wide-reaching. Recognising the symptoms is the first step towards the healing process. Addressing the problem through counselling is the second.

Family life specialist Dr. Denise Patton King provided the following guidelines: SYMPTOMS Depression: The most common symptom. Survivors tend to be more self-destructive and suicidal. Often experience chronic anxiety and tension.

Guilt and Shame: Children may believe they caused the abuse. Self-blame may be reinforced by overt or covert messages from the abuser, or others the child may have attempted to tell. Result: pervasive guilt. Adult survivors may become perfectionists as a way of over-compensation. Tendency to take responsibility for things which are not their fault.

Sexual abuse strikes at core of self-esteem and personal power. Victimised children assume they are bad. Adult survivors are left with feelings of worthlessness and shame.

Guilt and low self-esteem are reflected in poor body image -- e.g. obesity and eating disorders. Survivors often feel ugly and dirty.

Because of guilt and shame, survivors may punish themselves and their bodies by engaging in self-destructive behaviour or self-mutilation. Drug abuse and alcoholism significantly higher among survivors.

Relationships: The female survivor continues victim role by being passive, turning anger to depression, setting herself up for re-victimisation. Feelings of powerlessness. Difficulty standing up for herself.

The male survivor may continue in passive role but more likely to identify with the abuser and express anger indirectly by exploiting or abusing others.

Has trouble trusting others appropriately, and a poor sense of personal boundaries. In relationships, may suffer conflict between cravings for intimacy/dependency and need to control and manipulate.

Sexuality: Survivors tend to sexualise all relationships and exhibit seductive behaviour. May have difficulty combining sex with affection and emotional intimacy. May go numb during sex, reverting to childhood pattern of dissociating themselves from their bodies in order to tolerate abuse experience. During sex, may experience flashbacks to abuse incidents. May exhibit periods of promiscuity, have difficulty rejecting unwanted sexual advances. May indulge in sadistic fantasies and/or behaviours.

Denial and Repression: Often cannot remember parts of childhood. Adults may suffer from memory and learning problems.

GROUP THERAPY How it helps: Reduces survivor's sense of isolation, gives a sense of "belonging''. Breaks through denial. Helps work through feelings of guilt and shame, ventilate anger, regain sense of power over their lives, grieve for lost childhood, understand dynamics of dysfunctional family. Relieves burden of secrecy.