A young woman from Mexico reflected on how the abuse affected her life in the years that followed: “There were many [challenges]. Mainly in my social environment, something that worried me a lot was how to relate to society after what happened. I did know how they would react if I told them what happened to me, I was afraid of facing that. Also, family … that was something … well it took a lot of effort … to tell them so they would understand. Well, the school environment too, it was very hard for me to go to school and [hear] things like ‘What happened?’ ‘What’s this?’ ‘What was that?’ It was very difficult … there were many challenges. Mainly it affects my emotional health, it made me feel depression and anxiety.” Shame, embarrassment and self-doubt shape how children see both themselves and the abuse they were subjected to. These feelings do not exist in isolation; they are reinforced by anticipated reactions from others and by social norms that sustain them. This is particularly evident in cases of image-based abuse where a child has initially shared an image voluntarily. Internalized shame and self-blame can deepen the harm and intensify an already distressing experience. A young girl in the Dominican Republic recalls being blamed by her parents for following perpetrators’ instructions and taking a picture of herself and sending it. At first, she struggled to understand why she was being blamed and punished for the abuse she was subjected to, but later she had come to internalize it: “After a long time, I understood that what I did was wrong, the photo I took and all that”. She reflected that her family continued to blame her over time: “Literally years can go by and every time there is an argument, they bring up what happened”. Parents’ victim-blaming reactions towards their children can have negative impacts on their relationships. Such reactions may compromise trust and make children less likely to communicate openly, especially about sensitive issues such as sexuality, relationships and other topics they are learning to navigate, as explained by another young person interviewed in the Dominican Republic: Through Children’s Eyes How does abuse affect children’s lives? 32