The Search for Love That Almost Cost Her Everything 

“I never heard the words, ‘I love you.’ We never hugged each other. There was no affection,” Joan recalls. “What is said about me was, ‘I’m not enough.’ It was very hurtful.”

On the outside, Joan Bresil appeared confident, driven, and successful. However, deep inside, she carried a desperate need to feel loved. That need seemed unattainable.

“In order to be worthy of love, I believed I had to be perfect,” she says.

For Joan, growing up in a strict Haitian home in Brooklyn, New York, love wasn’t freely given it was earned and always looked just out of reach.

“I scored 97 on my exam, and I was coming home so happy to share the news with my dad, and the first thing he said was, ‘What happened to the three points?’” she remembers. “I believed that I couldn’t afford to make a mistake.”

By 13, her search for love took a dangerous turn when she became sexually active. 

“I was looking for that affection. I was looking for the hugs,” Joan says. “I started using my body to get attention. It made me feel shameful.”

Two years later, a neighbor introduced her to pornography. What began as curiosity quickly pulled her deeper into sexual addiction and shame that held her captive for years.  

“If I was experiencing any type of disappointment, that would be my comfort zone,” Joan says. “You just knew, like, ‘I don’t think this is right.’”

Her sexual promiscuity took a toll on her body. In her twenties, after doctors warned she might never have children, Joan became pregnant. Then, everything fell apart. Her father disowned her, and at just sixteen weeks she lost the baby. Soon after, her boyfriend left her.

“It was one of the most loneliest experiences ever,” Joan says. “I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to take my life.”

It was then, at her lowest point, an encounter with an evangelist brought her hope.

“She told me about Jesus and just spoke about Him in a way that I never knew,” Joan says. “And I remember raising my hands and her leading me into a prayer and repeating every word and saying yes. I receive Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I repented for everything that I’ve done. And He just held me close to His heart. I felt protected.”

Joan started attending church, growing in her relationship with God and was delivered from her porn addiction. However, she still had that need to please men in order to feel loved. 

“The sex addiction was so hard and it became my drug because all along that’s what I wanted as a little girl was to be loved,” she says. “The need to be loved wasn’t fully embraced yet with God, even though I knew He loved me, but I didn’t know how to embrace that love.”

Then during a heated confrontation with her boyfriend, she had a revelation. 

“I became so outraged that I said things that I probably shouldn’t have said, and his response was, ‘You’re the devil,’” Joan recalls. “It truly became a wake-up call for me because it’s like, I’m a Christian and here’s this man calling me the devil. And it was like, no, I’m God’s daughter.”

On January 10, 2022, Joan finally entrusted God the one area of her life that held her captive for decades. 

“And I said, ‘Lord, forgive me. Forgive me for not trusting You. Forgive me for going back, looking for love in men when You already love me. I’m giving You permission to search me because this is not what I want, and I know this is not what You want and my desire is to be pure. I may no longer be a virgin, but I can protect my virtue.’”

And in that moment everything changed. 

“To be free from years of sexual sin and addiction was like I could breathe again,” Joan says. “I didn’t have to be perfect because He is.”

God also healed her deepest wound, Joan’s relationship with her father. 

“And I remember saying, ‘Daddy, I just wanna say I’m sorry, I’m sorry for hurting you,’” she recalls. “He said, ‘You have no idea how proud I am of you and your brother.’ He was like, ‘I love you so much. The void of the father wound was healed completely’”

Today, Joan walks in freedom, secure in her identity and rooted in God’s love.

“I’m no longer damaged goods,” she says. “I am accepted, I’m His beloved. God wants to heal you. He wants to cleanse you. He wants to purify you. He loves you no matter what, and He will not give up on you if you don’t give up on Him.”