I was addicted to over the counter pain pills until a supernatural encounter with the Lord started me on the road to freedom.

Now, before you click away or yell at your computer screen, saying to yourself over the counter pain meds are not the same as being addicted to prescription medication, I will say you’re probably right. But a big proponent of being addicted to any substance is the mental part.

What you believe you are addicted to or what you believe is your weakness that’s your weakness. As soon as your belief changes, you get free.

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Let me tell you about what happened to me. For many years, I had migraines, and it was probably due to certain health issues I had. I didn’t know they were migraines. I just knew I had severe headaches three or four times a week, every week for a long time.

I didn’t go to the doctor to find out what’s going on. I looked for over the counter pain meds and started taking them. I discovered Excedrin Migraine. It worked. I became so fearful of the pain of the migraine to the point that I started taking the medicine every single day.

Then I upped the dosage. Not because I needed to or because the pain wasn’t gone. I upped it because I started to become addicted to it. The pills had become my trusted friend. I felt like I needed it.

I took three pills a day every day. I started to feel I couldn’t live without taking three pills every day. Not because of pain but because like I said I trusted them. I felt a sense of being okay if I had three in my system. If I took two pills, I would feel desperate to take that third one, and I would take it.

I kept talking to the Lord, telling Him I hate this. I don’t like being attached to these pills. I knew they weren’t good for me. The warnings talk about liver damage if you take too many or take them too long. There was also the possibility of rebound headaches from overuse.

Whenever I tried to get off the pills, I would immediately get a migraine and immediately have rebound headaches. So I would get right back onto the pills.

One day, I was sitting on the side of my bed, communing with the Lord and worshiping Him. All of a sudden, the Lord said you trust in those pills and not in Me. At the same time He told me that, He showed me the degree of my trust was in the pills.

I had the sudden sensation of being in space, hanging on nothing. For a flash of time, God took away my dependency on the pills. He took away my trust in the pills. If I had both trust in God and trust in the pills, when God took away my trust in the pills, I should have been left with trust in God.

With the trust in the pills gone for just a flash of time, I had the sensation of floating in space, hanging on nothing. It was the most terrifying, shocking feeling I’ve ever had. It only lasted for an instant, but it was so jarring.

Immediately, I was so heartbroken that I could completely trust in the pills and completely not trust in God. Now, I had trust in God in other areas of my life, but in this area, I had zero trust in God.

There’s nothing wrong with trusting God for your healing while taking medicine to relieve the symptoms of your sickness. There’s nothing wrong with trusting God for healing while going to the doctor. I’m not talking about that here. I’m talking about a position I was in where I totally trusted in the pills and not in God.

When God showed me I didn’t trust Him at all in this situation, I cried. I repented and asked for His forgiveness. I asked Him to help me to get off the pills. Asked Him to help me to learn what it meant to trust in Him.

I didn’t get complete freedom and deliverance right then. In that flash where God took away the trust in the pills, He was just showing me where I was. God doesn’t want to force you to trust Him. He wants you to willingly trust Him, and that’s what He wanted for me.

When God took away my trust in the pills, He was doing it for only an instant to show me where my trust truly lay. It lasted just a flash of time, an instant, and it brought it all home. After that, I thought I would be free and I could just lay the pills down. As soon as I did, the same symptoms came back. Not only the pain returned, but my longing for the pills themselves.

Over the following months, I quit and picked up the pills, quit and picked them up. There were times when I would look in the mirror and hold those three pills in the palm of my hand and I would say, “Lord, I know you didn’t give me that experience on the side of the bed for nothing. I know you’re going to deliver me from these pills.”

I would say that but not every time I took the pills, just now and then. Sometimes I would say it and acknowledge the Lord. I know it. Maybe right then I didn’t trust the Lord, but I said to Him I know He was already in the process of bringing me to that place of freedom.

Months went by. Sometimes I would quit and I would think this is it! The symptoms would return, and I would fall back into taking the pills every day. I hid the addiction from my husband. I didn’t tell him I was taking so much every day. Not until I started making progress, that is.

Then one day, all of a sudden, the drive–and it was a drive–to take three pills was gone. I still had a drive, but it was less. So I took two pills. I no longer felt like I could not live unless I took three pills and no less. I suddenly felt like that wasn’t true anymore, and I could take two.

So for a few months, probably less than six months, I was taking two pills a day. Then I was thinking, God is giving me some kind of progress. Let me try one. Then something would happen, and I would get a migraine, and I would go back to two pills.

One day I switched to one pill, and I knew this is finally it. This is it! So, I transitioned off the pills very quickly. When you overuse pain medicine you can have rebound headaches. I had rebound headaches every time I went off the pills before my experience with God. I would have rebound headaches day after day until I would break down and get back on the pills.

The information I read said rebound headaches could last six to eight weeks. The last time I tried to get off the pills, I had a migraine for four days when I went cold turkey. Then I couldn’t take it anymore, and I picked them up again.

This time was different. I knew that I was free. I knew the addiction was broken. I transitioned down to one pill, then one every other day. Then I was like I know I’m free, so I’ll just skip another day. Oh, I’ll skip another day again.

I had a rebound headache two days compared to six to eight weeks. And that’s how God delivered me from an addiction to pain pills.

If you have a similar situation, whether it’s to pain pills or any habit, or anything in your life that you can’t seem to let go of, I encourage you to turn to the Lord in your heart. Ask Him to help you. Know that He will help you.

Think of my situation. I had zero trust in God. It’s not you who forces yourself to trust in the Lord. It’s God who teaches you how to trust Him. He shows you His gentle love, and that gentle love draws you in. When you start having encounters with the Lord, when you start talking to Him, and communing with Him in your own heart, you begin to trust him based on that relationship that you’re building.

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Please check out my book Simply Led. I tell the story of how I learned to hear God’s voice and talk about my journey toward a closer walk with Him. I think you’ll enjoy it.