Beca’s mom spent most of Beca’s childhood passed out from drugs and alcohol, while her dad was out having affairs with other women. Because of her absent and aloof parents, Beca was cared for by her teenage brothers, which led her to be molested and raped by her brothers’ friends. There were many violent fights in her house and Beca’s only solace from the fighting was to pretend that she was invisible. Beca was introduced to church when she was 8 and gave her life to Christ, but admist her tumultuous childhood, she found her identity in getting good grades and being a super genius.
While Beca was in High School, she was raped again, but didn’t know who to tell about it. A few years later, she was raped in college, just a few weeks’ shy of her 21st birthday. After that rape, Beca began to unravel. She threw herself even further into her schoolwork, cutting, anorexia, and silence. But over time, God drew her back to Himself and she finally saw His light amidst her darkness.
Over the past 10 years, Beca has been working with a therapist to get “all the dirty secrets” out, ask for God’s help, and rebuild her life brick by brick. She still has negative thoughts about herself, thinking she is contaminated, unlovable, and irreparably broken; but now, Beca catches herself and realigns her thinking to God’s truth: remembering that she is loved, washed clean, and precious. Today, Beca is a youth leader and kindergarten teacher at a public school and sees God redeeming her terrible past experiences through her teaching. Beca has a knack for figuring out who the broken kids are in her classes and gently loves them and shows them God’s truth. She says, “I am so grateful to God for redeeming me and working me toward becoming whole in Him. I’ll always have scars (at least until He calls me Home), but He uses those scars every day to tell an incredible story of His grace.”
