Article June 2, 2003 Issue

Leaving drugs and physical abuse BEHIND

By Sandy Herbinger

Christian Science was introduced to me just over two years ago—in the hairdressing salon where I work in Miami. That day I was really suffering. I was almost doubled up in pain. In fact it was so bad that I asked one of my regular customers if he would slip out and get me some stomach pills.

For more than five years, I'd been telling him about my abusive childhood, my abusive marriage at 17 with two kids to raise, my drug addiction, serious stomach ailments, and my slow passage through drug recovery. The more I talked, the more he listened. And he was always patient. I told him my kids had actually raised themselves because I was such a mess. I was a terrible mother.

Suddenly he swung around in the chair and said firmly, "Do you really want to be healed?"