Well into her mid-forties, Nanci Lamborn was a critical, angry Christian who carried a
consuming hatred of her mom. Frustration, annoyance, and offended contempt were constant companions at every family gathering, and these emotions robbed Nanci of her inner peace for decades. With no concept of the freedom available, she surrendered to heart healing prayer and experienced profound transformation. From navigating the messy relationship with her dramatic, difficult mom, to surviving traumatic abuse, and finally assuming the role as a caregiver before her mom’s tragic death, Nanci’s story blends gritty, uncomfortable truth with beautiful and tender healing. Now as an ordained minister of inner healing, Nanci walks with hurting people to introduce them to the supernatural power of forgiveness, repentance, and release of the painful past to Jesus. Angry Daughter is Nanci’s very personal journey down that same path to peace. Part personal growth, part hilarious memoir, and part self-help, Angry Daughter thematically weaves its way through resentment and grief, to fear and shame, and from trauma to destiny. Nanci paves a clear pathway for those ready to begin their own journey of releasing Mom to the
Lord in prayer.
Well into her mid-forties, Nanci Lamborn was a critical, angry Christian who carried a
consuming hatred of her mom. Frustration, annoyance, and offended contempt were constant companions at every family gathering, and these emotions robbed Nanci of her inner peace for decades. With no concept of the freedom available, she surrendered to heart healing prayer and experienced profound transformation. From navigating the messy relationship with her dramatic, difficult mom, to surviving traumatic abuse, and finally assuming the role as a caregiver before her mom’s tragic death, Nanci’s story blends gritty, uncomfortable truth with beautiful and tender healing. Now as an ordained minister of inner healing, Nanci walks with hurting people to introduce them to the supernatural power of forgiveness, repentance, and release of the painful past to Jesus. Angry Daughter is Nanci’s very personal journey down that same path to peace. Part personal growth, part hilarious memoir, and part self-help, Angry Daughter thematically weaves its way through resentment and grief, to fear and shame, and from trauma to destiny. Nanci paves a clear pathway for those ready to begin their own journey of releasing Mom to the
Lord in prayer.
Our handwriting was almost identical. I could forge my mother’s name perfectly as early as middle school, which I did often. It came in very handy when skipping school to cross state lines with my boyfriend, which I also did often.
Our widow’s peak hairlines were also similar. She could walk into my band camp rehearsal with her hair tied up in a high ponytail, and half of my classmates who had never lain eyes on my mother would look at me and say, “Your mom’s here.”
How often I hated her hairline, and the squinting angry eyes and tightly pursed lips that came along with it. Usually the ponytail meant she was on some warpath, and I’d better look productive or else. When she was trying to impress others, her dark, shoulder-length mop of baby-fine hair was curled and teased high, then well set with several passes of Agua Net Extra Super spray. When she was addressing the thorn in her side, which she often deemed her daughters to be, she needed her hair to be out of the way. It felt like she wanted to be feared, and she was.
She didn’t seem to care much for my hairline either. There was absolutely no place for any sort of tenderness when it came to “. . . getting that nasty mess out of your face.” Massive tangle or not, my mother wielded a hairbrush with the delicacy of a construction backhoe. She seemed to both despise the task of fixing my drowned rat hair and also love the fact that it hurt me. Her criticism was most likely her way of toughening me up for the hard realities of life, but I just felt like an unloved nuisance.
I hated her hairline back then. But not too long ago, I found myself stroking it in loving comfort, kissing her forehead gently as I whispered, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Go and enter into your rest with the Lord.” And I meant it.
Her death at seventy-six was torture for her and torture for me to watch. Like many others who had trusted their doctors to recommend what was best for their health, my mother’s body had reacted to this one particular injection with a swift and irreversible devastation. We and the ICU doctors could do nothing but watch throughout the day as Mom slowly bled out from the ruptured clots in her bloodstream. By the time the evening finally rolled around, any more efforts to save her life were clearly over.
Ignoring the bodily smells and undignified drool under the ventilator tube taped to her mouth, I gently held her hand. I wasn’t angry. In this moment I felt oddly proud to be with her, sensing the sacred honor of being present for her final hours.
“Remember this moment. Pay attention,” the Lord said loudly in my spirit. Dad was home resting after his long day shift at Mom’s bedside. My brother, Edgar, was too compromised to visit a hospital, and my twin sister, Jillian, lived out of state. So I was alone with Mom in her hospital room as a nurse changed out her IV. The nurse rounded the bed and glanced out the westward-facing window and said, “Wow! Did you see what the sunset looks like out there?”
I moved out of the nurse’s way and sat down in the window seat. She was so right. The sinking sun was just at the tree line, a dark orange ball without a single cloud to compete with it. As I marveled at the shift from orange to blue to the first visible stars all in one frame, I heard the Lord again clearly as he said, “This sunset is beautiful.”
The journey of the seven years leading up to this moment played across the movie screen of my mind in a flash. I realized that going from despising to loving to losing my mother could have been a vastly different story. I very nearly became one of the many tragic statistics who refused to deal with the wounds of the past. I had every opportunity to end up saddled with resentment and regret after burying my mom with lots of unfinished business to haunt me for decades. But the Lord in his goodness orchestrated otherwise.
I marveled at the beautiful sunset for a few moments, then turned back to look at Mom, her eyes closed and her breathing labored. My eyes brimming with grateful tears, I knew the Lord wasn’t talking about the sky.
~
Jesus, I choose to forgive my mom for leaving us too soon. I forgive her for the grief and the pain and the hole this has left in our lives, and I forgive her for leaving Dad in such grief. I choose to forgive those connected to the chemicals that ended her life prematurely and left us with anger and injustice. I release all of this to you, Jesus, and I ask you to take all of this, and to come and heal my heart like only you can. In your holy name, amen.
Nanci was an angry daughter, and reading her story, it was not hard to understand why. Left to face abuse on her own as a small child, she also suffered emotional abuse from a mother who knew how to appear charming to the outside world. And yet, through faith, Nanci found out how to forgive her mother and to extend compassionate care towards her mother during her old age.Â
Â
This is a wonderful story of healing and forgiveness, which shows that, while bearing a grudge might feel more powerful, forgiveness is actually for the benefit of the person who suffered abuse because it allows her to move out of pain and into a transformed world. Nanci is clear in pointing out that forgiveness does not always mean reconciliation. She further highlights the importance of recognizing the emotional impact of traumatic experiences and the need for release.Â
Â
Nanci shows how faith helped her to see not only her own value but to place herself in the shoes of other people. Nanci’s name means Grace, and she provides a clear demonstration of her grace and compassion throughout her book. She openly showed how her mother’s wounds had impacted her life and how she let go of her distrust and isolation to make a contribution to her community.Â
Â
Looking back through scenes of emotional abandonment and condemnation, Nanci sees how the divine was always there for her, sitting with her during a harrowing experience, weeping for her, and showing her love when she was wounded. Her story ends by showing readers how to let go of pain and to forgive those who have hurt us.Â
Â
This is a brave story that shows an understanding of both Nanci's and her mother’s pain. It further shows that on the other side of trauma is the ability to make a difference. I would recommend this book to readers who feel alone with their pain, who are struggling to make sense of their lives, or who feel invalidated by the words of others. It’s a hopeful and inspiring read that shows a way out of the darkness. As a reader, I couldn’t put it down.