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Pharmacological castration will not cure the pedophile, but it can lower the testosterone level that is responsible for a man’s sexual activity.
– If Trynkiewicz was sick, he would be treated in the hospital. Since he was in prison, it means he is healthy. Therefore, it should not be expected that any treatment can change it – says Prof. Marek Jarema is a national consultant in the field of psychiatry. – The desire to murder does not have to mean mental illness – he adds. Sexologists believe that no therapy can change sexual orientation because it is deeply rooted in the personality. – There is no method that would allow to remove a child as an object of sexual desire from a pedophile’s head and put a mature woman there – explains the sexologist Wiesław Czernikiewicz, MD, PhD, who has been dealing with the diagnosis and therapy of sexual disorders, including criminal acts for 30 years.
Compulsory pharmacological castration
In Poland, the court may refer the perpetrator who has raped a minor under 15 years of age or a relative (e.g. a daughter or son) for outpatient treatment. If the perpetrator evades treatment after serving the sentence, the court orders his placement in a closed institution. This provision has been in force since 2010 and was not yet operational at the time of the Trynkiewicz trial. Unfortunately, prison penalties have a rather weak impact on the abandonment of pedophilic acts. The recidivism of sexual crimes affects as much as 80 percent. punished. However, today, for many people, a sentence means the necessity to start treatment.
Outpatient treatment consists in administering substances that reduce sexual desire. Pharmacological castration can mean quarterly injections or tablets tailored on a case-by-case basis. The regulations provide for the use of this treatment until the risk of the convict returning to the criminal path is reduced. For many, this type of pharmacological castration is a lifelong necessity.
Pharmacological castration has been known in medicine for a long time as it is a method of treating prostate cancer. Patients are given injections every six months or daily tablets block the secretion and effect of testosterone. It inhibits the growth of prostate cancer. Sometimes such patients are also subjected to surgical castration involving removal of the testicles. Urologist Dr. Jan Karol Wolski says that patients who undergo pharmacological or surgical castration, apart from the loss of sex drive, also lose the will to act, they do not want anything, cannot think strategically, and they age at an accelerated pace. Their skin and silhouette change.
How to cure a pedophile? Male castration is not enough
Male castration is not the only treatment option. Treatment of pedophilia is based primarily on training that will allow you to control your own libido. With the help of sexologists, a pedophile can learn to recognize the symptoms of impending obsession. Psychotherapists can prepare him / her to act to deter him from committing a crime.
– Most pedophiles, when obsessive symptoms worsen to ease themselves, start watching child pornography or seek refuge into alcohol. However, this only makes the symptoms worse. In such a situation, you should use the help of specialists – says Dr. Czernikiewicz, who has been working with pedophiles for years at the Sexology and Pathology of Intercourse Clinic in Warsaw. – Then, during psychotherapy, patients are made aware of the enormous harm they can do to the child, especially since during this period their drive interferes with their ability to make objective judgment – she adds.
Group therapy is most effective and lasts about three years. – We work in groups of 8-10 people. My youngest patient was 10 years old, the oldest 66 years old. Most of them are undergoing compulsory therapy because they have a court sentence. There are also those who come voluntarily – he says. After treatment, the pedophile is monitored by the clinic for 20 years. This means that he has to come for an appointment from time to time. – However, many come voluntarily when they feel that a crisis is approaching and ask for pills and mental support – says Dr. Czernikiewicz.
Sexologists divide pedophilia into those who accept their different preferences, see nothing wrong with them, do not hide them, and even flaunt them. Especially since they can build a relationship with a child that allows them to be sexually completely non-violent. So they become convinced that they do not harm the child, on the contrary – they do well. The second group are those who are aware of the horrors of their drive. They suffer from it and try to do something about it. This is what sexologists can help.
Where does pedophilia come from
Only 30 percent. pedophilic acts are committed by pedophilia. Almost 3 of these crimes are committed by people who can also achieve sexual satisfaction with a mature woman. However, they do it with children because they believe that anyone and anything can be used to satisfy their sexual urges. Sometimes they are intellectually disabled or those who have blunted their emotions as a result of atherosclerotic changes or alcoholism in the brain. There are also those who would like to have sex with a woman, but are afraid of all sorts of complexes.
Science does not give a definite answer where pedophilia comes from. One of the concepts says that this deviation is the result of incorrect psychosexual development. In a pedophile, this development stops at a very early stage. Another cause may be development reversal due to some traumatic event. Depending on their own emotional resistance to the same event, everyone will react differently.
Some who become victims of sexual abuse are able to deal with such a trauma, while others, by merely witnessing some terrible event, may regress into psychosexual development. There is also a biological theory that in the period of sexual differentiation of the brain during fetal life, there are disturbances which result in different sexual preferences, e.g. pedophilia, homosexuality or masochism. Most often, however, deviation is the resultant of all these causes.
Is it possible to define the characteristics of a pedophile?
Unfortunately, there are no external features that would make it possible to identify pedophilia. A pedophile can be an intelligent, educated and wealthy person, as well as one who did not even graduate from elementary school. – Among my patients I had professors, directors, priests, as well as drivers and turners – says sexologist Wiesław Czernikiewicz, MD, PhD.
Pedophilia appears during puberty, when we begin to feel the sexual desire. When healthy boys fantasize and dream of a teacher, a classmate or a magazine model, pedophiles dream of children. Even then, they are looking for contact with children, sometimes only emotional. Sometimes they look for pictures of naked children on the Internet. Pedophilic disorders are most often obsessive and paroxysmal, with seizures occurring with varying frequency once a week or every six months.
– Pedophiles describe them as an external force attacking their mind. As they claim, pedophilic thoughts appear despite their will, increase tension, and only performing a pedophile act brings them relief and relief – says Dr. Czernikiewicz. Character, e.g. strong will, religious views, as well as training, pills or fear of punishment can help in controlling this obsession.
Not all pedophiles have sexual contact with children. Their attraction to children is not only physical but also mental. Some of them build emotional relationships with children. They are fulfilled in professions where they deal with minors. They are good teachers and educators.
Tekst: Halina of Pilon