NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. — Ten years later, Carolyn Spring is still trying to cope with loss.
Her great grandson Eain Brooks was only 5 at the time his mother's boyfriend was on drugs, and then sexually abused and murdered the child.
The pain of losing a child doesn't get any easier.
"I still have videos of him I watch all the time, of how happy he was and the things he did," Spring said.
But she is trying to raise awareness about child abuse, so other families don't only have the memories to remember the lives most precious to them.
Spring, along with the Stop the Abuse Campaign, placed blue pinwheels down in Niagara Falls to remember those who lost their lives to child abuse, and those who are still suffering from the trauma of the abuse.
They also want parents and loved ones of children to educate kids about speaking up early on.
"It's very important. It's something that needs to be taught to them at a very early age, the person they love and know the most and that they can trust. Go to them and say I just don't feel right here, something is not happening right," Spring said.
She also says it's important that family members ask kids the right questions.
Melanie Blow is the executive director of the Stop the Abuse campaign. She says typically kids tend to change their behavior or withdraw when they are being abused, or ask to stay away from a certain person.
And in most cases, the kids do survive the abuse, but it usually comes with consequences.
"Child abuse is behind an awfully big chunk of suicides, of our overdoses, of all of the bad things that happen in our culture. So much of it is people killing pain, and that pain was bestowed on them in their earliest year," Blow said.
She says there are thousands of cases of child abuse in Erie County every year.
While Blow says the key to lowering those numbers is through state and federal funding dedicated to prevention efforts, Spring says Child Protective Services needs smaller case loads.
"Child Protective Services, they're overworked," Spring said. "If that would ever change, we might see more of a positive change here."