Bleeding Daylight

Cody Wieler spent years battling with food obsession, constantly getting on and off of diets, binging and restricting, all leading to punishing workouts. After years of struggling to obtain and maintain his dream body, he was struck by a realisation that was to change his life forever. His podcast, Strong for Your Tasks is now helping others to that same realisation. He has also written a book of the same name.
 
http://instagram.com/codywieler 
http://codywieler.com 
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08NS97NYS/ 
 
 

Marnie Swedberg went from being someone who struggled to read while she was at school, to now having read thousands of books and written more than a dozen herself. She is an international leadership mentor, the host of her own radio talk show, a media expert and a keynote speaker for organizations around the world. She has trained, coached and mentored over 15,000 leaders from 35 countries.
 
http://marnie.com
http://facebook.com/SpeakerMarnie
https://www.instagram.com/mentormarnie/
https://www.youtube.com/c/godlywomenworldwide

Chris Staron is an award-winning filmmaker, novelist, improv-comedian, and the producer and host of the Truce Podcast, which dives deep into history to explore how we got here and how we can do better. He's an author and the writer, director and producer of the films Bringing up Bobby and Between the Walls. On Bleeding Daylight he shares his journey of leaving a faith based on anger to one marked by compassion and love.
 
www.trucepodcast.com 
www.twitter.com/trucepodcast 
www.facebook.com/trucepodcast 

Jenny Toh studied Law in England, had a legal career spanning almost three decades in Malaysia and Singapore working for a range of employers including a global oil and gas company as well as global banks. Personally, life was good, with a great family and close friends, but something was still missing. Jenny is the director of River Life Coaching where she coaches individuals to align their career and life goals with their values and strengths.
 
https://www.riverlifecoaching.com 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenny-toh-cpc-acc 
https://www.facebook.com/riverlifecoaching 
https://www.instagram.com/riverlifecoaching 
https://www.positiveintelligence.com 

Laura Padgett faced the pointing fingers of those who considered her unworthy. In her younger years, she was excluded and experienced a very difficult upbringing. Now she’s opening the door to others who have faced discrimination and exclusion. She’s an Author, Speaker, Dancer, and Podcaster who shares stories of inspiration and transformation.
 
https://lauralpadgett.com
https://www.facebook.com/LauraLPadgettAuthorSpeakerDancer
https://www.instagram.com/laurapadgettauthor
https://twitter.com/lauraleepadgett

Where do you turn when your life has been routinely punctuated by abuse and even your friends have ripped you off? Who do you trust? Staci Diffendaffer has replaced hurt with healing. Right from a very early age, she experienced a tremendous amount of pain and trauma. The events that caused that pain and trauma shaped her thinking and caused her to form harmful beliefs about herself and about others. Severe financial loss and serious health issues caused further heartache. Her book, Unconditioned Love: Healing Hearts and Minds in a Time of Conflict and Division, tells the story of her trauma and her healing.
 
http://ownyourvictory.com
http://bit.ly/Unconditioned-Love
http://linkedin.com/in/staci-diffendaffer
https://www.instagram.com/stacidiffendaffer

Tony Green has known what most people would consider success. He reached incredible heights in the corporate world, earning significant wealth and respect, but it all came crashing down and Tony was left to build his life again. These days, life looks very different. His book, Triumphant Surrender is a best seller that talks about a very countercultural idea of what success means.
 
http://www.triumphantsurrender.com/
 
https://www.facebook.com/Triumphant-Surrender-The-Book-by-Tony-Green-107487784539654
 
+1 504-384-3888
 
tony.green@triumphantsurrender.com 

None of us like to be constantly put down and criticised, yet our harshest critic is often our own internal dialogue. The words we speak to ourselves can hold us back or even cripple us emotionally. John Stange is helping people discover a better way. He is the lead pastor of Core Creek Community Church in Pennsylvania, as well as being an adjunct professor at Cairn University. He hosts three podcasts, The Chapter-a-Day Audio Bible, Daily Devotions with Pastor John, and Dwell on These Things.
 
http://DesireJesus.com 
https://www.instagram.com/pastorjohnstange/ 
https://twitter.com/pastorstange 

What if you’re not who you’ve always thought you were? What if you discovered that you’re someone entirely different? Sharon Hughes believes that’s not only her story, she would suggest that it’s very likely to be your story too. This episode could change the way you think about yourself, forever. Sharon Hughes is the founder of Confidence Academy, the host of Called to Confidence podcast, a confidence and Self-worth expert, and Critical Incident Stress Debriefer. Her first book, The Girl in the Garage: 3 Steps to Letting Go of Your Past became an Amazon number 1 new release.
 
http://sharonhughes.net 
https://www.facebook.com/CalledtoConfidence 
https://www.instagram.com/sharonhughesofficial/ 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharon-hughes-speaker/ 

Mike Hatch spends much of his time equipping men to be all they can be. He’s the National Relationship Generator with an organization called CLC, or Christ Led Communities. In a time of uncertainty and confusion, he’s making a difference in the lives of countless men. Mike is also a podcaster. During our conversation, you’ll hear how to get a free copy of his new book, which tells about his own journey towards empowered manhood.
 
http://clchq.org 
mhatch@clchq.org 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikehatch02 
http://empoweredmanhood.com  
http://instagram.com/mhatch0202  

Kirk McCarley has so far lead a fascinating life, with a number of careers, many of them at the same time. A major health event caused him to reassess his life direction and drew him into his current main vocation. Known as The Seed Sower Coach, Kirk has more than 30 years of executive leadership experience in both the public and private sectors. He’s been married for over 40 years, has two children and two grandchildren.
 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kirk-mccarley-1bbba950/
https://theseedsowercoach.com/
https://www.facebook.com/KirkMcCarleyTheSeedSowerCoach/
kirk@theseedsowercoach.com
Phone: +1 314-677-8779
 
 
 

Jerry Dugan spent his childhood moving not only from state to state but from country to country. Unfortunately, it wasn't an idyllic life. He grew up with massive expectations hanging over his head, and issues within his family made growing up a very rocky road. These days, he hosts a podcast named Beyond the Rut, and he focuses on helping others be the best they can be.
 
https://beyondtherut.com
https://www.facebook.com/Beyondtherut 
https://www.instagram.com/beyondtherut/
https://twitter.com/beyondtherut 

What does it mean to be in the presence of God? Is it a meaningless religious phrase or a reality? My guest today talks about an encounter that transformed his life. Kevin White is a pastor and author. Some years ago, he was nearly broke, had no job, and yet began generously putting food on the table for other families. That sparked him to found an organisation that feeds over 500 families in his area. He is the Founder/Executive Director of Global Hope India, a mission organization providing access to the gospel to Indian Nationals. He's now traveled to India over fifty times, hosting a thousand people on mission trips.
 
http://kevinwhite.us
https://www.amazon.com/Audacious-Generosity-Experience-Receive-Possible/dp/1544516142
 

After reaching rock-bottom, Damon Covert knew something had to change. This is his story of how change happened and how he’s helping others find healthy life change. Everywhere we look, sexualized images that once would have been hidden from view and now are readily available online, whether we want to see them or not. Damon allowed society's take on sex and sexuality to shape who he was. It almost destroyed him. His story is now one of hope.
 
 
https://www.principle8ministries.org    
https://www.facebook.com/Principle8
https://www.instagram.com/damoncovert/
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening. You can follow Bleeding Daylight and connect to our social media channels by following the links at bleedingdaylight.net If you’ve been encouraged by episodes of Bleeding Daylight, please encourage others by sharing episodes and leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
After reaching rock-bottom, today’s guest knew something had to change. Today we’ll hear the story of how change happened for him and how he’s helping others find healthy life change.
 
It's everywhere we look. Sexualized images that once would have been hidden from view and now are readily available online, whether we want to see them or not. More than that they're on our televisions, on billboards, in advertising in our shopping malls, and so many other places that we've become desensitized to how much something that was once private, is being pushed into the public sphere. Damon Covert is someone who allowed society's new take on sex and sexuality to shape who he was. It almost destroyed him. He's my guest on Bleeding Daylight today, and together, we'll explore a very different kind of addiction. Damon, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Damon Covert 
Thank you, Rodney, it's a pleasure to be here.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You describe yourself as a grateful recovering addict and that immediately makes us think of drink or drugs but your addiction was very different. Tell me what it was that gripped you.
 
Damon Covert 
I was introduced to pornography when I was only about eight or nine years old. Now this is BC This is before computers before cell phones, at least before personal computers. And I grew up or rather got older in the 80s. And so you know, if you wanted pornography, you had to go out and find it. I wasn't even actively looking. I was just with some friends. And again, it was after a Cub Scout meeting of all things, which was, which was kind of crazy. Because, you know, in scouting, they teach about, you know, morality, and being gentlemanly, and so forth. And there was nothing gentlemanly about what I was introduced to in that attic that night. You know, I didn't even fully understand what I was looking at. as a as a child of only eight or nine, these magazines were actually fairly explicit. They were not, you know, this wasn't just nudity there were there was a bit more graphic nature to it. And I didn't have an immediate craving for more of that, that would that would come later in my adolescence. And my exposure to pornography actually was was kind of it wasn't terribly overwhelming until I got into my my adolescence, my teen years, when, you know, friends were exploring this sort of thing. And it developed slowly at first. But the introduction was very early. At an impressionable age,
 
Rodney Olsen 
We hear more and more especially in this digital age, that the time that young people are introduced to pornography, or at least first see pornography is getting younger and younger, that it seems that it was pretty much the case back then and maybe not as widespread. But for you as an eight or nine year old, you're starting to see things that you really don't understand. So what was it that brought you back to it? Or was it something that well, that's what I've seen, and, and I'll move away from it. And you were drawn back in your adolescence,
 
Damon Covert 
I think it was just like any addiction. I think this is why it's so easy for people to get hooked on anything. It could be shopping, gambling, it could be video games, I think it was just a way for me to medicate my emotional pain. You know, I really didn't understand what I was looking at. But it did, it did create a certain reaction to my brain. And and actually, we've come to understand, since that the science behind pornography is virtually identical. In terms of what it does in your brain, to drug addiction. I've seen brain scans of people who have just taken heroin. And compare those with a brain scan of someone who's viewing pornography, the same areas, the same pleasure centers of your brain are lit up when you're when those two activities are going on. So it is it is a biochemical thing. But you know, again, it's it's just interesting that you don't have to actually physically take a drug to get that same high in your brain. I was not necessarily the most popular kid in school, I wanted to be well liked. I wanted to be thought of as as a fun person to be around. I typically didn't feel like I fit in very well. And we're also hearing that a lot these days with younger people, you know, where they don't feel like they fit in. So they start to assume certain things about their, their identity and so forth. And it was just a way to medicate my emotional pain.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So that emotional pain, what was going on for you at the time? Was it just those struggles that we all face through adolescence and wanting to be liked by people as we go through those high school years? Or was there more to it at that stage?
 
Damon Covert 
I think there was much more to it. And I do think that a lot of addiction is rooted in early trauma. I think it had to do mostly with my family of origin. I had a loving family. I grew up in a nominally Christian home and we really didn't go to church a lot, maybe on Easter. You know, my mom sent my brother and myself to vacation Bible school to get us out of the house for a couple weeks during the summer. And you know, that really was it. I didn't have a great foundation spiritually. But my home life was a little tense. I learned to walk on eggshells because I never really could fully predict what side of the bed my mom might wake up on. And so I learned to kind of toe the line, I knew my parents loved me. But I couldn't always feel like I deserve that love. And that sort of shaped my my view of God to growing up, I wanted to have a little more control over my life didn't feel like I could have that openly. So I think it was channeled into addictive behavior. And when I think we see this with with other addictions, as well, but it certainly was, was just a way of exercising a degree of control, or at least the feeling that I was in some kind of control over some aspect of my life. And so I think it was more to do with the the early trauma of dealing with parental anger and so forth. You know, I was never physically abused, I have no recollection of being sexually abused, although many people that are addicted to pornography and struggle with sexual addiction are, in fact, emotionally, physically and or sexually abused. To, interestingly enough, the emotional abuse is, is a higher incidence, it's over 90% of people that struggle with sexual addiction, are dealing with some sort of emotional abuse, versus 70, or 80%, of physical or sexual abuse,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're talking there about having some kind of control in your life, being able to control something because everything else seemed out of control. I'm interested in the whole idea of addiction in this sexual addiction that you found yourself in, along with addiction to drugs or alcohol, that they seem to start as being a way of someone having some kind of control. But how quickly did that start to control you? How quickly did the tables turn for you?
 
Damon Covert 
Yeah, that's a great question, Rodney. And I think it probably happened a lot earlier than I realized. And I think that's how it knew that is in the addict mind, is that we tend to think that it's all under control. It's not a problem, until it's a problem, it's not a problem until somebody finds out or you get caught. So I think it very quickly, especially me, in my adolescence, it very quickly escalated, daily need to partake of this, this addiction. Again, it wasn't like you could just pick up your phone these days, I actually feel sorry, for a lot of the you know, a lot of people that struggle with this, because it is so easy to access this material these days, you don't even need to go by anything, you will probably already have the phone, and you probably already have an internet connection. And so it's just a matter of grabbing that piece of technology and beaming this stuff into your brain. But even if I wasn't able to seek out and physically find pornography to look at, again, this is the early 80s, there were no personal computers hooked up to an internet, my friend had a Commodore 64. And that was, you know, the hot computer at that time. There was also the the physical gratification that goes along with that was something that quickly took over my life, we're told it's kind of a normal thing for for adolescents to do. I prefer the word common, I think we use the word normal far too often. I think that, you know, it quickly spiraled for me, where I was, you know, I was acting out in some way, shape or form almost every day, and unable to go even even a couple of days, without using my drug of choice in some way, shape or form.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're mentioning that it's very common. Society would like to tell us that this means that it's normal. And of course, it becomes more and more normalized as we go on. And I think probably around the 80s, and especially into the 90s. And after that it became even more normal, where even in our television shows if there wasn't something pornographic in there. There was mention of it, there was a lot of mentioning just some fairly standard comedies on TV where they're constantly talking about use of pornography as if it's a very normal thing. Do you think that this has been one of those things that has supposedly normalized it in our society and stopped people from getting help when they need it?
 
Damon Covert 
Absolutely. It's sort of a chicken versus the egg conundrum. Which came first? Is it art imitating life? Or is it life imitating art? Or are we now just sort of stuck in this cycle of life imitating art imitating life imitating art? And and I think that it definitely has been normalized. And we've seen that across the board. And unfortunately, it's it's a slow progression as well, we're seeing more and more deviation from what used to be normal, normal no longer means much anymore, because we have overuse that word. There's a commonality in terms of our internal struggles and the way we deal with things as human beings. In the United States. We have an estimate of about 30 million Americans who are struggling with some form of sexual addiction, you know, it's 68% of our population, I honestly do the numbers a lot higher, because, you know, it's a very touchy subject, nobody wants to really admit that they have the sort of problem. But I do think that absolutely the the media have created this the sort of standard that it's perfectly normal to, to view pornography and act out on a on a regular basis, you know, alone or with others. And that's just how it is. Somehow celibacy is fatal. You know, I've never met anyone who died of celibacy. And you won't, because, you know, when I was in college, I was taught in psychology class that, you know, sex was a basic human need, you know, you had food, water, shelter, and sex. And that's just not true. It's just not true. We have a sexual element to our personalities, God created us as sexual beings. But there is a stewardship that should go along with that I never really took seriously. I mean, I did initially because I wanted to do the right thing. I wanted to be pure. I was anything but but you know, I, since I technically had not lost my virginity, yet, I still thought of myself as a pure person. And honestly, I was weird even back then for that, yes, I didn't grow up in the, in the, the new Victorian 1950s in America, where you didn't say the word pregnant on television, and people slept in separate beds on TV. You know, I grew up watching, I Love Lucy and Dick Van Dyke and all the reruns from, you know, the 50s, and so forth, where you didn't see, you know, husband and wife, even sleeping in the same bed now, you know, somebody goes out to a bar, and they meet somebody on a TV show, and the next scene, they're in bed together. So it is it is definitely a problem where this is normalized for our kids. This is normalized for young adults who are trying to discover, you know, what it means to be alive here in these modern times.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you're talking about the tricks that we play in our own minds. They're about thinking, Well, I haven't actually slept with anyone. So therefore, I'm still pure. I'm still sexually abstaining. And yet we see that there are these tricks that we play. And there, of course, was the famous one some years back where one of your presidents said I did not have sexual relations with that woman, because he decided what was going to be under that heading and what wasn't?
 
Damon Covert 
Yeah, I had a feeling you were headed there Rodney. And I was I was going right there, too. I do. I do have to blame our one of our former presidents, but it's not just him. You know, it's it's been like that we've been trying to redefine things for so long. You know, if we don't like the way a word is used, we'll just redefine what it means. And we're seeing that more and more and more. And, and it's just to suit a certain narrative. So that we can feel like, you know, everything's okay. It's a control thing. I think we have people that are there. Basically, we're addicted to self, we want to feel better than we feel. If we don't feel accepted, if we don't feel loved. We're going to redefine what love means. And actually, I mean, that's the the the other point I'd like to make is that too often, I mean, we are trying to equate love and sex. Sex is sex and love is love. There's a certain movement where you know, you'll see this, the words Love is love, and that that's true. But sex is sex. You know, sex is not equal Love, love is greater than sex. Going back to the books, we read the shows, we watch the music, you know, the words love and sex are used interchangeably. And I think it's just because we have been for so long, we've been redefining what words mean, we're, we're redefining things where they now have no meaning. And we're seeing that go. In the United States where we're seeing that go to an extreme. We're just assigning the gender really isn't even a thing. And I know that's a very touchy topic. But, you know, we've we've gone and taken some steps here in the United States, and it still hasn't played out completely, but we are D gendering our legislation. And I do think too, and a lot of ways these gender issues, these are addictive thought patterns. You know, this is a way of exercising control a, here's how I want to be seen, here's how I want to be, you know, addressed. Here's how I want to physically dress, here's what I want my body to look like, and we just make these changes, whether it's, you know, some sort of implants to make us look more attractive. Or if it's, if it's just more radical modification of bodies. There's there's there's a whole rabbit trail of things that can come out of this, this idea that you know, our identity our sexual identity is paramount in our lives.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested that you bring up the the whole point of the love is love campaign that we've seen, which is designed to say well, anything goes because They use love as as an attraction rather than defining it as that self giving love that that we might understand it to be. So when I say love is love, I have to agree. But first you've got to determine what the terms mean that you're actually talking about.
 
Damon Covert 
The Greeks actually have as you probably know, there are at least six or seven different words for love. It's it's sort of like the American Eskimo or illusion, people's, you know, words for snow, they have all of these different types of snow. And they have a special word for each one. And, you know, in in the Greek language, you know, people are maybe familiar with the term agape love, which is sort of that all encompassing, accepting altruistic love, but then you know, you have philia, which is a love of friendship. And again, there, there's an interesting, we're not going to touch on a really touchy topic here. But when we talk about pedophilia, for example, and when you tell somebody you have a sexual addiction, I think their mind in a lot of cases wants to go to the worst possible place. They want to assume that you're some sort of pedophile that you know, you have a problem with sexual attraction to children. I praise God that my situation didn't get to that point. But it is a progression. So it is something to be very, very careful about because, again, the mind wants something different all the time. And the media will feed you whatever filth you want, they will provide that for you ad nauseum. I don't like the word pedophilia, only because I don't think that really fits the definition. a pedophile is a Laker of children. I think that we should if we're going to create a word for that that type of aberrant behavior or attitude, it should be a little more accurate. This is we're talking about erotic love, or physical love. You know, the Greek word arrows. You know, again, it's a way of softening that word. Well, I just like kids, you know, when when Penn State University in my home state of Pennsylvania, a number of years ago, there was the Jerry Sandusky scandal. And Jerry Sandusky, for example. He just said, Well, you know, I just I like kids. I love kids. But yeah, not in the right way. Jerry, I'm sorry, you know that there's, there's no point at which a child should be subjected to the sexual advances of an adult. And I think most people would agree with that. But we are gradually heading toward as you said, anything goes? The logic could be well, that's just my sexual expression. You don't have the right to tell me that that's not okay. I think right now, the majority of people would say, absolutely not, this is totally off limits, and never should be okay. But I think we are going to see a Fabian progression, start to blur those lines. And we do see that, where I'm where I'm broadcasting from right now, in the state of Maryland, we have a law that says if it is cultural, that a minor can be married to a much older adult with parental consent. So if it is cultural, you know, out of specific religious belief. And we have a 14 year old girl whose parents are okay with this 45 year old man being her husband, that's legal. And again, as you said, it's we're headed toward a situation where anything goes where there's this this concept of pansexuality, you know, anybody anything anytime, as so long as I can feel better about me. And that's really what addiction is all about.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We were talking about the fact that you became hooked in your adolescence. But where did it go from there? Where did it become such a problem for you?
 
Damon Covert 
You know, when you're young, and you're single, and you're unattached, and you think, well, this is no big deal. You know, first of all, sounds like all my friends are doing the same sorts of things. It's not a problem. But it becomes a problem when you're especially when you're impacting another person directly. Now, I think there's there's a concept in a lot of people's minds that pornography is a victimless crime. It's not. Because you know, we have we can demonstrate the direct connection between human trafficking and pornography, and the the so called sex trades and pornography. Where it became a problem for me was relationally. One of the one of the things about a sexual addict is typically when they will want to find someone who's willing to to be with them and kind of satisfy their physical needs or desires. A lot of times, immediately after that there's a rejection because of the shame But the addict feels, and they will often push that person away. And this would this was my problem, too, I was keeping people at arm's length, I was desperate and hungry for intimacy. And the physical intimacy did not provide what I wanted. I was not I do not feel necessarily accepted, simply because I was with someone physically. And so I kept trying to go back to that. And a lot of times that, you know, there is a cycle where you'll go to someone you know, is going to say yes to whatever it is you want to do. But immediately after, there's almost always a rejection, well, look at the time I've got to go. And, you know, we see that played out in the media, too, that there is there is some truth to it. I mean, that's the the really attractive thing about any lie is a grain of truth, that rings, you know, with, with other people in resonates with them and say, Oh, yeah, I've experienced that, where it really hit home for me, I wish I could say that this was not part of my story. Out of my addiction, and, and out of a lack of caution. One of the young ladies that I got involved with got pregnant. You know, we were panicked, we were scared, and we were young, it was a terrible time for either one of us to try to start a family. And because we didn't know what else to do, we had an abortion. I am every bit as responsible as the young lady involved, I still deal with the feelings about that. I mean, I think about that almost every day of my life. And it's easily by far the worst thing I ever did. And again, here, here's society, saying this really isn't a big deal. You know, we don't even call it a baby anymore. We're not we're not, you know, terminating a baby, it's a pregnancy, we're just terminating the pregnancy, the condition of being pregnant. That was my first real rock bottom moment, where I thought, Oh, my goodness, you know, this disease that I have, has driven me to the point where I have taken someone's life. In terms of the other ways it affected me. I carried it into my marriage, I you know, I eventually met a wonderful woman got married. And, you know, we were pretty happy at first or so I thought I still had my my secret sin, you know, ever since I bought a computer and was hooked up to the internet, I could access that. Anytime I had a little privacy. And that has, you know, I was going on for a long time. And, again, it wasn't a problem until it was a problem that kept fueling my my desire for that intimacy that I was searching for, which again, was never gonna be satisfied by pornography, or by physically acting out, you know, so this was going on, the entire time I was I was married, I would be okay, for a couple days, maybe, or I would try to quit. And maybe I'd make it a couple of weeks sort of white knuckling my way through recovery. And I wasn't involved in a recovery program at the time. So I was just doing it on my own, which by the way, never works. But eventually, because of the other stresses and strains on my marriage, I had emotional affairs, a couple of these in a short period of time. And then my wife found out she asked the right questions, and I was honest with her, and things hit the fan. And I really felt like, you know, my marriage was over, my family was over. And, you know, this was this was the next rock bottom for me. But by the grace of God, my wife took me back. And we've worked things out. And here we are, you know, 15 plus years on the far side of this stuff. Our marriage is not perfect, but it's good. And we work on it, you know, we actually have true intimacy, I can talk to my wife about some of my issues, and, and I have accountability and so forth.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested, first of all about that term of an emotional affair, because this comes back to the whole idea that we can justify certain things Hey, look, I didn't go very far with it. It was just a sort of a connection for those that that perhaps don't understand what we're talking about. What would you classify as an emotional affair?
 
Damon Covert 
I would say it's any relationship that you wouldn't want your spouse or girlfriend or boyfriend to know about. We have these relationships, whether it's someone at work, or someone we know socially, or an online relationship. So I think anything that you would want to keep a secret, when truth is our secrets keep us I was as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs, as they say, I just always worried that one of those rocking chairs was going to come down on my tail. It's any kind of relationship that you would not want your significant other to know about. I termed these emotional affairs because they did stop short of sex. But there was a physical element. You know, there was a physical affection element to these relationships, but just because they didn't actually involve intercourse. That doesn't make it right. We have to put up boundaries in our lives to be safe. You know, because Because it's it's very easy to get into a conversation and feeling an emotional connection with someone. And again, if you are an addict mindset, you can find a little touchstone with just about anybody. But it's just very dangerous. And it doesn't end well Trust me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've come to your own rock bottom, what was it that turned things around for you? How did you start to claw your way back to where you should have been?
 
Damon Covert 
I can't take a lot of credit for that. I think that in a lot of times, a lot of situations like this, we have to be broken, very, very few people will wake up and just change because, okay, you know, I realized I'm in a bad way. For me, and let me just speak from my experience, I had to have those Wake Up Calls, you know, that was I had to suffer the consequences. And again, this is something we like, we want to have our, you know, our cake and eat it too. We don't want to have the consequences of our actions. And so I had to feel that sting. And I had to realize that, you know, the pain of continuing in my current way of thinking, My current mode of operation is greater than the pain of dealing with my stuff. And so after the disclosure of these emotional affairs, and the fallout from all of that, there was a long road, the spiritual connection really was, was what started that for me, I began to realize that I could not help myself, I needed a power greater than myself. And until that point, the God of my understanding was me. Again, I grew up in a in a nominally Christian home, I had heard the name of Jesus, I knew, you know that God loved me. But I didn't really comprehend that. I didn't really get that until I realized, I have nowhere else to go, and God will still take me back. I was the Prodigal Son, you know, I had been given all these great things, and I squandered them. And yet, my father not only took me back, but ran out to meet me. That was the point for me where it turned around, I realized that I was isolated, and shows isolation, as a way of protecting myself and my lifestyle. But I got plugged in to a church. And in my case, I'm a musician. So plugging into our worship team was was a logical step. And I served in any capacity, I told the worship leader, I said, I'll do whatever you whatever you need, you know, I ran the soundboard. I wasn't on platform for a while. I just did whatever they needed. And that helped me and I met some real friends, I met people that I can actually talk to. And I remember very clearly a number of years later, you know, finally opening up to one of my buddies on the worship team and telling him I had a long way to go in terms of my sexual purity. I remember that night with crystal clarity. And that was the beginning for me. And then our church started a Celebrate Recovery ministry. I started attending that because I knew they needed a worship leader for their their program. And I thought I'd go help those people, only to find out I was those people. And I needed to be there for me. For the last several years I've been I've been involved in some capacity with Celebrate Recovery. And then I heard about another fellowship that was geared towards sexual addiction. I started attending that as another layer of accountability. And, you know, I found a sponsor and people that understood my specific issues, although I have found and what I love about CR is that it is basically everything, you know, I mean, you can you have shopaholics there, you have gambling addicts, you have people who struggle with drugs and alcohol, you have people who struggle with codependency and sexual issues, it's across the board, we can get hooked on anything, to try to medicate that emotional pain
 
Rodney Olsen 
Before we talk about the this ministry that you've begun. And I want to find out about that, and how we can hook people into that. But I want to go back to some of the things that you were saying before you were talking about pornography and those that it affects. And it's not just those who are consuming pornography, but those who are involved in it in the first place. And I heard a statistic somewhere that it's around 70 to 80% of the people that we see in those images have been forced there that have been trafficked there in some way. And, and I'd suggest that their number would probably be even higher.
 
Damon Covert 
I'm sure it is Rodney, and you cannot prove consentuality even if there's some affidavit on the website that says everybody's 18 is here of their own free will. There's just no way of knowing that for sure. I don't want to be part of that problem. I got better for myself, and you have to want to get better for yourself. You have to be, I guess more miserable. You know, again, realizing that that point of your own pain is greater to continue in what you're doing then to make a change and start owning up to your stuff but You know, socially and culturally, there there is a greater mandate to not be part of the problem. I was definitely part of the problem. And I think you're right, I think that the the numbers are probably much higher. I actually had the privilege and blessing of hearing a woman speak her name is harmony Grillo, she was pimped out as a dancer by one of her former boyfriends. But she got out of that got away from this guy and went to school. Now she's got a master's degree, I think she might have two master's degrees. And she actually has her own ministry in her own organization that helps women get out of the sex trades. Over 80% of people that are working in the adult industry, women in particular, say they would rather not be some of the like, they don't have any financial choice. This is just, you know, the only only marketable skill they think they have. They also get into these situations where it's it's a promise of some some degree of fame and notoriety. I actually sat on a plane with a young lady. I was visiting my brother in Atlanta. God has a sense of humor, he puts the sex addict next to the aspiring playboy model. This young lady was probably 20 college age. I just felt like God was saying, you know, you should talk to this young lady, but it was not in a creepy way. It was just Hey, let's there's something going on here. Let's find out what what her story is. And so I started talking to her and I found out she was actually flying to Atlanta to do a swimsuit, shoot. This is how it starts, it starts out as Okay, well, we're going to bring you in, we're going to take some some pictures of you and your bathing suit next to a car and the setting, I think for some sort of advertisement. But then hey, what if we did this? And what if we did that? And hey, if we gave you a little bit more money, or let's let's have a couple drinks, or have some some, you know, have some drugs and try something else. And people get duped into this fraud, coercion and force? And yes, absolutely. I think the numbers are shockingly and terribly high. And it needs to stop. But we have to stop the demand. And the demand is within each one of us on some level. Even if you're just buying a dimestore novel, book, something that has graphic descriptions of you know, these these sexual conquests with these guys in a loincloth and tearing some lady's dress on the cover. This is porn. This is pornography. I had a pastor friend, retired pastor challenged me said, Well, how do you define pornography? I said, Well, you know, I had to think about it, because the old definition was you knew it when you saw it. Unfortunately, we don't know it when we see it anymore. So I would say that we should redefine pornography. Anything that triggers you to sexual lust is pornographic. Whether it's a book, you're reading a magazine, you're looking at a video, you're watching the music, you're listening to the way someone is talking to you or the way you're talking to somebody else. All of these things can be pornographic, it does not have to be an image. It does not have to be a video, we have to stop that demand in our hearts. We have to stop looking to fill ourselves up by taking from somebody else
 
Rodney Olsen 
And stop redefining things. Stop calling something like 'ethical porn', when there's no way that it can be. We've got to stop redefining it to make ourselves feel comfortable, I guess.
 
Damon Covert 
Absolutely. Yeah. And actually, there's a there's a fantastic but disturbing TED Talk. Lady talks about the so called ethical porn and some of these issues. And that the titles, the most popular titles, and the things that people search for are absolutely shocking. It's you know, whether or not that's actually what's being depicted, or whether it's just this is a scene we're setting for you. It is very disturbing. But again, it's disturbing, because this is somehow in some way it is relating back to an unresolved trauma, or unresolved issues in your past that caused you to seek out certain things. It is common, but it's not normal. There are other ways to process this, instead of just giving in and saying, I'm going to look at this, that or the other thing, I'm going to seek this stuff out and as you pointed out, it's you don't have to seek it out. It will find you and your phone and your TV, your TV's watching you. I don't think people realize this. But you know, George Orwell was right. He just didn't get the timeline quite right. You know, we're well past 1984. But we have black screens hanging on our walls listening to us watching us. Your TV has a camera, your phone has a camera. My computer has a camera, my iPad has a camera. There are microphones and there are things going on where I will have a conversation with my wife about, I don't know, paper towels or something. Sure enough, the next time I'm on social media, I get an ad for paper towels. So if we are, again, sort of letting these sort of things come out of our mouths, certain words, certain phrases, things like that. Then our phone is feeding us what we want. AI is behind all of that stuff, you can have an argument with your spouse, or your your boyfriend or your girlfriend, and it, you know, he may not even be specific to sex. But now, big brother knows your relationships a little rocky, Hey, remember this old girlfriend, you know, remember this thing that maybe you haven't seen this before? You know, take a look at this. And unfortunately, it's meant to divide. It's meant to undermine the the safety and security of our relationships and our families.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It takes a lot of courage to come out to the world and say, this is where I was, these are the issues that I faced. But you've gone beyond that. And you've started up an opportunity for others who are caught in these addictions, to actually make a change in their own lives. Tell me about that.
 
Damon Covert 
This actually was born out of my own recovery. And again, I'll give Celebrate Recovery, a little plug here, because that was that those were the rooms that I started to get well in and continue to work with other men and women toward getting better. And actually, the ministry is called principle eight. And it is based on the eighth principle of Celebrate Recovery, which mimics the 12 step of you know, and any other a program, whether it's, you know, Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous or Overeaters Anonymous or what have you. And that is to share the message, I consider myself a hope dealer. For me, Jesus is the hope, but I want to make the introduction, I used to be a certain way, and now I'm not. And the difference for me was my higher power, the highest power that I can can think of, and that's, that's Jesus Christ. So I want to share that message. But a lot of people are skeptical of the church, they've been hurt by the church, they've been hurt by somebody in the church, you know, they think of religion versus relationship with God. And, you know, maybe they grew up in a certain type of Christian church or, or they just have certain baggage attached with the way someone treated them. So they won't necessarily come to a church, they won't necessarily come to a recovery meeting that's held in the church. I know when I was in my active addiction, I thought, Man, I'm going to walk through the the threshold of that church and I'm going to burst into flames, God is going to smite me right there, I thought I had to get cleaned up. So I was good enough to present to God. And that's not the case. God says, Come to me, I will get you cleaned up. I want to be able to take this message out to college campuses, where we have hookup and date rape culture, and wild promiscuity. I want to take this into jails where you know, not everybody is there for a sexual offense. But there There certainly is a great deal of difficulty behind bars, and certainly, people medicating their emotional pain, sexually speaking, I think we need to start talking about this in church, you know, some pastors are brave enough to actually bring these things up. But it's usually one Sunday, a month, or maybe an occasional allusion to pornography or something like that. I'm actually really proud of my home church pastor, because he does bring this up on a regular basis. And we're very recovery friendly. Because I think recovery is God's plan. It's the same sort of thing. Look, you can't do this, I can turn it over, let's work on this together and get better. But I want to be able to take this message out to coffee houses, campgrounds, basically any place where I can gently ambush somebody with a message. And I do that through music, I write original recovery based and faith based songs. And somewhere in that language, maybe something's going to resonate with somebody, and they may not even fully understand why. But it's an introduction to a conversation. And a little explanation, then after the fact, might might help them, you know, want to seek out certain resources. And we're developing our own curriculum. But we also recognize that there's a lot of great work that's already been done. And we can refer people out to different organizations and different resources to help them on their journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm sure there are some people who would feel that you're just another one of those Christians trying to tell others how to live. But in the meantime, I'm sure that there are so many people that you come into contact with who are saying, this is something that I need, I need this to break free from what is holding me back, as you said before, it started out as me wanting control. And now this thing controls me. I want out. So there must be a number of people that you've met with that are just so thankful that you were there for them.
 
Damon Covert 
Well, it is a blessing to hear that somehow your story is helping somebody else. Because I have had people come up and say, You told my story or at least a part of and we say in the rooms of recovery, that if you you know come here long enough and you listen to enough testimonies, eventually you're going to hear your story, or at least something very much like it. You know, there is that again. It may Be not normal, but there is a commonality that exists. And, you know, just hearing that and knowing that you are not the only person who is struggling with this right now, you know, when we think about pornography, even in terms of whether it's a gender specific problem, it's not. It is a male and female problem. Sometimes it manifests in different ways, with men and women, but it is a it is a human problem. And acknowledging our commonality, our common struggles are common, you know, we suffer no temptation, except that which is common demand, it says right in the Scripture, and that is the truth that we do have these issues. We don't know how to solve them. But yes, talking to people and saying, Man, I really appreciate that you actually came out. And I mean, I started out by sharing a very, very detailed testimony in front of 150 strangers at a men's conference at my church, and I was terrified. But I was met with acceptance and gratitude. And it was a beautiful thing, to be able to share these deep, dark secrets and not be kept by them anymore. It was like, like nothing else, you know, it's just being accepted for who I was. And that's what that's what I was shown the love of God that way. You know what I want to show the love of God other people that way, regardless of what you done, no matter how far down that that spectrum, you slid. And again, it's not about comparison, everybody's rock bottom is going to be a little different. But boy, I would have loved a wake up call earlier, the alarm was going off, I just, I just kept hitting snooze, I wasn't listening,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that you've come to that point where you can share what you've been through. But I'm sure that there are people listening right now who say, Look, I'm not at that point, I need to reach out. But this needs to remain something private, until I'm ready to share it is there hope for people like that,
 
Damon Covert 
I wouldn't just encourage them to find one safe person that they can talk to. And that can be difficult. You know, it might not be your pastor, it might not be. It's probably not your spouse or your partner right now. Because again, they they are on the receiving end of this. And we have to be very sensitive that we have heard other people that there is there is absolutely hope. There are lots of great programs, many of them are geared toward anonymity, it is just a firm understanding and requirement when you walk through the door. The people you see the things that you hear, they stay in that room. And so you know, there, there are safe places. But even your most trusted friend might not be the best person because it might be your so called drinking buddy that you always, you know, hung around with and gotten into trouble with. So you need to find someone who looks like they have what you've got and then spend some time with that person, you know, find out if they're they're the real deal. Do they really walk the walk? Or are they just another, you know, person dressing up and shining up for Sunday.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If people want to find out a little bit more about principle eight ministries or to contact you where's the best place to find you?
 
Damon Covert 
Start with our website. It's www.principal8ministries.org. There are some resources there to help you get started on your recovery journey. Really, the vision for the ministry is to be able to go wherever God calls and whatever way God provides. So it is a vision driven, mobile, global multimedia ministry. And we exist to engage, encourage, equip, and empower people who are struggling with or affected by sexual addiction. That's the 15 second elevator speech for you right there. So yeah, check out www.principal8ministries.org And you can find out more about what we do and how we do it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'll put links in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net, so that you'll be able to find the details there. But Damon, it's been great talking to you. We've covered a lot of ground. I want to thank you for your openness, for your honesty in sharing about this issue. And I'm hoping that it's going to bring a lot of help, and a lot of healing to some of our listeners today. Thank you for your time on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Damon Covert 
Amen, Rodney. Thank you so much. It's been a blessing.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Samantha Jackel was raised in an Australian country town, the fourth child to alcoholic parents. Instead of finding love at home she encountered manipulation and abuse. She suffered a traumatic and abusive childhood, but even in the midst of the trauma, there were moments that held out a hope for the future. Her autobiography, My Purple Pants, tells about her road to transformation. In 2014, she was named as Mother of the Year in her home state of Victoria.
 
http://mypurplepants.com/
http://mypurplepants.com/product/book/
https://www.facebook.com/mypurplepants 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening. You can follow Bleeding Daylight and connect to our social media channels by following the links at bleedingdaylight.net Please share Bleeding Daylight episodes and leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Today’s guest was raised in a country town, the fourth child to alcoholic parents. Instead of finding love at home she encountered manipulation and abuse. Today we’ll hear her story of finding hope and healing.
 
Samantha Jackel suffered a traumatic and abusive childhood, but even in the midst of the trauma, there were moments that held out a hope for the future. Her autobiography, My Purple Pants, tells about her road to transformation. In 2014, she was named as Mother of the Year in her home state of Victoria in Australia. It's a real honor to have her join me on Bleeding Daylight. Samantha, thank you so much for your time.
 
Samantha Jackel 
It's a pleasure, Rodney, thanks for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Let's go back to your earliest memories. Tell me about your very early family life.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Look, my earliest memories would be of my mother and father arguing constantly and hiding in a bedroom with my hands over my head trying to drown out the noise and escape to another place and I would have been around four when I think that's around that age, when I had those experiences of just wanting to escape my screaming mom and dad, my father was an alcoholic. So he would often come home in a very aggressive, abusive state. And because I was the youngest of my siblings, I was home with my mom. And I would watch them interact. And even though I was so little, I still felt this incredible fear as my father would enter the house. So they would be my very first memories of my childhood.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And who made up your family at that stage.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Yeah, so I have a brother and two other sisters, and there was quite a large gap. So my brother is 10 years older than me. And then my two sisters are eight and six years older than me. And I was kind of conceived because my mother believed that if she had another child, and if it was a boy, that that little boy would save the marriage that was falling apart. And I think from the day I was born, mum rejected me. She really wanted a boy and she made that known to me, right throughout my life, that if I was a boy, I was I would have saved the marriage that her life would have been different.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That's a really hard burden to carry for a young child. And what was the other siblings? Like at this stage? How would they coping with the things that were going on in the family,
 
Samantha Jackel 
My brother moved out very young, and my other two sisters, they hung around for as long as they had to, and then they moved out as well. I mean, it was an uncomfortable setting. My mum did leave my father when I was quite young. So when I was around six, she moved us from a country town on one side of Victoria to the other side of Victoria to another country town, and just kind of moved straight in with another guy and my oldest siblings found that very difficult because it was mashing two families together. And it certainly wasn't The Brady Bunch or what you imagine, you know, from, from television that coming together, they the two families did not mesh together very well. So my siblings moved out of home as soon as they could.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And your stepfather? What was he like?
 
Samantha Jackel 
Yeah, he was a lovely man, a gentlemen, not really prepared for what he was going to be taking on with, you know, with my family. But I have amazing memories of him fond memories of my stepfather. He was always incredibly kind to me very loving, and very accepting of me. Unfortunately, my mother as, as they spent more and more time together, my mother turned to alcohol because she had this void in her life. So my father, my stepfather, really tried to avoid her sorry, he would go to bed very early before she started ranting and would be out of the house very early in the mornings. And I guess at that point, the rants were left to me to handle.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at this stage, you're seeing that relationships between adults are always fractured, which is not a great base to build from, is it?
 
Samantha Jackel 
No. And absolutely, you know, I did have a friend that I used to go to her house all the time, a Christian friend from school, and I would notice her parents not arguing or yelling, it was kind of a really weird space to be in to see her parents interacting differently. And it felt good. So when I would go home, and what my norm was, you know, I started as a kid wondering, you know, Why are my parents like this? And why is her parents like that? and wanting more and more in my own heart, my parents to be more like her parents.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that right from the time that you were born because you weren't a boy. There was this resentment towards you. How did that play out in the subsequent years?
 
Samantha Jackel 
I think it started off at a very young age. My mom was a very manipulative lady, and she had manipulated the situation. So I learned much later on in life that she called me Samantha because my father couldn't pronounce the word. He would say 'Samanfa', he couldn't get the 'th' and so he actually shortened my name to Sarman, s a m a n, because he couldn't get that 'th' out. But I was told that it was because he was in denial that I was a girl. And he couldn't bring himself to acknowledging that I was a girl. So he would call me Saman. And so from a very young age, you know, my mom used the fact that I was a girl to manipulate me to emotionally blackmail me, you know, she would say, you know, if you're a boy, your father would have loved us more, and you want to save the marriage. And I just grew up with that. So I actually found that it was much later in life, like in my 20s, that I realized that it wasn't my fault that that marriage broke down. My brother who was a I grew up believing that I destroyed the marriage because I wasn't a boy. And because she had so many webs of manipulation and deception in our family. They all believed her too. So it wasn't until we were in our 20s, when we sat down and talk that we realize that what had been said and how stupid it was, you know, our eyes were kind of open, hang on, you know, a child's not going to destroy the marriage. Now, just because you were a girl, that it was already destroyed. There was already problems that wasn't you that caused the problems.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And again, we see this pattern so often in in all sorts of abuse, whether it be emotional abuse, or physical abuse, or whatever, that the victim is often blamed. And we see there's blame for something that the victim has no control over, you had no control over. Whether you would be born as a boy or a girl. And yet you're being blamed for that. This seems to be the way of manipulation of so many abusers.
 
Samantha Jackel 
That's right. And then what happens is, you become an incredibly guilty, so then you you are constantly working out of this place of guilt. So I became an incredible people pleaser, I would do anything my mother asked and protect her because I felt so guilty that I had destroyed her life, my mom and then would take it to a new level. And so I you know, I would do anything at all to protect her to look after her lie, I would tell her stories. That emotional abuse then with my mother turned into a sexual abuse, which we don't often hear about, but it is actually way more common than we know. And then outworked in that. And again, I would protect my mom, you know that she was a good mom that she loved me that she showed me love. Even though I ruined her marriage, she still loved me. And she still was taking care of me. And I didn't deserve that, that he she was giving me everything she had, even though I was the worst child in the world. And I'm talking about an eight year old, you know, a seven year old processing this and thinking through it and really truly believing that my place in my life was to make my mum feel better.
 
Rodney Olsen 
At what age did this sexual abuse from your mother begin?
 
Samantha Jackel 
I'm not really sure when it began, and I'm not really sure the exact time it finished, I can just remember, it didn't happen anymore. And that would have been probably around the age of early teens where I suddenly realized our mum isn't asking me to come into her bedroom at night, or I'm not getting undressed in front of her. But I actually can't pinpoint exactly when I just know it kind of disappeared, because you got to understand, in some ways that was my normal. The only time I thought it was abnormal is when I would go to my friend's house and her parents, I would say to her, do you sleep with your mom? And she would be like, no, there would be times I think I'll wonder why she doesn't. But again, my mother would lay it on really heavy on me the fact that, you know, I owed her my life because I destroyed her marriage and I had destroyed her life by being a female. So, you know, I needed to look after her and she would manipulate me you know, she would keep me up late at night and say, you'll be the one that wheels me off the cliff. When I get old. You'll be the one that destroys my life. You're the one that's gonna throw me in the home and, and throw away the key and as a little kid, you know, I'd be there begging her No, mom, I'd never do that for you. I love you. I know that I hurt you. You know, when I was born, I hurt you and I am not a boy. But I tried to be a boy and and I was you know as quite a tomboy or tried to be to place her.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned in the introduction that even during this traumatic childhood, there were moments that held hope out to you. Maybe you can tell me about one or two of those instances where you start to see a glimmer of hope and obviously one of them was visiting your friend and noticing that. Uh huh. There is something that's different, but I know that there were a couple of others.
 
Samantha Jackel 
My friend Heidi, she was incredible and her family and they really didn't know what was going on in my home. But they introduced me to church and to God and to a whole different world. So on Sunday, they would drive down, we lived in a housing complex, it was full of a lot of domestic violence. And so it was kind of brave for them to come down sometimes into our area that would come down or pick me up and take me off to church or Sunday school, and then they would take me off to youth group when I got older. And so I knew there was a god. And I knew there was a love out there that came from God. And I had accepted Jesus, you know, God showed up in some incredible ways for me, even though it didn't take away from the abuse. And I think the time that stands out, in my mind the most words when I was 13, and, and life was really, really bad at this point, when mom was keeping me up to midnight, shouting at me and making me choose between her and my stepfather. And if I didn't choose the right one, she was going to commit suicide and, and so one day, I was just desperate. And I had saved up some money. And I had ridden my bike down the street and try it on these beautiful pair of pants, and they were purple. And I thought to myself, I'm going to buy them which normally I'd give it any money I had to my mother. So I felt very guilty that I was going to spend it on myself. And I tried these pants on and they were way more than my $6. So I lay by them thinking that maybe I'd be able to get the money or perhaps mum would do something and buy them for me and I rode my bike home. And our street, like I said, was full of domestic violence. So there was always yelling or cars burning off, there's always noise in our street. And this day, I was out the back of our yard swinging on a swing and the door was banged on. And my mom screamed at me, you know, to get the door. So I ran through the house to the front door, and no one was there. And the street was dead quiet. There was not a car inside, there was no kids playing there was no parents yelling, it was just dead quiet. I looked down. And right there was this paper bag, and on it had my name and I opened it up. And there was the pair of purple pants I had tried on in the morning. And I just remember feeling this incredible, like love is something I can't describe or articulate. I've jumped on my bike and I ride straight back down to the store. And I asked the woman you know, can you tell me? I came in I lay by these? Can you tell me who picked them up? And she looked at me and she said you did you came back in and pick them up? And I said No, I didn't. And she said, Yes, she did. And I walked out of there, not understanding what had happened. But understanding that there must be a God that loved me so so much that he would give me a pair of purple pants. And then many years later, I went back and I visited all those church friends. And I asked them, did you ever buy me these pants or not one of them did, I still to this day have no idea who paid for those pads. So if it was an angel that was like, look like me, that I know at that specific time that just showed me this incredible love of a father for a daughter of this God that was so big, and it didn't take away from the abuse, and the abuse didn't just disappear, but it gave me this sense that someone loved me so deeply. Something loved me so deeply. Why more deeply than my mother did. And my stepfather. At that stage.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that your siblings moved away from home as soon as they could. When did that start to happen for you? When did you start to look towards leaving that home?
 
Samantha Jackel 
I was the opposite. I didn't want to leave the home because I thought that if I left the home, what right? Would I have to leave home? What right? Would I have to leave my mother? I owed her my life. So why would I leave her? You know, that would be incredibly selfish. And it wasn't until I was 18. And I had gone off to a three month Bible course. And through that time mom would constantly write me letters and tell me what a dreadful child I was because I had left her and how dare I do this. And I had been supported by a pastor to go out and do that three month course, because he knew something wasn't right at home. And I got back from that course and moved back in with my mom and it got really chaotic. And that pastor and his wife saw that how chaotic it was and often needed move in with them. And I said yes. And then I'd say no. And then I'd say yes and would plan a date and I would tell my mom, and then she would tell me you know that she was going to kill herself. She was going to I now have a half sister. She was going to kill my half sister. She was going to kill my stepfather if I moved out. So I'd ring the pastor and say I can't move in I'd make up all kinds of excuses. And then one day, it got to a point where I ran around to their home, my pastor and his wife in tears, banged on their door and told them that I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't live with her. And they basically gave me an ultimatum and said, you know, if you don't move in on Monday, the offer's off the table, we're not going to offer our home to you. So you either have to move in, or you're not. And that was probably the hardest thing I've ever heard the toughest love I've ever been shine. But it put me in a position where I had to make that decision. And I did on that Monday, I packed up my room or my what I had, I only had a few clothes. And I moved in with my pastor and his wife. It was amazing. You know, it was hard. My mother actually then would ring him with a pastor and abuse him. And he took a lot that family took out a lot taking me in. But it was a step to freedom. It was a step getting out of her shadow, it was a step from getting out of her control,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've moved from this abusive situation into a much more loving situation and we'd like to think that everything just goes in the right direction but it's not always the way. What happened at that point.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Look, I think I moved to Melbourne, I moved out of that country town and as far away as I could from my mother, I moved in with another family up here I attended a church in the inner city of Prahran. Got involved in church met a guy in church, fell in love. Now I had promised myself as a young child that anyone I kissed I was going to marry because I felt like that was the only sacred part of my body was my lips. That's the problem is I still haven't dealt with anything from my past, I've just now changed, I basically taken on a whole new personality. No one knew where I came from, never talked about my past, I was just a country girl probably lied a little bit about where I came from a rich family in the country or something like that, to different people. And I was never, I never lied to hurt them, but to cover up my past. So I was just so devastated and embarrassed. I didn't want anyone to know what it looked like. Eventually, that guy that I was dating, asked me to marry him. And I said yes. And he did Kiss me. And then as our engagement progressed, he started seeing cracks in my personality. And he wanted to meet my folks. And I was, I did not want him to meet my family. He was a bit confused about that. And while he did meet my mom, and it was a horrendous kind of introduction. She wasn't on her best behavior at all. And I remember traveling from the country back to Melbourne with him in silence, not knowing what to say to him. And from that point, our relationship started to deteriorate. And he didn't know why. And he tried everything he could. So he called off the engagement and said, Sam, you know, I don't think we can get married, you know, I don't think I can marry you. And he was from a broken family. So he did not want to enter into another, you know, into a marriage that could possibly break. He wanted it to be forever. So we kind of broke off her engagement stayed friends, and eventually, our friendship turned into a sexual relationship just once. And we told our leadership, and after that I actually told him that I was pregnant, he decided he would marry me. And then three weeks before our wedding day, I told him I miscarried our baby. And he still felt that he needed to honor his promise to marry me. And so we got married three months after I told him I was pregnant,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've learned from your mom that you need to carry some sort of facade so that people will like you and you carry this now into a marriage relationship. This must be an incredible burden that you're continuing to carry.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Yeah. And I had learned from my mom the very art of manipulating and lying, I solely believe she didn't necessarily want to hurt anyone. But she didn't know how to do life herself. And I had learned the same art how to manipulate, not to hurt anyone else. But to save myself to put up a good front for myself. And so to carry that into a marriage, that was how, you know, I would sit up to early hours of the morning screaming at Peter telling him all kinds of things running out of the house at you know, midnight 2am and not coming back to early hours and then apologizing and then would go through it the next night. He didn't know what was going on. You know, he had no idea how to handle me at times he thought he was going to have to get me assessed because he just didn't know what to do with me and and then I realized that perhaps if I could tell him the truth of our marriage, that would make things better. So, I was about nine months in and I rang our leadership of the church and said, I needed to talk to them and then rang Peter and said, Would you meet with me to talk with the leadership of our church, and he didn't know why. And he thought it was another game I was playing. And so we met with our leadership, I met with our leadership of our church first, and I said to them, I actually was never pregnant. And I would never miscarried a baby, it was a lie. And they were stunned, as you could imagine. And then Peter came in. And I then told him the same Peter, I was never pregnant. I never miscarried your baby, I just wanted you to marry me, he literally just got up in that meeting, and stormed straight out the door. And I really didn't see him and for another nine months, and the church didn't know what to do with me, you know, it was 1988, that he they have a young girl like 21 year old now, that had lied not only to her husband, but to the whole entire church, you know, that she lied, that she was pregnant, and then that she had miscarried, they didn't know what to do with me. So they suggested that I go and visit another church, and maybe get another group of friends and leave Peter at the church to heal. And so that's basically what happened. And I found myself very alone in our apartment, not knowing what to do with nobody.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at the same time, that being able to tell the truth was the right thing to do. You've grown up not telling the truth, and you've been able to protect yourself. And suddenly, when you tell the truth, the world starts to collapse around you, you must have started to have doubts about this truth telling thing.
 
Samantha Jackel 
It was so confusing, I didn't understand. And I didn't understand what the big deal was, you know, I really had no concept, that Peter was hurt, like, why are you hurt? Like, I don't understand why this hurt you. I had no concept of all how big the lie was, and what the consequences of that lie was going to be. If I had even thought that he was gonna leave me, I would not have told him, You know, I would probably have carried it on. But in the same, it was kind of this feeling that now that I had told the truth, you know, instead of him riding along on a white horse to save me, not only did he desert me, but the whole church deserted me and I couldn't run home. I was could never tell my mother that my marriage had failed. So I was stuck, stuck by myself to try to work it out.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you starting to repeat patterns that happened right from your early childhood, those early childhood memories were of all those arguments, and then your dad eventually leaving, and you're seeing the whole pattern play out over again. What was that doing to you internally,
 
Samantha Jackel 
I didn't see the pattern was only many years later, I saw that pattern. In fact, I would sit out as nothing like my mother Back then, I would have said that my allies are very different. I was in complete denial that I was anything like her. But I think more I was just in this incredible pain. And it was a pain I'd never felt. See through my childhood, everything seemed normal, you know, even though I'd be in anguish at night, and I'd climb into bed crying and sobbing because of what mum was doing, or I would beat myself up. Because what she was doing, it was a pain that I didn't understand what this pain was different. It was like, here, I was thinking that I had a church family and that life was different. And suddenly I lost everything. And I was alone. I always had my mum there when I was a kid. So the pain was very different. This was a real isolation, just a yearning to be accepted and loved. And realizing that I probably was never going to be accepted or loved in this world.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How did things start to turn around for you at that point? Okay,
 
Samantha Jackel 
it took a long time. I remember getting a call from Peter and him saying he wanted to come and see me and we made a time. And he came around and I thought he was actually going to hit me. I thought he's just gonna come in and he's gonna just beat me up. I hadn't seen him. I hadn't spoken to him. Now, in all of this, his father was this incredibly gentle man. And every week his father would put a check under the door of our flat for me to be able to pay my bills, because Peter had just wiped his hands clean of me. I just thought he's found out maybe that he's dad's been supporting me and he's going to go through the roof. What is he going to say? And he came back and he knocked on the door and I had a girl living with me at the time and he said, You need to kick her out. And I'm moving back in. I don't know what's going to happen. But the Lord has spoken to me and he had had this conversation with a leader base. The leader said You have no right to divorce Sam. And he didn't like that at the time. But then he was led to Joshua. And in Joshua, it talks about Joshua making a treaty with the Gibeonites under deception. And the Lord made Joshua honor that. And so Peter was like, okay, Lord, I'll honor my vow to Sam, but I don't know what that's gonna look like. So I really don't love her. He moved back into our unit and slept in the spare bedroom, and I slept in the main room, we lived together. And that's really what it was, was living together, there was no communication between us, I was holding down a part time job was just three hours a day, I'd get home from that. And I would just go ballistic and him and scream at him and tell him, you know, he was useless. And I didn't love him being in the house, I hated him being in the house, and he was invading my privacy. And one day, I got home from work. And I just remember feeling this tense, anger towards him, like I could kill him. And I had shaking hands, and they were hot. And I thought I could just kill this guy, and walking into his bedroom. And he was praying for me. And I thought that was just ludicrous. Like, why would you be praying for me, and just going off at him walking out of his room and slamming the door shut and going into the kitchen. And Peter came in. And he had had just enough, he had a gut full like, of my slinging matches with him. And he just came in. And he's, he says, and he writes is in my book, that all he could think of is rebuking me in Jesus name, because he didn't know what else to do. So he just came into the kitchen I was facing the other way. So it was to my back. And he said, I rebuke you in the name of Jesus. And I remember at that point, feeling like something was gonna burst out of me. And I remember turning around in this incredible voice, I could hear the voice but not control and tell him in not so many kind words where to go. And that was it for him. He said, there was this relief that came over him, because he suddenly realized there's a spiritual element to what's going on here. And that I can deal with. And from there, we kind of sat down and talk that we come down, he sat down and chatted to me and said, Sam, I actually think that you need deliverance, I think that you have some really deep wounds, and the enemy has come in and taken advantage of those deep wounds. And I think that's what the problem here is. And I still hadn't shared with him about what happened in my childhood. So he was still completely in the dark about my mom and my dad, other than he had met them and thought they were weird. But other than that, he didn't really understand the depth of the abuse.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So going from something that seemed to be just following a pattern that came out of your family of origin. Even though Peter didn't know about this stage, he realized that there was something going on there from this weird family that he had made. Yeah, to now realizing that there's something deeper going on, there's something spiritual going on. How quickly Did you accept what he was saying? Or were you still saying no, no, I'm okay.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Look, I listened to him. And it took a little while for me to understand what he was saying. And he asked me some questions. He said, Sam, have you ever been abused? All through my childhood? I was asked the same question that they always targeted my stepfather. Does your stepfather touch you in inappropriate ways? You know, and I would always defend in a way, you know, I love the guy, he would never do that. But no one ever asked about mom. So there was no questions about mom, so I never had to talk about it with Peter. When he started asking me, I said, well known, you know, my stepfather didn't harm me at all, or my stepbrothers nor my siblings never did. And he said, Have you ever been abused? Has anyone touched you in appropriately and now we had a babysitter, a girl babysitter that did it sexually abused me as well. And so I told him about that. And then from that, I started telling him about what would go on in the bedroom with my mom, you know, that started snowballing. And I'd tell him about all of the things that happened. It was like I had permission to talk. And I guess at that very point, because he had come back, I I trusted him enough that he wasn't going to leave again, that was at this feeling that he wasn't going to just run out on me again. And I'm not sure if that was just God, covering me for that moment. So I just I started telling him things that had to happen. And one of the things that happened was when I was young, I had so much pain in my heart that I remember screaming out at the top of my voice, God, if you love me, and if you get me out of this situation, I'm going to follow you for the rest of my life, Satan or the devil, if you get me out of this situation, then I will commit my whole entire life to you. I don't care who gets me out of this situation, just get me out. So I was telling Peter that and he says, he's just looking at me wide eyed and saying, Sam, we need to pray for you. We need, you need to pray for you, you know, you need to start learning scripture. And so he started making me memorize scripture. And it was so hard, you know, it was like falling on deaf ears. I just couldn't remember I'd read it. And then I'd forget it. Luke 10:19. You know, I was trying to where it says that I have authority to walk on snakes and, and I'd be trying to read it, and it would just fall apart. And I'd be like, what does that scripture say again, and he would be like, you just read it. And I'd be like, I don't know what it said. And so he realized, you know that there was a lot at play here. So we worked for around three weeks, training me up and getting me to learn scripture, understand scripture, understand God more, understand what Jesus actually did for me on the cross. And then from there, he's began to pray for me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I guess at this stage, a burden is starting to lift even though you're not quite there, you're finally able to tell the truth. And finally telling the truth is actually having a more positive effect. What was the result of that praying for you? How did that begin to turn things around,
 
Samantha Jackel 
Look it completely turned things around. But it wasn't a one prayer one day, you know, it wasn't like I got a prayer. And then life was beautiful again. But Peter did pray when over three days, and I was delivered of many different spirits, actually, that had permission to come into my life that I had allowed to enter in. And I knew I had through different ways of different prayers, or asking the enemy to help me at different times. So we went through that, and after that, I actually felt empty. I felt like I had to articulate but it was like I had been completely cleaned out. And suddenly, I didn't even know who I was. All the games had played for the entire time of my life. 22. Now I am, I suddenly had no idea who I was, I didn't know what I liked what I didn't like what I thought was humorous, what I didn't think was humorous, how to love. And so after that period of prayer, I went into counseling, it was through those many, many counseling sessions that went on for a few years of rebuilding and understanding who I was, and who I was in God, it was a Christian counselor, a beautiful, beautiful, older lady. She just walked me through, you know, my childhood, what happened, and it was an incredible place to feel safe, to be able to tell her everything. And to have her just gently work me through that and allow me to process what was going on, but also enable me to be in a safe place to be who God created me to be, you know, to understand who I was, you know, what I did enjoy what I did think was funny, and what I didn't think was funny, or, you know, even the point of how I spoke, I changed with whatever my mother wanted me to change. So she wanted me to be a boy than I put on a tom boy voice, you know, and I would play the game really well with her. So it was undoing all of those years of training as a kid, and discovering who I was, while Peter was patiently waiting, and watching and walking with me through that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Now someone listening might think, well, that's great. This counseling has helped you to break old habits, and break old patterns, and to start to build up new patterns. But there is something deeper in that isn't there. There's something as you mentioned, that he discovered that there's something spiritual going on, that needed to happen spiritually, rather than just resetting patterns.
 
Samantha Jackel 
The first thing we had to deal with was the spiritual stuff, which was deliverance, I had deliverance. So I had to be set free of all kinds of things, you know, of guilt, a spirit of guilt, I had all these different things that I needed to deal with. And then I had to also release forgiveness to people. And I think it was until I started to realize that Jesus had forgiven me by going to the cross that I had to then also forgive those others. And that was a real tough one, you know. I mean, the deliverance in itself was amazing because I had a spirit of hatred and that Spirit had outworked itself, by me self harming. I didn't necessarily hate other people, but I hated myself. And so I would begin to self harm and Peter would come home sometimes and find me in a cupboard with a black eye or he might find my body scratched up and he didn't understand what was going on at the time. Until he began to pray. And he realized, and when he started scratching around that I had this spirit of self hatred that had come in. And it was something I could never control, I would try to control and maybe some of your listeners have felt this way you, you feel like you've want to get it under control, but it's out of your control, you're unable not to do it. And for me, that was a spirit. And once that left, I was set free, and suddenly I had control of my actions. And suddenly, I didn't want to actually hurt myself, then the Lord then began to come into that area and heal it. And suddenly, I could actually see myself in a new light and begin to love who God had created.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's one thing to learn how to forgive others as as you did. I'm wondering about accepting that forgiveness, because you mentioned that you didn't even understand way back when you had told that lie about being pregnant. You didn't even understand how that could have hurt Peter. And yet, here he is, he's he's forgiving you for that and helping you to find new life. What was it like for that side of forgiveness for you?
 
Samantha Jackel 
It was hard to accept that, that forgiveness, because of the guilt, you know, you felt guilty that you had done that to someone when your eyes when my eyes were open, when the blinders came off, I suddenly realized all i devastated you, you know, I, I gutted. And it took me a long time to actually come to a place of being able to accept His forgiveness. And again, the more I understood, Jesus, and his forgiveness for me was the more I could then accept forgiveness, and forgive myself, I think, often we don't forgive ourselves for the things we do now there are consequences to our sin or the consequences to the things we do wrong. And there are consequences to what I did wrong. No, I did have to go back and apologize to the leaders of the church and, and I had to live with the fact that some people for many years didn't trust me, you know, I didn't have any runs on the board. And so it took a while for people to trust me, that was just the consequences of my sin. But the Lord renewed me and I could live with those consequences. And I didn't blame myself because of that forgiveness that I had from, you know, it sounds cliche, but I really felt the forgiveness of Christ. And out of that I could forgive others. But I could also receive forgiveness, where I didn't come under that guilt and shame of what I did
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've forgiven a lot of people during this time but that doesn't always mean that things are smoothed over or that things go well, what was your relationship like with your mother after that time of forgiveness?
 
Samantha Jackel 
I truly thought I forgive my mom. And she had now started to show signs of alcohol induced dementia. You know, I truly thought that I was at this place of being able to love my mother, and I have forgiven her for what she had done to me. And then just one day, I remember sitting beside my mom, and I felt the Holy Spirit, I felt this, this word in my mind, share Jesus with your mom. I then just felt this anger, like and I'll be honest, I thought she deserves to burn in hell. I had to leave that leave her. And I went home and it just kept going over, you know, you're meant to love her. But I want her to burn in hell, I don't want it to be in heaven. That was the last place she doesn't deserve that. And I so I kind of pushed it to the side. And then I would go back in the visitor and this again, it's the Holy Spirit right? In my mind, share me with your mother. And I would be like, no way am I doing this? Eventually, I went to counseling, I got advice about I talked to Peter and I was just angry, like, No, I don't want to I the interesting thing here is that I think God is such a gentleman, and he doesn't push us into things that we can't handle or that we're not ready for. So it wasn't like the minute that I said no to her that God gave up on me. But he just gently kept reminding me, you know, keep putting it in my mind. You know, I'd tell her about me, sir. And so one day I was sitting next to her and and at this point, she wasn't really communicating much and she was kind of sometimes she would remember things sometimes she wouldn't. And so I said to her mom, I just want to share with you about Jesus. You know, if you don't love Jesus, you won't be going to heaven. I made it really simple. And I was holding her hand and said if you want to know Jesus Mom, I can pray with you right now you to squeeze my hand and I will share you know I'll say a prayer with you and you know, then you're going to meet Jesus one day and and you're going to have peace in your heart and your life will be the way he wanted it to be. You know, you're going to be dancing with him in heaven. Anyway, she squeezed my hand. And I remember just this overwhelming sense that I was about to lead my mom through a prayer of a prayer of salvation. And as I was praying for her to stop this incredible weight off my shoulders, I've suddenly realized that now I have forgiven you. Now, I have this overwhelming love that the Father has for you. And I truly do forgive you for what you've done. done to me. And, and you know, from that point on, there was this amazing feeling in my heart that I was free, I was free from all that past. And it doesn't mean I forgot anything, I didn't forget anything from my past. But I was free from the pain of the past. And you know, one of my beautiful thoughts are when the Lord calls me home, I will actually be able to embrace my mother, in a relationship that was always meant to be mother and daughter, and that will both be dancing before the throne room of God.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I wonder if there are people listening right now who a yearning for that kind of freedom from the past from past hurts, and perhaps would want to get in touch with you or to read your book, where is the easiest place to find your book or to get in touch with you,
 
Samantha Jackel 
Probably on my website, which is www.mypurplepants.com, I have an email up there, and people are more than welcome to email me and I am the only one that reads those emails. And you can buy my book up there, either hard copy, or you can get it on Kindle. The link is on my web page or connect with me through Facebook. And that can be through My Purple Pants, on Facebook or personally. But I'm happy to connect with whoever needs a hand because I know to have someone walk with you. And it is a hard road to walk with someone that's been abused. It's not a one week walk or a day commitment. It is a lifetime commitment to walking with someone. And I understand that. And I am happy to walk with people through their journey and, and encourage them and help them along the way. And most importantly, pray for them. You know, I have a book. And whenever I go to speak, or I'm contacted by someone, I always write their names in my book. And I bring that book before the Lord and pray over them, pray for their lives, that God would transform them heal them. And they would know what it's like to have the joy of the Lord as being their strength.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I will put links so that people can find you find your website, Facebook, and your email address as well as being able to buy that book. That's all going to be in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet. I want to fast forward just before we finish up, I want to fast forward to what life is like for you these days. How is life traveling for you?
 
Samantha Jackel 
Yeah, life is amazing. Peter and I have been married 33 years in October this year. We have five adult children who all loved Jesus, which is just a blessing in itself. We're pastors of a church here in Melbourne in Carnegie, we are just a family of believers that just have seen God transform a life and my kids know my story of my story, of course, and our story is a couple. And I believe you know that there's so much blessing in that decision Peter made to come back to me that he was a righteous man. Remember, he was only 23 back then. And he made this righteous decision to come back and honor his wedding vows. And through that there's been such blessing and I believe our kids are the product of that blessing. And so life is great. It doesn't mean we don't have hard times. That doesn't that doesn't mean we don't have battles every now and then. But we have seen certainly seen the goodness of God over our lives, our marriage and over our children.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Samantha, it has been such a delight to hear your story to hear about the transformation that has happened in your life and that is available for others. As I mentioned, if people want to get in touch, I will put details in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net. But thank you so much for your time.
 
Samantha Jackel 
Thanks for allowing me to share my story.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

If you’re battling addiction, or know someone who is, today’s episode is not only the story of Craig Brown and his recovery, there are some really practical steps to move towards healing and wholeness.
Craig Brown's life became marred by pain, shame and distraction. Now in his book, Stop Hiding, Start Healing, he uses his own experience and talks about more than 20 years of helping others discover how to be free from the pain and shame of their past.
 
https://www.stophidingstarthealingbook.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Stop-Hiding-Start-Healing-Discover/dp/B08PJPWLGT
https://www.facebook.com/craigbrownstophidingstarthealing 
https://www.facebook.com/craig.brown2
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening. You can follow Bleeding Daylight and connect to our social media channels by following the links at bleedingdaylight.net Please share Bleeding Daylight episodes and leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
If you’re battling addiction, or know someone who is, today’s episode is not only the story of my guest and his recovery, there are some really practical steps to move towards healing and wholeness.
He was the son of a minister, but he struggled to connect with his father. Instead, Craig Brown's life became marred by pain, shame and distraction. Now in his book, Stop Hiding, Start Healing, he uses his own experience and talks about more than 20 years of helping others discover how to be free from the pain and shame of their past. It's my honor to welcome him to bleeding daylight. Craig, thank you so much for your time.
 
Craig Brown 
Rodney, thank you great being with you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That early search for identity is often so vital in setting us up for success in life. And your search was difficult. Tell me about those early years for you.
 
Craig Brown 
I grew up in the church, my father was a minister. I have two older sisters. And the three of us always had to be on we had to make Father Brown looked at. I'm sure you've heard about preachers, kids and their reputations depending on the denomination. But I lived up to mine, it was a very difficult role. For me to play starting in my again, when I was born, all the way up through my youth and young adult life and into my adult life. Everything about our family was about making our father look good. What I saw from the pulpit was not what I experienced behind closed doors. My dad had his own demons that he had to struggle with, we saw a lot of anger. My parents marriage was never, we never really witnessed true nurturing love between the two of them. And as a youngster, when we would be blamed for a lot of things that were not our fault, our Father tended to rage out and take it out on myself and my sisters. And as a result, yeah, as we all do, when we're younger, we develop coping mechanisms and coping skills to deal with the hurt, the shame, the pain, the abandonment and I developed those early on. I mean, when the pain and the shame presented itself, and I, you know, I found that escape route. I kept that for most of my life, until I became honest and took responsibility and started dealing with that later on in life. My mother was the typical pastor's wife enable her, make her husband look good, make sure the family was on. And that was just unfair pressure put on young people that you know, like, like us, as a result that was just searching, you know, my father, and I didn't really have a relationship, I can count on one hand, the number of things he and I did father and son, and I'd have fingers leftover, he just didn't seem to be invested in my life or interested in my life. My identity was their identity, his identity, and I didn't have one till much later on in life. And as a result, I just suffered from that, instead of buckling down and proving that I could do something with my life, I took the easy route. And that is searching for, you know, something that would accept me and something I could participate in. Unfortunately, I made very, very poor decisions, and ended up in the drug world and the drug life and a life of destruction.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So your father is effectively teaching you about this double life, because you're seeing him one way in the church and a different way at home. And you're learning that too, because you're you're trying to deal with what's going on at home. But at church, you're the perfect little saint. So this must cause conflict right from the beginning within yourself. It did.
 
Craig Brown 
Oh, yeah, it's very confusing. Now, I must say, the life of the church was I loved it, dealing with, you know, with all the adults and getting the attention. I really, truly enjoyed growing up that environment. And that's one thing. But, you know, from a spiritual discipline, and finding out about, you know, God's love, Grace, mercy, I'm sure it was there, and the seeds were planted. It wasn't till much later in life, that that fruit began to bloom and I became, you know, a much different person. I just look back at that. And, you know, it's easy for me to say on this end, that I wouldn't change a thing. And I wouldn't, because it's what you know, everything I am today is a result of that pain, my deepest pain. You're right, it was trying to find that identity and trying to find that mission, trying to find that purpose. And it was hard to do in that dysfunctional environment. And I deal with this all the time in ministry, and that is when we're growing up, we think our families, the perfect family, we don't know any better, until well, afterwards, we look back and realize, Wow, man, how did I survive that? And that's essentially what I the attitude I had.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I've spoken to a lot of my guests about this. In our growing up years. We just know what we know. We know that family life, and it's a matter of eventually realizing this isn't normal. So when did that Penny drop for you that The the way you grew up was not normal.
 
Craig Brown 
I would say it certainly wasn't in the midst of my pit of hell experience because that's I was totally in bondage to that. I would say it was well after that, when I had a major epiphany and life change, and I began to inventory my past and embrace my past and deal with my past, that I was able to kind of the scales coming off my eyes, and I realized what I experienced was not normal. As a result, I've got to process that I've got to do with my my father in his role, my mother, her role, our family role, and what that meant to me and the effect it had on me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that you ended up in the world of drugs, and you certainly did very heavily. But I'm wondering how this church boy ends up there, because it doesn't happen all at once. What was the road that took you from being this well behaved child at church and trying to do that at home, even though you weren't getting that connection you were seeking? How did you start that slippery slope towards where it ended up?
 
 
The party welcomes everybody, you don't need a membership card, you know, to show ID, you know, it just welcomes everybody in generally, it's those that have no self control, no self discipline, very lack of self worth, low self esteem, just looking to search and searching to fill the void. That is in our life. You see if our family if our family structure if our relationships, if we're if there's not that nurturing, love, support, care, identity, we're going to find it somewhere else, we will find it somewhere. For me, I had a lot of pain and a lot of loss. And I just wanted to medicate that. And as a result, entering into the drug world, it was wide open, and I walked in. It wasn't like I was like, you know, I think I'll go do drugs today. Or I think you know, I just think I'll make a mess of my life today. It's not like that. It's just a progression. And it's one step after the after another. Rodney, here's the thing about addiction, or here's, or drug use, or anything that we use to hide or medicate the pain, we make a decision to. Right, we make a decision. We get so deep into it, that we can't make a decision not to do it. It sounds very simple. But it truly It begins with that first choice. And mine multiplied and I ended up there. But here's the thing, Rodney. Yeah, I look at as I'm in the pit of hell, based on what I my youth and what I am, where I grew up, and how I grew up. Sure. I was looking around going what am I doing here? What am I How did I end up here. But at the same time, it's so engrained in my life and says, and has such a bondage on my life, that I knew no better. And I just continued on that lifestyle until I got to that defining moment in my life where I realized that I can't do this anymore.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And of course, it's not just drugs that can hold us down. There's a whole range of issues. And I want to talk about some of those in a little while too. But you didn't just get involved in drugs in in taking them but you went a lot further into that drug culture, didn't you?
 
 
I did. I started drinking in high school just to parties and things like that. And right now is a really good athlete. I should have played college basketball, but I had very little or low self confidence. Everybody else was telling me how good I was. But I didn't believe it. And I really didn't have any support from home. I can count on maybe after four years of playing varsity basketball. My parents, I think came to two games. I mean, I just didn't I had nothing at home. So I should have I should have gone on to play college basketball, but I didn't. But I graduated from high school and I went to college. And it was at college where here's the thing, Rodney, when we're suffering in that family environment, we cannot wait to get out. We cannot wait to be set free. And I did I walked out of the house and I went off to that campus and I rarely went to class I drank I got involved and you know, just that lifestyle. I dropped out of college and came back home. And I started working and the bar business bar and restaurant. And I took a job at a bar in Washington DC and unbeknownst to me, it was owned by the largest cocaine dealer on the east coast  and he was working that drug trade out of that establishment as a 19 or 20 year old Rodney, I've died and gone to heaven. This is just amazing. Cocaine I'm sure you're aware, and the 80s in Washington, DC and all throughout the area and and the country for that matter. Cocaine was everywhere dominated every party scene is dominated every scene where alcohol and everything else is involved, and everybody had it. I wasn't a heavy user before then. But I sure was once I got there. And then I did low level drunk stuff on on the side and stuff like that. His drug business, that was just a major operation, all the who's who would come into this establishment, there was music people, local television, people, athletes, when you have no direction, or mission or purpose in life, and your whole life is the party was just in that in a place. And I operated in that environment. For years. That whole lifestyle dominated my life. And again, as I mentioned earlier, and as you referenced, Rodney, I'm looking, I'm in the middle of this mess, this just pit of hell. And I'm just, you know, I'm asking, I'm partying, but at the same time, I'm saying, How in the world that I get here, because I was in such depression, darkness, denial, pain, shame, guilt, and I just medicated it. I just kept medicating it instead, and I hid.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How was it that you actually came to the point where you decided I'm not going to try and medicate anymore? This is not where life should be going.
 
Craig Brown 
At that time, I did exactly what was the title of my book, stop hiding, start healing. I got to a point, Rodney, and the first chapter of my book is when the pain is greater than your fear. My pain level was at such an elevated level. Again, it was around 1985, I had this epiphany. And here's the kicker of it. From a spiritual standpoint, what we don't realize is that God's hand is on us at all times, at all times. And I didn't realize it at the time, even though I grew up at the church, because I had no relationship with God I, I was so far from it. The pain in my life was so great that I got to a point where I was no longer afraid to make some life changes. And I said to myself, Craig, you're either going to end up dead, Rodney, I had car accidents, I was in the hospital for throwing up blood, you would have thought one of these situations would have gotten my attention. And it didn't. But it led up to this defining moment, where all of that was multiplied. And the pain level was so great, that I realized that if I didn't stop, I was going to end up dead, or continue on this life of destruction, depression, and darkness. And I just made a decision to extricate myself from that pit of hell, from using drugs and alcohol to medicate my pain. And over the course of weeks and months, I was able to stop using drugs and stop drinking. You know, as they say, in recovery, I got clean, I got sober. And my whole life began to change, everything began to change. Honestly, honesty crept in, responsibility crept in. And I was able to change that pit of hell lifestyle, and enter into a period of my life, where I was able to live a healthier lifestyle. But I was still miserable.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So it started with a decision. And we need to start here with that decision. But I imagine for people who have an addiction of some sort, whatever it may be, it's very hard for you to make a decision and then to hold to it, because the addiction keeps calling to you and dragging you back in all the time.
 
Craig Brown 
Yes, yes. Now, I've invested 22 years of my life, serving in Christ centered recovery, helping people and serving and caring for people who experienced or are experiencing exactly what I went through. And it is difficult, but here's the thing. It can happen in your life. Those who are struggling, those who are dealing with addiction, those who are dealing with pornography, shame, guilt, drugs, alcohol, food, codependency, divorce, abortion, whatever it is, that is wreaking havoc on your life, and causing that pain and that shame and that guilt. The good news is You can be set free, when the pain is greater than your fear. folks that are dealing with struggles and issues and life struggles, it's hard to make that decision, it's hard to step out and admit, it's hard to step out and be honest about the struggle because of a number of different things. One, embarrassment, the shame. I mentioned shame a lot, Rodney, because shame comes from the parallel. And it is meant to keep really good people from finding the resources to get well and be set free. Shame is number one, guilt and pain and all the other categories, all the other issues and struggles are there as well. But shame is number one. If the person can get to the point where that pain is greater than the fear, that shame will begin to lessen. They'll enter into an environment where you find safe people, you find people you trust, because people that struggle generally have dysfunctional people, surrounding them, and people that are trying to fix them. And that's not healthy. And it's not what they need. They need people with empathy, people that will listen, people that have been to the pit of hell and back that are there to care for them. Now that can be in a number of different forums, Rodney, whether it's rehab or Christ centered recovery or recovery or AA, find that place where people understand you. And that'll be your first step, you have to admit, first, this My life is unmanageable. And I cannot do this anymore. And I've got to be set free. And that's the defining moment that happened in my life. And it can be the defining moment for your listeners as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm really interested in you coming back to Faith. Because in your early years, your experience of faith was that you live one way in front of people and a different way behind the scenes. And you must have had those doubts that can this even be real, because my dad's a minister, he's meant to have it all together when it comes to these things of faith. And yet, I don't experience that. So how did your walk back to Faith actually happen?
 
 
I'm never Rodney going to discount my experience in the church at my youth, because the Bible is very clear that seeds are planted. And they may sit there for a very long time, before they come to life. Even though I didn't take it in, even though I didn't comprehend it. The denomination I grew up in, it was really tradition. It was more, you know, tradition in the prayer book, this and that. I never ever experienced or learned about a personal relationship with God through Jesus, his son, nothing was really explained to me about that the Bible tells us the only way to the Father is through Jesus, his son. I never knew anything about that, you know, I operated in that church environment, you know, at a very young age. And I do I believe the seeds were planted. As I mentioned earlier, God's hand is on all of us. It's there. And it's a matter of us opening up our heart and saying, God, come in and take over my life, heal me and set me free. And that's essentially what I did. But it wasn't until I was clean for about six or seven years. I hadn't been using drugs I hadn't been drinking. But as I mentioned, I was still miserable. There's a couple of defining moments that I've, I've shared, but the the defining moment was when I received that phone call. My sister called and said, dad's dying, and we need to get to the hospital. Here's a man that I had very little relationship. Now. I loved him. He's my dad. Right? But I had a very challenging relationship with Him. And we weren't the closest. So I am led to his bedside in the intensive care unit, and my father is dying. Here I am. I've been in the pinna, hell, I've made nothing of my life. I felt like a complete failure. And I'm standing there and my whole life came right before my eyes, and I'm looking at my dad struggling to breathe. And I'm sitting here as his son, and I've done nothing with my life. And it just was a reminder to me of how powerless I am and what a failure were the decisions I've made in my life. That led me up to that day. And Rodney that The defining moment in my life, and that is this, when the pain is greater than your fear, you have an opportunity to be set free and change. I realized that here, this man is going to die. And neither of us were able to have the relationship that I longed for. And so the very next day, Rodney, I just cried out to God, I say, God, I've heard of you, I know what you can do. Because I've heard about the testimonies of what you've done in people's lives. I need you to come in and take over my life, because my pain is greater than my fear, I am miserable, take over my life, come in and set me free. From everything I've done in my life, forgive me. And Rodney, it was a miraculous experience, because that lasted for about an hour. And then when I got up, after crying out and praying, which I'd never been instructed to do, and know me, nobody told me how, my life was completely different from that second.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me how it became different. What was that feeling? Because a lot of people will say that they come to that point of accepting Christ and they don't necessarily feel different, but they know that something has changed. And yet other people have an experience by the sounds of it like you have had where there is something physically that is happening, there is something tangible, tell me about that.
 
 
The Bible is very clear about when you do you say, God, Jesus, come into my life and take over my life. Now, again, it you've heard it, it's been shared many different ways. Be my Lord and Savior, take over be your lead my life Forgive me, offering forgiveness, confessing. It's very simple. It's so simple. But we make it so complicated. You know, the Bible is very clear, Jesus, come, come set me free. Come take over my life. Be Lord over my life, my pain, my shame, my guilt, my past, my purpose, my mission, all of it, Lord, take it and he did. And so yes, for me, a lot of people think that they make that decision, oh, life's just great. Now, you have to begin to do the work. And what does that mean? It just means you now have the power, the same power that rose Jesus from the grave, you have now received, and it's called the Holy Spirit. So the Spirit begins to live in your soul. The spirit is in your life, your heart, and he wanted to take over your mind. For me. It was miraculous. When I stood up after that hour. My whole perspective on life changed the burden, Rodney, the burden of the pit of hell drug life, the pit of hell pain, the youth of abandonment, the use of blame and shame, everything the burden was lifted immediately. It was miraculous, I don't have enough time to be your guest today to share how deep my pain was. Okay? That was absolutely instantaneous. I, at that moment, began to be honest with myself, I began to confess everything that I had, and believe me, Rodney, this is not a one way thing, where I'm the victim, I was not a victim. I made poor decisions and poor choices. Okay, that led me to where I was, I began to be honest with myself. I then devoured scripture, that day was when my recovery started. And that's when I began to immerse myself in every single principle that God has in this life manual called a Bible, and I apply them to my life. I've been doing that for now, Rodney, for 28 years, my life continues to be on track. Now, I've had some major challenges. Since that day, I've had major, major challenges that I've had to work through that day. But the difference is, I have a power and a strength and a different mindset to get me through it now, versus what I had in the old me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what I find interesting is that you say at this stage, you had stopped taking drugs for quite some years. And so you're completely clean for some years, but still miserable. And you say this is the day that your recovery started, the world will often see recovery as being free of drugs. And yet we know that that's not always the case in your recovery started on this day on wondering how soon after you were set free and started that recovering, did you start helping others?
 
 
Let me touch on that for a minute Rodney, and that's recovery versus Christ centered recovery, there is a difference. And that is this Rodney recovery began, like AA began back in the 1930s 40s. And it was faith based, they made no apology for the fact that God has a higher power. Now that's been watered down some over the years. But Rodney, there's only one that can fix, he'll change and restore. And that is the Lord God the Father, he's the only one that is able to do that in our life. And so a lot of people enter into recovery with a myopic track to get clean and sober. And that's good. Now there's nothing that that's absolutely should be the goal. But it's not. The end goal is see sobriety and abstinence are the byproduct of doing the work. That's recovery. Now the difference between recovery and Christ centered recovery, and that is this. And this is where relapse, this happens. Often slips happen, often it happens in in all life. Don't get me wrong. Oftentimes, people get into recovery to get clean and sober. And that's but they neglect the catalyst for what got them there. The pain, the shame, the guilt, the the abandonment, the abuse, maybe there was trauma, or physical sexual abuse, emotional abuse that they experienced. And yes, they're clean and sober. But yet, they're still miserable. And that's what happened to me. I was seven years out, great, I was off, no drugs, no drinking of any kind. I was living a healthy lifestyle, but there was something missing. And I was still miserable. So I get to the place where I realized, why am I still miserable? Well, in recovery, it's all about especially Christ centered recovery, it's all going back to discover the root of my sadness, the root of my grief, my shame, my guilt, my pain. And the Bible's very, very clear about that in Scripture, search my heart of God, change my mind, Oh, God. And when you change the mind and the thinking, and then it relates to the heart and healing the heart, you can be on a track of recovery, sobriety, abstinence, and what I call freedom, and be set free, and avoids slips relapse, when you have worked the steps and the principles and apply the principles to your life. And the other thing about recovery is, it's all about developing self awareness. And that's what recovery is all about self awareness, but also not avoiding the warning signs. And also being able to identify the triggers in your life. All of us are triggered every single day, they're everywhere, right. And for people in recovery, you've got to know what they are. If you're struggling with pornography, well, you got you know very well that if you click on that ad, or click on that link, or click it, that's a trigger, that's going to take you that's going to take you right back if you're not careful, or I can just have one drink, or I can just smoke that dope or whatever, you've got to be extremely mindful of your warning signs and triggers in your life. And you're able to do that in recovery, recovery, especially Christ centered recovery is able to uncover, pull back the layers, deal with the things deal with the challenges and the painful things in our life. And once you're able to embrace that and do that, you have a guide and a power, and God that's able to help you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you've been helping other people to break free from a whole range of issues. You've touched on a few there. It's not just drugs, as you say. There's a whole range of issues that we can be freed from that cause pain, and misery and especially shame within our lives. Tell me, what's the experience, like when you see someone else come out the other side and be released and become free from whatever it is that's been holding them?
 
Craig Brown  
Oh Rodney, it's amazing. I've been serving for 22 years and Christ centered recovery. Our ministry has helped 1000s of people. And Rodney there are 1000s of testimonies of people. And now people that come to our ministry. They're either Christian believers and non believers or they're, you know, all different walks of life. It's not that you have to have to subscribe to that. I mean, it's totally your choice. God gave us a choice accept me or don't you know, it's dope. Yeah, it's your choice. But anybody can come all are welcome. All are loved unconditionally, all are supported and accepted for who they are, no matter who they are. And they come in there and they sit in that environment where the Scripture and the gospel is being shared and the 12 steps of recovery. It's just absolutely powerful to see someone come in. First of all, it takes a ton of courage, Rodney for some of the steps into a Recovery Environment. That's where I say if the pain is greater than your fear of being known, if the pain is greater than your fear of embarrassment, you're ready to come in. And a lot of people walk through that door with a lot of courage on that first night. And, and I'm a firm believer that healing takes place, and circles. And we offer a lot of small groups, where men can be with other men and women can be with other women, in a safe environment, where nothing, there's no condemnation, what is shared there stays there, fellowship is developed, relationships are developed, accountability is established. And healing begins to take place over weeks and the coming months. So I see Rodney firsthand, the life change, and just going from dysfunction, going from brokenness, to wholeness and brokenness, to happiness. And it's just, it's just what's keep it keeps me going. And it's, it's wonderful to see people be set free, and marriages heal relationships with show their kids healed, relationships, restored, amends being made, hearts being healed, it's just miraculous. It's wonderful to see. And it, it's what keeps me going,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm sure that there are people that are going through their own moments of hell, who are thinking, I wish I could be a part of a group like that. But obviously, we're talking to people all around the world. How do we actually find a group like that for ourselves? If, if we're in that situation, how do we find that group of loving people to surround ourselves with to go through this kind of Christ centered recovery,
 
 
Our society, as you know, Rodney, it doesn't take it takes seconds to go to Google or some other search engine and put in Christ centered recovery in the search bar, or recovery near me or find a recovery meeting. Now, just a word of caution. Again, I can only speak for the ministry I've been a part of, and I am confident that we're recovery, your shared recovery is done to help others and the motivation is to help other people. But I also tell people to have a really good filter, and very good discernment as to where you are going to go. First of all, there's no perfect church, and there's no perfect environment. But there are environments and churches that have really good structure that have really good guidelines and accountability, and have a really good platform and an offering and a place and a beacon of hope. I don't know if you're familiar with Celebrate Recovery. But that's the ministry that we started 22 years ago at our church and the ministry we've been a part of, and there are celebrate recoveries all over the world. And all you could all you need to do is go on the website, and you can put in Celebrate Recovery, and your listeners could find one, hopefully near them. There's another organization I'm really support. And that's new life ministries, new life ministries, and that's led by Steve Arterburn, a pioneer in Christ centered recovery here in the United States. And he has ministries and networks all over the world as well, your local church or you know, again, a meetings, other meetings that could be that are nearby, it's taking that first step. And you may have to visit a few places, your listeners may have to visit a few places to find that there may be state offerings or resources or county resources or other resources. But there's also Christian counselors and therapists that are available as well. It's about research. And but here's the thing, Rodney, I am more than happy to be a resource for your listeners, if they have any questions whatsoever. They have an open invitation to reach out to me through email or on my Facebook page to send me a direct message or through your website if you'd like it, I would be more than happy and honored to help anybody that was searching, if I could be of a resource to them.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And of course, it brings us full circle to talking about your book as well. Stop Hiding, Start Healing and we're not just here to sell a book. But when you have a resource like that that's available that is going to help to bring healing. We can't help but recommend it to people and so where can people find this book that you've written.
 
 
One, you just go to Amazon in the search bar put in Stop Hiding, Start Healing. Put in Craig Brown, Stop Hiding Start Healing  so you can go directly to Amazon or you can go to my website, stophidingstarthealingbook.com, you can purchase the book at either of those.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know, we've mainly been talking to people who may be going through their own difficulty, their own shame. But I'm also aware that there will be people listening right now who have loved ones who are going through difficult times, whether it be addiction or whatever it might be. How do we actually come alongside those that we love? When they're not ready to make the step? How do we love them? How do we bring them to that point?
 
Craig Brown 
That's a great question. No, I'm so glad you brought that up. Because it's one of the areas of my ministry that brings most heartbreak at times, because you look in the eyes of a mother or father, or a spouse, or a family member or a friend, and you just see the sadness and the grief, because they have tried and tried and tried to get their loved one to get help. But Rodney, it's so important to realize, and parents especially and family members, you must realize that it's not your fault, that that individual who is struggling, made a decision on their own, to put their life in that situation. So many times parents want to take that role of a rescuer. First of all, we have to admit that person is dealing with a very, very troubling lifestyle. And as much as we want to rescue because as parents or loved ones, we all want to rescue, we all want to help. And unfortunately, the hardest part, you have to allow that person to suffer, you have to allow them to get to the point where they realize that their pain is greater than their fear, and they have to get out, or their life is completely unmanageable. And they have to get help, that can be done in a number of different ways. There are organizations and other resources that can help families with intervention. And oftentimes, it takes the average person that is struggling to be confronted something like 57 times before they get agree to go get help. It's just an arduous process for family members and loved ones to help someone that struggling. A lot of times I have to tell people just to get out of the way, get out of the way. They're on a track, right now they are so in denial, they won't listen to anybody. They'll blame family, they'll blame everybody, for their troubles I did years ago, families need to find the right resources that are available. But it's up to that person to have to make the decision to want to go get help. If they don't think they need help. There's nothing anyone can do other than pray for them, support them, encourage them, and be there for them. until they get to that point where they realize they have to go get well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We're a long way away from that young boy who had such a difficult lifestyle growing up and that difficult relationship with his father. What is life really like for you now for you and for your family? What is your relationship like with your own sons?
 
Craig Brown 
That's a great question. Great, great question. First of all, I've got an amazing wife, we are will be celebrating 28 years of marriage next month. I'm so grateful that I got over that I extricate myself from that total mess of a life before I met my wife and I didn't bring it into the marriage or into my family. We have three sons that are absolutely amazing. I made it a point early on that my relationship with them would be in stark contrast to what I experienced myself with my dad. But I have been brutally honest with my sons. I shared with them. my testimony I shared with them, the struggles that I went through, I shared with them. My being brutally transparent, not sharing details per se, but sharing my pain, shame, guilt, everything that I went through as a catalyst to be there for them as their mentor and their guide and their father who absolutely adores them, who always has their back. You know, I am there to support them in every endeavor. I'm also there to hold them accountable and to be a spiritual leader for them. You know that it started with them. My role as a spiritual leader and I been there for that, Rodney, I still have a bunch of defects I continue to work on, I still, you know, continue in my own recovery, I still continue to work extremely hard to getting better at who I am. And as a result, they know my defects and they're very and, you know, I am not perfect as an I've told them that my dad apologized to me once in my entire life. Like I've lost count of the number of times where I have had to confess, or share or ask forgiveness from my son's for my attitude or approach or what have you. But like for me, right now I am in an amazing season of life, Rodney, and it's all due to the grace of God, it truly, truly is. If you knew me, back then Rodney, and saw me today, you would be absolutely amazed. It's such a difference that the Lord has made in my life and will continue until I'm all used up to care, be there love guide others that have been where I've been. And I'll do that until the last day,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Craig, what I love about your story is that it's not just your story. But it's the story of 1000s that you've been able to help with God's help, obviously. And that's part of the story that is in Stop Hiding Start Healing  the book that you've written, and that's going to be a help for many, many more people, I'm sure it's going to be a help for those who are going through their own difficulties as well as those who love those who are caught in addiction or, or whatever it may be. So if people want to get a hold of that you mentioned before where they can find it, I will put links in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet, so that people can find the book, but also connect with you, Craig, it has been a delight to talk to you. Thank you so much for being so open and honest in sharing your story.
 
Craig Brown 
Rodney, thank you, I just want to commend you. You have a wonderful, wonderful platform. And it's such a beacon of hope to others. And I just pray the Lord's blessings over you and your mission and purpose and all you're doing to help others that may be struggling. And I just encourage your listeners if they are in a tough place in their life, to speak out. Find the right help. And again, allow the Lord in should you so choose to set you free. Thank you my friend. I really enjoyed being with you today. Thank you
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 
 
 
 

Where is God when trouble strikes? Where is he when things go horribly wrong? How can a God of love allow the suffering that many of us face? Sarah Nelson has had to seek those answers for herself and her family. Out of that experience, she's written the devotional book titled, A Perfect Storm. Sarah is today’s guest on Bleeding Daylight.
 
https://sarahnelsonblog.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Storm-Devotions-During-Crisis/dp/B08VY76WXF
https://www.facebook.com/sarah.millernelson
https://twitter.com/SarahNelsonBlog
https://www.instagram.com/sarahnelsonblog
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen
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What do you do when the busyness of normal family life is shattered by a medical emergency that threatens to change your world forever? That’s the story of today’s guest. We’ll meet her in a moment. 
 
It's one of the oldest questions ever asked, where is God when trouble strikes? Where is he when things go horribly wrong? How can a God of love allow the suffering that many of us face? Today's guest has had to seek those answers for herself and her family. Out of that experience, she's written the devotional book titled, A Perfect Storm. It's my very great honor to welcome Sarah Nelson to Bleeding Daylight. Thanks for your time.
 
Sarah Nelson 
Thank you so much for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We're going to explore a very real crisis that you faced as a family but before that tell me what was life like for you and your family before everything suddenly changed.
 
Sarah Nelson 
It was fairly normal. We were a family with three young children ages seven, five and two. So I was very busy. I was managing a business, as well as managing my children. And we had just moved across country. So we were busy, but things were kind of getting back to what I call a normal routine after having three children. So anyone who has young children right now knows what that normal balancing act looks like but my children were healthy, we were healthy. We had really no medical issues that we knew of, and everything was going really well,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Something more than just one of those natural ups and downs happened for you. Maybe you can take us through that.
 
Sarah Nelson 
Sure. We were on a family ski trip. It was the first time we were skiing as a family of five in Park City, Utah, beautiful place, and the second day that we were there, I noticed changes in my daughter, we rushed her into the hospital and we realized that our two year old baby girl who was completely healthy, no pre existing conditions was suffering from a stroke on the left side of her brain. And she quickly debilitated and lost the use of her right side of her body and was paralyzed on her right side and lost her ability to speak. And we were in the hospital for two weeks in Salt Lake City. She was in a rehabilitation hospital for over a month in Dallas, and our lives were turned upside down.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I can imagine and I'm wondering about the doctors at the time when they are looking for what is causing these differences in your daughter did their minds immediately go toward a stroke? This is something that we would normally imagine happening in someone much older.
 
 
Actually they did. They were able to assess her quickly and identify what was happening right away. That morning. I actually saw a difference in her face. When she smiled. She only smiled a half smile. Later that afternoon. She was not responding to me are talking back to me as she did. Fortunately, she was a chatty two year old. So I noticed something that was off. And then by the time we got her into the hospital, the doctor showed me that her grip on her right hand was weakening. And she was dipping her leg on her right side was dipping as she walked. And the doctor looked at me right away in the pediatric emergency room. And he said, I'm sorry, but I fear your daughter is having a stroke. And immediately, they went into testing, CAT scans, MRIs, and they were able to identify it right away.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What goes through your mind in a time like this? A perfectly healthy two year old, you've got two other children that are there with you on the holiday that need to be taken care of at the same time. What goes through your mind?
 
 
The first thing we thought was we didn't know a two year old who is completely healthy could suffer from a stroke. It's typically something you hear about an elderly people as well as maybe here and there. Sometimes you hear of someone who is in their 30s or 40s. But never a child. It's not something that my husband and I had heard of before. There's really sort of this vacuum in your mind because you're trying to process the information that you're being given. It takes a while to try to come to grips with what is actually taking place.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And how does that balance work in your mind? You're obviously concerned for the here and now and what's going to happen to this beautiful child of yours. Was there a balance between that and then wondering what is the long term prognosis, what does this mean long term?
 
 
Yes, in fact, I was thinking that in the emergency room as they whisked her away to do an MRI, and I was standing in the hallway, realizing that she may never walk again. I might have to use sign language. There were no guarantees. What we learned was every stroke is different and every patient recovery is different. And we were watching her abilities deteriorate in front of our eyes and I imagined her possibly in a wheelchair for the rest of her life or walking with a walker. I had no idea moving forward what our life was going to look like the rug of normality literally had been pulled out from under us and are normal had completely changed?
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did you start to get a grip on what might actually happen? When the doctor start giving you a prognosis for what's going to happen toward the future?
 
 
Well, they gave us a little bit of insight, like I said, in the emergency room, but once she was in the pediatric, ICU Intensive Care Unit, they began to lay out the issues that we may face in the hospital there for the two weeks, while we were in Salt Lake City. And again, they told us that she would never fully recover 100% of what she lost. And they could give no guarantees if she would ever walk or talk again, they said, once again, children have a good chance of recovery, because the neurons in their brain are growing so quickly. But they could give no guarantees. And he said, a full recovery for a child like this would be to regain up to 80% of what they lost. And that a true full recovery was not possible.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So it's difficult enough for you and your husband to deal with this. But how did you talk about it with the other two children?
 
 
Well, my husband did a great job. As I mentioned, we were skiing, unfortunately, we were with family. And so I stayed with our daughter Adalee in the hospital, he helped manage the other two children and drove back and forth to the lodge to take care of them to talk to them. And we were just very honest and open to let them know what was going on. So by the time they were able to come to the hospital to visit her, they accepted her differences. We just told them that we weren't sure we prepare them that she was moving around in a wheelchair in the hospital. And they loved her and they embraced her and it was very sweet to watch them just accept her for the condition that she was in.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what about the wider family that you were there with at the time and, and obviously other family members in different places? What was their response to this terrible tragedy happening within your family,
 
 
Everyone was in complete shock and because we were 1,000 miles away, we live in Texas. My family is in Texas, my husband's family was in Houston at the time. They were in shock. And they were in dismay, because they couldn't come up to help us because there were only a certain number of people who could be up there in the hospital. And it was hard ache for them because they couldn't come to help. But what they did was they began to pray for us and pray for our daughter and they called on their churches and their prayer groups and their friends to start praying for us and for our daughter  and we began to have many, many people praying on our behalf and praying for her recovery.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We often hear at times like this, where something happens to people of faith, that there are such a network of churches that suddenly get the message and start to pray. Were you aware of that happening around you?
 
 
I was at the time I was aware of it. We had our home church in Waco, Texas praying for us. My parents had their churches in Dallas and Houston, praying for us as well and I have family in Illinois, Indiana, California. They reached out to their prayer groups and their churches and they began to pray in a way where people were praying for our daughter who didn't even know her and we ended up having thousands of people praying on her behalf. And I call it our army of prayer warriors because when we were in the hospital, we felt those prayers sustain us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're feeling that sustaining power of prayer as you're going through this. But there must have been those doubts, there must have been some of those questions that I mentioned in the introduction of how can God allow these? How did you start to process that I was
 
 
Standing in the pediatric ICU, the doctors had just given me the rundown. And the prognosis of what I mentioned earlier that she would not have a true full recovery that she would only be able to regain up to 80% of what she lost. And my husband had was not there yet that morning, because he was taking care of the children. I was by myself standing over her as she laid there asleep in her hospital bed. And I just prayed. I said, Lord, I'm willing to accept your will for her life. But right now, I pray for a full recovery over my daughter. I know you have the power to do that. I said so Lord, I pray that she will talk. I pray that she will walk. I pray she will run. And I gave her to you right now. And I pray that she will be a normal kid and have a normal life. And I just handed off to the Lord because I knew that only he could do what I was asking. And then I had to focus on taking care of her. Whatever that look like if I had to take care of her, because she was in a wheelchair for the rest of her life. That was my mission to do that at the time. And I felt that resolve as a parent, but I did have to hand it off to the Lord. And that was the first step in just moving forward in what was to come.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what was to come from that point on, what were the things that then started to lay out in front of you,
 
Sarah Nelson 
As people were praying for us, her process of recovery begin to stabilize. So we saw her stabilize, she began to learn to sit up again, it was as if she were a six month old trying to go through therapy. For two weeks, we walked through the process of checking all of the different things that may have gone wrong. Fortunately, everything checked out well. And the doctors called her situation a perfect storm. And where it's all these components coming together, they couldn't necessarily find the cause of the stroke. But it could have been different components coming together at just the right time to cause this crisis. And so we took that as good news, because that meant that there wasn't a blood disease or an organ issue. And so we just continue to move forward. And then once she was admitted into the rehabilitation center in Dallas, where she was an inpatient for a month, where she did intensive therapy. Her process was out of the gate a jumpstart. We were there one day, and she went from not being able to walk, got up in her first therapy session and began to run. I actually had to step out to go to the doctor during that time. And my parents were there because they were helping me Unfortunately, it was in my hometown of Dallas. So they were able to go with the to the therapy session with her I had come down with strep throat, and had to go to a different doctor while she was in her therapy session, and I left with my dad carrying her down the hospital hallway to begin her first therapy session physical therapy session to strengthen her leg. My goal at the time, was that by the time we left the inpatient rehabilitation center, I at least wanted to and hoped it to be able to stabilize her on a walker, so that she can begin the journey of walking again. So as I watched my dad carry her down the hallway, I went to the doctor was treated, came back two hours later, my dad had put it on video so that I have it on video to watch. But my daughter was standing next to my father and had begun to run back and forth during therapy. And I knew in that moment that God had given her a miracle a jumpstart in healing. And her stay in the rehabilitation center was only four weeks her original, estimated stay was eight to 12 weeks. But the doctors didn't know what to do with her they had never, or they acted as if they had never seen a child recover so quickly. And so they could only justify her being an inpatient for a month. And during that time, she ran, she got occupational therapy for her arm, she had speech therapy. And by the time she left that hospital, she was able to talk, walk and run and live life as a normal child.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's an absolutely remarkable turnaround. And no doubt people of faith would say, well, it's largely down to the fact that 1000s of people at this stage are praying for this girl, some who, as you say, don't even know her. There's a remarkable turnaround. But was that the the completion of the therapy once she got home? Was there an ongoing therapy that she needed to be part of?
 
 
Yes, when we got home, she underwent two and a half years, almost three years of occupational therapy and physical therapy. And for her right arm, her right leg, her hands, just to continue to build the strength and the right side of her body. And so that was a daily process multiple times a week, our schedule was very different from our schedule beforehand. But in that process of recovery, it was amazing to watch how God makes our bodies in this incredible, remarkable way to be able to recover things that we lose and how we exercise our mind and our body, especially for a child because they're growing so quickly. I do believe that God designed our bodies to be able to bounce back and which is kind of another form of healing.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you have this two year old at the time who has been through this trauma. This was back in 2014. where many years on from there now. How is she these days?
 
 
She's great. She's a third grader. She's nine years old. She's the life of the party. She is a true joy. Very social, has lots of friends, and she gets to live a normal life. This year, we have realized there are some reading issues that we have to address. But you would never know, looking at her that she has been through anything like she has been through.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Does she have any recollection of those early days? I mean, most of us would not remember what we were doing when we were two years old. But is there any recollection of that? Or is it more the therapy that came after that went on for a couple of years?
 
 
She doesn't remember having a stroke or being in the hospital. Although it was very traumatic for her so for a while, she got upset when we had to go to the hospital for checkups. But she really remembers therapy, you know, her whole preschool years, were just therapy three times a week. And so she remembers that she talks about her situation matter of factly, because that's what therapists do. Each day you have therapy, they talk to you about what you're doing well, and what we need to work on. She takes a daily aspirin. So she remembers how to take care of herself in ways that maybe other people don't have to do. And she's actually very responsible about it, because that's all she's known. But we try to be very upbeat, and Matter of fact, but not to dwell on it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So there's this amazing turnaround, and you've got your your beautiful daughter back. But of course, there are many people that go through all sorts of crises that it doesn't turn out so well. And you decided that you wanted to speak for those people as well. And so you've written this devotional book, tell me when did the thought of this idea come to you?
 
 
Well, I began writing updates on a CaringBridge blog while she was in rehabilitation in the hospital, because we knew there were so many people praying for us, that I wanted to start updating them on the progress she was making. I felt a responsibility very, very early on that that was meant to be shared and so I was updating everyone on this blog, because I wanted them to know, we see your prayers being answered, this is God working, and he is teaching us lessons in this process. And I began to feel the responsibility of that. During that time. You know, I would never think that I can speak for someone whose child has not recovered or for someone who's lost a child. But during that time, I began to feel led to share a testimony based on Psalm 118:24. This is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it, about how God had prepared me for this moment to deal with this crisis. And initially, I did not want to share it. But God gave me a sign to share it. I prayed over that. I released it on the blog, I had no idea why he wanted me to share this testimony. And when I got home, a friend of mine who I'd had known was pregnant with her fourth child in December, walked up to me. I was back home. I'd seen her for the first time I had no idea what was going on back home because I had just been in this complete vacuum during the time and I saw she was in her third trimester. I walked up to her. She walked up to me. I said, Oh, Shelly, how are you doing? I'm so excited to see you. What are you having? And she looked at me and she said, Well, I'm having a girl, but she's not going to live. And my heart broke. Here. I had just come out of the hospital where my child had lived, I had no words to offer her. I just looked at her. And I said I'm so sorry. And I felt so ill equipped to say anything that could be of hope or encouragement, I felt so ill equipped. And she looked at me and she said, Sarah, I read your blog on Psalm 118:24. For a while at least it was in the hospital. And it ministered to me and she said God changed my perspective through your situation. And I was stunned, totally stunned, and humbled because I knew that that did not come from me that came from the Holy Spirit. And part of this journey as we have began to write things down. It, it came to the fact that I did feel we were supposed to write this in devotional format, and Shelley is actually a guest featured in this devotional in devotionals, 24 and 25. And she shares her story. And it really is able to minister to those who have lost a child or lost a loved one during a crisis. And it's about how God cares for the brokenhearted and how he ministers to those who have lost.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I sometimes feel that when we're asking those deeper questions about why things happen, we need to keep it in the perspective that this life isn't all there is. Is that something that really came home to you during this time?
 
 
Yes, it came home to me as I was standing in the emergency room, contemplating on the fact that my daughter may never walk or talk again. And as I was standing there, I would look down this dark corridor behind me, I could hear the noise of the doctors and my husband Mark talking through the scenarios, talking through the test and the blood work. And I just had a moment to stop and pause. And I, as I stood there, I felt the Lord speak to me, because the rug of normality, like I had said, had been pulled out from under us, and I was envisioning of the possibility of what life may look like. And I felt the Lord stop me. And I felt his presence. And I felt him say, Sarah, I am Here I am God, I am constant, I will never leave you nor forsake you. And he spoke so many lessons to me in that moment, and I felt his piece kind of fall over my shoulders as if he was draping a cloak around my shoulders. And it helped the ball of stress in my stomach, it didn't make it go away. Because as a mother, I don't believe it's made to go away. But it did sustain the stress that I felt. In that moment, I realized how temporary this life is, the her body may be broken. But how quickly that would pass because I knew that one day, in eternity, she would be whole again. And in that moment, he gave me such an eternal perspective, a perspective that this life goes by so fast, and that our focus should be on eternal purpose.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's an interesting perspective to bring out of this. And we mentioned at the start how you had this so called normal life of running after three active children, and you were on this holiday. And that seemed to be life as normal. I'm wondering how much life has normal has changed? What are the different perspectives that God has now brought to bear? What are the differences in your normal today,
 
 
We have a greater understanding of our relationship with the Lord and how he interacts with us in our crisis in our in our darkest circumstances. But we are also very aware of, of what people are going through with children who are in the hospital, who are suffering from disease, who are suffering from this kind of crisis, you have a greater understanding, a greater depth of emotional awareness of what those people are feeling and going through. And we've been able to minister and reach out to people who are going through similar circumstances. And my heart also has a greater understanding for children who are in wheelchairs for children who are stabilized on walkers, for parents who have a special needs child. And even though my daughter is not categorized as a special needs child, I've watched and been so close in the hospital, and understand the day to day schedule and demands that they have on their life. And so it opened our eyes to deeper feeling deeper understanding and in that we've been able to turn around and reach out and minister to those going through similar situations.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Have you had a response from some of the people that have read it who are going through those sorts of difficult times?
 
 
Yes, I have. It's the response has been incredible. People can identify even if they have a different circumstance, people can identify going through pain and sadness and crisis, because unfortunately, that is a part of life. And so when people see how God interacts in a very tangible way, in a very practical way, it really helps them to apply scripture to their own lives. And the scripture that I actually used in this devotional is the scripture that was given to me on note cards on a three ring binder, by the people in our Sunday morning class at our church, they gifted me with this scripture, and each of the Scriptures I've included in this devotional because those are the scriptures that God use to breathe his peace and breathe the lessons of him being there for us during that time.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what are some of the responses that people have made those that have had the opportunity to read through that day by day journal? What has been the response coming back? What are some of the stories that you've heard?
 
 
I think the main thing that people say is, I identify so much, because I know a child who is going through cancer, or my daughter just was diagnosed with this rare disease. That is the response that I get the most, especially people with children, people who are dealing with a family member going through cancer, even though That's different people have just related so much, just through hearing a story and understanding the pain of a loved one or the pain of a parent, the agony that a parent goes through watching that family member or loved one suffer. And so the main thing that I hear is identify so much with us. And it meant so much to me, because we're walking through a similar crisis.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that at the time, the scriptures that you had, knowing that people were praying for you, you had this real sense that God was holding you up. Have you had responses like that from some of the people that have read through the devotional that that has given them that same sort of sense that that God is walking through this with them?
 
 
Yes, in fact, one of the readers reached out to me via Facebook, and they had just lost a family member. And that family member had gone through sickness. And she just reached out to me to say, as we're walking through this grief, this journey and this devotion, and the scriptures have given us strength, to understand the reality of life, but that how God intervenes on our behalf, and he how He intercedes for us, through His Holy Spirit. And, and really, they understand how scripture comes to life, because scripture is breathed by the Holy Spirit is breathed by God. And so even if it's applied to a different scenario, or circumstance, the Holy Spirit ministers to everyone on such an individual level through that scripture, and so yes, the person who reached out to me had just lost a loved one and was able to work through their grief while reading the scriptures through this devotional.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that many people who are facing crisis, who are already people of faith would want to have something like this in their hand to help them through at this time to read those scriptures that have helped you so much. I'm wondering, have there been people who have been further away from God who have thought, I just need something that they've been able to pick up this book and start to relate to God in a different way?
 
 
Yes, in fact, I had someone recently gift, this devotional to several people who are really searching, and they're in the process of reading it, or they've heard an interview or a podcast, and they are beginning to respond and ask questions. And the first devotional is on salvation. So if there is someone who has never had a relationship with the Lord before, or maybe never even been taught about what our relationship with Christ is, we start off with the basics of salvation, to describe who Jesus is and what he offers us through His sacrifice and through His resurrection. And so yes, I am starting to see a response people asking questions, people reaching out to those who have gifted the devotional to them. And it is it is incredible, because I have just prayed over this, that whoever reads this, if they don't already know Christ, that they would come to him after reading this journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So I'm wondering if you have a copy of the book handy, and maybe there's a devotional in there that has been extra special for you? And maybe you could read us a little of what's in there today?
 
 
Absolutely. I think the one that is really the most special to me, is devotion. Three, it says God never leaves us. And the Scripture is Deuteronomy 31:6, Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of the for the Lord your God goes with you. He will never leave you nor forsake you. And the reason this is so special is because this is the foundation of the purpose for this devotional. And it's the first message God laid on my heart because it's the first thing he spoke to me in this crisis to say, I am God, and I am always with you and I am constant. And regardless of what happens on this earth, I will never change. And it just talks about the story. It said, the pediatric ER doctor looked at me and said, I'm worried about your daughter, I think she is having a stroke. Immediately, doctors and nurses flooded the room and began drawing blood, poking Adelee for IVs and prepping her for a CAT scan. It was apparent at least brain had been affected and her ability to talk had been impaired while the other symptoms were progressing. Adult he was losing the ability to use the entire right side of her body as well as her ability to speak. The next step was to answer a multitude of questions in the middle of the whirlwind. I stood in the emergency room hallway looking into the dark, empty corridor. Moments earlier my daughter had been lying on the bed and the room adjacent to where I was standing. My heart felt like a heading bowling ball pressing down my chest and my stomach was a ball of knots pulling in opposite directions. Time stood still That moment I felt the Holy Spirit fall over me as I heard a voice over my head, state the Word of God, I heard the Lord say to me, I will never leave you nor forsake you, Sarah, I am here. I am God, and I am constant. And that is the thing. And the message that I want to make sure that listeners hear is that when you're going through a crisis, God wants to be there for you. And he wants you to feel his presence.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that reading just took us right there into that situation. And we can start to feel some of the anguish that you're feeling. But also at the same time, there's that immediate comforter. And I wonder, if you look back to the Syrah before this incident happened, would you ever have believed that your faith would be strong enough to carry you through that you'd be where you are now and being able to minister to other people.
 
 
I don't think we can ever foresee the circumstances. The Lord had been preparing me with Psalm 118:24. For two years, I began to quote that every day, this is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it. And I begin to quote it, because we had had a lot of things going on. And I just needed to make sure that I maintained a positive attitude and joy in the Lord, regardless of what happened to that day. Because sometimes the blessings even on our normal day can feel overwhelming, especially when you have three small children. But the Lord prepared me and disciplined me with that scripture so that once I was in a situation where something happened, that was a crisis. And that was something that was truly awful. The Lord helped me to remain in a perspective, where regardless of what happens, even though my daughter may never be the same, he is my joy. And it's a day that the Lord has made, and I will still rejoice that he is God, because he does not change. And that just sustained me. When that happened, you know, I looked back over the last two years of being disciplined in that scripture and thought, Wow, it's incredible how God will go before us and prepare us. And looking back, it's amazing to see how God works in that way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When these large events happen in our lives, they continue to define us in a couple of ways. Sometimes, they will define us in a way that we cannot get past that. And it's going to hold us back for the rest of our lives until we're prepared to do business and bring some change. Or they can define us as a way that launches us into something else. And I see that that's what's happened for you that this has defined you to a large degree, to be someone who is continuing to minister to other people. And I guess that's the legacy that this event has taken place. Maybe you can help us to fast forward to where things are now. Explain what normal looks like in your household today.
 
Sarah Nelson 
Ah wellI love that question. First of all, because you're right. The purpose of this devotional is to let people know God wants to be there for you during crisis. But it's also the point. And this is where Shelley comes in. And her testimony is we can allow the Lord to minister to us, which he wants to He wants us to receive that peace and comfort. But then when we learn how to receive that, there are things that we can do then to turn and look outward into the lives of other people to then minister to them. And that is what the Lord, I think wants us to do and and sometimes calls us to do. And so that is how this has taken shape. And as you mentioned, it is the legacy of this devotional and of the stories of two families intertwined, that we are now able to see how God ministered to us, and how he ministered to Shelley and her family to know that we can then turn and look outwardly to minister to those who are going through a crisis. And that is the whole point of this. But today, a normal in my house is very, very busy. Our children are now 14, 12 and nine, and they are active. They're busy. My husband is an entrepreneur, I have a part time job on the staff at our church, using my background in business, to minister to people and so we are literally jumping from one thing to the next. But this has also taken priority, that together as a family, we've had the opportunity to stand up and share what God has done in our life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And as you continue to do that through this wonderful devotional I'm sure that there are people listening right now who say that is something that I need in my life right now because I've been through a difficult time or, as you say, to be able to gift this book to someone else who if they know that someone is going through a difficult time that they would like to gift it to them. If people are trying to get themselves a copy of a perfect storm wish should they go?
 
Sarah Nelson 
They can go on Amazon, and they can get the ebook or they can get a paperback copy amazon.com You can type in A Perfect Storm: Devotions During a Crisis. You can also go to my blog, sarahnelsonblog.com and there is a link where you can buy it on Amazon there as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And of course, we will put links to both Amazon to get the book, also to your blog, on the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net. So the people can track that down very easily. Sarah, it has been wonderful to talk to you to hear how God has used this very difficult circumstance to bring good for so many more people. I just want to thank you for being open with your story. And thank you for being prepared to hear God's voice in putting this devotional together for others. Thanks for your time today.
 
Sarah Nelson 
Thank you for having me.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

His parents were told they should abandon him. They didn’t listen and Dorsey Ross has been ignoring every limitation ever since. Dorsey Ross was born with a severe congenital disability. Now, in his mid-40s, Dorsey has proved the doctors wrong but life still has been full of challenges. He's been told that so many of the milestones that most of us take for granted would be impossible for him. He's refused to listen.
 
https://dorseyrossministries.com
https://www.facebook.com/DROCKROSS
https://anchor.fm/dorseyrossshow 

John Simmons battled an invisible addiction that plunged him into debt and deep depression. He was living a life that was totally out of control and the very thing that was pushing him closer and closer to destruction was the thing he thought would solve the issues he was facing. It was a downward spiral that almost cost him his life. Things are very different now. These days, John is bringing hope into the lives of others through his ministry, Testimony House.
 
http://testimonyhouse.org/
https://www.youtube.com/c/TestimonyHouse 
https://www.facebook.com/testimonyhouses/
https://www.instagram.com/testimonyhouse/
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
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Today’s guest battled an invisible addiction that plunged him into debt and deep depression. We’ll hear about his remarkable transformation in just a few moments.
 
My guest today was living a life that was totally out of control and sinking him further and further into debt. His problem was that the very thing that was pushing him closer and closer to destruction was the thing he thought would solve the issues he was facing. It was a downward spiral that almost cost him his life. Things are very different now. These days, John Simmons is bringing hope into the lives of others through his ministry, Testimony House. It's a privilege to speak to him today to hear more about his story, John, thank you for joining me on Bleeding Daylight.
 
John Simmons 
Thanks, Rodney, for having me on the program. So excited to share my testimony today with you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We're going to talk about what it was that threatened to wreck your life completely but before we do, tell me what life was like beforehand.
 
John Simmons 
Before I got wrecked? Well, I grew up here in St. Louis, Missouri, in the States and normal life, two parents, until I was 12 years old, my dad passed away. And that was the genesis of my destructive life, essentially, because I had been attending church I had some nice, godly friends, I had thought I had accepted Jesus into my heart. But I prayed the night before my father died that I wanted to not go to school the next day, because I had a project to and it wasn't finished. And so I woke up the next morning, and it was 9am. And school started at eight. School was out of session, and I wasn't there. And I was so excited. But then a few moments later, my mom walked in and she said, we lost your dad last night. And for 20 years, Rodney, I thought that I had prayed. And I'd always heard a church when I was a little boy, I God answers prayers in a way that's unusual, or more than you can ask or think or imagine. And I'd heard these sorts of things. And so I put those things that I'd heard together and thought that I prayed for a day off school, and instead the God that I was praying to had killed my dad for me, and I was just so devastated. I was like, well, that's how you answer prayers, I'm never gonna pray to you again. And that was, that was life before I started gambling, I just sort of live in my own way away from God.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That's a very heavy burden for you to have to carry to feel that your prayers had actually killed your father. And even the fact that it then tainted your picture of God to say that, well, he will go out and kill someone. For me. That's another burden that you're having to carry. Was your dad. Ill for a long time before that, or was this totally unexpected?
 
John Simmons 
All this was sudden he had a massive heart attack and passed away the we had had floodwaters and before our basement was flooded, he was downstairs trying to deal with we had about three inches of water in our basement, and he was trying to get it out and deal with it. And he had just 3am just had a heart attack and die whenever the last thing I said to him was would you take the dog out? You know, and so it's just no one knew what was coming.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you mentioned there that the problem that really caused all the issues that you were facing was that gambling. So between that 12 year old boy and the time he started gambling, how much time was there? When was it that you started to go down this track of gambling,
 
John Simmons 
I started gambling when I was 18 years old on line, we had a poker website called bet us calm or something like that. And it had just poker tournaments. And I was led there by my brother who I was living with at the time. And he said, You know what, they play these $5 tournaments. And so I remember getting online, and playing $5 tournaments with him and a couple other friends who we knew he had more recreational money. But I had actually started working a bunch of part time jobs, I loved having money in my pocket. It was, I mean, the love of money was in my heart deep from an early age. By the time I was 18 years old, I was working three part time jobs. And so I was working 40 to 60 hours a week, as soon as I turned 17 different jobs around where I lived. And so I started to accumulate some actual money in my bank account at a young age. And since I didn't have any rent to pay, and I had no bills, I started just put my money online. Eventually, I graduated from $5 tournaments, to $100 buy ins to cash games, which are a lot different than poker tournaments, if no one's familiar, you know, a tournament is one set buy in and you go in and you play for you know until you're out of chips or till the time is over. And you know, going in how much money you might win or lose. A cash game is a lot different. You go in with your money and at anytime you can reload and put more of your money on the table. You can lose all of your money in a moment's notice. And there's no set limits of how much you can win or lose.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was this something that you started to get good at as you started to understand how it all worked? Was it something that made you think, Hey, this is something that I could do more full time?
 
John Simmons 
Yeah, I absolutely thought I was the world's best poker player. There's no doubt about that the origin of why I thought I could do this stems from ESPN. And they had started running these programs called the World Series of Poker and it was highlighting these poker tournaments that took place in Las Vegas. And this man in 2002 named Chris Moneymaker What an awesome name right? And he had bought into a tournament like it About a $40 online tournament and want to see in this tournament that cost $10,000 to enter, and he won that tournament. So he won't, he turned $40 into $2 million. And I was like, Well, I have $40, I can go do that. And so I bought every book I could on Poker. So I was trying my best to do as good as I could. The problem that I found out Rodney, and this is, is that no matter how good you are, when you're in addiction, you have no off switch. And that was the issue for me is the reason that I lost so much money, the reason that I couldn't stop and I went on for so long, and it became such a burden to my life is because no matter how much I won that day, I would go back the next day, and I would continue until it was all all gone.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm sure that even then you had this idea that there were some losers out there who wouldn't know what they were doing. And they would gamble their money away. But you were clued up, you were reading up and and you must have felt, you know what my turn is going to come because I'm getting educated about this. And I know what I'm doing.
 
John Simmons 
Yeah, I thought that there was any moment I was due to hit one of these jackpots that they offered or win a big tournament or get a place in the next tournament. And I really thought that the suckers at the table that I would win from some days had nothing to do with me, and that I actually wasn't part of their world. You know, I didn't see myself as someone who was behind the eight ball, so to speak, in terms of my skill level or my winning level. It wasn't until a few years later, when things started to really, it doesn't take long for you to lose money, even no matter how long you've been working to save it up when you have a consistent gambling habit. And so for me, it just started to overwhelm my finances to the point where I had to start doing payday loans and credit cards to fund my habit. And that's really when I started to be like, ooh, maybe maybe I'm not as good as I thought or, you know, I didn't recognize it as a problem. But I definitely started to have questions about what's going on,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me about the first time that you actually walked into a real game, because you've started out on these online games. And it's easy enough to switch that off at the end, although, as you say, you're being drawn in and spending more time there. What about the first time that you walked into an actual game with people around the table?
 
John Simmons 
Yeah, I'd love to tell you about that because it happened the weekend of my 21st birthday, which is the legal gambling age in America. And I'm so excited because I'm like, oh, finally, I've been playing poker online for three years. But I'm in a room by myself clicking buttons, and I'd seen all the tournaments on on TV, I'd saw Chris Moneymaker won this tournament, and he's in Las Vegas. And I'm like, maybe I'll run into some of these guys I've seen on TV. I'm so excited. You know, these older guys, they were all smoking cigarettes or cigars at the table, and they all had sunglasses on inside, it was just so much like a movie or you picture it. This like gangster vibe, you know, I was just like, this is great. I love it. And cash is flying around the table. And I think I lost $100 my first time. So I don't have this, like I want a million dollars. And that's why I kept going story. But for me, it was the atmosphere. It was the culture. I just wanted to keep going. I played in a dozen tournaments that weekend. I didn't leave with much money in my pocket. But I just had the greatest time. And I just went home saying I want to do this. I want to play cards like this a lot. And I remember someone who I was working with at the time I said, Well, you know, there's poker rooms in St. Louis and, and there's a couple local casinos, but I'd never been in them. I wasn't gambling age. And I didn't realize what was behind those doors. But they were like, yeah, and so I drove up there. As soon as I got back from Las Vegas, I went to a local casino here where I live, sat down at a game and it was the same thing I experienced in Las Vegas. But now it was a mile down the street from me. And so it led me to a pattern where I would just continue to go to the casino whenever it was open. And until that money started to run out.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this is starting to become less of a pastime and more of a lifestyle that you're being drawn into. And it seems like a very attractive lifestyle for you at this stage.
 
John Simmons 
For me, yeah, I was wanting to be near it. I wanted to surround myself with it. So much so that I was working in radio at the time. I had gone to school for radio, I had this passion to be a radio host. I was so lured in that eventually I left my job at the radio station and took a job at the casino dealing poker. So now that I was able to work at the casino, I was able to play the casino. And then if I wasn't doing those two things I was sleeping. And so this was a pattern of rinse and repeat for me for years, years and years. And eventually I had to sign myself off the casino to get away from it. My lifestyle would become too oppressive on my actual life and the things that I was dealing with the results of my gambling.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me about the sorts of losses that you are going through at this stage. When did it start to mount up and you started to realize all this is going a bit far?
 
John Simmons 
When I turned 21 and I started playing cash games more regularly. That's when it really started to dwindle and quickly. And so after school I was working two full time jobs. I was trying to play catch up with my losses, but it never happened. The biggest losses occurred when I lost all of my working income and started getting credit cards. And so I would get, you know, a $25,000 limit credit card, or I would get payday loans from across the city where I would, you know, basically barter my paycheck for extra money. And so I'd have dozens of these types of loans. And so by the time I was 23, I had accumulated over $200,000 of debt, I had to go file bankruptcy, because eventually I lost my credit, you know, these creditors weren't issuing me any credit, I wasn't paying these bills back. Obviously, gambling addiction is one of the ones where you can be an addict, and no one can notice, you know, I'm not walking in my, my speeches and slurred, I'm not hunched over, I'm not drunk at a wheel, you know, I act and look normal. But on the inside, Everything's going haywire. And that was the first time I told my family and friends that I had an issue was the first time that I had to confront when I was dealing with and everyone was telling me that all these problems that I had, and I needed to get help, and they all had their suggestions and ended up with me being in counseling sessions, and I had to get give over my money. But that was the first time that I lost a lot of money, but it wasn't the last.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And so often we hear these stories of people who have run up huge gambling debts and to be down $200,000 at the age of 23 is massive. And so often the thing that people think is, well, why didn't they walk away when they noticed that they were starting to lose money? Maybe you can talk us through that help us to understand what it is that keeps driving you back to that, even though it's it seems to be quite plain to everyone else outside of it, that this is a losing game.
 
John Simmons 
There was no doubt that people thought that I was dealing a losing game. And I would consistently be taught Johnny, why don't you just stop, you know, you just quit this. It's ruining your life for some people were as bold enough to be like, Johnny, you're a loser, quit. Just stop right now. And I just remember thinking, you guys don't understand if I just win this jackpot. If I just win this tournament, just like Chris Moneymaker, if I do any of those things, and all of a sudden, I have a million dollars in my bank account. I'm not a loser anymore. I'm not stupid for keeping going. You're going to envy the life that I have. And that was really a driving motivating force for my thought life at that period of time. I was just like, no, they just don't get it. They don't get it. Because they're there. They don't realize that if I win this, everything's fine. all my problems are erased, all the problems that they see are gone. Once this money shows up in my bank account. I don't have an issue anymore. But that was far from the case.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And now I mentioned those that are offering these opportunities to gamble, such as the casinos and poker houses. They're doing their very best to make you think that the next big win is just around the corner too, aren't they?
 
John Simmons 
Yeah, they put signs on the wall that will say jackpot. It'll say $250,000 and you hit this jackpot. If you hit a certain hand in poker, or if you get beaten in a certain way they call it a bad beat. And so they have jackpots listed on the walls, they offer you playing, you know, perks, if you play long enough, you get free meals. And so I was like, Well, if it's just like getting free lunch, sometimes I would think, you know, take my $200 up there, and I'm gonna get a free lunch, but you're not gonna just take in $5 up to the store and bought a sandwich. But that was not my mindset. My mindset was like, how can I keep going in these casinos certainly make it attractive. If you if you buy in for a certain amount, we'll match it today. And those types of offers. They came quite often.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you mentioned that this was the first time that you tried to address this issue. And you've talked to counselors. And yet it didn't stop there. What happened at that point?
 
John Simmons 
In these counseling sessions, I wasn't really trying. I was just going through the motions trying to get out of that session and get myself back in a place financially stable, and then I could gamble again. And so that's what I did, you know, I would just constantly do the things people wanted me to do to try and appease them. And then I would go back to the counselors or back to GA meetings which Gamblers Anonymous, and take these types of steps to try and get help. For my problem. Even though I didn't think that I had a problem. It wasn't till years later that I finally woke up one day and was like, yeah, this is me. This is not going to happen when I woke up at 30 years old. And I was thinking, this isn't the life that I imagined having as a child. You know, when I was a child, I had these big dreams and aspirations and things that I wanted to do and be in radio and be a musician and all these different things that had filled my hopes up as a young boy. But as an adult, I realized that my hopes had all been dashed from all the losses in the gambling and I was hopeless. I was depressed. I was severely depressed. By the time I got into this addiction for 10 years and long after I really got into a point where I was betting sports and doing other things to try and hide and mask some of my losses from family and friends by using a different method of gambling in order to keep the thrill of you know that adrenaline those things going in my life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Where was the money coming from at this stage because that initial time weighing you down $200,000, you've gone to counseling, you've declared yourself bankrupt. So what is actually funding this habit at this stage?
 
John Simmons 
That's a great question. They passed a law that said poker dealers essentially could keep their own wages, their own tips. And before that, we had done a pooling system where all the tips that came into the room were shared equally among 50, or 60, poker dealers that were at this particular casino that I worked at. And in that year, that they created that new law, I was one of the better dealers, I dealt really fast, and I worked fast. And so a lot of the players like me, the regulars appreciated my speed and accuracy of doing the games quickly, so they could keep that thing going faster. And so I made about $90,000, in my first year of making my own tips, and I did that for several years. And so this was able to fund them keep me going and sustain through those years of of high income losses,
 
Rodney Olsen 
The whole time that you're there dealing and doing the very best that you can to get all the tips coming in, it must have been just rolling around in your mind, well, once I finished this, today, I'm going to go to the table myself and start to bet some of this money, it must have been that drawer for you.
 
John Simmons 
It was payday and I had two days off work, I would have to drive hours, I'm talking minimum of four hours away to the nearest casino where I was legally allowed into because when you sign yourself off to Casino in my state, if you go inside, it's illegal and it's considered trespassing, you can be arrested and go to jail. And so I would have to find new ways to gamble and play cards. So I would drive to casinos around America trying to find a place, you know, in a two or three day span where I can get to there and I can gamble for two days straight, I wouldn't sleep, I would be exhausted afterwards. A lot of times I would leave without any money in my pocket at all. I remember having to float bad checks to try and just get gas money to get home. Those are those results of me trying to chase these losses.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And initially you went in and there's this great romantic sense of this lifestyle that's happening and these people around the table that the sunglasses that the cigars, the cigarettes and all of this is drawing you in. How's it feeling? Now, at this point, when you're having to use bad checks when you're having to drive all these miles just to find another casino? Was there any of that thrill left at all?
 
John Simmons 
The thrill was always there when you're at the table. Because when you're at the table, you're not concerned with any of those other things, you're still in that culture in that atmosphere, you're you're still a moment away from that jackpot, that tournament win. And so when you're at the table, you lose connection to the rest of the world, you're not there anymore. The thrill of it was always there on days that I had cash in my pocket on the days that I didn't, it was miserable. I mean, I was completely frustrated and angry at my life, I would spend as much time as I could asleep or working to try and make more money to try and pay back some of my debts to the people who needed it the most. A lot of times that was my bookie for years who would you know, call or text me every, every so often, john, Where's my money? Where's my money, and that was a stressful situation. And so at one point, I do remember thinking, maybe it's not going to happen. And that's when I finally realized, you know what, maybe I need to get help. And that's when I finally entered a rehab center on my own. Well, for the first time I was 29 years old. And I was looking to find that hope that I never had.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's this thrill when you're at the table but as soon as you walk away, things are vastly different and you touched on the depression that you felt had they did that go?
 
John Simmons 
Well, the war, the mind the Bible describes is that my mental thought life was completely different than anything I've ever experienced. And that is something I never would ever want to go back to the pressures that I was under financially would not allow my mind to rest. And so I was constantly thinking about what I owe this guy money, I owe these 10 places money, this war of my mind would start and then the devil would come in and say, well, let's let's go to the casino with that $2,000. And maybe you can double it up. Or maybe you can triple it up and you can have everybody paid off by the end of the weekend. But of course the money would usually be gone by the end of the weekend. Because even if I would win if I win if I win a tournament and like there was a weekend that I want a jackpot and a tournament the same weekend, and I had $10,000 in my pocket. But two months later that money was gone. It started off by me just sort of pulling myself back from others and just sort of like wanting to be alone. And I would spend so much time alone that my friendships would suffer, my relationships would suffer. And then eventually, when I got really bad, I started to blame my friends and those closest to me, I kicked my best friend out of my apartment because I blamed his party for not being able to sustain my happy life. And but the truth was, is that I'd stolen and gambled his rent money I didn't want him to know, I was engaged in that relationship was broken off and I never got married to her. You know, my my brother. He hasn't trusted me ever since. And, you know, there's a lot of different fractured relationships throughout my life all stemming from the fact that first I pulled away I got depressed. I got angry, I got bitter. I got frustrated. I'm taking it out on the people closest to me and the rest that I could never find in my mind, the only time I could ever seem to have any peace in those situations was when I was sleeping. So I slept a lot on days that I didn't have money to gamble. Because if I had money to gamble, I was at the casino, or I was watching sports betting on them. But the days that I didn't, I would fall asleep as best as I can, I'll take medicine to fall asleep. And the only relief that I could find in as soon as I would wake up, those thoughts would flood back into my mind and making every waking moment as miserable as possible.
 
Rodney Olsen 
In the end, you mentioned that you checked yourself into rehab, give us a bit of an understanding of what happened in that process.
 
John Simmons 
So I was 29 years old, I woke up one day basically was reflecting on the life that I was living in how much money I've lost and how many relationships I broke in and how miserable I was and how alone I was in this little, you know, one bedroom apartment, and I didn't talk to anybody unless I was at work and the work was causing me to, you know, be in a culture and an atmosphere of continuing to do the same things over and over again, I was in this bad cycle. And I wanted out. This wasn't the life that I thought I was meant to have. As a young boy, I just thought I was gonna do all these things. And to have lost all those dreams was really upsetting to me, when I finally woke up at 29 and realized that I hadn't reached them. They weren't even in the distance. It wasn't even like I was in just a few years on my get it No, they were gone. They were long gone. And that was really that was upsetting to me in a major way. And so I went into this rehab facility in town. It's a joke anyway, because the rehab facility that I call to get put into is run by the government that also runs the casinos. So it's like having the the people who make the cigarettes make the cigarette recovery material. They make money either way. So the system's not really built for creating successful support. When you go into these programs, though, there's a couple different things you can do. They recommend going to GA Gamblers Anonymous meetings where you meet with other problem gamblers and you share swap, bad beat stories. And commiserate essentially, is what I believe were happening in those meetings. And some people walk the steps, but I was seeing the same people in these meetings that I saw there years ago. And so no one that I noticed was even getting the help they needed. I went in and I started to have counseling sessions and group sessions, trying to stay clean, and I was trying hard. I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this. And I remember it 30 days I've gone 30 days sober. And that was probably the first time I'd gone 30 days sober in a decade, one of my counselors handed me this pin and it was like 30 days clean. And everybody clapped. And then john, great job, you did an awesome job. You're so awesome, good job. And I remember feeling pride in myself for the first time in a long time. And I hadn't experienced that and so long that I created that I was like, Oh, I'm gonna keep doing this. Like I couldn't have pinpointed why that was happening. But I was definitely feeling that I wanted to chase that high. And that was a new high essentially, of this recognition of the things that I had accomplished in life, when really all I had done is not done this bad thing for 30 days. So I went 60 days clean, and I went 90 days clean in both sessions. The party happened to get a good job, john, you did a great job. Great, great, great. And then my counselor said at the end of 90 days, and this is the thing that set me on a path to change my life. He said the next time we'll celebrate your win as a year, and we only celebrate years after 90 days. And I go what Wait, why? I was like, I need this. I need you to continue to like encourage and support me and like I need a goal to drive through because the desire to gamble has never left my heart. Every single day for 90 days. My thought life had been gamble, gamble, gamble, let's go to the casino and gamble, let's go to placing gamble, let's but like that was my thought life. I was doing everything I could to stop myself from doing those things. I would overeat I gained over 100 pounds during the season in my life, from constant overeating. I would smoke 100 cigarettes a day, you know, I would do anything that I could to either try and take my mind off, I go to the movie theaters to take my mind off of these things or to just avoid it altogether. I had no one to spend time with no one to be around me. So I'm isolated. And I'm trying to get fixed. And I was so upset when my counselor said that I wasn't going to get any affirmation anymore. And I realized that the desire to gamble hadn't gone away. I asked him in that session, I said, Well, this sucks. I said, this is rehab, you're supposed to fix me. Why aren't you fixing me? And he's just basically like, well, we don't fix you was his response. We don't fix you. He said you have to learn to live one day at a time, or 15 minutes at a time. And they quoted the Serenity Prayer at me again. And I was just like, no, this is ridiculous. This isn't working for me. And so I left that session. I called my bookie I put all the money that I'd saved up in 90 days on a bunch of bets and I went on this eight day bender and I just spent anything that wasn't tied down on my part it went to the pawn shop. Everything went out the door any money I had was gone. At the end of it. That's when I finally was like this is it. I guess this is I've I've placed myself in a hopeless situation. There's nowhere left to go.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what was it that then brought about the change. You've gone through the counselling and that didn't work, you're really just going through the motions, you've gone through the rehab, expecting to feel fixed and for that desire to go away and found out. No, that's not what we do here. So you've gone on another bender, and that hasn't helped, what actually turn things around for you?
 
John Simmons 
Well, at the end of the bender, I was just beside myself crying in my dark one bedroom apartment. That's when the the legitimate thoughts of suicide can remind for the first time, I was thinking about taking my car and driving it into a wall, or jumping off a bridge, which I'd seen one of my other poker friends do a few years earlier. And he had killed himself because he was in a similar situation. started about taking the pills in my apartment, and I had serious thoughts about taking my own life that night. And in a like, just a, oh my gosh, what's happening to me moment, I was just like, oh, maybe I'll maybe I'll pray. I've heard people talk about prayer before. I haven't talked to God. In a long time since that prayer that I thought killed my father. I know that now that that's not what he did. So I sat on the edge of my bed, and I sort of just looked up at the ceiling. And these are the words that I said, and I didn't really know how or what to pray. But I said, God, if you're real, I need you to show me a future and a hope for my life because I just don't see one anymore and in that moment, I started to hear the words repeat in my head, The kingdom of heaven is upon you. The kingdom of heaven is upon you. And it just started getting louder. And I honestly thought, Rodney, that I had gone crazy that I was finally hearing voices because the kingdom of heaven is upon you was not a phrase that I was not even not familiar with, but I didn't even understand it. And so I thought weird things were happening. I ran out of my bedroom, and I ran into the living room. And I noticed my dad's Bible, it was the one thing from my dad passing away that was given to me. I didn't have any of his clothes. I had no articles to remember him. I didn't even hardly have any pictures. But they'd given me his Bible after he passed away. Apparently, he was a he was a believer. He taught Bible school years ago, he never talked to me about Jesus any any point. But I opened up his Bible, I felt compelled to, I don't know really wide carried it for 20 years, he'd been dead for 17 years at that point. And I had never opened it. It is collected dust on the shelf. And I didn't really know what to look at. But I felt like I had to start reading it. And I opened it up to the New Testament because I knew from my brief experience in church that Jesus was in the New Testament, I was just like, I think I need to read about Jesus. And so I opened up to the first page of the book of Matthew and a couple paragraphs into this reading. It says, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is upon you. And I froze. I just stared at that sentence for a few minutes. And I felt this warmth on my body. And I just, I remember, choking up and in that moment, I realized God's real. I think he's talking to me. I just kept reading that book of Matthew that night a couple times. And I had this revelation that night. That all the words in this Bible that everybody told me for my whole life. And I agreed with a lot of the opinions of the world that the books of the Bible are for old people. They're just a list of rules. They're hard to understand, no one really gets it. It's a bunch of contradictions and all these things. And I believed all that, but I was having a different experience. In this moment. I was reading the book of Matthew and I was reading about the life of Jesus. And these words, were jumping off the page and into my heart. I realized in that moment that this guy had come. And he had lived a life for me. And he died on the cross without doing anything wrong, so that I could find forgiveness. And so I got down on my knees. I didn't know what to do. But I was just like, God, I messed up. I've just lived a life that's dirty. I don't even I don't even know what the prayer was. But I remember just, it all came out. God help me I need your help. This is not something I want to carry anymore. I don't even know what to do I owe all this money in Lord just forgive me, just please forgive me. I don't want to do this anymore. And it was just, and I felt all the weight of the world fall off my shoulders. In that moment, it was the best relief that I've ever experienced. It was physical, in the sense that I literally felt like a pressure and a weight had been lifted off of my body. But in that moment, I realized that life was about to get different for me. How different did it become because you're still a person who has this enormous debt that you're having to pay back. You're still in the same situation. But as you're saying, there's this weight that feels it's been lifted from you. So
 
Rodney Olsen 
How did that change start to manifest in your life?
 
John Simmons 
For me, it tarted with daily Bible reading. I was I was so thirsty for God's word that in that early days that I wouldn't leave without my Bible. I'd go to work with my Bible. I'd read my Bible in the in the break room at work or in the car and I listened to sermon messages on the radio on the drive to work or when I got home, I would watch Christian sermons on TV and I was just trying to fill myself with all these new ideas and things from the Bible and trying to learn more about who God was and his love for me and how to make my life different. Not really applying much of it yet. At one point I remember somebody asked me if I wanted to go to church with them. And I was like, No, I don't need church. All they do is take your money. And I just was like, I don't want to go there. I've got my Bible. That's all I need. And, of course, I was wrong. I needed that community, the community that I hadn't had in my life for so long. Eventually, I find myself in a church service for the first time and the pastor. He had a series on vision and he said, if you're a Christian, you need to find God's plan for your life. And you find it by praying for it. And this was revelation knowledge to me, I'd never prayed for anything except my food at that point. And so I was like, Okay, well, if God's got a plan for me, I want to plan for my life. I'm aimless, I have nowhere to go, I have no word. I don't know what to do. I'm working at this casino. I obviously want to get away from this gambling addiction, which didn't come off right away. I start praying for six months, every day, every minute that I can think to pray, God, show me your vision for my life, God, show me your vision for my life. So for six months, all I prayed for was food and a vision. And as I was doing that, I was continuing to study God's word and go to church more often I got involved in the parking lot ministry waving at people as they came into church in the mornings. And I was excited where my life was, but I still had the issues and the results of my sin, you know, the debt that had piled up and I was still smoking a lot. And I was still drinking and some of these things, and God started one by one. taking those things out of my life. The first time that had happened was with my cigarettes, and I was trying to lose weight. And on a walk, I was smoking cigarettes. And I just remember the holy spirit being like, how are you ever going to get healthy if you're doing that? I tried quitting smoking a dozen times before I was saved pills, patches, gums and all that and never worked. But in that one conviction note, I threw that pack of cigarettes in the in the dumpster near me, and I never smoked again. And it was this just deliverance moment. For me. That happened a few times later, it happened again with my drinking. And then eventually, with my gambling, I placed my last bet a few months after I'd gotten born again. And I got back into the casino for the last time and I had this not this huge knot in my stomach. It felt like there was weights on my ankles as well. And I just remember the physical manifestation of like, john, you should not go in there. John, you need to get out of here. And so that was the last I walked in there. And I played for about five minutes. My stomach hurts so bad from being in there that I left. And I cried on the way home and I was just like, oh, gosh, what you know, why do I feel like this and, but that was him breaking that off me. And so I never made another bet again, of course, you still have to deal with the issue of the money. And so I stayed at the casino until May of the following year when God gave me the vision for Testimony House. after praying for six months, God revealed to me that I would start a ministry, I knew it was God talking to me because I didn't really know what a ministry was. I was like a ministry, the only ministry I'd ever heard of at that point was the parking lot ministry. at my church, I was thinking, you want me to go wave at people like I don't know what that is, or how that's a job. But that's what I saw, I knew that it was him talking to me. And a few hours later, he gave me a download. And I've never experienced anything like this before since and he said, john, you're going to start a ministry, it's going to be called Testimony House, I was in the middle of dealing a poker hand at work, I stopped basically stopped the hand and everybody's just sort of looking at me and I take a pen that was sitting next to me and I start writing on my hand Testimony House, it's going to be a Christian Learning Center. And all these words are Greek to me, I don't know what Testimony House is as that's not something I've dreamed of, or thought of, or, you know, I had aspirations to be a musician, or maybe you play Christian music, if he was going to give me a plan. Those are my plans. His plan was for me to share my testimony, and start a ministry where we share the testimony of others. And I write books where I'm inspiring and encouraging others to walk out and find God's plan for the life. And that's those are the types of things that I'm writing down here on my hand and this poker table, because I don't want to forget what he's saying to me, I get home and I put them all in a Word document. And it's about 20 pages long. I've never done anything like this. And I start sharing it with some of the people from church and they're like this must be from God, because you're, you're too dumb to have thought of any of this basically, is the gist of their conversation to be like, and so it was such eye opening that oh my gosh, I found the vision that I've been praying for for six months. I don't know what it looks like, I don't know what's going to happen. But over the course of those six months, God had delivered me from the afflictions in my life. God had given me a new a new vision to walk towards in my life, I still had to pay down debt. You're right, Rodney, and it took me years of that. And you know, it wasn't until, in fact, the summer of last year that I finally became debt free. And so now I'm debt free walking in fullness of what God has for me in ministry. And in life. I have a family and a wife and three kids,
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's a couple of things. I just want to touch on there that you've talked about. And the first is the fact that you prayed constantly for six months. God give me a vision. And I'm wondering, firstly, do you think that people give up way too soon when they're praying for something that they might pray for a couple of days, maybe a few weeks? If they're being really persistent, it might be a month, but then it's like, well, God's not bringing it. And the other thing is the fact that the Holy Spirit was actually touching you on the shoulder and saying, Hey, this is time to give this up and then giving you the power to do that. Do you think so often We try and take the place of the Holy Spirit by telling people what they should and shouldn't be doing.
 
John Simmons 
Yeah, I'll start with that question first. So the Holy Spirit thing is it was so unique to me, because I remember having to ask people like, Is this normal? Like, it was so unusual for me to, like, hear that internal monologue that I knew wasn't my voice? And that's how I experienced the Holy Spirit, you know, these these just little phrases? Usually, it's a question like, why are you doing that, and these sorts of things. And so for us, we're just like, well, to stop gaming, why can't like I've tried, I'm saying that I still can't stop. Like, I need the Holy Spirit to show up and convict me and, you know, speak to me in a way that my mind needs to grasp the reality of the situation that I'm in. And it was so awesome for me to experience that I would encourage anybody who's like trying to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit to just like, what, usually when it's telling you to do something, you know, you shouldn't be doing that's probably him. And you just listen to some of that walk into instead of trying to like, self correct, because I self corrected for 10 years, Rodney, and nothing seemed to work, you know, my family tried to give me a self correct I was sent, I was one time sent to a psychiatrist where I was prescribed pills to stop me from gambling, and they definitely worked. But I also didn't want to leave my couch or work or live or do anything else. So they didn't really work as in terms of being able to correct my life. So all these things that I had done, none of them worked as good as is partnering with the Holy Spirit to walk in what he wanted me to do with my life. As far as the vision goes, I absolutely believe that a vision is the number one thing. This is my own personal opinion, a vision is the number one thing that can help someone in any issue of their life. Whether it is you know, you're sick, and you need to find a vision to be healed, or someone in your family, or whether it's a you're an addict, and you need to have a vision of not being an addict. And you need to figure out what God's plan is for your life so that you could walk further in that. And for me, the desire to pray was well, first off, it came because I didn't know what else to pray. No one had taught me how to pray for anything besides vision and food. And so I was like, well, these are the things that I pray for. But it was such a hunger for me because I had nothing else. I had nothing else in my life. And I was so desperate for it. And you see this often in the Bible, the stories of the people who are like Daniel, fasting, fasting, fasting, fasting, and praying, fasting and praying, and he was so desperate to get out of his situation. And so many times you see this in other Bible people, that's what I was experiencing, I was so desperate to find what God had for me because Jesus died on the cross for me. And I recognize that now, I asked for forgiveness of my sins. But he was asking for more he was asking us to take up our cross and walk with he's asking us to walk in love and demonstrate the power of the Holy Spirit. And all these different things in the Bible were talks about like your next steps. I was like, I want to do that for him. He died for me, I want to give my life to Him. And so for me, I was like, I'm gonna find it, I'm going to go chase this vision, I'm gonna pray for it everyday, I'm going to believe for it, I started writing things down. And in the midst of all that, I will let you know that I I stepped out on my own a couple times trying to be like, well, maybe this is what he wants me to do. And so I tried a series of things, including trying to be a stand up Christian comedian, including trying to write Christian music and starting a Christian band. I tried to start a Christian podcast, and I did all these things that I thought was God speaking to me. But it wasn't, it was me trying to fill in from God, when you hit when I heard from God, I knew it was God, it was something way bigger than anything I could have planned for myself. That's how you know it's him, because you're going to need help from others to do it. The other thing is going to be probably be something you don't necessarily want to do in a million years, I would have never expected to be brought in, sit in a ministry and lead a ministry. Now that I'm in it, I realized that Oh, my goodness, I have been made and created and designed specifically for this. And I got when I finally read Ephesians 2:10 and said, You are God's handiwork created to be used by God for great things. Through Jesus Christ. I was just like, this is what I've been created to do like this, is it? I know that this is it. And so for people who are giving up on their visions, yes, I absolutely would agree with you that so many of us, we don't see it overnight. And that as time passes, it becomes so easy to let go of the things that are important to you. Because you're just not seeing any fruit in that area. We give up so often on vision. But if you just press and you say God, I want this so bad and you don't give up and you don't let those prayers go. Imagine the moment you can have where God gives you a revelation where this is the answer to your prayer. This is the healing you've been praying praying for this is the vision of a career that you've been praying for this is the vision of unlocking the salvation for your child has been such a trouble and hasn't been able to get saved or set free from the damage they've done in their own lives. All of these things can happen if you just don't give up Never give up on that prayer.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that there are several different aspects to Testimony House so the ministry that God asked you to set up maybe you can give us a thumbnail sketch of what Testimony House is all about.
 
John Simmons 
Testimony House we call it a Christian Learning Center. Our Our objective is twofold. One is to lead the loss to Christ and we believe we're doing that mainly through creating testimonial videos and books and doing podcasts like this where I either either share my testimony or Share the testimony of others. We do long form testimonial videos. We do short form testimonial videos, we do books that have testimonies in them. All these things are to encourage someone who doesn't know Jesus to find Jesus, someone who is dealing with something and wants to have an aspiration of faith and their own heart. They can overcome or get through or find Jesus in those types of moments for themselves. The second part of our ministry is that we wanted, we call it finding God's sentence for your life. But most people would say, your discipleship, or they would say, finding God's plan and purpose for your life. So we want people to get saved, and then we want them to find what God has for them. We created in the last two years, a studio here in my house where we create live stream content, we invite other ministries to come in and share the messages that God has put on their heart. We do videos, I've written several books, one book's called Finding Faith, and that articulates my path from gambling addict to being born again. And the one called God Has a Sentence for Your Life where I describe how you are step by step guide on finding God's plan for your life after you get born again. And so mostly what we're doing is online videos right now. And we would like to do more events and things in the future. I am sure that there are people listening right now, who want to find out more about this, where's the easiest place for people to track you down? testimonyhouse.org is the website where you can take a 12 question quiz and find out where you are on your path to writing God's sentence. If you want to see any of our video resources, we've merged everything into YouTube, all of our videos, all of our content that has been currently distributed as on our YouTube channel, it's youtube.com/testimonyhouseorg
 
Rodney Olsen 
So there's a couple of easy ways to find you. And we will put links to those URLs in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net, so people can find them there. But John it has been a delight to speak to you to hear about the transformation that you have you experienced, there can be no doubt that something amazing has happened in your life, and you're continuing to share that to so many people. So I want to thank you for spending some time sharing that story here on Bleeding Daylight,
 
John Simmons 
Been a pleasure and honor I thank you so much, Rodney, for having me on today.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

In recent years, we've seen a growing interest in what many refer to as true crime. There are blogs, books, podcasts, television shows, and more dedicated to delving into the details of real crimes, and in many cases seeking resolution for previously unsolved crime. Lori Morrison takes us deep into the world of true crime. Lori is a paralegal and a licensed private investigator. Her podcast, The Unlovely Truth, is dedicated to exploring the intersection of faith and true crime.
 
https://www.theunlovelytruth.com/
https://www.facebook.com/theUnlovelyTruth
https://www.instagram.com/theunlovelytruthpodcast/
lori@heunlovelytruth.com
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening. Please connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and please share this and other episodes with others.
 
Our guest today takes us deep into the world of true crime. As a private investigator she’s seen the best and worst of people. I’ll introduce you in just a moment.
 
In recent years, we've seen a growing interest in what many refer to as true crime. There are blogs, books, podcasts, television shows, and more dedicated to delving into the details of real crimes, and in many cases seeking resolution for previously unsolved crime. My guest on Bleeding Daylight today is Lori Morrison, a paralegal and a licensed private investigator. Her podcast, The Unlovely Truth is dedicated to exploring the intersection of faith and true crime. Lori, thank you for your time today.
 
Lori Morrison 
Well, it's a pleasure to be here, Rodney.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to explore the reasons that people seem so fascinated by the dark world of crime and maybe the best place to start is asking, what is it about crime that actually fascinates you?
 
Lori Morrison 
That is a great question. I cannot remember a time when I wasn't interested in mysteries. You know, I started out with the little kid mysteries, the Encyclopedia Browns, and the Nancy, Drews and all that and then got into more literary I guess, if you will more adult things with Earl Stanley Gardner and Agatha Christie, and those just always fascinated me as puzzles. And when you look at true crime, I think that puzzle factor is still there. And the whole psychological aspect of what could possibly drive a person to behave this way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you think there's something in there that makes us wonder, what's going on in that person's mind? Am I someone who could actively carry out a crime like that? Is there something deep within me, do you think that there's something of that, in the whole sense of of wanting to tune into true crime?
 
Lori Morrison 
Exactly. Because at our core, we want to think, why I'm different from that person, I could never do that. Or that could never happen to me. You know, we're all the same. We all have a broken nature. And you know, the Bible tells us that our hearts are all dark. And without God, there's nothing good in us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you think sometimes it becomes a little bit morbid for people that they're wanting to find too many details? Or is that part of the the interest that we have into wanting to know it all?
 
Lori Morrison 
I think it can get too morbid. I know that I have worked a case where people have publicly shared autopsy photos and that's absolutely no one needs to see that, you know, the family really didn't even want to see that you're at your absolute most vulnerable at that point. You know, what, what's left of you here on earth. And so, you know, people using that to hurt other people, or to be sensationalistic or to just have clickbait to get people to look at things, you know, really appealing at the darkest aspects of our nature. I really try to stay away from that type of thing. I want to talk about the issues that are important to understanding why things happened. Understanding, is there a way we can protect ourselves and our loved ones? And is there an avenue of service that we can be involved in? to help prevent these things from happening? Again,
 
Rodney Olsen 
There are a lot of people delving into True Crime through a range of podcasts these days and I wonder how many of those people are actually reaching out to the victims of the crimes to the families and seeking permission or just going here? And this comes down to that question that you're mentioning, of how much should we share?
 
Lori Morrison 
I agree. And I I've done a mix of both if, of course, my podcast is based on true crime books, because I just I love books. And I thought that would be an interesting way to choose issues to talk about. And I have had victim's family members on my podcast, you know, you have to think about what is your motivation? Why are you doing what you're doing? And I actually had started out, I was just gonna do a little True Crime book review, you know, this one is balanced and victim centric, this one's exploitative, and kind of tried to steer people that way. But a very good friend of mine, we were talking about how I was getting things set up. And she said, You know, there's a lot of noise out there in the true crime world. And there certainly is, like you said in your introduction, TV shows, documentaries, movies, podcasts, books, it's everywhere. And she said, the thing that makes you different Lori, and that would bring a unique perspective is your faith. And she was exactly right. And so I pivoted just a little bit. I still use the books because I just I love the books. But I tried to just kind of summarize a story, because we were a people that love stories. And that's how Jesus taught as well. And I tried to pull out larger themes, whether it be forgiveness, retaliation, whatever that book really highlights, and talk about how that can apply to our lives in any area of our lives, because most of us, thank goodness are not going to run into a serial killer in our lives. Most of us are only going to meet maybe touched, kind of at the edge of something. And so I wanted to give people that sense of again, how do you make sense of this? How do you maybe protect yourself and your loved ones. But I want people to understand that there are simple things they can do to be of service, I call it being a true crime hero. You can do things that help victims that help maybe prevent some future victimization, and even help maybe, and this is a hard one to swallow the perpetrators. Because God loves them. He doesn't love what they did. But he loves them in the same way he loves us. And we're all created in his image.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's so much he there that I want to draw around. And maybe before we go there, I'll ask this question. We see so many programs, there's CSI programs, and all sorts of other things that we've seen on TV over various years, NCIS, and all these different things which are about solving crimes, and even back in the day of just good old fashioned murder mystery, which are fiction. Do you think sometimes the lines blur and so when we're actually getting involved in something that happened to someone that we blur the line, because we're so used to these mysteries as entertainment,
 
Lori Morrison 
I think that can definitely happen. And of course, it's it's pretty well known the CSI effect. It's even affecting juries, everybody expects that there are going to be fingerprints and DNA, and surveillance camera footage and that's just not always the case. fingerprints in usable form, aren't that easy to recover, they get smudged, they get smeared. If it's a potential offender who has been around that victim, maybe they live in the same house, their friends they visited, of course, there's going to be fingerprints, DNA is only going to help you if you have a sample to compare it against. It's not as easy to solve a lot of these crimes as people think. But then on the flip side, some of them are a little easier to understand what probably happened, but difficult to prove in court. And I think that frustrates people, you know, the rules in our justice system, where certain things are admissible, certain things aren't. And I get that frustration, I really do. But you've got to protect the rights of the accused. Because someday that might be you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How do you as a person of faith, managed to continue to surround yourself by this darkness of true crimes and some fairly despicable things happening to other people to victims? And yet hold on to your faith? How do you surround yourself with all of this darkness, and yet still talk about the light,
 
Lori Morrison 
You do have to be very intentional about working that through. So I make sure I'm staying in the Word, I'm having my time with God, staying in community that is very, very important, having other believers around you that they're bringing other perspectives into your life. And I think for me, what really helps is something that a victim's mother said to me, I was interviewing her, she was telling me her daughter's story. And she had actually become a victims advocate she was working with and for other families who had gone through similar situations. And I asked her, how difficult is that for you? Does that just constantly bring up your own pain and your own tragedy? You know, how do you do that? And she said, Oh, it heals my heart. I was so blown away with that amazing perspective. But she's right. In any type of situation, when we get too involved in self, that darkness is going to stay as a cloud around us. But it's by stepping out. It's by helping others. It's by focusing on other's needs. Because the darkness never leaves on its own. The light has to come in and drive it away. And so I try to remind myself, that that's what I'm doing. It's not about being stuck in the darkness. It's about needing to go there because without me bringing the light into it. It's not going to go anywhere.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that there are some of these television shows that have changed our perception What really happens and so we expect there to be perfect sets of fingerprints everywhere, and DNA that automatically matches and and it's in the system. But of course, one of those other areas where we have got a wrong perception at times I'm sure is that of the private investigator, there are magic life that that is tell us what it's really like,
 
Lori Morrison 
Well, it's definitely not like Magnum PI, he kind of want to blend in, you don't want to be driving the flashy car and wearing the the loud, bright clothes. So you know, that's fun to watch on TV. But I try to really, really blend in. I try to be unmemorable, if you will. And it's not glamorous, I've I've done surveillance before where you sit, and you sit, sit for long periods of time, waiting for something to happen. Because you can't always predict when people are going to do what it is you want them to do. The hardest thing for me is, if you're interviewing an individual, it really depends on your circumstances. But a lot of times you're trying to get information from individuals, and you don't really necessarily want them to know why you want it. And so you come up with what we call a pretext, you give them a reason to talk about something that's slightly different from your, your actual motive, and trying to be sympathetic and warm and draw information out of people that you feel may have done some fairly horrible things. That's not always easy. But I think you see on TV, you know, people are coming in, and they're being really aggressive, and they're demanding answers, and the people fold and give it to them. I have not really found that that works. Well. I think you come in with a softer approach. You're sympathetic, I apologize a lot. I'm so sorry to be bothering you really try to put people at ease. Sometimes in an unguarded moment, they'll tell you something that they don't really realize, has given something away.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I do remember being a jury in a court case quite some time ago, and watching the prosecution talking to to the witness who was the defendant. And it was quite interesting to see just some of the almost, you know, passing by kind of questions that were asked, and I just kept thinking that's gonna come back and most of the time it did. So I imagine it is the same as you say that you're asking questions, that the person that you're talking to isn't necessarily imagining that this is going to be a key piece of evidence.
 
Lori Morrison 
Right. It's interesting, though, I did have one person that the minute they said something, they realized that they shouldn't have said it. And their body language and their facial expression, and even a quick intake of breath. You knew, okay, that information is important, because she just realized she should not have shared that, from her perspective,
 
Rodney Olsen 
As a person of faith. you're wanting to do the right thing to to be an honest person, obviously. So where do you draw the line with the ends justifying the means? So you're having to come up with a pretext, which is not necessarily what you're really there for? How do you draw that line for yourself as a person of faith?
 
Lori Morrison 
That's a great question. And nobody has ever actually asked me that. So I'm glad you did. I try very hard not to lie. Because just from a practical standpoint, when you start telling lies, you have to remember what you told who. And the truth is just always easier to remember, what I tend to do is make kind of open ended statements, and allow people to interpret them the way they want to. And then as you see that they're thinking that the conversation is coming from a certain point of view, you just, you just kind of roll with that. If I actually have to tell something that is not entirely true. Again, I try to stay as close to the truth as I possibly can. But I also try to remember Rahab, you know, she missed directed the soldiers away from the spies. And that was credited to her as righteousness, because her larger purpose was God's work and having God's justice be done. And not that I am some agent of God and in some kind of, you know, overblown way, but God uses people that is how he often does his work in our world. and so I just tried to remember the bigger picture of what I'm trying to do, and why I'm trying to do it and who I'm doing it for not only my clients, who are victims, but also a God who loves justice.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Again, to contrast the wonderful world of television, which is where most of us get our information on these things. In the real world, of course, on the TV, the cases that private investigators take are always involving a millionaire and, and there are all these hard cases to crack, I would imagine that the sort of cases that you have to take on a quite different to that what would an everyday case be that you would need to take on as an investigator?
 
Lori Morrison 
Well, I have yet to work with any millionaires. So we can dispel that myth pretty quickly. Unfortunately, a lot of people that I'm working with are folks that are just broken, because they feel like the system has let them down. Maybe someone whose loved one has passed, and there was no real investigation, they just quickly said, Oh, this is a suicide, we don't really need to look into things. And the family says, but when I look at the circumstances, and I know my loved one, I just I don't believe that's true. So sometimes it's families that are just wanting more information, to either confirm that determination, or if that determination is not correct, they want justice for their loved one. And they want to take back a narrative that was false. So I've done a lot of work in that area. Sometimes I'm working with attorneys in civil suits. So that's a little bit of the more mundane, where you might have some surveillance, that kind of thing. So it's a pretty mixed bag, but it's not ever really movie worthy from a Hollywood standpoint. Now, from a human standpoint, I think these stories are incredibly compelling, and actually would make good documentary type series again, to to educate people on if your loved one has been a victim of a crime. Here's some things that you need to be doing, to make sure that an investigation is staying on track, and doing everything that needs to be done. Because you know, police departments can get overwhelmed, they just don't have the time to devote to every case that comes their way. It could be a type of crime, that doesn't happen in that jurisdiction very often. And you just don't have officers with the training and experience to look into that particular type of incident. Just a lot of different factors. A lot of times, it's just helping families walk through this and get answers that they are wanting.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So let's take those examples you're talking about. Sometimes if if a client comes to you and says, look, the police have said that my loved one has suicided below, I believe that there's something more in it, or a case like that, and you're trying to exonerate the person who has passed away from what they've been accused of doing. Oftentimes, I'm sure that you're able to come up with that evidence. And that's a great relief for the client. But there's obviously other times where the evidence that presents actually confirms the police's case, how do you comfort a client when you come to them and say, Look, I'm sorry, but this is how it happened.
 
Lori Morrison 
That's a tough one. I've had my my arms around clients while they cried. And you just, you just have to be there for them. There's, there's really nothing you can do in that moment, that's going to fix anything. And I think a lot of us are fixers, we want to be able to step in and do something to make it better for them. And if we don't think that we can, then we tend to shy away and not do anything. What I've found with a lot of these families is they just want to be heard, they want to be told that they're not crazy for thinking what they thought, even if things are are looking like they were wrong, because that's going to be most families natural tendency. You know, my loved one didn't do this. You know, you just you have to be willing to sit with them while they absorb that. You have to be willing to just let them talk, let them cry, let them do whatever they need to do. And let them know that they're not alone.
 
Rodney Olsen 
A lot of the trouble that people find themselves in, as we have said, or what more mundane than the sorts of things that that we might imagine even coming down to the fact that there are disputes between neighbors. And we hear about this all the time. Have you ever had to intervene in that sort of a case,
 
Lori Morrison 
Actually a couple and one of them was quite scary because the neighbor had a family member that lived with them that we weren't certain was entirely stable, and they had access to a lot of weapons, and routinely liked to just shoot those weapons kind of wherever they were. The neighbors felt very He threatened certain actions that had happened, I understood why they felt threatened. And so drying to step in law enforcement was getting a little tired of being called out, didn't really see this as a problem. And so just just working with them to maybe almost be a go between. And of course, civil litigation is always a good opportunity to let cooler heads decide what should be done. Because a lot of times, people wait until things just get so heated, that the parties themselves really have no good way of working out their differences. But if you can say, you know, look, there's been this type of civil wrong, let's see how the system handles it. And then we will live by whatever is decided in that venue. And sometimes even if somebody thinks criminal behavior has been possibly involved, and the police have not uncovered what they think is enough to move forward in that direction. civil litigation can help there as well. If you have McCollum torts and civil litigation a civil wrong as opposed to a criminal wrong. If you have a tort, you think you can prove a lot of times if you can get that into civil court, that gives you the opportunity to explore other investigative avenues, you can serve subpoenas for documents, or you can hold depositions where you're able to compel sworn testimony. So that venue is very, very helpful. And so with my background as a paralegal, also, I do work with attorneys. And hopefully I can help again, kind of bridge that gap between them and their client. And also maybe save the client some money, litigation can be very expensive. And it's very unfortunate that families would have to pay out of their own pocket to do things that they felt like the authorities maybe should have done. And so if I can do some of kind of the heavy lifting, and then the, the attorney supervises it all and does all the final work on it, that can often help families in that way. And I'm glad that I'm able to do that as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Social media these days, has really cracked open the world to us in seeing what people's immediate reactions to things are. So we're not just having conversations with like minded people where we're seeing the whole thing broken open. And whenever we see a crime or reporting of a crime in social media, there is an overwhelming sense in the comments of just throw the book at them, they deserve this. And yet, you earlier mentioned that as people of faith, we need to be offering some sort of hope, or some sort of love to the perpetrators. How do we do that? How do we keep that balance between bringing justice in a situation, and yet still honoring and loving someone who has done the wrong thing?
 
Lori Morrison 
I will admit that that is very hard for me. Because when you're working with clients, you get emotionally attached to them. And so someone that has wronged them, it is very hard to to have warm and compassionate feelings for that person. So again, I think that's one of those things that you have to be very intentional about, you have to cultivate that mindset, because I don't think it's a natural mindset for most of us, because we do like vengeance and making things right and punishing bad people and rewarding good people. And it's just hardly ever that neat and tidy. You know, life is messy and when you're talking about criminal behavior, it gets even messier still. And so just remembering that, again, like we said before, deep down in all of us, is that broken nature, that sin nature that we all have that little darkness in us that were we to make a series of disastrous choices could lead us to some pretty dark places where we are really capable of doing things that we don't like to admit we're capable of doing. And so just trying to remember, this person is a dearly loved child of God, no less than I am. I may have made some better choices than this person did. But you know, sin is sin. There are issues in my life that God is highly displeased with. And so, just trying to remember that you're not better than that person, that you're maybe just making some better choices right now. your priorities are more aligned with God's and At the moment than this person, but you're not better, you're not more loved. So just being super, super intentional about remembering that it's, it's just the mindset that we bring to what we're doing. And it's hard.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You talk a lot about choices there. And I know that as you investigate cases, and as you say, You've become quite close to some of the clients and someone has done them wrong, or they times that you actually investigate, but you can start to see the circumstances that have led them to this dark place.
 
Lori Morrison 
Oh, for sure. And not that ever excuses what anybody does. I don't want people to think that I'm doing that. And it's never about blaming the victim, you know, you shouldn't have been involved with this person, or you shouldn't have been in this place. Nobody wakes up in the morning and says, I'm going to make a series of choices that will lead me to be a victim. Nobody does that. So I don't want people to think that victim blaming is ever appropriate. And typically, I find it so interesting, because we would never blame someone whose house got broken into. Well, why did you have that nice TV? Well, why did you not have a security system? We wouldn't do that. But especially sexual assault, physical assault, and homicide. There are times when we say, Well, you know, if you wouldn't have been there, if you wouldn't have done that. But like you said, on the flip side, you can start looking at these perpetrators. And you can say, okay, you made a lot of bad choices. But some of these choices were made for you, whether it was in your childhood, or whatever. And again, I don't want to say, you know, if you had a bad childhood, you get a free pass on whatever you do. But you can see where kind of the foundation of that was, was laid. And so one thing I like to really encourage people to do is, if you are someone that really likes the true crime genre, you want to make a difference in people's lives. But you don't want to do something crazy, like I did and go out and become a PI, I already take that kind of leap, mentor at risk youth. Those kids don't always have someone that is showing them what the better choice is. And so if you can be that person, whether it's through sports, or scouting, or youth group at church, or whatever it happens to be, if you can help those kids learn that there's a better way, learn how intentional you have to be to stay on that path, then you are making a difference.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that in your job, you must put yourself into risky situations, and there's probably quite often danger there. What are some of the most dangerous situations that you found yourself in?
 
Lori Morrison 
I actually try to avoid danger every time I possibly can. I am certainly not someone. Yes, thank you. I'm not someone that courts that. So there are cases I've actually turned down. Because I think that the personal danger is really more than I'm equipped to take on. There may be other people that are there better that they should be doing that particular case, probably the most dangerous one I've ever been involved with. Didn't seem that dangerous to begin with. And I was very fortunate. I was working with a team of investigators. And so they were mostly more experienced than I. So I was able to just really soak in their knowledge and their experience. They were all extremely kind, very mentoring. But we were working a case that had been a determination of suicide, the family, for good reason, did not believe it. And so we were investigating and doing some interviews. And it turned out that we found some information that there was perhaps some official cover up maybe possibly even misconduct and ties to some human trafficking. And that is a very dangerous area to work in. And we did not pursue that angle because it really didn't bear too much on the case itself. It was just kind of peripherally a part of it. I was very glad to be in a group. I try not to do a lot of things. One on one, if there might be any, any way that things are gonna go sideways. I usually take another investigator with me. My husband's gone with me before he's not an investigator, but he's just there to be a person because there's you know, so At a numbers, there are dangerous situations. And I let people that are better equipped than I to handle those maybe people that are ex military, ex police, that kind of thing. I do a lot of document recovery, that kind of that kind of evidence recovery, interviewing of witnesses. And a lot of times just writing out timelines, people have given different accounts of what happened. And when you start laying everything out and just writing it out in linear fashion, you realize, okay, I can't tell who's lying, but somebody's lying here. Because this could not have all happened the way everybody is explaining that it did. And so again, just kind of putting that puzzle together. A lot of investigative work is kind of behind the scenes like that,
 
Rodney Olsen 
In the middle of everything that you're discussing here. There's this internal scream for justice, and I can't help but think that this is really a part of the Father's heart. So I imagine that as you do spend that time in Scripture, as you do spend that time with God, there is something there that renews you to go back in as difficult as it may seem to actually see justice happen.
 
Lori Morrison 
I think a lot about Micah 6:8, where the writer says, What does your God one of you, He wants you to do justice, love, mercy, and walk humbly with your God. And so I try to balance those things. That, yes, we're going to seek justice. And yes, we're going to try to temper that with mercy. But most of all, we're going to be humble and realize that God is on the throne and is in control. And we're just trying to work out his purposes. And I've also come to learn, the longer I do this, is that justice can have different meanings. Not every case is going to be able to be resolved with this was the perpetrator, we bring them to court, we get a conviction. And then we go on with our lives, you're never going to be able to put a victim back in the position they were in before the incident happened to them. That would be true justice, restore everybody to where they were. That's simply not possible. So then we can look at our system of justice in whatever society we live in. And again, for different reasons. It's just not always possible to achieve that measure of justice. But some families find justice in knowing the truth. And again, being able to reclaim the narrative of what happened. If it's been put out there in a way that the family feels is false, or dishonouring.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We've tackled a lot of heavy stuff here. But I imagine that there are occasions when there is a lighter side to this investigation, or the humorous moments amongst all of the heaviness.
 
Lori Morrison 
Oh, sure. One of my favorites, the case that I talked about, where I worked with a group of investigators, we were from different parts of the country and media company had wanted to do a story on this. And so we volunteered our time, but they paid our expenses to come in and do this. And so we were all staying together at a giant Airbnb. And I remember, everybody came in different times of the evening, because we were coming from different places. And so the next morning, the first morning, we were all there together. We sat up in the dining room to kind of have a war room a little bit. We had already planned out what we were going to do. But we're just going over last minute things and did anything need to change and who was doing what and all that. And one of the investigators who is a security expert, he pulls a big like Rubbermaid tub out from under this table and sets it up on top and says, Okay, what does everybody want? And he pulls the lid off. And he said, I've got 22s, I've got this. And I'm thinking, I've never been to a staff meeting where they armed you. That was fascinating to me. And so I didn't carry anything my job in that particular operation was to kind of be the, the head of the nerve center, the operation center. So as people were going out, when they needed information, I was pulling information for them if they couldn't locate someone and they needed an alternate address. I was finding that for them and and keeping track of where everybody was because, you know, we were dealing with what we felt was criminal activity. And so you won't keep tabs on everybody. So that was my job. Kind of command central. But I did kind of geek out a little bit. And as we were going back to the airport, when everything was over, this particular investigator shared one of our rental cars back because his flight was at about the same time that ours was. And so I said, Can I carry one of the gun cases into the airport? Because I just want to be able to say that I did that. And he's like, Okay, if that makes you happy? Sure. And so I learned that when you take a gun into an airport, you immediately go to security, and declare, here's my gun, you take it, you know, there, there are little, little moments like that, that keep you sane.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Now, we've talked a lot about your work as an investigator, but coming right back to where we started, was talking about your podcast, and your your podcast is all about true crime and started out, as you mentioned, as really a book review of true crime books, and it's, it's gone from there. But I know that it's been very helpful for people, it hasn't just been something to entertain. But it's been something that has helped people along the way as well.
 
Lori Morrison 
Well, that is certainly my hope. And it's, it's so wonderful. When I hear from a listener, which I did, just a couple of weeks ago, I had done an episode about fraud. And the the crime itself was a man who not only committed fraud after fraud, but he was the first known person to use the internet, to lure victims, he was a serial killer as well. And so you know, we think of most serial killers as being kind of the roaming person that's out there looking for victims, he was just sitting at home, drawing them to himself through the internet. And so I interviewed a fellow PI, and she was also a fraud expert. And so like I said, before, you know, not many of us are going to encounter serial killers in our lives, hopefully. And so we talked about the fraud aspect for the listeners, what they could do to recognize fraud, protect themselves. And I had a listener, reach out to me over social media and said, Oh, I listened to that episode. And someone had tried to scam me. And now I know where I can go, to get resources to protect myself. That is what it's all about protecting ourselves protecting our loved ones. And I also try to encourage people again, step up and get involved, there are so many ways that you can make a difference in victims lives, or in heading off people, hopefully, being a victim, that are easy, they're safe, and they involve skills you already have. And so trying to encourage people, making them aware of wonderful nonprofits that they might be able to get involved with. And even something just as simple as sharing a podcast episode. I do highlight unsolved crimes, from time to time. And just sometimes getting that information out in the public. Someone who knows something, may say, oh, gosh, I didn't even realize that was still unsolved. Maybe I should tell the police this. Or maybe it's been a cold case where you were close with the perpetrator. And so you know, some things well, now that relationship has soured, you're not so close, maybe you're ready to talk. You know, I don't want it to be just entertainment. And I hate to even use that word, but I want the entertainment value, the knowledge value of the stories, to bring people in to listen. And then I want to bring in a mix of wonderful guests who have all this knowledge and all the the resources that I don't have, that we can share with people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm sure that talking to a lot of the people that you do on the podcast, is actually helping you to sharpen your skills as an investigator as well.
 
Lori Morrison 
Oh, for sure. One of the favorite sayings I have is, we're all smarter together than any of us are by ourselves. And so I love a team approach in almost everything. These type of cases almost always take a team approach, the lone wolf PI, who can do it all by themselves. That is very rare, because I'm certainly not a ballistics expert. I'm not a forensic expert. I'm not a statement analysis expert. I'm learning just enough about all of these things. That when a case I have needs someone like that, I know who to go to.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If people are wanting to find The Unlovely Truth, your podcast, where's the easiest place for them to go?
 
Lori Morrison 
It's on Podbean, Apple, Stitcher. Most of your your major podcast hosts have picked it up. You can find it there. You can go to my website, theunlovelytruth.com. The episodes are all there. You can also email me, lori@heunlovelytruth.com or you can find me on Facebook at The Unlovely Truth or Instagram, The Unlovely Truth Podcast.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And Lori we will put links to those various places to get in touch with you in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net. But I've got to say it has been an absolute delight to speak to you to get some of your knowledge of places that most of us don't go. But thank you so much for your time today.
 
Lori Morrison 
Thank you and thank you for your podcast. You have had some fascinating guests on that are educating people in all kinds of different areas. So you're doing a real public service and I appreciate it.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Yvonne Rempel faced trauma from the day she was born. Her childhood left her with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Following a difficult upbringing, she experienced a life transformation in her early 20s. She’s come a long way since then and now helps others break free from their past to become the person they were meant to be. She co-founded Damascus Experience and co-hosts the podcast On the Road to Damascus.
 
https://www.damascusexperience.com/
https://www.damascusexperience.com/podcast
https://beacons.page/DamascusExperience
https://www.facebook.com/DamascusExperiences
https://www.instagram.com/damascusexperience/
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Welcome to Bleeding Daylight. Please remember to share this episode with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. You can follow Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts. It's free and it'll ensure you never miss an episode.
 
My guest today faced trauma from the day she was born. Her childhood left her with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. How do you come back from such a harsh upbringing? We’ll find out soon.
 
Today's guest had a difficult upbringing before beginning a life transformation in her early 20s. That was quite a number of years ago and she’s come a long way since then. She now helps others break free from their past to become the person they were meant to be. She co founded Damascus Experience, which we'll explore a little later and co hosts the podcast On the Road to Damascus. It's my great honor to introduce you to Yvonne Rempel. Yvonne, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Hi, thanks for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned that your upbringing was difficult. But that probably doesn't even come close to describing your early years helped me understand what life was like for you as a child.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Well, my early years were difficult. I have ... My psychologist has said PTSD because I had numerous traumatic experiences as a young child. So my upbringing was very unusual. My mother, when the day that I was born, my mother didn't want me, my stepfather named me, my grandmother gave me my middle name. And then they sent me home with my mom. So that was a pretty rough start to to a beginning, that should have been such a joyous occasion. And then I found that, you know, by the time I was aged five, that there was a way to behave so that you didn't get repercussions. So you weren't beaten, so that you weren't called names. So that those moments that happened, you know, you just learnt to protect yourself as a child really early on, so that you didn't have to encounter that type of abuse. So yeah, my childhood was was pretty rough and very different than most people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're talking about postnatal depression, perhaps, at the start, but obviously, it's more than that if this has gone on, and you've had to learn to behave in a certain way. So was that the start of it? Or was it just that your mother didn't want children at all?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
No, actually, my mum went on to have four more children. My mom had me under certain circumstances that were not great and those circumstances have actually been a secret even to this day. So I don't really know the reason and having to live with the unknown, and not understanding why these things were happening over and over and over again, really played a part in my childhood. You know, when when I tell my own kids when they were younger? Hey, there's a reason why you're doing this. So this is how we adjust this is how we correct there was never any direction on how to correct something, because they never knew what I did.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That makes life very difficult. Was that kind of abuse coming both from your mum and your stepdad or is this just something that your mum played out in your life in those early years?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
My mom was the biggest factor, my stepdad was actually only in my life for another three years after I was born. And then there was another step that that came into my life at 12 years old. So the majority of the time was just in my mum, me and I had two siblings at the time. So the abuse was predominantly me and her. And when she would get frustrated with the other kids, I already knew enough to step in, and directed at me so that they didn't have to suffer those consequences. Because they didn't know what they did wrong. You know, you're a child and you accidentally drop something or you accidentally break something, or it's an accident, you clean it up and you move on. But the consequences is being slapped in the face or thrown across the room or locked in a bedroom with no food, those types of consequences. You know, you never understand them. Because when you have friends, and they tell you the things that happen in their home, we don't understand it. So my mind just never wrapped around why those things were happening.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that you're someone who feels very deeply and it seems that this is something that started at a young age because you had the courage to step in and take punishment that wasn't yours, even at that early age to protect the rest of the family. Do you recognize that as something that is outstanding for a child of that age?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Yes, I do. I didn't realize that at the time. To me that was a normal behavior. This is what you do. When you have siblings, you protect them that that all costs. And then you don't realize it until later on when you start having your own family and you realize children shouldn't have to protect each other from their parents this this should be the safe place for them. So you know when people tell me stories of my childhood and how I would do certain things, the most of the key word is that I was adaptable to every situation that I was in because I was protecting those around me, and I was trying to protect myself.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did you start to realize you mentioned talking to your friends, you realize that that wasn't the same situation for them at home. So when did you start to realize that what you were experiencing was not normal?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
I started experiencing that when our Child Family Services started showing up at my school, probably about grade one or grade two, they started arriving at the school and they started talking to me. The only thing with that is that every time they came in, they talked to me, we moved in, we switch schools, every time there was an incident and my mom got caught, we moved. So it became very difficult for an organization that's supposed to protect you can they can protect you if they can't find you. And so that became a recurring theme, right, where we went into running and hiding, so that nobody else knew what was happening. So there was shame that was coming out of what was happening. But then also a lack of understanding that was happening.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at the same time, this is the age where most of us start to form friendships that are going to last, if not forever, for at least a number of years, where we can feel that security outside the family at least. And you were even being robbed of this.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Yeah, I didn't have friends and having friends was very difficult for me. I wasn't allowed to do things that most kids were, you know, on top of making sure that my brother and sisters were taking care of, you know, I took care of them. You know, when they came home from school, I made their home, I did their homework with them. I made sure they were bathed, I cleaned the house, I did the laundry. So in essence, by the time I was seven years old, I was raising two other children, the mothering instinct, that should have been something that I gotten when I had my first child actually kicked in for me, at seven years old.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you're in those very early years, as life progresses, you come to that stage of adolescence of trying to find your own way. How did it play out for you, in those sorts of years,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
We talk about the destruction of a childhood, you know, when there's abuse, and there's trauma, and there's things like that, but but there's structure, right? So I knew my part I played, I knew those moments that I needed to be there, I knew all of that. And so at 17, I was kicked out of the house, and I went on a very destructive path. Because I didn't have no options. I had no structure. I didn't know who I was, other than, you know, raising my brothers and sisters, you know, other than trying to please my mother. When I left home, and I was out in the world, I got into some things that, you know, those are the kinds of things that you don't really want people to get into, you know, drugs and drinking. And I tried to find my worth. And I tried to find my place, you know, with other people, with friends with men, you know, it was a very destructive time in my life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And how was that separation from you, and your siblings, you spent all these years where you're trying to protect them, and you're effectively being a mum, in absence of your own mother doing that task? How did it feel when you were wrenched away from them,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
it was actually very difficult. So when I left my home, I never went back. And I spent many, many years not talking to my mother. And to this day, I still don't talk to her. But my siblings, it took them at least a good seven to eight years to understand that I was allowed to leave, and that the emotions they felt when I left, it was not my fault. And so we had to come to an understanding that I was not their mom. But they were extremely devastated. And they blamed me for everything that happened after I left because I was supposed to be there to protect them.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So again, they feeling not quite sure where to turn and and blaming you for and I've heard this before of people who have got out of a situation or being kicked out of home. And yet the story that's being told back at home is is quite different. And again, it is part of that manipulation. So from what you've understood from what your siblings have told you, that manipulation continued, even against you at that stage.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Yeah, and it still continues to this day from my understanding. But definitely in the first couple years, when I left, there was rules, like you're not allowed to say my name. All the pictures in the house of me were removed. So there was a manipulation that was happening, and I was made up to be the bad guy for everything that was happening because I was the one who left
 
Rodney Olsen 
And all this time you're trying to find your sense of self, your sense of identity, and trying to at least Please someone and this is, as you've said, leading you down destructive paths. When did you know that you had hit rock bottom,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
I knew I hit rock bottom when I actually woke up in a place that I didn't know, after a couple of days that I didn't remember, this epiphany kind of struck me going, this is not the life that I fought my entire life. You know, going through my life, I had this intuition, this guiding, you know, where I would go to school, but I would get good grades, because one day I was going to go to university and I was going to protect other kids in the world, or one day, I was going to do something good with my life, because out of this bad, there had to be something good coming out of it. And so when I, when I was growing up, I was very, I was guided by this deep intuition, you know, of right or wrong and how I should move and, and where I should go and the person I wanted to be. And when I fell out of that structure, I really, really lost that. And I lost that intuition, because they started doing drinking, and I started doing drugs to numb all the pain that came crashing down out of that structure. So when I hit that rock bottom, I sat there and I said, this was not how this was supposed to go. I didn't live my whole life fighting for something to end up going down the the wrong path that I wanted to go,
 
Rodney Olsen 
we can put up with an awful lot in life if there is just a little bit of hope. And it sounds like that intuition that you had, there was a sense of hope in there. Do you believe at that stage, you had lost that hope? Or was there a moment within that sense of rock bottom, that there was still hope that you had turned things around?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
No, I definitely lost that hope. I lost a vision of a future. And that's really what it what it was, you know, when I was living at home, even going through those moments of abuse, or things that shouldn't have been happening, there was still a hope that one day I was gonna leave, one day I was gonna do better. One day, I do better by my own self. But when you hit that rock bottom, you just you lose all of that sense of hope you lose yourself, you lose your vision for your future. And when you don't have that to really you cling on to what's the point of just trying to do anything with your life?
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've woken up in a place that you don't know, there's days missing in your memory, that you just don't know, what has happened? Where do you move from there?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Well, it actually it took me a little while to move from that point, you know, my deep sense of being needed and worth, you know, was still wrapped up in people. So I would do anything to do to please people, because it really I really needed that in my life. That was my that was my sole identity was being worthy. And so you know, it didn't really turn around until I actually got pregnant with my first child at the age of 18.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was it then that you realized, I'm now responsible for another life? I need to clean up? What caused you to start to turn things around? Because you'd been responsible for children before they weren't yours? They were your siblings. But you still spiraled out of control? What was it that was different this time?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
You know, honestly, there wasn't much of a difference. I guess it was really in shock. Number one, because he I shouldn't have gotten pregnant. And number two, it was never in my plan to have kids, because I never ever want any children in the world to ever experience what I experienced. So in my plan that I had in my life, I was never going to have children. Never. So when I got pregnant, and I was like, Oh, well, I knew instantly I knew I needed to be responsible. I knew I wanted to do different for this child. And so I needed to start going the right direction and start cleaning up my life. enough that I could help this child have a better upbringing than I did.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you're still in your late teens, how do you start to form a new life when you've really come from this destructive past? And you're trying to find a better way forward? How do you start to make that happen?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
At first, I tried to do it on my own. I tried to put in rules I tried to put in structure. So I tried to really build a structure in my life again, right because it was the time that I was, even though he wasn't thriving. It was a time where there was structure and I kind of knew who it was. So I started putting the structure in place. But when I put this structure in place, I had a lot of baggage I realized that came with it. And there was a lot of things have never been dealt with in my life. And so here I am at 18 you know i shortly turned him 19 right after I have my boyfriend who's sitting beside me, though the father of our child, you know, we're sitting in this apartment and we're like, now what do we do? You know, how do we move forward? Because this was never in the plan for either one of us, how do we move forward. And so at the time, we were living a couple provinces away from our family. And so we moved back closer to his side of the family, learning that there is families that live very differently than you. I remember, I walked in when I met his family, and I went, see you guys sit up the table to eat suffered together, you guys talk to each other. That's a real thing. How composites and plant pants are not flying at each other. When you're arguing like, there's another way to live, I started realizing that the way that I grew up was not normal. And that there was other people who experience life vastly different than I did, which I kind of had a little bit understanding. But now I'm looking through different eyes. And so I started looking at other people around me and other families around me going, how do you do that. And what I did is I started imitating them, and how they lived a life, because I liked the way they were doing it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And some of his hope is now starting to return. Because you can see that it is possible to live in a different way. You said you started with structure. But obviously that's not going to take you all the way what else happened in your life, that was going to start making things turn around for you,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
I started learning that there is people who want to be in your life, not to take things from you. And what I mean by that is that there's people who want to be in your life in a relationship without needing to have a transaction have some kind of relationship with you. And that was really started when my so my boyfriend, he's not my husband, but at the time, he had an encounter with God. And he started going back to church, and he would take our son with him at six months old. And he said, Do you want to come to church with me? And I said, Nope, I've never been a church in my life. I'm pretty sure it's the weirdest thing in the world. They're going to know I'm weird. So I'm not going to go. He said, Can I go with our son? Would that be okay? And I said, Okay, that's good. I'll have Sunday mornings to myself, you go to church. So he started doing that. And then he started going to church and then going to his mom and dad's house for one chapter. And then I was like, Well, why am I being all alone, sitting here, I want to have lunch over there. So then what we did is that I would go with him to his mom and dads before he went to church. And then I would stay in their house until they were back from church so that I can have lunch with them. So I started doing this, this weird kind of dipping my toe in, something's different. I don't really understand it, it's going to blow my structure that I carefully put in place. And then one day, my father in law said to me, You know, I know that you don't like to go with us to church, because you don't know anybody. But I'm a long distance trucker. If I come off the road, I don't really know anybody. Would you go to church with me on the days that I'm off the road? And I'm thinking in my head church once every four weeks, okay, well, that's the price I'll pay so that I can hang out with everyone, because I really didn't want to be alone. And then I started going to church. You know, people say that they have these encounters the moment they walk through the door and I tell you from the moment I walked through the door, I had an encounter where God spoke to me and I don't think from that moment I was ever the same.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What do you feel God was saying to you in that moment, when you walk through the doors of that church, that you resisted so much? What was this message that God was giving to you?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
The message the pastor was speaking that day was on forgiveness. The reason I never wanted to walk into the church is because I didn't feel like I belonged. I felt like there was a lot of things I did that I didn't deserve to be one of those Christian people who sat in a pew on Sunday, right? I lived a hard life. I did things that, you know, people would be appalled by and I was like, they can't they're there's no way that they would accept me. You know, I'm a lost cause. I'm one of those people that they talk to outside the church, but to actually be in a church that was I was like, No, and I sat down for my very first Sunday, and the pastor was preaching on forgiveness, and how Jesus atone for everyone sin, and how Jesus forgave everyone for what they did. And I was like, Who is this person who would forgive me who I have never known in my life and He would just forgive me, that doesn't make sense because that doesn't line up with anything I knew in my entire life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Forgiveness is an interesting thing. And you're starting to get this message. And you're starting to realize I need to respond to this in some way. And I want to explore that too. But I am interested, what was more difficult for you? Was it accepting the fact that there was a God who was prepared to forgive everything? forgive everything that you had done? Or was it actually starting to forgive some of the other people that had brought trauma into your life? Where do you think that tussle was for you?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
You know, the tussle actually was more that there was a God who loved me unconditionally and there was nothing I needed to do to earn it and that was the hardest thing I had to reconcile in my life. Because love for me, came at a cost in everything in my life, up to that moment, being loved, meant being abused by my mom, being loved, meant having to be the mom, to my brothers and sisters, being loved meant having to go a different direction in my life with my boyfriend, you know, so there was so many different things, love cost, something to me, it is was it was a something that has been in my life for many years. So when somebody told me that God loves me, and there was zero cost to that, I spent a good chunk of time reading the Bible, not to find out who God was. But to prove that there is no way that somebody loves you without a cost.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There are still many people today who would say that, there still is a cost that we still have to live for God's approval, and we have to work so hard at it. And yet the the message that I'm sure you found in those scriptures in the Bible, as you are reading it is that No, there's nothing we can do. That is going to earn us any more forgiveness.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Yeah, somebody who has ever read the Bible, it was a little bit shocking. When you open it up, and you read it, and you're like, Okay, so I'm gonna find all of this, it's a big book, you're gonna find something right? people disagree about the Bible all the time, they argue theology. And every time I read it every time I opened it up, and every time I looked at it, it was like, God was telling me, there's nothing you can do Yvonne, there's nothing you can do in your life, that would change my mind. And you don't have to earn it. You don't have to be somebody to on what I'm freely giving you. And so reconciling that in my life, and just accepting it was the biggest step I had to do in the process of healing, and forgiving other people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How long did it take for you to make a decision to accept all of this from that first time? When you walk through the doors? And you're confronted with this message about forgiveness? Was that the moment for you? Or did you continue to wrestle with this for a while, until you said, Yes, I'm ready to accept this.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
For me, I accepted Jesus, probably two weeks after I went to church. But I accepted it because I wanted to be part of the community. And then I was baptized three months later, because you know, reading the Bible, I went, people get baptized. So I'm going to do that also. And then it actually took quite a few years to fully comprehend what it meant to just live in his presence, and just to live with his unconditional love. And all through that time, like all those years that I wrestled with this and all those years, he was showing me in so many different ways, how he loved me, and that he wasn't requiring me to do anything in return for it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that must have been an enormous wrestle. Because you've been conditioned from the day you were born. That this is not how life is. And yet, there comes this powerful message of transformation that you finally start to accept and start to understand more and more what it's about, what did that do for your life, for your family, for your husband, for your child?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Well, I had a couple couple of really radical moments that really changed my life. And so one of them with my husband, you know, when you bring a lot of baggage into your marriage for both parties, and we really needed some counseling, uh, you know, so after being married for quite a few years, and I remember sitting in the counseling room with him. And there was two things my counselor said to me, number one, he said evil and I would never be married to you because I could never make you happy. And I realized that I viewed my husband as a knight in shining armor to save me from my terrible life that I lived because that was the fantasy that I escaped from when I was a child. And that's how I viewed him as the person who had saved For me, and I put all my hopes and dreams on him, which was, you know, very unhealthy and very damaging to our relationship. And when he said that, I realized that my happiness didn't come from him, it came from me, and that I had to be responsible for making my own self happy. And then the second thing for my own children, and I remember this, so clearly, it was three o'clock in the morning, we just we had a campfire the night before. And a three o'clock in the morning, I was woken up. And I could hear God was telling me I want to talk to you. And so I go outside, it's a beautiful summer day in Canada, right? It's Summer Night in Canada, it's so dark, the stars are out, I go by the fire, the embers are still glowing. And he said to me, Yvonne, I want you to train up your children. And I didn't know what that meant. And I had to spend the time looking at what that meant, and finding people who understood what that meant. But when I dedicated training up my children is God asked me, What I found was I he redeemed my childhood, by allowing me to be the mom that my mum never could be. He redeems my childhood and allowing me to relive it with my own children. And so when I submitted to allowing God to love me, I learned that I could love people in a way that I didn't know was possible.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to take a slight detour here, because you've mentioned a number of times that God has spoken to you mentioned, when you first walked into the church, there was that experience of hearing him through the words of the pastor who was preaching on forgiveness. And now you're you've been sitting around a fire and you believe God is telling you to train up your children. There will be people listening at the moment who say, well, I've never heard God talk. Explain a little of that to us. How do you hear God talk to you?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
What I learned was, and this is many, many years later, that hearing God comes in many different forms. And when I say I hear God, I have never, I've heard his audible voice one time in my life. But when I say that, I heard him I'm talking about this really deep intuition that guides you in life, you know, that, that those intuitions moments when you're standing at a crossroads in life, and everything in your gut is telling you to go one direction. For me, I have crazy feelings, and my feelings, and we call it being a feeler. And for anybody else who doesn't know what that means. It's called being an empath. And so what it is, is that my feelings guide me, in my life, I'll feel empathy towards somebody, or I'll feel sad, sitting beside somebody because they're sad. So really, I had this deep intuition from very, very early on in my life. And I realized that it was some something that really guided me. So when I realized that there was language to it, and it was actually very biblical, that, you know, being guided by God, I started putting language to something that I never knew existed and I realized that God actually talks to me all the time. I just didn't know it and so I started really discovering what that look like.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How much of a comfort was it for you to start to realize that even way back in those early days, when you were talking then about having that sense of intuition, that sense of feeling, and that understanding, that was God knocking on the door, all the way back then,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
For me when I took a soul care class, so I spent a good 10 years of my life, you know, when I, you know, just really quieted myself, close my mouth a lot allowed God to love me, heal me and just be a really good wife and mom as best as possible and learn how to do that. I did counseling, and I did you know, lots of psychologist and I did a class called soul care. And in the soul care class, I remember it was a class on forgiveness, and we had to forgive things in my life. And one of the moments was, where was Jesus in your life? And up until then, I was like, he was not really in my life. I never, I always pictured him as this, you know, spirit that always sat beside me when I was sad, you know, somebody who was there, but not there. And for me, though, up until then, you know, like, I could accept love, I could trust him. I can move forward. But a lot of the healing needed to come from is why weren't you there? God? Why weren't you there to protect me? Why were you there when things were going wrong? And as I sat in my class, somebody said to me, but Yvonne, he was there with you. And all of a sudden it was like God took me back to the parts of my life that I could remember. And he goes, I was there. I was the neighbor that got you and your sister out of a storm, and called the police so that you can go home, I was a police officer that picked you up instead of going home with somebody you should never have gone home with. I was a neighbor who made sure that you had food in your fridge and who took care of you. And I started realizing that God was not just this spiritual guide. In the back part of my life. He was the hands and feet on earth and people who were there to minister to me, I just didn't know it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
One more thing I'm interested in, as you say that there's this intuition, this sense of feeling. We know that our feelings can be deceptive. How do you draw the line between what you know? is God speaking to you through those feelings? And what are just the normal everyday feelings that we all have? Which are so often self centered?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
That's a that's a great question. I actually do a lot of teaching on being a feeler because we tend to be guided by our feelings. What I do know. And everything that I've learned is that when people who are feelers are guided highly by their feelings, we are a disservice to the world when we are not healthy. Because we act out of our own filters and our own unhealthiness and our own emotions. So for me, when I realized that I was a feeler, one of the things I needed to know was how to be healthy. Because I could not feel anything from God, I was no good if I couldn't figure out my own emotions inside of me. So when I, when I went through all of my healing, right, I mean, a good chunk of it, we still heal to this day, but what I went through the biggest chunk of my healing, I realize that that really stopped a flow of feeling what God felt for people on earth. And so to stay in that over my emotions, it's daily meditation, it's daily sitting with him, it's daily reading of the Bible, it's keeping him in the forefront of everything that I do, so that my emotions don't creep in. And when he's trying to speak to me,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned in the introduction, that these days, you're actually helping others. And part of that is Damascus Experience, told me about that
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Damascus Experience was a promise that God gave me 12 years ago, I went to a conference called Catalyst. And I had this moment in the evening where somebody was speaking, and they were talking about that God gave him a promise. And then he said, I just feel like there's other people who, you know, God's giving a promise to. And that was one of those moments where I had this deep sense of feeling this intuition. And God said to me, one day, you're going to do what he is doing. And in my mind, I was like, Oh, I'm going to stand on a stage, and I'm going to talk to people and gods, like, you're going to help people out of your story, you're going to help people. 12 years later, I finally you know, after many times of healing, learning about my identity, you know, really fine tuning what God was trying to say, and do it from a place of health, I realized Damascus Experience was what he was trying to get me to build. And that was allowing people to really encounter the presence of God in their life, especially in those moments, where they feel hopeless, where they don't know him, you don't where they are standing at a crossroads. We all have Damascus moments in our lives. And those are the moments that build our faith in our history with God, for us to continue on our journey of life. And so we facilitate experiences through coaching and consulting, at EA Park coaching and consulting. And we're actually developed another course, where we're going to help with the royal priesthood, walking in the authority of Christ. And what that is, is it's equipping people to continue on their journey, and not being held up by the world.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And on top of Damascus Experience, you have a podcast, which I imagine is along the same lines as Damascus Experience, especially seeing it's called On the Road to Damascus. Tell me what sorts of things you are talking about in that podcast.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
You know, we actually have a lot of guests on our podcasts. And what we want to do is we want to bring hope to people to let them know that God is not done with their story. And as you can see, hope is is a reoccurring theme in my life, you know, hoping for a better tomorrow hoping for a future hoping which are all promises that God gave us in the Bible. But you know, a lot of it, I think When I didn't have hope, I had to look at other people who were a little bit ahead of me in their lives. And they gave me hope that things were going to be better. So we like to have guests on our podcast where we share our stories of their Damascus moment, encouraging other people to keep going on their journey, because God's not done with it yet.
 
Rodney Olsen 
As you've mentioned, the healing continues. But you've gone through a large chunk of the healing that was required to bring you to where you are. Now, if you had the opportunity to reach back to that five year old seven year old girl that you were all those years ago, what would you say to her,
 
Yvonne Rempel 
I would tell her to keep dreaming, to keep dreaming, because there's going to be a point in your life where your dreams are going to come true. And they're not going to be anything that you imagine they're going to be, because they're going to be so much better than you could ever imagine. Yeah, five years old, you dream of things you're going to be. And I never knew I wanted to be a mom. And I never knew I wanted to be a wife. And I never knew I wanted to help people. But keep dreaming. And keep hoping because it does get better. Because God has not even started your story yet.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And to the person who's listening at the moment thinking, this sounds wonderful that evens been able to make this big change, but I'm too far gone. I can't see any way back from where I am. What would you say to that person?
 
Yvonne Rempel 
I would tell that person that that's not true. God will go anywhere to find you. Sometimes we need to sit still, so he can find you. And sometimes he doesn't mind running you down to get you. And so anybody who's listening to this, and they're like, yeah, I can't forgive, I can't. It's not about them. It's about you and who you are and who you were created to be. So there is no way that God wants you to stay where you are so have hope that he wants so much more for you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I love the fact that your story is not yet over that it's going to continue to unfold, and that we get to be part of it to through things like Damascus experience and definitely through the podcast and we will put links to both those websites on the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet so that people can contact you. What is the easiest way for people to find you,
 
Yvonne Rempel  
you can just jump on our Instagram @damascusexperience, or our on our podcast, Instagram @ontheroadtodamascus and you can find us there. If you drop a comment. I will definitely respond to you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Yvonne it's been wonderful hearing your story to hear how far you've come from where you've been. And as I say, I know that the story is not over yet. And we look forward to hearing a lot more from you in the future. But thank you so much for spending some time on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Yvonne Rempel 
Thank you so much for having me.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 
 
 

Everret Maxine’s story is one of heartache, but it isn’t one of defeat. Everret is using the struggles and hurdles of her life to walk alongside others who are facing their own pain and hurt. Today we’ll hear how her life of loss has helped her to become an agent of healing. She believes that being a survivor carries responsibility and an opportunity to serve others. She uses her podcast the absence of her to share her life story, and the lessons she has learned as a way of helping others through their own dark times.
 
 
https://www.spreaker.com/user/theabsenceofher
https://www.facebook.com/IAmEverretMaxine
https://twitter.com/everretmaxine
https://www.instagram.com/iameverretmaxine
 
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Everret Maxine’s story is one of heartache but it isn’t one of defeat. Everret is using the struggles and hurdles of her life to walk alongside others who are facing their own pain and hurt. Today we’ll hear how her life of loss has helped her to become an agent of healing.
 
Please remember to share this story with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. You can follow Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts. It's free and it'll ensure you never miss an episode.
 
Everret Maxine Johnson has seen more than her fair share of heartache but she's now sharing the lessons that trauma and difficulty had taught her to help others. She believes that being a survivor carries responsibility and an opportunity to serve others. She uses her podcast the absence of her to share her life story, and the lessons she has learned as a way of helping others through their own dark times. It's my privilege to introduce you to her today, Everret, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Everret Maxine 
Good morning. Good morning.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your story is one of loss in various ways and your first great loss began at a very young age, at just 10, help me understand what was happening for you at that time.
 
Everret Maxine 
Well, at 10, my mother and I were still living with my grandmother, my maternal grandmother, and her sister lived there as well. That was my great aunt. And me and my great aunt Lv, we were inseparable. She would create little games for me to play. And she was a lot older than I was when she passed, I think she was about 70. So she was like, it was like a 60 year difference, but we would play in the yard together, we would, we would just do all kinds of things together. And so when she passed, it was really hard for me. She went through two types of cancer and the last time she had, I believe it was a tumor in the stomach because she had two different things back to back and we had went to Astroworld, which was the theme park here in Texas. And I was having such a nice time. And I'm on a ride with my friend. And mind you I'm a 10 year old kid. And I look at my friend and it's not my friend. It's my aunt Lv sitting next to me, waving goodbye. I was just stunned, like what just happened. So I get back to my aunt Odessa's house. And we're there. And my uncle called to say that my great aunt surgery went fine. And he had left a message on the voicemail. And shortly after that, he called and said, she passed away. I beat my fist into the floor. I cried all night, I cried for days. Because here I was 10 years old, I didn't understand. And me and my friend had made her a welcome home sign. And I was so excited because I didn't understand death. You know, when you're a kid, you think everybody is immortal. And so that was really hard for me to understand.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So even before her passing, she was going through a very serious illness with the cancer. What was that like for you as a child, seeing someone that you loved going through that difficulty?
 
Everret Maxine 
Once she started going through, it was hard for me because she couldn't do the things that she used to do. And then she was relocated out of my grandmother's home to the nursing home, my mom worked back. Even though she was ill, I couldn't really tell other than her being in the nursing home until they had to shave her hair off for a surgery. And I believe that was the second surgery. And it was seeing her hair shaved off, her beautiful hair got gray hair gone. And she just didn't look like the same person. Now she looked like a sick woman. In my mind, I still thought that hey, this was my playmate, my great aunt, my friend, she was still going to recover from this.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know it sounds like you're surrounded by family at this stage. There's your mother and Uncle another auntie. were they trying to explain to you what was happening at the time? Or do they feel you're a child? And we'll try and keep that away from you?
 
Everret Maxine 
You know, Rodney, nobody took the time to explain to me what was going on. I was an only child at the at the time and my mother always felt Well, she's intelligent, she understands. And I think people think when you're book smart, you understand all things and you don't like even kids that are really smart me life experiences explained to them,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I guess it must have been difficult for them at that time as well. Seeing a loved relative who's on the verge of passing away, but it would be difficult to not actually know what's going on until it happened. So how did you begin to find a way back from that? How did you begin to find healing?
 
Everret Maxine 
Well, I started attending church when after she passed away, there was a church around the corner, and I started going to the church at that time. My mom was not going to church with me. And I started participating in a youth group. And as a youth group, we had a youth matron who I'm still associated with now. And she was just like this great woman of God had all this positive energy. And I started being around other children my age because at that time, I had only been around my aunt really, I would go to school. But as far as like being around children my age I didn't spend much time with. So when I started going to church, I was learning about God and this awesome power of positive experience in this life and salvation and that was just like my source. Like, anytime they opened the church doors, even if it was the elders having a prayer service, I want it to be in the midst of that,
 
Rodney Olsen 
After this tragedy of losing your great art, you found something to hang on to. And it sounds like church was a great place of solace for you. But back at school, it wasn't all that easy, was it?
 
Everret Maxine 
No, it wasn't because my newfound love for Christ did not eliminate my reality. One thing about Christianity, and I had to learn that over the years, is that although believing in Christ gives us a positive hope, it doesn't mean you're not going to go through things. Like when you're a baby in Christ, should I say you think oh, well, I believe in Christ. So I'm not gonna go through anything. And at school, I was still kind of like an oddball. Like I say, my mom only birth one child. So I didn't really know how to fix my hair. And I didn't wear the latest trends. And I didn't really care too. That was my thing. I didn't have to feel like I needed to wear the latest trends. I just cared about bookwork. I like homework, I like test, I loved math class. And so the kids picked on me a lot.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you're being picked on you're being bullied, I believe you're even skipping school at this stage. So something that you love you're trying to stay away from, because it's just too painful to be there. How did you reconcile those things of wanting to be there so much, and yet, knowing that, that's just going to bring extra pain for you?
 
Everret Maxine 
Well, I don't believe I just ever really reconciled it. I tolerated it. I never really learned how to do my school years defend myself. Due to junior high years, I would still go but I would go like half of the day, I would let up think my mother would think I've been to school all day, because she worked two jobs. So anything that was going on with me, it was putting me into a like a dark depression. I just really I didn't even you know, want to live or exist anymore. And one of the things that I talked about in the podcast is my attempts with suicide, and wanting to give up on life. I tried a number of times, but my relationship with God and knowing God, and knowing the basics of Heaven and Hell, even though I hated being on earth and felt like I was living in Hell, I was afraid that if I ended my life, I would end up in hell eternally. And so I kind of just feel like I was just stuck and had to pick up the pieces. Now once I got to me in high school, you think about college and things like that. And because my home life kind of wasn't, you know what everybody thought, I just figured, okay, if I buckled down, get the good grades, I can go off to college, and all of this life will be behind me. And well, it just didn't work out that way. But you know, I pushed through. I did graduate on time, I did graduate with honors as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And around the age of 16, your family life started to change to I believe.
 
Everret Maxine 
A whole lot things change. This is about in 1997 that my mother did get married. She got with him, I want to say in about 96. So during the time that my mother had got with her husband, I was a teenager, he had just been us for the most of our life. And so I was like, I'm not gonna live in this situation. I'll go live with my grandmother because we had moved out of my grandmother's house after my great aunt passed. I kept going back about I leave my mom's house, you know, I can't I can't do this. Because when she brought him into the picture, and I only speak about this because this was their past. They wants to deliver it from it. Call him my father. Now because he was there most of my life. He had a drug habit. She was still battling alcohol use. So that combined was just a toxic environment. At the point that my grandmother had accepted that hey, yeah, you know, maybe it'll be okay for you to come and stay. My grandmother passed away. So then they got married. My mom asked me what I attend a wedding and I told her No, I just couldn't. Because I believe if you attend a wedding and you sit Watch them exchange your vows. You agree to uphold those vows and support the marriage. And in my whole heart, I couldn't do that. I helped her get dressed for the wedding. You know, she wasn't beautiful that day, but I just could not attend.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That must have been a real struggle for you. Is there any time since then that you've regretted that or you still feel that that was the thing that you had to do in that moment,
 
Everret Maxine 
Even though they've both now passed on, I don't regret my decision. Because I knew that I couldn't support the marriage. I mean, I had my own wedding, I wouldn't want anybody whether they're blood or friend, to show up if they don't support.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So this is all still happening while you're still in your teenage years and these are the years that are the most formative years in our lives. And yet, it seems to be one trauma after another year, you've lost your great art, you've never lost your grandmother and and your mother is entering into a marriage that you you don't agree with? Again, where are you finding solace during this time? Where are you finding someplace to go to that is helping you through these difficulties,
 
Everret Maxine 
Our still crying out to God, because at this point, right about 16 was when I had stopped attending church, because when she got in the relationship, it was harder for me to go because it was like, I was radical for Christ, like I believed in Christ. And it was as if they were testing my faith, July of 1996, a couple of months before they got married, I had also been sexually assaulted, I had went to go stay with a friend from church and their family. And so nobody knew about it. And I waited about two months for I actually told anyone, but I kind of withdrew from the church, and the youth matron that I was close to we lost contact for some years. And so I just had to continue in my own faith. And with my own hope that once I graduated, I can just go to college and be free of the situation.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you're holding this hurting side that you've not told anyone about what happens when you do graduate college? How does life start to turn at that point,
 
Everret Maxine 
Right before I graduate high school, I was accepted to several different colleges, Spelman College, and Georgia Liberty University in Virginia, just a number of colleges, but I was not allowed to travel outside the state. My parents didn't think that was the best choice. My mom had a hard time supporting my decision to go to college. She had gotten her GED at the age of 17, when she had her first marriage before I was born. And she had been a Nurse Aide for majority of her life. So she just kind of felt like, you know, why are you pursuing this college thing? Why can't you just get a job like normal people and save money because not many people in my family at that point had been to college. So my first semester I went off to Wharton junior college, and I enjoyed it. I still worked, but it none of my college experience was like, you know, get to go enjoy the clubs or the college experience. My first semester was spent at Wharton, and then I went to Baylor, which was highly expensive. So of course, on my own, I couldn't afford it. And I really couldn't afford to stay. So then I ended back at Wharton. From then there was some gaps for some years. Somewhere in there. I would do a couple of classes here and there. But I didn't get to really have a consistent college, career and experience.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So how did college continue for you? Did you manage to graduate? Where did you get to with your studies?
 
Everret Maxine 
Well, in January of 2005, I decided to pursue a degree in environmental health and safety after working in a couple of what we call shutdowns. After chemical plants. It's where they shut down the plant for maintenance. And so I would do like helper jobs or Firewatch jobs and fire watches just watch for fires I happen. I saw people being this job title call safety tech that paid really well. And so I went and got my associates degree in environmental health and safety. And I graduated with that in December 2007. Now seeking employment for that particular position really didn't work out in my favor. But I did end up continuing my bachelor's degree and I want to say I went back around oh eight and started on my bachelor's degree again. There was some delay. After I went back I started attending Texas Southern University. Originally my bachelor's degree was in communications and poly side because I wanted to be a attorney. And when I decided to continue it I said, Well, I want to do education, I had been a substitute part time here and there. And I really liked being in the classroom. So I'm happy to say, even though it took me several extra years, I just graduated with my Bachelors of education. With the content area of math and science grades four through eight, December 2020,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You finally got that graduation that you were looking for all those years, when we go back and look at those years where it was a struggle for you to have that college education and going between colleges, what was happening for you personally, what was happening in your personal life?
 
Everret Maxine 
Well, in 2008, I married my husband, my former husband, and we had been friends, since I was 12, the marriage was rather difficult, and I'll say on both ends, you know, Women liked to bash the men but we both had issues coming into the marriage. And so I thought that, you know, it was gonna just be this great relationship, because we had lived together before. And we had a lot of financial struggles. And so somewhere in there, he says, you know, me trying to pursue this degree was, you know, draining all our money, which really wasn't, again, I went through a relationship, just like with my mother of not having the support to pursue my degree, I put it on hold, I didn't think it would be five years because that was 2013, I decided not to pursue the degree anymore. And so when I went back to finish it, it was 2018, there was a lot of toxic discord between me and my former husband, that kind of just wore me out emotionally, because I already didn't have a good emotional foundation, and had already been through several traumas that I had not addressed that I didn't see as trauma. Because let me say this, I am from the black culture, and we don't advocate therapy and mental health awareness, and talking about your problems. We advocate, you know, pray about it, and it'll go away, or, you know, you know, don't tell anybody your secrets. And so I had literally buried a lot of that stuff in me. I've come to learn, though, when you bury that stuff it's still taking root in your life. And so I stayed in the marriage for 10 years, we were together almost 20. Before I finally said, I had had enough that it was time to let it go. From January of 2017. Until the end of last year, I was in therapy, learning whoever it is, it was quite an experience. Now I know how much damage not only that I was doing to myself, but also to him for going into a marriage and having unhealed wounds.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I've spoken to a number of people about the fact that so often we don't actually know what is normal when we're in a situation that is so outside what we would see as normal. We don't see it as such, because it's all we know was that a bit of the case for you that really, as far as marriage and relationships went you hadn't had that modeled and so you were just doing what you thought you should do
 
Everret Maxine 
With my parents, their marriage, even though they were close knit, they were always together. Like when they'd have arguments yelling and screaming was normal. When me and my former husband would get into it, yelling and screaming was normal, me throwing something in breaking something was normal, saying degrading things to each other, you know, to tear each other down. That was my normal. And so I didn't see anything wrong with that. People reproduce what they see.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you had that difficulty of all these traumas backing up, and then just trying to act in the best way that you knew how you've already mentioned that you went into therapy. Did that start to turn the lights on for you to start to realize, aha, there is a different way of dealing with some of this drama?
 
Everret Maxine 
Oh, absolutely. There'll be took me to places I had never experienced it was nothing like I thought it would be it was with a Christian therapist. So I thought, Oh, she's going to tell them about Jesus loves you, blah, blah, throw some scriptures at me, and I'm not going to feel any type of way. But our first session was she dug into the sexual assault. That to me, you know, I just met this person, I don't know this person. And I'm like, Oh, that's what she wants to talk about. And it took me about three months before I began actually trusting her enough to open up and it was like layers were coming off. Because I learned that the mother is the foundation. And so because our relationship wasn't solid, and then we She got married, it was like, okay, I've never felt like I was first in your life. And then now here you are, you've married somebody and made him first. I don't have anybody. So then I get married, thinking this person is supposed to put me first. And when I felt like it was some disconnect, or he was putting me first, I just completely lost it. And sometimes it wasn't even the case. But I had all those insecurities that I didn't feel like I was somebodies priority.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So this whole time, there's this insecurity built right through your, your childhood. And again, that that teaching or that prevailing culture that says, We don't talk about our issues, we just stuffed them down. How was faith for you at this stage? Was that something you were still able to cling on to? Were you still able to reach out to God during this time? Or was this a time apart from him?
 
Everret Maxine 
In the marriage, we had stopped attending church after about the first five years into the marriage, there was some issues going on at the church we were at. So we had stopped going. In our own minds, we kind of just felt like we were okay. We would, you know, go gambling, we had loss of employment. We were kind of just as people say, doing me just living our own life. Now, as far as the miracles that God could do. I was believing he could turn things around. Because I believe it was about in 2004 that my mother who I said had the alcohol addiction. She collapsed at home and had been sick for some while but we thought it just was a regular chest call. And she collapsed and was life flighted, and was in the hospital for a month. For the first week in the hospital, she was comatose, the doctors didn't believe she was survive. And on the eighth day, she woke up and she gave me a call. She was in a state of paralysis. She had to learn to walk again. But her desire to drink and smoke she no longer had in my adulthood, I had a better relationship with her. And I had a better view of how God could change things. So my hope that God could change things was still there. But my desire to go to church to seek His word was not
 
Rodney Olsen 
What changed that for you. Because I know that you very much cling to God now what turned you around to face him and cling more tightly to him
 
Everret Maxine 
in 2014, my aunt Amanda, one of my mom's sisters, she suddenly passed away, out of nowhere in March of 2014. And I was at work when that happened. Fast forward to July of 2014, my father then passed my mom's husband going through that, it was just like, golly, these people were gone. And I need to do something to get myself in alignment with God. Because all my father asked for during his final days was his Bible. 2016, I lose another off. And in that same year was the year me and my husband separated. I had kind of felt like a huge disconnect from him. And it was it just seems like we were going in the same circles, no progress. And so I had started 2016, a lady that I was very close to Miss Mary Jane. She was in her 80s when she passed away. And her and I were good friends. She was also my us matron Teresa's mother. So we reconnected after about 15 years later. So I spent a lot of time at her home. And so I had time to separate myself from the things that were going on in my household. And I could see that this isn't good. And so she invited me to church. And so for a little while I didn't you know, accept the invitation. And then I finally started going. And as I started going and getting the word me again, and hearing the pastor preach, it felt like she was preaching to my situations. And one of the things that she said was that God changes people, you're going to wear yourself out trying to force people to change. My former husband had told me a number of things that he didn't want, he didn't care to do. And it was like I was still trying to force him to change and trying to force him to change. I was forcing myself to be unhappy. And so I finally got to a place in my life where when he walked out in my of my life in 2016 I was like this is gonna be the last time Because he had walked out in my life before, and I would beg him back or I would want the marriage to work, being a believer in Christ, and caring too much about what other people thought I would keep getting back in this marriage because I didn't want to fail. And I was afraid to fail, no matter how much damage it did to me emotionally.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I know that as you came closer to God, that that was maybe preparing you for some more difficulties that were coming your way and losing someone very close to you.
 
Everret Maxine 
I gave it a couple of years, because I don't believe in immediately running to divorce. Two years down the road, I'm now establishing myself to be an adult on my own, because I had never lived on my own. In 2018 May 28, my grandmother, Roxy, she took her final breath. And it was the five year anniversary of her brothers passing. And my grandma, Roxy was my grandma by marriage, but she was still my grandma. We went to her bedside. And at her bedside, my mom was talking about when she had an asthma attack at work. And so me and my my brother, like you didn't mention that. And so she says, Oh, I don't tell y'all everything. And for some reason, it hit me in my gut that if my mother ever passed away, that would be what happened to her. So on that day, before we went to go see my grandmother at the nursing home, I tell my mom about the therapy, because here I've been in therapy over a year now. And I've never mentioned it to her because I didn't know what her take of it was going to be. And when I told her about the therapy, she said, I'm so glad you have somebody to talk to the Sunday, June 17. It was Father's Day. And I had a video that I was going to show my mom sent to my mom that I had of her standing at her husband's bedside during his final moments. But I said, If she's not thinking about him, I'm not going to upset her. And so late that night, it was about 11 o'clock till 11 o'clock that night. I just had this urge to go and be my mom. I'm crying, carrying on. And now I've moved out of town an hour and a half away. So I drive back home. I parked in the driveway. And I told my friend Theresa, I said, I'm going to sit here because I don't know why. But I'm crying for my mom. But sitting in their driveway was a little creepy. So I drove up to some family's property and just sat there. And then I drove home. Once my spirit got calm, I drove home, and I prayed. And I was praying over myself. For no thoughts of depression, no thoughts of suicide, just and I'm like, why am I praying like this? Well, Tuesday morning, I got a phone call as I'm going into therapy. It was my mom's job. And they said, Everret, please go check on your mother. She hasn't been to work. She had sounded bad when she left work that Friday. That Saturday, she had called them and told them she wasn't coming in. She was sick. And I will assume she was off that Sunday and Monday. And so Tuesday when she didn't show. They knew something wasn't right. My mother never calls in sick from work. She's never no call no show. So even before anybody told me anything, I knew she was already deceased. So I didn't call the authorities. And I didn't know that the person who had called me which was an in law at the time, she had also called my husband. And he cause him and my mom so had a decent relationship. And he had called one of my cousins and they had kicked in the door. Well, nobody wanted to tell me over the phone. So when I got to town I called and I asked is she gone. Nobody wants to tell me and I said I'm okay because I already feel that she's gone. And she had been she was sitting on the couch. She had been gone a couple of days. So I really feel like that Sunday, when I pulled up and was crying her spirit was already leaving. And that was a transforming moment for me for my life. And that is where my podcast came from. The Absence of Her.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The podcast seeks to call out things in other people when they're going through dark times. And I suppose not everyone is going to have a story that is just like yours, but people will see themselves in some of those dark times. And I know that one of the things that called you to actually start reaching out and helping others with the help that God was pouring into you was a very odd dream.
 
Everret Maxine 
I have a lot of visions, but I had this dream where I was, I didn't have any clothes on. And God said naked but not ashamed. Here, I was going through the separation going through this very public time in my marriage. My grandmother had passed, my mom had passed. And people are saying, Oh, you're so strong, you're so strong, you know. And I felt like you're I am presenting this lot of people because I go through things as well. And so in him saying naked, but not ashamed, was for me to uncover the things that I had been through. And don't be ashamed of your life experiences. But share them so that other people know that, hey, somebody went through this and survived, because the same year that my mother passed away, she passed away in June, I filed divorce shortly after it was final November 5, of 2018. And so a lot of people were in shock, because they thought the marriage was so good, I thought things are so good between us. And so that's what I just been began pouring out my life experiences and things that I had been through. And I love that God used me as that vessel, because I've had responses from mainly women of things that they have been through that they've never spoke about and they're happy that I've shared, because now they know that, hey, I'm not the only one that went through this.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned before that it's very much a cultural thing for you to hide the things that are going on inside. So are you finding that those who are responding are people from your own culture in that way, who have been brought up in that same way to be told you don't go to therapy, you don't tell people what you're going through, you just stuffed inside?
 
Everret Maxine 
Yes, there are a lot majority of them are from the black culture, they are open to sharing with me, so I pray for them. And I tell God, you know, use me wisely. And I share with about my mental health experience. Um, and I share about the therapy and the benefits of it. You can't force anybody to do anything. But if you know somebody that has gone through it, you're more likely to try it and say, Hey, I see that turn that person's life around. That's just like with, you know, being a Christian, everybody's not gonna run to the church, but they were gonna look at your life and say, you know, is it doing is a relationship Christ doing something for them.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that's the point that you're bringing people to, obviously with the podcast has had quite a number of episodes already, as you start to unpack the things that you've been through. And I'm sure that it's not just helpful for the people that are listening and who are getting in touch. But it must be really helpful for you to be able to unpack a lot of that in front of your audience.
 
Everret Maxine 
It is a very healing experience. For me, I was told at the age of 16, that I would be standing before the people talking to the people and I had not even been halfway through what I've been through now. And so now I'm at the ripe age of 40. Last year with the podcast, I began doing Her Fridays, allowing other women to share their life experiences with others. I pray about every episode is not just me rambling out at the mouth about you know, my life or something that is going on. But I want it to be a purposeful message. And so it is very healing for me to talk about what I've been through those those God moments that hey, you some five minutes like you kick life in the tail, kiddo. So hey, yeah,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And of course, with all the trauma that you've been through over those many years in various ways, we will be foolish to think that you're completely over everything now. But you're actually still going on that journey. And it must be a real benefit. For those who are listening in to know that, hey, we're on this journey together. It's not some unrealistic expectation that suddenly it's all going to fall into place, but that we can walk this journey together, but you and your listeners are together, walking towards healing towards hope,
 
Everret Maxine 
Even the women that I interview, I still try to reach out and see how they're doing. Because every day is just because I am in a place of trying to heal does not mean that my life is perfect at this point. Grief is a process, but we don't have to stay in a state of depression and state of mourning. Because that person is not here. There is purpose for your pain. That's what I tell myself. I mean, I just had a cry the other day because I missed my mom. It's a process you know, but you you get up and you find some positive things to do. You you write you exercise You realize that I am not going through this alone. And that is, you know what I want all people that believe all motherless daughters that you're not going through this alone,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your podcast is called the Absence of Her. It's going to be very healing for a lot of people. I'm sure. If people are wanting to find that or get in touch with you, where's the easiest place for them to go?
 
Everret Maxine 
I have an Instagram which is at iamEverretmaxine. That's the same title on my Facebook page. And the podcast is located on just about any outlet, Google podcast, Spotify, I Heart Radio, Pandora. So if you just type in the Absence of Her, or if you do the hashtag, I am Everret Maxine. You can also find me
 
Rodney Olsen 
And we'll certainly put the details and links of how to get in touch with you in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet. But now people have a direct link to get in touch with you. Ever. This has been an extraordinary story that you've been telling him. And I want to thank you for your honesty and your openness in sharing this story with us. And I know that this is not the end of the story, but I know that it's going in the right direction. And I just want to say once again, thank you so much for your time with us on bleeding daylight today.
 
Everret Maxine 
Thank you for the opportunity to share.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 
 

Kash Memphis has seen more brokenness than most in his life. It was there in his upbringing, through his time in the military during overseas service, in relationships, in his body and health, even in seeking to serve God. These days he is pursuing dreams and helping others chase theirs. He’s a Christian rapper who has built his own label and coaching brand.
 
http://kodakpurple.com
https://www.facebook.com/kash.memphis
https://www.instagram.com/kingdompriest05
https://open.spotify.com/artist/4JS6JHuHiev1icOxDH13jW
https://music.apple.com/us/artist/kash-memphis/1460421161
https://www.amazon.com.au/Kodak-Purple-Kash-Memphis/dp/B08KWWZLM3
https://www.patreon.com/kodakpurple
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Kash Memphis has seen more brokenness than most in his life. It was there in his upbringing, through his time in the military during overseas service, in relationships, in his body and health, even in seeking to serve God.
 
These days he is pursuing dreams and helping others chase theirs.He’s a Christian rapper who has built his own label and coaching brand. I’ll introduce you in a moment.
 
Please remember to share this story with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please follow Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts. It's free and it'll ensure you never miss an episode.
 
Kash Memphis describes himself as a rapper dreamer, author and creative. But for so long he dealt with feelings of rejection and just not fitting in. We'll explore his story today on bleeding daylight, and will travel through some of the twists and turns that his life has taken cash. Welcome to bleeding daylight.
 
Kash Memphis 
Hey, Rodney, thanks for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to start by painting a picture of your early years. What was life like for you growing up?
 
Kash Memphis 
Well, you know, when I look back early in my childhood, one of the key words that continues to come up through my mind is that of brokenness or broken, I guess the way I would describe it as more like a desert experience, the first part of my life more like the childhood, I was called to Christ at an early age when I was about 10 years old, but went back into let's say, my living situation wasn't what typical people would think is a traditional church family, brokenness, as a child brokenness as a teenager and early adulthood.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you have this experience of church, but your home life doesn't reflect that tell me a bit about that home life,
 
Kash Memphis 
I was the first person to come to Christ and my family. I felt this calling towards God. And I almost felt as Okay, maybe I'm the one that wants this. But I kind of felt like I was still alone. I had discovered this new thing, this newfound freedom, this newfound peace, I'm newly found in Christ, but I go back into this environment. There's a seed planted, but it's almost as if it's a dormant seed.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what about the sort of neighborhood you are growing up in? What was that like for you.
 
Kash Memphis 
Growing up, it was more like a rural neighborhood, and a tri regional area in West Virginia, Virginia, and Maryland area, so very rural, and very mixed nature. It wasn't a town where it was majority of white people or black people, it was very, culturally different, ethnically different. In that I found myself growing up in a childhood that was ethnically challenging, I felt is almost almost as if like, I didn't fit in with my own people. I felt like I fit in more with other races than my own, not just one race. But I almost felt at that sense, like I had been adopted by the king. And I really, truly hadn't understood who I had been adopted by. So I wasn't really accepted by one sense of one group versus the other. It was almost as if I was a lost sheep, trying to discover myself.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And as part of that growing up, were you taking on elements of of the other cultures that you are now surrounded by to try and find that acceptance?
 
Kash Memphis 
Absolutely. So and I really love that you point that out Rodney, because one of the very first things that I ever took to was rap music. And I remember as I was younger, periodically, dreaming of man, because I grew up in a secular rap environment I grew up on Biggie and Tupac Shakur, and Snoop Dogg, and it wasn't very God glorifying music. So I had found an outlet and I don't think I really ever noticed it as a kid. But what I identified with rap music was the struggle, the acceptance, the cultural nature of it. So ideally, when I'm looking at these cultures, I'm seeing their struggle to so that at some point probably played a huge part in my life as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So rather than identifying with a lot of the themes that they were bringing forward, it was more identifying with that sense of struggle that they will portray.
 
Kash Memphis 
Absolutely, because I think where where I really struggled was for a lot of different cultures. Now, American culture is not necessarily this way anymore. But in other cultures, they were more let's say friendly to their, their elders, you know, there was still a communal guideline. And it was a way that different cultures operated. Part of me fell in love with that culture because they felt like they really loved their own people. And maybe I was asking the question of why didn't my people love me the same way?
 
Rodney Olsen 
We fast forward a little bit and as a young adult, you join the army was that again, a part Trying to find that acceptance to be part of a movement, so to speak, where you felt that you might fit in?
 
Kash Memphis 
Yeah. And you know, it's it's interesting how life happens, isn't it? You know how God uses us and shapes us. And we don't even really know the full grasp to that, after I'd come out of my school age years, and it was I didn't have these influences by these other cultures, what it kind of did was carried over and for me, I no longer had that influence. So I was trying to take that influence of my family, my dad, my brother, my mother, and then that was kind of my influence to join the military, because what other hope do I have in life?
 
Rodney Olsen 
So what happened during that experience in the army? Did that turn out to be the saviour that you were looking for in that acceptance or was it something different?
 
Kash Memphis 
I would really like to say that it was the greatest experience ever, it wasn't. But what I will say it was the most important experience in my life ever. And here's why I want you to picture a young 20 year old man who's grown, used to a life of brokenness. And then as I'm joining the military, and I'm feeling like maybe I should do what my family did, and, you know, they love to serve their country, or for whatever reason, in the back of my mind, I had this idea that I would go serve my country. And I had this idea that I would be a better person because of it. As I joined the military, I was still a Christian, not really, living the lifestyle that God requires of me, as I got into the military, it wasn't spiritually the nicest environment. But it made me grow up, it revealed a lot of things to me, as a person. For instance, seven of the 13 years that I spent in the United States Army was spent and more as I'm going through this, now, I'm really alone, I'm at war. And, you know, I have my battle buddies, and I have my comrades, but maybe I'm not necessarily the same, because I still have this spiritual struggle. And so this 20 year old is getting ready to go off to war, he's been married, he's going off to war. And while he's at war, his wife serves him divorce papers. So it becomes a very vital point in my life, where it seems everything is crashing down. Or at war, I'm losing battle buddies. This is a whole new reality. And now, I'm getting a divorce. I've been served papers, and I'm waiting to come back to the States after the war. So the war wakes me up. God shakes my life up in that any shows me truly who I am in that time. And in that experience, while fighting the physical war, the spiritual war is just starting at this time.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And of course, being at war, you'd be seeing and experiencing things that I guess we're really not designed to see and feel and experience.
 
 
Right. And, you know, when I look back at my experience on that all of the images that it's taken years to not necessarily get rid of, but the images of maybe those who didn't return, going through survivor's guilt, going through mass casualty events and not being able to bring friends home. Ultimately, when you do end up, almost making it a career, it comes to a point where it leaves you broken, it leaves you broken from the war. Because after the war, I came back, started jumping out of airplanes, and eventually broke and destroyed my back ended up being medically retired. As I'm exiting the army, I'm exiting, physically broken, spiritually broken and at this point, it's where it takes another turn towards more brokenness.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The USA has this great tradition of honoring those who have served the country. But I guess coming back and having to be medically retired, would really be a bit of a struggle for you in knowing that you're coming from this place where people would honor to have to leave that and again, to have to find another way of fitting in.
 
Kash Memphis 
The way I equated to the army and serving in the United States Army is that we were family. My friends are the ones I fought with my family were the ones that I fought the war with, as I'm coming out of this experience and and going into this new reality. It's almost as if you lost your family, your job, you lost all sense of purpose, you've been told you physically don't meet the standard anymore, you can no longer provide your services here. So in that experience, I walked away from that, feeling jilted and empty handed. But I also ended up leaving as a drug addict.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Is that something that started to happen whilst you were still in the military? Or was this your response to having to leave the military.
 
Kash Memphis 
As I was dealing with the physical and that the army was realizing that this is a much longer term issue. And mind you, you're being dropped out of air planes repeatedly over several years. And so the back is not in the greatest. And so once it's really injured, what they began to do was at this point, pain management. And so in that point in pain management, they began to retire me. And in that process, I did not know that I had become addicted until it was too late.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So where did that addiction lead you?
 
Kash Memphis 
Well, I can tell you, for sure, Rodney, it leads nowhere good. I do remember as we were exiting the military. And as as all of this stuff is happening. There comes a point where we lose it all, financially, professionally, coming out of the military. Now it's beginning to erode the family. It became a point where God had to step in, I feel what had happened was, is that in the midst of our opioid epidemic amongst the United States, even going back several years ago, I don't think that our leaders had the proper knowledge to know that this was going to happen. And so maybe in my physical treatment, that's what did it. But nonetheless, I had a problem that I now needed God to deliver me from,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And how did that deliverance come? What What was the low point that made you turn around and see God to cause a difference in that situation?
 
Kash Memphis 
It's really interesting how God likes to intersect our lives again, because, you know, it's, it becomes a certain point in our life, where it's like, God, I need you to help me because I've done everything I can. And most of the time, it's because we have to submit to Him and allow him to do the work in us. One night, I remember going to sleep and and I was using at the time, and as a result of that, my wife had an allergic reaction for the first time, and she almost passed away, due to my negligence.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it's at that point, you decided that this has got to stop,
 
 
I'd like to say that was true. But two nights later, I was going to bed. And in order to understand the story, we have to go back a little bit because while I was in a military, my wife, and I have miscarriage. After this, God reveals to me in this miscarriage who our daughter was in heaven. And I remember hitting this point in saying, God, I need to understand what's going on here. I need to know what you think of me. I need to know that you're there. And I remember going to bed that night, and seeing her and my dreams. And I remember waking up the next morning and saying I can't immediately fix it. But I'm running in the right direction. And it was shortly after that. God called me on to the next mission.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So where did this next mission take you?
 
Kash Memphis 
When you served in the military, and you've been medically retired and you've lived the life of brokenness, and you've had different life experiences that have brought you to where you are. The next logical point for me, that God was calling me into was pulpit ministry. So I became a pastor.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me about the process of becoming a pastor coming out of this background of brokenness, to a place where you're leading others. How did that transition begin for you?
 
Kash Memphis 
Well, the transition really began for me, kind of when I was in the military, as I was getting medically retired out I had come to a point now see, I served as a chaplain assistant, the last 11 years of my career. I had decided in my military career, I wanted to be a chaplain. And so while I was in the military, I had gotten my degree and then I was approved to go to chaplain school. Well, so That was the natural path. But when I got medically retired, that plan changed, obviously. So naturally I have this degree and I'm, I'm already accredited. And I hear God calling me to being a pastor, I seen this wealth of experience and and I had a number of people around me who were doing the same thing. And it really encouraged me that I could really make a change for the kingdom from that perspective. You know, I'm like, I can really put my mark my stamp on, this is the crescendo. This is what God called me to do.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you have the opportunity to be a pastor, and this continues on for a number of years. But it doesn't continue to go, Well, what what happened in that season.
 
Kash Memphis 
At this point, I think what changes is that God has a mission for me that I truly don't understand. Because as he's calling me into the pulpit, I have this this expectation in my mind, that it's white picket fences, I'm now doing the will of God, I've got the most important job, which is leading the sheep. And it seems that from day one, when I step in the door, I mess up from day one. I guess maybe the reason that I don't know that I truly understood what a pastor was. I think I failed from that perspective. But I also didn't know what to expect, you know, so I was a young pastor, and I just left the military, I just gone through this. And from the time I became a pastor, it almost seemed as if Satan wanted to destroy me from the ground up the entire time. And when we come through some things we don't always notice when God is providing us opportunities. And so when I look in retrospect, I think about it, what could I do differently? Why didn't it go? Well, I don't think I was a good pastor, to be honest with you. I don't think I lead people well, I'd come from leading soldiers to firing bullets downrange, and church just wasn't the same. So when I walked into my first rural New York church, you know, farmland, New York, I had this idea that people were just going to support me because they, you know, the pastor was the most important person, or, you know, when when we had the commissioning, it was like, everybody loved you with open arms. But I slowly started to find out that it was hard. And then war is waged in the spiritual realm. So I learned a lot there. But if I were to, if I were to put it in a short statement, I think I was a bad pastor.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that as a pastor, you're often helping people to deal with their brokenness and their struggles. Did you find it difficult that in your own brokenness that you were trying to help others with their own?
 
Kash Memphis 
Yeah, because if we're not active in combing through our struggles, our doubts and our fears and our anxieties, and if we're not focused on surrendering those things, if we're not dealing with those things, then I think it's difficult to help other people deal with their brokenness. What I was doing is I wasn't necessarily addressing all my baggage too. So it's kind of difficult, you know, you want people want you to lead them. And they want you to help fix them. But at the same time, when you have two people who don't understand the work that's required, it becomes really difficult.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So a few years down the track, you leave the church, and there is that sense, once again, that you've lost everything. But then there's a turning point, tell me about what happened then.
 
Kash Memphis 
I remember exiting the church that night. And I have to admit that I didn't quite agree with where this whole thing was going. I didn't understand what God was doing. The only thing I could see was the circumstances. And I was angry. You know, God, how could this happen? How could I lose it again? Now, you know, I've lost these people that have become my church family. Now I've lost my friends. They've all turned against me. And now I feel like I have to walk my head away and shame. So I'm standing in this church parking lot. And I'm just I'm walking and I'm pacing in a circle around this parking lot. I'm angry. I don't know if I'm angry with God or if I'm angry with myself, I just kind of had this vital moment. Like when you switch the light on the severe contrast that everything that I had worked for, and it lived for what I thought I was doing right, I realized that I had become sick and tired of who I become, I become disgusted with myself. And I felt like the organizational body or the organization of the church had left me misfit, orphaned, neglected, rejected, and I have nothing but to rely on is that of God. And so in my passion, and just you know, because rap is a very aggressive form of music, whether Christian or secular, it talks about the struggle, it talks about the pain, it talks about the realness of, it strips down all the pretty curtains, and you can see everything for what it is kind of feeling. And I'm pacing the parking lot. And I just, I'm listening to instrumental rap music that I either grew up on or I start freestyling with that. And if you're not really sure what freestyling is, it's just basically sped up talking to a beat in my heart, and and then maybe my, my frustration, I said, God, I'll give you the rest of my life, I'll do whatever you want me to do, if I could just live my dream and do it for you, and you take care of my family. But that's what I want to do. And I feel like that night I got God's blessing, even in the worst time of my life. Because I truly, for the first time, found an outlet in which I could express my thoughts, not only express my thoughts, but express a way for me to say, I'm sorry, thank you a way for me to say the thing that I normally could not say, at that point in that night, I just said, God, I want to write rap music, on a rap for you, I don't even know that I'm good at. But that's what I'm gonna do the rest of my life. And I want to build this company so that, you know, I can put my music under it. And you know, I'm just, I want to live my dreams. I want to work for you the rest of my life. But I want you to just allow me to be able to have some fun with it and be creative. I'd like to rap. And God answered my prayers. That night, it may not have felt like it that night, but he did.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So in a sense, you've come full circle from being that young boy in a neighborhood where you feel you don't quite fit in, and you're turning to wrap to to try and understand the struggle. And you feel a connection there. You're now using it as a way to connect with the struggle of other people all these years later. And to turn it into something for good. Tell us where this has now taken you.
 
Kash Memphis 
Well, Rodney, that's a loaded question. And so I'd have to respond by saying this is that once, once I started down that point, and all of this starts coming together, I realize God takes me back. Right before I began writing Kodak PowerPoint, he calls me to a 40 day fast with him, you know, I'm supposed to pour my blood, sweat and tears into it. And during that time, God really opened my eyes. So spent three weeks working on my music and you know, giving him you know, 110%. And then the last week I did a traditional fasting, you know that the Bible says don't boast about it, but I'm not telling you this to boast about me. I'm telling you this to boast about God. But when I spent that time with him, one of the things he revealed to me was, he left Moses in the desert for 40 years. It took him 40 years, to prepare them to enter the promised land. You know, at this point, I'm not I wasn't even entering 40. But I was going through my read, see. And what he revealed to me is that like that little boy, in that time was that all of my life, he's allowed me to experience the brokenness of human. I mean, you know, not like him because I'm not perfect, but I really identify with broken people. And really, because of my story, because the brokenness that I walked through goes so deep. I look at it and I say, Well, God had it not been for this brokenness, what I be prepared for now. The little boy that was broken, the soldier that was broken, for the marriage that was broken, and all of the broken things. I was allowed do live my dream. As I'm living my dream, I realize it's gonna take a little bit more work. And as I'm finishing up some music during this fast, a friend calls me and I, I just finished up recording as a friend from my military days. It's interesting how it comes full circle. The chaplain that I was serving with in Afghanistan, had asked a favor of me and he said, Hey, I would really like it if you could train my chaplains and my chaplain assistants on area operations overseas, because I have had a number of years deploying and I was highly experienced, and say, Well, yeah, I'll go ahead and help you. So after this is done, he knows of what I'm doing. He says, Would it be helpful if I get our unit to write a memo for you so that, you know, we can just express that you're professional, that things that you did, maybe that'll help you down the road? So well, Steve, that would be okay. So Steve calls me the next day. phone's ringing. I'm like, yo, what's good, Steve? He's like, hey, there's a change of plans, man. I thought we had two weeks. But I need you to do it today. And so that I was flexible. I said, no issues, Dave, I can I can get you there. So I do the training. And afterwards, he he's sending the memo over from the military. And what's really interesting about this military memo, is that when it comes to military memo, it's almost like its own language. And so it's very guided, it's very directed. But there was five bullet points on this memo. And while the other four are important, they're not as important as the fifth point. So I'm reading the memo. And I get down to this final point. And this is the part in my life, where I realize I should start taking my dreams a whole lot more seriously. Because God found a way to intersect with me to prove he is faithful to prove he is just because that last bullet point on that memo, would have never appeared on military memo. But it says, we recommend Brian Havens my real name, or we recommend Kash Memphis, for whatever he wants to do. And in that moment, God just invaded my heart, with love. And with an understanding, I thought, I have life. But to bring it full circle. It's like I felt like this is part of a releasing point where he confirms everything that I've been dreaming of and been working towards,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're now are running your own label. And you're also working with other people to help them release their dreams. Tell us about that experience for you.
 
Kash Memphis 
When I started this dream, I had the idea in my mind that the company would be named missiology. And that is the case. But when we, when I started that dream, in missiology basically means living on mission. You know, whatever you're doing, just as, you know, you can use that for kingdom. It's a missiological lifestyle. But what we're doing by that is the idea is that I started living my dreams when God called me to when he called me to them. And so it is my belief that when I walked into that mission, I wasn't only doing it for me. But I was doing it with the expectation that missiology his mission would be to awaken dreamers and sleepers to live out their kingdom purpose, and then provide them a roadmap to accomplish it. As we talk now. That's actually our reality. The first of the year, I started up my coaching program, that means I'm coaching people to live out their dreams. I'm coaching people, to have a little bit of fortitude, to push into their kingdom purpose, to seize the opportunity that God's called them to. Because while he says in Scripture, in these days, he will pour out visions and dreams on his on his people. I think the part that we don't acknowledge when we read that is that we're responsible for those dreams and we'll be rewarded for living them. So I've dedicated my life to living for Jesus while I predominantly write and perform rap music wherever anyone will have me but part of getting people to live their dream is also being able to lead from the front. And so that's what we're doing through coaching Through the many other things we do in this theology,
 
Rodney Olsen 
What has been the reaction to your music? You're talking about struggle through that and struggles that you faced? Are you getting feedback from people that it's actually helping them to deal with their own struggles?
 
Kash Memphis 
Absolutely. Let me give you an example. My music is played in 62 different countries, the response that I'm getting is phenomenal. A friend of mine from the military sent me a message the other day and said, Hey, man, I love what you're doing, I appreciate you, you are going to be able to go places no one else can go. And the reason I share that is because God is providing me opportunities that I never thought I would be in position to be here had I not start chasing my dream, had I not start living out what I felt God had purposed me for.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's a real different change to this young man that we heard about at first. And I'm sure that life still has its struggles, it has its ups and downs. But knowing that you're living this dream, obviously makes a big difference in your life.
 
Kash Memphis 
It does, it does. And you know, even as I sit here, and I'm talking to you, I just have the relative sense that that God still wants to do more. It's a sense of being found in being surrendered in my purpose. It's not so much anymore, that I'm unhappy with me, and I'm unhappy with where I'm at. Now, I've focused on my relationship with Jesus, I've allowed him to guide me in love instead of walking away in bitterness and that's been really formative, but to see where I'm standing now, and then look back at all the little places where he gave me like GPS, turn left here, do this, it really gives me the sense that, Papa, you love me. And when you say you died for me, you weren't just joking. When you say, you, you've got dreams, and you've got plans for me better than I could ever understand. I take you serious. I now feel like I did when I was once 10 years old. When I walked up, and I received Christ at this Baptist camp, this church camp that day that God called me when I was 10 years old. I felt as if I could walk into my purpose, with my head held high. Knowing God's sent me with authority.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your music is available through Apple Music through Spotify, and all sorts of other places if people want to track that down. But if people are wanting to find out more about you to get in touch, what's the easiest thing for them to do?
 
Kash Memphis 
The easiest way to get in touch with me Rodney would be either through social media, kodakpurple.com is up. That would be the primary way right there. So if you if you can't reach me there, contact me through social media and I'll be sure to return every contact.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'll put some contact details in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet so that people can get in touch and and hear more of your story. But cash Memphis, it has been so good to talk to you. Thank you for sharing some of your story, where God has brought you from and is taking you to and we look forward to hearing more about you in the future. Thank you for your time.
 
Kash Memphis 
Well, thank you so much for having me. It's been a pleasure and a blessing man.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 
 
 

Depression, anxiety, fear, pain, shame, failure, feeling not enough, even wanting to leave this world. These are all things that Caris Snider has experienced. Whether you’ve encountered any of these feelings, or you’re wanting to know how to help someone who has, you’ll find hope and encouragement in today’s episode of Bleeding Daylight.
 
https://carissnider.com/
https://carissnider.com/blog/
https://www.facebook.com/conversationswithcaris/
https://www.instagram.com/carissnider/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCntkMeezDEUqspk3UEkW-5A
https://www.pinterest.com/carissnider/
https://twitter.com/caris_snider
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Depression, anxiety, fear, pain, shame, failure, feeling not enough, even wanting to leave this world. These are all things that today’s guest has experienced. Whether you’ve encountered any of these feelings, or you’re wanting to know how to help someone you know, you’ll find hope and encouragement in today’s episode.
 
Please remember to share this story with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please follow Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts. It's free and it'll ensure you never miss an episode.If we're honest, most of us have some kind of disconnect between our personal inner world and the person that the world sees. But for today's guest, it was like a gaping chasm. Caris Snider seemed to have it all together. She was a wife, mum, friend and worship leader. Unfortunately, below the surface, things were quite different. Caris was hiding a secret, even from those closest to her and today we'll lift the lid on that secret and discover the turnaround that not only helped her, but that has allowed her to help others. Caris is the author of the book Anxiety Elephants and I'm very pleased that she's joining us today on Bleeding Daylight. Thank you for your time.
 
Caris Snider 
Thank you, Rodney, for having me today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to explore the anxiety elephants that you referenced in the title to your book. But first, let's go back to before the elephants arrived, what did life look like for you?
 
Caris Snider 
Well, life appeared to be wonderful for me, my husband and I, we were business owners, we had a daughter at the time who was two years old, and everything appeared to be great for us. We had lots of friends around us. And he even thought that I was this strong, Wonder Woman, if you will type woman. And I was terrified to show people what I was dealing with inside.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what were some of the things that you were dealing with in your inner world,
 
Caris Snider 
I was dealing with this need to be perfect, if you will, I was terrified that if people knew that I wasn't perfect, that I didn't have it all together, that I was a failure, that I was terrified of failure, and that I had lived with fear and rejection for much of my life. I was scared if I let them into those real pieces of who I was that they would no longer accept me that I would no longer be needed in my church that that even God wouldn't want to use me anymore because I wasn't this perfect person that I was portraying and I really just felt broken. I felt ashamedn and I just felt less than, really,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Where do you believe these feelings started to come from? Obviously, this is something that started way back before this supposedly perfect looking life. Where did all that begin for you?
 
Caris Snider 
Yeah, Rodney, that is a great question. And I honestly believe this all started for me when I was a child, I can go back and I can remember being in school in first grade for me. And I remember, a little boy who lived in my neighborhood with his family lived there. My twin brother and I, we all lived in this neighborhood. We all went to church together. It was a very small, close knit town. And one day he gathered our entire first grade class around me. And he began to make fun of me because I was born with a mild form of cerebral palsy in my left side, and I had no idea until that day that my body was physically different from everyone else. My my parents didn't treat me any different. None of my extended family looked at me differently. They they loved me. And they never called out to me that my arm was held up all the time or that I walked with a lamp. I didn't know until I was six years old. And this little boy gathered our class around us and he looked at me and he said Caris, why do you look like that? Why do you look like a bunny rabbit. And he held both of his arms up the way that I held my left arm up. And I'm in my 30s. And I can still picture this moment. And he began to hop around me like a bunny rabbit. And the entire class was laughing with him and laughing at me, and to choke the tears back to choke back the hurt and the pain that he caused. I laughed with them and I remember going home that day and I did something that I began to do throughout the rest of my life until I dealt with anxiety and depression. And what I did was, I told no one, I hid it. I didn't tell my parents, I didn't tell my teacher. I didn't tell my brothers because I was scared of what would come out of me sharing this rejection sharing this pain. So early on in my life, the way I learned to cope with the pain and hurt and rejection was to hide it to push it down and to become the master of the mask to find ways to hide my weaknesses to find ways to not be called out in the crowd again, because that moment, that rejection felt awful. It was just a terrible feeling. And it all began for me as a young child.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So there's this one instance that you remember very clearly, in that that place playground did that teasing go on from there was this a case of once this boy has highlighted it to the rest of the class that they was teasing that continue to go on from that point,
 
Caris Snider 
He did not tease me from that point. But throughout the rest of my grade school years, they were the other boys and other girls who would bring up different things to call out different weaknesses that they would be able to find, you know, we all can run into people that bring those things out to us in different ways. And so in those moments, I can remember even in fifth grade, a boy would make fun of the way that I talked, and he just like to pick on me and I began to have symptoms of anxiety, my heart would be racing, my breathing would feel very breathless, I would have migraines. And we had no idea what was going on in my body. Because in that time, in those years, we really didn't talk about anxiety, often, and we didn't really put a name to it. So I didn't know what was going on. And then, you know, as teenagers, we all deal with different moments in our teenage years. So I had those different moments that were kind of markers, I like to say, throughout my young adult life, my childhood life that kind of created these coping skills of not coping these skills of hide it, the whole, fake it till you make it thing,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Then we fast forward. And you've mentioned that you're married. And at this stage, you also have a daughter, and wondering about even in those courting days with your husband, and we know what that's like, where we express our love for each other. And I'm sure that your husband is saying, You're beautiful. Was there something inside you thinking? Yeah, but only if you knew?
 
Caris Snider 
Yes, there really was because I was terrified. If you know, if you know, the fears that I have, if you know these weaknesses, that I have, will you love me for who I am? Will you accept me, for who I am, it was funny, actually, when we met, Rodney, he was in a Christian boy band. And so they danced around and they sang, and he had all these girls that love to follow him and, and wanted his autograph and, and oftentimes I can remember I would find my way, kind of shrinking in the background, because I just didn't feel like I was as good as they were, I didn't feel worthy of his love, if you will. And so I can remember having those moments throughout our, our dating Season of Our relationship before we did get engaged and get married. But I would I would lie in the bed at night and wonder what is it about me, you know, if he would really love the real me, if I if I let him see that. Even after we got married, I was still this strong woman who, who went for it, who strove, you know, for, for perfection and to be the best of the best. Because, you know, all these other instances in my life where I had rejection, I thought if I show him, this part of me, will he reject me, as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So at the same time, as you're getting involved in something that's quite wonderful, there's this fear in the back of your mind that it's all on a precipice, and it could tip over at any moment,
 
Caris Snider 
At any moment. And that is so much pressure and young person's life, I think about even young people right now the pressure that they're under, you know, and I remember that with work and with family and, and these new relationships, and that pressure was mounting. And I had convinced myself that no one can know, no one can know about this pressure, no one can know about these weaknesses. And that I had to keep it all to myself, keep all the burden, all the pain, all the broken pieces, try to carry that in my own hands, and my own arms all by myself.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Did you have any inkling that there is this kind of disconnect to a smaller or larger degree in most people's lives? Or was this just something that because you were stuffing it down? You felt I'm the only one on alone in this?
 
Caris Snider 
Yeah, that you You said it, I truly believed that I was the only person dealing with all of these broken things because I looked at everyone else. I saw everyone else smiling. I saw everyone else laughing and having a good time. And it never clicked to me that maybe they're struggling too. Maybe they are going through a hard time too. And I will be honest with you and tell you that I grew up in even into my college years thinking that anxiety and depression that those things were not real. I honestly thought that if you said you dealt with anxiety and depression, that you were feeling sorry for yourself that you were just wanting attention, and that these things were just made up. And I really did not realize how real and how much of a burden those things Until I began to deal with those things, and I would even have people come to me and ask me for advice and for encouragement or, or asked me to pray for them, you know, to ask God to help them deal with with what they're going through mentally. And I would tell them, unfortunately, I would say to them things like, well, you just need to try harder. You just need to pray harder, you just need to trust God more. And I had no idea that I was causing more hurt. And I was causing more shame and pain, to fill their hearts and minds when I was telling them those things because it was not responding to them with the compassion that Jesus would have responded with.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at the same time, as you're telling them to try harder to pray harder, that these things don't really exist. you're experiencing this yourself but not realizing it.
 
Caris Snider 
That's exactly right. I remember when I began to experience for me personally, it was anxiety first. And I remember that I began to have these panic attacks, but I didn't know it was panic attacks, what it felt like to me is that my heart was beating out of my chest, and it would not stop and it felt like these elephants were sitting on my chest, and the harder I pushed to get these elephants off to get this pain off, the harder my heart would be, and then my breathing, I would feel breathless, and I would feel dizzy. And I had no idea that this was an anxiety attack, I was having a thought I was dying. And I would do I dealt with this for several months, I again, I'm still operating under these coping skills of don't tell anybody. And I sat on my couch one day in my house, and my daughter was playing with her toys. And it was just her and I at home, and my heart begin to race like I had never felt before. And I was terrified. I was paralyzed in fear. And my heart was beating, I couldn't breathe, I felt dizzy. And the only thing that I needed to do in that moment was to call my mother and she was a safe person for me a safe place for me, I called my mother. And she told me, Caris, you need to go to the doctor right now. I think you're having an anxiety attack, you need to go to the doctor. And I wanted to argue with my mother, but I knew even then you don't argue with your mother. I did what she asked me to do. And I took my daughter with me. And I remember in that moment, that brokenness and that anxiety, it just kind of overwhelmed me. And I would I looked at the nurses as they hooked me up to these machines, to check my heart and to make sure that everything was okay. And I looked at them, and I began to say to them, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, you're having to deal with this, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm causing you to have to work this extra hard, you know, your day, I'm sorry, that I'm a burden that began to come out of my mouth. And, you know, those nurses reminded me that they were there to help me, that was kind of the first seed of allowing people in to help and, and they begin to help me and the doctor came in and, and he said, Caris, you know, your heart is fine, you're having an anxiety attack. And I was still in this denial stage of his anxiety really real, you know, and I kind of wanted to argue with a doctor, but I told him, You know, I was good, I was fine, I was gonna be okay. And I left that day, not allowing him to help me not, you know, taking medication, not talking to a counselor, trying to still figure it out on my own, and then doing that, for me, the anxiety now moved into depression.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell us about some of the steps that you were taking at this stage, you say that you want it to be perfect. You You want it to present, this amazing woman that you didn't really feel that you were, what were some of the things that you were doing to try and project that image? And how are you dealing with that within your own body?
 
Caris Snider 
Some things that I was doing to project this image of perfection is I was focusing on the outside, what can I do to my physical appearance to make people think that I was okay and that I had it all together. And so what I did is I begin to exercise a lot. I exercise at least two hours every day, I was lifting weights that I had no business lifting, it was probably upwards of 10 pound weights. And I was eating less than 1000 calories a day. So I was not eating very much because I was again just trying to make my body look perfect. I was drinking three to four gallons of water a day, way too much water and I was starving myself. I was doing it to show this image of perfection but I was also doing it trying to starve the pain of the anxiety and the depression and the shame that I felt, and in doing that my body dropped down to almost 100 pounds. I looked like a skeleton because this weight of perfection, this need to, to have it all together was just beginning to to wear wear me down and wear me out. And at this time,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Were there any warning bells for your husband as he's seeing this? Or was he just believing that you wanting to be fit, and that you are wanting to get into the shape that you want it to be?
 
Caris Snider 
There were some warning bells for him, he noticed that I would go away into our bedroom and just, that's where I would work out and I would disappear for hours. You know, I wasn't with him or with my daughter very much. I was isolating myself away. I was isolating myself away from church from our friends. Whenever we would lead worship, I would always find a reason to have to leave quickly, to not stay and be around people. So then I wouldn't have to talk to anyone about what I was dealing with. He began to notice that and even we were going to the beach. This was my daughter's very first trip to the beach as a toddler and I cried, I cried the whole way there. I cried while we were there. Because these these thoughts, these what ifs that anxiety was plaguing me with. What if she drowns? What if we have a wreck? What if something happens to our house while we're going I was just played with these irrational fears? And he began to ask me, you know, Caris, are you okay? Curious What's wrong, I can remember telling him that I really didn't know what was wrong. But I remember asking him, please don't give up on me. I know that. This is not like me, I know that this is things that we've never gone through. But please don't give up on me. And he really didn't know how to respond. But he knew that in that moment, I just needed him to be there for me, he didn't have to have all the answers. He didn't have to know how to fix it. I just needed to know that in that moment. As this truth were being revealed as these things that I was dealing with this anxiety and depression, as I begin to talk to him about it slowly reveal it to him, that he wasn't going to leave me that he wasn't going to turn his back on me. And that was the biggest thing. So he did notice that I was isolating, he did notice that I was very particular and what I would eat, I would only eat certain things that I made, that I didn't want to go eat at restaurants anymore. And he just began to kind of see these red flags, he didn't really quite know what to do. So he didn't try to do anything, he just wanted to make sure that I knew that he was there. And that, that there was no way that he was going to leave me behind
 
Rodney Olsen 
The fears, the doubts, the anxiety, has stopped just being about you. You're projecting that onto others. Now you're thinking, what happens if my daughter drowns at the beach? What happens if the car's in a wreck. So it's starting to explode at this stage, isn't it?
 
Caris Snider 
it was exploding and that depression began to turn into dread, dread to get up and face the day dread of what if I caused, you know, hurt or pain on my daughter or my husband, you know, I'm beginning to think these things that depression tells you that you're a burden, that you're worthless, hopeless, useless and purposeless. And, and this would just begin to just wear on me day after day after day. And in the midst of all of this hurt, all this pain, all of the shame, we find out that I'm pregnant, and we could not believe that I was pregnant. And so I remember going to my doctor and and she was checking everything out. And she was you know, she's heard the baby's heartbeat and, and she said, you know, cares, the baby right now is healthy, but but for the sake of the baby, and for the sake of your health, you know, you need to eat, it's okay, if you eat cake, or you eat sweets or donuts for breakfast, lunch and dinner, we just need you to eat to put something into your body. And so that was something that did trigger in me to help me Stop starving myself. Because I knew for the sake of that baby, I needed to eat something. So that did help help me in doing that in over a course of about eight weeks. I gained six pounds, which was a huge deal for me that was a big victory because I was not eating very much before that. But also at the end of that eight weeks I lost that baby. And that was the rock bottom for me having that miscarriage and seeing that little life disappear. And so now I'm beginning to hear you see what you did see how you You brought hurt onto that child onto that life. You know, you're not needed here. This world will be better off without you. So now I am pushing down deeper into these thoughts of, well, maybe I do need to leave this earth and suicide, suicidal thoughts began to become real. And that scared me to see myself go that far but to realize how real anxiety and depression and shame and suicide is and how so many people are out there struggling with that thinking just like idea that they're alone and that there's no hope,
 
Rodney Olsen 
All this time you're you're heading towards this moment where you finally must admit that you need help. But you are living within a faith community, you're part of a church. And obviously, part of the teaching of the Scriptures is that were accepted no matter who we are, and what we like, why do you think it's so difficult for many, even within the church, to take those sort of scriptures to heart? Why is there such a difficulty for us to assimilate what we read about this God who loves us unconditionally? With who we are? Why is there that disconnect?
 
Caris Snider 
I have been asking that question for a while now. And I think it's a really powerful one. I think sometimes, you know, and I know, this is my opinion, I think sometimes we as the church and in the faith community, sometimes when we don't know how to deal with things, we just pretend like they're not there. And we, for a while there has been this disconnect between faith and mental health. And like you said, the scriptures tells us, you know, how God loves us. And he came, you know, he sent his son for the sick, and the hurting. And the scriptures even tell us that in this world, you will have trouble. And I think sometimes we get this thought in our head that that means everyone but us. And in actuality, it doesn't. It includes us. And what I found is in that moment, and that rock bottom moment for me, God was there. He was there with me in that pit. And just as he says, You know, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you. And in that moment, it was a two questions were there it was a you can look up, or you can give up. And it was like, God just kind of helped lift my head. And when I looked up, he helped me to see that they were helpers there that the church, the body of Christ was there to help me. And not only was my church there, my fame, my church family there, but he had a counselor there for me, who worked within faith and worked within the scriptures to help me. He had my doctor there who was helping bring those hormones and those things that were in my body out of balance, putting it back in, and my family was there. And my friends that I went to church with, they were there, and they loved me and they cared for me and all this time thinking, you know, if you tell, they're going to turn their back on you, that was revealed to be a lie. And you know, Galatians 6:2 tells us that we are to bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. And so God's word began to be real in my life. And I began to see Wait a minute, there is Grace is is real. And when Christ died for us, it was with grace that he came knowing that we couldn't get through this life without him there was going to be no way. And that began to lift this need for perfection off and allowed God's true grace to come in. And I'll never forget, as I was beginning to learn what grace really was, and to learn about bearing one another's burdens and taking off this mask of this need to have it all together. I was sitting with a friend and our daughters were playing. And she asked me how I was doing. And I told her, I said, you know what I'm not. Today is not a good day, I've been battling with depression and anxiety. And I'm working through that. And my friend looked at me, and I could see relief, kind of feel her shoulders, and she just relaxed a little bit. And she looked at me and she said, You too? And I looked at her and we both had tears in her eyes. And I said, Yes, me too. And, and in that moment, it was as if God was showing me this is what what this is about. This is what I want. My Church. This is what I want the body of Christ to do share one another's burdens. And in doing that, it allows his hope to begin to come in because we realize we don't have to be perfect. to work together. We don't have to be perfect to go out and be used by God because He works through our weaknesses. When we're weak, then that is when he can be strong and that was in a moment a shifting for me. When God began to restore me and help me to see that in my weaknesses that's where the world can see his hope.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested in the difference between, that scary time of having to admit, I need help. And the time just after that, once you finally told others, this is what I'm going through and the relief that must have come from that. Can you contrast those for us?
 
Caris Snider 
Yes, I can think back on that when I had to admit and acknowledge that I had a problem. And I needed help. And I remember in that moment, I did that with my head held down, not wanting to look anyone in the eyes, not wanting to see if they really were going to walk away. And you know, even in that moment, having my heart practically beat out of my chest. And it was a moment filled with beer kind of a moment that I was faced with, will the lies be real? Or will they proved to not be true. And it was a moment where those lies were proved not to be true. And I just needed that one moment to admit my struggle to admit my problem. And to face it. And once I face that fear, and realized that they were still there, that they loved me, it began to become easier. As I shared with my friend and talk with her, it was kind of like a aha moment, when not when we talked about it. As a more people need this more people need to know that there's freedom, in being vulnerable, there's freedom in telling what's going on inside of you. And in doing that, that's when God could begin to really bring that restoration in that healing into my life, because he couldn't heal any of that, if I wasn't willing to admit that I needed that healing. And so as I began to talk to my friends, and even share with others, it allowed us to kind of go through that journey together. And to truly realize, hey, we're not alone. We're not alone in this, there's actually millions of us going through this right now. And the more that we share our stories with each other, and the more we can say, hey, me, too, not only can we have that moment in our struggle in our pain, but we can have that moment together in our healing. And in our restoration, and in living our life in a new way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What did it do for your relationships, when you were finally able to bring the real up to the table? I'm interested, especially for you and your husband, how did that start to grow your relationship,
 
Caris Snider 
It allowed us to, to laugh more, to enjoy life more, it helped me to see that I didn't have to be perfect around him that it was okay for me to mess up. And it was okay for him to mess up, you know, I could take that, that need of perfection off of everyone else. So it really kind of brought relief around our household, it brought relief into our marriage. And it allowed us in our ministry, to really work together more in a way where where it was God's grace operating, you know, that gift of not needing to be perfect, allowing him him to work through us. And so, you know, I can remember that, that we could now go out on dates, and we could laugh, or we could be silly, or we could talk about things that I had questions about that I didn't know if they were true or not. And we could have good honest conversation. And it was like we kind of got to know each other in a brand new way, if you will.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested in the journey from there, you're talking about going through this healing process. And I'm sure that there are still good days and bad days. But what was some of the steps that you actually talk to get into a healthier place?
 
Caris Snider 
Right. So those steps, I like to call them. action steps were very important for me, a couple of those things, first of all, was seeking help from a counselor and going and talking to a counselor, which was something that I struggled with for a little while. And I didn't understand how a counselor could be so helpful. But in doing that it allowed me to talk about things that I was dealing with, it allowed me to go back to my childhood and see that that was kind of where the root of everything began for me. So having that counselor to allow me to share freely, with no judgment, and to just kind of explore and discover these things. That was a big action step for me receiving help from my doctor. That was really important as well. You know, she posed the question to me if you had heart disease, and I offered medication to you to help you with a heart disease, would you take it? And I told her Yes, I absolutely would. And so, and needing that medication to get my brain and those hormones back in order. That's what she was trying to help me to see this medication is helping your brain just like medication would for your heart if you had heart disease, and so that was an important step to take that into into help me get out of that fog and get back in balance. Some other things that were helpful was being around community, being around friends no longer isolating myself no longer living in loneliness. And so I would allow women into my life where we could be real and honest with each other and have that community that we were meant to have to bear one another's burdens my family, letting you know, again, leaning on my husband letting him be that supporter for me, knowing that I didn't have to be this strong and mighty person that he loved me even in my weaknesses and to know that our weaknesses partner together and allowed us to have our marriage and work together. That was important. Also, I think what was really important for me was really diving into God's word and seeing Okay, okay, God, what do you say about fear? What do you say, about anxiety? What do you say about different things that I was dealing with in my life and to really get in the Scripture, and to write it down, and to begin to hide his word in my heart, you know, and to know that he was with me. And in doing that, I even found Psalm 94:19. When anxiety is great within me, your comfort, brings me joy. So claiming to scriptures like that, that was important. Also, I began to journal and write down my thoughts, write down those negative things that was in my mind to get them out. And then I would replace it, I would take those thoughts captive and replace those thoughts, with like, giving thoughts with Scripture or with, you know, positive affirmations about myself. And then even having an attitude of gratitude. I even heard on a snippet of your podcast with Terry Nightingale, how he was talking about gratitude, when we give that thanks to God, right, it allows the Holy Spirit to invade that space. So I began to learn that power of gratitude and thanking God for every good thing in my life, knowing that all those good things came from him and that began to help me to not focus on the negative things and help me to keep my eyes focused on those positive things that I had around me. And that was huge. And finally, helping others realizing that there were other women, there were other men, there were other children, and young people who needed help, who needed to know you are not alone. And there is hope. And that hope is worth fighting for So beginning to pour into others and help others who were where I was, that was a big moment for me as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you've mentioned there that you started to reach out and help others. And you've continued to do that through your website. And tell me a little about that book. I mean, fascinating title. And we've already heard where the idea of the elephants come from, what was the thinking behind that book?
 
Caris Snider 
Right. So like you said, the idea of the elephants came from the description of describing anxiety as elephants sitting on my chest, I knew that that many people were dealing with anxiety, and they didn't know what it was. So giving them that description helped them to understand better. And then there were some that, that were not dealing with anxiety, but they had family members in their life who were and so that helped them to understand what that anxiety really felt like for them. And so in writing the devotional, honestly, I had never really wanted to be a writer that was not on my bucket list, I guess you could say, but but God just kind of began to do a work in me and show me you know, that that was something he wanted me to do. So I began to just kind of write and look for scriptures. And what I wanted to do was offer a tool, a tool to help people to know, okay, these are daily action steps that I can take, because when you're in the middle of that anxiety, you want to take action, but you don't really know what action to take. So in the book, there is a scripture for every day, there's 31 days and, and then we kind of in the text, we talk about that scripture and I share about different stories and parts of my my life. And then at the end of that there is an action step for the reader to take. And then after that there's a prayer they can pray. And there's a journaling page, or they can write down what did they learn? How are they going to take that action step for that day. So it's short reading, but it's power packed to really help people see you can overcome these anxiety elephants, you can get back to not just surviving in your life, but you can truly thrive and the purpose that God has for you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I imagine that for someone who's experiencing anxiety, experiencing depression, the last thing they want is reading through volumes of information. So those short, power packed devotionals are probably going to be the best thing for them to say. There is someone on my side. And I can just read that even through my mind fog at the moment.
 
Caris Snider 
Yeah, I love how you said that, that there is someone on my side. And I remember that's what I needed. I couldn't really process Going through those moments really in depth deep, you know, long reading, but I just needed someone to say take this one small action today. And that's a victory. And that began to help me to see that I didn't have to focus on what I was not doing, just focus on the small things that I could do each day. And so that's why I wanted to really write the devotional in that way, so that it would give people momentum every day to build on something new to say, Hey, I took this one small step. Now, what small steps can I take today?
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's been almost a decade since all of this came to a head. And you had to reach out and say, I need help in that decade, since we'd all like to believe that we can get an instant cure. But what has that journey been? Like? Is it an ongoing journey for you?
 
Caris Snider 
It is, I would love to tell people that I no longer battle anxiety or depression. But that would be a lie, that would not be true, I still have days, I still have moments where I struggle, where I wonder where I asked those what ifs. But now, I don't stay down in the struggle. And it doesn't keep me wrapped up. Now I have these tools. And I know what I can do to fight back. Now I may have a day where it knocks me out completely. But I can get up the next day and know these are the things that I know to do. I also know that God's grace is sufficient, and that he loves me that he is not mad at me. If I go back into those struggles, and I know that my purpose is still there for me, even when I struggle, and so I'm learning in this process over these years that the struggles allow me to lean in on God and to trust in Him. And that it's okay. To not be okay.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It must be wonderful to know that there are now more good days than bad days. What does the family life look like for you today?
 
Caris Snider 
Yes. So now today, actually, we have two daughters, we have a daughter who's 12 and a daughter who's eight. And so family life today looks for us, we have a lot of honest conversations, I want my daughters to know that they can share the good, the bad and the ugly, they will not get in trouble. So we make sure that we leave space for that space for that honesty. The days now are filled, you know, as best as they can with conversations with friends. Those conversations may be you know, Hey, how are you today. And if they need to share a struggle, there is space to do that. And then I also now have a tribe of people around me, that allows me to share allows me to open up and so the days are filled with leaving that freedom, for whatever may happen to happen. And to know that in that it could be something good, it could be something that that's hard, but God will use it for good. He'll use it in a way that'll bring honor and glory to Him. And so these days are filled with much more laughter much more freedom than where I was 10 years ago. And I am just truly grateful for that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
As you said, one of the things that you want to do now is to reach out to provide that help for others. And you do that through the book anxiety elephants, also through blog posts and various other things that people will find on your website. What is the easiest way for people to discover you or find you online?
 
Caris Snider 
Right, so they can go to my website that is carissnider.com. And there you can find more information about the book, you can find my social media where I hang out for social media, and like you said, different blog posts and other videos that I've done. So I feel like the website would be the easiest way for people to discover
 
Rodney Olsen 
Caris. It has been wonderful to talk to you to hear some of your story, which sounds like there's some very difficult things that you've been through. But amongst that there is some incredible hope. And we thank you for bringing that hope, because I'm sure that there are many people that are experiencing that both for themselves. But also, as you've mentioned, knowing that loved ones are going through difficult times and wondering how can I help them so thank you for what you've brought to our conversation today. And thank you for spending some time on bleeding daylight.
 
Caris Snider 
Yeah, thank you Rodney for allowing me to be on and thank you for having this this space to offer help to the world.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Markus Watson was investigated for a sickening crime with no knowledge of who had made allegations against him, what evidence they claimed to have, and not even knowing the crime he was alleged to have committed. He faced accusations that threatened to destroy his livelihood and trash his reputation. He was betrayed, investigated by the FBI and forced out of a job.
 
https://www.markuswatson.com/
https://www.markuswatson.com/podcast/
https://www.markuswatson.com/book/
https://www.facebook.com/MarkusWats0n
https://www.instagram.com/markuswats0n/
https://twitter.com/MarkusWatson
 
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Imagine being investigated for a sickening crime with no knowledge of who has made allegations against you what evidence they claim to have, and not even knowing the crime you are alleged to have committed. That's the story of my guest on Bleeding Daylight today. We'll hear his alarming story in a few moments.
 
Please remember to share this story with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please follow Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts. It's free and it'll ensure you never miss an episode.
 
Speaker, author and pastor Markus Watson faced accusations that threatened to destroy his livelihood and trash his reputation. He was betrayed, investigated by the FBI and forced out of a job. Today we'll explore his story, Markus, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Markus Watson 
Thanks, Rodney. It's good to be here.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Working in ministry wasn't your first career choice. In fact, I believe that the bright lights of Hollywood seemed to hold more of an attraction for you back in those early days.
 
Markus Watson 
You know, when I was a kid, my dream was to be a movie star. That's what I that's, I used to pray dear Lord, You know, as a little kid, you Lord, please help me to be an actor. While I'm still a kid, I still I wanted to be like a child actor. Probably good that I wasn't. As I got older, I was like, yeah, you know what, I don't want to be an actor, I want to be a director, you know, I wanted to tell the stories and be in control of the stories. And so after college or at the end of near the end of college, I got an internship in Hollywood as a production assistant, which is kind of the the bottom of the totem pole, that's, you know, that's the person who goes and gets coffee or delivers this script to that person over there, whatever. And is it kind of assists with a production, it was fun, it was a great experience for a while, until I realized that if I was going to succeed in Hollywood, I was going to have to make that my number one priority in life. And I couldn't really do that. I love God, I loved my church. You know, in college, I'd been involved in Campus Crusade for Christ. I mean, that was really my number one priority was my relationship with God. And I realized that if I was going to keep pursuing Hollywood, I was going to have to set that aside. And that's not to say that there aren't any faithful Christians in Hollywood, I know that there are, and some people maybe are better able to manage those priorities, than I might have been. So anyway, I got to the point where I realized that I was gonna have to leave Hollywood. And that was that was really, really hard. That was probably up until that point in my life, certainly, the hardest decision I've ever made. That dream had been with me for my entire life, you know. And so letting go of that dream was like cutting my arm off. I decided that I would do one of three things, I would either go on Stanford's Campus Crusade for Christ, which I enjoyed, or I would get a master's degree in communication, or I'll go to seminary and I lived in LA at the time and Fuller Seminary was nearby. And so I applied at Fuller Seminary, applied at the other two as well, Campus Crusade and, you know, explored some other graduate schools for communication. And I could get into those latter two, by the following January, I could get into Fuller, that fall. And I thought, well, let's give seminary a shot, you know, and if I don't like it, I'll pursue one of these other options. And when I got Fuller, first day of class was patristic theology with John Thompson. And I loved it. And I just thought, Oh, my gosh, I cannot believe I get to learn all this stuff. patristic theology, by the way, theology of the early church fathers, right. So just early church history. Gosh, I just felt at home, I didn't yet feel like I was being called to be a pastor, necessarily, but I did know that I was in the right place. That call to become a pastor was clarified over my time while I was in seminary. You know, several years later, I finished and I got ordained as a Presbyterian pastor and I got my first call to a to a church in Union, Kentucky, as an associate pastor out there.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's interesting that you had that self awareness then as a young man to say, you know, this is something that's a dream for me, but I know it's not kind of benefit me to pursue it. I wonder what life would be like if many more of us had that self awareness at a young age to say, yeah, this is a desire, but it's not a good one.
 
Markus Watson 
I don't want to give myself too much credit. It was, I mean, I, you know, I had grown a lot in my faith in college, but I'll be honest, you know, there were some difficult moments in that Hollywood experience. That was part of the self awareness, if you can call it that is just that, who I didn't like that. I didn't like that. You know, there were these expectations that you would work all hours of the day, especially if you're at the bottom of the totem pole. You know, no matter what even for no pay the couple of funny little stories, one was, I was delivering a script in the days, you know, just prior to email being widely used. So I was delivering a script to the host of this TV special, but delivered it to the wrong place and kind of stuck it through the door of the wrong unit in this condo complex. And I came back and the producer was like, You can't make mistakes like this. He's a star, you can't do this with a star. And then he goes, Well, he's not a star, but he is a celebrity. And I'm like, Oh, interesting. So there's a hierarchy that even with the big famous people, you know, and so there is that. And then the last job, it became clear, for me, it was a temporary job for two or three or four weeks at a company that did movie trailers, it had the possibility of becoming full time. And they did just decided not to keep me and I said, Oh, why, you know, what, was there anything I could have done? And they said, Well, you could have offered to stay late, meaning without pay, you know, beyond the eight hours per day, and I was just like, oh, okay, I see. And that was kind of, for me the, the last thing so you know, so that awareness came through difficult circumstances, and I was just kind of ready to let it go. But I do think that, you know, the more we can develop that self awareness, even as much as possible at a young age, the less pain perhaps we go through later in life, or the more less difficulty we go through later in life, if we can get started on the right track, I think it would have been harder for me had I stuck to my guns and said, I'm gonna make this work. I'm gonna make this work, even though I really kind of started to realize this just isn't gonna work.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm sure that the irony is not lost on some that you decided not to go with a calling that was going to mean that you had to work all hours for no pay, and decided to go into ministry.
 
Markus Watson 
Oh, there you go. I had never made that connection. But there you go. Yep. That's funny.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I do remember working in a very different profession years ago, and thinking, I wouldn't go to any great lengths to continue this profession. And yet, when I considered the alternative, and back then that was to go and work in radio is like, Yeah, I'd I'd move I'd do whatever it took to actually get into that industry. And so it really starts to tell you where your true priorities are.
 
Markus Watson 
That's a good point. Yeah, one of the things I realized, I guess, was that I wasn't as committed to that desire, as maybe I thought I was, you know, I think my experience in college and Campus Crusade, that's kind of where my, my faith really grew and became my own. You know, that's where I began to lead Bible studies, with other you know, college students with us. I would give talks in our weekly meetings, you know, college student versions of little sermons, you know, and, and we did a lot of evangelism. That's one of the things Campus Crusade is great. And I learned, so I learned to share my faith, and that it's important for people to know Jesus. And so all of those things, kind of set me on it on a trajectory, I think, well towards some kind of Christian Leadership. And I didn't really know it, until until I knew it, I guess, until it became, but it was this unfolding, right. It's like a peeling back layers of an onion, and you get closer and closer to the core of, oh, here's what God is calling, calling me to do.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So we jump ahead. And you've mentioned that you started your first job as a pastor in a small church. Tell us a little about that experience.
 
Markus Watson 
I was still newly married. So I had been a youth pastor in a really great church. I mean, when I think back to my favorite times in ministry, it was as a youth pastor of this church, Glen Kirk Presbyterian Church in Glendora, California. Something about that relationship with those kids really clicked. I still am in touch with many of those kids. They're all in their 30s now, but I just as recently as a year and a half ago, I officiated one of their weddings. That was a non ordained position. And then I became, you know, I finished my ordination process and then so Okay, now it's time gotta gotta go. Look for an ordained position as a pastor, senior pastor, associate pastor, and so I was looking at associate pastor positions. I was wanting to stay in Southern California, because that was home. And so I interviewed with a couple of churches in Southern California. And then I got a call from this church in Kentucky. But I was not interested in that, you know, I didn't want to leave California, but I thought, you know, what I need, I need interview practice. So you know, I, I said, Sure, I'll talk with you on the phone. They almost immediately said, Hey, we want to fly you out here and interview you in person. And I thought, what the heck, it's good practice. And I've never been in Kentucky. And so my wife and I said, Yeah, let's go. Let's do the interview. And so we did. I wasn't convinced that that's where God was calling us, although I wasn't totally opposed to it. Anyway, we came back And they offered me the position. But I was holding out to see what would happen with these other two churches. Well, just kind of things didn't work out with either of them. But in my mind after a month or so I had set this church in Kentucky aside, I wasn't even thinking about them. And I, I said to my wife, after these two churches in California didn't work out. I said, Well, what do we do? And she's like, well, there's still Kentucky. And I was like, Oh, yeah, oh, no. But the more I prayed about it, the more I you know, I went for walks and just saw right Lord told me, you know, what do you do? And it just became clear that that's where God was calling us. And so we said, Yes. And we, we lived there for about three and a half years. And it was it was a good experience. I was hired as the associate pastor, for youth. After a couple of years, the senior pastor resigned, which left me as the only pastor on staff. And so then I for about seven months, until they called an interim senior pastor, I, you know, I was the guy I had to learn to preach every Sunday and, and do everything else too. And so, in a way, I kind of feel like, I think maybe that's why God called me there, right? Because God knew I was going to need to push into that kind of a role to kind of prepare me or to show me that, Oh, look, I can do this. And that's one of the things I learned was that, oh, okay, I can do this. I can, I can preach every Sunday I can. I can lead teams and, you know, lead the whole congregation, I think I got this. And so I didn't just start looking, they kind of ran out of money. Markus, I think we need you to start looking for another job. And they didn't like push me out or anything. But, you know, I was like, Okay, good. So I started and ended up in San Diego, then after that,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what happened at that point, you move to another church, and what transpired as you started to pastor there at this new church,
 
Markus Watson 
it was great at first, you know, my wife and I were really excited to move back to Southern California. And San Diego is a beautiful city, we'd never lived there. But of course, we'd been there to Los Angeles is only about two hours north of San Diego. And we were close to family and friends, certainly within driving distance. And so we were just so excited to come back to San Diego. It seemed like a good fit this church for me for for that time, it was great for about seven and a half years. You know, we've made some healthy changes to bring some life into the church make connections with, you know, families and the preschool, and many of them started coming to church, did some work in the community partnerships with local schools, and then about seven and a half years and is kind of when things took a turn.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did you start to get an inkling that things weren't going well for you there?
 
Markus Watson 
That's a good question. You know, I think it would be when I requested a sabbatical. So I'd been there for about seven years. And you know, a lot in a lot of churches at seven years, churches will give the pastor a three month sabbatical, at least in our tradition that happens in a lot of churches. So I requested that and I had come to this place where I was like, oh, man, yeah, I'm, I'm on the verge of burnout. I had finished doing a doctor of ministry. And then after I finished writing that dissertation, I was like, you know, I'm gonna give everything I can to the church. So for like six months, I think I preached every Sunday, except for maybe like two, something like that. I remember crawling towards a two week vacation. And I say crawling, it felt like I was crawling on my hands and knees to this toward this little two weeks vacation just like oh my gosh, I need a break. And that's when I was like, I need I need a sabbatical. And I think it's okay for me to ask for one. So I did. But there was some pushback, our elders approved it. But they needed some convincing from another pastor in our presbytery, who came and he said, here's the value and someone suggested, why don't you let the congregation vote on it? Right? That way, you get sort of a vote of confidence. So I was like, Okay. And it wasn't a unanimous vote. You know, it was like a two thirds of the congregation voted to approve the sabbatical. The other third didn't. But I was like, Well, I'm going to take it. But but that was kind of a little hint. I'm not sure everything is as good as perhaps it once was. When I did take the sabbatical. That's when things really kind of took a turn for the worse.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It must have been a little bit crushing to realize that this group of people that you were leading in this church, they didn't all have your back. They weren't all going in the same direction. Even though two thirds is a good majority, to know that there's a third of people who didn't believe that you actually needed a break. Must have been a little bit crushing for you.
 
Markus Watson 
Yes, yes. I think I maybe tried to ignore it a little bit. But you're right. It was a little bit disappointing. At a minimum, you know why? How come they don't all support this? Can't they see right how much blood sweat and tears gets poured into a church by a pastor. Me in particular in this case, right? Yeah, it was it was disappointing.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So it was around this time that things started to turn decidedly dark. Explain that to me.
 
Markus Watson 
Yeah. So I was about two weeks into my sabbatical. And I got a call from our executive presenter, who's sort of oversees our local regional presbytery. And he said, Hey, Markus, I need to talk to you about something. I said, Okay. This was on a Friday afternoon. He called He's like, Can I meet with you tomorrow was like, Oh, no, yeah, I'm gonna be up in Los Angeles, visiting my brother and some friends. How about next week? He said, No, I really need to meet with you tomorrow. I was like, Well, I mean, I'm on sabbatical. And I've got plans. Let's, let's do it some other time. And anyway, so I felt a little bit put off by that pressure. And I was like, What is this all about? So we ended up meeting on Sunday of that weekend. And he wanted to meet with my wife as well. And that's when he said, Markus, someone has accused you of having a problem with pornography, full disclosure. It's not like I've never looked at pornography in my life. But I have been in accountability relationships for a long time. And so I had been in an accountability relationship with another pastor in our presbytery. And so I wasn't worried about it. When he said that the that accusation had been made. I said, Well, what do you what do you need? And he said, I need to look at your I need to do a forensic analysis on your laptop. I said, you want to right now. And he said, that would be good. So I gave him my laptop. And I didn't want to debate it. I didn't want to not cooperate. I wanted to cooperate. And so they took my laptop. What I didn't totally realize at first, although I guess I kind of did was they weren't following our official process. There's a process for doing an investigation when someone brings allegations he was doing this kind of under the table. So he took the laptop set, it was going to take maybe two or three days and ended up taking three weeks, which was very frustrating, just because, you know, I didn't have my laptop with me. And, and I didn't know what was going on. That was the other thing, like, Why is it taking so long? Finally, after about three weeks, he called me and he said, Markus, I can't give you your laptop back, because your laptop has been handed over to the authorities and is now a potential criminal investigation. And I just, I was like, What are you talking about? What could they possibly have found on there? That would lead to a potential criminal investigation. And of course, the the accusation originally was pornography. And so I'm thinking, I mean, I know I've never looked at child pornography even right before and I had any accountability. I mean, never, ever, ever. And so, but I'm thinking is, is there something there? And you know, one of the things I worried about was, did somebody put something there, our tech guy who would occasionally work on my laptop, which had become sort of a, an antagonist in the last couple of years. And so I was worried, did he put something there? He didn't. But that's where my mind went, you know, did somebody put something there? And I didn't even know if it was pornography related. Did somebody put bomb instructions or something, you know, my laptop. And so anyway, that that led to a really, really dark time for me, because I didn't know what was happening, or what was going to happen. And you know, it just felt it was a it was a dark night of the soul is what it led to just lots of fear, lots of anxiety. And I'm kind of, you know, pros and cons to the fact that this happened during my sabbatical. I am glad that it happened during my sabbatical, because I had lots of time for prayer and reflection and silence. I had also had a great therapist that I was meeting with, who helped me to process all of this, and you know, what I was feeling and, of course, he didn't know what was happening either, but just kind of to process what was going on. But I did have a few moments of grace. I had a moment where I was sitting on my patio and spent a lot of time doing lectio Divina, and just silence and solitude and so I had just spent some time in the scriptures and I put my Bible down, I was sitting there quietly, and of course thinking about all that was going on, or that might be going on. I didn't know everything, but I was afraid, you know, and so my mind went into all of these worst case scenarios, and I thought to myself, I might lose my job, which I did eventually, you know, I thought I might lose my ordination. Yeah, I might lose my reputation right I might be remembered as that guy you know, Oh, you know what happened to Markus right in our in our presbytery among the other Presbyterian pastors in San Diego. And then I thought I might lose my family. If it looks like I'm guilty of something. Now, I don't think I actually would have lost my family. But you know, my mind was going into all of these worst case scenarios. And then I thought I might, I might become a registered sex offender. And everywhere I go, someone might I mean, people will believe something about me that isn't even true. And then I thought I could go to prison, if it looks like I'm guilty of whatever it might be. And so I had this image of myself, just sort of, in my mind sitting in a prison cell, having lost everything, everything had been taken away from me. And then it's like, in that moment, it was like I heard God say, but Marcus, no one can ever take my love away from you. And that was what I needed to hear in that moment. And in that moment, it's like God's love was more real to me than it had ever been before. You know, of course, I had for you know, for years and years and years, talked about the unconditional love of God, God loves you unconditionally, of course. And I believed all that, but I hadn't really felt it. Until that moment, that's when God's love just became so profoundly real in a way that I had never imagined. And really, I've never been able to shake that, which I'm so so grateful for. That's one of the blessings right of going through a time like this is, is what God can do, because of our suffering.
 
Rodney Olsen 
At this time, you don't fully know what you're being accused of, of what has been supposedly found on this laptop. But did you know who was making these accusations at this point?
 
Markus Watson 
I didn't. I had some suspicions. And they turned out to be right. What I found out was that it was a staff person at our church. What someone had told me, she had said was that in one of our staff meetings, she had told me about her husband's problem with pornography. And I fully recall that conversation. And then she said that, you know, when I told pastor Marcus, he just didn't react the way I thought he would I bet he's got a problem with that, too. That was sort of the foundation for the accusations. And so the staff person went to the presbytery, and said, I think pastor Markus has a problem with pornography, and then they kind of took it from there. And then what I did find out later, whatever it was, that triggered my laptop, going to the authorities, which I found out also later was the FBI. You know, it was basically pictures of my kids, you know, goofing around in their underwear when they were little. And so the person doing the analysis said, well, it's not my job to determine if this is pornography or not. I'm just a mandated reporter. So I'm going to hand it off. And then eventually, the FBI said, there's no pornography here. And so they just gave me the laptop back and closed the investigation. And so that was that was good.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it must have been difficult, knowing that there was someone that you were somewhat close to within the church who is making this accusation? How difficult was it for you to step back and realize this must be coming from a pain point in her life? Because she's struggling with her husband dealing with this? How difficult is it to separate yourself from that and actually start to understand what she's going through?
 
Markus Watson 
It is really difficult in the moment, it's a little bit easier later on. In the moment. I wasn't even really thinking about that. I was just thinking about survival. To be honest. How do I get through another week? What happened was at the end of my sabbatical, within a few weeks, you know that my laptop was returned to me. And now all of this was an under the table investigation, right? not following the process. And so those who were involved in it said, Alright, hey is over, we're done, we can move on. Clearly, there was nothing there. Within a few weeks, someone I was hand delivered served a notice from the presbytery, saying that no formal allegations had been made. I still didn't know who it was. But now formal allegations were made of child pornography. The accusation was basically that well, since the laptop went to the FBI, there must be something there. And so that kicked off another investigation, a formal investigation this time, which after a few months, concluded again, that there was no evidence to support the accusations, which I'm really grateful for. Like at that time, I was like, somebody, somebody is not just trying to protect the church at this point. Someone is trying to destroy me. Right? They want me to go to prison, right. And so what I did find out eventually, a guy that was that was hard, and I'm not a particularly confrontational kind of a person. So I didn't really confront her at first. I did eventually bring our Chair of personnel into a conversation with her, and I brought it up and well, it did not go well. That was the last time I interacted with her and our elders said we're gonna put another elder over her as supervisor and I said, that's fine. It was really hard. I wasn't really able to begin to forgive her. I think and So after I was gone from that church A few months after that person made another accusation after the presbytery for the second time, you know, exonerated me, then she made the same accusations to our elders. So we had to deal with it with the elders. My accountability partner came in to that meeting and said, Look, I have years worth of accountability reports, if you want to see them. We had a new executive presenter at that point, he came in and said, as far as the presbytery is concerned, this is a closed matter. And so, you know, my friend and I, my accountability partner and I we recused ourselves for about half an hour came back in and our elder said, Marcus, you have our trust as our pastor and I thought to myself, Oh, maybe it's over. Maybe this is it, maybe I can finally move on. You know, it would have been great, except that one of the elders for whatever reason, decided to believe the accusations and started calling people in the congregation saying that pastor Markus is into child pornography. I didn't know that that was happening. The other elders didn't know that that was happening until about two or three weeks later, when we found out I realized, and I think so did the other elders, there's no coming back from that. Right. So there was a congregational meeting and a long discussion, you know, with me recused, but I was able to hear through the door. But you know, there was a vote to dissolve their relationship with me. And they voted to do that by a margin of two votes, it was a bare majority, you know, and then I moved on to another another work, that was a really good, wonderful place to be in that time, after leaving the church was when I was finally able to sort of step back and reflect on, you know, what might have been going on inside of her. I did know that there had been some kind of abuse in her past and, of course, her husband, his problem with pornography, so I knew that there was pain there. And, you know, they say hurt people hurt people, you know, I was able to accept that after, after some time. I remember being in the car listening to a podcast with Steve Scazzero who wrote Emotionally Healthy Spirituality. He asked in this episode, something like, you know, are you able to pray for your enemies? Something like that? And I said out loud, I think in the car, nope. I can't do that. And then I was like, oh, okay, Lord, I guess I have to do that. And so I started to I just started to pray for that person. And then a few others who were kind of involved in this. I didn't mean it, you know, with much affection I not that I didn't mean the prayer. It just there wasn't from my end, a lot of love at first, right? There wasn't much forgiveness at first, but I was like, okay, Lord, I'm called to pray for those who persecute me. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it. And then, you know, over time, I was able to mean it more. And I was able to let go of the bitterness and the anger. Sometimes I wonder to myself, what would happen if I ran into that person? Now? I don't think I would hate that person. But it would, you know, it would be an uncomfortable conversation. If there were a conversation, you know, my life is not consumed with anger, or bitterness, or how could they or why did they or I hope something bad happens to them? I got I don't have any of those kinds of thoughts. So I'm grateful for that. But there's, you know, when you look at someone who has never been through anything hard, or nothing significantly difficult in life, and then he looks at someone who has been there is there's sort of almost like a shallowness. And when I look at myself, prior to this experience, I look back and I'm like, That guy was just a kid. You had no idea what life was really all about? How could I even have been a pastor at that time, of course, God is gracious and helped me be a pastor. But, but it's almost like I, when I look at that, like, I hope I never go through anything like that again. But I would not undo it. Because I have become more fully I believe, the person that God created me to be because of that experience. When a person I think, at least my case, but I think when it when a person is able to move through suffering in a healthy way, right? You can move through suffering in an unhealthy way and become bitter and angry and cynical. Right and harbor unforgiveness, right? But if you can move through it in a healthy way, I think it makes you more compassionate, I am better able to relate to people who are suffering now, even if it's a totally different kind of suffering, right? But there's a part of me that goes, I kind of understand now, right what you're going through and so I'm better able to identify with them. I'm better able to pray with people
 
Rodney Olsen 
Where has life moved for you since then you said that you moved into a position with a not for profit, what happened since that time?
 
Markus Watson 
So I got voted out on a Sunday afternoon and the very next day I was on a plane to Little Rock, Arkansas for a pastor's retreat that had already been on my calendar for six months. And so it was like, okay, God knew what I needed this week. And, and that was a place of great healing. I was, believe it or not, not the only person who had been voted out of their church that same day. So there was a little bit of commiserating there and a lot of praying for each other. And so that was a real gift to have that that following week, within a few weeks, a friend of mine who had started a nonprofit called flourish San Diego, you know, said, hey, let's have lunch. And he invited me to join him on staff of this nonprofit. But that was a really good healing place for me to be. I was there for two years. The only reason I left was because I had to fundraise my own salary. And that is really hard. And, but I loved I loved every moment being there. And it was, for me, it was really good because I wasn't in charge. Right? I got to be a part of the team. And I loved being part of that team. As it became clear that I was going to need to leave for San Diego, I had been doing a lot of guest preaching a fellow pastor who was here in San Diego and kind of knew what was going on. As soon as he heard what had happened at my church. He said, Hey, Marcus, I need someone to preach in three weeks, do you want to preach for me? And my initial reaction? I didn't say to him, but when I read the email, I was like, Oh, I don't want to do that. I told my wife and she said, I think you should do it, you need to get right back into it. I was like, All right. Okay, I'll do it. And so actually, that led to a really great ministry kind of on the side, too, is just guest preaching, you know, a couple times a month in various churches all over the San Diego area. And I loved doing that, partly because I could go and I could go home, then go to the church, preach, and then go home and no pressure. But that was that was kind of a healing thing for me to to, to be able to proclaim God's word right and use my gifts. While not having to bear the burden of leading a congregation after having been through such a difficult experience.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested there in both those situations with your friend who's running the nonprofit flourish. Also your pastor friend who says, Hey, come and preach for me. Yeah, I'm interested in the value of close friendships at a difficult time. Because it's its friends who come alongside you and their offers of here, come and preach or here come and work with me. Yeah, in some way, saying, I don't believe any of that. And I'm here for you. Yeah. How valuable is that for you?
 
Markus Watson 
Oh, my goodness. So so valuable. In fact, my accountability partner who is also another pastor, and not the one who invited me to preach that, that first time, we're good friends and our wives I like we're as couples, we are good friends. And we get together a lot. You know, when we can when it's not a pandemic. But we used to do it every every week, and every Sunday night, we would get together for dinner, he was such a blessing to me, especially during those those first few months. He went to bat for me as a as another pastor in the presbytery. He went to bat for me in ways that I couldn't for myself, because I was the one being accused. And he would raise questions Why? Why are you doing it this? or Why are you investigating him like this? You know, what? Why aren't you following the process? And he would, he would just, you know, be a friend to me. And he would text me or call me at least every other day. How you doing today? You know, you're hanging in there. He Take me out to dinner every now and then. And and it was after one of those times, that I was confronted with my own sense of lack of self worth, where I realized, Wow, he really cares about me, you know, and that became a way for me to understand the love of God to when because he cared for me, clearly, God must also care for me. Right? And so that gave me that deepen my understanding of God's love. And then after, right after all this happened, this friend who had started a nonprofit, I mean, I don't know what I would have done I suppose God would have provided something else but but this is what God provided right through this friend Jeff shoe. And it was just what I needed. Same same with this other pastor John Moser, Mount Soledad, Presbyterian church who invited me to come preach, and it was just what I needed. And and I don't think I could, you're right, I don't think I could have healed as well. I'm trying to decide if I want to say as quickly I'm not sure it happened quickly. But it happened, right, because of these friends, that I had these relationships, these support the support system that I had, that helped me get the people who knew me, right, who also knew Marcus. This isn't true, right? This is Marcus, this is not true of him. And so it was so good to have those people to help me get through that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And then you move on, after a couple of years at flourish. What did God provide for you next?
 
Markus Watson 
So as things began to come to an end at Flourish, and I realized, okay, I'm being called to step away from here, I'd been guest preaching and there Was this one church, about two hours east of San Diego, a little rural town called Westmoreland. And there's a little Presbyterian church there. And, you know, they got my name from someone and I had been guest preaching there. Their pastor had retired and I was guest preaching there about once or twice a month on average for about a year. And then when they heard that I was leaving for San Diego, they said, Would you like to come be our interim pastor? And I said, well, let's, let's talk about that. And, you know, after some discussion on what that would look like, since they are two hours away, and it just, I think it just became clear, you know what I think this is where God is calling me now, there was a part of me that resisted becoming a pastor again, but truly, if it weren't for this little church, with some really wonderful kind, gracious people who I could tell, just loved me even as a guest preacher, but we had gotten to know each other because I was there on a semi regular basis. If it hadn't been for them for that particular church, and those particular people, I don't think I would have stepped back into a pastoral role. And it's been a really great experience. I've been there for two and a half years now. I'm their interim pastor. It's a part time position. I'm out there Sundays, and Mondays, and then I work from home the rest of the week. Right now, I'm just there on Sunday mornings, but we do a Bible study via conference call on Mondays, and they've done some really great things. They've got a food pantry, what I mean by great is just great service to their community. And I've loved to be a part of that. I can't take credit for it. Other than I asked a question one day, what else do you do besides church on Sunday mornings? And they like? Good question. And so they started this food pantry, this tiny town with lots of food insecurity. And they serve almost 200 people every week. And it's just fantastic. And it has brought life to that congregation. And I feel grateful that I get to be a part of what God is doing there.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And when you're not ministering there, you've got other things that are on the go, such as your podcast, also a little of that.
 
Markus Watson 
And that's another thing that came out of this experience. You know, my my podcast is called spiritual life and leadership. I do it because the inner life of pastors is really important for the sake of their outer life. Right? If we're going to if we're going to lead in a healthy way in our outer life, we need to have a healthy inner life of union with Jesus. And so that's kind of what the podcast is all about. How do we as pastors as leaders, develop that healthy inner life Emotionally Healthy Spirituality to us Pete Scazzero's language, right? union with Jesus? How do we navigate things like the dark night of the soul? Because we all have to at some point, and so sometimes, interviews focus on just kind of standard leadership things most of the time, there is certainly a spiritual formation component with it. Yeah, I don't think I would have even thought to start this podcast had I not been through what I went through. My podcast has been adopted by by Fuller Seminary as part of their new church Leadership Initiative. God provides in surprising ways. And I'm, and is led right life is not a straight line, it is twists and turns and ups and downs, and who knew who knew something like that was going to happen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So in the same way that you had a number of people who had your back through a difficult time, who were able to provide that support, you're able to do that to a whole range of pastors and leaders.
 
Markus Watson 
Yeah, that's a great way of putting it. That's really my hope and my goal. And that comes partly out of being at Flourish San Diego where I was able to support pastors during my time there and encourage them and, and so I just, I really do I love that I love being able to help pastors, because I know I'm not the only one who has struggled. And I know I'm not the only one who has suffered.
 
Rodney Olsen 
NACA, so if people are wanting to get in touch with you, if people are wanting to listen to the podcast, what is the best place for them to find you?
 
Markus Watson 
Yeah, so then go to my website, markuswatson.com and that's Markus with a K. A lot of times people misspell it with a C because that's a common spelling but it's Markus with a K, markuswatson.com you find my podcasts there, I've got some other resources. Anyway, you can check those out that are available for free. And I've also got a book that I released about a year ago called Beyond Thingification which, in part comes out of my experience as well and as well as some other things, but you know, a lot of times churches do what they do in order to either survive or just get bigger, right and and we tend to lose sight of the people that were called to care for and we think defy them and so we need to get beyond thingification So I invite you to check that out as well. You can find that on the website too.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Marcus, it has been a delight to chat to you. I will put connections into our show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet so that people can find you there but Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for being so open and honest and sharing your story today on bleeding daylight.
 
Markus Watson 
Thanks so much, Rodney. I really I love your show. And I think you're doing a great work by sharing these stories too. So I appreciate getting to be here and telling my story.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Do you run towards or away from change?
 
However you answer that question, this episode of Bleeding Daylight will be a real encouragement for you. It’s the story of Sharon Tedford and her family’s move across the world but it’s so much more than that. Sharon is a singer/songwriter, artist, podcaster and so much more. You’ll be inspired by her and motivated to make change in your own life.
 
 
https://61-things.com/
https://www.facebook.com/61things
http://instagram.com/61things
http://twitter.com/61things
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you run towards or away from change?
 
However you answer that question, this episode of Bleeding Daylight will be a real encouragement for you. It’s the story of a family’s move across the world but it’s so much more than that. I know that you’re going to connect with my guest as she honestly shares a message that will encourage and inspire you.
 
Please remember to share this inspiring story with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
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Sharon Tedford is a singer songwriter who, like many of us, has never been a big fan of change. It's ironic then that her life is marked by so many large changes, including a move halfway across the world. She's even founded a ministry named 61 Things which aims to help people actively seek change in their own lives. It's my real pleasure to welcome her to Bleeding Daylight today. Thank you for your time.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Rodney, it's really good to meet you. I absolutely love this show. So I'm so excited to be on this side of the mic and not just have you in my ears.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you very much. As we talk about change, let's begin with that big one. Where did you move from and to?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Well, we were living in a really pretty little village, just outside London in the county of Buckinghamshire, which is actually just north of Windsor Castle. So we could see Windsor Castle, in the far, far distance from the top of our road. So we moved from a little village where we knew many, many, many people to the outskirts of Dallas, where we knew nobody. So you know, it's a, it's a rural town where we live now, streets and it's very cityish, a completely different driving on the wrong side of the road. Speaking the wrong language. I know it's English but you and I both know, Texan is the greatest form of American. So there was lots for us to learn when we got here.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what was the catalyst for such a big change?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Well, the short answer is God. The long answer is my husband took redundancy from his company, which gave him freedom and he was very clear in saying, Let's allow God to take us wherever he wants us and so he was looking at jobs all over the world and Texas was the winner.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I suspect that he's someone that doesn't mind change as much as you did back then. So what was the difference in the dynamic there with him saying, hey, let's go everywhere? Were you thinking, Oh, please? No,
 
Sharon Tedford 
That's a really good point. He's an engineer. So things are very linear for him. So it seemed like the obvious next step for him like, there literally was a spreadsheet of we could do this, then this is the outcome. If we do this, then that is the outcome. So I think he had stuff much more controlled in his brain. And also, to be fair, for him, the change was obvious. And he knew he went from one job to another job from one set of co workers or colleagues, to another set of colleagues, and actually some of the people that he even knew, because he'd worked with them previously. So for him, it was a much easier step. It wasn't easy. It was easier. Whereas for me, it was completely unknown. I was moving, obviously, with my husband and our children. So a family unit together, not completely alone. But you know, they went to school and work and then I was home alone with our four year old, twiddling my thumbs, and staring at the walls.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you had three children, and you're moving across the world with three children. That can't have been easy to start with.
 
Sharon Tedford 
It wasn't easy. They were excited. God is very good, isn't he? The Christmas before we moved here, we knew that my husband Gareth, his name, is Gareth, was going to be taking the redundancy package and that he would be leaving his company. And before we left, we decided to go on holiday with our family and actually bringing my parents with us because we wanted to go to SeaWorld. So we thought over Christmas, we'll go to SeaWorld in Florida, get some sunshine, won't that be lovely but the flights was fully booked and it was really expensive. And then a friend of ours said, Well, actually, there's a SeaWorld in Texas in San Antonio. And strange but true. My dad actually used to live in San Antonio when he was a child. He and his parents emigrated to America. And my grandma got TB, so they didn't stay they couldn't afford the medical. My dad lived here for I think three or five years I forget how long. So we brought him with us to San Antonio. And we had this wonderful experience through his eyes as a child and my children just lapped it up. So we went to see his old house, we went to see his old elementary school, and they let us in, which was just incredible. So the children had a bit of a taste. And my my dad told them all about how he lived in the 40s and early 50s on a ranch with his own horse and a gun and how they used to ride around and shoot black birds and bunnies and all the stuff that other just the dream of boys and girls with the horses. So when we moved here, we told the children look, God's calling us to Texas, we're going to go and live there. I'm glad that you've had an experience of it. The first thing our eldest son said was, can I have a gun? And the first thing our daughter said was Can I have a horse? Because they both thought that's what you do in Texas.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I know that there were some moments where you realize just how much you didn't like change. Was that something that you knew back then when you're back in England, that change isn't something that I'm really comfortable With or was it those moments in Texas that made you realize, you know what change is not a big thing for me,
 
Sharon Tedford 
I think that I had had an inkling of it right before we left, we had put an offer on a house in an adjacent village to move from one village to the next so that we were actually closer to a school that would be better for one of our children, to have our kids have learning differences. And so this school had a unit, specifically for children who have dyslexia and other needs. And so we really wanted to be in that village. And we have sold our house. But I don't know what it's like where you live, but you have to be in a chain in the UK to be able to move from this house to the next house. And on the day that we were packing up and about to exchange, our house was all in boxes. The day that we went to exchange, our buyer pulled out because they'd said they had the money, but they never did. They never did. So that whole thing, when that fell through, we were all devastated. It was really difficult. But actually, even in that moment, I felt like God had been preparing me for change in a much bigger way that move from one village to the next village. I had found that difficult, we wanted to be closer to the school. And my friends in my village, we're going to be, I don't know, four miles away really nothing really, really nothing. But I'd struggled with that. Until I felt like no, this is what God's calling us to do. So I think that obedience of Okay, we'll move four miles down the road, was the catalyst for God saying, Okay, look, you didn't die. Let's do the next step and it was bigger.
 
Rodney Olsen 
A much bigger step. And maybe you can talk us through some of that you arrive in the US how quickly did you have to try and organize what we might call a normal life there in Texas.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Oh, my goodness, it was crazy. My wonderful husband had actually been working here in Dallas since May. So he's done about five months worth of work here while we were still living in the UK. And the company very kindly moved us. So we put everything of ours into a shipping container and sent it out four weeks before we came because it takes four weeks to get here. And we spent four weeks traveling around the UK saying goodbye to our family and friends. My husband is Irish. So we spent some time in Ireland. And some time in the south coast of England, I come from a seaside town Weymouth in Dorset. So I spent some time there, and homeschooling the kids while we traveled around. So when we arrived, our shipping container wasn't ready. And we had to live one month in an apartment in an adjacent town to where we are now. And we literally just had this is a bit embarrassing the 14 suitcases that we brought with us because we used every piece of luggage allowance that we could, because the kids were little and you know what it's like traveling with younger children, you need, my goodness, you need everything. So we had just that luggage and what was already in the furnished apartment. And I had to drive the children from one town to the next. And you know, in many areas that would be no difficulty. But this is in the Metroplex, I had to drive on roads that have seven lanes. And they were doing roadworks and it rained for the first time in October for they were saying it was something like the worst rain they'd had for 50 years. And you couldn't see the line markings. I can tell you, that's really good for your prayer life because I was driving on the wrong side of the road, with cars all over the place in seven lanes and you have to cut across so many lanes to get off to get to school, don't miss it, you're going to end up in another town that you don't even know. So it was all very, like I say very good for my prayer life. But pretty stressful. And I did have many the word with God about what are you doing? Why are we here? And you know, registering the kids for school. Everything was just so different. It was a big leap.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I believe that there was even this moment when it came down to such a simple thing as painting a room in your house.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yes, that is so true. We moved into our home, which is lovely, and great. But the people before us had painted the main living areas in orange. And we were like, yeah, this is not really us. And so we knew that we wanted to change it but at the beginning, that's expensive. We just moved across the world that was expensive enough. So we waited maybe two years, maybe three years and then we had the money to do it. And so my husband's like, Okay, what color do you want and we decided on green, but then you know you go to the local store to buy, you know the little pots of paint. So we had like three or four different kinds of green and we painted big splats on the wall. But those flats stayed there for about six months because my husband wanted to move This choice with me together in a partnership. But I could not make a decision. I just couldn't do it. I didn't like the orange. But I couldn't choose the green. It's just it was so ridiculous. And after the six months, or whatever it was, my husband said, Okay, look, we can't just keep looking at these splats on the wall. Let's pick one. And I said, No, look, I'm done. I can't do this. There's been so much change. I hate change. I can't do this. You pick it. And so he kindly did, and we moved on and painted it and it was lovely. But in that moment, when I said, I hate change. God just rattled that around in my head for days afterwards for days afterwards. And one day I stopped. And I looked at that phrase that I'd said, and I asked God, why is this still rattling around in my head? I hate change. And God who is very kind and gracious, spoke so sweetly to me and said, If you hate change, how can you become like me? And in that moment, everything started to change. Even now, as I say that, it gives me goosebumps because it was one of those ebeneezer moments for me that I have laid down the stone of remembrance, because that was like, Samuel. That was a victory moment for me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Did you feel a little bit shortchanged in that? Moses got a burning bush that wasn't being consumed, and you got paint splits?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yeah, I never thought of that. Yeah, I should have had a burning bush. And I actually know we don't like burning bridges in Texas, because they're turned into raging fires. So paint splatter, okay.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And all around this time as this is going on, are you starting to fit into the lifestyle there? Are you connecting with people connecting into a new church and getting to know people?
 
Sharon Tedford 
We did, and we didn't, I'm sure that any of your people who are listening who have sifted between cultures, know how difficult that is. I'm pretty friendly. And I like to chat to anyone. But it's difficult to go deep with people. People in Texas are renowned for being friendly. They, they really are friendly. But it's hard to then find people who have space in their life for you and who want to go deep with you. We did manage to find a church that we loved. And God was very kind that we were in that church by the December having moved here in October because my husband had actually already been church hunting before the family arrived. Before we arrived. I was actually invited to lead worship at the ladies Bible study. After my very first day there. It turned out that somebody in this mega church had a friend who I was leading their children in the Children's Choir in England, they used to run a church together in Hong Kong. When we arrived, she said, Oh my goodness, are you this family from this church? Oh, my goodness, my friends told us you were coming. And you're a worship leader. Can you do this? I was like, okay, so we were plugged in, we were in a small group. And there was many good things. But as the years went on, there was always something else that was new to learn. Because as our children grew, in the school system, particularly, there was a new way of testing, a new way of learning a new way of this and a new way of that, that we didn't know about. So it did kind of stay difficult. But because God had told me change is good, change is good, my heart was shifting towards allowing him to do these things, because His change brings us great strength. It makes us more like Him.
 
Rodney Olsen 
While you're having difficulty with some of these changes. How are the kids going? you saying that there's obvious differences in the learning and the testing and everything for them? But were they just adapting his kids so often do?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yeah, rather embarrassingly, they did. Yeah. They made friends. And because of their British English accents, they made friends pretty quickly. The language thing was difficult. But we had some really funny stories about teachers being confused about what our children were asking for. My son left his outer garment in the classroom one afternoon and had to rush back in to get it before he caught the bus home. And he rushed into the classroom and burst in and said to the teacher, I left my jumper here, I can't find my jumper. And she just looked at him quizzically because a jumper is like a what a baby would wear a onesy you know, it's LinkedIn with your hands and your feet and just zip up the front. Because here they call it a sweater. So he had to then explain what a jumper is, you know, it's it's knitted, and you were on the outside to keep you warm. And she was like, Oh, you mean your sweater. So that, that and there were many of those? No, but the children really adapted fast. Our eldest got into American football, which was his joy and delight. And our middle daughter made friends with lots of American girls, which she'd always watched American TV at home in England. And so she was just lapping it up. And our little boy really was only four so he didn't know much different he loved the fact that we had such a big back garden and a swimming pool, which is very exciting.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So he you are in this brand new nation. You're you're learning all these things, but You're being very much accepted, and you're getting opportunities to lead worship, which is something that you did back home in England, is this giving you some sort of a certainty or some sort of a reminder that this is what God has called you to.
 
Sharon Tedford 
There were certainly steps that, that over and over again, we knew Yes, this is what God's called us to. Like I said, in our small group, those people became friends and family very quickly, once we found them, which was probably about eight months into us living here, one of our members, one of her brother, died very suddenly. And very tragically, he went to hospital with a headache. But it wasn't a headache. It was a brain aneurysm. And he passed away very quickly. And so we were able to gather around her. And in that kind of moment, you really know who your family is, we got very close to them. I had a hospital visit, I herniated two of my disks in my back, couldn't walk, I had to go to the hospital in the middle of the night. And it was one of these people that my husband called, and they came over, it was like midnight when the ambulance came to sleep here in our house. So that when the children woke up, they were with somebody who they knew and loved and trusted. So there's something really special about the family of God, that we can walk into a church pretty much anywhere. And know that because we love Jesus, we can love each other.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And all this time, you're still trying to deal with change, even though there are these little messages along the way that hey, Sharon, it's going to be okay. But I believe that there was a pivotal moment in 2014. Tell me about that.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yes, that was incredible. I think as you say, God had just been reminding me over and over again, that changes, okay, changes, okay. And because of that little phrase, it was now rattling around in the back of my mind, it was in my mind. But it wasn't until 2014, as you say, it wasn't until then, that things started to come into focus. I went to a very large ladies event at a mega church just around the corner from where we live. And it was almost an accident. Of course, it wasn't an accident. But it felt like an accident that I went, a friend of mine called me the night before and said, The lady who I go to this conference with every year, mysteriously double booked herself. She doesn't know how she did it. But she's got to go to work. She was a cabin crew. So she couldn't back out of that. So I have a ticket Do you want to come? And I was very excited. So I went and my friend had booked seats, like you had to sit in row f seat three and four, whatever it was. And that's important in this story. So at lunchtime, there was there were probably I think 3000 women, there is a big conference, it was it was great. At lunchtime, we went out and had lunch and came back into the auditorium. And tucked into every single seat was a card. And on that card was a hand written word of prophecy. Now, you could say that those were placed randomly, well, the women and men who do that event, pray for an entire year. And ask the Lord for words of knowledge and prophecy and encouragement for the women who are coming to the conference. So as I said to you earlier, the seat that I was sitting in was meant for my friend's friend who wasn't able to go in, it suddenly became my seat. Well, this prophecy would never have fitted her friend. And when I opened it, and read it, I was absolutely gobsmacked. And I couldn't speak, which, you know, is unusual, as you can tell for me. And I was just crying. And when my friend read it, she started crying too, because it was so so onpoint, for what I've been through. You see, I haven't told you that. And part of our story was having been on this in this mega church and on the worship team and enjoying every second of it. In the middle of that we'd had some significant church hurt that had that we'd had to fight for, we'd had to fight for justice and truth. And this word of prophecy spoke to that almost word for word. And there's no way that anyone could have known that I was sitting in that seat and what had happened in my life. And that prophecy was based on Isaiah 61 verses one through four and that's what started my route to allowing change to be more than just for me,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm sure that those verses have become more and more real for you. Maybe you can tell us what is encapsulated in those first four verses?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yeah, actually, I did start off with the first four verses. And when I bought the prophecy home, I stuck it up on my wall and I was just Oh, it's amazing. It's wonderful. And I was just looking at the prophecy. And then one day I felt God say, you know, as it says in Scripture weigh it up, what does it mean? And so I got out the scripture behind this word of prophecy. And I said, Okay, God, let's dig and I sat down to write A couple of notes on these four verses. And after 58 pages of notes, I realized that God is doing something pretty special with this passage of Scripture. And as I've spent more and more time with it, I actually love the whole chapter. It's one of those chapters that should bring us all so much encouragement is actually the chapter that Jesus used in the temple in the New Testament in Luke, when he announced the beginning of his ministry, talking about the fact that every one of us is anointed. And then it gives us a great big list of what were anointed to do and every word, there are so many words of action. Through this passage of Scripture, I would love for you guys to just go ahead and sit down and read Isaiah 61, and pick out all the words of action, in this comfort, proclaim, bestow, you know, the Restore, rebuild, renew, all these things that God invites us to do in his name. And why can we do it, because as his people, we are all anointed by the powerful and loving Spirit of God,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I find it fascinating that throughout that chapter, and again, as you mentioned, now, Jesus picks it up in Luke, when he goes to the synagogue. But it's interesting that in this day and age where we're told to look out for number one, and number one is us, when we're told to seek our own highest good, that there's this chapter there. And it tells us that we're anointed to do all these things, which are basically, around serving, that's not a popular thing for a lot of a lot of people is it,
 
Sharon Tedford 
it's really not a popular thing. And here, there has become an attitude that if you stand on the stage, or you have a title, or you have an office at the church, it's your job to do that. And I'm going to pay you to do it. Don't expect me to get involved. And I think there's something really sad about that. And I believe that's why so many believers are weary, because we're not doing what we've been called to do. God has invited us to get involved because just as Jesus did, we need to serve, and we can serve with joy and it brings us joy to serve others. You know, there are so many ways that we can serve, it doesn't mean that you have to go and work in a soup kitchen. Unless that's what God's called you to do, then please go to that. But if God has called you to be a teacher, you are serving Him every day, in the way that you love those kids. If God has called you to sweep the streets, you are serving Him by maybe praying up and down the streets that you sweep, if God has called you to be a doctor, then you are able to reveal him through the way that you love and heal people through the gifts that he's given you. There is so much action, so much action in this chapter that we really need to step up. I want to invite people to think about how can you reveal God in your everyday What are you doing? How can you bring about change for others' good?
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've gone now from this stance of I really don't like change, but I guess I'll have to go through it to our Yeah, changes probably good to now this point of versus coming alive to you and you realizing I need to seek change. Tell me about that change in your mind of going from I hate change to I need change.
 
Sharon Tedford 
It's difficult to really plot that, you know, I think because I didn't like change. God didn't make me change overnight, he didn't just snap his fingers and say you need to do this now. And sometimes he does that. There's nothing wrong with that. But for me, he knows me, spoiler, he made me so he knows all about me. And he just gradually drew me into more and more and more of this love, and search for change. And I think that as I've been able to share my story through concerts, and you know, writing whatever I've done, as I've shared my story, it has become more alive. To me. It's a little bit, like I just said, that's how God has called me to serve is to serve the church, to serve others to invite others up, to wake them up from being weary and afraid. And so as I've spoken that out loud, it almost puts it in front of me and becomes a mirror for me to see it myself. and that in turn, it just keeps the wheels turning. And it keeps me chasing after God in an excited way. I just love to see, people say I'm doing something new because I think God's invited me to this. I've been so blessed that every single one of my concerts, I can't think of one where this hasn't happened. My somebody will come up to me afterwards and say, Oh, I didn't realize that I could do that in God's name. I'm going to go and do that. Or I haven't led worship for years because something awful happened to me at church. I'm going to go back and serve my church in a new way or it has woken somebody up to what God is calling them to do and if it's just one at a time. That's enough for me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It is remarkable. The change that God can bring into our lives when we are resistant to it, but then we we walk toward it. And I just want to pause for a moment. And I want to actually read those first four verses. And I know that you now say that you, you want to embrace that whole chapter and, and everything that goes along with it. But let me just read. The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me,  because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor;  he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;  to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor,  and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion—  to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.  They shall build up the ancient ruins;     they shall raise up the former devastations; they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations.  That's purely inspirational, isn't it?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Isn't it just it makes me want to cheer? It really does. I want to shout and say yes, come on, let's restore, rebuild, renew, we can all do that. We have like five or six different decorations of trees around the house, because we say that to each other, and to the children, you're an oak of righteousness, God has planted you exactly where you are because he wants to display his splendor through you and it doesn't matter what season you're in. God wants to display his splendor through you. You know, we've just been through a crazy snowstorm. And the trees are beautiful in the snow. In the springtime, here, the trees are vibrant colors, because our springtime is very short. And so that forces the leaves to grow quickly. In the summertime, the leaves offer us shade. And you know the whole seasons. And in the autumn when the when the leaves fall. And of course, the colors change again. And it's really beautiful. In all seasons, those trees are displaying the splendor of Jesus. And that's what we need to do, no matter what our season is. Even if things are really difficult around us. We can still display the righteousness that comes from God, we can still display the goodness that comes from Jesus.
 
Rodney Olsen 
A lot of the people that you're trying to reach out to, and to minister to those believers who are weary those who really need some kind of hope. When they're feeling worn out and feeling forgotten. We have such a life giving message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Why do you think so many people end up feeling worn out,
 
Sharon Tedford 
I think we've put our trust in the wrong places. instead of allowing Jesus to use us as individuals, we have shifted our gaze to our leaders, and our pastors who we need and we love and we should support and we need to listen to them. But they shouldn't be doing it all for us. That makes us very, when we don't do what we're called to do. It makes us tired out, you know, action is invigorating and revitalizing. That's how you know if you have a little toddler who's like, I'm bored. I don't know what to do, then you find them something to do and life changes. That's what Jesus wants for us. He doesn't want us to just sit down and watch someone else working. He wants us to be doing what he's called us to. And maybe you're doing is to sit down and maybe just to sit with someone and listen to them pour out their heart or write emails of encouragement. I'm not saying that you have to go and do something huge in the world's eyes. We just need to respond to God's call, and then we won't feel weary, we will be revitalized by His Spirit. Because using his spirit, walking in his spirit, living out the life that he's called us to, is a way that we can be filled with joy and energy.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And those verses, you know, as I call us to stop looking inwardly and and start to look outwardly don't they?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Oh, without doubt, absolutely. Everything that this scripture talks about is about our neighbors. It's about drawing together our cities and our communities. All of us can say that our cities have a level of brokenness. It may be in the physical buildings, but it may also be in the hearts of the people around us. And God invites us to rebuild those ruins that you see people around you whose lives are ruined, how can you rebuild them, just invite them in for a cup of tea. That is a great way to rebuild someone's confidence. You know, we can see around us that maybe the whole the whole generation has been devastated. But that's why God's called calling us up, to reach out to those generations around us. We need to renew them, we need to rebuild, we need to restore the hope of Jesus, that people around us they are lost. We say that often that people around us are lost. But we can show them the way to the winning post, you know, to run the race and meet Jesus to meet Jesus here and now and have eternal hope.
 
Rodney Olsen 
As I mentioned earlier, you are a singer, songwriter. And you've touched on that as as we've chatted, and you've certainly had opportunity whilst in Texas to pursue that, to pursue your music to release a couple of albums. And I'm sure that that's incredibly satisfying. But often the music industry is a very self seeking industry, how do you ensure that you stay grounded within that? And that you continue that outward looking focus?
 
Sharon Tedford 
That's a very, very good question. I think for me, it has been intentionally gathering people around me, who I know will not blow smoke, and will speak truth to me. And who will keep me outwardly focused people on my American team and my UK team, that I mean, it's just small, it's just a small number of people, people who pray for me, people who I know would say to me, yeah, that's not really the right thing to do. I even have a friend who I've made since living here, who is an expert in social media marketing. And that has been a real struggle for me, because I have felt often I don't want to be doing social media about me, because it's not about me, it's about Jesus. And she's really helped me to recognize that actually, using social media can be a way of sharing the kingdom of God, if I do, indeed keep it about my audience and about Jesus, and not about me. So I have had people around me, who I know will keep my eyes focused on Jesus, even my producer, who is an incredible guy, a two time Grammy Award winner, he adores Jesus. And we never did any work in the studio without praying, and inviting Jesus to be present in the recording, which might sound a bit crazy to you. But we are asking God to be present in every area of our lives. And I asked him to be present in every area of my life, and I'm not perfect, I definitely fall over and hit my nose, flat on the pavement. But I my intention is to share Jesus with everyone who I meet, I really do want to reveal him through how I sing, and how I present my life and how I love my children. And how I serve when I'm out and about how I pray with the person who serves me lunch at a restaurant, I really want to be outward looking. And I pray that God will continue to keep that firmly in focus in my heart.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it's not just about the music for you, I know that you released a devotional book alongside one of the albums. Tell me a little of the thinking behind that.
 
Sharon Tedford 
There's a bit of a funny story in that, in order to help your producer know how your song should sound, you go into a studio and you say, this is the story behind it. This is what happened. This is why I wrote it. And then I play it for him and say, I want this genre, this field is that editor. But one day, I think we were three songs in to the album. And I told him the story behind this particular song. And he just was like, stop, stop. And I thought, Oh, no, he hates it. He doesn't want this one, which he has every right to say. He said, okay, you are such a good storyteller. I need you to write that in a book. And I just looked at him and I said, john, Goodness me. We're making an album, there's a time for writing a book. And he said, No, I think it's a thing. You have to do it. So we finished the day I came home and it's best to record late at night. So I came home and crawled into bed next to my husband. And he was like, oh, how was your day in a sleepy voice? And I said, Oh, you'll never guess what john said today. He said, I should write a book about all the songs and the stories and scriptures behind the songs. And my husband, in all his wisdom said, Well, duh. Like, what do you mean well duh, because he was asleep, didn't want to wake up and chat about it then. But it became something really, that God put on my heart and actually on someone else, someone else said the same thing to me. They had one of the stories behind the song and said, You need to put this in a book, people need to hear the stories. The book is every chapter is the story and the scriptures behind each one of the songs. So you can sit and read the stories and hear from Jesus as He spoke to me through those stories, and then use the album to allow the song to minister to you. So you can have your own little time of worship as if I'm in the lounge with you or wherever you're sitting.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's a wonderful concept. I believe you've also started your own ministry 61 Things tell us about how that began.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Again, it just kind of crept up on me a bit like the loving change. It started because of the album when the album was being released. As we talked about it with my team, it did become obvious that there was more than just releasing an album. Because I have been speaking and teaching the Bible bits and pieces around around the world now, for for many years. And obviously, as I said, leading worship as well, it seems like there was more than one string to my guitar coming along here, and that we needed to gather it all together under one umbrella. So that when I introduce myself to people or so that when people call on me to, so that I can serve them, they can see that it's more than just under I don't want to just come to sell my album, I want to come to encourage you to rise up and all of the stuff that we've just been saying.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And there's a podcast that goes along with that ministry. Tell us a little about that.
 
Sharon Tedford 
Yeah, that's one of the joys of lockdown. And my co producer is Gary Dowell, who's been in radio and TV production for many, many years. And he's actually on my UK team. And before he called me, for about a year, I felt like people say to me here, because of my English accent, which really I can do nothing about it is what it is. They say, Oh, I could listen to you read the phone book? Or would you? Would you call me up at nighttime and read me a bedtime story, I'll just give you a children's book to read to me. You know, lots of jokes like that. And so someone said, you know, you should do podcasts. And I was, I really felt like, God kept poking me with that thought. But I really don't like technology. I'm really not very good at it. I can plug in my microphone, and I know how to do bits and pieces. But at the time, when I started thinking about that, there was no way there was just I was just resistant. I kept saying to God, I do it. But I don't know how to do the technology. And then my co producer called and said, Look, Sharon, I don't want you to answer me now. I want you to pray about it. But I think I want to start a podcast. And I want to do all the technical stuff, because I love it and I want you to be the host. Well, I was just like grinning and crying all at the same time on zoom, because he lives in the UK. And I said, Gary, it's okay. I don't need to pray about it. God's already been poking me. Let's do this. And so through lockdown, we we spent five or six months working on it from across the ocean. And on October the sixth, which was my 50th birthday, we released Episode One of God In the Ordinary and it's been going great guns since I absolutely love it. It's so encouraging to hear people's stories and how they reveal God in their ordinary everyday lives.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I love the fact that you go for everyone's unique story. But there's also a common theme that runs through that you asked people to comment on maybe you can explain that, to me.
 
Sharon Tedford 
It was the concept of what we were going to do on our podcast came first. And then one day as Gary and I were chatting through the concept of God being revealed in people's ordinary everyday lives. They're not celebrity Christians. They're just regular people living their lives. It dawned on us that Oh, my goodness, this is what Isaiah 61 is. And so we put it all together it I mean, it seems really obvious. Now it's kind of embarrassing that we didn't see that at the very beginning. But here we are. And so what we do is we ask our guests to have a look through Isaiah 61. And see how they live that out in their own lives. And it has been so incredible. At the very beginning, Gary and I were like, oh, what happens by the time we get to Episode Six, someone's going to tell the same story, we're going to hear the same thing over and over again, know, every single guest. We're into the double digits now. Every single guest picks out something different. And God speaks to them differently through this passage. And isn't that just like our God, you know, His Word is living and active. And it's relevant for all of us. So I absolutely love it. When our guests come with, oh, this is how Isaiah 61 speaks to me, and how I use this scripture to reveal God in my everyday
 
Rodney Olsen 
if people are wanting to start listening to God In the Ordinary, or to even find the Ministry of 61 Things. Where can they discover you?
 
Sharon Tedford 
Well, you can find me at 61-things.com. And on my website, you can find there's a tab that takes you to God In the Ordinary. But the podcast is on pretty much every podcast platform. So you should be able to find us easy.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's an easy one to find God In the Ordinary well worth listening to, as you say, different perspectives on that Isaiah 61 passage as well as exploring people's unique stories as they encounter God in the ordinariness of their lives. It's It's a great Listen, and I would encourage people to do that. We'll put a link to that in the show notes at bleeding daylight. dotnet. But Sharon, I just find it amazing that for someone who started their story, disliking change that you're now bringing change that you're bringing change, as you encourage people to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives to open the prison to those who are bound to continue to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, that you're comforting those who mourn. You are bringing great change into other people's lives. And I just want to thank you for what you do. And thank you for spending some great time with us here on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Sharon Tedford 
 Rodney, that's so kind I've absolutely loved every second. Thank you so much for having me.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

This episode is confronting. It’s the story of a young boy’s nightmare of abuse but thankfully it doesn’t end there. Forgiving the Nightmare is Mark Sowersby’s journey to forgive those who allowed the abuse to take place, and even the predator who stole his childhood.
 
His message is clear, no matter the shape of your nightmare, there can be forgiveness and even joy.
 
 
 
https://www.forgivingthenightmare.com
https://www.facebook.com/forgivingthenightmare
mark@forgivingthenightmare.com
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
This episode is confronting. It’s the story of a young boy’s nightmare of abuse but thankfully it doesn’t end there. Forgiving the Nightmare is Mark Sowersby’s journey to forgive those who allowed the abuse to take place, and even the predator who stole his childhood.
 
His message is clear, no matter the shape of your nightmare, there can be forgiveness, and even joy.
Please don’t keep this important episode to yourself. Share it with others and connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
Make sure you don’t miss future episodes by subscribing to Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Mark Sowersby has been married for more than 17 years, has four children, and has been an ordained Christian minister for over 25 years. He admits that life has been good to him. But that doesn't mean that it's been without its dark times. Only a couple of years ago, he faced the darkness, then journeyed through a time of great healing. These days, he shares his story through his ministry, forgiving the nightmare. It's my privilege to introduce him to you today. Mark, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Mark Sowersby 
Hello, and thank you so much.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The difficulties and the struggles that you have faced in life started well before you were even born, take me back to that time and tell me what you know of your mother's life before you came along?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Well, thank you for asking me that question. I believe every story is connected to somebody else's story and my story is connected to my mom. And I think my mom in her life carried many wounds and pains and hurts. And that just kind of floated into everything in her life, including her children, and some of her poor decisions, seeking hope of seeking acceptance and seeking love that pushed her into many dysfunctions and hurts again, spilled into our lives. And she met a man that was many years younger than her. She was looking for love. She was looking for hope, but that man became an abuser. He abused my mom, he abused my family and he physically sexually, emotionally verbally abused me to. So that's how this story begins forgiving the nightmare. forgiving the nightmare has so much in it. My testimony personally is about how I overcame abuse, how I overcame neglect how I overcame all the pains and hurts of one's rejection by parents and loved ones but the story of forgiving the nightmare is much more than that. I believe that all of us have probably walked through a season, a situation that's a nightmare. Regardless of how that came into our lives, maybe through abuse like mine, or disappointment or divorce, or rejection or death or sorrow but regardless of what it is, we've all had to live with a nightmare that would love to shackle us love to hold us down, love to lie to us, because that's what the enemy does lies to us. But through God's grace and through mercy, lots of prayer and hard work. We won't forget the hard work, a lot of prayer and a lot of hard work, that God gives us victory. God gives us hope, by His Word and His Son, Jesus Christ.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your mother married quite early, and I believe you had a couple of siblings before you came along. Tell me a bit of that story.
 
Mark Sowersby 
My mother was a woman of her generation. She desired what many women of her generation did. She graduated from high school. It was the 50s. She graduated in 1958. She was married in 1959. And my brother came into the world in 1960. Which kind of sometimes in our culture and our season seems a little different. But in hers, that was very common. That's what she desired. She married her high school sweetheart. right out of high school. She wanted to be the mrs. She wanted to be the wife. She wanted to be the mom. But unfortunately, that high school sweetheart that Prince Charming, would turn into somebody who would be another person in my mother's life that would hurt her, neglect her and reject her, as he found comfort in other woman's arms. Has he found pleasure in in lust and sin, hurt by mom. And he stole from her. Her self worth her value that just continued to push her into poor choices for the rest of her life when it came to decision making. But that relationship, that first marriage, my mom did have two children. I have an older brother and an older sister. They're a bit older than me. But that that marriage did produce my older brother and my sister who are loving the Lord today and are serving God with all that they have.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Then you came along but not by that first man who was the father of your brother and sister. What happened before you came along?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Well, after the divorce of my mother's first husband, she went back home had no place to go. She went back to her mother's house. The marriage was over. So here she was mid 60s. She was a divorced woman felt like she wore The Scarlet Letter around her neck if you would went back home because she needed shelter. She needed support she needed hope. Her parents took her in her parents loved on her and supported her. But she needed to find a job. She was she found a job and it was a factory job. And in that factory job. Of course another man would come into her life and promise her everything she hoped for another male would come in and say that she was beautiful and perfect and life would be good. And she found comfort in that man, she found hope in that man. But that man unfortunately was married to another. And he deceived her and lied to her broker. And I am a product of that relationship. So I, my father came in and abused my mom. Also, he preyed on her pains, and he preyed on her hurts. And he also abused her by lying to her promising her the moon, but just giving her selfish desires.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So your mother has been through these two devastating relationships and we can imagine that this man was already married, so he had no intention of maintaining a long relationship. And so now he's out of the picture. And you're growing up in the home of a single mom and your, your older brother and your older sister. What happens there because now you're on the scene? Is there another relationship that comes at that point?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Yes, there's another relationship that comes, you're right, I was growing up. and in this situation, at my grandmother's house, my grandfather has already passed. So my grandmother was alive, and we kind of grew up and that's the life I do. Grandma, my mom, my brother, my sister, my aunts and uncles from the neighborhood. That's all I knew. And then another man came into my mother's life. And that was the man I was referencing earlier, the man that came in that was much younger than my mother, he came in, and at that time, my mom was just so hurting, she was so broken, so afraid, she would have done anything, she allowed her life to become, just hurt and abused. So that abuse in that hurt, reflected in many decisions that my mom made, are reflected in her health decision, or social decisions are emotional decisions or spiritual decisions, that pain from those two relationships. The first being her highschool sweetheart, that she has so much hope and loved that pain, and then my father coming into the picture and breaking her heart. It's the time the third band came into her life. She was already a shell, if you would have herself, I don't think my mom at that point really understood what love was. I think that she just was an enabler. And she accepted enable for herself, and she gave enabling to others. And that third man would come into her life, I was seven years old. And that third man would come and he was the abuser. He was the one who abused my body, the one that would steal like, destroy us, as a family because of his own pain. So yes, the third man was the one who, who hurt and broke and one who abused me he was the, the fulcrum of the the nightmare that I speak of in forgiving the nightmare.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was there abuse for your siblings as well or had he just more or less zeroed in on you seeing you as the youngest and more vulnerable one in the family?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Exactly, exactly, I was the only one that had the physical abuse. I would say when abuse is in the family it abuses everyone but I was the only one was attacked in a physical way, in a sexual manner, in a emotional manner. In a physical manner, I was the one that was stabbed and beaten and broken and raped. But I think abuse affected the whole family. One of the reasons why I think he did not abuse my siblings is because there wasn't a large age difference between my siblings. And this man. Again, he was several years younger than my mother, I think it was almost 17 years younger than my mother at the time. So he's closer to my brother's age than he was my age. So I think at that point, my brother was transitioning out of the home, my sister was not far behind him transitioning out of the home. They were in their later teens, they were ready to go out. I was the minor I was the young one, I was the one that was the innocent one that was broken, and hurt. But again, I would say that when abuse comes into a home, even though I was the one that was physically abused, abuse, affects everyone in the home.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Were there others aware of the abuse that was going on? Did you feel that you could confide in someone else? Or was this a burden that you had to carry alone?
 
Mark Sowersby 
It was the late 70s and we look back in the awareness, the attention, the support that we see in our culture today for abuse victims, for it to have advocates and have channels to be able to report and share just simply wasn't there at the time? I think that time in our culture, at least the part of the world I was living in, when things happen like that. It was mostly handled in families behind closed doors. You didn't tell anybody, I think now we look at society and society says, oh here, there's advocates and channels to be able to share. So yes, at seven years old, I didn't know what was going on. I didn't understand. I didn't have a place to comprehend, my body was just ravaged. I was just attacked in a way that, I did not know how to understand it. I was threatened by by abuser, that if I was to share this, I would be taken away, I would be injured, I would be hurt, I would be rejected. So of course, not only did I have this abuse, now to deal with, but also the fear of leaving what I knew leaving the situation leaving my mother as only a child. So, yeah, I didn't think I can confide in anyone, I thought I did something wrong. I think as a child, I reasoned with the child's mind and again, the awareness that we see today wasn't simply there back then.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And obviously now you understand that the fear that he was using against you is a common tool that predators will use. But at that time, it must have seemed so real for you. How did it feel to, to live in that fear constantly to know that when you came home from school, that it might happen all over again? How was it living in that tension constantly?
 
Mark Sowersby 
You know, that's a great question you asked me because it became a part of my reality, it became a part of my world, I don't think there was a divide between Oh, today, I'm thinking this way, tomorrow, think another way, it just became a part of how I live my life. So I had to figure out a way to deal with it maybe an unhealthy way, maybe an immature way. But I think that we just had to deal with it. I did not realize there was any other way. I thought this was my plot of life. This was my situation, this is how I had to deal with it. So I think as a child, you reason like a child, I guess you put it in your mind, in places you kind of place all by home life is like this, in my school life is like that, am I but again, I think as a child, you just have to deal with it. And you build situations, to protect yourself. You live in an imagination you live in the what ifs you live in the day that you hope that this will all end, you look for somebody you could share with you look for a protector, if you would, a hero, somebody that would come beside you, and help this all end.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at this time you're you're living through what to you is normal. When did it occur to you that this was not normal, that this wasn't the way that things should be?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Well, yeah, I always knew it wasn't right. I just, I just knew that this was just a part of who I was. And obviously it wasn't right for my body to be ravished. It wasn't right for my abuser to do these things to me to sell me and to prostitute me to other men who abused me and I just knew that this was incorrect, it was wrong, but again, at 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 years old, there was no voice. I wasn't strong enough, I was already beaten down. I already was held back. But I always knew that someday this had to stop. I did reach out periodically to people. I remember reaching out to my mom at one time, and I think the shock of the story, she just could not comprehend her own self. She brought me in the abuser into the room. And she asked the abuser not to do that to me anymore. And he promised he wouldn't. And of course, next day, I got a severe beating for sharing and I got more threatened. So again, that just enhanced the rejection or enhance that no one will ever truly believe me, no one would ever be there for me. Until a time where I was about 14, 13, 14 years old. I was with my cousins. And we were building forts and playing games. And I remember sharing with my cousins who were about the same age as me. And we were, we were outside and they shared everything that went on. And they told me I should go tell their dad was my mother's youngest brother, my uncle. I went into the home and I'll never forget. I looked at my uncle that was after a long day of work. And I went to him and I shared details and experiences that a young person shouldn't be able to explain or share. And he looked at me and he said Marquis, because that's what he called me. Said Mark. Yeah, you telling the truth? I said, I shure am. He picked me up. He wrapped his arms around me told me he loved me. And next thing I know I ended up spending the next year and a half living with him. He became my he became my hero. He became a protector. That afternoon, my abuser came to pick me up at my uncle's house. My uncle looked at me and by this time, he already told my aunt and my aunt was comforting me and we were in the home and my abuser came to pick me up my uncle with the calmest face in the world. walked over to the closet and took out a bat and Let's say he chased that abuser away that day. My uncle served in Vietnam, never saw that kind of side of him. He was always a gentle giant. But he definitely defended me that day and never, never laid a hand on the abuser. But definitely let the user know that he was not welcome. And after that day, the physical abuse stopped, and it never took place anymore. And for the next year and a half, I lived with my aunt and my uncle,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm wondering how long it took you to actually trust your uncle, because obviously, your trust has been broken. But was there that instant connection, knowing here is a good man, here's someone who will protect me or did it still take you a while to feel Yes, I can fully trust this man. He's not like this, this other man that I've known.
 
Mark Sowersby 
My uncle was somebody that I can always trust. Again, his children were just about the same age as me. So the three of us kind of grew up together, I would say, I grew up closer to a brother, to my cousins that I did just a cousin. My uncle was younger. So you know, my cousins were right, they're the same age bracket. So when he would take them, he would just take me and the three of us would go out hot to holiday together, we'd go camping together, we'd share time together, because we were all about the same age doing the same thing. So I did spend time with my uncle. So there's already a trust in Him. Probably in my younger years, not knowing my own birth father, my uncle's relationship, in a lot of ways was like a father's relationship in a healthy way, he comforted us, he supported us. And I knew that he loved us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And were there other males in your life at that time or around that time that that you could put trust into to start to understand what a real male role model should be.
 
Mark Sowersby 
At that particular time, the probably the strongest male model I had was my uncle. So not so much outside our family. By that time, my grandfather has already passed my brother who is a good man, but he was a young man, and he was already out on his own away from the family. So really, my uncle at that time, was the only male figure that I had in my life that I could trust. That was an adult that I could look to for wisdom, support and guidance. Not until I became a Christian, not until I asked Christ to be my Lord and Savior, did I find other men in the church, other men that would come beside me and guide me through life with a big hug and a swift kick?
 
Rodney Olsen 
I do want to explore that, that coming to faith moment for you. But before that, I'm interested to know what's going on with your mom, at this time, you're saying that this predator has been chased away. You're spending about a year and a half with your uncle and with that family. So what's happening in this intervening period with your mom?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Well, at that time again, my mom's life was so broken. My mom was already just a shell of herself. I think you could see the hurt my mom's face. The rejection, that she felt her whole life was always about her. And it was always evident in her. So even though that we my my uncle took me in, even though she knew why there was just this denial, if you would, this didn't happen. It's not as bad as maybe it could be. And maybe it's my mother's own reasoning by letting me live with my uncle. She was protecting me. But she'd never truly ended the relationship with that abuser. And I think because she was abused by him in her own way. Again, I don't think what they had was a love story. I think what they had was an enabling story. I think my mom was so afraid of being alone in her life. She was so afraid of being rejected, like she was when she was the young bride, living her three years by herself that her whole family would walk away from her that she was do anything to keep some form of acceptance, no matter how dysfunctional it was. So my mom was still lost in our own pain. And this past year, we lost my mom. I remember sitting at her bedside, and she confessed some things to me, telling me how she asked me to forgive her, which I already did, because of the grace of God. She asked me to pray for her, which I did. But she told me that she only had one light, one love in her life. And that was her first husband. And when he broke her heart, that pain, lived with her forever. It's not an excuse. It's definitely not an excuse, but it is a reason. And I just hope I can understand that reason. Even though I was the blunt of The pain in the poor choices. I choose not to hate my mom, the world psychiatrists in the world, the world counselors tell me I have a right to be angry, I have a right to hate, I have a right to, to cast my mom aside. And maybe that's true. But you know, I only had one mother, I did not know my father, again, born from an affair. My father rejected me before I was even born. So I only had one mother, I only had one person that was my relative if you would, other than my brother and sister. So I wanted to know, I wanted to know where I came from, I wanted to know who I was. So what's their healthy boundaries, of course, was their decisions I made about my relationship with my mom to keep it safe and healthy for the rest of my life. Yes, I did. But I wanted to know her. So I had to come to a place to learn how to forgive her. And I could only learn how to forgive my mom, my growing growing close to Christ.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I imagine it's understanding that brokenness and understanding that your mother was in brokenness, this wasn't done out of a sense of wanting to hurt, but it was done out of brokenness that you can forgive and, and offer that forgiveness to her.
 
Mark Sowersby 
That's right. I, you know, I think if my mom's brokenness, in her Oh, by be rejected, in her own life, by being afraid in her own life, she I think she didn't have the foresight to see down the road, she saw what was immediately in front of her. And immediately in front of her was this abuser, that was lying to her, telling her that he's the only one who cared about her that he was the only one that was going to be there, that all her children would reject her, all her children would leave her. And she could not have the sense to look beyond that, because of fear and hurt. Again, it's not an excuse my mom, she even admitted that or at her elder years of what she did was wrong, and how she did not stand up for me or her children. But I think I'm glad even though it's not an excuse, even though it's not a healthy reason, at least I understand. There's a reason why my mom was caught in her own pain, and an abuse victim in her own way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it was in those mid to late teen years that you came to faith. Tell us a bit about that story.
 
Mark Sowersby 
A lot of things float around my life, not only was my abuser, somebody who abused my body, but he brought much dysfunction into our home. He used alcohol, he used drugs. And he kind of brought in that that side of society around our family. So as a young man, I already knew the pitfalls if you would have drug use of abuse. And as many of my peers were going out testing, trying new things, drinking and smoking and doing all kinds of things. I already kind of knew where that life lead I already is a part of that life. I wanted nothing to do with it. But my Achilles heel was girls, I guess it was important for me to have a girlfriend and important for me to have a girl by my side, being abused by a male. In my own understanding. I needed to have a girl by my side to prove to myself in a certain way that I I was normal, if you would. So I remember, we were living in an apartment complex at the time. And of course, the lifeguard at the pool was a beautiful girl, at least to my 15 year old eyes. She was beautiful. And I would go to the pool every day. And one day she said to me, do you want to go to the church with me? Boy, I didn't take me two seconds to say yes, I ran home. I got dressed for church and I came back and her her boyfriend picked me up to take me to church that day. It was a midweek service. I was a youth group service. I walked into the youth group and I saw people who look like me. It was the late 80s. They had long hair and Jean jackets. The youth pastor had long hair, and they talk like me, and they listen to music with rock guitars and drums. And, you know, I felt like, like there's people that I could understand. They asked that service if people wanted to make Jesus Christ and Lord and Savior. I didn't really understand that people wanted to hug me. And I wasn't really into that. So I remember saying, I'm not going to go back now because I didn't like them. Because I just didn't understand it. Well come to find out that youth pastor lived in the apartment complex that I lived in, and him and his wife would see me and they'd invite me. They invite me all the time to go back to church. And one day I went back with them. And that that day a young man asked me if I wanted to ask Jesus Christ to be my Lord and Savior. We sat in a car, and he led me in what I would come to know as a sinners prayer. He led me into asking Jesus Christ to be my Lord and Savior and I did it The next day it was a Saturday morning. And I woke up with a bunch of cars, beeping at my house, and we are all out front of our apartment complex. And I remember there's four or 5, 6, 7 cars beeping the horns, calling me to come climb a mountain, we have a mountain in our area called Mount monadnock. It's in New Hampshire. In United States, it's a mountain that the tourists climb. It's a fun climb, and they're all beckoning to me. Come Come climb this mountain with us. They had to be 30, 40 kids. And boy, not only did I find Jesus, but I found acceptance. And I ran into that youth group. And I ran into that church, and it truly became my life for the next 10 years.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Some people say that when they have that moment of understanding who God is through Jesus, and they accept Jesus as being the Lord, that they just know that there has been something change. And I understand that, but they don't feel a whole lot different. And yet other people say that there's this real sense that something has changed for young men like you, who was carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders with all that it can be for. What was that experience like for you?
 
Mark Sowersby 
Well, I think when I accepted Jesus Christ, there was definitely a shift, I could tell something was changing. I could tell that I had a friend at that point that you now I look back, and I understand I have a friend that sticks closer than a brother, I have a friend that would never leave me nor forsake me. I didn't understand that scripturally back then. I didn't have the words to express it but I just had a sense that I was no longer alone, that I had somebody that was going to be with me always. Again, my young brokenness, found hope in Jesus Christ. Not only the Lord find me, not only did his grace pour out to me, not only was his love made aware to me that day that I said, Jesus come into my life. But instantly, there was support instantly, there was just people coming beside me to walk with me in this journey of life. So I think those two things happened all at once. There was a spiritual awakening and there was a social or a, an emotional awakening that I was, I had people on my side. So again, I was only about a year away from the abuse, if you would about a year and a half away from the abuse, always coming together. Now, I'd say that was the beginning of my story, is that I had to learn to die to self I had to learn to repent, I had to learn to trust God, I had to learn to pray, I had to learn to seek. But those things, all were coming as I got to know the Lord, but that first moment, there was this transformation, I at this moment where God just filled my heart filled my life, with hope, with love with grace. I didn't know the words, then I know them now. But there was this transformation, if you would, internally, internally, and then the journey of transformation, externally.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that journey continues. And we'll fast forward. I mentioned in the introduction, that you've been married for quite a number of years now you have four children, you've been a pastor for many years. And so it would seem that the past is behind you. You're moving on. But then a couple of years ago, you had to go through a process of healing. What brought that on? You know, you're
 
Mark Sowersby 
Right. You know, I have been able to put many things under the blood, if that's what we say, in our circles, sometimes you put it at the foot of the cross laying at the altar. These are things of my past. I will say this for you, brother, that a lot of people would they walk through a journey like I've walked through, if we want God to take it away so bad. We pray, we ask, we seek we confess we stand on, we claim scriptures. We say, Lord, take this pain away, Lord, take this sorrow away, or take this hurt away. And I'm here to tell you, brother, that God has never taken that sorrow away from me. And I know it's kind of sounds funny. How can you tell me that you're forgiven? How can you tell me you're delivered when the sorrow has not been taken away? That sorrow is about me often. And it's always beckoning me. It's like a comfort to me, come back, come back. Live in this dysfunction. Live in this brokenness, live in these lies. what God did for me, even though he did not remove the sorrow of the past, His Word and His Spirit became bigger. So let me explain that I didn't have it removed. But God became bigger than the lies of my past bigger than the hurts of my past. Bigger than the rejections of my past. God's word, God's Spirit, God's love, God's grace, became larger. It's kind of like the gods the bigger about and Gods the bigger hope Gods the stronger, stronger place than what happens. To me in my past, but there are times in my life where on certain days and certain moments and certain situations where it'd be so easy just to slip back into those old ways to slip back into that old thinking slip back into those old practices. It's so comforting, because I know my parameters there. It's been such a part of my life for so long. But at that moment, God shows up and says, I'm bigger, I'm stronger, I'm mightier, I'm more loving, I'm more merciful, I and he's in those things become strangely dim, those things become strangely dim in the light of God and the promise of Jesus, and the hope of the Spirit. So, that journey started for me. When I was in Bible school, I accepted Jesus Christ, I was about 16 years old, I accepted Jesus Christ. And I felt, just a few weeks later, at a youth group meeting, I felt like the Holy Spirit just came upon me and called me to go to Bible school. I remember laughing because one of the casualties of my life growing up was my education. I'm dyslexic. And of course, I tell people, I survived my childhood. I wasn't raised. I didn't have the skills to get through high school. I didn't have the supporters. But I did. I graduated, they put me in remedial classes and, and I was able to graduate, but I never thought college was for me. I ended up going to college and a great testimony there of how God opened up doors and set people beside me, so I could finish my college in one day while I was speaking in college, the Lord put in my heart that I would share this testimony called forgiving the nightmare. And I remember laughing, saying, Lord, I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to get through this. And the Lord has brought me on a journey since then, in how to how to step out and walk in this promise that he's given me called forgiving the nightmare. So again, I said earlier, my nightmare was my abuser. My nightmare was the child molestation that I had to deal with. But we all have nightmares. And what the unforgiveness and hurts of my childhood was doing was shackling me to my abuser was shackling me, to my past was shackling me, to my hurt, it was identifying me, as a broken person, it was identifying me as a victim. And I remember one day at an altar, as the Lord came to me, and through His Word through His Spirit, and he spoke to me and in my heart, and I remember the Lord said to me, Mark, you're not a victim. And I remember saying to the Lord, if I'm not a victim, what am I, all I know how to do is be a victim. I know the life of a victim. I know the language of a victim. I know the manipulation of a victim. This is what I know, this is who I am. This is always one for me. It's got me, it's, it's gotten me gain in life, it's protected me. And the Lord said, I'm just going to strip that away from you. You're no longer a victim. And I was afraid, because that's the only life I knew. And I said to the Lord, if I'm not a victim, what am I? What will I be, and don't listen to me, you'll be victorious, you'll be victorious in me. I wish I could tell you it happened instantly. And I walked away, it was all done. That began the charity, the journey of forgiving the nightmare where I had to learn to forgive my abuser, I forgive my mother, forgive my family, forgive the ones who rejected me, I learned how I had to learn, truly learn how to accept God's forgiveness for me. I know it was there. I know I was receiving it. But I had to learn to live in that forgiveness. And let those poor habits of my life My poor habits of of manipulation, or habits of the brokenness that guided me for so long, I had to allow those things to become gone, let those things become small, let those things become empty, and stand on the promises of God. But again, those things still back in those things still call they're so easy to go back to. But Jesus has bigger, God is bigger. Amen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I know that as humans, we always compare. So I can imagine that there are people who are listening at the moment who think, Well, I haven't been through even half of what market is. So therefore, I really shouldn't complain. I've got nothing to deal with. And then there are people on the other side saying, you know what, that sounds horrific, what he's been through, I've been through worse and, and surely God can bring healing to that. So I guess for people on either side who are trying to compare and saying, no, that kind of healing isn't there for me? What would you say to them?
 
Mark Sowersby 
I say that healing is there for all of us. That healing is promised in God's word. The journey could be difficult. You know, I think of Jacob and the Old Testament. Y'know, Jacob means, deceiver, liar cheat. And that was his name. It's because he deceived, he lied. And one day he knew that he was going to go see his brother. But he had to meet an angel first. And he met that Angel. And when he met that Angel, the Bible tells us that he wrestled with that Angel. He wrestled all night long, so much that the angel even touched the socket of his hip. And as they were wrestling, the angel said to him, let me go, let me go. And he said, I'm not gonna let you go until you bless me. The angel then would say to him, you're getting a new name. You no longer Jacob. But now you're Israel, in Israel means promise. His email means hope. So he went from Jacob, the deceiver, to Israel, the promise. And I think sometimes for those of us that have been hurt in life, and have this situation, regardless of how it came in, maybe it was much more dramatic than my situation, maybe it wasn't as dramatic. But however pain came into your life, however it manifested before you, maybe you lost somebody, and you're mad at God, maybe you had went through a divorce, and you're upset, you weren't supposed to go through that divorce. Maybe it was a bankruptcy or, or some kind of disappointment, but it has shackled you to this understanding of your life being broken. But I want to let you know that God is still in the business of making people Israel, taking people to the promise changing our past and not letting it be be our identity anymore. So yes, is there a lot of tears involved? Of course, is there a lot of Is there a lot of wrestling a oneself wrestling with God? Yes, of course, do you have to learn to die every day, crucify yourself, as, as Peter Paul would say, crucify your flesh this year is because the old ways are constantly calling. And it's so easy when we get when we get hurt to allow those old ways, those old patterns of thinking to rise up within us. But when we get a hold of God, and let Him truly be the transformer of our heart and our mind, and we stand on the promises of God, and confess them, even in the midst of the battle, but when we do, by the grace of God, we can walk into the promises. So forgiveness is there. For all no matter what we've been through. And we were set free when the Lord has set us free. We are free indeed.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm sure that there are people thinking that they've been through their own nightmare. They've been able to leave that in the past and walk forward and and experience this forgiveness that you're talking about. But they're still continuing to carry a heaviness. They're still continuing to carry a weight on their shoulders. And yet, in forgiving the nightmare, you're talking about not just forgiving abuse or forgiving people that have done you wrong, but actually walking in that forgiveness and, and walking in joy. And I'm sure some people will be wondering, is it really possible, even though we've walked beyond this, that it could be replaced with joy?
 
Mark Sowersby 
I believe it is because it's the joy of the Lord. The joy of the Lord is my strength. Today I put on the garment of praise, the Bible tells us I put on the garment of praise. So the spirit of heaviness will be lifted off. It's not an immature joy. It's not a joy, of, of rejection of one's past. It's not a joy of of dysfunction. It's not a joy to say all those things, did it really happen? Because they did. It's a joy in Christ. It's a joy in hope. It's a joy that those things no longer have to be a part of me. It's a joy to know when they rise up. God has made a way for me to find a place of hope in Him. So the joy I have is not one that I have forgotten what happened to me. It's not one that I have not truly understood what happened to I know how bad I was broken. I know how bad I was hurt. I know those who meet. And those are real present issues. But my joy comes from God. My joy comes from knowing the Word of God, knowing the Spirit of God, knowing the hope of God, and knowing that God is the one who can get us through. God is the one who has made a way. God is the one who gave us his son Jesus Christ. So my joy is found in him. So it's not a joy of immaturity. It's a joy of Christ.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I think it's very telling that your ministry is not called the nightmare forgiven as if it's over and done with but it's forgiving the nightmare. It's an ongoing process. And I'm sure that you're still continuing to walk through it knowing that you're way ahead of where things were before you started this journey. And for some it it's an understanding Meaning that this journey may go on for some time. But there is joy in it. As people continue to walk in that forgiveness as they continue to understand what that means and go through that process. What's the hope that you would hold out to them?
 
Mark Sowersby 
The hope I hold up to is the same hope that I have found. Jesus, Jesus Christ is the only way to find true, true hope, true forgiveness. True. True blessings is only found in Jesus. And that's the hope that I have. That's the hope that I hold on to. That is my new identity. That's the victory that I have. I am no longer a victim. I'm victorious, but it's not my victory. It's Jesus Christ victory that he gave me that he died for me and made a way for me. So the hope I have the joy I have the peace I have is not because I did something right. Not because I'm better than anybody that because I have figured it out. The joy and peace I have is found in the promise and the hope of Jesus Christ, that when I am week, he is strong, that he has transformed me and made me a new man. He's taken me from Jacob and made me in Israel. And when the pastor raises up, I remember he's made a way for me to hold on, when the old ways try to show up. God has made a hope for me to go forward. So my promise, my hope, my trust is in Jesus Christ.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If people are wanting to be in touch with you, of course, I'll put some links in the show notes at pleading daylight dotnet. But where's the easiest place to find you and to learn more about how they can forgive their own nightmare?
 
Mark Sowersby 
forgivingthenightmare.com is the best way to connect with us. We're also on Facebook, @forgivingthenightmare. You can check us out there by forgivingthenightmare.com or you can go there there's a website there. There's an email there, mark@forgivingthenightmare.com you can email me at mark@forgivingthenightmare.com that's the best way to check us out either by forgivingthenightmare.com or on Facebook at forgiving the nightmare.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Mark. I want to thank you for your honesty for your bravery in telling your story. And I know that it is going to make a difference in many people's lives. So thank you for your time. Thank you for the integrity that you've shown throughout. And I look forward to sharing this story with many people. Thank you.
 
Mark Sowersby 
God bless you. Thank you.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Terry Nightingale is a pastor and author. His new book focuses on how we deal with past failings, disappointments, and broken dreams. How can we be free of a damaged past and walk into a fruitful future? How do we use what has happened to move forward?
In a world that either demonizes past failings or tries to sweep them under the rug, Looking Back to Move Forward takes the more biblical approach of examining and learning from our mistakes to move forwards into a more fruitful future.
 
http://terrynightingale.com
https://www.facebook.com/terry.nightingale.54 
https://www.facebook.com/bitesizechristiandevotions
https://www.amazon.com/Looking-Back-Move-Forward-Fruitfulness/dp/194627772X 
https://www.kharispublishing.com
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Something a little different today on Bleeding Daylight as we talk to a pastor and author about his new book which focuses on how we deal with past failings, disappointments, and broken dreams.
 
How can we be free of a damaged past and walk into a fruitful future? How do we use what has happened to move forward?
 
Please subscribe to Bleeding Daylight to ensure that you don’t miss an episode, share episodes with your friends, and make sure you connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Most of us would have heard the saying everyone has a book in them. While that may or may not be true, I do know that not everyone has a good book in them. Thankfully, Terry Nightingale not only had a book in him, he had a good book in him and even better, he took the time to write that book. In a world that either demonizes past failings or tries to sweep them under the rug, Looking Back to Move Forward takes the more biblical approach of examining and learning from our mistakes to move forwards into a more fruitful future. Terry, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Hi, Rodney. Thanks for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did the idea of this book first start percolating in your mind?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Well, I guess I would say this book has been percolating for some time for some years, I have found through my Christian life, it hasn't been success followed by success followed by success followed by success. And I've often faced discouragements and setbacks, in ministry and in personal life as well, for really, a lot of that time, I have wanted to try and make sense of them. I haven't wanted to just sort of push things under the carpet and say, okay, you know, I just need to move on. Now, you know, the past is in the past. Let's just move on. I really wanted to say, Lord, you know, in praying, God, why did that happen? What am I meant to learn from this? In that sense, this book has been in my heart for a long, long time. But it was only really a couple of years ago that I started to write it down and put it on paper. Well, not really paper, but my computer. Yes.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If you're writing a book about embracing mistakes, and learning from them, you've got to be honest enough to admit that you do make a few mistakes and in the book, you do go through some of the things where you have fallen short, yeah. How hard is it to make those public?
 
Terry Nightingale 
When I was writing it, I didn't feel I was being particularly candid about some of my stories. But interestingly, at the moment, I'm listening to an audio version of the book, and I'm hearing some of the stories again, and I'm thinking to myself, Oh, my goodness, I can't believe I was that honest, when I when I wrote that. But I think it is important, to be honest, you know, I think if you're in ministry, or particularly if you're in leadership in some way, I don't think it's helpful to people to say, I've got it all together, I think what's maybe more helpful to people is, actually, I know what it's like to be really discouraged or to be really disappointed, or for things not to work out as I'd hoped, or, or that that dream hasn't come true yet. I think it's actually much more helpful to be able to say, Well, yeah, I really know what that feels like, too and this is how I started to cope with it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to ask you about some of those failings in a moment. You can recount some stories for us. But there's a theme in some Christian circles, that we should be always living in victory, and we're constantly moving to another higher level. And we keep moving on in that way. Your book certainly encourages Christian growth. But it seems to admit that it's a lot more complicated than some would have us believe.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yeah, well, I think you've only got to read the book of Psalms to see that that's true. If you track the Psalms, particularly David Psalms, David was not living in victory constantly. You know, there were many times that he had incredible victories. And of course, you know, his most famous one is his slaying of Goliath. But there are other times when Wow, he's going through a tough time. And a lot of his psalms are reflecting that, in fact, many of the lament psalms are David having a really bad day, telling God how he feels, but then coming to a place of faith.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it is interesting that in our churches today, we don't tend to go there. The psalms are the songs that that could be sung. And yet we don't generally have these songs about Lord, you're so distant from me. Why? Why do you leave me in this pain? Why do you think that is? Is it just that we want to sort of shut that out? Is that what's going on?
 
Terry Nightingale 
There's a really good question. Maybe there is part of us that wants to shout that out. It's certainly easier to preach a message of victory and success, and everything will be fine. But I think in order to preach anything positive from the scriptures, we have to recognize where we're at sometimes. And sometimes we need we need to acknowledge, actually, things aren't fine today. And God, how do you want to get me through that?
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I suppose for some, that's the disconnect that they find with churches is that we hear about life is going to be wonderful. Well, I've tried it. I've tried to do this God thing, but it hasn't worked because I still have bad days. So is there an opportunity for us to be more honest within our churches?
 
Terry Nightingale 
I hope so. And I don't know, you know, maybe in our churches, we need to give that opportunity to be more honest by us as leaders being more honest. And there's a balance in that isn't there, you know, because nobody, nobody wants church leaders to sort of stand up in front of a microphone and then fall apart. You know, we still need to be those that are drawing on the Lord for the strength and wisdom that they need. But I think equally, somebody who is always sort of pretending that they've got life all together all the time, is equally not helpful to people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Maybe you can help us with some of the stories in your book where things haven't gone quite to plan.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Well, I can remember a time when I was running an alpha course. Now people will tell from my accent that I'm from the UK. This was not long after Sue, and I came to Australia. And we were part of a church. And I was running in Alpha Course. So if people aren't familiar with Alpha, you know, it's a very accessible way of investigating the Christian faith. So perhaps for people who are not yet Christians, and I asked a person in the church who was a sort of a fairly youngest Christian, I guess. And so there were still areas of their life that God was working on. And one of the areas of the life of their life was was one in terms of honesty, with how they acquired some things in their life. Let's say they acquired some things not quite legally. There was one night when I couldn't attend the alpha course. So I said to my friend, would you be able to cover for me? Would you be able to do it? He said, Yes, he said, and we find that we find. So the evening went by, and by all accounts, it seemed to be a successful evening. And then I heard from some of the guests on the course, that this friend of mine had given away stolen goods to people on the alpha course. And I thought, Oh, no, here's the reason why I wrote about this is because my response wasn't very good. I was furious. I was angry with this guy. And the next opportunity, I had to talk to him, I took it. And I took it with both hands. And I went up to him. And I just told him when I thought, I thought, I was very upset. My response was so bad, in terms of lack of grace, you know, lack of kindness, really over the top that our friendship was effective, probably for two or three years. That time later, he and I met at a social somewhere, and we made up and I apologize for the way I've handled the situation. And he said this to me, he's now bearing in mind, this guy is huge, you know, now I'm five foot six, whatever that is, in metric. This guy was six foot monster, you know, he was enormous this guy. And and he looked at me, and he's, and he was very grateful that I apologize to him. But he said to me, if you hadn't been my pastor, I would have asked you where you stood. In other words, I'd been so rude to him. And I probably would have deserved that decking to be honest. But I had to go through a process with all of that, of looking at, well, you know, why did I react like that? You know, why did I? Why was I lacking in grace? You know, what is it God's wanting to teach me about handling difficult situations?
 
Rodney Olsen 
The interesting thing I find in that story is that it's very easy to justify your actions, because he shouldn't have been giving away stolen goods,
 
Terry Nightingale 
Right.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And so it's easy to say, Well, look, he got what's coming to him. And we hear this more and more, even in Christian circles of, well, they deserve it. There's, you know, they weren't asking for forgiveness. And so therefore, I can't forgive and, and they deserve everything that they get. But that's not what we're told to do. No,
 
Terry Nightingale 
That's right. And I think that's really important. And I think some of my experiences have been examples of that, where it would have been easy just to, to feel justified or reacted like that, because that person did that or said that. But I am always responsible for how I respond to a situation, you know, and I think whatever comes our way. And Gosh, I'm not saying I do this perfectly got I'm still very much on a learning curve here. But I am realizing that whatever happens, I am still responsible before God to handle that in a godly way. And that's that's sometimes where it's really tough.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We read through the book in and we see those examples where you've been honest enough to admit that, yeah, I messed it up, I got this one wrong. And sometimes it's taken you a moment to realize that and sometimes it's taking you longer. So I think that most of us can identify with that. But you don't just leave it there. It's not about personal experience, but you actually take his way back to the Old Testament in the Bible. Yeah. And share a story that says, hate looking back isn't a bad thing.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yeah, so I've been really influenced by the book of Deuteronomy. And Moses is actually talking to the second generation Israelites after their 40 year wanderings in the wilderness. Were like flies on the wall listening to Moses, speak, speak to them. And and as Moses recants things have happened In the last 40 years, we travel back in their memory with them to relive some of those stories. And so I talk a lot about those stories. And it's interesting because the book of Deuteronomy really is a book called looking back in order that the children of Israel can move forward move forward into the promised land. Many will know the story, of course, that they would have taken the promised land Not long after they left Mount Sinai when they had the 10 commandments given to them. But as spies were sent into the land, then they came back with the report that there were giants in the land. And so the whole nation freaked out basically, and said, This is too big, we're frightened, we can't do this. And so because of their lack of faith, God's judgment on them was that that generation would pass away in the desert, and their kids will grow up, and their kids will enter the land 48 years, actually, 38 years later. And so what Moses does in the book of Deuteronomy is he gathered, gathers and more together. And he says, Let's relive some of these stories. And let's look at how your parents failed. Let's look at how leaders failed. Let's look at some of the mistakes that occurred in the past, let's let's look at what didn't work out. And let's meditate on those things for a moment. Let's also reflect on the greatness of God, and on the faithfulness of God. But until we do that, we're not going to move forward really, with God's blessing and and with the fruit that God wants to bear. So that story is had a big influence on me with all of this.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I do find it interesting that Moses here is talking to people who have no part in stopping them from from moving forward. And yet, he's saying we've got to own this collectively. And we can look to various instances, even in our own recent history, where people are saying, our people should just get over it and move on. And yet the Bible is saying something different. Why don't we embrace that message?
 
Terry Nightingale 
I don't know. I guess we don't like the the discomfort, do we? I really hear your point, actually, about the grown up children. They weren't actually the ones that failed. But actually they they put themselves in the same space. And they said, No, we're part of this too, you know, we need to almost repent on behalf of our parents, you know, it's a community thing reminds me of a story actually, of a class, I can't remember where this class was, I think it was in an African country somewhere where the children were studying for an exam. And all but one of the children pass the exam. And somebody was visiting the school and they were saying, congratulations, this is wonderful. But all of the children said, No, we failed. And they said, What do you mean, nearly all of you passed? And they said, No, because one of us failed. We all failed, we're in this together. And I thought that was powerful. In some ways, you know, I think it's easy to sort of apportion blame to people, isn't it and say, Oh, it was back then it was them, you know, but actually, we are God's people in a community. And we are responsible for each other and it's not about my personal ministry, or his personal ministry or her personal ministry, actually, we are called together to be the church,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I guess it's easy for us to dwell on the things in the past that haven't worked. How do we actually get ourselves out of that loop? For those that were sitting under Moses teaching? How did they resolve that issue? and decide to move forward?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yeah, so I do talk about this. And I think one we invite God into that space when we are meditating on things from the past. So it's not just thinking about something and and and then feeling discouraged about what's what's happened. It's actually intentionally inviting the Lord into that into that space and say, God help me process this helped me to learn what I'm meant to be learning here. I believe if if we're doing that with an honest heart, you know, with a with a genuine heart, then then he will lead us to scriptures that are appropriate scriptures that will help us I talk about repentance. So for example, there's the story of Jonah and the whale, which we're all familiar with. And in chapter two of Jonah, we get a glimpse of Jonah's repentance, because he ran away rather than obeying God, but actually looking at his prayer takes us on a journey of, of a good way of praying through something that's happened in the past and how we deal with it so so journeys prayer is really, really useful. So it's inviting God in terms of the Word of God is inviting God in in terms of praying, for example, with Jonah, you know, he starts off basically telling telling God what a bad day is head, and maybe that's a good start point. A good start point sometimes is to say, God that happened, and it really sucks. I hate it. This is how I felt at the time. God I'm really struggling to make sense of this. Please help me. An honest expression of how I felt about something but Jonah moves from that and he moves actually to acknowledge Where he could have done better. And and he's eventually worshipping, you know, at the end of it he's worshiping. So it's going through that process with God really starting off. This is where I'm feeling God. But where God wants to lead us, I believe is where we are expressing trust in Him, and we're worshiping him. And he's enabling us to put it away, learn from it, and then move forward.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How do we get beyond I guess that the polar opposites of being caught up in this morose introspection, where we're constantly going back, and we're constantly beating ourselves up for past failures? Compare that with some who just say, I'll look that was in the past, that's forgiven, let's just move on and try and ignore it completely. How do we strike that balance?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Well, I think the balance is we do go back. But because we are going back, the intention is that we can leave it behind because God has taught us the things he wants to teach us. If we don't go back and evaluate things in the Lord's presence, then we we run the risk of not learning the things he wants to teach us, and then perhaps repeating the same mistakes, or finding the same things are happening to us. If we go back, and we just feel sorry for ourselves, but we don't actually learn what God wants to teach us, then then we're just having a pity party, really. I think God wants us to take us back so that we can learn the lessons, and then we can put them back when discouragements come or we're tempted to think about those things. Again, I think we can genuinely say, No, the Lord's dealt with that. And he's taught me the things. I'm not going to get down about that. Because I'm now going on with him, you know. So I think the Lord wants to bring us to where we can genuinely say the past is in the past. Now, forget about it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've written this book, but your day job is as a pastor. And so some of the examples that you're using in the book, as you've already explained with with one of them are examples of you in ministry, where there's been that failure, how have those things helped you? As you've gone forward? What are some of the lessons that you've learned from those mistakes that have helped you to, to go forward?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Interestingly, where as I was writing the book, there were some things that I experienced, that were happening at just the time I was writing a particular chapter. You know, it's amazing when the Holy Spirit does that. So I remember a particular time, when I think I was writing about prayer, and particularly about worship, and there was one day that I had an issue I had to deal with, that was a difficult issue. And I didn't know what to do, I think, a common prayer for pastors, sometimes his Lord, I don't know what to do. I think it's good sometimes for us to admit that we have days you know, where we genuinely come to God and say, Lord, I really have no idea how to handle this one. Well, I had one of those days, where I was just praying, Lord, I just do not know what to do. And actually, what I ended up doing was threw a CD on the turntable, and it was an old Chris Tomlin album, and I just started worshiping, and just started worshiping. And as I was worshiping, I had tears running down my face, I was just declaring the greatness of God. One of the songs was that wonderful song, indescribable, you know, just wondering, marveling at God's creation, and just all the songs really seemed to minister to me as I worshipped him. And I felt a real burden lift as I was just worshiping God, God gives us the gift of worship, sometimes just to get our perspective, right. You know, when we're worshiping, we're not, we're not staring at a problem, we're actually putting our eyes on God. Immediately after that time of worship, nothing had changed, but my heart was lighter. And I and I felt that I was trusting in God more. But interestingly, out of the blue, I had a phone call with somebody later that day, and that phone call was the beginning of the resolution of the problem.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So we have this opportunity, when we don't know where to go, that we can begin worshiping in whatever way that is meaningful for us to worship God, we can worship, and that will start to resolve issues, certainly for ourselves, and in this case, resolving the issue materially as well. I know that you share another story about being thankful, and about being grateful where again, you can be caught in a situation that leaves you feeling down, and yet we turn our eyes toward heaven and things start to change. Maybe you can share that story with us.
 
Terry Nightingale 
So is the story of when I was much younger Christian, a student in my summer vacation, and feeling very down one day, and very discouraged. I was being paid to weed a garden. You know, as a student, you take any job to earn a little bit of money. So I was weeding this garden. I was having a bad day. I was having a black cloud day and the Thought just hit me quite randomly give thanks. And I thought, where did that come from? So I started giving things I started thinking of things, I could be thankful for food on the table, this friend, that friend, the fact that I enjoy music, just random things, simple things, I started giving things. And I had this extraordinary experience of every time I thought of something to be thankful for. Other things started popping in my mind that I could be thankful for. It's like I pushed the door open. And then other doors were opening. And, and I was starting to think of lots and lots of things that I could be thankful for. Literally, five hours later, I was still thinking of new things to be thankful for. And I got on my bike at the end of the day, and I'm rode home on cloud nine, I was like, E.T. on the bike, you know, with that famous shot of him floating over the night sky. Again, that taught me something that there's power in being grateful, being thankful. And at times when we don't think things are going very well, actually, maybe they're the times to be giving thanks. And you know, God says, This is my will for you that you give thanks. in all circumstances, he says that in one Thessalonians, I believe he gives that to us, because he knows that that's good for us. It's good for us to be thankful.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If we are people of faith, if we are people who follow God, then we believe that things are going on, in a spiritual sense. Because we can try to come at past failures and, and improving going forward in all sorts of supposedly practical ways. But if we leave out the spiritual, then we're missing something. And a lot of what you're talking about here, is actually including that spiritual so there are practical steps, but they lead to things happening in the spiritual.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yes, psychologists have found in their studies that people who are thankful in their demeanor in the way that they they do life, usually are stronger or more resilient people. The trouble with that is though, is who we giving thanks to, you know, we might have a diary of you know, I'm thankful for this. And that's a good thing to do. But actually, where where God comes in is when he's the one we give thanks to. And so as we give thanks to him, not just being faithful generally, but actually giving thanks to God, we are inviting the Holy Spirit into that, that space in our lives. And it's the same with worship, isn't it? You know, it's not just singing songs to make me feel better. It's actually singing songs to God and inviting him into where I am right now in this thing I'm going through.
 
Rodney Olsen 
But of course, if we were created to worship, if we were created to be thankful, then these are basic spiritual principles that will play out in our lives.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yeah. Yeah. It's funny, isn't it? We know these things are in the scriptures. But how many of us actually do it? And I know, if I'm having a bad day, I still have to make myself do these things, because oftentimes is not natural.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What are some of the other areas where you found yourself failing, and yet, you've learned that lesson and moved forward from it.
 
Terry Nightingale 
One example would be if I felt that I've needed to say something to somebody that maybe a gentle challenge or something. So this is something that may be pastors or those in ministry would be familiar with, you know, something is sits inside of you that says, you know, I'm, I heard that person say this, or I heard that person do this. And I think perhaps, as part of my pastoral care, I probably should say something just to draw attention to the fact that that, that wasn't helpful to that person. Or, you know, sometimes we need to say things bring correction to people in a humble way. Well, some of the mistakes I've made in the past have been where I've, my example, with the very large young man who nearly knocked me out would be an example of that, where I've just reacted. And I found that if I have got any lack of peace in my heart, that is the wrong time to talk to somebody. So you know, if I'm aware that some somebody has done something, said something and I, I feel I should intervene in some way, if I have got any kind of anger or or whatever it is even lack of peace, it would be a mistake to go forward because I would be doing it out of my own self rather than out of God. So, so what I try to do now, and I'm still wearing big metal plates, but what I tried to do now is wait until I've got that peace, so that hopefully, anything I say is, is from God and not my own emotions.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If we grasp onto this idea that we should be looking back, we should be looking at where things haven't gone well, so that we can repent so that we can learn the lesson that God is trying to teach us through that, we could end up on a crusade to make sure That every one is a reminder of their past failings. But what you're saying is, it's still got to be done in love. If we are bringing something to someone's attention. If we're, as the Bible says, bringing something to a brother, it's still got to be done from the right heart, not just our desire to catch them out.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Exactly. I think a good prayer to pray is, you know, when we are in pastoral ministry, and we do have that biblical command to sometimes go to people and say, Come on, we need to talk about this. I think the first prayer to pray is actually Holy Spirit, would you do something in them? Almost that I don't need to do not I mean, I think that's the first thing is to, to pray that God does something. And, Lord, if you want me to say something, then I will but give me the right words and make it the right time. But if we are eager to say something to somebody, then maybe that's a sign that we shouldn't, if that makes sense. I remember seeing a brother many years ago, behaving in a way that wasn't appropriate. And, and I was a bit cross with him. And I was very eager to put him right. And so I prayed about it. I said, Lord, just give me an opportunity to talk to this person. And you know, God never gave me an opportunity. And and I think what he was saying to me is, Terry, you are the wrong one to do this, you know, your heart attitude is not right. You just want to tell him off and maybe look good in the process. But so, first step, I think, pray for the person. And maybe God will do something without you. But he usually does a better job.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You said that this book is a good one for those in leadership, to learn these principles and to be able to, I suppose, take their congregations through through learnings. Do you think that that is something that we sometimes need to do to have leadership's of churches or pastors to say, Okay, today, we're going to look back at some of the things that have gone on in order for our congregation to move forward.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Wow. Yeah, that's a really good question. I think yes. You know, repentance is not just a personal thing. Sometimes it can be a community thing. You know, maybe it can be a, you know, corporately, we made this decision. But you know, years on, we're not sure if we did make the right decision. Maybe as, as a body of people, we need to repent to the Lord together. Yes, it's a really good question. But I can't think of a of an example where where our church has done that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And, of course, as you say, this is a book that is helpful for leaders for their own ministry moving forward. But I see throughout the book, that there are not only lessons for leaders that as you've taken on, but there are lessons for us personally, and a lot of those lessons that you've taken on personally. So this is a book, I would imagine that people, whether they're in leadership or not, are going to draw strength from and and find a way forward to be more fruitful.
 
Terry Nightingale 
I think my publisher was slightly frustrated with me, because they said, right, who we're going to target this to, you know, what's the target audience? And all I could come up with was, well, I think any Christian could benefit from this. So very vague and very broad. But I think you're right, I think, if we're a follower of Jesus, there are times when we don't get it right. Or there are times when we have questions. Or there are times when we have dreams that may not come true, or may not come true in the way that we hope they weren't, you know, all of these things happen to all Christians. So hopefully, there's a message message in there for everyone.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you touched just there on those dreams that don't come true. And that's often the case for people that it's not really that they've done something in error is not something that they've messed up. But there are sometimes dreams that reside within us. And sometimes we feel this is a dream that has been planted by God. And yet it doesn't come to fruition. How do we actually reconcile that if we are to look back on that, in order to move forward in order to be more fruitful? How do we deal with that? Yeah,
 
Terry Nightingale 
This this is a biggie for me. I spent quite a lot of time thinking about this and writing about this. On one hand, absolutely. Let's be prayerful about asking God, God, what are the things you want me to do? I love Ephesians 210. You know, we're God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, to do good works that he prepared in advance for us to do. So. There are things that he places on our hearts, things he wants us to go for fantastic. But sometimes we can have an image in our head of this is the dream I'm going for. We set ourselves on a journey and God's in it. But sometimes things don't work out as we'd hoped. I talk a bit about dreams because I've certainly had some dreams that haven't come true. So for example, I was very into the Christian music scene as a younger man and did a lot of worship leading at different churches, and would write songs, worship songs, and some of those songs were sung in my local church, which was a real joy. But I had this dream that my songs were going to go on. All over the world, I was going to be the next Chris Tomlin before Chris Tomlin was even known. But that didn't that dream never came true, none of my songs got published. And I don't know why that's the case. But looking back on that it didn't stop me from writing. It didn't stop me from worshiping God with songs that he'd given me. It didn't stop me from encouraging others who have that gift and trying to help them. And in fact, that brings me on really to the next point, and which is that sometimes God does give us dreams, but is actually a dream that's not just for me. You know, in a relay race, we pass on the baton to someone else. And I think that, you know, we are created to be part of a faith community, you know, when God gives us dreams, they are personal dreams, but we are part of a community. And I think God has purposes for that community. And maybe the dream that God places on my heart is something that is going to come true. But maybe he's calling me to pass the baton on. In other words, because I have a love for music, because I have a love for creating worship songs. Maybe I'm passing that on to others. And maybe some of them will enjoy having songs going around the world. For example, my own son has sort of inherited that. And he is a very talented songwriter, maybe his son, they've just got a new baby, maybe his son will grow up to be a worship leader, maybe this his songs will go around, who knows? All I know is that I know God, please put something on my heart. But it may not be that I see the fruition of it. It may be that I'm passing the baton on.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And we certainly see that in the story of Moses that he had to pass the baton on, it probably would not have been his first choice. He wanted to get into the promised land, but that wasn't going to happen. And he he recognized that he was passing the baton on how much of that? Is there in that story? Yeah, so
 
Terry Nightingale 
I do use that as an illustration. It's really interesting, because Moses is quite reluctant at first, as you say, but you do you see him preparing Joshua to to lead the people into the land. And Joshua, of course, does a better job because Moses is not an army commander, you know, so God knows the best leader anyway. But Joshua is, you know, a much better person in leading a nation in battle. The other area that I found myself thinking about is what is the eternal perspective in all of this. It's not just about me, and my personal goals. And it is much more about me being part of a faith community. And it's even more about being part of eternity.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your book, Looking Back to Move Forward hasn't been out for too long but I know that there's already been a few people that have been reading it around you guys. What has the reaction been so far?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Two nice comments have been made that have been said several times. One is easy to read, which is lovely. So I tried to avoid too many sort of long words in it, because I didn't really know that many long words. But I knew I was dealing with some theological concepts. And I didn't want to make too academic there, put it like that, really, I wanted it. I wanted it to be thorough in terms of biblical exegesis. But whatever knowledge people have of the Bible, I wanted to make it accessible to everybody. So people have kindly said that it's easy to read, which is good. And the other thing they've talked about is how, how candid I've been and how honest I've been and again, that's nice, nicer people to say. In fact, some of them are quite shocked by it, I think, saying, oh, my goodness, you're really honest about some of my family members have said that? Oh, that's honest. And I don't know, you know, me,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I think that term, easy to read can be deceptive. Because we think that that means that Oh, yeah, breeze through it. And there's nothing challenging in there. And while I would certainly agree that it's very accessible and easy to read from, from the language, being able to grab the concepts that you're putting out there, there is still a challenge in there, that if we are to take what you're writing seriously, that there is an opportunity to do business with God. Have you found anyone who's come back with with stories of saying, that kind of brought me on down? And I've, I've had to do business with God since?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Yeah, no, I haven't had anybody say that yet. One or two have said that it is challenging. But I guess, as you say, it's only been out a short while. So we'll see. I hope. I mean, at the end of the day, you know, that's why you write things. You write things in the hope that God uses it in some way. So I think that would probably be the best thing long term is if I'm hearing down the track, that people are saying, I just needed that at this time in my life, you know, that would be wonderful.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The book is available right around the world through places like Amazon, where people can pick it up as well as if they wanted to order a copy from you. I'm wondering if perhaps people are thinking yet sounds like I'd like to read it, but I would actually like to get to know you a little bit better. First you do write some bite sized pieces that might be give people an introduction, tell me a little about that
 
Terry Nightingale 
That's called The Best is Yet to Come. Nothing to do with American politics. Yeah, just call them bite sized devotions really takes four minutes to read them. And just really something to encourage people in their day. It usually got a little story in there or just look at a particular passage of scripture and just a few thoughts. And again, you know, easy to read, but there's a challenge there each time as well so designed to serve the busy Christian who perhaps needs a bit of help having a bit of time with God every day.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So if people are wanting to grab those bite sized pieces, or are wanting to look to get the book, where's the best place that they can go?
 
Terry Nightingale 
Okay, so the devotions, the bite sized devotions are on TerryNightingale.com. You can find out more about the book on the publishers website, which is Kharis Publishing. So that's kharispublishing.com. And there should be some information there but I think there's there's information on Amazon as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We'll put links to how to get in touch with Terry in the show notes at BleedingDaylight.net But, Terry, I want to thank you for your honesty. I want to thank you for your time and being part of Bleeding Daylight.
 
Terry Nightingale 
Thank you, Rodney. Thanks for having me.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Tammy Becker slipped into a 6-day coma following surgery. Her doctors had no idea what was happening or how to bring her out of the coma. She thought she had dodged a childhood illness but several decades later, there was no way to dodge the surgery that went so horribly wrong. Since that time, Tammy has begun reaching out to help others.
 
 
 
https://www.youministries.com
https://www.facebook.com/groups/youministries
https://www.facebook.com/tammybeckercoaching
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It’s another episode of Bleeding Daylight and I’m so glad you’re listening. Please subscribe to ensure that you don’t miss an episode, share episodes with your friends, and make sure you connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
Today’s guest slipped into a 6-day coma following surgery. Her doctors had no idea what was happening or how to bring her out of the coma. Her remarkable story in just a moment.
 
My guest today thought she had dodged a childhood illness but several decades later, there was no way to dodge surgery. That's when things went horribly wrong. Since that time, Tammy Becker has begun reaching out to help others. I'm looking forward to exploring her story on Bleeding Daylight. Tammy, thank you for your time.
 
Tammy Becker 
Thank you for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
To fully understand your story, we have to go back a number of years take us back to that young girl who loves sport describe your life in those days.
 
Tammy Becker 
Oh, yes, I was a sports enthusiast. Anything I could do and accomplish and move on to the next. That was me. If I felt like there, I had nothing else to learn in a sport, I was begging my mom to put me on something else. And so I was from one sport at age four from tap dancing into moved into ice skating. And then as I got into grade school, I began in track, a little bit of basketball. But that wasn't my thing. But just I experimented with all kinds of sports truly love sports.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What do you think it was back in those days that that caused you to continually challenge yourself? Where did that influence come from?
 
Tammy Becker 
Well, my father, I would say, My dad always instilled in me that no matter if I was a female, no matter how tall I was going to be, no matter anything, I could come my way in life that I could do anything that I set my mind to. So from a very young girl, a very young age, I had a perfect to me role model. I went out and I just explored life just like he told me to do.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That must have been incredibly comforting. Also, for your mom, knowing that there's a man in the house who believes that women can be what they want to be.
 
Tammy Becker 
Oh, absolutely, and she she was for it all the way. She encouraged me. Well, except when, you know, my dad helped me get a motorcycle for my first vehicle. My mom wasn't too keen about that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Now, of course, you're growing up, and you're still just very young, or very young teenager. And I believe you had an accident when you were playing sport one day,
 
Tammy Becker 
What happened was, as I was doing the high jump at a five foot two is all that tall I am. So I was a high jumper, believe it or not, and I was high jumping and landed wrong on my neck and when I got up off the mat, I couldn't move my neck and I had extreme pain, just shooting down my spine, and just excruciating pain. So I went home that day, they sent me home, and my mom decided I better stay home, they better get me into the doctor, the doctor then suggested that I go to a chiropractor. And so we went into the chiropractor's office, and there was an X ray sitting up on the wall, and it was an X ray of somebody's back that looked like a backward S and my mom is just staring at this X ray. And I'm staring at the X ray. And my mom goes, Wow, she goes that that poor person with a back like that I can't imagine. So little bit later, you know, the doctor comes in. And he continues to talk to my mom and then said, Well, I see you can probably have been looking at this x ray, and this is Tammy's back. And all of a sudden, time stopped for me right at that moment. Did he say to me, I was thinking Did he say that's my back, everything went to a blur. Everything was in a big cloud. And I didn't know at age 13 what was happening. The next thing I remember hearing is surgery, and seeing a specialist. And so everything just became just a huge cloud over my head and I didn't know what to do. I looked over at my mom, my mom was crying. And basically from that day, that is the only thing I can remember about that diagnosis.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's a fairly horrific diagnosis when you imagine this young girl who's so into sports and wanting to achieve everything to suddenly find that there's some some basic structural problems with your back. What did it actually mean for you, you say that the doctor was talking surgery. What happened from that point?
 
Tammy Becker 
Well, from that point, we did go to see a specialist. The chiropractor did fix my neck, by the way, but then we went on to go see a specialist and at the Phoenix Children's Hospital. I can remember my mom and dad were going in I remember them talking about surgery. When I go back and I read my mom's notes, I see that I had, I believe it was a 58 degree curve at that time on the top. And then the bottom curve was somewhere in the 50 range. So if you think of the backward S you go backwards on your back, so that top curve was 50, at the bottom was somewhere around 50. Those are major curves. So everything was scrunched together, they were talking to her about surgery. And at this time, the surgery technique was called putting a Harrington Rod in. And they called it that because the doctor that developed this process, his last name was Harrington. So they wanted to do a complete back surgery to straighten my spine out, put this pole to give you an idea, a long rod up and down my back and I would be in a cast body cast and in bed for a year. Now that was the process back then, you know, almost 40 years ago. So as you can imagine, I was talking to my parents, when we left, I was basically screaming to them and begging them and crying not to have me get the surgery. I said, How, how come you think I need the surgery, I can do all these sports. I don't have the pain that they're talking about. I don't want to be laid up in bed. I said, basically, I told my parents and I have a note to this day that I wrote them that I will not get the surgery, I will run away. And of course, that was the mindset of this very young girl. Because she felt like she was getting her whole entire life wiped out from her at that very moment. So my parents did a lot of praying to God. And I went to my parents at one day, and I says I just want to tell you guys something, I am a sound, mind and body. I know, I'm young. But I know my body. And I know I want to tell you that. Even though I'm young, Please don't make me get the surgery, I promise I will never hold it as your responsibility or hold it against you ever in my life, I will take full responsibility on my shoulders, knowing that I want to live my life going forward as I am today without that surgery. So they continue to pray about it. And one day, my dad just got a word from God, that everything was going to be okay. And that they were not going to make me have that surgery. And I did not have that surgery at that time.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's an amazing story and you mentioned a couple of times there that your parents are praying. So obviously this is a home of faith. Did you have your own faith at that stage?
 
Tammy Becker 
I certainly did. I was brought up in church. So I was saved at the age of seven. And I remember I was in love with God and Jesus, my mom said that she knew something was going to be of me someday, because she would always find me every altar call going down to the altar and I would just cry and I would pray and I still love that so much. And I love that relationship with that whatever that I have with the Lord,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Going forward from this point, you've said, "Look, I am responsible, I do not want this surgery". What did you do to try and counteract that to keep yourself healthy going forward.
 
Tammy Becker 
So I dove even harder into exercise and nutrition. And I made a lifelong commitment that I was going to keep my bones strong, keep myself healthy with weight training. And I continued in sports. But you know, as I got older, I was a gymnast also. So I went in onto my own fitness center. I taught gymnastics, I taught weight training, I continued to stay healthy, continued to live a good clean life like clean, healthy foods, not really much of a drinker and little wine here and there never dabbled in the drug place. But that kind of a thing. I just dove in to making exercise the key importance in my life and kept God at the head of all of that keeping him in control and helping me stay on path with what my purpose was.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And where was life taking you at this stage? You mentioned, you started a gym and so you're busy with all these different things and, and staying healthy. What was happening in the rest of your life?
 
Tammy Becker 
In the rest of my life. I was having children I had two daughters. And I like I said I owned my own fitness center. I actually at that time. Back in the day. I applied for the fire department because my dad's a retired firefighter. So once again I was I want to do what my dad did, because he said I could do whatever I want. So at that time, it was a little bit on the sexist side, I was the only female that tested and I tested with a 98%. And I got a letter saying they took everybody with a 99%, I was pretty happy with my test score anyway, and I kind of knew what the whole thing was. So I just dove into everything that I loved and just continued to go forward and stay strong. And I kind of moved around the United States a little bit just to kind of like the thing, what I did with my exercise, I wanted to see the world I always wanted to make the most of everything in life and just felt like I had to take every moment and live it live every single moment of my life. And that's what I did.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So this point, it seems that that diagnosis all those years ago, is not going to trouble you going forward. But then what happened?
 
Tammy Becker 
Oh, so then 49 years old happened and I started getting some back pain and I totally forgot about my scoliosis. Now. I know that sounds probably like How could she forget about it? Well, because I never related pain that I had to my scoliosis. I always just thought it was I hurt myself or pulled my back out or something. I never related anything to my scoliosis because I never had pain throughout my life. But I was getting back pain. So I went to see my doctor, my regular doctor, and she told me that it was time that I better go see a back doctor, and I said, See a back doctor Why? She goes because your scoliosis and I said, Oh, well, I haven't messed with that since I was about 13. And she's like, well, she goes, the older you get, you really need to go and check at least have it checked out and make sure this isn't what's causing your pain. So I made that dreaded call to a specialist. And I went and saw him. And then I hear these dreaded words. Well, what happens is, in your fourth and fifth decade of life, scoliosis gives you other problems, you start getting degenerative disc disease, you start getting nerve damage, your bones start deteriorating because they're not aligned properly. And he went on and on with all of his things that he wanted to tell me. While again, I was sitting in a fog looking down going, this can't be happening. But it was, it was definitely happening again. And then the next thing I hear out of his mouth is you are a surgeon's dream. And I said, what I'm a surgeon's dream, he goes, yes, you have a virgin back. Nobody's messed with your back. So you're a back surgeon's dream? Well, if you can imagine somebody saying that to you, after you've spent like the last 40 years 40 something years fighting not to get the surgery, and then somebody saying, Well, yeah, like I want to get in there and work on your back rather than, like, get a second opinion. Let's try this. Let's try that. So I'm already my I completely shut him out. And I went on the assumption of like, all he wants us to do surgery on my back. And I'm not going to have that. I asked him just to send me to some physical therapy. And that's what he did. And I went and got some physical therapy. And I was talking to the physical therapist, and she said to me, this probably isn't going to help your back much. And I says, well, let's try. I said, I have exercised my whole life. I said it, let's give me something, something maybe I don't know. And she goes, but you do all these exercises just right, she goes, this, this really isn't going to help you you're going to need to see a surgeon and I said I just didn't like that surgeon i saw i said he went all he talked about was getting in and doing my back. And you know, without any other options. I said Do you have any other patients that have scoliosis that you could have them call me and talk to me and let me see, you know what happened with them? And oh, you know, I had all these questions. And they were just, I had no one to talk to nobody personally to talk to so she did find somebody she'd said I do have somebody I'll call her and I will ask if she'll call you and I said Oh perfect. And so I do get this call from a girl named Lily. And she went on to tell me that she just had a little surgery, but I sounded more like her friend Laurie. And I says Oh, and she goes Laurie has the same exact surgery. She went through the same thing. Only she had her surgery when she was a teenager when they diagnosed her But recently, she's had to have it fixed and she went back in and she has a really good surgeon who I also saw in Vegas and I says okay, well we you see if she'll call me, and Laurie. calls me and we instantly had a connection. And our connection was God. And immediately we both laughed and says, God makes no mistakes. God put us together. Actually, she goes, where do you live, and I told her where I live, and she goes, Oh, my goodness, she goes, boy, God doesn't make a mistake, I live right around the corner from you. So, you know, man, God is good. So we became the best of friends. And I did go to see her doctor in Las Vegas. And he told me the same thing that the other doctor did. And I was now faced with trying to decide if I wanted to do the surgery or not. So a long story short, I did not do the surgery at that moment, because I was still determined, I could fight it, because I'd fought it so long. So I went on, to throw myself in even more exercise. But what was happening is all those other things in my back were getting worse. And at this point, my husband and I had to make a move from Arizona to Montana. So I kind of just put my surgery on the back burner. And we came up to Montana, I sought out a chiropractor, I sought out a physical therapist, and I sought out another doctor that was a non surgical doctor. So she worked with me for the next year and a half. And till she says, you know, we've done everything we can we've given you injections, we've, there's just nothing else we can do. It's really, you've, you've exhausted all your options, you're killing your nerve and your left leg, you're going to end up not being able to walk anymore, you're going to end up in a wheelchair, and you're in excruciating pain all the time. It's time I went ahead, and I did some more research, and I called around to different doctors. And I went to see even another doctor in Denver, we sought out this doctor, and yes, she was telling me the very same thing. So I decided, well, I'll go ahead and get the surgery with this doctor because it was closer to home and we could drive me home after the surgery and everything would be closer for my husband. So we get everything prepared. We get everything ran through the insurance, we had everything set up. So we have a place to stay down there. And then I get up the next morning to go to my pre op, and I break out in shingles. They say I cannot have the surgery. Now they had already canceled once on me. So this was a second cancel. So they rescheduled. The third time I got I still have the shingles. So after three times, I decided I was not going to have that surgery with that doctor, because that was three strikes. And so I was back to thinking about Dr. McNulty again, in Las Vegas. So what I did is I decided to take a trip home a long way, in my vehicle, a soul searching trip, a trip, I would pray to God. And I prayed all the way home to Arizona to my parents house. And I was I knew I had to have the surgery and God said it's time he goes, but we will use this we will use this as a testimony for people. And so I trusted God and I set that I called Dr. McNulty and I set that appointment. So I had a month worth worth of tests before I had the surgery. surgery was scheduled for December 3 of 2018. And it's a two part surgery. So it would be the third and the fifth. On the third I went in. And that was where they opened me up from two inches above my belly button to my pelvic and they built a cage and inside, that was a seven hour surgery. On the fourth day I rested and the doctor rested and I don't remember a thing. On the fifth day. They went in to do my back portion which they opened my entire backup and he was fixing my back from T one down to the pelvic area. And that surgery ended up being 17 hours. That surgery I didn't wake up from that surgery left me in a coma for the next six days.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to talk more about what happened from that point on because this is where it did go terribly wrong. But even in the lead up to those surgeries, there must have been a battle for you. You're you're a woman of faith. You're calling out to God this whole time and God is saying, Hey, this is time. I'm gonna walk with you through that. But tell me about that tension between your strong Faith in God knowing that he has a purpose, that he's going to bring something out of it. But there's still that human fear. How did you deal with that battle?
 
Tammy Becker 
You know, God has a sense of humor. I, I truly believe this because I have what I call, I play tug of war with God quite a bit. Because I am human. And he understands me because he made me so sometimes I want to give things to God, and I want him to handle them for me. But then I take it back, instead of fully releasing it to him, and saying, it's in your hands, Father, you got it, I'm trusting you, I want to take it back. The human part of me, wants to take it back because of fear. Even though the Bible tells us we don't have to fear God has my whole life planned out for me. And I life would be so much simpler if I didn't play that tug of war with God, if I didn't allow that fear to step in, if I just let go of that human part of me, and just let go and let God as the cliche, you know, quotations say, but it isn't that easy. It isn't that easy. That's why you have to stay in the faith. Daily, you have to pray daily, you have to be in tune with God, because God will then tell you that you've got to let go, Tommy, you've got to let go in order for me to do the work that has to be done. You've got to let go and have faith in what I can do for you. Because until you can do that, I can't use you. I can't work with you. I can't use you to help other people. Because you're putting it all on you, instead of relying on me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're coming into a very scary part of this story. And the spoiler alert is that you did eventually come out of that coma. you're unaware of anything that's happening because of that coma. What about your family? What have they told you of that time?
 
Tammy Becker 
I have my sister and my husband were the two main people that went with me. I needed my sister there because she is my soul sister. She's my blood sister. She is my Christian sister. And we, I needed her there to pray for me to be with me. And so she was and what happened was is that she prayed for me before I went in before with both surgeries. But when I didn't wake up, things went into a panic. You know, everybody was panicking. My girls were not there. They didn't come for the surgery. So the first day there, everybody's wondering, why isn't she waking up? The doctors sending me for tests, like does she have a stroke? Did she have a heart attack? nobody really knew they were testing me for things. But everything was coming back like no, everything was okay. But I just wasn't waking up. And so you can imagine my husband's aunt is a nurse. So he's on the phone, apparently with her all the time questioning her and telling her all the meds they had me on and what they were doing with me each day. And then, you know, the second day came and my sister needed to go home. And she didn't want to go and she's just crying. Now I have two memories in the coma. This is one of them. I have a brief thing that I remember of like to my left, there was some kind of a door and I thought my sister was there saying she was leaving. And I thought I turned my head to her. Now she tells me I did that. I did exactly that. But they still said no, she's just has reflexes. And she's not away. And my second memory while I was in the coma is just is being cradled with God. And in his hands. Like if you took two cupped hands might look put my little body in his big hands, that he had everything under control. And that's those are the really the only two things, slight memories that I have. So my sister did leave, but she did come back, you know, the third day and john called her that's my husband and said she's not awake. She's not awake. And my sister said I am on my way. And she called my daughter Amanda and says, Be ready. I'm picking you up. Your mom's not waking up. She called my other daughter said you need to get to Vegas. Your mom's not waking up. It's been three days. She's in a coma. off they went they came back. So every day was something new. My sister prayed for me every day by the side of my bed. She would say prayers in my ears. She would play me songs that she knew christian songs that she knew I loved. She would tell me to wake up because I was going to be on the sid roth show and tell my testimony and she was telling me all these things and praying for me and I'm so blessed that I had her by my bedside. Meanwhile, my husband was the one fighting with The doctors and the nurses to get me off all the medication telling them that I never used painkillers because I don't like drugs and that they needed to wean me off of that stuff where I was never going to wake up because that's what his aunt had told him who's the nurse. He continued to get after him. Now we're in like to the fourth day, and he finally gets a shift of nurses during the day to start weaning me off these drugs. And by the evening, like he usually said he would leave around 10 o'clock at night. He said, I was almost weaned off of the drugs, I still hadn't woken up. He comes back in this is the fifth day. And the night nurses had me all drugged up again. And he was so upset that he really laid into everybody about getting me off of those drugs, because they said on the sixth day, if I did not wake up, they were going to have to take me and my husband, my family, none of them wanted them to do that for sure. So they were really on the nurses and this and that. So everybody went home. And then the next day was going to be the sixth day. My sister told me, she was praying to God that morning, and God said go down before everybody goes down, get down there and pray for your sister go down to the hospital before everybody goes. So she got up, told her husband, I'm going I need to go spend some alone time with my sister. And then she said, she kept telling me Tammy, you've got to wake up or they're going to trache you today. Please squeeze my hand, squeeze my hand. And she said I did squeeze her hand. And then she told the nurses and they said no, that's just a reflex. She goes, No Watch, watch. And she kept doing it. And I kept squeezing her hand. Now I don't remember any of this. This is just coming from my sister. So my sister called my husband and says you need to get down here. Tammy's waking up. So she didn't listen to the nurses. She listened to what God had told her to get down there. Pray for me, because I was going to wake up that day. And that's exactly what happened. I did wake up that day.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned a couple of times that if it had gone on to the next day that they would take you a tracheotomy. Tell me what that actually means.
 
Tammy Becker 
Because I was in a breathing apparatus, this during the whole coma, I was intubated, and I was on a breathing machine. And so they have to remove that breathing machine, because otherwise it starts growing and causing bacteria in your throat and windpipe and so they needed to get that out of there. And so they would kind of like drill a hole right in your throat, you know where your trachea is, and make a hole and put a little tube there where I could breathe out of that without having that whole tube down my throat and into my lungs. So so to say,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me a bit about that experience of waking up, I know that you have some, some basic memory of that, that process of what happened. Tell me what you do. Remember,
 
Tammy Becker 
I remember before I actually opened my eyes, I really feel I had a little glimpse of heaven and a little glimpse of hell. And what I mean by that is in front of my eyes, because I know you know, they were closed, but I kept seeing a round dark circle. And it had two white eyes and I saw a white circle with two darker eyes. And I, I was scared. I was scared. I was terrifying. It was the most terrifying thing I have ever felt in my life. I felt like I was coming in one second, I was coming out of God's hands. And then like, I felt like I was experiencing like something evil. And I feel like the drugs played a big part of that what they had me in, but I also feel I got a glimpse of good and evil in heaven and hell, knowing that God always wins the battle. I am so thankful though, that I am God's girl that I am God's child that I have accepted. You know, Jesus in my heart because I can't imagine going through something like that and having to wake up not knowing, you know, that knowing my Savior. You know, God promised me he was with me. And he pulled me out of it. And when when I did realize where I was and with my family, it was comforting, but then, not 10 minutes later. I mean, it was so good to see everybody. I hear my sister go Tammy, do you know how long you've been asleep? And I'm like, no. And she says you've been asleep for six days. And I said no. She said Yeah, and I I just couldn't believe it. You You know there's no concept of time. You go in for surgery one day and then all of a sudden it's a week later. It's it's very bizarre. It's not like what's in the movies or anything that's for sure. It's not you wake up and you know exactly where you are what's going on, you wake up, very confused very, in in oblivion almost just really, really hard to describe to people how that felt.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that, hey, you're on these drugs, and all, all of that would have fit into these visions that you had. And some people would say that that's all it was. It was just drugs, messing with your mind. But we who know God would believe that he uses those things. And he's used that as a way to say, I've got more in store for you. So tell me what's come out of that since?
 
Tammy Becker 
Yes, afterwards. I have hallucinations. But I can tell you, Rodney, there's a huge difference of hallucinations. And God being present in my life and talking to me are two totally different things. A hallucination is actually, I felt like I was having full on conversations and things were happening all around me. And my husband would say they weren't with God, it never leaves. It's always with me. It's his, he lives inside of me. So he's present all the time. But what's come out of all of this is, before I went into surgery, and God was giving me a vision, and this is before the drugs and everything, he gave me a vision with this whiteboard, because he was silent for a little while. And sometimes God gets silent in our life, when we're going to hit a new season. And I was getting ready to hit a new season for sure. But I saw this whiteboard, just think of like a whiteboard, like a dry erase board. And all of a sudden, a y would pop up and I'm talking about letters, a Y and then an O and then a U, and then YOU would pop out Y O U you you. And I kept thinking, Okay, Lord, You want me to work on me? Okay? Well, that's what I'm doing. Okay, I'm getting the surgery, we talked about this, I am going to do what you wanted me to do, and I'm going to get the surgery and you're going to take care of me. After the surgery, after the coma. After I got out of the hospital, 15 days later, God said, start a ministry. And it's going to be called while YOU Ministries. And so that surgery was the beginning of December, April 1, I opened the doors to my nonprofit while YOU Ministries. And that's where I am at today. I have several Bible studies, we do several Bible study groups that we do things online together, I'm going through the Bible in a year right now. So anybody can join us at any time and jump right in. I record episodes for that group, I have a website. And we do a lot of giving to the public, I do a lot of fundraisers to buy Bibles and get a Bible in people's hands that don't have them. Since I can't go into the homeless camps right now, which is something that I've loved to do as part of my mission work. I taken it upon myself to reach out to nursing homes because they can't see their loved ones. And while you ministries provided a Christmas for a 39 bed nursing home real close to me this Christmas, that included 39 Bibles, socks, scarves, gloves, books, all kinds of nice things for each and every person there. And so that's where I'm at today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that Y O U turned out to be something quite different to what you initially imagined it to be?
 
Tammy Becker 
It certainly did. I kept thinking, it was about me. And I kept wondering why God was so quiet about it. But he was just prepping me and giving me a piece of the information ahead of time to I would understand, after I got out of that coma and what needed to happen. Because I was told I have a purpose, and we all have a purpose. It's just a matter if we reach out to God, and find out what our purpose is. We're not here to just live and have a good time. We're here God made us for fellowship with Him. God made us to communicate with him. God made us with purpose. He takes all of us no matter what we've done in our life. In fact, he take look at Paul, he took Paul he was a murderer, all of the disciples, gambling, I mean, they all did something. But that's what he does is he takes normal people because how can other people relate to us? He doesn't take normal people that have done things in their life and use it for the good to glorify Him.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's been an interesting journey that you've been on. And I would imagine that there would be people listening who are going through their own difficulty, and it might not be a medical issue as you faced, and that very serious time of being in the coma and family not knowing quite what was going on. But they're going through their own difficulty, what would you say to them? How can they reach out and make a difference in their life today?
 
Tammy Becker 
Well, first of all, I would say that the very first thing to do is pray is, is you just need to get down on your knees and pray. And if, if you're having difficulty and you don't know where to turn to, or you don't know how to do this, or to seek out your purpose, or you just need someone to pray with you. You can reach out to me at youministries.com. I have a place there for prayers. And you can send in a request to me for prayers, you can put your testimony in there. But I would love I am open at any time to mentor anybody that has questions or has difficulties in their life. I have I am an open book, I am willing to share anything that I've experienced in my life with others to help them through to make it easier to make their journey easier and to move forward in their life with purpose.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That's a great invitation and I'm hoping that people will take you up on that I will put details of how to contact you in the shownotes at bleeding daylight dotnet so people can head there. But Tammy, it has been a delight to speak to you to hear the way that God has continued to work through your life in very real situations and and the work that he has you doing now. So thank you so much for your time and for for spending their time with us on bleeding daylight.
 
Tammy Becker 
Thank you Rodney. It was a pleasure to be here. God bless you.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Shonah Marie had a fairly sheltered upbringing, and would now admit that she was quite removed from what she would call real-world issues. However, it wasn't too long before some very real issues invaded her life. It was the tough times that helped her to become the person that she is today but the lessons she learned during those times haven't been easy. 
 
 
 
https://steadyinthestorm.com/https://www.facebook.com/steadyinthestorm
https://www.instagram.com/shonahmarie
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen
Welcome to another episode of Bleeding Daylight. Remember to subscribe to ensure that you don’t miss an episode and connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please tell your friends about Bleeding Daylight too.
 
In just a moment I’ll introduce you to a brave guest with an inspiring story.
 
Shonah Marie had a fairly sheltered upbringing, and would now admit that she was quite removed from what she would call real-world issues. However, it wasn't too long before some very real issues invaded her life. It was the tough times that helped her to become the person that she is today but the lessons she learned during those times haven't been easy.  Today, we'll be opening a window into her life Shona. Thank you for joining us on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Shonah Marie 
Thank you for having me, Rodney, I'm really excited to chat with you today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've said that you grew up in a bubble of sorts that disconnected you from the world. Can you describe your early home life?
 
Shonah Marie 
Yeah, and I grew up in you know, a relatively great home, I was homeschooled, and we were very active members of our local churches wherever we lived. But being homeschooled and having most of my social experiences come from the church gave me a real narrow perspective of the world, I guess you could say, there were amazing aspects to that. And that I feel like I did have a really good childhood, a really innocent childhood, I guess you could say, I feel like I remained in that childlikeness for quite a long time, which I feel benefited me in some areas in the long run, but also left me somewhat naive and innocent towards how to handle navigating real world circumstances. I kind of call it the bubble. Now, you know, now that the bubble has been popped, I can see that it definitely was a bubble. But like anything, there were positive sides to having that upbringing. But also now looking back, I see how being so sheltered, didn't set me up for success in some areas.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And there's always that balance isn't there between wanting to protect children from the excesses of our world, but also not wanting to go too far. And obviously, your parents were just doing the best they could with what they had to give you a great upbringing. So it wasn't them trying to keep you away from the world as such, but wanting to bring you up in the right way?
 
Shonah Marie 
Absolutely. I would 100% agree with that, you know, like parents always do the very best they know how. I don't resent my childhood in the idea of having a child like experience, I think, just when those larger complications of life hit, I felt like I had no tools in my tool belt as to how to understand them or navigate them.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that as a young child, you were very fearful. But you certainly turned to a very real faith to counteract that fear. Maybe you can walk us through some of that experience.
 
Shonah Marie 
Yeah, absolutely. You know, they the same goes, you're most afraid of what you do not know and I felt like I didn't know about all kinds of things, therefore everything was terrifying. I remember reading, you know, Psalms 23 as a kid, and how it talks about how God is with you in the valley, and you have nothing to fear. And it's such an iconic verse for a reason. And I remember it was really, really something I leaned on as a kid, you know, like, you don't have anything to fear because God is with you. And so I explored a lot about what that meant, even as a child, what does it mean for God to be with you in those darker moments? You know, does it look like praying does it look like reading your Bible does it look like just being still and allowing his peace to come into you. And that was a real lifesaver for me in my life was leaning on Jesus and leaning on his peace in times, I was afraid. And I remember being afraid a lot and pretty well about everything that even carried through to my adult years, I was afraid of, you know, what it looked like to explore different jobs even or career paths, or what it looked like to go back to school. And it all just terrified me, and left me really without options within myself, because everything just felt like too big of an option to overcome. I really relied on my faith in Jesus to kind of allow his peace to guide me into the areas I felt I was supposed to go. His peace was kind of the indicator of this is a safe path, I guess you could say, because if it was fear inducing, I didn't want anything to do with it. So learning how to identify that relationship with Jesus as a peace guiding relationship was a real Cornerstone in my life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I believe you had windows into the spiritual side of life in ways that at the time seemed normal for you, but you soon realized we're not quite the same experience that everyone else was having.
 
Shonah Marie 
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's natural for every kid to have nightmares. You know, it's natural for, for kids to go to Sunday school and learn about Jesus and, and that sort of thing. But for me, it was a very dynamic battleground, I guess you could say, when I had nightmares as a kid, they were very real very impactful. And I would pray afterwards that Jesus would come and fill the room and be in the room. And I had experiences as a kid where I saw outlines of the shadows of angels outside my bedroom window, I felt very much like I could feel the presence of evil in my room, or even in locations around the city. Like I remember once there was a store, kind of a novelty store downtown that we liked to go with you. And they had really interesting things in it and such, but it gave me a dark, scary feeling as a kid, and I didn't like going in there because it just felt terrifying. So I always was very sensitive to the spiritual realm. And that felt normal for me, because that's all I knew. But then when you start talking about it, or asking other people, if they have these types of experiences, they kind of look at you like, I'm sorry, what, which made me feel a little alienated, but also made me feel like somewhat special as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And your parents were bringing you up in a somewhat traditional Christian family. So what was their take on these sort of senses that you had the spiritual connection that you had to go,
 
Shonah Marie 
they knew pretty early on that I was a pretty emotional sensitive kid. And I think the first interpretation of that is just, she's an over emotional child. But my parents and my family went to a fairly charismatic church for a while, and that kind of opened all of our eyes to the spiritual realm of the world, they became a lot more sensitive and in tune when, when I would have nightmares or when something was going on, they kind of took this as a sign of like, okay, like, we need to really pray over showing in her room and help her feel safe and secure in Jesus and within our home. So they were actually fairly supportive within that realm. I would say, especially my dad, I think like they understood what was going on. But as a child, I feel like you don't fully know how to explain what you see or what you feel so because I didn't really fully even know what I was sensing, how could they understand to that extent.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So back at this time, you were still inside this bubble, as you call it. But as you grow, and you start to experience life around you, I guess, that bubble had burst and you started to walk into life as an adult? What started to change for you, then
 
Shonah Marie 
it's hard to pinpoint exactly when, when that bubble burst, I guess you could say, so I'm kind of floundering as to I want to find that one event. But I moved out of my city that I was brought up in when in my early 20s. And that independence of a new city and a new life new job, kind of forced me into learning and understanding the world around me. It was a great experience, obviously, you know, any young 20 year old can identify with that grasping of independence when you kind of break out of your family circle. But I still, you know, I still was very much involved in the church and youth groups and what have you. I went my whole 20s, essentially, without any real dating relationship experience. And I would attribute a lot of that to my fear of exploring that relational realm. It was just so unknown to me, I'm certain I was constantly thinking, what should it look like? What do I want it to look like? And then that constant evaluating in my mind kind of kept me from exploring what it would be like to be relationship or pursue a relationship. I met my husband in my late 20s, we had some mutual friends and we kind of like knew of each other, but we weren't necessarily friends ourselves. We got to know each other through being on the prayer ministry team together at our church. And over time, we developed some more common friends and social gatherings. I actually asked him to help me install my dishwasher in my condo because I was I didn't have any family in town. And of course, I needed a guy who knew what he was doing and, and I really felt like I was supposed to ask him, you know, I would even go so far as to say as I felt like God was telling me like, Hey, you should ask Rhett to help you with this. And so I kind of went out on a limb and asked him and he came over, you know, super nice helped me out and something clicked in his mind, and he went, I need to pursue this girl. He's a very confident, bold personality. And when he decided that he was going to pursue me, he did it with confidence and boldness that terrified me. essentially said, like, like, hey, like, you know, I had so much fun with you like installing your dishwasher. We should hang out. Do you want to like, go see a movie with some friends? Sure. movie with friends turned into just me and him. And then from there, he was like, hey, like, Can I take on a date, and then roses showed up at my work, and I fell into a panic attack. Like, what is going on here like, this is moving so fast. And I even had a conversation with him right off the bat being like, hey, look, I need to understand what this looks like, you know, and where are we going and what is pursue will even mean and so I would say that was that was a pretty, pretty good shake up experience just being pursued in my early 30s, which sounds so silly to say even right now, you know, it's a reminder of how innocent I was and how naive I was to just like common world experiences. So we started dating and hanging out a lot. And I knew that he had had a history with addiction and but even in that moment, you know, I figured like, Oh, well, that's in the past, and Jesus will heal him of that. And we will that won't ever be part of our lives because Jesus loves me so much that he would never like put me through something like that. So, you know, Jesus will take care of this. And that was kind of as much thought as I gave into that which is so naive, I knew nothing about what being an addict meant, or being an alcoholic meant and how addicts and alcoholics live with that trait their entire life, regardless of whether they're in sobriety or in relapse, like I just had no clue until I was even in Al anon years later about what being an addict meant. It was fairly common in our social circles in the church to drink on the weekends and even drink a little too much. And I felt like those lines of what was okay and not okay, socially, really started to get blurred even in the church, right? You know, you go back 10, 15 years and to socially drink with your friends at church was kind of unheard of. And now it was commonplace. So for me to understand that Oh, Rhett has an issue with drinking in the past. I go, Don't we all? You know, I didn't understand there's a difference between social drinking and what being an addict means.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So how quickly did things move from there from this initial getting to know him? You had this bit of an understanding that there was a problem with alcohol in the past for him, but in your mind, that's all sorted. And you're moving forward? He's pursuing you? How long did it take before there was a proposal and a wedding? And how did that happen?
 
Shonah Marie 
We dated just over a year, year and a half, I think, before we got married, and there was a minor breakup in there over some conflict. And but like I was 32, when we got married, and my husband was 39. So we're both kind of in a phase of life of you know, as you get older, it doesn't take a whole lot of dating to figure out the type of person you want to be with. And, you know, as you get older, that dating relationship tends to shrink a little bit. So we dated for just over a year before we got married. This summer leading up to our wedding, our conversations just kept ending up at, well, where is this going? You know, it's sort of talking about we started talking about like, where we would want to live one day and what that would look like or career changes. And it was like, Well, why are we talking about that? before? We're talking about? Are we getting married? I think we both naturally, like avoided the question for a while. But then after so many conversations have an ending up at like, okay, like either where we're doing this or not, right. So we just kind of decided like, yeah, like, I think, I think we're doing this, like we're getting married. And we actually had our whole wedding planned before there was even a ring on my finger. Because we just knew where we were headed. It was just obvious to us it. It did scare us both just because Rhett was everything I wanted to have in a husband. But I also knew there were a lot of aspects to him that I purposely tried to avoid. So it was a little scary for me to think, okay, like, Whoa, we're doing this and I was kind of determined to trust God over falling victim to my fear. And likewise, for Rhett to date me and pursue me as a wife was really outside of his comfort zone. Me being you know, as innocent and protected and sheltered as I was, and him being my first experience of a relationship was really quite nerve racking for him as well. We got married in the fall. And by Christmas of that same year, I knew that alcohol was becoming a problem for Rhett and in our marriage, and I had no idea how to handle that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was there a sense in which you were thinking, Oh, God, you you've kind of warned me of things before you've given me this. This feeling that this is not right. And yet you've let me walk into this. What's going on?
 
Shonah Marie 
That is such a good question. I've really struggled with that a lot. I was like, okay, Jesus, like, I knew Rhett kind of freaked me out a bit. But I also felt so confident in God's voice over our relationship we both did. You know, we really felt like God was speaking and guiding our relationship. And there wasn't really any doubt that we were meant to be together. Like, even right now, as I speak to you like, I know that there was no doubt that we would be we were to be together. But when the drinking started ramping up, and I could see Rhett start to become very emotionally distant and start to choose alcohol over connection. I kind of unraveled and that not only fueled my distress, but it fueled Rhett's addiction.
 
 
I asked
 
Shonah Marie 
myself that exact same question like, okay, God, like I consider myself to be a fairly discerning person, I would consider myself to be fairly confident in hearing your voice, like, why would you allow this knowing chaos was around the corner? And I think a lot of Christians are asked to that question like, why would you follow a God who allows destruction to happen? You know, you say your God is loving, but he's also a God of judgment. And, you know, why would Jesus allow the Holocaust to happen? So it's all these big questions that people love to put in front of Christians in order to catch them in the corner. And I would say, like, what I've learned going through this experience is, I don't think that God's setting his followers purposefully on a path of destruction to teach him a lesson, so to speak. But I, I do think there's an aspect of God, who goes, You know what, this is going to be really hard for Shonah. But I know there's good things in it. And I know she's strong enough to get through it. And we're going to be with her as she goes through it, and it's going to suck, but she's going to come out the other side stronger, send her off.
 
 
And I think
 
Shonah Marie 
that is a loving God, to say, you know what, this is going to be hard, but you're going to be better for it. That's parenting that is loving parenting, to shelter your kids and to keep them from experiencing any sort of character developing experiences is kind of neglectful. So, you know, I wouldn't say that God wished for us to go through horrific things. But I do think he sees the outcome, and knows that we'll get through it. And he's okay with walking out that journey with us,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're starting to see these signs that things are not quite right. How did you feel about actually addressing that with red? Did you feel that you could actually approach him on this? Or is this still something that you weren't quite sure which direction to go?
 
Shonah Marie 
I kind of describe it as like, falling off a horse and having your, your foot stuck in the stirrup. And, you know, you get dragged for about 30 seconds before you realize you can't do this anymore. I've kind of felt like I had fallen off a horse, you know, right away with Rhett. And I was like, No, like, this is too hard. I can't do this. You know, I want off, one off this ride. I confronted him immediately, you know, the first time that he called me to pick them up from a bar. I was irate. You know, I said, like, What is going on?
 
 
Like, where is this going?
 
Shonah Marie 
What are you doing? Like, I don't understand why you're doing this. And because he had periods of relapse and sobriety in his past, this was no new experience for him. He was like, I won't do it again. Like, I'm going to work on this. Like, I'm so sorry. I don't know how it got that far or whatever. Right. But for me, I just exploded right away. And I wanted answers right away. For Rhett it was it was this journey of almost him wondering like, how did I get here? So not only was he asking himself that question, I was demanding an answer of something he hadn't even figured out himself yet.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this comes down to the whole nature of addiction, or alcoholism is it's not just a matter of saying, I want to stop this. There's something internal, there's something going on. That means I need to have that next drink. So he's, he's battling with this at the same time, saying he's sorry, and you're wondering, when will this end? So how did that journey continue from there?
 
Shonah Marie 
There was a lot of good moments, you know, in our first year of marriage, and I was determined to focus on those good moments. You know, like we went camping we went, we hung out with friends. We were part of a home church that was really fulfilling for us spiritually. There was a lot of really good stuff that happened that first year. Rhett sort of went through phases where he would binge drink. And then he go a few weeks or a month without drinking, and then it would come up again. And, and so I tried to write out the positives of what was happening. And I kind of ignored the negatives of what was going on, you know, okay, well, that was just a slip up, we're done with that now, when things would arise again, and the alcohol would increase, and then I would lose it again, I was completely out of control. And now we're fighting and now I'm demanding answers. And so it was this roller coaster of good memories and good times, and these depths of I can't take this anymore. And it carried on like that for essentially, the first two years of our marriage, the good times got a little longer, the bad times got really dark and hard. And eventually, to fast forward the story. Rhett ended up going to treatment. Two days before our second anniversary, he was there a month and came out of treatment at the end of 2019. And then he came back home, the end of December. And you know, we're still celebrating sobriety here. He's still working, his recovery and his sobriety, and I'm working on myself to help curb those emotions on my end. But it was it was a two year journey of up and downs before I reached the end of my rope and said, either you're signing separation papers, or you're going to treatment, like that's your options.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Were there people you could confide in, along this journey, especially in those early days that, hey, things aren't quite what they seem?
 
Shonah Marie 
Yeah, as I just mentioned, we were a part of a small group of some really good friends for a few years there. And we intentionally met every Sunday night at around five 5:30, we would all contribute to a pre planned dinner, we'd have dinner together, chat about our lives, and then we'd spend the rest of the evening focused more on a spiritual focus now that would change from week to week as to what that looked like. But that home group was really our lifeline, especially my lifeline through all of that, I have definitely been a very sheltered person, my whole life, I don't really like to let people in and show them what's really going on, you know, I, it's very much about maintaining the front, but this experience just didn't allow for luxuries of hiding. I was really vulnerable them you know, I, I leaned on them a lot in dark times called them at 10, 11. at night, midnight, saying I don't know what to do. Like, I don't know how to get home from the bar. I don't even know if I can be home right now. And they would come pick me up or tell me to come over and give me a reprieve. I honestly don't know how I would have got through without them. I don't know how people get through tough things like that without community and without Jesus. Like I just don't have an answer outside of those two things.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It would be easy for us to say, Well, this is obviously already doing. He's the one that's broken in this situation. But we know that each of us is broken in a different way. And I would imagine that God is teaching you things along the way. What were some of the things that you needed to work on yourself during this time? Oh, man,
 
Shonah Marie 
I'm still working on them, I would say but God was definitely shaping me and working on me. And I would say that those two years of relapse, I have never been closer to Jesus as I was in those two years. I felt like I was literally in his arms at times. You know, he was teaching me about how to be resilient. He was teaching me to find strength where I didn't know strength existed. The biggest things he was teaching me were compassion and love and grace for Rhett, you know how to look past someone's exterior and see who they are see their heart, see who God made them to be. I still don't know how I managed to muster up the grace and compassion in some of those darker moments. You know, like, it was really a day to day thing. I would have to seek God on almost every conversation every moment being like, I don't know what to do. Like, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to do. I don't know where to go, I don't know who to call. I would just rely on Jesus to bring the answer to me into to guide me again. So learning to trust God was was a real big component, and then learning to trust that he is good. Even in the midst of chaos was probably the hardest lesson in all of it. I feel I really started to understand the heart of the Father and it all a lot of like, kind of like I said earlier, a lot of people love to challenge God like Oh, how can you worship Loving God, who has done X, Y and Z that's so hateful. How is this a loving God, but really, in all of that, like, I could feel God's heartbreaking for what was going on, I could feel his sorrow for what we were going through. And learning to sit with Jesus in that empathy was probably the greatest gift. I remember one morning, I woke up, probably five 530 in the morning, and I was home alone, because it was one of those seasons where I had asked Rhett to take a hike for a while, you know, and he was staying in hotel rooms with friends. And so I was home alone. And I woke up at about 530 in the morning, and I sat on the couch, and I didn't feel like I could connect with Jesus, I was so hard in my heart. But I felt like God was calling me to himself, you know, he was saying, like, come spend the morning with me, come spend the morning with me. And I was like, No, I can't do it. But slowly, slowly, I got up, I just put some worship music on, I sat on the couch. And suddenly I'm bawling my eyes out. And like, the only words I can get out are Jesus my marriage. And that's all I can say. And I just felt like Jesus say, I know. I know. And that was it. And he didn't need to say anything else. And I didn't need to hear anything else. I just needed to know that he knew what was going on. I didn't have to tell him what was going on and have to describe it. I didn't have to say this big, long prayer of Jesus, this this, and this is happening. And I need you to show up in all these ways. All I had to do is come to him and bawl my eyes out and go my marriage. And he was just like, Yeah, I know. That simple, simple prayer just told me he didn't only see, but he gets it. And he's, he's hurting for us, too. And that was a sign of Jesus. I never know him prior to this.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You talked about the fact that you're learning grace and compassion for other people. And certainly that grace and compassion for Rhett, as he's walking through that, did you find it difficult to strike that balance between that grace and compassion, but still needing to call out behavior that was unacceptable to call out? What is broken in an effort to bring healing?
 
Shonah Marie 
Yeah, absolutely. I would never condone someone to stay in a relationship that where the other person wasn't willing to acknowledge their brokenness and come to a point of forgiveness and seek redemption through God. Like that's the point. So there was there was a lot of tough love that happened in that season two, I remember a lot of phone calls between Rhett and I, where i was said to him, like, you got to figure this out, you got to get up, you got to pursue sobriety, you have to call someone, tell them what's going on. Like, I can't do this for you, I can't be the person who heals you, I can't support this, like, you need to figure this out. And he was always like, I know, I know, like, like, I don't want to be here. I don't want to do this. But I just don't know how to do anything else right now. And so there was a lot of a lot of calling out of his behavior. And I would say to him, like, look like, I'll support you if you support yourself. But I have to see that you're supporting yourself. It was a back and forth tussle for the two years, you know, like I said, there were good times where things are going well, and there were bad times or things were falling apart completely. Anyone who has loved someone through addiction will know that they have to come to the end of themselves before they reach out for help, I would say Rhett came to the end of himself a couple of times, but that point where I said to him, like, Look, I have played every card, I know how to play in order to save this marriage. And I said to him, I'm like I'm out of cards. And I feel like you're still holding half a deck in your hand. So I'm going to play my last card, which is your signing separation papers, or you can start playing some of the cards that you're holding on to and you can get help. It was at that point where he was just so desperate for a different way of life that we ended up getting him into treatment. But yeah, it was really hard, you know, being a newlywed and just sort of wanting that like, blissful honeymoon experience. And I was trying to cling to what that might look like and love him and have a marriage and walk this out. But the reality of it was, there was no marriage happening because we had addiction stuck in the middle of us. I wouldn't even say I balanced it. Well, I would say I bounced back and forth you know tough love, Grace, tough love grace and I think some situations I responded wrong and some I responded correctly. It was a very much learn on the job type experience.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We all love the Hollywood movies where we see there is first All things are going well, then there's something that disrupts that. And then by the end of the movie, everything sorted. Everyone lives happily ever after. But we know that that's not life. And you mentioned that, whilst there's been this, this long period of being sober, that it's something that is a continual work in progress. How do you walk day to day with that? Working in with read sobriety,
 
Shonah Marie 
You know, that happily ever after is not going to happen until Jesus comes back, right? Maybe not even then maybe he's got more for us after that. And like we are a constant work in progress. And like I said, you know, where we're a year and a few months into sobriety, but we're still, we're still working on things. And like I said, at the beginning, you know, a person who has the trade of addiction or alcoholism will combat that trait their entire lives. And last year was a hard year. I don't know what statistics are like everywhere, but for us, and where we live, overdose rates, suicide rates, were through the roof last year of people who just couldn't take anymore and, and read had some close calls, you know, with relapsing last year. And I'm, I can't believe that he made it through last year without relapsing. It was a tough year on everyone. I can't even say how proud I am of him for getting through that year without relapsing. I, you know, I don't know what our future is going to look like, I don't know if, if we'll have to go through that again, or what have you. But I do know, you can only take it one day at a time. And that's kind of how we take it. And you know, you just have to focus on what you can do with what you have. And even retrospect, you know, like, I was speaking to a friend recently who is in a relationship with an addict, and they're in the middle of chaos with it. And then I'm coming home and I'm thinking, Oh, man, like, I remember what that was, like, like, I'm so thankful that we're not there anymore. You know, and I just had so much gratitude for what our marriage looks like. And it's not a perfect marriage, you know, we still have lots to work on like anyone else. But I was just flooded with gratitude for how far we've come. And that it is a day to day journey that we don't actually have to be perfect by tomorrow or next week, but that we can just focus on the one thing God's asking us to attune to tune into and work on and just work on that for right now.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You wrote the book steady in the storm, which really Chronicles that journey that you went through, and very much from from your perspective, obviously, was it difficult to write that to bring back those memories and walk through it again, in the writing of the book,
 
Shonah Marie 
That was actually kind of the intention of writing it down? To be honest. When I started writing out my story, it was really for my own personal benefit. I had a lot of friends and family and counselors asked me like, oh, have you ever thought of writing out your story? And I was like, What story like, what, what on earth would I write about, but they really encouraged me to do it just for retrospect, to work through those memories. And as a personal journey is a point of healing. So when I started writing the book, I I wasn't actually thinking that it would be a published book, I'm more thought, Okay, well, if I'm going to write up my story, where do I start? What do I say what's important? So I started writing it with the perspective of me sitting across from a stranger, telling them my story, you know, what would they need to know about me in order to understand why this journey was so hard? And I kind of started with that idea and went from there. It really was a healing thing for me, you know, there'd be times I'd be writing and I would just stop and bawl my eyes out and ask Jesus to come and help me heal that memory. And I feel like I learned a lot about myself and how traits I have were really points of strength in the story and how others other traits were points of weakness, and it helped me understand why I reacted the way I did. About halfway through writing the book, I really started to feel like I had something worth telling. And, you know, I thought, there's so many people out there who are going through this who feel so alone, you know, I felt so alone. I asked a lot of people for book references, podcasts, even like, pamphlets, anything like can you give me something to help me understand what I'm going through and to know that I'm not alone and all the recommendations that came my way were all about addiction or alcoholism, you know, understanding the addict, which I read, and I found helpful, but then I also felt like, Well, where's my side? For every addict? There's got to be 20 people that love them, where are their stories? How come I'm not hearing about them. So about half through writing the book, I thought, you know, this could be the book that I wanted in that season of knowing that I'm not alone and the empathy of hearing how hard it is to be in that position and the hope to get through it. As I neared the end of writing it, I had read it and my mom read it and give me constructive criticism. And I thought, you know what, God, if this is something you want the world show me how to publish it. And the blessing of the COVID, lockdown allowed me the time to get it published,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Rhett must have known that there was hurt on your side but were there new hurts that he was reading through that book and thinking, I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you, you experienced that at the time,
 
Shonah Marie 
He read the book, probably in three or four days. And you know, he'd be sitting in the kitchen, reading it on the laptop, and I'd be in the bedroom reading my own book, and he'd come in and let out a big heavy sigh and kind of flop on the bed, I'd be like, Whoa, like, What's going on with you. And he would be like, your book is amazing, and really hard for me to read. He's like, it's really hard for me to read that, like knowing that I put you through it. I remember when he was in treatment, we had a counseling session, and they encouraged me to tell Rhett certain things he had done and how it had made me feel because they said it was important for him to understand the sphere outside of himself. addicts, in general, are quite self focused and selfish. And they actually said, you know, it's important for you to share with Rhett, when you're hurting, or a memory comes up, what happened in that memory and how it affected you, so that he can understand how addiction affects people around him. So for him to read the book was really, really hard for him. I think it was also healing for him, in a sense to, to know how God was supporting me through it, and how I don't claim to be a very strong person to be honest. Sometimes I feel not a hypocrite, but close. Like, I remember when I was reading the book in the editing mode, and I would read something and I'd be like, wow, like, that's really good advice. I should do that. I'm like, wait, like, I wrote that. I did that. Like, there's aspects to it, where, you know, I went like, man, how can I do that? Like, how did I get through? Like, I can't believe that, that I have the strength to do that. And that that was what I was getting out of it. Whoa, like, Who am I, you know, like, I still feel like such a broken version of myself, I can really only claim God's faithfulness, that got us through that. So I think for rent to read that and really understand, you know, how, how much God was there for me and our community was there for me in the time was, was also kind of healing for him.
 
Rodney Olsen 
They would be some listening today who would think well, I don't actually have someone in my life who is an addict or is an alcoholic? So this book probably isn't for me. But that's not the case. You're telling the story of God's goodness in amongst struggle, and we all face struggle, don't we?
 
Shonah Marie 
Absolutely. And that was why the title to be honest, you know, steady in the storm, like, it doesn't matter what your storm is, like, we all went through a storm last year, you know, we're still going through it to some extent, you know, whether it be the storm of addiction, or the storm of walking with a loved one through an illness, or even losing your job are massive forms of grief. You know, a lot of the book I talk about grief and about how I was grieving my marriage when I was a newlywed and what that looked like, it is obviously my journey of walking with my husband through addiction. But I talk about what it's like to get through hard things, essentially, and what I needed to get through and how God came through. And I think a lot of that is applicable to whatever it is you're going through that you're being challenged in. I think there's a lot of aspects of the book that that can be tailored to your experience. It doesn't have to be. Yeah, oh, that's not for me. I don't know any alcoholics? I think it is. I think it is a worthwhile book for a lot of journeys
 
Rodney Olsen 
Shonah, I'm sure that there are people who are wanting to learn more from your experience to be able to read the book, what's the easiest way for people to find the book or to be in contact with you?
 
Shonah Marie 
The book is for sale just exclusively on Amazon right now. It is available in any country accessible that, you know, with Amazon, which is good if you're going to be exclusive with one person. Amazon's a good one to be. Yeah, so even if you were to Google Search steady in the storm book, it comes up right away with an Amazon link. I also have a website steady in the storm.com which links to the book itself. I also actively blog on that website. So if you're wanting more consistent content, that's a good place to go on Facebook, setting the storm alarm.com my Instagram is shown in Murray. Yeah, even just Google searching Steady In the Storm book will bring you to the Amazon store
 
Rodney Olsen 
Shonah, I want to thank you for being so open and honest about this story which has been a difficult road so many times and it's still a road that you're walking down, but I know that it's going to benefit a lot of people. So thank you for sharing your story. Thank you for your time on bleeding daylight today.
 
Shonah Marie 
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to tell it. I appreciate it.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

As well as sharing his personal story, Ryan Roy has some extremely valuable encouragement and guidance for parents, especially dads. From being abandoned by his father when he was just five years of age to being a champion for hundreds of other fathers, Ryan's story is inspiring.
 
http://bethedadyouwishyouhad.com/
 
https://www.facebook.com/bethedadyouwishyouhad-2701537033209816 
 
https://fbidads.com/ 
 
https://www.facebook.com/FBIDADS2020 
 
http://www.ryanroy.me/ 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening to this very important episode of Bleeding Daylight. As well as sharing his personal story, today’s guest has some extremely valuable encouragement and guidance for parents, especially dads. I am convinced that sharing this episode will be of great benefit to many families.
Please subscribe to Bleeding Daylight and connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
The struggles we face, the hurts we experience, will generally push us one of two ways. They can continue to harm and destroy us long after the events that initially caused us damage, or they can be the driver for transformation. Of course, even when we take the road of transformation, there's no guarantee that it will be easy or painless. Today's guest has not only seen transformation in his own life, he's actively empowering others towards transformation. Ryan Roy, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Ryan Roy 
Hey, thank you so much, Rodney, for having me. I'm excited to be on the show today and share a little bit of my journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The hurts in your life began so very early. What are your earliest memories? And how did they begin to shape you all that time ago?
 
Ryan Roy 
Well, we jumped right in, didn't we? So you know, one of my earliest memories is when I was five years old. It was right before Christmas that year. It was the day that I realized that my father had abandoned me. I was laying in bed, my parents had been divorced. And I had spent the weeks with my father. And I admit I was spending a weekend with my mother. And because I was such a good kid. And it was right before Christmas. I was sharing with my mother what presents I wanted under her tree at her house and, and what presence that Santa was going to deliver at my dad's house. And in that moment, my mom said she had to share something with me. And what she shared is that I would no longer be going to my father's house. In that moment, she assured me that Santa would bring all the presents to her house. I think that was her way of comforting me at the time. Many years later, I did some personal development. And they asked me, What did I do in that moment? How did I react? And my response was, I believe I was just strong from my mother. That's no burden that any five year old should have to put on, we should never have to be at that age strong for our parents. So it was a very, I guess, challenging time and I grew up and I realized that through life. I've always tried to be really strong for others as I was at that five year old. So that challenge continues throughout life today, even though I'm very conscious of it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You weren't the only child in the family but there was a big age difference, I believe between you and your siblings.
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, so I was it will get a little bit deeper into the story. But my mother gave birth to five children, but she had multiple marriages. So in and out of marriages, there was actually a total of 10 of us. And I was the baby of everybody and my next closest sibling in age was seven and a half years older than I.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What was it like going forward from there, as you say your parents had already been divorced. But there's still this being brought up in that time of your mom being a single parent, I guess in and out of marriages. What did that mean for you as a child?
 
Ryan Roy 
Oh, I guess it It created a level of instability, right finances were challenging. As my mom had five of us. You know, me being the youngest. She was at her last marriage. But there were still men that came in and out of her life. My siblings were older. They were experimenting with things that fortunately, I never experienced. But, you know, I watched my brothers get arrested. I remember hearing a conversation where my sister probably around 15 or 16 years old got rushed to the hospital because she was found drunk in a snowbank. I saw you know, my brothers and even my sister do drugs, smoke marijuana, snort cocaine. It's not not an environment, necessarily that you would ideally for a young man to grow up witnessing. I will say this though, my mother just worked really hard, and did the best she could. She wasn't part of that. Like my mother never drank a drink in her life never did a drug in her life. She did smoke cigarettes, but that was the extent of her use in any way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm always interested to find out when people discover that what they're experiencing is not normal. Because when we're immersed in it, that's all we know. So for you, this must have seen like, well, this is how everyone leaves. When did you realize it wasn't?
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, you know, Rodney, that's a fantastic question. And thanks for asking it. I think at a young age we I grew up in in Connecticut, for those of you who are unfamiliar, Connecticut is in the northeast of the United States. And then we we moved when I was seven and a half years old down to South Florida, which is in the bottom southeastern portion of the United States about a 1500 mile difference. And at that point, I was in the third grade. And I started, you know, I think around that age third and fourth grade as children, we start to do sleepovers at other people's houses, and things of that nature. And I, I slept over a friend's house. And there wasn't the chaos. As as I will describe it today, there wasn't the in and out of people in and out of the house there there was there was structure. There was consistency. There was, you know, my mom worked long hours. So there was always food in the house, but I kind of had to fend for myself at a very young age. Mom was there. And she cooked us a meal and asked us what we wanted to do. And, and there was a bedtime, and there was a bath time. And I went back home. And I was like, well, that's not what I normally experience. So I think I would have to say around third or fourth grade, you know, 7, 8, 9 years old.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was that a sense of hope for you in knowing that things could be different? Or was it more a case of Well, that's how everyone else has got it. But this is how I'm stuck.
 
Ryan Roy 
You know, another fantastic question. I think, as time went on it, I don't think in that moment, I thought it was a sense of hope but I realized there was another way. And if I were to find that, then it would probably be a better way of living. And I think it was a sense of hope. Because I knew there was another way of living that was, for lack of a better term more comfortable than the way I was living. And it was something that I could strive for, because I didn't just see it on television, right? I actually witnessed it. And it was just happening two blocks down the road at my friend's house,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You say that you saw your siblings go through things that they shouldn't have been going through through dangerous and risky behavior. And you managed to stay out of that. What did you do in the place of that kind of behavior to to keep yourself away from it?
 
Ryan Roy 
You must have done this once or twice, because these are actually really fantastic questions. I witnessed what it was doing to my mother at a young age. So as she was dealing with them going in and out of, you know, jail, or juvie, or detention centers, or whatever it may have been, or in and out of hospitals. I just I think she had a conversation, she goes, I hope you never do this to me. And I think that always stuck with me, if she didn't actually have that conversation. I had it with myself, I didn't want to hurt my mother the way they were hurting. So I always, again, trying to protect my mother didn't want to have that experience happen for her. So what I did, personally, is I dove into sports. Now again, my mom didn't put me in Little League or soccer or anything like that. But at school, I would show up to school early and a bunch of friends and I would play American football. for two hours before school even started. At lunch, we'd play football and after school, I would play football. And as I got older that led into I live really close to a beach, heading to the beach, a mile down the road and playing beach volleyball.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm still wondering, though, for this young man that we're talking about who has experienced such a fractured life to this point. There's this sense of empathy that you have for your mother and you're not wanting to disappoint, I guess part of it is is wanting that acceptance and wanting that from your mom. But but it's an empathy that sounds like it goes beyond that. Where do you think that's come from?
 
Ryan Roy 
Oh, my mom's a pretty amazing woman in a lot of ways, right? She has gone through a lot of hard things herself, and not not knowing that at that age. I think my mother, always even though it was extremely busy, always took the time to sit and talk. I feel as though what little time she had free. She actually spent teaching me really important life lessons. So when my siblings were going through some of that in and out of jail and things of that nature. I remember her at a very early age, you asked about my earliest memories. This is another early one probably right around that time, maybe five and a half, six years old, where she had a conversation with me about right and wrong. She says Listen, I've done my job. I taught you right from wrong. And there's consequences for actions in life. And I think it's because one of my brothers had just got arrested that week. And she was frustrated. And she just wanted to share this lesson with me. So she went through a series of questions. She goes, is this right or is this wrong? And she literally, I answered them all she goes, You answered every single one of those right? I've done my job. It's your choice. That when you make a choice to do something, whether it's right or wrong, you get to suffer the consequences and she actually went through She goes, listen, Ryan, you can do anything you want in life, as long as you're willing to suffer the consequences, both positive and negative. If she says, so if you were to kill somebody, what could happen? I was like, I guess you could go to jail for life? She goes, yes. So you can do that if you want to. She goes, I don't suggest it. But you can do it, knowing there's a consequence. I think I've always known about consequences based on that or even thought about consequences. So that helped me growing up, hey, do I want to do recreational drugs with my friends or not? There's a consequence to that. And I've seen what the consequences are that in my own family's life. And that's just one conversation I have with my mom, there's so many that she just sat with me, and taught me simple life lessons. So to me, that was her showing me love. But she took the time to give me that love, and frankly, wisdom. And I always wanted to respect her for it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And there's something incredibly empowering about choices and consequences, rather than just Oh, don't do that. No reason, when we start to understand that if she was empowering you even at that young age,
 
Ryan Roy 
Absolutely. We could call it what it is. But as a as a believer, and a man of faith. I look back, and I feel as though I could have gone so many different directions in life. But I always feel like I had God's hand on my shoulder even though I didn't have a relationship with him. Early on in my life. As I look back, there's so many choices I could have made and we can say that, you know, mom gave me that wisdom but I think God gave her that wisdom to impart onto me.
 
Rodney Olsen  
Where does life lead from here? You're into sports? And I imagine that you becoming quite good at it. Does that lead any way for you?
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, absolutely. As as we described, it was kind of an escape for me. None of my siblings had ever gone to college. College wasn't something that was ever spoken of in my household. It was like, hey, you're going to go through school. Your job is to go through school. That's what mom knew in school was to graduate from high school. That was the expectation there were no further expectations. But because I drowned myself, in sport, I spent so many hours on a beach playing volleyball. I did get pretty good at it. And at some point, in my junior year in high school, I was offered a scholarship to play volleyball in college. And very unexpected. I remember when the scout came to the school to watch my teammate who is a senior play, how it's trimming up a little of emotion. I've never seen a coach. I got to play them. Excuse me. I have to play my best game because I want Josh to get this scholarship. Oh, I played my best game that day. Statistically, I was a setter. And I had I think my best game prior to that was like 23 assists. And I had 46 that that night. Josh had an incredible game. After the game coach went and sat with the the coach that came to scout him. Coach was a mentor of mine. We'd often get on the phone after a game, talk about the game talk about how we can improve. Talk about the upcoming opponent. And I said so as Josh could get scholarship. And he says yeah, goes but I have some good news for you. They want you too. A very pivotal point in my life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's obviously very powerful when there's a man of influence who's putting their faith in you something that you've not had to this point in your life here. Absolutely.
 
Ryan Roy 
And he was actually a friend of mine. He was much older than I he had gone to the same school. We hadn't attended school at the same time. And he was just four years older than I and he came to coach the volleyball team. I knew him from playing on the beach. And I trusted him to guide me right because I had no other guidance. So the camaraderie of playing on a team being needed wanted, and being a significant part of a team played a very instrumental role at that point in my life, because like I said, not only did it get me a scholarship, but prior to that, it gave me purpose. It gave me a reason to go to school because school was a place for me to go play football for whatever reason The academic part of it wasn't important. It wasn't stressed in my house right survival was more important. often say I was, you know, in survival mode I was worried about if I was going to come home to a house that had, you know, a VCR stolen and sold for drugs, or if another one of my brothers was being arrested, or if, you know, I didn't know what I was going into when I went home. So leaving for school early to play football and staying after school, late to play football, or go to the beach and play volleyball, was because I didn't really care to be at home, having a structure of once we got into high school, and there were structured sports in high school, and having a coach pour into me, and I'll share this, we actually won a championship. And being a focal point of that championship team, and then relying on me was  a big why for me to show up to school because the academic portion wasn't difficult for me. It just wasn't much of interest to me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've learned what it's like to have people who believe in you who trusting you, who are helping you to put this structure in place. But I'm sure that there's still this yearning to connect with not just a father figure, but your father did you try and reach out to your dad?
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, so going through school, graduating, getting a degree can get you multiple degrees, I got two degrees coming out of college, did a double major, getting my first job being much more successful than I thought I would be just a few years earlier, I had this yearning to share that with the man who created me, I can honestly say, even to this day, even with all the reflection, that I don't think I ever had the strong desire, prior to that point, to reach out to my father really know who he was. But at this point, I consider myself successful. And I wanted to share that with the person who created me, I had this thought of, wow, I'm a pretty amazing guy. And I've done a lot of good things, there has to be a man out there that created me that would want to know this. And that would want to be proud and say, Hey, I'm proud of you, son. So I knew my mother knew who he was. I knew she knew where he was. And I went to her and I said, Mom, I need to know. And I need to meet my dad. And I want and I'm gonna go do this. As I know where he is, and I know how to connect with him. I just want to give you an opportunity to share your side of the story because I've never asked, because I don't I want to give you that opportunity. So is there anything that I should know? And mom basically said, some superficial things, you know, didn't work out. And, you know, in what I do remember, because there wasn't anything significant in that conversation is her saying and tell him that he still owes me a couple years of child support. And my immediate thought was, oh, man, I thought to myself, I'm not gonna ask him to pay child support. That's what I'm not, I'm not going there for that. That's something you would have to do. Long story short, shortly after that, I go, I meet him. I sit in his living room. And we have a four hour discussion. And I think it was just my sales pitch of what a great person I had become. I showed him my accolades from school, I showed him my degrees, I showed him pictures of my big office overlooking downtown Miami. And then at the end of the conversation, and he just listened, and I thank him so much for this. I listened. He listened to me for all that time. And I said, and I just have one question. After all this, why did you not reach out? Why did you not want to be a part of my life? And he says, I don't want to bad mouth. Your mom. She's obviously done an amazing job as you're an amazing young man. But you asked me a good question. And I want to tell you my truth. As much as I would like for you to be my son. I don't believe that you are. And he gave me his reasons. And in that moment, Rodney, I think I was strong once again. And all I said to him, as I said, that's your belief in Are you willing to take a DNA test to prove it? Because I would like to know. And he agreed to do so. So we took a DNA test and six weeks later it came back. That's it He was not my father, which led to a lot of hurt and betrayal from mom and 10 years of a lot of anger as she didn't want to answer my questions. But as I brought it to her attention, she very nonchalantly once I got the DNA test back and told her that he wasn't my father, she very nonchalantly said, My biological father's name, which brought up even more anger, because I told you, I gave her that opportunity to share anything that I might need to know going in to meet the man on my birth certificates. You know, so I was hurt, anger felt betrayed. I had been what I felt is abandoned by my father at age five. Now I'm being betrayed by my mother, not a lot of answers over the next 10 years and I just like, like I did in high school, I buried myself in a career in work, and felt lost.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I can't imagine how much that would have heard because there's this mom, who has always been there not always done the greatest job, but certainly always tried to do the greatest job. And to find at that point, that she had misled you towards who your father was, it must have been a deeper.
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, absolutely. It was a deep hurt and a lot of anger. I'm one who likes to communicate, and I probably didn't communicate. as best I communicated as best I could, at the time with the hurt that I had. But there were a lot of letters asking for answers, or a lot of phone calls, or a lot of Mom, please explain to me what went on. Because I was just trying to figure it all out, and again, had this hole in my heart. So, so much so that I was in and out of relationships with women. And I almost vowed to myself subconsciously, that I was never going to have children of my own, simply because I didn't think that I wouldn't be a good father necessarily. I thought that I didn't have an example of what it looked like to be in a healthy relationship, I didn't know what that looked like, and feared that I wouldn't be able to stay in a relationship and therefore anyone I brought into the world may experience the same experience I had, and that is of a broken parent household. And I didn't want to bring somebody into that experience, knowing the hardships that it caused myself.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned before that even at that point, you weren't a person of faith, but that you knew God was working in the background. And I strongly believe that God had something else in store for you because you weren't going to stay without a steady relationship or without steady children were you?
 
Ryan Roy 
No, it wasn't and thank God for that. I told you, I buried myself in work and and I suffered some hardships in that as I didn't have a lot of guidance and mentorship. So although I became successful, in a lot of ways that people would consider success, a lot of money, cars, houses, it all fell apart in 2008. When the real estate collapse happened in the United States, I suffered a bankruptcy, as I had multiple properties as I was flipping real estate at the time, buying houses fixing up and selling them. And it was a low point in my life, because I was at least good at that. And I wasn't even good at that anymore. I was I told you I never really did drugs. I never drank. But for a six month period, I must say that I sat at a bar, wallowing in my own stuff. I didn't share with anybody what was going on in my life. At the end, it was six months knowing I had to file for bankruptcy and every last dollar dwindling on what bank accounts I had. And the credit cards knocking at the door in the debt just amounting to seven figures. I had a conversation with myself. And it's interesting because it was right before Christmas again, as the new year was about to roll around. And I had a conversation with myself at this point. I didn't have a relationship with God. But I said Ryan, this is not you. You know better you can do better. And sitting at a bar for way too many hours each day. And each night is not ever going to get you where you could go you're a fighter, you've always been a fighter. So on January one, my friend I was giving myself another week through the holidays to to get through this you are going to turn over a new leaf and become your old self again and stop this drinking foolishness that you're going through. I had that conversation with myself I believe it was December 23 on December 28. This bar I went to I'm an avid football fan as you not only did I play but I enjoy the game. So at this bar that I hung out They had a sports, it was a sports bar, I would go and watch the game there. And that day, my wife walked into that bar. And she was wearing my team's jersey, she happened to sit two stools down from me at the bar, and the person in between was an acquaintance of hers and an acquaintance of mine. I think God planted her in my life that day. Not only that, I told you, I gave you a date of January 1. January 1 was our first date, if you would, it was actually it's actually her birthday also. So it's pretty amazing. I believe our God has a sense of humor. And I think that day, he was chuckling just like you just did.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That's a strong move, having the first date on her birthday. Well done for that.
 
Ryan Roy 
Thank you. I was pretty aggressive and not shy. You know, I worked quickly, but uh, you know, I was still in a state of brokenness, I wasn't looking for a relationship, I don't think she was either. She had come out of a relationship recently herself, I had come out of a relationship six, seven months earlier, myself, I don't think either one of us were looking for that. And that was the beauty of this relationship. We weren't masking anything. We had really deep conversations about life, we had really deep conversations about what we thought we wanted in life from a partner, right? I think when we're younger, we talk about what we want. And I think as we grow older, and go through some relationships, we started understanding, there's certain things that we won't accept, or tolerate. And we create these real expectations of what it looks like to be in a relationship as opposed to these false like, oh, he has to be six to enhance them, for the girl. And you know, and for the guy like she has to be, you know, she has to laugh at every single one of my jokes and be really cute and, and whatever those expectations that people put on that are superficial when they're young, her things were, I need my man to respect me, my previous relationship. He wasn't abusive physically, but he was verbally, right, he spoke to her poorly. And she's like, I will not put up with that. For me. I just can't even pinpoint it now, because I don't know what those relationships look like. Because at this point, I have a 12 year successful relationship and a 10 year successful marriage. So I don't I don't even remember what a very unhealthy relationship looks like. Because it's very much a part of my past. And I thank God for that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're married and still you have in the back of your mind that you don't necessarily want children because you don't want to see those same mistakes repeated.
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah. So I'll tell you as it started getting serious with my wife and I, as we started realizing we were falling in love she she wanted to have a very serious conversation with me. And she says to me, one day, she says, Well, how do you feel about having children? And like any smart man, I asked the question, Well, how do you feel because I knew how I felt right? It was one of my biggest fears to have children. And she says, Well, if it's a deal breaker for you, I need to share this because the doctors told me as I had an ovarian cyst at one point in my life, that there's a 5% chance that I would ever be able to bear children only a 5% chance. Internally, Rodney, I did a fist pump. I think I did a backflip I probably had the biggest grin on my face internally, I showed my poker face and at that point, because I'm falling in love with a woman that will never have the ability in my mind. For me to face my greatest fear. Not going to have to have children. We love to travel. We're having a great time together. She has a solid foundation, her career. I'm going through a little bit of turmoil, but I know I'm going to get back on my feet. She's chosen to stop by my side as she knew all the challenges I was facing financially, and some of them emotionally Hause. Like, wow, this is great. I've hit the lottery. So I chose to marry her. She said yes. I chose to ask her. She said yes. And on our wedding night. She says what are we going to do about this kid thing? And in my mind, I'm like, well, you said you have a 5% chance. And I said to her, I said, let's just do we do, let's enjoy each other. Let's have fun. And whatever happens happens. And six weeks later, we conceived in our New Year's Eve that year 2010. Going into 2011, we got the pregnancy test back positive and I realized that I was about to be a father. And I was ecstatic. But that fear was still there. And that fear turned into a positive. And I said not only am I going to be fully present, but I'm going to make the choice to be a dad that I wish I had, I just define that as being fully present.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And so that's the the track that you're wanting to be on, I guess there's still some nervousness. But at least you've decided within yourself, things are going to be different, you're going to be the dad that you wish that you had had. So how did that turn out?
 
Ryan Roy 
Well, thus far, I like to think I'm doing a pretty good job. And I'll share a quick story of my nine year old as I have two boys now, both of them are absolutely amazing. They're the loves of my life, being a father is one of the greatest gifts God could have ever given me. And I'm so grateful for it, because it allows me to live, relive my childhood, in a lot of ways through them, right, we get to play sports, we get to do things. But I get to see the joy in my boys, and it's not an escape for them. Right? When we just have conversations like my mom had with me, I hear a lot of my mom's wisdom come out of me. But it's in a completely safe space where they know that they're loved, they know that they're safe. And I think those are two of the most important things that any child can have, in order to have whatever they define as success as an adult. I'll tell you this quick story that my son shared with me just the other day, he has some friends that are dealing with some challenges. One of his best friends lost his mother two years ago to a massive heart attack, she was only 42 years old. So I can only imagine what that young man is going through being raised just by his father, and basically having witnessed his mother passing at, you know, seven years old when that happen. And because of that, I think he's out lashing towards my son a little bit. And I think there's a level of jealousy, right. And we we talked through that, you know, he's jealous. And we went through the reasons. And he said, I said, Does that make sense to you? hurt people hurt people, and he's hurt right now. And he's not doing it because he doesn't like you. I think he's actually doing it because he admires you. I said, so let's just sympathize and empathize with where he is. I'm not saying what he is doing is right. But do you ever have a sense of jealousy towards somebody else? He says, Why would I ever want to be somebody else? I love who I am. So that leads me to believe that I'm on the right path of whatever I'm doing as a parent. But how did I get there? I didn't have a father. I had a mother who worked long hours and did her best. There was food on the table. It was a roof over our head, there were some very intentional conversations. But that day to day, that moment to moment, I was there to guide myself. Or, as I like to put it, I watched what my brothers and sisters did, and vowed not to do that. Do you see a common theme there? And thank you for that in this interview, because I just discovered that for myself. I went to the experts. I read every magazine, there were actually a couple parenting podcasts that I listened to 910 years ago at this point, I asked my friends who I thought had a grasp on this parenting thing. Because they had children themselves. I actually went to Facebook and asked every single person on my Facebook that I went to high school with that had kids, I private message, every single one of them and I said if there was one nugget as a parent, you'd like to pass on, what would it be. And I got some golden nuggets out of that. I just researched what it looked like to be a good dad. And then I took what my gut said to be a good dad. And I formulated into being fully present, have schedule have structure, tell them and show them that you love them in so many other simple, simple, simple lessons that I try to use absolutely every day of this parenting journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So all along, you're gathering this advice, you're putting these things into practice. And you're probably feeling Yeah, I'm doing okay, sense of nervousness, but I'm doing okay. But of course, you were abandoned by your father at the age of five. So as you're approaching your son's fifth birthday, Was there some extra nervousness there? Was there something special that that happened at that time, that let you know you're on the right track.
 
Ryan Roy 
So approaching his fifth birthday, I had started talking to, unbeknownst to me a number of Christians just based on my, my profession, and surrounding myself and they were surrounding themselves with me. And one of my clients, a Christian. We're on a client call one day, and he says, Hey, Ryan, can I just ask you a personal question? I said, Sure. He goes, have you ever given yourself to the Lord? And I was like, I go, you know, we've been attending church. I'm trying to have a relationship. If I don't know what that looks like I said, if you mean going and getting baptized, you know, I haven't really done that. And he says, Have you ever said the Lord's Prayer? And I said, I don't think I have he goes, Well, if you don't think you have you probably haven't. He goes, let me ask you a few questions. So sure, he goes, do you believe that Jesus died on the cross? so that you could be forgiven for your sins? I said, Yeah, I believe that. He goes, do you believe that they they put them in a tomb, and he was there for three days was again, I believe that that's what it says in the Bible. You believe that he rose again? I said, I do. And he goes, do you believe that? He's here for your salvation and to guide you? I said, I do. He says, Well, do you want to say a prayer with me and accept Him into your heart? And I said, is that what I need to do? He goes, if you want to have eternal life, that's part of the process. I said, then let's do that. And we did it on the phone that day, and it just so happened to be August 30 2016. And my son's birthday is August 31. The amazing thing is years later, not even years, maybe months later, I was talking to my friend there, my client at the time and friend now. And we were reminiscing about that I said, You know, I didn't really realize that at the time. I didn't realize the impact that I didn't know what I was doing. He goes I know you didn't most people don't. I go but it was, as I went and looked at my journals, I said it was the day before Christian's fifth birthday. He goes, that is so amazing. He goes I gave myself to the Lord. The day before his youngest daughter's fifth birthday. Another God funny. I think he looks down on us. And he laughs He goes, Yeah, I have this all I have this plan. I'm orchestrating it. And yeah, it's just amazing. How if we really look how God shifts in our life, and how he works in her life, and if we really pay attention, that he's always there,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You have taken the fears, you've taken the nervousness about parenting, and you've decided, Hey, there might be some others in the same boat. And so you've been making a difference for other dads in helping them to come to terms with what being a dad is about. Maybe you can tell us a little about that.
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, so there's no coincidence, right? God has a plan. And I had just given myself to the Lord, my son had just started kindergarten. So he just entered school. They had a program at the school called fathers being involved. And I was super excited to be a part of this group. When I sign up for the mailing list, there weren't a lot of names on the list. But I thought my wife and I had just gotten to the school early as they had open house and and I waited patiently by my computer to wait for an email from this father's being involved group. They said there was a meeting, I showed up to the meeting. And it was just me and the guy who sent out the email. And I said, well, where are all the dads? And he says, you know, although it's called fathers being involved, it just doesn't seem like the dads want to be involved. And I knew in my heart of hearts, that was false, because I felt a certain way about that I wanted to be involved. I had been involved for the last five years. In everything my son didn't, I wasn't going to stop because there was a broken program at the school. So I decided to take over the FBI dads group, and I've grown it from me and that guy, to over 400 dads are on our mailing list. And pre COVID when we were doing in person events, we average over 155 dads showing up to a breakfast event, where we do an interactive lesson with the kids, we laugh, we joke, we scream, we yell, we eat a doughnut, we talk, we have the dads look into their kids eyes and tell them why they're proud of them. And it's just been a tremendous success, so much so that it's received some accolades. And there are people at the county and state level asking how we get this into more schools.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I really believe that most dads want to do a good job, but they really don't know how. So here you are, you're starting to hand him the keys, what sort of a response you're getting back from, from both those dads and some of the kids
 
Ryan Roy 
Well the dads. It's amazing because I get these emails that just say simple things like thank you so much. I know this has had a huge impact on my relationship with my daughter or my son. I've had responses or dads come up to me and say, you know, I didn't know where I fit in at the school. But I feel super comfortable coming to these events. And there's so much fun. The kids I hear through the dads but the kids often won't let the dads miss an FBI dad's event right and FBI stands for fathers being involved. Just hearing the stories of the dads saying like they won't let me go. From the counselors at the school and the teachers and the administration. They say they absolutely love seeing the hallways crowded with dads, what a great problem to have. Our biggest problem on an FBI dad's breakfast is opening the doors to the school early, and parking. Because the carpool line is just crazy that morning. And I see the Facebook feeds for the school that say, oh, it must be an FBI dad's breakfast for the moms and they say it in a positive way. Right. It's great to see so many dads flood the hallways, we're glad that we had such a positive impact. The test scores in the school have gone up, the camaraderie in the school has gone up. Not only do we have the dads come to breakfast, but we have the dads do reader days where after a breakfast we have the dads disperse into the classrooms and read to the kids. So to have 60 dads fill 60 classrooms and read has been a tremendous impact. And then a couple times a year, we get the dads to roll up their sleeves and do things that we absolutely love to do, which is you know, pressure cleaning school drop pine straw pull weeds. We're doing a project right now where we're we're rebuilding an outdoor stage at the school. And the dads really, really, really feel a part of the community of the school, not just dropping them off or picking him up occasionally at the carpool line.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's a remarkable response to this program that that you're implementing there along with others as well. And I've got to say, Ryan, that while your earthly father didn't want to walk the journey of life with you, I get the feeling that your heavenly Father is just continuing to smile. And he's filling that gap, although I'm sure there's still some pain there, that your heavenly Father is filling the gap that was left when your earthly father walked away is that the experience for you?
 
Ryan Roy 
The experience for me, once I gave myself to the Lord and trusted and started to really have a relationship with Him through studying his words, getting in men's groups and understanding other men's experience with God and, and talking through that with them and, and surrounding myself with fellow Christians while still being a part of the world, so that I can impact with my story, those who may not have a relationship with God, the best way that I can describe it. And I wholeheartedly hope everybody has this experience when they choose to have a relationship with our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ is a sense of peace and that peace helped me define my purpose, because I was able to listen without distraction. And I believe God's purpose for me is to help heal the father child relationship here on Earth, while I'm here to really pour into that. And it's so simple. And I think men fear this so much, because we don't want to fail that things that a lot of men don't show up. Or they show up the way they believe society has told them to show up, like go earn a paycheck. And just like our Heavenly Father, and what you desire, and what I desire, and whatever little girl and every little boy and whatever adult on this planet desires is to be loved. Through actions and through words. And if we could just show up and have those simple conversations like my mom had with me, because I know my mother loved me, although she wasn't perfect. Because I know she poured into me because she said so. And she did so through her actions. I think just showing up and telling our kids like we do at an FBI dads breakfast, son, daughter, I am proud of you because in finish it that sentence, often for our children. And then follow that up with a I love you. Which is followed up with in many ways, words and actions, I believe in you. And I trust you. Because I think those are all the things that our heavenly father say to us every single day. And if, as parents, we could say those four things. I'm proud of you. I love you. I believe in you. And I trust you through your actions and words. I think the journey becomes a lot easier for you as a parent and for your child receiving that love. And I think that's what God's put me on this planet and that's what my purpose is to relay that message to as many people as I possibly can.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Ryan I'm going to put some links in the show notes at bleeding guideline dotnet so that people can get in touch with you find out more about FBI dads or even to have a look at your book that you wrote about being the dad I wish I had. What's the easiest place for people to find you?
 
Ryan Roy 
Yeah, the easiest way is just that bethedadyouwishyouhad.com that has my podcast that has pretty much anything you need. If you want to know more about FBI dads, you could go to FBIdads.com. Those are the two best ways to get hold of me,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Ryan, it really has been a delight to talk to you to hear your story, to hear some of that pain, that very real pain that's there but to also hear the healing and the transformation and now the transformation that you're bringing into the lives of others. Thank you for spending some time on Bleeding Daylight today.
 
Ryan Roy 
Thank you, Rodney for having me.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

Life for Suzanne Burns went off the rails when she left home as a young woman. From a very sheltered upbringing, she soon found herself using drugs and alcohol and shortly afterwards becoming a single mother.
Suzanne has spent the last 20 years serving others. Part of that service includes being the founder and executive director of Foundation House, a maternity home for pregnant and homeless women, which offers educational and job training programs. She holds a Master of Science in Marriage and Family Studies from Lee University Cleveland. She's a certified Family Trauma Professional and a member of the International Association of Trauma Professionals, the National Center for Crisis Management and the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress. Suzanne also serves on the Executive Council for the National Maternity Housing Coalition, as well as the Leadership Council for the Southeast Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth. 
 
Foundation House maternity home ministry: http://foundationhouseministries.org/
Job training program: https://healingspringsgifts.com/ 
Suzanne's coaching/training site: https://www.becharitywise.com/traumachurch
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you for listening today. I’ve got a powerful interview with a remarkable woman coming up in just a moment.
 
You can find and follow Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please recommend this and other episodes to your friends and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Suzanne Burns has spent the last 20 years serving others. Part of that service includes being the founder and executive director of Foundation House, a maternity home for pregnant and homeless women, which offers educational and job training programs. Today we'll be hoping to find out what sparked that desire to help others. Suzanne, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Hi, Rodney, how are you today?
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm very well. Now you hold a Master of Science in Marriage and Family Studies from Lee University Cleveland. You're a certified Family Trauma Professional and a member of the International Association of Trauma Professionals, the National Center for Crisis Management and the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress. You also serve on the Executive Council for the National Maternity Housing Coalition, as well as the Leadership Council for the Southeast Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth. You could certainly be described as being a high achiever but life hasn't always looked that way for you has it?
 
Suzanne Burns 
No, not at all. Not at all.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Take us back a little bit and tell us a little bit of your early story.
 
Suzanne Burns 
So I was raised in a very Christian home. I was I was a rainbow baby. So for those of you that maybe aren't familiar with that term, that means my parents had at least one miscarriage, my parents actually had three before they had me. And then they had my brother 22 months later. And so I grew up in a very kind of protected bubble. I didn't realize I lived in a bubble until I got to college, which was 1800 miles from home. And even though I was at a private Christian school, I had no real idea what to do with my freedom. And so very quickly, I found out that I did not know how to use my freedom wisely and so by the time I got to my junior year, I was smoking, I was drinking, I was experimenting with illegal drugs and, you know, then one day I wake up pregnant and so for me, those were some of the hardest years that I've ever had to face. You know, I kind of liken it to the old frog in a frying pan adage. I was in the midst of this dating relationship and you know, I just kind of woke up one day, and I had no idea how I had gotten to that point. It took me quite a few years to get myself back out of that mess but I definitely learned a lot along the way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's a tension there isn't there for parents who are wanting to provide the best upbringing for their children, and in your case for your family, wanting to bring you up in that Christian environment and wanting the best for you. But at the same time, probably not allowing you to see what lies beyond those walls and what's happening in the real world. Can you talk to us a little of that sort of tension?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Yeah, for sure. So much of it is really my understanding, both from hindsight. And then also, you know, having raised my own sons, I have a 15 year old still at home. And then I also have a 21 year old who's in the US Marine Corps. You know, for me growing up, I never had a curfew. I didn't even get my driver's license until I was 17. And honestly, that was just so that I got it before my brother did by two days, technically, but I got it before he did. But the reason was that I just I didn't have any need for it. My parents were content to drive me everywhere. They provided everything I needed. And so I I just grew up, really not, not needing it. I found out in high when I was in high school, I found out that one of my boyfriend's in my senior year had been one of the school's largest drug dealers. And I had no idea we only dated for I don't know, maybe 6, 6, 8 weeks, something like that. Not very long. But I had absolutely no idea until probably two years after we had graduated, and somebody was telling me about it. And so I I just was incredibly naive and I was very innocent. And so you know that that was my parents' intent but in hindsight, it did not serve me very well because I didn't have a frame of reference. When I when I got to school, and the mid 90s, the legalizing drugs was was becoming much more common topic of conversation, especially a young among young people. And so for me it It wasn't that I didn't know my Christian heritage and my Christian beliefs. I think honestly, it was at my roots were not deep enough. I had never really made the decisions, to be obedient to what Scripture says. I was just kind of floating along in somebody else's wind. You know, my parents kind of blew me along in in their trajectory but when I got to school, now other people's philosophies, other people's belief systems are shifting mine, because I didn't have roots of my own.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So would it be fair to say that, despite your parents best intention, they actually brought you up to have a Christian morality, rather than to have a deep Christian faith?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Ooh, yes, that is exactly right. And my mom would be heartbroken. So I can't let her hear you say that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Look, I think it's one of those things that for all of us as, as parents, we want the best for our children, but there's no manual. And so often we, we do find it difficult to know exactly which way to go. And to be able to bring our children up with with morals and integrity, that's certainly something that we want. But knowing that that one to one relationship with Jesus is something quite separate to that. And that's what we're trying to guide our children towards. But it doesn't always happen that way, does it?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Right. And I really think that one of the biggest issues that I, that I see, not only in the women that I minister to now, but also as I look back, I think that we don't, we don't acknowledge the need for learning through the hard things, we, we want to make everything good and safe and protect our kids but we don't ever let them learn things the hard way. And, you know, we have, we have mothers and fathers calling us frequently and their daughters are in jail, and they want to get her out, because you know, no one wants their baby girl to be in jail. But at the same time, that's not necessarily what's in her best interest. In fact, sometimes she needs to stay there because she truly will not get the mind change, she will not come to terms with the needing to change unless she stays in jail. Because the Holy Spirit has to have has to put you in the place where you will hear his voice. And if somebody else is continually coming in and shortcutting that trying to help, you know, all too often we try to help God and and end up making things so much worse. I think that's the one of the greatest issues.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So often when we're protecting our children and those we love from the natural consequences that should come their way.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Right? Exactly.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You slipped into this time of drinking of using drugs. Let me understand how it was for you. Because you'd been brought up in this, this very Christian environment. And suddenly you have these freedoms? Was it a bit of a test for you? At first you started thinking I shouldn't? Or was it easy to start falling into these ways knowing that you're now surrounded by people with different philosophies with with a different worldview? How was that tension within yourself?
 
Suzanne Burns 
So I started dating this guy, he was much older, he was about six years older than me. So he was out of school, he was a musician, he was very cool and lived, you know, a completely different lifestyle than what I was accustomed to. So for me, it was partly, like wanting to seem grown up and and wanting to kind of fit in. And partly It was like, well, it was justification. It was like smoke. So smoking came first, you know, on our, I don't know, second or third date, I found out that he smoked and well, you know, he's he's older. He's age to buy tobacco in America is 21. And so he was 20. I don't know, 526 at the time. And so I thought, well, you know, it's okay, it's acceptable, because he's an adult, he's old enough. And by this point, I was also 21. So, so it was like, I could justify it. And then and then it was alcohol. And it was like, Well, you know, I, here I am. 21. And so now I get to drink alcohol legally. And so of course, it must be okay. Because some denominations say that it's not a problem. And my heritage said that it was a problem. But But clearly, it's not because clearly other people are allowed to do this. And then you know, it's like, well, you know, marijuana is not that big of a deal. Most people think it ought to be legalized anyways, and, and and then by the time we got to the harder thing is the the acid was really the only other hard thing that I ever tried, which I gotta be honest, I completely loved but don't, don't want to ever go back to it again. It was like an easy justification on along the way. And the crazy thing is, maybe it's because we're in the in the south here in the US. And maybe it's more common throughout others who are active drug users, but they're a very spiritual population. And so it's easy if you don't have strong moral grounding, and you only have kind of what you might call head knowledge. It's very easy to fall into this kind of moral justification, where you're sitting around completely stoned and yet you're talking about scripture, and you know, what Jesus would do if he were in the room with us, and, and so it was like I could continue to pretend that all of this was perfectly acceptable and all of it somehow fit together.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that you went through this time of using different substances, and then finding yourself pregnant, was that the point where you realized, I need to do something that this track is not leading me the right way?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Unfortunately, no, I was not quite ready for that yet. I did move back home to have my son. And my, my boyfriend was, you know, we were on again off again. And then finally, we got married. Partly because by this point, I was living 1800 miles away with my parents. And I didn't want to be the reason that my son didn't know his father. But I also didn't know how to move across country without my family support system without getting married without creating a new support structure. And so in hindsight, I feel like that was probably that was like the nexus of the bad decision, we got married, it was not good. It hadn't been good for a long time. And so it was equally bad. While we were married, we got married, we were married almost two full years. So my first husband, because he's a musician, somehow felt like that meant that he did not need to actually work for a living. He was just supposed to play music and play video games. And I was the one who was supposed to pay all the bills. And so because of that, I was working, selling mortgages, I was selling insurance, I was doing whatever I could to try to make more than minimum wage. And so one particular day I had been, I had had several different appointments, trying to sell some insurance. And just none of them went well at all. And so as I'm picking up my son from my then mother in law's home, I was just kind of complaining to her. And, you know, I still talk to the talk, because his parents were, were deeply religious, just like mine had been. And so I still knew how to talk the talk. And I was just telling her, you know, I just don't understand why God's not blessing me. You know, we were working so hard, and I'm just, I'm going on all these appointments, and just really doing everything I know, to do to make this successful. And she just kind of very casually turned around, and looked at me and said, well, Honey, what are you doing that God can bless? And man, that just struck me to the core. And that was in November of 2000. And for a few days, I just kind of sat and mulled that over and really just thought, what what am I doing? What am I doing. And then there was a few nights later, my son was, you know, toddling around the couch and put his hand in the in the ashtray, because, of course, we're still smoking. And so his hand is dirty, and he's coughing, and he's got a runny nose. And it just occurred to me that you know, what, I'm causing this. I'm causing this because I want to smoke in our little, you know, cramped apartment, and he's breathing it in, what on earth am I doing, and it was like, the, the scales, and the the, the walls that I had built to hide behind, started crumbling. And from that point forward, I did not use any illegal drugs whatsoever. It took me longer to actually quit smoking. But by the time New Year's Eve of 2000, going into 2001, came about, I was ready to publicly acknowledge that I don't do these things any longer. And my first husband, I do believe that marriage is supposed to be permanent, is supposed to be forever. And I gave him the option to come out of that lifestyle with me, and we would remain married. And he chose not to. So in March of 2001, I left and my son and I moved out. And that was really, really difficult.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It must have been a very difficult decision, especially as you say, you believe that the marriage is life long and so as well as the weight of what you've just described, of realizing that you're putting your son through this difficult time in this small apartment and, and all that goes along with that, you're realizing that I've just had a marriage fail. Did it start to really pile up on you and what did you do? How did you seek release from that?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Oh, it was a lot of tears. A lot of a lot of crying out to the Lord. I actually spent. I spent probably six months In the book of Jeremiah, I don't know why that was the book that I gravitated to. Well, I started in the book of Daniel. And I've always loved Daniel, because that's my maiden name. And so that's always been kind of a special book, even though so much of it is so weird. It's always meant something special to me. So I started in Daniel, and then I just kind of began reading through, and ended up in Jeremiah and just was just captivated by the Lord at that point. And I'm mold through Jeremiah 29:11  through 13, and just really started learning how to put down those deeper roots in my faith. I started learning about the potter and how how he was crafting us into the vessels that he desired us to be, from the time that he originally thought of us. And so from there, it was just this idea that I, I am worth more, and I need to be more more useful to the Lord as in gratitude, and not in obligation but out of gratitude, because man, I've, I sure have screwed up the first 23, 24 odd years of my life. And I really appreciate that I am not lying in a ditch somewhere, I appreciate that I never got on to the harder drugs that are so much more difficult to break free from, I appreciate the the ways in which the Lord protected me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it sounds as if when you are prepared to let go of those things that went right, that God actually fill that void. Because so often when we're afraid of, of letting go of those things that we know, are harmful. But we're not quite sure that we kind of find anything that's going to come close to filling those desires. And yet here God comes along and starts to fill those desires in your life.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Exactly. And we were just so foolish, we have no concept truly of how big and magnificent God is and the less we know about him, the less we we understand that. So while the more we learn about him, the more we learn there is to learn about him. And so when you're when you're very new in your faith, it's very difficult to let go and trust this, this big unseen God, that you you don't know if you can trust him or not. You don't know if he'll prove himself to you. Because when the people around you that you do see every day when when the people that are supposed to be the ones who are your protectors or your provider, when they're not doing their job, it's really difficult to then look to this unseen, unknown God and say, you know, I guess I'll put my faith in you. It's really very scary.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're in the middle of this time where you're starting to become a bit more heavenly minded. But you're still walking through the stuff that you have to walk through here on Earth. Where's that bridge that took you from where you were at that time to where you are now? How did life start to unfold from there?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Well, you know, the Lord, it just knows, he always knows exactly what we need. And Jeremiah speaks of the creating the the path and the plans for us. And he knows what he's doing, even though it looks like a complete and total disaster from our angle. And that's where I find a lot of peace, a lot of rest the interest. After a couple of years of being a single parent, I started dating again. And then we got married. And then I had my second son who they're six years apart. And over the course of several more years of, you know, figuring out the whole blended family thing, which you know, isn't super fun. A lot of times, even though we're all invested in it, it's still it's still hard. And you understand when you're living it you really understand why God intended this to be one man and one woman becoming to becoming one flesh, because it is challenging. One day in charge, a gentleman came to speak and was talking about the sanctity of human life and talked about a program here in our town where they do pregnancy tests and support services for mothers who are who are pregnant but in in a difficult situation. And trying to help them avoid having to have an abortion or trying to help them avoid considering that an option. And so I was captivated. Because you know, these were the girls that I had been and I really wanted to be able to give back And felt like I was kind of at that point where I could. And so, you know, the Lord provided me a seven years of opportunity to work there. And I absolutely loved it. But over time, we began seeing more and more moms coming through who were in such dire situations, you know, they were living in their cars, they were trying to escape abusive boyfriends or abusive step parents, you know, they they had no job skills, they were 2324 had never worked, had no GED, you know, had no marketable skills, and really had no way to care for this child that they had created. Over the course of a couple of years, the Lord began laying on the heart that we really needed a residential program. here locally, we needed a place where these women could come and learn what they had not had the opportunity to learn as children. In 2014, foundation house was opened, which is a residential training program for mothers in crisis,
 
Rodney Olsen 
it must be quite powerful when you're speaking to some of those young mums to be able to say, I really do know what you're going through to be able to say, hey, I've walked this path before.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Yeah, and the funny thing is, is that they are very shocked when I tell them these things, it, they always, it's not so much that they look at me differently. But it's more that they realize that Oh, you do understand, you have been here, that does definitely help in in conveying to them that you know what you can do this, you can make the lasting changes. But now that we've been open, almost seven years, being able to bring back other graduates, others of our own moms can say more specifically, I lived in this house, you know, that was my bedroom down the hall. And here I am now, that is really even that much more powerful.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that sense of example, must be very powerful. I know that what you're wanting to do is point people towards God. And yet at the same time, I'm sure it's not lost on you that people would be looking at you saying, if you can achieve all that, and you've come from here, maybe there is hope for me.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Yeah, exactly. Well, that's one thing I tell our volunteers a lot, and when I'm doing trainings for other ministries is that the trust is the most important thing. They, for the most part, if they do believe in God, they think that he's pretty stupid, or that he's very angry, or that he just doesn't care. Because the the facts of their life, the things that they've lived through, would would seem to demonstrate that. So you the one they see, you have to be that much more trustworthy. You have to prove God's faithfulness through you. So that eventually, hopefully, they will one day allow God to prove himself faithful. But we're the we're the message where the gospel that they see
 
Rodney Olsen 
What are some of the stories that have come out of some of the women that have been through the house?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Well, one of my favorites is Ashley, when she arrived, she came in September of 2018. And we had just launched our job training program. So she was eight months pregnant, had just come out of six months in jail. She was 28 years old, did not have a GED, did not have a driver's license and was also part of our recovery court system. From her completing that then the felonies that were on her criminal record would eventually be removed. And so she was in a really bad situation, did not have a whole lot of hope. And also had two older children that she did not have custody of. And so we get her in, we start building a relationship with her. We're teaching her how to make the lotions and soaps and wax melts and things like that, that we do as part of our job training program. And she just soaked it up. She just she loved it. And had never really considered it before but but it just spoke to her in in such a powerful way and really being able to go to like festivals and events where we were selling the products and having people come up and say Oh, I love the way the smells are. Oh this lotion makes my hands feel so soft. And for her to know that you know that that was me. That was my effort. It began to build in her self confidence that she had never known before. And so before she had been really resistant to getting her GED she Felt like oh, there's no way it's hopeless. Here. I'm 28 years old. It's just hopeless. I'm just, I've already wasted my opportunity. And so, one day after she had been growing and been been kind of loosening up and beginning to trust us a little bit more, we said, Why don't you just take the practice test, just just see, if you were to go in and take the test tomorrow, just see what you would get. And think she got a 27 out of 10 out of 30. So she was three points off. And when she realized how close she would have been, that lit a fire under her to begin doing GED classes. And in the midst of all of this, she's also seeking reunification with her kids and rebuilding those relationships. Because, of course, our kids have been traumatized all this time to having mom in jail. And, you know, Mom, mom, present but not present. She had been on drugs for, you know, probably six years at this point. And so she had to rebuild connections with her children, and eventually was was able to get custody restored of them. And so in 2019, she, she got her GED, she got her driver's license, she got her kids, her older kids custody back, she had her son, in 2018, she was able to buy a car. And through drug court, she began dating a young man who was also in recovery, and also was a Christian, she got saved and got baptized, she graduated drug court. And then in January of 2020, we celebrated our first foundation house wedding. And so we have this picture. Bo has one daughter, and then Ashley has her three children. And so we have this picture of them standing up there with at the altar with all four children and the two of them.
 
And it's just so magnificent.
 
Seeing how much hard work she put in, and how it's all paying off. And right now today, we're in the process of training her to come on as staff as a case manager for some of the new girls coming through now that she's a couple years beyond this. And it's just unbelievable, the light year difference that just a couple of years has made for her.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So Ashley, and Beau are now stepping into that blended family that you have, and you say is so difficult, but it must be powerful for them knowing that they have support behind them that they have people that are going to walk that journey alongside them.
 
Suzanne Burns 
For sure. For sure. Exactly. And that's really what we do. People always ask, Well, how long are the moms allowed to stay in your house and, and it's like, well, there really isn't a cut off time. Some programs say you know, six weeks postpartum, or you can stay up to a year. But really, it's like, what do you need, if she doesn't need to live in our house any longer than there's no reason to keep her. But if she does need to stay, then if we make her leave too soon, then then we're wasting our efforts and work. We're putting her and our child at risk to fall back into homelessness. But ultimately, it's about building those those family relationships. And so in a very real sense, Ashley is part of our family and always will be as long as she needs us. Even if it's just a chat on the phone, if it's just a call and commiserate even whether it's you know, to be frustrated because of the the annoying school pickup lines or things like that, you know it, we're part of the family, just like I call my mom, just to chat to not talk about anything in particular, I want Ashley to know that, that we're worried that for her to or her family regardless of where she is in life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this is where we start to see the New Testament lived out where people came together as community that had things in common and would share together and our western lifestyle has become so different to that we've become so individualized and yet when we call back into community, there's that structure and the support that we need to go ahead.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And what's so funny, too, when when the girls first come into the house, you know, they're always very hesitant. Some of them have been in programs before and so there's there's that negative connotation, or the or the other girl is going to like me in the house, am I going to get kicked out? Is the staff going to be mean or stupid? And so you know, first we have to build the trust. But it's always really cool to see the other girls in the house band together and support her. We we work really hard to make sure that they know that that's expected of them of course, but it's also really nice when you know, a baby is coming and they're digging through their, their baby clothes trying to get things for for this new girl, or you know she's outgrowing her clothes. And so will I have a pair of pants that she can have. And, you know, I have this top that doesn't fit me anymore. And so it's really nice to watch these girls that for so long, we're more focused on self survival, and how do I manipulate this situation so that I get everything that I need. And in it, I don't care if you get anything at all, as long as I get what I need, and to see their hearts shift and be a lot more open and receptive, even when they don't know the Lord, to be willing to be that support system to somebody else that's in even greater need than they are. It's just really encouraging.
 
Rodney Olsen 
In the introduction, I mentioned that you've been helping people for 20 years now and helping other people going through various circumstances. But I guess one of the big things for those of us who are wanting to help, is ensuring that the help we provide isn't just making us feel good about doing something, but it's actually providing the help that is needed. And I know that that is something very close to your heart
 
Suzanne Burns 
Through learning about the the poverty mindset, and the lasting impact of trauma on the brain chemistry of the people that we serve, we've really learned a tremendous amount about not only how to help, but how not to help. All too often, people want to, they want to do things for other people, they want to be a blessing, you know, you see someone homeless, begging on the street and you your gut reaction all too often is to, you know, give them whatever money you have in your in your wallet, or to go buy them something to eat. But then a lot of times that very same person has a home, or they've already eaten, or you're $20 is not going to get them very far towards those goals. So sometimes people will ask me, Well, you know, what do I do if if they're just gonna buy drugs with it or buy alcohol with it? And it's like, well, you know, the reality is, is that your $20 does really nothing to get them to lasting stability. So they probably need the drugs, they need the alcohol, because that helps them forget the pain that they're in, that helps them mask the feelings of loneliness, or of cold or of overwhelming depression, it becomes a kind of a catch 22 How, how do you help these people without enabling them? The The fact of the matter is, is that you can't, unless you're willing to build a long term lasting relationship. If you only want to give them something small, then recognize that they're not beholden to you. If they want to spend it on drugs, then you know, you really don't have that kind of power, that kind of weight in that relationship. There is no relationship, there's sometimes we'll get a church that maybe has been supporting a mom. And now they're they've been paying her rent, they've been paying her grocery bill, they've been picking the kids up, and they've been doing free babysitting. And and now it's to the point where like, they're tired of this, like, Why won't she just realize the great gestures that we're all pouring into her and like, light a fire under herself to go and get a job and to go and do these things for herself. And it's like, that's not how it works. She's already been conditioned by these years of living on government assistance, living in programs, that somebody will come along and do these things for her. And all you've done is tell her that, that you're the You're the one that for now. And so when you get tired of helping her when you get frustrated, or when you get burnout, you haven't set any framework for her to learn. You've only done the things for her that she could do for herself. So we all too often are come in with a paternalistic mindset that I'm I'm going to take care of things for you so that you can you can be better you can be fixed. And it just doesn't work that way. Because really, we're coming in just like my parents didn't give me the they gave me too strong of boundaries. And I didn't know there was things outside of that. We kind of do the same things with with these individuals that we're wanting to serve. We're babying them. We're doing the things for them that they could be and should be doing for themselves. And then when we get tired of it because nobody wants to baby an adult or very long. We haven't taught them how to do it for themselves and so they're left feeling free. frustrated and abandoned. And, you know, here's, here's one more church person, that's just a liar. And we're burnout and frustrated. And think that, you know, I, clearly I can't help anybody because nobody's worth helping you know that if this is what it's all about that I'm not interested in being the hands and feet of Jesus, I don't want to be a servant, I'd rather go back to be in a Pew potato. And it's a very delicate balance to get people to understand that that dynamic,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And it can be very difficult to actually lead someone towards doing something for themselves. When they know that, well, if this church is giving up on me in their mind, then they'll wander off to the next into the next in the next. So we need to be very careful. And you've wanted to help people along that journey. You've written a book called The Accidental Social Worker, tell me a little about that.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Yeah, so that's basically my learning about all of the the brain chemistry and why they're their wiring is a little bit different when they've lived in chronic trauma and poverty mindset. And so the accidental social worker is really kind of me, I did not come into this field, intentionally. I volunteered one day a week, but I worked in the corporate world, for most of my life. And so working one on one with people for an hour, once a month, is vastly vastly different than living with people 24 seven. And so the more we began to learn about the the dynamics of trauma and the experiences and how that has reshaped, rewired their brain chemistry, the more I wanted to share this with other believers, because I know that it is incredibly important for for people to understand, we all want to help and we all want to serve, but if we can understand their mindset, and if we can understand how their brains have shifted, we can serve differently. And so we don't get burnout, we don't get frustrated. And we're also learning how to empower them towards making these decisions for themselves.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So as well as serving those who need to be served. you're serving those who want to serve through things like this book, but also, through your podcast, trauma informed church, what are some of the things that you tackle in that?
 
Suzanne Burns 
Well, I love to talk about my girls. And so what one of the things that I love to do is I love to talk about one particular dynamic in each of the sessions and use a client as an explanation. Like, for example, Brooke, one of our young ladies, she came to us in April, she was already seven months pregnant and did not know it until she got into drug rehab, which was definitely a big concern as far as the health of the baby would go. But once she realized she was pregnant, she definitely wanted to make changes. The problem is, is that Brooke has not only a strong history of meth addiction, but she also has mental health diagnoses that are inhibiting. She's bipolar, she's schizophrenic, and also has to be on medication to manage all of this. And then on top of that, she also has cognitive delays, where she's, she's 24 years old, but she's effectively a 12 year old on a good day. And on not so good days, she's more like a seven or eight year old, stubborn and defiant, doesn't understand things, always asks the same questions over and over again, really has a hard time with comprehending the answers. So we spent a lot of time working with her and trying to get her to the place where where she would be ready to make the decision either to parent or to place her baby for adoption. And she did ultimately place her baby for adoption, but not until she had spent a week as the mom it within our home, you know and so always having oversight with her. You know, she didn't make it a full week before she ended up having to go into an inpatient program. She had a mental breakdown. And so she she knew that placing her baby for adoption was the best thing for her. But she also knew that that was the most difficult thing to do. So walking through with her the pain and the challenge of really giving her no good option but placing for adoption, but also giving her the room the space that she needed to make that decision for herself. In other words, we can't legally take her baby away from her. And we wouldn't want to do that because that would break her heart. But at the same time she is not fit to pay Aren't walking her through all of that has been so challenging. Because we have to go through the same conversations over and over and over again.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've been involved in so many different things. And obviously your podcast is going to be helping people to, to realize what they can do to help you have your book, you have your podcast, there is products online, that the the ladies that you're serving, are making this so much that people would want to get in touch with you about where's the best place to find you if, if some of our listeners are wanting to find you online, where's the best place to go?
 
Suzanne Burns 
You can download my free ebook, The Accidental Social Worker at traumainformedchurch.com You can also find out more about the products that our moms make at healingspringsgifts.com and the ministry is at foundationhouseministries.org. And we are also on Facebook and Instagram. And you can search us that way as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'll put links to all of those in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net so you can find all the information there. Suzanne, it really has been a delight to speak to you. There's so much more we could say if we had a number of days to keep talking but thank you so much for your time and for what you're doing to sow into other people's lives.
 
Suzanne Burns 
Thank you so much Rodney. I appreciate that.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

After meeting Ada, a young girl in Dominican Republic, I recorded a short radio program to tell her story. It was broadcast on 98five Sonshine FM, Perth, back in 2008. The episode is much shorter than most but I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s still powerful.
 
 
 
Compassion: http://compassion.com
Compassion Australia: http://compassion.com.au
 
Rodney Olsen is the host of Bleeding Daylight. In 2021 he will cycle over 4,000 kilometres for children living in extreme poverty through Compassion Australia. You can support Rodney's efforts as part of Ride for Compassion Coast to Coast at this fundraising page: https://rideforcompassion.raisely.com/rodneyolsen 

Sheridan Voysey is the author of seven books, a broadcaster heard by millions of people and a speaker in demand in a number of countries. Much of his success has come from the courage to share some of the deepest moments of his life with his various audiences. 
I’ve known today’s guest for many years and it’s an honour to be able to introduce you to him. I know you’ll enjoy hearing from him as he takes us on a very personal journey.
 
Website: https://sheridanvoysey.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sheridanvoysey
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sheridanvoysey/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sheridanvoysey
 

Nalini Tranquim has lived on various continents and brings together several cultures. She’s an artist, author, singer/songwriter, life coach and so much more. Her latest song took 15 years to finish, only being completed in the aftermath of a very dark season for her family where she found herself battling depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. On Bleeding Daylight we’ll delve into some of her story and hear about the constant call on her life that she just couldn’t ignore.
 
Website: https://nalinitranquim.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nalinitranquim
Instagram: http://instagram.com/nalinitranquim
Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/au/artist/nalini-tranquim/276673958
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/15n0J9VwXV0jIMFQGrKRWO
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6Q92GI97mfxpVu36LssAlA
 

 Brian Steele is a former cult member who underwent deprogramming by a world renowned expert. Even after his escape from the cult he battled to find acceptance and belonging.
 
These days he’s a pastor and has recently become an author, publishing his first book in a series focussed on one of the parables told by Jesus.
 
He has a passion for people to discover a really real kingdom as described throughout the Christian scriptures.
 
 
Website: https://www.kingdomfieldguides.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kingdomfieldguides
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/briancsteele/
Kingdom Field Guide: https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Field-Guide-Finding-Really/dp/1952602173
Email: kingdomfieldguide@gmail.com
 
 
 
(This transcript is intended as a guide only. It may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen
Today’s guest on Bleeding Daylight is a former cult member who underwent deprogramming by a world renowned expert. Even after his escape from the cult he battled to find acceptance and belonging. These days he’s a pastor and has recently become an author, publishing his first book in a series focussed on one of the parables told by Jesus. He has a passion for people to discover a really real kingdom as described throughout the Christian scriptures. I’ll introduce you in a few moments.
 
Please remember to connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Please also take the time to share this and other episodes through your own social media.
  
Brian Steele has been a corporate executive and a geologist. Life has taken him on many twists and turns. And these days, he's a pastor, and author. We'll explore some of the detours that Brian has taken along the way, as well as looking at his book, The Kingdom Field Guide. Brian, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Brian Steele 
Thank you, Rodney, really glad to join you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Your book looks at a story that Jesus told about searching for treasure and before we uncover more about the book, maybe we should look at your own search. Can you help me understand a little bit of your search for faith?
 
Brian Steele 
Sure, Rodney, I grew up in a Christian home but in the eighth grade, I sort of washed my hands of it all and decided to to wander and I really wandered far I found myself in some dark places in terms of drug use, and, and even involved in curious and some dark spirituality and in sort of even occultic practices. By the time I got to college, I found myself way underwater and was way over my head, and was actually scared with some of the things that I was involved with. So I had I prayed a short prayer. That was something like Lord save me. It was one of these desperation, prayers. And so the next day after that, I was going to college at the University of California in Santa Barbara. I was on campus, and there were some people there, and they were sharing a gospel message. And I thought, well, this is God, answering my prayer already. The next day, I went to a Bible study invited me to, and I made a commitment to Jesus and started a life of faith but what I didn't know was that the group that I got myself involved with was a cult and I got sucked in. And Rodney, the next three years of my life were a nightmare, not just for myself, but also for the friends and family that that really cared about me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to look at the details of that cult in a moment but first of all, what was it in your upbringing, you say you were brought up in a Christian home, that made you want to look elsewhere? What was it that you can identify that made you think I need to explore something else?
 
Brian Steele 
Well, that's it's a great question. Because I had really incredible parents, I do have really incredible parents, the church for for whatever reason, I didn't connect with the practice, in, in my home church, I had felt I was also adopted as a as an infant. And I think that adoption carried a sense of, of not belonging, not because my parents didn't love me, or my brother and sister didn't love me but there was just a deep type of not belonging. You know, for example, during some of the church services, instead of mingling in the commons, at coffee hour or outside with the other kids, I would hide in the bathroom. So there was that sort of painful sense that I don't belong. So when I got old enough, in middle school, I think it was an expression of that, where if I don't belong here, where do I belong? And that just led to a journey of exploration. I think it's also something that made me very vulnerable to being recruited by the cult because cults artificially provide belonging to people who at different stages in their lives are vulnerable. So I think that made me a prime target,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I was gonna say that cult would have seen you as ripe for the picking, because you're looking for identity, you're looking for a place and and so often, that's what they are promising to people who enter the cult. What were some of the practices there that started to tip you off to the fact that this isn't quite right.
 
Brian Steele 
It was a Bible based cult. It was Christian. Their doctrine, I would say now is was basically normal Christian doctrine. What made it destructive was their practices of control, manipulation, use of fear, guilt, shame, and also practices of isolation. So they had convinced me that my family was against me, that my other friends were satanic, quote, unquote, and so they isolated me. And then in that isolation, I was much more easily to control. So it wasn't at all about the doctrine. I would say you could take the doctrine that was found there in terms of basic Christian beliefs, and you could import that into any mainline church, but it was about the abuse of authority and the abuse of control over the members lives too. Very, very small degree. Basically, there were arranged marriages, if you wanted to date somebody had to seek counsel from the leadership, and they would tell you where to live, and where to work effectively. And there was a high degree of guilt, shame and fear that was used to control people. So just for example, Rodney, there was a member who ended up leaving the cult, and a week later, he died tragically in a plane crash. And the leadership said, See, look what happens when you leave. It's that level of control and fear. And really, I was turned into a different person, my personality was replaced, I'd become somebody that was the group ideal, and it was forced into a mold. And really, I lost myself.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I suppose that's the fear of some looking into the church from the outside that they see people taking this book that we call the scriptures, the Bible, and they can spin it in so many different ways. But what you're saying is it wasn't the Bible that was at fault, it was people trying to take stuff from the Bible and spin it in a way that it was never meant to be.
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, that's exactly right, that the scripture can be used as a two by four, to beat people into submission, we had so many different meetings in a week that the workload was, was incredible, there would be something practically every day. And if you missed something, for whatever reason, you know, one of the leading brothers would say, Brian, you know, the Bible says that we shouldn't forsake the gathering of ourselves together. And don't you think, brother that you need to be coming to all of our meetings, right likes that type of that type of control. And, and if you're isolated from the rest of your family, and friends and your, your whole world, depends on that social structure, then they can turn the love up and down, based on how you're performing and it's used to control people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How did you eventually exit that group?
 
Brian Steele 
Well, my parents knew that something was wrong. They saw a massive change in my life, they saw the personality change. And they had tried to get me out Rodney, they had talked with me a number of times, but but I didn't have any inclination of ever leaving. So the coal was going to send me from California to a university in Bellingham, Washington called Western Washington University. And I got into went into that school as a geology graduate student, that was going to be my guys. That was going to be my cover. And then I was going to recruit college students for the cult there. So on my way from Santa Barbara, to Washington State, my parents said, Would you please just come by our house just to say hi, and I reluctantly went, and then they said, We need you to go to your uncle's house to help us move a TV. So I go to the uncle's house. Well, they had hired a world renowned expert, he was a deprogrammer, somebody who got people out of cults across the world and they kept me there for a week. It was at that time an involuntary intervention. So they took my car keys and my shoes and my wallet, and they moved furniture in front of the doors, they nailed windows shut, they removed the sharps from the kitchen, they had two big bodyguards, and I was basically kept there to prevent me from leaving so that I could listen to this man as he walked through, hour by hour, day by day. So I could finally start thinking again. And that's what got me out of the cult was this intervention that my parents performed? And I am I have so much gratitude for them. Rod knew that they would do this, that they would show me that kind of love, that they would do that level of intervention in order to get me out. And I'm so grateful for that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
At what point during that time that forced intervention, did the light start going on for you? Do you start to realize, actually, what they're saying is the truth.
 
Brian Steele 
It was probably day three or four, that the irony is that there's no system of control. And that could be a cult control. It could be a domestic violence situation works on national levels, the whole system of control is the same in any setting of that kind of social manipulation, but it's never 100% perfect. So there's always doubts and I had my doubts while I was in the group, but I just kept pushing them down or I didn't have the courage to face them or I had the fear that if I acted on those doubts that I would be basically kicked to the curb or done away with and so It took about three days of listening to the programmer where those doubts were able to surface to my mind enough. And I was able to reengage my critical thinking that I thought, oh boy, I'm in trouble I have myself in something, it's pretty deep, and it's pretty bad.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you managed to then start to see that this wasn't the place for you to be. Were there recriminations from the group, once they found out that you were leaving.
 
Brian Steele 
I didn't tell them. I just didn't show up to my mission training team where the group was, was going to do more training. Instead, my parents sent me to a rehab center in Ohio for cold victims, which was another tremendous gift. So I didn't face any recriminations from the group because I just disappeared, I didn't tell them where I was, I just literally disappeared off the map from the group. At the Counseling Center, I got to learn about all of the cult dynamics and how the psychological implications I got to unpack the psychological baggage and the emotional damage that was done, I got to straighten out some of the spiritual baggage. And Rodney, I was so fortunate to have that type of recovery, because the vast majority people who leave groups like that, never fully recover. And they never understand what happened to them and why it happened. And they carry that baggage the rest of their lives. It's so sad. So this was 30 years ago. And I still have every once in a while little twinges, I would say, I'm healed. But I have some skin. I have some scars. From that experience. I wouldn't say person who goes through that can ever be fully healed. But a person can find a life that is healthy and thriving, again, a life of faith. But it sure takes a long time running.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what did that do, immediately after that, what did that do for your faith? Was it something that you said, Okay, well, I'm going to turn from this facade of faith into a true faith or, or did it cause you to walk away for a while?
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, I think what happened is the pendulum did swing the other way. I've maintained my faith. But I walked away from the spiritual disciplines and my faith inside the cult, I had to constantly be reading the Bible, always praying, always attending meetings, always on the treadmill, and just the hamster, running as fast as you could and never getting anywhere. So when I left, I think I went too far the other way, Rodney, where I never threw my faith away. But I did wander. And I didn't have the rooting and the grounding of some of the spiritual practices that keep people grounded. So the image that I have the cult felt like Egypt, if we're looking at Israel's story, Egypt was a place of slavery. And those groups like that are effectively a type of slavery. And then from Egypt, I went into a desert, and I wandered, probably for a good 20 years of still being a believer going to church trying to engage. But it was very difficult to engage it in a way that felt like it was really meaningful. And so so there's this period of wandering. And that's, that's really normal. I do feel fortunate that I didn't completely abandon my faith, because that does happen often and understandably.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And there was still further bumps along the road during their time afterwards, weren't they?
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, that's right. So during that period, what I'll call the this wilderness period, I got married, had a child, but I wasn't a whole person. In my marriage. I didn't have a life that was integrated. So I would say it felt like I was a Christian Sunday morning, probably for about an hour, and then Monday, not so much. Wednesday, Thursday, even less Friday, definitely not. Saturday, I'm repenting, so I could be a Christian again, Sunday morning. It was that sort of cycle, which effectively was a cycle of sin management. And that life of integrity, eventually, in part led to a divorce in 2008. And that was an even darker period of my life, going through divorce,
 
Rodney Olsen 
it must have been a very difficult time when you're not fully in touch with faith. So that would be difficult to hang on to. And at the same time, if this comes back to that early thing that you spoke about of not feeling that you you fit in that must have come back to haunt you again.
 
Brian Steele 
Yes. Yeah. And and actually, I've just recently started to understand this about myself with my story of belonging. Because I this last summer, I had a sabbatical and went to the soul shepherding Institute with Bill and Christie Gaultiere and, and was able to peel back some of the layers of the onion, and really look at some of the wounding in my past in a way that I hadn't before. And one of the themes was this belonging. So I think, you know, in in a cult, it's a hyper spiritualized, hyper social pressurized environment. So when I left, I think I want it to get as far away from that as I could. So I went to more of a material individual way of living, as opposed to a spiritual, social way of living. And that pendulum swing, you know, I was attending a church, but I didn't have really deep, meaningful relationships. I also had a type of pride where it was like, I don't really need other people. In terms of my faith, I had isolated myself from meaningful relationships inside the church. So as a member of the body of Christ was a member of the church, but I was withering, because I didn't allow myself to connect fully and meaningfully with other people, I was effectively cut off.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've been through a whole range of different things and, and now you're starting a new journey. When did the idea settle with you that you might even study and become a pastor?
 
Brian Steele 
I have a very unusual route to becoming a pastor. So during the early 2000s, I was actually practicing as a geologist, because I went to school for geology, got my graduate degree in geology, eventually, I joined a firm and was practicing engineering geology, became a partner in the company, eventually transitioned into I was transitioning to becoming president of the company, really doing very well in business and in practicing geology. And at the same time, my son was going into middle school. And so I was at a different church now, and just started volunteering in the middle school youth group, and got really surprised by how much I enjoyed working with the youth group, it was actually shocking. I was like, oh, my goodness, I deeply, deeply enjoy this. And this is satisfying in a way that I've never experienced before, was sort of alarming for me. I'm a volunteer in this ministry. And that just steamrolled, I started gaining more responsibility and having more involvement in it, it really came to a head where the The first time I got to deliver a sermon to these middle school kids, it was so deeply enjoyable. And that same week, I closed a massive business deal in my company. But I had way more satisfaction in this experience in the youth group. And then I thought, Oh, no, I'm in trouble. And so soon after that, the church actually offered me a pastor job to become the youth pastor in this ministry. I mean, that that created a huge dilemma, because I was six months into this transition to become president of the company. So I'd approach my business partners and lay it out and say, you know, this church has offered me to position to become a pastor, and I think I need to explore that. And they were so kind and so generous with me. And they said, Brian, you've been pastoring us all along anyways. So you have to go explore that opportunity. And they gave me this long, long leash, they said, Go check it out. If it's for you, that's great. If it doesn't, you can come back and you can still work for the company. And that was such a gift. And that was incredible. So I have been a pastor now for going on eight years, I was a youth pastor for three years. And now I'm working with adults and how to establish Christ as the foundation in somebody's life. And what's really cool if I could take one little side detour. Part of my responsibility at this congregation is called the belonging team, believe it or not, and my job is to help people feel like they belong in a big congregation and a big church. And I didn't even really connect the dots that this was one of the deepest aches and one of the deepest pains in my life. And God was so good and was so kind that he would use that pain and turn it around, to bring goodness into other people's lives. Like one of the deepest pains of my life, and now, it's part of who I am, and how I'm serving, and how I'm trying to help other people. And it's just, I think God is so creative in the way that he can do that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We know that God doesn't cause the wounds in our lives, but it's constantly amazing to see the way that he takes those wounds those things that we thought were wasted years and, and turn them around. So I imagine you're able to then use that experience for others who are finding that acceptance and that belonging very difficult to be able to walk them very gently towards that belonging.
 
Brian Steele 
That's right, you know, you've you've heard the expression, death by 1000 cuts, I think the Christian life is his life by 1000, cuts, every single one of those small little wounds, the Lord is able to not just restore, and heal, but is able to turn them around to bring blessing and goodness into other people. And it's precisely those small multitude of little cuts that makes our life, I think, meaningful and exciting, and that that ultimately leads to flourishing.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested in your book and the premise solid, looking at one parable that Jesus told that's recorded in the Scripture. And you've studied this for many, many years, tell me what drew you to study this particular parable. And maybe you can start off by outlining the parable for those who perhaps haven't heard it before?
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, it is Matthew 13:44, which Jesus says the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field that a man finds and covers up, and then in his joy goes and sells everything, and buys that field. And I stumbled on this parable in 2012. I didn't know anything about the kingdom at all. I'd been a Christian for a long time, but the kingdom was something that was totally outside of my experience. I'd read about it in the Scripture, but it had no bearing on my life. And backing up just a little bit, actually was reading the parable of the sower. And that's a familiar one which says, you know, the sower goes out, and so as a seed, and some of the seed falls on the rocky ground and some of the thorns and some of the shallow soil, but some of the seed finds good soil. And I noticed, for the first time after reading that parable, probably hundreds of times that Jesus said, the seed is the word of the kingdom. And it stopped me dead in my tracks. Because like, I have no idea what the kingdom is. And then shortly later, I was praying the Lord's Prayer. And we'd all you know, prayed that thousands of times our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come and again, I got stopped dead in my tracks. I'm praying for his kingdom. And I have no idea what his kingdom is. And then the kicker was the parable of the hidden treasure. I believe I was that guy had been walking across a field hundreds of times. And one day, stubbed his toe, and I looked down. And there is this treasure box. And so Rodney, I've been studying that single parable for over eight years now. And the question for me, that I've just been exploring is, what is the kingdom? And why is it worth everything? What is the kingdom? And why is it worth everything? I had to wrestle through whether Jesus was actually being a scam artist when he was telling that parable because my experience was, I don't even know what the kingdom is. So really, you're wanting me to sell everything to acquire this thing? And it didn't seem like a good deal for me at first, does that resonate with you at all?
 
Rodney Olsen 
Yeah, it's interesting that, you know, Jesus doesn't seem to tell us exactly what the kingdom is. It's so much of Scripture is the kingdom is like this. It's like this. It's like this will just tell us what it is.
 
Brian Steele 
Right? So and I think that's intentional. And Jesus being deeply rooted in Hebrew Scriptures and being a Jew himself. The Hebrew scriptures are intentionally vague, because they are inviting you in to explore. It's very different than western teaching. Western teaching is going to go here's your five steps for doing XYZ And then you can do this and that. But Hebrew literature in the Hebrew tradition is filled with question and filled the gaps and ambiguity and filled with mystery so that you step in and you explore the world. And when I say that I've been studying the parable of the hidden treasure for eight years, I really mean if you, if you open that treasure box, and begin to walk through the hidden chambers that are within inside that treasure, it really is endless. It's like pulling this piece of yarn, and you're pulling in, you're pulling in, you're pulling and you're pulling, and it's connected to a sweater that's infinitely large, and you're gonna just keep pulling. And but what happened was Rodney, it was a second conversion in my Christian faith. Everything seemed like it was brand new when I discovered that God's kingdom is not a metaphor, that it's not a symbol, but that it is a real actual kingdom, here and now and that Jesus is a real actual King.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did you start to really come to terms with what you believe this parable is saying?
 
Brian Steele 
That the shift for me is when the kingdom became there, it was a transition from the kingdom becoming real. To the kingdom being really real. This is just an example what I mean by really real. Four years ago, my wife, Katie, got a brain tumor. Before that time, I thought that the brain tumors are real, but they had no bearing on my life whatsoever. They were just kind of real. out there, it was external to my life had no impact on my life. But the moment that we found out about my wife's diagnosis, instantly, brain tumors became really real. That tumor affected every single detail of our life, it invaded almost every conversation that I have, that we had it, it affected our finances, it affected our planning, it affected how we spent our time, it affected our community, brain tumors went from being real, to really real, and that it wove through every fiber of our lives. And that's also what happens with God's kingdom. There's a moment when it becomes something external way out there, that when you realize God's kingdom is really real, and has a bearing upon every breath, that you take every word that you speak every dime, that you spend every minute of your day, every resource, every relationship that hit the rule and reign of Jesus as King has complete and total influence in your life. And meaning and significance. That's when it became it became something. And so that's this, the title of the book is the Kingdom Field Guide: Keys to Finding God's Really Real Kingdom, because Rodney, I don't think the parable, the hidden treasure makes sense so long as we think the kingdom is real. It's not enough. We're not going to go and sell everything for something that's real. It has to become really real.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you find that there are a lot of people in churches who would subscribe to traditional Christian belief, and yet they haven't caught this idea of a really real kingdom. And so therefore, it's part of their life. This Christian faith is part of their life. It's not all consuming as you're explaining, with this idea of the kingdom,
 
Brian Steele 
I think, yes, I think for the majority of Christians, I would even say the majority of Christian pastors, for a lot of pastors and leaders and influencers, the kingdom isn't yet really real. But they haven't understood that it's an actual kingdom. There's a tremendous irony in this, in that we were designed and made to live in an eternal kingdom. So it's written in our DNA. And so if you look at the consumption of media, people spend billions and billions of dollars on Kingdom narratives. Any successful franchise is a kingdom narrative. So Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, all of the Marvel movies, all of the Disney films, they're all Kingdom narratives. It's practically the only thing we'll pay money to watch is a good Kingdom narrative down Abby, like, I'm kind of ashamed to say that, you know, we've been 50 hours of Downton Abbey. And there's a reason. It's because it's a very good Kingdom story. So the irony is, is we're starving for Kingdom narratives were desperate for it will consume them in massive quantities. So I think it's something like this kingdom is the only thing we know. But the problem is, we don't know that we know it. It's operating back of mind.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So really, it's a case of when we do stumble across it, finally, we see it there, that's when we're prepared to sell everything for it, because we realize the value of it.
 
Brian Steele 
That's right, and and that it's been there the whole time. It's always there. The premise of my book is you can't see what you don't seek. And that the kingdom will remain invisible. It might even seem unreal, until you start seeking it as your highest priority. And that's why Jesus says, Matthew 6:33, Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. And he's saying, you don't want to seek it, like you've lost your car keys. You want to seek the kingdom, like you've lost a child, that type of priority. And until seeking God's kingdom becomes the priority of our life. It's not gonna matter. That's the the experience in the in the parable. Imagine the guy walking across the field, again, hundreds of times, the hidden treasure, it's not hidden, because it's buried. It's hidden, because he's not looking for it. So it's there. But he stubs his toe, he sees there's a box there he lifts the lid, he starts pouring through the treasure there's there needs to be I think we have to have a period in our lives where we have to dedicate our mind and our thinking by asking what is the kingdom and searching scripture to see what the kingdom is, then eventually, it's going to move from our mind into our heart, we're going to understand the value. So I love in this in this parable, I have this image in my mind where he's, he's finally captured the value of what he's just found. Then he looks up and what does he see? Rodney, he sees a for sale sign, and this field is for sale. And that's why Jesus says in his joy, he goes and sells everything that he has, it's a no brainer. And that's a test to find out if you have found the kingdom or not. Because if you have, it'll be your greatest joy, your highest priority to have the mother of all garage sales. If you're not yet ready to give everything that you have in exchange for the kingdom, you haven't yet found it or you haven't yet discovered that it's really real.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How do we begin that journey? How do we stub our toe so to speak?
 
Brian Steele 
Rodney, that is the question. It's such an important question. Part of the answer is that we have to learn about the kingdom in a way that Jesus taught the kingdom. He taught by using immersive experiences. So yes, he gave some sermons. And yes, he gave some teachings. But you have to look at where and how he taught. So he taught on location. In these places. The first century Jews were already intimately familiar with and his teaching used the physical stuff that they already knew. So he'd say, Oh, the teaching is like a seed. While they're like you mentioned, they're an agricultural society, so they understand farming. Or he would say the kingdom is like this net that's in the water. Well, they would understand that because they're fishermen, or the kingdom is like leaven while they cook with bread. And so they would understand that, the point being that you have to learn about the kingdom in the way that Jesus taught about the kingdom. So my book, I call it the Kingdom Field Guide, because I'm giving people immersive experiences, to learn about the kingdom, I'm directing people to, to physical places that are going to be all around them, and giving them experiences for learning and how to engage their site, how to engage their mind, how to engage all of their senses, to be immersed, so that the kingdom isn't just something that's just limited to their imagination, but they began to connect it to the real world.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've obviously been on this journey for some time as you've studied this parable. What has been the response of those people that you've helped to take on that journey for those who have entered into this study that you've done and realized it for themselves?
 
Brian Steele 
It's been so fun. I've worked with hundreds of people in my pastor role. And I've seen what's most interesting. I feel like it's been really valuable for people who are in leadership, who have responsibilities in ministry, but they're stuck, and how they communicate to other people about the gospel. So for example, the person who wrote the foreword to the book, his name is Joshua Sheets and he is in high level leadership in a international discipling ministry. And up until the time when we had, we started talking about the kingdom. He didn't know how to communicate to the kingdom, to people that are in his ministry to his leaders. And even further down to the people he was serving. Heat stubbed his toe on the king on the hidden treasure. And this is somebody who has been in ministry for four years. And it became really real to him. And what was so cool was it when he had a sabbatical, he set up different field trips for his family. So they traveled to Israel and to Europe. And he literally like for his kids, he, he hid a box in a field and it gave his children an immersive experience in finding a treasure. And then that helped them understand what God's kingdom was. So I think it's it's all about the immersive experience. It's about the way of learning and the way of really embodying faith. And I've had multiple encounters with people like that who've been Christians for decades, decades, decades, who have not yet made the connection, that God's kingdom isn't just real, but really real,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Is the book available for people to purchase now?
 
Brian Steele 
It is being published going to be on Amazon. And this is book one in a series of seven or eight, all about the parable of the hidden treasure. And you think that one book is enough to explain a parable but 10 books, Rodney is not going to be enough to explain the parable, the hidden treasure, it's all scratching the surface, I think I'd like to speak to people who are in a place where they've they feel stuck. Or maybe they feel like their faith is boring, or dull, or it's routine. And I just want them to know that there is a life of flourishing that's available in this life. That there is like a sense of thrill and excitement. When we discover God's kingdom is really real that that's unlike any other kind of religious duty or any kind of, of just kind of going through the motions. That's really My prayer is that people would stub their toe on the hidden treasure.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you find sometimes that people are so caught up in this idea of kingdom, the kingdom to come in eternity, that they are losing the opportunity to live kingdom right now?
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, I think it's a huge problem. Well, we have to agree that Jesus is an actual King right now, when he said all authority in heaven on earth has been given to me. That's a description of his current rule and reign that right now at this moment, his kingdom is here, not yet fully. But his kingdom has been inaugurated. And in fact, we are the body of Christ, the king, we are the the embodiment of the king on Earth. That means something if we've been delegated that role, and authority to act on behalf of the name of the king, then there's a real tragedy when that doesn't occur. And I even think of, of recently, Prince Harry, and and Princess Meghan, they have recently decided that they don't want to have official duties in the royal family. And so they've moved to Los Angeles and they have, in a sense abdicated their royalty. In many ways. That is a picture of how many Christians are living their lives, that in reality, they are royalty. They have been given responsibilities in the kingdom of God to act on behalf of the king. But they've decided to abdicate their royalty. They've decided to to live outside of the responsibilities The stewardship that's been entrusted to them, which means they're also going to lose a huge amount of the blessing that comes from, from working and living and having that type of relationship. On behalf of the king, there is a loss.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's fascinating to start to delve into this whole area, or coming out of this, this parable, and the parables around it, where, where Jesus talks about pearls and all sorts of things. But if someone is wanting to get hold of the book, or to get in touch with you, I will put some links in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet. But where's the easiest place to track you down?
 
Brian Steele 
Yeah, go to kingdomfieldguides.com. That's field guides with an S. And you can sign up to get the book. There'll be information there. You can also find me on Facebook, I have a Facebook page called Kingdom field guides. Or if you'd like to email me I'd love to, to have connection with people and my email is kingdomfieldguide@gmail.com.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Brian, it really has been an honor to chat to you to talk about some of the things that you've discovered as you've lived life and to come to this point where this book is ready to get out there and to invite others into this kingdom. Thank you so much for your time today.
 
Brian Steele 
Rodney, thank you so much. It's been a great honor being on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net
 

When part of your job is helping others overcome their doubts, how do you admit to the doubts that you’re experiencing?
 
Should faith mean that we never face questions or doubts?
 
Steve Hinton is a pastor and author who has used his own uncertainties to bring greater certainty to others. He has published the book Confessions: Finding Hope Through One Pastor's Doubt.
 
Website: https://www.stevehintonauthor.com/
Blog: https://kingdomology.org/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stevehintonauthor/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stevehintonauthor/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/stvhintonauthor 

When she was just seven years old, Amy Watson's mother left her in the care of two notorious serial killers. She spent several years in a children’s home and later her abusive husband tried to kill her. Amy has faced unimaginable trauma but her story is also one of healing and forgiveness.
 
Website: http://amywatsonauthor.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/amywatsonauthor/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amywatson07/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/amywatsonauthor/
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick out the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thanks for listening today. Please share this episode and don't forget to connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. When she was just seven years old, her mother left her in the care of two notorious serial killers. She spent several years in a children's home and later, her abusive husband tried to kill her. Today's guest has faced unimaginable trauma, but his story is also one of healing and forgiveness. This episode is confronting at times but it also offers hope, and is a story of light that shatters the darkness. Amy Watson is a blogger, author and podcaster. She holds a degree in biology, a master's degree in business administration and has enjoyed success as an entrepreneur, as well as an educator. Amy hosts the podcast Wednesdays with Watson, where she's not afraid to tackle some big issues with her guests. She's also sharing deeply about her own story. We'll get to hear some of that story today. Amy, thank you for joining us on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Amy Watson 
Thank you, Rodney. I am so excited. I so am a fan of your podcast and what you do and more importantly, your message.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you very much. I'm keen to find out more about your very early years, you certainly didn't have a usual childhood. Tell me about growing up for you.
 
Amy Watson 
Yeah, now I definitely did not have a usual childhood of though as most most trauma survivors will tell you. Of course, we didn't know that but I often tell people that I have been an adult for a long time. At the age of seven years old, I was placed into the care of two very well known serial killers here in the States. For those of your listeners here in the states will at least you know somewhat Gen Xers would would know the name Adam Walsh which is a young man who one of these serial killers kidnapped and killed. But my very first of seven abusers was another one of those serial killers. And so that's really one of my earliest memories is that first of seven abusers, and my mom basically let them babysit us and did what whatever she wanted to do and so she was absent for as long as I can remember, that is my earliest memory at seven years old. That's kind of how I got it got started in life, if you will. And so it's not been a not been a great go. Like I said that he was the first of seven, to, to sexually abused me over the course of seven years. At the age of 14, I was finally removed by the state of Florida and placed in a children's home. I tell people all the time. And I still would maintain that that those were the best years of my life, from age 14 to around 18. I was in a children's home. And that was one of the first places that I found unconditional love and safety. And so those seven years from that that first event that I mentioned to you. Fast forward to 14 years old, my mom basically abandoned me to marry abuser number seven. And so that is why I was removed from her care and so pretty rough go from from very, very, very early on, but also afforded some great opportunities that really kind of filled in some opportunity gaps that that somebody in my position could have had. I would definitely say that as non traditional, and it's beginnings for sure. You know, it was intense. And like I said, I feel like I've been an adult for for a very, very long time.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And obviously we're wanting to know your story. But I'm wondering if you can take us back and tell us a bit of your mom's story. What was going on in her life, that she would put a child in danger like that? Did she have some sort of abuse growing up? Or what was her story?
 
Amy Watson 
Yeah, you know, that's such a great question. And and one that one day I hope to get the full answer to. It's unfortunate. My mom was the daughter of a brigadier general and the army and if you google his name, he comes up he was a prominent general during World War One and World War Two Southern affluent family both of her brothers, one of them a lieutenant colonel in the army, another a well known author who wrote for the Baltimore Sun newspaper. And so all that to say that she was the apple of her dad's eye and when he died, she ran away and got married and had the first of four. I'm the youngest of four girls, and had two children by her first marriage and one of them ended up being somehow profoundly intellectually delayed. And it's now to this day institutionalized with an IQ of someone less than a year old. It is thought that she did something to harm my oldest sister to make that happen because she was born completely normal. We don't know is that is the real answer to that we know that she she had opportunities growing up afforded her, I would imagine that being an army brat wasn't easy, and certainly, at that high of a level probably wasn't easy either. And I think that, you know, she tried to measure up to her brothers, and she had her own intellectual difficulties was dyslexic, which, of course, in those days was was not even a thing. And then had some other health issues that came much later in life. And so I wish I could answer that question with great certainty. I do not know, if she also was abused, I know that it should not have been the story. Unfortunately, that was the story. And so by the time I was born, she was 38 years old. By the time I was born, she wasn't 19 when she left to go to get married to her first husband. So there's 20 years between my oldest sister and me, that is such an important question. So I'm so glad you asked us like what happened to you? You know, this podcast is called Bleeding Daylight. It's like what's so dark about you? And I wish I could ask her that. And she is she passed away when I was 19 years old. But what broke you so that you're continuing to basically break other people in some ways?
 
Rodney Olsen 
At the age of seven, she placed you in danger and started that abuse cycle. What about your sisters? You've mentioned one of them, but what about the other two?
 
Amy Watson 
The other two, ironically, is such a great question. I just met them for the first time in January of this year, the divorce with with her first husband was so contested. And even I mean, when you were talking early 1960s, that dad got full custody of both of these girls, and really protected them from her and then also from us. And so as I got older, I knew that they existed, but never could find them. And then of course, went on with my own life and had lots more trauma after that. And so, never really had the resources and so many ways, or even the thought process to try to find them. And Christmas of last year, I said, let me just type her name and Facebook. And she came and, and her picture kind of popped up on and it was like staring in a mirror except for, you know, 15 years from now, hopefully. But it was so obvious that she was my sister. And so I sent her a pm on on Facebook. And she didn't answer me until January. But ironically, she was living in Colorado, and I live in Florida on the west coast of Florida about 90 miles from the Tampa Bay area, and a sleepy bedroom town. She had literally just bought a house on this little town where I live. And so now we live in the same city after I had not met her my entire life. I'll be 49 in December, but just met her in January. And we went and saw my oldest sister in that institution. And that was hard. But we got to meet her too. And so that's been interesting. But that's a relatively new development of just this year, actually. But my sister Lisa, who I did grew up with is three years older than I she too was placed in the care of these of these same two men as as well as some other dangerous people. But at some point, we kind of parted ways. Even as younger kids, I would go one place and she would go and other sort of stories are different in a lot of ways. And then by the time I was 14 and taken away from my mom by the state, she had already left and so many ways while we grew up together until I was around 10 or 12. It was a whole lot of just kind of trying to survive trauma together. And then we were separated until until I graduate from high school when and she and I are so close to the state and she lives a couple hours from me. But But yeah, so she went through a lot of the same stuff. We don't talk about it a lot because that the stories are a little bit different. But she has the other sister that was that was also neglected and abandoned by the same person.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You touched on the point that it's very difficult to know what is normal and what is not. So you had no frames of reference to say, this is not normal. When did you start to realize that life was not actually normal for you?
 
Amy Watson 
You're right. You have no frame of reference. It was a knock on a door. And it was it was a providential knock on a door. And I will always be grateful for this knock on the door. But I was at a friend's house and I was about 10 years old. So about three years after this first episode, there was a knock on the door and we answered it and then a man and Lady stood there with a bag of candy. And they said, Hey, we're Dawn and Mary Lou. We're from Victory Baptist Church and we'd love it if we could pick you up tomorrow on a church bus and take you to church and here's some candy and we'll bring some candy tomorrow. And we're like yeah, we're in. We got on that church bus the next day. I begin to build a community even as a child at church and junior church and and Sunday school and so now I have Sunday school teachers looking at me and junior church pastors looking at me and all of my friends were from home. homes and healthy homes. And so as a beginning to figure out very quickly, when I would go stay with them, and you know, because I had now had a choice, I could pick a safe place to go when my mom didn't want us around, which was always and so I started hanging out with my friends at my at my church, and learned very quickly that Oh, wow, this I'm missing so much in my own home and, and Rodney. Oddly enough, it wasn't, you know, my friend is not in danger. It was my, my friend's parents loved them, wait, your mom is supposed to love you, your mom is supposed to hug you, you know, your mom's supposed to feed you. I didn't know any of that stuff until I started hanging out with my church friends. And then my uncle, my mom's brother put me in an a private school that was attached to that church. And that that saved my life, because I continued to be watched by people who were like, and something is not okay. And so one night, when I knew that my mom's live-in boyfriend who had literally just gotten out of prison as a pedophile and this was, of course, before you had to register to be a sex offender and all of those things. I went to church one night, and just told my pastor's wife what was going on, they called the authorities and I never went back that night, at least. And so I would say that that providential knock on the door, which is also how I, you know, came to know the Lord and the true sense of the word being introduced to him, and then of in later in life, building a relationship with him. But that was a game changer, the obedience of people who just had compassion for people and a bad neighborhood, to say, hey, let's, let's try to give some of these kids who had these opportunity gaps, let's try to give them a fighting chance of getting out of out of this situation that they're in. And so that was around age 10. And it saved me, by age 14, I trusted them enough to say, Hey, here's what's going on at home. And they stepped in. And because of that, then custody was removed from my mom. And decisions began to be made for me, that were in my best interest, and quite frankly, saved me, by quite possibly could have followed some of those same patterns as so often as a case, it was that knock on the door that shifted everything for me, and really helped me understand what I didn't have, which was just love, and protection, and safety. And I got to watch my friends be 10 and 12, and 13, and 14, and not worry about what they were going to eat that night, or if the power was going to be on or you know where their parents were. And that's how I learned the life that we were living wasn't normal.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And at the age of 14, when you're still in that stage of being a girl, and yet becoming a woman, you move to this home. Tell me about that experience and what that was like.
 
Amy Watson 
Yeah, you know, of course, going getting dropped off there. I did stay in foster care for about 18 months before I went to the children's home, that same pastor, that same church and his wife, who was the person that I told, kept me in their home, so I could finish out that school year. And then I finished my freshman year of high school. But it became abundantly clear that I had needs as most survivors of particular childhood abuse do, you have needs. And so there was a lot of attention seeking behaviors, nothing major, you know, no drugs or anything like that, but a lot of whatever I could do to get attention. So that would be you know, that would tell a lie about something silly, or really what it turned into just this. And this is still true about me today is something I fight, but it's this performance, like I'm going to outwait it, I'm going to work it, I'm going to outwit it. But because of some of those things that just occur and a child that has been through that I needed more attention than they could give me they had three kids of their own. And so they made the decision to put me in this children's home, which kind of on the surface doesn't make a lot of sense, because you know, there were 40 kids at the Children's Home. So the day they dropped me off Rodney, even telling you the story I caught my stomach kind of drops, my heart kind of drops, because they had chosen me for 18 months. And then in the drop off at the children's home, I felt like they had abandoned to me. And of course it goes to that famous things shame. Like what did I do to make you not want me? Why does no one want me? And so those early days at the children's home, I had no other recourse but to blame myself it was like it. You know, I thought to myself, my mom is just doing whatever she did. And I could even see my way clear that that wasn't my fault. But when I stayed with my pastor and his wife for 18 months, and they thought it necessary to take me out of their home because of some attention seeking behaviors. And again, I'm not talking drugs or alcohol I'm talking line. That's really the only thing I can think of off the top of my head but just a lot of attention I wanted I needed a lot of their attention. So those early days were hard because it was another abandonment. But what happened next was remarkable and was another one of those providential moments that was a game changer. For me, and that was the directors of the children's home, who at that time, were really just executive and they're in their functions there. But mom, mom and dad McGowan is what we call them. And mom took a special a special special interest in me, she would spend hours with me just hanging out with me, I would work with her in her office and, and she just loved me. And she didn't try to push anything on me. And then before I knew it, this, this children's home was my everything. And these people were my everything. And to this day, that's still true. And so that experience while a meet the immediate part of it was this is just another abandonment. And I had to work through, Why doesn't anybody want me? And I'm not saying that even even when I started to love it there that I didn't have that question in the back of my mind. And so Rodney, what it did was it produced this production monster. And so everything was done at you know, 185 miles an hour, and it was going to be done better and faster and stronger than ever. And so I figured if I perform that way that people would want me. And so that experience was a good one. But that was a habit that I took into my adulthood, unfortunately. But that was the first place besides my uncle and my aunt, who is my mom's brothers that I saw occasionally, that I remember being unconditionally loved. And, and I was loved so well. They're graduated from high school while I was there, went to college on a full ride scholarship. I also worked at the children's home while I was in college for a few years. And so that experience was a good one. It was redeeming it was healing. And I'm so so grateful for that place to be honest with you,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You found that kind of love that you'd been yearning for at the Children's Home. How long did it take you to realize that this was unconditional love? How long before those things in the back of your mind stop saying, well, they're going to give you up soon. anyway?
 
Amy Watson 
I would say two years, probably, I would just perform, perform perform. You know what it was Rodney. When I turned 18, I turned 18 in December and didn't graduate from high school until June. And when they didn't age me out of the system. When I turned 18 and December, when I still had six months of high school left, I knew that they were the real deal. And so it is actually an interesting question. I was never able to actually put a timestamp on that. But I knew then that they weren't going anywhere. And because they they very well could have just said you're 18 go and and they did not. So they allowed me to stay for that the additional six months while I finished high school. So I would I would say it took a while to undo that kind of fear, the constant evaluation of behavior and shame and all those things that love to hide and those dark corners, you know,
 
Rodney Olsen 
So even amongst all this sort of doubt that's going on amongst the abuse and all these things that are happening, there's obviously this potential that that lay there, because you've done well through schooling through college and, and being able to do well there. Did you think that from that point, life was just going to keep improving?
 
Amy Watson 
I did. I did it. I thought I hoped I knew that the worst was behind me. I absolutely did. And that is such a good question for for people that have been through childhood stuff like I have. It was such a gift that I even had the ability to, to hope for continued, and a better future. But I did I 100% debt I graduated from college, I left the Tampa Bay area, which is where the children's home is went back to my hometown. And that's kind of where some more things came off of the rails for me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I want to explore a little bit of that now because you've got these feelings that life is just almost way up from here. You've put the past behind you. But then what happened?
 
Amy Watson 
I moved back to Jacksonville. Like I mentioned, I was not even back in that city for three or four months before I started dating. A gentleman who is about eight years older than I am. I had gotten hurt in the church. And so it was on a bit of a sabbatical from God had been taught my whole life to stay in stay in church and certainly not to marry someone who did not share my faith and who did did not trust in Jesus. But he knew all the right things to say he had two kids already. I knew that I couldn't have kids fell in love with him and did all the things that I was taught not to moved in with him. All of those things. About three months before we got married was the first time that he hit me and he ruptured my eardrum. After that I went back into performance mode thinking okay, there is a common denominator here and it's me. So what am I doing to make people hurt me? Whether it was a serial killer when I was seven, or the six people that came behind him, or my mom, or now my soon to be husband.  Why do people want to hurt me? And it just threw me back into that performance mode, we started a business together, and it did very, very well. And it did well because of a skill set that I didn't even know I had. But I lived in that domestic violence marriage for 12 years and finally left him in 2007, when he put a gun to my head pulled the trigger. And I'm not sure whether the gum jammed, or there wasn't a bullet in the magazine of the gun. But I pushed him off of may tour a bunch of stuff in my shoulder, kind of made it apropos so that I you know, because the most dangerous time to leave a situation like that is at that point. And so I just kind of acted like I forgave him and waited for my time. And when that time came, I had some friends. And I and I'd like to say that all through out my story, I hope that listeners will see a common thread besides my faith is a community because so many people run they don't share our faith, and sometimes hard for me to tell my redemption story, and give them the hope that they need and that they're looking for. But if they don't share my faith, one thing that we all have in common, and I hope you're hearing my story is a community of people, somebody's always willing to step up. And so when it came time to leave him when it became safe for me to leave him, I had people hiding clothes everywhere, all over the city, people putting plane tickets on credit cards for me to get out of the country. So he could be served with divorce papers. So I left him and move back to my college town. That was in 2008. And that is when I realized that life isn't going up anymore. I lost all of that hope that I had as a 22 year old college graduate, or even all the way through my marriage when he would say I'm sorry. And I would attach that that particular incident to some sort of event, you know, live on this, look this, this hope that this is the last time this is the last time this the last time and so by the time I left him and moved in 2008, I had a significant substance abuse issue. And narcotic pain medication, I had been in a car accident a couple years prior to that, and realize that those pills did more than take away the back pain. You know, there's an old saying that when when you have a substance abuse issue, that one is too many and 10,000 is not enough at left him and did get involved in a church and in a community and started teaching high school for a couple years. But Life Life was hard. And all of the trauma came home to roost about that time when I was right after I left him and was living by myself, and an apartment that was you know, 750 square feet, which is like, you know, a bedroom in the house that I moved out love. Life was tough, then, and it led me into this almost as not almost as legitimate crisis of faith. To be honest with you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that there'll be people listening, who will say, What do you mean, you waited until you were almost killed to get out of that relationship? Because so many people don't understand that it's it's not as simple as walking out. You said that even before you got married, there was that first sign of abuse. And yet you stayed in that relationship? Can you help us understand the difficulty of leaving an abusive relationship?
 
Amy Watson 
Yes, thank you for asking that. There's two ways that that question gets asked, Why didn't you leave? or Why did you stay so long? And it feels to us like an indictment. Because what we need to understand is that one in four women will be in a domestic violence situation, one in seven men will be in a domestic violence situation. What people don't understand is if you can imagine so like in my situation, everything was tied to him every single red cent, my job, my car, everything was connected to him. And so to say, why don't you just leave or go to a shelter shelters basically are meant to triage for domestic violence victims. So there's the practical part of why domestic violence victims don't leave, particularly if there's children involved because they don't have the money to leave. And you can't just go to a shelter. And it's still, I can't believe in 2020 we're having this conversation where we, at least in North America don't have anything in place to help domestic violence victims at the onset of the violence. And that's why so many people don't call because they serve a restraining order, which is a piece of paper and that's all it is. And it makes life more difficult for survivors or for people that are in that situation. And so there's the practical part of it. There's the dangerous the physical dangerous part of it like they can find you and the most dangerous time for a domestic violence victim is Right after they leave. And then finally for me, Rodney, I was hell bent on getting him to love me. And so many domestic violence victims have childhood stories like mine. And all we want to do is to be good enough for somebody to love us and to stop hurting us. And so while I am very well educated, and when I finally did leave him getting a job wasn't a problem. None of that money stuff was a problem, because I had some friends and a community that helped me, and I failed at getting him to love me, at least I thought. And so those are the three reasons I stayed the practical, the safety, that probably most prominent was, I made a vow, I loved him, and I wanted him to love me back. I wanted to stop doing whatever I was doing to make him hit me, and it wasn't until I got back in church and got a community who was speaking life into me, that life began to at least look like it had a tiny little bit of hope people were were speaking that no, that is not your fault. They did not do what so many people want to do is just come in and save the day they walked with me they watched it, I really believe that had they thought that at any time, my life was really in danger, they would have called the police. And certainly the time you put the gun to my head, I made sure I told all of them. And they they were like you have 72 hours to go or we are going to do something about it. And so there is an appropriate time to do something about it. That is such a common question that I'm so glad you asked. Because it's just not that simple. We simply don't know what that domestic violence victim brought into that relationship in terms of insecurities, in terms of abuse, history, like I have abandonment history like I have. And we are just human beings who want somebody to love us. And I just wanted him to love me and I was so determined as a performer to make him love me and to stop doing whatever it was that made him hit me and it wasn't until I got a community of people at my church that spok into me and helped me and lifted me up that I was able to get out. And so it is such as lonely existence and domestic violence. And then when you tell friends, oftentimes they respond with that indicting question. And they Meanwhile, but they make it worse. And so we don't tell anybody. And so I've made it my my mission, whether it's my blog, or whatever, when when I get the opportunity to speak into the lives of people currently in domestic violence situations, to really just say, look, I get it, I understand, and to help them get out and get out safely. And that remains one of my passions, because that is an amazing question. I'm so grateful that you asked it because the average person just can't wrap their head around why you would stay. And it just isn't that simple. Unfortunately,
 
Rodney Olsen 
it sounds like all the way along. Those who will visit abuse upon someone are also using manipulation the whole time to make you feel like this is the best that you deserve. How do you break free from that?
 
Amy Watson 
Yeah. And that's exactly what they do. They they Gaslight you and I'm the best, you deserve, way, way worse than me and all of that. And so for me breaking free from that. There's an old saying in the psychological world that they get you by crook or by hook. And so he often would after an event, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And then lavish love and gifts and all of that stuff. And so I broke free from that manipulation, because of that community that I told you about. But after I left breaking free from the lies that that I deserved to be hit, and all of those things came from and continues to come from a lot of work in counselors offices, a lot of love by being loved by my community. And I real crisis of faith where I just cried out to Jesus, just like John the Baptist said, you know, are you going to help me or should I be looking for somebody else? And so, it wasn't until in the middle of PTSD, flashbacks and floodings and, and just horrific physical issues that I have as a result of this life that I've had of abuse as complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder with a ton of physical issues. I ended up in the hospital, a five day hospital stay for a nervous breakdown about a year and a half after I left him and walking around the halls of that psych ward was the first time in my life I remember not having any responsibilities for myself that my meal that day didn't depend on anything that I did, and my clothes or having a roof over my head. None of it depended on my performance because I thought the children's home would kick me out if I if I wasn't a good kid. But it wasn't until I was hospital. I was with a complete nervous breakdown, that that breakthrough from his lies and his manipulation and that terrible self worth that that gives a survivor of abuse. It wasn't until after that break down. And that crisis of faith and people just investing in me and, and speaking life into me as they continue to do this day. But Rodney, a lot of work in counseling, trauma informed counseling, but it's still very much cloud who I am today, I've just turned it into a mission and try to stay on the right side of it and use it for good. I don't agree to every interview, I wanted to do this one because I love your podcast, being a really good steward of the pain is important to me. And so I use my voice, and I use my story when I think it matters. And when I am when I think it'll help people, and it's turned it into purpose, it makes the pain, I was gonna say bearable, but it makes me embrace the pain. Because there's such purpose in the pain, people need to hear a voice of somebody that has been through some stuff and has every reason to have a needle in their arm, or to be drinking every night or any of those things. And that's just not my story now, because of a lot of people along the way. And obviously, you know, my faith and my church. And like I said counseling, but it takes a while to break that paradigm. And unfortunately, it comes back every now and then when you're in a domestic violence situation like that, that manipulation, like it's your fault. And and because I had already come out of a childhood abuse thing that is our default, that is my default is if something bad happens, it's my fault. And it's a hole that I often have to bury myself out love, come back to the center and come back to the truth of who I am, who I am, and who they were. And and really just try to let it Let it be used for good.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So as part of the healing, recognizing those defaults, and when you start to lean towards those defaults to be able to catch yourself
 
Amy Watson 
Absolutely and and second, a close second to that is having five star friends that will call you out on it, who will just say, Hey, I'm seeing flickers of some behavior that's indicating to me that that we need to get you back to back to center, back to what I call your Psalm 139ness are fearfully and wonderfully made ness or made in the image of God, as we see in Genesis 1:26 and 1:27. Now, so many years later, absolutely. There are defaults, that'll make me go. And there's some some cutting edge therapies that I've that I've been in that make that actually my brain will say you deserved better than than that abuse. And yeah, pull out all of that performance mode that I tried to get into make people love me and be me. But really a close second to that as a community of people who tell me that all the time and who will say hey, Amy, take a day off, walk away from whatever it is you're doing often writing or podcasting or whatever that brings back up the trauma, since so often make me fall into those old habits. And so yeah, there's a list of things eating not eating is one of them for me, Rodney, so I know that I'm struggling when I don't take the time to eat three meals a day. And so stuff like that the eating thing is something that's obvious to everybody. But that is one major one for me. And one that even in real time on this day that we're recording this that I'm struggling with, where my friend will say to me, Hey, did you eat today, and I get that text message every day. And some days I go? No, and she's like, it's four o'clock, I'm like, Okay, I'm going to eat now. And so I can't stress that that community aspect enough. You know, I would love to tell you a story like like Shay Watson told you on your podcast of this time when all of this stuff that the PTSD stuff stopped. For me, it is better, there's no doubt that it's better. But I still very much every day walk with PTSD. And every part of my body that is affected as well. That's not the story that the Lord has told. complete healing. For me, it is it is work. Every day, I use the analogy when I wake up. Most people wake up on sea level, I wake up in a basement. And so I just kind of have to climb out of that basement to get to where most people even just wake up in terms of how they're going to operate that day, and how they're going to treat themselves and how they're going to, you know what they're going to put in their body and that kind of stuff. And so there are definitely defaults, and definitely warning signs. I'm still in counseling, which I think is so important with this kind of body of trauma, and which also is obviously helpful and somebody somebody's watching me, I always say, you know, I've got plenty of people watching me or checking on their strong friend as they call it. That's That's such a good question. Because it it doesn't go away for everybody. It didn't go away. For me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's one thing to do that work within yourself to bring yourself to a better place and it sounds like you're a long way along that track, even though there's still work to be done. But it seems to be taking things to a new level when we start to talk about forgiveness, especially forgiveness for those who haven't ever come You said, I'm sorry, how do you start to forgive people who have brought that abuse into your life?
 
Amy Watson 
Yeah, I learned that lesson the hard way. Right after I turned 18 years old, the state could not tell me or my mom that we could not communicate with each other. And so after she left to get married to the seventh abuser, when I was 14, I saw her at my high school graduation when I was 18. A year later, I was standing in a hospital room where she was on a ventilator, essentially, I knew that was the last visit with her and I stood above her Rodney, and I listened to all the machines in the room, breathing for her everything, all of it, and I looked at her in the bed, and I wanted to just pick up her hand and say, I forgive you, because I knew she was going to die. And I couldn't even do that I just couldn't do it Am I was too, too shattered, my heart was shattered in a million pieces. And I couldn't even begin to know what that even look like to forgive her while she died just a couple months later, and I never got the opportunity to tell her that I forgave her. And I lived in that regret. And I promised myself that I would never ever, ever live in that regret again. And so then I just started over forgiving everybody like, like my ex husband, you punched me in the face. It's good. Let's move on. And there was some air quote, transaction of forgiveness, if you will. But it wasn't until I got healthy enough, especially after I got out of that domestic violence marriage. I've been in counseling a couple years, been really involved in my church gotten the help that I needed for the substance abuse, and so really beginning to deal with life. And I just really began to wonder, and I and I referenced that earlier, what happened to you to make you this broken? Because that makes me sad, whatever that is that happened to you. Somewhere along the way, I realized that when we read Ephesians 4:32, it says Be compassionate one to another tender hearted, forgiving one another. And so some, some translations say kind. I like that word compassion. And I like that it comes first. Because I think that if we can even take a tiny step, I mean that a millimeter of a step in the direction of compassion for the people who hurt us, like, what happened to you, and what broke you, because I'm so sorry, that whatever broke you, it affected me, and there's parts of us that are never going to be okay, I'm not going to continue to put myself on the line of your fire. But I'm so sorry for whatever broke you to make you do these horrible things to me. And so my path to forgiveness is not the, you know, Jesus forgave me and I must forgive even though that's true, I think that it stands to reason that being able to forgive is a is a fruit of being forgiven by Jesus and what he did for us on the cross. But that approach always fell flat to me. Like, if I didn't forgive, Jesus wasn't gonna forgive me that always fell flat to me. But what didn't and what doesn't feel flat to me, is what they did, they did. And and, and today, I still pay the price for it in many, many ways. But it makes me sad for both of these two people, whatever happened to them, they both took to the to their graves with them, and they were miserable, sad people. And so compassion is bread forgiveness for me. And at first, it was that regret, it was regret, you know, that regret of not forgiving my mom and she died. And that's why I would just over forgive. And I said, and I use that word like it is actual true, I don't know that you can over forgive. But I let a bunch of stuff slide that I should have called out on the carpet, because there's a difference between calling it out and forgiving it. condoning and forgiving are also two different things. And so compassion was my pathway to forgiving both of them. And I don't know what happened to either one of them to make them broken. But I am old enough in my life now to look at people who don't treat their wives and their children, like they treated me. And so the vast majority of the world doesn't treat their wives and children, like I got treated. And so it stands to reason they needed something. And so compassion was my pathway to forgiving both of them.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm sure that there are parts in your story that resonate very deeply with some of those who are listening right now. If people are wanting to get into contact with you to learn more about your story and connect with you, what's the best way for them to do that?
 
Amy Watson 
I think probably the easiest way is AmyWatsonauthor.com such as a m y, and then Watson w a t s o n and then author.com or Google Wednesday's with Watson, you also find me that way. But the easiest way would be my website and just hit that contact button I would love. It is a ministry of mine to work with survivors, particularly domestic violence and childhood abuse at the layman's level that I can. As you know, I've made it my passion with some of the interaction that you and I have had together. And so yeah, my website would be the easiest way for them to get in touch with me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And we will make sure that links to your website to your podcast, or in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet. So people can go there. But as you say, the easiest way is just to head to that website or just a Google and they will be able to find you very quickly. Amy, I know that there's a whole lot more of this story that we could continue to unpack. But I think this is a great place to leave things. Looking at this idea of forgiveness. It's not excusing bad behavior, but actually helping to bring healing to yourself and I really appreciate your openness and your honesty today. Thank you so much for sharing some of your story on Bleeding Daylight,
 
Amy Watson 
Rodney, it's been my pleasure and please keep doing what you're doing. I love what you're doing. dispelling the darkness and and love your podcast, love your heart. And please keep doing what you're doing. It's been such an honor to be here with you today.
 
Emily Olsen 
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net

Jennifer Wilcox is the Founder and Managing Director of Rahab Center, a place for women to break the chains of poverty and learn to grow and thrive in the community. Jennifer turned a horrific childhood and abusive, broken marriage into the beginnings of a program that is now helping other women to transform their lives. Her own story of transformation is inspiring. Today we’ll hear how she went from using alcohol and bad relationships to numb the pain to being in a stable marriage with two children and hope for the future.
 
 
Website: https://www.rahabcenter.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rahabcenter/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rahabcenter/
Email: contact@rahabsheart.com
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen
Welcome. Don’t forget to connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
My guest today has turned a horrific childhood and abusive, broken marriage into the beginnings of a program that is now helping other women to transform their lives. Her own story of transformation is inspiring. Today we’ll hear how she went from using alcohol and bad relationships to numb the pain to being in a stable marriage with two children and hope for the future.
 
She’s currently writing a book about her life, but we’ll get a sneak peek at her remarkable story today.
 
Jennifer Wilcox is the Founder and Managing Director of Rahab Center, a place for women to break the chains of poverty and learn to grow and thrive in the community. The center was born out of Jennifer's personal experience, and today we'll explore some of her story. It's an honor to have her joining us on Bleeding Daylight. Jennifer, thanks for your time.
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, thank you for having me today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Before we look at the amazing work that you're doing through Rahab Center, can you take us back to your own childhood and help us understand what growing up was like for you?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Sure. So I grew up in Louisiana here in the United States and I grew up extremely poor. We were raised on government assistance, meaning food stamps, WIC, state funded health care, all of those things and at the age of 15, I remember very vividly standing in line at the grocery store buying groceries for the family. And I had to pay with food stamps. And at that time, food stamps, were in a coupon booklet where you had to tear them out and count them out, just like you would money to the cashier. And this sense of humiliation just came over me. And at that time, I told myself, I will never live like this. I do not want my children to ever experience this. So at the young age of 15, I didn't realize what I was telling myself then but now I see why I told myself that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what was home life like for you?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, you know, my home life was not great. I had a very abusive mother and stepfather. You know, it just, it was a lot, a lot of abuse, a lot of emotional abuse, a lot of physical abuse. And don't get me wrong, I believe in the Word of God. And I believe that children do need to be corrected and disciplined. But there is a strong difference between discipline and abuse. I went through things with my mother causing manipulation. So she would tell me one thing, and then turn around and say she never told me that, and it would end me getting in some kind of trouble with my stepfather. When I would grow up, and I would have to be disciplined, we got a leather belt across our backsides, or we got in trouble with a plastic baseball bat. And so as I grew up, my mother became very angry with me and she would do things like pull me around by my hair, or hit my head into the wall. So I didn't have the greatest childhood experience. And I have three younger brothers. So I would take the brunt of what was coming so that they did not have to experience the abuse. I never wanted them to go through that. Once I got old enough, and I left home, you know, there was no one there to shield them from that. So they took the majority of it once I left
 
Rodney Olsen 
As a child we have no frames of reference to what is normal. At what age do you think you started to understand that what was going on was not right and was not normal?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, it was at the age of 14. And what happened at the age of 14 is like I said, I had no reference, like you said no money, no, no knowledge of what was normal, not normal. But I knew that if I wanted to get out of my parents' house, I needed a job, I needed to make money to be able to support myself, because I knew that it costs money to do that. So at the age of 14, I decided to take a job as a dishwasher in a restaurant, it was my very first job. And at that time, the pay was only $2 an hour, but they were paying me cash. So I took it. And I worked there for three years and decided that I was going to save enough money to get out. But that didn't happen. In my household when you worked. You were had to pay your parents and I had to pay them for driving me back and forth to work because I wasn't old enough to drive. So the majority of my check was going to them for payment to get me back and forth to my job. And then on top of that, they decided that since I had my own job, I had to support my own self meaning I had to buy my own school supplies. I had to buy my own school clothes. And I didn't have a problem with that at first. But when they were taking over 50% of what I was bringing in, that makes it a little difficult on a 14 year old child.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Now, there's never any excuse for abuse of this kind but there's generally reasons behind it. Did you ever get an indication of what was behind this for your mother and your stepfather? Were they issues in their past that caused this?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Yes. So with my stepfather as I got older, I started to learn more about his past. He grew up in an abusive home. So that's all he knew. So he was just repeating what he knew. With my mother, the story was a little bit different. She grew up in a home that was Roman Catholic. They were very strict Roman Catholic. So my grandparents were extremely strict. I would say that they never did any abuse. I never heard of any abuse from them or any of my aunts and uncles. I think my mother, just being the youngest child, just learned how to manipulate at a very young age. And she continued to do that. And when she wasn't able to manipulate the things that she wanted, she lashed out in an abusive way.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's very hard for a child to come to terms with the sorts of things. As you've mentioned, you're trying to save and trying to get out of home. When did that escape, so to speak, finally happened for you,
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
That finally happened at 19. Unfortunately, I thought I had met the man of my dreams at 19 and decided to marry him. But before we even got married, the emotional abuse started with him and so I jumped right out of one situation into another because what you see as a child, and you're used to you're going to repeat that cycle unless you know better. Well, I did not know that he had childhood abuse in his life. I just thought he was my knight in shining armor coming to save me. So before we were even married, the emotional abuse started. Now on our wedding day, very interesting. I had a gut feeling that I did, I just couldn't do it. I did not want to marry this man. And I went, and I told my mother that I did not want to marry him. And her exact words to me were, you're going to get that blankety dress on and you're going to walk your blank down that aisle and you are not going to embarrass me. And I was so scared of what she might do that I ended up marrying this man. And from that marriage, the abuse got very verbal and physical. And the night I decided I had had enough was the night that he put a gun to my head and pulled back the trigger and I just started praying, you know, for God to help me because I was scared. I knew I was going to die that night and I managed to get away from him. And I went back to my mom's house because that was the only thing that I knew. And I told her what had happened. And she said to me, Well, what did you do to deserve this? And right then and there. And that one moment, I knew that she did not love me that she did not care what had happened to me. So I ended up going back to him for a short period. And we separated. And then we were divorced two years later, because he refused to sign the divorce papers because he was trying to hold that control over me. So by the time I was 21, I had already been married and divorced.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's a real time of turmoil for you and as you say, during that time, you you were just praying. Was that out of a sense of I know there's someone out there or was there some kind of faith there to fall back on at that time?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
You know, I never grew up in the church but the one thing that my mother did do, she sent us to Vacation Bible Schools because she needed a vacation from us children. So I was grateful for that, because it was a week that I could learn something new, and there was no yelling and screaming and hitting during that week. So I always looked forward to that week. So I always knew that God was there. But I didn't understand God because I didn't have that foundation to build on. I only had once a year of going to Vacation Bible School camp.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So he you are at age 21 with this wrecked marriage and abusive marriage that you've got out of. What happened then? Where do you go when you're in that sort of circumstance?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, at that time, when I left him, I didn't have anything. He took all of our money and drank it away and used it for drugs. So I literally did not have but $20 in my pocket when I left him. And when I did, I didn't know what I was going to do. So I found some friends and lived with them for a little while. But unfortunately, my life took another turn. I when I left him, I had no self esteem, no self worth, I was seriously depressed because I had grown up all my life thinking that I wasn't worth anything. Nobody loved me. So I went down a road of starting to drink again. And I drank heavily. I started drinking on Wednesday night and this went through till Saturday night, I would just start drinking. And that's how I numb the pain. But that road took me down an even darker road. And that road led me to drinking to the point of passing out and I would wake up in places that I didn't know where I was, I would be in some hotel room with some man laying next to me. And I had no idea who he was or how I got there. And so this went on for several years, it was close to 10 years that this went on because I didn't know my worth. It's a very scary situation as a woman to be out there and drinking to the point of passing out and not knowing where you are or who you are with and you know it's by the grace of God that I did not end up dead.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So how did things start to turn around for you?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, I actually got a job. And this job was with this lady who she really cared about me. And she said to me, Jennifer, you have to stop this. I am scared that one day I am going to get a phone call, and I am going to have to come identify you. And I said, Oh, no, no, that's never going to happen. And because at the time, I had actually decided I was going to go back to school and start my life over, I knew I needed to do something different. But I didn't know what so I decided to become a CNA, put myself through school, got a job immediately right after but the problem with that job was is that I had to be there at 6am in the morning until three in the afternoon. So I was out drinking all night, until two or three in the morning, I would land and get some sleep for an hour or two, and then go to work, which is not a good thing when you're taking care of sick people. And this lady really connected with me, and she was scared for my life. And she just kept talking to me and talking to me. And finally, one day I realized enough was enough. I could not live this way anymore. We were supposed to go to a concert that night. And she never showed up. So I gave her ticket to someone else. Well, that night when I went to that concert, I ended up meeting a gentleman who is now my husband, you know, he really didn't have a great Christian background. But I knew that I wanted something more. And so we got married, and we started going to church before we got married. And that all stemmed of I had gotten into an argument with him, because that's all I knew with people, I only knew how to fight. I didn't know how to be kind and be loving, because I was never shown that. So my way of responding was always to yell, throw things, hit things, those sort of things. Because when you grow up in that situation, and you've had it, that's all you know. So we had gotten into a verbal disagreement. And I went down to the guest bedroom and just stayed there and started crying out to God, because I knew there had to be something different. And I was tired of living this way. I was tired of living angry, I was tired of having to drink to numb the pain that I was feeling. I was tired of the hate that I felt towards everyone. So that night, I stayed down in that room, and I just cried and poured everything out to God and just asked him to please help me to forgive everyone in my past, especially my mother, because that was my biggest hurt was her. And I just cried out to him and stayed down there until I got it all out of my system. And I felt a sense of peace come over to me because when you are crying out to God, and that time of need, he's there. And he answered me, and he lifted that burden from my shoulders. And from that point, you know, it's still a work in progress every day. But from that point on, when I prayed and cried out to him, he took the wheel. And he's led my life ever since. And you know, I'm 46 years old now. And I've had a lot of barriers and obstacles put in my way. But you know, those were put there for a reason. And it's made me the woman who I am today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned, seeking forgiveness with your mother and being able to forgive her. Was there a time when you've been able to do that and reconcile with it?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
You know, we do not have a relationship to this day. I have tried in the past. But like I said, I I went to God and I laid it at his feet, I laid it at the throne because that's what we need to do. And he really helped me through that process of forgiveness. But in that process, I wrote her a letter. And I just let everything come out. And I told her that no matter what I forgave her, and that I understood, and so I have chosen to this day not to reconcile with her because she has not made the changes that she needs. And through prayer and careful consideration. It is just not best for her to be in my life right now, especially with my children.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what about your brothers? How's the relationship gone with them?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
I have a very close relationship with my younger brother. We are extremely close. The other two, we don't really have a relationship that is because of their choice. They have chosen some paths that are not great. And so I just love them where they're at and when they are ready to make those changes. I am here and I have told them that but myself and my younger brother we are extremely close and we have been since the day he was born.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And tell me about your family. Now. It looks very different. Obviously. Tell me about how home life is for you.
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, my family is very different. I never thought I'd be on this journey that I am, like I said, I am married. And I've been married to my husband since 2007. And we actually have two young children, I have a seven year old and an eight year old. And God has blessed me with these two amazing little boys. We went through a lot of trials to be able to have children. And I was never physically able to carry a child. But God blessed me, I lost my last child in December of 2012, I was 12 weeks pregnant, and I miscarried that child. I came home from the hospital. And I just spent the day crying out to God and talking to him about it, because he knew where my heart was about wanting to be a mother. And a sense of peace came over me that I have only ever felt one other time in my life. And I just knew somehow everything was gonna be okay. Well, then the story comes to May of 2013. And I was crying to God, because I didn't want to go to church because I knew Mother's Day was coming. And I told God, please don't make me go to church and not be a mother again, you know, they're going to ask the moms to stand up. And you know how much I want to be a mother. I don't want to go and not have children. But we had already started the adoption process. But what I didn't know was that God was going to bring me my first baby on Mother's Day of 2013. I got the phone call. And I answered the phone. Sorry, I'm trying not to cry here because it just brings tears to my eyes. But he, my adoption counselor said, I have a wonderful little baby boy for you and he's 15 months old and she said, but there's a catch. And I said, oh, what's the catch? And she said, he has a baby brother that's going to be born in two weeks. And I need you to take both children. And I just felt the floor and started crying. Because you know, when God says he'll pay you back double for your troubles, he surely did. I lost a baby. That took a lot out of me. And he brought me to more. And so I am went from no children to two children in two weeks. And so it's been a little bit of a rollercoaster. But it's a good thing. Because God chose me to be there, Mama, I just didn't know that I was supposed to be their Mama until he brought them to me. So today, it's just me and my husband and our two children.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Is there still attention for you? Knowing what you came from knowing that you didn't have a good family life modeled for you in the way that you're bringing up your children?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Yes. So you know, before I had children, I've prayed a lot to God, because I did not want to repeat the cycle that I grew up in. And honestly, that was one of my biggest fears. And God had to help me overcome that fear. And he works with me every day about it every day. With my children, there's a huge difference. I do not like to discipline my children because of what I went through. Although I am learning how to do that, and I loving and caring way. It's better than no discipline. And with my children, you know, we are very actively involved in the church community. As a matter of fact, you know, my children go to the AWANA program here. On Monday nights on Wednesday nights, we attend another church for a children's program that they have, and then on Sundays, we're back at a home church. So you know, there's a huge difference between what I grew up in and what they're growing up in. They're getting to see firsthand the love of God, and what it's like to have a mom that that serves god what it's like to have a dad that serves God, you know, so they're getting to see that aspect of it that I never got to see. And I wanted to break that generational curse that was on me, so that my children could live to be able to grow up and serve God once they become adults.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We often talk about the church as family. Are you finding that you're getting that role modeling through members of the Church of of how to be family?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Yes, I you know, the church is a good example. And they do you are right, it is a family. And I do see that with other parents. My children are also homeschooled, which is an absolute blessing. And so I'm really close with some of the homeschool moms. And so I get to see them and how they are raising their children by you know, having them at home, homeschooling them, but also integrating God into their everyday lives. So I'm really lucky that I get it from more than just the church. I get it from the women around me that are in my circle.
 
Rodney Olsen 
This is all led to a place where you've experienced poverty, you've experienced abuse, and you've decided to make a difference for others. Tell me how that happened.
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
When I got the children, I went I went from full time working and traveling and doing what I wanted to do, to all of a sudden becoming a mom of two kids, I had a toddler and a newborn, all in two weeks. So anybody out there with children, I understand what you're going through, especially when they're that age, it came to a point where I didn't want to stay home all the time with my children. I knew there was something more out there. So I spent two days in prayer and talking to God and saying, what is it that you want me to do? Because I know there's more out there, I see the hurt, and I see the pain and I know I can be used for something now what do you want to use me for? So he showed me a vision of me helping women and teaching them the skills that they needed to overcome abuse and poverty, you know, me and my hardhead, I argued with God for a little bit over that and going, No, I'm not qualified to do that. And he said, you are qualified. Look at some of the people I've used. They weren't qualified either. But I chose them. So he chose me for this mission. So it took me two years to get it started. But I started what is called the Rahab Center. And what we do is we have women that come in that are on government assistance, and they come to our program, and they are looking to break that cycle of being on government assistance. Now, 98% of the women that we see coming through our program, are coming out of some sort of domestic violence situation, we seen very quickly that we needed to integrate some kind of trauma based healing for them to where they can heal from that trauma and be able to move forward and break that generational curse on them and their family. So everything we do at the center is biblically based, but they come into the center, and they are not a believer in God, they will see how much love we have for them. And they can see how all of my volunteers and I operate. And they soon come to know the Lord and start understanding their worth in the Lord. And that is the biggest thing to this is once a woman sees her worth and the Lord, and she knows that it doesn't matter what her family told her, or what her husband told her or whoever. But it's what God thinks of you. And when they see that that transformation that happens in them is something that's absolutely powerful. And so me adopting my children, I seen a lot of that poverty in the system of foster care. So we want to be able to help moms learn how to break those cycles, so that they're not losing their children into the foster care system.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're talking about bringing them into the Christian faith. And we look through the Christian scriptures, and there's so many references to father. And yet so many of these women, I'm sure, have really bad experiences with their own father, how do you get them to bridge that gap to understanding that there's a difference when we talk about farther in the scripture?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, you know, to bridge that gap, really, honestly, I use my own story, to show them and I get into a lot of detail with them. Because they need to know when they come in that it is not just me talking that I've actually lived this and learned that God is our True Father, he may not be our earthly father. And so that is the difference they have to understand. But he's our Heavenly Father, He created us. And if it wasn't for him, we wouldn't be here. So that's what we teach them is that there is a huge difference between what you have here on Earth, and what we have in heaven. And it doesn't matter where we came from. God still loves us enough. And he adopts us into his family. And he wants us, he cares about us enough to be concerned about what we're going through to lead these women to me, so that I can help them understand his love.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And how long has the program been running now?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
We started in 2018. So we are at our two year mark, we just passed our two year mark in August 15 of this year,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I imagine you're starting to see some of the successes that come out of that program. And I know that you wouldn't want to betray a confidence but are there some stories that you can tell us of some of the women who have been through the program and and what life is like for them now?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
The program goes up to 24 months. And the reason for that is because healing doesn't happen overnight. Sometimes it doesn't happen in 30, 60 or 90 days, like we'd like to believe it's not a quick fix. It's something that we need to take our time with and we need to do and we need to deal with all aspects of it. So some of the women that have come through and that they have left the program have been able to go out and get a job. So they're still you know, learning once you go from, I put this once you go from having nothing, no income, you're depending on someone else. And you are now making your own money that is a huge mind shift huge for these women. So because I can't break confidentiality, but I will just tell you a story of a woman who came to us and she had a degree, she had a medical degree. And she's very intelligent and very smart. She does have a job in the medical field right now. But she is still working on her healing process. She came out of an a very abusive childhood and marriage, she's a mom. And so every day for her, she's still working on that. I've had women come to me that just need help with budgeting, and how to grocery shop. And that's fine. We meet each woman where they're at in the program, we don't try to take them somewhere where they're not ready to go. We have a client that has a weight problem, she weighs 450 pounds. And where we are at with her she's been in the program for a year, she is overcoming right now, her hurdles with the weight. Because when she came out of her domestic violence situation, she got on so many drugs that the doctor had put her on, she became just like comatose, almost. And so then her way of dealing with all of that is she would eat food constantly. So we are still in the process of working with her. This is a journey for these women, this is not something like I said that happens overnight or in a time frame, we give them the time that they need to heal. Of course, being in the program, they still have to do the work. If they don't do the work, and they're not willing to show up and put the effort forth, then we release them from the program until they are ready to do the work. Because if they're not willing to take the steps to learn how to fish, then they're not ready to take the steps that they need to fully recover.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned there about the lady who's having problems with her weight, and she's on all sorts of medication. I imagine that in various cases, you would have to be working alongside other professionals such as the medical professionals in her case, is that a hurdle for you? Or are you finding ways to work alongside the other people that these ladies are encountering?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
You know, it's a great thing because when people know what these ladies are doing and that they're working with me, then what they do is we're able to bring everyone together and work together. The lady that I just was telling you about I praise God every day because she's off of those medications now. So she has a clear mind, and she's focusing. But yes, anybody that comes to us that has medical professionals, we cannot talk to anyone outside of ourselves circle until they give us permission, we hold everything we do at the strictest confidence. And I wouldn't want someone else that's working with them break their confidence. So we actually have a release form in place that these women sign and tell us who we can and who we cannot talk to.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm wondering if you look back to that 15 year old who was standing in the store with the food stamps, and you told her what her life would become? Can you imagine, try to get your mind around that as that 15 year old,
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
I look at that almost every day. And who would have ever known where I was at that 15 year old to where I am now. But you know, if I was that 15 year old today, I would tell that 15 year old, it's okay, just trust God, because you never know where your life's going to end up and look for mine. It took a complete 180. And so, you know, don't ever let let what you're going through now stop you. Don't ever let someone else tell you what you can and can't do. Don't ever let someone else tell you that you're not worthy, that you're not loved because you are and even if you don't feel it here from your earthly parents, there's a father in heaven that loves you more than you can even possibly understand. And when you find that person, that mentor in your life, that can help you. Stick with them. Don't give up. And I'll tell you it's some days are not easy, but it's okay. God never said we were going to be here on this earth and everything was going to be rainbows and sprinkles. We are going to have trials. But you know what he's there to pick us up during those trials. He's there to carry us through when you can understand that. That changes your whole perspective about things.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I mentioned that there's a lot of good advice in there. For women who are listening who would ever have access to the rehab center, or even a similar center, wherever they are living, is there other advice that you would pass on to women who are finding themselves in a difficult situation but don't have access to that sort of a program.
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
My biggest advice, if they don't have access to the program that we offer is I would reach out and find someone. If you are in a domestic violence situation, and you are ready to get out of that situation. Almost everywhere you are has a domestic violence shelter, reach out to them. That is your first step. Your second step is especially. If you are in church, because these types of stories don't just happen with women that are in poverty, these situations happen to everyone. And it even happens right in our own church, and we don't realize it. If you are in one of these situations, and you are in a church, reach out, reach out to your pastor, if you don't feel comfortable talking to your pastor, then you find someone in your church that you are comfortable with that can help you through this and get you pointed in the right direction. You can't do this by yourself. I tried. That road led me down a very dangerous road with alcohol, and ending up in trouble with different men. That's not the story I want to hear from these women. Reach out, get that help. And I would suggest start praying, start praying, God will answer you, He will guide you, he will actually bring the people to you to help you. But take a step. And know that no matter what you are going through, you are worthy. God did not put you here on this earth, to be abused, to be beat down with words. That is not what God created you for. God created you to go out there and live and let his light shine through you so that you can bring other people to him. So just remember that no matter what you may feel like you are worthy and you are loved.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And maybe a few words for the many people that we hear in our society, saying that if someone is in an abusive relationship, they should just leave. We know that that's actually difficult. Why is it so difficult?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
It's very difficult, because when you're in that situation, that's not just physical abuse, it's mental abuse. So you are made to think that no one else is going to watch you. No one else is going to love you. There's a lot of things that happen in an abusive relationship that is hard to understand, especially if you have children involved in it. The women don't want to leave because they don't know how they're going to be able to support their children. And that's a scary thing. But what they need to realize is that their children are seeing what is going on, they are hearing what is going on, and they're going to repeat that cycle. If you don't have children, like I didn't have children, so it was easier for me to leave. But again, there's a lot of manipulation that happens in an abusive situation and you are made to think you're not going to find anyone else, no one's going to love you like he's gonna love you. And you're mistaken that love is not the verbal abuse or the physical abuse that is not love. There are so many things we could get into Rodney about gaslighting, and all kinds of different things that happen in abuse. But just know that if you come across a woman that is in that situation, and she comes to you, be there for her, find out what you can do to help don't enable her to stay there. Don't that means don't encourage her to stay there. help her find a way out whether that means the police have to be involved and have to remove her from the home and take her to a shelter or she has somewhere else to go that is safe. Unfortunately, most of the shelters are so full all the time that these women don't get to stay any more than two weeks at some of them. So they're there for two weeks and they have nowhere else to go. Once that two weeks is up, where are they supposed to go, they end up going back to their abuser because they don't have the support that they need. These women need support. And that brings me to the next phase of what we are doing at the rehab center. We have decided that it is time to build an actual location where these women can live. Go through the treatments that they need, go through all the training that they need to continue to break these cycles and be successful for their family. So that is what we are offering so when women here in our community come out of the domestic violence shelter They don't have to go back to their abuser, they can come to us. Now, the second thing is everything that we teach our women is on our website. So if you are out there, and you are in this cycle of poverty, and you just need some help, all you have to do is go to our website, which is rahabcenter.com, fill out the application so that I know some information about you, we will chat, and then I will get you connected with our classes so that you were able to come in and do these classes where you are at.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's a great opportunity for women, wherever they are in the world to actually connect with you in that way and, and whilst it's not quite the same as being there, there is the opportunity to connect and to be able to be pointed in the direction of of help for them in their particular area. Obviously, this all takes a lot of money. How is the Rahab Center funded?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, we are strictly funded by private donations and we do have a website. So if you do want to learn more information about that, like I said, it's rehab center.com. And they can go there and everything is right there on our website, how you can help us more information about the program. Even if you're looking as wanting to be a mentor, we're always looking for great Christian women to come alongside us and help mentor these women. And with technology these days, it's amazing what we can do and how many we can reach.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's great opportunity for people to be involved in a variety of ways. And I'm just wondering, you've spent a lot of your life in situations where you just cannot trust people. There's that trust that is breaking down. There's that trust that has been abused and misused. And I know that you first of all, and mostly found your trust in God. But what's it like being able to, to know people around you and put trust in them? How is that for you?
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well, well, you know, I have been truly blessed that the women that God has brought to me that I have gotten to meet through this journey has just been absolutely incredible. So to be able to freely trust them, and learn by God's leading because he will always lead you. He will always show you when something is not right. And he has done that we've had some women come to us as volunteers that it was just not right. And he showed me and we release them from any obligations with us. But you know, when you really listen to him, that trust can be wide open and the amount of love that I have received from the women that have come around me to support me as been absolutely amazing. When you put your trust in God, he opens up doors that you didn't even see were going to open and he brings people to you that you would have never even had the chance to meet and I have been blessed 100% by each and every woman that has come around me to support me and work in this ministry. And then just watching the women that grow out of the program and watching their love, and their trust turned around to it's just a hundredfold Rodney, it really is. I wish you could see the smile on my face talking about it, but it just lights me up to see that and to be able to share that with everyone around me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Jennifer, it's been really exciting to hear your story. To hear how change has come about to know that for your children life is going to be so much different to what it was like for you growing up. I am going to put details of the website in the show notes at bleeding taillight. dotnet. So if you've been listening and you want to get the details there, but Jennifer, thank you for being open and honest and sharing some of your stories today.
 
Jennifer Wilcox 
Well thank you, Rodney for having me. I really appreciate this opportunity and you blessing me and the ministry and the women that we're serving by this opportunity.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Sandy Phillips Kirkham authored a book titled, Let Me Prey Upon You. It details how a youth pastor preyed upon her, a betrayal which left her broken, with a shattered faith, and the ultimate shame of being blamed and forced from the church she loved. It’s a story of sexual abuse which may be confronting for some people. It’s also a story of hope and healing.
 
 
Website: https://sandyphillipskirkham.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KirkhamAuthor/
Email: sandykirkhamauthor@gmail.com
 
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you for listening today. Once you’ve heard today’s episode please search for Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and please share this episode.
 
My guest today authored a book titled, Let Me Prey Upon You. It details how a youth pastor preyed upon her, a betrayal which left her broken, with a shattered faith, and the ultimate shame of being blamed and forced from the church she loved. It’s a story of sexual abuse which may be confronting for some people. It’s also a story of hope and healing.
 
Most of us have insecurities as we try to find our way in the world during our teenage years. Thankfully, many of us are able to find places of safety during that time and eventually we move past the awkwardness of growing up. But what do you do when one of those safe places turns out to be a place of betrayal? Sandy Phillips Kirkham was 16 when her world changed. Today we welcome her to Bleeding Daylight to tell her story. Sandy, thanks for your time.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Well, thank you for having me on. It's good to be here.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me what was life like before your trust was betrayed.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
I was happy little teenage girl in the church. My only issue in my life at that point was that my parents were divorced and that had a very traumatic effect on me. I didn't see my dad very much growing up. Sometimes I had difficulty with my stepfather. It was just an insecure part of my life, having the divorce and missing my dad. I was very active in the church in my teenag years from the time I was about eight. My family did not attend church, but I was invited by a friend and I went every Sunday with them to church. I was baptized when I was 13 and I was very eager to lead my new Christian life. I loved being at church and serving God. It was a place that I found safety. It was a place that I found love and concern for my well being and it was just a place I loved. I was very active. I sang in the choir, I taught Sunday School, I led prayer breakfasts, I think it would be no exaggeration to say that if the doors were open, I was there. So that was kind of where I was  when our church hired a new youth pastor.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this new youth pastor, I guess, as most youth pastors come along, and he's ready to shake up the world and that was probably his experience to of what happened at that church at the time.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Exactly. It was just after I turned 16 that they hired this new youth pastor and there was an unusual excitement among the adults about this new pastor coming to our church because they had heard of the growth and excitement he had created in his previous church. So they were looking forward to having this dynamic and energetic pastor on staff and really, within a very short time, there was a dramatic change in the youth group. There was a transformation from boring Sunday School lessons, they were replaced with interactive skits, there was guitar music, youth night was added. And the attendance just started to explode. Kids from all over the city were coming to our youth group because of this new cool youth pastor and he really was different in a lot of ways. And while he was close in age to our former pastor, he dressed younger, his hair was longer. He knew our music. He drove a convertible, I guess if you would say in the 70s vernacular, he was hip. When he came to our church, everyone wanted to be a part of this new change, and no one wanted to miss out. He was really like a rock star. So you know, if he asked you to do something, you didn't just do it because you felt like you should, you felt honored to be in his inner circle, so to speak. So it was very a unique time in our in our church and even his sermons were like anything we never heard before. So again, I think that his persona and his charismatic personality really created an atmosphere in our church that we had never seen before.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And so you were just like everyone else, you wanted to be a part of this, and get close to that youth pastor. So what did that involve for you in getting to know him and becoming closer to him?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Almost immediately, he singled me out as to be one of the leaders in the youth group. And so I picked up early that he thought I was special. And of course, that made me feel special. And again, not having the father figure in my life that I wanted. I sort of looked at him that way. And because it was the youth pastor, of course, I just trusted him. And I had no reason to doubt that he didn't have my best interest at heart. You know, when he would ask me to do something, I was happy to do it. I didn't question him. And he started getting me more involved in the church than I'd ever been before. He asked me to serve on committees, he would tell me that, you know, the people and the ladies in the kitchen need help on Sunday after church, I've told them you would help. And I was seeing this as a part of my way of helping God and helping the church grow. And so it was very natural for me, and I enjoyed it. It wasn't like I didn't want to do it. But I did notice that you know, I certainly was one of his special people.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When did things start to turn more sinister?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Well, that actually happened immediately. As far as it wasn't anything gradual. We It was after a youth group meeting at my house, and he was waiting for everyone to leave. We were alone. He walked over to me and simply said, how much he appreciated me and how thankful he was that I was involved in the church, and how much I was helping him and his ministry and of course, I'm on cloud nine because He's telling me these wonderful things and how great I am and then he suddenly bent down and kissed me. I was absolutely stunned. I didn't expect it. I certainly didn't know what to do or say I was so just taken aback. And then I thought, well, this is my youth minister, he wouldn't be doing anything he shouldn't be doing. And so for me, it was almost like I tried to call myself and justify it. Because in my 16 year old mind, I couldn't let myself go to a place that this man would be doing anything that he shouldn't be doing. So I thought, well, maybe I've just under misunderstood and it was just a kiss. So it was really how I rationalized it and so I just kind of let it go. But I babysat for his family. And so he had the opportunity many times to be alone with me. His wife worked evenings, so he would come home and after the kids were in bed, he'd asked if I'd sit and talk about the Bible, we talk about church, we talk about, you know, how we can get more kids involved, he would give me books to read on Christianity. And you know, none of this seemed out of the ordinary to me, because he was my youth minister. I've said many times you know if it had been my 30 year old neighbor down the street, I would have gone home to my mom and said, You know, this is weird. This man wants to sit and talk to me all evening. Why what interest would I have as a teenager talking to this 30 year old man, but because it was my youth pastor, and he used the church and our common interest in the church, he used that then to make it seem normal that this was okay. And so he would kiss me goodnight. Sometimes Sometimes he wouldn't. There was never any real pattern to it. This went on for about a year. And I call that the year of grooming, it was the year of setting me up to get to his ultimate goal, which was to have sex with me, which he eventually did. So that initial contact was very unexpected and but then it was a gradual continuation of this kissing in the hugging that then one night, he just put me on the floor and had sex with me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So to be absolutely clear. This is a man who is almost twice your age. He's married with a family of his own. So this is not a a romance between a youth pastor and someone in the youth group. This goes far beyond that there is no, no way that this can be justified is there?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
No. And not only that, but just after he was hired at our church, a young woman from his first church came forward and accused him of sexual misconduct. When the elders were informed of this, they confronted him. He said he was sorry, he asked for forgiveness, he promised it would never happen again. No information was given to the congregation and within six months, that's when he was kissing me in my hallway. So this was not his first incident of sexual misconduct.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And do you look back and knowing now what you know, just wonder what was happening for those church leaders to have seen those red flags and yet totally ignored them?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Absolutely. I mean, I'm stunned to think that they were aware of this kind of behavior, and they chose to ignore it. And what they basically did was to allow him to continue in ministry, so that he could offend a second time, they gave him the opportunity, not at second chance at ministry, but at a second chance to commit sexual misconduct and sexual abuse again, so basically, they felt that anyone in that congregation could be collateral damage, so that he could continue on in ministry. And I hesitate. And I wish I didn't have to say this. But even though that was over 40 years ago, not a lot has changed in many churches in their in their response. So often, churches will still decide to give these men second chances, or they move them to other churches and I'm sad to say that, because you would hope that it would have changed over the years. And sometimes there are churches, certainly that do respond in the right way. But many times that's not the case.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So how did this supposed relationship continue? Do you think he was justifying it to himself? Or do you think he was just a predator who was out for his own gain the whole time,
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
It was definitely a predator who was out for his own gain. He was abusive to me. He hit me it was not a loving, caring relationship, the sexual behavior became more deviant. But he had gotten to a point where he was able to control me through, you know, manipulation through gaslighting, grooming, and those are terms we can talk about, but he slowly and methodically changed my reality. He slowly methodically took control of who I was, and what I could do. I was I was afraid of being in many respects, you know, sometimes he would be kind to me, and then other times he would be abusive to me. So I never knew who I was going to see at that point. And the relationship then continued for five years in the beginning of the relationship. I did try to get out of it. I would either go to him and say look at the guilt is just killing me. I can't do this. anymore. And he would respond in one of two ways. Either he would be very kind and caring and tell me how much he needed me that the church needed me and that this was God's will that we were together, we were married in God's eyes. And this was part of God's plan, or he would become violent, shoved me against the wall threatened me and tell me Who do you think you are thinking you can leave me, you'll never be able to leave me, no one's going to want to because you're no longer a virgin. And so I was in this trap. And I had, I felt like I was in a black hole with no way out. Now, the relationship went on for five years. But near the end of the relationship, probably, I would say maybe into the second year of the relationship, I had given up in trying to get out, I just assumed that this was my life that I, I didn't feel like I could tell anyone, he made it very clear that if I were to tell anyone, then I would be to be blamed for what would happen to him, and no one's going to believe me. So I didn't feel like I could tell anyone and so I felt trapped and I felt that this was going to be my life, and that this relationship would end when he said it was over.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And they would be those keyboard warriors who sit behind keyboards at home and comment on things online. Who would just say, Well, why didn't you just get out? This is obviously something that you wanted? Can you help us understand that, that feeling of being trapped, that you couldn't actually release yourself from this relationship?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
First of all, I will say that trauma changes, your cognitive thinking and trauma changes how you are able to think and see things. So there may be a way out, and there may have been someone who would have believed me, but that's not how I perceived it. And then you have to remember, too, that these men and predators have a way of systematically changing a person's direction and their life. So through gaslighting, this is the most common. So it's a form of psychological manipulation, they obstruct and they distort the victim's reality, and their understanding of what reality is. So they'll start to say he say things to me, like, you know, you're too sensitive. And you're crazy. I never said that, or no one really likes you, but they tolerate you, or you're just imagining things, when I would, I would sit and try to reason with him. He'd say, That's not how it is. And so you become powerless to fight back because you begin to see yourself through their reality through the reality they want you to see. I know it's hard to understand at times, but that's why abuse women in abusive relationships can't get out because they don't see a way out even though there is one, I didn't see a way out. I just didn't see it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So is it that the perpetrator has so manipulated the situation that you don't believe that there's worth within yourself aside from from who they are?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Absolutely, I mean, they, for him, and the way he treated me was, you know, his, he constantly reminded me that I wasn't a virgin anymore. And that within the church, that's, you know, something that is taught that, you know, virginity is special, and that you should never give your virginity away. So he constantly reminded me that I would never be loved by anyone else, because I no longer was a virgin. He also berated me many times and how smart I was, I wasn't smart enough. I was too fat. Even though I was a thin 16 year old kid. It was a constant badgering. And so it took me to a level that I had no self esteem. And I began to believe his reality of what he was telling me. And again, who was I going to tell I was I knew enough to know that if I were to ever tell anyone in the church, that the minister that they all adored, and preached every Sunday that he was doing these kinds of things to me, I knew that was going to be a bombshell. I didn't know what the results would be. But I knew that trying to get that kind of information out, would have been devastating to the people in the church. And again, who were they going to believe me or him? So I stayed silent. I didn't I didn't say anything.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that there was an accusation from a previous church. Was there any way that you could tell Were there other women or young girls involved with him at this stage? Or were you the only one that you know of?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
No, he used to brag to me that he had so and so in his office and she let him kiss her and he felt her and he touched her. He would tell me of these incidences in his office, so he was bragging to me about other and these were mostly women. There weren't other teenagers. I learned later find out that there were other girls that he probably kissed or he touched, but I don't know of any that went as far as sexual intercourse that as they did with me, but there certainly were other cases and girls and women. That he had the same time he was having sex with me inappropriate behavior with other women and girls.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you think that some of that that kissing and that touching as part of his grooming for those other women and other girls, was actually kind of a test to see? How far can I take this?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Yes, I think so. And I think some of them, let him go farther than others. It's always a test with these men, that's part of the game for them, they derive some kind of pleasure out of watching to see how far they can go. And again, most of these women and young girls or insert, certainly children are vulnerable. There's something about them in their lives, that they know that they are craving attention, and that it will be easy for them to make these moves on them. And in they'll keep the secret. There were women I know he would talk about and say, Well, she would never let me get near her. They have a sixth sense almost about who's got a vulnerability that they can tap into.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It sounds like this is such a terrible place for you to be and you're saying that you're feeling trapped. But eventually you did break free of that relationship. How did that come about?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
That only happened because two people in the church became suspicious, and followed him one night and found us. He was called into the elders. I have no idea what he told them. But I'm certain that he gave his side of the story, which wouldn't have been accurate. But eventually, they decided to forgive him and they gave him a going away party, he was sent to another church where he once again committed sexual misconduct within a very short period of time. After he left, I was called in by the elders of the church. And I was told that because of my behavior, I was to leave the church, I can tell you of all the things that happened to me and that were done to me during that five year period, nothing was more devastating to me, than to be told that I was unfit to worship in the church that I loved. Even now, as I speak those words, it's very hurtful for me, to be reminded that I was told by the elders that I was to be kicked out of the church, when he was forgiven, and able to move on with his life. I left the church, and I kind of floundered a little bit and tried to find my way, I eventually married and then I spent the next 27 years feeling guilty. Because I felt that I'd had an affair with a married man who was my pastor. And I spent 27 years hiding my past for my husband and my closest friends, always fearing that someone would find out and it was a nightmare to have to live with that for 27 years, I had many trigger factors that I had to disguise when they would happen in my life. And I was out somewhere and, and I would be reminded of him. I spent 27 years trying to live a life that I wanted to live. I had a happy marriage, I had two great kids, but I always had this abuse. And I didn't even think of it as abusive to me, I saw myself that I'd had an affair with a married man, I didn't at that point, see it as abuse until a trigger factor forced me to face my past. And that's when I began to understand that I was sexually abused that this was not an affair, that this man never cared about me, and that I should have been safe with him as my pastor, but I was not.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So due to the inaction of the elders at this church. Exactly what he had told you would happen is that no one's going to believe you you are supposedly damaged goods, was actually the reality that they forced upon you by asking you to leave that church that the blame was on you. So he was gaming the system the whole time, knowing that would be the reality.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
You have to remember that these men are very charismatic, which he was, they not only groom and manipulate the victim, but they groom and manipulate the entire congregation. So he certainly knew how to work them. And they were willing to accept his version of the story. One of the things that he did tell me after he was called in by the elders, he made a phone call to me. And he said, if they ask you anything, tell them that this is only been going on for a year. Now. I think he did that for two reasons. One, he didn't want them to know that this started when I was 16. I was about 21 when they found him with me. So that's been five years. But so he said tell them that this has only been going on for a year, because one he didn't want them to know my true age when it started. But I also think more importantly, I think he felt like he could be forgiven if he could say that it was only going on for a year it would be a little tougher to ask for forgiveness if for the entire time of his ministry. He was having sex with me while he preached every Sunday morning. It would be a little tougher to say he made a mistake, and that this was something he was sorry for when and only been going on for a year instead of five years.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And just before we start to talk about that healing process that you went through, do you know where this guy is now? Is he still working in church ministry is he still doing the same things
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
I ended up confronting him actually, part of my healing process is that I hired a private investigator, to locate him so that I could confront him. At that time, he was still a pastor in a church, I got the same reaction from that church. And that was, we believe he's a changed man, we don't think anything that happened 27, 30 years ago, is relevant. This happened to you. It doesn't apply to him today. So I was pretty much shut down by that church as well. I eventually went to his denominational leaders and got the same response. I think he's semi retired now. But he still remains in good standing within the church itself. So he can probably preach part time. But he is semi retired, I believe, but he has, he has good standing within the denomination.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So I don't know the laws in the US, but essentially, starting to groom you and starting that relationship when you were just 16. And the age difference, and the the power differential that's there. He was not just doing something immoral. But surely that was something that he's done, that's illegal, that he's never been held account to.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
We have 50 states here in the United States. And each state has a different age as to what is the age of consent. In 1971, when this occurred, age of consent at that time was 16. So I was considered age of consent. So he didn't legally break any laws. I did try to file a suit against him, a new statute had coming out that you could put his name on a registry, if I could prove that something had happened. I couldn't gain any money from it. It wasn't anything that was could take legal action. But it was simply to put his name on a list. But again, because it was the age of consent at that time, I couldn't do even do that. Now, the age of consent has been changed to know in the state of Ohio, where I am to 18. Now, let me just say this, which is interesting. age of consent was 16. However, if he had been my school teacher, my high school English teacher, it would have been against the law. It didn't the age of consent did not apply to teachers, because they claim teachers have power over their students. And therefore they have the ability to abuse that position and power. Oddly enough, that doesn't didn't apply to pastors.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that's the thing that there's this power differential that even despite that age difference, despite any of that, that there's this power differential, and it's recognized in someone like a teacher, and yet someone who has access to more of your private life, being a youth pastor, or a pastor of any kind, there's not that legislation that holds them back. That just seems to be crazy.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
It's crazy. And they're only out of the 50 states, there's only 13 states that make it illegal for a minister who is counseling a woman, if she has sex with her, or any kind of intimate relationship, there's only 13 states that consider that illegal. So a pastor can call in a woman who's in a very emotional, unstable position, who may be going through a divorce, who's had a death, illness, whatever, he can counsel her, and use that situation to take advantage of her. And it's not against the law. Because she's supposedly is old enough, you know, she's an adult. But however, a doctor, a psychiatrist, they don't have that same pass, they are held responsible, and they lose their license if they do such behavior. So it we have given for some reason pastors and those in spiritual leadership, this kind of passed to say, because you're a pastor, these laws don't apply to you, when in reality, they should be held to a higher standard than the position of the psychiatry because they truly do, as you said, have access to these to the personal lives of these individuals. And they can use that against them. And so it's, it's it's almost, to me, there should be a stricter judgment. In fact, if you think about it, James three, one does talk about that, you know, not many of you to be teachers, and because there's a stricter judgment for those who do, they should be held to a higher standard, and our churches should demand that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Absolutely. And there is a higher standard that we shouldn't even have to rely on the law to know that this is absolutely wrong. I want to talk about this healing. 27 years later, you've been stuffing this down for so many years and trying to ignore the triggers that come regularly. How did the healing actually begin all those 27 years later?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Well, that began is I I was driving along the road and I saw a sign that was to the place he had moved after he left our church. It was an Next sign off on the expressway. And it just sent me into a tailspin, I had to pull off the side of the road and I totally collapsed. sobbing, I couldn't control myself, I, I didn't understand it, because I'd had trigger factors before, and I was able to control them and hide them. And this particular time, it just all erupted. And it was because I think for 27 years, I had stuffed it down, I had tried to, to keep it inside, you know, I became very good at hiding my secret. And all of a sudden, it was out there. And I didn't know how to put it back down. And so what I did, I probably spent two weeks just in a turmoil trying to figure out what to do. And for the first time, I decided I would tell my very good friend, what would what had happened to me. And that's started the beginning, when I was able to find one person that I could trust to tell my story to. And then I told to other friends, it would take me a while before I would tell my husband, even though I didn't have any reason to fear his reaction. It was something that I I was afraid to tell him. And so that took me a while to get there, though. So then what I began to do is through my friends, and through talking to some a couple that I was very close to who are very spiritual, I began my spiritual journey back to God, because for 27 years, I had a disconnect with the church and I never prayed again. I never read my Bible during that 27 years, and this I was someone, I carry my Bible to school with me every day, I prayed every day, I was faithful in my calling to Christ. And I was, I love my faith. And now for 27 years, I had this disconnect, because it reminded me of that time in my life. And so I missed it, but I couldn't figure out how to make it better. So I just accepted that this was the way my spiritual life would be. I took my kids to church, and I forced myself to go, but I never could have that spiritual connection to the church again. So what I was finding was slowly but surely, I was allowing God back into my life and that was because I had done a lot of hard work trying to figure this out in my life. One of the things I did early on, was, I read everything I could on clergy sexual abuse. And so once I began doing that, I began to understand what the grooming was, I could see the the manipulation that he had caused in my life, I could begin to understand, not what happened to me. But what was done to me. And once I began to see that, I finally was able to say, this man didn't care about me, this was not a love relationship. This was an abusive relationship. This was sexual abuse by a pastor. And that was the beginning of my able to let go of the guilt and the shame that I had carried all those 27 years. So I first thing I did was I told someone, then I educated myself. And then I found myself to the point where I could finally say, what what was done to me was not my fault. And that took four, then you would probably think he would think, Well, you could look at this. And of course, it wasn't your fault, you were 16, or he was in a position of power, and he had intimate details about your life that he used against you. But people who are abused, oftentimes want to find some logic to it. And the only logic we can find is that we must have participated or we must have done something to cause it. Otherwise, why would this person do this if I hadn't done something to encourage it. And so that took a while for me to get to that point to understand that. It was always his responsibility to maintain the boundaries, no matter what my issues were in my life, he had no right to do what he did. And so I finally came to that point. And that was a big step in my in my healing as well. And then I had to be kind to myself, I tell victims, healing is messy. It's not easy. You sometimes go from point A to point B, sometimes you go from point A to D, and then you go back to a again. There's no real straight line to healing, you're going to have ups and downs. You're going to be depressed at times but it's worth the effort. It takes time. And it takes work and it takes effort. So be patient and I and I say to be kind to yourself. And then if you're if you're still keeping the secret, like I found what I found was the more I could talk about it. The closer I came to healing, there was freedom in mind being able to talk about it. Now that wasn't easy. The first time I told my friend I literally sat there for 20 minutes and sobbed before I could tell her and come out with the words I was sexually abused by my youth pastor. Keeping the secret doesn't help. What I found was that secret was controlling me for 27 years. I thought by keeping my secret I was in control. But what was actually happening was the secret was controlling me because all it did was continually remind me of him. The secret that I had to protect was always a constant reminder and it wasn't until I let go of that secret that I was finally able to let go of him and the abuse.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you talk about holding this secret. And it was this secret that was holding things back. But in reality, it was this youth pastor who was continuing to abuse you, even though he was long off the scene, the abuse continues, he broke your relationship with God, he broke your relationship with your husband in that you, you didn't feel that you could tell him everything. And he continued to go on his way. When you confronted him, did you confront him with any of this?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
I did. For me confronting him, I knew from my private investigator that he was going to say he was sorry that you know, and what else would you expect him to say? But for me, I wanted him to understand what he did to me, it wasn't enough for him to say he was sorry, I needed him to articulate so I made a list of about 20 things that I wrote down, and I had him read the list back to me, it started with, I was wrong. When I took your virginity I was wrong. When I kissed you that night in your home, I was wrong. When I hit you, I was wrong. And so I there were 20 things that I went down, that I asked him to read the list. And he did read it to me. And at the end, he said to me, I don't remember all this, but I guess it's true. So I don't even know after the meeting, that he still understood what he really had done to me. I told him that he had taken my spiritual life and he twisted it, he contaminated the church for me, I wanted him to understand it wasn't just, you know, the abuse, it was who he was when he did it, by the fact that he was my clergy and my pastor, it affected my spiritual life, it touched a sacred part of my soul, that I can't get back, I can't have the same trust that I had prior to the abuse, I've been changed by what he had done to me. Now, that doesn't mean I'm defined by what he did to me, it doesn't mean that I don't move forward and find purpose in what happened to me but I have been changed by this abuse. No abuse victim is ever just totally forgets what was done to them. I did try to get him to understand, but I don't think he did. Because once he started speaking, then he start explaining why he was the way he was that he'd had therapy, he'd been identified as a sexual addict. Everything he said after he read the list was about him, and why he was the way he was. And again, he are true narcissist. That's probably how you're going to respond Anyway, you play the victim again, and look for someone to feel sorry for you as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And again, he's repeating that same behavior of not really caring for you, you were just part of his his path to fulfilling his own desires. And it sounds like you just continue to be that.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
And I kind of knew that going into the meeting someone who's as manipulative as he was, and who could lie so easily. But for me, it wasn't so much what he would say to me. But what I felt I needed to say to him, I needed to be able to look him in the eye and say, I get what you did to me now, I didn't understand it, then but I understand it now and what you did to me, you had no right to do and so for me that was power. And to be able to say that to him. I wanted so much to have a different reaction from him, but I wasn't going to get it. So I had to accept that that he wasn't going to get it not only was he not going to get it, but I also requested that his supervisor be in that same meeting. And his supervisor again said to me, Well, you're talking about a man, I don't know. And that's not the person I know. And he has taken this church from 25 people to over 300 people, we have a beautiful church building. And I'm sitting there thinking, this is kind of where I was 40 years ago, nothing has really changed. I was so disappointed in his supervisor, I suppose more than I was in him because, again, I think I expected his response. I was hoping for a different response from his church leadership, which didn't happen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Part of your healing has been to write your book. Let me pray upon you. Maybe you can tell us about the journey of writing that book and, and where that's gone to.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
I had been speaking at conferences and different churches about my experience. And so many people would come up to me and say, Oh, my gosh, you have such an empowering story. You really need to write a book. And I just never thought that would be possible. And so a couple years ago, actually two years ago, I was frustrated by the number of times I would hear people say things like, well, I don't believe that really happened to her because she didn't talk about it when it first happened. Why did she wait so long to tell? And I thought my story will. I think if I tell it right will explain why we wait so long to tell. And so that was part of the reason and the other reason was I wrote the book because I often thought many times. What if when this man was doing what he was doing to me, I had heard someone else's story because I thought I was the only one I thought I got the only bad apple in the barrel. I had no idea that this was possibly happening to anyone else. And I think victims even with even with the internet and everything we hear about clergy abuse, when it's happening to you, you still feel like, I'm still the only one because my situation is different. And so I think, to tell our stories, we empower others and help others find the courage to join begin their journey of healing. So I really wrote the story for for other victims. And then my second purpose was, I wanted to educate those who didn't quite understand, you know, what are the dynamics of clergy abuse? And why does it happen? And how can we prevent it from happening. And so that was the second reason for writing the book, it took me two years to write it, it was difficult at times to write, it's one thing to talk about saying that you were sexually abused, it's another than to go into detail, and write it down in black and white for everyone to read. I really felt it was God's purpose in my life. I think one of the saddest things for me over 27 years was the fact that I always regretted and felt like that when I reached the pearly gates, I would never hear the words well done my good and faithful servant, because I wasn't in the church serving in any capacity. I didn't even like going to church. And so I was sad for the fact that I knew that I would never hear those words. And now I know that this is my ministry, and that I will hear those words, because we need victims to speak out, not only to help each other, but to change the culture of allowing these men to continue in ministry, and to continue this kind of behavior. Because what they're doing, Rodney is they're stealing souls. They're not, they're doing the opposite work of Christ. Because Christ, we're supposed to bring people into our faith or to bring people to closer to Christ. And these men are moving people away from the church. And not only are they was my disconnect from the church, or because of that, my children didn't have the same kind of spiritual upbringing, they would have had had this not happened to me. And so that was a regret that I will always live with. But I did the best I could, you know, with the baggage I was carrying, I mean, I, I took them to church, and but I couldn't engage them, like children have never had a bedtime prayer with their mother. And so for me, that's very, very sad to have to say that, but that's where I was in my life for 27 years. And so now that I'm healing, and I'm moving forward, I have a joy in my life, I'm closer to God, I pray, I can read the Bible without feeling sick to my stomach like I used to do, there is still somewhat of a disconnect with church itself, but that's getting better. And when the trigger factors come now, instead of trying to hide them, I deal with them. And I understand why I'm having them. And I now know God understands why and so I'm in a good place. It took me a while but I'm here.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What has the feedback been like for those who have read the book, and perhaps even some victims who have been able to read through your story.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
So the most rewarding thing, of course, is when I get an email or a message from someone who's read the book, who's been sexually abused, and they tell me how powerful it is to have read that book, it's been able to, to resonate with someone else's story is so powerful, and it and it's given them some hope. One victim talked about, you know, the courage, she finally felt that she could talk about what was done to her by her, her pastor. The other interesting thing that happened, and I didn't expect was, how many women have said to me, I wasn't sexually abused, and I wasn't sexually abused by a pastor. But I was in an abusive relationship with my ex husband or my boyfriend, and all of the things that you talked about the grooming, the manipulation, the gaslighting were all things that he did to me. And it was so empowering to read that. And I could see that what was done to me by my boyfriend, and my ex husband, was not my fault that this was someone who was manipulating me. And one woman said to me, she was reading the book, and she got to the chapter when I talked about grooming, and manipulation and gaslighting. And she said, I just stopped, I handed the book to my current husband. And I said, I want you to read these two chapters, because this is exactly the kind of life I had when I was married to my ex husband. So that was an interesting twist that I didn't expect, but I'm certainly grateful for I've had a couple people talk to me about, well, you know, do we really think that these men should be removed from ministry because that's kind of where I'm come from. But overall, most people read the book and find it engaging. They've learned something from it. They appreciate the fact that I've been so open about my story, that it gives them hope and courage as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's so good to know that the book is having that effect and I would hope that there would be some as well who are in positions of power, who will be able to see the harm that this does and actually change the way that they react. And I know that's a slow process. But I'm hoping that that happens. If people are wanting to get in touch with you or to find the book, what's the easiest place to find you?
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
It's on Amazon, but my website is www.sandyphillipskirkham.com and my book is available through my website. I have some blogs, I have some other interviews that I've done. There's a lot of information that would be helpful if they were interested in that. And looking at the website, I think,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I will definitely put details of that website in the show notes at bleeding daylight. dotnet. Sandy, I want to say thank you for sharing your story with us for the courage that it takes to to speak about your story. And we do hope and pray that things do change, that the structures that are set up to protect predators will actually turn around and say no more. But I want to thank you for your courage. I want to thank you for your story and and for sharing it with us today.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Well, I appreciate that I so appreciate the opportunity you've given me and because I know it's not an easy topic to talk about, but it is one we need to discuss. And let me just say one last thing to any victim out there. Do not let your abuse define who you are. God has a purpose in your life and your abuse does not have to be the defining point in your life. There's hope.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you very much.
 
Sandy Phillips Kirkham 
Thank you.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Losing a child is hard enough but what about if no one is prepared to admit that there was even a child to begin with? That’s part of the trauma that Elizabeth Meyers suffered and why she wrote a book to help others facing distress, doubt and suffering. She is also the host of the podcast, Resilient Life Hacks. These days, she uses her experiences to reach out to others who find themselves in life's dark nights. Her book, Undefeated: From Trial to Triumph, How to Stop Fighting the Wrong Battles and Start Living Victoriously tells the story of her journey.
 
  
 
Elizabeth Meyers Website: https://elizabethmeyers.me/
Resilient Life Tribe on FB: https://www.facebook.com/groups/resilientlifetribe
YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/elizabethmeyers
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelizmeyers/
Resilient Life Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/resilient-life-hacks/id1530688662
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Hello and thank you for listening. I’d love to connect with you on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Just search for Bleeding Daylight. That’s where we can start a conversation about this and other Bleeding Daylight episodes.
 
Losing a child is hard enough but what about if no one is prepared to admit that there was even a child to begin with? That’s part of the trauma that Elizabeth Meyers suffered and why she wrote a book to help others facing distress, doubt and suffering. She is also the host of the podcast, Resilient Life Hacks. I’m sure you’ll enjoy her story.
 
What do you do when your faith and reality collide to leave you broken, discouraged and swimming in doubt? That's what faced Elizabeth Meyers after a tragic event, derailed her life and left her searching for true healing. These days, she uses her experiences to reach out to others who find themselves in life's dark nights. Her book, Undefeated: From Trial to Triumph, How to Stop Fighting the Wrong Battles and Start Living Victoriously tells the story of her journey. I'm so pleased to have her joining me on Bleeding Daylight. Elizabeth, thanks so much for your time.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Oh, yes, thank you for having me and giving me the opportunity to share my story.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We're going to talk about a very traumatic event that had a huge effect on you, but I want to take you back before that time. Tell me what life was like leading up to that event.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yes, well, my husband is active duty in the Air Force. So we move around a lot and at the time, just prior to that we had five children, you know, life was just clicking along, we were homeschooling and looking back now I see how my my faith in God was, I call it a fairweather faith, where, you know, I kind of had this concept of if I do my part, and if I do the right things, and don't do the wrong things, you know, God will bless that and, and life will just go swimmingly and everything will be great, but that that whole concept crumbled. When I faced real tragedy,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And just before that tragedy in the month leading up to it, I believe that there were a number of things that started to go wrong before that major tragedy, what what were some of those things?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Interestingly, I had really had this time of deepening my relationship with God, where I really discovered the power of prayer and I really felt connected to God, I believe that God's presence is always with us but sometimes we're more aware of his presence than others. And I really just felt like God and I were were gelling. We were working together. And then things just started to go wrong. And it was big things and little things. I went through a period where people that I prayed for seem to get worse, rather than better. I had a friend who had cancer and she passed away. My grandmother passed away. There were several others. We had friends who were struggling to get pregnant, and I was praying for their baby, they finally got pregnant, and then they lost the baby. There was just all these different things that really were kind of starting to shake my faith up a bit and kind of go, well wait, what's going on here? You know, I thought prayer was supposed to work. But you know, just all these things were piling on me. And I really felt discouraged. I also got pregnant again and I was having trouble adjusting to that, that pregnancy, that time, I was feeling a little grumpy about it and feeling, you know, like, my plate was already too full. And being in the military, we move a lot. And it was only a one year assignment. So I'm gonna have this baby, and then we're gonna move. And so I was really just struggling actually, with coming to terms with that. I love being a mom and I loved all my pregnancies but for whatever reason on that, that time, I was just really struggling, surrendering my life circumstances to God. It had been a couple of months, three months, I guess, into the pregnancy and I had finally kind of surrendered, I'd finally given it over to God and thought, He's got a plan. This is going to be okay and I started to get excited about this pregnancy. I went in for a checkup, and they couldn't find a heartbeat. And so I went for they said, Come back tomorrow, and we'll do an ultrasound. So I went for 24 hours, thinking that my baby might be dead. And I went in the next morning, and they did an ultrasound. And there he was alive and kicking around. And it was so exciting to me, so thrilling that I got to see him. And I just really was excited for the first time about this pregnancy and about this child and looking forward to that. So it was kind of a journey for me to get to that point. But that's where I was right, right before this happened.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And how many children did you have at this stage?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
So I had five, this was my my sixth pregnancy.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've got this big family already and you're having to move around as a military family and all these things, and then things start to go wrong and then there is that tragedy that I spoke of, and maybe you can talk us through that.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
So it was Memorial Day weekend, and we had left where we were living in Alabama and gone out to Texas to visit family. I was in a bit of a funk. I was frustrated. I was feeling like God wasn't holding up his end of the bargain for me. Way, way back when when I had felt him tugging at my heart to trust him to plan our family. I felt that he had said to me it's through a song by Chris Tomlin called More Than Enough, because I felt so inadequate. And I felt like he said to me, I will be more than enough for you. But I was just in this discouraged place. And I thought, Man, God, you're not holding up your end of the bargain. You know, I'm trusting you with my family but this is overwhelming to me and you're not being  my more than enough, I cringe and it's heartbreaking now to confess this, but I said to him, you know, if you're not going to hold up your end of the bargain I want out of this deal and that night, I started spotting. And so I was up all night, you know, I prayed. And I was like, Oh, God, this is not what I meant. You know, I don't, I don't want to lose this child, I've finally just accepted that. I want this child. You know, I love this, this baby. So I stayed up praying all night and I thought to myself, I prayed kind of three things. I said, Lord, not this, you know, I don't want to lose my baby. And then I said, you know, it has to be this just not here. Let me get back home. You know, we were on vacation, we were away from home. And then I prayed, you know, if it has to be here, then the not now, not today, because I was going to see a bunch of my cousins that I hadn't seen in forever, and I was really looking forward to spending time with them again, I'm like, this is like the worst day to have to deal with tragedy. And God answered all three of my prayers with a resounding no. Early in the morning, I woke up. And I told my husband what had been going on, you know, I've been cramping all night, and he put his hand on my belly, and he prayed for our child and his final words of the ending of the prayer of our Lord, we surrender this child to you and at that point, my water broke and I ran to the bathroom and my son was born in into my hands there he was just fits the palm of my hand. I was 14 weeks along. So I passed, you know, the three month mark, where we have this concept that Oh, after you get through three months, you're safe. Which that's, that's not true. But I can't describe I cannot adequately describe that moment. You know, holding this lifeless body of my tiny son. It was then that I realized he was a boy. He was too young to tell on ultrasound yet, but that was the first thing I said was it's a boy. And then I just remember sobbing, wailing uncontrollably like it. It didn't even sound or feel like it was coming from me. So that was the the tragedy that just started this long journey of depression and doubt in God and just wrestling with my faith. I was I was crushed on every side and I really struggled for many years.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this young boy that you held in your hands. You decided to name him. Tell me about that.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yes, we we named him Timothy Isaac Meyers. So his initials are Tim. And we had picked that out as a boy's name already, we had like a boy's name and a girl's name. When we realized he was a boy, we already had the name ready. And interestingly, you know, Isaac means laughter. And I was like, This is not, there's nothing joyful about this.
 
Rodney Olsen 
As well as having to go through this, you've still already got five children that you're having to, to look after, how did that work out for you in in trying to keep a family together while you're going through your own dark night of the soul and through the doubts that you're facing,
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
it was really difficult, and I really struggled. So following his birth, I started hemorrhaging considerably. And we went to the ER at the local place. And I, you know, I took his body into the hospital there. So some of my bitterness afterwards was towards the medical people that we encountered because he was less than 20 weeks old, they didn't really consider him a human life. I really felt that in order to protect another woman's right to choose, I was denied my right to grieve my son who I loved. They called him the products of conception, they would not give me his body back to bury him. So I was not able to have any kind of funeral or memorial service or anything, because he's less than 20 weeks, and he weighed less than I don't remember what the number is, they wouldn't issue a death certificate. Because if you administered death certificate, then that means you have to admit that there was a life there that died. That really left a big emotional wound in me. And then with all the the bleeding, I wound up having to have surgery A week later, after we got back home, my husband rushed me to the ER because I was just hemorrhaging uncontrollably, and I had to have surgery to stop the bleeding and everything. So physically, I was very anemic and very weak. they opted not to do a blood transfusion, but I was kind of right on the borderline of where you would need one. And they told me it would take about three months to regrow my blood and to feel healthy and normal again. But three months came and went and I still felt horrible, you know, and I went to the doctor, and I'm like, something's not right. And they run their tests. And they're like, Oh, you know, your iron levels are fine, you're good. You know, you've just been through a traumatic thing. And I'm like, I really do not feel well. And they said, Well, you know, your body has to readjust to what's just happened. So if you still feel bad in a year, come back then and talk to us. It's like, oh, my goodness, and they're just, you know, I tried to get help early on, I think and I was just kind of pushed aside. You know, it's like one in four women experience this and yet, we never talk about it. It's just not brought up and our culture doesn't really know how to grieve a child who dies before they are born. We don't really know how to handle that, so that I really got stuck in this place of grief. And then add to that it was only a year assignment, we were halfway through it. And by the time I got back home from the trip, all the friends that I had had that knew I was pregnant, were gone, they had moved on to their next assignment. And we waited like a month, and then a whole new class came in and of new people, and trying to meet new people, when you're going through this kind of grief was so so difficult. You know, a lot of questions. The first question people ask when they're meeting it, well, how many kids do you have? And I could not answer that question. Because I felt like, you know, the obvious answer would be five, because that's how many living children I had there. But when I said that, I felt like I was denying Timothy's existence, which is just what I felt like the medical community had done to me, and I felt like that was dishonouring. My son. And so I wanted to say I have six, but but one just passed away. But you say that and people go, oh, and they kind of just move on. To sum up, I was physically weak and not doing well, I was emotionally stuck in this place of grief and without close friendships. At that point in my life. I've since thought, you know, we've been other assignments in other places. And I was like, if I, if this had happened to me, here, I would have had so much support. But I just because of the circumstances of my life, I didn't at that time, physically and emotionally, mentally, I just fell into really, really negative thinking about everything. And spiritually, I started to doubt everything that I believed. So your original question was asking about, you know, keeping the family going during this time, it was hard, because I couldn't keep myself going, I might, how am I supposed to, to serve, and minister to my kids, when I'm barely functioning. And the difficulty that I had was, I felt, you know, in order to kind of heal and move on mentally and emotionally, I needed to get up and re engage in life and, you know, invest myself in the children that I have here on Earth. But in order to heal and recover physically, I really needed to rest and recover. I had been through my traumatic event physically. And my body was having trouble recovering from that. So I had this constant pull of these two things, and I wasn't sure how to handle that. And then my period of doubt, in faith, and God, I remember thinking, you know, Lord, if this is how you treat your friends, I don't want to be counted among them. And I didn't really voice my doubt aloud to many people, to a lot of Christians who you know, are solid and in what they believe to, for somebody to express doubt is kind of unsettling to them. And they're like, Oh, no, you know, you can't you can't question God. And so I clammed up about that, you know, I tried to get help, physically, and the doctors kind of pushed me aside, I kind of tried to find someone who I could express my doubts with. And I was unable to find an outlet for that. So I kind of just struggled alone and gradually, sort of pulled away from God, I felt like He had abandoned me. I felt like He had betrayed me. And my trust. The day that we left the hospital, and I had to leave his body there with a hospital that wouldn't acknowledge that he was even a child, that was the hardest day of my life. And we went over to the little Memorial Garden where they would, they told me they would cremate him and spread his ashes in this little garden. And so we went over there, and it was a cloudy, overcast day. And in Texas, and off in the distance it wasn't raining yet, but in the distance, I heard the rumble of thunder and I just kind of felt in my spirit that God said, I am with you and that there was that brief moment of comfort. And then I did not hear from God for years, he went radio silent. And as much as I pled and begged and cried out and said, help me change me helped me overcome this. And I just felt like all I got was silence. And that was crushing to me. During this time, I'm struggling with all these doubts and things on the inside, but I didn't I continue to teach my children, the biblical faith that I had. I had known and studied for years. And I continued on and that somewhere in the back of my mind, I was thinking I was aware of the fact that I'm going through a hard time right now. And I'm not really fully convinced that God is real and that his Word is true right now, but in the back of my mind, I'm like, I think I'm probably wrong. And I don't want to confuse my kids. So I, I kept kind of going through the motions, you know, we kept going to church all the time, and we, you know, outwardly I was still doing all the things but in Really, it just felt like emptiness. And, you know, it read in my Bible about these rosy promises of God or somebody would give a sermon on it. And I'm like, Yeah, that sounds great. But that that doesn't work for me. You know, it says, he'll protect you, you know, he won't let your foot slip, the play will not come near your tent, you don't need to be afraid. And I just felt like all of those were not true in my case. So I wondered, is God angry with me? Is he upset? Have I sinned? You know, I just went through everything. And I really just wrestled with that whole concept that everybody has wrestled with probably at some point and is the age old thing of how can a good, all powerful God allow this depth of suffering? And it was not just my own. But even as I look around to other people around me, or even, you know, things you hear on the news, and I just got very discouraged about how can Gods step back and let these things happen?
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned there that you continued to teach your faith to the children. I'm wondering also, how did you talk to them about their brother, Timothy, how did you talk to them about this brother that they had lost?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
It was difficult, they were also young. And so I wasn't sure how much to share. And I didn't really know how much they would understand. So the morning it happened, you know, we gathered all the kids together, and we told them that we had lost the baby and that we had named him Timothy, the kids were always kind of included in the pregnancies, you know, when we talked about the baby, and mommy's belly and all that. So they they knew all that was going on. At that time, it was only our oldest son, he was eight, he cried a little and seemed sad. The others didn't really seem to get it. And so they kind of appeared to move on. But late after we left that assignment, and move to the next place, my daughter, who was six, when it happened, began to struggle with it a little bit. And she, at that time, you know, in the years to follow, she was really the only one that kind of appeared to be going through a grieving process as well. She didn't tell me about it, she told her Sunday School teacher at church, and the Sunday School teacher kind of pulled me aside, and this was, you know, we were at a brand new church, we just moved there. So I was I felt a little bit like I had dropped the ball, that she wouldn't come to me, but that she went to this person that we don't know very well. But I was grateful that this teacher, she felt safe with this teacher and the teacher was very compassionate and very tender with both of us. And, you know, I think it was just one of those God moments where God puts just the right person in your path at just the right time. But you know, the next youngest one down was four. So he, you know, it just didn't make a big impact on them that our youngest was like, 18 months at the time. So she was kind of oblivious to all of that. But over the years, we have talked to them about it, you know, they're aware of where Timothy falls in the lineup, we went on to have three more rainbow babies after him. So you know, they know that Timothy's for these younger ones is their older brother that they've never met.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that the medical authorities would not say that Timothy was actually a human, that he had never actually become a baby and yet we know that that's not the case. I'm wondering if you encounter that outside and also, there's this thought for some people that if you have children, after you've lost a baby, well, they're a replacement and I'm sure that must hurt as well. Have you come up against that attitude?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yes. And there's a there's a lot of misunderstandings about losing a child during pregnancy. And not every woman responds to it the same way. You know, I've talked to women who have had early miscarriages and there, they didn't go through the level of grief that I did. So there's certainly freedom for everybody to respond to a situation in their own way. But I think it's healthy for us to honor different people's reactions to things, whether they're reacting the way we would or not, I felt in my heart, in my experience, you know, I bond with the child immediately. And I felt the same as if I had lost any of my other children. To me, there was no difference, except that I didn't have any happy memories to hang on to with this child. I had no pictures, I have one little fuzzy ultrasound picture of that one day, I was so grateful after the fact that they had not heard his heartbeat so that they made me come back and take an ultrasound. And I saw him. That's the only time I saw him alive. And I have a little fuzzy picture of that. That's all I have. And I'm so grateful for that. You know, I don't have memories of him. Nobody else has memories of him. When a loved one passes away, it's comforting to hear other people say that name or talk about what they liked about that person or happy memories that they have. I have none of that. It's just me. I'm the only one that remembers Timothy. So that's really hard. And then to kind of be dismissed by some people, you know, they say, Oh, just have another one. Like you said like that would replace it. Or people who will say oh, well, it's good thing. You weren't further along or there's this This concept that the younger the child is before pregnancy, the less you grieve, if they pass away, we don't have that concept after birth. If you lose a three year old child, nobody says to you, well, at least your child wasn't five years old. But we do that in pregnancy. It's like, for some reason, if you had a child, and if you miscarried, or had a stillbirth later than somehow, in our mind, that's worse than if it happened earlier. You know, everybody's situation, again, is different. I think a lot of times how these things happen, as I've spoken with other women who have had similar experiences is they go to the doctor, and there's no heartbeat. And that's where their tragic moment is, the way that mine happened was very trauma inducing to me that he was actually born, you know, that I held him. And so I think that just seared a lot more on my emotions, and I could not process them, I had no way. You know, like I said, there was no burial, there was no memorial service, the chaplain at the hospital told me that they would spread his ashes in the garden, and that I could come back for this service that they did once a quarter. So I called back later, I was going to drive back out to Texas to go to this memorial service. And they said, Oh, we've we've already done that. We don't allow parents to come because there's just too many diverse religious expectations to cover. So it's just the the nurses and the doctors that were a part of that pregnancy, they come in honor of that. And I was thinking I didn't have a doctor that was, you know, responsible for me and my son or that cares, anything. But I came in from out of town into the ER, so they cremated my son and spread his ashes in this garden, and nobody was there to represent him. I didn't even know what day they did it. They didn't notify me. I there was just I had no no thing that I could do, to process, the grief. Nobody that I felt that I could talk to. I did reach out to one woman who had I knew she had lost a baby full term. And so I told her what happened expecting to have some sort of bond and understanding from her. And she said to me even she's like, yeah, I had an early miscarriage and stillbirth, she goes there, nothing the same. It's not even she she even dismissed me know what you experienced, this is nothing, just move on. I would often replay in my head that day. And I would kind of come to and realize, I don't know what just happened to the last few minutes or hour of my life because I was reliving my past. So I just really struggled with the fact that nobody would validate or acknowledge my grief. And it was so overwhelming. And everybody kept telling me, you just need to move on. You're overreacting. And I just couldn't accept that. And then the one place where I felt like I should be able to go is to God. And I felt like he was being silent. And he was turning his back on me too. So I just really got stuck. For five years, I was stuck in this place of depression. And I wasn't seeking any treatment for it at the time. Because early on, I had gone to the doctor and they're like, you're fine. So I gave up asking for help. I just withdrew into myself. And I quit trying to find a solution.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How did you start to emerge from that you say that, that went on for about five years. You You didn't hear from God, you you didn't have anyone who could grieve alongside you? How did you start to emerge from that?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
So in the in that five years, when I struggled with depression, and during that time, as I said, we had three more children. And we did three more military moves. So life was just going along. And I you know, I was very busy. And I was a I guess you might call it a high functioning depressed person, I you know, I put a smile on on the outside, oh, I'm fine, everything's great. And I continue to just kind of go through the motions. But on the inside, it just felt like I was carrying this heavy, heavy burden. And I couldn't figure out how to set it down. People in general don't like to change, it's difficult, and we kind of like to stay in our little ruts. But I believe that people are motivated to change, when the pain of staying the way you are exceeds the pain that's required to make a change. And I got to that point in my life where I am. I just was fed up. I cannot do this anymore. I can't have this double life of being fine on the outside and struggling so hard on the inside. I could not figure out like what my root core problem was. I was like, Am I depressed because I'm so tired all the time that I'm you know, I can't get things done and I'm demotivated or am I exhausted because I'm depressed and that's a symptom of that. Or, you know, is there something physical going on in my body or is all of this just a big mess because I failed to trust God and this is the punishment I get or I couldn't figure out Where the root of the problem was. So I decided, you know what, I'm not going to waste any more time trying to figure out the root, I'm just going to attack this on all four fronts. That's how it worked out, you know, we're a military family. So I'm thinking I'm gonna attack this on four fronts. So spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, I took deliberate action on all four of those areas and nothing happened right away. There's no like, I mean, there's, there's the point where my life fell apart, there's not I cannot point to a point where it came back together. It was so gradual, you know, it was imperceptible from one day to the next. But gradually over time, it took about another five years, I think, God just led me through that and, and helped me heal in all of those ways. Briefly, you know, spiritually, I went to my pastor and his wife and I said, Hey, I'm depressed, and I'm having doubts about God, please pray for me. I got back into reading my Bible every morning. I kind of pulled away from that, because I'm like, yeah, God's not helping me anyway. But I just decided, you know what, I'm just, I'm going to dig in. And I'm going to read it as though God's Word is true. I had been, I had my filter flipped around, I had been filtering God's word through my life experiences and going, this doesn't match up. God's not real. I learned how to turn that filter over and I call it believe anyway, that's one of the chapters in my book, believe that God's Word is true, and filter your experiences through that. So I believe that God is real, I believe that he does love me and so how can I interpret what I'm going through with the knowledge that God does love me, rather than looking at my experience and saying, oh, God must not love me, because I'm hurting so bad. Physically, I went back to the doctor. But by this time, I, like I said that, and three more babies, and I found a doctor, she was a woman, she had had postpartum depression herself. She was very understanding, she listened to me. And so she helped me get on to a safe antidepressant that I could take while I was nursing. My youngest baby, I listen to so many sermons and suffer like a pill doesn't fix it. And that's true. But for me, taking that medication bumped me up just enough to where I had the ability to do all the other things I needed to do to heal my mind and my body and my emotions and to connect with God. One morning, soon after, just a few days after I started taking the present, I was playing with my toddler, she was in her high chair. And I was just kind of teasing her and you know, doing whatever. And I just suddenly had this realization, I'm like, I actually feel playful. I'm not faking it. And and that was a huge moment for me to realize that I had been faking it that much, you know, that I forgot what it felt like to feel joy and to feel happiness to feel playful. In my mind, I knew a good mother should play with her children. So I'm going through the motions, and I'm doing it, but I wasn't feeling it. And it was in that moment, that I realized how much I had lost by not pursuing healing sooner. You know, and I had tried early on, but I gave up too soon. I really try to encourage people, if you try to get help from a doctor, or a pastor or a counselor, anybody and they they don't listen, or they don't connect and keep trying. Unfortunately, sometimes we have to go through several people before we find the one that will help us. But so I got that help physically. And I started, I changed my diet somewhat. And I started exercising, which was huge for me. Exercising is great for depression and anxiety. But I needed that little boost to be able to get out of bed and go to the gym. I changed the way I think. I realized I don't have to accept every thought that pops into my head, I can consider some thoughts and go You know what, that's not actually true. So when the thought pops up of God doesn't care about you. I go, you know what, that's not true. God's word says that he does care about me. And to fight against those negative thoughts was huge for me. And then finally, with emotionally, just going through that process of grieving, I went to a counselor, I got help with that professional help. I had resisted that for a long time, because I resented the idea of I have to pay someone to listen to me. But it was it was very helpful. And now I encourage everybody, I think everybody needs counseling, we all go through stuff. We all have issues, we're all broken, all in different ways. But I think it's more like the dentist where we just go in for a checkup every so often and kind of just help ribcage, our thinking. And so I was able to go through the process of grieving more with her and get validation for the feelings that I was having. And now that I was on this medication, I could process that a little better. So I attacked my problem on all four of those areas. And it was just very gradually baby steps at a time. I just continued to improve. And my counselor had told me because I had big ups and downs. I wasn't depressed all the time. And when I was not depressed, I'm like What was I so upset out said about? And then when I was depressed, I was like, why did I ever think that life was hopeful? So she told me to write a letter to my depressed self when I was not feeling depressed. So I started journaling during a quiet time in the morning, and I got about three quarters away through the first notebook. And I thought, I think I'm writing a book. And I decided in my mind, like, yeah, you know, everything that God has taught me, it's taken me, you know, almost 10 years to learn all this stuff. I'm like, I really want to give somebody else the shortcut. And if there's other people out there who feel alone, who feel like nobody's listening to them, or who maybe they have doubts about God, and they have nowhere to express that. Like, I don't want those people to feel as alone as I did in those years. I want to say, Hey, you know, this is okay. God's a big boy, he can handle our questions. You know, it's okay, if you're seeking and saying, I don't understand this, God. There's plenty of examples in the Bible where people did just that, and God embraced them, even in their doubt. So I thought, well, I'm gonna write a book to share this message with other people. And it's called Undefeated. From Trial to Trial, you know about living a victorious life, even in the midst of, of suffering and pain. There were so many times during the process of writing that book in those three years, where I was just literally in tears going, who am I, to write a book called Undefeated, when I feel so defeated some days, it's just very powerful to see how God uses us in our brokenness in our weakness. That's when He shines, you know, and then we don't get the credit for it, we don't get the glory for it, he gets the glory, because I'm no, it wasn't me. It was him working through me on my own, I was just a mess, and not helpful to anyone. Like I said earlier, God can redeem anything that we surrender to Him, and He can work that out for good.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Part of the spiritual key that you talk about there is being able to go to that pastor, and to say, I am doubting whether God even exists, or whether he cares for me. Do you think that sometimes in church circles, we're so busy talking about this victorious life, and that everything has to be great that we don't actually get to be real with others? And in turn, we don't get the opportunity to be real with ourselves?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yes, yes, I think you you've hit that on the head, we do a disservice to ourselves, when we don't allow real authentic faith with that mixture of I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief. When we have this atmosphere of Oh, you have to believe everything just the way I do, or you're not a good Christian. That doesn't serve any of the people in the church. And it doesn't honor God. As you look through the Scriptures. He welcomed and invited people to ask questions, to wrestle with him over hard things to, to have a back and forth, we're supposed to have a two way conversation and relationship with God. And he is so much bigger than all of our doubts and questions and fears. And it's not blasphemous, to say, hey, God, I don't get this, this is not making sense to me. I eventually came to the point in my life, where I decided that I don't want a God that I can understand. I want a God that I can trust, even when I don't understand. Because if there was a god that was small enough for my little finite brain to understand, then he wouldn't be worthy of my worship. And he wouldn't be powerful enough to help me in my time of need. And so I have decided that these mysteries of God, the, the fact that we can't get to the bottom of every question, is a good thing. It means that God is bigger than our comprehension. But that also means that he can do more than our comprehension. I love that the verse in Ephesians chapter three that says he does immeasurably more than we can ask or even imagine. So we can't necessarily understand all the whys and the reasons in our pain and in the tragedy, but neither can we understand all the blessings, and the amazing things that he has planned for us that we can't comprehend. And we just have to trust. And I think that's what faith is, is trusting a God that we can't see. And that is bigger than our understanding. But trusting his character, trusting his heart, trusting his love for us. And ultimately, for me, you know, when I would still doubt, you know, is this true? Or does God really love me? Or does he care? All I have to do is look to the cross. It's if God was willing to sacrifice himself, his own son for us? Won't he give us everything else that we need? Won't he provide for us in every other way? And so when I have doubts now, I just I look to Jesus, and I go, God loves me because of what he did for me. For all of us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned before that you wrote the book, hoping that that would be a shortcut for some people. Yeah. I'm wondering what sort of feedback you've had from some of those people that have read the book, and it's been that shortcut for them. It's been that opportunity to start their own journey towards healing.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yeah, I always love hearing back from from readers and I feel like because I'm was, you know, very open. Especially in the first chapter about all these things I've shared with you, I was just this is where I was, this is how I was angry and hurt, I felt betrayed by God, then a lot of people are willing to write back to me and open up about their struggles. One of the stories that a reader shared with me that most touched my heart was about a year or so ago, the past couple of years, I've been going through some health challenges, I have some kind of autoimmune type thing that doctors can't figure out. So I've just been dealing with a lot of stuff. And there were several days where I was so exhausted, I just lay on the couch, and I would do nothing. And I'm, I've been trying to write my second book, I'm very close to, to getting that one finished, it talks about how to strengthen your life in in these areas that I talked about, I felt so discouraged, because I'm like, I'm supposed to be writing this book, and I can't get my body up off the couch. A lady who had been at a women's retreat, where I spoke on the topic of the book, wrote me several months later, and said, she had given the book to her grandmother, who was in a assisted living facility, and she had just lost her husband. And she had gone through several trips, you know, her health was bad. So she was just really in a tough spot. And she said, she read the book, and it encouraged her so much. And so she was this, like, 86 year old woman was just going around, praying with all the other people in her facility and ministering to them and sharing God with them. And she said, she felt like she had a renewed purpose in her life, that God wasn't done with her yet, that she could go around and tell other people how God could help them in the midst of their trial. And I was so moved by that, here I am laying on the couch, and I can't get up. And yet God is using the message that he had me write, and he's still working. Even when I can't get off the couch, God's not laying on the couch, he's still out there doing stuff. And that was just so encouraging to me that I don't have to be strong all the time. I don't have to feel well, all the time, or, you know, hit the ball out of the park all the time, I just need to be faithful in the little steps each day, and God does the rest, he takes care of all that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
A big part of your story is those people who have finished their time on a particular assignment, and they move on, and you have to make friends with the new people. And then you move on. And there's this real transients amongst the people that you're trying to connect with. And even within the church of not being able to share those doubts initially. And I'm wondering if that's why you've put so much effort into to your website, because you have created a place there, that for people just like yourself, who don't have someone to go to that they can actually interact directly with you there and, and be able to find that person to talk to?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Yes, that is huge. The tool that we have right now of the connectedness and the Internet, and all these tools that we have available, are so such a asset that we have to connect with others and to share God's message of hope with other people. At the point when I was writing the book, and I was trying to think, you know, what am I going to do and I realized I need to do something that is mobile in my husband has to move every few years because of his work. But work on the internet, I can keep doing no matter where I am, I can do it from my laptop at home, wherever home happens to be that particular day. I don't have to like keep starting over with a new set of people, the readers that I have in the the people who are on my email list that I chat with, they stayed the same. And it doesn't matter to them where I'm writing from.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I will definitely put some links to the website in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net so that people can get in touch with you and see all the resources that you have there on your website but for those who are listening, where is the easiest place to get in touch with you.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
So my website is just my name, elizabethmeyers.me. And on there, there is a contact page where you can just message me straight through there. Or you can just send an email direct to its hi@elizabethmeyers.me. And I do have a bunch of free downloadable resources that people can have there. And for podcast listeners in particular, I offer a free PDF version of my book that you can download and get the whole thing for free that way
 
Rodney Olsen 
When your time on earth finishes, and you get to see Timothy face to face. What do you think that's going to be like?
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
I have tried to imagine that so many times. And I you know, it's that song of like, I can only imagine I you know, I don't know. But I do know that heaven seems like a sweeter place because he's there to me beforehand before I lost him. You know, people would talk about eternity and heaven and I'm gonna just be honest with you. It sounded boring to me. I'm like, I've got things I want to do here on this earth but you know, I don't know them like eager to get to heaven. But after he passed away all that changed. I was not so enamored with this earth. I just saw tragedy everywhere I looked and I had a deep desire to be with my son which I can't fully explain it. wasn't necessarily that I wanted to be dead, but I just wanted to be where he was. And he was with Jesus. And I thought life would be much better with Jesus than it is here. So now there's this attraction, more so to heaven. For me, it doesn't seem like a boring place anymore. It seems, you know, a wonderful place where there's no crying where we're reunited with people, there's healing. We're whole, we're right there with Jesus, whatever questions we have have either been answered by God Himself, or they just no longer matter. And we just let them go and realize that we were focused on the wrong thing. I mean, first of all, we see Jesus face to face, like, I just can't even imagine that and then to get to, I don't know, do we hug and having to get to hug him and hold him? And you know, I don't know. But it is fun to imagine that and the confidence and the assurance that he is there and that he safe and that his life is better there than the one that I could have given him.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Elizabeth, it has been a delight to chat to you to hear some of your story, to hear about the story of Timothy in his life and the way that he is drawing people to Jesus through his story, and you're telling of it. So I want to say thank you for your time today.
 
Elizabeth Meyers 
Thank you for having me. Thank you for allowing me to share what's on my heart.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Mike Savage was convicted of 89 counts of money laundering, mail fraud, wire fraud, tax fraud and sentenced to 17 and a half years in federal prison. He's a former radio personality, television news anchor, and has been described as a criminal mastermind. These days he's an adjunct professor teaching Bible Theology and Psychology, and co-hosts A Savage Perspective podcast with his wife Cynthia, Mike authored the book, A Prisoner's Perspective: Redemption of a Criminal Mastermind.
 
 
 
Website: https://www.mikesavagebooks.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mikesavagebooks/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mcsavage89/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mikesav78418
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Welcome to Bleeding Daylight. Just a quick reminder that you can find Bleeding Daylight wherever you listen to podcasts, and you can connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
 
Today’s guest was convicted of 89 counts of money laundering, mail fraud, wire fraud, tax fraud and sentenced to 17 and a half years in federal prison.
 
His remarkable story of life transformation and a wife who stood by him throughout everything is inspiring.
 
Mike Savage was jailed for his beliefs. His beliefs were that he could get away with his crimes without getting caught. He's a former radio personality, television news anchor, and has been described as a criminal mastermind. These days he's an adjunct professor teaching Bible Theology and Psychology, and co hosts A Savage Perspective podcast with his wife Cynthia, Mike authored the book, A Prisoner's Perspective: Redemption of a Criminal Mastermind. Today, we get to explore his colorful life on Bleeding Daylight. Mike, thank you so much for your time.
 
Mike Savage 
Well, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for inviting me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I know that the question on everyone's mind is what did he do to get sent to prison? Tell me about the days before you were caught.
 
Mike Savage 
The best way to put it I try not to go into too much detail for two reasons. One, I don't want to glorify my sin and second, I don't want to give anybody any ideas of what to do to make extra money. I was a radio talk show host I was making very little money doing that in the 1980s when I was approached to do some work overseas which had to do with transferring large sums of money. It could be cash, sometimes other types of wire transfers, that sort of thing. Well, I made a little money to begin with and then suddenly discovered, you know, there's a lot more that could be made. So I got involved with doing that and so it was international money laundering. And then, in the United States, there's two there were two forms of money laundering. One was just general money laundering, and the other was international money laundering. I was convicted of both 89 counts of money laundering, mail fraud, wire fraud, tax fraud and so the sentence was 17 and a half years in federal prison.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm wondering now, about those people who knew you at the time, I imagine they didn't even know that this was going on. So this would have been a real surprise, especially for those people who were used to listening to Mike on the radio. He's a good guy, and suddenly you sent off to prison.
 
Mike Savage 
Right? Well, no one knew what I was doing. My family didn't know the people that I was working with the time did not No, I had two lives. I had one the the family man, the working guy was working in Napa, California at the time on a radio station there. And no one had any idea. None whatsoever. I mean, I kept it totally away from them. The other side was the criminal side, which was an entirely as a Jekyll Hyde type of personality. The nice guy, the funny guy who was on the radio, the controversial guy on the radio suddenly became an entirely different person when it came to running a crime business and, and necessarily, so you can't be a nice guy when you're criminal, and being around other criminals. And so there was two different distinct Mike Savages at that time. Both liars, both cheating doing things that he shouldn't have been doing. I want to make this clear I accept responsibility for my crime I went to trial was proven guilty. I was guilty, I am guilty. I take responsibility. I don't want to downplay any of that, like, I was a nice guy to get caught up and stuff. That wasn't the case at all. I was not that people try to pay Oh, it wasn't a pretty nice guys. No, I was a liar. I was a liar. And I was really, really good at it. And until the Lord broke me down, I probably would have stayed on that path and ended up dead. But the amazing thing through all of this was that my wife, Cynthia, who had no idea what was going on, until the federal government, organized crime, Task Force, FBI, IRS, US Postal Service. Everybody came busting into our house, and she was six months pregnant at the time. And they took her away from it to reduce the stress. They told me that until you talk with us, we're not bringing her back. Well, they actually took her to breakfast, you know, they're being hard guys. And so my choice at that point was to I could have confessed and gotten much Last time, but instead I became the tough guy. And so this thing drew out and dragged out for over two years before we actually went to trial.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So that day, this is the time that your wife finds out of what's been going on, you say that you weren't prepared to admit it to the authorities who came busting down your door. What did you say to your wife?
 
Mike Savage 
I told her it was a mistake. They had the wrong person. I lied. I was a liar. I was unsaved. I was I was trying to cover my tracks trying to figure a way out of this and so I lied, and because she loves me so much, and she stayed with me through the entire incarceration. She's with me today in the other room, right? We're still together. And I got out in 2007. She loved me so much. She went along with with what I was saying she she would believe and that was it. It wasn't until much later that I would confess anything to her. That's after I'd been in prison for over two years.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So at that stage, she believes that an innocent man has been sent to prison. She has no idea at this point that you were absolutely guilty.
 
Mike Savage 
Yeah, that's right. And she was raising our children at the same time and sacrificing to come see me visit me in prison every other weekend. six hour drive each way six and a half hour drive from where she was living in the in the Napa area to Lompoc, California. So yeah, I was I was a rotten guy, truly a rotten guy.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what did that do to the trust in your relationship? When finally you admitted that over those two years of getting to trial, and then a couple of years into the sentence, all these years of continuing that lie? And you suddenly say, Well, actually, I did it. What happened to the trust between the two of you?
 
Mike Savage 
It grew, it grew because she has always been trustworthy. To me and our relationship always been trustworthy, even though when I was trying to come up with reasons we should divorce While I was in prison, all this type of thing, she wouldn't have any of that at all. This is the the book honestly started out as an homage to her, and quickly morphed into oh my gosh, this is all about God. Only God could do this. Only God could bring a woman into my life before I got caught. Stay with me after I got caught through all the lies through all the stuff, stay faithful to me. And when I finally told her, she forgave me, she forgave me. Rodney of all of all the things I expected forgiveness was not one of them. But that was what came absolutely, totally, completely. And our relationship grew from from then on even further. If it could, I mean, it just it it mushroomed after that the idea of being able to just confess and say yeah, you know, look, I was I was bad. I got caught up and stuff. I had no business getting caught up in And I mean, the title of the book, the whole thing of the criminal mastermind is irony in the 1980s, and in the United States, they had this war on drugs and so forth. And I was convicted under drug statutes, even though drugs weren't part of the crime and every person that had more than one person working for them, was considered a criminal mastermind in the indictments. It was a it was like a template that was filled out if there was a kid on the street slinging drugs to and he had two or three people that work for him. He was a criminal mastermind it was the is the irony that everybody's a criminal mastermind at that particular time. I wasn't a criminal mastermind, I'd never been in trouble in my life. I just got greedy, and I fell for it and it was exactly the wrong thing to do. But it was a decision that I made willingly. I wasn't tricked, or duped into it. And then once I found out I was pretty good at it, then I expanded the enterprise and went from there. So that was, you know, that's just the way it is. I mean, I saw somebody say something about, you know, Mike never takes acceptance of response, but I did read the book, you know, I, I'm thinking I'm losing everything, including my wife and instead, God gave me the greatest gift, you know, eternal life and returned me to my wife. We've just continued to grow since then.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I imagine that label of criminal mastermind is really a masterstroke by the police because as soon as you're labeled, that you're going into court and assumed to be guilty if you're being called at a criminal mastermind, and still, they have to prove the guilt and, and obviously, as you've said, that was there but that's a great way to put the jury on your side right from the start,
 
Mike Savage 
Right? This this type of crime will never have to we have to stand up to that stop. It'll never happen again. I mean, come on. I was before Bernie Madoff or any of these other people are doing anything and and it didn't stop or slow down. Anything people are going to send because they're centers, there's gonna be crime because there's criminals. You're not going to make an example. I mean, here in the US, and I'm not sure about Australia, we have the capital punishment or that sort of thing. But in the United States, certain states do. And there's even a federal law that allows under certain circumstances, but people are still killing people. Even though there's there's the capital punishment. So it speaks to the inherent evilness of man's heart. Mine in particular. I mean, it was a dark dark place, Rodney, it wasn't a again, I don't come across as Oh, I was a nice guy. I really was not a nice guy. There's a lot of things I wouldn't tell you about because I don't think the audience would be ready to hear that. When God reached down he had to come down a long way to grab hold of Mike Savage.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You said that you had to eventually admit your guilt to your wife. Was there a part of you that found it difficult to even admit that to yourself? Were you kidding yourself to some degree and thinking, well, this is all justified, I need to make a living and this is my way to do it? Or did you just know straight out, I'm absolutely guilty?
 
Mike Savage 
No, I lied to myself. I felt like I was caught up in something that I couldn't get out of. I'll be honest with you I prayed even when I was an unbeliever I remember praying the last couple of years before I got caught caught please get me out of this. This this is let me just get out of this. This is this is killing me this double life is I got to get out of this and the answer the prayer because I got I got arrested and put in prison. I was out of it. And I'm not making a joke there. I'm serious. I mean, that was that was an answered prayer. I see it now as an answered prayer. But at the time. My whole thought process was justification. I'm justifying this. This is what I do. If it was against the law, I would have been caught or I would know that it was against the law. All the justification in the world I would pour into my, but knowing deep down inside you know, that's a lie Mike. But going against that, no, no, no, I got to keep going. Gotta keep going. Gotta keep going. And I had people dependent on me, not just my family. But the crime people that I was they were dependent on me. So trying to stop wasn't really an option. I needed someone to help and God did help. I mean, there was that's a thorough cut when you go to prison. That's it. There's no coming back on this type of thing for me. I don't know what had been happened would have happened if I hadn't been saved in prison. I don't know what would have happened when I got out, or if I would have gotten out, you know, because it was just it was a dark, dark time where there's just no hope whatsoever of change. But initially, it was all justification. This is what I do. This is who I am. It's gonna be fine. I can handle this. All the lies you tell when you're trying to justify sin.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And as for the money that you are making, through your, your job as a criminal mastermind. All this money. How much did you make and how did you hide that away from the people that knew you?
 
Mike Savage 
in the 80s it really wasn't that much of a problem. Remember? There's no cell phones, there was no internet, the most advanced technology was faxing things from from one place to another. So moving money around was extremely easy transferring from one bank to a bank overseas or bank overseas to places in the United States. It wasn't a difficulty at all. I mean, that there weren't these limits on how much you can transfer now without reporting it to the Internal Revenue Service here in the US. So those laws and those things weren't in effect at that time. The amount that I was convicted of was $2 million, which back then was was quite, I mean, still quite a bit. Now. What am I saying? But I mean, back then it was even it was meant even more, but there was considerably more than that. That was moved around and that I got commissions on being able to do stuff. And the government traced virtually every penny of it and any property that we had that I had at the time, was seized and forfeited to the federal government. The banks overseas they talk about they have all the secrecy, you know, They rolled over instantly when the federal government asked them for the information. So they were able to track it, but it was they they got all the money that was left at the time of things that I hadn't bought or, or given to others or that sort of thing. It was it was millions of dollars. And it was it was very easy to do back.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that you had an encounter with God whilst you were in prison, that he did answer the prayer that you prayed even before knowing if he was real or not and so often I find that that's the way that we pray for an answer, and we get the answer we didn't expect, but that is the answer that God brings.
 
Mike Savage 
Right.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How far into your jail term did that actually happen?
 
Mike Savage 
It was it was about two and a half years in. So the first I was first sent to the penitentiary in Lompoc, California. You know, it was classified as white collar criminal, all this kind of stuff, a civilian organized crime. They never proved any of that but I mean, they sent me to accidentally sent me to the penitentiary that they had misclassified my level of security supposed to be sent to a correctional institution which is a low, but I was sent to a very high level prison. So I was there for a short time till that got changed. And that I was transferred to the Federal Correctional Institution in Lompoc, which is right across the street from penitentiary. And I was assigned to the kitchen duty where I quickly ingratiated myself with some people there and began making alcohol for sale to the other prisoners. It's called pruno. And it was made with bread and yeast and sugar and I won't give the recipe out someone by trying it and going blind. But we would make that and so I had a little side hustle going on doing that I was also one of the guys making book, you know, for taking bets on football games and baseball games, basketball games, all that kind of stuff. So I fell right back into a criminal lifestyle. So I got into prison. So that was I was it was great. You know, it was where I got this. Now I can do this for the next you know, few years. But then about 18 months in I get transferred out of the kitchen where I was doing all this stuff to the chapels office the chaplains office and I became the lead chapel clerk. And I I didn't ask for the transfer obviously and and I went in and asked the chaplain, Why are you transferring me in here? Because I saw you on the on the compound he says, you know, Holy Spirit spoke to me about you and so I'm I wanted you to come work for me. And I said I look I don't know God I don't know any other stuff. You know, I've got time to do I'm not trying to sit around with a bunch of Bible thumpers or you know, Quran thumpers because like 13 different religious groups there you know from Muslims, Jews, Mormons, Jehovah Witness, Wiccans, all these Catholics, everything that you can think of right? So I don't want to be around people. Come on. He says now just give it a try. So I'm there and I know you gave me the responsibility for being in service. And then after the services are over with making sure everything was straightened out, everything was sorted, everything's cleaned out, ready for the next group ready for whatever was going to be coming in. And so over a period of six months, I'm going to all these different services, right? And not just Protestant service, I'm going to all of them and thinking this is the worst job in the world. Everybody thinks they're right. Everybody's got away to God, and we got to do this. You got to do that. Come on, come on. So the thing that I hated most was going to Protestant services. Because there was always this altar call at the end, where you know, you want to accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, come forward, say this prayer, you'll be saved and I'm like, okay, right. I'm sitting in the back. And it was it had been a particularly rugged week for me. I'd argued with Cynthia, I wanted to divorce or over the phone and so I want to divorce now you're not going to divorce me? She was she's just adamant, there's not gonna be a divorce. So I'm miserable. I've got, you know, a million years left on my sentence. I mean, this is 1990s I don't get out until 2007. And I'm thinking, you know, that's Buck Rogers time back since 2000. Oh, that's far, far away. And I'm miserable and depressed and angry because I can't make the pruno anymore. I'm upset about not being able to involve the gambling and do any of this stuff at all. And I sat through so many of these Protestant services, I probably could have given the sinner's prayer, even being an unbeliever. It's just and so this particular night, I'm angry, I'm depressed, frustrated, I'm sitting in the back waiting for these guys, just the volunteers that come in and, you know, volunteers before come in and see me and let me pray for you. They put their hands on, oh, God tells me you're not going to do any more of your sentence. You're going to go home soon. And you know, truly rockin it every single day of my sentence, so none of their prophesizing work but I didn't know at the time I was just irritated. Just Just a miserable person. As I'm sitting In the back and vice of rotten week, I said, You know what, God, I'll tell you what if you're real, if you really are real, and all this stuff I've been hearing for these months is true. Show me something. Just show me something. And the guy's going into the sinner's prayer at the same time, and I'm just seeing it together. Show me something. Because I don't. This is his last chance. Show me something. And Rodney, I started crying. I don't cry. I'm not a crier. Never been a crier. But I start crying not not like crying, but like, weeping. And all I can describe, and I don't expect everybody to go through this. I don't expect a lot of people necessarily gonna believe me when I say this, but suddenly it's like a synapse in my brain that had been dormant fired and all those sermons I sat through, and all those things teaching seminars that I sat through and all the stuff that I was so miserable having to do. I suddenly understood, I got it. I understood and I, and I believed. It made sense to me for some reason, while I'm weeping like a baby, this, I'm a big guy, I'm 6'3" at the time, I was like, 280, now I'm 220 Thank You, Jesus. But this big old guy weeping in the back, and actually believing for the first time, not only in God, that God loved me. And I just, that's how I that's how I got saved. As I don't everybody goes through that I'm just this is just what happened to me. It's just what happened to me. And it was at synapse firing. All that stuff filtered through. I could understand what was being said. I wanted a closer relationship with with this person, who when I asked him to prove something to me, made me cry. You know, I've just kept my head down, waiting for everybody to leave. Now, usually the volunteers come and we say something. Nobody said he left. And so I finished up cleaning up the thing left with back to the, to the to the cell, and just laid there quietly, trying to figure this stuff out. A couple of days later had to go back to work. I go in and see the chaplain, I say, Look, let me tell you what happened. So I told him, he said, I've been waiting for that. Like, it's just, I've been waiting for this, Mike, this is this is great news don't. And I said, Well, that's, that's great news for you. But I have no idea what to do. I said, I am I supposed to go to every Bible study? I'm supposed to go every service one, what am I supposed to do? And he said, Just be patient. This is let's let's let's pray together. And we did. And let's see what God would have you do. About a week later, I was enrolled in seminary because I wanted to know If, like in the first chapter of John, when it says that, that Jesus is God, I remembered from the Jehovah Witnesses when they read it so that Jesus was a god. So the first thing I wanted to do was see in the Greek what it actually said, he says, we're gonna need to go to seminary. I said, Yeah, give me the Strong's Concordance, and let's go through this. And so when I saw, I said, Okay, then I was in, then I, all I wanted to do was learn. And I was 30 something years old. And all I wanted to do was learn about God. And so over the next, you know, what was 13 years? That's all I did was I learned, I went to seminary. I got my degrees. I'm trying to figure out okay, when I get out what am I called to do? And the chaplain was gone by then other chaplains are talking, Oh, God, I'll show you that. But you're called to be a Pastor Mike. And I was saying, that's cool. You know, that's great. I only have to work on what Wednesday to do a Bible study. And then Sunday, I preach and I'm rest of the week mine pretty much, right? So I had obviously, I had no clue as to what a pastor did. But I became a teacher. And I began teaching the other inmates and stuff that I was learning. And, you know, I would preach, got to the point when I transferred Finally, when my custody dropped far enough down, I was transferred to a camp in Taft, California. And we put together a choir, and we would go out and sing in the local churches, and I would preach, and it was, so it Okay, well, you know, I'm not, I'm an okay, preacher, I don't know. But I'm really a teacher and a counselor because I was counseling guys and doing things like that. And so it was it was a metamorphosis, you know, over the over the period of time from from this cocoon of prison to where coming out, you know, what am I going to be? Am I going to be, you know, an ugly duck might be a butterfly, you know, what's this and you shouldn't be the person I want you to be like, and so that's kind of in a nutshell, from you just asked me about salvation, but I kind of felt like you need to see the whole story of how it played out. It wasn't a Oh, I've got this now. My life has changed. This is a road to Damascus thing. There was no road to Damascus God had me do every single day of my time. And my wife waited for me every single day of that time, and suffered greatly by doing so. But she stayed nonetheless. And I mean, that's kind of tell you, I mean, it's amazing that our youngest child became a police officer a year and a half ago. How's that? People say God doesn't have a sense of humor. How's that for a sense of humor, but I mean, it's just been kind of a that type of a metamorphosis is taking place.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you were able to undertake those seminary courses whilst you're in prison. I guess that's one way of making sure that you have the time to study.
 
Mike Savage 
Yeah, you know, I'm I don't know how many people you know, who have read all of Calvin's Institute's who've read most of the Pentecostal literature on preaching worship, teaching that story. thing, read through most of the word biblical commentaries, I went through all those. When I wasn't in the chapel. I was either at the weight pile, or I was in myself reading books. And if I could get away with reading books while I was on duty at the chapel, I did that too. I mean, I, I read every commentary I could get my hands on. I read different versions of the Bible. I learned the the Greek and the Hebrew writings, I can't pronounce it people laugh at me when I try and read it out loud because I didn't have anybody teaching me how to save the words. But that and I did some time with a priest and he was walking me through the Latin rights and Latin masses and, and going through those things. And so I had this this opportunity to get a world class education doing that. I was just amazed. You know, what I look back now. I'm amazed. But it was it was a rare opportunity. And I'm really glad I took that time to be able to read rather than you know, just In the stuff that I was starting out doing,
 
Rodney Olsen 
it certainly has been a big change around. And you mentioned that initial chaplain who saw you out there and just felt the Holy Spirit saying, There's something about this guy, you need some sort of connection. Do you ever get a chance to catch up with him once you left prison?
 
Mike Savage 
Thank goodness for Facebook, right? He found me. He knew when I was getting out, and we weren't allowed to communicate while I was in prison, but he had retired. And when I got out, he contacted me. So we have been in contact. This is just a wonderful, wonderful man of God. And there was there's another chaplain that I met at Taft that I'm still in contact with also he's retired as well. Just wonderful men of God that were instrumental in keeping me on the right path when I got to Taft, that there were some extreme rough edges because I'd been at higher level institutions and going into a camp it was entirely different. I had higher level institutions swearing is de rigueur, you know, it's part of the the process. So he, he had to work on my swearing, I had a tendency to, I felt like there were certain times where only a certain word would do you know, and I know that sounds strange for Christians but I have saved in prison I was educated in prison. So the the rough and he he worked as hard as he could to get those rough edges off of me and and I have to give him a lot of credit for, for having a lot of patience. There was times I would just I was amazed at some of the stuff that people would say that were the lower level institution. I mean, it's as low as it was no fence around it, not the walk off if you wanted to. But I mean, the people who come in were just straight from the streets where I've been in prison for over a decade. So if there was some some fisticuffs and other things that occurred just kind of leave it at that, but he I'm telling you, Rodney was the the Mike Savage of today is entirely different than the one that made it into that prison camp at the end for the final two years of a sense of Oh man, so that it's a It was a process and God always put the right people there to take care of that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There is a thought for some people that once you come to meet with God, you accept Jesus. There's that salvation that we talk about in Christian circles, that life gets pretty sweet after that. But you're saying that that's not quite the case. You still had to serve out that sentence. And that goes against the way that some people would like to believe.
 
Mike Savage 
 I had guys tell me, you just need to claim your way out of here. You just need to claim your way out Mike because God loves you. I said, show me one person that's claimed their way out of prison. Just one. I said, let's take a look at the scriptures. You know, where did Paul end up? Where did Peter end up? In prison. As if there's anybody that could have walked out? It's those two but they chose to stay. Why? Because their faith in God. I have faith in God that he's going to make now there weren't times that I wasn't still talking to Father and saying, hey, look, you know, this is this is good to go. I'm ready to go. But the thing is that the books that I read one of them was the practice of his presence by Brother Lawrence. Are you familiar with that book?
 
Rodney Olsen 
I've certainly heard of it. Yes.
 
Mike Savage 
Oh, that's the only way I pray anymore is this constant conversation I mean, whether I'm, you know, scooping dog poop in the backyard, or whether I'm cooking dinner, or whether the Bible open in front of me, He and I are in a conversation. When I teach prayer. When I teach the theology of prayer, one of the first things I tell the students is, from here on out for this for this semester, when you finish praying to God, do not say amen. Unless you're praying over food, because we don't want the food to get cold but other than that, we're forbidden from saying amen, because that's like hanging up the phone. You're done. Maybe he's not. And so would you be in conversation? And the first time I said that, I got reported to the Academic Dean who calls me to his office, I'm teaching heresy. I explained to him what I said, and he says I've never thought of that. That's a good point. And so the first lesson is for them. I want you to sit there for one minute, close your eyes and think about nothing but God just just got for one minute. Everything else is gone. Close your eyes. I'm timing. And of course, I'm a big guy. So these students are intimidating in prison. So they are their best right? At the end of one minute, okay, who was able to keep their mind on God for one minute without any intrusive thoughts, and whoever raises their hand, I'm going to call a liar, because there was no way you could do that. It takes practice. It takes effort. It takes building a relationship where you can be in conversation, and I learned that from Brother Lawrence. And Brother Lawrence said that even when he would forget when he would get caught up in the mundane things of life, God would call him back and we've got did call him back by the Lord's didn't have to fall down and apologize, guys, I know how you're from. Let's just continue where you left off. And they would have that communication. The same way Jesus did with his disciples when they were walking to me that was prayer. They're walking and talking to me, you're talking to God, that's perfect. He's talking back. That's the best form of prayer. So Those types of books made a big difference in my life. I didn't learn that in seminary. I just found the book and read it. It happened to be in the prison library. And it was it was a life changer for me. I mean, I walk around the backyard talking to God out loud. And occasionally some of the neighbors say you're talking to me. I know. Sorry. I was just thinking out loud cuz I don't tell him talking to God because I don't want him to think I'm crazy, right? But I do. Talk to him just like that every day. Walk around the house, my dogs will look at me. They know he's talking to God. He's not talking to us. My wife puts up with it, which is brilliant. I don't even realize I'm talking out loud to God but he brought me through so much. Why am I gonna give up on him now? Why? Why wouldn't I keep praying that way? Is our life terrific? Yeah. Because we're together. Doesn't mean we have millions of dollars or any of that type of thing. Sometimes it's tough to find a job, you know, for an ex con, who's a professor, an adjunct professor, rather than being a tenured professor. Sometimes it's tough, but he's never let us down. We went through hurricane Harvey a few years ago had bunch of stuff destroyed. God built it right back up. Went through another hurricane a couple of months ago. God was right there with his to do it again. And so it's kind of hard to doubt him. After all I've been through over the time being in prison and looking back and seeing what He did, it is hard to doubt that He's not going to do the right thing moving forward. So I mean, why would I doubt that will be the reason for that. He's never let me down before Why would he suddenly do that?
 
Rodney Olsen 
At the end of your sentence, you're released and even though your wife Cynthia has stood by you all this time, was it like studying a new relationship coming out and having to set boundaries again and, and just begin again, from a new point?
 
Mike Savage 
To a degree. Now understand when I left to go to prison, there was no cell phones, internet. Starbucks was just kind of starting type of stuff in California. When I get out, she hands me a cell phone. As I don't need his cell phone. I need to call anybody No, for 15 years you had to call me I wouldn't be able to call you. Okay. All right, I'm cell phone. I thought the internet was like a big library that everything was true on it. You can look stuff up. So I was anxious to to try that. But my behavior in prison. I'll give you an example. I got home shortly before Thanksgiving. And on Thanksgiving, the whole family came over right there stand in the house and I was talking all this. Well, 10 o'clock at night, you know, I was tired. So I went to bed. And Rodney when I say went to bed. I just got up and left and went to the bedroom, went to bed. And I got up the next morning. And Cynthia says, Are you mad? I said mad, what would I be mad about? I'm happy. I'm home. You know, this is great. I'm happy to be with you. You went to bed last night. You didn't say good night to anyone. Well in prison, you don't go around. Okay, night night, everybody. I didn't even dawn on me and I suddenly realize That that, you know, they talk about being institutionalized the idea that you become used to routines and institutions so you carry them with you. That's exactly what it happened. And so I had to learn to do those sort of things. Another example of that a few weeks later, Cynthia and our youngest son, we're going to the grocery store, get out the car, walk in a parking lot. This lady comes running up to Cynthia with a clipboard, asking if she registered to vote. And Cynthia is very polite, very elegant woman professional. She's director of case management for three hospitals here in Corpus Christi. Just a terrific lady. She goes, Yes, I have. Thank you. Okay. And so Jessie and I are beginning to talk. I mean, he's, he's a teenager. And so we were kind of struggling to establish a rapport. Me being there all the time. So we're talking about sports, we're talking about American football. And so we're going back and forth about football. We're still talking or walking up the street. There. All of a sudden ladies in front of me says, Did you register to vote? I just walked around or continue talking to Jesse. And we kept going. She comes around a second time gets right in front of me. I said, Did you register to vote? And I just walk around again, still talking to Jesse, third time, almost to the store. She She comes around, answer me, did you register to vote, but you don't point at people in prison like that you don't get in their face like that. I mean, it's just not something that's done unless you're looking for a fight. And so I informed her loudly that I was an ex con, I wasn't going to be able to vote, and that I just had 15 years in prison and the she needed to not stand in front of it. Only I used a lot of swear words to do it loudly and I'm a Christian at the time. Okay. But this is I'm acting, I'm acting out, you know, like, and so she kind of withers and goes away. I see Cynthia pull up the hood on her jacket and go into the store quickly. Jesse is my youngest son just beaming. He's, he's so happy. smiling. His old man just, you know, swore at this lady. I, you know, there's a little bit of the Holy Spirit convicting me. But sometimes the Holy Spirit wouldn't convict me until there was a lesson that had to be learned in the right lesson, the right person that we learned that lesson was there. Excuse me. Well, when I walk in, Cynthia's got her hood up. Got the grocery cart, trying to speed away, Hey, where are you going? Come here, come here. Let me let me push that for you. And it's what's wrong? And she said, you just you realize that you just very loudly swore at this lady and told everyone in hearing range that you're an ex con. Yeah. She said, there's nothing wrong with that, other than the swearing and being loud is nothing wrong being an ex con. But she says the people who heard you, they don't know what you did to go to prison. So they might think they're in the presence of a murderer or rapist or child abuser or something like that. You might consider that in the future beforehand. And that's when the Holy Spirit came said, Yeah, like, come on. Settle down. trust in me. Let me guide you a little. I had to learn that lesson that way. So there were a couple of times that I can remember right off the top of my head. That things did not go well. Yeah, I was a Christian. Yeah, I was saved. Yes, I believe all of those things, but I still had to change coming out of prison. So Cynthia and I, my relationship was great. She would support me through anything. But the children were kind of like, Who is this guy? Now? Well, Jessie loved the idea of the tough guy, ex con dad coming out. Daughter, not as much, oldest son not as much. So I had to learn to readapt into society. At the same time, be true to God, and be true to who he made me, which is sometimes I can be maybe a little loud or sometimes I can be a little, you know, demonstrative and in how I talk and I don't mean swearing, but I mean, I get close. Stop. I hardly ever do it from the pulpit anymore, right? No, I'm just kidding. I've. But it's one of those things I had to get back into me. Because I was a guy from the 80s coming out in 2007. You know, I it was rough inside prison. I mean, it's not I've been through riots. I've been through solitary confinement more times than I can count, but I never went to solitary confinement until after I was a Christian. Because I was always under suspicion for something because with the stuff that I used to do, I wasn't doing more so he must be doing something worse. So there was a change and things had to occur and I had to grow as a person as God wanted me to be outside of prison. And and that's that's been an ongoing process.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me a little of what life is like now. Very different to those prison days. And I'm sure that God is still teaching you lessons. But what does life look like for you today?
 
Mike Savage 
When I turned 60, which was a year and a half ago. I thought, Okay, that's it. I'm done. You know, that's it. It's 60 that's old. You're finished. You know, we're going to, okay, I'm going to retire, and then slowly fade away. But it's, it's it hasn't been that way at all. I wrote the memoir. I've written a novel that I'm working on now. I finished up a dissertation for my doctorate in psychology over the last few years. And so today I'm an adjunct professor, I teach online, occasionally I go into the classroom. I enjoy being in the classroom. I enjoy teaching students and and challenging them and having fun with them. But I enjoy the time alone with God. I can see what was so appealing to to Francis Merton and his writings a Roman Catholic monk, a Trappist monk, about that this solitude of being God. And so there are days when I have contact with them. No one but Cynthia, and I can, I'm content with that. There are other days that I'll have me doing interviews, or we'll be interviewing people have classes, and I'm busy going back and forth. And it's fine. But any problems that arise, I always put into the perspective of what I've been through in the past and how God was faithful with that. And I've been in prison riots where, you know, things got ugly in a hurry, and he still protected me. And so, I always give the example of this way in prison when they say that brother is gonna stab you in the back. They mean it literally. It's not like it's not a metaphor of, he's going to say something bad about you. So there's this perspective that I've been that I've been given by God, that it's okay to be alone. Because you're not alone because you're with God. It's okay if if people don't always remember your name or they're not struck by this interview or by reading one of your books are. That's okay. That's okay. And so my life is one of pleasant solitude at times of pleasant action at times, but of trying my best to be led by God and whatever he wants me to do it and sometimes that's moment to moment because sometimes I can get a little restless, I'll admit. And that's time of Okay, we'll pick up the guitar. You know, let's just talk Mike why you play your little chords, or, you know, let's let's write some more. Let's edit some more. This is a quiet more contemplative time and I've described it to Cynthia as being in solitary confinement, with privileges. But I mean, it's a good life. Our children are all grown. We have five grand sons. It's an enjoyable life because I see it through how God wants me to see it in times that I get restless. I realize I'm just being kind of a knucklehead and just to settle down.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm going to put some links to your website in the show notes at bleeding daylight dotnet. But for anyone listening, what's the easiest way for them to get in touch with you? They want to pick up a copy of your book and delve further into your story or listen to the podcast. Where should they go?
 
Mike Savage 
Well, I made it pretty simple. If they want to buy the book, it's on Amazon. It's called a prisoner's perspective, the redemption of a criminal mastermind. So it's right there on Amazon. If you're interested in finding out more about me or for whatever reason that may be, you can go to MikeSavageBooks.com. That's, that's the website and I'm also on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. And I'm not a master of any of those, but I am capable of returning messages. So if I can at least do that, but the that's the best way to get in touch. I appreciate your you're putting those out there. Thank you, Rodney very much,
 
Rodney Olsen 
Mike. It has been a delight hearing your story to hear where you've come from and where God has you headed and I'm sure that the story is not over yet but thank you so much for your time today on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Mike Savage 
Thank you very much.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Melinda Tankard Reist founded Collective Shout ten years ago, a grassroots campaigns movement for a world free of sexploitation in all its forms. She's an author, speaker, media commentator, blogger and advocate for women and girls. She's best known for her work addressing sexualization, objectification, harms of pornography, sexual exploitation, trafficking, and violence against women.
 
 
 
Melinda Tankard Reist Website: https://melindatankardreist.com/
Collective Shout Website: https://www.collectiveshout.org/
Collective Shout Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/collectiveshout
Collective Shout Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/collective.shout/
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I need to warn you that today’s episode of Bleeding Daylight may be confronting at times, but it focusses on issues that affect us all. They’re also issues that give each one of us opportunity to shine light into some very dark places and to make our world more compassionate with greater respect and equality for all.
 
My guest founded Collective Shout ten years ago, a grassroots campaigns movement for a world free of sexploitation in all its forms. This is an episode that should be heard by many, especially parents. I encourage you to share it widely so that we can all take action to draw closer to the kind of world we long to see.
 
Constant abuse and even death threats have become common occurrences for Melinda Tankard Reist. Those reactions only serve to highlight the seriousness of the topics that she raises in our society. She's an author, speaker, media commentator, blogger and advocate for women and girls. She's best known for her work addressing sexualization, objectification, harms of pornography, sexual exploitation, trafficking, and violence against women. I'm so pleased to have her joining me on bleeding daylight. Melinda, thank you so much for your time.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Thanks for having me. Thanks for your interest.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested in knowing where your passion for standing against this kind of exploitation actually began.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Look, it probably began in my hometown growing up in a country town in Victoria and I started to see the mistreatment of women in my community. I became a journalist from the age of 16 and began to document some of that mistreatment. One of the first pieces I ever wrote was about the opening of a women's refuge in my town for victims of violence. I also noticed that mistreatment of Indigenous women and migrant women. I was then awarded a scholarship to study journalism in the US and that I ended up traveling globally and witnessed for myself the second class status of women around the world, returned to Australia and continue to document issues affecting women and girls, that I wrote my book Getting Real: Challenging the sexualisation of girls, and that's really where this work took off. And I was asked look where's the grassroots movement against everything you've described, and that's how Collective Shout came about 10 years ago.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's interesting that there are a number of issues that you're looking at there, that are just obvious that these are harming but I think a lot of what you call to the surface are those things that just go past us without us recognising what's going on. What are some of the themes that you think that most people don't understand are harmful to women?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
I'm really glad you've asked me this, Rodney, because I've always believed that I was meant to document issues that were going under the radar. I've written six books now. And I felt led I suppose to expose things that were harmful in the hope that we might wake up and do something about those things. So the epidemic of violence against women globally, if you look at female genital mutilation, bride burning, dowry deaths, if you look at trafficking in the bodies of women and girls into the global sex industry, if you will. With the fact that girls globally are more often denied education and and kept in a very controlled and submissive environment, the way that pornography is shaping and molding attitudes and behaviors, that teaches boys that they have a sense of entitlement to the bodies of women and girls and teaches girls that they exist primarily for male sexual gratification and pleasure. And that's my main focus at present is exposing how we are warping the sexuality of an entire generation, how we are contributing to violence and brutality and sexual cruelty,. callousness, in what we are presenting as normal sex, and this is stuff starting earlier and earlier. So yeah, I've just felt that I'm supposed to bring these issues to the light in the hope that we can build an uprising, a global rebellion, if you like, against these harmful cultural scripts and harmful dictates which are causing so much documented damage.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned the the use of pornography and you campaigned very strongly against it. So how do you respond to those who would perhaps say, Well, if you don't like it, don't use it?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
That's like saying if you don't like pollution don't breathe it. You know, the fact is that we live in porn culture. We're trying to raise healthy, happy, resilient children in a pornified landscape that's floor to ceiling. It's everywhere. It's just a ridiculous nonsensical, stupid argument, to say, you know, close your eyes and don't don't look, because the research is solid, on the way that pornography contributes to violence against women, the way that it contributes to rape myth that girls actually want to be raped that no actually means yes. The way that it contributes to sexual harassment. Girls tell me in every school I go to about being groped at school about being asked for naked selfies about being asked for sexual acts in the school playground, being bullied to behave in to take up pornified roles and behaviors. So look, I just have no time for that argument. The fact is that the world is being indoctrinated by a porn, it's a propaganda. It's hate speech, cultural norms are being taught through pornography and that affects all of us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned about some of that starting at school. How young are we talking for those young girls that are being approached in this way?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
I'm now taking my message into primary schools, which I didn't envision when I first started out and that's the tragedy of it. Even children now, but hey, In inappropriate ways, they're acting out sexually, what they have seen in pornography or sometimes searching for it, sometimes innocently, putting in a search term looking for their favorite cartoon character. All roads lead to porn and it's not a matter of if my child will see porn, it's a matter of when. I would say most commonly year seven year eights. Now girls tell me that they're being approached, they're being sexually harassed, they're being groped, they're being touched. They're having photos taken down their blouses up their skirts, and the real tragedy is they think this is normal. They think they should just have to put up with it. And I have girls say to me, we didn't know we were allowed to say no. They get given a hard time for standing up for themselves, but then the whole culture tells them that being degraded is sexy. That you should behave in these ways if you want to be seen as free and sexually liberated and it's not just through overt porn sites, it's throughout the culture everywhere and music, fashion games, advertising marketing, in a shopping center with floor to ceiling quantified portrayals of, of women presenting this very harmful normative stereotype about women and what women and girls are good for.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Any of us who have seen on Facebook, Collective Shout, that movement that you're talking about that you founded, would have seen some very disturbing images of girls younger and younger being presented in a sexualized way. And the thing I think that disturbs me the most is oftentimes, these are through things like Instagram accounts that are run by these girls' mothers. How can they not understand the harm that they're causing?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Yes, we have a global campaign at against Instagram under the hashtag wake up Instagram. We've been calling out Instagram for facilitating predators. We have exposed hundreds of predators operating on Instagram contacting the underage girls, asking them to chat privately, posting sexual fantasies publicly about these girls, capturing their images and sending those images to designated websites for these men and their their friends. And tragically Instagrams become a predators paradise. Sometimes the girls appear to be operating their own accounts, sometimes it appears to be a parent, but sometimes it's clear these girls are being trafficked to being a being sold on online. And we've said to Instagram You know, this is just not good enough. You claim to care about children and child safety. But look at what we've exposed and my team is very small, you know? We've captured imagery of men live masturbating to schoolgirls in their school uniforms, visible school uniforms, we can identify the school. And the girl will invite anyone to chat with them, video chats, but they don't know who's behind the handle of those who attend the chat until she sees what they're doing. And it's, it's just so common. We don't think that any parent should have their child on Instagram to be honest. It's just too too dangerous. Most of the grooming now is happening online. Children have been groomed by predators in places that a lot of parents think are safe for their child and they're just not.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We hear from time to time people who are up in arms about various online platforms such as tik tok and others, but then you have that mainstream one Instagram and I guess that would be showing to a lot of people thinking well, I thought that that was a safe place and and they would think that certain online platforms are safe and yet it doesn't seem that any of them are
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
now That's right. I'm in tic tocs full of full of porn now as well and girls imitating what they're seeing in in porn inspired music videos, for example, parents have to be across what's going on online. However, having said that, it's too much for us. You know, it takes a village to raise a child, we can't monitor our child 24 hours a day, even if they're not being exposed to these harmful messages at home, what happens when they're on the school bus? What happens when they're at school camp, what happens when they're in the school yard or visiting a friend, on a weekend parents tell us this is how their child was often exposed in the first instance. And that's why we need our governments and our regulatory bodies and the heads of these things. big tech corporations to actually take child sexual exploitation seriously. One good outcome is that we are now in conversation with some of these global corporations, Instagram and Facebook where we're meeting with now. They're aware of our concerns, they know they need to do something to address them. We're also now in conversation with Alibaba after exposing the sale of child sexual abuse dolls, replica children, replica infants, lifelike babies and toddlers being sold through one of the biggest global shopping apps and online platforms in the world. And now they've come to us after we got those dolls down off their platform and asked for our input as to how they can do better. So there are some good things happening. I have to remind myself of that most days but you know, it's going to take a lot more before our children are safe online,
 
Rodney Olsen 
There is that online threat but another disturbing thing is you can just walk through a shopping center and you're seeing images there on shop fronts or on advertising billboards, within shopping centers that I guess 10 years ago probably would have been the sorts of things that would have appeared in pornography magazines.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Yeah, what we've seen now is just the pornification of culture, that wall to wall hyper sexualized images and messages which contribute to the second class status of women. The biggest study on the objectification of women in the world and meta analysis of all of the existing global research found that objectified portrayals of women contribute to a diminished view of women's competence, morality and humanity. That's how serious this issue is and yet we have the CEO's of our property groups, the shopping centres like Westfield, who are essentially landlords to the tenants Honey Birdette in this case the sex shop, which features floor to ceiling depictions of semi naked women, sexually suggestive poses. Honey Birdette is a repeat corporate offender. They continually act in breach of the Australian Association of National Advertisers code of ethics. However, there are no penalties for non compliance. There are no fines, there's no powers to enforce the rulings of ad standards. So the CEOs actually have the gall to call themselves Male Champions of Change. Now Male Champions of Change is an initiative to get a CEOs, male CEOs, to sign up to say we will do all in our power to stamp out sexism in our communities in our shopping centers and yet, they do nothing to rein in the unethical harmful behavior of their very own tenants. So, you know, we just don't buy it. We know parents that are boycotting the shopping centers, they don't want to go there, they don't want their kids exposed to these images. And that's an ongoing campaign that collective shot is running.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It sounds like these so called leaders of change, are actually just jumping on a bandwagon that they expect will get them some brownie points and yet people can see right through it,
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
We call it pinkwashing. You know, you look like you care, but what are you actually doing? And that's why we're that's why we're exposing the double standards.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And this seems to be the case in a number of instances where businesses that have a number of arms will try and look caring, they'll try and look like they're trying to bring about healthy change with one brand and yet, with another brand, they're selling exactly what they're supposedly against.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Exactly. And that's why we have a very big emphasis that present on corporate social responsibility on your values and your mission statements. If you claim to care about the community, if you claim to care about women and girls and children, then you know you can't have it both ways. Often we do, what we do is just quote their own vision and value statements back to them. and point out that they're not actually living this out. We've done the same in a campaign to ethical super funds. We have contacted 23, I think at last count ethical super investment funds, who invest in these property groups and yet claim to have, you know, very high standards around investment. You won't invest in tobacco, gambling, alcohol, those sorts of things and yet even some of the faith based super funds are still investing in shopping centers, which are hosting sexism. So we're calling out that double standard is.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Well, one of the words that I hear so often, when any of these sorts of issues are raised is empowerment. We hear of businesses who profit from what you call sexual objectification say that they are empowering women. So what's your response to those voices?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Well, it's just, it's just not true. That's just not true. And anyone following our work will see how how we have documented that that's not true. For example, we put in a major submission to the Australian Human Rights Commission's inquiry into sexual harassment. It's a relatively recent inquiry, you can find that submission and many others on our website, and we documented all of the links between sexualization and objectification of women and girls, right through to sexist attitudes, the formation of sexist attitudes contributing to sexual behaviors, inappropriate behavior, contributing to violence against women. We draw those links, we join the dots If you like and say that you can't just address, you know, say, the glass ceiling without addressing the way harmful corporate behaviors contribute to demonstrable harms to women and girls. So yeah, forget about you your language, let's look at what you're actually doing.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And yet many young women seem to have bought that lie of empowerment. And so anything that they do that is sexualized, they still keep under that banner of empowerment, not realizing that it's actually disempowerment.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
That girls have been lied to from the moment they're born. and empowerment, liberation freedom has been presented to them, really, by the sex industry or sex industry messaging, telling them that empowerment means, you know, adopting pornified roles and behaviors. Flashing your breasts in public providing sexual acts to boys being able to pole dance. This is not true empowerment. And again our work over a decade has been to try to help young women to to see through to see through that and to value themselves to something other than being able to attract the male gaze and being able to attract sexual attention. What about your gifts, your abilities, your talents, your art, your poetry, your desire to make a difference in the world, about you know, those kind of character traits that we so need in the world today, you know, basic empathy. You know, we're driving the empathy out of young people, particularly boys, and we've been working hard to help girls see that they are more than just porn fantasy props, that they that they deserve more that they are allowed to stand up for themselves and demand better and not conform to this these toxic cultural messages which, again, the research says is harmful to them. It's not just my opinion, it's what the research demonstrates. So fortunately, we have more young women now joining our movement. I get girls in school saying, you know, just so grateful to hear a different message, a countercultural messenger, a critique and dissection of the culture they live in. often they'll say, Oh, we thought there was something wrong with us individually, for not wanting to do all of these things. But then they realized that actually, no, this is all education and training provided by a sexed up world, which is harmful to them. And that's our only hope. I think we can help young people to resist upon culture to rise up against it and to demand something better for themselves, their friends, their little brothers, their little sisters and their future children.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And these young women who hear this message it must lift an enormous burden off their shoulders to know that they don't have to acting this way,
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Because it's the most probably the most rewarding aspect of my work is to see that realization to see the lights go on and for them to say, Oh, we don't actually have to put up with this, well, you know, we can say, No, we can just not conform to this pressure, this terrible pressure that they are under. And so, you know, even only if only a small number of girls decide to live differently, and not to conform and say they have the right to say no. And again, if more boys decide to change, to resist toxic masculinity, to choose to be men of integrity and empathy, that's going to gonna make a massive difference. You know, it has to be the boys have to change as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're touching on the boys and their responsibility as well and just in the same way that our young women have swallowed that lie that society has sold them, so have the young men and yet they don't realize it either. They somehow feel that this is what being a man is about and yet they've been sold a lie too.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Boys have been sold a lie and the research shows that, for example, if they're learning about sexuality through porn, it's corrosive to connection. It's disconnects them emotionally, it's dumps their sexuality. It molds them in a hollow and callous understanding of sexuality. their attitudes become more cruel and more degrading. They believe that they're dominant and that girls should be submissive and this is an absolute tragedy. They won't know what true love and connection and intimacy and sensuality look like they may not ever experience it unless they make a radical change. And I interview boys on this subject and they say things like a porn contributed to me or made me undress every girl I met you know, in my mind. I saw every girl as a sex object, that they lost their ability to just be friends with girls. They were fantasizing about them. They also said that they started to respond to computers rather than to actual human beings. So they get turned on just by seeing this inanimate object of the computer, knowing what they could discover, you know, on the screen. And so real women and girls just can't can't compete with that, and why should they have to? But fortunately, there's a growing movement of men and boys around the world who are resisting porn, and who wants something better for themselves and for the women in their lives?
 
Rodney Olsen 
 I would imagine that there's some parents listening, who are now very alarmed at what they're hearing and thinking, What do I do? How do I actually speak to my young people to my young girl or to my young boy about these sorts of things you've already highlighted. They can't escape. online because if it's not at home, and they'll see it somewhere else. So how do we go about preparing our young people for the reality of the world ahead?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Well, we have to act personally and we have to act politically. Personally obviously setting standards in the home. not tolerating porn in the home, not tolerating violent, videos, violent, violent music, looking for teachable moments, you're out you're here and inappropriate ad on the radio or you see pornified portrayals of women in the shopping centers use it as a discussion point. Obviously, modeling what respect based relationships look like in the home, not tolerating put downs or so called jokes about bodies, how the system might be looking at the moment or yet put down to about how she might look. There's some of the things obviously having the computer in a public place in the home, not allowing kids on screens behind closed doors, having rules around devices, many parents feel that they've lost control with the devices. Some parents tell me that, you know, they all hand in their phones at a certain time every night so the family can do other things. Kids can, you know, radical idea, read a book, and just have that non screen time in the evenings. But then, you know, we have to take it further. It's too much for parents on their own. So, of course, I'm going to say sign up to Collective Shout and get involved. Get involved in cultural change and social transformation call on our governments to do better. And we elect them to represent us we elect them to defend the most vulnerable surely that has to be our children. So we've been running campaigns for example, to get an age verification system, so that kids just can't enter torture porn right? porn, sadism porn, with you know, just one click because there's no proof of age required. So you're acting personally acting politically having those difficult conversations. If we're not talking to our kids about these things someone else will be and they may not share our values for our, our children. So even though we don't want to, we'd rather not have to, we have to start having these conversations when the children are young. I have resources on this you can find on my website, How to Talk to Your Kids About Porn is a very popular book that I have available. And another book is called Good Pictures, Bad Pictures which you read with your child and a young age to help them know that this is not appropriate and what to do if they see an image because it's inevitable they will see something. So we don't want them to feel ashamed. If they feel ashamed they won't tell us what they've seen. So we prepare them in advance for what they might come across and how to deal with that. I saw a really good tip just a couple of days ago and save the kid system another kid or have a look at this at school, then the child pauses and says, you know, well, I don't want to or, you know, don't just put that in my face just a really practical way, so that the child can just sort of catch their breath and not get exposed to something, because this is what's happening. And we need all the help we can get to prepare our children to strengthen them, and to protect them from the harms of pornography.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We're talking mainly at the moment about children or young people. Once people get to a certain age, of course, there would be some who would say all bets are off. They would say that sex is something natural, and it should be expressed, how ever an individual might decide what are your thoughts on that?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Of course sex is natural. No one's disagreeing with that but there's expressions of sexuality that's healthy and has expressions that that aren't and that's what we're seeing. We're seeing porn sex, we're seeing aggressive acts expected from primarily from women and girls. Girls, telling me men expect, boys expect to treat them violently, including some of the signature signature acts that we see in porn, like choking and gagging and other things I won't describe more cruelty more degrading and so yes, there's nothing wrong with sexuality but porn isn't teaching healthy sexuality and if women and girls are being harmed, that's not an expression of healthy sexuality, it's quite the opposite.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What about sex work and prostitution? What should we think about those sorts of issues?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
I wrote a book on this issue called Prostitution Narrative Stories of Survival in the Sex Trade and that was about woman first person accounts of women who have exited the sex industry and told the truth about it. So of course, were opposed to the profiting the sale of the bodies of women and girls in this global industrial complex trading in the bodies of women or girls, you know, you don't have trafficking without the sex industry, you don't have trafficking without without brothels because the demand is so, so high. It's an absolute tragedy. It's modern day slavery. And of course, we don't support that either. And we have the evidence that testimonials of women who were there who were in it, and now speak to the truth about what they were expected to do. And the brutality, the cruelty, the degradation, the suffering, the long term, post traumatic stress, and trauma, which is all well documented now.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned in the opening that you've received a number of threats and harassment over time. Where does the bulk of this harassment come from? Who are the people that are targeting you in this way?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Mostly men, and from people who have a vested interest in the way things are why Would they react unless they felt we were a threat over the weekend, we had around 1000 comments, most of them abusive. And this had come about as a result of a campaign we ran to get a hate page down off Instagram called Girls Getting Hurt and in this page, they feature images of women and girls being hurt, being injured. And it's all meant to be hilarious. So we actually got this page off Instagram and the ringleaders behind that page then initiated a cyber attack on us and across all of our platforms, and on posts that were directly related to our campaign to get this page off, and that's how that's how they operate. I mean, the main ringleader behind it as pictures of himself with his wife and children in it his profile. So you know, you have to wonder what life's like for them. But you know, I've long held the view that as Paul Keating used to say, the dogs may bark, but the caravan rolls on and you just keep rolling on you just you've got the dogs, you can get the tires, but you just keep on moving. And, you know, I don't spend a I don't look up my now to put my name into a search engine. I don't look at comments on articles I've, I've written, you know, in the public domain, I just can't expend my emotional energy, which is they want that, you know, they want to think that they've got to you. So we've made a bit of fun of it. We've shared some of the comments over the last 24 hours and there's there's some that are pretty, pretty funny. They're not meant to be funny. Anyone having a look at my Facebook will see why we're why we're saying that. So look, we, we debrief all the time, me and my team, we take time out when we need to, we do what we need to, to survive it. And just to press on, you know, there's a goal and we've got our eyes on it, and we just keep pressing on. They've been trying to destroy us for a decade now. And it hasn't been successful. I'm not saying it's easy. I'm not trying to make light of, of those attacks, because often they're very personal. They're often threatening. They're often disgusting, but we just, we just keep going.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And that's the thing I want to find out from you. You're totally immersed in a world where you're seeing some of the darker side of humanity, you're, you're plunging into depths that most of us will only scratch the surface of, how do you keep your head above water? How do you actually start to see the light in the world beyond all this darkness that you're encountering?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Look, I've had to become very intentional about that because you do pay a price for staring into the abyss every day. Staring into the abyss, darkness and exposing it all the time and it does affect you. So I, I hike. I just disappear into the bush with a backpack sometimes on my own sometimes with friends. You know, I spent as much time in nature as I can. The sun's out today that always helps. I tried to start the day with some kind of you know, just contemplations, spiritual reading just to sort of set my brain so that I'm not straight into the porn, although it's that, you know, pretty quickly. I'm usually on I'm usually on Twitter pretty quickly, but I try to start with something else. I debrief with my friends. We actually have a lot of fun, which people might find hard to believe, but we do have a lot of laughs I get to work with very funny, very funny, smart, intelligent, passionate women. And I get the pleasure I get the pure privilege of speaking to thousands of young people a year and seeing seeing lives changed without without me And I get the privilege of seeing major victories, like last year was one of the biggest years we've ever had one victory after another, just in the last two months, we've had seven, seven wins in a row. And there's an adrenaline rush to that, you know, it's enjoyable, it's rewarding when you get those victories. So those things all help to, to balance out to make up for the harmful side of it. At the end of the year, I take a long break, I turn my phone off. I try not to do any work related reading. I've had I've been forced to take a long period of time off at the end of the year to be able to renew and get back into it in the new year.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm wondering what action, and you've touched on this a number of times and various aspects of it, but what action can the average person take against this multimillion dollar industry of exploitation? What can we do?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Well know the facts know the truth. Don't buy into it. Don't buy the sexualised clothing, don't buy the violent music products don't allow that harmful industry to suck the life out of your children, protect them do all you can to protect them from porn have have every filtering device on. One that's recommended to me is his Family Zone, which seems to be pretty comprehensive. But as I said, we have to add broader than that and sign join Collective Shout, we make it easy for you to complain. We show you what the problem is, and we give you the steps to address it and do not think that one voice doesn't make a difference. We have seen campaigns won when one person has spoken out. Some of our quickest wins have been in two or three hours. One of the most common things people say to us is you helped me to be brave. In the past, I thought it was just me. I thought I was on my own. I thought there was something wrong with me. Now I've realized that I'm backed by thousands of people. And I can go out and say something I can take up my rightful place in the public square and speak, you know, we live here too. And we can't afford to sacrifice, especially our children to the global sex industry. We can't just stand back and allow that to happen. So it's time to get some power back and Collective Shout will give that give that to you. And you can be part of this what's becoming a global movement now against sexual exploitation in all its forms. Get on board collectiveshout.org, sign up and join our Facebook pages. We're on Twitter, we're on Instagram we're on LinkedIn and rather than sort of curse the darkness get involved in bringing about social transformation with us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'll certainly put links in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net for Collective Shout so that people can get there, also to your website so people can grab hold of some of the books that you're talking about. I do find it interesting that a lot of the people that we see reacting and talking on your Facebook page are, of course, women do men sometimes feel that they don't have the right to speak into an issue that is seen as a women's issue like this. How do we empower men who want to stop this as well? How do we empower them to actually make a difference?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Well, I don't know why it should be seen as a women's issue. It's a community issue. Because we need men to speak out. We need men to call out the bad behavior. We need men to stop being bystanders and not saying anything. We need men to stop joking along and laughing and underplaying what's really happening calling out sexually inappropriate behavior, sexist jokes, comments about women's bodies, calling it out. Something I find frustrating is when men ask me what are you doing for men or what are you doing for men? You know, I'm I'm really running this outfit with three women. That's it. And you know, we're running global campaigns, it's time for men to step up to recognize that they have to do something. Unfortunately, we have many good men in our movement. speaking out on this, I have young men working with me in schools now, Daniel. There's no excuse for, for not getting involved. Please get involved. We need everyone.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you think that's part of the problem that men don't see this as as their issue that they see it as a women's issue when actually it's going to provide them with with better relationships with the women that they love?
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Well, I'm just having trouble understanding why it would be just seen as a as a women's issue. This is a whole of society issue. Their children are being deformed and twisted into harmful ideas about bodies, relationships and sexuality. If they don't speak about this, their boys will be the sexual abusers of the future because men need to be involved, they need to demonstrate what healthy masculinity looks like. So the boys have some kind of role model. I mean men need to ask themselves this question. Why are boys now in the biggest cohort of sexual abusers, teenage boys now, why why is that? Why have we reneged on our responsibility to form boys in healthy ways? That question has to be asked by anyone who cares about our young people and where society is going. Why is this now so common that boys are featuring in our sexual assault statistics? Why's that? Now I'm going to say a big factor is the conditioning that porn has given them and the lack of guidance, the lack of inputting alternative ways to be men. I've written on this as well, when there was criticism of the Gillette ad The best a man can get. And I took a different different view, I believe the ad was encouraging men to act higher. Even though of course, you know, of course, it's to try and sell stuff, but I thought the overall message was quite quite good. You know, I just think this, this is an outstanding, unanswered question of our times. So please, men, please get on board. So some of the some of us women are getting a little bit, a little bit weary. And there's lots of ways to get involved. You may not want to be sort of a loud mouth activist, and you don't have to there's so many other ways to be involved. We need volunteers, we need help with website with, with design with fundraising, you know, if you've got money, you know, help us please. We run it running out of money. We're tax deductible. Now. You can donate, you know, and a lot of the action can happen behind the scenes. You don't all have to be upfront. There's lots of ways to help us and back us behind the scenes.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Melinda, I absolutely love your passion and there's so much in there that each of us can actually act on and that's what I love about it too. This is not talking some theory, but there are real issues that we can make a real difference in. So I want to thank you for your time today and thank you for leading away that we all get to follow. Thanks.
 
Melinda Tankard Reist 
Thanks so much, Rodney. Appreciate it.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Meg Glesener is a remarkable woman who has turned a traumatic upbringing into a life that brings love and hope to so many. Her home is one marked by openness, safety and love but her experience of a family home growing up was starkly different.
 
 
Website: http://lettersfromhomepodcast.com
Facebook: http://facebook.com/lettersfromhomepodcast/
Instagram: http://instagram.com/lettersfromhomepodcast
Email: lfhpodcast@gmail.com
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you for dropping in on Bleeding Daylight once again. I’m always interested in your thoughts and comments so please connect with Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Also, I’d really appreciate it if you could leave a rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Today’s guest is a remarkable woman who has turned a traumatic upbringing into a life that brings love and hope to so many. I can’t wait to introduce you.
 
When you think of Meg Glesener one of the first words that comes to mind is family. Her home is one marked by openness, safety and love and I suspect that her definition of family spreads far wider than blood relatives. So maybe you're surprised to find that her experience of family growing up was starkly different. These days, she hosts and produces the podcast Letters from Home. I'm honored to have Meg join me as a guest on Bleeding Daylight. Thank you for your time.
 
Meg Glesener 
Rodney, thank you for having me. I feel so blessed to be part of all the great stories you're getting out there to encourage our hurting world.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Thank you very much. I mentioned you growing up in an environment that's very different from the one that you and your husband have created. So let's start with where you grew up. Can you describe what kind of neighborhood you grew up in?
 
Meg Glesener 
Well, I went to about 10 Elementary School. So as far as the neighborhood Well, I'll tell you about My parents so my parents met in Memphis at playing a game in college. They were playing Bridge and my dad thought, Oh, she's really smart. And anyway, I think he lost some kind of a bet and ended up on a date with my mom and they dated for a very short time. Then my dad ran into a telephone pole while he's backing up for a football catch, went into a coma. He had broken up with my mom just before that my mom came and visited him and then they redated again for a very short time, and my brother was conceived. So they married, both being Catholic, but their marriage was volatile and loveless from the get go. And my dad didn't really grow up with a father. His father had abandoned him. He was very abusive, and then you add alcohol to the mix and they have three kids in three years. And so their marriage started off really, really bad. My mom because of the physical abuse kind of went internal and when I was five years old, they had moved to California and my mom had tried to reach out to her family, but nobody believed her that she was being abused, which is really awful. And so they ended up moving to California with three kids had a fourth in California and when I was five years old, it was Christmas time. And my mom and dad were fighting. It's the ..  only have two memories of when they were married, and they were fighting and they were yelling and they shoved us and sent us in a room. And I was sitting there on a bed with my brother and my sisters and I could hear that song that Christmas song Oh Tanenbaum, Oh Tanenbaum, and that's the only memory that I have of my parents interaction together and they divorced after that. Then I ended up living with my mom, while my father disappeared for probably five years or so didn't want to pay child support or anything and just kind of Adios. And my mom is trying to raise us on welfare and food stamps. in California.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that no one really believed your mom's story of abuse and these days, it's becoming more common that we hear of stories and that people are getting help. Do you think that life could have been very different for your whole family at someone believed her back then in that first place?
 
Meg Glesener 
You know, hadn't even thought of that. But yes, it could have been so different for her because not having the people that raised you and my mom was young, she was 20. And by 25, had four kids and If her parents would have believed her, maybe my dad would have gotten some help. Right there at the beginning. It could have Yeah, it could have been really different. Maybe he would have gotten the help that he needed. Maybe she would have had a completely different life. Maybe they would have separated, who knows. But instead, we ended up. It started 15 years of raging alcoholism for my father and with my mom, we were on food stamps and she was in and out of a lot of bad relationships. And because she was so kind of in her own world, we just were kind of on our own. And my mom would say that I raised my younger brother and one of her boyfriends was sexually abusive to my sister and me. You add up a checked out mom, who has no way to deal with anything, and a really needy situation in and out of relationships. And then my dad came back about five years after that, and he took two of the kids so that he didn't have to pay child support. And so I was left with a couple of siblings. My dad was kind of out of the picture. I don't remember a parent ever coming to a parent night or anything at school. I don't remember getting help with homework I was, I really hardly have any memories of my early life. And I think trauma plays a part of that. Another awful thing that had happened is that I didn't realize until I was I think I was my second year of college, I had a flashback memory. And the flashback memory was being sexually abused by my own father, which is horrific, and to be able to process that and so I I just mentioned that because I think because of that and the other thing with one of my mom's boyfriend's I think I hardly remember anything really before fifth or sixth grade besides a loving grandparent, you know who came from Tennessee and would take us to Disneyland and that sort of thing. So besides that, it's just so, such a blur until I got a little bit older.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If you put yourself back in that situation and start to imagine it as a child, did you know that something was was not right? Did you hear stories from other kids at school and realize that your family was different? Or did this just seem normal to you?
 
Meg Glesener 
It seemed completely normal. And Rodney I didn't realize till college that my home wasn't normal. You know, as I entered middle school, I live with my mom still. And we lived in kind of an area that had a lot of gangs. And she was spending, I don't know four or five nights away at her boyfriend's house and I would watch the kids. You talk about darkness knocking on the door. There were so many people in that apartment complex doing drugs and They would go down, we live right by this river bed right across from a cemetery and they would go down into the river bed and do drugs and I just really wanted to be accepted into. And I said, I'd like to, you know, come and they said, No, we don't want to, we don't want to mess you up. You're You're nice. And so there's little steps along the way where I do feel that there was some kind of presence if you will, protecting me along the way I could have. I could have brought guys into the house, I could have done anything. I mean, I'm alone as a teenager in a house. When so my relationship with my mom wasn't that great. And I really turned to sports for really felt good to be good at sports and that kind of thing. When I was a freshman in high school, my relationship with my mom came to a head one day and she was mad at me and she yelled at me about something she she thought I was giving my brother the wrong medicine and said Why are you trying to kill my son when I got the wrong medicine? And she had been out that night and she was yelling at me for no reason, and I just lost it. And I said, Hey, I'm the one who does. You know this and, you know, like, I've paid for my clothes. You're not grateful, blah, blah, blah. And I ended up throwing a shoe at her. Because I said, well, you here's your shoe back and I walked barefoot to my dad's house, walk seven miles, barefoot, stubborn. And when I got there, because we had all lived with him a couple years before, that is a trial year and he was so angry and so drunk, I just thought, I don't want to ever go back to live with my dad. She would threaten us all the time. It wasn't one of those nice situations where people speak nice about each other. No, they both spoke awful about each other. I didn't even know they liked each other at any point until my mid 30s. When I asked them about how they enjoyed each other's game playing game. I got to my dad's house. I he said You can stay here if you want. And I really wanted my mom to apologize. I want her to apologize for being rude for not being thankful for all that I'd done for her with taking care of the kids. And she never apologized, and I was so mad. And I was also scared because my dad was so mean, I remember sleeping under the bed, in my dad's guest room with stuffed animals piled around me and wishing my mom would call. Call mom, call back. She never called she called Five days later. And I had already made that decision. I will never let myself be in that situation. Again, I won't be vulnerable to my mom. She called Five days later and she said you can come back and I said, No, thanks.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that you threw yourself into sport as a way of coping because you really didn't have much of a choice between living with your mom or living with your dad. Either choice is not good. So you try to focus elsewhere and that was with sport. What sort of sport did you play? How did you go with it?
 
Meg Glesener 
I played volleyball and basketball and softball. And there was one thing my dad was good at was volleyball and he would take us to the beach on the weekends. So, though, you know, alcoholism, colors, things, that wasn't all bad. We did have some good family times where we'd go play volleyball on the beach. I was really good at that. And so that is one thing that helped immensely in high school, being known for being good at sports. And it took a few years for the whole friends thing to come along. It was it was devastating. I mean, it was really hard to be alone, and eventually ended up getting friends in the sports world.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was it difficult to form close friendships? You mentioned that you'd moved around a lot. Was there something in the back of your mind that, hey, I might not be here long anyway, so was that difficult in forming those relationships?
 
Meg Glesener 
It was really difficult. I remember sitting in that lonely phase of my life, and I saw these popular girls and a couple of them played volleyball. And you know, they were sitting in this one part of the school. And I remember thinking, by the time I'm a junior, I want to be in that popular group. I want to be the best on the team. I hope to please my parents, I remember having these unspoken goals in my mind. And by the time I got to junior year, I had all of those things. I was standing there with those popular girls feeling completely, like I was not part of the group, you know, imposter syndrome. And plus they all felt closer and I didn't feel like they like me No, so is completely alone. I was MVP in sports. I was doing well. But there was this emptiness. Inside there was an emptiness and a longing inside. I did meet a girl in one of my classes and she was So nice to me. And anyway, we went to a dance together. And then after a bunch of us went over to my friend's house to spend the night and while we were hanging out this guy open his Bible and shared some Bible verses and talked about Jesus, and how He loves us. And I didn't know it at the time, but this is how I would describe it. There's a verse in the Bible, Revelation three, verse 20, that says, Behold, and it's it's God talking, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come into him and eat with him. And he with me, at that moment with all the loneliness and the brokenness and things that have come up, I knew that the Lord was knocking on the door of my heart and this guy, Lance at this party at my friend's house said, who would like to give their life to Christ and I remember in my heart thinking Me, me, I want to and I said out loud I do. That night at 16 years old, in my friend's bedroom with this co-ed group, I gave my life to Christ. And I know people have different experiences. But for me, when I woke up the next day, I was a new person. The Lord had come into my heart and there was a burden lifted, there was joy. There was really the whole I almost feeling like birds singing, it was a new day, Rodney,
 
Rodney Olsen 
I suppose the experience that you'd have of anything to do with religion or faith in the past is this religion that your parents had grown up in, which is the thing that caused them to, to have to get married and and it was a bunch of rules. So how did this change in your mind you're talking about this idea of Jesus saying, hey, look, I'll come in and eat with you. And that's a very intimate thing to do. That's a very relationship based thing. It must have seen very different to any of the religion that you'd seen before that.
 
Meg Glesener 
After my parents got divorced, we lived in Tennessee with my grandparents for a year, and went to Catholic church every week and went out to brunch afterward. And that was really the only church exposure I had. I think my dad took his experience with the Catholic Church and he felt like when he was in college, nobody had any answers. And then he just thought it was a bunch of BS. My mom, I think, felt abandoned. And I never went to church once growing up. So I really didn't have a frame of reference. But when I heard the Bible being read, there was something that sparked in my heart. And yeah, a little piece of me thought, This is too good to be true. I can receive Christ and he's my Lord. And I can Go with him to heaven and forgive me for all my sins and cleanse me. It really seemed almost too good to be true. And it is not. It is not. It's the truth I've seen. I'm 53 now and I've seen seeing that to be true. Once I gave my life to the Lord. I thought I should probably tell my dad, there was a really dramatic situation that happened. So his his alcoholism came to a head my sophomore year, he was dating my stepmother. And she would visit and she gave him an ultimatum and said, You need to quit drinking or I'm going to leave you and my dad was just devastated. And he locked himself in a room and he had a harpoon and I don't I mean, who keeps a harpoon? I had a harpoon in his room and he was threatening to take his own life. And my stepmom who is very intense and rules oriented. She piled the kids in the car, because she had two little girls. And my brother and sister and I, we just hopped in the car and my dad said, Okay, I'll go in. So my dad went into a clinic. And he was sober from that point on and he's sober To this day, which I'm grateful for. But yeah, their marriage was not the healthiest or the best. We had 10 foot pot plants in the backyard, you know, hello, 60s left over. And I remember smoking a bong with them in the living room. And just they said, We here you drink so that you know you can do at home safely. I think they were trying to be good parents, but there was a lot of screwball stuff but the thing that affected me more than all that was the anger and the yelling and it probably because of the trauma, I went through younger. I'm just very sensitive still to this day. When I got saved. When the Lord came into my life, I thought I should tell my dad Add that I'm a Christian now. So I came to him and said, Hey, dad, he was in a good mood. I said, I, I wanted to ask you about God. And he was like, What? And I think his first time we'd ever talked about God and he was all sudden, his angry, Mr. Potato Heads, angry eyes, you know, came on. So I just said, I want to know about God. He's like, I'm the one who puts the food on the table. I pay the rent. You know, God, there's no place for God in my house. And I was too intimidated by him to tell him at that point that I was a Christian. I ended up getting a full scholarship for volleyball at a Christian college. And it was maybe half an hour away. I went in and tested. I did one test. They're like serve. They're like full ride, offered me a full ride for college. And I told my dad about it. I was like, Dad, I've got this full ride and well, what college and To Azusa Pacific, because now you can't go. It's a religious school. So I was only 17 when I started college and so I didn't go, I didn't take the full ride and I ended up putting myself through school without any financial help from my parents. I had never really been to church at that point. Still, and I didn't have a reference for that. But I knew the Lord was in my heart and I'd open my Bible and read it. And at home, I would just hide my Bible. I mean, I would read in my room with the door closed and be afraid if my dad walked by is he gonna say something? It's gonna do something because my Christian friends from that group that I went to it was a campus life group had gone to a different college. I thought I better find some Christian friends I you know, a better set myself up and meet meet some people. And so I signed up I went to Cal State Fullerton in California and I signed up for every Christian club. The first one that I went to, I walked in the room, and I met people and I thought, well, they're they're just not talking about God. It wasn't like, you know, you get this cheesy feeling sometime for people are over emotional or something. I was looking at these people and I thought they really know God. And I started really growing in my faith. And college was just a great life changer for me. So many things started changing for me in a good way. I wanted to go to church, I was invited in my I told my dad, Hey, Dad, I'd like to go to church. And he said, Well, you can go once, but if you ask me to go again, you're not welcome to live in this home. And he said, religions, a bunch of propaganda and a bunch of BS. And he said, I would rather that you told me you were on drugs, then that you were a Christian.
 
Rodney Olsen 
That's a pretty tough thing to have to deal with. Of course, you took that opportunity to go to church, once. What happened when you decided that you'd like to go back?
 
Meg Glesener 
I went to church, and it was so cool. I was listed hearing people singing praises, and I just thought, this is where I should be. I had asked this older lady who I had met, and she said, wait till you're 18. But I thought, I'm tired of hiding the Bible. I don't I want to keep growing. And so I decided, yeah, like you said, I decided to tell my dad and again, waiting for him to be in a good mood, like, Hey, Dad, I would love to talk to you. And he's like about what I think he knew called my step mom down. They're sitting there. We're in the living room. They're looking at me right at me. So what do you want to talk to us about? And I said, Well, I want to go to church. And they said, Well, you know what that means, don't you? And I said, Yes, of course. It's really hard to say this. I'm sitting next to adults. Yeah, I'm still a teenager and my my dad said, That's not Good enough Meg, we want to date. And I said it was a Monday and I said, All right, Wednesday, and they both would not let me say goodbye to my younger sister to sister two years younger. And my step sisters were about six years younger. They wouldn't let me say goodbye, I called mom and I said, Hey, Mom, I'm really grateful to my mom for this. I said, Dad, won't let me live with them. Can I come back with you? And she said, Yes. And she was living with a boyfriend at the time. So I moved in with my mom. And I never got to say goodbye. My sisters. My sister told me that she thought I left because of her and my parents told her that I loved God more than I loved her. And she didn't even realize that until our 40 is when we had this conversation. So I moved in with my mom and I started really growing in my Faith. And I was going to church and somebody was taking me aside and discipling me and I thought maybe I'll do a walk on for volleyball at the college. But I realized, you know, my sports are going to end but my life with God is not going to end. And at that stage of my life, I decided, I'm think I'm done with sports.
 
Rodney Olsen 
When your father had said, hey, look, you're not going to be welcome here if you continue on with this God stuff. When you came to have that conversation, was there a part of you that thought, surely he can be serious? He was just saying that, but he's gonna say, Oh, look, we don't agree, but you're welcome to stay here. Was that how you thought it would be or having known him for so long? Obviously, you realized what this might mean?
 
Meg Glesener 
That's a great question. There was a little bit of both, I suppose I was hoping that they would say that's fine. I mean, there really wasn't hardly any transition time before. They said That's not good enough we want to date. And that is another good thing my dad taught me is he's a man of his word and I keeping your words important, but no, I knew he was serious and he meant business.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You're living with your mum back again and you're starting to head off to college, you're starting to meet people, you're starting to grow in your faith. What comes next? What's the next step in your story?
 
Meg Glesener 
The next step in my story is my dad, I would just kind of, I guess, spend time with him over time. He he didn't want me to contact him, but I would still send him you know, a Father's Day card or different things like that had been a few years where there was just no contact besides written on my part, or a phone call, and he softened up a little bit over time and he said, Okay, I guess we can get together for lunch. So I planned on lunch with my dad and I was I came over to the house. The house where I'd gotten kicked out of and my step sisters were there. My dad was late, which was really unusual. I had determined in my heart I am not going to bring up God. It's I'm just going to sit here and you know, nervous and I go inside the house my stepsisters let me in. And I'm sitting in the living room with my sisters. And they look at me and said, Meg, tell us about God. We want to know. And so
 
Rodney Olsen 
Wow, wow.
 
Meg Glesener 
Right. So I answered their questions, and that we were having this incredible conversation and, and they said, I want to become a Christian. And so we planned in the middle of the lunch to go for a bike ride, which we did, right there in this complex, a house beautiful housing complex. And they got on their knees in this park with their little bikes at I think nine or 10 years old and gave their life to Christ. That's one way. That's one thing that happened. And I met my husband through that Bible study that I was going to. We started dating toward the end of my college years. And as I was growing in my faith, I would bring my brother, my brother had been kicked out for not looking for a job and he was struggling, he was living with a guy who was wasted on drugs. He started coming to church and my brother turned his life around my mom, who had been for many broken relationships and so much hard time and she had even been in a mental institution a couple of times because she couldn't handle life. It was so hard for her. She started coming to church with me and she gave her life to Christ that a good old fashioned 10th meeting. And all through college I was involved with this beautiful ministry if you will, and got to spend a lot of time with many college, young women, many gave their life to Christ and so many learned, learn how what it means to be a Christian. So I got to see God use my life and that choice all through college to affect so many people. And then right after that, my husband and I, we got married. We got married right after college the summer after I graduated from college.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's an amazing story. I'm just wondering if I can take you back to that time when those young sisters asked to, to know about God and they said, We want to know this Jesus. How did you feel at that point, knowing that if they went ahead with this step, it would make a huge difference in their life, but it may also bring rejection from your dad.
 
Meg Glesener 
I hadn't really thought at that moment about whether they would be rejected. From my dad. I probably should have. But I, I know after that time I planned a time with their twin girls. I came a couple months later and brought them Bibles to the house. So I met them and they had Bibles that they would read on their own. And I don't think their mom ever talked to them about it. But one of my sisters told me that when her mom was going through her room, she found it and just threw it away. So maybe she was a little softer than my dad was about it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Let's fast forward. What does life look like for you now? What does your family look like now?
 
Meg Glesener 
Well, my husband, Mike and I, within a year of marriage were both two very purposeful people and we got sent up from California to Seattle area to plant a church. And so that's how we got up here in the Pacific Northwest. We have as of last week, Heard that we have grandkid number five coming along the way we have eight children and a couple of them are married and we have two teenagers left at home. We have a senior and a freshman and we're about to start a virtual homeschool on a personal level. I'm a youth leader at church. I love working with youth and we've had so many families live with this. Over the years we've opened up our home to invite people in. One of the people that we've had come into our house more recently, is actually my dad. My dad would still say he's a pretty outspoken atheist and he has said to me his words, mag I really hate Christians but there's nothing I hate more than born again evangelical Christians. And yet I would say to this day, my dad now he loves my husband more than anyone else besides his His Son, dad says since regretted skipping our wedding because it was Christian wedding, and he loves us dearly. And when he ran on hard times, a couple of years ago, his marriage to my stepmom just was just over and then they lost everything they had so much. And they had kind of lost it all. And it's sad. You don't want that to happen to anyone. But without hesitation, my husband, Mike, and I said, Dad, you can come live with us. And so he moved up here, and he lived with us for a year and I just can't help seeing how God has a sense of humor and he also has a plan and my dad who was his heart and angry guy within 24 hours really of living with this just seeing that. No, we're not perfect. You know, we're not poor. We got our struggles. Life's not perfect. with being a bet with eight kids, there's all kinds of ups and downs and so much happening. But seeing the love in our home, and I but I do know that we have a ton of love in our marriage and with all the kids that that is the rule of our home. And so just seeing that and being here, I saw his angry stance with this chest stuck out, it just melted away.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It's interesting that the tables have completely turned from someone who said, because you don't believe what I believe you have no place in my home to being welcomed back by that same person who says you don't believe what I believe but you are welcome in my home that's got to have had an effect.
 
Meg Glesener 
I think it really did. And one time when he's still an angry fellow and you know, I think he just doesn't have a lot of strength and he had his own difficult story. But when something hard comes into his life, he backs away from it. Well when you back away from all the hard things, you end up being alone. And he's alone right now. And I love him and he has softened up a bit over time. But it's, it's a blessing for me. It was a blessing to be able to give that to him. And once we had a conversation while he was here, about all the stuff that happened in the past, and he said, I didn't let you go to college because it was too far away. And I said, Dad, your response to that? and kicking me out of the house. He said some other reason for it. I said, that changed my entire life. But he remembered it all differently. It was a it was gaslighted.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've created this family home that is so different from the one that you grew up in. You've got eight kids. And you've mentioned that you welcome a range of people in and maybe you can tell us some of the people that have been welcomed into your home over time apart from your dad, but was it difficult to be able to create that safe place having not seen it modelled in your own childhood?
 
Meg Glesener 
It's a great question. What I haven't mentioned yet is the probably the number of Sorry, I'm getting emotional. I'm probably the, probably the greatest blessing in my life around me. It's my dear husband. And when you learn growing up that the people who should love you, and you should be able to trust the most for whatever reason, and your home is a place of harm, and it's a place of brokenness and pain, and not safe and you don't know who you are. And you marry somebody who is loving, and kind and patient and consistent. Then I know everyone's got their own trials, but my marriage isn't one for me. We just celebrated 31 years of marriage and I am so grateful for my husband. I learned something different about love. If I did something wrong, he wasn't upset. With me, we would talk about, talk about it later. And so having that is a foundation of the home having my husband be so loving and kind. And of course, you know, when you're a parent you like, I'm not gonna be like my mom or dad, and then you end up noticing. I've got the negative tendencies of both of them. So yeah, you have to fight against frustration, and yelling and checking out and all the things that come with human nature, and with being a parent, but over time as you choose to bring those things to God. Again, and again, there's new habits form, there's a new environment form, there's a new new things for him and my husband and I've been very purposeful over time to set a direction for our home and to have values that we're working on with the kids reading. Like we read Seven Habits of Highly Effective People with the kids. What do you want your worldview to be? Well, how do you look at things, spending time with them? listing so many things in our home. And so you asked about people who've lived with this. My sister lived with us. She was on the East Coast, bad relationship after bad relationship. And we said, all this, my mom and all the siblings ended up talking together and said, Hey, Kimmy, why don't you come live with us? I drove out there. We collected money, we packed all our stuff. And we drove over to our home. My my brother, lived with us for a summer he graduated from college. He came up to stay with us, and I knew he had graduated from college. So I threw a party for him, right, just a normal thing you would do for someone graduated from college. And he said, Meg, and this is just about God and not about me, but he said, Meg, I've had more love in your home for three days than I've had my whole life. Can I live with you? And and we said, Absolutely. He lived with us for a year we had probably 10 different college students live with us. Over time, males and we teach them how to be young men until we got preteen girls and we decided, Okay, we're done having young men, we've had families, a couple of families live with us over time we once we even had a homeless person live with us. Oh, and we had a couple of Muslim fellows live with us to just kind of invited them in Rodney and I, I think that's one of the big problems in our, in our world today is so many people, maybe they're overcome with their own weaknesses or flaws or, or just trying to struggle with life themselves or depression. But we don't open up our homes. We don't open up our friendship group, we keep the same little clicky group and there's so many hurting people around.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm sure it's not lost on you that your family life now and your home now is so different to what you grew up in and by the sounds of it, you're offering that kind of love, that experience of what family could be, to so many people, I'm interested with eight children, I'm sure that they're not all doing exactly what you would like them to do. How do you deal differently to what your dad did? How different is it the way that you treat your children when they don't agree with everything that you believe, as it was to your dad?
 
Meg Glesener 
Well, your a parent Rodney, you know, it's a learning experience, right? It's a learning experience through every stage of parenting and dealing with or, you know, kids, teens that have different opinions. That's a different dynamic. And I will fast forward to having kids that are in college and post college, for me is probably been the hardest part because some of them are, they're choosing life and they're figuring out who they want to be. And you quickly see that if you are still still trying to parent them when they're trying to live their own life. Right, then they don't want you in your life. Or you have a friend who's starts being bossy with their grandkid. And you see their kids restrict them from having any time with their grandkids. And you're like, I'm not going to do that. So I think what I have learned is to be a listener. Each of my eight kids are different. They all have a different path. Some of them are embracing their faith wholeheartedly. Some of them are at different stages. And you know, it's true. You love them each the same amount. You can't love one more. I don't love one, more or less, and I'm learning and I'm still learning how to come alongside them in their life to support them. And once you get that down, then you quit being so worried about all the choices they're making. So yes, I I've had to learn how to deal with differences in a different way. And I'm still learning that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
On top of all these things that you do and we're all wondering now how you find time  for what you're doing, but you're also as I mentioned, you're producing and hosting your own podcast. Maybe you can give us a little bit of an insight into how that started and what it's about.
 
Meg Glesener 
My podcast is called Letters from Home. One thing that encourages me so much, Rodney, is when I hear stories like stories on Bleeding Daylight, I love the stories I just listened to Shea's story today. So many of your stories have really resonated with me and for me when I hear great stories, and especially faith stories, it ministers to me personally and I was thinking, if it means so much to me the stories of people in lives that I know maybe it would encourage and bless someone else. I didn't really even hardly know what a podcast was and I googled how to start a podcast. And when I was thinking about doing the podcast, so many faces came to mind of people in my life, who inspire me. And so I'm working away on that list to get the podcast stories out to so many. And I have so many people on my heart. As you know, there's so many, so many great stories in the world,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And you get the opportunity to bring those stories to life. I'm wondering for those who you've interviewed and chatted to, have there been some who thought, look, I really don't have a story to tell and yet you've been able to draw that story out that's been a blessing to others?
 
Meg Glesener 
For sure, I interviewed 11 year old twins and one of the girls she started a cupcake business because she was downtown with their parents and saw a homeless man and he was hungry and they're just kids right there eating cupcakes and Mom, can we can we buy a cupcake for him and the mom went with it. And it turned into a whole cupcake business where they donate 10% to Hope Linc to help with the homeless, beautiful stories like that my son, my son almost died four years ago when he had encephalitis which is an infection in your brain. He was acting crazy on his job. They thought he had a mental break. He was put into a hospital ward falsely. And that's my first episode. And so yes, that's that's one where maybe he didn't think he had a story to be told. And he's grateful and it's been freedom and a blessing for him to be able to take the shame away from what he went through and how God in 50 days got him out of that place of the mental institution into a place of healing and back in college. So, yes, God's used us to help get many stories out and we got a lot a lot more to share.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What I love about your story is it's this complete change of what was and redeeming it for what can be. And I'm sure that there's still plenty to come in that story as you continue to journey alongside others. We haven't even touched on the fact that you spend a lot of time discipling others and drawing them closer to Jesus, as well as doing that within your own home. But I just want to say thank you so much for sharing your story so openly. And honestly, it's been a delight to have you on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Meg Glesener 
Thank you, Rodney. We'll just keep trusting God's gonna keep knocking down those doors of the darkness to get the light going forward to this hurting world.
 
Emily Olsen
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Many of us face difficulties, but how do you hold out hope when life continues to push you back down, leaving you broken? Shea Watson has seen some of the worst that life can bring. From times of brokenness and not being able to see any hope at all, he's now able to offer lasting hope to others, a hope that transcends it all.
 
The Pantry Podcast: https://thepantrypodcast.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ThePantryPodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepantrypodcast/
Email Shea Watson: hey@thepantrypodcast.com or swatson@ggcf.info
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Welcome to a really inspiring episode of Bleeding Daylight. I’m so glad you’ve joined me.
 
Don’t forget to catch Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram  and please consider leaving reviews wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Many of us face difficulties, but how do you hold out hope when life continues to push you back down, leaving you broken? It took many years, but today’s guest finally found that hope.
My guest today has seen some of the worst that life can bring. From times of brokenness and not being able to see any hope at all, he's now able to offer lasting hope to others, a hope that transcends it all. He co-hosts The Pantry Podcast with his wife, Michelle. His name is Shea Watson, and I'm thrilled to be able to welcome him to Bleeding Daylight. Shea thank you for your time.
 
Shea Watson 
Hey, Rodney. It's good to be on today. Man, I've been actually following you on Instagram, listening to your stories, listening to your podcasts. I love Bleeding Daylight episodes and how people have been broken, but then they come out of that darkness and then they get to experience something much better.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Well, thank you and I'm really looking forward to delving into your story today. So let's start really early. Go back to the very early years of your life. How do you remember that early childhood?
 
Shea Watson 
Wow, let's let's just be honest on that. Before 10 years old, I don't remember a whole lot and I think that's because of the traumatic experiences that I had gone through. I grew up In a broken home, divorced parents. Probably not the best timing on telling us about this. They actually broke the news on Christmas Day and that kind of set a tone on how things would end up going in our lives. My sister and I grew up so basically with our mother, and our father moved away. And so we kind of just grew up in that one mother home. And it kind of left my sister and I vulnerable as my mom tried to come to grips with the separation from my dad, you know, that led to some some things that really had an impact. You know, if I had a word or a couple words to say it was like, my mold became broken, my identity became cracked. I lost my innocence at 12 years old. My mom was dating and, you know, back in the 70s and 80s, late 70s 80s. The thought of child predators weren't really in the minds of people back then. It was some a concept that people just I don't know if they didn't want to grasp it or just I didn't understand it, but they would give me money these, these boyfriends would give me money to go into the video arcade. And that is where I met a man who manipulated me, took advantage of me and actually ended up molesting me on several occasions. From that, because I would continually go back I was looking for something I was looking for love. I was looking for attention. I was looking to be accepted. And you know, I never even told my parents what had happened. I just kept going back. That was a summer and then the school year started. And it kind of faded away. It was like a season. And I never told anyone about this too later in life,
 
Rodney Olsen 
There must have been an enormous amount of shame within your own life. We know now that this obviously was not your fault, but did you feel that it was at that time? Did you feel guilt?
 
Shea Watson 
Oh, absolutely. Rodney. It was a destroyer of what I would called my identity who I was, I blamed myself. I never even looked at the the person that did it as being at fault, I looked at myself as being the one to blame because I just kept going. I felt like it was my choice and that actually created identity issues within my own sexuality.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm looking at all of that and thinking, the people that you should have been able to trust, the adults in your life, there's your parents, then there's the the men that come to visit with your mom and they just want you out of the picture. So they paying you to go off, and then there's this guy that you're talking about, as you're going off to play these games and he's manipulating and molesting you. What does that do to someone's trust at such a young age?
 
Shea Watson 
Wow, what a great question. Trust at that age. I became volatile. I pretty much came into my own self thinking that I was the one that had to take care of myself. I had to be the one that would forge my way forward, I was the one that would have to make something out of myself or do something. I didn't really have the the trust or actually respect that most kids would have for a normal set of parents. I kind of lost that and I started forging my own future and moving forward in my own shame.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you're not able to trust any adults because they've proven that. But what about the other kids around you? So for instance, at school, were their friends there.
 
Shea Watson 
I had a few friends. I think that I had a lot of relational struggles, making friends trusting people. You're right. It was tough. It was tough to become a part of because you wanted to be so much more. I remember in elementary school, man, I just had just gone through this. And I wanted to just be accepted by all the other kids and you know, I was the little scrawny kid. Believe it or not, you If you looked at me now, you'd be like, Ah, no, but I was I was a little scrawny kid. I got picked on a lot. I got bullied a lot. And what's amazing in that whole thing is how sometimes the world wants to hold you down. And I had a young boy who called himself my friend, and my nickname that he gave me was 'Shea gay'. Now imagine the impact of this. I've been molested. Nobody knows about this. Next thing, you know, Shea gay becomes the nickname for for Shea and I honestly kind of withdrew back and just didn't make good friends. I tried to be a part of all of the kids around the neighborhood like I had to be accepted. But because the acceptance wasn't always there, I just withdrew.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what were some of the things that you were doing at that stage to to gain acceptance? We hear often of people who try to gain acceptance and they go about it all the wrong ways. Was that your story too?
 
Shea Watson 
Oh, absolutely. I remember Our next door neighbor, they had two boys. And you know, that was, you know, when you live next door to people, they become your friends, whether they're always great to you or not great to you, that's just you know, that's just the way it works. That's how, you know, childhood is. And I remember that I experienced marijuana, I drank alcohol, because why? They had it, they were doing it. I wanted to be a part of them. So pretty much I ran with the crowd. I remember getting arrested for shoplifting because another one of my friends wanted to go into a store and steal. And they caught both of us. Of course, I had nothing on me at that time. But I was with him. I was blocking, so he could take other things. So yeah, I definitely would do things. It didn't matter good, bad or indifferent to fit in with those around me
 
Rodney Olsen 
And did that risky behavior that you're engaging in, did that give you a sense of life or fitting in? Or was it just something that you felt you had to do to fit in? I felt like it was just a motion. Just I was just moving with the tides are moving with with with life. It didn't really fulfill me. If anything, it just added to the shame. So you're living this life of shame that no one seems to know about. At this stage, you've been still living with your mom, your dad's far away. What happened to the relationship between you and your father,
 
Shea Watson 
My father loves me. I would never destroy that love that He has for me but he also was raised in a home where the father wasn't as communicative as loving or caring. He just was there. And so I kind of grew up in that same environment. He was there. He took care of us. He paid for school stuff, he paid for clothes, but as far as the building of a relationship and the communication that a young man like myself really wanted in a father, that never transpired. I just didn't have that.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So you've been through elementary school, you've been experiencing all these amazing things. I guess you move up the ladder continue your schooling and and what happens there?
 
Shea Watson 
I moved in with my dad in high school and that was kind of one of those moments you look at your mom and you're like, I don't like you. I want to live with dad. Now you're not really thinking about this. You know, with my mom, I had so much freedom. I pretty much ran myself. I would do what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it, sleep when I wanted to, get up when I wanted to. Yes, I went to school, my middle school years, my grades weren't that great. I just kind of just did what I wanted. And then I made that statement. I want to go live with my father. And you know what, they talked about it and they decided that that would probably be the best move being the direction that I was going. So I moved in with my dad and you know by this time, it's amazing. You know how God works as the divorce from the divorce point, now my dad has has found God. He's going to church. He's remarried to a Christian lady and I stepped into the picture. And one of the requirements was that, hey, you will go to Christian school, and you will attend church with us on Sundays and Wednesdays, I was down. I wanted to be away from my mom. And I think a lot of that was because of the brokenness that had happened. And so I moved into high school and of course, I'm always seeking I'm always looking for I'm always trying to be accepted. I'm always trying to be a part of a group or a thing and, you know, high school to me in my mind, at that point, I wanted to transition and I actually went with my middle name in high school. So I got rid of Shea because the Shea gay was so traumatic to me, then that I turned my name over. And so when I introduced myself at my new school, it was Scott Watson. And you know, I succeeded. I man, I loved sports. I always loved sports. Now, I had a little bit of discipline in my life, actually a lot of discipline. My dad was a cop and so He, he laid down a law he laid down a rule he laid down things that I had to do. And so I grew up in that. And so I did athletics, show choir Student Council. I mean, you name it from the high school newspaper, I always got involved. My Grades came up. It was a small school, they had time to focus on me. I had people constantly tell me, oh, great job, good job. You know, you're awesome, right? Actually graduating high school with what in America, we'd say 3.8 GPA, 4.0 being the best. And I had all of these awards and all of these championships under my belt, and I just felt like I was going somewhere, but I still was lacking relationship. I was still lacking my identity. I was still a broken pot, not knowing who I was, at that point in my life. You know, I knew that God and and Jesus existed, and I knew that they were they were real to me, but I didn't know how to have that relationship because I'd never known how to have that relationship with my own father.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It sounds like things are turning around and you still haven't reached that moment where you're feeling fulfilled. But obviously life is on a better track. And it would be wonderful if it just continued to go from strength to strength. But that's not necessarily the story of your life, is it?
 
Shea Watson 
No, it's not, not at all. With the shame of childhood, weighing, or actually just hovering over me. I really believed that I could never stand in front of God and be accepted. I mean, that's how deep this wound was on me. And so I always thought that until I could stand before God, I was worthless. And so when I graduated here I am trying to think of the future and what creeps back in the acceptance what creeps back in, you know, hanging out with the wrong people. Yeah, they accepted me, but they were doing the wrong things between my my graduation and the following year, I found myself in that summer hanging out with people who were selling drugs, who were just running the wrong kind of life. So I started to run with them and I actually ended up getting arrested after high school so after all of this beautiful buildup, you know, man acceptance and doing good, but just being crushed, not having an identity not having, not knowing who I am. I went to find it again in the world, when again to find it and other people, and it ended up getting me in trouble again. And that is actually where one of the greater turning points of my life started, is after I got arrested, so my dad being a police officer, they dropped the drug charges and they ended up charging me for just carrying a concealed weapon, a pistol, which by the way, happened to be my dad's service revolver for his job. They worked out a deal and we ended up signing me up for the army. And that is where another part of my life started.
 
Rodney Olsen 
It seems that you go through stages of, of this shame, trying to find acceptance, then going into this disciplined life and I guess trying to get acceptance in a very different way by conforming, then that fell apart. And now you're going back to this conforming again, going into the military. How did that work for you?
 
Shea Watson 
Again, like you said, Man, you work. We're working through levels. It's like It's like a wave, right? I joined the military. I'm good at it. I'm athletic. I listen to orders because why I want to please people, right? So all of the the leadership just was like, Man, this this is good soldier. He's awesome. He does what we want him to do. He works hard. He he doesn't break down. He just keeps going. And so military with the discipline became another one of those pedestals or another one of those Portions of life where I'm living by others complements, I'm living by others acceptance. Basically, they're forming my life and telling me who I am. And it was going good. It was it was good. And then I met my first wife. And I'm and I'm saying that wasn't the greatest meeting of my life actually. It was rushed. We had met briefly, I was supposed to be deployed, to go overseas to battle to war. And I told her, we should get married and I think we had known each other for six months. So I just jumped into that relationship. And that brought back see I think it's always like, you start to feel like you're moving up, you're starting to, to move forward, you're starting to get away from those feelings of, of inadequacy of mistrust of just pain and the shame that goes with you know, what you've been through in life. You know all the mistakes that you've made? The woman that I married, believe it or not abused me. She was into drugs, drinking, you know, when we would argue things might be thrown. I remember one time we were in an argument and as I walked away all of a sudden I felt a stabbing pain in my back. I had scissors lodged into my back. Did she come up and stab me? No, she threw them from across the room and they hit perfectly. I ended up in the hospital with staples with a deep gash about two inches deep an inch off my spine. And of course, when I went to the hospital, I did the thing that most abuse people would do. I lied. How did this happen? I fell on the couch, the scissors were there. Another time she was hitting and punching. And I grabbed ahold her not to hurt her but to just stop her and she kicked me so hard in the nose. That I ended up in the emergency room again. And they had to put my nose back in place through surgery. And of course, I said, I got hit by softball. So it was a little abusive in that time, but you know what army? So yeah, my home was horrible. My army life was awesome. Always going forward. But you know, we went to war and war has its tolls.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to look at some of the tolls that war does have but first, just touching on again, there's the abuse from this wife, obviously very different from the abuse you suffered as a child. Again, we see the same pattern of lying and trying to hide what has happened then. And I don't think you're alone in that. I think there's probably a lot of people listening who things have happened in the past that have not been their fault. And yet, they feel the need to cover it up. This can't come out. There's too much shame.
 
Shea Watson 
Yeah, I definitely think that there are a lot of people that fall into this pattern. We don't want to admit things sometimes. I know in my own circumstance, pride, pride became my silence. Pride became that shutting of my mouth and not not allowing other people's in to see what I was going through because I thought I could hold it all myself. I thought I could carry it all myself, I thought that I could deal with it. And I would be okay. You know, the whole your whole life, the army, you know, I mean, you get an army, there's like, you fall down, you sprained something, you gotta get up, boy get ups on, you got this. We got this. And it's just it's constantly building up, but you're not really addressing the issue. Like I said, we went to battle right? And again, you know, in this thought, it's like the bill job, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, but you're seeing things. you're experiencing things. Man, the battlefield is an ugly place. And I think because of all of the other trauma all of the other impacts. This just became another layer of impact. And I know in 1997, I had come to a point in my life in the military where I felt like I was out of control, where fear no longer played a role. And if anyone knows anything about combat, if anyone knows anything about war, there always needs to be a little bit of fear in war, without fear becomes recklessness. So without that control without, you know, thinking of outcomes without thinking of the responsibilities and what might or might not transpire, in other words, putting the whole picture together when you start to go without that, and you start to just go reckless, you start to endanger other people's lives. And so I put myself in front of a psychiatric doctor because I knew something was wrong. I was starting to have flashbacks. I was starting to have delusions. I was starting to have nightmares, and I needed to talk to somebody.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you feel that somehow that recklessness, that lack of fear was a sense of, of almost self destruction of not caring what happened to you?
 
Shea Watson 
I would say that would be 100%. accurate, sir.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So how do you come out of this? I mean, you say you've put yourself in front of medical help, what was the prognosis and what happened from there?
 
Shea Watson 
So I was diagnosed with PTSD. And I think that at the time, it felt like a horrible decision because they said, I couldn't go back to the military. The diagnosis was Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I want to just go back at that point, I was like, Okay, I'm fine. I've talked to somebody let me just go on, you know, it was a Shay fix. It was like, Okay, okay, let me let me just go, let me get back into pattern. You know, they kept me there. And they're like, no, you're not fit to go back. Now, that had its own impact, because I'd always been fit. In my own mind. I'd always been okay. In my own mind. I'd always been able to pull myself out of it. And now I had somebody telling me, no, we're going to keep you back. But it was a good thing. When you look back at it. Now you look back and you say why Wow, that was my god taking control and saying no, it's time to move forward. It's trying time to fix this. And so in, in care in the psychiatric care that I was that I went through the admission of being molested of a child was brought out for the first time to anyone. I had never talked to anyone and I was, what 2027 28 years old. And one of the first questions my doctor asked me was, have you told your parents about this? And I looked at her and I said, No, I've never told them. So one of the first things that we had done as part of the treatment and healing was to bring our my parents in and let them know that hey, during this time, during this period, you know, I experienced these things.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I imagine that that was incredibly tough on them. Because they're thinking, well, we didn't really help the situation. Our relationship was breaking down and these things were happening around us. So did they feel a sense of guilt and shame as if they'd let you down at that time?
 
Shea Watson 
I would say that they did. Especially my mother, my father responded like most fathers would. He said, Man, I'm glad I didn't know then, you know how we, you know, we always stand up for our kids. I'm a father and it's like, if I would have known, I would have done something. And you know, I'm kind of glad that he didn't know because at that time, he wasn't with Christ, or he wasn't with God. He wasn't, you know, in a mind frame that probably was healthy. My mother, of course, felt extremely guilty. And it took her a lot of years to find peace in that later in life. She also came and started to believe in Jesus Christ. And so now I have two parents to this day that believe in Jesus Christ. And so through that process, we have continued to heal. They were there. My dad, you know, again, not the greatest communicator in the world. But I know he loves me. I know it had an effect on them. And I know that it also answered a lot of questions. Why was Shea so broken? Why was shave so angry? Why was Shea toxic and kind of helped them understand that you know what there was a lot more going on.
 
Rodney Olsen 
As we listen to the story. We're hearing that familiar theme of coming to a better place and at this stage, you're getting some of the help that you need. But after you come out of the military, what happened then?
 
Shea Watson 
So I lost what I considered my love. I'm very pedestal. In my past my past I would put items or people on pedestals, they became my everything. I had really no foundation in myself. I had really low self esteem. Even with all of the achievements, I still never looked at myself as worthy or or good. So I lost the love. I lost the army. I didn't know what to do. I'm trained in Combat Arms, and now they're telling me you can't have that job. During that time at the hospital, I actually met my future boss. And he was an ex Green Beret. So he understood who I was what I was. And he actually was working in the medical maintenance field for the army. So that's working on medical equipment. So anything from x ray machine down to a simple microscope, and he said, Look, if you ever have to leave the army, you just give me a call. Army day came it was it I was done. They medically retired me, shattered, didn't didn't understand what's going on. But watch this. I had this great job. But still with that great job because it wasn't what I strived to be just became another job. I never looked at the blessing that was behind that job. I moved forward. My sister happened to live in the area. And she was like, Hey, why don't you move in with me because this is where the job was. And so post military, you know, I'm feeling but I'm still feeling lost. I'm still filling this Dark Void. I'm still filling all of these shames in this turmoil. That always was Inside of me, I'm feeling like I'm nothing. And I have this job. But what did I do? I went out again and I met the wrong people and I got myself into drugs. And this time instead of selling the drugs, I started doing the drugs. And that list of drugs is quite extensive. To be honest, I didn't even want to live. I didn't care if I lived. Here. I had this good job. I had a sister who loved me, who was a believer in Jesus Christ, who really threw everything through the drug addiction. And just this this two years that I stayed with her, where people were like, just kick him out, get rid of him. She kept me she helped me. I lived in that darkness. I lived in that shame and that pain. I felt I didn't finish the army. I wanted to retire. I told everybody I would retire in 20 years, you know, normally, I'd have this job that I loved that I went forward in that, you know, people always told me I'm good at now. I'm starting a whole new job and it's like, yeah, you're okay, but you're learning. So you're not Great. So again, I'm back at the bottom. And I'm trying to find a way to pull myself out.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And still trying to find that acceptance that even as a young child on that Christmas day when, when your life was broken apart on on a day, that should be one of the happiest days of the year, you find out that your parents are splitting your life will never be the same again. And you're still trying to find that acceptance as as what now about a 27, 28 year old man?
 
Shea Watson 
Yeah, and you know what? I've found that acceptance. Again, you know, it's here we go through that pattern. I found that acceptance I I met my second wife, so I had to divorce my first wife. We were actually married nine years. I think that whole nine years we spent three years together. The rest of the time we were separated or away from each other. She was doing her things. Another traumatic story there, but we'll save that for another time. So I divorced her and married my second wife idolized her. I put her on a pedestal. I put All of my focus into her. And you know what, in some ways, it had a great outcome. I stopped doing the drugs because my wife had told me she said, Look, if you're going to do drugs, I don't want to be with you, you have to stop doing drugs. So I stopped doing that drug and then she became my drug. She became my everything she became my my lift my boosts my, my high. And of course, when that would fall apart, I would feel empty and alone. And I would react that way. I would really react. scared, I would read, I'd have this elephant on my chest. I mean, the elephant on my chest was in my whole life. I don't know if you've ever heard that expression. But it's just that heaviness like your heart aches. when things don't go right. Your heart just is just pounded it just like it feels like you're being crushed. And every time that we'd have an issue, I'd feel crushed because I didn't have me. I always had it in someone else. This whole time work is going great, by the way. Work. She's going great. You know, I'm moving Moving up here and my my relationship honestly was beautiful. A lot of people would say, Hey, we want to be like you guys we want to have that friendship like you guys have but you know when we fell apart, we would fall apart because we were alone when we fell apart. We went through some tough times we went through eight miscarriages we went through you know, the the normal wife and husband fights probably more intensified because we only had each other and when that fell apart, we we felt alone. But the eight miscarriages started to have its toll on her. It started to have its toll on me. We went through some serious miscarriages while we're talking fifth and six month miscarriages. And so you're sitting there and you're adding more to the pressure more to the life more of these things that you have to handle together and we were failing at handling them together. We did attempt to be a part of that lifestyle of Christianity, that we got baptized together. In fact, it was like I was like yes, maybe We're moving forward here. You know, we're gonna get through these miscarriages. We're gonna get this. I mean, I think God was starting to call on me. God was saying, No, no, no, we can't You can't live this way. I started to decrease my alcohol. And God just kept saying, Come on, come on, come on, I could just feel it, I felt that there was a directional change that had to happen. But see, we were on different levels. And she and my wife just kept going deeper and deeper and deeper into darkness. And when I say that, I only mean that in the most loving way. She was in pain, and she didn't know how to deal with that pain. One day she came home, and she was like, you know, I just want to I just want to hang out with my friends. Because the younger crowd and I just want to go to the bar, just want to party just want to have fun. And I told her, this is just me being loving. I said, Look, just be home more than you're away. And she went and did what she did. And one day she came home again and she's like, I just want to start smoking weed and actually I smelled it on her I knew drugs. And she was I want to start smoking weed. I just want to, you know, start doing these other things. And I looked at her that day and I said, we can't bring that into this house. You know, my past, I stopped drugs because of you. And I told her, I said, we can't do that. And that is the starting point of when she started to move away from me. It started out with just weeks apart in our own home to where one day she just decided that she was going to leave and move in with a friend. And that kind of finalized my my second marriage, she never wanted reconciliation. We were fighting, you know, over the reconciliation we tried a couple times. And she just ended up leaving. And so I was again alone.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned at the start that you were someone who really at many times had not seen hope. And even the hope that was coming especially through those those miscarriages of seeing a baby develop and maybe there's hope there to be dashed again. And again, it's hard to understand what that does to push So what finally was the trigger to start turning things around for you?
 
Shea Watson 
New Year's Eve 2013. I was home alone. And you know, I'd been in this position before. I remember another year way back in my military days with the first wife where I was sitting in a hotel room alone on New Year's Eve. Of course, that time I turned to drugs. This time, again, although much milder, I just wanted to sleep. And so I drank a couple beers took an Ambien, which is a sleeping pill, and I just wanted to go to bed. And when I woke up, I was sitting in front of my my good friend, he lived about an hour away. And I'm just mystified. I'm sitting in a chair. As you know, I wake up in a chair from asleep, and I look across at my friend first. How did I get here? I don't even remember driving. Number two, he was sitting across from me. He had a pistol, a gun sitting on his chair. And I looked at him and he looked at me and I said Why do you have a gun and he said, reach inside of your your pocket. And I reached inside of my own pocket and I had a one of my pistols on me. I think that was a wake up call. That was one of those moments where you sit there and say, I don't want to turn to drugs, I don't want to turn to alcohol. I don't want to turn to anything that's going to be destructive in my life I need to change and I remembered back to high school. I remembered back to learning about Jesus learning about God. I'd never discredited God or Jesus through my whole life. In fact, if anything, I was just too shameful to approach him or talk to him, or have a relationship with Him. And so that morning, I went home on New Year's Day of 2014 and I opened up my laptop and I said, You know what, I need to be in church. I need to be in church and I looked at To God in a very defiant way, almost, if I look back at it now and said, Fine, I'm done trying to do it myself, show me something. Prove it to me. Prove to me that I'm worthy, prove to me that you love me the way that I'd always been told. And so I looked up the church that I'm actually in now, Greater Grace Christian Fellowship, it was close. I could walk to it if necessary. I wanted a place where I had no excuses. And so I went to church,
 
Rodney Olsen 
And what happened at that church to change because you'd known about Jesus, you've known about God all this time. And the sense I get is that you've been trying to please Him, just as you've been trying to please everyone else. You've already said that you felt that you needed to shape up before God before he would accept you. So what was different this time?
 
Shea Watson 
In one word, Grace. And I know that that term doesn't always fall on every one the same way. But really, when I went to church that day I learned about his unfailing love. I learned that no matter what position that I was in, he still loved me. He loves me. No matter, the brokenness, the the shame, the pain, the things that I had done. He was standing there willing, Lee opening his arms and saying, Come to me, son, come to me, I will give you the rest that you need. And that grace that that just is a healing grace, and what he's done to ensure that we could have that grace when we accept him and receive him. When we say that, yeah, you know what I want to trust in you. And it was the first time that I'd ever heard something other than what I had been used to or in my head, thought The past that you know, if you send you, you know, it's the it's the big ad of everybody, here's this if you send you go to hell, you know, and that was kind of in my mind that like I was I had this destiny to hell. And in that first church service, it's amazing how God works. He broke down a message he gave a message through my pastor to me personally, about how you're okay. Just come to me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
How did you manage to change your thinking of forever trying to please people and forever trying to please a God who, in your mind could not be pleased, to just accepting the love from a God who said, it's all free, it's all grace?
 
Shea Watson 
I think what I had to stop putting in my mind was me going to God and allowing God to come to me. I simply reached out to God So show me if you're if people are going through something right now and they don't feel like there's a way out. Sometimes it's just easier. Maybe Maybe you don't believe it. 100% maybe you're like, but is it real? Or is this What's going on? Because I mean, I lived in the in the world of I knew it was real. But I didn't feel worthy enough. I would always find myself coming up short. But I sat there that day, and I said, Show me. Show me. And let me tell you something. When you put a request to God like that, God shows you like he showed me. Was I perfect? No, I mean, I went to church for one month. You know, it has like, yeah, I'm succeeding. Now. I traveled to Africa a lot. Now I'm all in into the mission side of it. But before that, I was traveling to Africa and I was on the party scene, the club scene the do it wrong. Seeing is how I would see it. And I went back to Africa in that February and you know what, I stumbled again, it was a big stumble. The one thing that I had against my wife coming back into the home was drugs. I ended up finding in Africa which is very unusual. And I found myself going back to the drugs. So again, back into that pattern. But you know, as I flew home, after the month of being in Africa, and realizing that, you know what, that really isn't the lifestyle that I wanted. That's not what I wanted. I had experienced something better in that January as I was going to church and Bible studies and, and I was starting to feel like I was being filled with something that was good. As I flew back from Africa, I made a promise on that plane. I said, God, I will serve you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
We can all turn over a new leaf and and several points along your story. You've turned over a new leaf, things have started to look good. But you can only fake it for so long, right? This was back in 2014. And this seems to be something that has stuck. So what's actually happened since 2014, when you made that concrete decision?
 
Shea Watson 
So 2014 there was one more little story that that really made the difference in me. And I think this is what solidifies the reality to to the relationship that God wants to have with his people. I was at church, I was broken. I mean, you know, when you start to realize that the way that your life was, isn't necessarily the way it should be, that the things that you invested in the things that you put your heart and mind and soul into, were things that didn't build build you up. They actually brought you down. You start to go through this phase of brokenness and you start to really seek to be different. And I remember going to church and I can came home. And I'm I'm listening to actually it's a pretty cool song. It's called a Sweetly Broken by Jeremy Riddle. So if anyone out there I'm pumping them up a little bit I think that's allowed, but you should listen to this song. You should listen to this song because it just says that you know what, even in my brokenness, even in my brokenness, God says I'm okay. And I fall down in my entryway and yeah, I'm gonna admit it as a man I laid there crying, because I was like, You know what, it's okay to be broken. It's okay. Because God is gonna be there for me. You know, I'm starting to solidify in my mind that I don't need anything else. I just need God. And I kind of shake it all off. I'm listening to that song in my headphones, and I stand up and I walk around to my kitchen. And to this day, I don't understand how but all of my cabinets were open and the dishes were on the floor broken. And I'm looking at this and I sit down and I have this overwhelming feeling right? of like, Ah, man. I'm trying To get better, and I'm just keep running into stuff. And I had this feeling and it said, Get up, clean up all that brokenness. And then when I cleaned it up, the floor was completely clean. There was no more dishes, no more broken, no more anything. And I had that feeling that that understanding that God was saying, that is how I cleaned you. You're okay. The funny behind that I had one bowl, one plate, one cup left, and it would kind of solidify the idea that it's me and you got it's nothing else. We're gonna build this you're gonna teach me how to love myself. And on that day, he started to teach me how to love myself something that I had never done my entire life. And so from 2014 to now that has been the building process that has been what's been going on, when things start to fall apart. I don't fall apart the way that I used to fall apart. Yes, you like you said there are times you know You go through challenges you go through, man, I got remarried, I'm on my third wife. But this is my final life. And I can say that wholeheartedly. Because both of us have a different foundation that we live by. We don't live by our own foundations, our own self, what we believe we believe in a core value that comes from the Bible, and how to forgive and how to give grace and how to give mercy, all of these things that I struggled with my whole life. So now even when we have an argument, we don't fall away and fall apart, we fall into the Word of God. That has been so healing when things come up in our path COVID right now in the United States, all of the you know, the the riots, the protests, the things that are going on the things that bring instability to our hearts and our minds because we just don't know the direction and I'm not signing either way. I'm just saying that, you know, these things come at you but you know, he continually take Those stressors away that elephant that was on my chest in 2014. I have not felt that since the PTSD that I experienced has now been taken away. I no longer experience delusions, nightmares and flashbacks. God is doing a work in my life God is has lifted me up. And I have never felt this alive in my entire life through everything that I've been through.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's not just a set of beliefs that you now follow. But there's actually real healing that has happened in your mind and in your body.
 
Shea Watson 
Absolutely, absolutely. Beliefs are one thing, but actually feeling the change is another thing. I don't look back at my past and think, oh, how horrible I was. I actually look back at my past, and I think, how can I help people. They're going through the same things that bring me to where I am today. Healthy, satisfied, joyful, at peace. Full of comfort. because my whole life was anarchy, twisted, broken. And now I feel like I'm part of something greater. And it's not just a set of rules. It's so much deeper than that. It's acceptance.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What does life look like for you in the present day?
 
Shea Watson 
Very busy, Rodney. No, my my life today. here's here's a beautiful what I hold daughter number nine. In my arms. I have a beautiful wife that is a believer in Jesus Christ the same way I am. More importantly, we are ministers in the Word of God. I also I lead men's ministry, I attend Bible College. leader in our church, we do a podcast, the pantry podcast, as you mentioned earlier, I still work for the army, although now that's become my second job. And you know what's amazing about that? When God became my first job, my second job became more fulfilling. I've linked up with churches in Africa. I've linked up with churches in the Republic of Georgia. My life is just completely different. Do we move a lot? Do we go a lot? Absolutely. But you know, this is a message that I think more people need to hear. This is a message of hope. This is a message that heals people, and that healing. I can't even describe the healing. But I know that it's there. And I know that it's real and it hasn't gone away. I've been in doing ministry work for seven years now and it doesn't go away. But that relationship with Jesus, that wanting to know about Jesus wanting to know the love that he truly has, is what guides our steps and gets us through every day.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If people want to To get in touch with you maybe explore a bit more of your story and how that can become their story, what's the best way for them to contact you?
 
Shea Watson 
I have a couple different ways. First of all, we have our Pantry Podcast. So you can always get ahold of both my wife or I through this. It's hey@thepantrypodcast.com or you can reach out to my personal email. It's swatson@ggcf.info Either one of those would be a great way to reach out to us.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'll pop links to that and to to the podcast for sure  in our show notes are bleedingdaylight.net. Shae, it has been remarkable time to spend with you to hear some of the stories, some of the brokenness but the hope that continues to break through. Thank you so much for your time.
 
Shea Watson 
Thank you, Rodney. Appreciate it. Hey, keep up the good work brother. Love you.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Jean Bailey Robor is an international writer, speaker, comic, professional communicator, and so much more. Her book, 'She Has a Big But: Get Past Your Excuses and Realize Your Dreams' tells the stories of women who've overcome obstacles and excuses on their way to success. She is also a successful fitness coach for over 50s.
 
 
 
Website: www.JeanBaileyRobor.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/JeanBaileyRobor
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jeanbaileyrobor  
Facebook: www.Facebook.com/JeanBaileyRobor 
Fit After 50: www.FitAfter50TheRevolution.com 
 
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If you’re a regular listener to Bleeding Daylight, welcome back, if this is your first episode, please remember that you can find Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Don’t forget to share this and other episodes of Bleeding Daylight to help shine even more light into the darkness.
What do you get when you cross a comic, an author , public speaker and fitness coach? You get today’s guest.
My guest today is an international writer, speaker, comic professional communicator, and so much more her book, 'She Has a Big But: Get Past Your Excuses and Realize Your Dreams' tells the stories of women who've overcome obstacles and excuses on their way to success. Jean Bailey Robor is also a successful fitness coach for over 50s. Through everything she does, it's obvious that she has a heart to see others reach their potential. Jean, welcome to Bleeding Daylight.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Thank you, Rodney. Thanks for inviting me to be a part of your show. I'm just so grateful to be here and thanks to all the guys that are gonna be listening and tuning in. I just appreciate this opportunity to speak to you today.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You seem to be the kind of person who's very comfortable in her own skin, happy to be in front of people.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Absolutely. You have pegged me exactly right because when I was growing up, I was super shy if you can believe that.That's how I was most of my life. And I realized that that was really holding me back from a lot of opportunities that, you know, would have been a lot of fun. And if I could have had more success, it took going through a really hard time in my life. You know, sometimes you have to hit rock bottom is what we say sometimes in order to start rising back to the top. And it took a really tough time in my life when I went through a divorce that was just horrific. And, you know, there was no place I could go but up. So I started listening to books on tape, you know, back in the day, they were on cassette tape, and I started listening to those as I sat at work, trying to find myself trying to, you know, dive into these self help books and there was one in particular, the author's name was Cheryl Richardson, and she mentioned something about how she learned to speak in public through Toastmasters. And I don't know if you've heard of Toastmasters Rodney, but it's an organization that teaches leadership and communication skills. And I thought, well, what the heck is that so I googled it and that was a turning point in my life Rodney because I joined a club. It's been about 15 years now and they taught me how to regain my confidence and I regained my self esteem. And I actually found out that I enjoy being in front of an audience, which in the past, that would have scared the heck out of me, you know. So it's those little steps that we take sometimes and those choices that we make, that can lead us in a whole new direction, to go to a place that we've never even dreamed of. So I got past the fear of public speaking the fear of speaking in front of people, and being able to find my own voice and speak confidently about what I believed in and found a way that hopefully I can help other people step into, you know, their purpose in life. It's just been an amazing journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
So back in the day when you were listening to those voices on cassette at work, what did work look like? What was your job back then?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
I was working for a lab and don't let that make you think that I know what I'm doing in the lab because I worked behind the desk. I didn't actually, you know, do the lab work. But I was working in a lab and processing specimen records. And it was sort of, you know, mundane at that point, because it was the same old, same old, but the good news was, for the introvert in me it was perfect, because I could sit in my little cubicle and not have to worry too much about interacting with people. It wasn't long that I had been there that I realized if I wanted to move up in that company at all, I was gonna have to step out of my comfort zone. And so this all came about kind of in the same time period, because I've been there about five years before I really did anything, you know, that mattered. It was just an eye opener when I found that, you know, life can be a lot more than we think it is. Sometimes we think it's you get up, go to work come home. That's it. And it's so much more than that, but we have to be intentional about it. We have to make those choices that lead us to the places where we can feel fulfilled.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that it took you out of your comfort zone and certainly public speaking is one of those things they say, is so many people's greatest fear. You learned public speaking skills through Toastmasters but I think that comedy would turn the fear factor up to 11. You're not just speaking on a subject that you know, you're very much putting yourself on the line and trying to get a laugh. When did comedy come into the picture for you?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
That was interesting. I'm glad you asked me because I never dreamed that I would ever become a comic that was not in the plan. Even after I became more confident and I started enjoying speaking on stage, I was giving motivational talks. I was talking about my book that you'd mentioned earlier. And I love humor and I enjoyed inserting humor into my talks, but I never thought hey, maybe you could get up there and you know be on stage like Jerry Seinfeld, or somebody. That never occurred to me, and then I went to a fundraiser in my local town, and there were three comedians, and they were holding this fundraiser to raise funds for cancer research, which is near and dear to my heart. Because, you know, we all know somebody that's been affected by cancer. And so I showed up to support them. And after the show, we started talking, and the three of them, you know, we're out there in the lobby, and we started talking to one of the guests said, Hey, you should come and go to comedy school down at the comedy zone in Charlotte. And I'm like, comedy school? What is that? And he talked about it and, and he talked about it in such terms that it made me think I at least need to go and check this out. I need to see what this is about. I had no idea that people actually went to a school or went to a classes to learn how to be funny. And it just in it made me think that maybe I can make my talks a little bit better if I go and, you know, learn a few things from these guys that are experts at it. So for seven weeks, I signed up for a course and for seven weeks I would leave work at 5pm drive to Charlotte, which was a couple hours away, get there just in time for the classes seven, and get back home at midnight. And I learned so much I hung out with people who like me were coming out of curiosity. Others were coming because they had been on the stage, but they wanted to be better. And we just meshed as a group. We were from all walks of life. It was an interesting experience. And I can remember one of the things that was such a challenge and this I found so funny, because it wasn't just a challenge for me, but for all of us. Some of us who had been on stage before but not in the comedy world. We were used to speaking with a microphone, but it was usually a fixed microphone, or something that we held in our hand while we walked around. And if you notice a lot of comedians, they start with the mic in the stand and then you know, they make it look effortless. They take it out, they take the stand and they move it around behind them. I'm telling you that was the most awkward for me was moving that stand without letting it fall over or tripping it up on my legs it was, it was the funniest thing. And it wasn't just me. And I thought, I guess the reason they're so effortless is because they've done it 100 times. And here we were doing it for the first time, I actually went on eBay and I bought myself a mic stand just so I could practice at home. The rest is really history, but it was such a great experience. And it wouldn't have happened if I hadn't shown up at that fundraiser and talk to those comedians afterwards, and found out you know, how they were going out and they were doing things like this for their communities and helping in their communities and, and using humor to do that. And I think it's such a good connection for people, when we can throw some humor even into something that's, that's maybe a little bit serious of a subject but we can insert some humor and it just, I don't know, it's like, it resonates with people because we want to laugh. We want to have fun.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Oftentimes when we think of humor, and especially stand up comics, we're thinking questionable language and questionable subject matter but you prefer to stick with clean humor. I imagine that would give you a wider audience.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
This is something else that I learned in comedy school. They said, you know, you can take a clean set, and you can always dirty it up, but it's really hard to take a dirty set that you've written, and clean it up. So we would start with the base of you know, let's write that clean set and that works so well, because there are a lot of corporate audiences that want comedians that will not hire them, if they're afraid they're going to say something on stage, you know, that offends somebody. And it's so it's so important that we learn those skills of creating the clean set so that we can use that anywhere and Rodney, you know, I decided early on that if I couldn't say something in front of my mama, then I wouldn't let it come out of my mouth on the stage. You know, and that's just sort of been the standard that I that I go by. So I've been asked to speak in churches and different places that I wouldn't have been asked to do if I had gone a different route. And for me that was just, it was the most normal thing in the world to say, hey, I want to be funny that I want to do it in such a way that it's good for all audiences,
 
Rodney Olsen 
What would be the strangest comedy audience you've had to face?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Okay, I don't know if you're familiar with Charlotte, North Carolina, but it's a great place for comedy because it does have the comedy zone there. A few years ago, they were doing what they called a Fringe Festival. This where was where a bunch of comedians got together. And we were assigned different places in the city to go at different times to share comedy. And you could be in a coffee shop, you could be in a bar, I mean, you know, you were just assigned like five or 10 minutes, something like that. I think it was five minutes. And so on that particular day I was assigned to a coffee shop, which that was my first time of stepping out into that situation. I had always given talks in the past. corporate world for civic organizations at the comedy zone, but not in a venue like a coffee shop. So when I did that, I got such a nice little response. It was a small audience and I thought, Oh, this is great. I can't wait to get to my to my next spot. Well, my next spot was actually in a bar. And I will tell you, it wasn't set up for comedy. There was not a stage. They did give me a microphone. But people were sitting at the bar drinking, they were conversing. They were, you know, paying attention to each other. The big screen TVs were own with sports. I mean, it was like the worst. I've never been in a place where I just felt so ignored, you know, but I found out later, that's kind of how it goes. Sometimes. You know, when we were like I said, we were just like, five minutes here, five minutes there, that for me, that setting that venue of being in a bar where everybody was, was paying attention to everything except for the person talking in the mic. You know, that was quite an interesting experience. And I realized that, you know, you still have to bring it whether your audience is there with you or not.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Was anyone paying attention that night?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Not very many. I think there were two people that came up to me afterwards. And they probably just felt sorry for me for being, you know, the comedian that was ignored.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I mentioned in the introduction that you do cover a wide range of interests. There's the comedy, there's writing and we'll talk about your book soon but there's also the fact that you're a fitness coach for those over 50. How did you fall into coaching?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Oh, I fell into this because I was in really bad shape. So I'll just let out a little secret. I'm actually 57 now and after I turned 50 You know, it wasn't like being in my 20s anymore. And I realized because I did have a job where I sat most of the day that it actually hurt when I had, you know, times on the weekend when I was doing things and on my feet for Well, and I thought, you know, I'm a little too young for this to be happening. Why does my body hurts so much? Why are my knees creaking? You know, why am I gaining this weight? And I started researching, you know, how can I, how can I make myself better because I believe strongly in getting your mind body and soul healthy, and I had let my body fall apart a little bit, you know, not in a bad way, but just not really being intentional about keeping it healthy. So I decided I was going to start walking, walking was the starting place. And I started doing that, but also realize something about myself, I have to self ... and this is true for everybody. We have to find ways to set ourselves up for success. And I knew if I told myself, you're going to get up at 6:30 every morning and go for a 30 minute walk, I might do it a couple of days, then I might miss a day. I needed to be accountable somebody that's how I need to work how I need to operate. So I created a group called fit after 50 and the company Have that group and the people that count on me to show up to walk with them, it became a habit. Now, if people don't show up, I'm okay with that I'm still going to show up anyway. But early on, I needed that encouragement, and I needed to be accountable to others. So now we have over 200 people in our group. Now, they don't all show up to walk, but they're hanging in there with an online Meetup group. And I'm putting out information about ways that we can get healthy after 50 and things that we can do. And in the past, I always had this perception that you had to be a certain shape in order to be fit that's not necessarily true. If you exercise if you eat right, you can just look at the stats like in your blood test that you get and say, Okay, look, from last year to this year, my cholesterol dropped this many points. And recently, I did have a wellness screening and it had it dropped by 20 points. And I was like, yeah, you know, so I can see the results and I feel the energy that I didn't used to have I feel younger at 57 than I did at 50. And it makes a difference, you know, and not just in how you feel physically. But how you feel mentally as well. You're not, you know, your mind can be sharper or sharp, and by the habits that you create, and by the way that you're intentional about bringing good health into your life.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Do you think we sometimes use age as an excuse? Do we start to believe that once we hit a certain age, it's all downhill, that our body beginning to fail is inevitable? So let's not try and fight nature?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
I do. I do. And I think that's an easy way out, but it's a natural thing to do, it seems because we see other people giving those excuses, you know, and when I wrote my book, I was talking about getting past your excuses and realizing your dreams. And that's what it's all about, whether it's physical fitness or what have you. We do tend and as we age to say, Oh, I'm just getting older. That's why my knees are creaking. But I can tell you going up and down steps had been, I found myself in a lot of pent knee pain. And since I started working out and building muscles, I mean, that's almost negligible. Now, it's amazing the things that we can do that we don't even realize, because we do attribute it to, you know, I'm just getting a little older, this is what's happening. And I have come to realize through this whole journey, that when I find myself saying, Well, I'm getting older, then I stop myself now because I think, I believe I'm using that as an excuse, and that's not right. And I try to find a way Well, is it truly that, you know, this is an age thing? Or is this something I can either reverse or stop right here in the tracks? So, you know, I think we just again have to be very intentional about what we do. And even in what we say, I'm such a big proponent of, of the self talk that we give ourselves and to make sure that we don't beat ourselves up. I used to feel that I beat myself up a lot because I was listening to my negative self talk about why I couldn't do something or what was going on are those limitations I was putting on myself. But you know, once you get past that and you realize and you understand that, you know, you talk to yourself more than anybody else talks to you and what you bring into your mind, it just makes the biggest difference in how your day goes and and how your life goes.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I want to talk about your book now and as we've said, it's a book about people who have ignored the excuses or got past them in some way. Maybe you can give me a little bit of an understanding of what drove you to write the book in the first place.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
When I first wrote the book, I didn't have a title for it. When I put the title on it. She Has a Big But: Get Past Your Excuses and Realize Your Dreams. I did that because I had always thought of excuses as being those big buts b - u - t that we put in our lives, right? And it just seemed to make sense when I put out the call for women to submit stories about challenges they had overcome. And I would read the stories and I thought Yes, she got past her big but and this is what it was, you know. So as as it came about it was a project that in the beginning I was just so passionate about. I mean, you know, we've all come through some stuff one way reach my my age. And so I know what it's like to feel so low and then to come back even stronger. And these were the stories that I was looking for. I didn't want to just put a book out with my story and and I wanted to have other people who would experience things that I had not to encourage the readers. So I reached out and I ended up with 15 stories that I call stories of hope. Some of those stories include a cancer diagnosis. Then I have a friend she was a black woman who grew up in Chicago and she explained how she overcame some prejudices and became a very successful business woman. There are two stories about fellow writers. They didn't really have the confidence that there they had the ability to write and then they found courage and confidence and they talked About that, there's a story about something that resonates with me a story about a woman who was really shy. And then, you know, just like my journey she she got past that and found her voice and now gives presentations to large audiences, at least when we're not affected by COVID. And then there was a story of a caregiver who was experiencing some burnout that was caring for her mom. And she found out how to better take care of herself in order to take care of others better. So she shares her story. And she impacts others who are in that same boat, you know, who are caring for other people. There's also a story about a woman who found a way to deal with anger. And then another one that experienced some domestic abuse you know, which happens way too often. That in the back of the book, I also have some resources that you know, you can read the stories of the women, but then you have resources that you can reach out to to find help if you need to. And I also have a little bit in there about how God can help us find our joy and peace because you know, I'm a person of faith. And I believe in that one of the most interesting stories that I really want to share with you today, Rodney, it didn't really come to me. I had to seek it out. And I don't know if, if you've heard of the movie, it was many, many years ago. It was called Lorenzo's Oil. Does that ring a bell?
 
Rodney Olsen 
Yeah, I don't believe I ever saw the movie, but I certainly do remember that title for sure.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Right. Right. So it starred Susan Sarandon and Nick Nolte, and they were playing the parts. It was a true story. And they played the parts of Augusto and Michaela Odone, whose son Lorenzo had a very rare disease, it was a dystrophy I'm going to call it ALD, because that's the acronym. It's a really long word that I would completely not be able to pronounce well, but it was based on their story that they had lived back in the 70s. Back in that time, there wasn't a lot of medical evidence on ALD and certainly not a cure. But the parents of this five year old boy were very tenacious they didn't have a medical background, but What they did have and what really impressed me and carried me through these years, you may still remember it was that they had an attitude that it was like a never give up attitude, and such a great love for their child, the movie, just, you know, it just moved me. And so I began reading all the stories that were submitted for my book. And I thought about this story about this movie that I'd seen, you know, the story of Lorenzo and how his mom had just completely dedicated herself to finding a cure. And I thought, Gosh, this would be a perfect story for a book about women who had overcome challenges to realize some success, you know, so I thought, wow, you know, I remember back when I when I saw the movie and how the medical community told them that that Lorenzo, who was five probably wouldn't live past 10 years old. That's just what happened in these circumstances, and that they should just keep him as comfortable as possible. And at this point, the parents had seen their son go from being a typical five year old, you know, lots of energy and everything to almost a vegetative state at times, you know, it was just heartbreaking. Through their efforts, he actually lived to be 30 years old, if they had been able to, you know, affect some type of cure before that he would have done better because they were able to help other children who early on had been diagnosed and then able to use this Lorenzo's oil this, this. I'm not even sure what it's called. But it was something that affects myelin because that's, that's one of the things that we have in our bodies that that wasn't right, and Lorenzo's body. So what they've done is they created this foundation that I found out later when I was doing my research. You know, these years later looking for the story for the book. They've created the Myelin Foundation and it promotes research to help find a cure for ALD for multiple sclerosis, and from some sort of other for some other leukodystrophy space. So you know, they're doing great work, right. So my dilemma now was How can I get mckaela odos story in my book, but fortunately now we're in the age of the internet. So, you know, I searched it and I found and heartbreakingly that she had passed away from cancer several years ago. But you know, I'm all about not letting these excuses hold and hold you back. Right? So I found that her husband gussto was still living. And I actually reached out to him. And I said, you know, this story really impacted my life. I remember seeing the movie when I was younger. I've read up on your model and foundation, I think it's great. Is there any way that I could use Michaela's story in my book to help encourage other people? And then I asked that question and I knew this question could either make or break the deal right? asked what would you like in return for allowing me to use the story? And then I kind of held my breath because Rodney, you know, I didn't know if he was gonna say well take about a million dollars. You know what I'm saying? All he wanted in return Rodney was a copy of the book. That's all he asked for. And I was just thrilled. I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'm really going to get this story in my book. So that was it. And as soon as I had a book in my hand, I went straight to my post office here in Burlington, North Carolina, mailed it to his home in Italy. It cost me 30 bucks, and it was well worth every penny. So I'm very thrilled to have that story in the book as well.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The story that you're describing there is of someone who's come up against obstacles and seeing tragedy in their life and yet, has overcome not just for themselves, but for other people. Did you find that that was a common theme with the women that you spoke to that once they overcame their own obstacles they went on to make the world a bit better for others as well?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, it does seem and you've probably experienced this too. When you see somebody that's overcome any kind of obstacle in their own life. They almost seem passionate about helping others overcome similar circumstances. I remember I listened to one of your recent podcasts, Rodney, where you were talking to Cristabelle, about her brain injury, something that she said, really resonated with me. She said, if we wait until we're at 100%, before trying to make a difference or help other people, we might never do anything. And you know, when you talk about the women in this book, that's the thing. They didn't wait until they were 100% healed or 100% better from there, you know, ever come in those circumstances. As they found success. That's when they started to reach out. I just said, believe that. If there's anybody in your audience that that's going through a hard time, find ways intentionally take steps to set yourself up for success, whatever it is, whether it's in a relationship or career, whether you're overcoming some kind of physical problem. I mean, try to be the best you can be but don't wait to be the best you can be in order to reach out and help others because you can do it. As soon as you start to realize that success you can share with other people and bring them along in that journey.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm interested in the process of writing the book and how you gather the stories. You spoke about people submitting stories, what was actually the process of collecting those stories from the ladies who appear in the book?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Well, that's interesting because it kind of worked in a different way. I did put a word out on the internet and said, Hey, I'm writing this book. This is what it's about. If you want to submit a story, here's the email address. And I got several submissions that way. But there were others where I knew people personally and I thought all I know enough about their stories. I really want them to write a chapter for me. So I reached out to a few people and said, Hey, this is what's going on. Would you be willing to share your story? So that's what happened in many instances, but in other instances, people would submit their stories, and I tried to keep their voices within their chapters. You know, I would edit to some degree, but I wanted to keep it real and authentic in their own Words. So there was, there was very little that I've changed in the stories of some women, they would submit their stories and they're like, you know, I don't want to tell them my story to you. But I don't want anybody to know, this is me. So we changed the names. And I have a little disclaimer in there that some of the names on the stories have been changed, you know, just to, to make sure that we kept that on anonymity that they asked for,
 
Rodney Olsen 
For any of the women featured, qas there a sense of hey, how will my story help someone else? Why would my story mean something to anyone but me? Do they find it difficult to believe that others would want to hear about what they had overcome?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
You know, in most instances, they were pretty eager to share. But yes, there there were some where, you know, they thought Why are you talking to me? What do I have to give and I and I hope and I truly believe that? That the ones that did the few that did feel that way, came away realizing that yes, they did have have an impact and a positive impact. There's one in particular. And she's, I wouldn't say shy, but she's sort of a quiet person. And she talked about her experience in overcoming overcoming alcoholism. And I'm not so sure that she truly believed what an impact it would have. But not long after I had order. You know, I had published the book. She asked if she could have several to give out at some talks that she was giving after that about her experience. And for me, that was just amazing. Because even I didn't realize To what degree you know, including 15 stories in this book, how far reaching it could be. It was like, Oh, yeah, I'm gonna put this book together and get it out to readers. But it's so much more than that. Because each one of these women have the potential of going out and touching other lives, and sharing the book and sharing their stories whether they share the book or not just sharing their stories. You never know whose life you're going to touch. I mean, I've had women come up to me, after talks before with tears in their eyes because they grasp a nugget of truth. That's truth for them that something that can change their life. And it humbles me, it truly does. I just can't. It's hard for me to even believe that God has allowed me to be on this earth to make a difference in even one person's life. But when I realized that I'm just so humbled by
 
Rodney Olsen 
Some of the stories, obviously are about women who have more or less climbed a mountain so to speak, they've struggled to overcome obstacles, but for some of them, there's healing required. Did you find that some found healing in sharing their stories?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Yeah, I think so. I haven't reached out to talk to them particularly about that. But just seeing where they where they've gone from here. You know, where they've gone from the day they submitted their story to when the book was published, to being able to share with their friends And family and and people that they speak to if they speak, I don't see how they could not see some type of healing because it truly does is it truly does make a difference when we get our stories out in the public to impact others. It doesn't just impact them, it impacts us as well. And I don't know if you've had that experience Rodney or not. But it's almost like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders, you know, like a burden has been lifted, because it's not just circumstances that are holding you down. But it's a freeing of those circumstances and stepping into that healing and walking through it and bringing others along with you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
The stories are incredible and you've already touched on some of the responses you've received. What's some of the feedback that you have received since publishing the book?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
One of the most interesting things is and you know, we were talking about him earlier and how I didn't really have the title for it in the beginning, everybody seemed to embrace the title, they would say she has a big but, they would laugh and chuckle a little bit, you know, and we would talk about it. And I remember being at a at an event, and I walked by and one of the ladies who had submitted a story in the book was there. And when she saw me, she said, she just yelled across the room. She has a big but. You're the she has a big but speaker, you know, and we were laughing about it. And, you know, it was kind of funny, but I mean, it's, it's something that really sticks in people's minds and I think that's one reason why I like it so much because the stories in there I mean, there's one that's a little humorous, I'm not going to give it away right now. But um, most of them are pretty heavy. You know, most of them are pretty heavy. But when you think about it, and you realize that, you know, we, we do we tend to put these buts in our way, you know, we want to do this but we give our excuse. You know, I want to do this, but I didn't go to college. I can't do that. You know, things like that, when we get those buts out of the way and realize, hey, if I want to do this, if I have a passion about doing something, you can forge ahead and find a way. So I think when it comes to feedback, everybody loved the title they just did. They loved it even more than I did. Because in the beginning, I thought, you know, when people were finding it a little funny, I thought, this isn't really a funny book, you know, but it seems to work. I've appreciated all the all the feedback that I've gotten, and there are certain stories that resonate with certain people more than others. You know,
 
Rodney Olsen 
There are stories of external obstacles that needs to be overcome, but a lot of what you're talking about are sorts of obstacles that we put in our own way. How do we start to deal with that? How do we start to realize that we're sometimes our own worst enemy, and we're the ones creating the obstacles?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
I think you really have to know yourself. You have to be aware of who you are, and what's in your heart. What is that dream that you almost been afraid to dream but you would love it if your life looked like that. Find a way to get there. Let's just take for instance, you know, all this going on, I don't know what it's like over there where you are. But here where I am, you know, we've been kind of locked down for a while, it seems like it's not exactly locked down. But early on when COVID-19 came to our country, and especially here in North Carolina, we were told, you know, go home work from home, that kind of thing. I was staying home or I was having groceries delivered, I wasn't going out too much. And I could have looked at that all that time that I was spinning at home as one of my big buts. Well, I really like to do this. But all the events were being canceled because you know, you're not going out into crowds anymore. Crowds aren't gathering anymore. So that could have been seen as a big but people have found ways to get around that. Like for instance, you know, we're having this conversation and we're miles and miles apart, right? So we found ways to do virtual presentations, even in the comedy world. There's been some comedian, friends of mine who have gotten together on Saturday nights and they've put together clips and they, they've shown them you know, it's like a comedy show, I mean things that we never dreamed of before. So we could have looked at this sheltering in place because of COVID as a big but but you know, there's some good things that that have come out of it. And I think if you look at your life that way, you know, you don't stop at that, but you might have a but there but you don't stop there. You know, you find a way around it if possible. If it's a true dream of yours. I don't know about you, but I'm a grandma. So I was missing my grandkids. You know, once I was sheltering in place, and I thought, Hmm, I don't really like this I don't like not being out there and, and giving them hugs and hearing them call me, me, me and all this stuff. So we would do some video chats and I thought, you know, after after a minute or two a video chatting, I mean, with my kids, it's one thing, but with four year olds, you know, they get bored after a couple minutes if you're not doing something fun. So I decided, I'm going to write some kids stories and I'm going to read These stories and I'm going to be animated on this video chat. And we had the best time. So now I have these three kids stories about a tiger and his friends. And I'm thinking about publishing a book with those in the air, you know, that never would have happened if I hadn't had this big, but that I got out of the way because I was sheltered in place at home. So, you know, good things can come out of what we see sometimes as a big but as a big excuse in our way. But if we just think kind of outside of the box, you know, to coin the phrase, just start thinking differently and being intentional about what we want to do. I've also started working on a book, it's actually a novel that set of course in the year 2020, because this is a crazy year. So you know, hopefully that'll work out as well. And then a couple years ago, I started on a fit after 50 book that I sort of put to the side so I've pulled that back out because you know, I have more time now. So what looked like something that could have shut me down and you know, kind of gotten in my way has really given me the chance to do some things that I just didn't have time to do before.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If you could go back and speak to that young woman in a fragile state after a bad divorce, sitting behind a desk at a lab and tell her that everything's going to be alright. How would that conversation go?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
I think at that point, she was so fragile, to have me enthusiastically say, you just got to get past that, you know, you just got to get to the other side that would not have worked. You know, I think I would have had to help her see, that, you know, little by little step by step. You can live a better life. Maybe seeing the big picture like where I am today that might have scared that woman off you know, she would have been like, I can't ever do that. You know, but but just to come along slowly. First, it started with the self help book. That I was pouring good things into my mind. Through that I learned about self talk and how important that was, you know, so that was another step. There was a time where I really wanted to turn my back on my faith because of all the bad things that were happening. You know, it's easy to blame God when sometimes it's our own choices that put us where we are, right. And so I found a way to regain and reclaim my faith. And to me that strengthened to me as well. So it was little by little it was it was almost like baby steps leading up to where I where I was going. And I don't want to discourage anybody and say, it's going to take you years to go from here to there. Some people go, you know, you go at your own pace, but for me where I was, I needed to take the slow road, you know, I needed to take it little by little because I had so much junk inside of me to overcome. It wasn't gonna happen overnight. And that was okay. Because I think as long as we move forward, you know, that's how All we can do and sometimes it's like taking two steps forward and one step back. I mean, that's just how it works. Sometimes it kind of works that way with grief, too. You know, when you lose a loved one, you don't just continue to get better over time. Sometimes you have good days. And sometimes you have bad days where you just missed them so terribly, you know, so it's not something that you can say, here's the cookie cutter, you know, everybody that does this is going to get here. But there are steps that we all can take. And most of it really is just knowing who we are and where we are at the time, identifying what's holding us back, identifying that big but, and then trying to identify the steps it's going to take to get us on the other side of that,.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Jean, I'm going to put the details of how people can contact you in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net but for those listening, if they did want to catch up with you online, where's the best place to go?
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Okay, my website jeanbailyrobor.com is a good place to start. Also, you can find me on Facebook, LinkedIn, on Twitter at .... you know, my name is Jean Bailey Robor. Apparently I'm the only one in the world so it's not hard to find me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Remember those details will be in our show notes at bleedingdaylight.net. Jean, it has been a tremendous opportunity to chat with you to hear about overcoming obstacles and I understand that we all have our own mountains to climb, but we can overcome them. There is hope. Thank you so much for being generous with your time on Bleeding Daylight.
 
Jean Bailey Robor 
Thank you, Rodney. It's been a pleasure.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net
 

Cristabelle Braden is a courageous young woman who continually defies the odds. She had a severe brain injury that could have cost her her life. Doctors didn’t expect her to even make it through high school. Her story of continually overcoming setbacks is inspiring.
 
 
Website: https://cristabellebraden.com/
Online Store: https://shop.cristabellebraden.com/
Declaration Life Podcast: https://cristabellebraden.com/declarationlife
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/cristabellebradenmusic
Twitter: https://twitter.com/itscristabelle
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.) 
Emily Olsen
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen
Please remember that you can find Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. I’d love to connect with you through social media. Sharing this and other episodes of Bleeding Daylight will help shine even more light into the darkness.
 
Today’s guest is a courageous young woman who continually defies the odds. She had a severe brain injury that could have cost her her life. Doctors didn’t expect her to even make it through high school. Her story of continually overcoming setbacks is inspiring.
Cristabelle Braden is an award winning singer, songwriter, speaker, author and host of the podcast Declaration Life. That's an impressive list of achievements but there was a time that doctors believed that she would never be able to even complete high school. Cristabelle's story is simply amazing. And I'm honored to have her join me on Bleeding Daylight, Cristabelle. Welcome.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Thank you so much for having me.
 
Rodney Olsen 
There's a major incident that radically changed your life and I want to explore that but firstly, what was life like before that incident?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
So I had a traumatic brain injury, my first brain injury when I was in high school, and it completely changed my life. Beforehand, I was an honor student. I was in line for valedictorian. I was 14, I was in 10th grade because I was put a year ahead in school and I was pretty active. I did sports and dance. I did a lot of theater. And I just was a typical active, happy teenager. And then one day changed my life forever.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me about that incident. What actually happened?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
So it actually happened from playing the game Red Rover at my church's youth group. Have you heard of that game?
 
Rodney Olsen 
I haven't. Maybe you can. Maybe you enlighten us.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
It could be an American thing. Yeah. It's a kids game. It's a running game. So basically, there are two teams on one side, everybody lines up and then on the other side, everybody lines up and the goal is they call somebody over Red Rover Red Rover, send Cristabelle on over, then that's my cue to run. So the goal of the game is to break through their hands and they hold their hands as tightly as possible. Needless to say, it did not go as planned. When I went to run. They said Red Rover Red Rover send Cristabelle on over and that's the last thing I remember for about a year and a half. I've been told what happened, all the boys on my side of the my team decided to run behind me and rush the other team. And instead of breaking through their hands, they dropped their hands. So I ran full force and hit my head on a concrete wall. I had bounced off the floor and I was knocked unconscious.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And as you say, the first thing you really remember was quite some time after that, but from the reports you got, did you seem alright, were you rushed to hospital? What was the action that happened at that moment?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
So I came to after we think about a minute or two, we don't actually know how long I was unconscious, but from what the kids had told my parents when I came to I seemed totally fine, normal, wasn't showing signs of concussion. Normally, when somebody hits their head, they get a bump on their head which is outside of their skull. There's a swelling or a bump, and you want there to be a bump when you hit your head, that's a good thing. Instead of it's swelling outside of my skull, my brain started swelling. So while I seemed totally fine and totally normal the night that it happened, my brain started to swell and swell and swell. I wasn't sent to the ER. The adults that were there that night, didn't call my parents and tell them anything happened and I got sent home with the carpool. Everyone acted like it was fine, like nothing happened. Three days later, my brain had swelled so much that I couldn't walk straight. I had blurry vision, I couldn't hold conversations. I was functioning around the level of a small child I had to relearn how to get dressed, how to take a shower, I lost a lot of my speech abilities. I struggled with some muscle spasms, the right side of my body, the muscles atrophied and I basically was functioning around the level of a small child
 
Rodney Olsen 
And when you started displaying these symptoms, your parents hadn't been told that anything had happened. So this must have been incredibly concerning for them.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yes. And they did say that when I came home that night, I told them that I had hit my head. But they were thinking if it was a big deal, somebody would have called or something. So they were aware that I'd gotten hit on the head. But we didn't know how severe it was. Until you've had a concussion or brain injury. You've met somebody who's had it, you don't realize how much one hit to the head. Well, in my case, it was hit to the head and bouncing off the floor. But you don't realize how much that can really affect your brain.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And a lot of the story that you're telling at the moment of that actual incident and and what happened immediately afterwards, I'm sure are just details that have been recalled to you that they don't actually remember happening.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yeah, I don't remember it at all. More recently been starting to remember some flashes around when it happened. It was over 10 years ago. So it's been a long journey, but I don't remember it at all. There's just giant holes in my memory.
 
Rodney Olsen  
What sort of an effect has it had long term? What was the rehabilitation that you had to go through to get to where you are now?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
So I went through occupational therapy, speech therapy, cognitive therapy, physical therapy. I eventually started doing vision therapy and vestibular therapy, once I learned about what those were once we learned about them. But it's really been a long journey of just relearning common sense. I know it sounds odd, but that was like my biggest deficit and struggle because I wouldn't remember to look for cars and crossing the street, or my short term memory was so bad that I would be confused all the time. I wouldn't even remember that. That morning, I would forget I ate breakfast, I'd eat breakfast for four or five bowls of cereal in the morning because I would forget that I'd eaten. And everything just became confusing and disorienting. I remember feeling so confused, and I got really bad pain in my head and migraines. It was like, my brain had just been shaken up so much. Like if you picture a puzzle, you know, if it's put together that's kind of like your healthy brain. But you know, when you shake it all up, all the pieces get disconnected. And it was like there are certain places that were still connecting. But then there were other places that were completely misplaced and didn't make sense. And it's been a really long journey. I've been reinjured. I've had more concussions since the first one. My balance was so bad that I would fall all the time and I re injured my brain so reinjuring my brain has not helped the recovery process. But I know that the Lord is my healer. And he's brought me so far. And the doctor is, like you said, didn't even think I finished high school. And I was able, I took an extra year. But I was able to finish high school and I was able to go to college. And I'm actually I now just started grad graduate school, the struggles, some of them have gone away. Some of them are still there. Some days are harder than other days. There are some days I'm in extreme pain. And then there are other days that you know, I get up and I can, you know, function pretty on a pretty good basis. But it's been just a really long journey of learning to let go of my expectations of what I think life is going to be like and take it on a one day at a time.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Tell me about the kind of diagnosis that the doctors gave you back then, as we've said, they didn't believe you'd ever finish high school, let alone go to college and go on and study after that. But what would their expectations of you back then?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
So my, the first doctor that we saw was a neurologist that said, I had a mild concussion, I'd be fine in six weeks. The thing about brain injury is it's invisible. So even though I had some clear deficits, this was like I said, over 10 years ago, so there was a lot less awareness about brain injuries than there are now. But they said you'll be fine. In six weeks, six weeks came and went, I was worse. I wasn't better. So my parents found a different doctor, and I got proper testing done and I went gotten the therapies and they did neuropsychological testing, and tested my and found the areas that I cognitively had struggles. A big concern was my memory loss. I can't tell you how that was their sword. I don't have an explanation for it. The doctor didn't even have an explanation for it. I believe I have faith, I believe that it was the Lord. But my short term memory was really, really bad. Like, I couldn't tell you what I did that morning. So that's come a long way. But at the time, yeah, they, they told my parents to be prepared that I would be highly disabled and dependent on them the rest of my life that my cognitive abilities might not return. And so I was a teenager, I would throw temper tantrums, like a toddler like a two or three year olds. And I couldn't control my emotions because I had frontal lobe damage. And so I would snap at the smallest things or I would just start sobbing if something upset me the tiniest bit and it was really a challenge on Even figuring out how to get through every day,
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've touched a couple of times there on faith taking you through,. Tell us about your faith and what part that has played in your healing.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
It's honestly been everything earlier on in the recovery process. So my right side got weakened. And that's the side that I'm right handed. So I had to relearn my handwriting and how to write and my mom told me the story on this was maybe, I don't know if it was like six months or a year, but I don't remember it. But it was within that first couple years that I don't remember. And she came into my room and found me writing, really trying hard and just like writing every letter that I could, and I was copying Bible verses from the New Testament and I was reading them on index cards and taping them on my walls. Now, of course, like I mentioned earlier, because Common Sense piece was kind of not there. So I was using like, duct tape, like the kind of tape you don't put on paint. Because I hadn't remembered that you shouldn't do that. But, um, the idea was, and my mom asked me why I was doing that. And I said, because I need God, I need I need reminders. And so I have found some old journals from them and the handwriting, you know, the handwriting of like an eight year old. Yeah, that's kind of how it looks. And it was just me and I would I just have all these Bible verses just printed out and copied through and I don't remember that time. But what I do remember is when I started when I started having some memories back is I would just pray constantly, I would ask God to help me get through every day because I was in constant pain. I was constantly confused. One of the things that when you don't have a brain injury, before my brain injury happened, you don't think about how much you use your brain until it stops working. Right? So I would ask God to help me and be my memory. Because I was I was scared all the time. Like, what if I forget this? Or what if I don't remember this? Or, you know, I, I was just constantly in this state of confusion and I think I've really learned what dependence on God means. Because I couldn't even depend on my own mind. And that's something that has carried me through over the last decade of my, my journey is on the days that I still have head pain. I remind myself how far I've come. You know, I I'm capable of so much more than doctors ever thought I would. Now I still don't have a driver's license. I can't medically have a driver's license because I'm not aware of my surroundings enough I had my we tried one time I went to a driving program at the hospital and we tried working on that. And while my reaction time was in the legal limits, so to say, I had no spatial awareness what was around me, so it really did not go well. So, you know, I don't have a driver's license, there's a lot of things that I cannot do. But the Lord has led me on the things that I can and I started writing music after my brain injury. I never wrote a single song before it happened and again, in those first couple years that I barely remember, I was writing hundreds and hundreds of songs, and I never, it was not a talent that was there before. And the doctors think that it's possible the brain in the brain injury caused it that somehow hitting my head caused me to be able to write songs but that really helped get me through everything. And so I was just writing songs and writing songs. And the first time somebody asked me to sing them, I was like, Oh, sure, I guess and I started singing them around in like local coffee shops and one local singer songwriter, he heard me perform. And he had found my parents and asked them if I could come and open for him at all of his shows. He had a full schedule. And so I was started having gigs every weekend, opening for this singer songwriter, this local singer songwriter, he was such a nice man. He has a nonprofit that helps veterans. He's a pastor, and he's around my parents age. And so he really God used him to open up the doors into music, and since then, I studied music in college, and I started after college. touring nationally and playing concerts and writing, putting out CDs. And that's something that I never, ever would have considered before my brain injury. I wanted to be an attorney. So it music wasn't even something I was thinking about. But the biggest thing has been focusing on what I can do rather than what I can't. And so, music is a gift I never had before. And if it can encourage one person, I write songs about my journey through brain injury and about faith, with the hopes that they encourage people to keep going.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And there's some great music too. I will put a link to your website in the show notes of this episode at bleedingdaylight.net so that people can get on there and listen to some of your music because I'm sure that they will enjoy it. Some great stuff there. So you're performing you're recording and this is a whole new life, but it doesn't stop there. You're also speaking out on behalf of others who suffer from brain injuries, tell me a little about that.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
When you go through something hard, or something traumatic in life, I think kind of the natural response is, you want to make a difference. Like once you kind of get on the other side a little bit yourself. I started posting videos about what it was like to have a brain injury about five years ago. I didn't really think anyone was going to see them. I just wanted to talk about what it was like. And then one of my videos which is called You Look Fine, the Struggle of an Invisible Injury started to get shared and shared and shared. And I wouldn't say viral because it didn't go like worldwide or anything, but it got over 100,000 views out of nowhere, and I was like, whoa. And from there, I started getting invitations to speak at brain injury conferences. These organizations started contacting me to come and speak at their event. And I was like, Oh, I guess Sure. And I kind of fell into it in a sense. But the more that I started speaking about brain injury I have, I have a online community called Hope After Head Injury, about finding hope after having any type of head injury and it's really addressing the emotional side of living with traumatic brain injuries, or strokes, or brain aneurysms or any kind of injury to your brain. That's then led me to get involved in the Brain Injury Association of America. And I've done advocacy work on Capitol Hill meeting with members of Congress and advocating for brain injury survivors, because I know what it's like to not be able to speak and express myself. And there's a lot of survivors out there that by me, using my voice to talk about it can help make a difference.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And I'm sure that you're not only giving hope to those who have suffered brain injury but those who are their loved ones. And not everyone will have the kind of healing story that you have. But you must be giving hope to a lot of people through what you're presenting it a lot of these places.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Thank you. I hope so I really I really do. I am because I still, I still struggle with it. It's not like I'm on the complete other side. You know, I found myself tonight, as we're recording this interview mixing up my words a little bit. And it doesn't happen all the time. And some days are harder than other days and some days, my balance goes off and my vision gets blurry and I have trouble functioning. But that's part of the journey. And if we wait until we're 100% on the other side, before trying to help people or make a difference, we might never do anything and so if anyone's listening, if you've ever gone through anything, or you have something inside of you that you want to make a difference, but you don't know how to get started or you don't know if you're ready, I just want to encourage you to know that no matter where you are at, you can still make an impact greater than you know, by being honest and authentic and real about who you are and about your experience in life and whatever thing that you want to make an impact on. Just know that you have something to offer. You're the only person in the whole world with your story. And we can use our stories to help and make a difference for others who might be in similar situations who might not know how to say it.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You mentioned that you never thought that music would be part of your future. And I imagine you never thought that speaking to people in Congress would be part of your future. That must be an interesting experience to be able to speak out on behalf of others in front of those who lead your land.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yeah, it is. I was really nervous. First time I've, they have a brain injury Awareness Day every year on Capitol Hill run by the Brain Injury Association of America, and their representatives from every state across the country that come and I go in helping to represent my home state of Pennsylvania. The first time I went, I think was 2017. And I was so nervous. But it's gotten easier over time because they're just people. If it makes a difference for me to share my experience. We bring up certain legislation and pieces of legislation and health reform and issues that are coming across that affect people with brain injuries. They say that having a face or talking to someone who's actually lived through it helps them to know who they're fighting for. So to say when the legislation comes across their desk, it's not just the topic on brain injury, but they think, oh, I've actually met with this group. And that's actually real people that are being affected. And so that's kind of what we try to do in the advocacy.
 
Rodney Olsen 
A lot of your performances have been in the coffee shops, as you mentioned, and other places like that. But you also spend time performing at hospitals at rehab centers for some of the brain injury groups, even homeless shelters and prison ministries. You have a very wide sphere of influence, don't you?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
It's only by God's grace, I just I'm willing to go where he opens the doors and sometimes those doors have taken me to very interesting places.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And even though the struggles that the people that you're talking to are not the same as your own, I guess they see a connection in facing struggles and moving on with life.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yeah, I mean, I hope so. I usually my songs are about hope. And you know your topic of your podcast Bleeding Daylight, I actually have a song called light in the dark and it's about holding on to that light through the dark times. And if one word or one note, or one chorus of a song can touch somebody's heart, and let them know that they're not alone in what they're feeling and facing, it's completely worth it. When I'll do tours. We would have concerts on the weekends, at churches or music venues. Sometimes I would do worship leading or do a concert at an event or conference or whatever. But during the week, I would always find places to go and Minister with my band. So that's where we'd end up going to the homeless shelters or the prisons or things like that. Because whatever city that we're in, I always I don't just want to go there, play a concert and leave like to me, I want to really be the hands and feet of Jesus wherever I can go, and if I can bring one person help by singing, then that's what I want to do. More often than not my favorite times at all the shows or ministry events, or wherever I'm at is praying with people, you know, I'm always honored anytime anybody shares some of their journey with me. And after the events, often people will come up and share some of their own struggles and share some of their own journey. And I think of it as a great privilege to be able to be there and just maybe hug them or cry with them or pray with them. Just be that person that can say you're not alone, right now and God loves you.
 
Rodney Olsen 
You've been able to find so many ways to express yourself. And another way that you've done that is through writing. You've written a book. Tell me about that.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yes. So It is called More to Me: Discovering Your Freedom Through Identity. And it's actually a devotional prayer journal type book. I wrote it based on the lyrics of one of my songs by the same name called More to Me, and it's about how there's more to us than our struggles. The book really takes you through a journey on dealing with difficult emotions, through understanding that God loves us through finding rest and owning your story and knowing it's okay to struggle. And there's more to you than whatever you've been through.
 
Rodney Olsen 
What's some of the feedback that you've received from some people who've had the book?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yeah, I've received some really great feedback. It's really humbling. I published it independently. I really was just thinking it would be something that it was something I wanted to share. But I would sell it on my merch tables or on my website, and I didn't realize how far reaching it would be. Often people would buy it and then they would come back and buy it for their friend or their daughter or their aunt or their sister or whatever. And then I get emails from people saying how much it helped them. And that just really meant a lot to me. And it does mean a lot. Because I didn't really have any expectations. I just wanted to create something to help people through the struggles that I know that I go through. It's been really great. I released it. Two years ago, a little over two years ago, and I've been writing some new I've been reading a new book and it's all the things I love reading.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And as I talk to you, I get this feeling that you just constantly doing what you feel you should do. Each time you think this is for a few people. And God says no, this this has got to go wider.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
No, thank you that that just really encouraged me today. It's humbling and I've released music. I'm an independent artists. I've never had a manager or record label or anything. And I was going on tour doing 80 shows a year on the road, two years straight. And it's all been word of mouth. Literally everything has just been. Somebody would see me at one show, tell somebody else, they'd invite me to their church, they would invite me in and things just grew from there. And so I can definitely see the Lord's hand in it. Sometimes I get unsure of where I'm going or what I'm doing, especially, I think so many of us have felt that way this year. I released an album in March, actually. And I had a whole bunch of shows booked and not even the album release show got to happen. Back in January, I felt like the Lord was calling me to apply to graduate school. So I applied and I was thinking I'd start in the fall to online program, I'm actually going to send my I am working towards a Master's of Divinity in Biblical Studies. Because of everything getting canceled. I was actually able to start school about six months earlier than I thought. And I could just see the leading of the Lord back in January to apply. I thought it was kind of ridiculous to apply that far in advance. But I was like, You know what, I could just get everything in order ahead of time, and I'll be ready to go for the fall. And it was just crazy because I was already accepted into the program and already had the financial piece together. I was able to start earlier. And so right now, I'm focusing on school, and learning and growing and growing and writing. And that's been a journey too, because with my brain injury, I always have felt very limited by my TBI. It stands for traumatic brain injury and I felt like there's a lot I can't do and I was really nervous about Trying to go to school and do this with my headaches. And there are still some days that I can't look at a screen and my vision gets blurry and I can't work on my computer. But then there are other days that I can just feel the Lord is strengthening me through it. And I'm growing as a writer and as a person, hopefully. And that's where I'm at in this current season.
 
Rodney Olsen 
And on top of all those things, you've also been releasing episodes of a podcast Declaration Life. Tell me a bit about that.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yes, so Declaration Life is a podcast I launched at the beginning of this year. It goes along with the title of my album, which is called Declaration. And another piece of my testimony of my story is I am a survivor of an abusive relationship, domestic violence relationship. There was a really awful situation And he abused me and took advantage of my brain injury and it's only by the grace of God, I escaped that. And I suffered extreme PTSD and depression and anxiety. And I had to go through a healing process. And my new album declaration tells the story of coming out of that. And I stopped touring and I just shut down. I couldn't function and I felt really worthless. The podcast was actually born out of a resolve, to not allow that experience to silence me and to allow women to share their stories of things they've gone through. So I interview women who've been through different experiences. Some have been through domestic violence, some have been through brain injury. Some just have encouraging conversations, every episodes a little bit too. But the theme is living your life intentionally. After being in an abusive relationship, I didn't know that I could leave. I didn't know I could walk away. After the beginning, I felt trapped and I felt scared and I felt like I had to stay with him and I was afraid of what he'd do if I ever left. I did leave and I have legal protection. Now, I have a legal order of protection. So it's like a restraining order. He can't come near me. Through that process. I really have grown in wanting to help other women to know and everyone, people, men, anyone, to be more empowered and know that you can choose how you live your life. And so Declaration Life is about declaring truth over your life and not allowing lies and negative thought patterns to influence you to instead make intentional decisions on a daily basis. And know that, you know, there's a lot we talked a lot about faith on the podcast and different struggles. No matter what you've gone through. You can live an intentional life, you can live a declaration life, you can declare truth over your life. You can reclaim your story. You can live empowered and know that you're not defined by the things that have happened to you. So that's kind of the inspiration behind starting the podcast, and the heart behind the episodes.
 
Rodney Olsen 
If we were able to rewind back to your high school years, and we were able to take you to that youth group and stop that brain injury from happening. Would you take that opportunity and say, I don't want to go there.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
That's such an interesting question, because in a lot of ways, I'm not thankful. I have of brain injury, the it's not just me that it's affected my whole family, the struggle that it affected on my entire family and the pain everyone's gone through. I mean, I wish that I could take that pain away from my parents and my siblings. My sisters were really hurt. You know, my, my sister felt like she lost her sister. I wouldn't wish a brain injury on anyone but at the same time, I don't think I would want to stop it because through the pain and the struggles, I've come to know God on a deeper level. And there's been so many people that my music and things that in ways that I didn't even realize that it's made a difference. And so I would never want to trade those blessings that have come out of it for anything. Plus, I've seen enough sci fi time travel movies to know if you mess up with one thing, probably something worse happens like, in Back to the Future,
 
Rodney Olsen 
As we look back at the various things that you you've had happen in your life, time and time again, you talk about, as I say, this faith in Jesus that has made a difference for you. And I get the impression that as you speak to people in various situations, the story that you're telling is whether it's a brain injury or something else, that there is something in this God that you worship, there is something about him that will make the most out of any situation. Do you hear that coming back from people that you speak to?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Yeah, absolutely. He He's, he's the strength. You know, when we're weak, he's strong. He, he's brought freedom into my heart. Through Jesus, I have freedom that I never could have. in any other way, and the relationship with God has been everything. There's no way that I would have come out of the depression that I was in right after the brain injury happened. I don't think I ever would have been writing songs or doing anything, I might have even taken my own life like, I was so hopeless like, I couldn't see. I felt like brain damage was the only thing that I could ever have. And that I had no hope I have an album called Hope Survives an organization called Hope After Head Injury. Both of those have hope in the title because I remember what it's like to not have hope and to feel hopeless. And it is an awful reality, to feel like there's no way out and God has shown me through his love for me and his healing and even in the still struggles that I have with the brain injury, like I know God has healed me. And while I still have headaches and still have struggles, he strengthens me to get through them all. And he's shown me love and freedom that has enabled me to live a life that I am thankful for. And I feel grateful every day to have survived and to be able to keep going. I didn't say this at the beginning, but the pressure in my head, the doctors actually think it's a miracle that I lived through the night that my brain injury happened because the swelling was so great that normally people would need to be in the ER. And there's a high risk of not even surviving through going to sleep with that type of brain swelling. And I'm still here, and I know that's only by the grace of God.
 
Rodney Olsen 
I'm convinced that we haven't heard the last of you that God has plenty of other things in store for you. You seem to be able to go from one thing to the next with his strength. And we certainly hear that it's a struggle. But if there is someone struggling in the moment that they don't feel that they have this hope that you're speaking about, what would your encouragement be to them?
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Whatever you're struggling with, on whatever level wherever you're at, remind yourself that tomorrow will still be here. The sun goes down and comes up every day. And sometimes if you only have to take it through the next 10 minutes, take it 10 minutes at a time. breathe through it, and pray. For me reading the Word of God helped me get through everything. Psalms, Psalm 23 Lord is my shepherd I shall not want that Psalm helped me through so much. Find somebody to talk to somebody that you know will give you good advice, not a negative Nancy, find someone who'll encourage you. You could even go in the phone booth and phone up a church. If you need help and find somebody to talk to that can encourage you. But I can guarantee from my life experience, that God is real and he cares about you. He cares about us. I can't fathom why he created the whole universe, but he decided to create us too. And he cares about the details of our lives. He cares about every little detail, everything, every hair on your head. He is there for you and he wants to hear from us. And Jesus died for us, because He loves us that much. And so he's demonstrated his love for through pain and suffering, so that we can be free. And so whatever you're going through, hold on to that hope and know that you are not alone. God does care about you. He is listening. I remember praying and being like, God, Are you even listening? I don't even know. Like, do you even hear me? And even much later he would answer those exact prayers. I just didn't hear it right away. I didn't see it right away. It took time. But he is listening, and he does care. And hold on. There is hope.
 
Rodney Olsen 
Cristabelle, it's been a real delight to speak to you today. Thank you so much for your time. We wish you well. We'll put links in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net so that people can get to your website and to listen to your music and hear more about what you're doing. But thank you so much for your time.
 
Cristabelle Braden 
Thank you so much for having me and thank you for doing this incredible podcast.
 
Emily Olsen
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net

Jane'alam Sheikh grew up in Kolkata, India. As a young boy, he saw people starving and suffering in the slums of that city. The experiences of his youth gave him a heart to make a difference for people living in poverty. He co-founded Pursuit International, an organization working to empower people restricted by physical and spiritual poverty to pursue a life of hope and purpose.
 
 
Pursuit International: https://pursuitinternational.org/
Pursuit International Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pursuitint
Compassion International: http://compassion.com
Compassion Australia: http://compassion.com.au
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
Emily Olsen:
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
Rodney Olsen:
I want to start with a thank you to those who have left reviews for Bleeding Daylight and those who have been sharing episodes. I really do appreciate it.
Please remember that you can find Bleeding Daylight on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. I’d love to connect with you through social media.
Today’s guest is inspirational. After overcoming so much in his own life, he’s now making a difference for others. I can’t wait to introduce you, and as always, please share this episode with others.
 
Jane'alam Sheikh grew up in Kolkata, India. As a young boy, he saw people starving and suffering in the slums of that city. The experiences of his youth gave him a heart to make a difference for people living in poverty. He studied in the UK, graduating from Manchester University with a Masters in Business Administration. He then co-founded Pursuit International, an organization working to empower people restricted by physical and spiritual poverty to pursue a life of hope and purpose. It's an honor to have him join us on bleeding daylight, Jane' thank you for your time.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.
Rodney Olsen:
I want to know about those slums in India that I mentioned. Can you give us a bit of an understanding of what life is like for those living in a slum?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Yes. you see I have experienced poverty first hand, but I was also born into generational poverty. My mum grew up in poverty. My dad grew up in poverty. My mum grew up in a village that there was no electricity, no school work and kids from the age of six or seven will work in the farm with their parents to make sure there is enough to eat. My mum was 14 when she got married, not because she wanted to, but that's what happened to a young girls there. They have to be married off early and she was 15 when I was born. She was 17 when my sister was born. So my mom never really got to experience a childhood and obviously I was born into a slum in Calcutta. It was kind of a refugee slum. When in 1947, India was broken into three smaller countries, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, and it caused massive civil war and stuff.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And many people lost their home and became refugees in India. And they found this little open space when they came and started living in slum dwellings. So that's where my grandparents lived. That's where my father was born. And that's where I was born. Just to give you a little picture it was a community of roughly about 10,000 people in about one square kilometer area. You know, our typical house would be eight by 10 foot in area, families of six or seven would be living there. There was two toilets and then one tap for the entire community. As girls, boys, men, women, we used open drains as toilet. I always say one of the first things that poverty did for me and my people in the community was it took away dignity from our lives. So yeah, that's where I was born.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
You know, you had to collect buckets of water every day for all your years. Cause the tap around a couple of us in the day and we would wait for our parents to come home who goes out every day, looking for jobs. And the days when they wouldn't find any work with men, that we would go to bed hungry. So I grew up in the midst of diseases like malaria, dengue, diarrhea, because when it would rain, the community would get flooded. And you can imagine with the open drains used as toilet, the flood is not just rainwater the sewage and faeces floating around. So grew up in the midst of hunger, starvation, but also suffering from all these diseases because people couldn't access medical care. Yeah. So as a kid I felt very hopeless and scared to be very honest because you don't know what your future holds. You see people suffering and dying and that makes you feel scared. Let's say poverty is an injustice. It takes away hope from your life. It takes away dignity from your life makes you feel there's nothing you can do in your power to change your circumstances.
Rodney Olsen:
I suppose that growing up we only know what we only know. So this was your experience, right from the start. When do you first remember realizing that life wasn't this way for everyone and that you were living at disadvantage because of poverty?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Yeah. I mean, I experienced that quite early because like any place around the world, India, more so is a land of extremes. There were places which was not poverty stricken. You know, you see high rise buildings and children going to school and people going out to eat and restaurants, the extremes of life of privilege live and, and life in poverty was quite evident as it at an early stage, which was also quite disempowering because you know that there's nothing in your power to take you out from where you were. I was about five, six years old when it was very clear that our circumstances limited us and kept us in this trap because there was no opportunity to get education. You will always dependent on hand to mouth, you know, depending on work that was available for your parents, there was a cost system. So you came from a certain place. So you are not able to get to white collar jobs, let's say and there was discrimination. So it was pretty evident from early on that this is what is our story going to be. We are stuck in here and there is no way out.
Rodney Olsen:
There's this sense of being stuck and I'm wondering within that, knowing that this is a generational issue and that this has continued for, for generation after generation in your family, was there a sense that, well, this is what it's like? This is all there's going to be? Or was there a sense of injustice that rose up within you trying to find a way out?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
A bit of both, actually one of the worst things of poverty is it makes you believe there is no hope. I always say living in poverty is like living in a well as a frog. You know, the walls of injustice are so high that you don't see any other possibilities. So that was, there was a sense of dread that this is how my grandparents live. This is my, how my father grew up. This is how I grew up. This is going to be my reality. But also there was this frustration that you knew, well, if you, if only you could go to school, you can have education. You can then work your way out, but there was no opportunities. So that was the big frustration that there was no way for us to access that and make a difference by working hard. So there was a sense of that this is going to be stuck in here because we can't access anything that would empower us to change our circumstances.
Rodney Olsen:
So really the systems that existed were against you. What can you do when there are systems like that and what actually happened for you because obviously life did change for you. Where did that change?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Unfortunately, I'm talking about 25 years ago. You know, the challenges for the Indian government was huge. There was a huge population of people living in poverty and the government is trying to support in ways they can, but also as a developing nation, it has its challenges at this corruption in the system, there is limitation of resources. So yeah, you were disadvantaged by the lack of support from the system, but yeah, you're right, Rodney, if you see me, you don't, you wouldn't say I grew up in poverty. Amazing things happened when I was about five, six years old and it was all because of what local people decided to do for its local neighbors. There was a church community in Iraq, slum and they saw what was going on for generations in this community. And they wanted to help. And one of the things they wanted to do was bring empowerment in the lives of people and children in that community.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
So they partnered with this international development organization called Compassion that works in partnership with local churches and really local people who understand the local issues and the best way to address them. So these people we knew from this local church came to our families and said, we want to help you guys. We want to help your children. Would you allow us, allow us to help you? So our parents were very excited. The city of what, what, what can we do? They said, well, we're going to bring education for your children. We're going provide healthcare services and food service food produce. So you can feed your children essentially. What happened when I was five years old, I got sponsored through compassion and to the work of this local church, which meant I became the first child in a community of about 10,000 people to go to school for the first time.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And it was incredible. It's not something that my parents thought would happen in my life. Obviously all, all parents have hopes and dreams for their children. And all my parents wanted was that my sister and I would be able to have a different life than what they've experienced, but they knew they couldn't make that happen in their own. So my parents were delighted when they found out I was going to be going to school. I remember my dad was more excited than me. I received a, the school uniform pack and my dad opened it up and he was so excited and he was confused. See this piece of rope, which he thought rope was actually my school tie, but we have to go back and ask the people in the school. How do you put this on? So I don't know if you have this Rodney where you live, but we got a tie with the hook that went on my shirt collar. School was incredible.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
One of my, one of my fondest memories of my childhood was teaching my parents how to write their names. You know, it was education brought empowerment, you know, teaching my father, how to write his name, teaching my mom, how to write a name. My family knew immediately that things were going to be different for the future, because education will put me in a place where I could access those opportunities. I could get a job. I could work myself out. And my family out of poverty. I remember getting very, very ill when I was a child because of malaria and diarrhea and stuff. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say, I wouldn't be alive today, if I didn't have support from the local church with the sponsorship of Compassion, to go to the hospital and then access medical care. So that's when things changed for me by five years old, when some local people decided they want to help the children in the community and through the support of Compassion, lots of kids got sponsors. Yeah. So I was not the only one. I was the first one, but hundreds of other children got help and we started getting education and all the other support, which was really to empower us to change our circumstances.
Rodney Olsen:
You mentioned the excitement of teaching, both your father and your mother, how to write their own names. But I imagine that that would be bitter sweet because we expect it's the parents that hand those things down to the children. Was there a mix of emotions in that?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Of course, that's the norm. You learn to do those things from your parents. And that's something as a father, as a mother, you look forward to, but that's the injustice of poverty as well. And that's a good example of, you know, how poverty limits you and how it takes away the joys and the little things in life that we take for granted really. But also it was exciting because my father knew his story. Wasn't going to be his children's story and an excitement, almost like my parents live their dreams and their hopes for their life through me. I remember when I was I used to have school exams. I was always a last minute guy. I mean, I somehow did okay. In school, but I would always have to put an all nighter before the exam. I didn't have it in me to should do regular revision throughout the time.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
But my dad I mean, he could not read and write the things that I was reading. He wouldn't understand it, but he was sitting next to me and just listen to me, revise. And I used to tell my dad go to bed. What are you doing? He was like, I love this. I love the fact that you are reading and that you are studying all this biology, physics, and chemistry. And it just made me realize that also for him, he was experiencing all those things that we all get to do. If we grew up, grew up in an environment like in England or in Australia or in America, or in most parts of the developed world that he didn't through me, he was living that for himself. So there was this great excitement for that. Yes, that sadness of, I didn't get that when I was a child, but the huge excitement that, you know, I can, my children are having it. And I know that it's going to be different for them in the life. So it was, it was very much a bit of sweet, more sweet than bitter. My dad was a person who, who lived in the positives in that he would expect a good things coming out of a situation, not dwelling the negatives too much. You can't really afford to when you live in poverty, if you hold onto the negatives, it probably will never be able to come out of a deep hole because there's so much negatives that you can latch on to.
Rodney Olsen:
It must have been quite incredible to be changing your complete mindset from that knowledge, as you say, from very young that this is what you could expect from life to suddenly have that completely turned around in your mind.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
It is very much a, a change in mindset around me. I think you put it beautifully there. I have the privilege of working to support people back in my community now and I always, with my personal experience and the little experience I've had of being involved in development work, I think the biggest challenge is the change of mindset in a change of mindset from, I can do nothing to help myself to knowing I have the potential, the skills that God has given me to change my circumstances. I just need the right opportunity and I need to give it my all and I can change it. So it overcoming poverty. The first step is a change of mindset and the worst thing that poverty does, as I said, it doesn't let you, it makes you believe that there's nothing good. That can come off your life.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
You don't have any skills. There's nothing you can do in your power to change the circumstances. So we have to, as a family, believe that change was possible. And I truly believe that in any circumstances now change is always possible. No matter how dark it looks, how difficult it looks, there is always hope for change. And also as a family, we believe that it's not just on our own strength. We are working. We have got people who love us well-wishers but also God works with us, you know? And and he works with us through difficult circumstances. So yeah, the first big mind shift change that we have to go through was that believe in ourselves, that change is possible and that we can come out of our current circumstances, that we can overcome poverty. And I believe know that's the biggest thing we need in our world is that believe that poverty is injustice and change is possible. We can overcome it and we must overcome it.
Rodney Olsen:
Most of the time in the developed world, we think of poverty as a lack of stuff is a lack of, of housing, of education, of, of all sorts of things that you've mentioned there. But you're describing something that goes way deeper than that. Do you think that's very difficult for a lot of people in, in the Western world to understand?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
I guess Rodney I've been have had some experience of the western world. And I feel like there's poverty in the western world as well. Exactly what you pointed out, not just physical poverty, but there's a poverty of the spirit and your soul. And I'll try to explain what I mean by that. You know, obviously we had less food to eat. We didn't always have new clothes to wear, you know, I grew up in a house that is smaller than my kitchen, now, kitchen I have in my flat in England. That's where I live now. It's bigger than the house I grew up in now with my mom, dad, my sister, and all. So yes, there is lack of material things that you need for everyday life. But the bigger poverty is of the spirit. It's of, you know, your emotion, that there is no hope that there is no change possible that you are trapped in this environment.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And you see that sometimes even people with material, stuff, that there is a lack of joy in their life because it's some way or the other they're caught up in the cycle of, I don't see hope in my life. I don't see purpose. I don't know my purpose in my creator. If you know what I'm trying to say, that the biggest thing that we need to be empowered of is or rescued from is this property of the spirit. And that is the big thing that keeps you trapped in there. No matter how much material support you can have or give it won't make a difference. Educate. I want to say education. Wasn't what changed our life and food provision wasn't what changed our lives. Hospital care or medical support wasn't what changed our life. It helped us to survive better or change our life.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Is that the belief that was given into us, that there's a God who loves us and trust God to be with us both through our difficult times and through good times. And that God has given us the skills and potentials to make a difference in our life, in other people's lives. That was the game changer. You know, once people who live in material poverty once they then have that belief, things change for them. People who live in lots of material wealth, but there's a deep sense of spiritual poverty. Once you have that belief, things change for you. It's very much a spiritual battle, an emotional battle, rather than just a lack of physical things or material things in your life. I remember having some of the most happiest days of my life when we didn't have much when we would have one time chicken curry cooked by my mom because it was my sister's birthday or my birthday.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And we would just celebrate with having some meat, no cakes, no buntings no parties or anything, but was a very joyful occasion because we shared what we had little with with the family. Some of my fondest memories was when my dad would come home and they would have had work and we would cook dinner. And then he would talk about his day. And he would ask me about my school day. And then we'll sit and chat as a family and eat together. We didn't have a lot to eat. We didn't have three course meal or anything. We would eat some Dahl and rice dahl is lentils, but then we'll have great time together as a family. And those are some of my happiest days of my life. So it's, it's not material that brings joy in your life. It's a family time to either relationship, positive relationship and, and hope and purpose that you have in your life. A God given hope and purpose. I don't know if that makes sense.
Rodney Olsen:
It certainly does. And you talking there about a change in mindset of the things that are important, but also that depth of faith that gives you that hope for the future, no matter what may come. And I'm wondering what part that faith continue to play, because I know that even though you are now on a very different road, you were getting education, you had food security and all those things. Life didn't always go according to plan. And there were still some difficulties along the way. You,
Jane’alam Sheikh:
No matter where you live, whether you live in Australia or you live in the slumps in India, I, life is never a linear path. Is it there's always ups and downs and that's life. I remember when I was in high school, my dad got a malaria and it got really bad, very quickly. He eventually died because of that. He called that multiple organ failure and I had to make a decision. I was the only, yeah, I was the eldest child in the family. I was also the only male child in the family. My mum has never had much experience outside the community and where we lived. So I had to make a decision whether I leave school and start working to support my family in the absence of my dad. And if, if I had done that I would not be where I am today, but there was people around us who encouraged me to continue to study and put our faith in God that he will provide.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And he did, he did, my mom got a job and she excelled and she's such a talented, gifted woman. If my mom had good opportunity at school and of going to school and college and stuff, she would have, I dunno, I've been a very powerful business woman or something. There was a difficult times. My losing, my dad was one of them and we have to continue to fight and continue to believe that a good things will come out of some difficult situation. And I would love for my dad to be around today, but I know his passing away, give me a resilience and a tenacity in life to do things that he hoped and wished for us and make that a reality. And that helped me to go through some of the other difficult times. I remember when I finished high school and it was about to go to university.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
I was so scared. No one in my family has ever been to school, let alone university. It was a terrifying prospect, but I, to courage in the fact that, you know, my dad believed in us and my dad believed in me, and there are people who believed in me and it gave me a lot of impetus to keep trying. And if I have a difficult day, I wake up the next morning and I'll keep trying again. So yeah, life hasn't been, you know, all upward from then there was ups and downs, but what helps me personally I believe in Jesus, I, I believe God loves us all irespective of where we come from here. This unconditional love for us. He has got a great purpose for us. And when we work with him, you know, there is amazing things that he can do in us and through us. And that belief really took me through and he continues to take me through all my ups and downs in life
Rodney Olsen:
You touched a couple of times there on potential and perhaps untapped potential. You said that if you had left school to care for the family, then you wouldn't be where you are today. You mentioned how your mom got a job and that if she had gotten an education early on, it would have given her a very different life. I'm wondering about so many people, millions of people over the years who have lived in poverty, that there remains that untapped potential. Is that something that you're seeking to draw out of people in, in what you're doing currently?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Absolutely. That's kind of become the vision for my life. You see we and this is a bit of a generalization, but there is this idea that people in poverty, they need to be given everything in their life. And and we do it out of goodwill, out of care and concern. We're always trying to support them, provide them with the need, but don't, we always overlook the amazing potential in the people. We see poverty as an issue as statistice, as numbers, as a resource draining problem. And but it's not, you see people living in poverty is the solution to overcoming poverty. I'll give you an example. You know, when Compassion came in and worked in our community, 15 years on the community is completely transformed. There's hardly many families living there anymore cause they empower the children there.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Then there are teachers, there are businessmen, there are local leaders that have come out from that community and, and they're not just helping their family, family, they're helping other people in poverty. So, so there's two things. One, you have to appreciate the tremendous amount of potential in the people living in poverty and true development will happen when you not just give stuff into the problem, but when you do things that truly empowers the individual to realize their potential. And for me, that's what I'm passionate about. And you touched on it a little bit in the beginning. The charity I started with my friends, our focus is how can we empower a person living in poverty to a belief that change is possible in their life. Secondly, believe that God has already given them all the skills they need. They just need the right opportunities and you combine them to potential and opportunity. Then the sky is the limit.
Rodney Olsen:
And you mentioned about how Compassion had helped you as a child, but you're dealing with people of a different age. So you're dealing with people perhaps in the teenage years. Is that correct?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Correct. Yeah. Well, how pursuit really started was just to give you a little bit more background. When I finished university in Calcutta I studied business there and I was always keen on, I've been sort of a person who can't look at an issue and not get involved. And sometimes I get into trouble because of that, get myself into a sticky situation. And, but I guess that's how God made me. But the other thing is, for me, it's not just the immediate fix. I'm always looking for how you change the game for longterm, you know, more sustainable changes. And that was kind of what led to pursue today. And what happened was I finished my education in India. I was doing some work with the local organization, doing some microfinance work in some red light communities, you know, helping women there to set up businesses, to make a living for the family so they can come out of prostitution and provide the children for the children and for the family.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And once I was doing that, I got an opportunity from Manchester University to do a master's program, which brought me to England. When I first arrived in England, Rodney, I was so confused. It was such a culture shock. Calcutta is like average, mid 30 degrees Celsius throughout the year. I arrived in England and it was like 15 degrees people walking around shirtless because it was summer and I was in three layers, so complete culture shock. And so I went there at uni, but I would go back home to visit. And one of the things that really bothered me was I was also quite involved in some of the children's home or orphanages in my community where in my area so there was some local organization that rescued children off the streets who have no family and we'll keep them in those homes.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And growing up, I would go around, hang out with them and play with them. And they were very close friends. So when I went back, I tried to catch up with them. And what I saw was that they have to come out of the homes when they were 18 by law, they can't stay there anymore. And then they were out on this open world and which was scary and they didn't know how to navigate it. And more often than not, they would end up back into the environment where they were rescued the first place as it started off. As I know these guys, they're my friends. We grew up together. I've got such a different life. They're back into where they were rescued 20 years or 18 years ago or something. And that really bothered me. So it started off, how do we help those young people, what it has become now, what pursuit does is it primarily works with 18 plus young adults who have been raised in institutions.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
And we work through one to one mentorship program and providing them life skills, how to navigate life outside in the world, giving them employability skills. So we help them get a vocational training. Some of them would have had school level education and it would be very academics. It would help them to go to university. We get them into part time jobs to learn on the job skills and really want to one mentorship to support them emotionally, to learn how to navigate life in the outside world. The goal is to kind of provide them that family style support that you would get when you first go off to uni and for them to just learn to live outside an institution, but also gain the skills to sustain themselves outside an institution. So I, I think last, last year we helped at 16 young people go through training skills, training, life skills training, and one to one mentorship. And the goal is in two to three years time, they'll be able to live independently away from poverty and that vicious cycle would be broken for good.
Rodney Olsen:
Does it amaze you when you look back at that young boy growing up in the slum and not knowing any different to, to becoming that five year old who is sponsored and now being able to make a difference for others. Do you sometimes sit back and just amaze yourself with how far you've come?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Yes and no. I feel like I've got a long way to go. You say how far I've come. That's good. Interesting. I do have to pinch myself to think where God has brought me so far. You know, my my mom, I'm able to support my mum to live in a place that she grew up sharing a toilet with the rest of the community. Now she has got a whole toilet herself. So in this little thing, she's got a safe place to live in. You know, my sister has been through university. I only supported her to go through school and then she supported herself through university. She's got a job now, full time job and amazing, amazing young woman now. So God has done amazing things in our life. And I'm married to an amazing girl. Naomi who's as passionate about Pursuit as I am.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
We started it together and we met in India as she came on a trip to, to work with the children and the children. So I'm actually where I used to go spend some time. And then I never knew that our paths will cross again in England. It's a long story short. Yeah. I have to pinch myself sometimes and and tell myself how privileged my life is now and how far God has brought me. But also there's an sense of responsibility now for whom much has been given, I think much should be expected. So I believe I've got a responsibility to multiply all that I have been given in my life. There are millions of children in India, living in extreme poverty in conditions, worse than me. I at least had a family and a roof over my head. There are children who literally live on the streets.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
In the rainy season, they'll be out shivering in the cold and there are millions of them, but then I had all these opportunities. So I always carry this sense of responsibility that I need to multiply what I have. I need to make a difference in someone else's life. And I believe, you know, anyone living in an environment that you believe you've got, you've got lots of blessing in your life. Never feel guilty. You didn't choose to be born in Australia, Rodney, and people in England or somewhere else, didn't choose to be born here. But then we've got all the resources and opportunities we have in our life, which means we should be responsible with it. So I feel like I've got a long way to go. You know I'm passionate about making a difference in the face of poverty, but I'm more passionate about how we help the people living in poverty to make a transformational change, not just in their life, but in their community.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
So how do you tap the potential that is in people whose lives are limited? Because of the circumstances, there are about 380 million children in the world in extreme poverty. So there's a long way to go, but together we can make a difference. I am to do what I can, even if it's changing more life, I'll do that and keep trying that for the rest of my life. But yeah, I do have to sometimes pinch myself and just think, you know, I live in a flat where I've got a bedroom and a guest bedroom and a kitchen that is bigger than my house that I grew up in.
Rodney Olsen:
You talk about those very changed circumstances in which you now live, and it's wonderful that your standard of living has risen and you're working to see the same for many others. But as you mentioned, India is a country of extremes where there are those in extreme poverty, but also those who are extremely wealthy and moving to the west, you've, you've also seen sometimes that extreme opulence does that sometimes concern you that some people simply are seeking after wealth.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
There's two things that bothers me. One that we sometimes get so sucked up in pursuit of wealth, that we define success in life and value in life, in how much wealth we have accumulated that we forget to enjoy the gift that is life it gift that is there to make a difference, not just in our life, but in others life. We miss that because if somehow it's become how much wealth you've accumulated as how successful you have been in life. Whereas I actually feel is completely the opposite. It's a trap that really saddens me. And I see a lot of that in the Western countries, not everyone, but I see a lot of that. There's a great sense of emptiness and a lack of vision and purpose in life that is just in pursuit of material wealth. But also also saddens me that there's such a lack of awareness, awareness of how life is for a huge chunk of the world of people living in extreme poverty.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
I've seen people truly caring and wanting to make the difference, but I also have seen so many people just not aware and not appreciating what we have and also not aware how people live. And I think the big, one of the big thing that I want to do in life is just create awareness, create awareness that guys, you know, you'd go on one less holiday in life is that's not the worst thing. You know, we're, we are living through a pandemic and it is hard. It's incredibly hard. We, our choices have been taken away. You know, we can't go see friends. We can't go see family. We are stuck in our house, but if you truly flip that on its head and think that being able to do that is a privilege in itself because for so many people living in poverty, the council's wise, violet, you know, they can protect themselves from the virus.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
You know, how do you do when you've got 10,000 people in one square kilometer area and that, you know, people living in extreme poverty, this has been their whole life. They never had a choice. They never choose to do what they want to do. You know, the choices have been taken away. So what's happens is two things. One we've got so caught up in the rat race of accumulating wealth that we forget to use the gift that is life for ourselves and for others. But also what saddens me is the lack of awareness that is there. In so many people about a, the privileges we have here, B the, the extreme different life that so many people live around the world. And I believe with the awareness comes change will happen because people deep down care, you know, we are wired and built to care for each other. If we know we will do something about it,
Rodney Olsen:
You mentioned the journey that you've been on by the help of Compassion and the local church and you've mentioned Pursuit International that you have co-founded if people want to get in touch with either Compassion or Pursuit International, we'll put the details on the show notes of this program. So just go to bleedingdaylight.net. But if people are interested in knowing a little bit more about Pursuit International, are there ways that they can help and how can they get in?
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Absolutely. I mean, I'm, I'm passionate about both the organizations, but we are going through some very challenging time at pursuit. You know, our main work is in India. And as you know, India, one of the many countries around the world that is going through this pandemic, and we know people personally cause life has been affected. The livelihoods have gone. They're struggling to keep themselves protected self isolate. So yes, we would love to get in touch with you. We would love to hear from you, tell you more can go visit our website, it's www.pursuitinternational.org. So it's www.pursuitinternational.org and you can find all the information you can support us financially. You can support us prayerfully or in any other way, you can you know, use your network, use the gifts that you have to bring hope in the lives of people we're working with. So yes, we would love to hear from you and any questions you have, there's a contact, email drop a thing we would love to hear from you. You can also follow us on social media. We have a Facebook page, you search Pursuit International or @pursuit, and you'll be able to find that we would love to hear from you and any support, especially during this difficult time, when we are trying to gather resources to best respond to the huge need that we all find ourselves in would be much appreciated.
Rodney Olsen:
It has been a delight to speak to you to hear of your story of the way that you've been able to be released from poverty, but also what you're doing now. And that comes full circle that you were given a hand up and you've taken advantage of that potential that lay within you. And now you're wanting to see that drawn out of others. So we wish you all the best for the future of Pursuit International and what you continue to do in the days to come. But once again, thank you for spending time with us today on Bleeding Daylight.
Jane’alam Sheikh:
Thank you so much Rodney, for having me. It's been a true pleasure and I've loved catching up with you again and just want to thank all our listeners and please now believe that we can all make a difference. Even if it's to one life, you never know what that one life can go on and do for the rest of the people in the world. So yeah, we believe that change is possible that we can overcome poverty.
 

In a world of frantic busyness and increased anxiety, Rob Mason’s book Shame Off You deserves to be on everyone’s bookshelf. As well as telling Rob’s personal story of anxiety and shame, it’s a practical book that will hand every reader the keys to begin a journey towards better mental health.
 
 
Rob Mason – Shame Off You: https://www.robmason.co
Rob Mason Shame Off You Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RobMason.co
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/robmason61/
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
Emily Olsen:
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
 
Rodney Olsen:
In a world of frantic busyness and increased anxiety, Rob Mason’s book Shame Off You deserves to be on everyone’s bookshelf. As well as telling Rob’s personal story of anxiety and shame, it’s a practical book that will hand every reader the keys to begin a journey towards better mental health.
 
Details of the book and how to contact Rob are in the show notes of this episode at bleedingdaylight.net
Today we’ll take an honest and open look into Rob’s inner life and the lessons he’s learned along the way. Please feel free to share episodes of Bleeding Daylight and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts.
 
Rob Mason suffered with the shame associated with chronic anxiety and panic attacks for over 10 years but he says that what he once thought would ruin his life, has in fact, enhanced it. As a church pastor and sports chaplain for nearly 30 years, he's had the privilege of walking alongside thousands of people, struggling with their emotional wellbeing. His book Shame Off You is a practical handbook for anyone facing the shame associated with mental health and anxiety issues. Rob, thank you for being part of Bleeding Daylight.
Rob Mason:
Oh, thank you, Rodney. And so good to hear your voice.
Rodney Olsen:
Your book starts with you identifying some of the root causes of shame and anxiety in your life. So where did it begin for you?
Rodney Olsen:
Oh, I could probably go back to about the age of four or five having minor surgery under general anaesthetic and yeah, it was a traumatic experience. It was the days where you just got dropped off. Your parents weren't with you and I got dropped off. I went to a bed and then I was asked, where do you want your injection, your arm or your bottom? And I just screamed and freaked out. So what happened, the nurse had to get a doctor to pin me down while they gave me an injection in the bottom and I think that was my first experience of fear, but probably even at a young age, feeling humiliated or I made a fool of myself and then where was mom and dad? And so that was also that sense of abandonment. And that was probably the beginning where I realized that there was a shyness and probably always a sense of feeling timid and fearful. It was probably at a very early age I realized, oh, the world is not a safe place and that's probably where it all began. Almost like a narrative. I began, you know, the story I told myself about myself of, Hey, you, you know, the world is scary and you're on your own.
Rodney Olsen:
And there are several other instances throughout the book that you cite that cause more anxiety. But I'm wondering for some people they're experiencing things that they don't understand. They're experiencing anxiety and panic attacks, and yet they can't bring it back to anything in particular. Does our healing of anxiety have to be tied back to remembering what it was that caused it?
Rodney Olsen:
Not necessarily. I think the value of counselling is you take the time to try and track back. When did you start experiencing, you know, the feelings of depression, anxiety, overwhelm? But I think if you can't find, go right back to your childhood and discover it, I think it's still trying to discover what were those from your perspective, what were those trigger points? And even if they are only recent, there's still that sense of, okay, well I'm human. I can relate to thousands and thousands of other people I'm not alone. And then it's going on. Well, what do I do with it? So once you've got a basic of what anxiety depression is, then there's a sense of, okay, well I've got a sickness. I haven't made it up. It's not simply genetic. It's real, but overall it's manageable. And it's just having the, the courage of, Hey, I'm going to go on a journey. I don't want to, I don't want this to dictate my life any longer, knowing that it won't be an overnight success. It will be depending on the person and the issues, you know, could be months for myself. It was years. Cause I think it was so, so much part of my narrative from such a young age,
Rodney Olsen:
There was that instance way back that you've just told us about as a young boy and having to go to hospital and the shame that's associated with that, and I think you play that forward into where you were later and I guess you carry that for the whole of your life until it started demonstrating in other ways. Tell us when you first realized that this was going to cause you real problems.
Rob Mason:
Yeah. That's a good way of putting it. So in the book I talk about a few, I call them defining moments of dysfunction and a lot of it had to do with my relationship with my father who also had mental health issues. And he was a pastor like myself. And so I think I, without knowing, I probably absorbed some of his shame that he had to get out of ministry early and he was unemployed for such a long time because of depression. And so I think I took that on to myself, but yeah, I'd say decades and decades, I lived with shame. I had issues like insomnia and chronic shyness, but it was in 2007 that everything hit the fan. And I was with my wife, a pastor friend, and a couple from the church who were recently appointed as associate pastor. So we're in a local place, we're in a restaurant in Wembley for those who are in Perth, you know, Wembley.
Rob Mason:
And we looked at the menu and in, it felt like a millisecond, everything changed. My breathing changed. My heart was pounding. It was almost like I was going into shock and I didn't know what was going on. There was a combination of, am I having a heart attack, but I don't. It was almost like I've just got to get out. And so in front of my wife and these people who are very close to me, I just ran out of the restaurant and went into my car, crying uncontrollably, not even concerned, what sort of scene I created because by nature I'm, I, I'm probably a fairly private person. I don't want to make a scene, but I just had to run and escape the restaurant. It was almost like, even though it sounds crazy now there was a threat, but I didn't know what it was.
Rob Mason:
And so I had to get out and I'm in my car and this pastor praying came in, said, what is going on? And the fearful thing is, you don't know what's going on. It's like, my body is in overdrive. I feel there's this there's this threat. Now I know now it was my first full blown panic attack. My body was just absolutely saturated with adrenaline cortisol. So it's these hormones that are often released during times of either activity like sport, you know, thrill seeking or when you, your brain centres, there's the threats. And for, for some reason in this public place, I've felt threatened. But I think it was just years and years and years of living with shame and feeling like I'm not good enough, which is really the essence of shame. It's that tormenting and menacing feeling of inferiority. And I think then in 2007, it's like almost for the first time, it manifested itself in a physiological way where it impacted my breathing.
Rodney Olsen:
It was uncontrollable. And you know, I had my first full blown panic attack in a public place, which makes it a little bit more complex because some people have their first panic attack in their sleep or at home. And it's still terrifying because you don't know what's going on, but when it's in a public place, what happens you, then you're almost panic, panic. You, you fear going into a similar situation. So it happened in a restaurant a shopping centre or, you know, just walking down the street, well, then you naturally want to protect yourself. You don't want to be in that situation again. So that's where you need help. And I needed help. I couldn't deal with this on my own.
Rodney Olsen:
On the surface things were very different. You were quite successful as a pastor. Maybe you can paint us a picture of what life on the outside for you at that stage,
Rob Mason:
Ah, very discerning. And it's often the way isn't it. I always had that analogy of a dark. You know, you see it gliding on the water. It looks so effortless and almost majestic can get underneath the little legs paddling like crazy. And yet for our world, we had a, a church that was growing. It was innovative. We had you know, a few hundred people. We had multiple staff. We also had a indoor play centre for parents and children. And that was a very innovative thing, been going for a few years. And we had every week hundreds and hundreds of people coming into our place centre, we were doing a lot of things in the community, feeding the poor and the need needing. So from the outside, yes, we're, you know, we've got a few hundred people, multiple staff, a, a million dollar, not for profit business.
Rob Mason:
People are going overseas for short term mission trips. And yeah, you know, we had an amazing facility credibility. And to be honest, when I, my wife and I started the church, I never in my wildest dream would have ever thought we would be where we were. It was like, this is just a wild ride. And I, to a point that I was enjoying the journey, but the more it grew, the more complex it became. And to be honest, the more, yeah, my confidence was challenged. I began to, as the church was growing, becoming more complex and financially multiple staff, staffing issues, pastoral issues legal issues. I then started again that sense of overwhelm and spinning plates. And I think, you know, for, for people on the outside yet, they each way growing innovative dynamic. But my private world was, I'd say slowly imploding.
Rodney Olsen:
You mentioned that issue of credibility. You had credibility in the community and I imagine that that fed into your anxiety because there was this fear. If anyone found out this could all come crashing down in a moment.
Rob Mason:
Totally, and it's always hard in church life to define success or what is a healthy church, because in many ways it's a very subjective thing. And it depends who you talk to. And I don't think in a bigger is necessarily better. I think it was Rick Warren that said, you know, better is better, whether you're a small church, medium sized or large, but once we became a larger church and well known in the community, I guess on the, you know, the flesh part of my being a pastor, you know, I'm human, you know, there's ego, but then there's a sense of there's more, more to lose and, you know, disappointing people. And the last thing I wanted to do was to let people down to let my guard down, but especially in the context of being with a couple, we just appointed as associate pastors in front of my wife and in front of this pastor, there was just this overwhelming sense of humiliation.
Rob Mason:
It was almost like I'm busted. This is the real Rob Mason coming to the surface. All of my insecurities, my emotional damage. It was almost like, okay, I'm exposed like Adam and Eve. And probably for a long time, I tried to cover all of that insecurity. And I think a lot of leaders, pastors can relate to this. You know, you just try and be busy and you try and do things that bless people. But at the same time, you're also trying to protect yourself. I don't want people to really know who I am and by, you know, that dark night of the soul, it's actually more than a dark night it's it's decades, even though it was ugly and messy and confusing, it was a redemptive thing. It was almost like, well, for decades, I've been wearing this pain and all this confusion and turmoil, it was like, God graciously said, Rob, it's time.
Rob Mason:
It's time not to stop being a pastor. In fact, it's time to go deeper as a pastor and to really look at your soul and to have someone skilful to walk alongside you, including my church board. I shared with my board what had happened and probably a few weeks later, I shared with the church because in a way, if we're community, well, I can't give this persona that Hey, on this amazing dynamic leader and it's all going well, we're going from strength to strength. It's like, Hey guys, I'm on one level. Our church will be business as usual, but for my personal world, it's not business as usual. I'm going to do a pretty long journey of getting counselling and relearning how to, to think and deal with how to change my physiology. That, that sense of panic through a whole lot of different exercises.
Rob Mason:
And yeah, you know, probably like a lot of people, you hope it's one or two sessions, but it ended up being probably about a 12, 18 month journey of counselling doing a whole lot of exercises, such as breathing and meditation, and really taking a closer look or almost taking the infantry of my thinking and beginning to catch my thoughts and realizing that, wow, I didn't realize that for decades. My thinking has been negative, toxic, catastrophic, and words do damage. Maybe not immediately, but if you've got this self-talk, that is so toxic, at some point, it's going to affect your body to the point your body's going to cry and say, Hey, I can't keep doing this. I can't keep absorbing this toxic message of living on high alert and so that's, that's the beauty of when it came to the surface, it was time to do an inner work, a deep work.
Rob Mason:
And I can now look back on it and it's, it was a saving grace. You know, it was a time where God intervened and it was an act of mercy. It wasn't punishment. And even though it felt like exposure, it was a positive thing, not a negative thing. It's like, okay, it's out in the open now I've got nothing more to hide because shame is hiding. Well, if you take the hiding away, you tell people what's going on in your, in a world. Well, in a sense, the shame goes, it's like, okay, I'm ready to do this. And the, the ironic thing when I shared with the church, the feedback was I became a lot more relatable in some ways, a lot more approachable. And those struggling with mental health on the side said, Oh, you, you may not be aware, but I also struggled with depression, panic attacks.
Rob Mason:
And to know that our pastor is struggling well, it's okay. You've almost taken that sense of shame away from me cause you've gone public about it and so once you go public about our brokenness and shame is all about hiding and that sense of inferiority almost disarms shame, oftentimes in Christian circles, there's this belief that we should be living in victory, that if we are following Christ, that everything should be okay. So did you find that there were some people that brought that thinking to the table and said, well, you obviously are not walking close enough with God. And that's the answer. Yeah, there's a little bit, thankfully, not a lot, but there was a few well, meaning people who said Robert, it says in the Bible, you know, don't be anxious. So, you know, there you go. Just don't and probably a little bit, not necessarily from friends, but from certain circles you know, blogs or books that I read that are very much that victorious living, which look I believe in victorious living, but that doesn't necessarily mean from strength to strength.
Rob Mason:
Sometimes that includes working through our humanity, our brokenness, you know, those sort of thoughts of, Oh, well you need to pray longer or pray hard, or have you done a seven day fast or maybe you should do this. And there was a little bit of that, which is coming from people that are well meaning. But to be honest, there are probably times early in ministry. I didn't understand mental health either. And so I probably, you know, did the prayer and Hey, you read these verses every day, claim this. And I think for a lot of us, it then adds to the shame or at least it makes shame and mental health a little bit more complicated in the Christian world that, yeah, there's this sense of, I should be stronger as a pastor. I should be stronger. And I think the more that people, and it's not just pastors, but the more that people come out in the open, I think we've done that quite well in our nation.
Rob Mason:
There's a lot more people, media entertainment, politics, sports, and it just ordinary people like myself have come out in the open and it does help. It's like, Oh, and, and often that responsible, Oh, I never thought they would get us as if there's some profile of the typical person who has anxiety or depression, but there is no typical profile. It could be any person, any personality. I think for those of us like myself, who probably are more of the introverted shy have been you know, some, my upbringing issues, maybe I'm a little bit more vulnerable, but some of the most what we would call the most dynamic strongest leaders we've ever seen the most successful people we've ever seen when they come out the open it. So it almost gives permission for all of us to go, Hey, it's okay. You know that saying it's okay not to be okay.
Rob Mason:
I think we've gone through an era where was all about success and looking impressive. And maybe in the early days of social media, it was all about, well, it was probably a little bit plastic. It was all about giving this impression of we were going from one breakthrough to the next. And the reality is, and I've heard a number of different people, different leaders share how it's not necessarily that there can be breakthrough success followed by brokenness, followed by the dark Knight or the soul follow by another breakthrough. And it's just that there is no formula. There is no typical pattern. It's messy. And I think it's time as Christians, we accept messy spirituality. It's not, you know, all of the spiritual disciplines, prayer, fasting, meditation, church attendance, giving money to the church, the poor. And then therefore it's almost like, well, we'll live the good life.
Rob Mason:
It's it's messy. Life is messy. It's actually in the journey and the turmoil and the good days and the bad days. And sometimes just showing up and maybe getting counselling and maybe doing different meditation exercises. And, you know, for myself, we've all heard that spiritual disciplines. There was still a time I was struggling with sleep and physiology. And so medication also played a part. It wasn't the answer. You still had to do the hard work, but the medication actually probably just took the edge off and enabled me to be in a better place to receive counselling and to do some of that confronting inner work,
Rodney Olsen:
I was going to touch on those various areas. There is, of course, as you mentioned, during the anxiety attacks, your, your body is rushed with chemicals. And so there's definitely something happening physiologically, but you're also harking back to some of those earlier experiences that are causing that. And then there's the spiritual side. And what I do like about the book is that you're looking at them all because we've all experienced those books that as we've discussed, just say pray more or be more spiritual it's okay. There are those people who would say it's all about the chemicals. So just take medication there's some that would just say, it's all about the counselling of what you experienced at, at an earlier date. And so you've actually brought them all together in the book
Rob Mason:
And it probably was intentional in the sense of that's been my experience. So I wasn't so much strategic or, Oh, here's, here's a different sled. It has been my experience. And you know, it's very hard when people say, what were the two key areas? Obviously I've got to include, you know, the personal side of prayer and meditation, but then there was community in my family. You've got to do it with your family. If you're close friends, but then exercise plays a part and the counselling, it may not be for everyone. But I realized that this was so, Oh, it was almost at a point of derailing me. I knew it was beyond more than just a chat with a pastor friend or someone said, look, I'll pray for you. I realized I needed professional help. I needed insight into, you know, what are the triggers, but what is the way forward?
Rob Mason:
And I couldn't do that on my own. I was very fortunate in our church. One of our leaders is a mental health nurse and I've told her my symptoms. And she said, Oh, that was a panic attack of which I'd I'd heard of, but didn't, and didn't really understand what it was. So she told me briefly and she said, look, one of the best people in Perth, I'll contact her and you'll have an appointment in two days, which is normally you've got to wait months. And she said, Oh, by the way, this person isn't a Christian. And so I had to go, Oh, okay. So where are they coming from? And this person, their specialty or their premise is cognitive behavioural therapy. So in other words, their premise is when they look at an issue like a trauma or anxiety, they look at your thinking that they're thinking triggers your behaviour.
Rob Mason:
And then, you know, the therapy of trying to learn how to rethink and challenge your thinking and change your thinking enough to time it changes your behaviour, your physiology. And I realized, well, I want the very best available to help me navigate through this. And it was probably only two times where she asked me to do an exercise and I set up, Oh, actually I probably can't do that. It's a little bit of a conflict with my spiritual beliefs around a couple of minor times. But apart from that, at the end of the day, truth is truth. I might be a little controversial. Almost say it was all spiritual, even learning to sleep. Sleep is spiritual breathing, learning how to breathe, that spiritual going for walks along the beach, that's spiritual and even getting counselling, even though the person was not a Christian, it was spiritual because God is still giving me insight. Have you got time for a funny story while I was getting counselling?
Rodney Olsen:
Absolutely.
Rob Mason:
So here, we've got this person, who's probably got a bit of Eastern philosophy and she's, you know, doing some exercise and went, Whoa, stop. And she went, what I said, I've just had this revelation. She said, what? I said, I've just got this image of all these dominoes, the standing upright. And I believe God's saying those dominoes represent all of these false thoughts I've had about myself and my father. And that the big picture was I've never been fathered because of my father with his illness. Wasn't able to really father me well or in the way that I needed. And then I had this revelation. I told this lady said, in a moment, God gave me this revelation. Rob, you've always been fathered. And the moment I had that revelation all the dominoes started falling, and I said to her, I could hear them just go. So this revelation I said to her, Oh, it's a revelation. God's always love me. God has actually fathered me even when my earthly father couldn't. And it was just like, that was my payday. That was probably the biggest revelation. And it came from God in the midst of a counselling session with a lady who's probably got more of an Eastern philosophy. So she accepted it. She, I think she went, hi, I'm not going to argue with it. That's actually a really great revelation. You've always been fathered. So good on you.
Rodney Olsen:
Now, I'm interested in you speaking about your father because you've touched on the relationship there for some time. And in the book you outline the fact that you knew something was not quite right there but you didn't have the tools to know what it was, and so you inferred something very different.
Rob Mason:
Well, that's right. And I think particularly when you're very young you just, you know, obviously you probably think you've got the best parents in the world is safe and we're then when something happens, you know, whether there's a friction or there's an argument. And obviously the kids who go through, you know, seeing their parents divorce, it is a very traumatic thing. But with dad who was very passive, he wasn't around a lot. He wasn't affectionate, he wasn't nurturing. And so my conclusion as a kid, because there were, you know, I had traumatic experiences and debt in, see me afterwards, say, Hey, how you going? I'm sorry. You went through that. Let's talk because if his silence, I then interpreted as, Oh, he must be silent because he's really embarrassed about me. He's actually ashamed of me. He's I'm not living up to what a son should be.
Rob Mason:
So I just purely took it as it's not dad's issue. It's my issue. And I think it was Brene Brown talked about as parents. We have to be very careful when there's a trauma and we don't talk to about kids. You know, there's a silence because what happens when there's silence, you make up your own narrative, you'd join the dots. And there may be dots that were never meant to be joined. So for a long time, I just assumed dad didn't like my company didn't like me. And so I would try really hard to be a, you know, a good student or good at sport. But then when I didn't do well at school was sport. It it's just all this sense of, Oh, he's just embarrassed on I'm a disappointment. And it wasn't until probably my mother felt I was able to receive some background.
Rob Mason:
When she said, look, you were born during his last year of Bible college. I said, Oh, that probably wasn't too good. So I was born in October. He would have had his final exams in November. And I apparently wasn't a good baby. I had colleagues. So would have been difficult for dad. And then in his first year or two of ministry, he had a breakdown. And so as a little kid, you know, I didn't know what was going on, but obviously that was unemployed and unemployable on medication for depression. And so mum began to talk about, look, the reason why your father isn't around or is, gets very angry or he's just not emotionally available. It's because of he's got a sickness and then it was, Oh, okay. That it gave context. So it wasn't that I was a disappointment and it wasn't that. Yeah, I was a failure.
Rob Mason:
It was, wow. Dad had the sickness and that impacted his capacity to be a father for me, when you slow down and you go back and you feel the emotions and you might do an exercise where, you know, it was like three chairs, the counsellors in one arm in the other. And then she said, okay, just imagine your dad is here and your 10 years old. And you've had that traumatic experience in the hospital. And a couple of the other things, what would be the questions you would want to ask dad? What would you want to say to him? What would you want him to say to you? And in a very safe place with a skilled person, you, you go to a place you never thought possible where you actually remembered the emotions and you remember your thoughts. Oh, and yeah, it was very emotional.
Rob Mason:
I remember one session just crying uncontrollably yet. It was very therapeutic. And then I go home and Karen said, how's your, you know, session number seven or eight. And I just burst into tears because wow. I had to get messy. I had to get worse before it got better and I'll have to readdress all of those emotions and the story I told myself for all those decades. So yeah, throughout the book, there's definitely a narrative about myself, my father, and I won't give much away cause yeah, it's it finishes in quite a beautiful way. Near the end of the book,
Rodney Olsen:
You spoke about this narrative, that life goes from strength to strength and we've called that out for being false. But we could also give this narrative that your learnings and your recovery just went from strength to strength, but that's not always the case either. Is it?
Rob Mason:
No, I guess I always thought, and I think a lot of us think linear, you know, you're step one, step two. And then in a year you'll be in this place. And then in two years, all of that stuff is behind you. And my journey was all up and down and, and that's where again, I had to relook at my language. There were times that I had, I guess I called them a setback. And so, you know, I might've gone well for a few months, no panic attacks. It's all behind me. And then out of nowhere, another panic attack and in my faulty thinking, Oh, I'm back to where I was. It was Whoa. No, that's, that's not true. It's just a bit of a bump in the, that's all it is. I don't think for a lot of people, whether it's, you know, with a physical injury or an emotional injury, we're going to go through times where there's quick progress or someone on a, going on a diet.
Rob Mason:
You hear of people the first couple of weeks where the weight is dropping off. And then they, there's a bit of emotional eating, comfort eating and they put the pounds on again and then up and down it's I think for most of us that's life and we should probably have a more realistic expectation that there will be a few bumps along the way. But then when you share that with people again, that's relatable, you didn't just lose the weight and have kept it off perfectly. Or you didn't just deal with you know, a breakup with a girlfriend boyfriend, or you didn't just work through an emotional issue. And now it's all perfect. It's was still going to be messy. And I still have, I guess if I'm honest, I still feel vulnerable to mental health issues. But on my K with that, it doesn't mean I'm fearful.
Rob Mason:
It doesn't mean that I'm waiting for another breakdown or anything like that. I just feel, I think I'm just a person that's always going to be vulnerable. I've just got to be vigilant on my guard and just, I've got certain daily routines and rhythms that just keep me in check. And from time to time, I might tell someone that, Oh yeah, not having a good day or, or I could feel my physiology change. It wasn't a panic attack, but I thought a bit of mild panic come upon me. And it's good. I've got tools in the toolbox now, you know, with breathing meditation or I know what to do. I don't panic about panic anymore. It's just, it's just part of who I am. And that's okay.
Rodney Olsen:
I imagine that there are people listening who say I have anxiety issues or I have shame issues, but they're not as big as what Rob is describing. Or on the other hand, people saying, you know what things were a whole lot worse that I went through. And yet I find that the book actually helps people at any space in that spectrum. You would have had feedback from people that have read the book from all over the place. What are some of the responses that you're getting from people?
Rob Mason:
Oh, that's it. And there has been a lot of response, which is great. And I also loved the diversity of people. It's not just one demographic. It's all sorts of people, including people that don't have a faith. I've had a few people that aren't Christians who read the book and they didn't feel it was preachy. It was just very transparent and it was still relatable and I'm hoping for them, but it, it showed a perhaps a different side of Christian spirituality that they probably haven't seen before. But yeah, I had people saying, yeah, the practical exercises, cause in the book, it's not just, you know, information and my narrative there's at the end of every chapter, there's a time to stop and almost do an inventory, ask some questions, times of meditation, how to do meditation. So people found that really helpful. I had one person that said, you got me in the introduction in the first paragraph.
Rob Mason:
I said, all that was wonderful. Just the first paragraph. It was just oh. I'm in, I can tell this is a book that's going to be relatable. And again, there are no formulas and that can be for someone with very mild mental health challenges or severe. And that's where it's a very subjective thing. I share my story, but it's very hard to say, well, that's say seven out of 10 and someone else's only gets three out of 10. It's, we're all different. Our circumstances are different. So I think for anyone that feels a little bit of overwhelm, they need to not ignore it or deny it, but think, Oh, what's going on and try not do it alone for those where it's severe and it's been chronic, meaning, you know, it's been for years and years again, that's where they relate to my story. It's not, you know, a one month, six months, you know, it's over a decade now and now I'm still saying to people I'm still vulnerable, but I'm, I'm functional.
Rob Mason:
I probably have a greater sense of awareness. And as I said before, there's, it's like, you're carrying this toolbox wherever you go. And I didn't have that in 2007. It was just, Whoa, this is the end of me. Whereas now when things happen and you know, have those days you're not doing so well, it's like, Oh, it's okay, I'll get through this because I've now got a history of resilience, which I probably didn't have before. So you do build a resilience. I think that's what it is to be human. And even to be Crossfield, it's just, yeah, you look at a lot of the people in the Bible and you read biographies, autobiographies, where people are transparent and we're all in the same boat. We've all got our, our dysfunction and that's okay. God is glorified. Yes. When we do well, but God has also glorified. He now suffering in our, in our brokenness.
Rodney Olsen:
You talk about the inferences that we often make. When we see a situation, we don't have all the information around that. We join dots that should never be joined as you say. I imagine that there's possibly people listening who have already inferred what a response would be if they came out and spoke about the things they're dealing with, that they've joined dots that shouldn't be joined and so they're fearful of actually taking action against this anxiety and this shame. What would you say to them?
Rob Mason:
Well, first of all, don't try and not feel those things. I think the fact that you're feeling those things, that's again, it's being human. So don't it's, it's why people saying, you know, don't feel that or don't think that it's like, look you are, if I was to say to your listeners right now, don't think of an elephant with a pink Tutu. They're going to think of it. That's just part of being human. You know, you have that thought. I think you just own it. You own your vulnerability. I think part of why we often need help is you need someone skilful to go back to some of those original, original self-talk, you know, from the age of, you know, very early on in school, you know, you drop the ball and sport and for some people, Hey, it's no big deal for others.
Rob Mason:
You actually spoke a message to yourself. And then you, you probably try to avoid those situations again. So you thought, Oh, I let the team down on the fire. I'm useless. I'm uncoordinated. And so this is where we have to go on the journey of first of all, catching our thoughts, even if it's just for a week, every time you have a thought, write it down every time you think of something, when you're young, you know, what was that thought? What was the statement you're saying about yourself? I'm not as good as my brother or I I'm no good on useless. So you catch the thoughts and then this is where the work comes. You, you challenge them. In other words, are they true? Are they biblical? Where's the evidence that you're useless. Where's the evidence that nothing good ever happens to you. Whereas, so you actually start demanding evidence to see is this statement that I say about myself to myself.
Rob Mason:
Is it true? Or is it just some faulty perspective through whatever issues in life? And so you challenge it, you get really brutal about those statements and then you change them. And it's very hard to all of a sudden stop saying, Oh, I'm no good, nothing good ever happens to me, but you learn to replace it with truth. And that's where some of those statements in the Bible about who we are in Christ. So I can say, Oh, I'm useless, I'm hopeless. And you know, you compare yourself to other people, but Whoa, what about truth? The truth is I'm a new creation. The truth is, you know, I'm filled with the spirit of God. The truth is. And so you, you then have a new self-talk and it's what we call the renewing of your mind. We now have evidence over the last 20 years in neuroscience so that we can actually create new neuro pathways in our brain.
Rob Mason:
So you're actually changing these pathways. It takes several months for you to create these pathways, but you're, you're getting rid of the old messages. You're replacing them with new messages and you consistently do that. And it does take several months. And we're always default to the negative stuff when we're under pressure stress. But that sense of today's a new day. I'm going to think you thoughts and the new thoughts are truth. The truth sets me free, that the truth releases really good hormones, chemicals into my body. That sense of wholeness and wellbeing. I think we're living in a world where there's so much information, especially with social media, we're just inundated with information and probably comparing ourselves to people. And it's so easy to just allow these negative thoughts, infiltrate, and this sense of I don't measure up. I'm not as good as it's social media. It's often a little bit plastic. It's a little bit exaggerated. What, why do I need that? Why do I, why am I comparing myself? And then you realize it's such a futile thing to do because when we compare, we're either going to feel really proud that we're doing better, or we're going to feel humiliated and feel inferior that I don't measure up. So either way, it's not a good place.
Rodney Olsen:
Rob, it's been great talking about some of the things that you've experienced, but also the way that you're continuing to overcome them. And I'm going to put a link in the show notes to today's episode, where people can find your book, but for those listening, where's the best place to find the book and to contact you if they want to be in touch?
Rob Mason:
Yeah, probably the easiest way is my website. And so that's just Rob mason.co. It's a pretty good investment of my journey, which I do believe is relatable. It's a very practical book and it's certainly a book you can give to someone who doesn't have faith in God at all. It's not preachy, but there's certainly a lot of really good biblical content, but in a way that's very relatable.
Rodney Olsen:
Absolutely. It is a good read. And even if you're wanting to understand what someone else is going through, if there are people that you know, who are suffering through shame through anxiety, through depression, and you want a better handle on what they might be facing to help you to be a better aid to them, then this is the book to grab. It's called Shame Off You by Rob Mason, who's our guest on Bleeding Daylight today. Rob, thank you so much for spending time with us today.
Rob Mason:
Oh my privilege, Rodney. Thank you to you for the invitation and for all of your listeners and I love what you're doing with this podcast and I'm sure it's going to impact a lot of people for a long time.
 
Emily Olsen:
Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit BleedingDaylight.net

Bradley Hopp is the co-founder of Teshuah Tea Company. He works to see young women and girls rescued from sex trafficking. On today’s episode you’ll hear stories of people who are truly kicking the darkness until it bleeds daylight.
 
 
Teshuah Tea Company: https://deliverancetea.com
Teshuah Tea Company: https://teshuahtea.com
Teshuah Tea Company Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/teshuahteacompany
Liberty Unveiled Podcast: http://teshuahunveiled.com
 
 
 
 
 
(Transcript is a guide only and may not be 100% correct.)
 
Emily Olsen: 
Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host Rodney Olsen.
Rodney Olsen:
Today’s episode contains some confronting and disturbing content. It also contains stories of hope and deliverance.
 
My guest works to see young women and girls rescued from sex trafficking.
 
He also produces a video podcast titled Liberty Unveiled. Links to his podcast and the anti-trafficking work are in the show notes of this episode at bleedingdaylight.net
 
Today you’ll hear stories of people who are truly kicking the darkness until it bleeds daylight.
 
On the surface, Teshuah Tea Company is a small business selling quality tea, coffee, and unique gift items, but there's something far more serious behind the scenes. Bradley Hopp is the co-founder of Teshuah Tea Company and he joins me today to talk about the reason behind the business. Brad, thanks for joining me on Bleeding Daylight.
Bradley Hopp:
Oh, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.
Rodney Olsen:
What is the meaning behind the word Teshuah and how does that fit into what you're doing with a tea company?
Bradley Hopp:
Okay, so that's a great question. Teshuah is the Hebrew word for deliverance. The deliverance is very much what the show is all about because my business partner, Andrew is a missionary and communist Asia behind the bamboo curtain and he and the team rescue underage girls out of sex trafficking over there. So minor, minor girls, and they get the girls out of this horrific situation that they're in and into our rescue and rehab facility, where we meet all of their needs. We take care of their food shelter, clothing. We give them medical care. You know, we give them crisis pregnancy counseling. We teach them to read and write. We teach them to do different work crafts and skills, like making the braclets and the tea and the coasters and so on and so forth. And then what we do is we come alongside and, and that's where I come into play is we actually buy the products from the girls for whatever they're asking on them and then half our profits are going back to the rescue facility. So it's really a double whammy for the, for the rescue house and for the girls, it's really all about deliverance.
Rodney Olsen:
And really what you're doing is your empowering them, because you're not just saying, Hey, I'll give you a handout you're saying, here's an opportunity for you to do something for yourself and it's actually paying off and showing them that there's a very different way.
Bradley Hopp:
And that's, that's the reason, you know, because living here in America, we have such a culture that is so entitled, and I'm a very much a firm believer. I grew up on a dairy farm. I grew up on a small scale farm here in Iowa. So I'm very much of the mindset that you give a man, a fish, you feed him for a day, you teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. So that's really the philosophy behind Teshuah is to economically empower the girls. We, we basically work to give them a work ethic so that they know how to provide for themselves when they leave our rescue facility and they don't have that entitlement mentality. They, they, even though we're, you know, we're providing their needs while they're under our care, they have also learned to contribute to the household. They've learned to contribute to the needs of the household through doing dishes and through doing laundry and, and working in the tea shop and, and so on and so forth. But then they're also making these crafts and these and stuff so that we can buy those from them so that they're seeing that they have skills and abilities that they can take into the marketplace.
Rodney Olsen:
I want to explore a little bit more about what sex trafficking means, because I think it's a phrase that we've heard too often and we become desensitized to it. But before we go there, I would imagine that for many, the idea that this is a sex trafficking, that's happening in a communist Asian country absolutely fits our Western narrative. And we would say, well, certainly that sort of thing doesn't happen here. It doesn't happen in countries like Australia or in the U S but is that the reality?
Bradley Hopp:
No. by, by far, no, the U S is actually the biggest consumer of pornography and U S tourists. And I'm really embarrassed to say this, but U.S. Tourists are some of the biggest consumers of the sex tourism industry throughout the world. And I used to deliver fire trucks, a million dollar, half million dollar fire trucks all over the country here in the U S. And so my world was different than a typical truck driver because I didn't stay in truck parking lots. I would, you know, hotels every night and, and whatever, but still my world crossed enough that you would see truckers against trafficking and you would see different things. And so it's very much a real problem. And I actually, the Asian country in the apartment, my partner works in their technology for running brothels has been imported into the U S through massage parlors, through karaoke clubs through front businesses like that, that provide a cover for, you know, well, it looks like a legitimate business is actually a cover for the brothels.
Rodney Olsen:
So it's actually a lot of the people in Western countries like ours that are actually fueling this kind of industry.
Bradley Hopp:
Right. And partially because of our opulence, as far as our income, you know, we're not a third world country. We have expendable income, you know? And so that makes us purveyors of this kind of, of garbage
Rodney Olsen:
You're talking about young girls and you're talking about minors. What sort of age are we looking at here?
Bradley Hopp:
The youngest girl that my partner and his team have had a hand in rescuing was 11 years old. And she was literally drunk off her behind. Real briefly, the way a rescue mission goes down is they go into the brothel. They have two people inside that are not participating, but acting as patrons. It's a karaoke club. So you can go in and sing and spend the evening singing and stuff and so they go in and spend the evening singing, and then they wait until everybody else gets sauced or drunk. And then they start a ruckus. And then my partner and the team come in and, and cause even more of a ruckus and literally start grabbing, grabbing girls and picking them up and carrying them out of the building. And he picked up this 11 year old and carried her out. Now we always make sure that we at least one of our female staff in the rescue van waiting so that she can explain to the girls what's going on, who we are, why we're there. And then they ask them, do you want to come with us? And a hundred percent of them have said, yes,
Rodney Olsen:
It's a frightening scenario that you're setting out there. How are these girls originally lured into this traffic?
Bradley Hopp:
A lot of times it's either they are one of the girls, her, her parents went on vacation. She was staying with her uncle, her uncle abused, sexually abused during the, he sold their off to his if I remember right, it was his sister and then she pimped her out and then she ended up selling her or she might've sold her directly. I don't remember if she pimped her out and then sold her on or, but anyway, so that was one of the scenarios. A lot of them have aged out of the adoption system or the orphanage system by 14 in this particular country. They, they expect 14 year old people to be able to survive on the streets by themselves at 14 you know, which is being a father of six and having 14 year olds. I that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. I mean, quite honestly, a lot of times it's either they were sold by a family member or they were, you know, out on the streets and somebody picked them up and, and offered them something that looked legitimate. And that's the biggest one. A lot of times, they're, they're sold a bill of goods and told, Oh yeah, well, you know, we'll get you into this whatever job. And that's not the case.
Rodney Olsen:
You say, you're providing all that these young girls need to return to society and to help them to heal, how do you help a young girl who's being treated in this way by probably hundreds of men. How do you teach them to trust again?
Bradley Hopp:
And this is where my faith comes into play because we can't on our own. We have we have a book that it was actually written by a I believe the gentleman's from Australia and he's a Christian counselor, but he has written this book and, and that's kind of been the textbook for our house mothers. They get the girls into a safe environment and obviously it takes time, but the girls begin to see the older girls that are there caring for each other and, and helping each other in that stuff. You know, they go through devotions and Bible study and, and eventually we don't force it down their throats, the girls. So I have a choice, you know, I mentioned earlier that we get them crisis pregnancy counseling, and we don't force them to keep their babies, but three out of the four have that came to us, pregnant, have chosen to keep their babies. And so that combination that we have going on, really the girls see what true Christianity is all about. And they, they begin to see that, Hey, these actually care about me in they're endangering their own lives. For me, it opens up that door for conversations and it opens up the door for, for us to be able to, to share the gospel with them, but then also to help them to recover in, in deeper ways. Because for example, let's just give a short story here. One of the girls came to us and she had been pimped out for three years, if I remember, right, she had not slept a solid night's sleep in, in at least three years. Since she came to the rescue house, she had not slept peacefully all night long. She would always wake up a night terrors and, and just horrific dreams, 28 days in, she decided to put her faith in Jesus Christ and she decided to become a Christian and that night she slept peacefully for the first time in over three years. She slept peacefully for nine hours at night, and she's not had any more night terror. She's not had any more nightmares and the awful dreams and stuff and, and it has really helped her to come to the wholeness that she needs, because limited on what we can do. I mean, we're humans, there's spiritual healing that has to happen. And we're, we're only able to give so much healing, but we can offer Christ. And, and that's where the true healing is found.
Rodney Olsen:
You touched on the danger, that's involved for the team that is doing these rescues. What sort of danger have they encountered? And is there an ongoing danger for them day to day?
Bradley Hopp:
Yeah. First off, this particular country is cracking down on, on Christians for one, for two, one of the girls, the girls are free to leave if they want to. And so one of the girls had saved up her money and she thought that her brothel owner was in love with her. So she went back to him because obviously he told her he loved her. I mean, that was always part of the bill of goods. So, she saved her money and she went back to him and she pretty quickly figured out that that was not the case when you beat her up and put her in the hospital for a week. But then when she left the hospital, she went back to one of Andrew's Bible schools, the brothel owner followed her back there. And then he called some of his corrupt police buddies at the police department there in the area and had some of his, his goons come along with him too. And they were going to bust them Well, we don't know who did this, but somebody higher up in the police department knows or must know something and actually called another police department and, and got Andrew arrested for his own protection. And they got him out of there. They took him to the prison in this country is never a good thing, put him in jail for the day. And then that night at midnight, they took him out the back door in a, in an unmarked squad car. And he's thinking, you know, nothing leaves the back door of one of these jails that ends well, especially at midnight. So they took him to a hotel and they put him up for, for 24 hours and and let everything blow over after that. Then they told him, okay, this is what's going on. So it's very real danger.
Rodney Olsen:
And how do you stop something like this, for the team that's on the ground there, and for you who is totally immersed in this world, day-to-day, how do you stop it from breaking you?
Bradley Hopp:
You have to have a sense of humor. So growing up on the dairy farm, you know, my parents always had an expression cause we went through the farm crisis, the early eighties where guys were losing their farms left and right. And my parents always said that you might as welll laugh about it, otherwise you'll cry. That's one of those stupid sayings that really has stuck with me and held true. But more than that, much more than that is, is just simply my faith in Christ and my belief in Christianity and, and what, what God has done for me, it would be very easy to get discouraged when you're, when you're going up against such wicked and such evil, you really have to have that solid foundation. Otherwise it will because you're looking at the dregs of humanity. There's many days that even as a Christian, you'd rather just throat punch somebody and you know, you hear these stories and you're just like, if I could get my hands around their neck and ring it, I would, you know, and I know the Father, God feels that same way too, but I also know the terrific testimonies that happen when brothel owners become Christians, we've had several brothel owners become Christians over the last couple of years and to see the transformation there really at the same time, it gives you hope too, because you see guys that have, that are like in, in, you know, just name some of famous America, mobsters like John Gotti and Al Capone. I mean, some of the most famous mobsters in the world, these guys are Asian tong. And as part of the mafia and part of the tong, they're not guys to be messed with. So as guys that should not be messed with when they come to Christ and they become Christians and they are willing to put their own lives on the line to see these girls rescued and set free. That's where you begin to, to grab a hold of that hope. That really is just such an astounding thing.
Rodney Olsen:
I imagine having some of those former brothel owners on board would give even more insight into ways to rescue the young girls that you're seeking to save and see healing for.
Bradley Hopp:
One of the, the very first guy or the very first brothel under the Andrew led to the Lord was kind of an interesting situation. Andrew had a, an American restaurant in this particular town. He put an ad in the newspaper for, or put an ad out for, for some waitress help for the restaurant and he had a young lady apply on a Wednesday and he said, come back on Saturday and I'll, I'll give you interview at nine o'clock. Nine o'clock came and went and it was noon before she showed up and he was like, I'm not hiring this girl. And he felt like God said, no, I want you to hire her. So he, he did reluctantly, but he did and she brought a friend of hers on and they ended up both becoming Christians and then they both had a heart to see the girls be rescued out of the brothels and to see these brothel owners come to Christ and so they, they started studying and they started taking gifts into the girls and into the brothel owners because in this Asian country relationship is extremely important, Andrew, his wife had actually helped us. The Christian psychologist that I talked about earlier, she had helped him translate his book into this Asian language. So they had a copy of it and they, they gave it to these two girls and they started studying and then they, said to this brothel owner, they said, do you want to meet an American, that speaks your language? And he said, well, heck I've never met an American let alone one, that actually speaks my language. Sure. So Andrew sat down with the guy and they got to talking and, and Andrew shared the gospel and this guy, as I said, he was Tong. I mean, he was mafia. And when he ran into Christ, it was such an encounter that he set all of his girls free, 20 girls free and gave them all severence packages, gave them on bus tickets back to their home villages and then had a fund that he had money, you know, $45,000 or $48,000 that he had made off of the girls set aside in a, in a fund for a matching fund to raise money for the rescue house and stuff. He's actually helped us. Cause he's still knows all the boys in the clubs, so to speak. And so he's actually helped us get the layouts of the buildings, do different things and has, has really been instrumental in also introducing Andrew few other brothel owners and stuff. And for example, in January of this year, we had a rescue of eight more girls. The way that one went down was really interesting because a year earlier, Andrew had sat down with a brothel owner that he had been introduced to and had shared the gospel with the guy. The guy didn't want to hear anything about it. And he was like, you know, I'm making too much money. And I don't really don't care. Fast forward to this year, January 22nd Andrew and some of his Bible students are praying one morning and they feel like, you know, like the Holy spirit says, I want you to go North. And Andrew's like, all right, I don't know anybody North of town. So he's like, alright, I guess we'll go. So the six of them, or seven of them piled into his, his SUV and they headed north of town when they drove 50 miles out into the country on the toll way. As they were driving along, one of the Bible students speaks up and says, hey I think we're supposed to turn on this side road. So they turned on the side road and when they turn there, they went 15 miles on that road, paralleling the tollway. They got up the road 15 miles and one of the other ones speaks up and says hey, I think we're supposed to turn on this turn around and go back to that, that little gravel two track and go down that road. And so they follow that for three miles out into the middle of the country, out in the middle of nowhere. And they pulled up in front of this really ornate gate. This 90 year old gentlemen comes walking out and he looks at him and says, What's your business here? You know, real gruffly. And Andrew is trying to figure out what the heck to tell the guy. Well about that time the guy's son-in-law walks out of the house. He sees Andrew. He stops dead in his tracks, and he's like, how the heck did you find me here? And Andrew, looks at him, he goes, I know I should know you from somewhere, but I don't know how and the guy says, well, you met me in my office a year ago. And Andrew's like, Oh yeah, you're the brothel.... you know it clicked on his head that he's like the brothel owner that I talked to a year ago. That guy became a Christian. His in-laws became Christians. They all received their first Bibles that night. They all got baptized and they all and he set all of his girls free. So we rescued eight more that night, just from him meeting Christ.
Rodney Olsen:
You're talking about releasing young girls from sex trafficking, but you're also releasing some of those brothel owners. I imagine that they would have enormous amount of shame once they come face to face with what it is that they've been doing.
Bradley Hopp:
They do. But at the same time, a friend of mine and I were talking about this the other day, that sin always curious consequences, you know. Look at the story of the woman at the well, or the woman caught in adultery rather, and she was brought, brought before Jesus and all the Jewish leaders are saying stone her and stuff. And Jesus looks at him and he says, he stands up. And he says, whoever is without sin cast the first stone. And then he goes back to writing in the dirt and slowly one by one, they stop and they dropped their stones and then they walk away. And something that's interesting here is legally, under the Jewish Old Testament law, she should have been stoned, but they failed to fulfill the law because they didn't bring two or three witnesses along. And they didn't bring the man along. If they caught her in the act of adultery, they should have brought him along. And so Jesus, knowing this knows that he can't justly have a case because he didn't have two or three witnesses and he doesn't have the man. And so he goes in and throws this out them, and they all walk away. Now, as I said to my friend the other day, if she would've been pregnant, Jesus looked at her and he said, go and sin no more. He didn't say, be free of the consequences of your sin. He said, go, go and sin no more. If she would have been pregnant, she would have been obliged under his, his current command go and sin no more. She would have been obliged to keep that baby. She would not have been free from the consequences necessarily of that sin. Well, you know, oftentimes we can, you know, these brothel owners, they can set the girls free, but they're still gonna have that remorse. They're free from the guilt. They're free from the condemnation. You know, he who says he, he who Christ sets is free indeed. So they would have been free from that guilt and that condemnation, but they're still gonna have that remorse, that sorrow from that. And it's going to be a godly thing. That's going to keep them from doing it again. It's not always an unhealthy thing to have that remorse because it keeps us from doing it again.
Rodney Olsen:
You've mentioned that some of the girls have been stolen away from their families. Some of them, their families have actually been involved, but for those girls who have been stolen from their families, is there opportunity for them to, to reunite. And what's been some of the results of that.
Bradley Hopp:
I don't know any of the stories of the 20 girls that were set free from the first brothel owner. I don't believe that any of the girls have gone back to that situation because a lot of times, if they do go back to that situation, they would end up back in that same situation. You know, they would have ended up back up in the same situation that oftentimes that got them there in the first place. In other words, there was some reason that they ended up getting trafficked and to send them back into either their village or whatever would be just putting them back into the hands of the, of the original sellers. So to speak the kidnappers in the first place. And so oftentimes it's safer for us to keep them, you know, they have the right to go back. If they want to.
Bradley Hopp:
As I said, the one girl, she saved her money from, from selling the products to us. And she used that money to go back to her, her brothel owner, because she thought he was in love with her. So they have the freedom to go back if they want to. And none of them have chosen to. One of the young ladies that actually won't talk about her parents. Won't talk about how she came to be trafficked. Won't talk about any of that stuff she actually learned to read and write. She learned to do her math. She learned, passed all of her high school classes. She got all caught up. She took her insurance classes and passed her insurance boards and is now as of last summer living in her own place. And, and actually is a licensed insurance agent.
Rodney Olsen:
It's an incredible story to hear someone going from being trapped into an opportunity like that, to be running themselves in their own business and to, to be doing so well in life. It must give you great encouragement to keep doing what you're doing,
Bradley Hopp:
It really does, because there's a lot of times where when you're doing stuff like this, especially when you're, when you're rescuing girls from just absolute hell on earth, as much as I talk about Christianity, there are sources on the other side that don't, don't want to see what we're doing done. You know, they do try to discourage you and dissuade you from doing what you're doing. So yeah, it makes it a challenge some days, but, but you look at those stories and you're like, you know what? This actually brings up a really good story that I was reminded of here a couple of weeks ago. And it really kind of summarizes Teshuah And we actually have some bracelets that I, I hadn't made this connection until just a couple of weeks ago, but we have some bracelets that have starfish on them that the girls have made.
Bradley Hopp:
And the story goes that this little boy is standing on the beach and it's low tide and there's all these thousands and thousands of thousands of starfish all down the beach, they're all trapped because it's low tide. And this elderly gentleman comes up and he's standing there on the shore with his little boy and he's watching a little boy throw the starfish back in. He goes, what are you doing, son? And he goes, I'm throwing the starfish back cause otherwise I'll die. And the elderly gentlemen listed and then goes son, you're not going to be able to rescue all of them. You know, you might as well just quit. You're not gonna be able to rescue all of them and you're not going to make a difference. And the little boy stands there and thinks about it for a second. And he reaches down and picks up a starfish and checks it back into the ocean. And he goes, I made a difference for that one. And that's the thing, you know, there's I was, I was looking at some trafficking numbers tonight before we came on the air and nearly more, nearly 4 million adults and 1 million children are victims of sex trafficking and seven out of 10 of them are exploited in Asia and the Pacific region. It's a 97 or $99 billion a year industry. It's a huge industry. And while we may not be able to get to all of them, we can make the difference in one or two or five or 20 or 40 or 80, we can make the difference in their lives. So it really means a lot to me to be able to make that difference, even just a few people's lives.
Rodney Olsen:
I was going to ask about the numbers and the scope of the problem, and you've outlined that, and it is shocking, but I do wonder sometimes. And I remember once being in India and in a street where there were hundreds of brothels and they estimated between 12 and 15,000 girls being prostituted in that street. And my mind started to turn to the amount of guys that, that each girl sees each day and therefore continuing to try and do the maths in my head and come to terms with the enormous number of people that are using these terrible, terrible services. It's a huge problem.
Bradley Hopp:
And you know, this is, this brings up something on our podcast, Liberty Unveiled. We were talking about on Monday when we were courting and Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested during the last 30 days. She's Jeffrey Epstein's girlfriend and accomplice. And she has supposedly has proof, well she does have proof of a global pedophile and human trafficking ring. In the UK There was a massive global pedophile ring bust, 31 children are rescued and 700 suspects are being investigated. Germany is investigating 30,000 potential suspects in a pedophile ring, 116 trafficker arrests and 1,489 victims were rescued. Florida had a six human traffickers busted, and five women rescued. Pennsylvania had eight men arrested as part of a trafficking ring. Spain had 12 arrests and a thousand victims rescued. Italy had 10 arrested in a trafficking ring. A Baltimore businessman paid $90,000 to sex trafficking operation, The feds charge. A man in California, was arrested for operating a $21 million international sex trafficking website. Bangladesh, 52 were arrested in a trafficking ring, Scotland, dozens of arrests and 18 rescued. Malaysia had 18 police officers and army officials arrested for human trafficking. It's amazing. A French man was arrested for raping 300 plus young girls. India, 67 rescued out of trafficking there. So, I mean, I just skipped over several of them, quite a few of them actually in the trafficking numbers.
Rodney Olsen:
When we start to try and think through these numbers and see the size of this problem. And we can see that most of the time it is fueled by a desire, especially by men who have a desire to, to act in a way that they should not be acting. And that is absolutely evil. There would be some who would see prostitution would see pornography as something that as long as the participants are willing it's okay. What would you say to that?
Bradley Hopp:
A major, major, major misnomer, because oftentimes men are looking at pornography and they think that the girls are willing, but oftentimes they're not. I think they said like 70% or higher are actually trafficking victims. And what you're seeing well, looks like they're willing participants, but they're really not. And oftentimes the reason they look like they're willing participants is because they've either been threatened with death or their family has been threatened, or they're, they're being told if you don't participate and you don't act the way we want you to act your family, it will be killed. There's much in the way they have coercion and blackmail. And, and so, you know, when, when men think that that, that all, this is all just fun and games and it's, and nobody's really being hurt us, not the really the case. That's not really the truth. There is no choice. If, if you are told either do this or you'll be executed or do this, or your family will be hurt and you've already been raped and you've already been, see something that happens.
Bradley Hopp:
And if you look at the method for most, all of the traffickers, when they're grooming somebody, they will first rape them and, and what that does psychologically to the person is it breaks down there. If you talk to trafficking victims, they'll, they'll always say after I was raped, I felt like I was worth nothing and it causes the psychological and spiritual damage to them. And so then when their frame is, are threatened and stuff, they still care for their families. And they're like, I'm not worth anything anyway. So therefore I might as well, you know, I'll to save my family. I'll, I'll do what I'm told.
Rodney Olsen:
It's a very dark world and sometimes we just have to call things for what they are. We're talking about an industry, so to speak, we're talking about sex work, and we use all these phrases, but obviously if women are being coerced in any way to participate, and especially for these young girls, that's not sex work, that's not an industry. That's, as you say, rape, that's, that's pure and simple rape.
Bradley Hopp:
This is where I get really frustrated. And really, yeah, I suppose angry would be the right word with the, I try to be nice. The numbskulls in, in Holland and, and in Northern Europe that are, that are protesting for a sex workers' rights and stuff like that. If you go back to the, really the basis of all of this, even the ones that are older and say, they're there willingly. I will guarantee that if you look back through their past, they were molested when they were a child. And so if they were molested as a child, even though they think they're there willingly, now, they didn't start out there. They were molested, they were raped when they were a child, there has been some kind of childhood traumatic damage done to these children.
Bradley Hopp:
Like my partner, Andrew is rescuing where they're, they're still underage and their minors, or where they say they're willingly in the industry as adults or whatever.
Rodney Olsen:
I don't imagine that that point of view makes you very popular in some circles.
Bradley Hopp:
No, but you know what? I, I'm a farmer came from Iowa and I really don't care. You know, I'm not trying to be crass, but it's, you know what I care more about. I care more about the people that we're rescuing. And I care more about the people that are being damaged than I do about me being popular or anything else. When you damage a child, you're causing things to be set in motion. And Jesus said, well, he took this, this approach to it when you damage one of these children. And he said, when you, when you cause one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for you. If you'd had a millstone tied around your neck and you've been tossed in the ocean, He doesn't take to it kindly. It causes a string of damage in their lives. But then what it does is it also causes them to go on and become abusers later. A lot of times, and it perpetuates, you know, Andrew has an expression and it's really true hurting people, hurt people. That's the reason we take the approach of, of getting them healed in and completely made whole before we set them back out into the, into the world on their own.
Rodney Olsen:
I'm wondering if someone who's listening today and thinking, this is something I need to get behind. This is something I need to act on. How can they contact you and make a difference?
Bradley Hopp:
To make it easy on everybody? I have two URLs for our website. I have to teshuahtea.com, which is T E S H U A H .com. But the easier one is deliverancetea.com. I just decided after two years that it would be probably smart to make it a little bit easier on people. So deliverancetea.com is a easy way to find us on Teshuah or on deliverancetea .com. They can go to the donate page and under the donate page, we have a direct link, a PayPal link to the rescue house. So when somebody makes a donation there, it does not go through me. It does not go through the, the business side of everything. It goes direct to the rescue facility and helps us take care of the, because it costs a lot of money. A typical rescue mission is about $500, but after care or the initial aftercare, getting them new clothes medical care, all the things that they need, all the toiletries, all that stuff because they literally come to us with the clothes on their back and nothing else. And so we get them all new clothes, toiletries, medical care that costs about $2,000. But then on a monthly basis, per girl, that's in our rescue facility, it costs us a $16.67 a day per girl. Well, what I haven't told you about is we had a brothel owner reach out and he's like, my brothel has been shut down because of COVID and I've been housing and caring for the girls for the last six months, and I can't keep doing it. And I heard about you guys and so here's my 13 girls. So we now have 41 girls and two female staff in our, in our rescue house. We're in the process of finding a second one because obviously a 2300 square foot house is too small. So we need to expand and get more staff. So when somebody makes a donation that helps us defray the costs of, of that, cause it costs right now with 41, girls is closer to 21 or $22,000 a month that it costs us to care for everything. But a donation is, is, is a great way to get behind what we're doing.
Rodney Olsen:
And we'll include links to the website in the show notes. So you can check that out at bleeding, daylight.net. You can find all the information there. Brad, it's been wonderful to speak to you speaking about some, some very dark things, but, but the light is starting to shine through in, in so many of those areas. We thank you for the work that you are doing and thank you for your time here today.
Bradley Hopp:
Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
Emily Olsen: 
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