Well, were to begin? I was not born in the church. As far as I remember my mother was somewhat religious and I went to Bible school during the summers. All I can remember is getting my first “kiss” there. LOL Hummmmm a reoccurring theme I believe but I will get into that latter.
Anyway my family moved from Ohio to Arizona when I was around 7. I do not remember us as a family going to any particular church until I was 12. Somehow my parents were contacting by the missionaries and we began the lessons. My parents, in particular my mother, bought the story and we all got baptized. My childhood was not a typical LDS childhood in that my parents did not follow the word of wisdom. They loved coffee and smoking. They would quit off and on but it would not stick. Because of this they did not go regularly to church nor did they hold callings. Sometimes my mom would be involved in teaching food storage/canning stuff but for the most part she rarely went. My dad stopped going all together. My mom will go sometimes now but only at the time that is good for her. She does not care about ward boundaries and such. LOL She still has a testimony, especially of genealogy and does her part to get our family history stuff done. She is a big time genealogy nut. She and my father have never been to the temple but she has a “testimony” that her genealogy is very, very important work that needs to be done.
My brother and I went to church by ourselves a lot. We lived right near the church so we could walk. I never went to primary, of course, but I did like going to mutual. I have many fond memories of that time and of seminary. Mostly I was there for the boys. LOL I did have a few WTF moments especially regarding polygamy. I remember telling my Sunday school class that if my husband could have lots of wives then I was gonna have plenty of husbands! Needless to say that did not go over very well. LOL I also remember doing baptism for the dead and thinking that the bulls around the font reminded me of statue of the golden calf in the movie “The Ten Commandments” that the people in the wilderness worshipped. What the hell, there was something wrong about that I just knew it. Looking back though I think I was very lucky because the wards and stakes where we lived were pretty poor and very excepting of others. We had plenty of single parent households and members with non-LDS spouses. People were generally very nice and always lending each other a hand. I am always surprised by some of the accounts I hear of wards that are filled with “un-Christlike” members. Thankfully my parents and daughter are still living in that same area.
After high school I met a man in YA and we were married. Not in the temple but we attended regularly and held callings. Unfortunately my taste in men was/is not good. LMAO He was not someone that liked to work for a living and we soon divorced. I remarried soon after into a family I had known all through my mutual days. We had one daughter and I threw myself into callings such as nursery and 1st councilor in Primary. I actually loved doing this calling and the president I worked with was committed to her calling and took it very seriously. We ran a tight but loving ship! LOL
When I realized that this marriage was not going to last either I decided I needed to be on my own and work full time. It was hard being a single parent but I had a lot of help from my parents. It was at this time I stopped going to church. I could not handle the pressure of being active. I worked 60 plus hours a week and had no time for church stuff. Plus I carried a lot of guilt from some various past “sins” so I did not feel right going to church. I should mention briefly here that as a very young child I had been sexually molested by a babysitter. That incident shaped my life in ways I did not understand at the time and caused more guilt through out my life. Plus I found that as I got older I actually liked sex and masturbation which added to my dilemma and confusion. I came to the conclusion that it must be true that people leave because they are weak and wanted to sin. I was the perfect example. More guilt to add to my collection!
So I went about my sinful life raising my daughter and having a career. I made plenty of mistakes over the years and that sure added to my guilt collection too but in the back of my mind I had always thought that some day I will get my shit together. That someday I would go through the temple and be back in the church full time. Fast forward a few years later after my daughter was grown and married when I started being curious about certain things I saw on the internet. Soon I was looking at so called anti-Mormon websites and books. That was about a year ago and the rest, as they say, is history.
I am still dealing with guilt issues. It is an ongoing process. And I still get angry thinking about how the church teachings added to my baggage. Sometimes I feel bitter over the wasted years of thinking someday I will be a good Latter Day Saint when I finally repent and fall into line. Etc…etc…etc… I am lucky in that most of my family is still in the church but not TBM enough to care if I am not. No love bombs and we get together without guilt, for the most part. LOL Lots of inappropriate laughter and fun! There are times that I have to bite my tongue but it is what it is and I am grateful. As far as “religion” goes I still believe in a higher power but think that no one person and/or religion can even begin to really know what exactly that is or have authority to say that they do and that’s ok. I can have my own relationship with that power and no one is the wiser. ;)