My school picture from second grade shows my desperation. Rather than face Mama’s wrath at my knotted hair, I cut out chunks of tangles. Even today, I see terror in those seven-year-old eyes and whisper healing truth:  “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11).

Daddy tried. He took me to church and we read the Bible together, but like everybody else, he was afraid of Mama. Surely God loved good church ladies, but me? At age nine, I asked Jesus into my heart. I entered the warm baptismal water and watched my white gown float. You can’t ever be good as an angel, but this is what it feels like.  

The sparkling-clean feeling didn’t last long. Almost before my hair had dried, a relative sexually molested me. I told Mama. She called me a trouble-maker and beat me with a metal clothes hanger.

Later, my mother was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, manic depression, alcoholism, and drug addiction. She believed everything that went wrong was my fault. So did I.

Like other abuse victims, I learned to disconnect from pain. But manifestations of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse clung like leeches — hives, bedwetting, promiscuity, drugs, and alcohol. My goal? To hide from myself. Escape the ugly, smelly, pest named Jan.

At seventeen, married, pregnant, and miserable, I added God to the snake-like list of offenders. Soon we divorced and I raised my son, Chris, alone. Years later, I remarried. Despite my college degree, name-brand clothes, and nice house, I remained a broken little girl.

Three months after the wedding, a drunk driver killed Chris. My only reason to live. I died too, leaving arms and legs, a blank face without a spirit. I didn’t eat, sleep, talk, or glance in a mirror.

God hates me. I can’t trust Him.