Ordinary People Extraordinary Things

95. Julie Schondel's Journey: From Trauma to Redemption and the Power of Healing

• Nancy Bruscher • Season 7 • Episode 95

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Julie’s journey is one of astonishing resilience and transformation. From surviving a childhood marred by abuse and trafficking to finding hope and healing, her story is a powerful reminder how God can use pain to bring purpose. In this episode, discover how Julie navigated the complexities of life between an abusive household and the loving home of her aunt, a journey that ultimately led her to speak out against her past and seek justice. Her candid reflections on confronting her stepfather in court provide a profound insight into reclaiming one's narrative and serve as an inspiration for anyone facing similar battles.

Through therapy and the unwavering support of her husband, Julie not only found healing but also a purpose in helping others. This episode doesn’t shy away from discussing difficult truths about human trafficking and the importance of community and kindness in healing. Julie’s narrative reinforces the strength found in faith and she shares, “I never thought I would say I'm grateful.”


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We all have a story, all of us, share your story. You don't have to have the perfect answer or the perfect life - share what Jesus is doing in your life. This is an easy, real way to witness & share your testimony.


Nancy Bruscher:

My name's Nancy and you've found Ordinary People, extraordinary Things. This podcast is all about hope, real hope, found in stories of ordinary people just like you, sharing their faith and stories of how God has worked in their lives. I have a disclaimer on this episode that I want you to know. If you have young ears listening, please take heart. This episode that I want you to know, if you have young ears listening, please take heart. Listen, probably by yourself at least first, to see if this is something that you want your kids to hear.

Nancy Bruscher:

Julie is so vulnerable in sharing her story of trafficking by her stepdad. It is a very powerful story, though At the end she says that she is grateful for what she went through. I literally can still not believe that she said that and that she means it and how God has shown up in her life in amazing, powerful ways of redemption and healing. And this may be a difficult one for all of us. I know it was really difficult for me to listen and process and sit in it with Julie, but it is a wonderful story and I promise you you will not want to miss it. But if you do have young ears listening, please take heart on what this is about. Well, welcome to Ordinary People, extraordinary Things. I'm here with Julie. Julie, thanks for being on.

Julie Schondel:

Oh, thanks for having me.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yeah. If people don't know who you are, can you give three words or phrases to describe yourself?

Julie Schondel:

So I thought a lot about this. But resilient, okay, tenacious Ooh, and servant those are good.

Nancy Bruscher:

Could you give examples of those Like why would you call yourself resilient?

Julie Schondel:

Resilient because I have come through a lot of very difficult things and still have a very blessed life and I feel like I am have overcome a lot we'll have to get into those. Tenacious, because if I get a hold of something, it's like a dog with a bone. I just don't let it go. I don't let it go, you know, and servant, because I tend to serve other people, like my husband and my kids and my grandkids and church and things like that, and that is really part of my purpose.

Nancy Bruscher:

The servant's heart, yeah.

Julie Schondel:

Right yeah.

Nancy Bruscher:

How many kids do you have?

Julie Schondel:

I have two girls, three granddaughters. Very good, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nancy Bruscher:

So, yeah, can you share your testimony or might say, like, how you come to know Jesus, or maybe some of your resilient stories with us?

Julie Schondel:

So I came from a very dysfunctional, abusive background and I kind of lived in two households. I had my biological mom and stepdad that were alcoholic, narcissist, abusive, and then I had a loving home, my aunt. I went to her house every day after school. She had four kids, but she treated me like her own, went to my soccer games, taught me how to sew and garden and cook and all those things, and so I had an example of a loving family. But that wasn't what I was experiencing. At my other house.

Julie Schondel:

I was abused by my stepdad for 10 years and trafficked for him by the last two, and so there was a lot of things that I had to overcome in my life in order to function on a daily basis, and some days I still don't function.

Julie Schondel:

There's just days that I've had to accept the fact that I'm not functional, and I found out recently with my I call them my sisters and my brothers that I grew up with in my aunt's house, and I call her my mom because my biological mother was not a mom. She didn't have a maternal bone in her body and I was like an inconvenience to them. In fact, they tried to ask my aunt to take custody of me and raise me and she said, no, you're responsible, you need to be responsible. So I was treated like an inconvenience. I've been in and out of counseling my whole life trying to peel the onion layers off and get down to who I really am, and that's been very difficult to figure that out, when I'm not trying to be what everybody else wants me to be, but to figure out who I really am and who God created me to be and what his intention for me was and is.

Nancy Bruscher:

That's a lot, it is a lot your biological dad is. Was he in the picture at?

Julie Schondel:

all. No, I didn't meet him until I was 18. Oh wow, and it was uneventful. It was not a wonderful reunion of hey, you're my dad, because he never was in the picture.

Nancy Bruscher:

Okay and never really came into your life, Even I met him.

Julie Schondel:

That one time, I think I talked on the phone with him, I remember when I was little little, he would call about every six months or so as I was, you know, I can remember like five, six, seven, eight, you know and he would make a bunch of promises and then never follow through and my one of the things my biological mom did was she actually did not bad mouth him and let me, you know, create my own opinion of him. So that was interesting, you know, create my own opinion of him, uh, so that was interesting. You know, uh, that she was capable of doing that because she wasn't capable of a whole lot of things, but that was one of the things that she did.

Nancy Bruscher:

Well, and when did your stepdad come into the picture?

Julie Schondel:

They started dating when I was probably two Okay. And I have memories and feelings, but he started abusing me when I was five. Oh Like physically, emotionally sexually.

Nancy Bruscher:

Sexually yeah, oh my gosh, when you were five, I was five. And I have distinct memories.

Julie Schondel:

Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry, thank you. It's interesting, when I tell people my story, the responses that I get Sometimes, because I'm very open about my story and, very you know, I can say it pretty unemotionally, you know, and for a long time it was because I was detached.

Julie Schondel:

Okay, but but I was able to connect with those emotions and actually feel with the therapist that I the counselor I'm working with now helped me get back in touch with those emotions, you know, and how horrible it really was and what I went through and that I am a walking miracle that I went through all the things that I did. But so 10 years I left home at 15. Okay, and because of the trafficking and rape and things that he was doing, and your mom?

Nancy Bruscher:

does she know about it, or she didn't care, or do you know?

Julie Schondel:

I have a story that I tell myself she was an alcoholic and so she was drunk a lot, but I feel like it doesn't. It seems to me that it shouldn't matter how drunk you are. You got to know that's going on and unfortunately, there were times she was in the room and I think she had to have known. There's no way that she didn't know, but I think that she chose to ignore that, as in my story that I tell myself that she I was the inconvenience and so she didn't want to deal with it. So she just either ignored it or chose not to do anything about it. It or chose not to do anything about it because she she looked at me as competition for his affections, and when I finally did say something about when he raped me in Mexico, she looked at him and said couldn't you control yourself any better than that?

Julie Schondel:

which, to me, I mean, she didn't say oh my gosh, are you okay? Do we need to take you to a doctor or counselor, or can? What can I do to help you? That that wasn't her response. And even later in life, as I was, you know, I left home at 15, and it was the height of her alcoholism. And when I was 16, she tried to commit suicide. She succeeded, but my stepdad came home and found her and gave her CPR and she'd survived and went into rehab at that point and that was when she got sober. But even after she got sober she wasn't a mother. She didn't believe me. I think she had put it out of her mind and she didn't believe that it happened. Travelers were installing memories into their clients that weren't actually there, because a lot of people don't remember what happened they block it or something they block it and a lot of people do, and sometimes to survive, right, right, yes, it's

Julie Schondel:

just, it's just, it's actually part of ptsd. Ptsd when you go through a trauma, ptsd, our brain, our subconscious, is there to protect us and it actually stores that trauma in the amygdala. I don't know if you've heard any of the. You know this about PTSD, but it stores the trauma in the amygdala and then later on in life you can have a smell or an experience or a song or and I have all of those triggers. I just have learned how to manage them. So there's definitely music that will trigger a memory and a lot of people adults don't have those triggers or realize it, because then your body responds. It's actually like an uncontrollable trigger response that people have, trigger response that people have, and then all of the memories come flooding back and all of a sudden they're a mess.

Julie Schondel:

And I've been through that. Like I said, there's still times where I still have triggers that I will have a very emotional response.

Nancy Bruscher:

And that's what you were saying on. You accept the fact that you can't function. Is that what you were alluding to?

Julie Schondel:

Yes, yeah, so there's times where I just like can't get up and take a figure out if I need to take a shower or if I, you know like it's. It's hard to like share your demons. You know, like the fact that I don't get off the couch I'll watch stupid TV or a movie that I've seen five times, or you know, because there's certain things that kind of give me comfort, you know, plain solitaire, or those types of things, and I will escape into that because I don't want to deal with my reality, and it's usually when I'm overwhelmed when there's a lot going on in my life and I don't, I stop taking care of myself, I stop eating right, I stop, you know, doing the things that I know make me resilient.

Nancy Bruscher:

That's good. That's good. It was really brave of you to be able to run away from that, because I think that sometimes you hear about once you get into trafficking, it's hard to know how to live any other life really.

Julie Schondel:

Well, to be honest, I lived on the streets for two years. Okay, I was addicted to alcohol, marijuana, speed. I dealt drugs to survive. I slept on people's couches, I was a couch surfer and traded myself for places to stay, and it wasn't until my mom's suicide attempt that I got sober. So it was like two years on the streets.

Julie Schondel:

Were you into alcohol before 15 or that was part of my grooming process from my stepdad. So they were entertainers, they like to have people over and we had friday night poker parties and sunday morning brunches and I was their like servant making drinks for everybody, and everybody thought I was so cute. So I grew up in a very adult environment and drinking was part of that. Smoking pot was part of that. They were they were marijuana users, and so I was taught how to roll joints so that I could go do that for them when I was like nine. Oh wow. And so alcohol and marijuana were a big part of the grooming process that he and later on he would use that to hold over me. If he wasn't allowed to touch me, to hold over me. If he wasn't allowed to touch me, I wasn't allowed to drink or be a part of the family.

Nancy Bruscher:

So sad so you had two years on the streets.

Julie Schondel:

Two years on the streets Got sober when I was 17. How so? Obviously, my biological mom went into recovery and so she's like you need to go to Al-Anon or Alateen or something. And so I did. I went to Alateen.

Nancy Bruscher:

And that's a recovery.

Julie Schondel:

It's a 12-step program for teens Okay, and I ended up in AA and got sober. And I was probably 10, 11 years sober when I ended up at another 12-step program, codependents Anonymous. Oh, okay, and I realized that it wasn't alcohol that was my issue.

Nancy Bruscher:

When I ended up at another 12-step program Codependence Anonymous.

Julie Schondel:

Oh okay, and I realized that it wasn't alcohol that was my issue. It was my trauma and the people around me, and so I can. Alcoholism runs in my family. It is genetic, and so I'm very careful. But I can have a glass of wine with dinner or go out and have a social drink and not overdo it. So I did. You know, like I said, I was.

Nancy Bruscher:

I think, 28 when I took my first legal drink, and so you were completely sober for a long time 11 years, yeah, yeah. Wow.

Julie Schondel:

Wow and so that. But that helped me actually, but I was still really screwed up. It wasn't until I was 21 that I actually got into my first counselor. So I had a friend in AA and she was horribly abused by her dad her biological dad and she said here's the number of my counselor. You really need to get some help.

Julie Schondel:

Because I was, um, very promiscuous Even in my sobriety. I was acting out and acting in. When you have PTSD and you hit triggers, you either act out at people around you or you act in and abuse yourself or don't take care of yourself. And so I was doing all of that and really not taking care of myself and not having any kind of good relationships. And I actually got married. That didn't even last for a year. That was, you know, tragic. I finally got to a point where I decided I needed to work on myself and I went to this counselor and she helped me a lot and I was with her about three months. When I met my current husband, oh wow, and I told him you don't want to get involved with me because I've been through a lot and I'm not good in relationships and you should probably just run and because I'm just gonna hurt you, I don't have the capacity to have a good relationship. And he said I'll wait. And he went to counseling with me and and we got married nine months later.

Nancy Bruscher:

Wow, yeah, yeah so actually, how long have you guys been married?

Julie Schondel:

Uh 37 years.

Nancy Bruscher:

Oh my gosh, that's amazing. It's totally God. It's totally God From what you just told me, before I mean yeah, it's totally God, Um, because, uh, I told him.

Julie Schondel:

I said I just started counseling and I was abused and raped, and at that point I didn't know that I was trafficked, but you knew that you were I knew that I was molested for 10 years and raped by my stepdad and that was.

Julie Schondel:

That was part of my story and there is so much to the story. Like I actually sued him in civil court. When I realized the damage that he and my biological mom had done, I filed a lawsuit in civil court, took three years to actually go to trial and that really gave me and we went to trial. He actually left the state and called the judge and said I don't want anything to do with this, I've left the state. I fired my attorney and so we still had to put on the whole trial. I had to get up and testify. I had to present expert witnesses.

Nancy Bruscher:

How old were you?

Julie Schondel:

21. Oh, okay, well, 21. We filed it when I was 21. So I was like 24.

Julie Schondel:

Okay 21, so I was like 24, okay so pretty young in your, in your kind of counseling and trying to figure. Okay, yeah, and it actually empowered me because I had somebody, an authority, say what happened to you is wrong and because nobody had ever said that to me. Nobody had ever said what he did to you is wrong and you're the victim here. I was treated. Unfortunately, the system back then didn't know how to treat survivors of molestation and incest. It was a very broken system and I'm sure it's not wonderful now, but it was a very broken system and I was accused when I was 15. It did come out after the rape that um and my aunt took me in, but I was on drugs and really not able to accept her.

Nancy Bruscher:

So a lot of other people at when you were 15 knew that this had happened. Yes, okay, yeah Okay.

Julie Schondel:

And, uh, the authorities knew, Okay, Uh, and they told me that they were going to put him in jail, but they never said what he did to you is wrong. And my court appointed attorney accused me of seducing him. And it was. It was horrible. I so I ran, I I left. I had a boyfriend, I went and lived with him for a little while until that fell. He was abusive and was beating me, and so I again didn't know how to take care of myself and stand up for myself so then the the court thing when you were 21,.

Nancy Bruscher:

That actually was empowering for you.

Julie Schondel:

Yes, because I had an authority say this is absolutely wrong and I was awarded a huge amount of money which I never got because he hid all of his money, which I never got because he hid all of his money.

Julie Schondel:

But it was still emotionally good for me. And I actually spoke at the National Press Club for an organization that was against pornography because he used pornography as part of my grooming and abuse and so it was. So I had people that were like, come tell your story at our, you know, and I had like so many people come up to me and say I've never told anybody, come up to me and say I've never told anybody. But since you told your story in a venue like this, I'm telling you I have been through something similar and so I actually facilitated some support groups and did a lot of using that power until I started having children and then I kind of stepped back from that whole role and was a parent and of course I had two girls, which made it very difficult to. I was very protective. I didn't want anything like what I went through to happen to them and um, and it was very hard to, because every time they hit a milestone of a memory that I had. I kind of relived that.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yeah.

Julie Schondel:

So I remember when my oldest daughter turned five and I realized how insanely horrible it was that he was molesting me at that age. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And having three granddaughters, it's still.

Nancy Bruscher:

All girls.

Julie Schondel:

All girls, yeah, yeah so it's still very difficult.

Nancy Bruscher:

Was it hard to be a mom because you didn't see how to be a good mom, or did you have your aunts, kind of, or how did that work?

Julie Schondel:

So I did have my aunts example, and my grandmother, my maternal grandmother, was phenomenal. She had 28 grandchildren and she loved all of us so unconditionally. It was her example also. But I mean, even today I rarely read a fiction book. It's all about personal development, or how can I improve myself, how can I take care of myself, how can I be a servant to others, and so I read a lot of personal development fiction, those type of books. Yeah.

Julie Schondel:

But, and I kind of probably went the opposite direction, because I really didn't have, uh, that maternal I was. I was never going to be that.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yeah, so you and your husband got married after nine months and you're still working through. You probably had a lot of changes to go through still, as you were newly married.

Julie Schondel:

Right and I did like we did go to counseling together, because he also comes from a broken marriage, like both his parents divorced and got remarried, and so we realized early on that neither one of us had a good foundation for how to be a couple. So we did go to counseling for a while together, in addition to my individual counseling, and learned how to be in a relationship and have a good relationship, and we did pretty good until about 12 years and we had a separation okay and did you have kids by this time?

Julie Schondel:

yeah, we had both of them they were seven and four, okay, and we had almost got divorced it was. It was pretty bad and I moved out, got a two-bedroom apartment head and we were in counseling at the time and I was going to take the girls with me but I was out of the school district, even though I wasn't far away. I was out of their school district and our counselor said it's going to be better for them to be in their community where they have friends and go to the same school and all of that. So I decided to not try and make them be with me. So we did 50, 50, you know, and about a month after I moved out he came to my apartment to say I'm done, I'm, I don't want to do this.

Julie Schondel:

You know, just get an attorney. We're going to get divorced, yeah, and I remember praying, probably a couple months before this. Okay, god, I don't know if you are even there or if you even care what I'm going through, or if you just want me to be happy, or I don't know what you want, or if you're there in my life. I don't know what you want, or if you're there in my life. And when Greg came to the door to say he was done, right after that he said I'm willing to try again if you are.

Julie Schondel:

And he literally turned around to see who said it. It was like God took hold of his mouth and said those words and I knew immediately that God had just intervened, like the God of the universe that created all the heavens and all the earth. Had stepped in to intervene in my divorce. Had stepped in to intervene in my divorce. And because that was an answer to my prayer.

Julie Schondel:

And I had tried everything except Jesus. I mean literally. I tried, you know, like probably Buddhism not really, but like Eastern beliefs I had tried, like paganism, wiccan, healing crystals, you know chakra cleansing, you know aura cleansing, all of that. I had tried to fix that hole that was inside of me and later on I learned that God puts his thumbprint on our heart and the only thing that can fill it is Jesus. And in talking with my two sisters that I grew up with, like your aunts, my aunts yeah, my aunts' kids.

Julie Schondel:

I was an only child. So my two sisters, we were talking recently and they shared with me that they because they were my example of Jesus when I was growing up, because they were both very strong Christians and they sang. They both played guitar and sang and had beautiful voices and we would sit after school and sing songs. And they both told me recently that both of them shared Jesus with me when I was like six, you know, staying at their house after school. I was there a lot of weekends.

Julie Schondel:

I was there all summer long because my mom worked for my stepdad in his dental office because my mom worked for my stepdad in his dental office, and so I had several opportunities or introductions and my grandmother gave me a King James Bible. I still have that Bible. That was one of the things that actually made it through my living on the streets and that I don't know how I ended up still having that, but I do. It's on my bookshelf, and did you read it?

Nancy Bruscher:

when you were on the streets, or did you just kind of have it as in like? My grandma gave this to me.

Julie Schondel:

I don't necessarily remember that. I remember one time when I was at my aunt's house when all of this stuff when I was 15 and all of the court stuff was going on. I remember sitting in that bedroom holding that bible and trying to read it and I I didn't understand any of it, but I knew that God was there. Like I always believed in God. I just didn't believe in Jesus but and I had several opportunities throughout my lifetime where Jesus came into the picture, but I was not in a place where I could receive that.

Julie Schondel:

And it wasn't until, like I said, god literally intervened in my divorce that I realized that God had been there all along. Through all of the things I went through, through, all the horrible things, I experienced that God had been there all along. Through all of the things I went through, through all the horrible things, I experienced that God was there. And in that moment I said, okay, god, I will never deny Jesus in my life again. And so that was what brought me to Christ and I started going to church, church, and I always went to my aunt's church like it was never. I never found a church that was mine. I always ended up going to church with my aunt and my, my two cousins, my, who I call my sisters now it's only been a few years since I really realized.

Julie Schondel:

It was when my aunt died. It was February of right before COVID that she died and she had Alzheimer's for a lot of years, like 10 years, and she had not. She had been non-verbal for the last three or four, five, five years and it wasn't until she died that I realized that she was my mom, that she really that, she her, and that family was God's provision for me, because he knew that my mom and stepdad were not going to be parents to me, and so God provided my aunt and her four children to give me a loving, caring environment. So I didn't realize that until she passed, which is really sad. I became a full-on Christ follower, believer, and my husband was raised Catholic and he's very much a traditional moral, you know never wanted a divorce.

Julie Schondel:

He had some very foundational values, morals from that upbringing. But he was not a practicing catholic and so when I told him and it's funny because he, he started reading his bible after that and we and I started going to church he had been commissioned as an officer in the Navy so he had to go to school for like three months right after we reconciled, and so he was there reading his Bible. He was away for three months and so we started talking about it and he came home right around Christmastime and I said I'm going to church and I've accepted Christ and you know, and I'm doing this, and so he started coming to church with me. This was like Christmas time, january. The church that we were going to did baptisms twice a year in Mission Bay. We were in San Diego. So I said I'm getting baptized in May when they do baptism. They did it Memorial Day and Labor Day.

Nancy Bruscher:

Oh, that's funny.

Julie Schondel:

And so Memorial Day is always usually around my birthday, and I said I'm getting baptized by the pastor. We were going to church and somewhere around April the pastor gave a sermon about by the way, if you're praying, you know it might be falling on deaf ears if you haven't made the choice to make Christ your Savior. And so he said, by the, you know, around April he says by the way, I prayed the prayer today the way I prayed the prayer today and of course inside was hooping and hollering and celebrating.

Julie Schondel:

And I said oh, that's nice. And so we ended up getting baptized together in Mission Bay. So it wasn't just an individual baptism where we each accepted Christ, but our relationship was baptized also.

Nancy Bruscher:

Oh, wow, and how old were you?

Julie Schondel:

I mean about Okay, 34-ish. We decided that divorce was never going to be an option. You know, if God of the universe was going to come down and intervene in our divorce, obviously that wasn't his plan for us and we needed to take the word divorce out of our vocabulary. And, whatever happened, we were going to work through it. And I remember when we I guess it was probably 25 years Some of our friends were getting divorced at like 19 years and he's like why would they do that? That's just when it's starting to get good what a story, julie.

Julie Schondel:

I know right like a very, very, very heartbreaking story well, and it wasn't until a couple few years ago that I realized that I was trafficked. That was that came when I started volunteering for Covered yes.

Julie Schondel:

And I was studying to be a case manager and one of the things they recommended reading for working with the trafficking survivors was a book called Road to Redemption and it explains a lot of different types of trafficking. You know, gang and pimp, and boyfriend and familial was one of them and there was a story in there and I took the book into my counselor and I said this isn't far from what I experienced. And we started talking about what happened in my house and I used to say like part of my story was that I was the family offering, because all the men that started that would come to our house would end up in my bedroom With you. Yes, and I was 13. And it hit me when she said that's trafficking. I will never know the truth, whether they paid him or what the exchange was or how that happened. I'll never know.

Nancy Bruscher:

But I do know that I was trafficked. I actually heard that from other people that they didn't know they were trafficked.

Julie Schondel:

And it almost seems like impossible. Is it because you're groomed so much? Yes, okay, yeah, the grooming is hideous. It really is. It really is. One of the things that I've noticed is that I can pick out. I met a girl at a farmer's market in Larkspur last year and she only had to say a couple things for me to realize that she was being trafficked, because I recognized the grooming.

Nancy Bruscher:

Were you able to talk to her.

Julie Schondel:

I did try to connect her with Johanna from Covered. And I have another friend that was there with me and she was heartbroken that we could not get her because I don't think she knew she was being trafficked. But we could not get her. She started backing away when we started trying to connect her with joe and it was very sad, yeah, but there's a lot of people like trafficking wasn't even a thing when I was a teenager. Now it's so prevalent, like so obvious.

Nancy Bruscher:

Would you say it wasn't a thing as in, people didn't understand it. I mean, obviously it was happening.

Julie Schondel:

I'm sure it was. I mean, it's happened for decades, you know, forever. Forever I mean even in biblical times you know there was. There was trafficking, but it wasn't, I guess, on everybody's radar, because right now it seems like human trafficking is on everybody's radar.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yeah.

Julie Schondel:

So it wasn't, I guess, a household name Sure right, you know, definitely, definitely Like.

Julie Schondel:

I said, even the authorities didn't know how to deal with me, right yeah, and how to treat me.

Julie Schondel:

To be honest, I had no idea until I was about 12 or 13 that what was going on in my house wasn't going on in everybody's house. I didn't often have friends over or sleepovers or things like that. Often have friends over or sleepovers or things like that and I didn't know it wasn't happening in everybody else's house until I started getting to that age where I was having more friends that we were, you know, doing sleepovers and things like that, and figuring out that that didn't happen in everybody's house, that I didn't know that daddies didn't love their daughters that way, that I didn't know that other kids didn't watch porn movies in their house. I do know that, like I said, my aunt took me in when I had left home and we had to go to court and there's my mom, my biological mom, in the courtroom on his side of the courtroom and my aunt is there with me on my side of the courtroom and I feel like I've done something wrong.

Nancy Bruscher:

Maybe you can't answer this, but I'm sure you've asked this question. Why does God allow this sort of thing?

Julie Schondel:

so I was going to kind of wait for that one until you asked me what I'm grateful for, because because I but I will go ahead and talk about it God does allow it. I'm sure it breaks his heart.

Nancy Bruscher:

I mean it's breaking my heart right now, like it really is. This is so hard.

Julie Schondel:

You're making me cry.

Nancy Bruscher:

This is so hard, you know, yeah, no it is and, like I said, I have a lot of people that have different responses A lot of people.

Julie Schondel:

Sometimes it's like the story in the Bible of the Good Samaritan, where people like go around the path and avoid this person with all these gaping wounds, you know, and um, people will avoid me because they can't handle the story much. It is, it's a lot, and but then there's people like the good samaritan that pick you up and dress your wounds and pay for you to rehabilitate, which I didn't exactly have. That but it is. Yeah, no, it's a hard story. It's a hard story and when I tell people they have very different responses and I stopped talking about it for a while because I had so many people just walk away because they couldn't handle it. I know God allows it because what I went through has made me the person I am today and I never thought I would be able to say that I'm grateful.

Nancy Bruscher:

I'm like no, don't say that, Julie, I know.

Julie Schondel:

But think about it. Don't say that, julie. I know, but think about it. I mean, if I had not endured those things, I would not have the opportunity to be resilient or tenacious. Or, like you know, I'm on the security team at church. I do that because I don't ever want to be out in public or somewhere that some horrible thing like a shooter walks in and I'm not able to be a part of the solution rather than a part of the problem. I am a mom affair.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yeah, I can see that.

Julie Schondel:

Yeah, I don't think I would be all of those things if it weren't for what I went through, what I've had to overcome and there is just true evil.

Nancy Bruscher:

Isn't there?

Julie Schondel:

there is true evil yeah, and God does give us free will and he allows people to do horrible things, but that doesn't make him bad because he, like I said, he provided a loving environment for me, he provided an example of a loving family. He provided, you know so, even though I was going through that, because he's not going to intervene in somebody's free will to do evil. But that doesn't mean that he's not there.

Nancy Bruscher:

He never left me. Julie, can we pray before we?

Julie Schondel:

end this yes.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yes, absolutely God, such a story. I've been just kind of silent because I don't have the words, god, and I think sometimes that's okay. So just bless the story that Julie's been so brave to share and may, when she walks out of here here, make she feel peace and comfort and not like re-hit by something, not have a PTSD moment, not have to walk through something and go through something. God, because of her bravery, please just give her peace and comfort. And, god, I'm just praying for the people who are listening.

Nancy Bruscher:

I don't know who's going to listen, god, people who have no idea what she went through. Thank God, people who do know what she went through. God, help us just with whatever. However, we're listening to this story. Help us to hear your words. Help us to just give us whatever you want us to get from this, because this is hard, god, it's just hard. So we ask this in your name. You talked about that. We go to the same church. I'm always amazed at the stories that are there, that you don't know that are there. I say that a lot.

Julie Schondel:

That's part of one of the things that are there that you don't know that are there. I say that a lot. That's part of one of the things that in my servant heart I don't know if you do a word for the year I gave up resolutions years ago because those just don't happen, right. What's the Quitter's Day? The second. Friday in.

Julie Schondel:

February, january, you know Like. So I do a word for the year. This year my word is connection. I want to make connections with people because you don't realize what somebody sitting next to you has been through or how they're feeling. I haven't.

Julie Schondel:

I was suicidal probably 10, 15 years ago because I got re-traumatized, but I have not been suicidal in a lot of years because I can see that God is using me to do good, to use my story for something good. There's good that comes from the evil. That's done and it says in God's word. But I tell people a lot be kind, because you don't know what the person that cut you off in traffic has just gone through. You don't know. You know, instead of getting angry and yelling at them, pray for them. We don't know what the people everybody walking around and post-pandemic people need. Connection, like it really is something that we were deprived of during the pandemic. I personally got very comfortable in my home. My home is my sanctuary, yeah, and I've isolated, I've been guilty of isolating myself, and so I really believe that God's calling me to make connections and that's why I'm working on my podcast.

Nancy Bruscher:

Yes, yes, what is your podcast going to be called?

Julie Schondel:

Vibrant Living Essentially.

Nancy Bruscher:

I love it. I love it. Well, if it's out by the time we get this out, we'll connect it. Otherwise, when it does, then I'll just change the show notes in there. Right, as we wrap up. What is your favorite Bible verse or story?

Julie Schondel:

Esther, because God put her through a lot of hard stuff.

Nancy Bruscher:

She was trafficked right I mean, that's what they kind of assume happened to all of these women that came into his bedroom for a night.

Julie Schondel:

Right.

Nancy Bruscher:

I mean it's kind of like glossed over a little bit.

Julie Schondel:

It is glossed over and God chose not to put that part in the story. But what he chose to highlight in the story is that he used her to save God's people, and that just totally gave me chills. God has called me for such a time as this to make a difference in the lives of the people that he puts in front of me.

Nancy Bruscher:

I do the Bible recap and that she said that I'm Esther. She's like if you have little ears, you might want to to stop. And I was like this is Esther. What? What did I miss something? They brought all of these young women in to him.

Julie Schondel:

Right For a night.

Nancy Bruscher:

Until he found the queen and I was like, oh, oh, I didn't see that and maybe God's like you don't always have to see that right away. It's such a powerful story right, it is. Of her being brave enough to go before the king, then, right yeah, when that?

Julie Schondel:

before the king, then Right yeah, when that? Was not a thing, Right. You know that they didn't allow it, right, yeah, and so I could probably add to my words brave and courageous because, like you said, being willing to tell my story.

Nancy Bruscher:

What are you grateful for?

Julie Schondel:

Healing, the healing that I have done and, like I said, I can honestly say I'm grateful for everything that I went through.

Nancy Bruscher:

That's hard for me. Yeah, and it's hard for me.

Julie Schondel:

Yeah, and, and it's hard for me too, you know. But and and I have to say that I am grateful for my husband. We've been together 37 years and he has been my safe place. He has been through all my insanity, because there have been very insane times. Well, I was getting through some of those triggers waking up in the middle of the night in a fetal position, shaking, and I couldn't have him touch me because of the trauma, but he would sit there, he would lay there and say it's okay, I'm here, you're okay, you're safe. I couldn't have him touch me because of the trauma, but he would sit there, he would lay there and say it's okay, I'm here, you're okay, you're safe.

Nancy Bruscher:

What kindness have you shown or what kindness have you received in the last week?

Julie Schondel:

I am not the type of person that tries to call out what I do for people. You know what I mean. Yeah, I mean obviously you know that I'm serving my daughter right now because she's going through a very difficult disability that she can't drive. So I spend at least two days a week, sometimes more, taking care of my grandkids, picking them up from school, doing all of that of my grandkids, picking them up from school, doing all of that. What I wrote down when I was preparing for this. I'm in a life group and one of the couples is a foster family and they have teenage daughter that they're trying to adopt and they just got a brand new safe haven baby that they're trying to adopt and they are just so kind to these children that have been abandoned and I I guess it means a lot to me to see godly people stepping up to be to be parents yeah because that wasn't what I mean.

Nancy Bruscher:

It did happen for me it was my aunt, so good. Well, julie, thank you for being on. Thank you for sharing your story thank you for inviting me on ordinary people, extraordinary things.

Nancy Bruscher:

Your story is his glory. I hope that Julie's story her being so vulnerable and sharing such an intimate, difficult part of her story has impacted you. Maybe it was just empathy. I don't know what God is going to use for you in this story, but thank you for listening. In two weeks we have a brand new episode coming out. It is with Darcy. Darcy is going to share so many great things.

Nancy Bruscher:

We had such a fun conversation. We're both from the same town in Iowa Lake City and we talk about some really fun things as far as food that is specific to Iowa or that area, just some fun things like that. But then we really dive in. We dive into finding faith, finding faith from a storyteller, farmer's perspective. She really talks about how sharing your story does help others and the eternal ripples that has. She talks about people that have truly impacted her life in kindness. That might sound like a small way, and we talked about putting the power of curiosity to work and how that's vital, and even if that means questioning God, maybe you feel like she does In the episode she said that she has seen herself as a problem child of God. So if that resonates with you please listen in two weeks when Darcy shares. We'll see you then.