Before I start today’s post I want to say three things: First, the following story is true and is based on the sexual abuse I experienced at the age of thirteen and the after affects of the initial abuse. To protect the privacy of certain people and locations in the story a few names and identifying details have been changed. Second, Part 2: Then and Now is written in both present and past tense. The italicized paragraphs are flashbacks to the time in my life when the abuse happened. Written based on notes and conversations I had at the time. The other parts are written from perspectives from more recent days pulled from journals and thoughts I have had looking on that time in my life and this lifelong road of healing. Most importantly, third – God has proven His sovereignty and faithfulness in my life. He continues to blow my mind in how we can “know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28, ESV). “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” (Gen. 1:27, ESV), and “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. ”! (Gen. 1:31, ESV). “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (2 Cor. 5:17, ESV). “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” (1 Cor. 1:9, ESV).
Part 2: Then and Now
October 31, 2010
I just turned 13 years old eleven days ago. The youth group I go to at church does this camp every year in the fall, that’s where I’m at right now. Here at camp I think I just realized something important, I need to grow up… Struggling with self harm and wallowing in a sort of self pity is unacceptable, and I recognize it. One second my mind is calm. The next second there’s a situation or circumstance that triggers my thoughts to scatter.
My chest tightens. I have a hard time breathing. The most common feeling I get is this shaky feeling all over my body; I get really weak and feel like I may fall over. I only know one “out” to these episodes that I have. There’s only one thing that I know to give me relief and lift the burden. Self harm. Enough is enough though. I consider the fear – struggle catching my breath – over thinking – tenseness – all signs that show me what’s coming: a weird sort of anxiety attack. It terrifies me, not the episode itself but the fact that I don’t recognize what triggers it. I just need to grow up and move on from this. I need guidance to do this.
We got back to the church today from camp. Since I realized that I needed to step it up and now that I know I need help to do that I asked one of my friends, Julia, who she thought could counsel me. Julia said that there was a youth leader named Sam who is well liked. I asked Julia if she would give me Sam’s number, and she did. Later that evening evening I sent Sam a quick text introducing myself and asking, “Would you mind helping me out with some things I’m struggling with?”
Later that night Sam replied, “Sure, what’s up?”
I explained a little bit of what I was going through. Then asked, “Have you ever struggled with anything like this?”
Sam replied, “Not self harm but I have struggled with depression and thoughts of suicide before.” A pretty instant connection and I felt comfortable.
* * * * *
October 31, 2014
Reflecting back on how I was feeling in 2010 having just turned 13 years old – even looking all the way back to the standards I held for myself when I was 9 years old when I first started cutting – I realize something that’s hard for me to fully understand. It’s a ripple affect of holding too high of standards and expectations for myself.
In my eyes, I’m always a failure. My mindset is negative; always assuming there’s something I have to fix and feeling unworthy until I felt satisfied. I have always had very high expectations for myself – which could be a good thing – if they weren’t impossible to reach. It almost seems arrogant and prideful to have such expectations. Do I really think I could ever reach those impossible expectations, or was I setting myself up for failure because I thrived off of striving?
In July of 2014 I realized something really important while coming out of a hard season of my life. Talking with my friend Rachelle about how I thought I had to get everything in order, I was trying to explain that I did not think I was ready for a relationship with God. While talking to Rach, I realized I just needed to start getting to know God in a relational way and not thinking about all of the Do’s and Don’t’s.
Over the course of about two months – August to September – I realized how simple and easy it was to have a relationship with God. You don’t have to get all dolled up and make sure everything is in order with Him. Just go with it. When you’re all sweaty and icky after a run. On a walk at the beach. In the middle of a thunder storm in the middle of a Panamanian jungle. Driving down the road alongside the Panama Canal. It’s so simple to see God in the midst of it all if I’m paying attention. Until, like all relationships, something crazy happens and I momentarily forget all the ease. God is always right there. I just had to remember to actually acknowledge Him.
* * * * *
March 17, 2011
That seemingly instant connection I had with one of the youth leaders came to a not so innocent affection. Shortly after Sam started helping me, the abuse started. It started with a strange look in our churches nursery that lead to a really uncomfortable hug. After this moment I was beginning to feel entangled. Time has passed and I’m not sure where it has gone. My fight or flight mode has been gone for weeks now and I’ve just been frozen in these uncomfortable situations repeatedly. I didn’t know what was even happening. For weeks I’ve been caught in this hurricane of a trap, unable to fight back.
My mom and dad left for the week to go to Nicaragua to train some young men to become pastors. My oldest brother saw something no one should ever have to see, much less, while he’s helping watch the kids. Later, Tommy called my grandmother in Dallas asking her what he should do about what he saw. Next thing I know my Aunt Kim is at the house making Sam leave. A quick wave of relief overcame me. I’m so glad Sam’s gone. Then I realized my Aunt wanted to talk.
Tommy had taken my younger siblings to another building on the missions base we are living on in Laredo, TX. Now I’m alone in this empty house. Sitting with my knees tightly against my chest, my heart pounding, my thoughts racing 150 miles per hour in every direction trying to piece together what Sam did to me. I snapped back into reality to the sound of my Aunt Kim’s voice asking me what happened. She had been sitting there for several minutes.
Even though I knew what had happened, I didn’t know what was going on at the same time. Wearing the biggest jacket I had to cover myself. Trying to find comfort in being hidden. Sitting on the couch, I feel completely alone and I want it that way. I’m so lost in intense and vivid thoughts of death and killing myself. How easy it would be to escape everything that is to come. I just tuned Aunt Kim out because I don’t know what to say and I just want to run away. I don’t want her here because I knew it was all my fault. I knew that she, along with everyone else, would hate me and I knew I would be rejected and blamed for what has happened over and over again. Fear, guilt, anxiety, panic, and anger are the emotions I feel to those thoughts that SOMEONE else planted into my mind. Someone bad. Someone who doesn’t have the right to control me in any way, much less in my very thoughts.
* * * * *
March 17, 2015
Today four years ago was the end to a new beginning. That bad person who crept into my life grabbed a hold of my innocence and held it like a toy to be played with. Looking back now, I don’t know when or even if I ever would have said anything to anyone about what this bad person did to me. Because I was threatened, groomed, and manipulated into traps to be used for sexual pleasures. That day, March 17, 2011, my oldest brother Tommy, had picked up on Sam’s odd behaviors, and he decided to snoop around and see what was happening behind the scenes. Also, if my Aunt Kim hadn’t been there for me after she kicked the perpetrator out of our house my road to healing would have been drastically different. Even though in that moment I thought comfort was the last thing I wanted, it was definitely one of the most important moments of this lifelong journey of healing. Just having her there meant the world to me because it gave me hope that even if it was just in that moment someone still loved me. Turns out a lot of people still love me. The lies of the bad person who took advantage of me were thrown right back into the pit of hell where they came from.
Finding Beauty In The Midst Of Ashes 