- [Narrator] Growing up,Kim just wanted to know

she was valued and loved by someone.

But her father wasn't around

and life at home withher mother was unstable.

By the time she started 6th grade,

she had endured years of sexual abuse

from two male relatives.

- I was just in a lot of pain

and not getting the help that I needed,

so I then started acting out.

I started getting in trouble,I started doing drugs,

and the next thing youknow, I was selling drugs.

There was a big hole in my heart.

I wanted to be loved by a man.

I wanted that father's attention.

But it was even moredevastating to me, I think,

to know that I had a mother

but she chose to not be a mother.

- [Narrator] Kim got pregnant at 16

and relied on a relativeto help raise her daughter.

Meanwhile, she met a man

who seemed to say all the right things,

but she had stepped into atrap for human trafficking.

- One of the first thingsthat he commented to me was,

"You are beautiful."

Those were three wordsthat I had never heard

in my entire life from peoplethat were supposed to love me,

and so it literally onlytook the three words

to draw me in closer to him.

- [Narrator] The mangroomed her for three weeks,

buying her nice thingsand making promises.

Kim thought they wereleaving for a vacation

when the man she called her boyfriend

took her to a different state

and forced her to work in a strip club.

The trafficker threatened Kim

and told her not to contact her daughter,

who was still in a relative's custody.

- He began to tell me things like,

"No one is looking for you.

"No one loves you.

"You have nowhere to go.

"If you go back home,

"I know exactly where you're gonna be at

"and I'm gonna findyou and I'll kill you."

I began to feel that, "He's right,

"and this is my new life andI just better accept it."

My trafficker, he brandedme, it was his name,

and I had to look at that for many years.

- [Narrator] By 25, Kim had been sold

to five different pimpsacross several states.

Eventually, she was able to escape.

- When we were driving,

he jumped across prettymuch to the back seat

and he was beating me senselessly.

He threw me out.

And so I figured, "You know what?

"Either I'm gonna tryto run and live today

"or today he's gonna killme and I'm gonna die."

I mustered up this courageand I started running

and I ended up hitchhiking.

- [Narrator] She got her daughter back,

then she became involvedwith a drug dealer

and had a second daughter with him.

Kim thought about her life

and wanted more for her two girls.

She ended the relationship andtook her children with her.

- I had told him, "I can't dothis anymore, this drug life."

I just knew that I had two daughters

and I needed to be around forthem, not in a federal prison,

and so that's what gaveme the courage to leave.

- [Narrator] But when her ex came back

to her new place causingtrouble, she called the police.

Once her report was complete,the officer gave her a card.

Written on the back wasthe name of a church.

Broken and looking for hope,

Kim decided to attend Sunday service.

- I remember when I came,they were in the DNA series

and it was all about identity,who you are in Christ,

if your mother and fatherleave you and you're abandoned,

how the Lord adopts you into His family.

You're love, you arevaluable, you are accepted.

They were talking about this love,

a love that I had neverknown but I had wanted.

- [Narrator] Kim began studying the Bible

and kept coming backto church each Sunday.

Then she opened her heartto receive God's love.

She said the salvationprayer and was baptized.

- Jesus made it real to me.

Through His Word, he'dspoke to me that day

and He'd said, "You arefree, you are clean,

"you are forgiven."

- [Narrator] As Kim embracedher true identity in Jesus,

she says her life was transformed.

She began to heal from her painful past.

- What He did for me wasHe sent people into my life

to show me His love.

He would bring thesemotherly figures into my life

that would love me and allow me

to know what a healthy,real love looks like,

what a mother's love looks like.

I can be that for my girls.

I can give them the love,the affection, the attention,

and I can have the beautiful relationship

and watch them blossom intothese beautiful, young women.

- [Narrator] Kim says, when she realized

God's unconditional love,she found her true identity

and freedom.

Today, she treasures spendingtime with her daughters

and is an advocate forhuman trafficking victims.

- Now I know that my story has a purpose.

So I went through allof what I went through

so that He could use meto glorify His kingdom.

God is our healer.

He's no respecters of persons.

What he did for me, He'll do for another.

It's just all aboutsurrendering the heart.