Rooted & Rising

As I approach 45, I reflect on a truth that has taken me many years to fully accept: much of my life was shaped by pain I did not deserve.

I survived a childhood marked by abuse—abuse that came from the very people who were meant to protect me. I lived through repeated violence at the hands of my own mother and brother, enduring physical and emotional harm that no child should ever experience. When my father was not around, I learned fear instead of safety, and silence instead of comfort.

By the age of nine, the weight of that pain became unbearable. I did not yet have the words to name what was happening to me—I only knew that I felt unwanted, unloved, and invisible. I grew up hearing that I was ugly, that I was never good enough, and that my existence was a mistake. Those words cut deeper than any wound and followed me far beyond childhood.

For years, I questioned my worth. I questioned my place in this world. I questioned what love was supposed to feel like—because everything I had known was distorted.

Those early wounds shaped the choices I made as an adult. They affected the relationships I tolerated, the boundaries I failed to enforce, and the pain I normalized. Trauma has a way of disguising itself as familiarity.

But that is not where my story ends.

I survived.
I endured.
And I am still here.

I am no longer defined by what I suffered, but by the strength God placed within me to rise above it. I am healing—not perfectly, but faithfully. I am learning to nurture the child in me who was never protected, and to give her the love, safety, and peace she always deserved.

I am an overcomer.
I am victorious.
I am no longer a victim.

My life today is not rooted in pain—it is rooted in faith, healing, and the quiet strength that comes from choosing peace over survival mode. What I survived shaped me, but it does not own me.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” — Psalm 34:18