What you read below is where I was when Jesus met me. He has restored my life in so many ways, it’s often hard to believe. But that is God!!

Because why? Because this is what He does…even when it’s tough and you wonder how you are going to make it….

He takes you from the pit to the palace.

He removes your label of victim and makes you a victor in Christ.

He takes you from the place of being stuck to being the one who overcomes.

He takes you from lost to found.

He takes your brokenness and gives you the mercy and grace that heals your heart and makes it whole.

He takes your abandoned heart and adopts you as His child.

He takes you from rejected to chosen.

He takes you from the pit to the palace.

He takes you from full of fear to full of hope.

He removes your anxiety and brings you peace.

He removes your sadness and fills you with joy. His joy!!

Let me tell you, my friend, the journey of faith and a relationship with Jesus is THE MOST exciting, adventurous path you will ever walk in life.

It’s hard. It’s beautiful and it’s so so rewarding.

There is nothing like walking with the Lord.

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For those of you who want to know some of the specifics of my story to see if you’d like to be mentored, read below.

These are just pieces of my story to give you an idea of what I “get”. It’s been a challenging but extremely rewarding walk with the Lord. I pray it speaks to your heart and gives you hope and a desire to walk with the Lord!

One more thing, if none of these resonate with you, I understand. We don’t all share the same story, but often we can see parts of our story in each other’s even when the are different. I pray it helps you know you are not alone. I also want to tell you that there are women who DO “get” you. In fact, we are currently in the process of building a community and network of warrior women of God who can mentor and guide you through your toughest seasons, because I know I can’t do it alone!

 

• Have you been through trauma? Maybe you are a child of divorce who wonders if healing is even possible. I’m here to tell you that it is. My parents got divorced when I was eight, and I turned to food as I navigated life between two different worlds that were three hours apart. Over the years, more addictions were added until the Lord pulled me out of the pit. For me, it was going to treatment for those who forced me to confront the pain of my parents' divorce and heal from it. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got addictions; you CAN recover from your parents' divorce.

 

• Have you struggled with your Dad? There can be a massive abandonment wound with that.  I was fortunately pretty close with my Dad when He was alive, but He wasn’t in my everyday life. He was a good dad who came to get me every other weekend in Philadelphia and took me back to DC, but I still had that abandonment wound. It got worse over the years as I imagined losing him someday. It was so bad that I’d have panic attacks and drink over it. Then one day God did take him unexpectedly (August 2011). The Lord took care of me and showed me that even though Dad was gone, He was my Heavenly Father. Not only that, I had three years of recovery before Dad passed, so we got that much healing because I got sober and started to follow Jesus.

 

• Have you lost someone you love, and you are still challenged with the grief from that? Grief has a funny way of changing us. When you lose someone close to you, it impacts everything in your life. It’s not something you “get over.” It’s something you walk through to healing. Praise the Lord, when my father died suddenly, I was devastated. He was the greatest mentor. But I thank the Lord, having been rescued from the pit and gotten baptized almost a year to the day before He passed, I was surrendered. Praise the Lord, he used that loss to help me confront all my fears of losing him and made me even more surrendered to Him as God the Father than ever.

 

• Have you struggled with your Mom? I get it. My Mom and I struggled for what felt like a lifetime after my Dad left. Even in early recovery, it wasn't easy learning how to build my life separate from her. There were times when we didn’t talk for long periods, and sometimes it got tough. But through it all, I kept leaning on the Lord and trusting His plan. Is our relationship perfect? No. But He has restored it in ways you can’t even imagine and in the process helped me become the woman (and mom) I’m meant to be!

 

• Do you want to get closer to God, but you don’t want it to be in the context of the religion you grew up in? I get it. It’s hard to leave the religion your family raised you in. But the thing is, when you meet Jesus and He draws you in, He pulls you out of the places that He doesn’t fit for you anymore. You can walk that road. So many people are meeting Jesus right now. If that’s you, you can pursue Him, and I’d love to help you with that, cause it’s a crazy journey!

 

 

• Do you feel like you’re having a quarter or midlife crisis? It really doesn’t matter what age you are. Mine started in college, but I never really confronted it till I was 31. You can be in your twenties, thirties, forties, or even fifties and realize that life isn’t working and you need some help. When we’re confronted with things we haven’t dealt with before, it happens in the middle of everyday life. You feel alone, like there’s something wrong with you, and you need to get help. I get it, and I can help you out of that space.

 

 

• Are you struggling with any addictions? Maybe you are in recovery?  When I hit that point of realizing I couldn’t control my behaviors anymore, I knew I had a problem. That place where Jesus met me was the pit of multiple addictions. I was definitely cross-addicted (meaning I had more than two), and when I went to treatment, we confronted them all. Many places only treat one, but I thank God for sending me to a place that addresses all of them. If you might have an addiction, there is a way out. I am so grateful that today I am secure in Christ and don’t have to use those addictions to cope with life. You don’t have to either. Perhaps you are someone who has been in recovery for a while, but you want to deepen your relationship with God; I can help with that, too.

 

 

• Maybe it’s a mental health issue. Addressing mental health issues can be very complicated. Oftentimes, you do need professional help. Whether it’s addictions, panic attacks/anxiety, depression, or something else, you don’t want to walk that road alone. A lot of people resort strictly to drugs and/or therapy to address it. However, I can tell you that if you want deep healing from these issues, you need to bring God into it. I’ve addressed these issues in multiple ways and still treat them, but it is my relationship with Jesus that is my compass. I have found that it is what keeps me on track the most. The Word of God and time with God every day are what keep me healthy mentally.

 

 

•  Are you sick and tired of having to try to fix your food or weight constantly? Have you struggled with an eating disorder that you haven’t addressed? Our issues with food and weight go way beyond just our physical health. It’s not even just mental. Many of us have emotional issues tied to it as well. However, what many people don’t realize is that it’s truly a spiritual issue. We try to “fix” our weight or our “food issues” with diets, pills, workouts, and programs, never realizing that it’s a God issue. When I realized God was in the middle of this and wanted to help me, the game changed. Treatment was the place that gave me a roadmap for dealing with it all. But bringing God into it is what has kept me on track.

 

 

• Sometimes it’s not mental or emotional issues we’re dealing with, it’s physical challenges that challenge our mental and emotional health. When I got into recovery, and got further on the path with the Lord, I ended up having multiple surgeries - for one shoulder, another arm where they put a rod in it, endometriosis, appendix, C-section, and gall bladder. I totally get how challenging it is to have surgery and recover from it. It can knock you out for longer than you think. If you are facing a surgery or feeling like a surgery changed you, I can help you walk through recovering from that with God’s help.

 

• Are you that woman who is still single and waiting for the man of your dreams to arrive? I get it. Having never heard from a boyfriend from high school through college, I thought it would never happen. It was so bad that I ran towards the guys who would never be good for me anyway. Not to mention all the baggage I had from my parents' divorce. But eventually, it did happen. It wasn’t the guy I expected. But it’s the guy God had planned, and He came at the time God intended. But guess what? It’s when I started to confront all my issues with it that He came into my life. Thank you, God! It can happen for you, but you’ve got to let God work you out so He can bring the right guy into your life!

 

• Have you met a man who's been divorced, AND maybe has kids, and doesn’t know what to do? First of all, girl, I get it. I met a man with three kids and never expected to fall in love. But our relationship has been such a fantastic demonstration of God’s love. We are a couple who've been previously broken by divorce, like so many, and the Lord has just used our marriage to shine his light through that healed brokenness. And the kids? They have expanded my heart, taught me so many things, and helped me recover from my own parents' divorce in ways I never imagined. I’m so beyond grateful for these kids (well, adults now).

 

• Do you wonder if you’ll ever be able to have kids or wonder if you even want them? There is definitely a trend these days to have them later or be “child-free.” I can see why. I’m one of those women who didn’t have a child till I was 41, and it wasn’t because I planned it that way. But now I know that my thirties needed to be a decade of healing so that God could bring my amazing daughter into the world through a healed mama! I also never considered being “child-free” a choice. I wasn’t meeting the right guy, and honestly, because I was too busy navigating my life between two homes, I hadn’t grown up dreaming of kids. I literally had to sit down with a friend and address whether I really wanted to be a stepmom after being one for a while! Between my career, the healing, and what would be infertility, it just ended up being when it was! If you are in any of these places with this part of life, I can certainly help you see what God wants to do in yours.

 

• Is infertility part of your story? It is part of so many women’s stories, and it’s so private. Oftentimes, people have no idea that we’re suffering. Maybe we’re ashamed or afraid of being judged. We need God (#1) to help us, and we need people who “get” us. There are numerous scenarios to consider. Mine is just as crazy as the next. You need to know you aren’t alone, and you need someone cheering you on and letting you be real through the toughest parts of that story. I know mine turned out with a child. But the grief of that infertility journey still gets me like the loss of my father. When you get it, you get it. I’d love to meet you there and help you find God in the midst of it.

 

These are all pieces of my story. You have your own. But I wanted you to know that I've been through the fire, and I know that if you’ve been through it or are going through it, it is absolutely possible with God’s help. You CAN be an overcomer, and I’m proof of that.