BYU May Not Be for You

I hate the question, what year are you in school?

Um, 6?

Oh, so how much longer do you have?

2 years. 

Oh.

Yes, I’m a super senior attending BYU.

This last weekend I went back to visit BYU-I, the school I attended first before transferring to BYU my sophomore-ish year. 

Right in front of their building was a sign that read, “If you take 30 credits a year, you will save money and graduate faster!”

I couldn’t help but laugh and cry at the same time, I wish BYU had that same attitude.

Let’s rewind a few years. 

After meeting and marrying the love of my life at BYU-I, we both got accepted to BYU and felt, even though we didn’t necessarily want to, that we both should transfer there.

Leaving BYU-I was hard. We both loved it there! I was leaving a graduation year of 2018 and because of a ridiculous system at BYU for not taking all transfer credits (even from their sister school), I was put back two semesters. 

It was exciting to be at such a large school! The football games were a blast, the classes were hard, and playing in the band was thrilling. 

I found myself missing the 30 student classes that BYU-I often offered. But melting into the crowd on the 25th row sometimes felt nice. 

My career goals didn’t change with the new school, so I took the pre-requisites for the marketing program, and then retook one of the classes to get my grade high enough.

With great excitement I turned in my application and waited. 

Only to find out that my BYU-I grades were docked and therefore weren’t high enough to apply. 

Their reason? They didn’t know the classes were as “rigorous” as theirs. 

Trying to ignore the ridiculousness of not accepting sister-school grades, I changed my career goals to advertising,

Only to apply twice and get denied both times. 

An important part to know is each application can only be turned in once a year (for marketing), and every other semester (for advertising). Meaning that just trying to get into a program has added a year and a half onto my already lengthening college sentence.

Before I continue I want to talk about what kind of student I am. I get A’s and B’s with one C. I never miss a class and take organized notes in every class. I study for every test and meet with groups to study. 

I’m not a bad student, but for BYU, I’m not good enough. 

BYU is a competition. 

They’re not there to help you achieve your goal, unless you’re the best. 

I’m a husband and father who not only works and takes care of my daughter, but also balances a schedule for my wife to continue school also. 

BYU is not designed for people like me to graduate in a field they want. 

That’s why I couldn’t help but laugh/cry at BYU-I’s sign.

The reason I wanted to write this is for YOU to know that just because BYU is “prestigious” or has a football team, it may not be for you.

Please don’t make a quick decision, really think about it. BYU-I or any other school may be a much better choice for YOU.

No matter what you’re parents or friends say. Think about it for YOU. 

Panic, Magnesium, Pitocin, and God’s Hand

9 months had never been longer.

It was July 6th.

With only days until my baby’s due date, we had everything ready. A duffel bag sat in the trunk of our car complete with our detailed birth plan and everything we could possibly need or want for those hours at the hospital.

Our birth plan had been carefully planned out with a lot of research put in to every inquiry.

Here’s a summary:

We didn’t want to be induced, we wanted the room lights dimmed, we didn’t want an episiotomy, and definitely not a C-section.

We had been meeting with a doctor that agreed with us and knew our plan. 

Now, back to July 6th.

After helping my wife to the car, I drove to the doctor’s office for her weekly check up. 

The ever increasing-frequency appointments had become pointless in my mind. Without seeing the baby every time, the checkups became mundane, inconvenient, and dare I say, boring.

Until July 6th that is. 

You could tell something was wrong after the nurse took my wife’s blood pressure.

She didn’t say anything to us, and left to get the doctor. A few seconds later, the doctor broke the news that her blood pressure was 180/120. That’s high.

With a smile on his face the doctor explained that we should head over to the hospital and have the baby today.

Wait. What?

Then he left. 

We pieced together that my wife had pre-clampsia. I had watched enough Downton Abbey to know that wasn’t good.

We drove to the hospital and arrived. After being checked in, we sat in a room wondering if we were simply getting her blood pressure re-checked or if my frightened wife was going to be induced. 

After the third nurse came and left our room, I stopped her and asked if we were being induced.

“Yes.” She said.

Well there it is. 

Things are about to get real. 

After I.V’s pumping Pitocin and Magnesium, vital monitors, and a tube in my wife’s spine, the contractions came.

And my wife slept through them.

A calm before the storm is a real thing.

Remembering the advice my dad gave me, I walked to the cafeteria to eat before what I was sure was going to be a busy night. 

With the room-temperature, cardboard fajitas in my stomach, I grabbed a sugarful can of Barq’s root beer and sat down in the dark room. 

With magnesium coursing through her body, my wife was in and out and not completely there. Her blood pressure was dropping dramatically, accompanied with vomiting and extreme nausea, and then rising with a growing headache and increased swelling.

She may not have been feeling the contractions because of the miracle of an epidural, but emotional pain and panic ran rampant.

After many violating checks, the nurse told us it was time to push. These next two hours are some of the scariest I have ever experienced. 

It was a rollercoaster of emotion as Jess’s blood pressure flew up and fell down while My soon-to-be-born daughter Winnie’s heartbeat dropped dangerously low with every push.

At one point, with Winnie’s heartbeat low and not rising, the nurses quickly helped my wife on her knees in an attempt to relieve the pressure on the baby. Normally getting on your knees wouldn’t be hard, but when you don’t have any feeling below the waist, it’s pretty close to impossible. 

The doctor was called in (along with the 8 other nurses and the newborn specialist on skype) as the nurses announced that our baby girl was soon to be in our arms. We were told throughout the process that Winnie could have a lot of problems.

My wife finally was able to lay on her back once again and I saw Winnie’s head for the first time.

“Does she have hair?” My wife asked amongst pushing. I couldn’t have heard her right. Is that what she’s worrying about?

Yes.

She did have hair. 

With Winnie’s heart rollercoastering through each push, the doctor ordered for the operating room to be prepped for a c-section.

At this point I really started to panic. Everything came down to this moment. Winnie had to come out in the next push. With her heart rate dropping and the danger of my wife having a seizure rising, we hit the point of no return.

Nothing had gone according to our plan. My wife was induced, she now was getting an episiotomy, and we were probably going to have a c-section. 

Then, as usually happens in these points of life, a miracle happened.

With the help of a suction cup on a string, the doctor pulled Winnie out on the last possible push and her beautiful scream rang through the air.

We were told she would be silent and limp. With so much magnesium in the mom’s blood, it often adversely affects the baby. 

She came out, in every meaning of the phrase, kicking and screaming.

The room went from 12 nurses to 3. Everything was going to be okay. 

It was over, Winnie was born. 

After everything was cleaned up and my wife was put back together (figuratively and literally), it was just her, me, and our baby.

I have a family.

I finally met my baby girl. 

We slept for the next few days. The nurses in the nursery were a godsend.

My wife’s recovery was rough. We avoided a seizure during birth but she had one afterwards.

Finally she was off the magnesium with her blood pressure in control and ready to head home. 

Finally it was over. 

On the drive home I couldn’t help but think that God knew us. I couldn’t include everything that went wrong, but in the end everything worked out. 

God brings us to the point of no return, just to show us He is guiding us. 

It doesn’t always end with a healthy baby, or a recovered wife, but it does always end with His loving hand guiding us.

I smiled at these thoughts as I turned our little Honda Civic into our welcoming apartment complex. Things were going to be okay, it was over. 

Then I got home. 

I Was Addicted to Pornography

I have fought with the idea of sharing my story for a long time.

On one side I didn’t want people to know what I had done.

On the other side I battled with feeling if it was appropriate or not to share…

Finally I realized that I needed to share it.

If we don’t talk about the addiction as often as we talk about alcoholism or smoking,

Then it will never be fought against as much as other addictions are.

Along with sharing my battle with pornography I invite anyone else who’s gone through similar 

battles themselves, 

if we share our stories others will find strength to reach the same point we have.

My addiction began in Middle School.

I had always been an avid reader.

Being mesmerized and obsessed with the Bourne movies I decided to read the novel it was based on.

Now to understand where I was at this point, I was naïve and clueless when it came to sex.

As anyone my age should be, however that’s becoming less and less normal.

I remember being in elementary school and coming home from a bus ride asking my mom what a 

blowjob was,

She never let me ride the bus again.

The book hooked me right at the beginning.

However not too long into the book I began to read a passage that was curious yet disgusting.

The main character was described having sex with the woman in the book and I couldn’t stop 

reading.

Not knowing what the feelings were I read it multiple times until the feelings became overwhelming.

Shutting the book I felt confusion and guilt rise inside of me.

I decided, after fighting myself for an hour, to go and tell my parents.

Too embarrassed to tell them it was from a book, I just explained what I was feeling.

They told me it was normal and that I was going through puberty.

Dismissing the event, I forgot it as quickly as I could and never read the book again.

I am not alone in this type of event in a young man or young woman’s life.

There will be a moment where someone discovers the sexual feelings inside of themselves.

Sadly, these events are coming more and more often through pornography.

Whether it’s a picture, a book, a movie, etc.

It’s Porn.

Parents have a responsibility to teach their kids not only about sexual feelings, but also about pornography and what it can do to them.

Because kids will experience it at a very young age.

At this point, if I knew fully what the effects of pornography were, then it may have stopped the addiction right then.

I don’t blame my parents.

At that point pornography was barely spoken about in society, it was there, but not in the same degree it is today.

The next few years I went through the angst of the teenage years.

Pornography began to creep in stronger and stronger.

It became a daily use type of thing.

I felt that I had to get the emotion out somehow, and if I didn’t use daily then they would just bubble up until I had to.

I decided that I was going to stop.

Then a couple of weeks to a month later I would fall back into it.

What was the trigger?

Stress and guilt.

Do you see the cycle?

I would use, feel less stressed, then feel guilty, then use again to remove the stress.

This is the same cycle with any other addiction.

The addiction itself leads to the trigger.

I was miserable.

And I can honestly say I hated myself.

Now I wasn’t the guy sitting in the back with my hood up depressed all the time.

I had friends,

I smiled.

I contributed to church youth group activities.

I got okay grades.

Yet I hated myself. A lot.

There would be nights where I would physically hurt myself because that is what I deserved.

What kind of person was I that couldn’t overcome this small thing?

What I didn’t realize was it wasn’t a small thing.

I needed help from others but couldn’t bring up the courage to talk to anyone about it.

Eventually I talked to a leader at my church and he explained that I wasn’t the only one.

That this problem and addiction is normal.

How was this normal?

Nobody around me did it.

They liked themselves, they were happy.

The problem with pornography is it doesn’t present itself like other addictions do,

 by someone becoming drunk,

or making a person smell like smoke.

It is completely secretive.

The addiction doesn’t show itself unless the person is driven to rape someone or act violently in a sexual way.

However most people don’t reach that point.

They stay in the hidden, self-loathing, position that I was in.

Telling someone helped.

I began making the changes I needed to.

But I slipped right back in.

Seven years after my initial exposure to pornography I used it for the last time.

What made this different from all the others?

First, I had been trying to stop for years.

All of those efforts were important to quitting finally.

I had been eager to do missionary work for my church but they had standards each person had to meet.

One of them included being sexually pure, which included not watching pornography.

The opportunity to do missionary work came a lot faster than originally planned and I found myself not being able to go,

Because of the simple fact that I couldn’t get over this one addiction.

I remember being torn and distraught.

The feelings of self-hatred returned quickly.

I didn’t want to go back to that life,

I had improved.

Improvement happened, but the perfection needed didn’t.

Walking to the classroom I was going to meet my church leader in was a long one.

I knew how this was going to go, I wasn’t going to be able to do missionary work.

Once again, as it was every time I openly shared my addiction with another person,

he was extremely understanding and was an important influence in me overcoming the addiction.

He again shared that I wasn’t the only one.

I set a plan with him to overcome the addiction,

And with him decided I was never going to use again.

And I didn’t.

It’s been four years since the last time I sought out pornography.

I am happier than I have ever been.

I am faithfully and happily married to the most beautiful girl I have ever met.

Happiness isn’t on a screen, or through pictures, it’s with healthy relationships with those around you.

Pornography addiction can and will be overcome.

I know many who read this are, will, or have faced an addiction with pornography.

It will destroy your life and your relationships.

I know because it destroyed my closest relationships.

Take the first and hardest step,

 and tell someone.

It’s the first step in a long journey.

But it’s the most important step.

Stop reading this blog and call someone,

Text someone,

Or talk to a person under the same roof as you.

Start today, and I promise one day you will be able to write something just like this.

You will overcome it.

You can and will do it.

www.fightthenewdrug.org

Don't Let the Test Deter the Decision (Part 2)

WAIT, DON'T READ YET!

Before you start, have you read Part 1?

Oh you have? Great, you can keep reading then ;D

Weeks and months, then years flew by as I embarked on the greatest adventure of my life. Returning home, I found the similar numb feeling I felt when I first left. It quickly faded as I spent the time I had been dreaming about, with my family. Then college came, too soon if you asked my mom but not soon enough in my opinion. Before I knew it I was back in Rexburg, Idaho. My "goal setting" training from the past two years stayed ingrained in me. I had a goal and was going to work at it. I was going to find a wife.

The second date I went on I knew she was special. Four months passed and I found myself taking the same seemingly long, both mentally and physically, walk to the Rexburg temple. Jessie’s hand was in mine. I gently squeezed her hand and smiled. We followed a path that was all too familiar to me. I felt much different this time. My walk wasn’t slow and heavy. My feet sprang as step by step she walked with me. Elated as I was, there was a grounding sensation that began to weigh me down. Pushing off the sensation we stopped at the granite bench. What was the sensation? Was it doubt? Fear? An answer to not continue? Or was it simply just the worry that the bricks would come raining down upon me again? Looking into her piercing blue eyes I smiled. The worries fluttered away with the wind. We faced the granite bench, facing the temple, and knelt together. My elbows began to ache as we opened up our hearts and future to our Father in Heaven. We weren’t necessarily asking what direction we should head, but rather if the one we joyously were embarking on was the right one. Rushing sensations filled my being. Familiar with the feelings now, I welcomed them with open arms. Saying my personal prayer of thanks I opened my eyes and with surety, looked at the face that would fill my future. We were getting married.

I immediately opened the steel coated umbrella--the bricks didn’t come! It was exciting to me. Maybe I had grown up enough to move past that.

            I struggled as I carried the hide-a-bed couch up the two flights of stairs to our apartment. Our apartment. The idea didn’t scare me. As I gratefully dropped the heavier-than-you-can-even-imagine couch onto our living room floor we thanked the family that helped us and both sat down on our couch. Our couch. In our living room. In our apartment. It was then I felt the familiar feeling of raining bricks as responsibility came crashing down on me once again. I caught each brick with grace. Sure, some hit me on the head but I had Jessie there to catch those bricks I missed. Together we were able to build a bigger mansion with those bricks than I could have ever dreamed of. I was familiar with responsibility and welcomed it like I would a bowl of Reese’s Cup ice cream. I turned to Jessie and smiled. She smiled back with her sky blue eyes and that beautiful smile I fell in love with nearly a year ago.