Alicia Whitley

                                                                                      Alicia Whitley

My name is Alicia Whitley. I am 34 years old. My husband and I have four children and one granddaughter (yes I know we are to young but she is a big blessing!) We live in SMALL town and when I say small I mean one small singlewide trailer post office, and one store that is our grocery/ plumbing supply/ gas station/ everything all in one. And several churches (praise God) one of which My husband is the pastor of and I am one of the youth leaders and part of the praise team. God is so good! Being involved with the kids there is such a blessing to me! (My husband and I are just big kids ourselves!)

  There is something else that I do and have a strong passion for and that is volunteering at the local care pregnancy center.   And the reason I have such a passion for this ministry is because I know what its like for most of the girls who come in there, because I was one of them. I was seventeen years old when I went to a Sav-a-life center and found out that I was pregnant with my son Sandy. Who is now sixteen, I married his father but we divorced only a year after Sandy was born. So there I was nineteen and living in an income based apartment on my own with a baby.

    When I was a child I was sexually molested twice by trusted people in my life. This along with my parents divorce when I was twelve sent me on a downward spiral of bad choices in my life except one very good choice to except Jesus but I didn't have anyone to disciple or lead me so the change only lasted for a couple of weeks and I spent the next ten years continuing down that spiral.

    Which lead me to where I was,  nineteen, divorced, living in that income based apartment with a one year old and I was searching  hard to fill that void in my life in all the wrong ways, that void that I know now only Jesus can fill. I became pregnant again and chose to have an abortion. My boyfriend had told me that he would support me what ever I decided, leaving it all on me making me feel very alone." I wanted him to tell me that he loved me and would marry me" but he didn't. I couldn't bear to have another child and not be married and because of the things that had happened to me in my life I didn't think that there would be anyone in this world that would take good care of my child so satan had deceived me into thinking that adoption was not an option and that my child was actually better off dead than in this world. He also had deceived me into thinking that I had no one to turn to, to help me, so I had the abortion. A big part of me died in that clinic. I instantly became cold and numb. I came home and laid on my sofa for a couple of days only getting up to go to the bathroom or get something to eat. I was so depressed I didn't even take a shower, I'm not sure if I even brushed my teeth. Then a friend came over and pushed me into the shower to snap me out of it and made me get out for a while. The bad thing is I couldn't even figure out why I was so depressed. I wouldn't allow myself to associate the depression with the abortion. I can remember asking my friend "what is wrong with me?  why am I so depressed?"

    I went on to have a second abortion that year and continued to live just going through the motions of life doing only enough to get by. Shortly after the first abortion I began going to the doctor telling them that something is wrong with me, I don't have any energy and something is wrong but they could never find anything. For thirteen years off and on I went to the doctor and they ran all kinds of tests and could never find anything. I prayed and asked God to please heal me and show me what is wrong. That's when he lead me to a crisis pregnancy center and a book about post abortion syndrome. It listed a lot of the symptoms of PAS and it was as if God showed me that this was it. I had lived thirteen years in post abortion trauma and then began my healing process. God lead me to name the babies and write them letters. I had nights of uncontrolable crying spells. One night I went into the bathroom so I wouldn't wake my husband and I could not stop crying, when I finally did stop I felt a big heaviness lift off of me. The process continues but God is so great and he continues to shower me with his love. He will do the same for you. If we confess our sins he is faithful to forgive us. You must learn to forgive yourself also. May God bless you on your healing journey!