I'm in an awful spot and need to get this off my chest. This may be tmi (regarding sex), if you don't want to read that's okay. I'm in a straight-passing relationship cause I'm bi. They're not lds. We are getting married soon, but we started to have sex, and I had a panic attack and stopped. I feel like I have destroyed myself spiritually, and I don't think I can go back, even if I wanted to, because it's not the first time its happened. I feel so dead.
The way you’re describing things sounds like you feel shame, not guilt. Guilt is you feel bad for something you’ve done and you want to do better. Guilt is meant to have us want to repent and get back on track. Guilt is focused on behavior, shame is focused on yourself. Shame says you are bad, you have no value, It’s the difference between thinking “I did something bad,” or “I am someone bad.”
You are not a terrible person. You are not your worst choices. It’s important you understand this. Your intrinsic value is not diminished, you are loved and worthy of being loved. Your Heavenly Parents don’t love you any less.
You can stop beating yourself up, okay?
Let’s address some of the things you brought up.
Regardless of who you are having a relationship with, it doesn’t make you straight or gay. You have the capacity to love twice as many people compared to most of us, that’s an incredible gift.
It’s terrific you found someone to spend your life with and to trust them fully. You must be quite a person if they want to spend their life with you, I imagine you bring a lot to the relationship. And they must be a treasure if out of everyone, you chose them.
Certainly some LDS couples have sex before marriage, and I think most non-LDS couples in the US have sex prior to marrying each other. it doesn’t make them horrible people. As far as the church is concerned, it’s more a timing issue.
You know what happens when missionaries meet a couple who is living together but aren’t married? They don’t ask them to stop sleeping together, they ask the couple to get married. The missionaries don’t even ask them to stop having sex until they’re married.
When an LDS couple has added sex to their relationship prior to marriage, they are basically asked to do the same thing, get married. Or if they don’t want to marry, to end the relationship. The couple won’t get married in the temple, but can be sealed a year after they have a civil marriage. I’m not sure what sort of repentance process they’d be asked to engage in, but it’s doable.
By saying you don’t think you can go back, I’m assuming you mean to church. This is false.
If you want to go to church, my recommendation is find the missionaries for your area and tell them you’ve been inactive and want to come back. They will happily greet you and sit with you. I don’t know about you, but it’s easier for me to be in a group of strangers if there’s someone who knows me, or at least lets me be next to them, they’re sort of are like a security blanket for me. And plus most missionaries carry a special spirit with them and are concerned about people, which makes them nice to be around.
If you’re feeling spiritually dead, coming to a church is a good place to jump start your spiritual battery. If church is too big a place to begin, you can pray, you can go for a walk in nature, any number of things.
In my opinion, too often we teach the Law of Chastity as if it’s one-and-done. That makes people believe that once they’ve broken it, they can never go back to being chaste or a good member. This is not true!
God wants to forgive you, the price for anything you’ve done has already been paid by Jesus. You are never too far gone, you can always return.
You’ll have to figure out what all this means for your relationship. How will your partner feel if you go to church? Think about how far away the wedding is, will they accept going back to a non-sexual relationship during that time? If not, you can work on the repentance process as a married person. If you do go to church, you don’t have to meet with the bishop right away or confess anything until you’re ready. No one should be putting pressure on you, this is something you do when you’re ready.
If it’s been a while since you’ve been at church, I want to make sure you’re aware that you don’t have to meet alone with the bishop. I know that can be really intimidating, especially if you’ve had a bad experience with this in the past. You can ask for another adult to be in the room with you. It can be the person you’re engaged to, the missionaries, anyone at church who is friendly to you, male or female. This is meant for your comfort, if you think that would help, then ask for someone to be there.
Remember, you get credit for trying. You don’t have to be perfect. Elder Holland says that “the Lord blesses those who want to improve,”
When the Lord says, “Come unto me,” and “Come, follow me,” He means, come as you are. Come and let me help heal you, let me help improve you. We don’t have to wait until we have our act together, He’s going to help us.
