Child abuse hurts long-term

By Dylan Fremlin

When most people think of post-traumatic stress disorder they think of men returning from war, but that is not the only cause of PTSD.

Patrick O’Sullivan is a 31-year-old ex-NHL hockey player who suffers from PTSD. O’Sullivan’s father John, moved around from city to city in the U.S. playing for minor league hockey teams. He caused problems everywhere until he ran out of teams that would give him week long contracts. In one case, he even took a slap-shot at his coach’s head in the middle of a game.

John became obsessed with the thought of Patrick making the NHL one day and was convinced extreme abuse was the best way to make that happen. Patrick knew at a young age he was eventually going to have to do something drastic to take his father out of his life.

“I always looked at it, even as a kid when I started to understand what was happening to me, that the person was my father, but only on the simplest level,” said O’Sullivan. “There was nothing else he did that would constitute him being a parent.”

O’Sullivan’s father abused him on a regular basis, such as making him eat his own vomit and forcing him to run on the highway behind the family van in the winter. John also stood behind the glass and screamed at him all game, every game. Other hockey parents saw this and suspected there may be other things going on but nobody did anything about it. At one point, somebody witnessed John kicking his son outside an arena after a game. The witness spoke to team management, but the police were not called to investigate.

“These other parents knew my dad was a little off, they even saw some stuff happen at the rink and in the parking lot,” said O’Sullivan. “Nobody ever followed up. They couldn’t believe how serious it was because of how good of a player I was.”

Many people hesitate to report child abuse due to the fact they don’t have concrete evidence the abuse is happening. There doesn’t need to be concrete evidence.

“If you suspect child abuse in any way, you would contact either the police or Children’s Aid directly,” said registered Clinical Social Worker and Master Social Worker, Michelle Weglarz. “All you have to do is suspect it.”

According to a 2012 report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the percentage of Canadians who have suffered some type of child abuse is as high as 34 per cent. The three types are physical, sexual and exposure to intimate partner violence.

“There’s no way for the victim to talk about what’s going on because it’s a child,” said O’Sullivan. “And that’s really why it’s so important for all the other parents to be aware and to actually step up and do something about it.”

 

*to report suspected child abuse, call Children’s Aid at 519-252-1171

 

Patrick O’Sullivan skates in warmups with

the Phoenix Coyotes in his last NHL season.

(Photo courtesy of Patrick O’Sullivan.)