This post is in response to a group writing project about sex, at The Idea Camp. This week’s emphasis is on sexual abuse (#ICSEX). I considered not participating this week because I don’t have my own “story” to tell, but at some point last weekend, it occurred to me that I can help tell someone else’s story…my courageous friend, so full of grace – Cindy Ferguson.

(Note: While not explicit in nature, the details of this story are sometimes difficult to read. In order to accurately cover Cindy’s story, this post is lengthier than most of the posts you’ll find here.)

I’ve known Cindy for two decades, give or take. She’s like a sister to me. We’ve been through a lot together: infertility/miscarriage, pregnancy and childbirth, (my) divorce, job loss/job change, death of a parent or in-law, teenagers. Cookouts and camping. Jimmy Buffet and James Taylor. Unbridled laughter and unending tears. Card games and Cranium. Sunday afternoon naps and late nights.

We’ve shared the ups and downs of life and have loved and supported one another along the way. So much in common. But there’s one experience we don’t have in common.

Sexual abuse.

I know Cindy’s story, though I can’t remember now when she first told me. In recent years, she’s bravely spoken difficult words because she knows God is using her story for her good and His glory, and to help set the captives free. I asked if she would be willing to let me interview her for this piece, to which she responded “yes,” almost immediately. Such willingness to be used by God…

These are her tender words, like fragile eggs in a basket. I must carry them gently. I pray you’ll do the same.

(Note: Cindy and I talked for more than an hour. Some of her comments I’m paraphrasing, to allow for better flow. She and her husband have read and approved of this post.)

CS: Tell me about your earliest memories of sexual abuse.

CF: It started when I was between 2-4 years old, with two different baby sitters. I had a teenager girl as a baby sitter who used to give me baths, but they weren’t normal baths. During that time my mom and dad were separated. My mom would leave us with different people. One of those ladies had two teenagers, a son and a daughter. We had to sleep in the same room with them, in the same bed…

The next encounters were by my paternal uncle, when I was four. During the summer we visited my grandmother and grandfather. One day my grandmother went to run errands and left my uncle in charge. As she was leaving, she told us we had to listen to him and do what he said. Before she was even down the lane, he took me to the bathroom and set me on the sink…This continued for two years, whenever we visited my grandparents. At one point, my uncle actually lived with us for about six months, but I don’t remember anything about that time.

When I was five or six, an older cousin made me perform sexual acts for him.

After school, my younger sister and I played with friends who lived down the street. On a regular basis we were exposed to a lot of pornographic magazines and pictures. Every time a new magazine came in the mail, we went to their basement to look at it.

Fondling and sexual encounters happened all through school, because I was so curious. The door had been opened.

CS: How did you deal with those sexual feelings?

CF: During middle school I started recognizing the names kids were called when they participated in sexual activities. I didn’t want to be called any of those names, so I didn’t talk about it with friends, and tried not to be involved in anything of a sexual nature. But I still had fantasies. I knew I was aroused by these things, but I didn’t talk to anybody about it. When I was in the 6th and 7th grades, a lot of the fantasies (about boys and girls) started taking over my mind.

By the fall of my 8th grade year, I knew if I wanted my life to be different from my parents’ lives, I had to make different choices. One night while I was doing my homework, I had the television on in the background. We only got three channels and preaching was on all three. Something the preacher said and everything he was describing was like my life. I prayed, “God get me out of this mess!”

(I lived with my dad then, who played in a band on the weekends and was with different women every weekend. He would be so drunk on a regular basis that we would have to wake him up so he could go to work.)

Not long after I prayed that prayer, I went to live with my mom. I hadn’t seen my mom for a number of years, and had just started visiting her on the weekends a few months before. After I told my dad I wanted to live with my mom, he cussed me out and didn’t speak to me for months.

CS: Looking back now, could you see God at work in your life?

CF: During 1st through 3rd grades, the Salvation Army bus came to our apartment to pick us up. My stepmother’s parents took us to church with them when we visited them during 1st-3rd grades. At night, my stepmother said prayers with us before bed. In the 4th-5th grades, we started going to church with my dad.

During the time that my mom and I didn’t see each other, she became a Christian. When I went to live with her, I started going to church on a regular basis. I started to read the Bible more and understand that God had a plan for me (regarding sexuality).

The Guilt Cycle
CF (continuing): When I was a teenager, we lived a small town. Teenagers found sexual things to do. I didn’t want to be pregnant but I knew there were others things I could do to keep my boyfriends. I would feel guilty all the time and go the altar most every Sunday. The pastor wouldn’t really talk to me about it, except to say that I needed to forgive myself.

The first time I had sex I was 18. Most of my friends were already sexually active. I didn’t really want to, because there was a part that felt like that’s not what God wants, there was a part that didn’t want anybody to touch me like that. All my friends were doing it and it was a big deal that could say “yes” I have too. There was a huge spiritual battle. I didn’t understand and didn’t know what to do about it. I couldn’t talk about any of my abuse – no one knew.

A Wedding Draws Near
When I was 20, I met Robert. We met in December, were engaged in February and got married in September.

Around the time we were engaged, I knew I needed to tell him some of these things. I didn’t want it to end in divorce, having lived through multiple marriages from both parents. I didn’t want our children to experience anything like what I’d gone through.

I wanted to lay out my cards for him and it didn’t scare him away. Thank God.

I was worried I might be gay (because of the fantasies). It didn’t seem like a big deal to him. He wasn’t worried.

Breaking the Silence
It wasn’t until we moved to Lynchburg that I started realizing how dysfunctional and abnormal my childhood was. I had talked with you and M (my ex-husband) and you suggested I needed to talk to Steve, our pastor. He suggested I talk to a chaplain at the hospital. I couldn’t start a family with the feelings I had towards my parents and I didn’t want our kids to see my parents through my eyes. I had to deal with those things somehow.

For almost a year, I saw a counselor. I talked through it, prayed about it, worked through materials. For the first time, I realized how powerful God’s word and his love are.

Forgiveness is a Process
Working through those issues and learning to forgive – forgiveness is a process. When we say the words, there are still things that have to be worked out.

That was the Beginning of a lot of healing. I wrote four letters. One to my dad, and after he got that letter, he didn’t speak to me for about a year. His perception is still different than mine. One was to my mom. Mom chose for us not to talk about it. It was something I needed to go through, but she didn’t need to talk about it.

One was to my uncle and it was at Christmas time. I gave him his letter in a card addressed only to him (he was married at the time). I really needed to say “I’m sorry for holding this anger in my heart for a very long time.” The other thing was to tell him that I forgave him for what he did. I wanted him to recognize that he was just as much a child of God as me and that he has just as much potential as I do. I let him know I would be praying for him and how he chose to take the letter and allow God to work in his life.

CS: Tell me about the healing process.

CF: A lot of my healing took place through the ministry of Aglow. My first experience with Aglow was at a woman’s retreat in 2003. It was there that I received my deliverance. That taught me that when things came to mind, I needed to repent of them, to call them out, that through His word, I have the power and authority to bind those spirits, and call them out. Whenever those thoughts would come to mind, I would recite scripture, take those thoughts captive and bind those spirits because I could choose a path to either be tempted by the thoughts and pursue those thoughts/fantasies in my mind, or I could choose to have a pure heart and a sound mind.

Within a year I heard Fern Gunnoe speak one time about “Call it what it is/Name it what it is.” In that sermon she talked about sometimes we become so politically correct that we don’t call it as it is. We don’t call sin what it is or hold people accountable. So whether it’s the sin in our own lives or the sin in someone else’s life that has affected us, we still have to be accountable to our actions and our responses.

The next summer Cozette Conway facilitated a retreat about sexual abuse. She talked a lot about how sexual abuse affects your way of thinking. I remember as a teen, my step father talked about “two becoming one flesh.”  I learned how true that is. When you are sexually involved with someone, you become one with them. You take on characteristics of one another – and sometimes those are not good things. That’s why God intened sex to be in marriage between one husband and one wife. Not only do those things affect us, but if we’re not married, it affects every successive partner.

In 2005 and 2006, several people in our church felt led to begin a Celebrate Recovery (CR) group. CR is a Christ-centered recovery group and helps people walk forward with hope. Not just stop doing your habit – but to really start walking forward with hope and receive the healing God wants for you. It’s full of Scripture. That’s when the power of God’s word starting meaning even more to me.

CS: Tell me how you’ve come to a healthy view of sex.

CF: We’re still working on that. Within the last 10 years (this Sep is 21 years), God is still helping me deal with those issues in my own marriage and how it affects my marriage. For me to see Robert for who he is and his touch not resembling any other kind of touch. Knowing that Robert loves me like a husband should love a wife. Me continually praying about that. God, when I have these feelings, to take those thoughts captive.

Even after all these years, I think, I should be over this by now.

I have to understand that this is an attack of the Enemy to keep me from being all that God wants me to be in my marriage. That’s still a part of the process. But I choose that process. I choose to keep looking for what God has and not to give up. Because there are times when I could say no and shut down, or not say anything, but I choose not to do that.

CS: How has all of this affected your parenting?

CF: I see my kids at those ages, and in my mind, I’m actively watching what they do, but don’t want to shelter them so much that they don’t experience life. Even the first few times I left Robert alone with them – knowing that he’s not like that – I had to make myself do that.

Even leaving them with other people is a struggle sometimes. And I don’t talk about it but in my mind, I’m struggling and I pray, God you have to help me through it.

I am beginning to talk with my children about sex (the oldest one is now 13) and want to keep those lines of communication open.

CS: Someone reading this post will have a similar experience. What would you say to that person?

CF:

1. Don’t ever give up. Make sure that you align yourself or are in fellowship with believers who will encourage you and give you hope (sometimes when you can’t find it yourself).
2. Don’t pretend these things didn’t happen. Deal with them, work through these issues, whether it’s one-on-one with a counselor or with a support group, but find a safe place where you can talk about these things.
3. Don’t blame yourself for the things other people brought to you.
4. Take responsibility for your own thoughts and feelings about those things.
5. Know that God’s strength can help you through and His arms are not like any person that you know. Let Him wrap His arms around you.

Creative Commons photo on Flickr by MissTessmacher.