In 2009, I started sharing my story about my struggle with porn addiction.
I did so anonymously at first because I didn’t want to deal with people knowing this was my story. I felt like I was the only woman in that world who had this struggle. No one needed to hear my story. No one cared.
In late 2010, I stood in a room at a conference in Canada. I was leading a breakout session for women on the topic of lust and the room was packed. Every chair was full, women stood around the room, and some even sat on the floor near where I was speaking. The experience was surreal and watching God move in that room, I felt like I had a choice.
I could walk away. I could pursue my dreams of a career in medicine or missions. The “normal” life I had always wanted. Or, I could step into what God wanted to do with my story.
I refer to it as my “Esther moment.”
If you aren’t familiar, in the Bible there is a story of Esther. She is a Jewish orphan in captivity in Persia being raised by her relative, Mordecai. She becomes the queen essentially through sex trafficking. In time, one of the king’s advisors, Haman, took issue with Mordecai and decided to concoct a plan to annihilate the Jews. Mordecai finds out and pleads to Esther to go to the king on their behalf to save the Jews. Esther is hesitant because attempting to go to the king could result in her death.
Mordecai, in response, issues a rather ominous threatening message (I summarize):
Don’t you dare think that staying silent is going to save your skin. If you don’t do something, God will bring deliverance from somewhere else, and you will not be spared.
“And who knows if perhaps you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”
We love that last little bit. We put it on coffee mugs and get all inspired, but the first part of Mordecai’s response was what spoke to me (perhaps minus the ominous threat).
Make no mistake, God will bring deliverance.
I realized, sitting outside of that breakout room in December 2010, that I had a choice. I could stay silent and keep moving on with my life, or I could be a part of what God was doing.
As I wrapped up the session, a nun came up to me, wrapped me in a hug and whispered in my ear, “Thank you. I thought I was alone.”
How could I walk away when I knew other women struggled and I knew how to get out? How could I just walk away and leave them there?
So began this journey of publicly sharing my story.
Someone recently asked me what the hardest part is about sharing my story.
I have to say, over the years, as I have grown and matured, that has changed.
Initially, it was very much a fear of people knowing and judging me for it. I wanted to be Jessica. I didn’t want to be the girl who talked about porn. I feel like that’s the least interesting thing about me yet one that would cause people to make blanket judgements about my character and value.
To be clear, this is still an issue. People are still judgmental, and shame is alive and well.
In 2016, I put my story on paper for the first time in my book Beggar’s Daughter.
The hardest part of writing that book was reliving some of the more painful moments. I don’t think any of us enjoys rehashing pain and reading through old journals and trying to put those darker days on paper was NOT fun. Writing that book began a very raw and dark part of my own journey.
I truly believed writing that book would be the end of me.
The end of all of my hopes and dreams for marriage. The only reason I had the confidence to write it when I did was because the man I was dating at the time supported it. A month before I finished, he revealed he had been seeing someone else for the past three months of our relationship. I was devastated.
In April 2016, I stood on a stage, sharing my story, fully believing this was my last chance at any kind of change. For years, I had met resistance from the church. Churches, magazines, and ministries did not want to talk about this. They felt it wasn’t that important and wasn’t that big of a deal.
So, when Josh McDowell asked me to speak at a pastor’s conference. I accepted, realizing it might be my only opportunity to get them to listen, and if I was going down, I would go down swinging.
Before I stepped onto the stage, the woman who was escorting me around prayed for me and she said, “You have been called for such a time as this.”
And it honestly felt like another Esther moment. Not in a “I’m going to save the world” kind of way but in a “this could very well kill me.” That presentation on the stage set off a whirlwind of activity. Speaking requests poured in and, while working full-time in accounting, I began to travel and speak on the weekends. In early 2017, I had over 20 speaking engagements around the world. That summer, I went to Australia and New Zealand.
By the end of that summer, I was completely hallowed out and exhausted. I remember standing in a hotel room in Australia (sounds so glamorous, right?) in tears. I stared at the empty bed and said, “God, I can’t keep doing this. If this is what you want for me, something has to give. Something has to break because I can’t go on like this.” I felt abandoned, exploited, and alone.
I went on to New Zealand where I literally had a nervous breakdown at my last speaking engagement there. I made it back home and believe, looking back, I was in a state of depression. I never wanted to write or speak ever again, wanted to leave the community I had and go hide somewhere. I felt so vulnerable and wounded.
I began to question if God was exploiting me.
How could this be fair and good? Dragging me all over the world, making me share my most intimate struggles with complete strangers. I sat there as a group of counseling students picked apart my story and put labels on the different pieces. “Isn’t it interesting that she (she being me, who was sitting right there) said this and such. Don’t you think that qualifies as {insert psychological term}?” I had been interrogated and analyzed by counseling students like I was some corpse on a table.
And, if I’m honest, I think that is a running theme throughout my journey. That’s perhaps the hardest part.
How do I let God use my story without me feeling used?
The most recent time this happened was in early 2019 while speaking in Singapore. I was newly pregnant with our first child and had flown to Singapore on my own. Hours after landing, I began to bleed heavily.
I shared my story on the stage of a church in Singapore all the while believing I was losing my baby. God, how could you do this to me? I’m doing what you asked! How could you take my baby here, of all places?
I spent the afternoon in the ER in a foreign country watching as my escort texted everyone in her prayer chain about the pregnant speaker she had who was bleeding. For someone who is very private, this just added to the humiliation and pain of that experience. When all was said and done, the baby was fine. The bleeding was unexplained and I carried her to term but that experience bothered me for quite a while. When we nearly lost her again in a traumatic birth, I began to wonder if God just enjoyed toying with me.
So I would say the hardest part of me is to remember God doesn’t just intend good things for my story; He intends good things for me.
I think sometimes we Christians are guilty of separating the story from the person.
If I had to pick a second hardest thing it’s dealing with people who feel they have a right to my story. I’ve noticed the times I’ve felt most exploited and weary haven’t been because of something God did but because of other people. This is also something I still have to contend with even now. I’ll write a follow up post to this one about boundaries when sharing.
But for now, I want to share what has helped me in those moments, and this, again, is a lesson I am still learning now.
How can I remember God wants good things for me, not just “my story”?
- I remember who God is. It is against God’s nature to exploit us. He is kind, loving, and good. He is not malevolent, manipulative, ill-tempered, and unjust. When we are encouraged to present our bodies a living sacrifice in Romans 12, that is not implying serving God must be miserable or that misery is proof of Christian service.
- I remember that my story did not start and end with pornography addiction. Like I said before, I feel like that is the least interesting thing about me. So, it has been very helpful for me to realize that struggle is simply part of my story. It is not my whole story. It is not the most interesting part of my story, and when I frame it like that, it helps protect me from people who want to exploit it. It helps me share the greater story of God’s grace in my life which is always life-giving and redemptive.
Like this:
It was so hard for me to write my book because I truly believed if I put my story of pornography addiction out there no man would ever want me. What man would want to be associated with me? So, for years, I did not write out that part of my story. When I finally did, it was because I had a boyfriend who seemed very supportive, and I had a conference coming up where I felt it would be helpful to have my story written out for people to read.
As I finished the book, my boyfriend revealed he had been seeing someone else for three months and he was basically picking her. I was so heartbroken I became physically ill and called off work. I finished the book, but I struggled to believe God had anything good left for me. My dreams of marriage and motherhood were over. I would forever be the circus freakshow who struggled with pornography. That’s what it felt like.
A year later, a man ordered my book. Four months after ordering it, he finally read it. To hear him tell it, he read it, felt drawn to the voice of redemption and healing in the book, and prayed about how to proceed. He found out we lived near each other, so he reached out, asking for a box of books and to get to know me better.
It took a lot of convincing on his part, but we eventually met in person. We married less than a year later.
So, when I start to question God’s goodness, I remember that some of the sweetest evidences of grace in my life came from those places that felt too broken to redeem.
I remember that’s who God is. He is a God who steps into our stories, disrupts our stories, and redeems our stories.
