Question 1

What is your book, Washing The Inside Of The Cup, about?

Accepted Answer

The book is about being in a situation of hurt, pain and despair and believing, because of your beliefs, that this is your lot in life and you just have to accept it and make the most of it. It’s about crying out to your father in heaven, knowing in your own strength you can’t make it in this, and drawing near to Him amid your pain. His words say draw near to me and I will draw near to you. It’s about completely surrendering your whole heart to God and watching Him show up in a big way and do exactly what He said He would do; He drew near to me.

This caused my focus to change from being on the abuse to being on my heavenly father. I saturated my mind and heart with His word and arrived at a point where the hurt, pain and despair didn’t matter anymore. God had turned my tears of pain into tears of joy and happiness just being in His presence.

Question 2

What inspired you to write it?

Accepted Answer

My youngest son who was only 2 when I filed for divorce was too young to remember everything the older children and I went through. He asked me to write down some of the stories he had heard me talking about and bring it to a family vacation.After reading it he said to me, “Mom you’ve got to turn this into a book, it could help so many people. So that’s what I did.

Question 3

What does your title mean?

Accepted Answer

Jesus said in Matthew 23:26 “Wash the inside of the Cup” I believe He was telling the religious people of that time. It’s not just about religion. It’s about a relationship with God. It’s about changing your inner self to line up with His precepts. Don’t just put on a outer show of religiosity while your heart is full of selfishness, greed, hypocrisy etc. The cup was referring to the person’s life. It’s all clean and shiny on the outside but the inside, representing the person’s heart, was still full of evil. God wants us to be changed in our hearts where we reflect Him in our actions and choices.

Question 4

What advice do you have for women who find themselves in a bad, if not violent, marriage?

Accepted Answer

I know there are way more women in bad marriages than most people realize. I would never recommend staying in an abusive marriage, but each person must make that decision for themselves. An abusive spouse will try to rob you of your joy and peace and happiness, and you find yourself wondering why, why me. We may never know the answer to why. So, the real question is, what do you do when you don’t know why. That is a question you can choose the answer to, regardless of what situation you’re in, I would recommend turning to the Lord with all of your heart because in Him is where real life is and no one can take that away from you. No one can take away your relationship with Christ because it’s in your heart and soul.

Question 5

How do you hope to inspire other women to both strengthen their bonds of faith and to take steps to live a life free from monsters who try to twistedly turn the teachings of the Bible against these loving, innocent women?

Accepted Answer

For women presently in a physically abusive marriage, do not leave yourself or children in a dangerous situation. Reach out to your family or a local shelter. Find someone that you can confide in. The National Domestic Violence Hotline is 800-799-7233. If he gets help you can always get back with him later. For those women who are in a marriage with verbal and mental abuse and have chosen to stay in the marriage. Go to Gods word and find out what he says about you then start renewing your mind. Start seeking God with all of your heart so you can rise above the abuse. Cry out to your Father in Heaven He sees your pain and hears you. For those women who are not married yet. Be very careful who you say “I do.”

First and foremost, make sure you marry a real Christian, not just someone saying they are a Christian or acting like they are a Christian just to get you to like them.  Look for a man that has a relationship with Jesus and at the same time be preparing yourself to be all that God wants you to be. The answer to 1001 questions is “Be led by God’s Spirit” Find that peace in your heart and mind and in the quietness listen for His voice. No one on this earth can give better advice than He can and no one on this earth loves and cares more about you than He does.

Question 6

Was it a cathartic process to write this book?

Accepted Answer

No, I don’t think I had any emotions in me that needed to be released. I do believe going back in my mind to those days brought back the memory of the hurt and pain even causing me to cry and to have some anxiety just thinking about it.  Which I gladly cast over onto the Lord. At the same time not all the memories are bad ones. My close relationship with the Lord was then and will always be something very good that came out of all of that. Also, I have 7 beautiful children. When Samuel was young, he asked me one day if I regretted marrying dad.  I looked him in the eye and said, I have you and your brothers and sisters and that’s made it worth it all. God’s word tells us to forget the past, He tells us this for a reason and I believe that reason is because he wants us to focus on Him and the future, and what he has ahead for us.

Question 7

In your book, you say that you regret the times that you didn’t listen to what God was telling you to do, but how would you know exactly what you were supposed to be doing in each situation?

Accepted Answer

There’s a Bible verse that says, “My sheep hear/know my voice.” When you know someone and are familiar with them you can recognize their voice even if you don’t see them.And suppose that person tells you if you do this then this will happen or tells you to do this to prevent that from happening. And you know that person is always faithful to their word. Then it boils down to trust. If you do what they tell you then you trust them. If you don’t do what they tell you then you don’t really trust them. In my situations my flesh would get in the way sometimes and lead me by my limited thinking instead of me just blindly stepping out in trust. God knows the future and knows the plans he has for us. His plans are always for our good bringing hope for our future. That’s why in the book I said something inside of me still needed a lot more washing to get me out of the equation.

Question 8

You also wrote of having a powerful vision of seeing Jesus. What do you make of that incident all these years later?

Accepted Answer

First off, I still feel honored that the Lord would reveal Himself to me and let me see Him in His Glory. The message from that vision is just as relevant today as it was then. God wants our hearts and minds on Him not on the things of this world. When we do that, then He has no problem giving us everything this world has to offer. When we seek Him first, He gives us the best of both this world and His Kingdom.

Question 9

You wrote of some miracles – once about surviving a house fire and one of avoiding a major car accident. Did you believe there was Divine intervention taking place?

Accepted Answer

Absolutely, when your house is burning down and your sound asleep and a fire truck shows up at 4 a.m. in the morning and you ask the fireman who called it in, and the fireman tells you no one called it in some one up above was watching out for you. I would say that is divine intervention. The fireman told me my children had about 15 minutes and they would have all been dead. Only God can orchestrate a couple of simultaneous events that saved our lives. The fireman told me both events were a first in the history of that fire department. Praise God! If we only realized how much our father in heaven loves us, we would all be working towards a closer relationship with Him.

Question 10

You were raised by loving, religious, kind parents. Your ex-husband was abused during his childhood. Do many people become their parents – or can they break the cycle?

Accepted Answer

While some abused children do grow up and become abusive parents, and being abused as a child is a risk factor in the causation of continued abuse. Only about 30% fall into those intergenerational statistics. However, most abused children do not become abusive parents. I believe most abused children know how it felt and the bad memories it leaves you with and don’t want to grow up and inflict that on their children. They long for that peaceful home life and want their children to grow up to have happy memories. Also, how a person acts is a choice. If everyone would choose love, peace, kindness and forgiveness, wow what a difference it would make in the world.

Question 11

One of your children is a pastor. Have many of your kids continued to live their lives consistent with the teachings of the Bible?

Accepted Answer

Six of my seven children are saved and love the Lord and are raising their children to love the Lord our savior. I have a son and a son-in-law that are both pastors. One of my daughters is a praise and worship leader at her church. The other ones love the Lord and are very involved in their local church. I’m confident the one that isn’t currently involved in the church will eventually come back to the Lord.

Question 12

How can one develop a closer relationship with God and live their faith?

Accepted Answer

By having eyes only for Him. When you’re in a relationship with someone, you call them all the time, you think about them all the time, all you want to do is spend time with them and if it leads to marriage then your just abiding with them and your confident in your relationship with them because you gave them your all and they gave you their all. That relationship took both of you working on it. It’s no different with the Lord he wants your ALL. You completely surrender your heart to him, saturate your mind with His words, spend more and more time with Him till you are abiding in His presence. The Lord is waiting for each one of us to do our part in the relationship. He already gave us His all. The ball is in our court. Accepting Him as your savior is just the first step. So many Christians stop there and then just live their life with one foot in the world and one foot in the church and never give Him their ALL. I was in that space for 8 to 9 years before my eyes were opened.Move yourself from being a carnal Christian to being a spiritual Christian.

Question 13

You eventually remarried and have lived a productive, normal life. You also have 11 grandchildren – with three on the way. Do you feel like you have lived multiple lives?

Accepted Answer

It certainly felt like I’ve had multiple families. Raising the older children was a family, Raising the younger children by myself was a family, and then being remarried with the two youngest still at home was like another family. My oldest son said to me, these younger children aren’t being raised the way we were raised. The older children were homeschooled, the younger children were going to a public school etc. My first husband did not help with the children. I used to tell my friends I was a married single mom. Then I did become a single mom, but I had older children who helped me with the younger children. My parents even helped some with the younger children. But we always had God on our side, and I never worried about the future because I knew we were in His hands.With Him all things are possible, even a single mom raising 7 amazing, wonderful children. I was so blessed to have all those children.

Question 14

Even after suffering a broken neck, and humiliating verbal abuse, and after seeing your husband abuse your children, you still held out hope for several more years after you left that he would somehow make the changes he needed to, to get his family back.  Did that happen? Were you ready to forgive him and take him back?

Accepted Answer

Well, we walked in instant forgiveness, so he was always forgiven. That is a choice that anyone can choose. No matter what situation they are in. The younger children were not abused as much as myself and the older children were and if there was ever any hope of restoration it wasn’t so much for me as it was for our children.  During the time of the divorce, we had a 2, 5, 7, 10-, 13-, 15-, and 17-year-old. The teenagers and I were so ready for the divorce, but the younger children would cry for their dad.  So, if he had gotten help and worked on his behavior and made radical changes that door was open until we married other people which was around 10 years later for both of us. But that never happened. We concluded he really didn’t care enough about us to make those changes. Once I remarried that door was permanently closed. I will say I didn’t ever want to be with him again and I’m glad that didn’t happen to me. When the youngest son was between 7 and 11 years old his dad picked him up less than 5 times to see him during that 4-year period. My son would cry because he thought his dad hated him.

This broke my heart. When the youngest daughter grew up, she said, before the divorce we had a mom and dad. After the divorce we didn’t have either.  So, while I got us out of the abuse (and thought I was doing a good thing) it created a whole other set of problems that I didn’t see coming at the time. So, in a situation like this where you feel you must decide, no matter what decision you make there will be consequences.  I come to realize why God hates divorce, it’s because the children suffer. In this situation it didn’t matter what decision I made they suffered either way. Which decision is better?? Each person must decide that for themselves.

Question 15

You recently retired as a Registered Nurse, having helped many people. Did you choose such a profession as a way of healing yourself?

Accepted Answer

No, at the time I already had an associate’s degree in business management. I was thinking of doing something in Real Estate since my dad was a builder. But one of the counselors at the university recommended I go to RN school. She said you only need two more classes to get in the program. That was the first time I had ever entertained a nursing degree. I chose it because the pay was good, and the ADN was a 2-year program. Two years went by fast, and I knew I could start working and provide for my children with an RN salary.

Question 16

After leaving your first husband, you got your RN Degree, then a Batchelor’s Degree and eventually a Master’s Degree-- all while being a single mother to seven children. How did you do it?

Accepted Answer

When I filed for divorce my oldest daughter told me she would stay with me and help me as long as I needed her to.She was 17 and she stayed with me till she was 23. She was like a second mom in the house helping with the younger children. So, I could work on my schooling. She also went to school during this time and received a Respiratory Therapy degree. After she moved out, she kept going to school and received her Bachelors in Human Services. My oldest son took the youngest son in under his wing and helped with him. My parents also helped with the younger daughters. I couldn’t have done it without everyone’s help. Big families rock!

Question 17

So, a commitment to your faith and a surrendering belief in God helped you to change your life?

Accepted Answer

Our Father in Heaven is faithful to His word. If He tells you to do something, you can guarantee it will happen if you do your part. You can trust that He will do it. Even when heaven and earth pass away. He will still be standing by His word. There are multiple verses where He says seek me, search for me with your whole heart and I will let you find me. So, when I surrendered ALL my heart to Him like he tells us to do. His grace showed up to help me do my part which I did. My mind went from despair, hurt, pain, suffering and all that goes with that to peace, love, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control, faithfulness, goodness and joy.

Instead of just accepting what the world offers you, even if your circumstances don’t change. You can change how you receive it and live in it. This change made me resilient in a difficult situation and made me a vessel for the Lord to work through. No answers ever come from wallowing in hurt and pain the only thing you get from that is more hurt and pain.  After my heart changed, I was able to help people as the Lord used me.

Question 18

How did you summon the courage to finally leave?

Accepted Answer

In the book I talk about an incident where my husband was choking and hitting on our 14-year-old son, and we were all screaming trying to get him off of Samuel. I remember thinking he’s had 20 years to change that’s long enough. I remember thinking divorce may be wrong, but this is wrong too. There was no love radiating from him for his family. I was so emotionally numb from all of it, I had no feelings left for him or for that marriage by that time. In my heart I knew that day, it was time. The next day I received a call from the head man over Excel telling me I needed to get the children out of the abuse. That call was confirmation of what I had decided the day before.

Question 19

You became a Born-Again Christian at age 15. How did your religious beliefs, to a degree, lead you to stay in a marriage that was insufferable?

Accepted Answer

While it may have started off as religious beliefs that kept me in it, it eventually became a close relationship with my Father in heaven that had my attention while life was happening around me. Just like driving down the road, your eyes and mind stay on that road while the landscape passes by you. I was so busy with working, having children, keeping house, cooking, home schooling, managing rental properties, and seeking the Lord. Having my eyes on the Lord helped me transcend and rise above all the abuse.

Question 20

You were in an abusive marriage, almost from the start, for 22 years. Why did you stay?

Accepted Answer

I stayed because I was taught that marriage is a covenant and is not to be broken.  That divorce is wrong. I was taught to not ever let the word divorce be in your vocabulary. To always work things out. The Bible teaches that wives should not leave their husbands. It also says that God hates divorce. I didn’t ever want to be divorced, and I wanted to be obedient to my Father in heaven. This works great when both people are always working on themselves, adapting and adjusting to life and with each other.  The problem in this marriage was he never worked on anything in his life. It was like he had not matured past the mentality of an early worldly teenager. He didn’t think anything was wrong with his behavior.

So, the abuse just continued on and on and on. He would say he was sorry but that didn’t mean anything because he never changed. The reason the marriage lasted for 22 years was because I did all the changing.  Also, a woman’s heart is for her man, God made us that way. Abuse doesn’t change that; it just complicates it.