A few days ago, Noemi came over to join my wife and me for Bible study as usual on Thursday nights. We’re going through Ecclesiastes and just reached chapter three. I prepared to teach on the sovereignty of God in light of man’s incapability to find satisfaction in life apart from him.
Conversation flowed between us, and something that seemed to come up continually was, “God has a plan.” It came up so often that Noemi and Yailinee repeated this phrase every few minutes in a joking manner.
Bible study concluded, but we continued to chat, reflecting on past events in each of our lives. The joke continued, and at the end of each story, someone would say, “But God had a plan.”
Something came up about trauma in Yailinee’s past, and the discussion began to turn toward the effects trauma can have. Yailinee told Noemi about a time when we were both battling depression during the spring of 2023. We were considering moving away—away from family, away from friends, and away from the life we came to know. It was a difficult decision to make, as we weren’t sure if we were just trying to run away from our problems.
As we battled this decision, there was a specific night Yailinee recounted when we visited our friend’s Tim and Olivia, seeking advice and encouragement. Tim spoke about trauma, questioning if it was a possible factor of our depression.
For Yailinee, she said she felt the answer was a resounding yes. While it wasn’t the only factor, it definitely weighed heavy on her heart with different memories from her childhood.
Tim then turned to me, asking if I felt the same. I said no, that my childhood was normal and nothing stuck out to me as good or bad.
The memory came back to me as Yailinee retold the story. Tim asked simple questions about my life. One that I specifically remember was, “What are some happy memories from your childhood?”
The room fell silent. I thought for a while before saying, “Honestly, I don’t really remember my childhood.”
To me, I thought that was completely normal. Don’t people forget about that stuff?
Tim pressed me more. “Come on, there has to be something you remember.”
Again, I took some time to think about it. “First thing that comes to mind is falling in the septic tank.” (That’s another story for another time.)
Tim asked for more, and I shrugged my shoulders.
“I don’t know. I don’t remember the happy stuff. I was depressed for a lot of it. I remember my parents argued and worked all the time. I remember being the butt of the jokes as the youngest. I remember never getting along with my one brother. But those are just normal things you deal with growing up.”
After saying the words, I felt embarrassed, wondering if I was wrong—that people do remember their childhoods, that people do have happy memories. Tim further proved this point by talking about his own, saying his first memory goes all the way back to 3 or 4 years old. He then mentioned other things about his childhood that highlighted friends, adventures, and family events.
As I thought about it more, I did recall some happy moments, but they were few and far between.
“But I wasn’t beat as a kid. I didn’t have a drunk dad. We always went to church. I don’t have trauma.”
Saying it out loud made it all too clear in my own heart that this was a lie.
Tim showed compassion in light of my ignorance. “Trauma isn’t always associated with things like that.”
As we continued, I remember mentioning how I always struggled with my emotions. I couldn’t cry, even if I felt like I wanted to. I never wanted to show weakness, which led to a punky rebellious phase. I was always blunt, lacking care for others’ feelings. The more Tim and I talked, the more I realized the defensive walls I had put up in my life.
After telling Noemi this story, Yailinee talked about how I still don’t remember things. Whether it was just a few years ago, highschool, or childhood, those memories don’t always come to me easily. If someone jogs my memory, then things will come to mind, but trying to think back on my own has always been difficult.
Since that conversation with Tim, I’ve come to accept the reality that I do struggle with childhood trauma. After researching it, I found that forgetting aspects of your childhood is sometimes a defense mechanism the brain uses, as if it's trying to protect us from the pain. Another defense mechanism is bottling up emotions, and up until that point in my life, that was the normal thing to do. My family wasn’t the empathetic type. I grew up in a blue-collar area with parents that owned their own business. It was a grind ‘til you die kind of mentality. Emotions were always kicked to the wayside. It wasn’t until that night at Tim and Olivia’s that I began to try and work out my feelings about the past.
It’s now 2025, and since then, I’ve come a long way. We did end up moving, and that process caused my wife and me to have to put our full faith in God, leading to a lot of growth in many aspects of my life. While childhood memories still aren’t fully there, I have learned to talk about these things more, and opening up has become easier. My wife often jokes that I’ve become a softy, but I take it as a compliment, as it means I’m making progress.
Funny enough, as we told our friend Noemi about all of this, a memory did cross my mind!
I ran to the other room and pulled out some boxes of files that hadn’t been touched since moving. Searching through them, I found an old copy of a memoir I wrote right before turning 18.
I brought it to the living room saying, “I forgot all about this!”
Noemi said I should publish it, and I laughed. “Yeah right! Last time I remember looking at this, I was disgusted by the writing.”
I stared at the yellow folder holding a hundred pages. I thought to myself, I don’t even remember what I wrote.
I opened the folder and read the first few paragraphs of the prologue. I made a gagging noise as I looked at the mediocrity, thankful that my writing didn’t reflect this form today.
“Yeah, this is garbage,” I said out loud.
But then I kept reading, and Noemi and Yailinee’s conversation faded into white noise. Memories, both good and bad, were coming back to me. I flipped through the pages, recounting things I had forgotten for years, never realizing how they impacted me at such a young age.
One passage I skimmed through was my salvation story. I was in 5th grade, sitting in the auditorium at my Christian school, listening to a Wednesday chapel message from Uncle Bob. The message convicted me, and staring at the floor, I said a prayer in my heart, asking the Lord to save me.
Flipping forward, I found myself pulled in by one section. It floored me when I came to this line:
Just because I made a decision to follow Christ doesn’t mean I became perfect right away. I had a lot of growing to do; God had a plan.
No freaking way, I thought. I couldn’t believe those words were coming full-circle.
I kept reading, finding myself shaking as I finished each page. There were flashes of light but also a lot of darkness. Then, I came to this:
The age of thirteen was not a good time of life for me. Pornography really took a hold of my life at this time and started changing the way I talked and acted. I cut God out of my life except for in my Christian school. After each school day I pretty much crammed God in my locker along with my unwashed gym clothes and school books I never used. It’s sad, I can barely remember anything else from that school year.
I do remember a little bit outside of school. We use to have family time every Sunday. Mom, Dad, four siblings, two brother-in-laws, and I would get together and eat lunch and spend time together. I use to love it! Didn’t always show it (my siblings use to call me Debbie Downer), but I truly did love when everyone was together. The sad thing was no one knew about the sin I struggled with. No one knew the bad friends I had that told me about porn. No one in my family knew about the filthy music I started listening to. No one knew about the language I started picking up. I was filthy on the inside, and I kept it hidden pretty well. Sometimes I felt really broken and awful about who I was; I would think, “If I’m really saved, then why am I living like this? Am I even saved?” Family time always made me feel better about myself. I could act like none of that was true and feel accepted by the ones who matter most to me.
Apart from the repetition and grammatical errors, something became very clear. At 17, when I wrote this, I was aware of my trauma and depression. While I may have not used those words or fully understood it, it was obvious in my descriptions.
Yailinee looked over and interrupted my reading. “Are you crying?”
I wiped my eyes, not even realizing the fact at first. “Yeah, this is heavy.”
They asked me to read aloud. I took a deep breath and reread that section for them. Then, I read this:
During my seventh grade year of school my father became very sick. He had a disease called trigeminal neuralgia, also known as the suicide disease. It’s a disease that affects the three main nerves that travel up the side of your face and into your brain. The pain can be so excruciating, that people with this disease end up killing themselves. I can remember one night in specific that I was lying in bed trying to listen to a conversation in the office near my room. My father was talking to his friend, Dave, who is a nurse. They were talking about decisions my dad had to make about finding a surgeon. While they were talking, my dad kept having these episodes of pain. Listening to my dad grunt and breathe heavily was a little scary, but then it got much worse. Unexpectedly my dad screamed in pain. Hearing my father yell so loud in such a agonizing way was terrifying to me at only thirteen years old.
It was that moment that I cried out to God for the first time since fifth grade in the auditorium. I prayed, “God, please save my dad! Stop this pain! Don’t let him die!” I hadn’t ever truly fallen to my knees before. I was so broken inside having these awful thoughts in my head: Why would God ever listen to you? You’re garbage to Him! You deserve to rot in hell. He should take your father away! I hadn’t been scared like this ever before, but I realize now that sometimes God uses some seriously hard trials to bring His children back to Him.
I stopped there, my shaky voice unable to continue. Sitting back, I tried to catch my breath, tears blurring my vision. I didn’t remember this memory until that moment. While it was hard to read and hard to talk about, it was freeing. Even in the light of a depressed state at a young age, I still found faith in my God.
Regaining my composure, I continued reading. I read about my sister getting a divorce and running away from the family in shame. I read about how my brother hated me when I wished we could be friends. I read about how my parents worked long hours and never had time for me. I read about how I hated myself because of the sin I lived in. It was raw, cutting to the heart, filling me with emotional memories I hadn’t re-lived in ten years.
After finishing a large chunk of the memoir together, we realized it was 2 AM and finally let Noemi go home.
Before she left, she thanked me for sharing and pointed out the beauty in the young writing style. Not only does it show how much I’ve grown in my craft, but it shows the innocence of the time. If I were to rewrite it, it wouldn’t be the same.
She then said one last time, “God has a plan.”
And she’s right. Looking back, I did have a lot of trauma, but so much has changed since then.
The surgery was a success, and today, my father is pain free.
My sister is back in our lives, no longer hiding in shame.
Today, Dave is not only my brother; he’s my best friend.
I have a better relationship with my parents now than ever before.
Time and time again, God has blessed me undeniably, and in a way, my sufferings have made me who I am today.
While I may not remember everything, and there are still wounds that will take time to heal, I know my sovereign God is in control. I know that He has a plan.
-Michael Jaymes
Romans 8:28
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.