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by Deana RobinsonFor most of my life I looked for love, but I looked in all the wrong places, and always came out of the experience feeling degraded and all alone.
I am the youngest of 3 girls in our family. Many times, it was made clear to me by my mother and sisters that I did not belong with them. It always seemed as though I was looking at our family from the outside of a glass dome looking in, where I could never really touch them or feel close to them.
For as long as I can remember, my mother and sisters would take joy in seeing me feel miserable and unwanted. I often thought I was adopted. The feeling was so strong that I would secretly search my mother’s drawers for pictures of me as a baby, or look for papers that had my name on them. One time, after my sisters said I was
adopted, I went on a quest back through my mother’s bureau in tears to find anything. When my mother came in and found out what I was doing, she laughed mockingly at me, never taking a moment to reassure me I was really hers.
When I was 5, my father left my mother and she divorced him shortly after. Then Harry moved in for 5 years, until my mother kicked him out. Harry had an alcohol problem, and my mother would not put up with it any longer.
Of all my family past and present, Harry was the only one I can ever remember who actually showed me he cared about me. He took time to teach me things and to help me with my school work. Even after my mother kicked him out, he tried to visit me at my grandmother’s, where I spent most of my time from age 8-12. Each time Harry tried to visit me, my grandmother wouldn’t allow it, saying my mother didn’t want me to see him anymore. Each time he left, I saw the look on his face. It was the same as the breaking feeling in my heart. I cried every time because I truly wanted to talk with him. Not long after, Harry died, and so did my feeling that someone really loved me.
When I was 11, while at a girlfriend’s home, her brother forcefully raped me. I didn’t know what to do, or who to talk to. There was no way I could approach my mother about the awful indignity that had happened to me at my girlfriend’s house.
Later on that year, in a confidential talk I was having with my cousin, I told her of the terrible thing that happened to me. She breached my trust and told her mother, who in turn, told my mother I was having sex and also told her that my sister was taking drugs.
My mother’s reaction was to lightly scold my sister for her drug use and come down on me as though I was the worst person in the world, calling me a slut whom she had no use for. She never did ask me what happened or how it happened. She made it perfectly clear that it was my fault and that I was to blame. My mother continued to make it clear she didn’t care about me or what happened to me.
I kept looking for love from people I thought would care for me. I wanted to find a place where I belonged. Unfortunately, I was 13 and very inexperienced in knowing how to find someone to love me. From that time until I was 20, I became involved in several physically violent, abusive relationships.
I got married at 17 to escape being daily beaten and placed in a closet. Unknowingly, this mistake led me into other awful situations. One night while at a party with my girlfriend in Chicago, my drink was spiked with a very powerful drug, and I was gang raped. At the end of it all, one of them took a handgun, put it in my face and said, “ Now I’m going to shoot your pretty little head off.” As I looked into what seemed to be a cannon, a sense of total worthlessness came over me, and I said, “Go ahead, it doesn’t matter - I’m not worth anything anyway.” At that moment, out of nowhere, a man ( who I found out later was a bus driver) came into the room and told the guy to put the gun down. The bus driver took me out of there and dropped me on the south side of Chicago where two policemen found me. I never would have dreamed God would put an angel there that day, but I’m so thankful that He did.
I realized I had to leave Chicago, so I contacted my grandmother in Vancouver who sent me a plane ticket to bring me home. I was so grateful!
Things didn’t change much. I kept looking for that warm loving feeling from someone. Somehow, the people I chose to associate with kept me involved in drugs and alcohol.
At 18, I got into a relationship that I thought was really good. All appearances led me to believe this was the best opportunity I had ever known for a little piece of normal living. I became pregnant, and my son was born December 23, 1976. However, after the birth, my son’s father became more distant and less supportive, and the relationship crumbled. I realized he truly didn’t want to provide for us. After that, from time to time, I had to get help from Social Services to make ends meet as I tried alone to raise my son -- always an uphill struggle.
It was at that time I was hospitalized with a severe kidney infection and came very close to dying. While I was in the hospital, my sister cared for my son, and unknown to me, she transferred that care to a lady on her street -- someone I didn’t even know.
After I got out of hospital, practically every day I was pressured by my social worker to give my son up for adoption. Every time I saw her, she kept putting adoption papers in front of me, telling me it was the only way my son could be cared for properly. I eventually gave in to the constant pressure of my social worker. At that moment, I really thought it was the right thing to do.
Shortly after that, I changed my mind, but my social worker said there was no way I could get my son back. I went to court to try my best to keep my son, but every word I had spoken to her was used against me to prove how unfit I was as a mother. They even testified that he didn’t even call me “Mommy”. My heart broke into
countless pieces as they took my son from me in that court. His words are still fresh in my ears as he screamed, “Mommy.” They had to pry his little fingers off me to take him away.
Just prior to that time, a friend invited me to church. She also told me Jesus loved me and that I had to get my life straightened out, or I was going to die. She said I was going down the wrong path. From as far back as I can remember, even as a child of 3, I used to think about God. And even though I came from a home where God was not honored, I sometimes felt as though God was near to me, and at times, I would pray up to the sky when I needed a friend.
But now, the more I thought about what that lady said, the more I realized how far off the track I was. The fear of God and of dying hit me. She told me I should say a prayer so I did. I asked Jesus to come into my life. I did not have a reference point to start from or a person to keep in touch with. I attended a few meetings here and there, but I was really still flying by the seat of my pants without any teaching or grounding in the Bible.
After accepting Jesus, I felt I had to keep looking for more spiritual answers to my life’s questions. Even though I thought I was following Jesus, I went totally away from God. I met a man from my past, who now said he also wanted to find out more about following God. I married for the second time, and we moved to North Carolina.
As time went by, things went from bad to worse as my husband was indulging deeper and deeper into drugs and extra-marital affairs, which he joked about to me. It was during this time I became pregnant with twins. It was a medically difficult pregnancy, and my husband did not want any children. I was unsure how to handle this, but I knew I was going to have these babies. I knew I had to have a more stable environment for these new lives to come into, so I told my husband he was free to do as he pleased and I was going to Vancouver to have the babies. As I left, he seemed glad or relieved I was going.
In July 1986, I returned to Vancouver for the birth of my second son. I had to focus on the task of leading a better way of life, because I was never going to allow history to repeat itself. During the pregnancy, one of the twins died, and I prayed to God that if He would let me have the child that was left, I would raise it up to know Him. My son was born on December 26, 1986. I purposed to settle down and have some roots.
I was still involved with other religions and started a relationship with what seemed to be a stable man and followed him to Dallas, Texas, where I became pregnant with my daughter. One day, he asked me if I thought I could live the rest of my life with him. As he asked, it felt like God was leaving me. I wanted to go to church, but
he would have nothing to do with God. It was then I thought that if I was ever going to have a proper lifetime relationship, I was going to have to work everything out before the relationship ever got under way. Many times I wish I would have been taught the things that cause people to make good and right choices. It seemed as though I was learning my lessons, painfully, one at a time.
Realizing that my daughter’s father wasn’t going to change, and feeling that God was all but gone from me, I decided to return to Vancouver for yet another medically difficult pregnancy. My daughter was born on June 4, 1988, and I also dedicated her to God. I resolved to sit still and not move around. For two years, I did everything in my power to create a warm and loving home for my family.
Still something was missing. When my little girl was two, I started a friendship with a man I had met briefly a year before. As the friendship grew, I became more fond of this man every time we got together. Before long I was in love, and for the first time, it felt perfect, absolutely perfect. For a brief time, we went into business together.
One day we went to see a friend of his. While we were at this man’s office, we were talking about going to different churches. He turned to me and said, “Really Deana. It’s all a matter of the condition of your heart.” At that precise moment, it was as if God lifted the veils off my eyes and I could see clearly. The path that I had been following was not the path I needed to be on. Suddenly, I could see instantly all of the mistakes I had made. It was right then that I knew for a fact that I was not truly following Jesus.
This nice man invited us to visit them at their church, and we accepted the invitation. When we walked into their church, we felt we were meeting God. Both of us experienced a physical touch of God warming us incredibly from head to toe. It felt like He was literally wrapping His arms around us. We knew we were finally home. From that moment on, we not only understood but constantly experienced God’s unconditional love and acceptance. It wasn’t long before we voluntarily removed everything from our lives that didn’t fit in with our new life. Together we made decisions to live only for Jesus Christ and His will for us.
One good thing after another happened. The people at the church received us openly. We were married July 1991. We got right into the Bible and learned more about God. God kept reassuring us that He would never leave us. Along the way there have been some mighty big hurdles, but God has brought us over each of them, showing His love over and over again. God has changed my life completely.
Over the years, there have been times when I have felt death was the only thing left for me. A lot of terrible things happened to me and I have felt totally hopeless and that all was lost. But I am here today to say that is not so. I have hope in Jesus. Even if I don’t have parents who care about me, I have God, as a Father, who cares and loves me enough to take all the bad things of my life and bring good out of them.
In the past, I never felt worthy enough to be freely given love without conditions, or without being asked to pay a price for it, but God has taken those thoughts out of my mind and replaced them with His love, His kindness, His acceptance, His forgiveness.
Even though for most of my life many people told me that I was worthless, I now know that I am not worthless, because God said so.
Even though many people have tried to make me feel very unimportant in this life, I know I am an important person, because God told me so, and His love makes me feel really important to Him.
Even though I didn’t do a good job of managing my life in the early years, since I’ve given God control of my life, He has taken all that seemed bad and turned it into good. Today I am not looking at the past. I am looking straight ahead with Jesus at my side, walking me through the best years I have ever lived.
Last year on Christmas Eve, I was reunited with my son, after not seeing him for 17 years. We were reunited in time for Christmas. What a gift!
Some of you may have experienced some of these same things, but I am here to tell you that there is a God in Heaven who loves you and wants to make your life worthwhile. And I know that if you let God lead your life, you’re in store for your own amazing gifts.
God wants to be our leverage in living, empowering us to feel better about ourselves, more excited about our future, more grateful for those we love and more enthusiastic about our faith.
If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, God has given you His Holy Spirit to help you live life according to His perfect plan. Why not pray this simple prayer and by faith invite Him to fill you with His Spirit:
Dear Father, I need you. I acknowledge that I have sinned against you by directing my own life. I thank You that You have forgiven my sins through Christ's death on the cross for me. I now invite Christ to again take His place on the throne of my life. Fill me with the Holy Spirit as You commanded me to be filled, and as You promised in Your Word that You would do if I asked in faith. I pray this in the name of Jesus. As an expression of my faith, I thank You for directing my life and for filling me with the Holy Spirit. Amen.
If you prayed this prayer, we would love to hear about it!
~ Deana Robinson was born in Calgary, Alberta and raised mostly in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is a caterer and enjoys volunteering. She is happily married and privileged to have a part in 5 children’s lives.
