Christianity Wrap-up, Part III - Tilde's story of resiliance and healing

This is Tilde's story.
I guess for me my whole transformation started back in 1994. I was married in 1991 – I was 23 and my husband was 20. We were in the military, and we were really young, and I had not dealt with a lot of issues that I had growing up as a child. I was molested from the time I was five until the time I was eleven or twelve by multiple people (family members, but not my parents, they had no clue). I really didn’t tell anyone until I was seventeen, and at that time, I just told my mom about one person, not about all of it.

Keeping that to myself was really hard, so it all came out in marriage: being young, and not knowing really how to deal with all that anger and rage and jealousy and insecurity. I could be a really bad wife at times, when that side of me would come out. I hated it.

Christianity Wrap-Up Part II - Dawn's Story [the caretaker]

This is Dawn’s Story.

I’m the oldest of 6 kids and all of those kids are either half siblings or adopted. Obviously, I came from a fractured home, and in my case, it was fractured more than one time.

My mom was an alcoholic and a drug addict. I was born in Houston and when I was about two years old, my mom, who was pregnant at the time with my little sister, left her home under the cover of night, took me and moved with a Marine to California. She had my little sister, then eventually my little brother, and I remember from the time I was about five years old being surrounded by people who were doing drugs, drinking, a lot of sex. I remember seeing my mom on drugs and drunk. I was molested more than one time when I was a kid, just being around all the sexual promiscuity, the drugs, and the alcohol abuse.

Christianity wrap up part I - Story of a Survivor

I had the privilege of interviewing a handful of women who opened up and shared their stories with me on how Christianity has changed their lives. Before I move on to mormonism, I would like to share some of those stories with you. These ladies have given me permission to use their information and have allowed me to give them a voice to speak to the world about their relationship with God, for which I am very grateful. These stories are in their own words.

***

Photo by Mark Cornwell

This is April's story.
When I was younger, I grew up in a Methodist church. I was baptized as a baby, so I wasn’t aware of what was going on or anything like that, my parents raised me in the Methodist church. I had a lot of fun writing notes back and forth to my friends during the service. I wasn’t really engaging at all. I tried to listen to the sermons, but it was just not my thing at all, even when I got older. 

As soon as my folks allowed me to not go to church, I stopped going to church. It wasn’t because I stopped believing in God – there hasn’t been a moment in my life where I didn’t believe in God. I know that that sounds weird to some people, but my parents introduced me to him at such a young age, that out of the gates, I believed in God. Most of that had to do with my mother and how she raised me, how she treated me, and how she had that hopefulness all the time, happiness seemingly all the time.

On finding peace and breathing

I have been "practicing" yoga. Thats what they call it - you don't DO yoga, you practice yoga, I guess because you'll never be perfect, but you'll always be perfecting your practice.

It has been a journey for me spiritually - learning to breathe. Learning to intentionally relax. Overriding my body and forcing it to submit, to stay still, to bend and stretch. The breathing is something I forget alot - funny how you can forget to breathe. When my legs are shaking from holding Warrior Pose (see below)  for long minutes, and my arms are extended and shaking, I look at a point in the room, then my natural reaction is to hold my breath to still myself.
Hold my breath until I can become steady and strong. Hold my breath until I can regain control. Ah, and there we have my control issues.

[in]tolerance in Christianity

Tolerance is not a word that is found in the Bible. Are you surprised?

It is an English word defined in the following way:

tol•er•ance [tol-er-uh ns] –noun
1. a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward those whose opinions, practices, race, religion, nationality, etc., differ from one's own; freedom from bigotry.
2. a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward opinions and practices that differ from one's own.
3. interest in and concern for ideas, opinions, practices, etc., foreign to one's own; a liberal, undogmatic viewpoint.
4. the act or capacity of enduring; endurance: My tolerance of noise is limited.

spiritual sensitivity - angels and demons

I was a spiritually sensitive child, and I am today a spiritually sensitive adult.
My mother used to tell me a story about when I was a small child. My parents had rented a home that was once home to another family. There was a history of abuse in the family, and the story I remember my mother telling me was that the husband had gone to prison for hurting his wife and child. My bedroom door had locks (as in, more than one) on it, and my mother tells me I refused to sleep in it. Instead, I slept in the living room floor or in their bed, or anywhere but my room. My dad would come and pray for me every night before bed so that I didn't have nightmares, and my mom said one night he came to pray for me and when he ended his prayer, I said "Daddy? Who's the pretty lady in that chair?" He looked around, looking for a woman, and saw nothing. "I don't see any lady, where is she?" he said.
"She's over there, in the chair. She's there all the time, but she never told me her name. She's so pretty." I yawned and went to sleep.

gratefulness

I don't take enough time to be grateful for things. I am happy when good things happen to me, and when things are going well, and sometimes I whisper a prayer of thanks for what I have... sometimes when my children are asleep in their beds and I am lying half asleep in my bed, I say thank you out loud for their beauty. Sometimes, when sunshine is out and breeze is stirring, I lift my face to the sky, breathe in the warmth and comfort, and smile my thanks. But I don't practice gratitude regularly.

I don't thank people as often as I should. I often forget to let my co-workers know that I appreciate their efforts along side mine.