33:02.880 --> 00:33:05.039
I need to spend more time with you. Right there.

00:33:05.039 --> 00:33:06.750
Well, that's it for now. Until next time,

00:33:06.869 --> 00:33:07.589
bye bye for now.