Going To Live My Life Differently
By Blanche Edwards
At the age of three I was raped by my babysitter (a woman). When I was seven in first grade, my mother allowed the lunch teacher to take me home, and her daughter (who was 8 years older than me, but was the size of a woman) took advantage of me. When my mother lost her job and house, my siblings and I moved in with an aunt and uncle and their children.
My uncle that I loved so much and wanted to see him as a father image, began making passes at me and touching me in all the wrong places especially during the time when he was putting us kids to bed. My uncle was molesting me. I wanted to tell, but I was scared, and I did not want to hurt my aunt and cousins and believed it was my fault. We lived all over Indianapolis, wherever there was a hole in the wall. However, living with my aunt and uncle I felt like I had died and gone to heaven but this was not true! Actually it was living in hell. I went to 13 different schools before I entered the seventh grade. I did not receive the education that was required of me upon graduation from High School. Let’s just say, I could not read. Even when I went to Cosmetology school, I received help from other classmates all throughout.
However, at the early age of four, I gave my life to Christ and confessed Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I really did not know Jesus as I do today, but hearing through my grandmother, I knew Jesus as my protector. I felt my mother and father left me uncovered. As a child I remember saying: "This is my mother’s world and I am just living in it". However, when I become an adult, I thought, “I am going to live my life differently”. But upon receiving my cosmetology license I made a lot of money, and began living large and living loose; I went to every party, became an alcoholic and addicted to cocaine. Soon I became homeless which led up to me leaving the church. So for six years I was out in the world – plus I became pregnant while I was on drugs. I was not going to keep my baby until a friend/enemy told me that God would help me, so I decided then to keep my baby. It was also at this point that I went back to church and Jesus used Bishop T. Garrott Benjamin Jr. to speak life into my life. That life was Jesus.
As of today, God has called me into the ministry and I’ve built my second home! He has given me my own Salon, I am graduating from Martin University in 2006, and my daughter is a healthy, intelligent and beautiful kid. To God be the Glory for the great things he has done. Philippians 4:13 says I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me. PRAISE JESUS!
