I would use the pause button on the remote; pause and have the strength not to marry him. Pause and realize that courage could rise up in a 15-year-old girl to have what it takes to bear the child within her body and protect her and guide her. Pause.

He didn't look like a pervert when I met him. But at my age did I really know what a pervert would look like? Surely, not this one? Well built, dark and handsome, gee, he looked like Prince Charming to me; how was I to know that perverts sometimes come in pretty packages? Five years down the road, when the beginning of the "marriage from hell" came about, I realized my "Prince" was a pedophile. And even though my daughter begged me to forgive him and get help for her beloved daddy, no amount of counseling, Doctor's visits, (where I was told to give him more sex) or love, was going to keep us together.

The damage was done. I didn't find out until I was in the midst of the divorce proceedings, that he had started her on the road to drugs. It took her over 26 years to overcome a strong addiction and begin to have courage to change.

When I was getting the divorce, I made sure there was a clause where there would be no unsupervised visitation. Although my lawyer and the judge knew the details, no one suggested I have him put in jail. Big mistake! The average pedophile goes on to other children and they all seem to fit the same profile. Some years later, my daughter and I helped to put him in prison. We were witnesses for a young girl, whose mother lived with him. As they are taking him out of the courtroom, he is looking at us and shaking his head." How could we do this to him?" was the look we were getting.

I glanced over at my daughter and the girl she considered her "stepsister."

My daughter was crying; the young girl beside her was mouthing, "I love you" to him. He looked at me. I stared him down with not a tear in my eyes.

"Go to jail. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Just go to jail." Only the verse "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay," is my comfort. Because prison wasn't long enough to undo the damage he did when Momma let me grow up and marry a pervert. How I wish I had a Pause button in 1966.

Advice For Mommas

Don't let your precious daughters date too young.

Don't let them date men many years older than themselves

Perverts can sometimes come in pretty packaging

Statistics say molesters usually know or are related to the children

Watch your children

Talk to your children

Warn your children

Pray for your children

And always love your children.

 Donna Collins Tinsley copyright 2010