Category Archives: Marriage & Relationships

Sober October: The Month Everything Changed

It was the beginning of September 2025 when my husband returned from a failed hunting safari with three clients. The week leading up to it had been stressful — we could hardly communicate due to how remote the area was, and during the few moments I did reach him, I felt the pit creep into my stomach. Things were going wrong. Fast.

The hunt collapsed halfway through. I scrambled to arrange flights home, while holding our lives together on this side. When he finally arrived back late on a Sunday night — exhausted, deflated, and carrying the weight of failure — chaos rolled in behind him. A week later he left again for another hunt that would keep him away most of September.

And that’s when the world shook in a different way.

During this time the CEO of Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk, was assassinated. My kids and I sat until the quiet hours of the South African morning watching his memorial service live. As I listened, something ignited in me. This man lived boldly for God — unashamed, unfiltered, and unwavering. He called men to rise, lead their homes, and stand under God’s authority so their wives could flourish in their God-given calling.

And in that moment, with tears burning behind my eyes, I realized something painful and true:

I had been living lukewarm.
One foot in the world, one foot in the Kingdom.
Drifting. Coping. Surviving.

I felt my life folding open before me — decades of striving, storms weathered, pockets of beauty — yet a hollow ache that whispered: You were created for more than this.

I wanted transformation. I wanted Kingdom alignment. I wanted to stop wasting time wandering far from the Father who had always been waiting.

But I wasn’t walking this life alone. My husband was stuck in the same lukewarm space. And so the question rose: How do I create an opening for God to lead us out of this wilderness?

The answer came sharper than expected: Sober October.

The Plan

I had been experimenting with alcohol-free stretches for the last few years. By then I had gone nearly two full months with only two or three glasses of wine. I was training hard, eating clean, and feeling the clarity and strength that comes when the body and spirit finally breathe again.

So when my husband returned home, I didn’t suggest — I declared — that October would be a fast:

  • No alcohol.
  • Daily time in the Word together.
  • Aligning our home and business under God.
  • Church every Sunday and joining a cell group.
  • Stewardship and Kingdom leadership at the center.

He hesitated — mostly at the alcohol part — but finally agreed.

What followed wasn’t holy and peaceful at first. It was messy.

I was angry. Angry at him for decisions made. Angry at myself for choices tolerated. Angry at both our parents for not modeling spiritual leadership better. Angry that it took me nearly fifty years to face the truth.

And all of this while facing financial loss, legal threats from clients over the failed hunt, and an income winter ahead.

We were tired. Wounded. Scared. But we were deciding to stand.

Day One

Wednesday, 1 October 2025.
Alarm at 4:45am. Coffee. Dining room table.
Two stubborn hearts learning to bow again.

Those first mornings were raw — both of us bruised, licking wounds, trying to shift blame, then learning slowly to drop it. But by week two, something softened. We began repenting — truly repenting — for years of self-reliance, pride, and financial bondage.

We gave God our business, our marriage, our direction, and our future. We confessed that trusting our own wisdom had led us into loss and strain — and we asked Him to lead instead.

By week three, my husband was changing — deeply and visibly. For the first time in 29 years his body and spirit were sober. Clear. Awake. The spiritual ground under our home was shifting.

We still didn’t have answers for the financial mess. We still felt the weight. But now we were walking aligned, submitted, and together — finally stepping into our God-designed roles as husband and wife.

Today

It’s the 3rd of November 2025 as I write this. We still don’t know exactly how everything will unfold, but I know this:

God knows.
And He is leading.

My husband is stepping into spiritual headship with humility and conviction. Our mornings with God continue. Our business decisions now go through His hands first, not ours.

We have traded survival for surrender, and confusion for calling.

Sober October wasn’t just about alcohol.
It was about obedience.
About repentance.
About turning our feet toward the Kingdom and not looking back.

And for the first time in a long time, I feel peace.

Unfiltered. Unfinished. Redeemed.

Grace in the Blended Spaces

Being a stepmom is probably one of the hardest things I have ever done. People look at us as a family and often say we make it look so easy. Those who don’t know us well usually assume that all three children are mine — and are surprised to learn that two out of the three are my stepchildren.

My biggest fear is that women contemplating divorce might look at me and think that starting over isn’t so hard. But it is. Very hard.

Ask any parent — raising children is no easy task. Raising children who aren’t biologically yours brings unique challenges, filled with complexities that require patience, prayer, and perseverance.

The DNA Divide

When my biological child acts out in a certain way, I can almost always recognize myself or his father in his behaviour. That makes it easier to respond with understanding. With a stepchild, however, you only know one half of their DNA intimately. The other half is a mystery. A person known from afar and through comments and conversations with the children.

And that mystery extends beyond genetics — it shapes the way they see the world, how they process emotions, and what triggers them. Learning to love and parent into that unknown space takes humility and grace that only God can supply.

The Parenting Puzzle

Different parenting styles are another ongoing challenge. Establishing rules and consistency at home becomes complicated when the other household operates differently. Sometimes it’s even the small things — what foods are sent along, or what products are introduced — that create disruption. Especially during the younger years, when parents control to a larger extent what children are exposed to. It takes years to discern which battles are worth fighting and which are best surrendered to peace.

In our case, all the children live with us permanently. This means that by default, I am the parent who enforces structure, discipline, and boundaries. Their biological mother, who only sees them during short school holidays, naturally becomes the “fun mom.” When the children are with her, it’s a holiday. When they return, it’s back to real life — homework, chores, rules.

It used to frustrate me deeply. I tried to involve her more with the harder side of parenting, especially as my stepdaughter entered her teenage years. But I quickly learned that words and promises made over a phone call often don’t hold up in reality.

A Promise Before God

Eight years later, I have been raising my stepchildren for three years longer than they lived with their biological mother. Yet she remains their mom — and always will. There were moments when I was ready to give up, but I made a promise to my husband before God — a covenant — that I am determined not to break.

We live in a time when marriage is often treated as a contract rather than a covenant. The sacredness of marriage as designed by God has faded into the background. The world tells women to “choose happiness,” to leave if things get hard. “The children will be fine,” they say.

But those words are far from the truth. When you live in a blended family, you see clearly just how deeply the fracture of divorce runs — and how far it takes us from God’s original design.

A Call to Restore

I’m not saying that it’s impossible to find joy in a second chance. I love my husband. We do life together as a team. But hear me clearly — if there is a way to restore your marriage, fight for it. Seek God first. Pray without ceasing. Do not give up simply because it’s hard.

Unless your life or your children’s lives are in danger, do everything in your power to bring your marriage back under God’s covering. Many marriages fall apart not because of tragedy, but because couples have drifted away from the Word — from God’s plan for unity, love, and stewardship of family. Instead they shifted their focus to the world’s view on marriages. Easy to step into and easy to jump out.

“But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife,
and the two will become one flesh.
So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
— Mark 10:6–9

Marriage is hard work. It refines you. It teaches humility, forgiveness, and compromise. But when you put God at the centre — truly at the centre — it becomes a space of grace rather than struggle.

When you put an ex-spouse at the centre, chaos reigns.
Choose wisely.