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Here is my story.
I was born in March of 1968 out of wedlock to a mother who had an IQ of roughly 83 - as documented by the State of Utah. By three months old I ended up in Foster care and stayed there until a single man adopted me at the age of 12. During that time I suffered through two failed adoptions (adopted and then returned to the state) and went through 28 homes as I was passed from family to family. I was severely abused in a handful of homes. In one home that I stayed six years the Foster parents used cattle prods, horsewhips, boards, belts and anything else they could get hold of. I have scars to this day on my back and legs from being horsewhipped. I went into this home at age 5 at 63 pounds, came out at age 11 weighing 60 pounds. I was beaten, starved, neglected and used as a cash cow.
As a youth, alone my entire childhood, I had a deep and profound belief in God. I knew nothing of Jesus or the bible or any kind of religion. My belief was the purest form of belief that you could know. And it got me through the worst of times, in the darkest moments of bitter pain.
Lucky for me I was adopted by a single man when I turned twelve and he showed me a tenacious unconditional love that changed me forever. I became a new person and adopted a new identify. I changed my name from Steven to Michael to begin a new life. I love him dearly to this day and we often have very long talks about the history of Mormonism and the problems therein. He absolutely adores my little girl and now wishes that he had not moved out of the State of Utah where he is now 1000 miles away from us.
When I was 18 years old I met a young woman named Robin Bushman. Many of you know Robin's father, Robert Bushman. He later left the church and posted his testimony of leaving here: http://home.comcast.net/~robertbushman/history.htm
His daughter was a beautiful red head and myself, young and gullible, she convinced me that unless I joined Mormonism, my relationship with her could go no further. I walked into the Mormon chapel (which is my home ward to this day), into the Bishop's office and demanded to be baptized. He agreed and set a date. A few days later I was visited by Mormon Missionaries who said the Bishop had it wrong and I had to go through the lessons first. I did, with Robin by my side. I was given a copy of the BOM to read and began the weary test of trodding through its pages. I never got out of 1st Nephi as I was already convinced that I was going to be baptized regardless and skipped to Moroni's promise. I prayed and prayed and prayed and tried desperately to have feelings that it was right. I never really truly felt the burning in my bosom but decided to be baptized anyway.
I was baptized in my home ward on May 17th, 1986. However, the relationship with Robin was nearing an end. Robert took a job back east and moved the entire family from Utah to Virginia. Robin stayed and began attending BYU in September of that year. Shortly after that came the letters from Robin and her mother that our dating time was over. I was pressured extremely hard by both Robin and her mother to go on a mission. I even got a depressing letter telling me that since I was not going to go on a mission I was doing "nothing with my life."
My grandparents on my fathers - mothers' side were temple workers in Atlanta Georgia and claimed that I had changed my name from my birth name my name now - Michael - and it was a sign from above because of who Michael was in heaven. They pressured me beyond belief to go on a mission. I began convincing myself in my mind that I was going to go on a mission and my father and I began to fight daily. He knew the church was a Cult and tried desperately to stop me. I began having nightmares and anxiety attacks about being gone for two years on a mission.
After breaking up with Robin my church attendance began to suffer. Slowly I began to drift away from the church. Into that winter of 1986 my social life began to open up in ways I had never known before. I began working at dance clubs and became one of the best dancers in the place. Before I knew it I was dating a new girl every week for months. The church began to be a place very distant in my mind to the point where I was no longer attending, reading or praying - even so, it was still burned into my mind.
Soon afterwards I experienced sex for the first time. And while it was an incredible experience I was continually filled with guilt and shame. In fact the guilt was so bad I was in a constant state of depression. I constantly felt that Heavenly Father was very angry and displeased with me. I can defiantly say that my years of depression in my twenties was due to the guilt heaped on me by Mormonism.
Earlier that year in 1986 my lawsuit against the State Of Utah (after four years of work) came to light and we won. The goal of the lawsuit was to get Utah to change how it handles Foster Children. The settlement was small by comparison, roughly only $200k and enough to pay the attorney fees and a little left over. My bishop demanded that I pay 10 percent of it as Tithing saying it was a blessing from the Lord and the Lord's money. Thank GOD my father kept me from doing that.
Because of the complexities of my past coupled with dealing with the present, I spent most of it cars, clothes, stereos, computers, anything I could get my hands on to fill the emptiness I had inside myself because of my horrid childhood. In 1988 my father convinced me to put the last of the money into a home and I did. Best investment I have ever done and I live to this day in the same home.
When I first bought the house my girlfriend moved in with me. Shortly afterwards she became pregnant. We both knew that we were too young and it was not the right time to have a child. We had an abortion and shortly after separated.
Two years later I met and began dating my current wife. She was fully TBM at that time although had a little rebellious side to her. She wasn't BIC - she had joined when she was 9 years old and ended up converting her parents to Mormonism - her father was already an inactive Mormon.
I was truly smitten with my wife. She was sophisticated, had a job, had two years of college and was absolutely beautiful. Again, I began looking towards the church in order to become what I thought she wanted of me. I began attending church at my home ward but was told I was too old and not married and needed to attend the singles ward.
My wife's father took an immediate dislike to me. He forbade my wife - who was 21 at the time - from seeing me. He was rude, cruel and extremely mean. To prevent us from talking with each other, he physically cut the telephone line going to his daughter's room. On Christmas day I brought presents for him and his whole family. He shut the door in my face and turned off the light. He telephoned my place of employment and queried co-workers as to what kind of person I was.
Needless to say, my wife decided to move out and she did. She got an apartment with some friends and we continued to date.
I persevered. I wanted to know why this man hated me so badly. I asked him to come over to my house and have a meeting with myself. I asked my current bishop of the singles ward to be there as a witness and a mediator. All agreed and the meeting was held. Her father stood there and blankly told me that he had received a priesthood vision. And in that vision he had an angel appear before him and he had been told that I would marry his daughter, have a child, and that I would destroy her life. He left without agreeing to anything and stated that he would do everything in his power to prevent us from dating. On his way out, he pointed a finger at my female roommate and called her a whore (for some reason, Mormons can't fathom a male having female roommates without the male having sex with them. Yeah right, I was having sex at age 22 with my 47 year old roommate..)
That was the last I heard from him for over a year and a half. I spent the next ten years trying to come to an understanding of how God hated me so much that he did not want me to marry the one person I truly loved. It was not until I left Mormonism that I began to unravel the fact that the church was a fraud and God had never done any such thing, if there even was a God.
Back to the ward house. So I began to attend the singles ward and the bishop immediately wanted to set up an appointment and do an interview with me. This was the same bishop that mediated our talk at my home. When he found out that I had pre-marital sex and an abortion, he set up an immediate "Court of Love".
I found myself in a room with strangers having to tell in excruciating detail my sexual past and problems and the abortion. Within hours I was excommunicated. I had not felt as humiliated and defeated like that since I had been in foster care. I was so depressed that I walked off my job and didn't work for several months, living off what little I had left in savings.
Later in 1991, a year and a half after I had met my future wife, I began working again and started to pick up the pieces of my life and move forward. I have never gone without a job since then. I began getting closer and closer with my future wife to the point of where we became intimate. She never regretted it and to this day does not regret it. She said it was because she loved me and knew that she would be my wife. When the church found out they threatened to excommunicate her. Later that year I proposed to her and we agreed to get married in June of 1992.
Her parents, realizing that we were going to get married with or without them, suddenly had a 190-degree turn around and suddenly became "friendly". They have been friendly ever since, but more on that a little later.
In March of 1992, the church threatened that if we did not get married immediately, they would excommunicate my wife. To avoid this, we ended up getting married in a private ceremony in the Stake President's office. Only myself, my wife and my father were present. The Stake Present didn't even get out of his chair for the ceremony and just signed the marriage contract. It was another humiliating blow from the church.
I decided that now that I was married, even if it was secret, I was going to begin studying the church in depth. If this was the one and only true church then I was going to find out that truth for myself. As poor as I was, I was riding the bus to and from work. A 40-minute ride each way I began reading the BOM. When I finished reading it, I started over again. At work I was a typist for a title company. I became so proficient at typing that I began listening to the BOM on tape while I worked. In one year I read the BOM seven times and listened to it 13 times for a total of 17 times. I knew the book inside and out. My 1952 copy of the BOM was marked up left and right from passages I had studied.
After our "Real" wedding in June, I asked to be re-baptized. This was a full year and a half after my excommunication. I was refused. I was told that I was not ready yet. I was told that my sins that I had committed required First Presidency permission.
I began to triple my efforts. I continued to read and study the BOM. I read the D&C; and the BOM. I purchased and read one church book per week. I read from cover to cover Mormon Doctrine, Doctrines Of Salvation, Jesus the Christ, and tracked my way through the entire History of the Church.
I found myself knowing vast amounts of church history and felt proud that I knew the richness of the gospel. I knew the BOM so well that you could open the BOM and read any chapter and within seconds I could tell you what chapter, who was talking and what was going on.
Two years after my excommunication I asked for baptism again. Again I was denied.
After two years and six months (June of 1993) I told my bishop that I was no longer interested in baptism. I began to stop attending, stop praying. I felt that I was too much of a sinner and could never be forgiven for what I had done. Immediately the Bishop telephoned me and a baptism date was set up. Miraculously the First Presidency had given permission, the past Bishop and Stake President as well. The whole thing was attributed to a "Clerical Error" and I "should have been baptized a long time ago." My date was set.
I was re-baptized on July 28th, 1993. The day of my baptism just minutes before I was to be dunked the bishop pulled me aside and said that he forgot to do the baptismal interview. He pulled me aside into the kitchen area of the ward and asked if I was worthy enough. I said that I was and that is all he wanted to know.
It was strange experience. It did not feel right. It felt - wrong. I spent the next three weeks in a deep depression. I felt as if I had made the wrong decision. I could not figure out what was wrong. I thought that even though God had let me get re-baptized, he was still angry with me. I began to wonder if the person who re-instated my priesthood was worthy, and if the person who baptized me was worthy. Somehow God was still out to get me.
If I had tripled my efforts in studying the gospel, I quadrupled it. I prayed, I fasted, I attended, I paid. Nothing brought the spirit back. I felt that I had been given my chance the first time and was never going to be given it again.
As I studied the gospel I began to find problems, inconsistencies, changed history and things that just did not make sense. The whole Plan of Salvation was messed up. I began to realize that there was no such thing as free agency. I started having questions as to why past prophets were racists. I wanted to know why there was no more Doctrine & Covenants.
I sat and argued with my bishop for nearly four hours that the whole Plan of Salvation was a farce and a loving God couldn't be that way. I was told that I was "looking beyond the mark" and that I needed to put my questions and ideas on the shelf and be obedient.
I was told to pay, to pray and to obey.
I was told that all of my questions would be answered in the temple and that I needed to become worthy to enter.
I never went. My attendance in the church began to drop off. I was resentful of the way the leaders ignored my questions. I was resentful of the way I was told to obey. I was resentful of my father-in-law's curse, which still hung over my head. I hated the way that full grown men that I'd never met told me that they loved me - it sickened me.
Since I was 12 years old I've been programming computers and I've made a career of it to this day. In 1996 I logged onto the Internet for the first time. Since then my eyes have been opened to the true history of the church - those things that were hidden from me. I learned about the temple ceremonies - and I was again sickened. I didn't want to be naked and touched just so I could go to heaven.
I began reading things about past prophets I had never known. I began to realize that there were multiple first visions. I began to understand what the Adam/God doctrine really was and how the Church today was ignoring past prophets. I saw that the laws of tithing had changed only when the church was threatened with bankruptcy. I saw that the History Of The Church - something that I had relished was not what it appeared to be - that it had been re-written and changed by the Church to block out embarrassing things the Church didn't want me to read. I saw that Mormon Doctrine was not what it appeared to be. I saw that the Doctrines Of Salvation had been watered down into a single-book called "Answers to Gospel Questions". I saw that the Autobiography Of Parley Pratt was a total lie. I saw more and more and the cracks in the wall of Mormonism began to shatter before me.
I began to get angry.
I was lied to.
For years, those men in those suits who I thought were men of God - LIED TO ME.
They controlled me. The harassed me. They excommunicated me in my darkest hour when loving arms would have done more good.
My anger turned to hate. To shame.
And worst of all, I let them do it to me. I let them control me. I let them force me to get married early. I let them FORCE me to obey them. I let them coerce me into a little room and force me to tell them details that were NONE OF THEIR BUSINESS.
In 2001 I searched everywhere and found a copy off a website on how to have your name removed. I immediately changed the form to fit what I wanted and hand delivered a copy to the Bishop and the Stake President.
They sat on it for over a month and did nothing therefore I called the LDS Church and demanded that my name be removed.
Roughly 3 months total I got my letter saying I was out.
It was pure vindication. I was now in control, not the Cult.
It is my hope and fervor that I can be an aid to anyone in Mormonism that is looking for the truth and wants to get out. I also hope that I can prevent anyone from joining the Cult of Mormonism by telling the truth - THE TRUTH MORMONISM HIDES.
As to my father in law, I forgive him, he's just a cult member with small-cult mentalities and the man absolutely adores my little red-headed girl.
My wife and I have a very good relationship, even if she is still Mormon and I am not, we have peace. And our daughter is beautiful. I tell you this, I have experienced more love from my wife and daughter than the Mormon God ever did or ever will. It is true love.
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