When I was growing up, there was an uncle that made comments on my body. When I started to go through puberty, he often remarked on how much I had “filled out” since the last time I saw him. He made said things like I’d need a bigger bra if I kept growing at this rate, and he always had something to say about the size of my butt, usually that it was getting bigger.

For several years now I have been aware of the impact those comments had on my self-image. Despite being a muscular athlete with a jeans size 10 and being 125 pounds, I always felt fat. Comments from him and other family members specifically about my butt size warped my perception of my body, and I have spent a lot of time overcoming that.

What I wasn’t aware of until recently is how his comments groomed me to be an easy target for other predators.

No one ever told that uncle to stop saying those things. Everyone heard it. He made comments at every family gathering. He said them with other aunts and uncles around, my grandmother, even my dad. NO ONE EVER TOLD HIM TO STOP. So you know what that told me? That is what older men say to young girls, and it’s okay. It’s normal. It’s normal for men in their 30s and 40s to ogle and give commentary on young girls’ bodies. And young girls let them and say nothing.

So when a high school coach made similar comments about my body, no alarms went off. It never occurred to me to tell. It never occurred to me that it was inappropriate. Because I had been taught that is what adult men do. They make objectifying and sexualized comments about young girls’ bodies.

When that same coach asked me to have sex with him, I didn’t tell then either. I just did what I did at all those family gatherings. I avoided him as much as I could. Made it a point not to be alone with him. Made myself small so he wouldn’t notice my body and maybe wouldn’t ever ask that again.

And you know where I learned that I was the problem? At family gatherings where a perverted uncle who sexualized a teenage niece wasn’t a problem.

When families don’t deal with the sexual abuse and perversion within its members, it creates members who are easy targets for other predators. The comments and touches that are rationalized as “just what he does” or overlooked because “you don’t want to upset anyone” at family gatherings become the weapons other predators use at school, at church, on dates, at work.

I have to wonder how many young people become victims to teachers, pastors/priests, bosses, dates, or one night stands because they were taught to accept that treatment right there in their grandmother’s kitchen or at the family’s 4th of July barbecue.

Because you know, if it’s okay for an uncle to ogle your butt or make comments about your growing breasts, then it must be okay for a high school coach to say those things.

Or so I was told.

Jerri Kelley is a writer, speaker, curse breaker, and life healer who believes sometimes the boat needs to be rocked and other times it just needs to be capsized and sunk.