Let me start off by saying, that I want to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, for walking along side me through my journey called life. For without him I would not be where I am today. As I laid in bed last night, I started thinking about my life and things that I have been through. I felt that I needed to write about it, in hopes to help others that have been through some of the same things in life. I have never done this before so please bear with me, as I try to write about it.
All of us ask at some point, God why am I going through this, or why are you doing this to me. Know that God knows what he is doing, and if you allow it, all the things you have been through in life that are bad will and can make you a much stronger person. God knows I use to ask this all the time. Why God why. I have been through some serious heartache that know one should have to endure in there lifetime. But I thank God that he took me on the Journey, for it made me such a stronger person. I was in such a dark place in life, felt that I was worthless and would never be good enough for anything or anyone. I now know that was satan and it is not true. I want to reach out to those you may need someone to talk to about things and have no one to turn to, or thinks no one will understand. Ok now lets get down to my journey.
As a lot of you know, I was married by my senior year of high school, and had a baby girl on the way. Her name was Jessica, such a beautiful little girl, who brought so much joy to my life, the moment she was born, I then knew what true love was. I was married to a man who was not the great man I thought he was. We were married July of 94 well that August he was arrested for domestic violence, her turned abusive in every way possible, mentally physically, and verbally. He always told me how ugly and fat I was and hitting. This went on for a couple years, and at that point I believed every thing he told me, that I was worthless and no one else would ever want me. In 96 I had finally had it, he went to hit me, and almost hit me daughter in the face, I gently sat her down and started hitting back and walked out the door for the last time and never looked back. We got divorced and I moved to Carthage with my two beautiful little girls (Jessica & Briana). It was while I was living there that I met some one else, who changed my life for ever in the worse way. Man if I could go back and change things. We got married and had a son his name was Dallas, I could not wait to meet this little fellow, for he was the first boy in my family to be born, I could not wait for my dad to finally have a grandson that he wanted, and although he loved all his grandaughters he was happy that a boy was finally coming. Well my dad had been fighting cancer and lost his battle to it a couple months before my son was born. I never felt such sadness before, losing our father was the worst pain I had ever felt, until one dark day in September when my son was just 26 days old. I will never forget that day, my husband at the time came into our bedroom around 4 in the morning holding a lifeless body saying he is not breathing. That day I lost my little angel Dallas, God had called him home. I could not understand why he had passed and why God would do such a thing to some one. My life had changed in every way. I did not know for weeks later, when the autopsy came in that it was because of his father that my son had lost his life. His father had taken his life by giving him cocaine and Alcohol, as he as well was abusive. I never would have thought he would have taken the life of his own child. He was arrested and only got sentenced to two years in prison, and served a year of it before he got out. Of course we divorced and I lived with my mom. Thank God for her, she helped me in so many ways. Then of course I found someone who I thought was great, and good father to his own three children. The two of us together had 5 children in our home. Well this man was no better than the others. In most cases he was a lot worse. He was extremely controlling, although he never hit me, he was abusive in other ways, threatened me in certain ways if I was to ever leave him. So I stuck around. I was not allowed to go, to the store by myself, speak to my family unless he was sitting right beside me, so he could hear anything I was saying. I just keep falling further and further in a deep dark hole. I did not know how to get out of it. We had a little girl together (Tiffany). She was born in 2000. In September of 2001 my life again had taken a bad turn, one night my daughter Jessica had gotten in trouble, where he spanked her. I was not against a spanking, as long as it was done in the right way, It was around 9:00 that night when she should have been in bed, that she got into trouble, he spanked her and told her to go back to bed, which she did. It was not until the next day, which started like every day. I woke her up for school, she dressed herself in the clothes that I had laid out for her, the night before. She ate breakfast, brushed her teeth and I had fixed her hair, the same routine everyday. A couple hours later I got a phone call to come pick her up from school, and there they explained to me, that she has bruised on her butt, and she talked them her dad had spanked her. They went and arrested him immediately. A couple weeks later they came and arrested me for not reporting it, I was charged with child abuse/neglect. Man I could not believe this was happening. My life just kept getting worse and worse. Well needless to say I spend the next 5 and half years on that charge in the Tennessee prison. I could not understand why God had allowed all this to happen. Well honestly God did not allow it to happen, I did, cause I did not have the guts to leave this man a long time ago. It was my fault. But through this Journey I went through in prison, It taught me a lot about my self. I learned that I did have self worth and that I was not worthless, I learned to love myself and where I wanted to be in life. This was a hard time for while I was there I lost custody of all 3 of my beautiful little girls, another serious painful time in my life. It took all this to wake me up. Man If I could change it all. But all we can do is learn from out mistakes. If you are going through an abusive relationship that you are scared to get out of. Wake up now before it is too late. Do it now. Don't lose everything you have, before you wake up, cause God is going to wake you up, whether you like it or not. It is not worth it. Let him threaten you how ever he wants, just leave. I am here to help. The is another way, it does not have to end badly for you. With all that said I am now in the best place that I have ever been in my life. Thanks to God and some beautiful people that I met while I was sitting behind 4 little walls for all that time. Some of the volunteers that came to the prison the biggest one being Tina Hutchison. God thank you for bringing her into my life. And some of the people who go to my sister Beth's church, that reached out to me and showed me love, just like I was apart of their family. Wayne and Loretta who I love dearly..Thank you for the love you showed me and did not even know me. God will bless all 3 of you in major ways.
I have been out for over 3 years now, and my life is great I have a healthy and loving marriage, with the most almost husband a girl could ask for and a beautiful daughter (Abby). God had blessed my life once again. Through him anything is possible. I never thought I could be this happy. Please if you are in a relationship that is hurting you turn to someone find the strength through God, to turn it all around. May God bless you all and I hope this helps someone. I know this is long and I am not very good at writing, but I am doing what I felt was laid on my heart to do.
