Esther Fleece's young life has been nothing short

of a long journey.

She's endured pain and abuse all while faking fine.

Now she says it's finally time to put an end to the pretend.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

NARRATOR: In high school, Esther Fleece

who is known for being smart, cheerful, and fun,

but she was hiding a terrible secret.

Esther had been physically and emotionally abused for years.

By the time she was 15, her family

had left her to fend for herself.

She slept in the homes of several church members.

She wouldn't talk to anyone, even God, about her pain.

After college, she became a successful businesswoman.

But years of hiding behind achievements

and the strain of her double life became too heavy.

In her book, "No More Faking Fine," Esther

shares how she found freedom by getting real

with herself and God.

Esther Fleece is with us now.

Esther, thanks so much for sharing your story

and being with us.

Thank you for having me.

It means a lot.

Let's talk about your childhood.

You had a pretty normal childhood in your early years,

but then something started happening with your dad.

What was going on with him?

Yeah, my father did have a mental illness,

and took out a lot of his anger on my biological mother.

So it was interesting.

We looked like we had a great family life from the outside.

We had a pool.

We had the fun house to be at.

But slowly, my father's anger really overtook the family,

and led my mother to be in a lot of pain,

and then she took her pain out on me.

It was really just generations of hurting each other.

And then your mom started dating a guy named Mike.

Well, your parents' marriage, I guess,

dissolved, at that point.

It did, it did.

And she did start dating again.

WENDY GRIFFITH: What was he like?

He was not a good person.

Yeah, I think a lot of times just as women,

we are just longing to be protected and comforted,

and Mike was not the solution to that.

And he ended up--

And you knew, even though you were-- how old were you,

like eight or nine?

I was actually at that time around 13

when they were getting married.

So you knew he was lying and even cheating on your mom.

Yeah.

And you basically told your mom.

We don't give kids enough credit, I think.

They know what's going on sometimes.

So unfortunately, Mike did leave the family,

and that was another significant loss of my life

in the teenage years.

And my mother ended up leaving me shortly after that.

Now your mom was not happy that you told her

what Mike was doing.

She blamed you for him leaving, right?

Yeah, unfortunately, yes, she did.

It's pretty painful.

Now tell me what were some of the other ways

that your mom treated you?

I know there was a lot of not good stuff.

Yeah.

I did go through physical and emotional abuse

from both of my parents.

But I think that in those years, I

was discovering that God meets orphans in that time of need.

I didn't know how to cry out to God,

because I didn't have parents that I could cry out to.

But somehow, God was coming near to me and drawing near to me.

I was a believer in those years, and the Lord really

did adopt me.

And then Psalm 68, he placed me in families.

He always provided families for me

to live with, even in my public school and through the church.

Because your mom, she put you in a psych ward at one time.

ESTHER FLEECE: Yeah, she did.

WENDY GRIFFITH: Why?

I think that my father had a mental illness,

and I think that--

I don't know.

There was a lot of fear that she was living through of.

I see.

So she ended up abandoning you at 15.

She did.

And that's when you that's what you mean by "God

puts the lonely in families."

Where did you go?

What did you do?

Well I ended up living with families,

like I said, from my school and my church.

And God set me in families.

I was never legally adopted.

But for all intents and purposes,

I was adopted by God's family.

Well you met a guy.

You had a boyfriend and you thought--

I don't how old you were at this time.

How old were you when you met him?

My now husband?

No, no, no, no, The first guy, the boyfriend.

Oh yeah.

So that, I think that story I talk about in the book where--

You thought he was the one.

I started praying, right, and then I thought that this guy

was the one, and he wasn't.

And so then I felt even more disappointed in my walk

with God.

And I think through that story, a lot of times we're

praying for a certain outcome.

We don't get the outcome that maybe God has for us,

and we stopped praying.

I wanted to stop praying.

I thought why is my life just not working out?

Why is it so difficult?

Well something was working, because you

had learned to stuff everything down since that first time

that you had to go into a courtroom, and the judge--

what did the judge tell you when you were--

Told me to suck it up, he said.

When I was crying in a courtroom,

my parents were on opposite sides of the aisle,

I was a 10-year-old girl.

And in the time, I really needed comfort.

I really needed a defender.

The judge said, you need to suck up your tears.

And I thought that that's how God looked at me,

and He doesn't.

God is a judge, but he's not a judge like the courtroom judge

I had.

God never tells us to suck it up when we're in pain.

But that "suck it up," that was your life's theme

through your early childhood, and all the way up

through your teen years, and even into your 20s,

when you became a very successful businesswoman.

Tell me about that.

Well I just wrongly defined strength.

I thought strength was not letting people see you cry.

I thought strength was not letting people

know that you're in pain.

It's just overcoming that.

I had to redefine what strength is.

I think my new definition of strength

is admitting my weaknesses, and asking God to meet me

in those weaknesses, admitting in my need for Him,

and asking God to be strong where I'm not strong.

Well Esther, you talk about your book is called "No More

Faking Fine--

Putting an End to the Pretend."

And I love that because I think a lot of us are doing that,

because there is so much heartbreak in us

that we try to hide.

But you're saying that God is OK with us coming to Him

and saying, I'm hurting?

He is OK with it.

And what I love is that I knew that God wanted my strength,

He wanted good fruit from my life.

I didn't know that God wanted my weaknesses, that He wanted

my sad, He wanted my pain.

I missed all those invitations and scripture

to come to Him when I'm weary, come when I'm burdened.

And so I hope that this book is an encouragement to people

that yes, God wants your happy.

Yes, God wants your accomplishments

for His kingdom.

But God also wants your sad.

God also want your disappointments.

He wants to meet you in your heartache,

and that's when He does a really deep transforming work.

So we're not to despise those hard seasons.

Well, you have totally moved on now beyond that abuse,

and you are living a great life, and you just got married.

I did, which I never would have thought

that I would have married.

Honestly, I had faced so much abandonment.

I had to redefine love.

And love does take sacrifice, but love is beautiful.

And when God is in love, it is so beautiful

because He is love.

And so by God's grace, I have been

able to forgive my offenders and find a new definition of love

through Jesus Christ.

And I hope to change my family legacy in my new marriage.

And I just love what you say about lamenting.

Because listen, King David, he certainly lamented quite a bit

in the Bible.

And I think a lot of us are afraid to take

that kind of thing to God, and say

what we would call complaining, but God can handle it.

And there's a difference between lament and complain,

so I'm so glad you said that, because the Israelites

complained.

They were grumbling against God.

But a lament is a deep cry in your heart to God.

It's taking your prayer directly to God.

Like what's a lament?

Like why, God, why?

Yeah, why, God?

Where are You?

How have I lost Your favor?

King David prayed that.

Where are You?

Have You forgotten to be merciful to me?

And those prayers are all throughout the Old Testament

and the New Testament.

And Jesus himself gives us an example of a lamenting prayer

when He says, is there any other way, Father,

is there any other way?

And then Jesus was able to submit to the Father's will

after lament.

I think too many of us are trying

to pursue the Father's will, and we're not

bringing our laments to Him.

We have to bring our entire heart to Him,

and that's when He meets us.

We have to end the pretend.

We have to stop thinking that God only wants our good days.

He wants our entire hearts.

And so the lament is different from a complaint.

I'm glad you asked that.

And it's an expression of grief that God meets us.

Well if anyone out there is tired of faking fine, tired

of pretending, this is a great book for you,

"No More Faking Fine."

And you can get it wherever books are sold nationwide.

Esther Fleece, God bless you and thanks so much

sharing your story.

Thank you.

Thank you for having me, Wendy.

I know it's going to help a lot of people.

I hope so.

Thank you.