Parent Compass Radio

Debbie Moore: What has happened to us? Our dad kind of disappearing, our mom kind of trying to kill us, and now this?

Nicky Moore: I think it's devastating. It's extremely traumatic and can break up a family.

Debbie Moore: My grandmother starts beating us, psychologically torturing. They were physically torturing. "You're going to go crazy just like your mom." My mother was in what they used to call insane asylums. "I'm going to be homeless like my mother." God, I don't have a mother. I don't have a father. I don't have anybody. I mean, Jesus!

They had actually left a bullet in my spine that was too close to the spine to be removed. My mother was in what they used to call insane asylums. I couldn't see her. I think she must have grazed her skull instead of going straight in, because obviously if she had done that, she would have been dead. My brother was still in the hospital because he had to have an incision all the way down his chest to remove all the bullets.

Nicky Moore: I think it's devastating. My grandma and great-grandma, it's extremely traumatic and can break up a family. That's why even though we do have a small family, we have a very strong family. And we love each other no matter what.

Debbie Moore: I look back, and I know that the Lord was there. The Holy Spirit was there. His angels protected all of us right there in that second.

What were the good memories? I've often thought about that. What were the memories that I remember where my family was together? They were intact. My mother was operating motherly. We were happy. I remember one time my parents had stashed all the Christmas presents in this little pantry by the kitchen. And they had put a lock over the top.

I was probably five, my brother was three. I was going to find out what was in that cabinet. I went in there and got on a chair, got up to the latch, unlatched the latch, and opened the door, and there they all were. I remember things like my mom would have all these manipulatives in the home with little blocks and clay and colors and crayons and ABC things, and she would teach us at home. She would teach us preschool at home.

And I didn't know what that was. I just thought it was fun time with Mom. She really wanted us to learn. She took us to Sunday school. She took us to church. My father didn't go because he felt like he was an agnostic at the time. So he didn't go, but he didn't mind her going and didn't mind her taking the kids. I remember learning all about the Bible from real early. How many books there were in the Bible, Bible verses, and just really absorbing that and absorbing it from her.

I remember she was very beautiful. My father was very handsome. I have pictures of them where they literally look like movie stars. It's unbelievable. He was from Philadelphia. She was from Alabama. Automatic conflict: North meets the South. But they seemed to be working it out.

I was never really able to process it. Because immediately, we went to Mobile, Alabama, to live with our maternal grandparents. And they were really awful. They were psychologically torturing. They were physically torturing. They were good Christian people. Went to church every Sunday. I kept telling my brother, "Maybe our dad will come get us."

We overheard a conversation with my grandmother and one of my mother's brothers that said that he was a scoundrel, that they hated him. He was the cause of all the problems that anybody had ever had in our family. And he had told him, "If you come anywhere around Mobile, Alabama, I will kill you." I told my brother, "I don't think we're going to see our daddy ever again." What has happened to us? We have gone from this. Our dad kind of disappearing, our mom kind of trying to kill us, and now this?

My mother became homeless. And she was homeless for many years. She tried to go back to the hospital, get proper help for her mind. And she did. She got help. She started recovering. She got a job in Mobile, Alabama. She came over to visit. She brought over a big box of food: peanut butter and crackers and cereal and stuff that kids would like.

And when she left, my grandmother said, "Throw all that crap out. It could be poison." You're going to go crazy just like your mom. She was horrible. She had these heart problems. She had these diabetes problems. Everything was failing on her. When she would get these health problems, she would send my brother and us off to the orphanage. She would say, "I'm tired of looking at your ugly faces," or whatever choice words she would say.

Because my grandmother would cuss like a sailor. And she taught me every cuss word there was in the book, I guarantee you that. That was a hard thing to deal with with the Lord later on in life. Most people think orphanages are bad. No, I loved this orphanage. It was awesome. There was nobody screaming at us. There was nobody hitting us. There was nobody telling us we're going to go nuts.

We had such a great time. Never had any therapy. Never had any counseling. Never had anybody talk to me about what had happened to me. Carrying all this trauma. I'm carrying all this everything with me. God just wanted to show me, people in this orphanage are good people. This is how you're supposed to live. This is how you're supposed to treat people, not like that.

And because I was seven, I was to the age of reasoning. I knew that my mother had done this terrible thing. I knew that my grandmother was not treating us right. I knew that. I even had a point of reference from my mother and father when they did treat us right. One of the trips to the orphanage, they had this little white church. And I walked the aisle.

God, I don't have a mother. I don't have a father. I don't have anybody. And these people who are taking care of me, they're not doing a very good job. I need Jesus. I need Jesus to come into my life. I need help. And I think Jesus did come into my life at that time.

When I was 14 years old, she drove me up to the local shopping center. She said, "Get a job or don't come home." And she knew that my mother was homeless at this time. How do I get a job? I'm going to be homeless like my mother. God, please help me get a job. So I go into the first shop and I'm like, "I'm here to get a job." "How old are you?" I'm 14. They're like, "Oh, well in the state of Alabama, we can't hire till 15."

I go to the next door and it's a Baskin-Robbins. Mrs. Stuckey was there, the owner. She's like, "How old are you?" I'm 15. "You're hired." I'm like, "Okay, good." I'm working at the Baskin-Robbins several months, and things at home just get really bad. My grandmother starts beating us. I'm 5'10". She's like a grandmother. I just caught the belt.

And I said, "You know what? You're not going to do this to me anymore." When you stand up to a bully and you're no fun anymore, then you have no value to them. So her idea was just to kill me. And she threatened me with a gun. Can you believe that? After the trauma that I've had. With a gun! I knew that my life was in danger.

I'd been trying to get help. I'd been going to my high school counselor saying, "I'm getting beat up at home. You've got to help me." They didn't believe me. CPS was called because the neighbors heard children screaming from the house. And it was this big $300,000 home: white living room with white lamps and white carpet and a white couch. Two little beautifully dressed children. Full of food in the refrigerator, full of clothes in the closet. They're like moving eyes. She told us, "You tell and you're dead."

I didn't know what to do. Mrs. Stuckey came up to me one time at work and she said, "Debbie, are you being abused?" And I'm like, "Yeah, I'm being abused." And there were scratches on my neck and there were scratches on my arms and bruises on my arms because you could see them because of my uniform. And she said, "I am so sorry. I want to help you. The next day when you come to work, I'm going to get you some help."

I went home and I asked my little brother, I said, "Look, I'm getting out of here. Do you want to go with me? I want to take you with me." He's like, "Are you sure you're going to get away with it?" I'm like, "No." And he's like, "No, I can't go with you. I'm an epileptic. I need my medicine." He had really severe epilepsy. He could have like 200 seizures in like an hour. I've got to go because she's going to kill me.

So I packed up some little things. I put them out in the backyard and I made my plan the next day to go to work. Every day after school, my grandmother would make my brother and I lay down for a nap for three hours because she didn't want to see us and she didn't want to hear us. I was in my uniform, I was under my covers, I was in my bedroom.

And all of a sudden, she comes in storming, throwing everything off the dresser. She's got the belt, the belt buckle this time, swinging at me. She slings everything out of the closet and she's like, "I know you're lying to me. You don't have to go to work." I'm like, "Look, I'm in my uniform. I have to go to work." And she's just like, "I know what you're up to."

I'm not even going to say what she said to me because I blocked it. The Lord has healed me of it. We don't go over that anymore. I just said, "I'm going." And so I left the house, I went and got my little bags, and I ran to Baskin-Robbins.

The police were there. The Catholic Charities were there. They took me to a shelter. They examined me. They talked to me. They believed me. Thank God. Finally, I've gotten out of this horrible hell of a life. There was a court case: the city of Mobile and my grandmother against me as a 14-year-old girl and St. Mary's Catholic Girls Home.

The Catholic Girls Home wanted to keep me, and my grandmother wanted me to have to come back to her home. The judge said, "Let's let Debbie decide." I lived in St. Mary's group home for a couple of years until I graduated from high school. My grandmother had raised me to hate Blacks, hate Jews, hate Catholics, hate Italians, hate Mexicans, hated anybody that wasn't like me. Well, when I got to this wonderful Catholic group home, dude, these people are great. I loved them. That was the turning point in my life.

In college and I was trying to get my life straight, trying to keep my life straight because Mobile's kind of a wild town. That's where Mardi Gras was invented, not New Orleans. I was starting to feel depressed, kind of out of it because that's what trauma does to you. That's what happens when you have no home life and you have no upbringing and you have no nurturing, no love.

Maybe I can find my purpose in partying. Mardi Gras balls and parties and dressing up. Couldn't find my purpose in that. Well, I'll find it in modeling. Went to New York and we were in an agency and had that whole jet-set lifestyle, thinking that all of that's going to bring me some sort of purpose to make up for my terrible childhood. Couldn't find my purpose in that.

I wind up getting a good job in Dallas and I'm like, I'll find my purpose in my work. Couldn't find my purpose in that. It felt like my past was overtaking me. I was being encompassed with negative. It was bearing down on me mentally. Everything would bother me. Scream. I would get upset, I would get anxious, I would get dramatically upset.

My kids saw it, and even my spouse saw it, and even I saw it. And I was like, I don't want to be this way. Why am I this way? And I would even ask the Lord, "Make me a good Christian woman, because I'm not." It was because of all the trauma, it was because of all the abuse. It seems like a spiritual stronghold. I wanted to get rid of that. I need to learn about the Bible.

Ron Moore: I don't know what's going on at my home. I grew up in a Beaver Cleaver type home, totally different from my wife's. When I was 11 years old, I felt the call of God to preach. God's like, "Hey, have you considered Ron Moore?"

Debbie Moore: For what?

Nicky Moore: I kind of encouraged her to do it, too. I wanted her to date.

Debbie Moore: He's been a bachelor for almost 20 years.

Ron Moore: You say we're going to do things our way at our age, that usually means one of you is not getting your way. I just think of the difference that the Gospel makes. Mental health issues. The trauma started healing, literally falling off of me.

Debbie Moore: Lord, what is happening?

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