Recent Articles
10/29/2015
How I Can Help handout When someone you know is experiencing abuse in their relationship: Listen and believe them! Minimizing or excusing the abuse does not help. Show empathy and understanding. Don’t automatically tell them to leave. Help them to feel empowered to explore their options, make their own decisions, and support them in their […]
10/10/2016
Is Hope’s story your story? No matter what Hope does in her marriage, something is always wrong. She tries to be a good wife. She reads books; she prays; she follows the advice from well-meaning friends. But she still hurts. No matter what she does, her husband still treats her as if he doesn’t love […]
10/15/2015
My life as a boy was filled with violence, blood and hiding places. My siblings and I were shuffled back and forth between our violent-alcoholic parents and a terribly abusive orphanage.
I carried the abuse inside me like a brick. I felt like I had so many bad secrets that I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone, and I was so scared to let them slip that I stopped talking.
10/01/2015
Can a bicycle chain hold an elephant in place? Yes it can!
Josh McDowell tells a story about a chained elephant which reminds us of some adults who are chained to their horrific past of physical, emotional or sexual abuse. Josh writes:
“We’re like a circus elephant tied down by a bicycle chain. We ask how one small chain could hold a powerful elephant. The trainer explains that the chain doesn’t hold him; it’s the elephant’s memory that keeps him from trying to escape.
09/16/2016
WHAT TO DO IF I AM BEING BULLIED? OR IF SOMEONE ELSE IS BEING BULLIED? What can I do to stop bullying? That was my question when I heard that a young teenage girl in my community was the victim of relentless bullying. What can I do to stop the bullying? A very helpful website which deals […]
10/09/2015
Acknowledging the abuse was horrible.
Admitting that my grandfather had sexually abused me meant three things: first, he didn’t love me; second, no one in my family cared enough about me to know that I was hurting or to protect me; third, I felt like a piece of litter that no one even bothered to throw in the trash. Realizing that no one really cared about me when I was a child was the most painful part of my healing process.
10/27/2014
Years passed. I married a wonderful Christian man and two years into our marriage our first little girl was born. In the days that followed, the harder I tried to care for our vulnerable, colicky baby, the more desperate and out-of-control I became. That desperation triggered the memory of the helplessness that I felt as a ten-year-old. My past began to haunt me. Migraine headaches and nightmares became frequent. I struggled with intense explosive anger. I was depressed, critical with my husband and I felt undeserving of God’s love.
