It is my prayer that my testimony reflects my life before I came to Christ, How I came to see my need for Christ, the circumstances surrounding my conversion, and my spiritual growth from the time I accepted Christ!
On July 21, 1992, I was born in Bamberg Germany, where my father was stationed at in the Army. At the time my father was married to my mom, and they already had my brother. My mom at the time also had another child whom she had with a man before my dad was ever in the picture. I am not sure exactly how long we lived in Germany, but I do not that it was only for a short time that we all lived there together as a family. While in Germany my mom cheated on my dad and because of that my mom went back to the states with her oldest daughter and left me and my brother there in Germany with my dad. My dad and her ended up getting divorced over it. I was only a baby, so I of course I did not know much about her nor did I know that she would never be a part of my life. After awhile in Germany my dad was not able to continue his career that he had in with the Army because he had us to take care of, so we moved back to Georgia and got a home together. When we returned my dad got into the construction business with his old best friend and they built houses together.
Growing up life was wonderful; I had a father, a brother, and other family members. My mom only came around a couple of times while I was younger, but I never had much to do with her. When my brother turned 7 or 8 he wanted to live with our mom, so he moved out and moved in with her. I did not like not having my brother around so I also decided to move out and follow him. During that month or two months that I lived with my mom, my brother, younger sister, and her boyfriend I was exposed to a lot of things a child should not have had to see or experience. My mom was strung out on drugs and was an alcoholic. She was so drunk and strung out one night that she began to abuse me. My dad found out and took me back in with him. My brother wanted to stay so he did. My mom was no longer a part of my life much after that.
After I moved back in with my dad he had his girlfriend Heather and her child living with him. Unfortunately Heather was a drug addict and because of this my dad got hooked on drugs. Not only were they doing them but they were making methamphetamine’s and other drugs and selling them .One night I asked my dad if I could stay the night across the street with my babysitter and her two kids, little did I know I would wake up to a street full of police cars at my house. The cops had apparently been onto my dad for awhile and locked him up. I ended up in foster care for awhile after that day. Everything I had owned at that point was left in the home and I was never given any of it back again. I didn’t get placed in the best foster care home so of course it felt like it was one of the worse times in my life. I was there for awhile until my grandma took me under her wing. Thankfully, when I moved in with my mawmaw she had my brother. My mawmaw was really good to us. She always made sure we had what we needed. I loved living with her but missed my dad more than words could say. Eventually, my dad ended up getting out of jail. I remember this day because I got off the school bus and saw my mawmaw at the end of the driveway waiting on me. She told me she had a surprise for me and to go in the house! The surprise was my dad! My heart never felt better than it did that day.
We never lived with my dad again but got to go to his house on the weekends all the time. I was always embarrassed to tell people, but my dad was right back on drugs again and still with the same woman.. I knew he was on drugs pretty bad because when we would go over to his house he stayed locked up in his room all day. When he did come out I could always tell he was strung out just by looking at him. I knew what was going on and hated it because I always hoped I would be able to live with him again. I was still young, but was not oblivious to what was going on around me. I’d always go back to my grandma’s house and cry and tell her how mad I was at him. I could never understand why he was choosing drugs over my brother and I.
When I was in the 7th grade, my grandma got upset with my brother about something. To make a long story short the she ended up abusing the both of us out of anger and the cops came and took us away and took us to our mom’s mom. This grandma did not have too much to do with me because I looked like my dad so it was a little rough living there. My mom at this time was in a rehab center getting treatment; my little sister was living with her there at a halfway house. We were living with with my grandma for only a few months.
We got up one morning and got ready for school when the house phone was ringing for awhile. I was about to leave when my mom pulled up at the house. She told us that the night before someone had murdered my dad. I get torn up just typing it because I never loved anyone the way that I loved my dad. So there I was 12 years old, with a mom that could not get her life together and never had anything to do with me, and now no dad. Anybody that knew me knew that I did not take this well. It was a ROUGH time for me and I’ve always had a hard time coping with it. I loved that man with everything I had. There was not much escaping from it at the time because it was all over the news and in the newspapers. The guy that murdered my dad had just got out of prison for murdering someone else. The pain continued when the night of his funeral, his girlfriend had a party and sold everything my dad owned in his house. Everything else was trashed. Any memories we had, pictures, videotapes, was all gone. She was having an affair the sheriff in town and was pregnant by him so of course she got away with all of it.
After this, my mom was released from rehab and she rented a house out and took me, my brother, and my little sister in. She was able to pay all the Bills from all the money we were getting from my dad passing away. It was only a matter of a few weeks when she was hooked back on drugs and was spending all the money on drugs and alcohol. I spent that month arguing and physically fighting my mom. We were back where we started. I never thought it would end at this point. My mom ended up getting locked up, so we had to find somewhere to go. I began to think this is how it would always be. I felt like I had no purpose in the world and I had no hope to live by.
My little sister’s (half sister) aunt ended up taking all three of us in. She was divorced and had one child herself. She worked out on the Air Force Base and was truly an amazing woman. Not many people would take in three extra kids, two of which are not of any ken to her. She got all of us involved in sports and very active in school. It was so different, because it was the first time we were finally able to do something in school. She cooked dinner every night, and took us to do things all the time. It was the first time we all had a stable life. My little sister had been with my mom, and was put in a ton of foster cares. Things were always so crazy. We lived with Kim, my sister’s aunt, for almost Three years. She was like a mom that I never had, she really cared for us!!! I loved her a lot!!!!!! We were all finally doing so well! When we were officially hers she came into the house dancing around with papers and smiling and loving on us. Not only did she take us in, but she wanted to and it made her happy to have us in her life.
Kim got really sick my junior year and ended up in the hospital. They told us it was just some stomach troubles she was having and that everything would be fine. A week later, when she got more results back it turned out she had cancer. The cancer had already spread and she continued to get sicker. She was very unable to take care of all of us anymore so we had to move back in with my dad’s mom because we had nowhere else to go. My grandma was always gone because she worked three jobs, so it was always easy to do kinds whatever I wanted to. I was in a relationship with a guy for a while and was sleeping around with him, I was drinking, and even smoking weed sometimes. It was easy to hide doing all of it so I just kept on doing it. I would lie and just tell my grandma I had a swim meets on the weekends or some sort of school function. During all of this kim continued to get really sick throughout that year. I ended up quitting the swim team my senior year and tried to go and see her more. I started to get super depressed and could not control it anymore. I started to not care about anything or anyone anymore. I was hurt, confused, lost, and had no idea how I was going to get through this. Kim started to get really active in church. She went to ladies Bible Study and started to just really have a love and a passion for the Lord. She would ask us to come sometimes but I never did since I was staying at my grandmas. I had no idea what church was, and was just not interested at all. Her Birthday was in October and I really wanted to get her something nice so I asked my friend what I should get her. My friend was saved and went to church, (had no idea what this meant at the time) so she told me I should get Kim a Bible with her name on the front cover. She told me where I could go to get one at so I went. I told the lady at the store that I needed a Bible with a name put on the front. She asked me what kind, and I said “I don’t know…just a Bible.. Something to read..You know a book???”. She looked at me and just told me there were different versions of the book, so I just told her any one would be fine. I gave Kim the Bible and she loved it! I had begun to get really curious about the Bible and looked into it a little bit but not too much. My depression was getting worse and worse. I got put on depression medication to try and get better. It worked for a little while, but I always felt it was a hurt that was much deeper than what medicine could heal. Something bigger and stronger than a pill was gonna have to heal this pain.
A month later I was sitting inside a computer class when I got a text message to hurry up and go to the hospice center because Kim was not doing well. When I went in there she could not respond to me at all. She just laid there and kept making these noises. I just held her hand and kept telling her how much I loved her… I was told then that she was not going to make it and that I needed to go ahead and say my goodbyes, so I did. That day was so emotional, and so so very hard. This was the lady that just took us in for three years and gave us the love we needed, this was the lady that came home dancing and so happy that the court finally made it permanent that we were hers. This was the mom I never had. … Kim passed away early that next morning. My heart was shattered. No one had loved me and my brother as much as she did since my dad had died.
My depression continued to get worse but I continued to fight it. I contemplated suicide many of times. Held a razor by arm many of times… Held a bottle of pills and contemplated taking them all so I would not wake up… You name it and I thought of it. I just felt like I had no purpose… I felt worthless. I did not think I had a purpose in the world. When I thought of this I also thought of my dad, I pictured his face and I would picture my baby sister’s face, and my brothers. I knew I could not carry out something so selfish. I would have much rather dealt with all this pain then to ever cause my siblings more pain. Ten days after Kim passed away we lost our pawpaw. He had a heart attack and died. That was two funerals that I had to go to in a matter of ten days. Life was just so crazy to me at this point. I was still so upset about Kim passing away that when pawpaw passing away did not affect me as bad. I remember getting the phone call about him passing away and remembered my brother crying his eyes out on the porch swing. My brother was my heart, so when his heart broke mine broke ten times more. We were both just depressed and hurting. Pawpaw picked us up every day after school when we got out of football and swimming and took us to get ice-cream from McDonalds before he took us home. We were close with him also but my brother was definitely closer to him than I was. We lost two more very important people.
Those last few months that Kim was sick my brother got into a terrible car accident when he and a guy where on their way back from Florida. It was raining bad and the car had lost control and flipped a few times. They had to cut my brother out of the car and when they did he was not conscious. They immediately transported him to the Mobile Alabama Trauma center. I thought I was gonna lose my brother during all of this, and remember getting in my car and traveling 7 hrs to Mobile to go see him. He ended up being okay and was able to come home. My brother acted different from then on out. A few months after Kim and our pawpaw passed away and after his accident my brother started going to church. He ended up getting saved. He had been acting really different and was listening to Christian music. My brother invited me to church every weekend but I always blew him off. My brother’s whole life changed. He was happy and I wanted whatever he had because I was far from happy. So I went to Church with him.. I ended up liking it so I kept going. It was the summer of 2010 that my whole life changed! I GOT SAVED!!!!! Best thing to happen to me. God healed me from a lot of pain that I had. My life began to radically change for the better. I was so on fire for God. I had to know EVERYTHING about him! It was so crazy. If you remember the day you got saved then you know exactly what I am talking about. The feelings were so unreal! The whole time I felt like I had no purpose I truly did. I wish I knew about him sooner. I wish I knew the true meaning about life SOONER. I kept wondering why nobody really took the time to tell me about Christ and Witness to me. I tried my hardest to learn a lot on my own. I ended up meeting a guy that summer who was also very dedicated to Christ. He did some Bible studies with me and really helped me grow in Christ.
God continued to blow my mind that summer. I had moved out of my grandmother’s house because of a lot of differences and moved in with my best friend and her family. They were so gracious to me and asked me to just stay there for a little while. They became like another family to me! I went on to a community college around home for the first semester. It was then that I felt God calling me to move away and go to a Christian College. I knew that was a part of God’s will for my life so that is exactly what I did. I got accepted into Liberty University but did not have all the funds that I needed. My youth pastor kept telling me that God would provide for me. I had already told my boss at work that I was gonna go off to school, and when I found out I did not have all the funds to go to school I told him that I was no longer gonna go off to school. That was when he told me he was gonna pay for it and to just go. I refused for a long time, because I do not ever take anything from anyone! He kept persisting and I finally agreed to it. Little this man know that he was about to help change my whole life! I had 200.00 bucks in the bank and traveled up to Lynchburg for school. I got there and had no money for books or anything. The school gave out New Student Book Dollars and it covered the cost of all my books. In every single way GOD PROVIDED for me. I trusted in him and he kept on making things happen for me. What God really kept doing was blowing my mind out of the water!!!!!!!! I was growing spiritually and growing into the Women Christ wanted me to be. During this time at Liberty, I would meet with an RA and talk about my future. This person really helped me change my whole focus on things and prayed for me. This person helped me grow spiritually and really kept me in line. I really tried keeping my focus on Christ while I was there and did my best to let nothing else get in my way. I was always dating someone so I made it a point to stay single and really focused on God that entire year! I let him transform me and work in me. I was so blessed to continue to be at Liberty. Unfortunately, I was not able to afford to stay there. I had to work at the school to pay some tuition off while I was there. This was the only way I could stay at Liberty. It was tiring but I knew it was worth it. I would not be who I am today without going to Liberty. I began to view life in a different way. I realized I talked to God every moment of every day. I was amazed by him and his work on this earth. Everything was remarkable and still is. God is so incredible. God was writing my story the whole time and I had no idea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He knew he was going to use me if I let him. This story he was writing for my life was beautiful. God has given me a powerful testimony, one that I hope to share with the world. Through this Testimony I have had the privilege to help friends rededicate their lives to Christ and to ask Christ into their lives. This was all God’s doing, but I felt blessed that he choose me to go through what I did so I could share it with everyone else.
My story did not stop there. God continued to “fill my mouth with laughter and my lips with shouts of joy.” (Job 8:21). God showed me the book he wrote of my life, he showed me the purpose, and he showed me what to do with it. & here I am…. Still filling up the pages, following his will, and constantly picturing his beauty. He is so WONDERFFUL! I had a professor at Liberty that told me to always make sure that when my testimony was told, that it always reflected what GOD has done FOR ME…. So I always try to show that. I had a dream one day at school of God rocking me in his arms, It was so real. I was crying and God took his hands and wiped my tears away. I cry just typing that, because that’s exactly what he did for me…He wiped my tears away. He healed me. God told me that the person that I was, was no longer the person that I had to be. God told me everything was going to be fine…and that’s what I find rest in now. I’m living in a swimming pool full of his blessings right now. God has given me a man that loves me just as much as my dad did and just as much as Kim did. God has provided away for me to go back to school while being able to work, and has constantly provided for me and all of my needs. God is constantly showing me something greater than what I deserve… I still struggle, just like every other sinner but it is easier knowing that God is on my side guiding me through. I still find myself wishing I had parents, or wishing I could afford to go to school and get done with it, and of course like every other woman in the world I wish for nicer things in life but God is constantly reminding me that my purpose and Identity is found in him and him alone. I feel so blessed to be able to share my story, and even more blessed that I have a father in Heaven that cares and loves me!