We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Keeper CatranWhitney. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Keeper below.

Keeper, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with talking about how you serve the underserved, because in our view this is one of the most important things the small business community does for society – by serving those who the giant corporations ignore, small business helps create a more inclusive and just world for all of us.

After the sexual abuse of their sisters has been exposed, brothers suffer their own form of mental and emotional PTSD. Not only are we left out of the conversation, but it is demanded by our sisters that we do not attempt to engage them in conversation. And yet, after the betrayal, brothers are the ones no one asks about. We are the ones whose pain is never noticed. We are the ones no one checks on, the ones who desperately need to talk but with no outlet to do so. The ones who contemplate suicide for failing our sisters. No one asks, “Are you okay? Do you need to talk?” However, we are the ones whose sisters asked, “How could you not know?” “How could you not suspect?” “How come you didn’t protect me, save me?” “How come you didn’t hear me weeping or see my tears?” It took me nine years to act when I told my stepfather, “You have 24 hours to leave our house. If you are still here by this time tomorrow, you will be dead because I will have killed you!” Without support, all I could do was lash out, almost killing my stepfather or, worse, him killing me.

There are no books written about the emotional struggles brothers of girls who experience sexual abuse endure. There are no articles about our torment, there are no talks about our pain, our guilt, our shame. We are the ones without interviews in magazines or appearances on talk shows. The ones who have no movies, mini-series, or documentaries about our nightmares. Without a moment to comprehend, understand or process, we are deemed more guilty than the molester or rapist if we do not immediately attack, strike, beat, or execute upon learning of the crime. We are the ones without family or friends with whom we can share our pain and our guilt. We are the ones society leaves behind. After the betrayal, we are what is left over.

Brothers must engage in the conversation. We can and must become allies with our sisters in the fight against child sexual abuse. Without this alliance, an invisible, unspoken wedge exists between sisters and brothers.

Brothers must be taught to recognize the signs of our sisters’ trauma, and we must be taught how to ask questions that support our sisters when they are afraid to speak to us. By the same token, sisters must be able to recognize our silence not as uncaring but as our inability to approach them and to cope with our trauma.

Brothers are the last taboo, the last inconvenient truth in the conversation of child sexual abuse. For 45 years I have had a front-row seat to my own and my three brothers’ PTSD trauma. I have witnessed grown men, who have carried their pain of being unable to protect their sisters, break down and cry because of the burden. And yet, many women to whom I have spoken about what my brothers, I and other men are experiencing have told me without hesitation, “It didn’t happen to you. You can’t talk about it” or “It happened to your sisters, so you have no say in the matter.” One sister told me, “Unlike us girls, you boys chose to carry this burden.” No brother would choose to carry such a burden.

What man chooses to go through life imagining what his sisters experienced, knowing he didn’t save them, and then not being able to talk about it? What brother chooses to be locked out of one of the most important conversations in his life? A conversation that determines, in many ways, his life’s emotional and mental trajectory. I have borne witness to the consequences that not having a conversation has on brothers and families. My passion, my mission is to prevent as many brothers and sisters as I can from suffering what my siblings and I suffered. An open conversation would have changed the trajectory of our lives. If I can’t help families after what we went through, what was the point of it all?

In light of that harsh reality, I decided to write HELPLESSNESS, a book for brothers, the first narrative of its kind. I wrote it to help myself and other men and brothers cope with our pain, guilt, and shame of failing our sisters. I was determined to let other men and brothers know they are not alone in their silent sufferings. I wrote HELPLESSNESS for sisters and women, too, in the hope they might gain insight into what brothers experience emotionally once we learn of their sexual abuse. The goal was that sisters and brothers can come together to help each other heal as opposed to being enemies, which is so often the case. I’ve been told that on the topic of what brothers experience, I am the subject matter expert.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

In 1977, my family made Billboard Magazine’s Top 100 for both album and a single. After years of living in poverty and often being homeless, we finally found our way out when Motown Records called. Days before we were to sign our contract, my brothers and I learned a dark family secret. A secret kept in our home for years. The secret was that my stepfather had been sexually abusing my four sisters for years and that my mother knew all along.

What could never be broken was broken in ten minutes. The wreckage of relationships between brothers and sisters lay on the floor when we learned what our stepfather and mother had done. It took me forty-five years to find the courage to speak to my sisters about what happened. It took that long because my oldest sister said to her four innocent brothers, “It didn’t happen to you boys. It only happened to us girls. It didn’t happen to you. You can’t talk about it – EVER!”. And like that, we brothers were locked out of the most important conversation of our life.

My book breaks open the one conversation no one wants to have: what about the brothers? We are the ones no one asks about, the ones no one asks if we are okay or if we need to talk. All too often, we are either an inconvenient truth or taboo subject, or we are viewed as uncaring and callous bystanders regarding our sister’s molestations. Our feeling is often treated as disposal because of our gender proximity to the predator. Not surprisingly, men in positions of influence (clergy, community, and legislative) are the ones least likely to want to have this conversation.

What I am most proud of about my book is three of my four sister’s willingness to participate in the book. Without their contributions, I would not have had the credibility it takes for women to read it. Another significant thing I am most proud of is my 96-year-old Jewish father-in-law telling me, his Black son-in-law (me), the trauma he has been carrying for over 70 years after learning about his sister’s molestation. This informs me that the trauma brothers carry crosses race, religion, socioeconomic, and age lines. All too often, I have run up against people thinking because a Black wrote HELPLESSNESS, it must be a black community problem. Nothing can be further from the truth.

On my website (www.KeeperCatraWhitney.com) can watch my 16-part podcast where my older brother and I finally discuss what happened and our forty-year journey to talk to our sisters. This, too, is an industry first.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

The hardest part was, as a man, realizing I was not alone in my trauma. Realizing it was okay to be in pain, to be in trauma. Being in that condition is part of the human experience. It’s the denying of the trauma that is unnatural and damaging. When you are in that condition, it can easily become a mental health challenge for brothers.

This lesson took forty-five years to learn because 1) My three brothers and I never talked about our sister’s molestations because being ordered not to, we felt we weren’t allowed to. So there was a sense of isolation, and 2) understanding the only way out of my guilt and shame was to trust someone enough to share my pain. But how do you trust anyone when you are convinced you are alone and there is no support or tools to contradict that belief? That belief solidifies when you are not invited into the conversation. That is the challenge brothers the world over face.

When I speak at events, I am often asked what the biggest challenge for brothers is?

The biggest challenge for brothers is threefold 1. Not being invited into the conversation, and 2. Being expected to answer for our non-participation in the conversation. 3. Having to carry our burden in silence because of the first two.

I tell people — when brothers are told it didn’t happen to us, what we hear is — our trauma doesn’t matter, our voices don’t matter – WE, don’t matter. Of course, this is not true. We do matter. We have to learn our voices matter in the conversation and speak up. Because at the end of the day, the men we grow to become are directly tied to the support we get or don’t get.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I wished there were resources for brothers when I first learned of my sisters. I wish there were resources today for brothers.

I made many mistakes with my sisters after I learned what happened to them. If I had the chance to do it all over again, I would change three things 1) recognize my sister not wanting to talk to their brothers was them protecting themselves. 2) Engage my sisters much sooner. Perhaps we would have learned that even though our traumas were different, they were the same. We all wanted to be seen, to be heard, and to feel valued. We all wanted to find a way forward so we could heal as best we could and feel empowered to take our lives back from the perpetrators 3) Find someone to talk to. This is the key to recovery because it means you recognize the need for help and aren’t afraid to seek it out.    

Contact Info:

• Website: www.KeeperCatranWhitney
• Instagram: @keepercw
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/KeeperCatranWhitneyAuthor
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/KeeperCatranWhitney
• TikTok: @keepercatranhitney