When I was growing up, no one talked to parents about this important subject.  Now that I'm a mother with my own history of positive (and negative) experiences, I want to make sure I'm doing all I can to keep my kids healthy and safe.  Here's my personal plan to do all I can to protect my children from inappropriate sexual attention from adults:

• Follow your gut.  Take some time to go over your list of friends and family who might be potential caregivers.  If you have an unnamed uneasy feeling about someone, take that as a sign that babysitting might not be an option with this person.  You don't have to pass judgment or make sense of your intuition.  Trust that your instincts are guiding you in the right direction.  Many times the people we don't feel super confident about will go on to be trusted caregivers, but it's okay to wait until have a strong sense of safety attached to this person. 
  
• Choose your child over the approval of your peers.  I don't see any reason to even disclose your reservations about certain people when you can discreetly make other arrangements.  But sometimes the decision to not leave your child with a family member--even when this person is known to be of questionable intent--will stir up family tension.  That's okay.   Remind yourself you can do anything when you have your child's best interests at heart.
  
• Think twice about people who push hard about your boundaries.  If you have a relative or caregiver who is always looking for ways to be alone with your child, look further into the situation.  Also, I don't like to leave my kids with people who reject my rules or find ways to "treat" my kids behind my back.  Anyone who cares for my kids needs to understand that the limits I have set need to be honored and valued.  I often worry that people who push my boundaries or who are manipulative about boundaries will pull the same stuff with my kids.  That's not okay.
• Take your own history into account.  Don't think for a second that you are the only girl in your family that your relative had an inappropriate interest in.  Chances are this person is still pursuing children.  You can change your child's life forever by simply honoring what you know and putting boundaries in place to protect your own children.  A wise and gentle friend or a professional counselor can help if saying "no" in this way feels scary, impossible or just too difficult for you at this time.
• Consider not leaving your children until they can talk.  I first heard this advice from a Japanese mom living in the US.  She did not have family nearby and had no reassurance that her little baby would be able to let her know if someone violated her in anyway.  She was keeping her daughter close to her until they could talk to each other about these things.  While this approach is not always possible, I appreciate this mom's insight into the power of her daughter's voice.
• Avoid situations where people you don't know will be present.  Certain situations punch my buttons--babysitting arrangements where the caregiver passes off responsibility to another adult I don't know, sleepovers where big brothers or other teenagers are present, a household where lots of adults come and go.  In these situations, I prefer for my children to remain in my own home where the environment is more predictable until I have a deep settled sense of the place where they will be staying.  I don't want to take chances on someone else's brother or family friend who might not be on the radar when it comes to child safety.
• Tell the child in front of the caregiver that this person will not touch or harm them in anyway.  I used to tell my babies that this person would take care of them kindly and to please cry for me if they needed me.  This sent a message to the caregiver as well as my child that their needs mattered to me.  As the kids got older, I reminded them--often when I had to leave them someplace new--that if anything at all happened that made them feel uncomfortable, they could call me immediately.  From a young age, my kids knew exactly what I was talking about.  People who struggle with their desire for little children often report that they choose children who seem like they wouldn't talk about it later.   I want my kids and their caregivers to know that all these topics are open for conversation at our house.
  
• Give your child permission to cry, speak, protest when they feel boundaries are crossed.   Kids are so used to conforming to meet the expectations of adults--especially when it comes to making a fuss.  Make sure your kids know that this is one area where their voice can and must be heard!  No is a powerful word--especially when you are facing emotional or physical harm--so I want my kids to get plenty of chances to feel comfortable using it.   Think about all the ways the word "no" serves you well when you aren't afraid to say it.
• Have a no-one-gets-in-trouble policy.  I constantly remind my kids that their bodies are their business and that if anything happens at all that makes you feel uncomfortable in your body, we can talk about it.  Kids are really worried about getting into trouble as well as getting other people into trouble.  They need to know that you aren't going to totally flip our or make a big deal about something.  One way you can do this is to give your kids the final say on how they want their information handled if something off does indeed happen.
• Listen to your children.  If your child consistently and adamantly rejects being alone with a particular caregiver or loved one, honor her discontent.  Sometimes kids can feel that something is up even before we can.  You'll do better to take your own child seriously than to overlook his worries and find out later that they were well-founded.  We want to leave our kids with the confidence that they can trust their own intuition--especially about these kinds of important matters.

Even the most attentive and tuned in parents find that situations come up where their children's sense of security and privacy has been violated.  In these cases, kids can find resilience and healing in an environment where they feel safe to be open about their experiences.  We get into trouble when we doubt our children's perceptions or when we worry about how other people will receive this information or when we ask our kids to keep secrets.  By receiving whatever they need to tell us with gentleness and love, we can together do the work of restoring voice and courage. 

If your intuition is telling you that your spouse is a potential threat to your children, seek out counsel immediately.  Your children are counting on you to do so.

Would this advice have made a difference in your own childhood?  Anything else you'd care to add to the list?  Comments are open below.