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I am in recovery for codependency and relationship addiction and all types of abuse: sexual, physical, emotional, verbal, mental, and spiritual.
I have struggled emotionally with depression, suicide, shame and rejection.
I have had numerous powerful spiritual experiences, including visions, speaking in tongues, hearing God’s voice and feeling His presence and His absence.
I have been a stay-at-home mom, a homeschooling mom, a working mom, a child care provider, a craft artisan, the president of my company I will describe later, a professional truck driver, an office temp, an office manager, and now I am an elder caregiver/companion.
At 15, after being molested by my stepdad and my mom not believing me, I was a runaway and a drug user, living on the streets in Berkeley
I am the mother of a heroin and methamphetamine addict daughter, now in recovery, and am also the adult child of an alcoholic mother and the wife of an alcoholic, in recovery and the ex-wife of an addict. Two of my four daughters have gotten pregnant before they married, and three have been divorced.
I have attended many different churches and different denominations and also was in a pseudo Christian cult.
I have been homeless, lived in abandoned buildings, in a teepee, a log cabin, beautiful new homes, mobile homes and now in an RV. I have had plenty and had nothing.
My life story is not simple or linear. Lots of my hard times occurred after I gave my life to Jesus.
I was very religious as a child in Catholic School
I turned my life in great sorrow and repentance over to God completely. I discovered a Christian communal house and moved in. Unfortunately, it ended up becoming a legalistic cult. We took every Scripture very literally and to the nth degree, as far as possible. The women wore long dresses and had long hair; the men wore robes or tunics and had beards. We hitchhiked all over the country during the ‘70’s, living off of donations and what people brought into the group. We lived in tents and in abandoned houses. We did not believe in going to doctors or taking any medicine. All of the children were born wherever we were, by whoever was available to help out. I helped with about a dozen births. I thank God there were no complications.
I married and had two of my children while in the group. We got out in 1978. Getting out was tough, but getting that mindset out of my thinking took many years.
There was some physical abuse from my husband in the cult, but after we got out, he became more violent and got involved in drugs and drinking. I did not think of myself as a real person. I felt invisible and acted like I was. I believed every accusation against me and took on the weight of the guilt of those accusations. For a long time, I hardly ate anything, feeling guilty for just being alive. My husband told me he resented having to work to support the family. But God is always faithful. He gave me some wonderful Scriptures and even a vision of my spiritual house being like a falling down shack. Heb. 12:12-13 Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble, and make straight paths for your feet, so that the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.
We bought our house on Long Island for $15,000, in 1980. It had been an American Legion post, but after a drunk driver crashed into it, they abandoned it, and we were able to buy it as a “fixer upper”. The renovation took years and was never really finished. The house had electric wires hanging out of outlets and the roof leaked down through the light fixtures onto the children’s beds, and other places in the house. It rains all year round on Long Island , so it was a constant problem and it smelled moldy. There was a coal stove in the basement but I was not allowed to light it because I had once smoked up the house, so we heated the house with some electric space heaters and the oven. For most of the 12 years we lived there, I had no functional, normal kitchen. I had particle board counters and floors and everything in boxes.
I had several serious bouts of depression to the point of suicidal thoughts. Once, my pastor and sister-in-law came over and prayed for me. Then I called my mom and she sent my aunt to come and get me. We secretly packed up some things we needed and the kids and I moved to Salinas , CA Walnut Creek
Then, my husband found out how to contact me, and started his unrelenting badgering and manipulating. He promised many things, including that we would enroll in Bible school and live on their campus. My dad did not believe him and called the school. When they heard we were separated, they would not allow us to live on campus. I confronted him on this and so he was pressured to rent a house off campus for us.
However, I believed his promises, and packed up the house and kids and moved back to New York Chicago
I was in a panic, but I made it on to the plane with four tired, upset kids. As we flew on to New York, we got word that our plane was going to have to land at LaGuardia instead of MacArthur, a smaller airport on Long Island, because it closed at 11:00pm. I noticed passengers making plans with each other to travel together to their destinations. When we landed at LaGuardia, a lot of people had family there to get them because they knew of the situation. But not us. So we stood, feeling stranded, waiting to gather up our ten large boxes, at midnight, and then got on a bus to go to MacArthur Airport
We arrived a couple hours later to a totally empty airport. The security guard allowed us to go inside the closed terminal. I found a phone and called repeatedly, but I got no answer. Eventually, my “husband” showed up and took us to the rented house. There were beds in the house, but no bedding, so I had to unpack our boxes to find sheets, blankets and pillows and get the children to bed. It was about 4:00am by then. Then, he had the nerve to think he could spend the night, after I had adamantly told him that was not going to happen without a lot of marriage counseling and some courtship. At nine the next morning, he let himself in and assumed all was just fine. I knew I had made a huge mistake by returning to him, but I was way too ashamed to go back to California
Nothing really changed. Yes, we did go to Bible school, for a semester. I refused to live in our old house until it was decent, so then I was blamed for our financial troubles. I eventually gave in to his pressure and moved back into that house.
I was so miserable. I went to a women’s bible study at another woman’s house and met a very special friend. We met in an interesting way. The woman hosting the bible study started complaining about her husband and how he hadn’t gotten the Christmas dishes down from the attic. Kari and I were sitting across from each other and both of us instantly broke out in tears. Then we started sharing our lives and the two of us were being abused by our husbands. Also, we were both very poor and special Christmas dishes were completely out of the question. Plus our husbands wouldn’t lift a finger to help us around the house, whereas her husband worked hard to provide for their family, did a lot of the housework, and she was able to stay home and homeschool the children.
Kari and I prayed over the phone together every morning for probably a year. We prayed for our husbands and children and encouraged each other. When we would say goodbye, Kari would always tell me, “Jesus loves you and so do I”. I brushed it off, in my mind saying “yeah, yeah”. I could not accept that anyone could really love me and I couldn’t accept that Jesus really loved me. However, it was working on me because, every time I was criticized, in my mind, I would say, “I may be stupid, but Jesus loves me”. And I would sing “Jesus loves me” to myself all the time.
One day, Kari came to my house to pick me up in her car. It was summer and we were both wearing shorts. As I got in her small car, I noticed her legs and then I saw mine and realized that I had a body that I could have control of. I was an individual person. That may sound stupid or obvious, but it was quite a revelation.
I got pregnant again and again insisted that we move to a decent house. We did rent another house and we also refinanced our home, so we had some money for renovations. We were going to church as a family and the church people helped us out with some of the work. We went to counseling at the church, and in the end, the pastor’s wife told me I just needed to submit more. At that, I left their house and refused to continue in their counseling. I always did absolutely everything my husband told me to do. I was a doormat.
Shortly afterwards, I hit bottom and prayed for God to give me clarity and peace about what I should do. I got my Bible and a Daily Bread Devotional, and two notebooks. When I opened the Daily Bread and began reading, the story that day was about a man who knew his father loved his mother by how he treated her and by the things he did for her, such as lighting the coal stove in the basement before he left for work in the winter. I put my head down and cried, knowing that God was answering my prayer in detail. For six weeks, I read the Bible, prayed and wrote what God was saying to me in one notebook. Psalm 55 that Dan taught on last week was a very important Scripture I meditated on and that comforted me.
6. I said, "Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest--
12-14. If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. 13. But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend, 14. with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God.
20-21. My companion attacks his friends; he violates his covenant. 21. His speech is smooth as butter, yet war is in his heart; his words are more soothing than oil, yet they are drawn swords.
In the other notebook, I wrote the daily abuses. It was very clear that I needed to leave, for my children’s sake. I knew it was wrong for my children to grow up thinking this was the way a husband treats his wife.
I went to the senior pastor and told him that I was going to leave, and asked if he or someone could be with me when I told my husband. I told him that even God gave Adam and Eve the choice to do right or wrong, and even if he didn’t agree with me, I didn’t think I should be beat up for making that choice. He refused to be involved and after that I was shunned by the church. No one would even talk to me.
I was able to escape from him in 1991, and fled from Long Island to my family in California
In California
In that work, I found that the problem was not all my ex. I had issues of my own to work on. I realized I would get obsessed with men and thought I needed to be in a relationship with a man to be ok. Since I needed the affirmation of a man, and I had a perverse understanding of love and sex and of a woman’s role in a relationship, it was impossible for me to say no consistently. As a Christian woman, wanting to live my life in obedience to God, this was quite a trial, and caused me immense pain and shame and serious consequences. 1 Th. 4:3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;
During the time I was single, I developed a very close relationship with Jesus. When my children spent every other weekend with their father, I would turn on worship music and spend time worshipping and singing and in prayer. Then I started getting songs. My first reaction was to argue in my mind that God wouldn’t give me songs. My view of myself was still as a battered wife: worthless, incompetent, inferior, etc. But after the songs kept coming, I yielded and started writing them down. I had no musical instrument except for a toy piano that had the notes written above the keys. So I plunked out the tune and wrote down the words and notes and started filling up notebooks.
I also got involved in a ministry to a homeless shelter/drug rehab. When I volunteered, my intention was to encourage women who had been beaten down by life circumstances and let them know how much Jesus loved them. I had no knowledge that worship music was involved in this ministry. The first night I was there, the leader pointed to a microphone and said that was my mic. I told him that I didn’t sing but he insisted. That night, when I was singing, if I opened my eyes, no sound would come out. I was petrified with fear. As time went on, I got much more comfortable and eventually became the lead singer. I also worked on my songs and the guys in the band surprised me with a guitar!
My children were hurt by living and growing up in an abusive, dysfunctional home, plus, after the divorce, they were hurt by their church and their father who viewed me as a sinner since I initiated the divorce. They prayed and believed God that their dad and I would remarry. When that didn’t happen it was devastating to them, but they accept the divorce now as a good thing.
In 1996, I remarried, and in my legalistic thinking, believed I had to be perfect and that life would be perfect. After a couple of months, when I goofed up by bouncing a check, I couldn’t sleep and stayed up all night and wrote a song that God used to do healing in me, called Less Than Perfection, which I would like to play for you.
Another significant thing that helped change my life and understanding of who I am was that my new husband put me in charge of a business he had helped develop: a buying group for interior designers. I knew nothing of business or of interior design, but I quickly learned and took on the positions of president, sales rep, negotiator, bookkeeper, order processor, meeting organizer and chair. To be successful at these jobs and to have the respect of important people, such as presidents of furniture companies was life-changing. It proved to me that I wasn’t stupid or incompetent as I had been told for years. I have learned that I am not less than or better than any one else.
My life has not been anything like I would have planned. I’ve had so much disappointment and pain. Some people in my family even doubt God’s hand in my life because of all the problems. However, I believe just the opposite. I wish my life had been much different, but in all the pain, I have come to know God intimately and deeply, especially during the times I was absolutely desperate for Him. I have experienced his healing. I have had to struggle with forgiveness and God has faithfully given me the grace to forgive those who have abused me. I now know that I am loved by God, forgiven for my sins, and not inferior.
Because of what God has done in my life, I started an internet group to minister to people who used to be in the cult. I have also been a speaker at two cult conferences. I had four consecutive years of recovery in Celebrate Recovery before moving to Reno
In 2006, I had an incident that I would describe as a type of seizure. After tests, a lesion was discovered on my brain. The surgeon told me that we could wait and watch it or go in and take it out. I chose to watch it which we did for two years until a change was spotted and I had brain surgery in September of ‘08. It turned out to be a rare cancer usually only found in children, and the only treatment was to remove it and it doesn’t return. However, since I am obviously not a child, we are continuing to watch it. I have no symptoms or problems, so I don’t think I should have a problem.
After my surgery, my daughter, Christine, offered me a job managing her office. I worked for her for several months and then moved on to do what I am doing now: caring for elderly and handicapped people, by housecleaning, cooking and shopping for them.
We moved up here in our motorhome and expected to find a house to rent shortly after moving. However, because of the economy, we are still living in the motorhome and probably will be for awhile longer. I have learned to be content and trust that God is fully in charge and will take care of me.
