MADELEINE WEST: 'I live with childhood trauma. Here's what it actually feels like.'

Madeleine West is a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. Her abuser, Peter Vincent White, was her next-door neighbour in rural Victoria. West was just four years old and it continued until she was 11.

In 2022, decades on from the crime, West proved instrumental in the case against White. On the morning of June 13, the actor was fitted with a wire and confronted White. In 2023, White pleaded guilty to 33 offences and was handed a 15-year prison sentence for the sexual abuse of seven children.

West now wants the parents of other children who have faced unimaginable trauma to feel educated about what trauma feels like. This is her story, in her own words.

Right now, there are a lot of little people out there staring down the barrel of a life riddled with trauma. I know because I live with it.

For victims of the horrifying child sexual assault case alleged to have occurred recently in Melbourne, their pain will continue long after the media coverage has died down. This is trauma without end, which may not present itself for years to come.

The term gets bandied about flippantly. So many of us struggle with trauma. On behalf of every victim, I want to explain what it feels like.

Watch: Child sexual abuse — why kids don't tell. Post continues below.

In my experience, it starts with an odd sense of uneasiness, a funny feeling in the tummy in certain places, and in the presence of certain smells or certain people. Sudden waves of panic, anxiety, heightened emotional responses to things that don't really warrant such a reaction. Lapses in focus, fogginess, a dull ringing in the ears, the sensation of bugs crawling under your skin.

Then the memories begin to surface. 

They start as vague, uncomfortable visions, shadowy recollections from a time long ago. It's like skimming through someone else's photo album, til the pictures gradually brighten, sharpen, lengthen until a fully formed, sickening scenario is playing out behind your eyes, with the realisation you are staring at your own past.

Though desperate to look away, there is no escaping it.

This scene you dimly recognise but have no desire to recollect in full happened to you, at your most innocent and vulnerable. Now, like a dog with a bone, you can't help but revisit it, re-experience it and all the feelings of terror, powerlessness and shame that came with it.

It's horrible, but compulsive, and beyond anyone's ability to control. It can occur over days, weeks, months, even years, but once the pattern emerges, it becomes more and more frequent until it's a constant white noise humming through your days. Suddenly, exposure to otherwise normal things, a certain food, a certain sound, the sensation of fabric on your skin, the sound of someone's voice is enough to send you spiralling.

This is what it is to be triggered.  Once in this state, you will do anything you can to avoid it, to silence it, to shut it down. Vagueing out or freezing is common, but most remedies are harmful in themselves.

Drinking too much, eating too much or too little, dabbling in drugs, being too loud, too emotional, too aggressive, blowing up relationships, blowing up at the workplace, pushing away friends, family members. Indulging in risky behaviour, gambling, even criminal activity, from shoplifting to serious destruction, violence, and the urge to end it all. Hurt people hurt people.

Victims will do anything to get that sensation out of their body, the sense of helplessness that comes from being returned to the child you were, who had no power to defend themselves. This is how abuse manifests in the body. It happens to every victim. It takes years to investigate, and even then, no healing is ever truly complete, all you can learn to do is tolerate it. 

Is this the legacy we want to leave our kids? 

Given the horrendous stats on child abuse, the fact is there are a significant number of parents right now who, like me, are struggling to support their children without the emotional bandwidth to do so because their own trauma has been reactivated. There is no guilt greater than discovering the evil that so heinously impacted your life, now threatens to impact your child's.

But we can't lock away our children out of fear, and in the current economy, out-of-home support such as childcare is a necessity. Let's stop burning it down and start building it up. Where there is no access, there is no abuse, it's upon us all to create services where harm can't hide.

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In an ideal world, there would be no more victims to begin with. That might just be possible if Australia starts handing down sentences that meet the crime, that act as an actual deterrent rather than a laughable slap on the wrist.

But right now, TODAY, we can remove the stigma around abuse by having the uncomfortable, necessary conversations that foster a safe space for victims to be heard and heal. We can report our suspicions TODAY rather than waiting until harm has occurred, and be brave enough to disclose our own experiences. Instead of waiting for mandated changes — centres could build trust TODAY by:

1. Banning solitary supervision, especially in vulnerable areas.

2. Prohibit personal phone use.

3. Install security cameras.

Don't wait for harm to force your hand. That ship has sailed. If we are serious about protecting kids, we must do all we can to prioritise their safety and wellbeing right now. 

Our children deserve better, and until we can look every child in the eye and promise them 'you are safe', we haven't just failed to protect them today, we've failed to protect their future.

Feature image: Instagram/@msmadswest.