My family is a powerful family in Ghana and I wanted to devote myself to the Church, so at 10 years old I was given to a priest. I stayed with him and learned the religion.
I was the lead choir and never missed any church mass. The community I grew up in, there is no tolerance for Islam.
I never liked Islam and muslims and I never wanted to talk to muslims at all. Yet, I did like how muslim women dress, hijab and other stuffs muslim women wear.
My journey to Islam started in Ramadan 2010. I finished junior high school and was at home doing nothing so I decided to read something.
There was a muslim man staying in the house, so I started with books from him. First one is about reverts, why did they accept Islam, their struggles. Second is about Hajj.
I had a dream that night, a man wearing white, said to me, "Maryam, drink this water, it will purify your heart"
I asked,"This water is for muslims and I am not a muslim, why should I drink it?". But I drank it because my entire life I am always concerned about purification.
Then the dream moved on to the next stage which is the slaughter of animal (qurbani) and the man told me to eat the meat as it will make me stronger when I am weak.
I know now that with that dream, Allah was preparing me for whatever would happen in my journey to Islam.
I was very weak personality, so Allah prepared me spiritually and then physically.
When I decided to revert at 15 years old, I knew the scary consequences. Gradually my parents knew, because my church activities dwindled.
But since Islam wasn't just something I read and wanted to practice, this is something I knew that I need to survive, I found the courage to tell my family.
It was a big shock and since then, they tried to do everything to stop me, including taking me to live with them in the jungle, away from the muslims.
Every day a priest would come to tell me lies about Islam, Allah and Prophet sallallahu 'alayhi wa salaam. But I knew I had found the Truth.
Before I went to the jungle, I had written down Surat Al Falaq, An Nas, Al Ikhlas in my diary so I was able to read them every day.
The night before Eid ul Fitr 2010, my father found out I was reading those 3 surats and he wanted to shoot me because Islam is the worst abomination to my family, but my mother interfered.
I was then disowned and he told me I can go live with the muslims.
It wasn't easy for a 15/16 years old to make a stand and fight for what I believe in, leave family, live on her own, get sick and recover (I was hospitalized frequently due to stomach ulcer because of hunger),
meet good and bad people, take care/ support myself without parents - but I believe that anything Allah takes from us, He will give us better.
I realized my family is in this dunya, if I follow them and do not worship Allah during my lifetime in this dunya, my family cannot save me from the wrath of Allah on the Day of Judgement.
Alhamdulillah Allah saw me through the many difficulties after I took my shahada, from hunger to living on the street, struggling on my own, the loneliness - it's all worth it.
O Mankind, if you should be in doubt about the Resurrection, then [consider that] indeed, We created you from dust, then from a sperm-drop,
then from a clinging clot, and then from a lump of flesh, formed and unformed - that We may show you.
And We settle in the wombs whom We will for a specified term, then We bring you out as a child, and then [We develop you] that you may reach your [time of] maturity.
And among you is he who is taken in [early] death, and among you is he who is returned to the most decrepit [old] age
so that he knows, after [once having] knowledge, nothing.
And you see the earth barren, but when We send down upon it rain, it quivers and swells and grows [something] of every beautiful kind.
That is because Allah is the Truth and because He gives life to the dead and because He is over all things competent. (Al Hajj 5-6)