Why I Don’t Share Every Detail

If you picked up my book Redeemed or Renewed expecting to read every gritty detail of what I went through—the abuse, the trauma, the heartbreak—you may have been surprised.

Maybe you were curious. Maybe you even felt a little let down, wondering, “But what exactly happened to her?”

And I get that. I really do.

When someone says they’ve been through something, it’s natural to want to know the full story—the specifics, the facts, the jaw-dropping moments. But from the very beginning, I knew I wouldn’t write that way. Not for this book. Not for these pages.

Not because I’m hiding anything...

But because I’m protecting something.

My healing.

The truth is—I’ve been through it.

Addicted to cocaine.

Bouncing from motel to motel just to stay high.

Leaving my son behind.

Covered in shame.

Dead inside.

I lived a lifestyle that nearly killed me.

There were days I didn’t recognize myself in the mirror.

Nights I cried on motel bathroom floors, too numb to feel and too broken to care.

I walked away from the people who loved me most because I believed I was beyond saving. I was lost. Exhausted. Spiritually dead.

But Jesus came for me anyway.

And that’s the part I want to shout from the rooftops.

Jesus didn’t save me so I could relive every dark chapter in vivid detail.

He didn’t walk into the middle of my wreckage so I could perform it for people’s curiosity.

He came to restore.

To redeem.

To rewrite the story I thought was over.

The point of Redeemed isn’t the sin or the abuse or the shame.

It’s what Jesus did with it.

That’s what I want to magnify.

That’s where the glory is.

I didn’t want to glorify the pain—I wanted to glorify the Healer.

This doesn’t mean I’ll never share certain parts of my story in more depth. Maybe I will one day, in another book, or at an event, or in a Spirit-led conversation with someone who needs to hear it. But Redeemed was never meant to be about the trauma. It was always meant to be about Jesus.

If you’ve walked through your own silent battles, I want you to know this:

You don’t owe the world your wounds in order to be seen.

You don’t have to bleed publicly to prove you’ve healed privately.

You can share the fruit without having to relive the fire.

You are not the worst thing that happened to you.

You are not the worst thing you’ve ever done.

You are the story Jesus is still writing—beautifully, redemptively, and powerfully.

Let Him lead what you share.

Let Him guard what you don’t.

And may it always, always, be Him who gets the glory.

Scripture to carry with you:

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit."

—Psalm 34:18