Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E20: Forgiving The Unforgivable: Child Sexual Abuse, A Conversation with Jozanne Marie

Transcript

E20: Forgiving The Unforgivable: Child Sexual Abuse, A Conversation with Jozanne Marie · The Lila Rose Show

• 0:00
  Hello everyone, welcome to the Lila Rose Show.
• 0:03
  We have a really important episode this week.
• 0:07
  I'm so thankful for all of you who have been tuning into the
• 0:09
  podcast recently. It's been really awesome and
• 0:13
  exhilarating to get back into podcasting and there's so much
• 0:16
  to talk about, so much to discuss.
• 0:18
  So this week's episode, a little bit of a trigger warning.
• 0:22
  So we will be discussing some really important but challenging
• 0:27
  topics. It will be a discussion about
• 0:30
  sexual abuse as well as forgiveness and healing.
• 0:34
  And so our amazing guest, Josanne Marielle introduced her,
• 0:38
  introduced her in a moment. We'll be sharing her story and
• 0:41
  her just how she overcame a lot of incredible hardships in her
• 0:46
  life with the power of God's love and grace and mercy.
• 0:49
  So I share this because if you're listening and you are
• 0:52
  listening with children, this might not be a good podcast to
• 0:55
  listen to with kids in the car. Or if you are listening to this
• 0:59
  and you're wondering if you should share it with a friend or
• 1:01
  somebody who's really young, I would say high school age on up
• 1:05
  would be the right age for this podcast.
• 1:07
  I'm also going to be sharing. Some resources for those who are
• 1:12
  survivors of sexual abuse or other people who are looking for
• 1:16
  healing. I will have some resources to
• 1:18
  connect with in the podcast description.
• 1:21
  So without further ado, I'm so excited to welcome my friend
• 1:26
  Josanne Marie under the podcast. I met Josanne about two years
• 1:29
  ago, maybe more than that now, three years ago through a mutual
• 1:32
  friend, and I was just struck immediately.
• 1:34
  She's a very talented, beautiful person, and she's a poet.
• 1:38
  She's an award actress and she's also an author, and it was her
• 1:42
  book Beautiful after reading it, that I really became acquainted
• 1:45
  with her story and realized how incredibly important it was for
• 1:49
  people to know her story, how inspiring and freeing it could
• 1:53
  be. So I'm going to have Josanne on.
• 1:55
  She's going to be discussing that story and we're going to be
• 1:57
  having an amazing conversation on not just sexual abuse, which
• 2:01
  is a crisis that affects so many people in our society.
• 2:05
  One out of every. Some statistics say that one out
• 2:07
  of every 9 underage girls are abused by an adult in their
• 2:11
  childhood, and one out of every about 50 young boys are abused
• 2:16
  by an adult. But there are other statistics
• 2:18
  that say one out of every four or five adult women experience
• 2:21
  some kind of sexual abuse and even rape, including rape from
• 2:28
  their own dating experiences. So sexual violence is an
• 2:32
  absolute epidemic. I have a lot of thoughts on
• 2:35
  that. We're not going to get into all
• 2:37
  of those in this interview. We're going to talk about it
• 2:39
  more from the lens of a survivor and the healing and the
• 2:42
  forgiveness that sets survivors free.
• 2:44
  But I will say that, you know, I did an episode on pornography.
• 2:47
  I've done an episode episodes on what the proper view of sex is.
• 2:51
  I'm going to be continuing to talk about this because I think
• 2:54
  the sexual violence in our culture is directly tied to the
• 2:57
  brokenness and the confusion and really the appetite we've
• 3:00
  created for sexual objectification, which is an
• 3:04
  appetite that has been created because of the way we sell sex
• 3:08
  and the way that pornography, porn use, including violent porn
• 3:11
  use, is continually on the rise. So.
• 3:14
  With that said. I'm really looking forward to
• 3:17
  this powerful discussion. And without further ado,
• 3:20
  Josanne, thank you so much for joining the Lila Rose Show.
• 3:24
  Oh, man, thank you so much, Virus.
• 3:26
  It's such an honor to be here. And just the amazing work that
• 3:30
  you do is inspiring. And yeah, I'm glad to be here.
• 3:35
  Yeah. Well, thanks for making it
• 3:37
  happen. I know we've been talking about
• 3:39
  doing an interview for over a year now and then the
• 3:41
  coronavirus happened and all all the craziness.
• 3:44
  And then we were both in LA, we're going to do in LA and now
• 3:47
  I'm up in Northern California. So I'm glad we're I'm glad we're
• 3:50
  finally doing this. So first of all, tell everyone a
• 3:54
  little bit about your yourself. I know I shared a little bit
• 3:59
  but. Who is Jozanne Marie?
• 4:01
  Who is Jozanne Marie? Well, you know, the first thing
• 4:07
  I would have to say before I share about the things that I
• 4:12
  do, because that's a very interesting question.
• 4:14
  You know, identify myself first as a child of God.
• 4:18
  And it seems such a like, you know, answer, but it is because
• 4:22
  I feel like everything that I do comes from that place of my
• 4:27
  identity. And so, you know, God has
• 4:31
  allowed me to write and do poetry and to act and tell
• 4:38
  stories. And, you know, I'm a Jamaican
• 4:42
  girl. I was born in Kingston, Jamaica,
• 4:46
  moved to the US when I was 10 years old, to the Bronx, NY.
• 4:53
  And, yeah, big move. And, you know, and I'm sure we
• 4:59
  will go into that later, but I moved lives with, you know, my
• 5:02
  family on my dad's side and just basically coming as an
• 5:06
  immigrant, having a dream to do great things.
• 5:11
  You know, most times when you leave your country, no matter
• 5:14
  where you're from and you come to the United States is for
• 5:20
  opportunity, you know, and my, my grandmother sent me here, you
• 5:27
  know, we had a big send off and it's like go be great, go do
• 5:32
  something good and bring us back a lot of stuff.
• 5:34
  When so you were 10 and you were, your grandma sent you to
• 5:38
  New York by yourself. Yes, well, I came with my, I
• 5:42
  came with my my brother, so. OK.
• 5:45
  He's from a different mother but same dad, so we both came here
• 5:48
  at the same. Time so she puts you on a plane
• 5:50
  and you're off OK and then and what was your dream You said you
• 5:54
  had dreams and you come you know, as an immigrant company
• 5:57
  the US, you have dreams what was your big.
• 5:58
  Dream a little girl. I always wanted to be an actor
• 6:00
  from I was an actress from I was a little girl to be honest,
• 6:05
  because I it all started, believe it or not, with the
• 6:09
  Cosby Show and I always played Vanessa when I was little like I
• 6:18
  want to be Vanessa and I would rehearse her lines in the mirror
• 6:21
  and just all you know, but my Jamaican parents grandmother was
• 6:28
  like acting does not pay the bills when she had you know, she
• 6:33
  read a lot of The Enquirer and stars.
• 6:36
  So she thought that I was going to end up either on drugs.
• 6:42
  Oh God. Have a lot of sex with
• 6:43
  everybody. Like she just read everything
• 6:46
  that was from The Enquirer and she's like, you're not doing
• 6:49
  that. What did she tell you to be
• 6:51
  instead? Did she have an alternate plan?
• 6:54
  There's there's only three things you could be in Jamaica,
• 6:56
  a lawyer, a doctor or engineer. Those are.
• 7:01
  Those are not. Too bad, not as fun.
• 7:06
  So so tell me how it turned out that you're so you're born in
• 7:09
  Jamaica and you are with your brother, your half brother, your
• 7:14
  grandma sounds like is a big I mean, I've read your book so I
• 7:16
  know your story, but our listeners don't yet, at least
• 7:18
  the ones who haven't read your book.
• 7:19
  I recommend Highly Beautiful by Josanne Marie so.
• 7:22
  Beautiful, unashamed and unafraid, Yes.
• 7:24
  Beautiful, unashamed and unafraid.
• 7:26
  We will link that in the in the episode show notes so people can
• 7:29
  find it. But tell us how you, first of
• 7:31
  all, you start your life in Jamaica.
• 7:33
  Tell us about your childhood. And then leading up to that,
• 7:36
  that big monumental move to New York.
• 7:39
  OK, well, you know, like I grew up, you know, I would say an
• 7:45
  unconventional home because growing up I used to see a lot
• 7:48
  of my peers, little girls who was raised with a father and a
• 7:52
  mother in the home, regardless if it was dysfunctional or not.
• 7:56
  But with me, I just grew up with my grandmother and I say the man
• 7:59
  she lived with because they they weren't married.
• 8:03
  So her boyfriend pretty much. And you know, I wasn't.
• 8:07
  There was just a lot of secrets in our home.
• 8:10
  So all I knew was that my dad lived in the US and he left when
• 8:15
  I was one years old and that my mom was sick after she had me.
• 8:20
  But no one really explained what the illness was.
• 8:23
  So that was all that I had up until the age of 6 when
• 8:29
  everything changed in my life. So at six, I did my mom.
• 8:34
  Did you get to see your mom before 6 or that's when you
• 8:36
  first met your mom? That's.
• 8:37
  When I first met my mom, yeah. So from a, you know, from I was
• 8:41
  born till the age of 6, I just knew that she was in the
• 8:45
  hospital. And you never really questioned.
• 8:48
  It was just like, oh, she's sick, but what does that really
• 8:50
  mean? And no one was really saying
• 8:54
  much. And then I knew my dad was in
• 8:56
  America and being in, you know, in Jamaica, you, you 10, third
• 9:04
  world country, the US is a big thing.
• 9:06
  So if you have like a family member who was in the US, it's
• 9:09
  like there was hope. There was especially, it was
• 9:12
  apparent, you know, it's like, oh, I'm going to get to go to
• 9:14
  America one day and, you know, leave the dismal, you know, hard
• 9:22
  life of city life in this country, you know, And so my dad
• 9:27
  used to write me letters and, you know, used to send money, do
• 9:31
  you know, for school and things like that.
• 9:33
  And so for many years, I kind of looked to him as like this major
• 9:40
  figure in my life that I wanted to meet after, especially after
• 9:46
  I met my mom. So I met my mom when I was 6 and
• 9:48
  I met my dad when I was 6 at different, you know, time in
• 9:53
  different times. But I met my mom and my
• 9:57
  grandmother. We took a walk down to the
• 9:59
  hospital and I didn't know that my mom was mentally ill.
• 10:03
  So going down to Bellevue Hospital in Jamaica and we took
• 10:09
  that walk. And you walk into this on this
• 10:12
  compound and you see, you know, people who are struggling with
• 10:16
  mental health and, you know, for a child, it's kind of scary.
• 10:21
  And for me at the time and different and you know, when,
• 10:25
  when your parents tell you, oh, your, your mom is sick and she's
• 10:28
  in a hospital, your, your mind. I mean, that's such a vast
• 10:32
  blanket statement. Like it could be, you know,
• 10:35
  anywhere, you know, and you know, is she sick?
• 10:40
  Like she can't walk? Is she has a stomach?
• 10:42
  What, what sickness? You know, no one really told me
• 10:45
  what that was. So when I met her for the first
• 10:47
  time and realized that she was mentally ill because, you know,
• 10:53
  kids used to make fun of those people who had mental illness in
• 10:57
  school. So when I realized like, oh, my
• 11:00
  mom was in Bellevue Hospital, that was like a very traumatic
• 11:04
  thing for me. And meeting her the first day,
• 11:11
  you know, she didn't, you know, I was 6, she had me when she was
• 11:15
  13. She was a 19 year old girl.
• 11:18
  And, you know, I just remember I still have that vivid picture in
• 11:23
  my mind of walking down this wooded hallway with some
• 11:28
  patients locked away in a cell. And we walked up to my mom's
• 11:33
  cell and she's sitting on the bed and she looks at me.
• 11:37
  And I could just remember when she she, she was happy to see my
• 11:41
  grandmother, but she wasn't happy to see me.
• 11:44
  And I remember that feeling of fear.
• 11:49
  So my first experience with my mom was fear, not a sense of
• 11:57
  love. And and then I was a trigger for
• 12:02
  her. You know, I guess we'll talk
• 12:03
  about that later. But I was a trigger for her when
• 12:06
  she saw me. She became very violent that
• 12:11
  day. So it was like, you know, they
• 12:14
  were just talking and I'm holding on to my grandmother
• 12:18
  because my grandmother is like mom to me now because I've, you
• 12:21
  know, raised with her and I'm holding on to my grandmother.
• 12:25
  And, you know, she, my mom got quiet and then she just started
• 12:33
  looking at me. And then she just, you know,
• 12:37
  like all of a sudden my grandmother told me to leave
• 12:40
  because my grandmother probably have experienced this with her
• 12:42
  before. So I, I leave out of the cell
• 12:46
  that she was in. And I just, she grabbed my
• 12:49
  grandmother and pushed her up against the wall and, you know,
• 12:54
  very violently. And she just starts screaming
• 12:57
  and she, she hates me. And, you know, these words are
• 13:01
  coming out of her mouth and the nurses are running down the
• 13:03
  hallway and for me. And I just found myself running
• 13:07
  down the hallway, running outside because I was so scared.
• 13:12
  And that was my first experience that day when I went home at it
• 13:15
  because I struggled with asthma a lot when I was in Jamaica.
• 13:18
  And maybe those things was what triggered it because I never had
• 13:21
  it when I was in the US, but I just, I had an asthma attack on
• 13:25
  the way home. And I just remember feeling like
• 13:32
  I never wanted to see her after that, you know?
• 13:35
  And so my, my, so the big contrast was here was my mom,
• 13:41
  this violent woman, this woman who didn't really love me or
• 13:45
  want to see me. And here was my dad who lived in
• 13:48
  America, the place of dreams and opportunity, who was writing me
• 13:51
  letters and, and sending me gifts, you know, sending me
• 13:58
  things. And so I wanted to go be with my
• 14:01
  dad. That was the vision.
• 14:03
  I want to go live with my dad. I don't want to stay in Jamaica.
• 14:06
  I want to, I want to leave this place and, and go where it was
• 14:10
  better. At least that's what I thought.
• 14:12
  And then after you got home and your grandma was back, did you
• 14:15
  guys talk about the whole scene? I mean, it just, it's so, as you
• 14:20
  said, traumatic. I mean, did you just get to
• 14:21
  discuss it with her? How did you process, or were you
• 14:24
  even able to begin to process something like that at such a
• 14:27
  young age? Not that I can remember, to be
• 14:30
  honest. I I feel like all I remember my
• 14:34
  grandmother saying, whether it was that day or after that day
• 14:38
  was your mom got sick when you she couldn't handle having you.
• 14:45
  And so she got that made her I'll because she had you at a
• 14:49
  young age. So that was what she told me.
• 14:54
  And so I think, I think to some level, looking back on it, you
• 14:59
  know, it becomes kind of like psychological because you're
• 15:03
  supposed to feel like a gift, not a burden or something that
• 15:08
  makes someone feel sick, you know.
• 15:11
  So I mean, I don't think I was looking at it in that depth, but
• 15:14
  I'm sure in my mind I was commute.
• 15:17
  That's what the communication was to some level, you know?
• 15:21
  And then when? How old were you when you
• 15:23
  eventually learned what happened?
• 15:26
  You know why your mother was only 13?
• 15:28
  You know what she went through and all of the all of the
• 15:31
  revelations around that. When I was 17, obviously, you
• 15:35
  know, I came to America and a lot of things happened over the
• 15:38
  years that I was here and I found out that my mom was raped
• 15:42
  when she was 13 and it was by my dad.
• 15:46
  And obviously, and that was what triggered why she felt like she
• 15:55
  couldn't. She didn't want to see me.
• 15:58
  That was the real reason. And I didn't know that till I
• 16:01
  was 17. Yeah.
• 16:04
  And and that trauma from that whole experience was why she was
• 16:07
  in a effectively an asylum or hospital for years because of
• 16:11
  the trauma of her, her assault and everything that happened
• 16:14
  afterwards. Yeah, yeah, definitely.
• 16:17
  I think it's a combination of a lot of things.
• 16:20
  It was definitely the trauma of that, the fact that she was
• 16:23
  young, the fact that she wasn't, no one spoke up for her because,
• 16:31
  you know, back then, I believe in Jamaica, people think that
• 16:38
  once you are pregnant or you were raped, that you, you
• 16:42
  weren't, you know, pure and no one was going to marry you.
• 16:50
  So they hid it. They didn't want anyone to know.
• 16:53
  And here's a 13 year old girl who was taken advantage of and
• 16:58
  was, you know, basically took out, was taken out of school.
• 17:03
  So her whole life stopped. You know, just think of a 13
• 17:06
  year going to school, having fun with her friends, trying to
• 17:09
  learn. Life falls in this situation.
• 17:12
  You think, well, my parents are going to stand up for me and
• 17:15
  they're like, no, you know, obviously my dad wasn't
• 17:18
  prosecuted or anything like that.
• 17:19
  And we're going to hide it. We're going to pull you out of
• 17:23
  school. You're going to stay in the
• 17:24
  house for nine months because we don't want no one to know until
• 17:27
  you have the baby. And, and all that pressure of
• 17:31
  shame and us being ostracized and being, you know, pulled out
• 17:35
  of her normal life and not being able to voice as if she did
• 17:39
  something wrong. And then, you know, and then
• 17:46
  from there, basically she had me.
• 17:50
  And then the man who did it, you know, he came around a little
• 17:55
  bit and then one day he picked up and he left and went to live
• 18:00
  his life. And I believe it was right after
• 18:03
  that, because it was a year later after she had me, she
• 18:06
  just, you know, my grandmother said she just woke up one day
• 18:08
  and she just started crying and she wouldn't stop.
• 18:11
  Like she cried from six in the evening to almost 12 midnight.
• 18:17
  And she just kept crying. And my grandmother was like,
• 18:20
  what's wrong? And Jean.
• 18:23
  And my mom's name is Jean. And she's just like.
• 18:27
  And then in the middle of the night, she came and she took me
• 18:29
  out of my crib and she threw me in the yard.
• 18:32
  And that was the beginning of her illness.
• 18:36
  And, you know, I think, too, because Jamaica at the time
• 18:40
  probably didn't have the means of therapy or they weren't
• 18:43
  thinking that. They probably thought that was
• 18:46
  really extreme or not even knowing about postpartum
• 18:49
  depression and, you know, a lot of things that was involved.
• 18:52
  So they gave her shock treatment, which is very strong
• 18:56
  for a child. And, you know, just a lot of
• 18:59
  things that I think escalated the situation even more, you
• 19:03
  know. Yeah.
• 19:05
  And, and that she was just not, there was no justice and no
• 19:08
  protection. And so it's just one hurt after
• 19:11
  the next. I can't, it's hard to even
• 19:13
  fathom like all those things combined, that pain.
• 19:18
  So, so you're six years old, you didn't know this yet, of course,
• 19:21
  but you have this very painful encounter, traumatic encounter
• 19:24
  with your mom who's still sick. I mean, she's basically been
• 19:27
  locked away for her entire teen years.
• 19:30
  And then that same year you met your dad.
• 19:32
  You had no idea yet about your dad, Like what?
• 19:35
  That he was an abuser. You didn't know any of this.
• 19:38
  But tell tell us about how you first met him and then your
• 19:41
  encounters with him. Well, I, you know, I was home
• 19:47
  one day just running around the yard being a troublemaker, and I
• 19:57
  just. Acting Just practicing your
• 19:59
  line. Exactly And then a a cab pulled
• 20:05
  up, a car pulled up, a Volkswagen pulled up and this
• 20:10
  man steps out and I'm I'm like shocked because I had AI had one
• 20:15
  photo of my dad. So when he walked up to the
• 20:17
  gate, I knew exactly who he was and I didn't run to him out.
• 20:22
  I was so frightened. I ran inside and I was like, you
• 20:26
  know, I told my grandmother that my dad was there.
• 20:28
  She was just like, oh, so Josanne, please, your dad is not
• 20:30
  here because he, he just came. He didn't tell anyone he was
• 20:33
  coming, you know. And and Josanne, was your
• 20:36
  grandma in touch with your dad? Yeah, because she was sending,
• 20:40
  He was sending mom money. So in her mind, he wasn't the
• 20:44
  abuser of her daughter. He was.
• 20:47
  I mean, how did she see your father?
• 20:49
  I mean, it sounds like. Well, she.
• 20:51
  Saw him as a bit of a lifeline maybe financially or how did
• 20:54
  that work? I think she because your grandma
• 20:57
  loved. You, I mean, she, she was caring
• 20:59
  for you, but it just sounds like there was no boundary there.
• 21:03
  Because I feel like my mom was her only daughter that happened.
• 21:09
  So one of the reasons they didn't want my dad to be
• 21:14
  prosecuted, because they didn't want me to be raised without a
• 21:16
  father. Like they rationalized it that
• 21:19
  way. So it's like, OK, the, the, the,
• 21:22
  the, the mother is raped and, you know, whatever.
• 21:26
  And now we can't say the, the daughter don't have a dad.
• 21:31
  We want her to have a dad. So, you know, that's how they
• 21:35
  kind of rationalized did and I know my, my grandmother had
• 21:40
  this. What would you, what do you call
• 21:43
  it? This love hate relationship with
• 21:45
  my dad. I knew that from a child.
• 21:46
  Like she, she liked him for sending things, but then there
• 21:50
  was this underlying thing like you're, you're sleazy.
• 21:54
  I, you know, she never said those words, but looking back,
• 21:58
  that's the word like you cannot be trusted or you're no good.
• 22:03
  Like, you know, she'll throw little words out there every now
• 22:05
  and then. And so, you know, I just, I
• 22:08
  think as I was getting old, I thought it was more like, oh,
• 22:11
  because he left me and he went away.
• 22:13
  And, you know, but I didn't know the depth of it.
• 22:17
  And I think she probably thought because my dad was 23, my mom
• 22:20
  was 13. And so she probably thought,
• 22:24
  well, you know, at least one of these daughters gonna do
• 22:31
  something good, right? And like, I, like I said again,
• 22:36
  like, America was like the big goal.
• 22:41
  So it was like if you knew anyone in America, especially a
• 22:47
  family member, life was going to be better for you.
• 22:51
  So I think she was holding on to that side of it and kind of
• 22:55
  disregarding the other side of, you know, it was something to be
• 23:01
  prideful about, you know, culturally like, oh, you know,
• 23:05
  oh, you know, how was your saying, you know, well, how is
• 23:09
  Jean? Let's not talk about Jean, but
• 23:12
  let's talk about our dad that lives in America, you know, and
• 23:15
  that would change a conversation.
• 23:17
  And people saw you differently culturally if you had a family
• 23:23
  member in America. So did people not put it into
• 23:27
  their mind that he they didn't think of him as a rapist?
• 23:30
  I mean, it sounds like there was this like agreement that was
• 23:33
  unspoken that he was off the hook for that.
• 23:36
  Yes. And, and, and was that because
• 23:38
  he was a man and because he moved to America like those kind
• 23:42
  of combination? Like man, he was a soldier in
• 23:44
  the Jamaican army, so he carried authority.
• 23:48
  He was charismatic. He lives in America.
• 23:52
  He people loved him. He was.
• 23:55
  So he gets away with it. Yeah.
• 23:57
  It was a lot of things that, you know, that kind of let people
• 24:02
  turn the other look the other way, if I may say.
• 24:07
  So he shows up and you're six years old and what?
• 24:12
  What happens next? So he shows up when I was 6 and
• 24:16
  I was excited because going back to that picture, I was just like
• 24:19
  excited. I brought him show my
• 24:21
  introducing to my friends and, you know, he brought gifts and,
• 24:27
  you know, took me around and it was the first time I had like a
• 24:31
  father figure because my step my, you know, the man my
• 24:34
  grandmother lived with, He he was more like a provider.
• 24:37
  Like he wasn't, he wasn't, you know, I mean, I would hang out
• 24:41
  with him at the bar, not a place for little kids to hang out, but
• 24:45
  you know, whatever, you know, he'd buy me food and, you know,
• 24:49
  snacks and stuff, but he wasn't gonna the the love and the
• 24:54
  attention that wasn't there. He never hugged me.
• 24:59
  I never got a hug from him, you know, And so being with my dad,
• 25:03
  my dad was a little bit more affectionate.
• 25:05
  It was the first time that I got a hug from a man and the first
• 25:10
  time someone told me they loved me because that wasn't big.
• 25:14
  Also culturally, you know, I mean, I mean, now it might be
• 25:19
  different, but then, you know, culturally it wasn't like, oh, I
• 25:25
  love you cold the way Jamaicans let you know they love you.
• 25:29
  It's like I got you, you going to school, you got a roof of
• 25:31
  your head, you got food on the table.
• 25:33
  I love you. OK?
• 25:36
  But so having my dad around and, you know, he came and he had an,
• 25:41
  you know, an American twang and he was just cool, you know, and
• 25:47
  charming and loving, if I may say.
• 25:50
  And, you know, one day he was there for two weeks and one day
• 25:54
  we were just playing. We were sitting in the backyard
• 25:59
  and he bought me like coconut ice cream.
• 26:02
  And, you know, he lift me up, put me on his lap and told me to
• 26:06
  give him a kiss. You know, I kissed him on the
• 26:07
  cheek and and then he kissed me inappropriately.
• 26:14
  At the time I didn't know what that was.
• 26:17
  I I just knew this is awkward and weird and kind of nasty, but
• 26:23
  OK, it's my dad. So was, I don't understand it.
• 26:31
  I'm sick so I don't know what it means.
• 26:33
  And so I just remember I didn't, I don't remember feeling like I
• 26:40
  was violated necessarily, but I remember it was different
• 26:45
  because no one has ever done that.
• 26:48
  And when I went home, when my dad took me home that day, I
• 26:52
  never told my grandmother about the kiss.
• 26:55
  I just told her about the fact that we had ice cream and we
• 26:57
  hung out. And I think I'd never really
• 27:03
  thought of mentioning the kiss to her to some level, you know,
• 27:09
  and I think I did probably layed her down and she she kind of
• 27:14
  said don't tell anybody that. But it was it was just in
• 27:18
  conversation. So it wasn't like, you know
• 27:21
  what, you know, did this. It was just more like, oh, you
• 27:24
  know, and she was like, don't tell anyone that, you know, but
• 27:28
  she never told me why. So that was the first thing that
• 27:34
  happened. And I never took it to heart.
• 27:37
  You know, I just, it went, my dad went away and the goal was
• 27:44
  to get me in United States. And it happened four years
• 27:48
  later. I was 10.
• 27:50
  So you didn't see him for four years and then you go, you get
• 27:55
  on a plane with your half brother, you went, you're in the
• 27:58
  Bronx and he, he's in the Bronx. So he basically moved in with
• 28:02
  him at 10 years old. Yes.
• 28:06
  So then what happens next? You're in the Bronx.
• 28:08
  You're, I mean, how are you feeling?
• 28:10
  And then what are the? What are the next things that
• 28:11
  happen for you? Well, you know, I'm in the Bronx
• 28:14
  and I'm excited. It's New York, Big Apple,
• 28:20
  trains, Broadway, you know, just all this.
• 28:24
  I'm just naming all the things that was, you know, as a kid.
• 28:28
  You're, you know, 74th St. you know, Macy's, you're like, you
• 28:34
  know, just so much high rise buildings.
• 28:37
  Even though it was the projects for me, it was like a castle
• 28:41
  because it was bigger than anything I've ever seen, you
• 28:45
  know, And so it, I was excited. I live with my dad.
• 28:51
  I had my cousin, I had my whole family on my dad's side, lived
• 28:54
  in New York. So it was the first time I was
• 28:57
  around large family like my aunties and cousins and, you
• 29:04
  know, uncles and, and that was used for me because I grew up as
• 29:09
  a single child, just my grandmother, my and her and her
• 29:12
  boyfriend. And I was the only child on the
• 29:15
  compound. So I didn't have kids, you know,
• 29:18
  I mean, I would play with kids at school and stuff, but as far
• 29:21
  as family like that, I didn't have that.
• 29:23
  So that was used for me and I was excited about it and
• 29:28
  promising. And then, you know, I guess, you
• 29:33
  know, 'cause my dad was, is married and he, my stepmom was a
• 29:38
  nurse, but she worked at night. So she was rarely home obviously
• 29:45
  at night time. And when she was home during the
• 29:48
  day, she would be sleeping. So that's when a lot of things
• 29:54
  went on. So and if she worked overtime
• 29:58
  where she worked at night and she didn't come home, like if
• 30:03
  she worked at night, there were times when she would come home
• 30:05
  early in the morning. But then there are times when
• 30:07
  she worked overtime meant that she was going to work like
• 30:10
  almost like a double shift. So she wouldn't come home till
• 30:14
  like probably 6 O clock in the evening, like around that time
• 30:18
  after leaving at 11 at night, but you know, the night before.
• 30:21
  So there was a lot of time where I was alone with my dad after
• 30:28
  school. So, you know, I come from
• 30:29
  school, my brothers sometimes would have football practice and
• 30:33
  I would come home and you know, my dad got home like around 3:00
• 30:38
  or 2:00 around that time to three.
• 30:41
  And so if my mom, I mean, my stepmom wasn't there, you know,
• 30:45
  that was like a three hour span where we were together alone.
• 30:49
  Or if it was that night when she left to go to work, then, you
• 30:53
  know, and so the after school, it started with the after school
• 30:56
  situation. So I'd come home and if she
• 30:58
  wasn't there or if she was sleeping, you know what I think
• 31:03
  about, and I want to say this because when I think about
• 31:05
  abuse, people think like when we think of abuse, we think of the
• 31:08
  Hollywood expression of it. You know, a woman walking down
• 31:12
  the hallway and she's dragged and choked and her clothes is
• 31:15
  ripped off and she's raped, you know, or if it's happening in a
• 31:19
  home, we think of this menacing looking man.
• 31:23
  You know who you just automatically know he's an
• 31:26
  abuser. And it's like, you know what?
• 31:30
  Actually, no, most women are abused by people we know,
• 31:36
  whether it's a friend, a family member, or, you know, someone
• 31:40
  very close that we trust. And that's why it's so hard to
• 31:44
  believe because they're not the menacing looking man we see in
• 31:49
  the movie. They are fathers, they're
• 31:51
  uncles. They're people who have
• 31:52
  respectable presence in society that we miss it.
• 31:58
  And and that's the thing for my dad.
• 32:03
  My dad is very charismatic. Everyone loves him up until this
• 32:07
  day, every all my friends loved him when they come.
• 32:11
  I wish my dad was like your dad is so cool.
• 32:14
  Everyone. He was the life of the part.
• 32:17
  He made you laugh. He he was giving he you know, he
• 32:23
  was he he was funny. He was just all these things
• 32:28
  that kids want their dad to be like, you know, But then there
• 32:32
  was this other side of him that no one really knew.
• 32:37
  And obviously I lived with two boys in the house.
• 32:40
  So and my, I had a sister or half sister, but she lived with
• 32:44
  her mom in Brooklyn. So she was only there on the
• 32:47
  weekends, you know, like maybe every other week.
• 32:51
  So it wasn't something where, you know, oh, there was like 3
• 32:59
  of us, you know, females in the house or something like that
• 33:02
  where we can be like, OK, you know.
• 33:05
  So it was people missed it. And as a child for myself, you
• 33:10
  know, it just started with first a lot of touching in
• 33:14
  inappropriate places. Like after I take a shower,
• 33:17
  he'll tell me go take a shower and he wants to drive me off or
• 33:21
  a lot of not groping, but just like I just remember like he
• 33:25
  would sometimes lift me up and like rub me against this crotch,
• 33:30
  you know, like just things like that.
• 33:32
  And I'm like 10 years old, you know, and the, I guess the big.
• 33:40
  So at that time I am now more aware of my body and now I know
• 33:45
  this is inappropriate, but what do you say?
• 33:49
  Because the thing we have to also understand about sexual
• 33:57
  molestation is that especially when it's happening between a
• 34:02
  child and a guardian, a parent is that God placed an innate
• 34:08
  love in a child for a parent to trust them, to protect them.
• 34:16
  It's it God placed it there. So when a parent crosses that
• 34:21
  bound, it leaves confusion. It makes you second guess
• 34:26
  yourself because you're like, I know this is not supposed to be
• 34:32
  happening, but this is my guardian.
• 34:33
  It's my parent and I love him. And am I supposed to speak back?
• 34:40
  Am I supposed to even talk back? Because you're taught to respect
• 34:43
  your parents. And so now you're silenced and
• 34:47
  there's all these emotions, you know, And that's the thing about
• 34:51
  abuse is that there's a grooming, there's a trust, you
• 34:55
  know, there is a manipulation. There's a sense of power
• 35:01
  dynamics and control, you know, and so you're not your clothes
• 35:08
  is not ripped off, you're you're not dragged, but you're dragged
• 35:12
  by your emotions, you know, and you're ripped of your voice and
• 35:18
  your identity in some level. And at a young age, you find I
• 35:24
  found myself, let me say for me starting the role start to
• 35:28
  switch now where I'm no longer, I'm now trying to protect him
• 35:34
  because I love him. And I don't want to see my dad
• 35:39
  hurt or taken away or whatever, you know, or for people to see
• 35:44
  something like this is happening.
• 35:46
  And was that? Was that one of the tools he
• 35:48
  used to to keep you quiet in a way is saying don't tell anyone.
• 35:52
  I mean, that's typically part of the abuse.
• 35:54
  You know what was funny? He never told me not to tell
• 35:57
  anyone because I did end up telling someone for a girl, you
• 36:02
  know, a kid at school my age. And that brought a lot of
• 36:05
  problems as well. But I think it was more of my
• 36:13
  that's why my book, one of the reasons why my book is called
• 36:15
  beautiful is twofold. It's that it's beautiful because
• 36:19
  of Ecclesiastes 311 that says God has made all things
• 36:22
  beautiful in his time. But the other flip side of it
• 36:25
  was that my dad, when my dad used to touch me and violated
• 36:31
  me, even when he kissed me the first time.
• 36:34
  And I was like, oh, I told him I said it was nasty because I
• 36:37
  remember wiping my mouth. And he said, that's because
• 36:40
  you're beautiful. And so my, my first encounter
• 36:45
  with the word beauty was in a perverted way, you know, And so
• 36:51
  it's, it's, it's, it's playing on the, the emotions of a child,
• 36:59
  a girl child who wants to hear that she's beautiful and wants
• 37:04
  to feel loved and loved by dad. And so there's, there's a lot of
• 37:09
  confusion. So he never necessarily told me
• 37:11
  to not tell anyone that I can't remember, let me say that.
• 37:19
  But innately I knew if I did it would cause a problem.
• 37:27
  And it sounds like eventually you did tell a classmate and it
• 37:31
  caused problems. And what was the consequence of
• 37:33
  that for you? Well, I would school to a
• 37:38
  friend, you know, ask her to keep it a secret.
• 37:42
  And she told her mom, Mom told the guidance counselor.
• 37:47
  And before you know it, I'm in the guidance counselor's office.
• 37:49
  And then they're asking me questions.
• 37:51
  And I knew this was big and scary at the same time because
• 37:55
  now they want me to write the statement and I didn't even tell
• 37:59
  him half the things that took place because I knew how serious
• 38:05
  it was. And social worker came to the
• 38:07
  house and that was the first time my I vocalized that my dad
• 38:18
  touched me. And that was very, I just
• 38:22
  remember a very scary time because I was standing in the
• 38:25
  living room and my stepmother was there and social worker my
• 38:32
  dad. And they were asking me
• 38:33
  questions. My dad was like, no, you know, I
• 38:36
  was, she took a shower and I probably she misunderstood and I
• 38:40
  dried her off and which he did, but he did more than that.
• 38:44
  And you know, so then they took the statement, they left and.
• 38:52
  They left you with them, huh? They, the social worker, left
• 38:56
  you with them. Yes, yeah.
• 39:01
  And that went on. So we had we had Thanksgiving
• 39:08
  and now, now the whole family knew about it.
• 39:13
  And so that created a lot of division and ostrich, you know,
• 39:18
  I was, I would say ostracized because Thanksgiving came and,
• 39:22
  you know, I could hear parents telling their my uncle's aunt
• 39:27
  telling their kids not to play with Josanne, 'cause she's a
• 39:32
  troublemaker and she lied on her dad and, you know, and.
• 39:37
  Did the abuse stop for that period and it did and then and
• 39:42
  then? When did it start?
• 39:43
  And then? But nothing changed.
• 39:44
  You didn't. Nobody intervened, right?
• 39:48
  Or intervened because I think from that September.
• 39:54
  So then we had, I mean we had, we had Thanksgiving, went back
• 39:59
  to school. I think the guidance counselor
• 40:03
  kind of talked to me a little and I was like nothing is
• 40:05
  happening or whatever. We had Christmas and then, you
• 40:10
  know, we had that holiday going into January and by spring.
• 40:14
  I don't know if because the case was contained, you know, it was
• 40:17
  an open case. Obviously we had spring break
• 40:23
  and my dad came home during spring break one day and he was
• 40:28
  like, you know, you want a lot of trouble to this house.
• 40:33
  We can't afford to keep you here anymore.
• 40:35
  And we're taking you back to Jamaica and you're leaving
• 40:39
  tonight. And it just took me like a
• 40:43
  brick. Like when I don't even know how
• 40:46
  to explain it. Like I think, you know, when you
• 40:49
  say as a child, for me, I think that was the first time I had my
• 40:53
  heart broken because I remember how devastated I was.
• 40:59
  I was really devastated because one, I felt like I didn't, I
• 41:04
  didn't, I didn't let my dad. I let my dad down even though I
• 41:09
  was the one to make hurt. I let my grandmother down
• 41:12
  because you don't. You don't come to America to be
• 41:16
  shipped back to America. You come to America to make a
• 41:20
  life for yourself. So I felt like I failed her.
• 41:23
  It just amazes me the capacity of a victim to feel like it's
• 41:27
  their fault. I know, yeah.
• 41:29
  You know. Like, so many girls, so many
• 41:33
  women, so many stories. And to hear you, I mean, it's
• 41:36
  just heartbreaking to hear the heartbreak.
• 41:38
  I mean, you were losing like, is your dream to be in America, but
• 41:42
  everything was against you. And here you are taking it on as
• 41:47
  if you're the one, you know, causing pain to your own abuser,
• 41:51
  to your grandmother who puts you here, you know, sent you there.
• 41:55
  Yeah, no, totally, totally. So, yeah.
• 42:00
  You know, he took me back to Jamaica and showed up.
• 42:03
  Another surprise again, he showed up and my grandmother
• 42:07
  didn't know I was coming. And.
• 42:09
  And you know, my grandmother, you know, the the story was, oh,
• 42:12
  Josanne went to school and to rely on me and, you know, all of
• 42:16
  this stuff and my. I just remember my going back to
• 42:19
  secrets again because I remember my grandmother didn't say
• 42:22
  anything. She was quiet and she looks at
• 42:26
  him because she knew what he did to my mom so and she never told
• 42:33
  me what he did to my mom. So here I am saying similar
• 42:38
  things, right? So she she must have known in
• 42:42
  that moment. Yeah.
• 42:44
  But then what was her her next move?
• 42:47
  I mean, she has you in her home again.
• 42:50
  So she, you know, we, she took me to, you know, end up going to
• 42:53
  school, Christian School. And so, you know, everyone is
• 42:57
  wondering, like, why is this little girl back?
• 43:01
  What happened? And now we have to keep it a
• 43:03
  secret. And there were just so many
• 43:05
  secrets, man, like, and, you know, I went back to school,
• 43:13
  but, you know, my grandmother was living in life.
• 43:15
  She was living with this man who wasn't abusive physically, but
• 43:18
  he was definitely abusive verbally so.
• 43:23
  She was a victim too, yes. I mean, that's what's hard.
• 43:26
  If you, if you're victimized and you're, you're, you're living in
• 43:31
  that, you become voice, you can become voiceless.
• 43:34
  And then it's like, you know, when you, when someone close to
• 43:38
  you is also victimized, it's hard to find the voice.
• 43:43
  You're already not using it for yourself.
• 43:44
  It's so hard. So, so how long, how long were
• 43:48
  you in Jamaica? And then you end up back again
• 43:50
  in New York and then. I was there for two years.
• 43:54
  OK. So grandmother couldn't take
• 43:58
  care of me. Things were getting worse
• 44:01
  financially. The boyfriend was becoming more,
• 44:05
  you know, cuz he also had an alcohol problem.
• 44:10
  And she was just like, you need to go back to the USI cannot
• 44:13
  take care of you here. And what I need for you to do is
• 44:16
  I need to pick up the phone and call your dad and tell your dad
• 44:19
  and your stepmother that you lied and that you're sorry and
• 44:22
  you won't do it again. So I, you know, first I was just
• 44:28
  like, no, I'm not gonna do it. But then, you know, and for the
• 44:32
  parents out there, that's listening.
• 44:34
  I think it's so important for us to know about children, the
• 44:38
  dynamics of children and parent because kids want to be trusted
• 44:44
  just the same way you're protecting your child, your
• 44:47
  child want to protect you, you know, and, and I saw how much my
• 44:53
  grandmother was suffering. And even at that age, I felt
• 44:58
  like it was my responsibility to take care of my grandmother.
• 45:01
  I wasn't thinking of, man, I cannot go back to US.
• 45:06
  You know, I, I was rationalizing, well, I'm young,
• 45:11
  my grandmother's getting older. If I go back, maybe my dad is
• 45:14
  not going to say do this again because of what happened.
• 45:17
  And I'm sure my grandmother was probably thinking the same
• 45:19
  thing. Maybe I don't know, but she was
• 45:22
  playing Russian roulette, like let's see what happens, you
• 45:25
  know? And we made that phone call and
• 45:29
  I think like 6 months or three months later, I was back in, in
• 45:32
  the US, you know, and, but this time it was different because
• 45:40
  when I came before, it was just like family members and everyone
• 45:43
  was at the airport and it was like this big greeting.
• 45:46
  And when I came back, it was only my dad picking me up.
• 45:51
  And that was the, the, the message, like the only person
• 45:55
  that wants you here is your dad. But that puts me in a very
• 46:00
  sticky situation. And he made sure he told me that
• 46:05
  on the way home. So if I needed, you know,
• 46:11
  woman's, you know, stuff, you know, you, you know, I'm, I'm,
• 46:16
  I'm now I'm seeing my period and you know, I, I go to my dad.
• 46:21
  I don't go to my stepmother, you know, I need money, I go to my
• 46:26
  dad, I need clothes, I go to my dad, everything was I go to my
• 46:30
  dad. But that kind of played in his
• 46:33
  favor. And now I know because of the
• 46:39
  punishment, if I say anything, I could be sent back to Jamaica.
• 46:42
  So now you don't say anything. And things just escalated from
• 46:47
  one thing to the next. So for my got back to the
• 46:51
  country 12 going on 13 till I was 16.
• 47:01
  And I would say the first two years was definitely difficult
• 47:05
  because it was no longer just touching.
• 47:09
  Now it was very sexual and and then I started to change.
• 47:17
  So the flip side of that is like, you know, here's this girl
• 47:22
  that's cheery and laughing and talking to now this hard
• 47:28
  rebellious according to my family at the time and angry
• 47:37
  teenager because I wasn't able to really say anything.
• 47:42
  And now I start hanging out with boys and you know, the cycle
• 47:46
  just starts to continue and coming home late 1:00 in the
• 47:50
  morning because I don't want to be touched.
• 47:53
  And that's the best time to come home when everyone is home.
• 47:58
  And but people thought I was breaking curfew, you know, and
• 48:02
  just all these things. And then by the time I got to
• 48:08
  14, I was pregnant at 14 and by my dad.
• 48:15
  So it was like my dad gave me my first kiss, my dad took my
• 48:18
  virginity and my dad got me pregnant.
• 48:21
  Like all the beautiful things that a woman should experience
• 48:26
  in another way, you know? And I think that's when
• 48:32
  everything changed for me, I think was after the pregnancy
• 48:36
  because, you know, obviously he wants to hide it.
• 48:42
  And I was, you know, he accused me that I was, you know, maybe I
• 48:47
  was out there with someone or something and I was just like, I
• 48:49
  never had sex with anyone. Like, what are you talking
• 48:52
  about? And, and, you know, one day he
• 48:55
  just pretended like I went to school and, and he took me to an
• 49:01
  abortion clinic and aborted a child.
• 49:05
  And I think it was after that, I just remember the emptiness I
• 49:11
  felt coming home. And I just remember, you know,
• 49:18
  it's funny how there's certain things you remember in certain,
• 49:21
  whether it's a good thing or a traumatic thing.
• 49:25
  I just remembered looking at kids and feeling like I wasn't
• 49:30
  one, but I was 1 and I think it was after that the darkness kind
• 49:38
  of came in, I would say, where I was just angry.
• 49:45
  And he drove you. I mean that was.
• 49:48
  Yeah, I. Mean you were in his control.
• 49:50
  He was just victimizing you again and again.
• 49:52
  He you're pregnant now he blames you.
• 49:56
  It's also typical. And then he sets an abortion
• 50:01
  appointment, drives you. Was there any like conversation
• 50:04
  with you? I mean, he's an abuser, so
• 50:06
  probably not. But did you even talk about that
• 50:09
  or was it just like, oh, here, next step?
• 50:12
  I don't remember anything that he said.
• 50:15
  I don't remember anything he said.
• 50:17
  Coming to the abortion clinic. I just remember a lot of
• 50:26
  silence. But what he did say before we
• 50:30
  got in was if they ask you how you got pregnant, tell them it
• 50:34
  was a boy at school. So and they did because we got
• 50:39
  to abortion clinic and the other, you know, whoever cup
• 50:43
  comes in there, whatever. And my dad was with me and they
• 50:48
  asked me if they did ask me if I wanted to keep the child or
• 50:51
  didn't want to keep the child. And they asked me if you know
• 50:59
  who it is? And I said a boy at school, my
• 51:02
  dad was sitting right there and, you know, and I was like, no, I
• 51:10
  didn't want to keep the child. And.
• 51:12
  And he was in the room physically when they were
• 51:15
  asking, so he was physically there.
• 51:18
  Well, they're still having you filled the form.
• 51:20
  Yes, Yeah. I don't know if it was because
• 51:30
  I, because I was underage. I was 14.
• 51:33
  So I, I mean, I don't, you know. So after after that, how much
• 51:42
  longer did the abuse go on for? I think it went on for like a
• 51:48
  year and then I started to set up for myself like I think what
• 51:57
  once after the so maybe like maybe not even quite a year,
• 52:01
  maybe like 6 or seven months or something after the abortion.
• 52:06
  And then I started to just like really stand up for myself.
• 52:10
  And he didn't like that. So before it was never, it was
• 52:15
  always sexual abuse. He never verbally abused me in a
• 52:20
  sense like, you know, spoken. But when I, when I started to
• 52:24
  stand up for myself, it became verbal and physical.
• 52:28
  So yeah. I mean, I know folks listening
• 52:32
  to your story are just like, our hearts are just like, you have
• 52:36
  been through the worst, I mean, the worst kinds of, you know,
• 52:40
  physical, sexual abuse, you know, abortion, all these things
• 52:45
  from a very young age. And here you are, you know,
• 52:48
  you're an accomplished author. You're married.
• 52:52
  You are just, I know your message is one of saying you can
• 52:57
  move on, you can heal, you can you can even forgive after such
• 53:02
  terrible trauma. So how did it go from the
• 53:05
  Josanne who's angry, who's now fighting, you know, physically
• 53:08
  fighting your dad, to within just a few years your world has
• 53:13
  gone 180? Well, I'm going to say this, you
• 53:20
  know, parents leave their kids inheritance and some people are
• 53:24
  fortunate to have homes and you know, physical inheritance.
• 53:29
  But if anything my grandmother left me was God regards to the
• 53:34
  situation. My grandmother took me to church
• 53:37
  when I was a little girl. I used to go to church a lot.
• 53:40
  I was aware of Jesus, I was aware of God, but I didn't know
• 53:44
  him as Lord of my life. I didn't know him.
• 53:47
  I didn't have a relationship. It was just a religious act.
• 53:50
  But there were seeds planted and my grandmother gave me the
• 53:53
  scripture, which is Psalms 27 that says the love, the Lord is
• 53:56
  my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear?
• 53:58
  Lord is the strength of my life. Whom shall I be afraid?
• 54:01
  But one part of that, that that chapter one, one part of the,
• 54:08
  the verse in that chapter says the Lord, even though my father
• 54:14
  and my mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me and I will
• 54:18
  see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
• 54:23
  And that was the first, you know, scripture that I had
• 54:31
  memorized. And my grandma told me to
• 54:33
  memorize that Scripture before I came to this country.
• 54:36
  And it was the only goal that I had in my pocket that I felt God
• 54:42
  used to change my life. Because even when me and my dad
• 54:47
  had that fight before I ran away from home, I wanted to take my
• 54:52
  dad's life. That's what it came down to.
• 54:55
  And that Scripture, as God would have it, came back up in my
• 55:00
  soul. That scripture saved not just my
• 55:03
  dad's life, but it saved mine. And I didn't know where I was
• 55:08
  running to. I just packed a suitcase and
• 55:11
  dragged it across the courtyard to a friend's house and, and
• 55:15
  just lived day by day, you know, with a, with, with a little hint
• 55:20
  of faith. Because sometimes we think we
• 55:22
  need to have a huge amount of faith, but sometimes it's just
• 55:25
  one step at a time. And my step was I need to finish
• 55:28
  high school. I need to finish high school.
• 55:30
  It was a goal of mine. And and I did and then it was
• 55:36
  college and you know, I've made some obviously some mistakes and
• 55:40
  some things along the way, a lot of bumps in the in the road, you
• 55:46
  know, because when you're in a situation like that, you start
• 55:49
  looking for love in the wrong places and the wrong faces and
• 55:52
  you realize, you come to a point.
• 55:54
  To answer your question, I realized that no one outside of
• 55:58
  God and outside of what needed to happen internal of myself was
• 56:04
  going to save me. Nothing, no one like I needed a
• 56:07
  greater source than human being or themes or money or fame or
• 56:13
  anything. I needed something higher.
• 56:16
  And I knew that in my life, there were little moments where
• 56:22
  I felt like I felt God, you know, a little glimpse of God
• 56:26
  that was there, but I knew there was something greater.
• 56:31
  And, and so, you know, to answer your question, I think from
• 56:38
  being broken enough and hitting the ground enough, seeking
• 56:44
  things outside of God and seeking things outside of the,
• 56:48
  the, the, the invisible things that really matter matters.
• 56:54
  I was like, OK, God, I, I, I, I surrender, I, I hand in my pain,
• 57:00
  I hand in my brokenness, I hand in my own wisdom, I hand in all
• 57:05
  these things to you. Here I am.
• 57:08
  And that was when I decided to, it was right after college and I
• 57:12
  moved out to LA because I wanted to pursue acting.
• 57:16
  And I was like, you know, I left an abusive boyfriend
• 57:20
  relationship wasn't physical necessarily, but it was
• 57:23
  definitely emotional abuse. And I came out to LA and I was
• 57:29
  just broken. And I knew I needed to find a
• 57:33
  church because I remember as a kid the the the greatest joy I
• 57:36
  had was in the church. And that day I went to church
• 57:42
  and the preacher spoke the gospel and I just knew that I
• 57:49
  was that woman at the well that needed living water.
• 57:52
  I knew that that everything else failed me.
• 57:56
  And I, you know, I gave my life to the Lord and God just changed
• 58:02
  me over time. It wasn't, you know, instant,
• 58:06
  but I, it was instant in the fact that I knew something
• 58:09
  happened in my heart for sure, but the manifestation of that I
• 58:15
  had to walk out and through prayer and being around people I
• 58:20
  call people are like trees, that people who are in God are like
• 58:23
  trees. They give off oxygen and life to
• 58:27
  me as a young girl. And, you know, going to prayer
• 58:30
  meetings like, you know, that's what beautiful honest shame is
• 58:34
  about. Also, it's about taking
• 58:36
  responsibility because we're not always in charge of how we come
• 58:41
  into the world. We have no saying in that.
• 58:44
  We just know we're here, but we definitely have, we are given
• 58:48
  power to how we go out of the world by our choices and taking
• 58:54
  responsibility. And I'm not saying it's easy,
• 58:56
  but I'm saying it's possible. And so, you know, I just started
• 59:01
  to like, really did not want to perpetuate what my mom went
• 59:06
  through and what my grandmother went through.
• 59:08
  And I was determined and intentional about living a
• 59:13
  different life and what I was going to accept and seeking
• 59:17
  restoration, you know, and that came from studying Scripture and
• 59:24
  reading the Word and putting myself in an environment that
• 59:28
  was going to feed my soul. And over the years, things just
• 59:32
  begin to change. My heart begin to change.
• 59:35
  And when I understood grace and forgiveness, which leads up to
• 59:41
  me eventually forgiving my dad because I realized that we are
• 59:47
  all born in sin and shape and iniquity and no one comes in
• 59:52
  this world perfect, you know, and, and it is God who's perfect
• 59:57
  and, but is God also who can make us into perfection.
• 1:00:02
  And so I, I started to be convicted not just about the
• 1:00:09
  sins that happened to me, but the sins that I also commit
• 1:00:14
  myself, you know, outside of my dad, right?
• 1:00:18
  Because, you know, and this is not a.
• 1:00:23
  And pray people understand this. It's not an insensitive like IA
• 1:00:27
  statement in the sense that I feel God is very close to the
• 1:00:32
  broken hearted and close to the fatherless and those who are,
• 1:00:38
  you know, there's no justice where there's injustice.
• 1:00:43
  There's so many scriptures that tells us that, but I also
• 1:00:49
  believe that in our trials and in our misfortunes and our
• 1:00:54
  tribulation that God is so powerful that he uses them to
• 1:01:00
  reveal identity in US. And we can use our situation
• 1:01:06
  that we've been through as a fortress where it keeps us in
• 1:01:10
  clothes and keep us in prison, or we can use it as a fuel that
• 1:01:16
  drives us to express and manifest the glory of God.
• 1:01:22
  And that's what really God did in my life was through those.
• 1:01:29
  It didn't happen overnight, but just daily of, of stumbling and
• 1:01:34
  getting up and, and and making choices with my life.
• 1:01:39
  I started to become transformed internally until what my dad did
• 1:01:47
  was no more a this, this, this thing that I filter my identity
• 1:01:54
  through and more of just an event that took place in my
• 1:01:58
  life. And there was a comma and a
• 1:02:00
  comma and a comma after that. It was not a period.
• 1:02:04
  You know, the, the, the, the 10 year old girl, the 14 year old
• 1:02:07
  girl that was in this abortion clinic was not a period.
• 1:02:11
  God had a comma, a continuation of life for me and and that just
• 1:02:17
  came through the Holy Spirit, through God just working in my
• 1:02:21
  life. And it's a it's a partnership,
• 1:02:23
  you know, it's a a Co labor, Co laboring of me and faith and and
• 1:02:31
  and walking that out. And I think that's accessible to
• 1:02:35
  every single person in the world, you know, And so I
• 1:02:40
  started to just really have more of a sensitivity and even seeing
• 1:02:45
  my eye, my myself through God's eyes and realizing that, no, my
• 1:02:50
  father, you know, my dad doesn't get a pass in the sense of no,
• 1:02:58
  God is not like, oh, I don't care about what he did, right.
• 1:03:03
  But I also see it from the sense of God sees sin, a sin.
• 1:03:14
  And when I started to see my old fallen nature, you know, some
• 1:03:20
  people commit murder, some people commit all these other
• 1:03:25
  acts. My dad decide that he was going
• 1:03:29
  to commit the act of molestation and rape.
• 1:03:33
  That was his thing, you know, that he didn't surrender to God,
• 1:03:39
  you know, and it, it just caused so much, so many damage down the
• 1:03:45
  line to everyone, you know, not just myself, my mom and my
• 1:03:49
  grandmother and the, the, the dysfunction of our family,
• 1:03:52
  right? And that's what sin does, right?
• 1:03:55
  It it, it's a constant became of.
• 1:03:58
  It doesn't stop until you stop it, you know?
• 1:04:03
  And it's also that that lie that our our sins don't have to
• 1:04:07
  affect other people, that they still do because they affect us,
• 1:04:11
  whether they're direct sins against somebody or even sins
• 1:04:14
  against ourself or sins in our mind, you know that it all does
• 1:04:18
  in the end affect us and others. Yes.
• 1:04:23
  And deteriorate, like you said, it causes that deterioration.
• 1:04:27
  So I mean, this is an incredible, in a way, rebirth.
• 1:04:31
  I mean certainly to be born again to see who God is had that
• 1:04:35
  discovery of grace for the first time, at least to it choose it.
• 1:04:40
  You know, say I want Jesus, I want you.
• 1:04:43
  I remember like different moments in my life that I would
• 1:04:46
  just say Jesus, I need you. I don't fully understand you or
• 1:04:49
  this or it doesn't you know, I don't have all the answers.
• 1:04:52
  That's part of the reason I need you because I don't I don't I
• 1:04:55
  don't understand. I know my limit, I know my sin,
• 1:04:58
  I know my need. So tell me how you got to the
• 1:05:01
  place where you're forgiving your father, because there's
• 1:05:03
  this incredibly powerful scene in your book, Beautiful.
• 1:05:09
  That is a story of you forgiving your dad.
• 1:05:13
  Well, you know, through my walk with God, I eventually, you
• 1:05:18
  know, just serving and walking the Lord I met, you know, an
• 1:05:24
  amazing man and in ministry and you know, we decided we were
• 1:05:33
  going to get married and you know, every girl's dream right
• 1:05:39
  is to have her dad walk her down the aisle.
• 1:05:41
  Well, at least majority of girls.
• 1:05:43
  I don't know. Some people might be like, no,
• 1:05:45
  but you know. Oh, and if it's a no, it's
• 1:05:48
  because there's probably some sort of neglect.
• 1:05:50
  Or problem or something. Yeah.
• 1:05:52
  It's because of sin, it's because of some brokenness, you
• 1:05:55
  know, in that relationship. So I, you know, I was planning
• 1:06:03
  this wedding and I didn't know that as I'm planning it, I'm
• 1:06:07
  like, you know, you need somebody walking down the right.
• 1:06:11
  Like, you know, it wasn't like a thought at the moment, but you
• 1:06:15
  know, I'd reach a point in my life where I prayed about
• 1:06:18
  everything, everything, especially huge decisions that
• 1:06:22
  I'm going to make with my life. I bring it before the Lord, and
• 1:06:27
  I had great men of God, brothers, you know, in Christ,
• 1:06:31
  fathers in Christ, that I could have asked.
• 1:06:35
  So it wasn't as if there were anyone I couldn't have asked.
• 1:06:38
  But I prayed about it. And the honest truth is, I
• 1:06:42
  thought God was gonna give me an answer of picking one of my
• 1:06:46
  brothers or fathers in Christ to give me away because I was just
• 1:06:54
  like, who should I pick? You know, my dad was not in the
• 1:06:58
  cards for me to be honest, you know?
• 1:07:01
  Were you still at this point? So it's been years since you had
• 1:07:04
  left his abuse. You weren't under his control
• 1:07:08
  anymore. You're grown.
• 1:07:09
  You're you're on the spiritual renewal journey.
• 1:07:11
  You are living your faith. You're, you know, doing your
• 1:07:14
  creative work in Los Angeles. You're meeting the love of your
• 1:07:16
  life. Were you in touch with your dad
• 1:07:19
  at all or had you had any communication with him?
• 1:07:21
  OK, so he's as far as you know the.
• 1:07:24
  Picture yeah like I I still had the phone number 'cause they
• 1:07:28
  lived at the same place I knew you know, I had cousins that I
• 1:07:32
  was still kind of close with to some level that I kind of knew
• 1:07:38
  here, you know there like hear things about him and things like
• 1:07:42
  that, but we weren't communicating as in like, hey,
• 1:07:45
  how are you like none of that so he you know, I went and I prayed
• 1:07:53
  about it and my the the answer that I heard was call your dad.
• 1:08:02
  I'm like, you know what? Let me pray again because this,
• 1:08:04
  this praying going. Through was the answer.
• 1:08:07
  Call your dad and ask him right away.
• 1:08:10
  Or just call your dad and there's unfinished work there, I
• 1:08:13
  mean. Well, it was, it was more like
• 1:08:15
  call your dad. And in my sense, when I heard
• 1:08:19
  Call Your Dad, I felt like, well, one, for sure closure, but
• 1:08:26
  two, it was like, call them and say what?
• 1:08:32
  Like I'm getting, you know, 'cause I was praying about who's
• 1:08:35
  going to walk me down the aisle. And that's the answer was call
• 1:08:38
  your dad, you know, and I, I just remember, you know, I've
• 1:08:49
  reached a point in my life to, you know, 'cause you know, we,
• 1:08:54
  we, we talk about things like that, people, it can come off
• 1:08:57
  like, oh, super spiritual. But what people have to
• 1:08:59
  understand is that all these revelation and things that I am
• 1:09:03
  talking about now took over a period of time.
• 1:09:07
  It wasn't something where I just woke up one day and was just
• 1:09:09
  like, you know, it took an investment in my spiritual life
• 1:09:16
  where you know, I, I had, I, I had nurtured a prayer life, you
• 1:09:22
  know, where I was waking up every morning, four o'clock 5:00
• 1:09:26
  in the morning, praying and reading and and seeking God's
• 1:09:30
  face and going on a fast. And like I was very at that
• 1:09:34
  place of being intentional about my spiritual disposition.
• 1:09:39
  So when I heard, because I felt like I knew God's voice when he
• 1:09:44
  was talking to me, call your dad.
• 1:09:47
  At first I was a little bit hesitant, and then it was almost
• 1:09:53
  like what I heard was, can you honor someone who's
• 1:10:01
  dishonorable? That was a question that was
• 1:10:05
  coming up to me because call my dad.
• 1:10:08
  My answer in my heart was why I don't me to call him.
• 1:10:13
  He doesn't deserve to be called. He's definitely not coming to my
• 1:10:17
  wedding. Like all of the things that
• 1:10:19
  you're going to innately feel, you know, But in my in my
• 1:10:25
  spirit, there was the other part that was saying, can you honor
• 1:10:33
  someone who is dishonorable? And so when I call my dad, I did
• 1:10:37
  make that phone call and it wasn't a happy phone call.
• 1:10:41
  Like, Hey, how are you? It wasn't one of those things.
• 1:10:46
  It was, it was more of a it was by like AI was almost like I was
• 1:10:56
  a robot, right? Like I would, I just picked up
• 1:10:58
  the phone and I was just dialed a number.
• 1:11:00
  And so I want to say like obedience.
• 1:11:04
  We don't always have to feel to do the right thing because we
• 1:11:09
  always feel like we need to feel happy to do the right thing or
• 1:11:17
  do the thing that we think God is calling us to do, you know?
• 1:11:21
  But when? And I think it's so powerful and
• 1:11:23
  important to make that distinction of like in the
• 1:11:25
  spiritual life. It's not just these random
• 1:11:28
  inspirations. I mean, it can definitely feel
• 1:11:30
  like a random inspiration, but it's, it's a, it's a practice of
• 1:11:33
  prayer and discernment. And you felt after your own
• 1:11:36
  prayer and discernment that you were supposed to call him and
• 1:11:39
  reconnect with him. But you know, how does this fit
• 1:11:42
  in? And obviously we want to hear
• 1:11:43
  about how that went and, and how it ended with that.
• 1:11:46
  How does this all connect with because you know, he's he
• 1:11:51
  abused, he was he, he committed horrible crimes against you and
• 1:11:55
  how what does it mean to forgive is really the question here.
• 1:11:59
  What does it mean to forgive him?
• 1:12:00
  Because it sounds like you were basically being asked to forgive
• 1:12:03
  ultimately. But what does forgiveness
• 1:12:06
  actually mean? Does it mean you have to invite
• 1:12:09
  him to your wedding or or can it mean something else not?
• 1:12:12
  Necessarily, I think every, and I must say this, I think every
• 1:12:15
  case is different. Every person situation is
• 1:12:18
  different and God is going to talk to you differently and,
• 1:12:20
  and, and treat a certain situation different.
• 1:12:23
  For me, it was important looking back on it because, you know, I,
• 1:12:29
  I called him and he did come 3, three days before my wedding and
• 1:12:34
  I was able to have a conversation.
• 1:12:35
  It was like a moment by moment thing with him.
• 1:12:37
  And it was the first time I ever confronted him about everything
• 1:12:40
  he had done to me as a child. And, and, you know, he showed,
• 1:12:46
  he showed remorse, you know, so. He acknowledged he acknowledged
• 1:12:52
  he. Acknowledged it.
• 1:12:54
  And, you know, I didn't know if I was going to still, you know,
• 1:12:58
  invite him to give me away. He was definitely going to come
• 1:13:01
  to the wedding. But I just remember we were
• 1:13:04
  sitting at a Cafe and, and, and I, I just felt like the Lord was
• 1:13:10
  like grace, extend grace and mercy to him And, and I
• 1:13:16
  understood. Going back to forgiveness, I
• 1:13:21
  think sometimes the the reason why we find it hard to forgive
• 1:13:25
  is because of how we look at sin and how we look at ourselves
• 1:13:31
  with forgiveness. Because, you know, like I shared
• 1:13:35
  earlier when I understood the cross and understood why God,
• 1:13:41
  Jesus Christ died for every person in this world, It's
• 1:13:46
  because of sin and forgiveness. Like, no, you know, everyone has
• 1:13:50
  fallen shorts sin and fall short of the glory of God.
• 1:13:53
  And when I understood forgiveness to the depth of
• 1:13:58
  myself, I was able to extend that to someone because I
• 1:14:02
  understood that even if my dad didn't abuse me and didn't
• 1:14:05
  didn't do the things he did, I would still need grace.
• 1:14:08
  I would still need God. I would still need forgiveness.
• 1:14:11
  I was not spotless. I still did things that was
• 1:14:14
  displeasing and to other people. You didn't rape anyone.
• 1:14:18
  Like, that's huge, you know, but when we compare the standard of
• 1:14:22
  God to the standard of our moral self, it's, you know, Scripture
• 1:14:27
  tell us that our righteousness is like filthy rats.
• 1:14:30
  You know, it's like we, we, we look at sin by by degrees, like,
• 1:14:36
  oh, you murdered. OK, well, I just told a lie.
• 1:14:38
  So I'm down here. I'm not as bad, you know, but
• 1:14:41
  the heart is desperately deceitful and desperately
• 1:14:44
  wicked. Who can know it?
• 1:14:46
  You know, you know, we even here in the Scriptures that if you,
• 1:14:51
  if you're angry at someone, it's like you, you kill them in your
• 1:14:54
  heart. You know, so God is not looking
• 1:14:56
  at just the manifestation of sin.
• 1:14:58
  He's looking also at the state of our heart.
• 1:15:01
  You know, and I understood that. Let me just say that to make it
• 1:15:05
  short, I understood that from a spiritual level in the moment
• 1:15:08
  that I asked my dad to come to my wedding and I was also being
• 1:15:13
  obedient. And it wasn't, it wasn't just I
• 1:15:17
  had a piece about it. There was a piece that I had
• 1:15:20
  about it and no one knew anything.
• 1:15:23
  They, I mean, until I did my play, everyone knew the story
• 1:15:26
  and they were just like, Oh my gosh, what?
• 1:15:29
  You know, But I invited him and to, to, to talk about what
• 1:15:34
  forgiveness is. Forgiveness to me is releasing,
• 1:15:47
  releasing the judgment, releasing the revenge, releasing
• 1:15:52
  the person from our soul that we hold on to over and over for
• 1:15:58
  what they did and handing that over to God and saying God, if
• 1:16:10
  we had to take it deeper, I am. I am extending what you have
• 1:16:13
  extended to me. Much is given, much is required.
• 1:16:17
  I'm extending what you extend to me.
• 1:16:20
  I don't. You don't have to feel it,
• 1:16:23
  because you're not going to always feel like doing it.
• 1:16:26
  But it's an actual choice. We have the choice to forgive
• 1:16:31
  and it doesn't come easy. Yes, it is a process.
• 1:16:35
  And when we do forgive, we're not just releasing the person,
• 1:16:39
  we're releasing our own selves as well from the torture of
• 1:16:44
  holding someone in our heart. So not only have that person
• 1:16:49
  violated you, what in in whatever way we constantly have
• 1:16:54
  them violate us in our soul over and over.
• 1:16:57
  Every minute we hold on to what they have done.
• 1:17:01
  It's a constant bondage and captivity.
• 1:17:05
  And when we forgive, we're saying, God, I trust you.
• 1:17:09
  I receive your forgiveness over everything I have done and I'm
• 1:17:14
  extending it to someone and I'm releasing them, but I'm also
• 1:17:17
  releasing myself and we allow God to move in that situation.
• 1:17:23
  Does that mean you got to invite the person to your wedding?
• 1:17:28
  No. Does that mean you, you, you
• 1:17:31
  might never, you know, for those who've been in, in the situation
• 1:17:34
  similar to me, you might never get the opportunity to meet your
• 1:17:40
  perpetrator, if I may say, and them saying they're sorry.
• 1:17:45
  How do you release that? How do you forgive that?
• 1:17:49
  It starts inside. It's, it's an internal seeking
• 1:17:53
  and a daily choice, you know, that we have to make.
• 1:17:58
  I make that choice still every day, you know, cuz I could find
• 1:18:01
  10. You know when someone sin
• 1:18:04
  against you and you, you look at your life, you can see the
• 1:18:08
  traces of their mistakes sometimes catches up into your
• 1:18:12
  life. You know, ways my dad didn't
• 1:18:16
  teach me how to what was true love, so I chose men who didn't
• 1:18:21
  love me. My, you know, there were certain
• 1:18:23
  things I didn't get from my dad, so I made a lot of mistakes and
• 1:18:27
  stumble along the way. And what do you have to say?
• 1:18:30
  I have one more question on this because I mean, it's just
• 1:18:34
  incredibly powerful that and it's a forgiveness that, you
• 1:18:38
  know, God gave you the grace for.
• 1:18:40
  It's just beautiful that you were able to do that.
• 1:18:43
  And it's just, it's a very different message than I think
• 1:18:46
  we're used to hearing because, you know, sexual violence and
• 1:18:49
  abuse and harassment. It's just such a, you know,
• 1:18:52
  epidemic today. They say one out of every nine
• 1:18:55
  girls, you know, underage girls are abused by an adult.
• 1:19:00
  It's about one out of every 40 or 50 boys.
• 1:19:02
  And it's just, it's so many people are, are living with
• 1:19:06
  this. And there's a lot of talk about
• 1:19:09
  boundaries, which I think is very important, you know,
• 1:19:12
  because in cycles of abuse, sometimes that is perpetuated by
• 1:19:16
  the inability, especially for women who blame themselves to
• 1:19:19
  have the boundaries to, to try to leave an abusive situation.
• 1:19:23
  That's can be really, really hard to do sometimes even feel
• 1:19:26
  impossible based on circumstances.
• 1:19:29
  But how do you how do you define and I know you said already it,
• 1:19:34
  it depends case by case. You know, you had that grace and
• 1:19:37
  you had that calling you felt from God to specifically forgive
• 1:19:40
  your father in that way. Have them at your wedding.
• 1:19:43
  But what would you say to someone listening who has been
• 1:19:47
  told maybe they're out of their abusive situation.
• 1:19:49
  Thanks, thank God and maybe in their heart they forgive their
• 1:19:52
  abuser. You know, they're they're
• 1:19:54
  working on that, but they also want boundaries.
• 1:19:59
  They don't want to have that abuser in their life anymore.
• 1:20:01
  They're trying to walk a separate path.
• 1:20:05
  Can you talk about the forgiveness that includes
• 1:20:07
  boundaries or how you see those two things?
• 1:20:11
  Well, it's wonderful you ask that question because even
• 1:20:15
  though I forgave my dad, I still have boundaries.
• 1:20:18
  I mean, you know, after he came to my wedding and he laughed, I
• 1:20:24
  tried to kind of continue a relationship with him and, and
• 1:20:28
  you know, he was kind of a little bit disrespectful, you
• 1:20:32
  know, to me, to my, you know, spouse.
• 1:20:36
  And, and then God was like, you did what I asked you to do.
• 1:20:41
  You don't need to continue this relationship.
• 1:20:43
  You don't need to, you know, so to answer your question, God is
• 1:20:52
  so gentle and he cares about, yes, he cares about us for, you
• 1:20:59
  know, forgiveness is in some way for yourself as well, you know,
• 1:21:03
  So he wants us to forgive so that we can heal and so that we
• 1:21:06
  can live fruitful lives and not be taken captive by the
• 1:21:12
  situation. And the boundaries are out of
• 1:21:15
  love and protection. So, you know, God doesn't want
• 1:21:20
  us to put ourselves in harm's way, whether it's emotionally,
• 1:21:23
  physically, verbally, sexually, he we can forgive and still keep
• 1:21:27
  a distance. We can forgive and, and, and
• 1:21:32
  don't feel like we have to call that person.
• 1:21:34
  You know, it doesn't mean we have to have relationship.
• 1:21:38
  Forgiveness doesn't give the license to for someone else, you
• 1:21:42
  know, someone who's abused you to enter through your life.
• 1:21:45
  Forgiveness is a release of that person from our soul in order
• 1:21:49
  that we can have our life to continue in an abundant way.
• 1:21:53
  You know, so it is great and and boundaries is an act of love.
• 1:21:58
  You know, that's something that I'm even learning more in this
• 1:22:01
  season outside of the situation that when we set boundaries for
• 1:22:04
  people and situations in our life, it's us also knowing that
• 1:22:10
  we are daughters of the King and the King wants us to be
• 1:22:13
  protected and for us to guard our hearts, you know, which is
• 1:22:17
  the wellspring of life. So I would encourage anyone to
• 1:22:20
  set those boundaries that you are comfortable with and that
• 1:22:24
  keeps you safe and that keeps you productive and live a
• 1:22:27
  fruitful life moving forward. You not talking to the person
• 1:22:31
  who abuse you doesn't mean that you didn't forgive them.
• 1:22:34
  It means that you are being wise and you are setting these
• 1:22:39
  boundaries so that you can live a life of abundance in God.
• 1:22:45
  That's beautiful. That's a very powerful
• 1:22:48
  distinction. And I think back to what you
• 1:22:49
  were saying earlier about prayer.
• 1:22:51
  You know, for a person of prayer who's studying God's Word, who's
• 1:22:54
  studying God's calling and the way he wants us to live, we can
• 1:22:59
  be more sensitive to those special, you know, acts of love
• 1:23:02
  or forgiveness he wants us to do and how to do them.
• 1:23:06
  But I think that's, that's very powerful to talk about how
• 1:23:08
  forgiveness and boundaries actually go together, because
• 1:23:11
  boundaries are not just about loving and protecting yourself.
• 1:23:13
  They're also about preventing someone else from enabling them
• 1:23:18
  or giving them permission or giving them space to harm, you
• 1:23:21
  know, and then that's, that's, that's, you know, giving them
• 1:23:24
  space to sin. And you're saying, no, you're
• 1:23:26
  not, you don't have that space here.
• 1:23:28
  You know, that's, that's not permitted in my home.
• 1:23:30
  That's not permitted in my life, and so it's an act of love for
• 1:23:34
  others too, to set to set those boundaries.
• 1:23:37
  Yes. You're, you've traveled the
• 1:23:40
  country giving, you're telling your story.
• 1:23:43
  You gave a Ted talk, you wrote your book and using spoken word,
• 1:23:49
  you actually have dramatized and told the story, stories from
• 1:23:52
  your life. You've used art in this.
• 1:23:55
  And that's how I became aware of your story.
• 1:23:56
  You've used art, your creativity, in this beautiful
• 1:24:00
  way. I'd love.
• 1:24:02
  I know we've been talking a while now and I so appreciate
• 1:24:04
  the time. I'd love to close this out with
• 1:24:06
  your thoughts on the power of art and words and using what you
• 1:24:11
  know, your gifts of acting, to tell stories that educate but
• 1:24:18
  that also inspire people to to to be able to forgive and to be
• 1:24:22
  able to have faith. I think art is a great medium
• 1:24:27
  because people use it a lot to it communicates art is Insp it
• 1:24:33
  you know, as an actress, one of the the the saying that they
• 1:24:36
  define acting as is living under imaginary circumstances, right
• 1:24:43
  life under imaginary circumstances.
• 1:24:45
  And it's, it's, it, it reflects as an artist, Nina Simone said
• 1:24:53
  this an artist is here to reflect the signs of the time.
• 1:24:57
  And so I believe God gave me this gift, these gifts and my
• 1:25:02
  I'm reflecting the signs of the time where we're living in a
• 1:25:07
  time where women are taking advantage of more than, you
• 1:25:11
  know, ever before in the sense of, I mean, rape and all these
• 1:25:17
  things were happening. We had it from the book of
• 1:25:20
  Genesis. Like, you know, it's not new,
• 1:25:24
  but we're more vocal about it now.
• 1:25:27
  Let me say that in our society, and I feel like the greatest
• 1:25:32
  artist is God. We see it in the expression of
• 1:25:35
  the world. We see that we are his poema,
• 1:25:38
  his poem. And we, you know, for me as an
• 1:25:42
  artist, I want to express God's heart, heart in art.
• 1:25:48
  And so that was like a tongue twister.
• 1:25:54
  And you know, so for me, I, I, I love, I think it's a great way
• 1:26:00
  to tell stories. I think Jesus was the greatest
• 1:26:02
  storyteller and he told parables and things that communicate in
• 1:26:07
  his time what he wanted people to understand.
• 1:26:12
  And so I use poetry and I use acting to do that in my art as
• 1:26:17
  well as writing so that I can communicate, you know, hopefully
• 1:26:21
  communicate God's heart to someone else.
• 1:26:25
  So. I love it.
• 1:26:27
  And last question, thanks for letting this go so long.
• 1:26:32
  For people who are listening, especially if there's a woman
• 1:26:35
  listening, maybe a man, but woman, a girl listening who has
• 1:26:39
  been a survivor of abuse. And you know, I'm sure
• 1:26:42
  listening, there's a lot that in your story they may relate to or
• 1:26:45
  just are inspired by. What would be some words you
• 1:26:48
  might have so many of the words already are for, for, for them.
• 1:26:52
  But what? What would be some final words
• 1:26:55
  you'd have for someone who maybe is still wrestling with that
• 1:26:58
  part of their story, but they don't want to be defined by it?
• 1:27:07
  The main word that comes to me, two words that comes to me right
• 1:27:11
  now is grace and gentleness. That one of the things that I
• 1:27:21
  have discovered about God is that God is gentle and He cares
• 1:27:33
  about the tiniest little thing that affects our heart.
• 1:27:40
  That He doesn't expect us to know the big picture overnight.
• 1:27:50
  What He does desire is that we take steps with him, little
• 1:28:01
  steps. I love the scripture that said
• 1:28:04
  is you have faith as small as a mustard seed.
• 1:28:07
  You will move mountains. He didn't say big faith.
• 1:28:11
  He says you just need this, just this little bit because I am, I
• 1:28:16
  am that I am. I am the big thing.
• 1:28:19
  I am the thing that's going to take your nothing and make it
• 1:28:22
  into something. I am the extraordinary that that
• 1:28:26
  takes your ordinary and make it into something magnificent.
• 1:28:29
  And if we just put a little bit of faith, if you put a little
• 1:28:34
  bit of faith in God and say I give you my pain, I give you my
• 1:28:40
  brokenness, I give you my sadness, I give you, I give you
• 1:28:45
  my anger, I give you all these things, what we'll realize that
• 1:28:52
  God is close to the broken hearted.
• 1:28:59
  God is close to the broken hearted.
• 1:29:03
  And, and with this, Psalms 139 says, where can you go for my
• 1:29:14
  spirit? Where can you flee from my
• 1:29:17
  presence? If you are in the dark, I am
• 1:29:22
  there. When you wake up, I am there.
• 1:29:27
  If you're out in the middle of the sea, I am there.
• 1:29:31
  That even in your darkest moment, God is there.
• 1:29:38
  And that's the little seed of faith.
• 1:29:40
  And that will take you a long way.
• 1:29:43
  So I would just encourage that you are made an image of God,
• 1:29:47
  which is the image of love, and that a Father loves.
• 1:29:52
  You might not have a father, the earthly father that you feel
• 1:29:55
  loved you, but you have a heavenly Father that love
• 1:30:01
  outweighs so many things. He says the thought of you is
• 1:30:05
  more than the grain of sand on the sea.
• 1:30:11
  I don't know about you, but there's a whole lot of thoughts
• 1:30:13
  that you cannot count and they are wonderful.
• 1:30:17
  So I just encourage you, whoever is listening, that God is
• 1:30:23
  gentle, loving, and there's grace for you no matter what
• 1:30:30
  you're going through. Beautiful.
• 1:30:35
  Thank you, Josanne. You are amazing.
• 1:30:38
  It's been an honor to talk to you.
• 1:30:41
  Thanks for sharing your heart, your story.
• 1:30:45
  You're awesome. Thank you.
• 1:30:51
  Thanks so much for joining this episode of the Lila Rose Show.
• 1:30:54
  If you enjoyed it, if you liked it, please share it with your
• 1:30:57
  friends and family. This will help the podcast reach
• 1:31:00
  more people. You can also leave it a review
• 1:31:03
  on Apple and give it five stars. That will also help it reach
• 1:31:06
  more people. And as always, I love to hear
• 1:31:08
  your feedback or thoughts. You can send them to
• 1:31:10
  thoughts@lilaroseshow.com. I also am on Instagram and I
• 1:31:14
  love to respond to direct messages there sometimes not
• 1:31:17
  able to get to them all. So the thoughts at
• 1:31:18
  lilaroseshow.com is a great place.
• 1:31:21
  Because I do read all of those. Emails.
• 1:31:23
  Thank you all so much and have a wonderful rest of your week and
• 1:31:26
  I'll see you back next week.