My life had always felt a little bit rocky. I always had depression issues. I remember when I was seven, I would write “I want to die” all over the walls. I never knew why I was an unhappy child, but in time I grew into an unhappy adolescent.

     My parents were having obvious marital issues since I was young, and me and my two younger sisters were caught in the middle of it. I recall when my dad worked night shift in a factory and would be home all day, while my mom would go to work. As a child, I would cry for my mom to stay. When she was gone, my dad would beat me and my sisters. He would scream at us even if we had done nothing wrong. Me and my sister who is only younger by a couple of years would be scared of him, and try our best to stay invisible, while my youngest sister, who is six yours younger than me was too young to remember any of it. Even through our efforts to stay invisible, we couldn’t hide from the CAS. My parents “nipped that in the bud” really fast though. After I let a few things slip (I was really honest in saying “I am not allowed to tell”), my parents explained to me exactly what to say, word for word.

     They disappeared for a while.

     My parents divorced when we were 12, 10, and 6. We were all very quick to go with my mother. We moved in with my grandparents and my mom very quickly got a new boyfriend -One I believe she had before the divorce. She would leave on trips with him for weeks on end while leaving us home with our grandparents. That wasn’t so bad at first. We really missed her, but we love our grandparents. It quickly became not so much fun. My grandparents would be gone during the day into the evening, and I would have to watch my sisters all day long. The ten year old, only being a couple years younger than myself, did not like to listen to my direction.

     At the end of the summer of the following year, we moved into a place of our own. I became what felt like the nanny of the house hold… only I didn’t get paid. Half the time, there wasn’t even any food to eat.

     My sisters were also becoming harder to handle. I was having break-downs almost every night and I became one of those teens who locked themselves in their room and blasted their music all day. I avoided all contact with my family.

     I visited my dad on the weekends. He was trying hard to be a good father now, but both my parents had (and still have) the fault of acting like teenagers. 

     I went to visit him one day, and he invited us to his baptism. I had never ever heard of Mormonism before that. Apparently my grandparents on my fathers side and some of my uncles were (and most still are) Mormon too! I was very confused , and did not go to the baptism because it all seemed a little weird to me. The last time I saw him before that, he was showing me his eyebrow ring.

     I couple years later I started going to church dances and youth events to get away from my family. I always felt out of place, but I wasn’t treated badly like my mom and sisters would treat me. At school, I was constantly put down. I went home, and my sisters would make fun of me and tell me to kill myself. The one closest to my age was bigger than me, and would beat me on occasion. Then my mother would come home and make fun of me as well. I felt like they hated me, and I hated them right back.

     It is safe to say that the eternal family doctrine was not what “reeled” me in.

     One morning, when I was fifteen (and not getting any happier), my mom just exploded. She yelled at me for using a hairbrush that she was apparently using. She wasn’t touching the hairbrush the whole time I was around, so it was an honest mistake. I was surprisingly polite about it though. I don’t really know why. I just didn’t see any point in being negative anymore. I was so tired of being negative. I just said, “Oh. I am so sorry. I didn’t know you were using it.”, then I put it down right away. The response I got was just as shocking as the initial greeting. She just said, “Why don’t you go live with your father?”. I just stood there giving her a “what are you trying to say” kind of glare. I asked, “are you kicking me out?”. She said yes. I wasn’t going to be nice anymore. I said fine in my snotty teenage way, and left the bathroom. I finished getting ready for school and was moved out by the weekend.

     After I moved in, I had about two weeks without being nagged about church. Finally my dad cracked, and I went to church with him. The first day I was there, there were three female missionaries there. It was testimony meeting, and one of them went up to speak. I was very intrigued at the thought of being able to leave the country and meet new people. I thought girls weren’t allowed to go! It just seemed kind of cool to me. My dad saw my reaction and jumped on the opportunity to make an appointment with them.

     They would come by the house when my dad was at work and when I was home alone and give me some food and talk to me. They would tell me about the spirit of which they referred to as the comforter. I really needed comforting. It was such a welcoming idea. She also mentioned how when you are confirmed, the comforter is with you all of the time. That sounded nice. The one thing I wanted to know was how to get baptised. I was seriously just curious, but everything spiralled a little bit out of control from that question. A date was picked for me and I was promptly given the four necessary lessons.  They kept telling me I should read the book of Mormon and  pray about whether it was true before I joined so I could have my own witness. I never did because I didn’t want it to not be true.

     I told my dad I was getting baptised, and of course he was pleased. That made me happy. I really just wanted a parent to love me. I thought I needed one…

     When I started attending church regularly for the first time, everyone was so welcoming. They loved answering questions. I was ill educated about the church, so my questions were easy. I was a 15 year old just looking for acceptance! Give me a break. And the church didn’t look that hard. It just looked like a feel good society. I didn’t realize it was a life church, that made you conscious of your every thought. Made you mentally tired.

     I would try hard to follow all of the commandments.  I wouldn’t have anything I knew had caffeine in it, and I was very chaste. I had already had sex before I was baptised at the tender age of 14 when I thought I was in love with my first boyfriend, but I had tried very hard to repent of that. I was reading my scriptures every night and saying my personal prayers at least three times a day kneeling. I also never did anything on a Sunday that wasn’t church related, even though between all of my homework and church related activities, that would have been my only day off to do anything at all. It didn’t take long to realize that I was the only youth I knew of taking the church that seriously. I had no social life anymore, and wasn’t interested anymore in many of the blessings the church was offering anymore. Sometimes I told myself that I would rather go to hell then be denied some of my freedoms. I would quickly abolish those thoughts, and pull out my Book of Mormon.

     My dad was even getting depressed. He would say things like it was actually “unnatural” to be happy, and that the gospel will tear families apart. He began and still is taking anti-depressants when he re-joined (apparently he was raised Mormon) and he was telling me that life was for work and not for fun. He is still a strong believer in the church.

     My dad wants to remarry really badly, and there was this one point where he saw a woman in the church, and said that the spirit told him on countless occasions that he was actually going to marry her. He was getting nervous about it because he had asked her out on numerous occasions and she declined. He said something that stuck with me for the duration of my stay at the church. He said, “If I am wrong about this, then what else am I wrong about?”. He didn’t need me to answer. We both knew that the answer quite possibly was everything. Something like that would just crush him, but I wish there was a way I could tell him. I feel so bad for him. He is so sad, and trying so hard.

     My depression was soon becoming deeper and I was quickly becoming more stressed and irritable. I would think of things to do that would guarantee my death. I had a bottle filled with pills of my dads tendentious pain-killer prescription, and I had a good idea of when the train came down near a high school I used to attend. I just needed a moment to get over there and do the deed. I just wanted to end it. I was so tired of everything.

     Part of me always knew that the church wasn’t true, but I managed to convince myself that if I tried hard enough, I would be living the good life. It was like I thought I could make it true.

     I met a boy during summer school a little over a year later that changed everything for me. For some reason, he decided he wanted to do everything in his power to help me. I ended up leaving my dads place and moving in with him and his family. That wasn’t the best experience, but I was allotted  some freedom.

     It was hard at first to get the old Mormon habits out of my system. I still said personal prayers, and read my scriptures. I was even still afraid to drink anything caffeinated. The transition was hard. I eventually adjusted to the non-Mormon life. Even though leaving my dads place resulted later in homelessness and “motel hopping” for a place to sleep, I was so much happier. I didn’t know what I would eat, or where I would sleep, but I was living my life for me and my own experiences. I wasn’t having experiences as a Mormon that weren’t church related. My life was the church. It felt that there was nothing deeper about me. If you knew the standards of the church, you knew my every day life, until I shook things up.

     I am now 18, and me and my boyfriend now have a place of our own. We are very happy, and doing very well with budgeting. I didn’t need the church to find love and acceptance. I could love and accept myself. No one ever taught me that. No one loved me enough to teach me that.

     I love you all. In and out of the church, you are all special and good in your own way. You don’t need an organization or religion to tell you that you have a light inside of you. You already do!

                                                        
          


                                                                  Sincerely and with all of my love,
                                                           
                                                                      Desiré