Julie was raised in the church. At a young age she was the victim of sexual abuse. After her father and grandfather were arrested for abuse, she had to deal with the repercussions of everyone she knew treating her different because of the situation, including ward members. She struggled finding places to live, and eventually enlisted in the army. She met a man that became her husband, and they started taking missionary discussions together and he was baptized. Later she found out things were not what they seemed to be in her marriage, and it ended in divorce. Julie came back to Utah and found love and hope in new friends. She witnessed miracles that pushed her back to the gospel. Today, Julie's love for the gospel & the peace that radiates through her life, is evident.
Transcription
ASHLY
00:14
Okay. All right. Well, Julie, I am so excited to hear your story. I don't know a lot. So I'm excited to just hear it for the first time. And yeah, let's hear a little bit about you and kind of what you do, and just, you know, all the things.
JULIE
00:36
Oh my gosh, so much. Let's see, I am a mom of four. My kids are ages four to nine. And so I'm not I'm not typical, like a Utah mom having all the kids so close together. I'm 37 years old. I live, like I said, in Lehi with my husband and kids, we have two dogs. I've been through a lot of career changes. I don't know if you could say that in my adult life. Almost right out of high school, I joined the military. So I served in the Army for five years. And that was a great experience. It taught me a lot. There's a lot of things I don't like about the Army, but there's a lot of things that I really value from my service. And then after that, I am in the military as a computer geek. I just worked on all the information systems. And then after that, I trudged into the civilian life and started a career in information technology, worked for a big organization in Salt Lake City. So, I was a computer geek, and then after that, I quit there when I got pregnant with my first. Actually, after my first was born, I left. And I've been living the stay-at-home-mom life. But my birth experiences have shifted my mindset and I wanted to help other people have better birth experiences. I became a doula seven years ago, after my second really empowering birth, and I've been helping women have babies ever since. More recently, I have become a birth photographer. So I'm more birth photographer now, a little less doula work. And that's really cool to be able to be a part of people's experiences that they bring their babies into the world and get to document that beautifully for them to remember. So that was really cool. I was going to say one other thing. Oh, yeah. And I also co-founded a company called the VBAC link. So lots of women in our country have cesareans and think that they need to have cesareans for the rest of their births. And the reality of it is that vaginal birth after cesarean is a safe and reasonable option for most parents who have had a C-section. They're just not given the information, education or support in order to have that. So the VBAC link is created too, and we have a podcast as well. We train doulas, we have parents, and share information, teach classes and stuff all over the world. So it's really cool for that. So that's kind of about me.
ASHLY
03:13
Yeah. Awesome. Well, let's dive into it! Let's hear your story of coming back to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
JULIE
03:22
Yeah, I love that you're doing this, first of all. I saw a thing on Facebook somewhere. And I'm like, “Oh, my gosh, I have to be part of this.” Because I feel like right now, especially lately, in the last several years, there's been a lot of stories about people leaving and just leaving. And I think it's really empowering for people who have left, or who are coming back to have this type of support. Because I didn't have support in my family when I was coming back. I had a few close friends that kind of became family. And without that system, I don't know what I’d have done. So to have something available like this, I think it is really, really cool. So I'm excited for what you're doing.
ASHLY
Awesome, thank you.
JULIE
I think a coming back story kind of has to start with a leaving story, I guess you could say.
ASHLY
Mmhmm. Yep.
JULIE
So, I was born in the church, my mom and dad were sealed in Salt Lake City temple. I was born in the covenant. And I was the oldest. So I have two siblings, one each, a brother and a sister. And I grew up in a really little rural town in southern Utah. And church was always, my dad was always kind of the guy that I could go to with questions or, kind of like the scholar, I guess you could say. And he was a convert when he was 17. He got converted, and then he went on a mission a couple years later, and then his parents got baptized while he was on his mission. So that was kind of cool. But it was interesting, growing up, I don't know, I could reflect back now like 20, 30 years ago, right? Because I am that old that I can look back that far now. Looking back and seeing the different dynamics in my house, how some things were a little bit unhealthy in our relationship with the church. And we would have moments as teenagers, right, your teenagers and you kind of rebel, just what teenagers do, right. And so I had a period of time where I was kind of a difficult teenager, I'm not gonna lie. And I didn't want to go to church, I didn't want to do a lot of things that my parents’ household had in order for us to do, the rules or the requirements. And so if I didn't go to church, one day, my dad would ground me until, like I'd be grounded until I went to church next. And I feel like there's a couple little things that are really unhealthy in that relationship, but nothing too drastic or too big, like that alone themselves would have pushed me away.
But when I was 17 years old … Well, I guess first, let me kind of preface this with one of my very first, or my very first memory at all, ever, as a child was being sexually abused by a babysitter that we have had at our house. And then after that, I had started being abused by my grandpa, my dad's dad, and so from the time I was four, till the time I was a teenager, I was being continually sexually abused. And I think that's kind of a big part of the story. So it's pretty traumatic. I'm actually still healing right now from that. So working on that trauma and all of the stuff, healing, so I'm so proud of everybody who takes the time to heal themselves so that they don't continue the generational stuff, you know, that just keeps going. So, anyways, when I was 17, actually it was just before I turned 17, I came home from school one day, there's a four-generation picture hanging up on our wall of my brother, my dad, his dad, and then his grandpa, so four generations. So my brother, dad, grandpa, great grandpa, and the picture was off the wall. And I don't know why I noticed that the first thing when I walked in my house, but I walked into the office, and I saw my mom and like, “Hey, where'd the four-generation picture go?” And my mom was at the computer crying. She was crying, and I was like, “What is going on?” I'm a 16 year old teenager. I'm like, “What the heck's going on?” I was the first one home, and my mom told me to sit down. And I was like, “All right, well …” starting to feel a little weird here. So she told me that my dad had been arrested. And I said, “Arrested for what?” Well, it turns out that he was abusing my brother. And one of my brother's friends. They were 12, probably. Little 12 year olds, 12 year old boys. My dad was molesting them. And he had been for a while. My mom had walked in on it. These are all parts I’ve heard, that I've learned through the years. She didn't tell me all of this right there. But she told me that she had walked in on it happening. And she closed the door and left. And my dad had told her that if she was going to turn him in, then to let him know. so that he could kill himself.
ASHLY
Mmm.
JULIE
And my mom couldn't sleep with him in the same bed after that. And so he slept in the living room, on an air mattress with a shotgun under the couch. For months, my mom decided what to do. And us kids, we were just oblivious. We were just, we just thought he was sleeping out there because he snored really loud, which he did, so it was believable. But so my mom had this big burden of what to do. Right? She struggled and wrestled with it for a long time. And ultimately, she did the right thing. And she reported him to the authorities. He got arrested and he served a really long time in jail. He's out now, which is a whole nother story for a whole other podcast I think. And a few months after that happened, my mom sat me down and talked with me because my sister had come to my mom and talked about my grandpa abusing her. And my mom wanted to know if he had done the same to me. And so I told her that he had and then he got arrested, like I said just a few months after, and he also served a very long time in prison and is out now which is a whole nother story for a whole nother podcast.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
09:59
So there's a lot of trauma, deep rooted issues there. But after my dad got arrested, my mom was a single mom living, you know, in a house that she couldn't pay for with three teenagers that she couldn't afford and dealing with her own trauma and stress and healing and everything like that, too. And so the church just kind of, we just became inactive. We just didn't go because there's so much work and she had teenagers. And everyone was grumpy, and it was difficult. And it was interesting because in a really small town. I don't know if you ever lived in small town, but anyone who's from a small town knows that word travels so fast.
ASHLY
Yeah.
JULIE
So fast. So that day while I was at school, the day my dad got arrested, my English teacher, no, it was History teacher, she, her dad was the sheriff of the county, one of the county sheriffs. And she came up to me before class put her arm around me and asked if I was okay. And I was like, “Yeah, I'm totally fine.” Like, “I don't know what's going on. Why would I not be okay?” Because she knew that my dad had got arrested before I found it out, during school.
ASHLY
Mmm.
JULIE
So it was a big thing. And there's three little towns that went to my school, and everybody's kind of talking about it. And you know, as teenagers, you don't know how to deal with anything. And what was really interesting, though, is the moment where my family needed the most support, like our ward is very, very Mormon rich town or Latter-day Saint rich town, most people were members, and everyone in the ward kind of isolated us. The Relief Society president told my mom that she couldn't believe she had the nerve to stay in town, after what had happened. Yeah, I see your eyes, and like, yeah, but she said that. And the bishop that was there, couldn't even make eye contact with my mom. And me and my mom had a visiting teacher that was really great. But the visiting teacher worked at the same prison that my dad got moved to. And so it was a conflict of interest. And so she couldn't be a visiting teacher anymore. She's the only one that came to support us and help us during that time. And so, you know, I hear in a lot of people's stories, when they leave the church, that so-and-so did this, or the bishop did that, or, or the community or the people. And I totally get that, that people totally isolated my family. And I can kind of understand to a little degree because it's a small town, not a lot happens, right? In the small town, somebody gets a speeding ticket, and everybody knows, you know, within an hour and so it's people probably don't know how to process that type of big thing, when they're not really that used to it. But I also struggled with my mom really needed help. She really needed help,
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
and nobody was there to help her. And so ever since then, and this was, let's see, however many years ago. 21 years ago, so what year does that make it? I don't even know, 2000, 2001.
13:19
And it was really interesting, though, just kind of that big shift. And we went from going to church every Sunday to not going to church at all, questioning everything, and not having support right from our ward family. So a year after that, just before my 18th birthday, I was a senior in high school, and I remember planning on moving out to live with my boyfriend who lived in Phoenix. He was going to college in Phoenix, we met in this small town, and things just weren't working out at home. Everybody was just dealing with baggage differently. And I was just planning to move out. And so my mom, it was like the middle of the night when I couldn't sleep. And so I ran a bath to kind of relax myself. It was like two o'clock in the morning. And my sister's room was right next to the bathroom. And she came out of her room, it woke her up the shut the tub woke her up. And she started yelling at me, because I woke her up, and I started yelling back because that's what teenage girls do. They yell at each other. And my mom came downstairs and she told me, she just screamed at me. She's like, “I want you moved out of this house before I get back from work tomorrow.” And so I don't fault her for that because you know, a lot of trauma response, a lot of stuff to unpack there. But I was already planning on moving out, but you know, I was just going to finish up some classes first but I packed up my little car with a few of my possessions and I left that day in the middle of a snowstorm in January, and I moved into Phoenix. I had an apartment. I lived in an apartment with four guys. It was a two bedroom one bathroom apartment, I lived in it with two guys. And my space was a little coat closet. I had a coat, like, you know, like you hang up your jackets in. It was just as wide as my shoulders maybe a little wider and just about as deep right. And that was where I put my little little chest of drawers, all my clothes on my hygiene stuff. And that was my space for a year.
And it was, you know, I was officially gone from the church by then. And so I did all the things that you can do, that you know, you never do in the church. I was drinking and spending time with the guys, all the things that you just don't do. You know, when you're actively living the church standards. And so it was really interesting, because about a year after that me and my boyfriend, we had gotten engaged, and then we broke up. And so I was living in Phoenix, Arizona, and my mom told me, I could not come back home because she didn't have any space for me. And so I was homeless in Phoenix. I had like two days to move out. And so it was really funny, because I think all along my journey back into the church is not happening yet. But there have been little snippets of things to let me know that God still loves me, you know. And that's the thing that I really like about our gospel is that it doesn't require membership of the church to feel God's love for you. We can feel that love no matter where we are, no matter what we believe, no matter who we are, no matter if you have a house or not have a house or live in the closet, a coat closet, right? So I remember when I got kicked out, or when I was homeless, I thought, “What am I going to do?” and I looked up the closest church building I could find, and I called the clerk's number. There was a clerk, like the ward clerk’s number was on the website, and I called them, and it was a singles ward. And I just asked if there's anybody was looking for a roommate by chance. So it's so funny, but it ended up that there was somebody, one person looking for a roommate. And so I moved in with a stranger. I'm working as a waitress at Denny's. And I went to, I didn't really go to church and I went to a couple of the activities and the bishop had me over for Christmas and Thanksgiving. And it was really nice, I didn't become active or even have any desire to do so. But it was nice that somebody was showing up for me, you know. It felt good that I was able to rely on that part of our church when I hadn't been able to, and my family hadn't been able to for such a long time. So after I was living in that apartment with a friend or I guess she became a friend. I don't know, it was really weird. It's kind of a strange relationship. Again, I had my own space. She had her second bedroom. It was a guest bedroom, and I had a dresser. So I have a dresser, and a shower and a roof over my head. So I can't complain too much. But it served me well for what it was. But again, I was working at Denny's and one of my friends that was working there who had joined the Army. And we used to go to the mall where the recruiting office was and we would just sit and just shoot the breeze with her recruiter. And one day I was there he’d buy us lunch because there is you know, the government would pay for lunches and stuff. And so one day, we were there, talking with the recruiter, and I was like, “You know what, tell me more about this Army crap, you know, like, what is up with this Army crap?” Like, “What’s the deal with it?” because I was working at Denny's when I just got unengaged a few months before that. I had a scholarship to go to a college down in Phoenix, which I had given up because when I was engaged I was like, “I don’t even need to go to school, I'm just going to be a stay at home mom.” So I had nothing going for me. So I was like, “Tell me more about this Army stuff,” and the next week I took the ASVAB test and the week a month after that I was off to Basic Training, and it was really interesting because again in Basic Training every Sunday I don't know if people know a lot about the military or Basic Training, probably not too much but you do basic training things every day but on Sunday, it was kind of a rest day, mostly a cleaning day. You just clean the barracks and the other parts you know around the grounds, but they have every single denomination of church for you to go to and so there's Buddhists and Catholic and Baptists and Seventh-day Adventists but those guys went on Saturday. So the Saturday, those people had a special little exception, which was kind of neat. But anyways, I digress a little bit, but there's all the different religions. And so anybody would load up in one of the back of an Army truck and you would go to whatever church service you wanted to go to, based on your religion. And I would always get in the back of the truck to go to the LDS church, because that's what I knew, right? And so we'd go there, and the LDS church had a reputation for people’s families would send would mail, like treats and candy and stuff like that to the church. And then during Sacrament meeting, the soldiers could get their packages and eat their sweets and stuff like that during Sacrament Meeting. And so, lots of people want to go to the LDS church, because that's the one where you could get all the good stuff, because you couldn't get shipped that stuff straight to your unit. And so it was really fun to have that little thing. But there's always just like three or four people in the back of the truck on Sundays to go to the LDS church. And those people went their own little ways, and then you come back and clean the barracks and stuff all day. So it's kind of like you wanted to go to church if you believed in God or not, because then that was less time you had to spend cleaning.
21:24
So it was really interesting throughout my military service. At first, I went to South Korea after Basic Training. And when I was in South Korea, I met a guy who played high school football with my uncles in Utah. And so it was really cool, because he was from my mom's hometown, and I was like, “Okay, do you know these guys?” and he's like, it was kind of cool, because he was an active member of the church still, and he went to a Korean branch off post. And a couple of times, I went, you know, with him and his family to the Korean branch off post. And it was just kind of interesting, definitely different than Utah, because it's such a small congregation, there's a couple dozen people, maybe, there, and it's just in a little upstairs loft from the main church where the Korean members went. And it's just interesting because like I said, it only went a couple times and I only knew a handful other LDS members when I was in, whenever people thought like, I was LDS, then I would kind of get made fun of a little bit. But I was also like, not really too interested in defending the religion either because I was drinking, at one point I was smoking cigarettes, and just hanging out, you know, doing all of the things. And so I mean, there's a couple of times where they got the complete core doctrine completely wrong, like I would correct them. But most of the time, I was just hanging out and having fun with people. There's a couple of times where I went to some Relief Society activity where we made little seek-and-find quilt things where you can, like little baby quilts. And I went there one time. And I mean, it was nice, because I had that contact that knew my mom and her brothers. And so it was really nice.
And then I got married, when I was in Korea to my first husband, I’m married to a better one now. My first husband, we met there when I was in the military. We got married at the embassy in Seoul. And then we got stationed in Hawaii, our whole battalion moved from Korea to Hawaii. And in between that time, he got deployed to Iraq. So he was deployed. And the whole battalion moved from Korea to Hawaii. And so we were in Hawaii, and I was living on base in a house when my first husband was deployed. And in some weird way, the missionaries found me. They have this way of doing that with members, right? They just find you. And so one day the missionary show up at my door, and they couldn't come in because I was the only one there and you have to have another male in the house when missionaries are there. And so I would just open the door and stand out on my lanai and talk to the missionaries for I don't know, 30-45 minutes. We’d just chat, and I’d you know, go back and I'd smoke cigarettes and drink and keep living my life because I had lost that desire to have anything to do with the church. My big examples in the gospel were my dad and the people like in my town that didn't show up for us. There's just a lot of trauma associated there with that. And so I just didn't have any interest. I knew God loved me, I believed in God still. It wasn't ever, I didn’t ever get to the point where I lost my faith in God but I just didn't have the desire, the pull to you know, go back there.
And so the missionaries would come and we’d talk, and it turns out right across the street from me in this really small Army base in Hawaii were the only other members on post. They lived across the street from me. So I got to know them. And they had me over for dinner a couple of times, which was really nice. And then my husband came back from Iraq, and the missionaries kept coming. And we would just talk, they could come in now and we would just chat just about whatever.
ASHLY
25:30
Was your husband, did he have any ties to the church at all? And if not, what did he think about having the missionaries over?
JULIE
25:38
Yeah, no, that's a great question. I was just about to get there. His dad is a Baptist priest. Oh, I forget the title. I don't know if that's right or not. But he was some type of clergy in the Baptist church. And so it was really funny because he had a completely different upbringing than me completely different belief system. The fundamentals are kind of there, but just lots of different beliefs. And so it was interesting, because they've come over and my husband would just ask them all the questions and joke and laugh and not really anything doctrinally. And then my husband told his dad that the Mormon missionaries were coming over and he got really mad at him. He was like, “What are you doing?” He kind of got a little stern on the phone with him, because he knew I was Mormon, too, when we got married, but just neither of us were practicing. Neither of us were big into our faiths. So it was really interesting, because eventually, my husband started taking the discussions. They were still discussions then, I think maybe it was right about the time Come Follow Me was getting started. So I can't remember if it was the discussions or maybe the Come Follow Me, but one of those. And eventually, you know, I stopped drinking. On New Year's Eve, I had my last drink on New Year's Eve, and then, you know, sobered up a few hours so I could drive us home a few after that.
ASHLY
27:11
And wait, what year, how long ago was this?
JULIE
27:15
Oh this was, let's see, 2008.
ASHLY
Okay.
JULIE
So it was New Year's Eve, 2007. New Year’s Day was January 1st, 2008. So, then, a couple of days after my birthday in February, you know, the missionaries had challenged us both to stop smoking. And so we stopped smoking, and I'd been trying to quit for a little while, and just never really had a good motivation. But then, what happened was my husband quit before me. And then the missionaries were like, “Oh, he can quit, but you can’t.” It made it like, “He's better than you.” But they didn't say that, but it was like a competition thing. And I'm really competitive. So I said, “Oh, I can totally quit smoking, too.” And they took my pack of cigarettes and they like ran it over with their cars. Like really,
ASHLY
Dramatic.
JULIE
like made it fun, a little symbolic, dramatic thing. Yeah, totally. And eventually, they invited my husband at the time to get baptized. And he said yes. And it was really amazing, because I was starting to gain my faith, and we were going to church in a little town called Wahiawa on Oahu, and I love, like, Hawaii church is so amazing. So, so amazing. And so we kind of had that little bit of, I was just like, okay, yeah, I can kind of had that shift, like “I think I'm heading back. I think I'm believing, I think I can start to feel these things.” And so he got baptized on the beach, in front of the Laie Temple.
ASHLY
Oh my gosh! That is incredible that he had his baptism there.
28:54
Yeah! It was beautiful there. Yeah. And so the only time the missionaries could go in the water, when they're stationed in Hawaii is when they baptize someone in the ocean. So they always want to baptize you in the ocean. And so I mean, it was perfect. It's beautiful. And I remember, a couple weeks after he got baptized, he was a military police officer. And so he had to work sometimes on Sundays. And so there was a Sunday where I just didn't want to go to church, without him and I'm feeling alone, and like, “Oh, it's been a long week,” you know. I was out of the Army by this time. I got out in May, and this was sometime in the summer. And I ended up going. And just I don't know why, I don't know why, because I just I felt a little bit of a pull, like nothing super conscious or whatever, but I just went. And then I was in there, and there was a couple members that had become my friends, kind of my friends by then you know, friendly, and I was sitting in church, and they, it was about Mosiah in King Benjamin. It was in the Mosiah book, or the Book of Mormon and it's about King Benjamin's sermon. And I remember the scriptures they were reading, and the Spirit touched me so hard, and I felt so strongly that I was where I need to be. And that Heavenly Father approved of this and that He loved me so much. I just could not stop crying through the whole lesson. Like everybody knew I was going back to church, everybody knew, but you know, this is new, my husband was recently baptized. I just sitting there sobbing the whole time because I felt the Spirit so strongly, that verse in Mosiah touched me to my core. And I can bring it up and read it. It’s Mosiah chapter 2, and actually goes from verse 36, to verse 41. But I'm not going to read all of that. But the part of it that got to me, that made me start really crying, but also feel that Spirit was in chapter 2:36. And it said, “And now I say unto to you, my brethren, that after you have known and been taught these things, if you should transgress and go contrary to that, that which has been spoken, that you do withdraw yourselves from the Spirit of the Lord, that it may have no place in you to guide you in wisdom's path, that ye may be blessed, prospered and preserved. I say unto you, that the man that doeth this, the same cometh out in open rebellion against God, therefore, he listeth to obey the evil spirit, and becomes an enemy to all righteousness. Therefore, the Lord hath no place in him for He dwelleth not in unholy temples.”
And I have goosebumps right now. Just reading it, but that verse, right, I have done that. I had left the church, I had denied those things I had been taught, the Spirit was not with me. And then how he, so I love King Benjamin because he's so direct. He just doesn't beat around the bush. And he says, you know, you're, you become an enemy to all righteousness, and the Lord has no place in you. I felt all the weight of all my decisions and everything that had happened over the last however many years, just on me, but at the same time, I felt the seriousness. I felt that impression, that the things and the choices we were doing were not great. But at the same time, I also felt that peace and comfort that the choices I was making now, were good. And then it goes on, the last verse in Mosiah chapter two is verse 41. And I absolutely love this verse. And it says, again, this is verse 41 in Mosiah chapter 2. It says, “And moreover, I would desire that you should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual. And if they hold out faithful to the end, they're received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never ending happiness. Oh, remember, remember that these things are true for the Lord God hath spoken it.”
ASHLY
Wow. That is so good.
JULIE
I know. Goosebumps, right? So I'm like, there's two very polarizing verses, like this misery and an enemy to God and all these things, but then it goes on to say, if you remain faithful, look at all these things that are going to be given to you. Like it felt like, so there's so many big feelings, so many big feelings, and the “remember, remember” words in there, “Oh, remember, remember that these things are true for the Lord God hath spoken it.” That's going to be a little important, maybe a little bit later on in the story. But it was just that day that I knew that I was not on the right path. And that's the but the path I was starting on, was the right one.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
And so it wasn't very long after that, maybe just a couple months, that I found out that my husband hadn't actually really quit smoking or drinking. Right? And that he had a girlfriend on a different military base, and that he didn't want to be married anymore. That’s kind of like the big summary of all of it.
ASHLY
Ohhh.
JULIE
Yeah. So we ended up getting divorced. I caught him in these conversations, and he had issues with pornography and stuff in the past, but my thing is like, with marriage, even though we weren't sealed in the temple, right, we made a contract and a promise. And as long as you're willing to work on it, I'm willing to work on it, and we're both working on it together. Then it's going to work. If we're going to fight, we're both fighting for it to work, then we have a really good chance. But as soon as he gave up and told me he didn't want to be married anymore, I was like, “Alright, I'm out. I'm not going to be in a marriage when half of it doesn't want to work.”
ASHLY
Yeah.
JULIE
So it was really a simple divorce, we had no kids, you know, he was in the military, I had just gotten out, it was pretty clean cut, you know. Lots of dividing, he showed up to go through all of our stuff together, completely wasted drunk. So I just got to decide what to do with everything, which was nice. But I also didn't take advantage. It was pretty, like I said, pretty clean cut, straightforward. So I got my biggest part, I think, the hardest part for me by that point, I feel like the Lord had a big hand in my life, getting me to that point. I was ready to leave, but still had enough faith growing that I could sustain myself. Because my family, they're still inactive. They’re still inactive. Nobody in my family is active members of the church. And so nobody was gonna help me come back. And so I left Hawaii, and I moved back to Utah in the end of
September, and it was too cold for comfort. And my mom finally, my mom had space in her home for me this time. She had gotten remarried, since, you know, in the years that had passed. And so I stayed with my mom in a different small town, same area. She had moved out but moved to a different place. So I moved and I ended up getting a job in Provo. So I moved up to Provo, in my own little, I had a one bedroom house all by myself, in Provo, and I hadn't gone to church since I left Hawaii. Because I was like, “What do I do now?” I wasn't quite sure, I wasn't quite strong enough in my faith yet. I had no idea what I was doing. My mom wasn't active, so therre was like nobody to go to church with when I lived down there for a few weeks. And then in Provo, I wasn't really excited to be the recently divorced single person.
ASHLY
Mmhmm. Yeah.
JULIE
You know how Provo is–like, you know, it's really, really, oh man. There's just lots of inexperienced
ASHLY
Yeah.
JULIE
young Mormons there at church.
ASHLY
Yeah.
JULIE
And I was very experienced by this time. I had a lot of life experience, right. And I had just gotten out of the marriage, and I was still unstable in my faith. And so I didn't go to church for several months. But then I remember one day, I had a cousin of mine, a second cousin twice removed, and we're weird like that, because we are Mormon so we know our genealogy, right?
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
So we know our relationships. But she kind of helped me a little bit when I moved up to Utah County. And then, after a while, things just started to get weird with her. And we
38:31
got in an argument that she just stopped talking to me instead of wanting to resolve it. And I just want to talk it out. Like, we can talk about, let's talk it out. And she chose to handle things differently than that. And that's her way and I have my way not that either one is correct, the correct way to do it. But we kind of lost touch. And so here I am, again, in Provo alone, right? I have a little bit better space, this time and a solid job, but I was kind of lost. So I looked up what church I was in, I was in a student ward, and it was actually in Orem, but it was a student ward. And so I just went to church. And by this time, um, I guess maybe I forgot to say this, but after my husband got baptized, before we got divorced, I have some repenting to do so like former repenting to do. And so I went to the bishop there in Hawaii, and we started my repentance process and I was actually on formal probation for a little while. So I couldn't take the sacrament, I couldn't have a calling, I couldn't pray in church, things like that. And when I left Hawaii, I’m still on formal probation. So I’m like, “Here I am!” Like still on formal probation, right? I kind of didn't know what I was doing on my journey. I was like lost and alone, and so I went back to church and then I scheduled a meeting with the bishop that day that I went, and we started you know, kind of picked up my new bishop called my old bishop and got all the things situated then I get situated, I’m not sure exactly how that works. But I do know that they talked, and kind of got back on the way. But the first couple months maybe, yeah, this was December. So in December, I remember there was a Fast and Testimony meeting, and there was a girl that got up to bear her testimony. And she shared that her brother had committed suicide that summer. And she shared a lot of her journey and her process surrounding that. And while she was talking, I was like, “Wow, I just really love this girl.” I feel this love for her. Right? She had a really rough summer, I had a really rough summer, I've been through lots of trauma in my past, too. And I was like, “I want to know this person.” And so that night, the Relief Society president in our singles ward had some people over for dinner. And she was one of the ones that she that was there for dinner, and I was one of the ones and we met and we connected, and we just became best friends. And she's still one of my best friends to date for her and a couple other people that I had met in that singles ward. And through those connections, kind of became my family. And they were there for me, carrying me through. One of the guys that we met at ward prayer, one of those nights, had served his mission in South Korea, and I was like, “Boom. We have this connection.” So me and her and him became this close group. And then one of his friends, we just kind of became this band of people. And they strengthened me, so much. And I rely on them so much, because I didn't have people like that, that I could look up to. And so it was very helpful for me and very strengthening for me. I feel like God placed those people into my life. I know that I went back to church exactly when I needed to. I know that I met these people, I know that I overheard the conversation about South Korea, at ward prayer at the right time. These people came into my life to bring me back and help carry me the rest of the way in.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
And they were, shortly after, you know, I got taken off of formal probation, and I got my patriarchal blessing. And it was a very beautiful blessing. And one of the things that they talked about, like in that scripture it has, “Oh, remember, remember these things.” Ever since then I was like, every time I would see something in the scripture where it says “remember, remember,” I would underline it, because it's very important, right? So you remember two times, right? So you gotta remember, remember, not just for regular remember, two times remember. And so in my patriarchal blessing, the words, “remember, remember” show up multiple times.
ASHLY
Wow.
JULIE
And throughout my blessing. I know I got chills when I was listening, and I was rereading through it, and it's so important to me, because I feel like the Lord speaks to us in ways that we can understand that.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
And, and at that time, I was hyper focused on the “remember, remember” things in the scriptures. And I still do that to the day, “remember, remember,” because it's really significant things. And so kind of to wrap it up a little bit, I guess, not too long after that I got endowed in the temple. I was, oh my gosh, 25. And, you know, no relationship in sight, no future husband in sight. And I was at that age where I felt like I wanted to progress more spiritually. So I got endowed. And my friends were all there with me in my endowment room. My mom was there waiting outside when I got out of the temple because she wasn't able to go in, and along with my siblings. But it was nice to have kind of that family with me. And so then just a few years later, I moved up– actually, not even a few years, it was maybe a year later, I moved from Provo to a place near Salt Lake City. And I moved into a singles ward there. And that's where I met my current husband, the forever one. And it's very nice, because his family is really great. They're really strong in the gospel. And it's been nice to have that to rely on as well. And it's just interesting how throughout my journey, I can look back and see that the Lord put me in certain places in certain situations where I would be where I would have information and revelation presented to me so that I could receive it. Obviously agency is my choice, I could choose to receive it or not receive it. But I have been in those positions and in contact with those people and learning those certain things at those certain times, to where I could at the right times.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
Where I can receive it and come back and Heavenly Father just meets our needs in the most beautiful ways. There's been really cool things along my journey. Lots of cool little spiritual revelations that, you know, there are so many I can’t even share them if I wanted to. But there's one that I do know that I will share. As I was driving home one day after a long day of work and really long drive, and I felt the very distinct impression that the reason why I got married the first time was so that I could be in Hawaii, for the missionaries to find me so that I could start my journey back.
ASHLY
Wow.
JULIE
And so because I thought that it was very strong impression, I hold on to that, and really tightly, because if I wouldn't have gotten married, and had a choice where I could stay in the military or leave, I would have stayed in. And I would have been in Iraq with my unit at the same time the missionaries started knocking on my door. And not to say that I wouldn't have come back later on or any other time, but that time was right for me.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
And Heavenly Father is very, very wise. And He knows when we're ready and open to receiving certain things, and He will give us that information when we're ready for it at the right time. And I don't necessarily think that all of the circumstances that led to me leaving the church were my fault, there's a lot of influence. And as a teenager, you know, there's so many things going on in your mind and spiritually as well that I don't think anybody would have expected me to be the only one in my family to stay strong in the gospel.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
You know, after our lives fell apart, I don't think anybody would fault me for that. I don't think anybody should fault anyone for leaving, first of all. I mean, we all have our own paths.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
But I look back, and there's just definitely some really cool things that have happened along the way. And like I said, like when I was in the service before even the missionaries even found me again, there's been lots of little moments where I just looking back, it was obvious at the time. But looking back, you can see that Heavenly Father is very mindful of you, and knows, and He's just waiting,
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
just waiting for us to come back. I heard a devotional one time, I can't remember the speaker. I can’t remember his name, but I see his face clear as day. And he said something to the effect of, “You can venture off the path as far, you can go off as far and deep into the woods, and off into the distance far as you want to, far as you can possibly imagine going. But the second you turn around, Christ is there to receive you, no matter how far you've gone off.”
ASHLY
48:15
It's so true. That is so true. I love that.
JULIE
48:19
Yeah, and I love, yeah, I love that so much because like nobody's ever too far gone. You are never too far gone from the Lord's love. And from Heavenly Father's love. The second you turn around and look for it, it's right there for you. The second you turn around.
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
And I love that so much. And so here I am. I just, you know, there's just like everybody else's testimony, it kind of goes through moments where it's super strong, and other times where it's not as strong but going upwards, in that upwards trajectory. And it hasn't been easy. There have been lots of really hard times, especially with my family not being in the church. Getting married was one of them. This was, I love the recent changes that they made where you can have a civil ceremony and then get sealed right afterwards because when I got married, if you did that, you'd have to wait a year
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
to get sealed in the temple. And so we chose to get sealed in the temple. And so my mom wasn't there. Because I told my mom, I'm like, “Mom, I will wait for you. I will wait if you tell me you want to be there, I will wait for you to be temple worthy.” And she wasn’t even doing anything massive and she doesn’t even drink coffee or anything, right? I told her, and she said no. And that's okay, because that's her journey, but it still hurt a little bit, you know,
ASHLY
Mmhmm.
JULIE
to have to make those harder decisions. It was really interesting because my husband's family is very big. And they took up a lot of the sealing room. But I have my friends, right? My friends, the three of those guys that were there that were my family and you know, my grandpa was there because my grandpa's still in the church and his wife who, his first wife passed away but his second wife, who's really really amazing, just like a grandma to me, and I had a couple of my aunts and uncles in there, but I missed my mom, and that was a hard one. But one day, one day, maybe she'll come back and
ASHLY
50:22
Be on this podcast.
JULIE
50:25
Maybe! Yeah, maybe one day, maybe. You guys keep waiting for maybe the right things to say, or the right time to maybe bear witness or bear testimony. But I've never felt like … There's been actually a couple of times that I have. The Payson temple was built and she was born in Payson. And I was like, “Mom, so you're gonna go to the Payson temple when it’s complete?” And she's like, “Whenever I come back to the church, the Payson temple will be the first one I go to.” And I was like, “Well.”
ASHLY
We'll take it!
JULIE
No pressure, I'll take a win. I'll take a win, you know?
ASHLY
For sure.
JULIE
And, yeah, I guess that's kind of my journey. Yeah, I guess. I've been talking for a while.
ASHLY
51:06
Um, we have just a couple more minutes left, but I just, I love what you said about, you know, the second that you turn around, the Savior's waiting to embrace you. And it's so true, I think that, you know, in my own personal journey, I was on drugs and all that, and I just was, like, “You know, what? Maybe I can just see if the church will help me and give me some sort of fulfillment.” Or, you know, because I had tried everything else, to try and get my life back together. And it was like, when I made that decision that I was just going to experiment, as Alma says, I was going to experiment and see what happened. And, you know, and it truly did. I had all of these little things. And this is a common theme that I see in people that come back, is they see all of these little things. Just all the things that you mentioned in your story, with the missionaries, and your friends and the South Korea, that your friend that served in South Korea, and it's like, all of those little miracles, they may seem like not that big of a deal to somebody that's an outsider. But when you're in that position, and you see these miracles happening, it's so incredible. For example, when I first was, you know, starting to get clean, I was only like two weeks sober, and I was in rehab. And I found this Book of Mormon bookmark in this Bible at the Salvation Army in the middle of Fresno. And I was the only person that had church roots. And it was just totally random and crazy. And I found that common theme in people since I've been doing this is hearing them come back, and they have these, these little miracles that they see in their story. And so it's just so incredible. And you have an amazing story. You've been through a lot. And it's really cool to see how you've come back and you know, where your life is today. And you know, how you can make it through traumatic events, and you can make it through hard things and, and your life is amazing today. And I loved in that scripture, how you said, well, in Mosiah how it says that if you keep the commandments, there's a blessed and happy state.
JULIE
Yes.
ASHLY
And it's so true. It's so true. And you know, just in my own life, and just what you described, it's like, the fruits of how you're living your life before coming back, and then the fruits of how you're living your life today, it’s like, they're very obvious, you know what I mean?
JULIE
Mmhmm.
ASHLY
And so I love that. That's kind of what that scripture reminds me of. But yeah, any last thoughts? Any thoughts or advice you might give to somebody that's thinking about coming back or struggling or any thoughts that you have?
JULIE
53:59
Oh, man, um, yeah, I do. You don't have to be perfect at it. You don’t! It'd be unreasonable to expect anybody to do all the things right the second you decide “Yeah, maybe I want to come back.” Like I had to just pick one thing at a time, work on one thing at a time. When I was coming back from my journey. Work on tithing. I got tithing down solid, feel comfortable with that, okay, next, like work on my sailor mouth, because I had the mouth of a sailor. I needed to stop saying the F-bomb, like even two times a sentence. Right? And so I just like, okay, I'm just gonna stop saying it. I’ll still think it, I'm just gonna stop saying it. I stopped saying it, then I stopped thinking it, and that took a couple months, and then I got that down. It was second nature to me. So then I moved on to something else, right? And you know, and it's, you're not going to be perfect at everything all the time. Even, you know, right now, I'm not perfect at everything all the time. But it can feel overwhelming to have to do all the things and make all the adjustments, right? At the same time, and you don't have to do that. Pick one thing. Do one thing and do one thing until you're really good at it and then find something else to add in.
ASHLY
55:09
I love that. I love that.
JULIE
Thanks.
ASHLY
Well, thank you so much for being on the podcast you're amazing
JULIE
Thanks.
ASHLY
and I am just so excited to have you, so thank you so much.
JULIE
55:19
Yeah absolutely. It's so great to chat. Thanks.
