DA produces video about teen dating violence

LYNN – “I was unconscious for six hours,” said a teen named “Sarah,” no last name given, as she described the abuse done to her by her ex-boyfriend in a new video released by the Essex District Attorney’s office. She woke up after her head injury with him standing over her, but no one had called the hospital because there had been people drinking.Sarah is just one of the victims from Liz Claiborne’s teen dating abuse curriculum who speaks out on the horrors of teen dating violence in the 15 minute video, “Teens Talk About Dating Abuse.”District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett said the video was made in response to the number of cases his office has seen involving violent teen relationships, which, according to Blodgett, has increased both nationally and in the commonwealth.”National surveys show half of teens who are in a relationship have reported physical abuse in the past,” said Blodgett. In a 2009 survey by Teenage Research Unlimited, nearly one-third of teens surveyed who have been in a serious relationship “report physical or sexual abuse or threats of physical harm,” according to the DA’s office.The video captures Ipswich High School’s Teens Against Dating Abuse Club discussing the different kinds of abuse. The group of teens – male and female – talk about types of physical and psychological abuse, including not only punching, shoving and kicking, but also threats, stalking, and over-communication like constant texts and calls; any kind of attempt to control the victim.Both the Ipswich teens and the victims speak about how to help a friend who is being abused. In most cases of abuse, the victims are unable to recognize what is happening in their relationship as abuse; they write it off as a one-time thing or confuse it with a healthy relationship.Often it’s a concerned friend who is the wake-up call the victim needs. The signs are not always “a bruise or a scar,” as one victim says in the video. If the person seems depressed, is always with their boyfriend or girlfriend or is constantly afraid of them, gives up on things they used to love or makes excuses for the other person’s behavior, they could be experiencing abuse.One Ipswich teen offered up that abusive incidents “shouldn’t be ‘sometimes’; it shouldn’t happen at all.”Blodgett met with the Ipswich teens in a conference and seminar.”We want to be up-front to help schools and young people know what do you do if there’s been abuse, either physical or mental,” said Blodgett. “We want people to know it’s not normal – they shouldn’t be in a relationship where they’re being physically abused.”Dennis Thompson, the Assistant Director of Health and Physical Education of Lynn Public Schools, uses the District Attorny’s office information in the school’s health curriculum because he believes the information has “integrity.””We use almost all of the District Attorney’s information,” said Thompson. “In the health field, topics change quickly because the issues are so current. With textbooks, by the time you purchase it, the information is outdated. The District Attorney sends out new information a couple of times a year.” Thompson says there are plans to use the teen dating violence video in next year’s health classes, either in the sixth or ninth grades.Thompson says there haven’t been a lot of cases of teen dating violence in Lynn, chalking it up to the education and prevention programs that incorporate community resources like Healing Abuse Working for Change (HAWC) and Girls Inc. However, Thompson said a possible explanation for the nationally high numbers of teen violence is that “kids are growing up a lot faster” due to the availability of media and technology. Kids are becoming more influenced by the media as music and videos are available at the touch of a button, and cell phones, once a convenient tool, can be an object of control.Thompson believes that by teaching kids about respect, healthy relationships, and how not to give in to peer pressure, they can prevent Lynn teen