My Story Part 1

I have had some emails and comments from some of you wanting to know more about "my story" of how and why I went from being a Catholic to becoming LDS (aka Mormon).

I know that My Story will be a really long one so I am going to do this in parts.

So here goes nothing! Part one!

I grew up in Boston, Massachusetts. I was baptized and raised in the Catholic church. Most of my childhood we did a lot of moving around due to my Dad's job (project manager of an electrical company)

We moved from Boston to Southern California and from California to Oregon. Our family was really close and we did a lot as a family. I couldn't have been raised by two better parents. I would have to say that our family was pretty spiritual in the aspect of attending church every Sunday or every other Sunday. It was usually my Mom taking us to church every Sunday and my Dad would sometimes just stay at home. Every Sunday that would come around, I specifically remember my Mom forcing us to get out of bed to go to church with her.

Mom: "Kimberly....Kevin...get up and get ready....lets go to church"

My brother and I: "Ugh...we don't want to go.... do we have to go..can we just stay home?" "Ppppllllleeeassseee"

I'll can tell you honestly that I never really wanted to go. I more less just went to go with my Mom and to please her. It's so hard to remember because it was so long ago...but I think we attended the Catholic church from the time I was just an infant until I was a freshman in High School. I remember going to church for a little over an hour, listening and singing then getting breakfast after. This was only on Sundays though. We never read the scriptures as a family, we never prayed as family. I remember being very doubtful and confused whether or not there was or wasn't a God and at that point in my life I wasn't interested in knowing. My thoughts were more focused on friends, school, boyfriends, shopping, etc. I do recall one thing though...I remember feeling pretty good after every service.

So that was freshman year...lets fast forward to my Junior year of High School. My parents divorced.

It was a huge shock to both my brother and I and came out of nowhere. We were both so devastated.

I kept wondering why is this happening! They were so perfect together! Or at least I thought. Just a week after they sat down and told us, my brother and I came home and found all of my Dad's stuff gone. There was such an eery feeling in the house after that and it was very hard on all of us..including my Mom and my Dad.

As my Junior and Senior came and went, during that time so much happened. There were lots of nights that I cried myself to sleep, there were lots of nights where I went to sleep with my Mom and we both cried ourselves to sleep, there were numerous times that I had to just hold my Mom, Brother or Dad and tell them that it would all be okay, there were instances where my Mom would come to pick us up from my Dads and my brother would throw these huge tantrums to try and stay with my Dad including one time where he trying jumping out of the car while it was moving to run back to my Dad. These were really rough times for me and my family. Because of my Dad's position, he had to move to California to find work which made it even harder.

We stopped going to church.

After Graduating High School, I went on to a community college and just started taking basic business classes. I got into the whole party scene and that is pretty much what my weeks and weekends consisted of.

Drinking, smoking pot, and going to dance clubs every weekend. Looking back it seemed like such a great time! All the partying kept my mind off of all my problems and the things that happened in my life over the course of a couple of years. But only for the night...every morning when I would wake up with a hangover my problems would still be there and I would still feel miserable. After a few months of this whole partying stuff.. I started dating this guy named Brian. You guessed it...yes we met at a house party. We hit it off right away and started dating seriously. We moved in together. We were together for almost 4 years. He was a pretty good guy and treated me really good. I really liked him alot but couldn't see my future with him. He wasn't that excited about having kids in our future, he was a non-believer and thought it was silly, and I felt at times like I was just with him because it was all I knew. It was comfortable.

About two years into our relationship, my Mom, Stepdad and his Dad decided to open up a full service salon. We offered tanning, nails, body wraps, massage, waxing, etc.

We were all so excited and it was alot of fun working with family.

When the economy was good, business was good and everybody was happy. Almost 2 years passed and boom! the economy hit and business started getting slower and slower and slower until we finally were going to have to shut down soon.There was A LOT of money, time and effort that was put into that business. There was a lot of tension, stress and so many fights between everyone because of it. My parents home was on the line, my boyfriends Dad had to continually write checks out of his own pocket just to cover the rent. I can't even begin to explain just how bad that situation was and how it caused such a rift between everyone.

Between the divorce and our business failure I was lost. I was depressed.
I felt like everything in life was hopeless. I kept asking myself what is life about?
Why am I here?

Looking back, God was reaching out to me and placing many people in my path. 
He was planning everything out.
During this rough time, I ran into a lot of different people that I knew that were telling me about God.
One of our workers that later became a good friend gave me a bible for my Birthday. One of our other co-workers gave me a book and talk to me about how God has changed her life. One of my friends from High School wrote me this heartfelt letter expressing how much God has changed his life in so many ways. I also remember the LDS Missionaries coming to our house time after time but my boyfriend wouldn't answer or answer and send them away.

I continued to fall into a more depressing state, I continued to feel hopeless, lost and worthless.
My relationship with my boyfriend got worse because of the salon situation.
We fought all the time and I would cry myself to sleep so many nights wondering why this was happening and what I did to feel this way.

I remember that Bible that my friend gave to me. I didn't know then, but I know now.
Every time my boyfriend and I would get into an argument, I would go to our bedroom open up that
Bible, read it and cry. At that time I didn't understand exactly what I was reading but it made me feel better. Those words made me feel at peace and made me feel like everything was going to be alright.

The salon finally shut down and things continued to get worse.

I remember one day (it was a Saturday) we got into another fight. I ran to our bedroom,
sat down on our bed, got out the Bible and cried and cried and cried.

I said a simple prayer:
"God I don't really know how to pray or if you are even real. All I ask of you is for you to show me if you are real or not. I am going through a really rough time right now and I don't know what to do..please help me God"

**CHECK BACK FOR PART 2**