She walked into 8th grade, and she was different. In our NY school, most girls looked like 30 year old woman. A, on the other hand, was a sweet, innocent blond Mormon girl.. who made no apologies for her beliefs. She moved a few months later, and we stayed friends. She moved around the country, and I went out to meet her. Her house was every thing mine wasn’t : safe, happy, loving, orderly. I love/loved her family so much.
Fast forward: me, at 18, pretty much an after school special kinda girl, not the sweet naive one, the "other" one. My world was crashing down. "A" was living in UT, and I moved out there because I was in a really bad way and I needed to start over. The rent was cheap.
I got baptised a month later. I wasn’t really sure about JS, but I was living in Provo in a very active ward. It made the transition easier. I needed the Word of Wisdom, the structure and stability the church provides. I will never, ever regret joining the church because I believe it saved my life.
My husband was in my singles ward. We got married 8 months after my baptism, and had our son nine months and three days after our wedding. My husband comes from a very active family and from a very active community in happy valley. I love his family. They are TBM, and I love them for it. They believe with their whole hearts. They are some of the best people I have ever met - ever. They still don’t know about me leaving the church. It breaks my heart that they soon will. I usually am very open with them. I just know how broken hearted my dear MIL and FIL will be and I never thought I would do anything to make them so hurt and upset.
But. I am getting ahead of myself. My hubs and I were sealed a year to the day after we got married. It is a bitter sweet memory now. A few months after that I believe my husband began searching on the Internet, and dropping hints about the way he felt about the church.
He came out fully and told me about his unbelief when I was 1 month pregnant with our daughter. I made his life a living hell. I played the sad wife, tormented over her husband’s straying. Inside, I was jealous that he had the balls to be honest. I felt abandoned. I plunged into church activity, and nearly tore my family apart. I was ready to pack up the kids and leave. People would have understood, maybe even patted me on the back for being so "righteous." I realize now how horrible I made my husband feel. I really believed if I prayed enough he'd come back. I was still praying for my own testimony as well. People are probably saying that this is his "fault"..Poor sister xxxx, husband left the church and turned anti and look what happened to her." They are probably talking about me in fast and testimony meetings, I'd imagine. But I try not to think about that. In fact, I try to replace what my friends must be thinking or the ward must be saying with the quote that so often turns my stomach:
“I have more to boast of than ever any man had. I am the only man that has ever been able to keep a whole church together since the days of Adam. A large majority of the whole have stood by me. Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jesus ever did it. I boast that no man ever did such a work as I. The followers of Jesus ran away from Him; but the Latter-day Saints never ran away from me yet.” (Joseph Smith, History of the Church, Volume 6 Pages 408-409)
and then it comes to me, the clarity that I am doing the right thing for my FAMILY.
One day, I was preparing for a lesson for YW. I had been having my doubts for awhile, but I figured, it was a good way to raise a family, and I put everything on a shelf. I had read "In Sacred Loneliness" a while back, and it made me SICK. I thought about those woman constantly. We went to the new Emma Smith movie as a mutual activity, and the whole time I watched the YW crying, and I thought, "if you all only knew who this man was..."
I realized I couldn’t lie to these girls. It was the Obedience lesson I was preparing that day. I know from the journal entries of his wives that JS taught Obedience when trying to marry them. I called in sick for a couple of weeks and then asked to be realised. I think about those girls every single day and how confused they must be over what they hear about me. It is a shame, but I hope one day they find out the truth and find out for themselves.
It was so surreal, one day being a devout Mormon, and that night taking my garments off for the last time. It was so weird looking at all of the LDS things in my home with new meaning. I cried, and mourned. I am still mourning. This was a month ago. But it has been a couple of years in the making.
I miss church activities everyday. I miss the belonging. I hurt when I think of the many people I’m hurting, will hurt, and have or will lose. I think about my kids not being able to be raised in the church, not being like their cousins and friends...But I know my husband and I will raise amazing, open minded, sweet kids.
I hate the closemindness of the church. I am not sure I will go to any churches. I don’t know what the future holds, but I know my husband and I will be together through it. I know I am doing the right thing. Its wierd, you know, deciding what is right FOR yourself. Trying to figure out who YOU are and what YOU believe.
I didn’t have any bad experiences with the church. I can’t say I’m bitter or anything. I feel like the church is an old friend who I outgrew. I can’t just be loyal to it because it saved me. I can’t. I won’t. I have to look at it for what it is, objectively, and for who the founder was. I refuse to teach my children half truths,lies, and cult - like behavior. Its kind of funny though, I spent my whole life searching for who I was, to find Mormonism, and here I am, a couple of years older, a couple of years wiser, with a family, and I am still searching. Only this time, I don't have the church as my lifeline.
I figure that once I submit my exit story, we will be pretty easily identified to those who know us. Maybe if they come on here looking for me, they will find out the truth. If they are happy in their ignorance, I can't blame them for staying in the church, or for trying to save my soul. Sometimes, I wish I could walk through life in the church with blinders on, ignoring my better judgement, and just enjoying the warm fuzzies and the activities and friendship. Life would certainly be easier for me. But who says life should be easy?
We will be sending in our resignation letter soon. I feel like it is the right thing to do for our family. Our family. Because that’s what life’s about. Family.