It has been awhile since Charlie and I have shared on the blog. Life has been busy and we have had a couple wrenches thrown into our plans lately, but God is faithful and although His plans are not always what we want, they are always good and ultimately better than anything we can imagine for ourselves.

The last two Sundays, Charlie and I were given the privilege to share our testimonies at church. We shared them as a means of introducing a new ministry that will be starting at the church we attend in Marcell. Life Recovery is a Christian 12 Step Ministry that helps bring hope to the hurting and allows those who are recovering to share hope with others. Charlie and I can both testify to the hope and healing that comes through a relationship with Jesus Christ. We have decided to share our testimonies here on the blog. Our stories are a tiny glimpse of the transformation that can occur through faith in Jesus Christ and the grace that He has shown us in our brokenness.

My testimony is below and Charlie’s will be shared in the coming week. To God be the Glory!

I was born to unmarried, young parents. My mom was sixteen and my dad was twenty. My upbringing was very unpredictable, as my dad was an alcoholic and a drug dealer and could be very violent. We were poor and lived in low-income housing or with my grandparents most of my younger years. My only exposure to church or God were the few occasions we went to the Catholic Church with my grandma. I enjoyed attending church then, but was confused by what I thought of as the “rituals” and felt awkward and out of place. My dad was an atheist and wanted nothing to do with the church of his upbringing. My mom had been baptized and confirmed, but no longer attended church or ever spoke of God, so my exposure to God was very limited. I was never baptized or dedicated as an infant and had no understanding of the true meaning of such holidays as Christmas and Easter.

I was a perfectionist and struggled with enormous anxiety in my preteens. I struggled with an eating disorder and depression. My freshman year of high school I began to rebel and started skipping school and refusing to get out of bed. Soon after, I discovered alcohol and believed that it was my solution to the overwhelming social anxiety I struggled with. I quickly became addicted to alcohol and drugs and went from being a straight A student to dropping out of school my sophomore year. I left home and moved in with my drug-dealing boyfriend and his family. I started working in bars and hanging out with people who would support my habit. I was extremely depressed and full of guilt and shame for the way I was living and attempted suicide on two occasions. I had no God in my life, but would pray in moments of desperation for God to let me die.

I went through my first addiction treatment program at the age of sixteen and again at eighteen, but never took sobriety seriously. I was given a moment of clarity when on July 4, 1995, I left a family picnic driving drunk and rolled my car off a dirt road onto the front yard of someone’s home. I was so drunk that I did not realize that my car was upside down until after I had crawled out of the side window and stood up and looked back. It was the middle of the day and all around me were children in their yards. They just stood staring at me. I escaped with no legal consequences or serious personal injuries, but the reality of how close I had come to killing one of those children has never left me. I enrolled in my third and final treatment program soon after and finally found lasting sobriety. By the grace of God, I have been sober since July 24, 1996.

I became active in AA, but struggled with the God concept and clung to the idea of a God of my own understanding. I met and married my ex-husband who was also in AA after I became pregnant with my first child. We were married for twelve years and God blessed us with two children, Al and Sam. We struggled in many areas throughout our marriage and divorced. I have come to understand that without Jesus at the center of a marriage, it is almost impossible to endure the storms of life. My children are my greatest gifts. They have taught me more about life and love than I ever imagined possible.

Even in my sobriety, I did not know Jesus and struggled with anxiety and depression and control issues. In August, 2004, my mom died unexpectedly from complications of diabetes. Losing my mom was extremely hard for me. She was living in California and I had only seen her once in the two years prior to her death. I had never heard her speak of God and the reality of death and not knowing where she was going hit me. I knew that I wanted to know what I believed, and I wanted others to know, as well. I started attending a church in Savage in August of 2004 during a sermon series based on the book The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. The sermon series impacted me and the Holy Spirit was softening my heart. On Good Friday, 2005, I attended a service which reenacted the crucifixion of Christ. It was then I finally came to understand that Jesus died on the Cross for me and the forgiveness of my sins. I accepted Christ that night and wept for hours in the freedom I experienced.

I have walked with Christ ever since. I became very active in my church. I served in Children’s Ministry, Prayer Ministry, Worship Team and attended many Bible Studies. Most importantly, I came to know God personally through prayer and Bible reading. My church family became my brothers and sisters and God blessed me through those relationships tremendously. I experienced a new freedom and a new happiness that only comes through faith in Christ.

In 2014, I felt God pulling me in a new direction – to a new church. I did not understand why and I fought it for quite a while, but I began to feel more and more disconnected from God in my disobedience. That June, I moved to a new church and while singing in the choir, I met Charlie Hazzard, who I married on June 12, 2015! Our God is a God of second chances and he has blessed me with a man who loves the Lord, and I am so grateful to walk with my husband in Christ. Our blended family has a total of five sons and two male dogs! I am eagerly awaiting the addition of a new daughter-in-law! Finally another girl! (

In my 22 years of sobriety, I have grown so much by sharing in joys and struggles with others. I have stayed active in 12 Step Groups, including both AA and Celebrate Recovery. God has set me free from my addiction to alcohol and drugs, but I still struggle with ongoing anxiety, depression, and control issues. I am always growing and learning how to deal with these strongholds and through faith in Christ, I have been given tools in the Word of God, the 12 Steps, and fellowship with other believers. Charlie and I are passionate about sharing the freedom we have found in Christ with others. We hope to start a Life Recovery Group in the near future and provide a space for others who want to break free from sin habits and become all that God has created them to be!

My Life Verse:

For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. 2 Timothy 1:7

I love this verse because I spent so many years of my life walking in fear and darkness and feeling like I had no way out. Christ found me and He saved me. I am a new creation in Christ. There are still moments when I struggle with fear, but I am no longer alone. I am the child of a loving God who will never leave or forsake me. Everyone has this hope in Christ! No matter where you have been or what you have done, it is never too late for a new beginning.

Have you ever been ANGRY?

Have you ever been upset?

If you answered yes, this is the blog post you don’t want to miss!

I have talked about some of my past with you. I have talked a little bit about what its like to become an autism step dad. I want to tell my story. I want you, the reader, to see through my eyes, to feel what I feel and to know what I know. BUT… that’s not exactly possible, is it? 

I got a call from my brother shortly after my last post about our father locking me in the basement as his form of “rehabilitation”. I don’t remember my brothers exact words but it was something like this: “So, I wasn’t the only one to survive those childhood traumas?” This got me thinking this morning about how everyone has a time of trauma in life, some are more severe than others and some are so severe we can never actually get past them, but everyone has a story to tell.

As I grew up, my father was a major source of constant childhood trauma, the beatings, the verbal abuse, the work-load… it was good and bad growing up. I wanted a “normal life”,  but what is normal anyway? Normal is what we see as common. Normal is what we see on the other side of the fence… Normal is fantasy… or is it? Is it really fantasy? 

Organized hoarding, that’s how it started.

Before we continue, I want to clear the air, set the stage and paint the picture for you. There is a difference between hoarding houses and trash houses. Hoarding can become trashy (as in my childhood home) but they start very organized, categorized and arranged. What you are about to read was not, at its core, saved pizza boxes and dog poop. It was stuff! Bought for the sole reason that it actually has value.

The day started as a normal day. My brothers and sisters woke as normal. We ate our day-old oatmeal, carved out of the big pot that was left on the stove. We found joy in having food, yet again, it wasn’t much, just cold, congealed oatmeal stuck in an aluminum pot, sitting on the one open burner. The same stove that had a small path in front of it. This path was cutting its way through the house like a snake in the tall grass of a forest. We had no more access to the kitchen sink. We had been washing dishes in the bathroom sink next to the toilet which was usually plugged and in need of the plunger. Our kitchen had become another holding area to dads “stuff”. The dinette was filled from ceiling to floor. A foot path leading from the dinette, though the formal dinning room and across our “spacious” living-room to the front door. This path was only used for accessing the mailbox.  The front door was also blocked and hadn’t been opened in years. The mail slot went from outside to inside the house. Situated near the end of the path was a spot where I could sneak away and hide from my “normal”…. a hiding place, a void in the collection that dad didn’t know about. If you knew where to look and could crawl on your belly, it was a hole into a mysterious land of safety from the pain we kids all felt. I didn’t go there often. I guess I didn’t want it to be “discovered” and filled with more stuff. Our bathroom had also come to the same fate as our kitchen. It was a great place to store more stuff, leaving a small space in front of the toilet and sink, but totally blocking the bathtub and vanity. The sheet draped across the unusable door was our only privacy, but it was better than nothing, maybe. The attached garage hadn’t been entered in years, blocked by the back door that barely opened now. The entryway was also access to the basement.  By the time I entered the 9th grade, I was bathing in the basement laundry tub. Avoiding the sewer rats that would frequent the home from the open sewer pipe in the basement, which made it easier for dad to clear the plugged pipes. The old ringer style washer stood next to the laundry tub and allowed me some stable hand holds to climb into the laundry tub for my bathing. I would usually wash my cloths while I bathed in the laundry tub. Looking for a safe place to set my feet as I climbed out. The two concrete laundry tub configuration That dad fixed the plugged pipe by knocking it out of the way…. It drained well now, onto the floor. This house wasn’t some dramatic scene from a tv show. It was my home! It was my normal! I was embarrassed. I was defeated. I was learning how to handle traumatic life everyday. God grew me where I was. God gave me strength to overcome and not quit. God was there when I didn’t really know who He was.

Overcoming. Is that what life is about? Taking your knocks and not giving in? In many ways, God was preparing me for this very day, today… March of 2019. I am reminded to not give up, to not quit, to keep going… because our God is bigger than our problems. Becoming an autism step dad is a challenge. It’s not all roses. It’s not all fun. Don’t get me wrong, it has its rewards… many rewards, but it also comes with its challenges. Challenges of the mind, body and spirit. Challenges that some may never know and yet others know all too well. For me the challenges are foreign, but for Jess it’s just normal. For me, things need to make sense, for Jess it’s just normal. For me things need to be fixed, for Jess things are just normal. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying Jess is just sitting back, taking things as normal. What I am saying is that Jess has adapted, learned and overcome (or should I say “discovered contentment”). Sometimes the emotions come back from when I was still in my old house as a child, learning how to manage life. Learning that all things do not make sense. Learning that order can look different to others. When you look at my tool box, unless you know what to look for, it looks “dis-ordered”,  but to me, I can see order (not as much as I would like), but its ordered in many ways. When I look at Autism, I don’t see this order. I see random chaos. I see confusion. I see something that needs to be fixed… BUT…. the reality is, it’s not broken, dis-ordered or chaotic…. it’s normal! It makes perfect sense and the reality is, the deficiency is found in my perception of the situation. Don’t get me wrong, I do see clearly to know there must be some controls put into place for health, safety, well being and so on. BUT!!!! It’s not totally my perception that is right. Where sometimes I see no “segue” … Al moves from one scene of his life to another, seamlessly. I get confused and loose track of his fluid connections. It’s a new world, a new way of seeing life, a way I never knew existed.

I told you in the beginning of the blog post you should read it… IF you have ever been angry, well… stay tuned.

Jess says I have incredible patience with Al. In someways I don’t feel patient, and Al knows. He can tell when I’m worn thin. He can tell when I feel like “butter spread over too much toast”. How is it I could ever be considered to be the least bit patient? I’m not good at waiting. I’m no good at sitting around. I AM THE LEAST PATIENT PERSON I KNOW! And yet, my loving bride encourages me with edifying words to build me up, not bring me low. How is it I have come to deserve this woman? How is it she can see such good in a man with the past I have? It’s simple. She is forgiven and in that forgiveness from God, she has grace for me. She can see the good because she has received good and she now overflows with that same grace from God.

Growing up, all I ever saw was an angry father, yelling, screaming, blaming, profane words like I have never heard elsewhere (I was in the NAVY), and name calling…. OHH THE NAMES!! Every racial slur, demeaning terms for women…. stereotypes….if it’s PC now, he violated it then. My father was anything but PC and likely the number one violator of the new “PC WORLD”. I still feel that learned response at times. That unrestrained emotion that leads so many people to hurt others. I don’t let it control me. I wont! Camping there is deadly to self. It takes practice, control and mostly, it takes GRACE. The Grace that God shows us everyday. Autism is difficult. Autism is different. Autism is normal. 

Being angry is a decision to react to the environment in a way that is damaging to self. Choose to find joy, when Its difficult… keep choosing and don’t give in. I’m not saying its easy, just possible.