Been Groomed as An Adult? You are Completely Normal!

After several years of research amongst individuals who have been groomed as adults, the results are in: you are completely normal!!

Research Findings:

We are currently in the early stages of examining our research findings, and more will doubtless emerge, but the first tranche of research into 374 people who have been groomed as adults was looking at characteristics of victims.

We have taken the view that we should share information as we find it, especially where it may be of use to people. We also want to make our thinking public so that it can be challenged before publishing a final report into our findings.

Here’s what we have so far:

Women are far more likely to recognise that they have been groomed than men and seek our help at CAAGe. The non-heterosexual community is perhaps more targetted for groomers, but there are no national/reliable statistics for comparison. (Read more: Sexuality, Gender and Grooming ).

Specific ethnic groups are no more or less likely to be targetted by groomers. (Read more: Ethnicity and Grooming.)

Being married, in a relationship or co-habiting will not protect you from being targetted by groomers. (Read more: Are single people more vulnerable to grooming?)

You can be groomed at any time of life: Grooming and Age.

If you are disabled, you may be slightly more at risk of being groomed, but more data is needed: Disability and grooming.

Having children (17 and under) at home makes you no more likely to be groomed - 39.41% of our respondents (people who’ve been groomed) fell into the ‘children at home’ category. The national average is 42.3%. If anything, you are less likely to be groomed if you have children at home. This may provide some comfort for grooming victims who suspect they’ve been targetted to get at their children. Of course there will be some groomers with that objective, but the stereotype of bored housewife seeking joy elsewhere is blown out of the water.

In short, nothing you are affects whether you get to become the target of groomers. The only thing groomers need to target us is wanting something, and that applies to almost the entire human race. Maybe you want to do well at work, are seeking emotional peace, want to be loved, want to get fit… Wanting something gives us the drive to carry on. It is a completely normal part of everyday life.

So we can stop blaming ourselves for having been open to the grooming. It’s on the groomers, not the victims.

Busting Stereotypes

Myth: It’s a bunch of lonely ‘Shirley Valentine’ types desperate for escape.

Our research blows that out of the water. We will be taking a deeper look at what people have been groomed for, what the groomer was after. But you can be groomed at any age. Married or not. And it’s not just women…

Myth: They’ve all got mental health problems, that’s why they were groomed.

Wrong again. Whilst our research wasn’t explicit enough in its questioning, signs from the responses are that grooming causes mental health issues in the same way as any other trauma, not mental health issues leading to the grooming.

This has some very strong implications for counsellors quick to label people as ‘co-dependent’ or left open to grooming by childhood issues. We will be looking more closely at this at CAAGe, but if you’ve been groomed it was because you’ve been targetted, not because there was something wrong with you all along.

Stereotype: It’s all a bunch of immigrants picking on white women

Wrong! You can be groomed no matter what your ethnicity. There is no conspiracy against white women. Our research clearly demonstrates that people who have been groomed experience it in almost identical proportions to the general population.

Stereotype: People who get groomed are stupid

People who have been groomed are not stupid, they’ve been targetted. We have had people of every ilk including highly qualified legal professionals seeking support at CAAGe. Fault lies with the groomer not their target, a fact now supported by the data we’ve gathered so far.

However, there does seem to be an issue around being ‘nice’. There are clear signs that being ‘nice’ sometimes blinds people to what’s happening, or they ignore what signs they do see, instead blaming themselves for having fanciful or unpleasant thoughts about someone.

Groomers have time to learn what works and what doesn’t. Depending on how they operate, they will often have tried multiple times and failed before finding what works for them to get what they want. They can change their names, their language, their way of approaching their victims, who are very rarely random.

Our Research

We had 374 responses from people who self defined as having been groomed as adults.

As we reviewed the research, with a view to rewriting it based on changing rules and increased knowledge, we have been able to refine the questions we ask and how we ask them based on people’s responses to open questions.

We also realised that we need to provide definitions of terms like ‘disability’ and ‘marital status’ when asking questions.

But one of the clearest things to emerge when we look at the cohort of people who have been groomed as adults: they represent every kind of person in society.

Anyone can be groomed as an adult!