CREATED: November 8, 2002
I want to start by saying that I was a victim of child abuse;I have to be honest and say it was physical abuse and also "inappropriate behavior" at the hands of people that were known to our family and were trusted. When something like this happens to children, it breaks their spirits, changes who they would have been to someone altogether different. On the mild end of the scale, the child may just grow up needing counceling and end up having broken relationships that never give them that trusting love that they are searching for. On the extreme end of the scale, the child may end up with extreme mental problems that result in in-patient psychiatric care, drug addiction, alcoholism, self-destruction behavior, or leading to suicide because they can't cope with the their nightmares anymore.
THANK YOU CRYSTLE, MY ROS SISTER, FOR CREATING THIS SPECIAL GIFT GRAPHIC.
Dedicated to this page on June 3, 2000
When I originally created this page,I had mentioned a few of the details concerning my abuse, but recently, I have been asked by a member of my family to please delete this page because it was inappropriate to talk about my abuse and molestation on the internet. Even though I never mentioned specifically who it was who violated me, it has caused some hurt. But, I feel that it isn't fair to ask me to completely delete a part of my life just because it isn't happy. Instead of completely deleting a page that I feel God led me to create,I am editing it, again, so that it will be even less specific. I don't want to cause any hurt or embarassment to anyone in my family because I love them and understand how they feel. But, I also feel that God intended this page to help others who have been through what I have or may be going through it now. So, I am still letting you know that it happened but not what specifically happened. The main purpose is to share my experience, not the details of those experiences. What is important is to let you know that if you have gone through or are now going through abuse and molestation, you are not alone and there is hope. I carried the emotions of my childhood abuse around with me, causing resentment, bitterness, insecurity, and always wondering why these things happened to me. But since knowing Jesus personally in my life, He has shown me there is always hope, even in the deepest pit of despair, even in the darkest place,in the deepest valleys, even at the brink of feeling like I couldn't go on.
This abuse and molestation started at the age of eight until I was eleven years old. I can't mention what all was done except to say that I was lucky that I wasn't raped. I can't honestly say it wouldn't have happened if that opportunity had arisen. Only God knows how I would have ended up if it had. But what did happen was bad enough. My trusting, caring, spirit was taken advantage of. I have been emotionally scarred but not as bad as others have been.
At the age of eleven, I got sent to live with my Dad and my Granny. No one knew about what had happened to me because I was warned not to tell. I had to live with memories of what happened alone, for the time being, but I believe God was watching out for me and every evil action this person did,God countered with a good action, which is how I ended up at Granny's home, which got me away from having any more contact with the person. For a long time,I was so traumatized by the whole incident that I blocked out most of what happened. How I started remembering was by having dreams about it. I was starting to feel hurt, bitterness,dirty, and feeling like I had been abandoned by being sent to my Dad's and Granny's. I wondered if Mom suspected anything and that is why I was sent away.
It wasn't until eight years ago that I had the opportunity to talk to Mom about what happened. I had re-dedicated my life to God after quite a many years passing from the time I got saved at age fourteen. I wanted to join the church and so I had the need to know that I was worthy of being a child of God and so wanted to be baptized;before doing so, I felt God telling me that there was some unfinished business from my childhood and that I had to release it, have forgiveness for it before going on to the next level of my relationship with Him. So I asked God to help me to be forgiving and have the courage to talk to my Mom. Since my Mom got to be there for my baptism, I felt this was the right time to talk to her about all the resentment, bitterness, and hurt I had been going through and also ask her why we never talked about what happened. But the weekend was really busy and the right time never came so I wrote her a letter and I told her I had been carrying all this around like extra-large suitcases and that it had to be resolved before I could be at peace about it.I told her I needed to talk to her. After she got my letter, she gave me a call. I asked her all the unanswered questions that I had and we talked a long time.
During this talk,I found out that she never suspected anything and didn't know until I had told her after I had went to Dad's and Granny's house.Once knowing, it had never been discussed again. I also found out the reason I went to my Granny's home was because of marital problems and she didn't want her kids to be around while she was trying to work them out. It would have been alot harder to do with all five children there. All of my siblings went to stay with family members until things were resolved. She knew I would be better off at my Granny's for awhile. So,after a whole childhood of living with these memories, feelings of thinking I was at fault, I stopped being a victim and started being a survivor.
I have to tell you that even though I had been feeling this way about my Mom, I had never stopped loving her. She was my Mom and nothing she could do would make me stop loving her. We are closer now than we have ever been in my whole life and we were pretty close then! I let Mom know I didn't hold anything against her anymore, now that I had the answers I had been searching for. Neither one of us has had the need to discuss it anymore. Doing so would be letting satan continue to try to cause more hurt.
Let me tell you, all the heaviness that I had carried around on my shoulders and in my heart has disappeared! Part of the burden on my heart was from my experiences, but the other part was because I held it against my Mom without knowing the whole picture. Thanks to God for showing me the way out and giving me the strength to make it without breaking! Thanks to God for helping me out of this season of my life that I was living in a valley. I have reached the mountaintop and now have victory over my past.
After I prayed to God for strength to forgive all my hurts, all the hurt and bitterness over being betrayed by someone I had trusted disappeared. Where I had been harboring thoughts of getting revenge, should I ever see them again, I found peace and I forgave them, also. I know they will never know just how their actions affected me or that I now forgive them. I have left it in God's hands. God has been working good throughout every situation since the very beginning of my abuse. God planned for me to live somewhere else, to get me away from that situation. God planned for me to forget my experiences until I could better cope with the memories without having more serious problems. God put me in the path of people who would tell me about Jesus. God also showed me that I wasn't the only person who had bad things happen to them as a child. I know, without a doubt, that God was working to counter-act every bad thing with something good. But I didn't realize it until I had became an adult, who had already been through one divorce and three serious relationships that had each ended without any warning; until I had spent alot of time in places with people that were on the wrong path, and taking me with them....
God intervened in my self-destructive lifestyle; I was led to a place of employment where my Assistant Manager was a Youth Pastor and I worked most of my scheduled hours with him. I know that God had His hand in this to lead me back to him. I had already stopped going to inappropriate places and had stopped drinking alcohol. I didn't realize it at that time, but God had made my desire to do those things start to be unattractive and unenjoyable anymore. Then God led my Assistant Manager to talk to me about visiting his church. I wasn't ready and would tell him I would think about it but wouldn't go. Eventually, I did go to an event they were having for the youth at his church and then started going all the time....
It was at this church that God worked on my heart and through reading the bible on my own and attending the services, I came to realize that I needed to get my self into a close,loving relationship with God; one that would never cause me hurt, betrayal, or abuse of any kind. One that would never cheat on me or just leave me without warning, never to be heard from again. God accepted my burdens upon him and granted me mercy, forgiveness of all my sins committed against Him since I had gotten saved and then was led astray. He granted me grace to begin again as a child of God; He took away my desires to do the things I used to do that were not pleasing to Him. I was truely a new person!! The new life that God gave he here helped me to grow; then God showed me it was time to move on. I was led to the church that I still attend now and where I was baptized. If you haven't read my Testimony Page, please visit that page and it will tell you alot more about how I became a Christian and what God has done in my life.
I still can't understand how God could love me after all I had been through. I had been broken, used,betrayed; I felt like my heart could never repaired. I had also grown up thinking that all of it was my fault and that I was dirty and undeserving to be loved in a respectful way. So, this was really a new experience for me! To love me so much that He gave His son, Jesus Christ, to die for me! That He took my sins--past, present, and even future--upon Himself, just so I wouldn't have to spend eternity separated from Him. No one else will ever show me this kind of love.
I am so thankful that God was always waiting for me! I am also joyful that even in being born into a world of sin, where the sin was brought on by free choices, God still loves me and waited for me to see the truth. The only way I could ever be lost again would be if I turned my back on my beliefs, faith, relationship with God and never returned. Then at my departing from this temporary, fleshly body, I would not go to live in heaven for eternity because this would separate me from God. No matter what I have been through, nothing that happens to my body can be as bad as being separated from my God, my Father in heaven. This body and life is only temporary, but my soul is an eternally-living being that God created in His image; His image meaning I have a soul! Not that I look like Him in my appearance.
I may still make mistakes; I may still do or say things that make God unhappy, but God can always forgive more than I can fail. I will never leave the only one who unselfishly sacrificed His own life for me. The only one who knew that even though I was broken, used, tarnished, He could make me sparkle like a diamond again. God has been my Potter and has molded me like clay and then polished me up to be a light in the darkness. I pray that the light of Jesus always shows through me to others without me even saying a word.
As you can see by my experience, I have lived to tell it to whomever is reading this and I have been really lucky that I wasn't permenantly damaged emotionally from my experiences. I know that others are not and will not be so lucky. I give all the thanks, glory, and honor to God for giving me that strength to make it; I feel He will use my childhood of abuse to help others to see that they are not alone. God has also shown me that it was never my fault. God has helped me heal and has mended my broken heart and spirit. He has made me an inheiritor of His kingdom in heaven. I have also learned that I should forgive others because He forgives me. I used to wonder why these offenses were committed against me; why would a loving God let this happen? But God didn't choose for sin to be in this world; man did. God didn't choose for things like this to happen to anyone; man did. These are the consequences of sin: that even those who are innocent will be affected by the sinful choices of mankind. Mankind has to learn that there are consequences to every action; it is like a person committing a crime and then not having to pay the penalty of prison. They never learn not to do it again if they keep getting bailed out instead of getting the punishment. We are going through this journey to learn something and are destined to live until we do! We are to love one another, not commit sins against one another and God.
My prayer is that anyone who reads this to speak up if they are having suspicions that a child they know may be being abuse or molested. Please help to stop this awful crime against children, which are a gift from God to cherish and love, not to hurt and abuse. Scream out against this awful crime! Do something to protect the innocent. If you are a person who is living with the sin of abusing and molesting a child, don't die with this secret; you need to repent before God and make it right! Also, that one day, the whole world will come to know God before it is too late. If you let your bad experiences keep you from having a relationship with Jesus, then satan will have won and you will have lost your soul to him. Don't let satan win another soul to live with him for eternity. If you open the door for satan, he will barge right in and take control! Anyone who chooses to abuse or molest a child and never asks for forgiveness or lives their remaining lives for God are separated from Him forever and they are living for satan. Where will YOU spend eternity? Heaven or Hell? Have you made your reservations yet? Don't wait until time runs out.When you die, you have already had plenty of chances and they have run out! If you have not accepted Jesus as your personal Savior, then you are serving satan. Who will you choose to serve this day? As for me and my family, we will serve the Lord.
I want to mention one more thing; if you are a child/juvenile that is being abused or if you know of a child/juvenile that is being abused in any way, it doesn't have to continue!! Please call the NATIONAL CHILD ABUSE HOTLINE AT: 1-800-4 A CHILD (800-422-4453) and break the silence! Don't let this crime go unpunished. I can't go back and stop what happened to me, but you can stop it or make a difference in a child's life. As soon as I find some, I will put some links here to websites that have ways to get help and warning signs to watch for.
THIS IS MY FIRST AWARD FOR THIS PAGE! THANKS,VALERIE, FOR THIS AWARD-January 21, 2001
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This candle was put here in honor of all those who have been hurt or damaged by abuse.
Thanks, Lisa, for this beautiful gift--Received for this page on July 8, 2001
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