The intergenerational transmission of intrafamilial sexual-abuse related trauma: an exploration of family stories between mothers and children raised as daughters
Creators: name: Mendez, Alicia
Publisher: name: No Publisher Supplied
Year: 2024

description: This dyadic narrative study explored how intergenerational trauma and posttraumatic growth presented in mothers who experienced childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and their unabused daughters/offspring. Children born to mothers who experienced CSA are 3.6 times more likely to also experience CSA. While breaking the cycle of CSA is possible, children of mothers who experienced CSA are still at risk for experiencing intergenerational trauma. Decades of research has centered how intergenerational abuse presents among these mother-child relationships, yet substantially less focus has been given to how intergenerational trauma emerges in adolescent-aged children of mothers with histories of CSA. Mothers who are survivors of CSA have been shown to endorse an insecure attachment and recreate this attachment style with their children, resulting in an intergenerational insecure attachment cycle. Intergenerational trauma theory explores the different ways that parents pass on their trauma symptoms to their children. It posits that trauma symptoms are passed in numerous ways including by sharing traumatic memories with their children and modeling trauma symptoms, all of which can occur consciously or unconsciously by the parent. Integral to this passage of trauma is the relationship between parents and their children, or their attachment style. Emerging literature has also explored how survivors of sexual trauma experience posttraumatic growth or are able to learn from their trauma and reframe their negative experience into more positive outcomes for their present and future. However, a dearth of literature exists examining how this growth may occur in CSA survivors’ parenting skills and behaviors. Guided by attachment, intergenerational trauma, and posttraumatic growth theories, this dissertation study explored how mothers and daughters/offspring (assigned female at birth, between the ages of 18-25 years old, who did not experience physical or sexual abuse) perceived trauma impacted their understanding of selves, others, and their mother-daughter/offspring relationship.This exploratory study included seven dyads, including seven mothers who experienced CSA and eight daughters/offspring (one set of twins) who did not experience CSA or physical abuse, n=15. It utilized two qualitative approaches: Life History Calendars (LHC), and Narrative Inquiry. Narrative Inquiry, which guided all data collection and analysis, is a qualitative approach that centers the stories, or memories that people describe and tell themselves and others, to make sense of their experiences. All participants engaged in two 60-90 minute semi-structured interviews. The first interview was the Life History Calendar interview, which focused on the important events that occurred throughout each participant’s life history until the present day (at the time of the interview). It was used to create a visual life trajectory of each participant in the form of a graphic timeline. The second interview was the Intergenerational Trauma interview, which explored participants’ perceptions of how CSA impacted mothers’ parenting, daughters/offspring, and the mother-daughter/offspring relationship. Data analysis included creating Aggregate Group Timelines, one for mothers and the other for daughters/offspring; applying an Analysis of Narratives for mothers and for daughters/offspring; and writing two dyadic Narrative Analyses reflecting the experiences of two mother-daughter/offspring dyads who represent the breadth of mother-daughter/offspring relationships included in this study. Each analysis builds on the previous analysis, gradually adding more detail to these mother-daughter/offspring relationships. Aggregate Group Timelines were created by analyzing all individual mother and all daughter/offspring timelines to assess shared important events among each group and in what order the sequencing of events commonly occurred. It resulted in a visual Aggregate Mother Timeline and Aggregate Daughter/Offspring Timeline and its analysis provides descriptive evidence that each important event represented in the group timelines occurred for half or more of the group sample. An Analysis of Narratives presents themes among each group comprised of mothers and daughters/offspring. Framed by Narrative Inquiry, the themes represent participants’ past, present, and/or future experiences highlighting the perceptions they held about their mother-daughter/offspring relationship, and how intergenerational trauma and posttraumatic growth occurred. The Dyadic Narrative Analysis presents entire narratives including a beginning, middle, and end inclusive of plot and characters for two mother-daughter/offspring relationships. The narrative highlights the important events and relationships (plot and characters) that occurred for each mother and daughter/offspring and connects these to their relationship, intergenerational trauma, and posttraumatic growth experiences. The Grouped Aggregate Timeline results showed that, outside of the mother’s CSA experience, other important events impacted mothers’ and daughters’/offspring’s understanding of selves and their relationship with one another. Aggregate Mother and Daughter/Offspring Timelines showed that all participants perceived their family contexts as pivotal to impacting their life trajectory, particularly the presence or absence of parental involvement. The Aggregate Mother Timeline showed that there were 12 common important events that most mothers experienced throughout their lifetime until the time of the interview. The most common events and sequencing that occurred for mothers began with their first CSA experience, experiences of revictimization, one of their CSA abusers being accused of sexual assault, disclosure experiences, marriage, birth of their children, divorce, finding a helpful therapist, remarrying or repartnering, experiencing familial medical issues, experiencing significant loss, and ended with their daughters/offspring beginning college. The Aggregate Daughter/Offspring Timeline showed that there were ten common important events that occurred for most daughters/offspring throughout their lifetime until the time of the interview. The most common events and sequencing that occurred for daughters/offspring began with traumatic event, memorable trips with mother, mother’s repartnering, first mental health struggles, beginning therapy, tension with mother, finding supportive friends, finding out about mother’s CSA experience, graduating high school and ended with beginning college. The Analysis of Narratives results showed that mothers and daughters/offspring perceived the mothers’ parenting skills were influenced by mothers’ CSA experience and their other childhood experiences such as their relationships with their parents. This was present in mother themes entitled learning from the past and breaking cycles of CSA, and daughter/offspring themes including different childhoods and combating CSA. Each of these themes highlighted how mothers were influenced by their childhood experiences to parent their daughters/offspring differently than how they were parented. One of the most important aspects of parenting for mothers was protecting their daughters/offspring from experiencing CSA. The breaking cycles of CSA and combating CSA themes highlighted the tactics that mothers practiced to ensure daughters/offspring remained unabused including instances of separating daughters/offspring from or limiting daughters/offspring contact with family members, providing guidance on how to dress, limiting or prohibiting sleepovers, educating daughters/offspring about grooming and practicing an open communication with daughters/offspring. Perceptions of intergenerational trauma and transmission were highlighted in the mother theme entitled the intergenerational is relational and the daughter/offspring theme entitled intergenerational trauma. Mothers and daughters/offspring described how mothers engaged in hypervigilant protective behaviors and conscious and unconscious storytelling about their CSA experience. These behaviors at times resulted in experiences of intergenerational trauma as daughters/offspring described that they too engaged in hypervigilance, particularly when it comes to others experiencing or being at risk of sexual assault. Intergenerational trauma also informed the mother-daughter/offspring relationship in various ways. In the mother themes entitled emotional closeness and caregiving, and in the daughter/offspring theme relationship with mother both described the spectrum of caregiving that daughters/offspring engaged in for mothers. Daughters/offspring felt compelled to serve as caregivers for their mothers, particularly after they learned about their mothers’ CSA experience. Some daughters/offspring described this caregiving as parentification while other daughters/offspring did not feel burdened or impacted negatively by the care they engaged in for their mothers. Posttraumatic growth was most present in the ways mothers and daughters/offspring perceived their relationships to be positive and emotionally close, and in the ways that mothers were more present and responsive to their daughters’/offspring’s needs. Mothers created vastly different childhood experiences and relationships with their daughters/offspring showing that mothers learned from their traumatic experiences. There was also evidence of intergenerational posttraumatic growth experienced among daughters/offspring suggesting that hypervigilance and other parenting behaviors that are often deemed negative, may occur on a spectrum.The findings from this dissertation study have potential to inform our current understanding of intergenerational trauma and CSA. This study, to the author’s knowledge, is the first study to include daughters/offspring to corroborate and build upon mothers’ perceptions of parenting experiences as survivors of CSA. Adding the daughter/offspring voice to understanding intergenerational trauma related to CSA provides greater evidence for the ways that transmission may occur and impact parent-child relationships and individuals. Additionally, this study highlights the toll that intergenerational trauma takes on daughters/offspring. While experiences of intergenerational trauma varied in impact, daughters/offspring could do with additional mental health supports to help them navigate and process their mother’s experiences of trauma and their own internalization of said trauma. This study, which centered transitional aged daughters/offspring also highlighted the need to further investigate the developmental impacts of CSA related intergenerational trauma across the lifespan. Daughters/offspring in this study were just beginning to make sense of their mothers’ CSA experiences and its impact on themselves. It is possible that as daughters/offspring mature, their interpretations of how their mother’s CSA experience impacted them could evolve. Future research is needed to investigate the ways that mothers and other survivors of CSA can create a more secure attachment and minimize the transference of hypervigilance and other intergenerational patterns. While this study did not center intergenerational abuse, it still has implications for the prevention of intergenerational CSA. Findings specifically can inform the primary prevention of CSA, which currently remains in its infancy with few evidence-based prevention strategies available. Mothers who experienced CSA are more likely to have children who also experience CSA. While mothers’ behaviors in this study did include hypervigilance, their tactics to prevent their daughters/offspring from experiencing CSA were effectual. Centering mothers who experienced CSA in primary CSA prevention centers the most at-risk populations. It is possible that mothers, like those who participated in this study, could serve as peer prevention support to other survivors of CSA as part of future primary prevention practices.