From Destruction to Wholeness
Words by Simonnè Robbertse
My mother did not know she was pregnant and had a DNC where my twin did not survive. I was an unplanned pregnancy. I grew up without knowing my Father. My mother married a number of times and we moved around a lot. So there was a feeling of rejection and instability.
I was molested from the age of 3 to the age of 8 by my grandfather. There was much trauma caused by this. I was a troubled child. I started using drugs and partying at the age of 15. It was “recreational” and what we called “soft” drugs. However, I got tired of this lifestyle at 19 and stopped.
I met a man I thought was good enough to marry at the age of 21 and we got married a month later. I fell pregnant on our honeymoon. He was a hard worker and that is the part I knew. I soon discovered he did not cope with the long hours or the dysfunction of his life on his own. He was a heroin addict. He would not come home at night and I would worry and go look for him without a car whilst pregnant. I carried our little boy full term and he died when I initially went into labour. I gave birth to a baby I knew was dead a week later. This broke me. I took it upon myself to take my husband’s heroin a month later. I felt numb when I did and felt like I could go on.
A month later my husband disappeared and never came back. I was distraught. I became a full-blown heroin addict. I was so unhappy and so broken. I tried to fight this addiction on my own for 10 years. I went to 7 rehabs but nothing lasted. I got married again and all I was looking for was a man that was not an addict. But he was very obsessive and jealous. He ended up cheating on me and when I asked for a divorce he beat me to near death with the steering lock of his car.
Towards the end of this very dark time, I started calling out to a God I was not sure existed and if He did I was not sure if He was a good God. As it became more evident that my life was so broken and death was very certainly approaching and I wished it would. My cries became more earnest. I went to the last rehab in 2012 where I met people from a church. I got saved and baptized in the Holy Spirit. It was the most wonderful experience. I was found. I had love. Rejection, however, was still much of a reality as well as all the rest of the trauma suffered.
I went for deliverance but no sort of counseling. I experienced or perceived rejection again and relapsed. I got clean again but was still very unsure and very much alone. I met Charl again in 2013. We met first and were at one another’s houses quite often when I was 12 – 14. We met up and decided we want to move forward with our relationship and at this stage we were quite clear about what we wanted. I had been praying him into existence for a year. God answered my prayer. I did, however, relapse again after about 1 month because of fear of rejection.
I called out to God and asked Him to free me from this horrible addiction. One day, almost 4 years ago on the 10th of April God answered the cry I had cried out to Him for about 5 years. He healed me from heroin addiction. Very instantly. Yes, it took 5 years but suddenly there was absolutely nothing. No cravings, no thoughts. It was a miracle!!!! I knew beyond any doubt from this day forward how very real God is and He does love me deeply.
My life turned around very radically from there. Charl and I got married on the 23rd of August 2014. I had been praying for a child for many years. I knew I had to heal as much as possible after the death of my first child before I could have another. Thing is, we thought it would be quite impossible to conceive seeing as the years of heroin abuse had completely removed my monthly cycle. I had not yet had a cycle when we conceived our twins. It was another miracle. I knew immediately it was twins and God showed me how He restores the years that the locusts had stolen.
There has been so much restoration. I now have a relationship with my father and his family. We love them! There has been so much forgiveness. I am healthy, sane, and sober. I am blessed with the most amazing family. We are part of the body of Christ and growing daily with other wonderful believers. I know now how important a church family and some pastoral counseling is after severe trauma. I am so excited for what God is doing and will still do.
Simonne is a child of God, a wife, mother, homemaker and home educator. She is a make up artist by profession and an artist by nature.
