by Vernon R. Wiehe

About the author: Vernon R. Wiehe is professor in the College of Social Work at the University of Kentucky and the author of Sibling Abuse: Hidden Physical, Emotional, and Sexual Trauma, from which this viewpoint is excerpted.

I was raped when I was 13 years of age—not by a stranger in a dark alley but by my own brother in my own home when he was baby-sitting me and my younger siblings. He threatened to kill me and make it look like an accident if I ever told my parents. I didn’t tell, and he used me sexually from then on whenever he wanted.

Iwould tell my parents about how my brother would hit me. “You must have done something to deserve it,” they would say. I didn&rsquo...