From Survivor to Thriver: An Incredible Transformation Story

Cindy Rosenthal

Health Services Administrator and Author

"For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." Jeremiah 29:11

"So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten," Joel 2:25

Cindy shared her story on a VictoryEmbraced: Truth, Talk & Testimonies broadcast.

May you share about your childhood and the process you went through to go from being a survivor to thriving? 

I grew up in a difficult household environment. My parents were highly abusive, and my father was a man of violence. At a very young age, I witnessed his violence toward my mother. I remember when I was 5 years old; we lived in an apartment and I watched him nearly take my mother’s life by strangling her in front of the window. Thankfully, he let her go. 

This is the history of my parents’ relationship until they separated for the last time when I was about 8 years old. My father was physically and verbally abusive to me throughout most of my life. I was 8 when they got divorced, but unfortunately, my mother learned from my father and abused me the same way. Growing up in that atmosphere was difficult, but after a while, I learned not to feel anything and that’s what I did, so when my father hit me, I was told that I didn’t have any reason to cry about it and I brought it upon myself. When my mother hit me, I tried to think of something else so that I wouldn’t feel what she did. My legs were covered in welts and I suffered from bloody noses which caused me great pain. As time passed, I came to accept it, and my grandparents became the only thing that brought me happiness in my upbringing.

I don’t remember a lot about my teenage years; I don’t have any memory of it because I believe it was God’s protection. He shut my memories off and took them away from me, so over the years of 13–17, I don’t have many memories of those years growing up. I only have fragments of memory and not much else. It was a response to trauma to preserve oneself. 

My grandparents brought me so much joy during those years until I turned 15. My grandmother used to pick me up after school every Friday and we would spend the entire weekend together at their house until she got sick. It was a special time together and I will always be thankful to her. We were very close, and to this day, there are things my grandmother told me that I never repeated to anybody because we had that kind of relationship. She was my saving grace. 

What is the importance of allowing the Lord to heal us and make us whole? Can you share your process of becoming that thriver?

It was a long process for me, but it all started at 16 when I decided to turn off my emotions. I think that was the only way I could make it through everything happening in my life. I was at a loss after my grandmother’s passing and shut down as a result. The continuous abuse from my mother and the overwhelming unhappiness led me to shut down for approximately 8 years until the Lord intervened in my life at 24.

When the Lord came into my life, I felt God say to me that it was time to tune my emotions back on and to start to feel again. A lot of people feel such joy, and for me, there was a lot of pain that I needed to come to terms with, so I started a journey of healing, and my dear friend Goldie helped me tremendously.

About 6 months after I accepted the Lord, I started to work with Goldie. The interesting thing is that through all the pain I faced growing up, this was the first time that somebody said to me, “Cindy, you are allowed to feel,” so for me, this was the beginning of the journey of feeling and coming to terms with what happened and starting to accept what happened during my childhood. This was the beginning of my healing process, and it continued for years. I will never forget it. Goldie brought in a Rabbi one night to pray for me, and this Rabbi prayed and spoke with me for over 4 hours and helped me with prayers of deliverance to where I could move on with my life and I could say, Okay, it’s safe for me to feel anything I want to feel and shed tears because it’s okay—there’s nothing wrong with shedding tears—there’s nothing wrong with allowing yourself to feel so for me, at that point; this is when I started my healing journey. So when you go through this, there are so many levels, and for many years I went through allowing myself to heal—allowing myself to feel pain—allowing myself to say, Okay God, you’re coming into my life now. I now have you and you’re going to heal me. You’re going to give me things that I’ve never had in my life before. Through this process, God did so much work in my life. I can’t say that it’s all been easy because it hasn’t. I spent 14 years at the congregation where that journey started and then God took me out of that congregation and brought two people and other people in my life who weren’t at that congregation. I met a Rabbi and his wife in the beginning of my healing up in Albany, New York, who became parents to me, who became a mother and a father to me that I never had and this was what God did for me because the scripture says that God’s going to restore what the locust has eaten—God did that. So God gave me parents at an age that I needed them, so they also helped me and I started going up to Albany every 6–8 weeks and God used them. That’s when I started using the scripture Jeremiah 29:11 in my life. “For I know the thought that I think toward you, says the Lord, thought of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope,” and through that process, God gave me a future and a hope because I ended up in Albany, NY, 14 years later for another journey. Healing is a process—it’s not something that’s going to happen overnight; it didn’t happen overnight—it didn’t happen overnight for me, but if you stay with the process, God heals us. He heals us physically and emotionally because that’s what He promises us, so I held onto that promise that God would heal me and then God started the next part of my journey when I moved to Albany and He used my spiritual parents to help me through the next part of that journey and that’s where I spent the next almost 18 years. It’s still a process because I still go through it—I’m still on that journey because that journey continues as I moved to Florida 3 ½ years ago and the next part of my healing journey started—God never leaves us or forsakes us, but it’s a process and that’s the important thing. 

While in Florida, God did a huge deliverance. I went to a meeting one night when I was in despair and received prayer—it was such a powerful night that I walked in despair and when I left, Goldie looked at me and said, “You are a different person—your countenance has changed; you look different and from that night I realized God did a work in me. That night, God started the next part of the journey of healing, so it’s a process because with a lot of healing, you need to go through and as you go through the process, you see how the Lord does the work. It’s important that you allow God to do the work and see how He moves in your life—you see how God is working and what He has for you because through this process, there have been terrible times in my life, but I also see what the Lord has done in my life, and that’s what I hold on to more than the terrible times as a child and adult as a woman of God where you have to trust God even through the hardest times—you hold on to what God says and God has a plan for your life.

Cindy's story is written in the book Hope Alive: Debilitated to Exhilarated with God by Connie A. VanHorn--Ambassador Coordinator of Women World Leaders and Kimberly Ann Hobbs--President/Founder of Women World Leaders (World Publishing & Productions).