Living through my husband’s excommunication was an interesting experience. People who he had considered his best friends turned their heads when we walked down the church halls together. In fact, I would often leave and walk around the neighborhood until Relief Society was over because I couldn’t bare it alone. I never felt like I was fully accepted in that ward. I mean, I get it, most of the women were friends with my husband’s first wife. It was difficult to put so much energy into a community that I didn’t feel like wanted me there. But he never lost his testimony, and I think he used excommunication as a way to help with his guilt from his divorce. You know, he was the one who called for his own disciplinary hearing.
The one thing I knew I wouldn’t do was join a church for someone else. I had to accept a lot on faith because it was very different from the church I’d gone to before. I think having doubt is a good thing. How else are you supposed to truly learn and believe in it if you don’t investigate? I studied forever to make sure that this was the right decision, that the word was true. My husband was re-baptized in 2001 and I waited until 2003. We wanted to be sealed in the temple, but were held up for years because Jerry’s priesthood blessings weren’t restored until 2007. As soon as we received permission from the First Presidency to be sealed, we went to the temple. We already knew that he had cancer and became sealed right before his first chemo treatment.
In 2009 my husband died. That was such a horrendous year. I lost my aunt and uncle, my husband, my sister in-law, and step-daughter. How did we survive? My belief in forever families is what gives me strength.
You asked me a question about whether I was still in The Church because of your dad. I said no, which is true, but I should have added it is the reason I got married again. I was worried about not keeping my covenants if I wasn’t with someone who was strong in the gospel. It gives me such peace knowing that I’m living in the way that God wants me to live. I guess I just feel like it’s my calling in this life. And since your dad’s death, my main focus in life has been to live worthily so as to join him in the celestial kingdom.