Describe a decision you made in the past that helped you learn or grow.

When I was 34, I was married to the father of my children. One night I was folding laundry in my bedroom and watching TV. My husband worked late that night and turned on what was left of the baseball game. It was late, like 10:00 pm, the children were asleep. As I placed the last towel in the basket, my husband stood in the doorway and announced we needed to talk. I looked up at him, smiled and asked he was hungry and offered to warm up what the children and I had for dinner. He declined and stood over me. He then announced that that he did not love me, that he never loved me. He said he did not believe in God and didn’t think he ever did. It was for my benefit. He said he would be moving out in the morning but he would tell me where he was going when he got there.

Needless to say, I had lost the power of speech. We had just celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary. We had a good life. We had a cute little house in the suburbs, our children went to a good school, a Christian school, we had 2 cars, we went on 2 vacations a year. We worked in the community with our church. It was a good life and it had just been blown up.

I looked at him, searching for the right words. So my prolific answer was, “what?” I know, right? Big and profound. To save your boring details, we fought all night, I cried a lot. When I decided, at 3 am, to sleep in the living room, I was carried to our room and held down for the rest of the night. In the morning, he told the kids, he wanted to talk with them and he said the exact same thing as what he told me. The kids were 12 and 9, that was traumatizing and as adults, they remember every word.

The next few weeks were filled with anger and unbelief. Things were said and done that I regret. I believe he may as well. If we were broken before, we were shattered now.

I was living in Missouri, my parents lived in Texas, as did other family. My company had offices all over Texas and near my parents too. I knew I needed to leave Missouri, because it had come to light that my husband was seeing his employee. One who was 13 years younger than him. It also came to light that she was not the only one. People kept feeling compelled to tell me everything they heard or saw. I did not need to know this. Then a very ugly thing happened, one night, at 2 am, I awoke to find him standing over me, staring at me, and then the ugliness was brought into the light.

The next week, I had found an attorney and asked about moving my children and myself to Texas. My husband agreed to me taking the children 1100 miles away. It was a big ask, but he was also enjoying his young girlfriend.

I loaded up a moving truck, friends and family came to help. My father flew in to help me drive to Texas. I left my family and friends, my church, my coworkers and started over.

It was one of the hardest things I had ever done. Leaving, what I realized years later, was an abusive marriage. I was fortunate to not have broken bones or bruises. No, my scars were not visible. Yet they were there.

Healing came, eventually. I had never lived alone and suddenly I was alone with my children, responsible for everything and everyone, and I had no clue. Lots of mistakes were made. Apologies given, lessons leaned (sometimes), but no one died.

I learned that I was stronger than I thought. Tougher than I thought. I had to be, soon my 12 year old would be over 6 foot tall (eventually 6’4”) and I had to be strong and not back down. Soon my 9 year old would be telling me about a boy who didn’t know her name but she was going to make sure he did (that boy is now my son in love for almost 13 years). I would stand up in front of other woman and share my story, and guide women who were experiencing the same thing.

I would see both children graduate from college, my daughter finishing grad school, both married and I was there when my granddaughter was born.

It was so hard. Some days I thought I was doing it all wrong. Other days I KNEW I was doing it all very wrong. I grew, I changed, my heart did not harden, bitterness did not consume me. I never share this story, only a handful of people knew what truly happened. It’s something I used to be embarrassed by. I was also ashamed. Then I learned to process those feelings. Each time I changed, I learned and saw my growth. God carried me each step of the way. I could not go backwards, it was not an option.

Twenty-five years ago, I walked into a courtroom, scared out of my mind, and I walked out with my head up, still scared, but in my heart I knew I would be OK.

In 1999, 53 people that I was related to, or knew as a close friend died. My marriage crumbled. I uprooted my children. I moved 1100 miles away. I was terrified, but I did not die.

Life got easier, better, worse and then fantastic.

Here is what I know: Do the hard thing. Say the rough thing. Talk to God, even when you’re angry. He already knows about it and it feels good to get it out. Sometimes we have to do the thing that scares us the most so that we can make to the other side. Then we grow as we heal.

Be blessed in your journey.