I am taking an English class that has a theme of monsters. We have had to read some Shakespearean sonnets, The Tempest, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Frankenstein, The Phantom of the Opera, and a lot of fairy tales and short stories in their original forms. A few examples are "The Little Mermaid", "Beauty and the Beast," "Little Red Ridding Hood," and "Bluebeard," just to name a few. It really has been a fun class! I have been going through a lot this semester and dealing with some monsters from my past. As some of you may know, I was sexually abused for a few years when I was younger. I had always suppressed my emotions and feelings about this. It was always a huge secret I tried to hide from everyone, even my parents. Well, not long after I was accepted to go on this trip, I started having terrible nightmares about it and not sleeping. It soon began to affect others around me. I could hardly stand to be around people. I went to a psychiatrist who diagnosed me with depression and told me that my dreams where really flashbacks. The flashbacks were/are so real. I feel everything all over again. One morning I woke up with scratches all over my face. The psychiatrist put me on anti-depressants and sleeping pills, which really helped a lot!

Now I no longer take the pills because I have learned to deal with things a lot better. I still have the flashbacks, but they are not every time I sleep anymore. When I got over the roughest part of all of this I was doing some make-up work for my English class.It was then that I realized that we all have our monsters. Everyone has their own fears and phobias. Some of us even have our monsters within us. These can be the scariest ones. They are the ones that we try to hide from the world because we are afraid of what other people may think about it. Then I started thinking that maybe our monsters are not so bad once we tame them.

God showed me how I can turn something evil into something good. He showed me how to tame my monster. If you have watched the video from AIM for Jeffrey's Bay, then one of the words you will see is rape. When I saw this is freaked me out a bit. I prayed to God a lot about this. Then He showed me that this whole time He has been preparing me for this trip. I had to learn how to deal with my own stuff first. I know that God is going to put some kid in my life who has been through the same things that I have and I will be able to help them now. Before I went through the depression, the flashbacks, the storm I did not know how to deal with it. Now I can be an example to them. I can share with them how to abide in God and His love will make it all better.

I can now be a better light for Christ. I can now be a better Christian because I have learned a HUGE lesson on forgiveness and love. I can be a better son, a better brother, a better friend, and hopefully a better husband one day because with God's help I have tamed my monster.