Rebecca's Story

Acts 10:34 "Then Peter opened [his] mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:"

It is hard to say where my story began or where it ends; because it continues to unfold. The whole of life is a growing changing process. What I believed to be true as a child no longer applies or holds true, for the most part, as an adult. I'd like to say that the Abuse started with the Abuse, but it has become clearer and clearer to me that the Abuse started with me. Not that I am going to take the blame for the actual violations but, I have to take credit where credit is due.

As a child, I remember not feeling loved or accepted. The perceptions of a child can be dangerous when it comes to growing up as a whole person. Many grow up only to remain enslaved by those childhood perceptions. The truth was I did not accept or love myself. Because of this, I could never please myself and had built up unrealistic standards of perfection. I, then, projected those feelings on to others, particularly those I loved and respected most. Authority figures, like my mom and dad made my life miserable because it seemed that they were too hard on me and had the same unrealistic expectations of my abilities and potential. Instead of allowing their instructions to motivate me to higher aspirations, I permitted them to send me into a swelling pit of self-pity. I believed I would never be good enough, so I made it so. It wasn't until I was much older that I realized my childhood was not as unhappy as I remembered it being. But by then it was too late, I was already on a steep spiral downward into self-hatred. I was worthless, that had been confirmed by my parents, always trying to get me to do better, my peers, first and second graders who made fun of me because I was extraordinarily thin and my teachers who were continually sending notes home to my parents reporting that I was not turning in my work. One teacher even told my parents that I was a remedial student, at best and guess what? I believed her. Sounds pretty typical of normal childhood; right? Not to me. To me it was a death sentence; a slow death. It was not until much later into adulthood God uncovered a memory buried deep in my mind of being molested before I was five years of age that had contributed to my feelings of worthlessness. An un-immediate family member had shattered my self-worth for his own selfish obsession.

Any way with my self-esteem in shambles I entered adolescence. Having a long history of being picked then unpicked; loved then unloved, pretty then ugly. Rejection had become my middle name. I brought all of my unloveliness and rejection into my first relationship at age 15. Not nearly old enough to have so much baggage and be required to stand up to so much peer pressure. If you really loved me, he said, and my innocence was lost. All I really wanted was to be loved and here was my opportunity. It was empty and then, the relationship was over. My first experience with emotional abuse that had not been self inflicted. You see, he had told me; I was too homely for anyone to love. Once again I believed his assessment; to me it was true.

Relationships are funny things when you believe what I believed about them. If you are unworthy, in your own mind, then the thing you want most: Love…. is the hardest thing to obtain without defacing yourself and compromising every value you know. It seems then that, I would go from that place at fifteen years of age through a series of relationships, users and abuses disguised as love. This type of sexual abuse can pervert the concept and individual perception of what love really is and mine was definitely perverted. I came to believe that sex was love, instead of an expression of the love that couples share when the relationship is real. While it is true that I could have chosen differently. I would have, if I had only known that I was loved, God loved me. But even though, I had been in church my whole life, I did not feel that personal intimate love that only comes from the Lord.

My first experience with physical violence was when I was in college. Fighting with a boyfriend, he grabbed me and flung me against a heavy wooden bench scarring my eardrum. I wrote it off as an accident, not once asking why he had his hands on me to begin with. It is true what they say, that it will only get worse. It did. I became the whipping boy for several men who where perfectly willing to physically, verbally and emotionally abuse me and I was willing to take it, the abuse was, after all, what I deserved because I was worthless and unlovable.

In the summer of 1980 I moved to Dallas, Texas to start a new life. In the fall of that year I met a charming attractive man from New York, we fell in love and were married in the spring of 1981. Once married, I became property, no longer placed on a pedestal to be loved and admired. He became very domineering, possessive and jealous. He began locking up and controlling the money, demanding that I had his permission even to carry out simple tasks such as grocery shopping. Then, he would go out with friends, get drunk and come home accusing me of cheating on him. I had become a prisoner in my home. He was isolating me from my family, friends and any outside contact. He became rougher and rougher until he put me in the emergency room twice. I was put through many black eyes and bruises, split forehead, a busted eardrum and dislocated joints before I escaped with just my clothes and my life. But the end was nowhere in sight.

I went through a series of abusive men, including a second husband who's only love was alcoholism and a personality that made Attila the Hon look innocent. You see, a co-dependant woman who has such low self-esteem as I, will systematically repeat bad habit patterns until she either dies or meets Jesus. I mean really meets Him and falls in love. It was during my second marriage that I finally fell in love with my Lord Jesus. My eyes were open to real love with the birth of my son and my love affair with the Lord. I knew then that what I had believed for thirty years about love was all false. When you have finally experienced love in its fullness you will never turn back the false idol we call love; the idol of physical love. There was no doubt in my mind that I needed to leave the second marriage or risk being hurt. Or worse yet; my son being hurt.

I was single for the next five years. I grew strong and independent. I started my Appraisal business in 1993 and began to prosper for the first time in thirty-two years. I was happy, self sufficient and ready to take on the world. Soon I grew lonely. I was ready to once again try and tackle love. This time my resolve was clear, I would not fall for cheap physical love; no it would be based on relationship and communication. I met my current husband while on an outing with my church group. We dated for a year. During that time, the religious group with which I was affiliated started demanding that he join the group or that he and I should break up. I was not ready to do that so I resisted their insistence. My relationship was with Christ but the leaders of the church demanded that I be obedient to them and their rules. Spiritually abused, I left the group only to find out that I had been involved with a true Christian Cult and that I was not the first person damaged by their control and psychological abuse.

I subsequently, in rebellion toward the Cult, married my third husband. Soon I found out he was not the man I believed him to be, a policeman, who treated us as if we were some of his customers. His abuse had been verbal and psychological, which is worse than the physical because the bruises don't show so no one will believe you when you say you've been abused. For five years, I lived with him in hell. But I had Jesus and I had prayer. On Valentines Day 1999, he moved out of our home; but only made it to the garage. He fully intending to leave, but my prayers kicked in and he wrestled God for the entire night. God won and he was saved.

It has only been in this relationship that I have had the courage to exercise the assertiveness I have learned by trial and error. And while we still have a long way to go to develop the relationship I'm am looking for; things are worlds better.

The things I have learned from all of this hurt and growth I have put into the work called HELP! After all, HELP! is what we need when our ship is sinking in an emotional quagmire. It is a Christ centered emotional healing program guiding a woman through the emotional healing process and onto a more productive, independent life. I have lived the program so I know it works. I hope that by the end of this program you will know without a doubt that what you think about yourself, what others think about you or say or even what you have done does not limit you. You are only limited by and to what God believes and says about you. He only knows you as his favorite child. God is no respecter of persons, so; since he did this for me he will do it for you too! Your healing is within your reach, so just reach for it!!! I sincerely hope that you will enjoy the program and get HELP! Just remember healing is a decision; your decision. Your healing is one decision away.