Healing After Birth Trauma and Addiction: Kamia’s Story

with Kamia McWilliams

Aug 7, 202341:42Testimonies

About this episode

Kamia McWilliams is 26, an entrepreneur, an author from Fitzgerald, Georgia. She went through birth trauma and postpartum depression. Heavy marijuana addiction. Not because she was partying. Because she was trying to survive her own mind. She talks about strong black woman syndrome. That pressure to hold it all together. The Holy Spirit told her to stop smoking right then, and she obeyed. God cannot heal what you conceal.

Topics

marijuanaidentityrestorationshame
Read Transcript
I end up having my son and I remember my family member who does marijuana because that's where it started for me again I wasn't a drink I wasn't a smoker I said I want to stay away from that but I remember dealing with postpartum depression and that's something that I dealt with my firstborn I remember the thoughts and a lot of women don't like to talk about this I guess from shame we've got Camille McWilliams with us I'm excited to have you on here now you're our first guest that hasn't come out of our immediate circle so I'm no it's cool yeah I'm really wow I told you this is gonna go viral so I'm really looking forward to that so normally one of us has got a back story to share and we can give a little details do you want to start out maybe by sharing a little bit about yourself and on and then we'll just we'll take the conversation from there yeah I am 26 years old out of South Georgia I'm a Country Girl okay I'm out of South Georgia got married when I was 18. fresh out of high school I have two beautiful children I'm an entrepreneur I do real estate photography but most of all I enjoy sharing the gospel I rededicated My Life to guy in 2020. and that's pretty much the basics about who I am I love writing I just released my third book which is well I released two books and two of which are devotionals and then my first one was a portrait book and so yeah that's who I am I'm a country girl I love the Lord and here we are amen South Georgia what part of Georgia is that it's a very small country town okay it's like three hours from Atlanta called Fitzgerald so yeah I like the first off ask what like what was your past right like I know that you said you just recently read that rededicated your life to the Lord so if you can fill us in a little bit of what transpired because obviously you might have slipped away for a little bit but then for me it was I was young I was 21 I was one of those ones I grew up like I said in the South with country parents and they believe in the alcohol they believe in a marijuana go to work and come home and deal with the children and so growing up and seeing it being around that I had told myself I do not want that for myself and I did good until I became a 22 year old with a three-year-old because I had my first child when I got married at 18 my first child at 19. and just a quick a little bit about me 15 years old I lost my biological dad who I never had a relationship with staying in the same city as me never had a relationship with and so I dealt with his death just through suppressing suppressing how I felt got married at 18 19 had my first child 22 I'm pregnant with a second and I went from my three-year-old being pregnant with a second to get in custody of two family members a teenager which who was 13 and then a five-year-old so here I am I went from from zero to four really quick yeah it all transpired within a year in 2019 and I ended up having my son and I remember my family member who does marijuana because that's where it started for me again I wasn't a drink I wasn't a smoker I said I want to stay away from that but I remember dealing with postpartum depression and that's something that I dealt with my firstborn I remember the thoughts and a lot of women don't like to talk about this I guess from shame but I just had thoughts of what my firstborn it wasn't self-harm it was more of harm hurt so I ended up having my mother-in-law being with me I didn't talk to doctors about it again it was something that I suppressed because us black women in the South we believe in being strong yeah and we're gonna hold stuff in and we got this and so I just wanted to avoid it with my son and I remember being so depressed I was so depressed that when I had him so I remember being in the car and I didn't want to leave I didn't want to go in the house and experience being with four children and so we ended up going to my doctor and I shared with them that I was feeling depressed but then want to be a strong black woman that come I say condemnation It Came Upon me and I remember my mom because a little bad story of my mom she dealt with postpartum depression and because she had two children and then had three children back to back-to-back so now she was home with five children dealing with postpartum depression and she ended up getting son off for a time and getting put on I think it was Zoloft and postpartum depression medicine and so I remember that story in the back of my head and I was like I don't want to deal with that so here I am a 22 year old I say I'm gonna take it upon myself and I went to a family member I remember people telling me stories about marijuana weed how it made them feel and I went and asked them for some and I remember getting high for the first time and that's where it started for me a bad habit and I saw myself over time of course of two and a half years deteriorating just going down I went from 180 pounds to 110 pounds because all I did was Smoke day in and day out and when I first started it was truly because it was an escape I was trying to pack down how I felt and once I got my first hit of weed it was like it's all gone I feel good until I did and so that's a little bit of backstory how I got started with the smoking and all of that good stuff well bad stuff right yeah right yeah so with the marijuana right if you scroll through the internet now it's legal almost everywhere now right it's it's you can get it anywhere and there are a couple of schools with thought on this right back when I was growing up they used to tell us all the time well he was the gateway drug and whatnot and it would always lead to other things but it sounded like that was your thing right that was your Escape for you but then what would you say about those who are saying well pot's not that big of a deal it's it's it's just marijuana it's legal everywhere and whatnot what are your thoughts that speak into that because you said it was an escape for you so could you speak to that just a little bit because it has become culturally acceptable right it's yeah it's good to smoke pot now and it's no more for some people than just having a glass of wine I guess in the week we engage what I'm saying but would you speak to that a little bit and so the issue for me it came in when I started because I even during this time I started pursuing trying to pursue a relationship with God and reading my word and here I am the enemy coming and Covenant With the Enemy and trying to twist scripture and it's a scripture I believe it's in Genesis where God gave us dominion and about the grass and the herbs so I was trying to even bring scripture to relate it with it's okay to smoke marijuana and so for me it became truthfully it became my God because before when I wake up in the morning I'm smoking my weed when I go to sleep I'm smoking my weed I was replacing meals with smoking and so that's where the problem comes in it for me and marijuana it was become in my life I became I used to use the exclusive it's helping me with my anxiety but I found myself when I'm high when I was high I was very paranoid and it seemed like anxiety was increasing and so the enemies how to play Streets on you even with I started to see and I stay in a very small country town in Fisher and we have a bunch of Dollar Generals and now on every corner you have different smoke shops because I also got attached to Vapes during this time I was smoking marijuana I was smoking Vapes and I was smoking Black and Milds all at once so I like they call it crossfaded and it's really no difference all you doing is damaging yourself and once I started seeing these smoke shops on every corner like we have small dollar gym we have three Dollar Generals probably one grocery store and three vape shops I had realized like it was a conviction where for it to be legal now and okay it's not okay because what the world it feels that's how it's it's becoming an issue it is an issue and that's why the world accepts it yeah so that was my personal conviction I started realizing like hold up and then the Holy Spirit was telling me like you have beautiful lunch you have a very powerful strong country voice and it was a season where I was barely talking because I was so high I couldn't talk to people because I was so high and out of it and it gave me an even more anxiety and so for me it started to not become an escape no more but it felt like a prison a mental prison because here I am stuck in my head because I'm I'm high and sedated the power of deception right he will it's it's like what Paul said right where he will present himself as an angel of Light right and so we look at things from the lens of our hurt and so it's like even the garden when you looked at the tree she's like that looks good I know I'm not supposed to have it but it looks good because of what my condition is I'm willing to go the extra mile to jeopardize my relationship with God to have a temporary satisfaction yep and so with you looking at your story you saw your mother going through something and you're like what I'm going to prevent this to become my reality there we go yeah wow by taking this course and so then what you did was you put yourself in this box and it was actually more damaging than having to face the reality of taking care of those four kids right because the enemy knew how powerful you are as a woman as you mentioned and you're gifting and your capability because he knew that the seed that was planted in you would be replicated in those children and so if he can sever the seed in you he can sever the seed in there come on man that's so good bro yeah so good yeah sorry I got my Preacher Man started coming out yeah I just I get so I really that's the truth this is why we love what we do because when we hear people's stories I really feel that the Lord is giving me a gift to really feel people's soul I like I felt everything that you were saying because especially as a black person it's hard to I feel like we're we're under a microscope yeah and so being under a microscope it's like what do I say how do I present myself and so the fear behind that or the understanding behind that can cause this sense of like fear just right yeah and so like how do you process that like I think if we can I'm sorry I don't want to be like rightful right so like I hope you don't get canceled on Facebook but as a black female no but as a black female that has gone through addiction you've had children at a young age grateful that you're married right like you're doing well now but like what click for you like you said you recommitted your life to the Lord but how did you come to your senses what was the aha moment for you yeah and it's crazy because one thing I got to talk about my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ because Jesus was sent to die for our sins why we already was in sins in transgressions and I was able to Fathom that love when I had that aha moment in my room because even when I was pursuing my relationship with God I still found myself occasionally smoking it probably wasn't as much as when I started out because when I first started I was smoking like eight times a day I'm talking about every day buying buying weed and then the more I read the word the more I began to drift away from it but I realized it was still a stronghold because I would sit in my backyard I'm smoking and I'm reading my Bible but I'm feeling conviction like no God wants my full attention me and my sober because the word of God says be sober minded and now I understand why because you can be hearing so many voices when you're in that state and so my aha moment was even doing my faith walk I began wanting to know more about where I come from and who I am as a black woman because like I said I wasn't raised around on my biological dad and that was a bit stronghold for me too and things that I was suppressing being that hurt little girl and trying to pretend to be this adult I got free will I can drink now I can smoke now I can do what I want to do now and the whole time it was just coming from that place of hurt not knowing who I was and so here I am in my room I'm reading my word and I'm also doing research on black history I'm doing research on black history and I went to listening to Nero spirituals and mind you I wasn't high but I used to collect different buds of marijuana and then I would make it into a full blunt and so I had that getting ready to get ready to smoke so that I can read my word but God had me caught up in my Bible and so I'm listening to the Negro spirituals and I'm doing research on the Emancipation Proclamation and then I came across this article I don't know if this was 1700 1800s I'm not sure in good history but it was a the conversation that was leading up to freeing the slaves with Thomas Jefferson and I can't remember which one mentioned it but something that they mentioned was that eventually God is going to seek venges for what they've done enslaving Africans and so I was like wow if something Came Upon me was like wow now if all the way back then around the 17 1800s they was fearing the Lord why aren't you fearing the Lord why do you think it's okay I'm I'm hearing it in my head because I used to get up in the morning and smoke so even though I would say it was a new morning I was coming down from that high so even though I hadn't smoked I was still a little and I could hear like it was so loud I'm the only one in my house and it's like now they fear the lord why don't you feel the Lord to stop because the Holy Spirit had been telling me I need to stop I started seeing the different smoke shops I kept hearing it over and over the same thing you have a beautiful voice the spirit of the Lord wants to use your voice the spirit of the Lord wants to use your voice and I would say to trying to make excuses for me smoking marijuana and I'm sitting there and it's like if they fear Him why don't you fear Him why aren't you taking him serious enough to stop and I started crying I caught my husband and I told him today it gots to be today but this is how the enemy used to get me because it was other times when I felt convicted and cut it hard and I'm crying and that's something else that I talked about condemnation and conviction true conviction Cuts you at heart and it initiate change when you're and there's no change you're stuck at condemnation in a cycle and so I would tell myself I would be cut at heart and then I probably stopped smoking but two days and I'm back smoking but this time I called my husband I was like I gotta stop because it was just falling condemnation was so heavy on me that I knew I wasn't supposed to be doing that and I knew it was real when I looked over at my dress and I was like what he'll go the enemy just smoke your last one take all of those little things you've been collecting roll it up smoke your last one then we're gonna be done and I remember rolling it and I got ready to light in as soon as I got real light I just broke down crying and I couldn't I had to throw it at that same day I thank the Lord that I'm shaking y'all that same day I stopped without no rehab without no it was truly the spirit of the Lord and the word of God says that if you draw near to him he would draw near to you if you seek the kingdom of God all that other stuff will be added and here I was trying to make myself stop smoking and I found myself in condemnation in a cycle but the minute I surrendered because I was steady digging I was looking for something and he gave it to me and it wasn't just black history what I was looking for the evidence of God the same God that I believe and I have a reconcealed relationship through Jesus Christ I'm looking for him and people in the 1700s was saying to him and was fearing him and here I am in 2020 whatever and that did it for me that day changed my entire life and I'm going on a year from being free from smoking marijuana oh come on God is good I'm telling you amen that's powerful yeah we gotta stop with these calls man I'm sorry like when I hear these testimonies man it's just the Lord just gets on me and it's just man so it's so amazing to hear the how the spirit of the Lord met you right where you were right in the middle of your sin and I love that you said while we were Sinners that's when Christ died for us he didn't come for the all cleaned up he didn't come for the all put together he came for those of us right in the middle of our mass and said let me show you a better way and man that is just such a powerful story now I do want to ask about the postpartum depression right because that kicked this thing off so how did the Lord minister to your heart and help you deal with some of that after going through this season of smoking and whatnot how did that ultimately get resolved for me postpartum depression I truly believe I suffered with depression even when my dad died I said something priest but what it took for me to overcome and I ended up I let my guard down because just a little thing in the South black people don't go to therapy okay [Laughter] [Laughter] [Laughter] I miss the run to try therapy and when I tried therapy she tried to diagnose me with bipolar disorder and that runs in my family strong and my husband had set up the appointment because I was having outbursts like just angry I didn't want to deal my children I'm just so angry I'm angry at my husband everybody's a reason for the reason I'm doing what I'm dealing with and so he set up the appointment and I remember coming out of my studio and I'm crying because she wanted to diagnose me with bipolar and depression and when I came out I had a prayer closet set up in an old bathroom that we have and I went back there and I said God let me tell you something I know this is not my portion my mama dealt with that my sister it just I said no it's just not gonna be me it's just not gonna I don't I just did not feel like that was my portion and I remember I was so angry and I'm so thankful for my Lord and Savior again I'm gonna keep saying I'm so thankful for God because he doesn't care how you feel in that moment he wants you to cry out be raw that's what that secret place looks like you've been your genuine self and I do that prayer closet up because I'm like I'm reading my word and I'm praying so why would they why would she try to speak that on me and I destroyed my prayer class I'm crying out to God and when I finish I felt a sense of peace and the only thing that I heard the Holy Spirit tell me is just keep walking with me and the more I walk with God I'm getting I can't describe this I'm getting healed from my postpartum depression because the things God was because we live by the spirit of the Lord and the spirit of the Lord was leading me to have conversations with my mom and the more conversations I was having with her I'm seeing her being healed from stuff and it's healing things in me because me being and this little girl I was trying so hard not that I did not want to be like my mom and I realized that was my stronghold I was trying to be someone that I wasn't that when the true meaning began and not really the true me but the hurt me the broken Soul me began to rise up I wanted to suppress it and cover that up and the only way I thought I could is not by not talking about it anymore but by being high and so when I started talking to my mom about my postpartum then I realized wow she went through the same thing I went through being depressed having father issues daddy issue she didn't grow up with her dad and these are things that my mom did not share again because we just grew up in a household where they just pretended like everything was okay everything was not okay and so that's what I was able to heal from my postpartum through my mom healing I got healing through conversations because that's been one of my assignments God has sent me on is to save my mom she wanted those tub cookies she her own way of thinking and through me the holy spirit is saving her and healing her and I got healed from my depression that I realized like wow me talking about what I'm going to be a gene with her and also her seeing my transformation because it wasn't by my strength and my will I was coming around with more Joy by talking about being abandoned by my dad because I was able to relate to someone that's older but she looks like me and she comes from me and that's why I truly believe that generational curses come from somebody in the family has to break it and that's by talking about it confessing it's not all about convincing our sins and our mistakes but the things that's been done to us also confessing it with each other and sharing it to stop that and so that's what it took for me and I stopped going to therapy now I'm not saying don't go to therapy but for me it took me looking myself in the mirror and that was my mom a reflection of someone I tried my best to avoid being like and that was my biological dad even though he's not here anymore I was hearing stories about him through my mom that connected me with myself and the reason why I act and behave the way that I behave and so looking at those Reflections and learning how to love them just like God loves me and embrace me made depression fall off postpartum fall off yeah because you no longer identified with your past yeah you identify with your new creature but can I ask you a question yeah you didn't really mention whether or not anybody in your family was saved but I just keep on wanting to ask your grandma where's your grandma in your life so was your grandma a Believer or a Granddad or this is crazy that you mentioned this because there's another thing my mom ended up giving me my grandmom died when I was like in middle school so I didn't grow up with grandparents really my grandma on my mom's side and it was her dad wish my great-granddaddy Willie Peavey he was the man of God in the family he had 20 children my grandma being number 18 from the same woman they was married and I ended up getting my grandma's letters and she was one of those ones that's why I thank God because I'm able to partake in the inheritance of being saved and that was something that my grandma used to write Fortress oh god I didn't even know she was a Believer but she was the right portrait saying she's a sinner and she's going to hell and she hopes that she be saved and so the only people that I knew in my family to have a relationship with God was my great-granddaddy who passed when he was like a hundred and again I was young and then the only reason I went to church is because I was a little girl and I'm talking about a country little girl I never stayed in the house I was always outside and one day I love climbing trees and I was climbing tree my tree went on morning in a woman she had rolled past and I don't know what church that was but they were their hair is very long and they don't cut their hair and then they wear the long skirts but she let down her window and she said would you like to come to church with me one Sunday and I remember riding my bicycle without my parents and I'm in the fifth grade and riding my bicycle down there and my mom felt so bad and my job was an own little black girl in the congregation and my mom felt so bad that she eventually got up and took me to church and then I started going to church with my great aunt and so that's how I ended up getting put into Ministry but the only really saved person in my family was my great-grandfather the reason why I say this is because I was telling my mom when I was on at her house this past week that through her prayers yeah by God's grace but by her labor yeah in the secret place and so believe it or not when I love always taking people back to the younger latter years because our early years is because you eventually find and discover that it was a seed that was planted in you as a child yeah and God saw you through everything and now he's using that seed to redeem your thing like yes God is good bro like that's that's that's it's amazing when you think about it because of how God operates and he's long-suffering oh yes and I think this is where addicts need what they need to understand and if you're listening to this right now I need you to get this your timing is not God's timing right and God is patient with where you're at and there's no mistakes just like this young lady there's no mistake in your story right like even though you went through what you went through yes that's traumatic it's hard it's difficult but what you did is you faced the Giant and you said I no longer gonna be this individual I'm a new creation today right amen I'm sorry I just I love hearing people's stories like I can do this all day every day hopefully we can get paid to do this but right now we're just doing it right my wife thinks I'm crazy at times now I'm just saying she loves that I do this but no it's it's amazing like it yeah it true you're 26 years old going through all these things now you've been mentioning your husband now has your husband engaged in the same relationship as far as smoking marijuana like is he involved in the church what's that like so would my husband he's he on the outside trying to because of course people went through his own healing and stuff and then me him being together going on 10 years and I'm just now discovering some things about my husband to help me better understand him but for him he was again the same age fifth grade going to church he's a musician so he plays in the church and so he was always he grew up in it and just watched me from not knowing how to deal with it because he wasn't raised with his dad his mom was a single mom but my mom was married to my stepdad and they've been married they got married when I was three months and so he grew up in a one-parent household and all of that and so growing up in two different households we learned how to deal with each other but through the depression I love my husband but through the depression and I thank God for it I this is myself from him because he couldn't handle it and him not him he even got to the point where I just wish it would go back to be in normal saying things like that and seeing that he's not gonna come between nothing that me and God got going on because he had become frustrated because I was very angry and violent and then I was always high and he just didn't know how to deal with it but he pretty much into the church and again he had moments where he backslide and don't want to read as far as don't want to read his word and all of that but when I got gotten a lot better so now finally because he was playing at two churches but finally I told him for a minute for a year I stayed away from the church and the only reason why was because I wanted to develop my own relationship with God I grew up in a Baptist background very religious and I told him I just wanted to develop my own relationship with God gets to know God for myself and through that pursuant I had convinced myself that I'm not going back to church like I'm fine with read my Bible and helping people and spreading the word when I do it but the Lord convicted me and said that he desires for us to fellowship with other believers so you need to be in a church and so finally in this President we're doing this interview now but just last week we went to an encounter night and we don't found our home church and this is not like what he's used to baptist I'm used to baptist Missionary Baptist but this is a multicultural church and this was something that I wasn't because again in the South Georgia you got blacks over there whites over there and I was fine with it being that way but the spirit of the Lord said no ma'am that's not what heaven looks like when everybody comes together under has a desire just like David after God's heart and when him and I experienced that just last weekend we said yeah so we found on one Accord yeah this is our home and so we finally have our home Church where we're just not going because he's a musician and that's what my husband was all about starting out but now he's developing his own individual relationship with God yeah amen yeah that's incredible I got a question for you so the as a husband right the fixer in me right when my wife is going through something like depression or going through a hard time right I there's those two Tendencies I either want to jump in and fix it right away right without the slowing down to feel and just be empathetic in the moment or as a husband I do the opposite I just Retreat so just from your perspective and what you walk through with your husband where is that sweet spot for a man right and speaking to a woman and somebody who's dealing with these issues as a husband trying to feel that and also help that but also not Retreat so much that we're not helpful in that type of scenario I think but I feel like women emotional thinkers and then men are more intellectual thinkers and so when you bring the two together man my husband is teaching me how to not react from a place of emotions but stop and think and now I'm teaching my husband to empathize and act from a emotional lives with me feel me and so for me just for my personal experience that soft spot is really just being able to emotionally understand and I truly feel like the more you spend time with God because God Is Nothing Like Us especially with compassion and love I'm a hot mess and you still love me and that's what the same when you bring husband and wife together still you coming together as one and not falling off track because you lack something that the other one lacked and that was for me my husband because I started smoking weed you got him he's smoking black and Miles he's smoking he started smoking Vapes and he started drinking and just like we see in the Book of Genesis with Adam and Eve you've seen Eve fall but it wasn't meant for Adam to fall Adam was supposed to be there to show her the right way and not act off of the same leverage that she added off of which was emotions she was looking at it and she was feeling it looked good and with him he just loved her she's made in my image so I'm just gonna fall back too and so me and my husband got a better understanding especially reading the book of Genesis about that and what both of us went wrong but that soft spot is genuinely loving each other just like Chrysler the church yeah that's so good yeah no I went there because I think a lot of places with these relationships that's really what the Crux of all this is right being able to walk in relationship with each other and knowing that sometimes and I speak myself as a former addict like that can be a reason like right when my relationships start to go drive and have turmoil that can be something that pushes those that have been in this back to relapse and because we don't know how to deal with our relationships then it creates tension and then we go out and try to find that escape again and right and deal with that and so I think for a lot of folks especially some of our audience coming out of these programs and a lot of them run right to marriage that's like let me find my identity in another person and right never really discover who they are and so then they get in that relationship and these relational conflicts come up which is going to happen in marriage we're gonna disagree degree we're two different people trying to live in the same house and raise four little kids running around that all have their own personalities and it's just like the perfect storm if we're not careful and so it really goes back to that sense of identity and self-worth and finding that in Christ first and then once we find that in Christ then we're able to like you said show that compassion to our spouse and the other people that are in our lives that's that's really good yeah well dude this is something I got to share at my mom's church this past Sunday so what's really powerful some people might study this way some people might not right but in Hebrew numerology wise the word one ikad in Hebrew it's numerology numero numeral number is 13. I thought you were speaking in tongues for a second [Music] [Music] [Music] love the number is 13 okay so one is thirteen love is 13 and to meditate is 13. he tells his children in Israel to meditate on the law of the Lord day and night yeah so check this out the number 13 for the Jews signify strength power strength God tells us to be one with him Jesus says I desire that they be one with me as I am one with you right the Commandment is love God with all your heart mind soul and strength and love your neighbor as yourself so if we're to meditate on God's word and you said this earlier in your testimony as you began to read God's word the desires began to fall off as we become one with God come on out of us will flood a natural flow of love because our mind is not fixed on what's going on around us but on the author and the finisher right and so our strength is found in the word of God but what we've done is we've tried to find our strength outside of God there we go and so as we become one with God and we meditate on his law day and night come on that is when God's love really becomes impactful in the unbeliever's life as well as the believer's life yeah and so what do we always see we see division in marriages we see this Vision in homes we see the vision in churches right because the enemy understands the power of one yeah he understands it more than the believer does but we'll find something that will bicker and complain about the reality is and I was telling my wife this earlier Justin and Miss K I'm gonna call you Miss K for right now that's mine but it's it's my pride yeah I have so much pride that we're unwilling to Humble ourselves to recognize that we got it wrong what or somebody comes into our life and hits us with something out of the blue we're like ah and then we're like nah I got this like yeah I don't need your hat what and so it's the root cause of everything is our pride but yeah I wanted to really touch on that because we're talking about marriage you're asking about how what's what's the middle ground here but I think the reality is that God has slowly but surely bringing people back to a place of Oneness in him yeah we can be one with others here we go so Camille on your website you talk a lot about your passion to share the gospel and I've heard you say it three or four times in this interview right that I've I've got to talk about Jesus and on yeah so and then I'm hearing your stories about how God's using you to bring your family back to Christ just some of this incredibly powerful stuff so how did you get to that place where being in the word I assume you're you're reading scripture and God's just birthing this passion in to share the gospel with other people can you just tell us a little bit how you got there and just for context my one of my favorite quotes and I don't know who said it I may have stole it from somebody is that freedom from addiction is not a destination it's just a launching point and I believe that really the people that stay sober and stay free and not from a Christian perspective it's those of us who get engaged in doing this Kingdom work right we understand that Christianity really is all about multiplication it's all about reproduce disciples and that is the fullness of what it means to be a follower of Christ and I think people that end up halfway doing this Christian walk right the Great Commission was go and make disciples that was not a suggestion right it was the commission that's the fullness of the Christian Life and so I would just love to hear how you got there personally and what's what sparked that fire in you oh for me it was not intentional oh no I'm I because I really don't like talking I used to and then I realized God I want to use my voice but it was not intentional it really came from a place of it's like being in a new relationship and went on a few days so I want to go run and tell everybody I want to see everybody and that's what it was for me I started I like to say fall out of love I feel I love my husband I'm gonna be real because what I thought was in love it really wasn't in love I had made my husband my God because I hadn't been prior to him I only dated like with three guys fresh out of high school so he really became my everything where I wanted my hair however he trying to compare myself to his ex because he was more experienced than I was and it took me falling out of love with him and really fall in love because the first commandment the greatest one is to love the Lord Our God with all our heart mind and soul and then love my neighbor so as long as I'm in love with God I'm able to love and so the more I became in love I found myself running to my mama house and this is somebody she'll she do not during this time she didn't care to hear about no word we barely talked about a Jesus a God when we didn't do that but we would go to church and it makes sense but I found myself every time we would sit down I'm talking about Jesus something some Revelation that I've read through the word I couldn't hold a conversation without including him and it got to the point where even friendships started to deteriorate because homegirls getting on the phone and they want to hear about my married issue and I'm like but Jesus and they like I don't want to hear nothing I'm sick of hearing and that's when it started for me I was like okay since now I don't have any more friends and I know my mama she developed me and my husband he just yeah that's all he do I was like what Lord I think you calling me the more and that's when I started the podcast started sharing the gospel on the part podcast hosting Gatherings sharing the word of God and everywhere I went I made it my duty and obligation to share the word of God because it's truly like being in a relationship with somebody who is just amazing I gotta tell everybody need this person

About the Podcast

Rebuilding Life After Addiction is a weekly conversation for anyone walking the long road of recovery, and for the families walking it with them.

Hosted by Justin Franich and Robert Grant, two guys with over 40 years of combined recovery between them. Justin is a former meth addict who went through Teen Challenge in 2005, spent nearly two decades in recovery ministry leadership, and now helps families navigate addiction through content, referrals, and real talk. Robert served 18 years in prison before finding freedom through faith-based recovery. Today he leads family support calls at Shenandoah Valley Teen Challenge and brings a perspective that only comes from living it.

Each episode features honest conversations about faith, identity, and what it actually looks like to stay free. Not surface-level recovery talk. Not religious platitudes. Real stories from real people who've been in the pit and climbed out.

Whether you're rebuilding your own life, loving someone who is, or serving in ministry, this podcast is for you.

New episodes every week.

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