Why The Most Well-Behaved Children Are The Most At Risk of Danger

My son was getting hurt at school, and he wanted to know whether he'd be in trouble for telling someone.

Ben was six. At bedtime, I was smoothing a loose plaster back over his knee when he asked whether he could stay inside at lunchtime.

I asked why.

There was a boy who pushed him when he tried to use the slide. He'd started waiting for the boy to leave. Sometimes he didn't go near it at all.

I looked at the plaster.

"Is that how you hurt your knee?"

He nodded.

That afternoon, I'd sat him on the kitchen counter and washed the grit out of the scrape. I'd asked if he'd fallen over again. He'd nodded then, too.

I had told him to be more careful.

"Did you ask a teacher to help?" I asked now.

"No."

"How come?"

He pulled at the edge of the blanket.

"Because you're not supposed to tell tales."

Then he asked whether the other boy would get in trouble if he told.

I was worried about someone hurting him. He was worried that telling us would mean he was doing something wrong.

I'd been putting spare plasters in his school bag

This wasn't the first scrape I'd cleaned that week.

Ben had stopped coming home with a complaint about every little thing. I thought he was learning to handle things without needing me for every disagreement.

Now he was telling me how he'd been doing that.

He knew when he could use the slide. He knew which boy to keep away from. And he was asking to spend lunchtime inside because that seemed easier than asking a teacher to help.

He was giving up part of his school day to avoid being hurt.

I'd spent those same afternoons asking what he'd done. He'd told me about his drawing, his lunch and the game they'd played in class.

I thought I was hearing about his day.

I could picture him standing back while the other children played, waiting to see whether he could join them without getting pushed again.

Then I thought about the spare plasters in his bag.

I'd put them there so somebody could help if he fell. I'd been preparing for the next scraped knee without knowing there was something we needed to act on before the next lunchtime.

If he hadn't asked to stay inside, I might have sent him back on Monday with another reminder to be careful.

I was seeing the injury, caring for it and missing what had caused it. He was six, and he'd been trying to work out how to manage the rest alone.

After he fell asleep, I kept thinking about that rule

I told Ben I was glad he'd told me. He wasn't in trouble. He could ask for help when somebody hurt him, even if he didn't know what to call it.

Then I listened.

I'd taught him that someone choosing a different game or taking the crayon he wanted didn't always need a grown-up to step in. I'd sometimes asked, "Can you sort that one out yourself?"

He'd heard adults talk about telling tales, too.

I knew where those little disagreements ended and asking for help began. I hadn't checked whether he did.

After he fell asleep, I stayed beside his bed for a while.

I couldn't stop thinking about the question he'd asked. Would the other boy get in trouble if he told?

He was worried about what would happen to the person hurting him.

What if the next person hurting him was an adult?

What if somebody assaulted him, or sexually abused him? Would he think telling me was allowed then? Or would he still worry that he'd be doing something wrong by getting that person into trouble?

I looked at him asleep, with one hand tucked under his cheek.

I'd always assumed that if something terrible happened, I'd be the person he came to. I would believe him. I would get help. I would do whatever I could to protect him.

But those were things I could do after I knew.

I could kiss him goodnight and still not know

I thought about school, the hours he spent with other people and all the ordinary moments when I wasn't beside him.

I was careful about who looked after him. I asked about his day. I listened when he had something to say.

I couldn't watch every interaction he had.

And I couldn't know from a hug at the door that he'd told me everything he needed help with. That week, he'd come home and talked to me while leaving out the pushing.

My fear was that something much worse could happen, and I'd carry on with our evening without knowing.

I could make his dinner, ask about school and remind him to brush his teeth. He could climb into bed while trying to make sense of something frightening on his own.

I could pull his blanket up and kiss him goodnight, believing he was okay.

He could be suffering in the room next to mine, worried that telling me would make him bad.

If I didn't know, I might keep leaving him in a situation where he was being harmed. The person hurting him could still have access to him while I thought I was keeping him safe.

That was the possibility I couldn't put down.

The pushing didn't mean something worse was happening. I wasn't looking at a scraped knee and deciding it was a sign of abuse.

His explanation had raised a question I hadn't thought to ask: did he understand that asking for protection was different from telling tales?

I didn't want his first attempt to work that out to come after someone had seriously hurt him.

"You can always tell me" had left something unanswered

The next morning, I contacted his teacher. I explained what Ben had told me and asked what we could do about the pushing, and how he could get help at lunchtime.

Adults needed to look into it and follow through. He wasn't responsible for making the other child stop.

At home, I made room for a conversation about telling.

He could come to me if he was hurt, scared or confused. He could tell me about someone he liked, someone I liked or someone everyone called nice.

He didn't have to know whether it was serious enough. He could ask for help even if he couldn't explain it properly yet.

And if he'd gone along with something, stayed quiet or waited to tell, none of that would make harm his fault.

Later, I found a body-safety handout from the Children's Advocacy Center of Kent County. It advises parents to make clear that a child will not get in trouble for telling, and specifically points out the conflicting message about not being a tattletale.

There was the same concern, in guidance for talking about body safety.

I'd told Ben he could come to me. I also needed to explain that telling me about being hurt wouldn't break the rule he was trying so hard to follow.

Helping him understand that distinction belonged in the body-safety conversation, too.

I needed a way to have that conversation with a six-year-old

I could tell Ben all the frightening things I'd thought about after he fell asleep. I didn't want to put those pictures in his head.

He needed a clear explanation, with room to ask the questions I hadn't expected.

We already read together at night. He'd stop me to ask why a character had done something, or turn back a page because something didn't make sense.

I could use that time to talk about body safety in smaller pieces. I could listen to what he thought an idea meant, rather than give him a long talk and take his nod as proof that I'd covered it.

That was what I looked for: children's material about body boundaries and asking for help, with support for the parent doing the explaining.

brand's description of My Words Keep Me Safe caught my attention. It specifically lists the difference between tattling and reporting for safety, alongside speaking up and who to tell.

That was the distinction I'd assumed my son understood until I found myself cleaning his knee again.

The book is part of the product, a set of three rhyming picture books with a printed parent guide and an anatomy chart.

I chose the set based on those descriptions. I wanted the reporting lesson within a wider conversation about what belonged to him, what he could say and who he could turn to.

The question about telling was part of a bigger conversation

The other two books covered topics I wanted to revisit with him.

I Trust What I Feel is described as teaching feelings and body signals. I wanted to give Ben room to talk about something that made him uneasy, even when he couldn't point to a sore knee and show me what hurt.

I'm The Boss of My Body covers body ownership and boundaries, including with familiar people. I wanted to talk about those boundaries without leaving him to assume they only applied to strangers.

And My Words Keep Me Safe brought us back to asking for help. Knowing a body boundary and understanding that he could tell someone about it were both things I needed to discuss with him.

The printed parent guide is described as including scripts, examples and conversation starters. I wanted that support because the part that frightened me was also the part I needed to explain calmly.

The anatomy chart was included for talking clearly about body parts.

Together, those contents matched the conversations I'd been meaning to have. I could bring prepared material to our reading time and work through one topic without trying to remember everything at once.

A parent can teach these things without buying this set, or choose another suitable resource. This was the format I chose for continuing them with Ben.

No set of books can promise that a child will tell, or that abuse won't happen. Adults still have to protect children, listen and act. I wasn't handing that responsibility to a six-year-old.

I was choosing material for explaining something I had discovered he was unclear about.

A few weeks later, I asked him about that rule again

We'd read all three books by then. We'd stopped for questions and gone back over things, and the books were still beside his bed.

One night, Ben climbed under the blanket while I sat down next to him.

I asked what he could do if another child took the crayon he wanted.

"Ask for it back."

"And if somebody was hurting you?"

"Tell the teacher."

"Even if they might get into trouble?"

He nodded.

"But I need help."

I sat there for a moment. A few weeks earlier, he'd been worrying about the boy getting into trouble while I cleaned the scrape on his knee. Now, when I asked him about it, he could explain why he was allowed to ask a grown-up.

Then we tried saying the words. I pretended to be the teacher, and he told me he needed help because somebody was hurting him.

He stopped halfway through to ask whether he could tell me instead.

"Yes. You can tell me, too."

This time, I could hear what he understood. I wasn't taking a nod as my answer.

He still had questions. We talked about what to do if I wasn't there, and about telling even when he wasn't sure how to explain something.

But I could answer those questions while he was beside me. I could hear where he was clear and where he still needed help.

I felt my shoulders loosen as I pulled the blanket up. He was already asking which story we could read tomorrow.

I couldn't take a conversation at bedtime as proof of what he'd do if he was frightened. I still had to pay attention, listen and act. His safety remained the adults' responsibility.

What eased my mind that night was hearing him say he needed help without treating that need as something wrong.

I'd wanted him to become more independent. I still did. Now we were practising how to ask for a grown-up when he needed one, too.

I kissed his forehead and left the books where we could reach them again.

brand's three books and parent guide cover body boundaries, feelings and asking for help, including the telling-versus-tattling topic in My Words Keep Me Safe.

Portfolio sample. Copy shown as it shipped for a client in parenting ecom; brand and product names are withheld and buy links are disabled. Product claims belong to the advertiser. This is not medical advice. Photos are stock images chosen for this sample, not from the original ad.