My Testimony

I’m stepping out of my comfort zone to share my story of what God has done, and is still accomplishing in me. I’ll be honest— I’m recognizing a deep, breath-constricting anxiety as I set out to share this here. I have family that won’t want me to talk about it, some who still don’t even believe what I experienced. Fear or worry about what they think or feeling like I have to defend myself, have been my boundaries in the past. Being called a liar, or treated like a liar has been an anxiety-riddled prison. So much so, that just speaking in normal settings about everyday things triggers an anxiety that I “talked too much”.

If you’ve read any of my previous posts here, or if you know me personally, you may already know bits and pieces— or large chunks— of the circumstances that started out as my mold. The mold that God broke when I surrendered it all to Him as I finally hit my rock bottom, and circumstances, mistakes, and unGodly beliefs tried to crush me.

The picture I chose above is significant to me. So many things I can glean from it that describe my personal experiences. The water can represent so many things, but I see it as God wearing through the hard places to forge a path forward for me to follow. My path has been rocky, twists and turns threatening to cause me to get lost or stuck, or even follow a wrong path. Before God— it was just rock. No path. No safe place for me to set my feet, no clear guidance. No water.

My story starts with me as a child. Let me preface this with— this is not in anyway a “bash” attempt. Things happened that were out of my control— like everyone has had happen to some degree. For me, mine were devastating. Through them God made me a strong person, deep rooted in Him. He has proven Himself to me over and over, so many times.

He is trustworthy.

He is Worthy to take the reigns of my life and be in control.

As a child, I don’t remember much. There are so many “holes” in my memory.

My dad struggled with mental illness, sometimes mis-diagnosed or misunderstood as he was a guinea pig of the VA. Had they understood more and accurately diagnosed him, maybe things wouldn’t have been as bad as they were.

Parts of my childhood are like memories of terrifying nightmares. Not all of it. We had fun family times, with lots of laughing and fun family vacation times.

Over the years I have gotten to where the nightmare things are being forgotten. I find myself wanting to cling to the good things.

I’m not going to get into the ptsd-invoking events, except to say I was in an abusive environment. My dad was a bit of a Jekyll-Hyde type— either angry/enraged, or joking and fun. He had bouts of depression, in there as well.

I never felt that security of stability with him. I was terrified of making him angry, or being spanked by him. I never felt loving type of discipline from him— he beat me.

At some point the sexual abuse started, but I can’t remember much about when. There are things he told me, and things he never told me. The most recent time he addressed it, about 15 years ago, he told not me, but everyone else in a mental hospital community room. Things I did not know. My husband heard it.

I was beyond devastated. Embarrassed and humiliated.

My mom tried to say what he said probably wasn’t true— but no way either of us could know for sure. That feeling of not even knowing what happened to me, or for how many years, is crushing. My dad saying those things about me— proudly— to strangers and my husband isn’t something she could even begin to understand.

That night I went back to my parent’s house and at the prompting of The Holy Spirit, I wrote my dad a letter, telling him that I forgave him.

When I think back, age 10 is where most of the memories start.

That’s when the eating disorder began.

We started spending summers living with my mom’s parents. My grandma poured her love into everything meal or dessert she made.

I needed love.

I ate so much “love”, I gained a bunch of weight the summer before. My dad made fun of me. We already had a dysfunctional relationship— making fun of me was salt in my deep emotional and mental wounds.

He was so vocal about women.

So, determined to not be made fun of or noticed, really, food became a type of poison, and my RN grandma had a poster on her bathroom door for what to do if I ate something poisonous— throw it up.

It started out once or twice a day. Then turned into food avoidance.

Over the next 10 years it developed into all-consuming rituals, every meal, every time I ate.

I am not going to regress back into describing in detail those rituals.

God has delivered me from those rituals, and from that “poisoned” mentality.

After a couple of years, it developed into more of a Bulimia, as God brought someone into my life that helped encourage me to eat.

By the time I turned 20, I was purging so much I started throwing up significant amounts of blood.

One particularly bad time, I called the ER and told the nurse I threw up blood. In the discussion, I mentioned making myself do that, and she said to me, “ Stop doing that!”

Let me tell you— that was so powerful!

In all those years, I never considered I could just choose to stop.

So, I stopped.

I never did it again.

In that time-frame, I was assaulted. Then I married someone who abused me, neglected me then raped me in my sleep.

And so, while the purging and rituals had stopped, my binging habits had not. Reaction to trauma made that all worse.

I gained weight.

Most would view that as bad. But here’s where I believe God’s deliverance began—

Fat did not kill me!

It was not the worst thing that could happen to me.

In fact, I began to find a comfort in men not paying attention to me.

My husband didn’t like that I gained weight. He was mean. He made humiliating jokes about me to our families. He did things that threatened my life. Then, he divorced me.

Devastated as I was— God saved my life, and then my soul through that divorce.

I turned to God.

I had missteps. My mind was still very much in the world, I didn’t understand God’s ways being different, or transforming.

Eventually I walked away from everything and every person I knew. After seeking God for His direction for my life, for weeks, I became convinced He was making a way for me by joining the military.

I enlisted, I traded my first military assignment to move overseas.

I completely left everything, and put my trust in God.

That was 28 years ago.

He provided me with a new husband. He promised and provided me with a beautiful daughter. He gave me 3 sons.

I never returned to the rituals of eating disorders.

I did however become a food and sugar addict.

God is in the process of both delivering and healing me from this, while raising me up to help others walk in His freedom.

It’s been a long time since I’ve felt hope or excitement.

I have all hope, and I am so excited for the future path God is continuously carving out for me now.

My feet are on The Rock.