I would like to take some time to introduce myself. I am still figuring out how this site works. My name is Paula Andriessen and I live close to Rotterdam in The Netherlands. I am very grateful for the gospel and I know it is true. And I found out that the gospel does bring true happiness. This is something I did not always believe. Because eventhough I always went to church and tried to obey the commandments, I served a mission (in Salt Lake, by the way) I felled depressed most of the time.
This mostly had to do with the way I was feeling. I was attracted to girls. In other words, I had homosexual feelings. I did not want those feelings, because I knew that the church was true and I believed the bible and the prophets. And they told me that to act on those feelings was wrong.
Now the fact of living a celebate life was not very appealing to me at all, so I had to make a decision. I either overcame these feelings and would do anything in my power to accomplish that, or I would leave the church and actually start living the gay lifestyle. There was no middle way for me. I do respect people who can do that, but I knew myself and I knew that for me that would be too difficult.
So I started searching for answers. Went into therapy, first in holland, but there they told me to just accept the way I was and enjoy my life. That was not the answer I wanted to hear. The therapist even laughed at me when I told him I wanted to change. I found some pamphlets about people who had overcome and read in the scriptures a lot. I looked for stories of people who had overcome anything. It strenghtened my faith, knowing that if Heavenly Father could help them, he could also help me. I applied the scriptures to my situation and became stronger and stronger. It took me a few years and it happened with a lot of ups and downs, but in the end I was able to overcome. I now have a husband from Cameroon (Africa) and we have a beautiful daughter. View the pictures on my profile.
We were married in the temple and I am very happy, I do not get depressed anymore, because eventhough a lot of things have happened since then, that normally would make me very depressed, I now get over things very fast. Because I know that there is a reason for everything. We are on this earth to learn. And most of all, I know that we are children of Heavenly Father and we have inherreted his Characteristics, just like we have inherreted things from our earthly parents. I guess what I have gained from this struggle, besides my family, is peace of mind. And that is a beautiful thing to have. Heavenly Father has taken me by the hand and shown me all the things I needed to do to make change possible.
So that is a little bit about me,
Hope to hear from you,
Paula
