A Road to Redemption

By Michelle Nash

A Road to Redemption is the story of how one woman faced a past that haunted her for more than thirty years. The Pandora box of haunting memories that she had so neatly packed away sprang open like an unexpected jack-in-the-box. After thirty years of trying so hard to forget the terrifying memories of a five-year-old little girl, those same memories began to consume her like a California wildfire. Flashbacks of abuse began to rear its ugly head. The memories burnt so hot in her mind that they almost consumed her. Just as she thought the memories of a childhood of abuse were about to claim her life, God showed up in the least expected place. Michelle takes you on a journey of how she hit rock bottom and made it out of the pit and down the road of redemption. Michelle hopes this book will help others who have suffered in silence as a result of abuse. Her prayer is that they may grab onto the hope and healing that only comes from Jesus Christ.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jul 23, 2019
• ISBN: 9781644927380

Book preview

Chapter 1

As a little girl, I have fond memories of my mother and me living with my grandmother in a small two-bedroom house in Indiana. The exterior was yellow and had a nice size front porch with a single large red brick column. Floor to ceiling windows were in the living room looking out to the front yard and pasture surrounded by a white picket fence. There were concrete steps with black metal handrails leading up to the front porch, where I spent many days sitting on the end of that front porch waiting on a semi-truck to come rolling down the highway as I would try to persuade them to blow their horn. There were cows in the pasture along with an old tattered red barn and an A-framed swing set with white plastic seats set in the front yard. The aroma of my grandmother’s cooking would fill the air of that small yellow house. In the evening before bed, I would crawl into my grandmother’s lap where she sat in her black recliner chair, and she would rock me. She would hum softly; her rough but loving hand would rake through my long dark hair as her other arm would be wrapped around my small frame. Sitting in my grandmother’s lap, her hand smelled like corn chips; rubbing my head was my favorite part of the day. My grandmother’s lap was my safe haven. I felt so loved in my grandmother’s arms. By all accounts, this life looked pretty good for a little girl.

I loved being at this house. I loved watching my grandmother sit at the long dining room table playing solitaire. Sweet memories were made at that table of hours of her and I playing a game of memory or go fish. I felt safe and loved in that yellow house with a large front porch and white picket fence. There were so many sweet cherished memories that reside in that cozy home. This house was the only place I ever remember living as a very young child. I never realized that our family was different from most families. I never realized a father was missing. I thought living with your mother and grandmother was the norm. But there were the days that in a distance I could spot through the large floor to ceiling windows in my grandmother’s living room that army green truck coming down the highway and turning into my grandmother’s driveway. I had hoped that truck would never reappear after returning to my grandmother’s house from prior visits. Only for a couple weeks to go by, and there once again his truck would appear in the distance coming down the highway to turn into the driveway. I could spot that truck a mile away. I hated that truck!

It was him; the man I hated and despised with every ounce of my young and tender being. Terror would overcome me as that army green truck pulled in my grandmother’s driveway between the cow pasture and the front yard. He placed the truck in park, and the tall lanky man I despised would appear in the front yard. As he approached those concrete steps, anger and fear would begin to rush through my little body like a raging river. I would see him out of the oversized windows of my grandmother’s living room, and like a gazelle being chased by a predator, I took off for my grandmother’s bedroom. Under her bed, I would slide, tears of fear running down my face. Screams begging not to go would be pouring out of my tiny little mouth. The cold wood floors made it easy to slide under the bed. For some reason in my young mind, under her bed was a place of hidden protection. My mother would have to come in grandmother’s bedroom, lift the white bedspread up and pull me out. Screaming at the top of my lungs, begging her not to make me go, arms and legs wrapped around her waist, and neck holding on for dear life. He would pry me off her. I knew at that moment that I had to go with the man I despised. The man I considered the enemy. The warmth and love I felt in that house would turn that sweet young child cold and bitter. Peace and love turned to rage and horror. The minute we stepped out on to the concrete porch, my world had changed. Countless times, the same scene would play out when he came to pick me up for his visitation. My poor mother had to witness her loving sweet child turn into a fearful, panic-stricken little girl. Frozen like a statue by the fear of what this man represented. Those visits with the man who I called father would forever change that little girl and affected the woman she would