Interview with Author Cheryl Lynn

 

1.      What is your book, Washing The Inside Of The Cup, about?  The book is about being in a situation of hurt, pain and despair and believing, because of your beliefs, that this is your lot in life and you just have to accept it and make the most of it. It’s about crying out to your father in heaven, knowing in your own strength you can’t make it in this, and drawing near to Him amid your pain. His words say draw near to me and I will draw near to you. It’s about completely surrendering your whole heart to God and watching Him show up in a big way and do exactly what He said He would do; He drew near to me.  This caused my focus to change from being on the abuse to being on my heavenly father. I saturated my mind and heart with His word and arrived at a point where the hurt, pain and despair didn’t matter anymore. God had turned my tears of pain into tears of joy and happiness just being in His presence.

 

2.      What inspired you to write it? My youngest son who was only 2 when I filed for divorce was too young to remember everything the older children and I went through. He asked me to write down some of the stories he had heard me talking about and bring it to a family vacation.  After reading it he said to me, “Mom you’ve got to turn this into a book, it could help so many people. So that’s what I did. 

 

3.      You were in an abusive marriage, almost from the start, for 22 years. Why did you stay? I stayed because I was taught that marriage is a covenant and is not to be broken.  That divorce is wrong. I was taught to not ever let the word divorce be in your vocabulary. To always work things out. The Bible teaches that wives should not leave their husbands. It also says that God hates divorce. I didn’t ever want to be divorced, and I wanted to be obedient to my Father in heaven. This works great when both people are always working on themselves, adapting and adjusting to life and with each other.  The problem in this marriage was he never worked on anything in his life. It was like he had not matured past the mentality of an early worldly teenager. He didn’t think anything was wrong with his behavior.  So, the abuse just continued on and on and on. He would say he was sorry but that didn’t mean anything because he never changed. The reason the marriage lasted for 22 years was because I did all the changing.  Also, a woman’s heart is for her man, God made us that way. Abuse doesn’t change that; it just complicates it.

 

4.      You became a Born-Again Christian at age 15. How did your religious beliefs, to a degree, lead you to stay in a marriage that was insufferable? While it may have started off as religious beliefs that kept me in it, it eventually became a close relationship with my Father in heaven that had my attention while life was happening around me. Just like driving down the road, your eyes and mind stay on that road while the landscape passes by you. I was so busy with working, having children, keeping house, cooking, home schooling, managing rental properties, and seeking the Lord. Having my eyes on the Lord helped me transcend and rise above all the abuse.

 

5.      How did you summon the courage to finally leave? In the book I talk about an incident where my husband was choking and hitting on our 14-year-old son, and we were all screaming trying to get him off of Samuel. I remember thinking he’s had 20 years to change that’s long enough. I remember thinking divorce may be wrong, but this is wrong too. There was no love radiating from him for his family. I was so emotionally numb from all of it, I had no feelings left for him or for that marriage by that time. In my heart I knew that day, it was time. The next day I received a call from the head man over Excel telling me I needed to get the children out of the abuse. That call was confirmation of what I had decided the day before.  

 

6.      So, a commitment to your faith and a surrendering belief in God helped you to change your life? Our Father in Heaven is faithful to His word. If He tells you to do something, you can guarantee it will happen if you do your part. You can trust that He will do it. Even when heaven and earth pass away. He will still be standing by His word. There are multiple verses where He says seek me, search for me with your whole heart and I will let you find me. So, when I surrendered ALL my heart to Him like he tells us to do. His grace showed up to help me do my part which I did. My mind went from despair, hurt, pain, suffering and all that goes with that to peace, love, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control, faithfulness, goodness and joy.  Instead of just accepting what the world offers you, even if your circumstances don’t change. You can change how you receive it and live in it. This change made me resilient in a difficult situation and made me a vessel for the Lord to work through. No answers ever come from wallowing in hurt and pain the only thing you get from that is more hurt and pain.  After my heart changed, I was able to help people as the Lord used me.

 

7.      After leaving your first husband, you got your RN Degree, then a Batchelor’s Degree and eventually a Master’s Degree-- all while being a single mother to seven children. How did you do it? When I filed for divorce my oldest daughter told me she would stay with me and help me as long as I needed her to.  She was 17 and she stayed with me till she was 23. She was like a second mom in the house helping with the younger children. So, I could work on my schooling. She also went to school during this time and received a Respiratory Therapy degree. After she moved out, she kept going to school and received her Bachelors in Human Services. My oldest son took the youngest son in under his wing and helped with him. My parents also helped with the younger daughters. I couldn’t have done it without everyone’s help. Big families rock!

 

8.      You recently retired as a Registered Nurse, having helped many people. Did you choose such a profession as a way of healing yourself? No, at the time I already had an associate’s degree in business management. I was thinking of doing something in Real Estate since my dad was a builder. But one of the counselors at the university recommended I go to RN school. She said you only need two more classes to get in the program. That was the first time I had ever entertained a nursing degree. I chose it because the pay was good, and the ADN was a 2-year program. Two years went by fast, and I knew I could start working and provide for my children with an RN salary.

 

9.      Even after suffering a broken neck, and humiliating verbal abuse, and after seeing your husband abuse your children, you still held out hope for several more years after you left that he would somehow make the changes he needed to, to get his family back.  Did that happen? Were you ready to forgive him and take him back?

Well, we walked in instant forgiveness, so he was always forgiven. That is a choice that anyone can choose. No matter what situation they are in. The younger children were not abused as much as myself and the older children were and if there was ever any hope of restoration it wasn’t so much for me as it was for our children.  During the time of the divorce, we had a 2, 5, 7, 10-, 13-, 15-, and 17-year-old. The teenagers and I were so ready for the divorce, but the younger children would cry for their dad.  So, if he had gotten help and worked on his behavior and made radical changes that door was open until we married other people which was around 10 years later for both of us. But that never happened. We concluded he really didn’t care enough about us to make those changes. Once I remarried that door was permanently closed. I will say I didn’t ever want to be with him again and I’m glad that didn’t happen to me. When the youngest son was between 7 and 11 years old his dad picked him up less than 5 times to see him during that 4-year period. My son would cry because he thought his dad hated him.

 

This broke my heart. When the youngest daughter grew up, she said, before the divorce we had a mom and dad. After the divorce we didn’t have either.  So, while I got us out of the abuse (and thought I was doing a good thing) it created a whole other set of problems that I didn’t see coming at the time. So, in a situation like this where you feel you must decide, no matter what decision you make there will be consequences.  I come to realize why God hates divorce, it’s because the children suffer. In this situation it didn’t matter what decision I made they suffered either way. Which decision is better?? Each person must decide that for themselves.

 

10.  How do you hope to inspire other women to both strengthen their bonds of faith and to take steps to live a life free from monsters who try to twistedly turn the teachings of the Bible against these loving, innocent women? For women presently in a physically abusive marriage, do not leave yourself or children in a dangerous situation. Reach out to your family or a local shelter. Find someone that you can confide in. The National Domestic Violence Hotline is 800-799-7233. If he gets help you can always get back with him later. For those women who are in a marriage with verbal and mental abuse and have chosen to stay in the marriage. Go to Gods word and find out what he says about you then start renewing your mind. Start seeking God with all of your heart so you can rise above the abuse. Cry out to your Father in Heaven He sees your pain and hears you. For those women who are not married yet. Be very careful who you say “I do” to.  First and foremost, make sure you marry a real Christian, not just someone saying they are a Christian or acting like they are a Christian just to get you to like them.  Look for a man that has a relationship with Jesus and at the same time be preparing yourself to be all that God wants you to be. The answer to 1001 questions is “Be led by God’s Spirit” Find that peace in your heart and mind and in the quietness listen for His voice. No one on this earth can give better advice than He can and no one on this earth loves and cares more about you than He does.

             About The Author: Cheryl Lynn is a survivor, a devout Christian, a mother, grandmother,                     retired nurse, and the author of an inspiring memoir, Washing The Inside of the Cup: My                     Journey of Walking in the Spirit (Christian Faith Publishing).

             She was raised in a wonderful Christian home, going to the Salvation Army Church. She was                 born again at the age of 15. At the age of twenty-three, she married into abuse and, in her                         desperation, turned to God with her whole heart. By God's grace, she found the wellspring of                 life and an intimate relationship with Jesus, our Lord. She homeschooled her children for 10                 years during the 1990s.

             After 20 years of living in abuse, she found the courage to divorce and remove herself and her                 children out of it. After the divorce, she went six years to school and received her MSN RN                     degree and has worked as an RN for the past twenty years. She is living proof that God's favor                lasts a lifetime, and His mercies are new every morning. For more information, please see                     www.cheryllynnbook.com.  

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About Brian Feinblum

This award-winning blog has generated over four million pageviews. With 5,000+ posts over the past dozen years, it was named one of the best book marketing blogs by BookBaby  http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs  and recognized by Feedspot in 2021 and 2018 as one of the top book marketing blogs. It was also named by www.WinningWriters.com as a "best resource.”  Copyright 2025.

 

For the past three decades, Brian Feinblum has helped thousands of authors. He formed his own book publicity firm in 2020. Prior to that, for 21 years as the head of marketing for the nation’s largest book publicity firm, and as the director of publicity at two independent presses, Brian has worked with many first-time, self-published, authors of all genres, right along with best-selling authors and celebrities such as: Dr. Ruth, Mark Victor Hansen, Joseph Finder, Katherine Spurway, Neil Rackham, Harvey Mackay, Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey, Warren Adler, Cindy Adams, Todd Duncan, Susan RoAne, John C. Maxwell, Jeff Foxworthy, Seth Godin, and Henry Winkler.

 

His writings are often featured in The Writer and IBPA’s The Independent (https://pubspot.ibpa-online.org/article/whats-needed-to-promote-a-book-successfully).

 

He hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America several years ago, and has spoken at ASJA, BookCAMP, Independent Book Publishers Association Sarah Lawrence College, Nonfiction Writers Association, Cape Cod Writers Association, Willamette (Portland) Writers Association, APEX, Morgan James Publishing, and Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association. He served as a judge for the 2024 IBPA Book Awards.

 

His letters-to-the-editor have been published in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, New York Post, NY Daily News, Newsday, The Journal News (Westchester) and The Washington Post. His first published book was The Florida Homeowner, Condo, & Co-Op Association Handbook.  It was featured in The Sun Sentinel and Miami Herald.

 

Born and raised in Brooklyn, he now resides in Westchester with his wife, two kids, and Ferris, a black lab rescue dog, and El Chapo, a pug rescue dog.

 

You can connect with him at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianfeinblum/ or https://www.facebook.com/brian.feinblum