‘Be bold, be brave, be true,’ is the mantra issued to women all over the country by a survivor of child sexual abuse, who shared her story in a powerful presentation at the 2024 Women & Agriculture conference, held at the Lyrath Estate last week.

Ann Moore is known to many throughout the country as the first woman to be elected to the board of Farmer Business Developments Plc. She is also a former winner of the FBD Women and Agriculture award for On Farm Innovation (2011), after which she went on to win the European Innovation Prize for Women in Brussels in the same year.

The mother of two and grandmother of five runs Glencash Farm, near Midleton, Co Cork, with her husband, David. Eldest daughter Joanne, who lives in the top half of the family home along with her three young children and her husband, helps out with calving and milking, while their son, Bryan, relocated to New Zealand last year with his wife Nekita and their young family, from where he also runs a dairy farm.

What most people don’t know however, is that Ann was sexually abused as a very young child, by a man she has never named. From the age of four years old to 11 years old, she was forced to have sexual intercourse and oral sex with the man.

She shared her story at the conference, in a room that fell so silent you could hear collective breaths being held as she recounted her traumatic experience.

On the day Ann addressed the conference, One in Four, Ireland’s leading support organisation for survivors of childhood sexual abuse, released its 2023 Annual Report, revealing a 42% increase in the waiting list for treatment.

The organisation delivered 6,562 sessions to 856 individuals in 2023, and has dealt with over 500 calls from people since it released its Scoping Inquiry findings into historical sexual abuse in schools last month.

Speaking to Irish Country Living, Ann said it never occurred to her to share her story so publicly. Up to this point in her life, she has only confided in her immediate family about the abuse that was inflicted on her throughout her childhood.

“My best friend died suddenly two years ago from a cardiac arrest and I just felt life is too short not to do the things that matter. I was very conscious of the fact that no one talks about abuse and it has happened to a lot of people who, like me, have been screwed up in the head by what they’ve been through. I decided it was time to have the conversation.”

My husband, my rock

Supported by her husband David, Ann decided to speak out in the hope of helping just one other victim.

“I have carried the abuse all my life, even though David knew about it from early in our relationship. We celebrated our 34th wedding anniversary recently and he has been my rock throughout it all,” she explains.

“When David was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 1999, he ended up suffering with depression. We were advised to go to counselling and it was through this that my abuse came up.

“The counsellor encouraged me to confront my abuser in order to move past it. It took me two years to do it, but it didn’t go as planned. He deflected things and I felt so defeated and humiliated.

“That put me back a good bit, but when my counsellor suggested I write a letter, that felt like a better way to do it.

“He did reply to my letter, with a conditional apology, in that he kind of blamed me for what had happened, even though I was only four years old when it began and almost 11 when it stopped.

“He told me he would blow his head off if I ever exposed him, and said I would then have to explain to everyone why he took his own life and that it would be my fault. It has taken me 20 years to get my confidence back, but after the letters were exchanged, the power had shifted and he was afraid of me.

I will never name my abuser, who has since passed away, out of respect for his family. I don’t want them to be hurt for something he did

“All I wanted was an apology and an admission that what he did to me was wrong. I did get that to a certain extent, even if it was a conditional apology. But I never wanted vengeance.”

Ann believes the reason she never confided in anyone about what was happening to her as a child was because she was too young to understand it.

“Abusers are so clever and devious; they are manipulative. We now have the language to describe what they do when they groom their victims. I never knew it as that. I was so young, I didn’t know what it was,” she says.

“I will never name my abuser, who has since passed away, out of respect for his family. I don’t want them to be hurt for something he did. This is despite the fact that one counsellor I attended, a sexual abuse counsellor, was adamant that naming him was something I had to do. I only told my siblings last year what had happened and they were very taken aback and upset, as they knew nothing about it.”

Psychological impact

The consequences of the abuse continues to affect Ann, over 40 years after she was violated.

“I was badly bullied throughout school, mainly for my appearance as I had buck teeth and a lisp. In primary school I was sexually abused by a child in my class, a girl who was only seven years old. Looking back on it, the same must have been happening to her. How else would she have known what to do?”

Ann’s speech at the Women & Agriculture conference is a rallying cry to victims of child sexual abuse to speak up and get the help they need.

“We need to get help, or it will come back to haunt us,” she says.

“I want to get survivors out of the mental prison we end up in as a result of what was done to us. I want us to heal. We need to build a sisterhood of support, so that we can lean on each other and realise that our abusers don’t get to control us, their actions don’t define us.

“I’m living proof we can go on to achieve great things in our lives, which can be a success.”

David says Ann has inspired him since he first met her, 36 years ago.

“Women that have been abused – they’re all heroes, every single one of them. Ann’s a warrior because nothing holds her back. We’ve bought and sold three farms along the way, one of which Ann did single-handedly, as I was in hospital, so there’s nothing she can’t do when she puts her mind to it.”

Ann is enjoying life, where she has found a new platform through her role as the first female director of Farmer Business Developments Plc, as well as finding new ways to make her family farm sustainable.

“It has taken me years to find my voice, and that only came when I won the Women & Agriculture award in 2011, and later COPA’s European Innovation Prize for Women Farmers. These experiences gave me a confidence I never had before. David and I are passionate about Irish agriculture and food, and we continue to farm for the future of our grandchildren.”