It is such a pleasure for me to share another amazing testimony of God's goodness in the lives of women. I pray it is a blessing to you as you read it!
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I was raised in a Christian household surrounded by very
strong Godly role models. My biggest role model was my grandfather. He loved
the Lord and strived to show it every day. When all the grandkids were born, he
gave us what he called “birthday verses.” Mine is James 1:23 “For if anyone is
a hearer of the word and not a doer, it is like a man looking in the mirror and
then forgetting what he looks like when he walks away.”
That verse was ingrained into my mind and every year on my
birthday, my grandfather wouldn’t say happy birthday until we told him our
birthday verse. My childhood was filled with AWANA, VBS, and Sunday school. One
of my favorite quotes I said when I was little, was “Mommy, if Jesus lives in
your heart, doesn’t he get food on his head?” Childhood was very normal for me
except for our move from Southern California to Colorado Springs.
When I was 4, I was in the car with my dad and I told him I
wanted to accept Christ. We were driving on the freeway and he said, “Ok, let’s
pray!” and he jokingly closed his eyes! I remember being so scared, but then he
opened his eyes and we prayed. It’s a special memory that my dad was the one to
pray with me.
When I was 11, my family tried out a new church. I had no
idea the role that that church would play in my life. I met my future husband
at that church, I made some lasting friendships, and I experienced some extreme
deep struggles. At 15, I asked my future husband to go to homecoming with
me. After 4 years of friendship, we
began our long journey of the ups and downs of a high school relationship.
During that time, we were the “ideal relationship role models” for our youth group.
We tried very hard to be pure, that is, until we broke up. We were no longer in
the spotlight, so we threw our boundaries to the wind. We were still very
involved with youth group and church, but it was all honestly fake. We would
meet up and fool around all the time. There was a lot of lying and impurities
that happened. We also had some serious fights and I truly thought that when he
went to college, I would never see or speak to him again.
In the midst of that, I struggled really badly with anorexia
and had some true suicidal thoughts. I didn’t know who I was and I didn’t know
where God was. All of my friends from youth group had left for college (they
were all the class ahead of me), high school drama was at an all-time high, and
I had lost the love of my life. I really struggled with self-image. I hated
myself, I hated how I looked, I just hated it all. That followed me for a long
time.
In March 2011, at the age of 19, I met the jerk. He was a
waiter at Cracker Barrel where I was working. He was the first guy to show
interest in me since my high school boyfriend and he was a smooth talker. I had
SO MANY signs from God and family that I needed to STAY THE HECK AWAY FROM HIM!
Did I listen?? Nope! He came to pick me up for our first date and my dad
grabbed my arm and said, “ I don’t like him, please don’t go on this date.”
Guess what, I went anyways.
When I met the jerk,
he told me he was an atheist and could argue every point that showed an
existence of God. He knew I was a Christian and would eventually use that to
manipulate me.
Right away, he began to manipulate and trick me. I was too fat, I was not beautiful,
everything was my fault, I was the stupidest person he had ever met, my family
was out to get me, they wanted nothing to do with me, I was an idiot for not
sleeping with him. Lie after lie came in and I believed EVERY SINGLE ONE OF
THEM! I was stuck in a whirlwind of lies that I didn’t know how to get out of.
I honestly don’t remember praying for several months because of this. Slowly,
the physical abuse started on top of the mental/emotional abuse. I was grabbed,
pushed, shoved, bruised, forced to do things that I NEVER wanted to do, and was
restrained by my hair. It took a month of me battling with myself before I
eventually slept with him. After he knew I would do it, he forced me to do
horrific things in the bedroom, none of which were intimate or the way God
intended. Most of those times ended in tears and being thrown on the ground
being told how bad and unattractive I was.
There is a church here called New Life and every year they
put on an amazing show each Easter called The Thorn. I took the jerk and at the
show, he “accepted Christ.” I was so excited because I thought that God put me
in his life to show Christ to him! That whole, “I can fix him and he can change
thing?” ya, those are lies as well. Right away, I started bringing him to
church and trying everything in my power to help him. My parents gave him a
Bible and the book Wild at Heart and all sorts of resources for him. I thought
things were going to change. NOPE! He started using God against me. “There is
no way God loves you, I can’t believe God made you so ugly and stupid, God is
so disappointed in you.” But, I still stayed in the relationship, I still
thought God would change him. I even helped our pastor baptize him! Such a
fake. That summer, he convinced me to buy myself an engagement ring. He even
met with my dad to ask him if he could marry me and that outing ended in a
yelling match and my father saying no. During that conversation, my dad also
found out that we had slept together and I had never seen such disappointment
in my parents. He proposed to me on a boulder on the side of Pikes Peak. I was
so manipulated and convinced that this was God’s plan for me, that I said yes.
My whole family cried big, terrified tears when I told them. From then on, it
was almost daily that he wanted to go to the courthouse and get it over with. I
had started making plans and planning a wedding, but nothing ever worked out.
And every time he mentioned the courthouse, I had this little nudge that said,
“Don’t do it.” That was the only time I listened to God during that
relationship.
After almost 2 years, he moved to Anchorage to go live with
his brother because he couldn’t hold a job here and his step dad said he
couldn’t live with them anymore. One month after he moved up there, he broke up
with me over the phone and told me that I was holding him back and he had met
someone else. Come to find out, he had been cheating on me the entire time we
dated. I truly thought my life was over and all the suicidal thoughts came
back. I thought I had no reason to live and thought God wanted nothing to do
with me.
About a month later, I texted my high school boyfriend and
told him I was single. We started texting again and it was so nice. However, as
soon as the jerk found out I was talking to him again, the jerk wanted me back
and I went running back to him. Stupid me. He re-dumped me a few months later
and started dating another woman. I was absolutely devastated. Here is where I
completely turned my back on God and my family. Two of my friends told me to go
to Alaska and find out what went wrong. I thought I needed him to look me in
the eyes and tell me that he didn’t love me. My friends helped me get a plane
ticket and I lied to every person in my life.
God gave me EVERY sign to not go to Alaska. Leading up to
the trip, there was a huge blizzard and I didn’t even know if our flight would
make it. The morning of my flight, my friend who was supposed to drive me, totaled
her car. I convinced my high school boyfriend to drive me. When he dropped me
off, he said, “I don’t want you to go, but I know you need to do this for
yourself.” I get to my gate and I lost my boarding pass. If that’s not God
telling me in a huge, flashing, fluorescent way to not go, then I don’t know
what is! I got on that flight anyways! I landed in Anchorage and had the
biggest anxiety attack of my life. I was 3600 miles from home! There was an
entire freaking country between me and my family. I was farther from home than
the length of America. What on earth had I done?! I thought about getting back
on another flight and going straight back home, but I did not. Luckily I had a
friend who lived up there who used to work with me and the jerk. She was the
only positive on that long 52 hour trip. During that trip, he manipulated me
into sleeping with him because he and his girlfriend had “broken up.”
Ironically, not even 2 hours later, they were magically back together. I still
get sick to my stomach thinking about how I slept with him. That night, my
friend and I went and hung out with him and his girlfriend. WHY?! That was one
of the worst nights of my life. The next day, he and I hung out for a while. He
chose then to tell me that he no longer believed in God and that he was an
atheist again. Instead of being calm and handling it well, I threw a Bible at
him and told him he was an idiot. I was then forced into his car and he drove
me to the airport. Once there, we got into the worst fight we had ever had. He
dragged me out of the car in a chokehold and threw me in front of a moving car.
The driver was not even phased. After that, I smacked him in the face and
finally stood up for myself. He threw me into the side of his car and then
drove away. Leaving me bruised, cut up, and crying at the airport 4 hours
before my flight was to take off. Luckily, my friend was able to come pick me
up for a little bit.
When I got back home, the jerk thought it would be a good
idea to tell my family where I had been. In that moment, everyone lost trust in
me. I had no one. That is when I FINALLY understood that no matter what, God
would always be with me! I ignored him and turned my back on him completely,
but during that season, He was all I had. Even though Alaska sucked, I don’t
think I would understand God’s love and faithfulness if I hadn’t experienced
that.
After that, every few months, if the jerk wanted to talk to
me, he would text me and say, “Hey, I really want to get my relationship with
God back, can you help me?” or “I realize that a lot of my problems were
because of my drinking, so I am going to start going to AA and I want to find
God again.” He knew that I would help him with his walk with God, so I always
got sucked back in. This whole time, he was dating his girlfriend and never
wanted me back. Also during this time, my old high school boyfriend and I had
started hanging out again. He had graduated college and we wanted our
friendship back. In May of 2015, we “officially” started dating again and it
was the best!
The last time I heard from the jerk was April of 2016, I was
about to graduate college and unbeknownst to me, my life was about to change
drastically. He texted me and said, “I know you don’t want to hear from me, but
I wanted to tell you that my twin died and I am really struggling. I need God
and I need you.” I responded and said, “I am very sorry to hear that, but I am
engaged (I was not), and I need you to never contact me again. I hope you find
God and find what you’re looking for, but I’m done and I don’t care anymore.”
He responded by calling me every horrid name in the book. I have not heard from
him since. Praise be to God! And come to find out, his twin NEVER died, he is
still very much alive! Ugh, makes my heart sick!
May of 2016 arrived, I finally graduated college with my 3rd
degree, got a job, and became engaged! Life was looking up! 3 weeks after
getting engaged, I was put in the hospital with a life threatening liver
disease diagnosis. Even though that was insanely scary, I had my fiancé by my
side and I had my family by my side. God had a plan and I needed to trust it.
Fast forward to 2019. I have been hospitalized twice because
of my liver, but besides that, God has been so faithful and amazing! I have an
amazing husband whom I have known for 16 years, I own a house, and have a
wonderful career. I also have endometriosis and had always been told that I
could never have kids or it would be hard. But guess what, I am 8 days away
from bringing my son into the world! God showed up in miraculous ways and
proved just how powerful He is! Yes, I have made mistakes and turned my back on
God. Yes, I still struggle with image and confidence and I still hear those
little lies sometimes, but my husband is so good at hushing those and reminding
me that they are not true. God loves me and God created me for big things! I
can’t wait to tell my son just how big and awesome God is and how God used such
horrible experiences to grow my faith and trust! Everyone has a story, but I
truly think mine shows true beauty from ashes!
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If you have a testimony of God's goodness that you would like to share, please contact me! I'd love to share stories from all walks of life so we can encourage one another.
