2021 Graduate Update
“When contrasting the life I lived prior to attending Mercy to the one I live today, it still brings me to tears, in a good way. Up until the point of attending, over two decades’ worth of consequences from multiple unfortunate events and devastatingly poor choices defined who I was and left an impression of darkness on my soul that I’d believed to be irreversible.
I grew up in a home where I witnessed physical, emotional, and mental abuse on a regular basis, and at the age of nine, my father, who was a pastor, committed suicide. I unknowingly internalized the event as my fault and a reflection of God’s disapproval of who I was. If my father chose to leave that way, how could the God he was supposed to represent love me? It was from that perspective that I had a complete emotional shutdown and the next 20 years became an ongoing cycle of chaos, abusive relationships, drug use, alcohol abuse, multiple suicide attempts with psych ward hospitalizations, and time in juvenile detention. The belief that I was inherently defective was my identity and no matter how hard I tried, it seemed impossible to break free. I literally wished I were dead.
Today, God’s grace shown through Mercy continues to be my testimony, ten years later. I’ll never forget walking through the doors of the St. Louis home and for the first time feeling as if my soul could finally breathe. The healing I received, the love of God shown through the staff, and the innumerable tools I learned how to practically apply, have enabled me to establish a life based on the unshakable truth of God’s Word. My identity is now found in Him and not in the circumstances, mistakes, and pains of my past. Today I’m married to my wonderful husband Paul of almost ten years, we have a beautiful one-year-old baby girl named Taryn Mercy, and run multiple businesses within our community. God took my broken life and made it beautiful and I’m forever grateful for the role Mercy played in helping me walk in the freedom I have today.”
-Camilla was a graduate from Mercy in 2011
