← The Miracle Files - True Miracle Stories
The Miracle Files - True Miracle Stories
Kidnapped by My Mother - Aria's Journey to Hope | Ep. 39
00:36:06
After being taken from her father and raised for years in hidden abuse, Aria grew up believing she was unwanted—possibly even by God. But decades later, a chance encounter on a quiet New Orleans street began a chain of events that would lead to...
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- [00:00]
Ryan Seacrest
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- [00:30]
Emily Jones
Aria's father, Jerome Smith, returned to their condo to find it stripped bare. No kids, no wife, no note.
- [00:39]
Aria
I remember the day we moved. Thinking, like there's something wrong. So I would always ask, well, where is daddy? And why doesn't he want to see us?
- [00:48]
Emily Jones
But the questions brought only anger.
- [00:51]
Aria
As a child, it didn't make sense to me. It just didn't add up.
- [01:00]
Emily Jones
This is the Miracle Files. I'm Emily Jones.
- [01:03]
Holly Worthington
And I'm Holly Worthington. We're two sisters who love a captivating true story. But we're also seeking more light in our lives.
- [01:11]
Emily Jones
So we're on a mission to find and share unforgettable, uplifting stories of God's miracles. We hope you'll join us on this journey.
- [01:23]
Holly Worthington
Welcome back to the Miracle Files. We have an amazing episode for you today.
- [01:28]
Emily Jones
Yes, this one is actually a story that takes place over decades rather than like a day or two, but it is fascinating. We will warn you, though, that it does dive into some sensitive topics like child abuse.
- [01:42]
Holly Worthington
Yeah. And no one has actually been charged that is in the story with any kind of crimes.
- [01:48]
Aria
So.
- [01:48]
Holly Worthington
So we just want to be clear that this is from Aria's perspective based on her interview. But we really think that it will be an inspiration to all of you, but especially to anyone who's going through a hard time or who went through a really hard time as a child. And if you're a young person who is going through abuse, we want you to know that there will be resources at the end of this as well that we'll share with you.
- [02:12]
Emily Jones
Yeah. And the most important thing to know is that you matter. And there is hope.
- [02:16]
Aria
So. So.
- [02:17]
Holly Worthington
Amen. Okay, let's get started.
- [02:20]
Emily Jones
Okay. Before she was a photographer in Europe, before Versace and private events with the King of Spain, Aria was a missing girl. She wasn't kidnapped by a stranger. She didn't appear in the headlines or land on milk cartons. What happened to her was quieter and crueler.
- [02:42]
Aria
She.
- [02:42]
Emily Jones
She was stolen by the One person everyone is taught to trust the most. Her mother, Aria, was born into legacy. A fifth generation New Yorker, her roots ran through Harlem and through Columbia University jazz halls and Ivy League scholarships. Her mother had modeled. Her father, Jerome, was a rising fashion designer who had already sketched hats for Stevie Wonder and suits for Luther Van Dross by his twenties. Her father was a six foot tall, soft spoken man who Aria called the gentle Giant. Her grandfather had marched with Martin Luther King Jr. They weren't just a family. They were history. And then one day, it all ended. Here's Aria.
- [03:29]
Aria
And after kindergarten, my mother packed up our condo in New York and told us we were moving away and we moved to South Carolina. And I remember the day we moved because we had this blue long old school 90s Volkswagen piled all of us into the car. And I just remember looking at my nana and her sisters in the yard thinking like, there's something wrong with this situation. We didn't get to say goodbye to our father. We're just, we're moving with this man we don't really even know, to a state that's extremely far away. It just didn't make any sense. And I've always been very outspoken. I was a kid who would say, but why, but why like a million times. So I would always ask, well, where is Daddy and why doesn't he want to see us and why can't we just call him? Why don't we go to where he is? Why don't you bring us? And it was always like, Arya Shah, stop asking questions. And just something in me, even as a child, it just didn't add up. And I loved my grandfather, my father's father. And she said, you know, they don't want anything to do with you either.
- [04:35]
Emily Jones
No, Aria thought that wasn't true. This was all wrong. She could feel it. Aria's father, Jerome Smith, returned to their condo to find it stripped bare. No kids, no wife, no note. He called everyone he knew. No one had answers. He went to the police. My children are missing, he told the officer. She took them and disappeared. But in 1992, there were no Amber Alerts for this kind of thing. No social media posts to go viral, no laws strong enough to help a father whose name wasn't on a custody order. The police told Jerome it was a domestic dispute and that they couldn't get involved. They handed him a pamphlet. He walked out without taking it. Jerome tried to contact Aria's maternal grandmother, but Aria's nana refused to give Jerome any information.
- [05:31]
Aria
And my mother had told My nana. He's crazy and abusive. Don't talk to him. He's dangerous.
- [05:36]
Emily Jones
Jerome called his father, Jerome Sr. In New Orleans. Jerome Jr. S voice cracked as he told his father, she's gone. She took the kids. His father flew to New York and searched every place his grandchildren had once been. Schools, parks, churches. But the trail went cold. He often returned to New York to visit Marcus Garvey Park. This had been a beloved spot for Jerome Sr. And his grandchildren. Whenever he used to visit them, he would take them there. It became a place of nostalgia and mourning for Jerome Sr. Every time he traveled to New York, he sat on a green bench by the playground where he used to bring Aria and her siblings, hoping his grandchildren might walk by. But they never did. Still, he returned again and again. In South Carolina, five year old Aria's world unraveled. She was enrolled in school, but nothing felt safe. She kept asking where her father was. Why can't we call him? Doesn't he miss us? But the questions brought only anger. Her mother insisted that her father, grandfather, and all of that side of the family hated Aria and her siblings.
- [06:52]
Aria
As a child, it didn't make sense to me that the loving, caring people that I did know, even at the age of five, it didn't make sense that all of a sudden they just hate everybody, hates us for what? It just didn't add up.
- [07:05]
Emily Jones
Aria only remembers feeling safe and loved in her father's and grandfather's presence. In contrast, the man living in her house now, her stepfather, was not gentle. He was not kind or loving. He was angry, he was violent. Her mother was 2. And the abuse went on for years.
- [07:27]
Aria
There were occasions where our punishment was like to sit outside in a thunderstorm. Our stepfather just was looking at us with a smirk through the window. Or I remember having to go outside in the freezing cold and rake up all the, the leaves on like this huge property that we lived on to the point where from the rake, our hands were bleeding like our skin had peeled from being left outside for so long and we would have to work for hours. And then he would put the food outside like we were a dog and we would eat outside. And I remember my sister saying she saw on the Discovery Channel if we stuff leaves in our jacket, that's how we could stay warm. So it was always very cruel and unusual punishments. He would give us like prison numbers when we were grounded, we would have like a number as if we were a prisoner and he would call us by our numbers.
- [08:15]
Emily Jones
Aria's family moved constantly. Lexington, Columbia, back And forth. Three schools before second grade, seven before high school was done. And the reason was always the same. Someone started asking questions. A school nurse, a teacher, a neighbor. Aria began to understand the pattern. If anyone got too close to the truth, she would never see them again. Aria's mother never kept a job. When she did, it was short lived. A sample lady at Sam's club, a cook, a doula. What did seem to last was the steady stream of money from Aria's nana, who couldn't say no to Aria's mother. Condos, cars, a custom home. But the money never made it to Aria or her siblings. They wore hand me downs and suffered hunger. Even though her Nana couldn't protect her. Aria loved her Nana. Her Nana had always exemplified compassion and faith. But the years passed, and soon it wasn't just Aria's Nana, Aria's father, or his family who felt so far away. Soon even God felt far away.
- [09:27]
Aria
I grew up in a Baptist church, and I grew up in a Christian household. My Nana always took us to church. My mother would never go, so I always wore a cross around my neck. And I removed my cross when I was 10 because the abuse in our family was so bad. And I thought, if there's a God, why would he want us to go through this?
- [09:48]
Emily Jones
Even though Aria wondered if God had abandoned her, she felt something inside her telling her to keep fighting.
- [09:55]
Aria
I remember watching Matilda in elementary school, and I told my mother, you can put me up for adoption. And she lost it. I thought, that is a great alternative. And I just never. I just thought, well, somebody else's house has got to be better than this, so if I can go live somewhere else, I felt like I could do something great with my life. I don't know where that came from, because I was being told the opposite by my mother and my stepfather. You're never gonna be anything. You're not good enough. You're an idiot. Whatever negative things they would say, but it never penetrated me. For some reason, I think for my siblings, it did. And it was a way to keep them attached. But for me, I just thought, you're the idiot. Like, I just. Even as a kid, I just. It. It didn't faze me for some reason.
- [10:40]
Emily Jones
But what did continue to bother Aria was how God could allow such cruelty. One day, Aria's baby sister broke her ankle, and Aria went with her and their mother to the doctor's office.
- [10:53]
Aria
I remember the doctor saying I was malnourished to my mother. And the doctor said, you know, oh, Aria, you really need to Eat more. And I said something along the lines of, oh, my mom won't let us. But I remember blurting it out in the doctor's office, and they would have these locks on the cabinet. And when I had mentioned the locks, my mother said, oh, they're childproof for, like, the baby. But that wasn't it because she would lock the top cabinets as well. So. So it was like, to control our eating because our stepfather said we ate too much because there was too many of us.
- [11:25]
Emily Jones
Aria hoped that speaking up would get the doctor's attention. She felt like everything could change if someone just became aware of their circumstances. But no. As soon as the doctor started asking questions once again, her family moved like a relentless river coursing through her life. Abuse felt like a constant. Where was God? And then, in the midst of her feeling of hurt and abandonment, Aria found a message of comfort in a most unusual place.
- [11:57]
Aria
I remember using my Christmas money to buy a Bible, and I was trying to find something that would possibly explain why is there so much evil in the world if there's a God? That doesn't make any sense. And you're going to think I'm totally crazy. There was a cartoon show, Rocko's Modern Life, and the cow on the show, Heifer, died, and he became a guardian angel. And he had gone through a series of bad things in the cartoon to become a guardian angel. So he couldn't become a guardian angel until he went through all these bad things. So at the age of 10, after moving my cross, I thought, oh, this is it. I'm supposed to go through these bad things because that's the only way I can go to heaven and become an angel and help people. And so as I got older, I kind of carried that with me with, like, maybe I don't need to die to help people. Like, I'm going through these bad things so that I could help my siblings. I'm going through these bad things so that I can help other kids in the future.
- [12:59]
Emily Jones
There he was at last. God hadn't forgotten Aria at all. She'd found his love, and she clung to it, wearing her cross again. Aria knew she had a purpose, and she tried to do all she could to help the other kids. She often took blame to protect her siblings. She didn't cry when she was hit. Unfortunately, that only made her stepfather angrier. At 14, Aria watched her stepfather knock her sister out cold, slamming her head through a slight sliding glass door.
- [13:31]
Aria
And I remember watching her fall to the floor, and she was just completely knocked out. And my other sister was screaming, trying to pick her up. And I went to grab my younger siblings, who at the time were 3 and 5. And he told me, don't touch them. And I said, okay. So they sat on the couch watching. And my sister called the police that time. And the police came and they asked the question, question, has this happened before? And one sister said, no, and one sister said, yes.
- [14:01]
Emily Jones
The police took down a report, and once again, Aria's family picked up and moved. Aria didn't want to leave her siblings, but at just 15 years of age, she knew she couldn't help them or herself by staying in that situation. When her Nana came to town, Aria begged her mother to let her go back to New York City with her Nana. The answer was no.
- [14:24]
Aria
So my Nana said, listen, I will take her for the sake of school. I need to have custody and legal guardian. My mother said, no, if that's the case, she's staying here because taxes, money. That's what it was.
- [14:40]
Emily Jones
But then Aria reframed the request as if she were doing her mother a favor.
- [14:46]
Aria
And I remember the comment my stepfather made was, well, it's one less mouth to feed. And so I thought, okay, I have to approach it from something that is appealing to them. It is. Yeah, it's one less mouth to feed. And I told her, you know, you're going to have to take me. I'm going to be the only one in high school. It's going to be out of your way. The other three are all in school together. And I pitched it in a way that made it more appealing. And she said, okay, you can leave as long as I can continue to claim you on my taxes.
- [15:11]
Emily Jones
Aria's nana agreed to not claim Aria as a dependent. And Aria packed her bags and left with her nana. New York represented a fresh start and finally, safety and peace. But New York offered something else opportunity. Aria got a job scooping ice cream at Haagen Dazs. She went to college at 17, then NYU. She then became a production assistant for a photography company, where she advanced quickly in her career. She worked fashion events, celebrity PR gigs, designer shows. She earned every promotion through calm, skill and focus. People said she was ambitious. What they didn't know was that she was building a lifeline so she could go back and rescue the siblings she left behind. Meanwhile, her mother fed her siblings a new version of the old lie my.
- [16:06]
Aria
Mother had told them. Aria left because she doesn't care. So what she told us about our father is what she told my siblings about me and it was just repeated to them for years and years and years where they started to think you left because, you know, you wanted to do your own thing and you don't care about us.
- [16:24]
Emily Jones
While Aria was fighting for a future and against her mother's lies, her father, Jerome, was fighting his own demons. After years of searching for his family, of trying to send mother money and hearing nothing back, he gave up and sank into the deep, dark hole of depression. Aria had no idea that her father was now living in the same city as her. He was no longer an up and coming fashion designer, but living on the streets, homeless. In fact, he lived on the very streets of New York where Aria went to school. She may have even walked past him possibly hundreds of times and never have known. He didn't know either. The same blood, the same sidewalks, strangers. At 24 years old, Aria left New York to become a travel photographer and see the world. She only returned home when she found out her mother had put her Nana in a nursing home and had sold her Nana's house. It wasn't long after that that her Nana passed away. The money that her Nana had saved for her own funeral was gone. Aria's mother had taken it. The service was nothing like Nana had planned. Aria paid for the obituary herself. The woman who had lived through the Great Depression, been a teacher for 35 years, raised a family, and given everything to her children and grandchildren was memorialized with a single photo and a stolen legacy. Years passed, and now, at 33, Aria had built a life out of light and focus, capturing faces through the lens of her camera in cities all over the world. Portraits, fashion weeks, presidential dinners. She built a name without ever needing to post a photo of herself. Word of mouth carried her further than Instagram ever could. She traveled constantly, but something in her never quite landed. She had success, yes, but no family, no roots. Throughout the years, she tried to visit her siblings, but had been met with a chill even colder than she'd felt raking leaves as a child. It had broken her heart that her family had bought into the lies her mother had told them. In the summer of 2021, amidst the COVID 19 restrictions, Aria booked a trip to California for a series of photography sessions. But when her housing fell through at the last minute, she made a spontaneous decision. She'd stop in New Orleans.
- [18:56]
Aria
The reason why I chose New Orleans was because it was very cheap during the lockdown and the states in the south were more open than the states in the North. So I thought, oh, I've never been to New Orleans. Why Not. And I knew my grandfather was from there, but I haven't spoken to the them in almost 30 years.
- [19:13]
Emily Jones
Aria arrived on a Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, she was at a 6:30am gym class downtown. After the workout, the instructor casually recommended a smoothie shop a couple blocks away.
- [19:25]
Aria
And the instructor of the class said, oh, Aria, you should try this smoothie spot. It's just one block up and one block over. I said, okay, and I walked one block up and one block over.
- [19:37]
Emily Jones
She walked the quiet morning streets, the air heavy with summer heat and humidity. Then halfway to the smoothie shop, she saw a tall woman walking toward her. Something in the woman's face snagged Aria's attention. Something uncanny, familiar. They made eye contact and then both looked away. Aria's pulse quickened, but she kept walking until she reached the shop and the door was open.
- [20:02]
Aria
But there was nobody in there, which I thought was very strange. And I said, oh, hello. And the guy said, oh, we're not ready yet. We're sorry. Can you come back in a few minutes? I thought, oh, okay. I'll just go back to my Airbnb, which was only two blocks away.
- [20:15]
Emily Jones
Aria retraced her steps. Here was the tall woman again, across the street, this time talking with two men. Aria made eye contact with the woman again and sheepishly looked away. Every logical thought told Aria to keep moving. But another thought tickled her mind as an overwhelming emotion hit Arya square in the chest. The thought, the feeling. She looks like me.
- [20:41]
Aria
And I thought, God, I know her. I don't know why. Kind of looked alike. I'm 5 11, so there's not a lot of women walking around. My height. She was the same exact height, same built. I don't know why I know her. And she's looking at me like, why are you staring at? Why are you glaring at Star? So I frantically walked away, and I just walked down the street. I probably got halfway home and something in me said, aria, go back.
- [21:07]
Emily Jones
Aria stopped, turned back, paced.
- [21:11]
Aria
So at this point, I'm pacing in front of some huge, beautiful government building, and she's talking to two other men, and all three of them are looking at me because I probably look psychotic. To be honest, I'm literally just walking back and forth. And I had the worst chest pain. And I was trying to tell myself to walk away, but I felt like something was holding me. Like, no, this moment, whatever this is, you have to do something with this. It was like something else was present and it would not let me leave.
- [21:42]
Emily Jones
Something deep inside Aria, older than fear, Louder than logic told her she had to talk to the woman. She couldn't explain it. She just knew if that woman got away, something irreplaceable would be lost forever. God had never forgotten Aria. And the message Aria was receiving from God right now was loud and clear. Go to her. Aria crossed the street in a rush, heart pounding.
- [22:09]
Aria
So she was getting in her car. I thought, oh, my God, if she gets in her car and drives away, this is it. So I run across the street and I was so shocked to talk to her. So I turn to the two men and I say, is her last name Smith by chance? And they were like, yeah, why? And in that moment, it was like everything just locked in. Oh, my God, that's my dad's sister. It was like everything just all the missing pieces just in that moment were, like, plugging in. And so I just blurted out to these guys, I think I'm related to her. My dad's name is Jerome Smith and I'm his daughter. And he's like, oh, you're one of the missing girls.
- [22:48]
Emily Jones
Missing girls. A jolt ran through Aria as if her heart had skipped a beat. The words landed like thunder. She stood frozen in stunned silence.
- [22:59]
Aria
And I just started crying. And they're screaming at her, like, come back, come back. Like, waiting for her to come back. And she walks over, and without anybody saying to her, her what I had just told them, she says to me, I haven't seen you since you were in diapers.
- [23:16]
Emily Jones
In an instant, time folded, the street disappeared, and 30 years of silence unraveled. The miracle had begun. It was too much to process at once. The timing, the faces, the fact that the story she had spent her whole life trying to understand was now standing across from her in the form of flesh and memory. Aria and her aunt stayed on that sidewalk, embracing, talking in gasps, crying in turns, piecing together decades of lost history. Then Aria mentioned it almost offhandedly. She had a ticket for an art exhibit. The next day, a local muralist she admired was unveiling a new piece. Her aunt froze.
- [24:02]
Aria
And all three of them just got very quiet. And I thought, oh, now what? And they said, when do you have the ticket for? And I showed them, and it was for the next day. Thursday at 1:00'. Clock. Thursday at 1:00'. Clock. This artist was revealing a mural he did of my grandfather.
- [24:16]
Emily Jones
The words rushed through Aria like a gust of wind. The mural wasn't just local art. It was a tribute to Aria's grandfather, Jerome Smith, the Freedom Rider, the civil rights activist, the man who used to sit on a park bench and wait for a child who never came. It was part of the city's Juneteenth celebration. And her grandfather's space wasn't just in a frame. The painting would also be printed on the side of city buses, his eyes staring out at streets he'd once marched down. Aria had booked the ticket days ago. She thought it was random. It wasn't. God had been guiding her footsteps the whole time. She hadn't just stumbled into New Orleans. She had been led. She hadn't just walked down a side street. She had been carried. The timing wasn't lucky. It was divine. At the unveiling, Aria stood surrounded by strangers who looked like her. Same height, same eyes, same fire. And best of all the she stood beside the man in the mural. Her grandfather.
- [25:24]
Aria
And the first thing he said to me was, I used to sit in the park where we took you. And I would sit and wait, hoping you would just walk by. He knew the parks that we went to because he used to take us to the same parks. And he said I would just sit there. I would go up to New York all the time and hope, maybe this year they'll walk by.
- [25:43]
Emily Jones
She had finally walked by. Just not then, not there. And not alone. And in that moment, as Aria stood beside the man who had stared down injustice and never given up hope, Aria understood something she'd never known with certainty. This is where she came from. This is where the fight in her was born. The strength, the defiance, the refusal to let darkness win. It wasn't just survival. It was legacy. Her father, Aria would later learn, now lives in Georgia. He's alive. He knows she's alive. But he is buried in silence and sorrow. The weight of those missing years still crushes him. He believes he failed. He doesn't yet know how to return. Aria hopes one day he will. But even if he doesn't, she is at peace. Because now, for the first time in her life, she has family. Not in name only, but in presence. In warmth, in memory. Aunts who call just to hear her voice. Uncles who tell her stories about the father she loved and the man he used to be. And a grandfather who never stopped hoping she'd return. They celebrate her. They believe her. They love her. She is no longer a girl who stands alone. She has a home, not a place, but a people who know her story and hold it sacred. A family who never stopped waiting for her because she knows the truth. She was never unwanted. She was never forgotten. She was never unloved. She was Never lost. Not to God, not for a second.
- [27:32]
Holly Worthington
Such an incredible story, and I am so glad that Aria was reunited with her family after all those years.
- [27:39]
Emily Jones
I know this story. Did it remind you of Ruby Frankie?
- [27:43]
Holly Worthington
Oh, yes.
- [27:45]
Emily Jones
Yes.
- [27:46]
Holly Worthington
And if you don't know who Ruby Frankie is, she was, like, this social media influencer lady. Abusive mother.
- [27:52]
Emily Jones
Yeah. You can watch a documentary about it.
- [27:54]
Holly Worthington
Yeah, there's a documentary. But it just breaks my heart that kids have to go through things like that. Like, it's just so wrong.
- [28:01]
Emily Jones
It's not fair. And it breaks my heart, too. But I am so grateful that Aria was able to make it through that and that the story turned out the way it did. I mean, the fact that she went to New Orleans, the fact that she ran into her aunt there, the fact she had a ticket to go see her grandpa's mural unveiling. I mean, so many details that are just more. To me, they're more than coincidence. I think that God was directing it.
- [28:30]
Holly Worthington
Absolutely. It was such a cool story. And can you imagine what that would be like? Like, you're walking down the street and you see this woman who looks like you, who has the same build and the similar face.
- [28:41]
Emily Jones
I know. It would be shocking.
- [28:43]
Holly Worthington
So weird.
- [28:44]
Emily Jones
It would be shocking.
- [28:46]
Holly Worthington
And I think it's so shocking.
- [28:47]
Emily Jones
It's so cool that, you know, she was reunited with their family, but also, like, her family's legacy. Her grandpa marched with Martin Luther King and that the city was celebrating him that weekend. I mean, such a cool story.
- [29:03]
Holly Worthington
Yeah. Like, I feel like it's an honor to even talk to Aria. I mean, her family history is.
- [29:08]
Emily Jones
Yeah.
- [29:09]
Holly Worthington
So incredible. And you can definitely see where Aria got her fight from.
- [29:13]
Emily Jones
Yes.
- [29:14]
Holly Worthington
Which is also so cool.
- [29:15]
Emily Jones
Yeah, for sure. I do feel really bad for her dad. I mean, I know that homelessness comes with so much shame, and it's really hard to dig yourself out of that hole. And I just. My heart breaks for him.
- [29:30]
Holly Worthington
Yeah, mine does, too. And we actually spoke with a woman named Tamika Riley a while back, who had been homeless herself, who'd been an alcoholic, who'd been through so much, and she shared such an inspirational story with us where she talked about how she went to church with a friend and a pastor there, actually cast an evil spirit out of her. And after that, she turned her life around.
- [29:54]
Emily Jones
Yeah.
- [29:55]
Holly Worthington
And she's doing amazing now. But we asked her. We had just done our interview with Aria right before we talked to Tamika. And so we said, what would you say to somebody like Jerome, who is going through this now, who is in that pit of despair. Like, what message would you give to him? Yeah, and this is what she said.
- [30:18]
Tamika Riley
I had been homeless. I was alcoholic. I would drink like a fifth of 80 proof a day. And it was hard to function without it. And I. I felt condemned. I didn't think God wanted anything to do with me. I was too dirty. I wanted to be free, but I just didn't know that I was bound. I didn't know. And I would pour out the alcohol and say, I'm not going to do this anymore. And the next day I will be doing it again. I didn't have the strength within me to stop. I didn't know that I was bound. I didn't know that there was a spirit behind it. You know, I knew that Jesus cast out spirits, but I thought that was awful back then. I didn't know that, you know, that they still were behind a lot of what people are going through today. But I just felt, you know, condemned. I didn't feel good enough. Everybody that had. That I had met, that would try to evangelize or witness, to me, it was just warning. It was never helped or hope or love. It wasn't his true heart towards me. And I thought that. That they were representing his heart for me, and they were not.
- [31:16]
Emily Jones
Okay, so this is the part where her friend invited her to church and she went, and when she was there, they cast out an evil spirit from her.
- [31:25]
Tamika Riley
That next morning, it was the weirdest thing. I was laying in bed, half asleep, half awake. And I remember feeling like I was being picked up out of my body. And my body was on the bed, but I was picked up and I was being held and rocked like a baby with so much love and compassion and just warmth. And I knew it was him. Nobody could tell me it was not. I knew it was him. His presence, the love and everything. I knew it was him. And then he laid me back down and I sat up and I looked around. Nobody was in the room. I sat up and I just kind of looked around and I. There was no fear. There was nothing. But I didn't know that was his heart towards me, even in my sin. But he. He looked at me and he saw the difference between who I was and what was trying to take me over. And he separated us. He separated it from me. And so that I could, you know, live. He told me, you're not just going to exist, you're going to live. Baby steps would just be to give your life to Christ and to believe that he loves you and that he does not feel the way about you that you do. You know that. That he desperately loves us. He. He really does. And there's no such thing as being too far. When people would say, is there anything too hard for God? I used to say, I am. I was not.
- [32:45]
Holly Worthington
I love what Tamika said, and I truly hope that Jerome one day will realize his worth and know how much God truly loves him.
- [32:56]
Emily Jones
Yeah. Love her, too. Yeah. And if you want to learn more about Tamika's story or hear some other inspirational story, she actually has her own podcast. You can check them out@tamikari.com that's T A M E K A R I L E Y dot com.
- [33:15]
Holly Worthington
Yeah. And if Jerome and Arya ever do reunite, we'll try to keep you posted on that.
- [33:19]
Emily Jones
Yeah.
- [33:20]
Holly Worthington
But regardless, Aria is at peace, and she's so glad she's found that family that she was missing. And she's such a force for good at this point.
- [33:29]
Emily Jones
Like, yes.
- [33:30]
Holly Worthington
She also has a message that she would like to share with anyone who is going through something similar to what she went through as a child.
- [33:39]
Aria
I think the first thing for people to do is to take the first step, whatever it is, whether it's calling someone for help or acknowledging that there's a problem or talking about it with someone is the first step. But when you do one thing, you realize, oh, that wasn't so bad. Okay, let me try little more. And then you kind of gain steam. You're like, okay, I can do. I can do anything. And now I think I'm in a better place to put myself out there more, to speak about it more, and to potentially help other people, especially other kids, because I think a lot of kids who grow up in households like that, you believe what you're told. If you're told you're not going to be anything, or you're told you can't do something, or, you know, it's natural to take in whatever you're receiving from your parents. And it's very hard to break free from that for most people, I think. And I feel like I was the black sheep of the family because God made me strong enough to handle it. And I think if my siblings had dealt with some of the things I dealt with, it would have destroyed them. And there was a quote that I saw. There's two quotes that I saw. One, that God gives his strongest battles to his toughest soldiers. And you were given this mountain to prove that it could be moved. And I feel like I was given all of this because it's something that I am strong enough to handle, even though it's painful.
- [35:03]
Emily Jones
I am so impressed with Ari. I mean, she has done amazing things with her life. She's worked parties for Justin Timberlake. She photographed an event for the United nations where Prince William spoke.
- [35:17]
Holly Worthington
Amazing.
- [35:18]
Aria
She's.
- [35:18]
Emily Jones
She's just as impressive as her family. And yeah, I mean, just such a good role model for someone who can thrive after going through such a chart. A hard childhood.
- [35:29]
Holly Worthington
Yeah, absolutely. And we just want to thank Aria so much for sharing her story with us, for her courage. Yeah, she's amazing. We're so grateful for this miracle that she experienced. And we know God has never left her side. He's always been with her and he is still with her. Yeah, it's awesome.
- [35:49]
Emily Jones
And if you or anyone you know is going through abuse, then you can call 1-800-422-4453 or visit child help hotline.org yes.
- [36:01]
Holly Worthington
Thanks again everyone for joining us today. God is great and you are loved, so don't forget it. Thank you for joining us. If you have a miracle to share, contact us@themiraclefiles.com or find us on Facebook.
- [36:19]
Emily Jones
We're now releasing multiple episodes each month, so subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and YouTube for amazing video content as well.
- [36:28]
Holly Worthington
Join us next time as we discover more of God's miracles. And don't forget to look for his light in your own lives.
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