#160 MATURE CONTENT - Sexual Abuse Prevention: An Interview with Kimberly King

The information provided in this podcast is educational and not intended to diagnose or treat medical conditions.

Dr. Donnie Wilson struggled for decades to solve her numerous health issues and heal her body. But with focused determination, she healed herself. And in doing so, she discovered the Dr. Donnie stress recovery Protocol. On this show, you're going to hear from doctors, nutritionists, and Experts along with Dr. Donnie, who will give practical advice and wisdom to help heal your body. This is how humans heal.

Hi, everyone, and welcome to how humans heal. I'm Dr. Donnie Wilson, and today I'm excited to introduce you to Kimberly King. She is a sexual abuse educator and author of several books. Thank you so much for being with me here today, Kimberly.

Thank you so much. It's so great to be here. I'm so happy to talk about the topic with you.

It's such an important topic, and I think one that doesn't get covered near enough. Of course, it's one of those things that a lot of times we. We rather not have to talk about, but we need to talk about it in order to raise awareness and help people to recover and to prevent sexual abuse from happening in the first place whenever possible. So please tell us, like, how did you. How did you even find yourself being an educator and raising awareness for this area?

Sure. So I was a victim of sexual assault in college, and in. It kind of threw me into the most survivors of sexual assault. They freeze, fight, or flight. That trauma response happens. So for me, I basically ended up blocking it out, but at the same time dove into work in the field. So I started to work in the Women's Health Center. I started to learn about healthy human sexuality. I took classes. I was a teaching assistant and a crisis volunteer on the hotline. So for some reason, I just found comfort in helping others from the beginning, but really didn't deal with my own trauma until my son had what I referred to as a body boundary violation at a sleepover. So that event that happened with him triggered, you know, many memories from years and years ago. And long story short, I started to figure out, okay, well, how. I wanted to know, how do we prevent this from happening? And I figured that if I could really do some research and learn about it and become an expert in it, perhaps I could share something that could change and help prevent children from being sexually abused. So that's. That's where it all started. And then I wrote the book and became a sexual abuse prevention educator with the Darkness to light organization. That's D2L.org, they do a lot of really great training for parents and educators. So that's where it started.

Amazing. And it's. Yeah, sometimes it's by observing the experience of what our children are going through, then we start to realize, oh, this is, this is something that kind of was in the background for me and I just, we. It gets so often, how would you say, pushed to the back. Right.

Yeah, it does. And I find in the work that I do. So I, yes, I write children's books, but I also run online training for parents. I do online classes for children and I do some limited, I call it body safety chats with parents and children. And I find that a lot of the people I work with are actually similar to me, that they have some type of sexual abuse trauma in their history because the statistics are just there. This is so common for women. So most moms I work with have some type of trauma that really almost paralyzes them with fear and they are scared to talk about the topic. So that's where I can come in because I've been where they are. And I know that every mom and dad wants to protect their children from this type of thing. So, you know, we have to handle it gently and you know, be very sensitive because people have trauma around it. But there are ways to talk about the topic in a very kid friendly, gentle, just simple, matter of fact way. And over time, when you start really having those conversations with your children when they're young, the topic becomes easier to talk about.

And.

Yeah, I have several questions that are popping in my mind for you. One is to just get more specific about how common is sexual abuse.

Yeah, this is like. So I'm in the middle of publishing a new book for adults. Basically any caregiver who wants to learn about empowering their families to keep their kids safe. So I was digging into all this research and it's a bit depressing. So 90% of children that are sexually abused will be sexually abused by the people in their inner circle of trust, the people that they already know, including family members, including siblings, including cousins, distant cousins, teacher. Those people we already know and trust. And of that, one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused before they're 18. Now that's a terrible statistic right there. But what's even worse is that only 38% of children ever tell anybody. So most of sexual abuse is not even reported or like it's just unknown. We don't know the real number, but it's of epidemic levels. And with the online access to online children with cell Phones and the Internet. It magnifies the problem to a point where we really don't know how bad it is, which is why prevention is so important.

Absolutely. So tell it. I mean, tell me more about that. Like, how does that actually happen with access to devices? You know, are we.

Yes, it's. So when you give your child a cell phone, even the most educated parent on the topic, when you, when your child has a cell phone, they have access to apps and they have access to everything. And so predators know that kids are there and predators are hanging out on these apps where our children are. So to give your child a cell phone is really dangerous unless you get very prepared and empowered to prevent it, to prevent sexual abuse from happening. So these conversations that we have to have with our children start back, you know, when they're two years old, way before cell phones, so that they understand body boundaries, body safety rules. They know who to tell. They know who their safe adults are and that you've trained them like their entire life until the point when they get that cell phone. And then you have to start implementing online safety measures to make sure that your kids are protected. But that also you have that communication behind that also that if they have a problem or if they make mistake, they will come and tell you.

And is this, I'm assuming, because you have. Tell us more about your books, because your books, as you mentioned, are books that, that parents can actually read to their children. And is that part of this education process?

Yes. So I wrote this book over here. This is the I said no book. And it was republished in 2020. And so what this book is, is a kid friendly, comprehensive sexual abuse prevention book. So you would sit with your child and read this broken up into little small segments so that your child doesn't get overwhelmed. So the first topic is like, okay, here are the names of our body parts, and we have to use our body parts because it keeps us safer. And then here are some rules. And what do you think about if this happened? We have scenarios. We talk about kid, real kid scenarios that kids might encounter. Not so much like the stranger in the white van, because that's not the risky person. So we talk about, like, how do we report something if we feel uncomfortable or unsafe? What are the steps we take? And you know, all about identifying feelings and communicating underneath all of it. So this book is really in technique because it's comprehensive covers. Like, it even covers some of the grooming techniques that predators use, like keeping secrets and those types of things. And to tell the difference between a Bribe and a threat, like, and a bribe and a treat. And what is a threat? And what should you do if. If somebody threatens you? And, like, why. It's always safe to tell it. It's comprehensive, but it's chunked so that it's not overwhelming, which is where a lot of parents get hung up. Like, you don't have to cover this whole topic, like, in one day. It's definitely like, sure, read my book. Read a section of my book every day, you know, or every other day until you've covered the topic. But then you've got to keep talking about it because it's really conversation, not just like a one and done, you know.

Absolutely. It makes so much sense to me. This, I mean, imagine if this was more of part of our usual conversation with our children and with adults. Right?

We. Right, exactly. And that's like, the goal, I think, is to make this, this is a safety concern. So the goal is to make sexual abuse prevention body safety as approachable as it is. When we teach our kids to just, like, put on their bike helmet or like, buckle up in the car, it should just be common language. Like, of course we know our body parts, and of course we know we have rights to our bodies. And of course, if we have a problem, we're going to tell our parents or are safe adults. So we have to kind of normalize talking about these things so that it's not so taboo that children are terrified to tell us when something happens. I even, I work with a couple of educators who actually, you know, start talking about this stuff when they're diaper changing their baby. So, you know, like, that's really an interesting concept, is that you can start like, you know, when you're changing a diaper, you can narrate, you know, okay, honey, I'm going to quickly change your diaper. Wipe, wipe, wipe. You know, like, you can narrate that. And then when your children get a little older, you can introduce consent. Like, okay, can mommy help you with your diaper? Oh, you know, and like, start the, start those conversations. Do you need help in the bathroom? Do you need help wiping? And start practicing those, those skills.

I love that you're reminding me because I, I remember doing this with my daughter when she was a child and, you know, yeah, like being. I think it could help for many reasons. First of all, just body awareness in general, and then, and, and then not only sexual abuse, but all forms of abuse. Listening to you makes me think this would also help to prevent even emotional abuse and, you know, physical Abuse. Because now we're, we're learning, hey, where's my boundaries? And that we can speak up for ourselves.

Absolutely. Yeah, definitely. And I think, you know, that's something sometimes we don't really teach our kids, but it's so important. Like they don't have to listen to adults. When an adult is demanding a hug or a physical attention or, or being mean or saying something dangerous. Like, we do have to empower them to use their voice because we're not always going to be there. Yes, we try to make really good decisions for our kids and put them in safe situations, but we're not always going to be there. So it takes practice.

Yeah. And you want it to be so natural that it's just, it doesn't feel right. We need to take awkwardness out of it.

Exactly.

It's amazing. So when you work with people, because I know you also, you do work with people like by, by over the Internet or one. On one or in groups. Okay. Yeah.

So I do online individual.

Consultation. I'm not a therapist or counselor, so I wouldn't call it counseling, but consultations, body safety consultations with parents. I do, like mom groups will have me come on and, you know, talk about safety tips for their toddlers. And I do online zooms with schools, libraries, pretty much anybody that cares for children and has a group. I can easily hop on a zoom and train people. I do like one hour workshops pretty frequently. And back before COVID I used to do a lot of school visits. I have not gotten the chance to do a bunch of that lately because I've been so busy writing these books. But I hope to get back to that soon. I'm in Connecticut, so that's my next year, next year goals.

Wonderful. I mean, I think that's so amazing. You know, the more education the better because it is such a. It's way more common than we'd like it to be. And, and I think that as much as we can prepare our. Prepare our children, but also prepare parents, how to have these conversations. You said that you were inspired just by having the conversation with your son.

You know, like, yes, I really, I really was. And it kind of connected the dots for me. Like, okay, nobody is talking about this with children, like, the real risks that they face. So I wanted my book to be about those real risks so that parents could understand and really, you know, take some. An assessment basically of like, where they're putting their children at risk. Because certainly we can educate our kids about this stuff. But as parents, we have to make really good decisions, like knowing what we know. Is it a great idea to let you know a random babysitter that you hired on Facebook? Watcher, two year old? No, it's not. So like we know enough now. And I recommend with all the parents that I work with, there's a great program on darkness to light called Stewards of Children. It's for caregivers, teachers, anybody. And it's a comprehensive training that really helped me understand like the gravity of this problem, but how preventable it is. So making really body safe choices for parents is like number one important thing you can do.

That's, that's amazing. And do you find it also that it's common that people may realize their own history of sexual abuse and as they're starting to learn this for their children?

Yeah, that happens quite frequently. And you know, in the middle of doing this research, I posted on my Instagram, does anybody have a story they'd like to share? Because I was trying to get survivor stories to make the book like, less about statistics and more about real people. And I got hundreds of dms, hundreds of people sharing my story, sharing their story and saying like, this is the first time I've thought about this or this is the first time I've told anybody this, or I just remembered something that happened to me last year because I watched one of your videos or whatever. So.

I mean the average age, the average age for someone who reports an incident or recalls an incident actually is 52 years old.

You're kidding me.

No. Because most children, most children don't tell. But then it creeps up in your trauma response, in your memory by the time you're in your 50s. I have so many 50 year old moms messaging me, telling me I had the memory. I. It's incredible. And I don't know if you do you know the book Happy Days by Gabby Bernstein?

Yes.

That's one of the books that I recommend to all of the parents that I work with because she really helps you sort through, you know, that trauma response and the big T and the little T and that, like how that all works in the brain. It's really, really interesting.

Yeah, thank you for sharing that. And it's because I, I mean I oftentimes I'm talking about how much, well, how much stress affects us as humans, but also trauma, what we would consider trauma, including trauma from childhood and how, you know, when we're, when we're exposed to, you know, we, when we realize, oh, I had this traumatic experience in childhood. And then we start to Realize, oh my gosh, how much has that been affecting my life?

Right.

Including our health. And, and my message is always to know that there's so much we can do to help you recover from that. So if, you know, if you're listening and you start to realize, oh, maybe what that experience I had as a child, first of all, was real. And I. And it likely has had an influence on your health and your life since then. And there's a lot we can do to help prevent it from causing other health issues, because maybe you can speak to that a little bit of, like, what do we, what do we see in terms of the effects of sexual abuse in a person's lifetime?

Yeah, it's, it's, it's real. It's. Well, I guess healing for everybody looks different, but you see a lot of, you know, drug dependency, alcoholism, depression, anxiety, like, psychiatric disorders, academic problems in school, school, like, criminal problems down the road. Like, it, it's. It really does blossom into, like, pretty much every disorder that you can think of, especially if left untreated. And even if it's only been one, like, not only one incident, but one sec, one problem can create a lifetime of anxiety, depression, and have just like, aftermath. So, so it would be ideal if we could really get ahead of this and prevent this from happening. But for the people that it does happen to, it's so important to get help and start the healing process. And if you can't remember what's happened to you, that's a problem. You know, like, you, you examine your life and you're trying to figure out, well, why am I making these choices and why am I drinking too much and why am I making bad choices in partner. Like, it's all, it can be absolutely all connected. So it's really, really important to try and figure out, like, if that has happened to you and you didn't really share that with anybody yet that, like, it's okay to share your. Find a safe adult, find a safe friend. You know, just talk about it with somebody because it will help just like letting that out of your head.

And do you find. I don't know if this is something that you've seen in your research. Does sexual abuse tend to repeat itself in families?

So it's, it's interesting. The data on that is not very well studied, but if you are a victim of sexual abuse once, you're more likely to have repeat abuses. So that is really common. And especially if you were abused as a child, you're more likely to be abused later. And I think that is from basically, you know, lack of awareness of what abuse is like. If you were a child and you were, say you were abused by your stepfather and you were threatened and you were, you know, blackmailed and you felt responsible, and he blamed it on all those things groomers do to keep children from telling. If you were raised in that environment and you didn't even know what you were doing, then when you get to be a young adult, you're still not going to know, like, what is normal and what is not, which puts you at risk. So that's why just education is so critical here. And for me, when I went off to college, my mother didn't, or my father, nobody talked about sex, drinking, you know, none of that. I didn't know anything. I walked out the door not prepared. I had no idea what I was getting into. And that's another thing, like, sending your kids off to college without having these conversations is dangerous, Absolutely dangerous.

It makes, it really makes you stop in our tracks and be like, wait a minute, we. We. It. Like you're saying it's even, even before your child goes to college. This is an. Another important time to have this conversation and say, here are some, some things that are likely to come up. How can we talk through how to, how to deal with those situations and have those conversations, even with, say, a teenager?

Absolutely. Yeah. And I, you know, with college and high school kids, you know that one thing about sex and mixing sex with alcohol or mixing sex with drugs and not being able to consent when people are drinking and when people are doing drugs, that is something that many young adults still don't understand. And we used to call that back in the 80s, date rape. But no, that's rape. And so you can't, like, belittle it. You can't make it what it's not it. You know, it's critical that your kids, especially teenagers, understand that because you don't want them to make a mistake just because you haven't talked about it. Because they don't understand when you could actually teach them, even though it's a little uncomfortable, you could really get ahead of it and save them a lifetime of hardship and prevent something from happening. So.

Yeah, it makes so much sense to me. And just I'm hoping listeners, you know, can really go, okay, it's time to have these conversations, even if. Because you could start anytime, right? It's not like, yeah, yeah, you can.

Start anytime if you haven't even broached this subject at all. And a lot of parents don't they, they figure well they'll learn it at school, which sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. And then sometimes at school you, they learn things that you don't want them to learn and then they get on the Internet and Google things and you don't want that either. So. But even if you've done absolutely nothing, like there's nothing wrong with starting today, doesn't matter what age your child is, just start talking about it.

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Absolutely, yes. And kids, young kids have trouble understanding that, especially when they're drinking because the lines are blurred. Right. So having that conversation with your teen about like, okay listen, if you, if you are drinking, you have to just stay in your lane and do not mix sex with alcohol, period. Because it will never go well. It just doesn't. And the other thing that kids have a hard time understanding is that you could, you could actually be in some type of a sexual situation with a girl or a boy and they can change their mind in the middle of it. And just because you have a girlfriend or boyfriend or partner does not mean you can keep going. You have to stop. And so like conversations about consent and what that looks like for your children and for their relationships is critical. Critical to have.

Thank you so much for saying that. It reminds me because I, I actually talk some about this in my book, the Master's Dress Book, because you know, I talk about how, of course, as humans, sexuality is part of being human and healthy sexual activity with consent can actually be so beneficial to our health. But that doesn't mean that we get to just go choose, you know, just force that on someone or.

Exactly.

Past these important boundaries. And so to really realize, I think that the more too, that these conversations can happen at a young age, I have to believe that we'll also be preventing the type of behavior that would, you know, push past the boundaries.

Right, yeah, absolutely. And I think, like, for young adults, having this education and being empowered in this space will prevent things like sexual harassment at the workplace. Like, our kids, when raised and taught these things, aren't going to accept, you know, like, fondling and groping from their boss. Like, that is what we want. Like, we want this to just be like a moot point. Like that they have boundaries, they understand them, and they're not worried about speaking up.

Yeah, yeah, because let's, let's go into that just a little bit, because if someone is like. Because I know that that's a big piece of. It is like that fear of speaking up for yourself. And, and, and what is that? I mean, I could imagine, like, say, from, I mean, when. From when I was also a kid, a lot of the parenting was that we, you know, we didn't, like, kids were taught to only speak when an adult allowed them. And there was a lot of this, you know, kind of like, even at school, you know, you, you know, you only get to speak if you're called on or something. You know, really, that messaging of. Yeah, doesn't matter as much. I mean, tell me more about that. Like, where do you see that issue is with. With that fear of speaking up for yourself?

Yeah, I think, you know, and I was raised that way too. Like, you know, you're better to be seen and not heard or whatever. Right. But that's really just not a super safe or effective way to parent, in my humble opinion, because of this topic and other topics, including like, you know, bullying and depression. You want your kids to be able to communicate with you from the start on. On things good and bad. Right. You. You want to develop a relationship with your kids that involves you being an active listener, not a dictator. Being a dictator. You know, the studies show that children with authoritative or, sorry, authority, not, not authoritative, authoritarian parents, you know, are more anxious or more depressed. They have more problems. So it's okay to have an authoritative type of style, but you also have to have some calmness and gentleness and, you know, listening skills. So that your, your children will talk with you and share these things with you. It's, it's. I think it's really critical in the topic of body safety because kids have to know that when something is wrong, they have the right to speak up, and they need to speak up and they need to know who those safe adults are. And not kids understand that. And not all parents teach that.

Yeah. Or the kids that are worried they're going to get in trouble.

Right. Yep. They're worried they're going to get in trouble. And when it comes to sexual abuse, you know, if a child is in a situation with a parent or somebody in the family, like, that's terrifying. Like, the person that they trust, the person that supposedly loves them is doing that. So who do they talk to? So they've got to figure out, you know, is this safe for me to tell? Who am I going to tell? Can I tell? Like, there are threats coming at me. What's going to happen? It's very, very complicated in that type of situation. So. Yeah, yeah.

So always have being for then for children to have safe people to talk to. But you're right, like who they thought was safe all of a sudden isn't safe.

Right.

You know, maybe. Yeah. Being able to have multiple. Helping children to have multiple options. And I think even from the very beginning, if they're, if the parent is having these conversations, then, you know, that's less likely to be this case anyway. I would think.

Yeah, I would think so too. And you know, the thing about safe adults, we. So I used to teach in my, in the edition before this edition, I used to teach that safe adults were like teachers or, you know, like a policeman or, you know, a doctor. But doctors abuse children, teachers abuse. You see it in the news every day. So, like, how I'm shifting that language now is to say that, you know, yes, while most teachers are safe, not all of them are there. And while most firemen are safe, not all of them are. So what you have to do as a parent when you're like, coming, like when you're figuring out, like, okay, let's make a list of safe adults in case mom's not available. Who is it that you love and trust in case of an emergency or who is it that's like super easy to talk to and that we could get on our body safety team. And so you try to figure out who those people are and how you figure out if they're safe is if you want them to have never asked your child to keep a secret. And they're safe if they've never violated a body boundary. And, and they're safe if they follow your family safety plan, your family safety rules. But if they're not in that category, they're not safe. So.

Oh, I love that. Like, to create a team so that you're. When you're reading your books and you're having these conversations, you're also talking about how do we. Because I think this is so important. I mean, I observe this for myself in some of the emotional healing work that I do, particularly with. It's come up for me even through my work with psychedelic medicines. But I realized that. And also when I work with women who have a history of HPV and, and risk of cervical cancer, this conversation comes up because I realized that in that in say, hpv, what's happening is there's a virus that's able to cause abnormal cells. And a lot of times we're. We're just thinking of it as I'm going to prevent exposure. But really what I find is a lot of it is how do we protect ourselves? And when I shift the conversation to more like, how do we learn to protect ourselves? Then I realized that it's really about protecting ourselves physically, but also protecting ourselves emotionally and spiritually at the same time. And that we're really not trained how to protect ourselves very well, at least not from my generation.

Yeah.

And so learning myself, like, what does that mean to better protect myself physically, emotionally and spiritually and. And how to communicate about that, how to make choices around that and how to. Yeah. Create then be able to perceive people at a different level. And I wonder if that's even something we. You also maybe train in your work is teaching children how to pick up on. Sometimes we can pick up on the energy of another person, and maybe that's a source of information.

Yeah, that's something I touch a little bit on in my book is I kind of talk about like, okay, feelings, Right. So we're going to teach a young child about feelings. We're going to. We're going to start talking and having conversations about what are the feelings that make us feel good. Right. And I call those green flag feelings. So I associate a color with the feelings. So we will review in the book, like, okay, green flag feelings are happy, joyous, silly. You know, we make a list. And then the red flag feelings are when you feel it inside of your body. Like, maybe you have butterflies, maybe you're nervous, maybe your hands are shaky, maybe you're sweaty. Like, that's what your Body does. And then what are those words? So maybe I'm angry, maybe I'm scared, maybe I'm stressed, you know, like, and have that conversation. Because that is so interesting to teach children, like, how their body feels when they're experiencing those emotions. Right. And then that helps them communicate with you better. And it doesn't have to just be about sexual abuse. It can be about anything. Like, I felt nervous today because my teacher raised her voice. Where did you feel it in your body? Okay. And you want to talk about it. And, you know, like, and so processing all these emotions instead of just having our kids, like, keep it all inside because they don't know how to talk. They don't know how to express themselves.

I love it. I love it. So it becomes really training about communicating about their. Their. Their feelings. And. And, yeah, I think then they start to realize, oh, if. If I'm around a person who gives. I end up feeling this red color.

Yeah.

It is like, okay, that means I need to step back and evaluate is this. Is, you know, is this a safe person? And how much. Yeah. Do I need to, you know, find a way that I don't. That I'm not interacting with this person.

Right. And so, you know, with kids in the book, I say at the end, like, let's make a list of who are you? Green flag people. And then make a list of if you have any red flag people. And then you can talk about, like, okay, why do these people over here, why are they in the green? What do they do that makes you feel special? Like, what. What's good about it? And then why are these people over here in the red? And then examine that, like, ask questions. It's a great way to have a conversation about it. And it's an easy way to talk about it.

Amazing. Really, Kimberly, I mean, what you're doing is so transformative. I mean, it's starting with this conversation about preventing sexual abuse, but it's really ending up being a place where we're able to be in such deeper, real, authentic conversations with our children that has the potential, I can see, has the potential to completely reduce rates of trauma in future generations. And I just love that because I know that the more we can prevent trauma experiences, the more we're going to be preventing health issues and an abuse and addiction in the future and break these patterns. Break these patterns of repeat trauma. And also, at the same time, you're ending up opening up the conversation about what even adults and parents have experienced and how can they heal in the process, because I think sometimes people are afraid to talk about this with their children because they're afraid of what they might feel as an adult.

Right, exactly. So you might not be ready to share your story with your kids. I mean, I. There are details of my story which I'm not going to ever share with my children, but they know that I have a story, and they know that I've been through a sexual assault. You don't have to get into the weeds with it. You know, you can just say, something happened to me, and I don't want it to happen to you. So let's talk about it.

Yeah. That's amazing, because then it just allows everyone to feel like they can be present with this and they can, you know, can go through the process of healing and. And shifting this pattern, you know, because otherwise, I think it's in the avoidance. I think if I agree, right, it's in the avoidance of this that things get worse.

I think so. And, well, if you avoid the topic completely, it's like you're rolling the dice, you know, you. Then you're just. Your. Your kids are just going to be. Maybe they're going to be lucky and they'll. They'll get out of childhood unscathed, but the statistics are not in the favor of that. So.

Even if it's difficult, even if you have to get through some stuff to talk about it with your kids, I just encourage everybody to just take one step. And even just listening to this podcast and maybe sharing it with a friend, that's one step. It doesn't have to be a monumental step. It can be one small thing.

I love that. Yes. I really hope that everyone listening gets to. If you're inspired by this, please, Emmy. So if you. If people would like to contact you, Kimberly, what's the best way to do that?

The best way would be at my website, which is Kimberly King books.com so you can email me right there or. I'm on Instagram, and my handle on Instagram is Tough topics, Mom. And I, I answer DMs all the time, so reach out.

Tough topics, Mom. I mean, there we go. This is basically just saying, hey, here's a place to come to help make these tough topics not so tough anymore, right? To just to learn how to have these conversations that we need to learn how to have. And so thank you so much for the work you're doing, and thank you, everyone listening, for. For reaching out and for opening up to this possibility and for sharing with anyone who you feel like this might be helpful. To you. And I know, as you mentioned, you have new books, more than one more books coming.

I do. I've got. So I'm like, my dream book is about to be published in, I think it's October or November and it's called Empowering Adults on Body Safety. So it's going to be a book that trains any caring adult on prevention strategies. It'll talk about risk reduction, you know, how to teach this to kids and like share personal survival stories. And it's just full of information. So that's coming. And then I am republishing the. I said no book. That's probably going to be March or April, so of next year.

Awesome.

Got a lot happening. And it's really an honor to work with so many, so many caring parents who really just want to know how to do this and want to keep their kids safe. I mean, there's nothing more important than that.

Oh my gosh. I mean, here I am now as a new grandma and feeling like, you know, they're just so precious and, and we can, you know, we can keep them in our homes, we can keep them, you know, with us as long as possible, but they're going to need to be interacting in the world with, you know, sometimes whether that's with relatives or with family members or with friends or with, with, in school and so on. And so how. I think this could also really help parents to feel more comfortable as they start to, you know, have their children being involved in, with other, with other people in their life.

Absolutely. And you know, one thing I think that helps create a ripple effect with this is when you're teaching your kids about this and when you're learning about this in your family to tell every single person that your children come in contact with. So, you know, give them a book. Give them. It doesn't have to be my book. Give them any body safety book. Give your preschool teacher books, give your daycare people books, give your babysitters books and like talk about it. Because when predators know that you are an empowered body safe family, you're just not a good target. And you don't want to be a target. You want to have like that target not on you.

Oh, that's a good way to think about it. Like even just to say, hey, I'm going to become less of a target by letting people know that I'm aware and prepared. And I, yeah, that's, that's amazing in itself. And I'm curious about, do you have any suggestions related to, say, apps or social media?

Like yeah, yeah. You know, one thing.

It'S a whole other podcast. But one thing I recommend to the parents that I work with is just have those conversations all the time. And if you do let your children have cell phones, I recommend a very specific type of cell phone. There's a cell phone called the Gab phone, which is produced by a company called Gab Wireless. It looks like a smartphone, but it is not a smartphone. It can text and it can call, but it does not go on any. It cannot go online and it can't receive pictures and it can't have any apps on it. So it's really just to keep in contact with your children. Like an old fashioned dumb phone.

That'S perfect for a 13 year old if that's the choice you want to make. And it has a GPS locator in it, which is nice in case you need to know where your child is. And then another thing I recommend to all parents is an app that you, if you decide to let your kids have a smartphone and you've had all these conversations, there is an app called Bark Technology. So the company is called Bark. You can add the app to your phone and it actually monitors what's going on on all the devices in your home and, and sends you messages. If it sees anything dangerous or about, you know, hot, hot words like, you know, self harm, suicide, anything bullying, also sexual abuse, inappropriate content, it lets you know, and then you have a conversation with your kids about what's going on on the app. And it has different settings for different ages, so you do have that control. And it's, it's a, it's not foolproof, but I recommend that to parents too. There's just a lot, there's a lot to learn about that. So be very cautious and know that you're going to be in over your head. So you need help, you definitely need help with that.

Oh my gosh. Well, thank you.

Yeah.

I think that's the thing is sometimes there's just so many, so many connections. Once you open up the possibility of Internet connection, then it's like, oh my gosh, how to address that and how to manage that. So even just, you know, again, having these conversations and then becoming aware of the tools we can use to help protect our kids and protect ourselves.

Yes, definitely. And there's a lot of tools available, so like, you don't have to try and like manage it yourself. There are a lot of tools available. So if you have to let the kids have the phones, just be prepared to invest in the tools.

Definitely amazing. All right, well, thank you again, Kimberly, so much.

Thank you.

Oh, you're welcome. And I really am so grateful for the work that you're doing. And so I want to say thank you on behalf of everyone listening in. And, yeah, I look forward to staying in touch with you.

I look forward to that, too. Thank you so much for having me.

And good luck with that baby. Thank you.

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