Orphaned No More (my very personal blog)

June 27

**Warning—long blog post but very important

I had to wait for the words to appear. The deep words from that deep place where I wouldn’t break down telling it. The words that speak on their own out of the depth of my soul.

Words I have not really spoken publicly but need to because I am feeling so much freedom. You don’t realize how bound up you are until you are free. These are words I need to share with others like me. Yes, you may be hiding but you are like me. You will recognize yourself here don’t worry. It won’t be painful. It will be revelational at best. So please read this, if it’s you take it and think on it, but if not, keep scrolling. You will need it later.

So, as an author, I waited for the words to come.

Well, they didn’t disappoint. The words appeared as if out of thin air on the paper, transparent, bare, and free. And this is that story. Why am I sharing part of it here…. because I need to not hide and show people God will still use you with pain. I have helped a lot of people even in brokenness. I just need to be transparent because I have experience so  much healing out of more pain.

I’m going to talk about something that I have suffered in and that we all have suffered from at some point in our lives in the journey of life. You may not know it and you may be on a different part of the journey and not manifesting symptoms right now, but you will, or you have. It’s the road that some of us know too well. A road we keep trying to detour off of. A road where we think “this won’t take me out, “I’m better than that”, “I’m cured”, “I’m a Christian, I am stronger than this”.

Me and Holy Spirit have a special relationship. He loves me and I love Him. He knows me and I’m always discovering more of who He is. He has always been there for me in all my pain and joys. He is there always  teaching, for the classroom is always open.  I understand I am His and He can do what He wants with my life. Even put it in pain, and He did.

This road sneaks up on some of us. We see it in others and yet it can be camouflaged in our own eyes. You can’t judge people on this road. Why? Because you are just like everyone else you pass on the road too. We hate to think we are like others, but we are because we are all on this one planet and have suffered from the rulership of satan at some point. Some of us struggle on this road for years at times, and then we have times this road is full of joy and peace.

We minister on this road. We can even help people on this road. We eat dinner with others on this road. We build churches on this road. We divorce on this road. We cheat on this road. We love on this road. We hate on this road. We go to church on this road. We leave God on this road. We find our way back on this road. We lose family, friends, job, career, maybe even our minds on this road. We can even heal others on this road but not ourselves. This road is full of masks and hidden pain, even for the strongest believer. The strongest believer can be the worst offenders because it seems to catch them off guard.  This road takes a lot of people captive.

But, after exhausting all means of help for a way out, countless healing sessions, talks, cries, & more with finding no end —-I found myself on this road yet again. Or maybe I was never off it. I knew I was there but didn’t want to be. Looking for any life preserver or dingy to stay afloat. Certain things triggered my road experience again. The past two years of our covid world nightmare triggered it as well. The state of isolation and loneliness set it on fire.

What road am I referring to? The road of the orphaned heart.

Recently in my life, events have happened, yet again, that have shaken me to the core and brought back that old friend called “orphan heart”. I’m going to refer to this as old friend because it is a feeling, a mindset, a pattern of thought. I see things about this old friend I have never seen before and that is all. This old friend is not in control because he has been exposed. But, it’s not a spirit to be cast out. How easy that would be.  Oh don’t we wish. But this strong familiar acquaintance reared its head once again. This stronghold of thoughts. But this time, something different happened. An awakening to what was really going on came into focus. See, I forgot the rule and I share it here with you. What you don’t deal with will deal with you.  I’ve told it to my clients, and I tell it to you. Beware. Whatever you don’t deal with, it will come and it will deal with your life.

Events of revealing and uncovering deep inside of who I really am or better yet what’s been going on my entire life surfaced, yet again. It’s so painful to live in emotional pain and even more painful when that painful gift is delivered by people that love you and you love them. But that is how it is most effective.

I’ve always had the eye of God watching me. I could feel God watching my entire life. Since I was a little girl about 8 years old, I was a seer or dreamer. I have seen the rapture, twice. I have heard and felt people in hell and heard God tell me “be ye holy for I am holy” only to realize years later that those words were a calling on my life, a separation of sorts from sin. They were a guidepost for my life to follow. Did I mess up, sure I did. We all sinned and enjoyed it when we did it too.

But my life was basically pointing towards God. Never too far from Him but still plagued by the orphan friend mentality.

I didn’t realize I was an orphan in my heart until I got married. Funny how marriage is like a beacon light or spotlight to all that is inside of you. The good, the bad, the ugly comes out when you say ‘I do’. I’m divorced today because I had orphan thinking and so did, he. We could have worked it out and still can but you have to be willing and he is not willing. I am today divorced because of nothing which is something that could have been dealt with but wasn’t so it dealt with us. In the process my children and I suffered a lot. Was it needless….yes and no. Nothing is too bad that God can’t heal. If He reveals it, He can fix it. But anyway, my orphan friend showed up all the time in me and in my covenant husband’s life as well. It was there before I got married.

After he divorced me, it was still there. But going forward I lived my life and was getting more healed. Gaining more understanding of me and this mentality but never totally healed of it. God sent people, wonderful people into my life. People that filled holes for short amounts of time and others that loved me for what they could and how they could. This went on for years. People came and people went (because they are orphaned in their thinking too) People left that I really loved and cared for. People that I needed in my life. But when people would go it would hurt. I never could understand why. Why did they leave? I was nice. I was kind. I’m even kind of funny.  I was me. Is there something wrong with ME? Am I the problem to everyone?

It caused a lot of self-judging to happen. Self-hatred for how I am. A lot of self-doubt and feelings of rejection, fear, anger, confusion, and more. It was an ongoing thing. So, I put on the masks. I tried to be what others wanted or thought they wanted. Realizing that didn’t work either. I wanted family more than anything. I had this idea that family would love you. But that failed too. All my family is gone. Estranged. Gone. So, then the isolation came. ‘Just stay away from people, don’t trust.’ Sound familiar yet?

Recent events of someone leaving me yet again after countless promises of never leaving me were told. A long term relationship that I needed will be gone and over.  Recent events of friends, ghosting me and I just don’t know why were happening yet again. Reaching out to find community efforts failed also. All this and more stirred up, no forced up a lot of old emotions that I didn’t want to feel. Emotions and thoughts of the orphan girl years ago. Thoughts I just didn’t want to handle at this age of 57 and thought they were dealt with. Thoughts and feelings of: Stuck, confusion, not sure what I should be doing, why should I do anything, what’s wrong with me, go kill yourself you have no value to anyone, feelings of dread, tiredness, anger, hurt, self-pity, and deep loneliness. All of these were orphan friend thoughts and conversations. They were raging in my mind.

But God. You know He knows us better than we know us. He was working a plan the entire time. I didn’t see it. Are you kidding! All I have felt was pain for months with people and myself. After being sick of myself I finally went to talk to someone. Not just anyone, someone very wise yet random. Someone that didn’t know me or my heart but could see my heart when I started talking. Because wise people can do that. They can see what you can’t. I needed that.

Our talk took an hour and a half to show me 50 years of pain and what was and has been going on. After telling them that the voice of the orphan friend was back, talking his lies of suicide, worthlessness, fear, dread and the usual …. I felt stuck. I felt lost. I don’t know how to navigate this evil yet familiar place again. I didn’t want to. I didn’t have the energy this time to do it– All. Over. Again.  It nearly killed me the first time to get to the place I am now.

Yet, this transition feels different than before. I feel older more tired but sort of aware that God was up to something.  But somehow my negative self talk in this season, those words didn’t seem true….only familiar. Very important point. You and I can be saying words that we know we shouldn’t but we feel them and we say them but our spirit man is screaming THAT IS A LIE, THAT IS A LIE.”

When I finished talking. This person dissected my words. Put them and my emotions connected to those words in compartments if you will. And showed me my life. Showed me the lie. This is what I want to show you.

This person said to me, “I have a lot of thoughts why your life looks this way. I heard you talking and as you talked, Holy Spirit talked to me”.  

This person continued, “You say I don’t know what to do and yet here you sit doing something you’ve never done before. You came and talked to random person that you feel safe with. I listen and I see this strong, called, gifted, anointed, woman who is at wits end of the road and maybe this is just a thought, maybe it’s because the orphan girl has ran through everything and tried everything and been down every road and nothing has worked.”

That was correct I was thinking.

“Little orphan girl needed a father, he is not there anymore in your life, orphan girl needs a sister but she left (haven’t seen my baby sister in 32 years), orphan girl needs a mom but she died, orphan girl gets married and says that’ll work because he’ll take care of me and our children on day I wont be alone and orphaned I will have family so I got the marriage and the husband but that didn’t work. He left. Little orphan girl needs a mom and dad and God gave you spiritual parents who are now leaving for their own good reasons (20 year relationship).  Every orphan needs best friends you had those in drove in your life and they left too. (29 yr sister relationship) You had your church (17 yr relationship) but they don’t need you either. Orphans really don’t wanna take care of other orphans, but your children feel obligated to take care of you (my two sons) because they are orphaned hearted too, by their father and orphans can often feel obligated for other orphans.”

The wise person continued….

“The orphan-hearted girl, Stephanie, who is well trained, has a doctorate, is smart, is gifted, friendly, called, anointed, loves church, loves helping people, has now ran down every street selling papers (so to speak) to make ends meet, to find happiness, to find meaning, to find purpose, to now look in a mirror and swear to yourself that I’m never going to become a victim to this orphan mentality I’ll do whatever it takes. I will work five jobs if I have to. But you are now the age you are, 57. You are worn out because you didn’t expect to be this age and this stage or place in life.”

Wise person continued….

“You are either too smart and no one wants to hire you or too dumb and need to go back to school get more education. But what is God asking of you? What does He want you to do? You speak as a woman of 10 years ago who was very directional, very purposeful, and knows what she wants. You are very laser focused, you want what God showed you and said to you until the lasers are gone. You put your laser on everything and once you chase it and get it, it wasn’t what you thought it would be.”

You say,

“I got the degree but,

I got the marriage but,

I got the job but,

I got the church but,

I had friends but,

I had the mother but

and everywhere you thrown your laser it’s ended with ‘it didn’t do for me what I thought it would do.’

Here is the point I want you to get  dear reader, that no matter what your life looks like or why people come and go, no matter the disappointments that come… if you make your bed in hell, He is there. If people leave, He is there. If pain comes, He is there. If blessings come He is there. This conversation with the random person saved my life. Because once lies are exposed you can go on. You don’t pay attention to the lie anymore.

Powerful! This lie is no longer important or gets energy.

You and I find healing in no one but Jesus. This person pointed out that the overarching word in my life is abandonement. This is the word that saved my life when he said it.

Abadonment is from relationship. It’s not the same as rejection. You don’t have to have a relationship with something or someone to reject it. But the idea of abandonment means you are more vested with something or someone  and there is some type of relationship and you abandon the person or could be as simple as abandoning an idea.

I have been abandoned by more people than I care to write or think about. But the funny thing is I never saw it as abandonment. I saw it as people didn’t love me. That is the key that set me free. When my wise friend shed this light on something hidden in my life it all came into focus and I could sense a new woman emerging. I wasn’t unloved…. I wasn’t feeling that from people. I was feeling abandoned by them and that is worse.

But God, over all these years showed me that He never abandoned me and never will. I know its sounds simple like I should have figured this out years ago. But, the enemy is sneaky. He takes a truth and put just enough lie on it to make it a LIE.

 The damage has been significant and the pain great. So, when recent events of “abandonment” happened again I was sent tumbling again into these words “no one loves me”. The feelings of love hurts resurfaced. But that is the lie of the orphan – “No one loves us”.

I realized at the end of this safe conversation I needed an encounter of His love, His power and His community. All of a sudden, the word had no sting in my life because I finally understood what had been happening for over 50 years. The freedom I felt after an hour and half conversation. I knew that God was about to reveal Himself to me in a way that I have never known him. I am about to experience Jesus in a new way for me. A revealing of Himself to me.

You see when Jesus comes to resurrect something it must be completely dead. Dead and stinking. He can’t resurrect what you and I still have our hands on. In my case I had my heart in every relationship to give what only He could. Let me please everyone.. so they will love me. So subtle but so like satan. Well, those relationship are now dead. I know for the first time the stink of those things in my life.

I’m ready for my resurrection revival encounter of love, power and community. It’s so clear now I almost want to say how did I miss it all these years. I will say it again, you don’t know how bound you are until you are that free.

My wise friend said a revival of love is needed to stop beating myself up with lies that I clearly know are not true. A revival of power because I was letting the orphan spirit rob me of Holy Spirit presence to drive the lies out and a revival of community so my roots of God can be watered and a new women will emerge in that community. A woman that I’ve never seen before. A woman most loved and not abandoned by anyone. It is okay now for people to go, to leave, to not speak, ghost me, reject me or to be whatever they want to be. I am not abandoned by them. By anyone. I love me. I really love me and who I am.

My wise friend’s words were like ointment to 50 years of pain, questions and wondering.

So, in closing…. If you are orphaned hearted, ask me about it if you want. Search it out, find help. You can overcome. What am I doing about the people that left my life or my friendship? Nothing. I’m not Jesus to them.

I can’t do anything but reach out, put an olive branch out and hope for the best. I’m not upset they left. I had that time with them all and value the relationships. But when we leave people abruptly we are orphaned and don’t even know it and God didn’t create us to be orphans and said that he would never, never leave us as orphans. I have to see Jesus one day, no time to be upset with anyone.  Maybe they were never my friend, maybe they were there to help me learn the lesson I learned. Maybe they were for a season. Maybe for a lifetime. But whatever the reason I am better for knowing them. Thank you to all those that left my life. Thank you.

Please yield to the pain in you. It’s telling you that something is wrong and to fix it. Jesus loves you. Now go live your life as I am going to. Leave your orphan rags behind and pick up what He wants. It’s okay. I’m excited to see what He can really do in my life now. I suspect a lot will come from this out of my life to women. How fun will that be. 

This new adventure with Jesus is so much fun!

Love ya,