OUR VALUES & STATEMENT OF FAITH

In 2014 I owned a high-end gallery in Midtown Houston with my ex-husband. We had just had our first magazine spread published in a local posh magazine. Lux Design Magazine called wanting to do a spread on us as well. From the outside looking in, I had everything a woman could want!

But the one thing that the outside world couldn’t see, is the mental, emotional, spiritual, physical, financial and sexual abuse that was happening behind closed doors. 2014 is when it became clear that if I didn’t leave, my 4 year old son and I were going to die.

In the process of trying to find safety I ran to a “safe house” where my 4 year old son and I were placed in a room with three twin beds. My son and I had to share a bed. When we were falling asleep another woman came in to stay with us who was actively hallucinating on Meth. If you know anything about these hallucinations they can make the person on the drug incredibly violent. I felt we were no safer in the “safe house”, than I was at home with the abuser I was married to. From what I’ve understood, that’s one of the reasons why a lot of women stay with their abusers. There is nowhere safe to go. The abuser knows where all the family & loved ones live, so there’s nowhere to hide and it leaves the victims family vulnerable. Another reason leaving is delayed or stopped is there aren't many shelters that allow you to take your pets with you.

In the process of me leaving, my ex shot and killed my 15 year old cat and sent me pictures of him. It was made clear, that I was next. My little Chihuahua also sustained head trauma that was so severe that she was in a coma like state for almost a month. She had to be syringe fed for months and gradually learned how walk again. My Great Dane had horrible whelps  from the beatings that he sustained.

Had it not been for an amazing friend in Pearland Tx who was willing to let my son and I sleep on her couch, for 6 months I don’t know what we would have done.

What that experience did, was give me a desire, a dream, to make a tiny house village; a TRULY safe place for women, their children and pets in their most vulnerable season to be able to feel safe, guarded & to offer healing from the abuse that they have been oppressed by! It made me want to provide a PERSONAL, PRIVATE (no roommates) space and time for God to make beauty from the ashes by offering His truth for healing. Honestly, the only one that can heal us, is the one that created us!

So fast forward to 2017, I meet my current amazing husband. After he proposed we were going through premarital counseling with Doug Jr. at Grace Church Amarillo. In his God given wisdom he wanted me to work with our on staff Biblical Counselor Jodi Zicker because of the past abuse. In her God given wisdom she walked me through a Bible study called “The Hem of His Garment” by Sue Liljenberg, which is a study provided through Healing Hearts Ministries International. That study changed my life! It blew the doors to my heart wide-open for the Lord to come in and clean house! Through Him, I was able to forgive everything that had happened! I was freed from the root of bitterness, and anger! I was no longer walking in fear! I was able to love my soon to be husband and son with a whole heart instead of shattered pieces of one! I was able to see and believe that God had plans to give me a future and a hope, as it says in Jeremiah 29! He also opened a door for me to become a Certified Biblical Counselor for Healing Hearts Ministries International. I now have the honor to walk women through the VERY study that changed my life, that God used to heal ME from the abuse that I endured through my childhood and a 10 year marriage.!