Our oldest was turning eight and about to baptized.
And I wanted us, as a family, to help her feel more prepared.
And during that time, I think I was just kind
of going through the motions.
I didn't really feel like doing any of it.
And I remember her specifically asking me,
like, "Why aren't you trying harder?
Why aren't you praying?
Why don't you care?"
I had to tell her.
I had to tell her that I didn't believe in God.
I wasn't sure if I'd ever felt that, ever.
My husband and I, we both promised before God
that we were going to be working towards eternal marriage
and be together.
And then my husband throws at me he
doesn't believe in God anymore.
My world had just crashed.
I had a lot of fear, now that he doesn't have the Church
standards, that he would start trying new things
and realize that his family's not so important anymore.
I guess that was mostly my fear, that the world
would be more appealing to him and a happier place
than being home.
I think the hardest was because we just stopped
communicating at that point.
We just didn't--we didn't want to know what each other was
thinking about, because it was hard for me to even say it
to you.
And I know that for you, it was hard for me to say it.
And we just stopped talking.
And I think that it would've went on like that until today,
really.
We both knew we didn't want to go anywhere.
We wanted to stay together.
We always loved each other so much,
and we were each other's best friends
until one point we both agreed that we needed help.
We had to learn how to navigate in this new situation.
I remember the first session with a counselor,
there wasn't a lot of talking.
There was a lot of crying.
There was a lot of silence.
You could see my pain.
You could see that I was hurting a lot.
It was just interesting to learn how to talk to each other
again, because before, you know, I think that we did talk,
and we were good.
And then when that happened, we stopped talking.
And so that was how we learned how to talk to each other
again, and it was good because it was all brand-new.
It was all brand-new.
Just came to the realization that we had to still know how
to take the next step forward, that there was no way that--if
we were going to stay together, we had to kind of decide
and make goals--new goals, right?
Ones that didn't have to do with, necessarily,
religion or faith, but goals that we
could continue in this lifetime, I guess, right?
And so, you know, we decided that we were going to raise
the girls in the Church, and that was a big--I mean,
it's not a big step, because I was raised in the Church,
and you know, I still believe in the morals that I was raised
with, that they were good, you know,
and that those things were good for children to know at a young
age.
We have got to a point that we understood
how to make things work even though we both didn't believe
in the same God anymore, or you didn't believe at all.
The way I feel about God and the Church, I know I can't deny it.
My testimony is there because I have experienced it.
I have studied it.
But I can't force that into anyone.
And then it's your choice to take your time
to come to that if you want to.
I don't dwell on the questions like "Why
is this happening to me?"
or "What did I do wrong?"
There were a lot of nights that I cried myself to sleep,
and I just prayed to Heavenly Father to take it away.
In my heart, I could literally feel Him carrying me through
so many days and so many hard times that--there were a lot
of hard times.
There were a lot of rock bottom that we hit.
And when we would just look at each other
and think that this is not going to work,
just that demonstration of love and peace
and Him carrying me through was everything
I needed to keep going and not give up.
This has worked for us.
This is how our family has decided to navigate
through this new situation.
I know it's not going to work the same way for every family,
because we're all so different.
This has been definitely the hardest thing I have ever done.
In the beginning, I couldn't see how we would go through this,
but it has allowed me to feel much closer to my Heavenly
Father and feel the love of my Savior, not
only for me but also for my husband,
in ways that I didn't know before.