Leaving Mormonism? That is something that I never thought
would be in the realm of possibilities. I loved it. I lived it. My testimony was always so strong, so
sure. It’s not something I thought could happen. Ever. Life has a way of
surprising you and kicking you in the butt. This blog is kind of my journal and
a chronicle of my family. The last two years have been very difficult and I
haven’t blogged about any of it. I think it’s time to write about it now.
In August of 2014 Scott disclosed to me a very secret 20
year porn problem. The life that I thought I had was gone in an instant, like a
puff of smoke. 6 months prior to his disclosure Scott had a faith crisis. He
had always been bothered by the priesthood ban and had studied the issue
throughout the years trying to find reasons justifying it. When the church came
out with their essays Scott read the essay about the blacks and the priesthood
and it rocked his world. The essay more or less admits that the ban was not
from God and that it was a mistake of man and that the church disavowed any
racist statement of the past. If the church could be wrong about that what else
could they be wrong about? Scott has had an ongoing relationship with
pornography since he was about 14 years old. He’s also had an ongoing death
wish and was very suicidal at different periods in his life. He never felt good
enough. He never felt worthy. If someone would compliment him he would think, “Well
if you really knew me you wouldn’t say that.” His only hope he felt was to get
worthy and die somehow. Despite his feeling of unworthiness he was worthy
enough to serve a mission and get married in the temple. He had a temple
recommend the whole time we were married, he served in high leadership callings,
and for years he cleaned the temple for 3 hours every week. I had no idea he
had this problem.
Scott felt if the church could be wrong about black people
having the priesthood maybe they were wrong about sexual sin (including porn)
being the sin next to murder thing as well. One night after a relapse instead
of his usual please forgive me and please be patient with me prayer he prayed
to ask God about it. He asked God if looking at porn made him a bad person. He
asked God if he had hated him all this time. The answer he got was that God did
love him and that looking at porn didn’t make him a bad person. He broke down
in bed sobbing the next night telling me that he felt like God loved him for
the first time.
Before his disclosure to me he asked me to listen to some
podcast episodes on Mormon Stories. One was on pornography addiction and
another one was better sex in your Mormon marriage. He also throughout the
years tried to complicate things for me when someone had gotten divorced over
porn. He would point all of the good qualities that person had and how
reductive a porn addiction label could be. He tried to prep me as best he could
so that he could one day feel safe enough to tell me about his own relationship
with pornography.
I knew something was going on with Scott especially after he
broke down sobbing in bed that one night. I didn’t ask him about it. I just
waited until he was ready to talk to me about it. Scott finally felt ready and
he felt like I was ready to hear it. He was wrong. The night Scott told me I
took it really well. I was so happy he had finally opened up to me. He was so
alone for so long. So many things made sense to me. I knew when we were dating
that he was very suicidal his freshman year of college, now I knew why. It made
sense that frequently at night he would have almost a panic attack and tell me
that he thought everything in his life was going to disappear. Everything made
so much sense. I was happy to know, that night.
The next day I felt like the life I thought I had was over.
The weight of pornography addiction was too hard to bear. Not only that, but
Scott had basically made peace with his pornography use. After his prayer to God that night he decided
he wasn’t going to fight it anymore. He was going to stop being Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde and incorporate it into his life. What he discovered was that his porn
use went down. His compulsion went down, and he felt better than he had most of
his life. I didn’t know what to do. I felt that no one was safe to talk to. I
cried so much. I also prayed harder than I’ve ever prayed in my life. God was
the only person who understood the situation perfectly. I didn’t feel judged by
God, I only felt love. I felt like I had all bad options. Get a divorce.
Becoming a single mom and trying to support my kids and raise them alone
because Scott looked at porn sometimes seemed RIDICULOUS; I almost immediately
threw that out the window. Force him into a 12 step program? I knew it wouldn’t
work, especially if he was going for me and not for himself. Accept him as he
was? But how could I do that and not feel like a second class citizen in my own
marriage, in my own life. The only way I could do it was to think about porn
differently and I did. I stopped giving porn the power to ruin me and my life.
I stopped seeing it as a threat. I started to think of it as junk food. Should
you live off of junk food? No. Do you crave it and eat it sometimes? Yes. We
made it through that difficult patch in our marriage. Our marriage grew
stronger and got better after that.
Our problems were far from over however. As time went on I
could see that going to church was very difficult for Scott. It drained him in
every way. Around the time of his disclosure he was the elder’s quorum
president. He asked to be released from his calling. He was very suicidal at
that time. I was trying my best to bring my kids up in the gospel while the
beginnings of my faith crisis were happening as well. I lead family scripture
reading every morning. I went to the temple. I read my scriptures. I had family
home evening. But all of it was painful. With Scott’s disclosure I started to
really question things in the church myself.
I had two different experiences while reading the Book of
Mormon twice in a month’s time. Years ago I was a young women’s leader and our
youth were doing a challenge called August rush. The challenge was to read the
Book of Mormon in one month. Before the challenge we had a speaker talk to the
youth about the Book of Mormon. She gave an excellent talk where she basically
explained that all of life’s questions could be answered in the Book of Mormon.
How could I be 30 years old and have read the Book of Mormon numerous times and
not realized that so much of what we believed came directly from the Book of
Mormon. I did the challenge that month and loved realizing that indeed so much
of our doctrine and culture came directly from the Book of Mormon. When Scott
disclosed his porn use to me it was the beginning of August. I decided I was
going to do August rush again. This time my experience was completely
different. I read the Book of Mormon with new eyes. I saw how condemning the
scriptures could be. I saw that so much of Mormon culture that I didn’t like
came directly from the Book of Mormon as well.
I had been bothered by the gay issue for years. I took a
parenting class when Corbin was a baby which was a class on basically raising
your kids to be faithful latter day saints. She gave a lesson about general
conference. She talked about how we should treat general conference like our
super bowl. Ya! Get our kids excited. We have a prophet! She also said we
should take questions that we want to get answered into general conference and
get our answers there. So I decided I was going to pray about my questions
about gay people during general conference and get my answer. Well of course
the family proclamation seemed to be mentioned in practically every talk. I had
my answer. Easy, done. But my questions didn’t go away. Scott’s disclosure blew
the cap off of EVERYTHING. I questioned the church’s stance on sexual issues in
general. I remember reading the book The
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society book and questioning things. One
of the characters has a baby out of wedlock. According to Mormon doctrine she
has committed the sin next to murder and yet she was one of the most courageous
and heroic characters I had ever read about. This book is fiction but it really
made me wonder. I knew a mom that wouldn’t let her kids read Harry Potter and
she didn’t know why but when it came out that Dumbledore was gay she knew she
had her answer. This really bothered me. Dumbledore is another amazing and
courageous character and just because he was gay he was what? Evil? I came
across the website Far Between with Kendal Wilcox dealing with LGBT issues.
Watching those videos broke my heart. Hearing people struggle with their
sexuality and their religion was almost too painful to watch. Then I had the
issue of my own sexuality to deal with. I felt like I was basically an asexual.
I was so good at suppressing my sexuality that I struggled for years in the
bedroom. I feel like it took a faith crisis for me to be able to allow myself
the space to have any pleasure in the bedroom.
I finally allowed myself to disagree with the brethren about
gay people. I was going to believe what I felt was right and I wasn’t going to
just be obedient. There are plenty of active, believing members that believe
the church is wrong about LGBT issues. I could be one of them.
As time continued going to church got harder and harder for Scott.
He could not stand to listen to the same things being preached that had ruined
him. He slowly started to go inactive. I could see how painful going to church
was for him and I had to let it go. I didn’t want to divorce him because he
didn’t go to church anymore.
In April Scott stopped attending church altogether. I could
not stand the thought of going to church alone with my four kids and have
everyone in the ward look at me and think, “she’s so faithful and strong” when
I wasn’t. I agreed that Scott shouldn’t be at church and we were on the same
page about most issues. I decided I was going to go inactive with him. I
emailed the bishop and primary president. I couldn’t teach primary anymore
(teaching those lessons every week was very painful). I emailed my family and
close friends. That was the worst day of my life. I have never cried harder. I
hated disappointing my loved ones. There were some rough email exchanges in the
next few weeks. The first Sunday I was supposed to go inactive was a fast
Sunday. I woke up at 5:00 in the morning and felt like I should go to church
and bear my testimony so I did. I got up first before the counselor was even
done talking. I stood up and told the ward my plan to go inactive. I told them how my family was devastated and
fasting for me. I told them that they were my people and that I didn’t know
what I know. I talked about love and compassion the end. The following month
Scott came to church and bore his final testimony. He read an 8 page letter
telling his church experience and he spoke for about 25 minutes. It was
intense. It was sad. It was uncomfortable. Around that time Scott and I also
recorded some podcasts with some Mormon therapists. I shared some of those on
my facebook page. I was feeling very vulnerable. I asked the bishop to put me
in nursery so I could still attend church but not be so exposed. For four
months I tried to make church attendance work. I tried to be a middle road
Mormon. I am not cut out for it. I have asked to be released and have a plan
once again to go inactive.
At different points in this journey I wanted to prove that
the church wasn’t true so I wouldn’t feel so guilty about leaving it. I delved
into everything including what some would consider anti-Mormon. I discovered
with that path for me at least that I couldn’t prove the church wasn’t true
anymore than I could prove it was true. If you want to find evidence that the
church is true you will find it. If you want to find evidence that the church
is not true you will find it. This is where faith comes into action. I felt
like I could choose to believe if I felt like that was the right path. Is the
church a net positive for many people? Yes. Is it a net negative for many
people? Yes. I knew it wasn’t good for Scott but what about me? What about my
children? These are the questions that have been CONSTANTLY on my mind for
months. I’ve cried. I’ve prayed. I have been struggling with my faith ever
since Scott’s disclosure but when Scott went inactive and things came out
everything reached its boiling point.
I worry about making a mistake, the biggest mistake of my
life. I worry about raising my kids in the church. I worry about raising them
out of the church. I feel very alone. I feel very misunderstood. I feel like I
can’t talk to anyone because everyone in my life is a believing Mormon and they
have all of the answers already. I am heart-broken. I feel like once again I
have all crap choices. For now walking away seems like the right path even if
it will be lonely and laced with misunderstanding from everyone around me. This
is where I am at right now. Where will I be in 6 months? Who knows?
