Category: Sexual abuse

Parenting Both Sides of Sibling Sexual Abuse

Parenting Both Sides of Sibling Sexual Abuse

A Message From The Hummingbird

I am the mom on both sides of a complicated story. Loving one child who was sexually abused and loving the one who caused the harm.

There is no road map for navigating something like this. No clean language. No version of the path forward that does not cost something deep and painful. Some days it feels like my entire role is simply to remain standing when I feel like falling and to stay present when everything in me wants to hide. Functioning while absorbing this kind of shock is a challenge in itself.

And yet, here I am. Learning how to love without chasing, how to hold boundaries without disappearing. How to remain myself even when relationships have changed form in ways I would have never imagined.

Lately, I have been thinking about the hummingbird.

A hummingbird migrates thousands of miles relative to its size. It burns enormous energy simply to stay alive. Even hovering in place takes constant effort. It does not rest the way other birds do. It must keep moving its wings just to remain where it is.

That feels familiar.

As parents and humans navigating trauma, we expend energy just to stay standing and emotionally present. We hover. We show up. We pay attention even when everything in us wants to give up. We absorb pain and strain quietly and keep going. Like the hummingbird, we need nourishment, spiritual and emotional, because the work of staying present is exhausting.

The hummingbird symbolizes resilience after hardship. It represents the return of joy and lightness, not because things become easy, but because survival itself requires strength. It reminds us that connection does not require possession, love does not require obligation, and presence does not require control.

We can love deeply and still protect ourselves. We can hold grief and hope at the same time. We can remain connected without losing who we are, and we can stay in place without collapsing.

If you are hovering right now, barely holding yourself together, that is worth remembering! Your quiet strength counts! The energy you put into staying present matters!

Even in the most challenging seasons, strength can exist. You are not failing, you are surviving. And sometimes that is the bravest thing any of us can do.

It Is What It Is

It Is What It Is

“It is what it is.”

I told my assistant, after spilling everything about why I had been absent,

“Hey, that’s a dismissive statement. You can’t dismiss this. It is not your fault.” He said.

Yesterday I stopped by my parents’ house to help Mom with her Facebook. After about an hour of scrolling through her activity history, and Dad complaining about how three of their specialist doctors were leaving our town for a bigger one, they ended with,

“She owes us an apology.”

I shook my head no.
They didn’t like that.

They insisted they had been wrongly accused. They brushed past the fact that they are still, even after everything, keeping contact with her abuser. Instead, they turned the extra pictures on Facebook into their own story. A story where they were the victims. A story where she had attacked them.

Dad with his angry, silent face.
Mom had her lip pulled in, as if she were bracing for battle.


“Yes, she does,” they sneered.
“Wouldn’t you want an apology if you were accused of something you didn’t do?”

I let out one of those airy laughs. The kind you do when you remember something painful. In my case, it was Dad’s accusatory text. I brushed it off again by saying,


“You have to understand how scared she is.”
And then the conversation was over.

I left feeling like I had failed her and myself.

I have never been good at ‘thinking on my toes’ when I get backed into a corner. And for some reason, my parents have always had the power to back me in that corner. Even as an adult. Even after therapy. Even after years of growth.

I think I have been dismissive of them for years without realizing it. Not because I didn’t care, but because I didn’t want to face the fear I carried of them. A fear I only recently learned to name.

Therapy has helped me draw cleaner lines. It showed me that my anxieties did not begin with my ex-husband. He added to the damage, but he did not build the foundation. My parents did. Their dismissiveness shaped me long before adulthood, long before marriage, long before the trauma that came later.

My dad does not know how to love without control. His love has limits, and those limits end where his control ends.
My mom has always believed the world is against her. So it makes sense she sees her own granddaughter as just one more person out to hurt her.

And for years, I’ve repeated the exact phrase like a mantra.

“It is what it is.”

But now I know that phrase was never peace. It was resignation.
It was the sound of folding into silence.
It was the armor I wore when I didn’t yet have the language to name the wounds.

But I do now.

So no, it’s not “what it is.”

It’s what it was.

When Doing the Right Thing Still Makes You Feel Like the Villain

When Doing the Right Thing Still Makes You Feel Like the Villain

A story about family, guilt, and the cost of choosing someone’s peace and safety

This year, I set a boundary with my parents.

We didn’t go to their house for Thanksgiving. We had it at ours instead. That might sound small to someone outside the situation, but it wasn’t. It carried years of pain, silence, and choices that should never have been mine to carry.

It wasn’t even about me this time. It was about my daughter.

There’s a story I’m not going into here, but I’ll say this much. My daughter was violated by a family member, their grandson, my son. He’s in prison now for what he did to her. But my parents still choose to stay in contact with him.

She was the one who said she didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to sit in a place that still protects the person who hurt her. And I decided to support her, choose her, and stand on her side.

It was the right thing. I know that. But it didn’t stop the fallout.

My mom didn’t speak to me for a whole week. My dad turned on the guilt, the blame, and the disappointment. Like I was the one punishing them. All I did was protect my daughter from the people who made her feel betrayed.

And still, I spiraled. I second-guessed myself. I wondered if I was being dramatic, if I had taken it too far, if I was being cruel by drawing a line.

That’s how deep the conditioning goes. That’s how beating yourself up becomes your favorite hobby.

You protect your child. You do what you know is right. And then you punish yourself for it.

Here’s how that cycle works. Here’s how the guilt gets under your skin and stays there, even when it shouldn’t.

1. You confuse guilt with being good.
You grew up thinking that if it hurts, it must mean you care. If you carry the guilt long enough, maybe it proves you’re the better person. Perhaps it means you’re nothing like the ones who hurt you. So you hold it. You nurse it. You call it empathy, but it’s not. It’s grief. It’s fear. It’s survival mode, you never got the chance to grow out of.

2. You turn on yourself before anyone else can.
It’s safer that way. You blame yourself first. You get ahead of the punishment. You run the worst-case scenario before it even happens. That way, if someone does get mad, you’re already halfway into self-destruction. You don’t have to be blindsided. You’re already bleeding. You call it control, but it’s fear disguised as preparation.

3. You were trained to carry the weight for everyone.
Keeping the peace was your job. Making things easier and smoothing things over. So when you finally make a decision that protects someone else, someone innocent, someone hurt, it still feels like betrayal. It feels like you’re letting everyone down, even when you’re the only one standing up for what’s right.

4. You think beating yourself up makes you accountable.
You think that if you suffer enough, it proves you’re not careless. That you’re not cold. That you understand the impact. But accountability is not self-punishment. It’s not turning your own heart into a punching bag. Accountability means standing in your truth and owning your choices, even when they hurt, even when you’re alone in them.

You can know something is right and still feel crushed by the guilt of doing it. That’s the part people don’t talk about.

The pain of healing is that it often makes you look like the villain to the people who benefited from your silence. And the reflex to beat yourself up is strong. It feels like the only way to keep the peace with yourself when everyone else is pulling away. But beating yourself up is not the same as being good. It’s just the story they taught you to believe. And you don’t have to keep telling it.

Why Happiness Makes You Nervous

Why Happiness Makes You Nervous

For the girl who thinks the tightness in her chest is normal

Good times make you nervous, don’t they?

You don’t call it fear—you call it “being cautious,” or “not getting your hopes up.” But the truth is quieter: you’re not used to peace. For so long, love has felt like tension, panic, apologizing, overthinking, and walking around someone else’s moods like they’re landmines.

So when something finally goes right… Your whole body glitches.

You look around, waiting for the explosion.
You wait for the tone in his voice to shift.
You wait for the moment he decides you’re “too sensitive,” “too emotional,” or “too much.”

And if nothing happens right away, your brain fills the silence with dread: Is this the part where it all turns again?
You don’t trust happiness—not because you’re broken, but because you’ve survived too long without it.

Girls like us learn early that peace feels like a trap.
A setup.
A calm before the next storm.

No one told you that real love isn’t supposed to feel like bracing for impact.
No one told you that safety isn’t the same thing as “keeping the peace.”
No one told you that if your body relaxes only when he isn’t home… that’s not comfort. That’s survival.

Listen, sweetheart—if happiness feels foreign, it’s not because you’re incapable of it.
It’s because someone taught you to expect pain.

And here’s the part I wish someone had whispered to me sooner:
You don’t have to keep living in the story where fear feels like love. You don’t have to keep shrinking yourself just to fit into a relationship that was never safe to begin with.

Real peace doesn’t make you nervous.
Real love doesn’t make you flinch.
And real happiness doesn’t feel like a setup—it feels like finally coming home to yourself.

You deserve that kind of happiness.
And I promise… it won’t explode.

When someone ties despair to God Himself, it buries you in a deeper kind of fear. You stop dreaming. You stop believing in the better. And every time life gets quiet, you brace yourself, because you know the calm never lasts.

I remember once, after one of our rare calm seasons, we tried to dream again. We made a little vision board together — nothing extravagant, just things a normal couple would hope for. A peaceful home. A reliable car. A future that didn’t feel like walking through broken glass.

But his face went dark, the way it always did when anything felt too good.

He looked at me and said,

“God hates me. We will never get any of this.”

And just like that, the air changed.
The hope drained out of the room.
My body learned — again — that peace wasn’t safe, and happiness wasn’t to be trusted.

Why No One Can Cheer You Up (And Why You Don’t Want Them To)

Why No One Can Cheer You Up (And Why You Don’t Want Them To)

It’s not that you can’t feel better…it’s that you don’t trust better.

When you’re upset, it feels like nothing can touch you. Friends try to cheer you up, but their words bounce right off. You shut it down with,

“You don’t understand,” or “I can’t help the way I feel.”

Here’s the thing: you’re not wrong for wanting to sit in your feelings. Pain can feel safer than pretending everything’s okay. But sometimes, without realizing it, you hold on to that pain like proof. Proof that you were hurt, evidence that your feelings are real, proof that you’re not invisible.

And letting it go? That feels scary. Because misery, as heavy as it is, can start to feel familiar. Almost like home.

You’re not broken for feeling this way. You’ve just learned to live with despair for so long that happiness feels foreign. But here’s the truth: you deserve more than the familiar depression. You deserve peace, even if it feels uncomfortable at first.

Such was I. I lived in an abusive marriage for 24 years. When I finally dared to leave, I started reflecting and asked myself,

“Why had I stayed so long?”

In the future, I knew I didn’t want to make the same mistake. I didn’t want to end up in another abusive marriage. So I looked back at my past relationships, and they were all the same. Abusive.

Wow. Who am I? And why am I choosing this path?

That’s when I realized I had an addiction problem. I was addicted to pain—the pain and the drama of the chaos. I was stuck in a cycle, like a revolving door. So I constantly had to remind myself why I was leaving. I had to remind myself that I deserved better and that I should look for someone who was the complete opposite.

And that’s precisely what I did. Today, I stand on the other side of abuse. Stronger, freer, and committed to helping others find their own path out.

Need help?
If you or someone you know is struggling with addiction, emotional distress, or abuse, support is available 24/7:

  • Addiction Recovery: Call 866-606-0182 or visit our treatment center directory
  • Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: Dial 988 (free, confidential, 24/7)
  • Domestic Violence Hotline: Call 800-799-7233 or text START to 88788
  • Sexual Assault Hotline (RAINN): Call 800-656-4673 or visit online.rainn.org

You are not alone. There is help. There is hope. And you are worth the healing.

A Quiet Voice Echoes

A Quiet Voice Echoes

Dear Me,


I hear you.
I see what you endured.
I believe every word you wrote.

You were a victim—not because you were weak, but because others chose to harm you, control you, silence you.
It was not your fault. Not then, not ever.
You were not to blame for the loneliness, the violence, the brainwashing, the betrayal.
You were doing your best to survive inside a world that kept telling you to disappear.

And still, you are here.
You are speaking.
You are remembering.
You are healing.

I honor your pain. I honor your courage.
You don’t have to carry this alone anymore.
You are allowed to rest.
You are allowed to feel angry, sad, and confused.
You are allowed to feel everything.

There is no right pace. No deadline.
Only this: you are not silent anymore.
And that is everything.

I love you.
I am with you.
You are not alone.

— Me

One Secret I Still Keep Is…

What You’d Never Guess Just by Looking

Does it have to be just one? There are a few secrets I keep.

The first thing that comes to mind is that I gave birth to 11 children. One at a time. However, that’s no longer really a secret. It is information I usually do not tell people. Not because it is such a big secret, but because their brains cannot seem to comprehend how one woman gave birth to that many children. Or why. Now that is the true secret.

Why? Why did I have that many kids?

Well, first and foremost, because we were in a religious mindset that allowed God to choose how many children we have. But I will tell you that when I was 40 and pregnant, I chose for myself to get that fertile tube tied up, or cut off, or whatever they do, so I cannot get pregnant again. (I only had one tube and ovary by the time 11 came around.) Another reason I had 11 children was that, with the birth of each new baby, came another person/soul who would love me unconditionally and make my fractured life feel whole, even if only temporarily. I desperately longed for someone to love me. And when a baby looks up at you and smiles because you are their entire world, you get the feeling.

Love. The missing piece of me.

Maybe it sounds selfish, but I wanted someone to need me the way I had needed others who didn’t show up.

Another secret I  keep is about my oldest son being in prison. He was a highly respected individual. Everyone loved him. So, for the longest time, whenever anyone asked me where he was or how he was doing, I would answer, “I don’t want to talk about it.” But the bigger secret in that is why he is in prison.

Why?

Because he was so traumatized as a child that he sexually traumatized a child, that’s why. It’s not an excuse, just a truth I’ve had to live with. Pain that isn’t healed will try to find something — or someone — to break.

A third secret I don’t tell anyone: I was a pastor’s wife for 20 years. I never really asked myself why I was, so the “why” in this situation is: why do I keep it a secret? Good question, good soul search here.

Why?

Because I do not want anyone to ask me what I believe now, I am still trying to figure all that out. Like, do I still want to use the term “God,” or is it the Universe, or is it just Spirit? None of those feels right. The closest to feeling like my truth is Universal God or Universal Spirit. But like I said, I am still working that out. I keep it a secret because I do not want people trying to persuade me back into church, back into conformity. I do not want to go to church every Sunday and Wednesday. I don’t want to go door-knocking, soul-witnessing, or whatever they call it. I cannot sit in a service without being overcome with anxiety. My nervous system shuts down, and I usually fall asleep. But I sit there and feel like a ghost of myself, singing words that no longer have a place to land inside me. I know this because I have tried. I tried to find a church so my youngest son could get a taste of religion and decide for himself whether it is something he wants. It’s a secret because I probably disagree with 90% of what they might be talking about if you tried to strike a spiritual conversation. I have read the Bible cover to cover multiple times. There is nothing they can say that will get me to see things differently. It’s a secret because I have not yet dared to share my beliefs with the world.

But here’s a start.

I believe God was female in nature. I believe the Bible is a history book. I think every religion has its great “man of the hour.” The Christians had Jesus. The Muslims have Mohammad. The Jews have the Messiah, and so on. I believe it’s the same thing, just described in a different style. Reaping what you sow is the same thing as karma. The Ten Commandments do not differ much from the Delphic maxims. Maybe the real secret isn’t what I’ve kept — it’s how long I’ve waited to say it out loud.

And the last secret I keep is my age.

They say you’re only as old as you feel. Some days I think I’m 37. Other days I feel 57. It changes with the weather, the weight of the day, or the way my knees sound when I stand up too fast. People often tell me I look so young — thankfully. And I want to keep it that way. Because age isn’t just a number, it’s a perception. It’s the difference between someone listening to your story and brushing it off. So I let them guess. And I let myself believe it too, some days.

The Book That Changed Everything

How grace broke the chains of control in my home and heart

“We are responsible to each other, not for each other.”
— Jeff VanVonderen, Families Where Grace Is in Place

I don’t remember the exact year or even where we were living at the time. But I know it was somewhere between 2007 and 2009 when I picked up a book that would change everything: Families Where Grace Is in Place by Jeff VanVonderen.

I didn’t know it then, but those pages were about to unravel everything I thought I believed about parenting, marriage, and faith.

Before Grace

At the time, I was a stay-at-home wife and a homeschooling mom of ten. Number eleven would arrive later. I was also a preacher’s wife. My husband and I were fully immersed in Independent Fundamental Baptist ministry. We pastored churches, traveled as evangelists, and held revival meetings across the country.

We were loyal. Passionate. Zealous. And convinced we were right.

We preached that having a television was sinful. That women wearing pants was sinful. That too much makeup was sinful—though a little was allowed, so long as it didn’t “draw attention.” I sewed all my own dresses and wore my hair long—though thanks to my hormones, it rarely got far past my shoulders.

We were strict with our children. They had no phones, no TV (because we didn’t own one), no outside friends, no sports. We believed all of those things would lead to sin. We even pulled our oldest son out of college once, convinced he was living “outside the umbrella” of parental authority.

We spanked often. Sometimes for small things. Sometimes for nothing more than an attitude. Every day, we sat our kids down and taught them right from wrong. We drilled obedience into them—not from a place of love, but fear. Fear that if they messed up, it would reflect badly on us. That we’d look like failures. That God would be disappointed.

When we lived in Iowa, I made my girls wear skirts over their snowsuits just to play outside. When we went swimming, it was always in remote places. The girls swam in culottes. The boys wore jeans. My children weren’t allowed to have their own opinions or make their own decisions.

They were born walking on eggshells—and we made sure those eggshells never cracked.

The Book

I don’t recall how I ended up with Families Where Grace Is in Place. Maybe someone passed it to me. Perhaps I picked it up on a whim. But as I began reading, the words leaped off the page. Sentence after sentence felt like someone had opened a window I didn’t even know was there.

The book talked about how families fall into cycles of control, pressure, and manipulation—often in the name of love or righteousness. It spoke of the deep weariness that comes from trying to meet impossible standards. The perfectionism. The fear of failure.

That was us. Especially with so many children, we constantly felt watched, judged, and evaluated. Our theology was built on performance. And we were exhausted.

Then came a line that hit me in the chest:

“We are responsible to each other, not for each other.”

It undid me. All at once, I saw the truth. I wasn’t parenting out of love—I was parenting out of fear. I wasn’t guiding my husband—I was trying to control him. And he was trying to control me. Together, we had built a family that looked good on the outside but was suffocating on the inside.

The book painted a different vision: one where grace replaced fear. Where children were free to make decisions and mistakes. Where love didn’t mean control. Where acceptance was not conditional on perfection.

And something inside me shifted.

The Bridge

As I read, I had one aha moment after another.

I realized we were trying so hard to protect our children from the world that we were crushing their spirits. We didn’t want them to sin, so we removed their freedom. We didn’t want them to mess up—so we made every decision for them. We called it holiness. But really, it was fear.

Even our decision to homeschool wasn’t about education. It was about control. About keeping their behavior within a bubbl,e we could manage.

After trying to “homeschool with grace” for a while, I finally admitted the truth: we weren’t equipped. So we enrolled our children in public school.

It wasn’t a seamless transition. One of my daughters started school in her junior year and had to double up on math to catch up. Thankfully, Arkansas accepted her science, history, and English credits. One of my younger girls had to repeat kindergarten because I hadn’t finished the year—we had opened a daycare in our home, and it consumed my time and attention.

My third daughter and fifth son—only a year and a half apart—both entered fourth grade the same year. He had fallen behind under my teaching. I warned the principal to separate them; I knew she’d do all his work if they stayed together. They listened, and the school helped bring him up to speed within that year.

During this season of change, I was also starting to rediscover my own worth. I filed for a restraining order against my abusive husband. For a time, I let him come back—still caught in that old belief that if I just tried harder, he would change. That if I prayed more, obeyed more, submitted more, he would become the man I needed.

But I was beginning to see: you can’t change someone by controlling them. You can’t fix someone who doesn’t want to be fixed.

After Grace

It’s been over 16 years since I read that book. My baby is now a junior in high school. The way I parent him is entirely different than how I raised the others—especially the oldest ones.

I’ve apologized to some of my children. I’ve told them I wish I could go back and do it all differently. And I mean it. I see some of them now, parenting the way I once did—out of fear, trying to control everything. But I don’t lecture. I offer gentle reminders. I try to model something different.

Our family structure isn’t perfect. Our children aren’t perfect. I’m not perfect. One of my sons is in prison. That hurts to say. But even in that, grace remains. We no longer try to control each other. We don’t panic when we see a child or sibling making choices we wouldn’t make. We offer love. We offer space.

And we let go.

Letting go is hard. Watching someone you love repeat mistakes you’ve already made is hard. Trusting grace instead of fear is hard.

But control?

Control is harder.

💬 Want to share your story of breaking free from control-based parenting or faith structures? Comment below or message me privately — you’re not alone.

What kind of God does that?

“Oh my god what have you done! This is all your fault! You are such a fucking idiot! You’re such a dumb fuck! You fucking bitch, how could you do this?” His anger was strong, his face was red from screaming. His eyes bulging, as he paced back and forth flaying his hands in the air. 

I sat sobbing, my face in my hands, heart broken for my daughter. 

I had no idea the puppy would jump off the porch. I tied her there so I could clean the laundry room, where we kept her. I didn’t know she’d jump, didn’t know it was a life threatening action.
He continued screaming.”you fucking bitch! I hate you! Everyone hates you! Ahhhh! All of this is your fault! This is a sign from God that you’re living in sin, your not right with God! You better listen! You better wake up!” 

Now he is within inches of my face. I could feel the heat from his words and smell the morning coffee on his breath. Flicks of spit were hitting my face with each word he muttered.

I had ceased to hear what he was saying. I had gone into my catatonic self preservation state. Staring through him, at nothing. My own thoughts screaming in my head, “Why God, WHY would you let this happen??”

It all started with my daughter wanting  a yellow lab puppy so bad. 

We couldn’t afford one. Every time she would ask we would tell her to pray for one because she was determined to have a yellow lab. 

Finally she decided to do just that, she began praying. I instructed her on how to pray and how to ask God for a promise. She had her bible verse promise and she prayed daily for that puppy. I told her “sometimes God might give us something a little different then what we pray for”. So not to expect it to be a lab.

One day one of our church members heard she had been praying for a puppy and said their daughters dog had a litter of pups and asked if we were interested in the last one. When we asked what kind they were Mrs Kennedy said that Lynettes dog had a litter of full blood yellow labs.

My heart fluttered and a small tear entered my eye. God was answering my daughters prayer exactly how she wanted! But there was still the issue of money, Pure Bred dogs are expensive. We didn’t say anything to Lydia, we just told her to keep praying that God would “give” her a puppy. 

Later that evening Mrs. Kennedy called Phil and told him that she and Ed wanted to give it to Lydia as a gift. 

I could not contain my happiness! 

The next day Ed  and Bonita brought the puppy to our house. We kept it a secret. When they handed the pup to Lydia she burst into tears. Dottie was absolutely everything she had been praying for. 

I felt such accomplishment. We had taught our daughter to pray for the things she wanted and also taught her that God answers prayers.
He has turned his anger up and out yelling and screaming at God, “where are you? You don’t exist!” Then he’d turn and scream into the air in front of him, “Satan I hate you! Get out of my house!” As spit fell down his chin. He gripped his grilling spatula and started beating his brand new grill. A fathers day gift from all the children. He beat it over and over repeatedly until it was nothing more than a curled up jumbled mess.

I’m thinking past all the screaming words and violence. I do not care what he’s saying about or to me or to God, Satan or that grill.

Where is my daughter? Is she ok? Her gift snatched from her in just a few short days – what kind of God does that? What kind of God answers a prayer exactly the way you prayed it and then suddenly takes it away? Who does that? Why? 

I never received an answer that day. My daughter has pushed the incident to the back of her memories calling her the “dog who committed suicide”.

I wanted to die that day. It wasn’t the first time nor would it be the last.

Maybe

“”Wow! You should write a book!” He shook his head in amazement mixed with bewilderment and perplexity.

I rolled my eyes, took a deep breath and looked up. I Shook my head in agreement. (If I had a dollar for everytime someone told me that, I would have enough money to actually publish the book!)

He continued, “No, I’m being serious.”

Tears started to fill my eyes, I didnt even want to come into his office today, but my daughter requested that I be in there this time. I laughed mockingly and said, “Yes, I know, but I’m not ready to revisit it.”

His face cringed as he realized that my daughters therapy session could easily turn into my therapy session. “I understand,  but just when you think that MAYBE you can, then that is the percise time to do it. It may even help you get some closure.”

 “Closure” But I am over my ex! or at least I thought I was. MAYBE it is time.MAYBE this is it. MAYBE this is the beginning, to the end.