Ep. 20- Becky's Story Revisited

Co-host Tiffany and special guest co-host, Beckie Hennessy, sit down with Becky, host of the Rise up Restored podcast, to revisit her story that she shared in the first episode. 

Becky loves traveling and road trips, reading, art, movies, and LOVES music.  She is almost finished with her Master’s degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling and feels so very called by God in her work as a counselor.  Becky has been married for 20 years and is the mother of three teenage warrior daughters. 

Becky says she grew up in a very religious home where she tried hard to check all the boxes and please her parents but did not feel she had a strong relationship with God.

She shares that she met her husband in Driver’s Ed in high school. After a year of dating, he trusted her enough to tell her that he struggled with pornography. Even though she knew about this problem, she didn’t understand at the time how much it would eventually affect their lives. They continued to date and, after he served a mission for their church, they got engaged and married 7 weeks later.  

We were told by clergy to just get married and the porn problem will be resolved.

But it did not resolve.  Becky says things only got worse. Soon, her husband would take the car and be gone all day, acting out. She shares that she had no idea where he was or what he was doing.

It was almost like I was more lonely after marriage than before.

Becky shares that even though her husband was always honest with her about what he had been doing, she felt helpless, hopeless, and very alone. They would go to clergy to ask for support, but she says the advice to “just be nicer to him,” “smile more,” “put on more makeup,” and “have more sex” made things worse for Becky.

Becky says that because her foundation with God was more cultural and not internally very strong, she became angry and hopeless in her relationship with God and stopped attending her church. 

We spent a few years away from our faith because of the pain we were experiencing.

Becky explains that, “I’d been taught that you do everything you’re supposed to, you check those boxes, you put that medallion on, and then, boom, you’re good. If you do THIS, then you get THIS, no matter what.”

As much as she fiercely loved her husband, he was hurting her. “The two things in my mind weren’t making sense,” Becky says.  So, in order to stay as sane as she could, she says she had to set the spiritual stuff aside. 

My relationship with the Lord at that time was just an outcry. My prayers were a puddle of crying on the floor.

Becky shares that looking back, she can see that the Lord was there the whole time; but in the midst of that pain, she felt lost.  Becky explains that she had learned some false beliefs about needing to hustle for her worth. She had been taught growing up that “what you do equals how much you’re worth.”  Becky says, “So, if I was ‘BLANK enough,’ then he wouldn’t do this.  If I was kind enough, if I cooked enough, if I dressed this way, or if my hair looked this way, if I did the dishes enough, he would stop.”

Not one time did her husband tell her she wasn’t enough. But she heard that every time he acted out. It wasn’t about her, but she heard it was about her every single time.

Becky shares that she became severely depressed.  She says that one of her numbing behaviors to dull the pain was eating. The emotional eating spiraled out of control, and she shares she became morbidly obese. 

Becky says that when they moved to the Midwest about ten years into their marriage, they finally found a good therapist. For the first time, the therapist had enough training to know how to begin working with her husband and even (finally) do some work with her, as the betrayed spouse. 

When they moved back to Utah, Becky and her husband found a place that had even more specialized training. They told her husband: “We recognize it’s really hard for you to stop, so we want to give you tools to get through it.” This was the first time her husband’s behaviors were seen as an addiction.

Becky shares that another tool that was instrumental in her healing was the 12-step group SALifeline.  “There is something about sitting in a room with people who can understand,” she says.

The nature of this beast of betrayal trauma is isolating. That’s how Satan attacks the spouse: isolation.

It was in these 12-step meetings that Becky was pointed toward God. Becky explains that, “Before, God was this dude in the sky with a white beard and a robe.” But suddenly, she found herself asking Him:  “Who are You really? And who am I?”.   The shift was a slow process for her. She learned about who her Heavenly Parents are and that taught her who she really is.

I am enough and my husband’s actions aren’t a measurement of that.

Another healing resource for Becky was the Heart of a Woman Retreat.  She shares that it was a safe place where she started really digging into the pain and the hard and the trust issues with God.  She deeply explored the hard and painful questions that she had been avoiding for many years.

“What? God loves me? And He’s always there?”

During this time, and through working with therapists, Becky shares that she learned she didn’t have to use food as a protection anymore. “That year of ‘Breaking’ was ‘brutiful,’” she says, “but it started me on this journey.”  She has learned that this journey consists of “an unfolding” and is not about doing more. 

Becky shares that her best tool for healing is connecting with God.

God is the ultimate healer.

Becky says, “I asked the Lord, ‘What is it you want from me?’  I thought it was going to be a checklist, like praying more”.  But when she heard that whisper of “Let go” from the Lord, it was too scary at first. She shares that it took her time, healing, and trust in the Lord before she could give Him control.

The Lord said: “Put the control in my hand, I will take care of you. I’ve had it the whole time, but I’ll take it even more.” 

Becky shares how this leap of faith has helped her to learn to trust her Heavenly family. “We can rise up fully restored and I know with the Lord, we can all do it,” she says. “A lot of times we want to restore it to just what it looked like. But we can be restored to more. I believe that’s what the Lord wants for us.”

In the end, Becky reminds us that we were meant to be brave!

Becky’s Recovery Resources: 

Her Heavenly Family

Meditation 

Music

Specialized Therapy 

Supportive friends 

Heart of a Woman Retreat

“Not Today” by Hillsong United

Beckie Hennessy’s podcast: Living Through with Beckie Hennessy

Becky’s Song: 

“Brave” by Skillet

Ep. 19- Kristi's Story

Becky and Tiffany sit down with Kristi to share her story. Kristi, a mother of three, works as an accountant. However, to feed her creative brain, she loves to go to yard sales and artistically refinish old furniture.

Kristi grew up in a small town in Utah. Her parents didn’t actively attend a church, but she remembers feeling, after going to Primary, that she wanted an eternal family. She loved the spirit in her grandparents’ home. As a teen, she became involved in Young Women’s, Girls Camp, and Seminary, where her leaders influenced her for good.

Kristi shares that she grew up six houses away from the man she would later marry. While he was on his mission, Kristi went away to college. However, during her college experience, she was sexually assaulted by someone from her church. “I felt like the Lord had turned His back on me,” she says.

I must not have been living right to not have the Spirit tell me the assault would happen.

Afraid and heartbroken, Kristi didn’t tell anyone. She tried to go back to normal college life but eventually could not continue and left college.  When her boyfriend came home from his mission, they got engaged the next night, and they were married four months later.

 “I didn’t say anything (about the assault) because I felt broken,” Kristi says. “I was finally going to have a home with a priesthood holder, and so I didn’t say anything. I’m the broken one, but it’s okay. I’m fine.”

Kristi shares that she took this belief with her into her marriage. “We had good times, but there were always times we struggled,” she says. “I blamed myself and my depression and eating disorder. ‘It’s me. I’m the reason we’re struggling.’”

Kristi explains that, over time, she and her husband were growing apart due to opposite work schedules and the demands of parenthood. She kept thinking there was something going on, but she didn’t know what it was.

I thought it was me, so I tried harder.

After fifteen years of marriage, Kristi says that she came home one day and her husband told her he wanted a divorce and that she needed to leave. Kristi shares that he refused her request for counseling and eventually served her divorce papers on the grounds that she was mentally ill.

Kristi shares that she internalized this false belief. During their painful and hard custody battle, a man her husband worked with came forward to inform Kristi about her husband’s infidelity. “Once he told me, things started coming together,” she says. The reality of the affair was really hard to face, but when Kristi looked back, things started to make sense. Soon, her husband’s pornography use came to light, as well.

 Kristi tells of her agony when she asked, “Where are you, God? You’re supposed to be protecting these babies.” She shares how she felt betrayed by her husband, and by God, and by this life she had worked so hard for. Kristi says she has major depression. And at this time she shares that she felt so alone.

I prayed, and it hit the ceiling and came back down.

Kristi explains that she stopped attending church because she felt if God wasn’t there for her, she wasn’t going to be there for Him.

Over the course of her marriage and divorce, she felt as though she had lost herself. She shares that before her divorce she had never made any adult decisions—she didn’t even have an opinion on her own life. However, over time, Kristi learned how to make decisions for herself and her children, with the help of great friends.  She shares she started to find strength.

I did a lot of healing.

But then, she developed cancer caused by a sexually transmitted disease from her ex-husband.  Kristi shares that she felt betrayed by her ex-husband, God, and her own body. “I felt like I was never going to be free.”

Three years ago, after surgery to treat her cancer, Kristi says she felt she needed to start over. She sold her home of eleven years and everything in it, and moved back to her hometown. She shares she began going to church again.

Becky shares that Kristi is such a faithful person. “You are the most faithful person,” Becky says. “You keep giving the Lord a chance. You keep trying. You don’t permanently turn your back on Him. You keep putting your hands out and saying, Lord, help thou my unbelief.”

Kristi explains that she wrestles a lot with her faith, but “I just can’t give up because if I give up, there’s nothing. So even though it feels like nothing a lot of the time, at least there’s a chance for something. And if I give up completely, there’s nothing.”

I can’t deny that the Lord has brought people into my life and that’s what I hold onto.

Last August, Kristi had her faith tested again when her cancer returned. Again, she asked, “Why am I having all these consequences for someone else’s actions?”.

Kristi shares how things turned around for her when she received a scholarship to attend the Heart of a Woman retreat in October 2019.  She says that she told God, “This is your last chance.”  She shares how just attending the retreat was a huge leap of faith because she hadn’t prayed in a long time.  The retreat was completely life-changing for Kristi. 

She shares that the first days of the retreat, she didn’t feel God, but then He showed up where she was at.   Kristi shares that God told her: “I have brought people into your life as a physical manifestation of my love.” According to Kristi, this message from God didn’t make it all okay. It didn’t make her healing journey complete, but she says it started her back on her path. 

“I needed to know that there was a path for me.”

Kristi shares that she always thought, “When I’m healed, I’m going to be completely different.” But now she understands that when she’s healed she’s going to be back to the person she was born as.  “I don’t have to be different or ‘complete’ to be healed,” she says.

She now knows there’s hope.

As Tiffany says, “Living without hope is not liveable. That little bit of hope keeps us moving.”  Kristi also shares that she recognizes her healing isn’t dependent on someone else fixing her or fixing the situation or taking accountability. She can still heal without that.

Kristi shares that the people who are surrounding her have been integral to her healing. “I feel very blessed from having so many people brought into my life,” she says.

Kristi shares that these friends seem to send texts, memes, and songs at the perfect time. They’ll pick her up and take her on an adventure. They accept her. They don’t push their faith or beliefs on her, allowing her to be where she’s at that day. They also give her tough love when she tells them that she can’t do it anymore. They tell her she did it yesterday and she can do it today.

Kristi’s Recovery Resources:

Not Giving Up on the Lord (even when you do, you come back)

Good Friends

Good Music

Heart of a Women Retreat

Kristi’s Song:

“It is Well” by Kristene DiMarco