Megan – 2017 Graduate

My childhood was filled with abuse, abandonment, and neglect. My siblings and I were placed in foster care when I was two years old. My mother gained back custody of us when I was four years old. A few years later, my mother started bringing different people to our home, mainly men. She became very involved in drugs and alcohol. It was during this time that I was physically and sexually abused by close family members and a neighbor. I never told anyone about the abuse that I had endured. Just to get away from what was happening in my house my neighbor would let me stay the night. They would feed me and let me bathe and occasionally sleep there. One day, police found inappropriate pictures of my unconscious body that had been developed at a local drug store. I went into foster care for the second time when I was 11. When I was 14, two kids in my foster home tried to sexually abuse me.

I ended up in seven different foster homes in eight years. At 18, I left my last foster home. I was sexually assaulted multiple times, and at one point, I conceived my daughter. I started giving myself to almost anyone for the exchange of love, or at least what I thought was love. I struggled with feeling that I wasn’t going to amount to anything, that I was only good for my sexuality and that I was never going to get out of this cycle. I hated myself. I constantly thought about ways to take my own life.

When I was at the point of going into a homeless shelter, my daughter was almost two years old. I put her through a program called “the safe families program” so she wouldn’t have to live in the shelter with me. Through this process, I met a kind family. They told me about Mercy Multiplied. As I considered the program, they helped me make a pros and cons list, and the pros outweighed the cons, so I applied.

The biggest turning point for me at Mercy was one night after dinner when I was hit with all these feelings of all the abuse, physical and sexual, that had happened to me. It was so hard for me to talk about it, but I was hurting so bad. A staff member let me cry and talk to her about the abuse. I was so ashamed that people where finally seeing the pain I was holding onto for so many years. After I couldn’t talk anymore because of the deep sobbing, she took me outside. I took two steps, fell to me knees, pounded on the ground, and just cried. After I was done sobbing, she gave me a hug and told me that it’s okay to feel and that I’m not alone. This moment was the doorway of what started my healing process.

Through my journey at Mercy, God has done some miraculous things in my heart. God has taken away my unhealthy desperation for the love of a man. God has made me pure and as white as the first blanket of snow. I learned that I love to worship God and that I am His daughter. I am royalty. I learned that He looks at my heart and that He has loved me when no one else did.

After Mercy, I plan on spending time with my lovely daughter, working, and finishing my GED so I can go to college.

To all the donors of Mercy Multiplied, thank you! Thank you so much for not only your financial donations, but for your time and prayers. You all are a blessing to my life – my new life in Christ. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!