Marriage, it's what brings us here together today.

Marriage, it's almost everyone's goal in life. I mean, come on, who doesn't hope to fall in love one day and maybe settle down with that person? What happens when you throw in sins that prevent you from going to the temple, but despite that, you still hope to one day be married there in the temple?

Yup, that's where I am at right now. I'm currently in a 2 and a half year relationship with my non-member boyfriend. He's been an atheist pretty much his entire life and until recent events, hadn't even really considered the possibility of God and religion. Well, I'm in love with my boyfriend, and would love to marry him if he were LDS. I've told him for the past year that I wouldn't marry him if he wasn't LDS.

It's been my lifelong dream to me married in the temple. Even if I've made all these mistakes, I want to find a way back to the temple some day. If there was only one thing I could accomplish in my entire life, this would be it.

Well, my boyfriend said he has an interest in the church and has been "meeting" with the missionaries. By "meeting", I mean he's only had maybe two or three discussions with the missionaries in the last four or five months. He makes little effort to make plans with them. I probably should push him more, but I don't feel like it's my responsibility. Maybe this seems selfish, but it's his beliefs, not mine. Who am I to force religion on him? I really would like to marry this boy though...

To get to the temple, so that we could even me married, requires a long road of repentance for myself. If I'm going to go down this long road, I'm going to make it count. I'm going to try my damnedest to never go back again.

This is where my boyfriend sees issues. As he put it, he doesn't see how I think things are going to "magically" change and be good after we're married. He wants to be able to still drink on a regular basis as well as other issues I know are wrong. Like I stated in the previous post, he feels that you can't just change like that, it's part of who you are. Example, he's brought up the fact that I enjoy sex. He feels that I can't just stop, because of the fact that I enjoy it. Just because I enjoy it, doesn't mean I don't know that it's wrong. If I really wanted to change and took the steps to change I'm certain I could abstain from sex until marriage. Along with this, I feel that because of the way he already feels about this, that if I did change he wouldn't love me because I wouldn't be the "same person". I guess this also brings up that maybe he doesn't really love me to begin with if he's not willing to accept that I can change. It's really just a long drawn out issue and always seems to be the issue of my life.

When we first started dating I was madly in love. Later on, I started to have doubts about our relationship, especially with the fact that he was dead-set atheist, and I was set on marrying someone of my own religion. During these doubts I thought about finding LDS members that I could possibly relate to. I resorted to dating websites like eHarmony where I did actually meet a few men I was truly interested in. I never cheated, just talked with these men. I know this was terrible, but they were kind of my "back-up plan" if something happened with my boyfriend. We had some more serious issues later and broke up. We eventually worked through things and got back together. It's been four months since we've been back together and I had no thoughts of ever leaving him. I was sure this was the man I was going to marry. We've discussed it plenty of times and I told him that I wanted to be engaged soon.

Suddenly, last night I had an odd dream of cheating on him with someone I haven't had an interest in for a long time. It was unusual, and suddenly today I found myself looking at ways to connect with other YSA men. Why suddenly now? It just seems so odd to me. Maybe all the talk with my sister is getting to me. I talked with my sister about him and it seems as if I have more negative things to say about him than positive, yet whenever I'm with him things are amazing and wonderful.

This makes me feel like there's enough issues that I need to talk with my boyfriend about, but I'm honestly scared of how he'll take it and if we broke up again. I really do love him and we already went through a rough breakup before. I don't know if I could handle another.

Honestly, part of me would rather find someone who is already a member or the church and has a decent background and foundation within the church than try to struggle with someone who seems barely willing to even learn about the church. I know my mother's never opposed to me meeting someone in the church to possibly get married to... Issues for me always come back to the fact that if I found a good Mormon guy, how would I ever explain what I've done and gone through? How often do you hear of virtuous young men in the church completely accepting someone who's not virgin, let alone had sex with multiple men, or even indulged in illegal substances. Who would accept that?

Honestly, part of me looks for YSA men that are going through what I'm going through; the struggle of church and sins. At least we could relate in our experiences of life. But maybe this wouldn't be the best, because the few guys I've found like this, have little to no interest in ever coming back to church. I struggled with them just for them to fall away faster than myself.

I know this was long, but it's probably one of the biggest struggles in my life right now. It's honestly harder to deal with than it sounds like. Even after writing all of this out, I feel more torn than ever. My heart aches right now. I know what I want to do, but I don't if it's the right thing to do.

I know I don't pray often, but maybe now, more than most times, I really should just pray.

Intro

So, I wouldn't exactly call myself your average Jack-Mormon. I tried looking up other "jack-mormon" blogs, but all seem to resent the church. In no way do I really resent the church. I guess you could say I've just strayed from the beaten path. I try to attend church on a regular basis, I will admit that I don't alway enjoy the monotony of sitting through three hours of church, and I still serve my calling as a Primary teacher. I believe the church, the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, and latter day prophets all to be true. My issues lie in the choices I make.

I've done a lot of things I know are wrong, and I go through personal guilt trips for them fairly often, but still do them anyway. I drink coffee, tea, alcohol, I curse, I've smoked cigarettes and pot, I don't always dress "modestly", as well I have sex.

Even now, my gut lurches some over admitting these. They're pretty big things, and how do I go about changing? Am I really willing to change? I'm just not certain that I really want to. It's tough when part of you is fine living the way you are, but the other keeps telling you that you know it's wrong and that you need to change. It's a huge leap for me at this point.

I'm scared to talk to a bishop about it. It makes me so nervous. I've discussed it with my non-member boyfriend and I feel like he doesn't take me seriously. He acts as if I've done it all this time then there's no way I can change. He says it's just part of who I am. It makes me feel that even if I tried to change, and did, he wouldn't love me anymore because I wouldn't be the girl he knew before. Which brings me to another topic, marriage, but I'll blog about that later so this isn't all one gargantuan post. I know that people can change, I know I've changed. People can change for the better.

Really, I want to know that there are others like me. Those who either have been through what I am going through and now see the light, or those who are going through this with me. I need people to relate to. I feel that even my best friend, also a jack-mormon, doesn't completely understand me. It's just really hard.