Father's Touch [Paperback]

Donald D'Haene (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 2002

Opening on a drive back to his boyhood memories, author Donald D'Haene recounts how dysfunction smothered his mother and her children. We're taken through the rooms of the D'Haene's Jehovah's Witness household and across the years as the children become pawns of a cunning and deceitful presence using ignorance and faith as his allies. Father’s Touch maps the breadth and depth of a father's perversion, his children's rebellion, the public revelation, and the family's struggle for acceptance and self-esteem. The author has included court transcripts plus comments from a father unfit. Here's a pedophile using faith to subject his children to years of abuse. The therapy, the police, the courts all play their roles for good or ill.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A courageous look at a personal hell. The generosity of D’Haene’s treatment of all his subjects is profoundly moving. -- Herman Goodden, The London Free Press, January 24, 2002

A very well written memoir filled with a myriad of emotion, only to finally triumph in the end. -- Denise M. Clark, Denice Clark.com, June 12, 2002

An evocative tale that cuts to the quick of human existence. Combines great insights with a natural story-telling ability. -- Judy Liebner, London Free Press Columnist, September, 2001

D'Haene's courage is equalled only by his far-reaching candour. That D'Haene has found his happiness seems almost a miracle. -- Jim Bartley, Xtra Magazine, August 8, 2002

Extraordinary. I have read many impressive memoirs by survivors of sexual abuse; many features set this one above the pack. -- Mike Lew, The Next Step Counseling & Training, Author, Victims No Longer; November, 2001

Poignant. Realism that compels the reader to wade into the text and once finished, to never let it go. -- The Compulsive Reader, Victoria Douglas, Reviewer; Aug. 30, 2002

Should be required reading for every adult in every community. A testament to the importance of public education. -- Peter G. Jaffe, Executive Director, Centre for Children & Families, Professor, Dept. of Psychology, University of Western Ontario; March 2002

This fluent book should be required reading. Created with undoubted finesse. A triumph of talent and the will over adversity. -- Dione M. Coumbe, Dover Web Review, April, 2002

Told with unusual candor. Its message of survival -- spiritual and psychological -- one of hope for all of us. -- Peter Desbarats, Journalist, Educator, Author:Somalia Cover-Up: A Commissioner's Journal, August, 2001

Unsettling. And cinematic. -- Eric Bunnell, The St.Thomas Times Journal, November, 2002

From the Inside Flap

Mike Lew's Thoughts on 'Father's Touch'

Father's Touch is an extraordinary book. I have read many impressive memoirs by survivors of sexual child abuse; many features set this one above the pack.

In addition to his fearless self examination, Donald D'Haene presents excerpts from his father's writings that offer a chilling first person portrait of an abuser's denial, distortions, justifications and rationalizations of his crimes. D'Haene details the response (ranging from ignoring the problem through outright resistence to re-victimization) by many segments of the community - religious, educational, police, and the legal system.

That Donald D'Haene persisted in his quest for understanding and justice in the face of these obstacles, is testimony to his strength, courage and resilience. This is a book that will stay with you long after you close its covers.

Mike Lew, Author Victims No Longer and Leaping upon the Mountains

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Sexual abuse survivor Donald D'Haene knows he is one of the lucky ones. Legions of paedophilia victims remain silent, afraid, isolated. They don't have to. Surviving sexual abuse more than two decades ago, D'Haene and his siblings refused to remain silent about the horrors of child sexual abuse. They told Elders of the Jehovah's Witnesses congregation, police, doctors, therapists and took their abusive perpetrator to court. How did that journey of sexual recovery unfold? D'Haene has written a memoir of his abusive experience that will be of great benefit to sexually abused victims, rape survivors and educators. Father's Touch details his father's physical and sexual abuse of his siblings, his mother, and himself; his experience with faith, educators, sexual orientation, therapy, and a trial.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 340 pages
• Publisher: Amer Book Pub (July 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1589821122
• ISBN-13: 978-1589821125
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,999,841 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars When real life is more unthinkable than your worse nightmare, November 1, 2004

By 

Bryan L. Mcglothin "Bryan Lee McGlothin" (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Father's Touch, Second Edition (Volume 2) (Paperback)

For an entire family to endure oppression and sexual abuse by a father - the protector - is unthinkable. Though, as Donald D'Haene sets out early in his book, "Fathers Touch", it does happen and unfortunately, probably more often than we know.
Danald's life story is not only of physical and sexual abuse, but also of religious oppression. It's quite obvious Donald's and his siblings abuse could have stopped, years earlier, if it were not for the secret system of the Jehovah's Witnesses.
"Father's Touch" will keep you wanting to know what's around the corner on the next page.

Thank you Donald for sharing with us your pain and your survival.

Bryan Lee McGlothin

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "The Game" is over., August 28, 2002

By 

Craig Chalquist, PhD, author of TERRAPSYCHOLO... (Bay Area, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Father's Touch (Paperback)

Very often, when sexual abuse survivors tell their tale, they have been made to feel so much like objects that even as adults their earlier thoughts and feelings remain hidden. In this case, however, the author has given us glimpses of the inner life of a child terrorized by a man given permission by a patriarchal religious background to be "head of the household": that is, a darth vader, the head domestic terrorist.

As the tale unfolds you can see how the perpetrator isolates, then brainwashes his victims while increasing their physical and psychological dependency on him. And how black-white, this-that, right-wrong beliefs merely reinforce his own absolutist opinions and literalistic excuses for seduction and violence. The self-justifications, the lies, the false faces and twisted thinking were familiar to me through my counseling work with perpetrators, whose primary agenda is the complete control of family members.

What the author also details for us is the adulthood fallout of abuse, and the lifelong struggle for clarity. Sticking closely to his experiences, he shows us what it is to try assembling a self without having had a sense of self--and burdened at the same time with the hyper-rigid shoulds, oughts, and other forms of shame and self-hatred deposited into his psyche by the abuser. (I believe it was Elie Wiesel who said that it's always the victims who feel shame, not the executioners.)

A particularly sad moment: sitting in the courtroom hearing attorneys warp a sexual abuse case into a religious battle, the author thinks: why did I put myself through this ordeal? Such legalistic wranglings only serve the perpetrator, of course, mirroring as they do his own attempts to control other people through misrepresentation, procedural weaknesses, and word games.

In spite of this, the author moves ahead with his own healing, demonstrating that the benefits of asserting oneself don't necessarily depend on happy outcomes, legal or otherwise. To find that the world isn't so bad a place to inhabit in spite of all the suffering, and to become comfortable with one's differentness, are only two of the treasures he uncovers on his pilgrimage. A third is learning to get more comfortable--despite abuse, rejection by "Christian" elders, and a homophobic society--with being gay, a thing hard to come by even without having been incested or raised in a fragmented family. (Remarkably, the abuser has written about the sinfulness of his son's homosexuality. Apparently it's OK to terrorize an entire family, use spirituality for subjugation, and even rape one's children--but not OK for a man to show love to another man. The family values of perpetrators and those who support them are truly unique.)

Finally, the book is also a topical reminder that sexual abuse is not confined to (or mismanaged by) the Catholic Church, and that many "Christian" organizations are more interested in protecting their clergy than its victims. In this they resemble the gentlemen whom Jesus criticized for shutting the door on those who follow. Not every church, temple, or parish provides a safe haven for perpetrators, of course--but an emphasis on politics, male control of women, missionary persuasion, ideological domination, and uncritical obedience make large religious organizations attractive to victimizers looking for protection and self-authorization. The more political an organization, the greater its usefulness to predators adept at making rigid rules work in their favor.

I recommend this book to abuse survivors actively engaged in the struggle for selfhood.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful, courageous, and honest writing., December 21, 2002

By 

Ruth Henriquez Lyon (Duluth, Minnesota USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Father's Touch (Paperback)

"A Father's Touch" is the the autobiographical story of a boy growing up in a family dominated by an abusive and unhinged father. Even though D'Haene's relationships with his siblings and loving mother are positive, it does not erase his suffering. In fact, all the family members suffer at the hands of the father; no one is spared. And no one is able to stop the father's abuses, even when the mother finally moves her children out of the home. D'Haene writes of his rural Canadian small town, where, even when other adults in the community find out about what is going on in his home, nothing is done to help or protect his family. Thus he touches on a dynamic that too few people are willing to grapple with: for every perpetrator there is a cadre of people in his community willing to aid and abet him by doing nothing or not enough to intervene.

Despite the horror that D'Haene recounts, the book is a very good read. The story pulls you in and moves right along. D'Haene's characterizations are well-drawn, utilizing just the right details to give us wonderful snapshots of the various members of his immediate and extended family. Also, he provides some interesting background on his parents' families and the milieu they were raised in (both parents were emigres from Belgium), thus giving us a context to help us understand the dynamics of his immediate family. Moreover, the family background gives food for thought to those of us who wonder about nature vs. nurture in regards to family abuse. It seems that D'Haene's abusive father grew up in a family of hard-working decent people, so anyone wanting to discover the origin of his mental affliction will have to look elsewhere to find a contributing factor.

D'Haene's story makes for painful reading, especially for people who've had similar experiences. However, there is hope in these pages, which are written by a due man who, although raised in an atmosphere of violence and cruelty, seems never to have abandoned his own gentle and loving nature. Thus the story illuminates one of our greatest strengths as human beings: the potential resilience of the individual soul.