Unyime-Ivy King's Blog, page 5

When God Showed Up,

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My Faith Is My Reality.         Pastor Victoria Atte-Valour Peters .

I recently had a most interesting chat with Pastor (Mrs.) Victoria Atte Valour-Peters, and the amazing story she shared, of how God delivered her from the clutches of a life threatening ailment, inspired me, and I thought to share with you all. Often times, we take our good health for granted, just like we take a lot of things in our life for granted, as if we deserved those things. But when you have been through some life threatening situations, you would be forced to acknowledge that really, there is a God in Heaven, Who rules in the affairs of men. Please read this wonderful, true life story and be encouraged that, no matter what the situation is, no matter what reports you get from your doctors, there is a God, Who is more than able to surmount those situations. Have a nice/inspiring read, I did.

SCHOOLS ATTENDED:  Federal Government Girl's College, Onitsha, University of Uyo (Economics).



MARITAL STATUS: Married for 15yrs to Pastor Valour Peters. We have 3 sons aged 14, 11 & 9.

OCCUPATION:Co -Pastor, House On The Rock,Ibadan. CEO, VAVIE After School Care.



HOW IT ALL BEGAN:

Pastor Vickie and her sisters
My mum was diagnosed with and treated for Breast Cancer in 2006. She lived with us through out her treatment so I saw first hand the perils of cancer. It made my sisters & I become conscious of it so we all had periodic checks.

About a year later, I noticed a small lump in my left breast, went for a Mammogram at University College Hospital & was told it was benign (not cancer).Instead of shrinking it kept growing bigger & about 6months later, the same hospital told me it was cancer. This was in March 2008.

REACTION TO THIS BOMBSHELL:Hmmm. I had to wait for 3weeks  to get the results. After I got it, I drove home in a daze. Walked up to my room, and  sat on a chair still in a daze. I was afraid to react because, I didn't know how I would handle it. A few hours later, my husband came home. As soon as he walked through the door, I felt to the floor screaming.‎​ After the initial outburst, my husband tried to comfort me. He stayed with me. That night after everyone had gone to bed, I went downstairs and just broke into worship.

DEALING WITH THE FEAR OF IMMINENT DEATH:Fear came, especially at night, but being one who knows not to let the devil have the last say, I never got tired of rebuking negative thoughts and of speaking words of faith. Sometimes I did it fifty times in one day but I made sure, the devil's suggestions were never the last thing on my mind. I always had the last say! The thought of death crossed my mind many times, but I never let it dwell. I'm human. So I didn't pretend like there was no fear in my heart. When you get the news about a terminal illness, fear will surely come. But I constantly and consciously didn't let it dwell. I knew that letting any negative thought dwell- even once, was all the devil needed, so I was constantly on guard. I can't stop him from flying around but I won't let him perch and  build a nest on my mind.

I'm a very realistic person. My Christianity is my life. There is no me without Christ. My Faith is my reality. I don't believe that Faith denies the presence of a problem. I'm the first to admit when I have a problem. I prefer to call it a challenge. Through my Faith, I acknowledge the problem first and then choose what my focus will be. Whether on the problem before me or on the possibility power within me. So I teach my kids that crying is good. It doesn't make you any less of a man. But don't stop there. Look beyond the problem to the power (of God) within you that is just waiting to be activated!After the diagnosis, my consultant told me he would have to take off my breast (mastectomy)  and I said "Oh no!!! I'm too young to go breast less!!!"

STEPS TAKEN TO HANDLE THE DISTRESSING SITUATION:My Dr. in church asked me this, "Pastor Vickie, how do you want to handle this- by faith or by medicine? I  responded that, both were given by God. I choose both because, I needed both!My husband and I prayed for God to send us an angel. He  led us to South Africa, to a God fearing angel called Dr Benn. After some tests, she came into the room and said to me, "Vickie I won't cut off your breast!" I began to argue with her, then my husband tapped me and said, "Isn't this what we've been praying for?"She decided to reverse the process & give me a 10-dose Chemotherapy treatment, shrink the lump and then do a lumpectomy instead.

Before we left for SA, we went to see our Parents in the Lord- Pastors Paul & Ifeanyi Adefarasin. I just want to say that I love them with all my heart. God couldn't have given us better spiritual parents in every sense of the word. They took care of me in every way possible. When we were about to leave, Pastor Paul hugged me and prayed for me. He said, "You are at the beginning of a very long journey but as your name is (Victoria), so shall your testimony be (victorious)."  At first I thought he was referring to my 6hr flights. Looking back now, I realize it was prophetic because, the next 2yrs became a long, victorious journey indeed.

THINGS GET WORSE...The story's quite long. I had the first round of chemo in SA and  decided to come home to complete the chemo and then go back for surgery. Two weeks after I came home,  it happened! I woke up one morning with heavy feet and  for almost an hour I sat in the bathroom trying to ease myself but couldn't. My husband took me to UCH. They couldn't tell me what the problem was. By the end of the first week, I could not lift my legs anymore. I was paralyzed! I could not feel anything from my chest to my toes. You could stab me with a knife and I still wouldn't feel it externally but internally, I suffered excruciating pain. It was terrible. I couldn't sit, dress myself or feed myself. I could hardly see and my condition deteriorated rapidly. My husband, my mum-may her soul rest in peace- my sisters, took care of,  and prayed with me. Members of my church, friends and family were constantly fasting and praying for me. One day,  in the third week, I couldn't take the unexplainable pain anymore. I made my peace with the Lord and told Him I was ready to die. When my husband came to see me that evening, I told him what I'd done and that I'd like to see the children one last time. He sharply rebuked me and commanded the spirit of death to release me. I realized that no matter how much love and prayers people gave, just like the bible says, the power of life and death lay within me. It had to be my choice and if I chose to die, no one could save me. In my moment of despair, I had given that power to the devil and I had to take it back. That night, with not much physical strength, I cried out to God in repentance, and began a spiritual warfare with all that I had left- my mouth! By 2am that night, he came to take me. I stopped breathing. I stopped speaking. But my mind kept declaring that I will not die, but live to declare God's glory, just like I'm doing now. I survived. Days later, my husband took me back to South Africa. That on its own, was a miracle because I made it through a 6-hour journey.



The day I left for SA, my consultant told our family doctor that the most I could live for would be till the end of the month. That was in May, 2009! After a few days of treatment in SA, I was told that I had a rare viral infection called ADEM. A severe form of polio and that if it had been caught on the first day, it won't have been so bad but also I was 2days away from a coma! By this time, the paralysis has gone up to my hands so all I could move was my head. I could hardly see. The Dr said I would be paralyzed for life so they would just work on gradually getting me able to sit up on my own so I could use a wheel chair. But I had taken back the power over my life from the devil. I declared there and then that I will walk again and return to singing in the choir. I was sent to a rehab center. A month later, to the amazement of doctors and patients alike, my toes began to move again. Then gradually, feeling, movement returned to my body. People didn't stop praying for me and heaven had no choice but to release my miracle.  I went through countless MRIs, Pet Scans, CT scans, Surgery, Chemotherapy, Radiotherapy, rehabilitation, blood tests, infections, etc. In June 2010, my husband, family and church -HOTR, Ibadan organized a thanksgiving and birthday service for me. I walked into church, wearing my high heeled shoes, jumping, leaping, singing praises to GOD with my choir. I fully healed & delivered. One day, while on my sick bed listening to Pastor Paul preach, God spoke to my heart: Be still & know that I AM GOD. That was my Rhema , my Anchor, my Word. It kept me through every trial. It's still keeping me now. God gave me angels in form of my husband, my sisters, my Pastors, my friends, my church, the Body of Christ. Being alive today is not just my testimony, it's our testimony and God will faithful complete what He started. He will do much more for anyone who can ask, think or imagine it according to His power working in us!



 ...ONLY TO GET BETTER.I was certified cancer free last august. The kids knew everything I went through. We try to be truthful and  open with them. While I was in the hospital, we sent them on vacation with my sister but I spoke with often. They knew I was ill, in the hospital. They knew about the cancer and everything else. They each wrote me heart wrenching, inspiring letters while I was in rehab and gave me so much motivation to work hard at my recovery. While in rehab, on my bed, I began a small counselling, prayer session for fellow patients as well as staff members. Patients came into my room on their own wheel chairs to hear me sing or talk about God. My Faith is my reality. Through good and bad times. No matter where you are, and what you go through, there's still someone whose life you can touch. Keep your Faith alive. God will come through for you.

UNYIME-IVY KING: Marriage at Twilight.

UNYIME-IVY KING: Marriage at Twilight.

HOUSEWIFE TALES { THE NITTY-GRITTY}: STIRRING THE HORNETS NEST....April 11th

HOUSEWIFE TALES { THE NITTY-GRITTY}: STIRRING THE HORNETS NEST....April 11th

EVERYONE HAS A STORY

Tutu Conde-Onwuachi- Survivor Extraordinaire .

Unyime-Ivy King.

Who said that a girl, who grew up surviving on the little that petty trade could fetch, could not find the chutzpah to work on her dreams and watch them materialize before her?



Janet Adetutu Conde-Onwuachi, CEO of Pizaas modeling agency, may be young, but she has loads of spunk and gumption. Tall and poised at 27 years old, she fiercely fights to claim her space and make an impact in the modeling world, despite dire circumstances strewn along her path by life, including sexual abuse from an old man, as a child. These debilitating circumstances could have fazed any other girl and made her give up on life, or end up on the streets selling her body for what she could get, like some have done, but then, Tutu is not just any other girl. This beautiful wife, and mother of 2, refused to allow meager means to diminish her dreams. Propelled along and fueled by the vision of a mother, whom despite her struggles to scrape by, from the proceeds of petty trade, was determined to see her 3 children make the most of life and not allow challenges to limit their dreams.

 Her life story is a rather complicated one. Born, the third of 3 children, and an only girl, into a polygamous home, though her father was wealthy, the politics and matrixes that exist in a polygamous home saw her mum losing out on the power play and as a result, things became quite tough, even though they all lived in their father’s house-they lived downstairs, while he lived upstairs with the other wife. “My mum was wealthy initially-she used to trade in gold, but things changed. Things were hard. Growing up was very difficult.” Tutu began, reflectively. “My mum was educated, but she had to sell firewood to send us to school. I used to follow mum to Oko Oba and Gbagada to get paw paw to hawk. I used to hawk ice water at Shomolu market. A lot of times, we slept hungry, because there was no food to eat. Sometimes, mum would cook and by morning, we would see roaches/rodents in the food, but we would still eat the food! It was either that, or hunger.”

Despite their limited means, Tutu’s mother placed a high premium on education. “My mum made sure we went to school-even if it was a public school. We would trek to school, without slippers, wearing rags for uniforms. I became used to suffering”  In spite of the suffering and deprivation, Tutu and her older siblings did well in school. On completion of her primary/secondary school education in Lagos, University beckoned and she had to write the West African Examinations Council exams, Tutu encountered a fresh challenge as her father did not give her the 3,500 naira needed for the exams. She approached her father’s tenant for help, and he flaunted 30, 000 naira in her face, promising to give her and more, if she slept with him, as he had been ogling her from childhood. Tutu, whose mum had raised her and her brothers with an iron fist, instilling strict moral virtues, in spite of their hapless circumstances, rebuffed his advances and went away in tears. “I could not tell mum what happened because, I knew she would go and make trouble. Finally, my mum was able to raise the money for me, but painfully enough, I couldn’t take the exams because I was hospitalized.” She later on sat for the exams in another school.

Tutu gained admission into the Grace Polytechnic, Omu-Ijebu to study Computer Science, and engaged in menial jobs to augment the little her mum sent to her, not wanting to trade her body for money.  In between schools, she decided to use her time judiciously and learned photography and hair making as her mum would not tolerate idleness. “If you had nothing to do, she would either send you to sell water or fetch firewood. In school, I did a bit of modeling. I decided to give modeling a try, but I wasn’t serious with it because I did not have the money to register for formal training. It was a modeling scout called, Ability, who first saw me in school uniform and approached me. He owned ‘Ability Concepts’ and encouraged me to go into modeling; he took me round. I was trained at Apple House Photography/Modeling/Events house. It was at Modela’s-then it was not well known-that I learned to catwalk.”

In 2003, two earth shattering events happened to Tutu. Her mum, who was a tower of support and a rock to her, died after some illness. It was an emotionally straining period for Tutu, and it was at this point that she succumbed to the advances of her now husband, who had been proposing to her. This one time of passion, resulted in an unplanned pregnancy. At this time, she and her siblings were reconciled with their father.

It was not an easy ride for Tutu immediately, as she had series of challenges with regards to her pregnancy. There was a brief separation period between her and her baby’s father, as she rebuffed his proposal of marriage, not wanting him to feel obliged to marry her simply because she had gotten pregnant, whilst she concentrated on building her modeling career. She traveled to Abuja often for modeling jobs, and began to make money. She modeled for V-mobile, as it was known then, in 2005, Indomie, and Nigerian distilleries.  Whilst at Wale Adenuga’s PEFTI institute doing a course in beads making, he noticed her and drafted her into his Super story production, titled, ‘A New Story.’ In 2007, she took part in a TV reality show called, ‘Angels Reality Show’ organized by GB2 audio visuals. Tutu was also a contestant in the Most Beautiful Girl, Face of Abuja beauty contest, and emerged as the second runner up. “After this, I started doing events, and got a contract from CB (Classic Beverages) makers of La Ca Sera drink, and started working for them. I went for the casting, and was asked to supervise the other girls-about 19 of them. After that, the GM asked me to call models on my own, saying that, the company would deal directly with me, and that was when I thought of owning a modeling agency.”

All seemed well outwardly as she was able to take better care of her daughter, and foot her bills, but inwardly, she was not happy about being a single mother, and about her mistake. Most nights, she cried herself to sleep and started drinking and smoking to dull her senses to the pain. She began to frequent night clubs-but never picked up men, nor did she allow men pick her up. It all stopped when she saw her late mum in a dream warning her to desist from the drinking, smoking and clubbing. “It was at the Coliseum that I met a European- Phillip Netherall, and he suggested the modeling agency to me”  Despite numerous love overtures from rich and influential men, she never succumbed to the temptation because, she hated men, due to the sexual abuse she experienced in childhood, coupled with the strict up bringing she had received from her mum. Though long death, her mum’s influence in her life still remained strong, as she would hear her mum’s voice in her sub consciousness, warning her, whenever she was about to take any wrong steps. Till date, Tutu sees her late mum as her strongest role model in life.

Finally, she married her baby’s father and her second daughter came, not long after that. Looking back at it all, Tutu is excited that she is well on the way to seeing her dreams become a living reality. She sold her car recently to be able to put up the money to set up her own studio in Ikeja. University is still in the pipelines for this tough young lady, who wants to study Business Administration. For now, she is working towards registering her agency-Pizaas, in the UK, and building it up, plus her studio. Currently, she handles various modeling contracts and also grooms models for professional events, training them to be morally virtuous as well.

Tutu desires to see herself in Paris-the seat of fashion, in the next 5 years, and had this to say to young girls like her, as her final words, “ Young girls are impatient-they want to get everything here, and now. With the right mental attitude, no mountain is too high. Right friends matter too, as bad friends and wrong influence marks the beginning of problems. Do not be afraid or ashamed of trying to be different because achievers are always on top.”

Fiction: Married, but mis-matched!

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Ngozi and Emeka, met and married as unbelievers. They lived an interesting and exhilarating life. Because they were wealthy, they could afford all the nice things life had to offer like-travels to exotic holiday spots every year, state-of -the-art cars, beautiful houses, expensive designer couture clothing, and so on. However, their seemingly happy marriage was to experience a strife-filled, emotionally churning phase when Ngozi became a christian.



"When i told my husband about my decision to become a born again christian, after attending a women's program at a friend's church, it was as if i had stabbed him with a knife. Emeka looked at me in disbelief, thinking that it was one huge joke. Then he said to me, in a snide and patronizing tone, 'It is your choice to use religion as a crutch to face life because you cannot stand on your own. You cannot fool me-all this talk of Jesus and church-going is an escape latch for you. Something is probably bugging you that you won't reveal. After all, we are both Christians and were born into christian homes. Be warned-do not give any of our money to church, because that is the only thing they seem to talk about, and do not pester me into going with you to church, because i won't! I do not need such a crutch!' That was the opening salvo to what became years of pain and strife. All of a sudden, our priorities and desires differed. The warmth in my marriage turned to ice and arguments erupted frequently.



On several occasions, to my shame, i allowed my frustrations and anger at Emeka's stubborn stance about my new found faith, pour over into a shouting and door slamming tirade. It was almost too late before i realized that i was living out my faith in a way that repelled my husband of 10 years, instead of attracting him. Whenever Emeka ranted and raved about my church attendance, i would rant and rave right back in defense. I would sometimes neglect supervising the housework just to be in church. I allowed church to take the time and attention that rightly belonged to my husband. No wonder he was not interested in my God. I tried to play Holy Spirit in his life by attempting to convict him of his sinfulness and it back fired of course.



Out of frustration one day-i had come to the end of my tether and was sad about the sorry state of my marriage-i knelt down and begged God to show me what it is I was doing wrong and as i began to study the Bible more, the Holy Spirit pointed out areas of deficiencies and as I allowed the Word to sink in, my attitude to Emeka began to change as I ceased trying to change him by force.



He has not committed to Christ yet, but at least, he is showing a little bit of an interest in church and goes with me once in a while. Our relationship has improved as I have picked up the duties that I neglected, and our kids are happier.'