"Scars That Speak Series: Abbie Martin" Ep#35

In this powerful installment of Scars That Speak, host Chris Jones sits down with Abbie Martin to explore a journey of survival that spans from the side of a road in Thailand to the deep complexities of long-term recovery. Abbie shares the harrowing details of a 2012 motorbike accident that left her with a severe traumatic brain injury and a five-day coma, punctuated by a profound spiritual encounter that shifted her entire perspective on worth and identity. Yet, the story doesn't end with a clean recovery; Abbie candidly discusses the shock of discovering permanent brain damage and seizures 12 years later, as well as the heartbreaking contrast of losing her father to COVID-19 despite the same "miracle" prayers that saved her. It is a raw, conversation about living with "scars," laying down the burden of striving, and finding the beauty in a God who stays close in both the walking out of a hospital and the walking into a funeral.

Connect with Abbie or Sunrise Sunset Candles in the links below

https://www.facebook.com/share/1FdnrVGaai/?mibextid=wwXIfr

https://www.instagram.com/abbiejeanmartin?igsh=eWhqa2ExcHNjNGtj&utm_source=qr

https://www.instagram.com/sunrisesunsetcandles?igsh=MWFsaDJ2amt0ZXNxcg%3D%3D&utm_source=qr

This episode of “Spiritual Hot Sauce” by Chris Jones is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.  

Transcript

Chris Jones 0:00

Scars That Speak is a series of people sharing their real life stories, of going through adversity and trauma, the storm in life that strips us of our identity, where the path ends, but yet they find life where there should be no life. These are stories of hope.

Abbie Martin 0:19

I am Abby Martin, and I have scars that speak.

Chris Jones 0:24

Welcome. I'm Chris Jones. This is Spiritual Hot Sauce. Abby, welcome to the sauce.

Abbie Martin 0:34

Hi, Chris. Thank you.

Chris Jones 0:36

It's nice to see you again. It's been a while. You know, I was trying to remember when I heard you speak. And this is seems like a couple of years ago, but I heard you speak, and it was the first time that I think I actually met you. And I don't even know if it's an actual meeting, but you talked about what you're about to talk about today. So when I started doing this series, Scars That Speak, I immediately thought of you. And I was like, man, we got to get Abby on the show. So thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing your story.

Abbie Martin 1:08

Thank you for having me.

Chris Jones 1:09

Tell us briefly just a little bit about you.

Abbie Martin 1:12

I'm Abby. I live with my husband and remarkable little family in a really small town in southern Illinois. And I have three kids, Mercy, Roz, and Boone. Roz just turned eight months old yesterday, I make candles out of recycled containers and wooden wicks. I spent my 20s and just a little bit of my 30s traveling. Got to live in lots of different, several different places overseas, doing technically what could be called mission work, just doing what I could to help people. And then when I was 32, I got to marry the man of my dreams and am now a stay-at-home mom. Been married for five years. And yeah, there we are.

Chris Jones 1:55

Well, take us to uh the mission work where all of this story starts.

Abbie Martin 2:00

Sure. I went to India for the first time when I was like 22, loved it. Lots of adrenaline, lots of, you know, culture shock and just amazed by India. It's a pretty amazing place. And so yeah, I just, you know, one door opened, another door opened. And that led me to Thailand in 2012. I'm 24. I think it was my second time in India that I had gone there in that summer of 2012. I lived in a children's home on the Bay of Bengal in the Indian Ocean, you know, 50, 60 kids in this children's home, you know, slept on a concrete floor, kind of thing. So I went from that to Thailand. And it was my first time in Thailand. I was supposed to spend three weeks there serving a ministry that helps kids in northern Thailand on the border of Myanmar.

Chris Jones 2:49

And well, tell us a little bit when you were in India, because you were getting ready to leave. The conditions, I know you had told me you picked up lice.

Abbie Martin 2:58

Yeah, I did. Got some head lice. So all the kids in the orphanage had lice. And so, you know, just practically, I was like, well, this is something I can do. Let's delice everybody. So I like brought lots of lice combs and supplies, and it was quite. I mean, that's pretty much all I did for two or three months was delice heads. Oh, wow. And then got my own lice in the process. Thankfully, I didn't have dreads at that time because, you know, dread lice don't come out of dreads. So yeah, spent a lot of that's right. Spent a lot of time delicing heads and, you know, just being with these amazing, amazing kids. You know, it was just really sweet. We'd have ice cream parties and I'd get them ice cream from this little man that would bring a little ice cream cart by. And um, you know, from our perspective, it would you would say pretty rough living conditions, like, you know, using the bathroom and a little concrete hole kind of thing. It was two or three months that I was there with those kiddos, and it was just me. You asked me recently, and it's funny because I had never thought about it. You asked me, What's the last conversation I remember having before my wreck? Like I said, I'd never thought about it. And so the last one I have that's like for sure I can pinpoint and say that was a memory, not just like a oh, was did I remember this? Which I spent a lot of my time thinking, like, is that a memory? But this I know, I remember it. I remember it clearly. And it was, yeah, it was on the flight from India to Thailand, where I was gonna spend three weeks. And so I'm going from, you know, this children's home, everyone speaks Telugu. There's a little, there's some English, but you know, it's not really fluent, that fluent. And so I get on this plane and I'm sitting next to a British guy who's who knows all of the words coming out of my mouth, and I just like dump on him. Like I'm I'm also like processing, right? And and I'm excited and I'm going to, you know, Thailand and I'm looking like really scruffy. I've been living in these, you know, somewhat rough conditions.

Chris Jones 4:59

And I just I You've got lice at that time.

Abbie Martin 5:01

And I have lice. I don't tell him that I have lice because I'm not sure if he would want to have sat by me on the airplane. But yeah, so I just I don't know what all I told him, but I talked his leg off. And I'm, you know, I'm sure I'm just telling him about these kids and you know, Avanti that loved combing my hair and Megan on Raj Kumar, who I had just met. And, you know, I'm I'm just filling him with stories. And he was a really good listener, thankfully. And at the time, I mean, I still wear, I still have a lot of bracelets, but at the time I had a lot of bracelets on and they were all sentimental. Like, like some of these are sentimental, but it's mostly just I stick them on. But at the time, I called it my friendship bracelet club. Anytime someone would give me a bracelet, I'd put it on. So they were all thoughtful, sentimental. Why did I tell the British guy about my friendship bracelet club? I don't know, but I did. And so by the end of our little hangout, and it was a it was like a just a couple hour flight, he says, Well, I'm I'm gonna have to give you a bracelet then, aren't I? And I I'm like, Well, no, you know, you don't have to. He's like, Well, I got one right here. I just bought it from my daughter, and I want you to have it. And so he pulls out this bracelet and he had just bought it at a duty-free store in an airport. And you know, they don't sell anything in those stores for less than $80.

Speaker 6:12

Right.

Abbie Martin 6:12

So it's like, it's a nice bracelet, and it's like kind of glamorous looking and like sparkly and shiny, and not at all like how I'm looking. Like I'm looking, you know, really scrubbed.

Chris Jones 6:24

Like you just came from a mission.

Abbie Martin 6:25

Yeah, exactly. Right. And I'm looking at this bracelet, and we're really like not going together, me and this bracelet. And I he kind of reads my mind, I guess, and notices that I don't go with the bracelet. And I remember his exact words. And he says, You'll scuff it up in no time. I'm like, Yeah, I will scuff it up in no time. And I still, I still have the bracelet, which is sweet. Yeah, so that's my last interaction that I I really solidly remember before my wreck. It was it was neat. Yeah, I'll probably never see that guy again, but yeah.

Chris Jones 6:58

That is neat. It's almost like he was supposed to be there, right?

Abbie Martin 7:01

Before maybe, maybe, yeah.

Chris Jones 7:03

All right, so tell us what happens then. You get to Thailand and you're gonna be there for a while. What? Yeah, and you don't remember any of this. So everything you're about to share is what you were told by other people, correct?

Abbie Martin 7:16

That is correct. That is correct. This has been reported to me from the eyewitnesses.

Chris Jones 7:21

So what did they say?

Abbie Martin 7:23

So I met a small missions team from my the church I was attending at the time, met me in Thailand. And it was the ministry we were serving was one that my church supported. And so I met those people, which I kind again, now we're getting into like maybe I remember it, but I don't think so. So I meet them in Thailand and they're just gonna be there for a couple days and then fly home. But I had said, I well, I want to stay longer, so I was gonna stay for three weeks. And so, you know, at some point in the first few days of me being there, they were like, Well, the ministry has an extra motorbike. In Thailand, motorbikes are super popular. It's kind of like a you know, moped that's a little with a little more oomph to it. Like a like an oomph up scooter. I'd never driven anything like that, but I was all game and I was like, Yeah, sure, I'll, you know, learn how to drive it and I'll, you know, drive it around the town and run errands or whatever you need me to do. And so they're like, Well, you know, let's get you trained on how to drive the thing. And, you know, it's not complicated. Well, it shouldn't be complicated, but I had never driven anything with two wheels besides a bicycle. And so, girl who was interning for this ministry, real sweet gal named Jade, a couple of years younger than me, she took me to some little side streets in this town, you know, showed me the basic, you know, how-to on driving the motorbike for a few minutes, probably like a 10-minute lesson, I would say. And then she asked me if I felt confident enough to drive it down the main road, you know, a larger road going through this town. That I I could just follow her short distance and see how it went, you know? And I was like, Yeah, sure. I can do that. You know, I'm feeling like real confident about my motorbike driving skills.

Chris Jones 9:01

And you have no memory of this.

Abbie Martin 9:03

I don't have any memory of any of this. Nope.

Chris Jones 9:05

That's just what they told you.

Abbie Martin 9:06

This is what they tell me, yeah. And so I follow Jade. She's in a truck, and I'm following her down the main road in Thailand. And it comes time to make a left-hand turn. And so when you're driving something like this, you know, a motorcycle or whatever, you have to lean when you turn. And apparently I hadn't mastered that in my lessons. And so when I I am trying to make this left-hand turn, I don't lean properly. And so instead of turning, there's a curb that's going around the turn. And so I hit the curb. And we think I whiskey throttled it and, you know, really got some speed up before I hit the curb, you know, slammed on the gas instead of the brake. Because when I hit it, I hit it hard enough that my body went flying off the motorbike and there was a metal lamppost there on the side of the road by the curb. And so my head, mostly the right side of my face, collided hard with that metal pole, left me unconscious and bleeding on the side of the road.

Chris Jones 10:07

And of course, you did not have a helmet on.

Abbie Martin 10:09

I know I did. I did have a helmet on. Yeah, I had a helmet on because it was mostly my face that took the blunt of the collision. So yeah, I had one on. When I collided with a pole, broke my eyebrow here, was cut to the bone. And we imagined that that was, you know, my helmet that probably cut in there. So yeah, so I hit that. So I fractured that bone above my eyebrow, and this was just like gushing, and you could see the bone above my eyebrow. And then my two front teeth got knocked out, and one of them, or maybe both of them, I don't know, went through my bottom lip. So my lip was gashed open. And then unseen damage was that my skull had been fractured in a few different places, multiple is what they said, multiple places. And my brain had it just, you know, had started swelling and bleeding. So Jade watched it all through the rearview mirror. She's a, you know, is a good loving teacher and wanted to see how I was doing. So she watched it all happen and she was for sure it killed me. And so she hopped out and then ran to me. A couple of Thai people who'd seen it ran to me, and she said that when she got to my body, she could see air bubbles coming in and out of the blood in my nose and mouth. So she knew I was breathing. So they took me from an ambulance via ambulance to the local hospital there. So they take me to this little hospital that is not equipped to handle a traumatic brain injury. So they put me in a room with like 10 other people.

Chris Jones 11:37

And this is more like a clinic. Is that correct?

Abbie Martin 11:40

Yeah, exactly. It's like a it is a clinic. So at this point, missionaries are called and people are called that are, you know, that are part of the ministry that are coming to like, you know, what do we do with Abby? I spent hours in this hospital. And from what they tell me, is that is that I probably would have died had I stayed in that hospital because they just couldn't take care of me, you know? Yeah. And so finally they got all the logistics taken care of so that I could be taken by ambulance seven hours south to Bangkok that had a really nice big hospital called Bumingrad International Hospital. And through all of this, these hours of being in this small hospital, I was unconscious. And from what the eyewitnesses have told me, you know, whether I was conscious or not, I would gain some kind of semi-consciousness and I would moan and like make these cry moan sounds and call for Jesus. And so they said that several different times I would, with eyes still closed and not aware of anything going on around me when they would try to talk to me, I would just say Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, repeated. And then I'd go quiet for a few hours and then one, you know, again, say Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. And so that went on for a few hours until finally I just went to sleep and stayed asleep for five days. And so in Bangkok, you know, they hooked me up to all the stuff, life support and, you know, a feeding tube and all of the things to keep me alive. You know, it was kind of like a hopefully she lives sort of scenario. And so they they hook me up to all of these things. I am in a coma. And, you know, what happens when someone's in a coma, you just hope that they wake up. And so my parents, who are the best parents that have ever walked on the earth, they were called and notified, you know, about my wreck. Yeah. And my dad, super homebody, like had no intention of ever flying across the big ocean. Like he loves home, love being at home. As soon as they were called and told about my wreck, they booked flights to Thailand. They just came, you know, as soon as they could so that they could be with me. Yeah. So they got there, you know, as quick as they could, and then they just stayed by my bed while I slept. And I have, you know, pictures that my mom just snapped a few when I was in the hospital. And my dad was always right by my bed. And he had this little suck, because I was drooling a lot, right? Because I had I was on life support and had tubes down my throat. And so I was just drooling all the time. And he would stay by my bed with this little slobber sucker thing and just suck the slobber off my mouth all the time. So yeah, they stayed there with me. They prayed. I, my pastor, Pastor Chad, was supposed to fly. His trip was over and he was supposed to fly back to the States because he had been there, right? On the short-term mission trip. But he canceled his flight and said, I'm gonna stay with Abby until she wakes up. So he also made quite a sacrifice to stay there with me in the hospital. Everyone just did a lot of praying and pleading with God to keep me alive.

Chris Jones 14:49

This isn't like you uh fell and broke your arm.

Abbie Martin 14:51

No, no.

Chris Jones 14:52

Yeah, you you probably shouldn't be here right now. Yeah, yeah. This is this is some serious stuff. And you're in a coma. How how long was you in the coma?

Abbie Martin 15:02

I slept for five days and then uh woke up on day five. And you know, there's a lot of questions, a lot of fear for everyone present, because you know, this are brain work, you know, being one of the Do you remember this time? No, no, no, no, no. No, I have weeks that are just gone from my memory. Wow. And so, no, definitely don't remember any of the hospital days. And so my parents gave me, because again, I'm I can't talk because I'm hooked up to all this stuff. And so they gave me a pen and a paper. And I don't remember, I could I should have looked up what the very first thing I wrote was because I don't remember it offhand. But I know very one of the very first things I wrote was I'm really hungry and and and where am I? Yeah. Yeah. They weren't putting enough food in my feeding tube, apparently. But anyway, just you know, whatever I wrote was wonderful news for my parents because it's like her brain works. She's she still knows the alphabet, she she still knows how to write. So, and you know, you hear stories about people waking up after a traumatic brain injury, and they are now a mathematical genius or they can speak three new languages. And unfortunately, that did not happen for me. I just such a story woke woke up confused with a headache. Yeah.

Chris Jones 16:21

Wow. Wow.

Abbie Martin 16:23

And people like the amount of people that prayed is something I ought to think about more about too. It's just amazing. Like because I come from a really small town of 1,300 people. Well, I think all 1,300 were praying, like, plus anybody else that I've encountered in my people I didn't know. And still today, because I live back where I grew up, I'll meet someone that we've never met and they'll say, Are you the girl that had the wreck in Thailand? I prayed for you. Wow. It's not rare that that happens. And it's just, yeah, it's just amazing the love that people showed me.

Chris Jones 16:56

It was a local movement to to pray for Abby. Yeah. That's beautiful. That's beautiful.

Abbie Martin 17:01

Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Jones 17:02

All right. So you come to you tell them you're hungry. You have no memory of this though. And everybody's still with their. So what what's the account? What's everybody telling you was going on?

Abbie Martin 17:12

Yeah. I don't remember at all what they told me. I it took me, I would say, months to realize the significance of the risk. Like I just didn't, you know, because of my brain healing, I guess, I couldn't, I couldn't process, like, oh, I almost died. And this is really serious. Like, I didn't have any of that processing. It was just like, whatever, I'm hungry. Yeah. You know, like I didn't, I couldn't, I couldn't process it. And so I do know that much. Okay. So yeah, they while I was still sleeping during those five days, because my face is like all ripped up, you know. And so a plastic surgeon sewed me up. He sewed my eyebrow that was all gushed up, my my lip that was ripped open. He's he sewed up.

Chris Jones 17:54

But you still don't have your front teeth. Yeah, still didn't have any front teeth.

Abbie Martin 17:59

No. And so I was pretty rough when I woke up, you know, and it's not anywhere on my radar, like, you know, what do I look like? But I rem I do remember faintly the first few weeks of being back to the States. Like I have really vague memories of seeing myself in a mirror and being like, whoa, I like look a lot different than I did. And again, I don't think I had the ability to process like that it was maybe not a great look for me. Like I didn't care at all. Like I had zero, you know, vanity at that time. But yeah, it it definitely affected my appearance. Yeah.

Chris Jones 18:32

When do you start getting your memory back?

Abbie Martin 18:35

I remember the so like I I say vague memories. And I do have those. Like I have a vague memory of a friend coming to visit me. And we like we would always like give each other like arm massages. And I remember her kind of rubbing my arm and it really ticked me off because I was, it's often a symptom. What what's the word I'm looking for? Like a side effect of a traumatic brain injury is that you're you're angry and like a kind of aggressive. And so I kind of remember that. Like I remember her getting on my nerves, and usually I would, I would never have been annoyed by that. And so I I do I remember being like just real short-tempered.

Chris Jones 19:15

What part of your brain was was damaged?

Abbie Martin 19:18

Yeah, that's a good question. My frontal lobe from where, you know, my face hit the pole and then my brain, you know, hit the skull, and then also my occipital lobe in the back of my head because my brain, you know, like bounced back and crashed into the back of my skull. So in those three three, two damages in the frontal lobe and then one in the occipital lobe. So I so I have these really vague memories of just kind of like being annoyed, just short-tempered with people. I would say the clearest first memory I have after the wreck is a moment I had in a in a conversation with God that was very significant and a huge influence in my relationship with him that still influences me today in my interaction with God. And during those first few weeks, and maybe even into a couple months, you know, I just had a lot going on in my emotions. And I had a lot of sadness and just kind of just heavy, just heaviness. And at some point I started to just feel really guilty for the wreck. Like it was, it was my fault, you know. Like I'm the idiot that got on the motorbike, I'm the idiot that, you know, didn't turn properly. And I just started feeling a lot of shame and like just as and a lot for my parents. Like I cost them thousands of dollars. I cost them so much worry. And, you know, and I just felt like a big burden. And so this started to build and grow and get heavier inside of me. And so I remember that. I remember those, some of those feelings of just bad, heavy, not good. And eventually started thinking like, it would have been better if my life had just ended when I had the wreck. I'm not doing anyone any good. And I wish I wish I hadn't lived. I it would have been better for everyone. Like those sort of thoughts. Very dark, really dark, deep, heavy. And so I'm in that sort of place. And I have a moment with God where I'm have turned my attention to him, and I feel like here deep down, and you know, where I feel like God can communicate with us with his spirit, I feel like he's asking me to remember what I said right after the wreck in my moments of semi consciousness, what I was saying. And so I thought and I was like, okay, I was saying Jesus. I was calling out to Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. And I felt like God said, When you were calling my name, I was calling yours. And when he said that to my spirit, it was so Such it was such a relief. It was a surprise. And it was it it lifted me. And I I took time to imagine it. Like I pictured myself in Thailand, laying on the side of the road, bloodied, broken, zero to offer.

Chris Jones 22:22

Yeah.

Abbie Martin 22:23

And and so I imagined God being there. I imagined, I pictured it. I pictured God like leaning over my body, saying, Abby, Abby, Abby. The feeling that accompanied that of picturing that was it was just so gentle and it was like unconditional love. And I I felt so important. And I felt I it was like, well, if God, if my maker takes the time to see me and call my name when I'm almost dead, I must be all right. And so I stopped wishing I was dead after that. Like it was a it was a significant enough dialogue between me and God that it changed my thinking about myself. And I I can from from then on, I can say like I wanted to live because of that.

Chris Jones 23:13

Was this something that kind of internally came up through you and it just was there, or was this external? How how did you hear this?

Abbie Martin 23:22

That's a great question. I would describe it like was in a place of wanting, you could say like a place of prayer or worship where I was already turning my attention to God, like just trying to quiet myself, still my mind, and be like, okay, God, you know, where are you at in here? Like that was sort of the posture that I was in. And then in that stillness, I I felt like I guess I could describe it as a thought that was that it felt like not my thought. You know, in more poetic language, I would have described it as like, you know, God whispered to my heart. But practically, I think how I would explain it is that I thought a thought in my head that I didn't feel like was coming from me. And I felt like it was God getting my attention and wanting to say something to me.

Chris Jones 24:16

Has God spoken to you like that before or after? Is this one of the is this the only time?

Abbie Martin 24:23

Well, I'm not, you know, I don't want to sound like a saint here, but I I feel like how I interact with God, I feel like if we are turning our attention to love and saying, okay, what would love say in this moment? What would you do about this person I'm really ticked at right now? What do you what would you say about this relationship or love, what would you say about my heart that really hurts right now? And I think how I experience it is that when I do that, there's an answer that, like, I okay, love would say this. Love would say to forgive that person I'm really mad at.

Chris Jones 24:57

Yeah.

Abbie Martin 24:58

Right now, love would say, Abby, you're still good, even though you've done this, this, or this. And I believe that that's the God inside of us communicating with us. Okay. So yeah.

Chris Jones 25:10

After you heard this, did the things immediately change, or was this like something that was the start of the change?

Abbie Martin 25:51

Oh, I'd say it was more like a start. And it's not like, oh, from then on, I only have wonderful thoughts about myself. You know, it wasn't like anything magical. But, you know, I think in our in the deep place of us where I believe that God interacts with us, whenever we feel loved there, whenever we feel seen, it it changes us. I I think being loved unconditionally changes us. And that's what I was experiencing was unconditional love that I didn't work for, I didn't earn, I didn't, I did, I was, I did nothing impressive to get it.

Chris Jones 26:29

Right.

Abbie Martin 26:29

But I got it anyway. He was still calling my name, he was still seeing me in my worst. And so that just just having that thought is what God's like.

Chris Jones 26:40

Kind of changed.

Speaker 2 26:41

So yeah, it it changes when we experience God like that. I think, you know, it changes how we see ourselves and how we see other people because he's the same for everyone.

Chris Jones 26:51

And that is what's changed your direction and pulled you out of the descent.

Speaker 2 26:55

That's right. And like, and like I'm okay.

Chris Jones 26:58

Yeah, I'm gonna be all right.

Speaker 2 27:00

Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Chris Jones 27:01

So what does that road to recovery look like?

Speaker 2 27:05

Well, I stopped wishing I was dead, was the main thing, I guess. Yeah. That it started looking like.

Chris Jones 27:10

Started seeing life differently.

Speaker 2 27:12

Yeah, yeah. And at that time, you know, I was still had a lot of immediate healing to do. I was still having really bad headaches. I was still, you know, several pounds underweight. I'd lost a lot of weight in the I see you. And so, you know, there was still a lot of healing to do. But then as I continued healing, I just did so with the perspective that was more hopeful and God likes me way more than I thought he did.

Chris Jones 27:37

Yeah. No matter what happens, it's gonna be okay.

Speaker 2 27:41

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Jones 27:43

Now, as this goes on and life happens, you get better, you physically heal. What does those moments look like in the mirror?

Speaker 2 27:52

Well, I went to the dentist pretty quickly and got hooked up with some new fake teeth, which helped my parents quite a bit. Unfortunately, fake teeth, the fake teeth I have acquired don't look quite like my originals, but you know, they're there. It's an improvement anyway. And then the scars, so you know, I have one here and on my lip. They sent me home from the hospital in Thailand with tons of tubes of aquafore. Like, I don't know, they were also little too, like 50 little tubes of aquaphore and just told me, you know, as many times a day as I want, just rub aquaphore all over my scars that would help them to heal. And they feeled all right. I mean, you can still see them, but they're not bad. They could be way worse. Yeah. And my, you know, my eyebrows are not exactly even and my lips not exactly even, but yeah, it could be way, way worse than what it is. And so, you know, I don't remember having a moment of like I'm looking in the mirror and you know, with like this dramatic, oh, you know, I have scars. But, you know, I don't I don't remember that. I might have had moments like that, but today what I'm like is you know, I had these scars, but they're all right, and they could be worse. And yeah.

Chris Jones 29:00

So you get home and you start getting better. Your attitude changes, you start healing physically. After you heal back up, you go back to India. Is that right?

Abbie Martin 29:11

Yeah, I went back to a few different places. Yeah. What I wanted and what how I saw my life was that I would just always live overseas. You know, I would probably find some land that stood out more than the other lands, and I would just live there forever. So that's pretty much how I lived my 20s. Went to several different countries in Southeast Asia to work with. But, you know, I would sign up for like three month or six-month commitments here or there. And then I made a friend named Kelly who lived in Hong Kong and worked in the red light district there, helping ladies who were in the red light district. I just loved that. Just, just love the ladies, loved that ministry. And so I ended up moving to Hong Kong and lived there for total of about three years. Worked with the ministry. I lived in a safe home. When a lady was ready to leave the sex industry, she could come live in the safe home with us and we would just like help her raise money and get ready to go back to her home country. So I did that for a year, maybe two. I think I did that for two years. Anyway, just it was a very significant, meaningful couple years and met ladies that I love dearly and still consider like family. And then it just my time in Hong Kong was like, okay, I think that this is, you know, summing up. I I don't think I'm gonna be here for the rest of my life. And so made some plans, like maybe what ministry could look like in the States for a little bit, and then would probably head back overseas. But during my plan making in the States, I was living in Louisville working with people there that were living on the streets. So I did that for about a year and just couldn't get over the guy that I've been crushing on for about nine years.

Chris Jones 30:54

And so about what year was this that you're back in the States? And yeah.

Abbie Martin 31:00

So I lived in Louisville working with folks there through 2019. And then in February of 2020, I started dating my man.

Chris Jones 31:09

Your man.

Abbie Martin 31:09

And that that kept that kept me in the States, yeah.

Chris Jones 31:14

So you found home.

Abbie Martin 31:15

Yeah, I found home. We started dating in February, got married in 2020, October. So we've been married for five years.

Chris Jones 31:23

They're the one, they're the one.

Abbie Martin 31:25

Yeah, that's right.

Chris Jones 31:27

So when did you start noticing that you were having issues? Because you healed up, but now there's some other things that start happening. What what did you start noticing? When did you start noticing these things?

Abbie Martin 31:39

So a few months after the wreck, I began having, and it's hard to explain. My brain would do this thing that would last like 20 or 30 seconds. And the best way I can explain it is like deja vu. When deja vu happens, you know, you're like aware that it's happening. You don't really have any control over it, and you're like, hmm, this is a weird thing. It's not deja vu, but it was again, that's the best I can explain it. It's like this thing would happen, my brain would like have all this stuff go on that I couldn't, I couldn't control. And it was uncomfortable, but I was aware that it was happening and I would think, oh, my brain's doing the weird thing. I hope it stops soon. And my heart rate would go up while it was happening. And then afterwards, like I'm I'm it I would be like, oh, like it was just uncomfortable. That would happen every few months. And so I just thought it was some sort of weird PTSD, and it wasn't a big deal. Like, I it didn't prevent me from doing anything. If I was driving, I wouldn't wreck, I could keep driving, you know, it wasn't, it didn't seem like a big deal to me. But it would happen like clockwork every two or three months for years. My sister Kara would just casually mention once in a while, like, Effie, maybe you should see a neurologist. And but I was like, no, because we were told, at least what we think we were told, when we left Thailand, there was no lasting damage to my brain that I would it was fully functioning, fully recovered. And so that's what we all thought for years. And so finally, 12 years goes by. I have one of these weird brain things, and I pee my pants during it. And then my sister, Era's like, Abby, you need to see a neurologist. I booked the appointment, and so it turns out that the MRI let us know that I do have lasting damage in my brain. And so it was damaged in the three places, twice in my frontal lobe and once in my occipital lobe. That was in 2024 that I finally went to the neurologist. We also learned from him that the weird brain things that I had been having for all those years were seizures. They were just mild seizures. And so he put me on a seizure medicine and basically said, you know, you're okay. We just have to monitor your brain. Yeah. And so it was just, it was a shocking and crushing thing to learn that you thought you had a brain that was fully recovered that is actually damaged. And so it's taken, you know, that was coming up on two years ago. And it's taken a lot of, I've done a lot of processing and like, you know, what does this mean? Like, how do you live with brain damage? And how has it, how has that changed my past 12 years?

Chris Jones 34:26

So what does that mean today? What does that look like?

Abbie Martin 34:29

Well, you know, I don't, I can't like pinpoint and say this behavior or these thought patterns here are because of the brain damage. Because, you know, everybody changes. We're, you know, our personalities, I think, change some throughout our lives. And so I I I can't separate and say, oh, this is because this, this, and this is because of the brain damage. This, this, this is just from being a human. I don't know. I don't I don't have those answers. I do know, you know, that I have a really pretty poor memory, that I got some OCD tendencies, and that I've had crazy emotional mood swings for years that have been hard. They've been difficult. But I'm on this medicine that prevents the seizures that also help stabilize your emotions. And I think they've gotten a little bit better. And so all of that I'm, you know, is like brain damage stuff.

Chris Jones 35:21

Yeah.

Abbie Martin 35:22

But you know, just like living 12 years thinking that you had fully recovered, and then finding out, oh, I'm I'm actually, you know, my my thoughts, my processing, my life is forever changed because of August 25th, 2012. Because I hit a metal pole, I will never be the same. And I think that that goes it's like that for a lot of us. You know, a lot of us are it's not because we hit a metal pole and we're brain damaged, but you know, I I went through that divorce or I had that way too early funeral or that diagnosis. And we think, well, I can recover from that. I I can get back to 100%, but a lot of it we can't. So we have to live with the damage. We have to live with the scarred faces or the damaged brains or the broken hearts. And that's just, you know, comes from being human, that we we have lasting damage that we've got to live with.

Chris Jones 36:20

What would you say to those people who are experiencing that kind of trauma and that kind of suffering and adversity? What would you tell them?

Abbie Martin 36:29

I tell them that we're in it together, that they're not alone, and that being a human is hard for all the humans, and that I'm sorry. I would tell them that I believe God sees them where they're at, and that he loves them more than they would ever understand, and that he's with them. I think that's what I tell them.

Chris Jones 36:52

I uh I have a question. And you don't have to just jump out with an answer. You might want to think about this. What happens if you don't hear from God in that moment where he says, Abby, when you were calling my name, I was calling your name. If you don't have that moment, what happens in Abby's life?

Abbie Martin 37:14

You know, it just it's really hard to say, and I you know, I don't think anyone can say because of the healing that my brain was doing at that time, and who you know, who knows? I I don't have an answer to that. I know that that interaction with him was very important to me and my um you know my self-esteem and just seeing the way God is. I'll say this that it it still today like affects how I view God. And you know, I'm a I'm a born and bred striver. Just I gotta get better, I gotta do more, I gotta give more, I gotta be kinder, just all the time.

Chris Jones 37:56

Yeah.

Abbie Martin 37:57

And so that type of interaction with God of, okay, I I'm I have zero anything, I'm at my worst, I'm hurt, I'm ugly, I'm bleeding, I'm I'm that. I have his attention and his even approval that he even in that moment, he's he's proud of me. It was like is like the feeling that I have. That helps get rid of the striving. Because it's like, well, my goodness, if he loves me unconditionally, then I'm good right now. And not to say that we shouldn't try to come back, you know, become better. Yeah, you know, have goals and stuff, but yeah, it helps me for sure to lay down some of that striving because God is just saying, no, no, no, you're good now.

Chris Jones 38:40

Yeah. I don't think there's anything you can do to make God love you anymore, just like there's nothing you can do to make God love you any less.

Abbie Martin 38:48

Yeah, that's right. That's right. Yeah.

Chris Jones 38:51

I think when people hear this, it's easy to think that in the worst times that you can pray and beg God and then he will be there. And I do believe that he will be there. But then you had told me that you had an another experience, like with your father.

Abbie Martin 39:08

So the the brain injury was hard. You know, it's a rough thing that life has presented that I'm living with, but losing my dad, way harder. Way worse. By far the hardest thing I've had to walk through yet.

Chris Jones 39:24

When did you lose your dad?

Abbie Martin 39:25

I I lost him two months after I got married at the end of 2020. He died on December 19th. He got COVID, couldn't, couldn't kick it, and died in the hospital. And so, thank you. He was the best dad in the universe, just amazing. And so he left a humongous hole that we're all, you know, we're we're we just miss him every day. When I was in the hospital in the ICU, you know, people prayed, people read certain Bible verses, they fasted, they proclaimed, you know, I I come from a charismatic sort of place. And so, you know, you pray for healing and you pray for you pray for miracles. And so seemingly, you know, that's what happened to me. I got a miracle. My, you know, my people prayed hard enough and I lived. And that's kind of how I always viewed it. So then when my dad got sick, we did all the same stuff. We prayed, we fasted, we read the Bible verses, we proclaimed the word of God, you know, we did all this stuff, but it ended in a funeral. Since my dad died over the past five years, I've just had lot done a lot a lot of processing and thinking and like, okay, what do I believe about this? Like, what does prayer do? Like, why are sometimes there miracles and sometimes there aren't? And I have a total of zero answers. But how I see it now is that I I I don't know. Well, you know, I got better, I got to walk out of Thailand, I wasn't in a body bag. And if the people hadn't prayed the certain prayers or if they hadn't fasted those days, would God have not healed me? Like I, you know, I don't know. I'm not I'm not sure the the part that prayer played. And I I believe that it did play a part, and I believe that God did help. I just I don't know exactly, you know, like how that all worked. So I don't I don't think I got to walk out of Thailand because pe my people prayed hard enough. And I don't think that my dad died because his people didn't pray hard enough. I think the answer to both is I don't know. And that God's with us. He's with us when we when we walk out of the hospital, and he's with us when we have to go to a funeral. Our dad doesn't walk out of the hospital. That's the biggest thing that I believe now is just God being close when it's really good, and God being close when it's really bad. That's how I see him now.

Chris Jones 41:58

I think that's a pretty incredibly strong message. Sometimes you walk away and sometimes you don't walk away. Life is life and he's still God.

Abbie Martin 42:07

That's right. That's right. Yeah. In the years of grieving my dad, it's not all been like, you know, trying to figure out my new theology. It's also been really, there's also been a lot of good and love-filled things that have happened as I've grieved my dad. And one of those is just as I think about his life and like the way he lived it and how he prioritized his days, like we were everything. His daughters and mom, and my mom, his wife, we were all he cared about. And he made the way he lived every day very apparent. Like that was we were his only priority. And so as I'm looking at my dad, of course, I'm seeing that God must be the same. You know, that God must be just crazy about us. And then, as in the midst of all this, as I've become a mom, you know, my daughter Roz, she started doing this thing where she smiles so big, her whole face is taken over with a smile and she scrunches her nose. You know, I've been able to see some beautiful sights and do some cool stuff in my life. I've, you know, zipline through the jungle in Thailand and rode a hot air balloon in Southern California and spent a summer watching the sunrise over the Pacific Ocean in Mozambique, and, you know, rode a cable car through the Swiss Alps. But none of that, none of the experiences, none of the beauty I've seen comes even close to the wonder of watching Roz scrunch her nose when she smiles. It is just unbelievable beauty. And so, you know, motherhood has me drawing some conclusions about God that he must be the same. But see, watches the cosmos and watches galaxies collide and the rings around Saturn spin, that he must be like, yeah, that's cool. But have you ever watched Abby make pancakes for her kids? Or have you ever watched Chris sit at his desk and edit a podcast because he wants to encourage people? That we, that humans, all of us, are the thing that move God. That we he is, I believe he's obsessed with us.

Chris Jones 44:19

And there's something in what you're you're saying that reminds me conversation I just had the other day about faith is less about believing and more about trusting. And that when we trust, we do. We just have to trust that it is what it is supposed to be, whatever that is. But we still are very much loved and that God is still there, even if we don't understand, and we just have to trust that we're not always going to get the answers, and that's okay. That's uh that's an incredible story, Abby. There's so much in that that we all can learn from and and be given some insight. And and I and I think you put it beautifully. God sees us all exactly as that amazing person that He just has so much love for.

Abbie Martin 45:11

That's right.

Chris Jones 45:12

Thank you so much for coming on and sharing your story. But tell us what you've got going on. Uh, because you say you have a candle business.

Abbie Martin 45:19

Yeah. Yeah. Little marketing here. So I'm a stay-at-home mom, but I can pour candles, you know, as I'm a stay-at-home mom. So that's nice little gig. My candle company is called Sunrise Sunset Candles.

Chris Jones 45:33

We'll put a link in the episode so people can click on it.

Abbie Martin 45:36

Yep. So they're earth-friendly, you know, they're made with clean oils, not gonna there's no toxins, not gonna give you cancer. They have wooden wicks and recycled containers. So I'm running a little recycling plant on my front porch, is how I like to put it. And people just leave jars on my porch all the time. And then I turn them into candles. Nice. So yeah, I make candles, and then, you know, mostly my whole life is just, you know, being with my kiddos, raising them and being amazed by them.

Chris Jones 46:02

So if people want to talk to you, is that okay if they reach out?

Abbie Martin 46:05

Well, sure. Yeah, I'd love for them to reach out.

Chris Jones 46:08

Okay. Well, I'll share your contact information in the episode so people can get in touch with you. And I hope everybody goes and buys a bunch of candles.

Abbie Martin 46:16

Yeah, me too. Me too.

Chris Jones 46:18

And it'd be awesome. Abby, thank you so much. This has been fantastic, and I appreciate you sharing.

Abbie Martin 46:24

Yeah, I really appreciate you having me, Chris. Thank you.

Chris Jones 46:27

Thank you. Thank you guys for joining us today. I hope you got something out of it. Because sometimes we make it through the storm and sometimes we don't. But we can always trust that he'll give us what we need to endure this storm. If you like the flavor of the sauce, then follow and share. And if you can relate to having scars that speak, then reach out to me. Maybe we'll get you on the show. Thanks, guys. We'll see you again next week.