A Woman of Many Names

By Ilona Miler

The story of a trafficked woman

When Ilona ran off to Spain with her lover, she had no idea what was in store for her. She believed in Jesus and hoped for a happy future. Instead, her "boyfriend" revealed himself to be a pimp who forced her into prostitution. Years later, she nearly lost her life when a customer attacked her with a knife. It was through many miracles that she was set free and healed in her body and soul by Jesus.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gabriel's Horn
• Release date: Oct 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9798888460009

Book preview

Gabriel’s Horn Press

Copyright © 2022 by Ilona Miler & Gabriel’s Horn Press

Permission of the copyright holder must be obtained before reproduction of this material, including excerpts.

Translation: Alison Brandt

Editor: Linda Ng and Faith Hampton

Cover design & illustrations: Laura Vosika

Graphics & layout: Laura Vosika, Gabriel’s Horn Press

Bible quotations © English Standard Version.

Names in this book have been changed.

ISBN: 979-8-88846-000-9

If you have fallen victim to a Joe, please do contact me. I am more than willing to talk with you.

Ilona Miler, Vienna:  

Instagram: ilona_leane_miler

Email: [e-mail]

You can also contact: [e-mail]  and they will try to connect you with an organization in your area.

Dedication

For my daughter Maria and

for all the daughters

who have been betrayed,

sold or abused.

Know that in His love, Jesus

paid the highest price

to buy our freedom so that

we can live as new creations,

free and whole.

Acknowledgments

First and above all , my thanks are to Jesus, without whom I would not be alive, and this book would not have been written.

Over the past months, about twenty people have said, You should write your story, or have asked, Why don’t you write a book? I have sensed that this was God’s leading.

My thanks to all who have encouraged me.

I also thank those who have worked hard to help me with proofreading, editing, corrections, illustrations, translation and printing.

Thanks to Rachel, Faith, Linda, Alison, Julia, Pat, and Laura!

Foreword

Throughout Ilona’s life, she has been called by many different names. Some of those names have been endearing nicknames by people who have loved and cared for her. Others were names she was called before and during her time in prostitution and represent a journey through immense pain, dissociation, and despair. Each name in this book represents a different phase of her life.

In 2020, she miraculously gained three new names: Madre (Mother), Omi (Grandma), and Urli (Great-grandmother). Her most wonderful new names of all, however, are Daughter, Beloved, Blessed, and Redeemed.

Rachel Zuch – Founder and Chairwoman of the Board for Herzwerk (Heart Works) – a ministry in Vienna, Austria that reaches out to women and men who are being sexually exploited or have been trafficked.

www.herzwerk-wien.at/welcome

CHAPTER I

"K ill me, or I’ll kill you ..."

He stood between me and the closed door of a grubby hotel room by the old docks in Marseille. I had come with him despite my gut feeling of danger. I couldn’t go home without money.  I had been in prostitution for five years and saw no way to break free from Joe, my pimp.

Sometimes I remembered the horrible words with which my grandfather used to curse me:

Your mother is a miserable whore, and you’ll end up just like her.

Someone needs to stab you in the belly, so your guts fall out.

You’ll get knifed so your blood spurts everywhere.

I was twelve years old then and had no idea why my grandpa had changed so suddenly.

In reality, he was not a bad man. He worked hard in his jobs to provide an honest living for his family of five: two sons, a daughter, Granny and himself.

Granny, always clean and neat, was a beautiful woman despite her hooked nose. She always took pains with her hair and wore chic clothes. Her sister was a seamstress and provided her with beautiful, elegant dresses. 

Granny often said, Clothes make the man, and, Nobody can see inside your stomach. She would have sooner scrimped on food than on clothing and had owned and operated a hairdressing salon in their town. 

In their homeland, the Sudentenland, now part of the Czech Republic, Grandpa had worked for the railways. Then everything changed. Granny often recounted their story to me:

"The Russians came at five o’clock in the morning and smashed the door with their rifle butts. They demanded loudly that we put everything of value on the table – gold, jewelry, bankbooks, and the keys to the house. We were to leave the house with only what was on our bodies. In the middle of all this, the alarm clock suddenly rang, and one of the soldiers shot straight at it with his rifle. He was probably from Siberia and had never seen an alarm clock.

GRANDPA HAD ALREADY heard that we would likely be singled out as German-speaking Czechs, so he had already prepared suitcases containing warm