This is my testimony leading up to how my Savior Yeshua/Jesus came and rescued me on April 23, 2005. May this glorify and magnify our Creator, and bless anyone who reads.
I did not grow up in a Christian home, and my parents divorced when I was 3 years of age. I still remember the day that my dad was packing up his things and I knew I was really sad, I remember sitting on his lap and him telling me he wouldn’t be living with us anymore. It broke my heart and I didn’t understand why he was leaving.
My mother worked full time to support us, so for the most part as I grew up I became independent and started to fend for myself. Not having a father around eventually would catapult me into many issues such as abandonment, self-esteem, self-worth, and un-trusting of men in general. I was able to see my father every once and a while, and he had remarried.
I was a pretty good kid until about maybe 12 or so, when my rage started to kick in, I became very violent, kicking holes in our walls, doors, breaking things etc. I had so much anger built up inside me, that it would bubble forth in explosions. I had started to be bullied at school from around the age of 10, and by the time I was a freshman in HS I started to get into physical fights to stand up for myself, as it was the only way I knew how. At night I was tormented in my sleep and had night terrors frequently. I started drinking getting into drugs and promiscuity when I was 13-14 years old, and it had escalated from there. There were many times that I no longer wanted to live because of the pain that I was in. I was diagnosed with depression and started taking paxil then switching to Zoloft (which I now have been completely set free from).
While the medication appeared to help, inside I was still dead, and used alcohol, drugs etc to help medicate me even more.
When I was 17 years old, I decided to join the military to get a life for myself. I was in complete rebellion and I wanted nothing to do with my parents(my mom had also remarried). When I turned 18, before I was about to go to basic training, I went and got a tattoo to show my ‘adultness’, and bought a pack of cigarettes(even though I had already been smoking for 5 years, just could actually buy them legally). I kept that receipt of my very first tattoo and although I no longer have it, I remember the name of the place, it was called the ‘Dragon’s Lair’. How fitting, considering I know who the dragon is now, and who owns tattoo shops. From that day on for 5 more years I got a tattoo every year, and it became another addiction, to mask the pain. The pain I felt from the tattoo, in my screwed up mind at the time, enjoyed the pain, because it was better than the pain I would feel from inside me.
So, off I went in to the wild blue yonder, I was in the Air Force and being shipped off to my first base of Alaska where my drinking would only continue to get worse from that point. It was also the same time that I would have a dream that showed me events that were to take place 5 years later.
So, off to Alaska I went, and for the next four years I would be. Even though I was just shy of 19 when I finally arrived to AK, it was not a show stopper from continuing on in the debauchery I was in, and getting alcohol when I wanted it. My drinking only escalated more when I turned 21, when I could actually go to bars and purchase it myself. I also along with my heavy drinking started blacking out. Although this was not an uncommon thing for me, as I started blacking out the first time I got drunk, when I was about 14. Many things happened to me and things I did during these times of complete intoxication/blackout that later I needed deep healing from.
Although I managed to keep it together at work, as I never came to work drunk, I had planned my drinking around times I would not be intoxicated at work. (At least not at this point, but this would soon change)
Shortly after I had turned 19, and living in the dorms I had a dream. In the dream God and Satan were playing chess, and Satan had petitioned God for my soul. However, God said, ‘No, she belongs to me’. I had absolutely no idea what this dream meant, and so I just backlogged it, and continued on in my destruction. Little did I know how this would play out once I arrived in Italy, but before that, I had to go to Turkey.
In late 2003 I went to Turkey, and for the next 15 months of my life, I spent all of my free time drinking, partying, and continued on in my other addictions. In fact my very first night there I was so drunk, that I did not become sober until about 1pm the next day, and it was my first day of in-processing. This was a foreshadow of how my tour was in Turkey.
There were many nights I would be one of the last people remaining at the club, so I could drink as much as I could, and I would walk home by myself, so drunk I could barley walk, just trying to focus on the ground and not fall. I would make it back to my dorm and if it was a good night, I would sleep some it off, others, I would spend with my face in the porcelain throne room on the cool tile floor. The bathroom had become my safe haven well before this time.
I started getting in trouble at work, as I got two ARI’s(Alcohol Related Incidences) where I don’t remember a whole lot but I guess I had decided to climb a palm tree. The next day I woke up with blood all over my bed because I had punctured my leg so bad you could put an entire quarter in it. My second one, the cops were called on me as I was leaving the NCO club as I could not even walk or talk right, and I became hostile. I am not even sure what my BAC was, but I know that they were shocked as to me even still being alive. I was putting down entire bottles of hard liquor and it would not phase me. It is quite a miracle that I am here typing this, as even then God’s hand was on me!
Most Friday’s I spent at work still intoxicated from the night before as I would go out to get cheap drinks called “Thirsty Thursday’s”. I would pass out at my desk, or sometimes just call in sick, because I could not even see straight yet.
“Woe to those who rise early in the morning pursuing strong drink, who stay up late at night-wine inflames them”~ Isaiah 5:11
So, my tour in Turkey came to a close, and off I went to Italy. It was only a few months into my tour in Italy before the Lord lifted the veil of my deception off my face, and I came ‘face to face’ with my Creator.
So, I arrived in Italy in Jan 2005, and I immediately started my partying and clubbing, it was pretty easy since the friends I had in Turkey were now with me in Italy. So, I pretty much just picked up where I had left off in Turkey, but opted for more wine and kept my refrigerator promptly stocked.
On April 22, 2005 I went to a party, and they had Soju. Many of you may be unfamiliar with Soju, but it is an alcoholic drink you can get from Japan and Korea, and is an unregulated % of Alcohol. So in one bottle you may get 10% and others 40-50% alcohol volume. I drank probably a liter, and I don’t really remember after a certain point.
On April 23, 2005 I woke up in my Italian apartment, smelling of urine (evidently I had urinated on myself while sitting in a chair at the party as I later came to find out), and I had no cell phone minutes, no car, and no keys. I knew something was really wrong. I began to see my life was out of control. So, I managed to use my neighbor’s phone, and a friend came and picked me up and I went to the field where I had left my car, as the people who dropped me off at my house locked me in my house to protect me, and left my keys in my car to get it later.
I remember after getting in my car parked in the field, that I had drove down the way to the house I was at the night before, and I humbled myself before this couple and I apologized to them for my behavior, that I had a drinking problem and that I was going to be seeking help. It was the first time I had ever been accountable for my behavior, and realized what I had done was wrong, and felt remorse and shame and that I needed to seek forgiveness. Before this time, I had no remorse for my drinking and the behavior that accompanied it, nor did I ever seek forgiveness for my actions.
As I left and got back in my car, I did not end up driving home, but rather drove on base and sat in the parking lot of my work. I pulled up into an empty parking space, almost half expectant for someone to come out of the building, but I just sat there. I sat there staring out my front window, with my hands gripping the steering wheel looking up into the sky, thinking there has to be more to life than this, there has to be more to life than the life I was living, because I was not really living.
Tears began to well up in my eyes, I closed them, when I opened them I no longer was looking at the sky nor were my hands on the steering wheel, but I had bowed my head, and as the tears began to fall I then covered my face with my hands. I began to weep. I knew I had hit rock bottom, I was killing myself, a slow painful death, and I was lost, but I felt hope.
I began to pray, I prayed to God, and I yelled out to Him in my desperation. Then, like a soft breeze, He came, and the veil was lifted from my eyes, like a lost sheep finally seeing his master, the Master of all found me right where He knew I would be; just as He had given me that dream 5 years prior when Satan petitioned for my soul.
As I cried out in anguish that day, I heard a knock, and a voice.
That day I answered, and listened.
The Lord Jesus/Yeshua spoke to me. His voice was as real, as talking to someone sitting right next to me, powerful, yet comforting and gentle.
He spoke to me His own Word, of which was so foreign to me. He spoke Revelation 3:20 to me, and said that He had been knocking on the door of my heart for a long time, and if I let Him in He would help me, for then He quoted Matthew 11:28-30, and said ‘My Yoke is easy, My burden is light’.
I let Him in that day, into my mess of a dwelling(body), felt peace for the first time and felt His mighty Hand break the yoke of bondage off my neck, and I kid you not, I literally felt His hand knock off a heavy weight around my neck, and it became lighter. It was intense. So there in my ’92 Mazda MX3, in mid afternoon, I dined there with my Savior, was set free from alcohol, and my sin of drunkenness and He made Himself a place to stay in my dwelling. In that moment, the desire to drink, was gone, and I have not picked up one drink since. Praise Yah! He was right, I belonged to Him!
•Rev 3:20“See, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I shall come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me
•Mat 11:28“Come to Me, all you who labour and are burdened, and I shall give you rest.
29“Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and humble in heart, and you shall find rest for your beings.
30“For My yoke is gentle and My burden is light.”
About a week after this, I self-identified through a program in the AF called ADAPT(Alcohol Drug Addiction Treatment). During a routine briefing concerning such, the Lord had prompted me to go talk to the woman who gave the briefing, and worked directly with the program. She was later the one to diagnose me with Alcohol Dependence, as again, for the first time, I was completely honest about everything concerning my drinking. It was a bit of a shock for me to know that I had to go to rehabilitation, however, I knew that is where I needed to go.
So, off to rehab I went up in Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Germany. I was in rehab for 6-7 weeks and it was pretty intense. I went to many AA meetings(of which I no longer support), and I had a sponsor, but most importantly I had my Savior, Yeshua/Jesus!
There were many struggles and obstacles I had to go through while in Rehab, and the months following, but Yah was with me, He gave me strength and when I arrived back in Italy I got rid of all my shot glasses, threw away all clothes that I partied in, destroyed all pictures of me drinking, and even removed many ‘friends’ from my life that were only my drinking buddies anyway, they were not real friends.
I had to figure out how to live without alcohol in my life, and recondition myself and my life. I had to relearn how to do everything without alcohol. At certain points I thought it was okay to still go to bars and clubs and not drink, but the Lord later convicted and showed me otherwise.
They say in rehab that you shouldn’t date or really start a relationship until after at least a year….I met Tony, my husband April 28, 2006….funny thing about that, was when I was young I told my mom I would meet and marry a man in Italy…and so I did….a man prepared for me. The Lord had told me that Tony was who He had planned for me to marry, within the few days that we started to date, 3 to be exact…we have been through much, but have gained much, and even if we lost everything, we still would have gained everything, we have our marriage built on the Rock!