Part 2 My Testimony
This was my dream man that God gave me, I would not could not lose him. So in Feb of 85 Romain went to the military, and I lost the one person who kept me sane. I cried so much my face looked like I was in a boxing match. My in laws did not talk to me. I had no car to go see my friend Janice in the next town over. I never asked my in laws for anything. I never asked anyone for anything. I still don’t ask anyone for anything except prayers. So my son became my world. I talked to him, bathed him, cuddled him talked more to him. Read to him, sang to him, rocked him. I loved that child with everything I had in me, which was tons of love. He was a very smart very active baby from the start. By three months old he was rolling around to get where he wanted to go. By 6 months old his vocabulary was 55 words.
About a month after Romain went into the military, I was in a huge fight with my in laws. The only things they said to me were negative stuff about my parents. Hey my parents weren’t perfect I know that, but neither were my in laws, and I would defend those I love to the death, if I had to. So I bundled Jon up at one a.m one night, and walked out the door with all I could carry of his in my arms, and him in the other arm. I went to a store down the road and called my mother and asked her (Yup I asked my mother for something) If she could come pick Jon and I up in Bristol. Praise God she came right away. I moved home for a little while. That meant I had to go back to that church that had voted me out. I was now married this made everything ok with them. I still did not go to Sunday school, but I went to church.
Mostly I sat there not even listening. I sang the same old songs I had sung before, I knew them all by heart. The people were nice enough to me, but I still felt the stigma of being branded a harlot. Things were ok for me at my mom and dads house. I was there with my little brother and sister. Ruby my little sister was a gem of a girl, and loved her nephew to pieces. I had people to talk to. I could see Janice again. I just was still so unhappy without my other half with me. Though I leaned on God still, I just did not feel that closeness I should have felt. I had no clue what was wrong, and no one to explain to me what was wrong. I felt if the whole church thought I was terrible enough to vote out, then how must God view me?
Romain came back for a visit and we went to his parents house for that visit. Things were not so bad at that time. His folks with him there, were somewhat nicer to me. I think they just missed their grandson. When Rome was leaving he said why don’t you stay here at my folks house? I said I don’t know Rome, at least in moms house I have people to talk to. He convinced me it would be best, Jon would have his own room. I would have my own room. My parents house was always chaotic. He thought that was not good for me or the baby. But I had grown up in the crazy and mostly happy chaos. I was used to noise and people coming and going all the time. But I moved back into his parents house. Back to depression and loneliness. I still had Jon though. Oh yeah, and my mother taught me this little trick of how to get your baby to go back to sleeping at night. You flip them (with two people) head over feet three times slowly. It actually works. Jon slept at night and I was a happy camper. Well ok not so happy, but at least I was sleeping at night mostly.
A few months passed and Romain was done with his basic training and AIT, and his orders got messed up so he was able to choose the army base he wanted to live at. It was Massachusetts he chose. He came to his parents house and picked Jonathon and I up to move out to our own place. Glory Hallelujah. Our own place!!! I thought this is going to be great. Man I was wrong. It really was horrible. The apartment we rented was a dive that had cockroaches ewwwwww. No phone. No family,no friends no one. The friends we made were very screwed up druggies. The women all were after everyone else’s man. It was no fun. I cried a lot and got very depressed again. Not to mention Romain and I fought a lot. He was partying a lot with all the army buddies as well. The army buddies wives were not there and I saw a lot of those men cheating on wives. I was worried sick that my husband might have been cheating too.
We moved out of the roach infested apartment into a little four room apartment not far away. Some people we lived next to moved with us. I was none too pleased they were abusive to one another. Both cheating on one another,and were abusive to their daughter. Not their son though, it was strange. They did not change sheets in their children’s cribs. So it really smelled bad in the room where the cribs were. I put Jon in bed with Romain and I, since we did not want him near that stinking room. Jon was so sweet at nine months old, I could swear he understood that the little baby Angela, was being abused. He would wrap his arms around her all the time. Just hold her and talk to her all the time. These people had acid parties in our apartment, and invited some really crazy people over. I needed to get away from there badly.
Romain at that time went AWOL, and the people who lived with us turned him in for fifty dollars. The MP’s came and arrested Romain, and Jon and I returned to CT to live with Romain’s parents once again. I was happy for the peace and quiet of Romain’s parent’s home once again,and did not mind that I was not spoken to. I had my son and took great pleasure in his company. He had to have been the smartest little guy in the whole world. He talked quite a bit already,and loved to laugh,and make people laugh. My son always a character. We still could not go anywhere without everyone going nuts over my little man. I swear there really was something quite special about him.
Romain meanwhile had his trial thingy for going awol as well as having marijuana on him. So he had to go to jail for a little while. He was a wreck about it,as was I of course. Then they discharged him. One year of being in the military was enough for him. He came home and we got into the business of living our lives together. He went to work, construction which was good for us. We lived with his parents for about another year, and then finally moved into our own place. There were not many people who wanted to rent to two teenagers. We had a hard time to find a place,but found some people who would only rent out to French people. Thankfully we have that very French last name, Levesque. I went to work in a department store evenings so I would not have to pay a babysitter. I then got pregnant with my daughter Meghan. I told Romain that I had gotten pregnant the night I conceived. He said no way your funny Tam you can’t know that. I said yup sure enough, I am writing it on the calender, and going to go to the doc in a month you will see.
Sure enough one month elapsed and I went to the doctors, and he confirmed it, I was definitely pregnant and right on target as to when I said I had gotten pregnant. My mother in law did not want us to have this baby,she said we weren’t ready. Which well excuse me for thinking so, but I had a child already and we were doing a fabulous job of raising him. Besides Romain wanted his little girl. He had been an only child and really was looking forward to not making our son an only child. So I went for my one month later appointment and the doctor says, so when do you want to schedule this? I said I don’t get it schedule what? He said all angry, the abortion? I was dumbfounded where would the doc get an idea like that? He said your mother in law called me and set this appointment for you to have an abortion. I was like WHAT????? I don’t want an abortion. I am a mother of a beautiful little boy that I am nuts about, and want my daughter in the worst way. I do not believe in abortion, I thought you knew that already?
The doc’s face changed dramatically, and he said alright!!! rubbing his hands together,then lets get on with having this baby. I was so heartbroken that my in laws thought they could say, and or do such a thing and get away with it. We did not talk to them for a while, this was just beyond sick as far as we were concerned. Then when we went back and began talking to them again, they told us, they would never could never accept another child, or love another child like they loved Jon. They seriously stuck by their proclamation. Everything about Meghan was never good enough for them. She was too full of piss and vinegar for their liking, according to them. The funny thing was this,They were nut’s over Jonathon, and he is his mothers son in every possible way. Meghan was and is her fathers daughter in every way. They hate me and love their son, but love Jon and dislike Meghan. Go figure. Meghan has always been a chooser of when or if she gets affection. Jonathon always gave affection rather you wanted it or not. I am an affection hound, and Romain chooses when or if he gives or takes affection.
Meghan was a very good baby. She slept like nobodies business, was always smiling and happy. She was into everything though. Dragging toilet paper all over the house I had trails of it lol. She was so very very inquisitive. She did not talk as fast as Jon nor did she roll around as fast as Jon. I thought oh my goodness is something wrong with her? She did not crawl she went from rolling around at about 4 months old to walking at 7 months old. Nope nothing wrong with her she was a skipper. Meaning she liked skipping steps that most babies take. She did not do any talking until about 9 months old other than babble, but boy let me tell you, once she began talking, there was no stopping her she was incredibly smart. She had at 15 yrs old an I.Q of 144. I was a good mommy. Always doing crafts with the kids. Always reading to them,always doing stuff with them to teach them. I did bring them to church quite often, but still I thought I was a Christian, and was not really a Christian. I was a halfway Christian which as I now know, was no Christian at all. With the Lord it is all or nothing.
In this time we became pretty much party animals, Romain and I. We never ever let it effect our kids though thankfully, Or so we thought. We became crack addicts, for about 6 months we sold off everything we had which was not much. Lost our apartment had to move. Then I woke one morning feeling sick and disgusted with myself. I could not look myself in the mirror. That’s when I decided either I kill myself or I straighten up, expell all the people whom I associated with, and go back to being a good mommy, and wife. Not that I was not a good wife to Romain. I did not cheat on him nor hurt him. I did not abuse my children in anyway other than to sell off some of their stuff to get crack. How sickening is that? We did not have much food either. I would go buy soup in cans and noodles, and pour the soup over the noodles for the kids. And plenty of cereal. Romain on that same day woke to the same exact feelings Thankfully. We just stopped the crack and moved forward. We were one another’s strength to not touch the stuff. We went back to smoking pot though. Pot was our friend for a good many years. We even smoked it when we first became truly saved.
At the age of 20 I was attending classes to become a Realtor. One of my last nights as a student I went out to go home, and discovered my husband was not there. The cleaning lady closed and locked the building up so I was outside alone. She would not allow me back in to go use the phone. I decided there was a restaurant across and down the street a little, I would go there and call my husband to come get me. As I got to the street a pick up truck pulled over. I thought the person was looking maybe for directions and so I walked up to the truck when he opened the door,and he dragged me in the truck and took off. I could not believe this I was being kidnapped. I did not know what to do, should I jump out of the moving vehicle? Should I stay put? I started thinking of my kids and what would happen to them if anything happened to me. The guy drove somewhere towards my home, which was three towns over from the realty school. I decided to just sit quietly and try to ask him some questions. I had heard if you get someone, who means you harm to talk, they are less likely to do anything to you.
I asked him his name he said Scott. Where do you come from? No answer. What do you do for work? Construction. Why are you doing this? No answer. I told him, I am a mom of two lovely children and married for 3 years,to my wonderful husband I love very much. Please do not harm me,please! He told me to shut up so I did. He pulled over in a dark street in a town called Burlington and proceeded to take off his pants in record time, as well as hit these auto locks on the doors so I could not get away. I decided I was fighting this, it was not going to be easy for him. So I turned sideways in the seat as soon as he grabbed my shirt and ripped it open. I started kicking him and punching and digging my finger nails in his hands as he was trying to rip my clothes off me. I kept fighting and screaming no no no no no no!! I guess he got tired of the fight because he hit the auto lock thing again, and told me to get out. I did, I gathered whatever I could as fast as I could of my books and purse and hauled butt out of his truck.
I ran to the nearest house a little ways down the road and banged on someones door. Thankfully they opened the door and let me in. I practically ran the guy over in his door way, as soon as he opened it. Yelling call the police hurry, this guy just tried to rape me. I was shaking so hard I had no idea if this guy was going to come after us or what. So the lady of that house handed me a cup of tea and called the police for me. The cops came about a half hour later plenty of time for the guy to get away. I called Rome at home and woke him up he had fallen asleep putting Jonathon to sleep. Well I had to go to the police department and make out a report. I drew them the picture of what the guy looked like. And gave them his first name,and the info that he worked Construction. The truck I thought was a black f350. I had no other info for them.
I had detectives calling me and coming over all the time. Finally one day a friend of mine and I went fishing, something I have always loved to do. We went fishing at my favorite lake west hill in New Hartford. On the way home from our unsuccessful day of fishing on the lake. I saw the man in his black f250 he was heading toward New Hartford where West lake was. I started yelling and hitting my friend Lisa thats, thats, thats the guy, thats the guy, hurry turn around, we need to follow him. We followed him right to his door. I gave the cops his home address and his license plate number. They went and picked him up and it turns out the guy had a record like 20 pages long for sexual assault and many other things. We had a trial and they slapped him on the wrist telling me, had I been able to prove the kidnapping and had I allowed him to actually rape me, we could have done more Mrs Levesque. I was dumbfounded.
A year later I had state police knocking on my door. They needed me to testify in court again against the same man. I was like why so you can slap him on the wrist again? No thanks I am done I have moved on with my life, and doing my best to forget all of that. They pleaded with me to do this. Nope not interested. So then they pull out their big guns. Well look don’t you want to see this man in prison? where he wont be able to hurt anyone else or try to? I said look unless he has murdered someone I am not interested. A very strange look passed between those state police men. I said oh wait he did kill someone? They said no not just one ma’am, 12 women. Most of them hookers, one of them a security guard. And they all look very very similar to you with longer hair. Which at the time of the attempted rape, I had long hair too. They asked me had I cut my hair recently? Yes I had it all cut off a few months earlier.
That explained it to them then, that made much more sense. I really did not want to do this besides what could I do to help their case? I mean he did not kill me obviously. He did not end up raping me, thankfully. I was the only one who knew his Modus Operandi. I thought about it and discussed it with Romain. He did not want me to do this. I really did not want to do this either. So I told the policeman I am not interested sorry, good luck though, I will pray for them to be able to get this case done.They told me if my daughter ever got kidnapped and raped don’t call them.I was horrified by such a statement. They acted like children. No wonder I did not like cops. I ran into the lead detective a couple years later they got him,(The serial murderer and rapist) and he was on death row.
The Lord was preserving me, I think, for the time I was going to come to him. I always had this knowing deep inside me. My hubby wondered if I were psychic with all the knowledge I had of many different things that had occurred in our lives, especially what he was doing long before he got around to telling me about it. I could find Romain no matter where he was in this country when he was a trucker for 5 years. I never thought of myself as psychic. I never spoke to spirits. It was just knowledge thats it, just a knowing of things that were going to happen. If I loved someone I had a foreknowledge of anything that would befall them or whatever it happened to be. We also seemed to have ghosts (what I know now, is demons) with us wherever we would go, and they always followed us.They seemed to really like bothering my Meghan.
At four years old Meghan came to us crying so hard begging us to not allow Ruby, my little sister to go away for college. If we let her go away to college she was going to die at that college and we would never see her again. We told her Meghan Aunty Ruby is in perfect shape and nothing will happen to her. She screamed and cried and threw a real fit the likes of which we never saw from our happy inquisitive little Meggie. No NO you do not understand mommy God told me, Ruby will die and we will never ever see her again, Mommy please please don’t let her go away. I said Meghan stop it your being ridiculous now, stop it!! She ran to her room and freaked out for hours on end. What on earth was going on with our little girl? A few days later Ruby was babysitting Jon and Meg while I went to work, and Meghan started on her aunty. Telling her please aunty do not go please your going to die God told me so. Ruby was an angelic sweet fantastically, wonderful Christian. She did everything for crippled and mentally handicapped kids as well as being one heck of a great witness for the Lord to anyone who would listen.
She told Meghan, Listen baby cakes please, I am going to be fine I have to go to college to become a doctor so I can help little children who are sick. I have to go to college honey. Meghan threw another fit. Cried and screamed and begged us to please listen to her. Why mommy won’t you listen to me please, oh God please mommy listen to me. I said because your being silly Meg now you need to stop it ok please come here and let me hold you and make it all better. I talked her down calmly, I am sure Meg baby that nothing is going to happen to aunty Ruby she is in perfect health. She just had all kinds of tests and she is perfectly healthy. She still argued albeit calmer than before that, nope she was going to get sick, very very sick at the college and die. We could not convince Meghan nothing would befall Ruby. It turns out Meghan was right.
Ruby was driven down to college by my parents,and on the way there they stopped off in Tennessee at the grand ole opry hotel. Ruby went swimming,and her ear blocker that was supposed to protect her brand new tubes, fell out. She got water in her ear,and that caused her a lot of pain. My mom gave Ruby a brand new bottle of Tylenol, and told her take a couple when you hurt. Well she did take only a couple at a time over an eight day period,but Ruby was homesick already and not eating, nor drinking very much. She was dehydrated and had an empty stomach. She kept taking the Tylenol,wondering according to her room mates, why it was not working. They were not absorbing into her system because instead of digesting, they just built up into the lining of her stomach. She began getting severe pains in her abdomen, so she went to the hospital a couple of times. They said your just home sick go back to your dorm.
She went back to her dorm, but came back four times more. Every time no one listened to her complaints, that this was not merely homesick there was something wrong here, very wrong. They just kept sending her back to her dorm. On the Sunday a little over a week of being there She went to the big hospital, she had to be walked in by two people the pain was horrifyingly bad. They said well we don’t know what is wrong but there is definitely something wrong. They decided it had to be gallbladder and would not listen to her that she wanted to go home right away. They gave her plenty of liquids and also a few saline drips to rehydrate her which then pushed all the Tylenol through her system at once. It destroyed her liver and every organ besides. By the next morning she had surgery but was now in coma. My parents had to rush down they did not think my sister would make it.
My parents got an emergency flight back down to Florida, went to the Hospital and begged my little sister to fight with all her might, to come back to us, not to leave us. We all prayed in CT everyone everywhere, all my moms brothers and sisters, my dads brother and sisters, his parents. I pleaded with God I bargained with God. I begged God, do not take my baby sister from us please God please give her back to us. Two days of begging, praying, pleading, bargaining with God, yielded no results that we wanted. It felt more like two months rather than 2 days. And then God took Ruby home, to be with Him. I felt it the moment she was gone from us. It was like something was ripped out of me. I screamed at God I swore at him, I called him every filthy vile thing I could. And then I apologized profusely. We had been forewarned. God sent us the message through my little girl. Besides which, once we knew she was ill,we all really kind of felt this was her time. She had been through many many traumas in her young 17 yr old life and was not supposed to have survived any of them. Each trauma she had been through, my parents were told she would not live and if she did she would have been a vegetable. She was no vegetable. She was a light in this dark world to so many many people.
There were 1777 people at her funeral. There were close to 300 people saved at her memorial service and funeral. The short time she was at Pensacola Christians College she touched many many lives (that was nothing new to Ruby). The Lord had glory from her death. I see that now. I did not see it then. I kind of just went away from the Lord a little further than I had been. Though I always sought him in little pieces of time, here and there, I never understood that I needed to humble myself. I did not feel I needed him. I thought I could just keep going my own way. After all I had been told over and over again you said the sinners prayer? your saved no worries. Man how very wrong people are. I wish people understood thats not true. It is not just as simple as a little prayer, and boom thats it your saved forever more. Jesus explained himself, about the seeds falling on rocks, by the way side, in thistles and some that hear and do not even understand or try to understand. I was one of those who heard but did not understand. I tried so hard to be good,but always felt I fell short.
Skipping ahead a few years. Jon one day found me smoking pot in my bedroom. I had serious pms besides being depressed all the time, and pot alleviated a lot of my symptoms. So I snuck up to my room and smoked myself a bowl. As I was lighting it up my son picked the lock of my bedroom door and walked in on me. Ouch !! He cried and I told him to come in, and discussed with him my doing what I was doing. He told me I had lied to him. I was devastated, he was devastated. So from that day on he knew we smoked pot. This made him very curious and at 14 yrs old he wanted to smoke some. We let him. He smoked with us after that quite often. We had always told them if they wanted to try something, they were to come to us, it would be better than if they were away from us and something happened. Luckily he never wanted to try anything else. We were not the good parents we thought we were, obviously.
Meghan found out too and tried marijuana with us a couple of times, but it turned out she was allergic to it. That nipped any problem for her in the bud. She was sneaky and tried other things behind our backs. She was quite the inquisitive child no doubt. We were always up front with them after mine and Jons little episode. They knew all of our little tries of drugs, and our stint with Crack. We had a few parties with our kids. We allowed them to drink a little bit here and there with us. Apparently our kids told their friends we smoked pot too, and so we became according to the kids who hung out with our kids, the cool parents. It was not only though that we smoked pot, that their friends all wanted to come to our house. It was because we listened to them, and tried our best to give them good advice, on just about every subject one could think of. Dating, why they should not to try this or that drug. How to communicate with their parents. Parents of most teens it seems do not understand the teens, and therefore do not listen to them.
It has been my experience that most parents are just afraid to talk to their kids. Afraid to let their kids know they made mistakes along the way. I honestly do not know of such a thing as the perfect parent. Nor perfect kids. everyone makes mistakes in some way or another. One thing good about our relationship with our children, they always came to us when there was a problem. They knew we would listen, we would do all we could to help them through any problems that might arise. They knew we were not going to tell them to shut up, or make light of their problem, no matter how little it might have been. We had a very close relationship with our children. We were not perfect, no far from it. But we did our best. Our kids did not talk nasty about us behind our backs, as I had always seen so many kids in my youth do. They often brought their friends who had problems to us. Knowing we would listen and help in whatever way we could. We were mom and dad to many of our kids friends.
Then we had my niece Jacquelyn whom we fosterd off and on for about 6 years. My sister had problems with crack herself. DCF (department of children and families) knew to bring jackie to me. They wanted us to adopt her,but we did not want to do that, with high hopes for my sister coming to her senses. That never happened. Then Romain did not want to adopt Jackie, because we were almost done with our own kids growing up, and he wanted us to have us time. That was a horrible time in our marriage and we almost divorced. We figured Jackie would be better off with my brother and his wife. So I had to give her up to them.I went through such a depression at that time I wanted to die. I really daily considered suicide. I was taking so many different pills at that time it did not help. It made things so much worse for me. Then I found out I had a brain tumor. A prolactinoma. No it would not kill me, but it made many difficulties for me. I gained 57 pounds in like three months. It could make me go blind. It could make me have high blood pressure and heart problems. It made my body think I was pregnant, so I started to produce milk. It could make my bones weak, and make me go into menopause.
Romain and I were like strangers. Giving up Jackie and all the other issues I had, put more of a rift between us. Things were not so good. One day Romain came home and said I want a divorce. I am done. He cried and said do you know what it is like to come home nightly, and wonder if I am going to find your dead body ? I cannot handle this anymore. It was a wake up call, somewhat. I did not know how to fix myself. I wanted to have my niece back in my life ,but it was too late my brother and his wife adopted her. I had stopped talking to my mother and sister because they had put tons and tons of pressure on me for Jackie’s sake. Which was part of the reason I gave her to my brother and his wife. That was a horrible sin according to my mother as well. I was always the person my entire family called when they had any problem. Call Tammy she will fix it she is smart she fixes everything. While it feels good to be counted on,it is also it’s own torment. To have your own problems, and that of your entire family riding on your back,well it can really drag you down, deep.
So I just did not speak to anyone anymore. I had had enough, when I had told my mother and my sister on the phone together, that they were making me nut’s, and I was so depressed I wanted to just curl up and die, or kill myself, they talked right over me. That was it I was done. This did not have the desired effect on me either. I was even more depressed. I still did not realize it was God I needed. I was just a very lost and tormented soul.
The demons were more and more active in our house. Even showing up at all hours of the day and night. Yes thats right we could see those demons. We thought they were ghosts, and never let it bother us before. But now I was suddenly being touched, and whispered to. I was held down in my bed by something, and told in a whispery hoarse voice, mmmm your so soft so soft. I freaked out hard and ran out of that room, as soon as I was let up. Well that night, Meghan and I went in to my room and turned the light off and both of us saw a shadowy figure skitter across my bed. We switched the light on really fast, and I never wanted to go back to that room again.
I prayed hard Please Lord make that thing go away. I went back into the bedroom that night with Romain and whatever it was, was not there, or active that night. I had remembered my friend Brenda telling me we had authority over ghosts, so I rebuked it in the name of the Lord. I thought it worked. It had not. We were seeing figures all over the place and that was very uncool. Not long after we ran into some problems with our mortgage company. They stopped accepting our mortgage payments, and were trying to foreclose on us. Apparently this mortgage company had been doing this to many people in the state of Connecticut. Our state attorney general made a huge lawsuit against this company and we signed up for that. This was so not helping my depression. The phone ringing 8 times a day. I was being harassed by the people who refused to accept our money. They called us names and said why do you not pay your bills? Told us we were dirt bags and just made life hell on earth. I took to answering the phone and blowing a police whistle in their ears every time they called.
Our son fell in love with a woman in Washington state, and moved out there to be with her. That ripped me to pieces too. But I knew in my heart Jon was supposed to be with Heidi, his adorable wife, whom we love to pieces. I cried myself sick over my son moving so far away from me. But he was a man,it was time for him to become responsible for himself. Things were not good between Romain and I still. We just did not know if we would make it past all of these hard times. Finally I let go of everything and kind of turned some of it over to God. I had just said I cannot do this anymore God, and basically screamed help me just help me , Or I am going to crack. He did help me some.
And then my parents, whom I was speaking to again, offered us a cruise vacation. On the Disney Magic. Being away from everything and all our problems was a balm to my tired worn out brain. The Magic was just plain magic. That was the best thing that could have happened. Romain and I found our selves clinging once more to one another. We found our passion for one another again. We enjoyed each others company once again. We left all our troubles at home, and decided this is it, let’s move out west. We asked our tenants, if they wanted to buy our house and they were overjoyed. We sold them the house for nearly 60,000 dollars less than it was worth, but we did not care. That mortgage company was not getting that house. We would go be close to our son. We would leave this life behind us in CT. As well as leave those demons for someone else to play with. We both felt so free. It was wonderful.
The sale of the house went off without a hitch. And since the mortgage company had refused to accept our mortgage payments we had a nice little nest egg to move out west. It was like the Lord set this all up himself. The way everything worked out,how could it be any other than the Lord bringing us to a new life, a new place. He uprooted us and it was not painful in the least. It was liberating freeing. My family was devastated, but I could not hurt for them. I needed this in the worst way. On the day we began our trek out of Connecticut, we both cried for about an hour, Rome and I. But once we hit the New York border, it was like ten thousand pounds was lifted off of us. I threw my passel of pills right out the window of that moving truck, and never looked back. What a fantastic beautiful trip that was. Romain and I were closer, than even before all our problems came about. We sang together, laughed together did things I wont discuss together. Yup the passion and joy of each others company was there once again and better than one could ever hope for.
Which brings me to my conversion from thinking I was a Christian to being a full fledged true Christian. I had the book The Rapture by Tim Lahaye ,and Jerry B Jenkins. I read that and realized from that book that to call upon the Lord’s name without having a reason or no prayer following was still getting his attention. Thus I decided I would not call out oh God without following with prayer. That was a life time of using the Lord’s name in vain,to not using his name unless in prayer. It was a hard hard thing for me for a little while, but practice makes perfect, and before long I was done with that. That book had me going back for the rest of the Left Behind series of books. I was at the library weekly for the next parts of the series. I was reading three of them a week. I got to the eighth book in the series when it suddenly hit me. I was lost, I did not know the Lord. I had taught my children bad bad Christianity. I was so stupid and had so much to make up to the Lord for. One on my kids behalf, and two on my own behalf. I read that book and realized just why and how my life was so not what it should have been.
I fell to the floor on my face and bared my soul for judgement from God. I finally understood what it was that I was missing in trying to walk of my own will in Gods ways. It was not my will I was supposed to be following but the Lords. I had to repent I had to open up to God. I had to face my sins through the eyes of God. I stood at God’s feet that day and saw my sin and what it looked like to God. I cried so hard and so long and layed face down in absolute dejection, for what seemed like a long time. Pouring my heart out to God. I was humbling myself,something I never had known how to do. I begged forgiveness for my sins and they had been many. I prayed for the Lord to pour his spirit out on me. To give me new eyes to see. A new Heart for him and all man kind. I prayed for new ears to hear what the spirit had to tell me. I was changed in a moment. A brand new person all the old me was gone. I now knew my strength my very courage to face life, would come through the Lord and his Holy Spirit which he poured out on me and into me.
I had not understood that redemption was tied to humility. That Humility in front of God was what repentance was all about. I needed to humble myself before God, and let all my shame and all my past crimes as well as all my sins stand forth. I had to strip down to the bare bones of who I had been. I had to look at myself through Gods eyes. To realize I was in need of redemption. I had to see the truth of who I was, to never go back to being that person. That night after getting up from the floor,I truly was changed and saw immediately how I was changed. I saw suddenly the world as it is. And I was sickened by how much a part of the world I had been and how much I had loved the things of the world. I sat down to watch my favorite shows Desperate housewives,and brothers and sisters which follows it on Sunday nights. I could not watch them either of them. I was sickened by the sn and saw for the first time, that TV is satans very best tool to reach the world. I searched the tv for anything worth watching,and had a very hard time to find anything at all. Finally I found TBN, and there was a movie on,it was Jesus story. Praise God I had found something worth watching.
I watched that channel for quite a few months. I lived on that channel. I read my bible for 10 to 12 hours a day. I searched the internet for anything and everything about God and life as a Christian. I became involved with many pretrib groups online. That was a mistake. I had so many questions that all these pretrib pastors, and people just like me could not answer. I still was so leary of Churches, thinking God could just show me the way. He did show me so much in one year. But once that year was up I was hungry for much more. I started to think of finding a good church to go to. I searched church after churches mission statements, and what their beliefs were. Still just not seeing the one that stood out. Meanwhile my son and his wife had a neighbor who was after them to go try her church out. This church was awesome she kept telling them. You have to give it a try. They did try it out, then came and told us I know the perfect church for you Mom. I was still so leary of churches though, that I did not want to even try it out. I kept saying oh I dont know guys I really don’t know. I mean I was waiting for the Lord to shout it out to me.
I finally gave in when my husband said let’s go give it a shot, just once wont hurt. So yeah I agreed,let’s just give it a shot, whats it going to hurt? I told the Lord I need to, one recognize the body of Christ there immediately. Two I need to feel the Spirit moving in it. Three that preacher had better give a message that shivers me timbers. The Rock church, even though the pastor was not there, held all three of my prerequisites. I have been going there since,and now am growing with this awesome church. I still have problems once in a while. Trials and mini tribulations, but I have learned that this is normal, and it is how you go through those trials that matters. My medicine in the midst of trials, the thing that sees me through them all, with joy still abundant in my heart, is simply praising the Lord, before, during, and after them.
And that is my story.
I hope someone can get something out of this very long march through my life.
God Bless you all and bring you ever closer to him.
Love in Christ Jesus, Tammy