Why in the world would the ‘children’ wait 20 years to exonerate their father?
I don’t get it.
She said that when she finally read the police reports she was “absolutely sure” the abuse never happened.
“I would have remembered something that graphic, that violent,” Tetz said.
“Both children said that while growing up in California they were told by their mother, who divorced Spencer before he was charged, that they were blocking out the memory of the abuse.
They said they realized as adults the abuse never happened, and they came forward because it was the right thing to do.”
They were afraid of their mother, and the same investigator probably told them they would go to jail if they changed their story.
They were persuaded as very young children to believe it happened, and grew up with that belief being reinforced by the mother. It can take quite a while to realize that such beliefs were all planted in your head by other adults for their own purposes.
I have a friend who was in a similar situation as a child. Her father was never jailed, but gave up trying to get custody or visitation rights. Her mother was the source of the accusations and her maternal grandparents firmly believed them. So my friend grew up sincerely believing it had happened, and that this why her father wasn’t part of her life. She’s in her late 20s now, and just a couple of years ago, with the help of a good therapist, realized the accusations just didn’t add up and that she would have remembered the abuse if it had happened to her at the age when it supposedly did. She took the initiative to seek out her father and now has a good relationship with him and his family, but it really did take close to 20 years for her to realize that the abuse never happened.