Then and Today...

I didn't like myself very much when I was 14. I was smart but not smart enough. I was cute but not cute enough. I was thin but not thin enough.

I was constantly trying to be something I wasn't. I wanted so desperately to just fit in. I was a typical teenager with atypical problems.

And then I found the Gospel. Or rather, the Gospel found me. A friend brought me home, only to a home that I never knew before. To a home where I learned that I was a child of God. That I had a Divine Nature. That I was more than I thought of myself.

It took a few years for me to fully grasp what that meant. Then, once I thought I understood what it meant, I decided to listen to the world. Then, as a young adult wanting to experience the world, I ignored what I knew for a few years.

It took falling in love with my unborn child. That was when I truly understood. That is when I understood what it meant to love a child. That is when I learned that as much as I loved my child, my Heavenly Father loved me more.

Then, as a fourteen year old, I struggled to ignore the whisperings of Satan that told me that I was not worthy of love. Today, as a thirty something year old mother, I still struggle to ignore those whisperings. Oddly enough, they are not that different. Satan knows my weaknesses. He still knows how to make me doubt myself.

Today, I like myself a lot more than I did when I was 14. Today, I know I am smart enough. Today (thanks to a husband who reminds  me daily) I am not only cute enough, I am downright sexy. Today, I know I am confident enough to do anything. I still struggle with feeling good enough, but today, I know better than to turn my back on what I know to be true.


Then, I struggled. Today, I still struggle. Then, I pretended to be strong. Today, I am strong.