Pastor Admits He Was Sexually Abused as a Child
At home, church or the gym, Monty and Kimberly Weatherall see themselves as a team.
Kimberly has helped her husband tackle his weight, regularly joining him at Insanity workouts, which are partly responsible for Monty’s shedding of more than 80 pounds.
“I walked in there well over 300—upwards of 320 pounds,” Monty recalled.
She also served as a rock of support when he spiraled to the depths of despair.
“I made a decision to end my life,” Monty relayed while chronicling his story for CBN News.
Those words hit his wife like “a ton of bricks.”
Hiding a Painful Secret
Monty resisted getting help partially because he felt more comfortable offering help and encouragement as a pastor of a church in southwestern Illinois just outside of St. Louis.
Yet when it came to his own personal problems, he couldn’t navigate the storm brewing within.
“From 4 to 7 years old, I was abused over those three years by two male relatives,” he recalled.
Fearing retribution, he never reported the abuse. Instead, he hid the pain by pretending to be someone else.
“For the rest of my life, I began to play these different characters, because I was so uncomfortable with being myself,” he explained.
It worked until the only character left was the man in the mirror.
“I didn’t realize that on some level I was blaming myself,” he said. “But I had to give myself permission to realize that it wasn’t my fault.” {eoa}
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