Welcome Back and Episode Introduction

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome back to part two of my episode with Amy Lloyd on Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. I'm here with my brilliant co host, Margi. Hey, Margi.

Amy Lloyd [00:00:11] Hey.

John Dehlin [00:00:12] And we are here answering the question or telling the story of part one, listening to your voice or the cost of being conditioned not to listen to your voice as a Mormon girl, Mormon young woman and. And a Mormon woman. That was part one of our story with Amy Lloyd. Hey, Amy, thanks for joining us.

Amy Lloyd [00:00:33] Thanks for having me.

John Dehlin [00:00:34] Back in part one, we talked about Amy's Mormon upbringing, her attending byu, her getting married relatively young, having kids relatively young, and probably entering into a marriage that neither she nor her ex husband would probably say was the best choice for them. And doing that under, let's just say, at least on Amy's part, under the influence of conformity and social pressure and in some ways against maybe some of her own inner voices or inner wisdom. So we left last episode with Amy having a couple kids 8ish, 9ish years into her marriage, losing her Mormon faith, separate from the difficulties in her marriage, Amy. And eventually making the tough decision to get divorced and become a working mom with kids in Texas and all that that entails. So that was part one. And part two is going to be covering a much needed, much requested topic, which is what do you do when you are divorced from your believing Mormon spouse? You're no longer a believer in Mormonism or a high demand religion, and yet you share children and the metaphorical tug of war that potentially ensues when the believer is trying to raise the kids faithful Mormon and the non believer maybe feels a little harmed by parts of their Mormon upbringing. And in Amy's case, I'm guessing there's going to be themes about teaching your kids to listen to their inner voice versus ignore their inner voice. And that's where the theme from part one is probably going to come to the parenting discussion in part two. So that's my intro. Amy, anything you want to add?

Amy Lloyd [00:02:25] I like it. Nope. That's good.

John Dehlin [00:02:27] Okay. All right. So thanks for joining us. Check out part one if you haven't yet, I think you'll benefit from it. And so where we left off, you're in Dallas, you're in Houston. Houston.

Amy Lloyd [00:02:40] Yeah. Outside of Houston.

John Dehlin [00:02:41] Outside of Houston. Go. Katie, where I grew up, we didn't mention that last episode.

Amy Lloyd [00:02:45] Yeah, no, that's right.

John Dehlin [00:02:46] And you get a job and you start pursuing what, accounting with two young kids as a divorced ex Mormon single mom, like really quickly, we talk a lot about how high demand religions, and Mormonism specifically, can wreck marriages and leave women, particularly in the state of being divorced and without the education or career to really help them land on their feet and how terrifying and difficult that could be. And last episode, we talked about how lucky you were that you pursued accounting, had some accounting experience which enabled you at least to land on your feet a little more than probably the average Mormon woman who's divorced would be able to.

Amy Lloyd [00:03:34] Definitely. Yeah. Yep. I've had friends who've had to go back to school for their bachelor's and kind of start all the way over that way. So I wasn't starting completely from scratch. I did have a really marketable degree. I had some work experience with, you know, big five accounting firm under my belt. It was, you know, out of date. I'd had five years where I had a break in my resume. But it definitely could have been a lot worse. I am very grateful that I had that part in place. I kind of decided at first that, you know what, maybe now that I am listening to myself, maybe I do want to go back and pursue medicine. And I thought, you know, with two young kids, med school's probably not in the cards for me, but maybe, maybe I can go back and get my nursing license. So I actually started taking some prereqs to eventually maybe go back to nursing school. And it just got to be too crazy with working full time and being a single mom and all of that stuff. And I just had this moment where I was like, you know what? I have a good job. I don't need to make my life this. It's crazy enough without that added. Without that added pressure. So I did a number of prereqs and then decided to kind of put that on hold and indefinitely, I guess. I haven't gone back and done that. And I guess that is one of the, you know, one of the consequences is that, yes, I could. I technically at some point. And some people do. Some people will, after raising kids or while they're raising their kids, go back. And I've known of people who've gone back to med school after raising their kids. And that's great, but it's not without other consequences. Right. Like now I have three kids to put through college themselves, and now I have. It just. There's not a right time to do that. And, you know, people sometimes are able to, and that's great. But as a single working full time mom, it wasn't. Was not practical for me to do that. So I kind of put that on pause and leaned into, started leaning into my accounting career. So,

Navigating Faith Transitions Through Divorce

John Dehlin [00:05:37] and so this is where the rubber meets the road on a topic that causes much pain and difficulty for people that we have not covered on Mormon stories. And that's, you know, your divorce coincided with your loss of Mormon faith. You felt harmed by some of the dynamics specifically around silencing your own inner voice. And so you're gonna want for your kids something very different, but you're still believing ex husband is gonna more than ever probably want them to follow the iron rod. And, and that can cause whether it's. And we're not gonna ask you to talk about divorce or legal stuff, but I get people reaching out to me all the time where judges, you know, when there's deliberations around custody, the conditions around custody, there are all sorts of ways that this can get complicated. I don't know if you know this, but in Utah, particularly complicated if in some ways the legal system is stacked to favor the, the believer and specifically a believing woman where sometimes the non believers feel discriminated against by the legal system because of their non belief. I don't know if in Texas, yeah,

Amy Lloyd [00:06:54] I mean it wouldn't be like that in Texas. Thankfully there's not a bias toward Mormonism. But yeah, I have heard of that myself and I'm grateful that that wasn't something that I had to contend with at least, at least in that way. But yeah, it's really tricky and it's tricky for everybody and I have compassion for my ex husband on this too because I can imagine that that was frustrating for him that he had always planned to raise his kids Mormon and now there's a wrench thrown into that and I can appreciate how that would be frustrating and obviously frustrating for me too and tricky for the kids and having, you know, to navigate all of that. So it is, it's really, it's really just a tricky space for everybody, for both of the parents and for the kids. So it was really hard as far as the legal aspect. When we got divorced. We did, we did not have. I know that people sometimes do add things into their custody agreements, their legal agreements. In our case, we ended up just doing the standard language around religion, which in the state of Texas just says that each parent has the right to direct the moral and religious training of the children during their own periods of possession. And so I tried very hard to be completely hands off on their weekends with their dad and you know, tried to, you know, expected the same, the same for me on my weekends. So that's kind of how initially that played out. But there were a lot of things that were tricky and I knew what some of the messaging was gonna be at church that I wouldn't necessarily agree with. But it was hard. Cause I also didn't want it to. I never wanted to, like, quiz the kids about what they learned at church or what they, you know, I didn't want to make it hard for them at all. And I didn't want to make it feel like they were having to report anything back to me. So it was hard. A lot of it. I just had to kind of sit back and be like, okay, we'll see. We'll just kind of see what happens. And I'll do the best to direct their moral and religious training during my periods of possession and let their dad do the same. Where it becomes really complicated is with ordinances and things like that. Do you agree to allow baptism? Do you agree to allow priesthood ordinations? And I really wrestled with that and what to do with that. Initially I decided to not pick that battle. And so I decided to agree to allow my older son to be baptized, even though in reality I think that that's more of an adult decision to make. But I did agree to allow him to be baptized and that experience was frustrating. Yeah.

Children and Baptism in High-Demand Religion

John Dehlin [00:09:48] So tell for those who have never been Mormon or never been part of a high demand religion, or don't understand what you were feeling, why in the world, like I can imagine in some traditional Christian religions, whether a kid gets baptized or not is just not an issue. And let's just say someone dropped in and didn't listen to your first episode. Can you just put words to why your kid getting baptized would even be something that would be concerning to you?

Amy Lloyd [00:10:20] If you can, a couple of reasons. Number one, like, and I didn't really have this language at the time, but informed consent is an issue. And so I feel like there's. When you have a high demand religion, baptism is depending on who's talking. Right. Like, some people take it more kind of literally than others, but there can be a lot of pressure to then follow the. So then follow the path all the way through. If you've made this decision to get baptized, then by nature you're going to need to make the decision to be ordained at age 12, to be ordained to the next level at age 14, to be ordained to the next Level at age 18, and then to go on a mission. And it feels like there's very much, especially I think for boys, there's very much this expectation that's wrapped up in it. And that's a lot of decisions to be making at age 8. And they're not really realizing that they're making those decisions. And I also worried that. I worried about the pressure that he might feel from some members, not from all. I'm sure people do it differently, but I worried that he would end up. That the kids would end up feeling a lot of pressure that because they made the decision to be baptized, that meant that they had to do XYZ as well.

John Dehlin [00:11:35] Yeah, well, people, you know, Mormon kids sing a song. I hope they call me on a mission when I've grown a foot or two. That's. From a Mormon standpoint, it's just righteous teaching. From a non Mormon standpoint, that's indoctrination. Right. Or Follow the prophet, Follow the. You know, these just the innocuous, seemingly innocuous primary songs.

Amy Lloyd [00:11:59] Right.

John Dehlin [00:11:59] Can make. Can strike fear and terror into the heart of someone who feels like she may have been unduly pressured to follow a certain path.

Amy Lloyd [00:12:09] Well, and they were going to get that either way, and I knew that, and I had to trust that it would be handled well. And fortunately, I happened to be really good friends with the people in the primary presidency at the time, and we remained really good friends, and I had a lot of support from them. I have a really great group of friends whose friendship we maintained after the divorce as well. And even to this day, to the point. And they're so supportive that. To the point where, you know, someone in the ward at one point called me, called them Amy Apologists, because anytime a rumor would be started at church or someone said something negative about me, they would. They would step right in to correct it and say, no, that's not true at all. Or they were all. They were very defensive of me and always very quick to make sure I knew about everything that was going on, make sure that I knew when the primary program was. Make sure I knew when my kids were giving a talk. And they. To this day, we call ourselves the Amy Apologists, and we've just kind of shortened it now to the aas. But that's what it stands for. And it stems from those early days when they kind of saw me, you know, by a couple of people being kind of unfairly treated, and they stepped right in and wouldn't allow it. And because of that, I didn't. I don't feel like I had a whole lot of fear around the messaging that my kids were getting in the early days just because I was very Comfortable with the people that I knew were teaching them. I see, was really helpful.

John Dehlin [00:13:36] And that almost seems also fortunate because I can imagine in another scenario, in a conservative religion like Mormonism, if there's a divorce and one of the two partners leaves the church, then there's going to be all sorts of assumptions. Was there infidelity? Are they wicked? Are they worldly? Clearly, the person who stays in the church is the righteous one. Even though we know there's a history of all sorts of types of abuse in and outside of Mormonism, there might be a default assumption in the ward that the person who's no longer there is the wicked one. Right. Or the one to blame.

Amy Lloyd [00:14:15] And there probably was some of that. But my friends were wonderful in making sure that if it came across their ears, they didn't let it stand. And they made sure that people knew what the actual situation was. And I am very grateful for that.

John Dehlin [00:14:28] When you say when there was some of that, you mean gossip? Yeah, okay. Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:14:31] Or incorrect things being said about me or, you know, assumptions being made that weren't true. Amazing. I love these women so much. They are the best friends. And still to this day, like, we just. They are lovely, lovely humans. Cannot say enough. Good thing. And they're all such strong women. And they're so funny, too. Like, they just. And this is another reason I didn't worry about the kind of church messaging from them, because I trust them all so much with that. Like, they do it in a very healthy way. If there's unhealthy messaging that they hear, they're all very good at reframing it to a healthy thing or. Or they're very good at. At stuff like that and teaching in a very positive way and, you know, standing up for the things that maybe aren't so great. I remember one. One of my friends, she was getting ready for the primary program, and she was. All the kids had done posters, and they were all really excited about the posters, and she had them all set up. And the. I think he was in the bishopric at the time. I don't think he was the bishop yet. But one of the counselors told her, you know, you can't have these. We can't have posters up. We're not supposed to have any posters, you know, up on the stand or whatever. And she said, well, no, like, the kids are really excited about these posters. I want to keep them up. And he kept telling her, nope, you need to take them down. And she finally looked at him and she says, listen, if you want to take These down. You can do it yourself and go tell the kids. And he let her keep him up.

Margi Dehlin [00:15:54] So it's.

Amy Lloyd [00:15:56] My friends are just very. They're very strong. They stand up. They. I didn't worry about. It was of great comfort to me that they were the ones in charge of primary when my kids were little. So that's fortunate. It was very fortunate. Very fortunate. I felt very supported by them in and out of Mormonism. So. Yeah, So I did allow him to get baptized. It was. Despite most of the members being great. There were a couple of just things that made it. Made it clear that exclusion was going to be. There was going to be a lot of efforts made at excluding me from. From these things. I really had to make sure that I inserted myself to be part of it and that I helped plan the program. I help. I helped do all of these things. But there was a lot of pushback. And

Events and Milestones Ex-Mormon Parents Miss

John Dehlin [00:16:51] what are the types of events that a parent, an ex LDS parent might be excluded from? Just to give people an idea.

Amy Lloyd [00:17:02] Well, you know, if you're going back to babies, a baby blessing baptism, you know, ordinations that happen for boys, there's three levels of priesthood ordination that would happen at age 12, 14 and 18, I think. Right? 12, 14, 16, 18. Maybe there's four.

John Dehlin [00:17:17] 16.

Amy Lloyd [00:17:18] Okay. Are there four levels now?

John Dehlin [00:17:20] Well, you become an elder at 18.

Amy Lloyd [00:17:23] At 18. Okay. So it's the. It's deacon, teacher, priest, and then elder. Yeah, so the four. So every two years, basically. And then I have two boys. So double all of that by two. And then, I mean, eventually it's, you know, all the way up to potentially a wedding, a temple wedding that you could be excluded from. And that was. That was definitely a concern for me.

John Dehlin [00:17:46] I guess there'd be patriarchal blessings.

Amy Lloyd [00:17:48] Oh, patriarchal blessings. Yes, yes.

John Dehlin [00:17:50] And for sure, probably also seminary graduation advancement stuff.

Amy Lloyd [00:17:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:17:56] Also, don't they do like, parent kid days where that's what I was gonna

Margi Dehlin [00:18:00] say or like a daddy something or like talks?

Amy Lloyd [00:18:06] Oh, yeah, there were talks. And again, fortunately, my friends were privy to when my kids were going to be involved, so they always made sure to let me know. So I would attend church on those days to be supportive so that they would see that their mom came.

John Dehlin [00:18:18] And that's complicated because sometimes one might be so traumatized by going to church that attending is difficult. But it sounds like, how was it? Well, how was it for you?

Amy Lloyd [00:18:28] Well, see, for me, I feel like my Mormon story in many ways is very, very positive toward Mormonism because it's very positive toward Mormon people in general. I. I have had so many wonderful experiences with Mormon people, such great friends that I've always had great community to this day. I have great friends in the church and obviously family that I'm very close to and that all do Mormonism very well, in my opinion. And so I never felt. I never felt uncomfortable going to church, particularly because I knew my friends had dispelled things that might have tried to get started. But, like, I always felt very comfortable and I always felt very welcome. I've been fortunate. I know that bishop roulette is a thing, but I've been very fortunate to have great bishops, including after I left the church. And so, no, like, I never. My reasons for leaving were not remotely because of the people. And that's actually one of the things that I find very frustrating when you will hear sometimes from the pulpit, that the implication that people leave because they were offended by this person at church or they were treated unkindly by this person at church, that, to me, like, is not my experience at all. I feel like, or by the way of anybody that I personally know who has left, which is a lot of people. It's.

Margi Dehlin [00:19:52] Those are.

Amy Lloyd [00:19:53] Those things are what keep people in. The people in general are wonderful. And it's the doctrine, it's the policies, it's the procedures, it's the actual history that we have been. That has been framed, that has been told an inaccurate way, a purposefully inaccurate way. That is why I left. Like, that is what didn't work for me. And yes, I heard some unhealthy messages from the church, but the people at the local level, I. I have really nothing but good things to say about the people. And so I always felt very welcome to go to church. Having said that, yes, you're right. The talks that are given are sometimes not my favorite. I just don't agree with a lot of the doctrine or policies or practices anymore. And I do find some of those harmful. And then, of course, that trickles down into what people believe on the local level. So there is that. But as far as, like, a friendship, community aspect, I love it. I love the people there. So I felt comfortable going. I didn't feel traumatized by going, but I did feel like with my child's baptism, that there was definitely efforts made at kind of excluding and keeping me on the fringes of it. And I just felt like I tried very hard to kind of keep that out of my kid's sight. And I think I did, but I made a decision there that I wasn't Doing this every two years. So, yeah, I just felt like with the baptism, it ended up being where I felt like I was having to really make efforts to be included in it. And I didn't want that to have to be something that happened every two years with every ordinance, with every something that was happening. And I was uncomfortable. Anyways, it was my preference anyways for them to be 18 before they made these decisions. I felt like, especially in a part member family, that was something that they should decide on their own when they were old enough to make that kind of a decision. But I felt like I was kind of, you know, trying to just pick my battles and make things amicable. And so when it wasn't necessarily amicable anyway, I decided, you know what, let's just put a boundary in place and say, no, no more ordinances after this until the kids are 18, and then they can make their own decisions. So I always tried to really support and go to any events that I was aware of, but I decided that I needed to not do any boundaries. I mean, any ordinances.

Church Policies on Children of Non-Believing Parents

John Dehlin [00:22:25] This is a really interesting topic now that you're bringing it up, because. So the church has precedent for not baptizing children in 2015 policy.

Amy Lloyd [00:22:37] That's the first thing that came to my mind when that policy came out.

John Dehlin [00:22:40] Tell people what I was gonna say.

Amy Lloyd [00:22:41] So in 2015, and the church had a policy, the we, you know, the gay exclusion policy, I guess, for lack

Margi Dehlin [00:22:50] of a better term.

Amy Lloyd [00:22:50] I'm sure that's not what it's actually called, but where they said that after

John Dehlin [00:22:55] same sex marriage was legalized.

Amy Lloyd [00:22:57] After same sex marriage was legalized, yes. They made a policy where children of same sex couples could not be baptized even if both parents gave permission. They could not be baptized until they turned 18. And the reason they gave for it or. And until they then denounced their life, their homosexual parents, lifestyle, or marriage. And the reason they gave for it when they got pushback was that it was actually a kindness for the child because it didn't put them in this position of having to choose. And the first thing I thought about was that cannot possibly be the reason, because they put my child in that position. They're willing to put. To put children of part member families in that position with no problem. They don't see that as a problem. And that was the first thing that I thought about when that policy came out.

John Dehlin [00:23:52] Yeah, it's kind of disingenuous for them to use that justification.

Amy Lloyd [00:23:56] Yeah, absolutely. And there are things that are kind of built in for part member kids that are exclusionary for them. Like my. Because the kids. Because I wanted them to be 18 before they decided to do any more ordinances, they weren't able to do youth temple trips, because if you are a male member of the church, you can only even have a youth temple recommend if you have the priesthood. And so they weren't able to do that. They weren't able to pass the sacrament. So that was hard. I would say that that's definitely one of the things that I wrestled with, because I don't want my kids to feel excluded at church. But at the same time, like, I also don't want to do something that I didn't feel was right. And I really did think it was important for them to be able to make these decisions for themselves as an adult.

John Dehlin [00:24:42] I never thought of that.

Margi Dehlin [00:24:43] So that was hard.

Amy Lloyd [00:24:43] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:43] So if you're a baptized male member who's 12, but you didn't get the Aaronic priesthood, I didn't realize they didn't let you in the temple.

Amy Lloyd [00:24:52] Nope, they don't.

John Dehlin [00:24:53] I didn't know that.

Amy Lloyd [00:24:54] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:55] Wow.

Amy Lloyd [00:24:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:56] So that's shaming. Because then all your friends are like, what are you looking at, porn? Like, why aren't you able to go to the temple?

Amy Lloyd [00:25:02] I mean, I think that they knew that they weren't that. I mean, hopefully they knew that their mom just didn't. And I'm. And I told them. I actually told them. I'm okay with you saying your mom won't let you. Like, that's okay. If that's the easiest thing to say, say that. That's fine. It's actually true. So just say that.

Margi Dehlin [00:25:16] Right.

Amy Lloyd [00:25:17] So I'm hoping that that's just what they said. But, yeah, it was. It was a problem. And it actually ended up. It ended up becoming a further problem, and it ended up becoming a legal problem because my ex interpreted that as me infringing on his rights to direct their religious. Their moral and religious upbringing. Because. Well. And again, this is. I'm trying not to speak for him too much. This is my interpretation of why he did this, because he wasn't able to take them on temple trips when he wanted to, even on his own periods of possession because they weren't ordained. It got to the point where a deposition, a legal deposition was actually held and both of our bishops in our respective wards were called to testify in this deposition over it. And I again feel very fortunate because both bishops were very loving and very supportive and were very clear during the deposition that that is not a rule that I made up that that was the church's rule that they couldn't do temple trips. I wasn't trying to keep them from anything. I just didn't allow the ordinations to take place until they were 18 and that that was my right as a parent. So it turned out okay. But there was a lot of legal stress around that issue. So yeah, it is tricky. It's tricky parenting kids when you guys are not on the same page. It's hard.

John Dehlin [00:26:55] And again, this is mostly for the never Mormons. But Mormonism is like a funnel. You know, the widest rim is either joining the church or if you're a baby, having the baby blessing, which puts your name on the records, which means that no matter where you move, even if your parents aren't active, your name and address are on the rolls. And church members or missionaries can always seek you out, knock on your door, invite you to church, you know, and that's part of the funnel.

Amy Lloyd [00:27:27] But I purposefully wanted to keep my name in there because I wanted my kids records to be attached to mine. I wanted to make sure that I was always going to be privy to whatever was going on.

John Dehlin [00:27:38] But that's for the opposite reasons, that the church would want someone to stay a member. But I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. That's great. But what I'm also trying to get at is baptism becomes the next part of the funnel where you have to make covenants and you make promises and as soon you, the church, especially in 2023, is really into this covenant path thing where it's like, why should you not leave the church? Because you made a covenant not to leave the church. And when did you make that covenant? When you were eight?

Amy Lloyd [00:28:07] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:28:08] And by the way, when you're eight, do you realize that you're committing what it means to say you're committing 10% of your income for the rest of your life, that you're committing to only marry a Mormon, that you're committing to give two years of your life in mission service. And even though maybe an apologist would say, well, that's not what it has to mean when you get baptized, it's

Amy Lloyd [00:28:30] just about committing your life to Jesus Christ. And certainly there are people who view it that way, but there are plenty who don't either. And I don't know which people my kids are going to be in contact with, so I don't know what messages they're going to get.

John Dehlin [00:28:41] Well, that's just not how the funnel works. Because the way the funnel works is you Hear the songs about missionaries. You hear people giving their talks about how great their mission was. All the leaders are basically prepping and priming and instructing you about your mission someday. And then also about eternal marriage. And you're hearing, just like you got messages about motherhood when you were a young girl in the funnel, they're going to be getting messages in youth about what is in eternal family. We what does it mean to get an eternal family? What do you have to do to get an eternal family? You gotta pick a Mormon, marry him in the temple, get your endowments, live worthily. And like we talked about, those messages, even if Amy's home, non Mormon Amy, mom is home, neutralizing the messages that her kids are receiving when they attend church. There's the conscious and then the unconscious. And your kids are gonna be getting the indoctrination about missions, temple, marriage, byu, that non Mormons are less righteous and less worthy than the active, faithful Mormons. And that's gonna be that pressure, that social conditioning that acts like a funnel to where when they get to be 18 or 19, oftentimes those decisions have already been made 10 years prior. And that's why it seems so innocuous or benign.

Amy Lloyd [00:30:14] But it's not.

John Dehlin [00:30:15] Given the priesthood, he's.

Amy Lloyd [00:30:17] It's not innocuous.

John Dehlin [00:30:17] How could it hurt him? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to rant, but.

Amy Lloyd [00:30:20] No, I'm just agreeing with you. Yeah, it's not. It's not innocuous. It's not always innocuous, I should say. And that actually kind of came up in the last couple of years after my son turned 18. My oldest, he did decide to do the first priesthood ordination. And I told him I attended and I was there for that. He told me about it, but I told him beforehand because the talk had just come out. I think it was Elder Bednar who gave the talk. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it was Elder Bednar who gave the talk about exactly what you were referring to, that when you decided to serve a mission, it's not at age 18, it's when you were 8 and chose to be baptized. And now you're under. What did he call it? Consent? What did he call it? Like righteous covenant or something? Like you basically already made that decision and so it's no longer yours to make. Like you no longer have the agency to make that decision because you made it already. Something like that. And that talk had come out. Well, at least I had gotten wind of that talk fairly, like around the same time that he decided to get ordained. And so I told him that that was a concern of mine. And I wanted him to know that just because he was making the decision to be ordained, that that didn't obligate him to anything else other than. And I didn't want him, even if he heard messages to the contrary, to think that he was under obligation to do anything else. If he chose to serve a mission later, that's also his decision to make. But the decision to be ordained, just like the decision, just like him having been baptized at age 8 was not something that made it so that he had to serve a mission. It was still his choice. He still had the agency, no matter what you might hear, because I didn't know if somebody was going to hand him that talk or if he was then going to feel. And especially since he was 18 when he made the decision to be ordained, if then it was even more so. Well, you did know at 18, you clearly knew. And so you definitely have to serve a mission now. I didn't know. Maybe he never would have gotten that messaging, but I had heard that talk and so it was a concern. So anyway, backing up a little bit. So for their childhood, I did decide that it would be best for them to wait until they were 18 to make these decisions. But yeah, it's. It's tricky because I can understand why that had frustration on my, on my ex's part. And I think if the roles were reversed, I probably would have been frustrated by that too.

Tug-of-War Parenting Dynamics After Divorce

Margi Dehlin [00:32:43] So I have a question with regard to. I'm. This, this. Did you find that you got into any type of patterns of. Oh, like a volley where. Like a tug of war where you found yourself reacting against. And if not, how did you stay kind of grounded without moving to this reactive place coming either from what they learned on Sunday or a talk that you heard because you're trying to stay connected to your kids and what they're learning and what they're hearing, or do you know what I mean? This kind of tug of war or pattern of reactivity where you're reacting against in an attempt to balance what they're hearing?

Amy Lloyd [00:33:34] Yeah, so. And I probably didn't always do it well. I probably did react sometimes when I shouldn't have. I can't think of specific examples, but I'm sure that there were times where that happened. In general, I tried very hard to just parent them on when they were with me and try not to worry about the times where they wouldn't and weren't unless something specific came to my

Margi Dehlin [00:33:54] attention,

Amy Lloyd [00:33:56] I would ask them, oh, hey, like, how was church today? Blah, blah, blah. But I would try very hard not to pry. And usually they're boys and would just be like, it was fine, you know, so usually I didn't get a whole lot to go off of anyways. But there were a couple of times where I remember. I remember one time my son told me that they had had a lesson on people leaving the church. And I was real interested in what that was. And so I asked him about it, and he said that his Sunday school teacher had told them about her sister who had left the church because she didn't like the pictures they showed in primary. And I said, okay. I said, first of all, honey, I don't actually think it was very kind to be talking about her sister when her sister wasn't there to speak for herself. And he said, no, mom, my teacher's really nice. And I said, honey, I am sure she is very nice. I'm sure she is. But that particular thing was not very kind. And I would hope that you wouldn't talk about me if I wasn't there or if somebody asked you, if you just said, well, it was a personal decision for her, but you'll have to ask her why, Because I actually don't think it was very nice. And I almost guarantee you that that's not really the reason her sister left the church. I said, I think I know where it might be coming from. And again, this is an assumption on my part because I don't know her either or her sister. And I said, but if I were to guess, I would think it might have to do with the pictures being shown at church that depict something that she knows not to be true in actual history. And I said, for example, I learned when I was an adult, and I told him kind of briefly about the translation process with Joseph Smith and his head in the hat. And I said, but when I went through primary, I was shown pictures of him with golden plates in front of him. And, like, it was an actual. Like, what you think of when you hear translation. Like, right, you hear. You write it down. You have the golden plates here, and then you write it down in the book over here. That's not. Those two things are not the same thing. One of them looks a lot better than the other, and that is actually not honest. To show pictures of something that is not how it happened and knowingly showing pictures of something where you know that that's not how it happened. And I said, if I were to guess, it would Be that that type of thing is what was upsetting because she didn't feel like the pictures shown were very honest. And that is a valid reason to feel upset because dishonesty is not okay. And so there would be things like that that would happen. I felt like there. It was hard, though, because I tried really hard not to sound like I was. I didn't want it to come across like I was picking on the church at all, because I did want to always try to still be respectful. And there's a lot of things that I love about the church. There's still a lot of things that I love about the church. In general, I don't feel like it was a huge issue with what they learned on Sunday, because in general, I feel like they're. They're fairly, you know, Jesus and let's be nice to our neighbors and be honest and things like that. But, yeah, occasionally I would. I would hear something that I felt was upsetting and that I wanted to correct.

John Dehlin [00:37:06] This is part of what's so confusing for Mormon culture. Everybody looks at Mormon culture from outside and says, oh, it's. I shouldn't say everyone, but many people are like, oh, Mormons are the nicest people. And the Osmonds and Steve Young and smiley, happy families. What could be wrong? And for many people in their Mormon experience, it's just like youth groups and temple trips and dances and clean, good, clean fun. And so there's a level where it's really happy and really positive and really clean. And then there's a dark side. And do you want to share as a non LDS parent, some examples of the dark side of what your kids could be exposed to that could turn really toxic, if not deadly?

Amy Lloyd [00:37:57] Yeah, well, like that one, for example, that I just talked about, it's like the implication there is that people who leave the church are idiots. Not idiots, but doing it for silly reasons. Right. That it's silly or that they're shortsighted or like they're never gonna tell you that there are actually valid concerns and that some people, like, some people have. Don't feel like their values align with the church doctrines or what I think they're not. They're not gonna put it that way. So that's a concern. Like, what kind of implicit message are they getting about their own parent who has left the church?

John Dehlin [00:38:26] Cause sometimes they can learn that their parents evil or inferior.

Amy Lloyd [00:38:31] They actually did tell me when they were really little, and I think this must have just been. I was surprised to hear it because I don'. Typical but they said, and I don't know who said it to them, but they asked me about am I, am I not going to go to the highest level of heaven because I drink Coke? And I thought it was funny because I was like, I also drink coffee, you know, and Coke Mormons are actually

Margi Dehlin [00:38:56] kind of okay with, between the two.

Amy Lloyd [00:38:58] But it was, yeah, it was that kind of thing. And so I actually wanted to make sure that from the get go, not that I started drinking coffee for this reason, but I did eventually end up starting to drink coffee. And I want, and I made sure never to hide that from my kids. I wanted that, I wanted them to view that as normal because it is normal. And so things like that. But I did always worry about that. And anytime they, I knew that multiple times during their childhood they were going to get word of wisdom lessons, I knew that. So I just, I tried really hard to. Well, one thing I did from the very beginning, and I guess this is kind of an answer to your earlier question, Margi. One thing that I tried to do was teach them as, teach them good values and morals as like separately from Mormonism so that they would know that the two aren't tied together or, and you know, that you have good values and morals outside of Mormonism too. And I would try to teach it from that perspective. And I taught them, I would teach them on how important honesty was and what it meant to be honest and what it meant to be ethical and, and those types of things. And I remember one thing that was really important even from a really small age. You know, they were three and five when we divorced. And so even from when they were really little, I would tell them, I tried to connect that beliefs were individual and that you got to choose what your beliefs were because that was something that, you know, as we talked about in the last episode, that was a literal epiphany to me at age 28, that you got to choose your beliefs. It literally didn't occur to me until I was that old. And I wanted to make sure that that was a given for them. I wanted, and if that ended up being Mormonism, then great, as long as they knew that that was what they were choosing and not that they didn't think that there was any other option. So that's one thing I did, is I would, you know, obviously it's hard to be nuanced with a three year old and five year old, but I would, I would say that, you know, a belief is, it's like a religious opinion is how I kind of phrase it, which I know it's a little bit different than that, it's more nuanced than that, but that's kind of at the three and five year old level how I explain that. And everyone gets to have their own opinions. And you might have the same opinion as your mommy or you might have the same opinion as your daddy and you might end up having a totally different opinion or you might take some from over here and some from over there. I really wanted them to know that they got to choose what they believed. It didn't have to be all or nothing. There's some Mormon beliefs that I maintain that I. Well, they, I don't even consider them Mormon specific beliefs, but I know that a lot of people in Mormonism consider them Mormon specific. But for example, being together with your families forever, I don't have any concern that I won't be with my family forever at all. I don't even think that's a Mormon specific belief, but it's kind of presented as though it is. And I knew it would be presented to my kids as though it was Mormon specific. And I wanted to make sure that they did not have that fear, not only that they aren't going to be with their mom forever, but that they would only be with their families forever if they chose to stay Mormon. I did not want them to think that. I don't think that. And so I tried to do things like that where I tried to teach things that, you know, we're going to be together, together as family. I don't know, I don't remember exactly how I did it, but I kind of tried to make it, to separate it and to make sure that I was kind of teaching them just good principles in general and that they actually did get to choose.

Toxic Mormon Teachings and Their Impact on Children

John Dehlin [00:42:21] So if it's okay, can I just list some of the Mormon teachings or doctrines that I think or practices that potentially are toxic and I'm going to just name it and then have you explain it from a non Mormon parent perspective and we'll just go back and forth. It'll be like a little lightning round. Is that okay?

Amy Lloyd [00:42:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:42:40] Okay, so I'll start with Law of Chastity, Modesty.

Amy Lloyd [00:42:46] Oh man, you're really starting with a doozy. Yeah, that one is one that I kind of specifically sat them down with. I sat them down with what's the

John Dehlin [00:42:57] teaching for never Mormons? What's the teaching and how can it become toxic?

Amy Lloyd [00:43:01] So the teaching is very much that there's no sex of any kind before marriage, including masturbation including more for girls. I guess technically for both. But it more often happens with girls like the dress and dress very modestly.

John Dehlin [00:43:17] Meaning.

Amy Lloyd [00:43:19] Meaning, you know, shoulders covered, you know, knee length. Knee length things. And of course, this is also an area where depending on the member.

John Dehlin [00:43:29] Shoulders, purse, straps.

Amy Lloyd [00:43:30] Yeah. Yes. No. Crossbody bags.

John Dehlin [00:43:33] Should we talk about that already?

Amy Lloyd [00:43:35] Yeah, no. And obviously that's something that individual members do differently. Right. So there's a wide range of what you'll see. But as far as like the Strength of Youth pamphlet, for example, is where they'll kind of get this from. And it's. It says right in there. I don't know if it does anymore. I know they recently changed it, but, you know, when my kids first had specified in there said that homosexual activities. I don't remember how they worded it, but it basically said that are not of the Lord or are not okay. Are not moral. However they worded it. I actually sat them down specifically and said, just so you know, I do not agree with this at all. Like, you know, some of this is great. Yes. You should listen to good things. You should surround yourself with good things. It's not like all of it is, you know, bad advice. A lot of it's great advice, but there were a couple of key things in there that I wanted them to know that I did not agree with. And that was one of them. So I did kind of try to do that. I remember a few years ago when Elder Holland gave that talk at BYU about the musket fire. I specifically talked to them about that and how I did not agree with that.

John Dehlin [00:44:34] And for those who didn't hear that talk.

Amy Lloyd [00:44:38] So that was a talk that he delivered at BYU where he.

John Dehlin [00:44:41] A Mormon apostle.

Amy Lloyd [00:44:42] A Mormon apostle, yeah. Where he basically talked about how we need to be more vigilant about. Like the crux of it was that we were getting too. Basically getting too inclusive. Too kind.

John Dehlin [00:44:54] Too kind and friendly to the gays.

Amy Lloyd [00:44:56] Yeah. At byu. And that he likened it to, maybe we need to have a little bit more musket fire to defend the. To defend the ride or defend the truth. I don't remember how he worded, but it was, it was not. It was not a great talk. And it was, you know, a lot of people took issue with his referencing musket fire, especially given how many. How often gay youth are subject to violence. And I wanted them to know that I did not agree with that position at all and that that was not okay. There is nothing wrong with being gay. You know, heaven forbid one of them ends up being gay. Like, I wanted them to make sure that I. I did not feel that way, that there is nothing wrong with that and that that was not something I agreed with. So I also wanted to make sure that they didn't have guilt around kind of normal, normal hormonal feelings. Like, I didn't want them feeling guilty about, you know, I don't want to get into this too much because I don't want to embarrass them. But like, I didn't want them to feel. I didn't want them to feel guilty about stuff like that, about masturbating. I wanted them to know that that was normal, that there's nothing wrong with that. That is actually normal in. And, you know, you don't want it to, you know, take over your day. But like it's normal. Right. So things like that and those modesty

John Dehlin [00:46:16] messages for girls are not very healthy, right?

Amy Lloyd [00:46:20] No, they're not that.

John Dehlin [00:46:21] You know, just the whole body, shoulder strap.

Amy Lloyd [00:46:24] Well, and just the idea of them being responsible for boys thoughts, like, I don't like that either.

John Dehlin [00:46:29] Girls being responsible for boys thoughts, how they dress somehow is connected to a boy's behavior. Rape.

Amy Lloyd [00:46:36] Right. Or is somehow a reflection of who they are as a person and how good they are as a person.

John Dehlin [00:46:42] Yeah, yeah, Those can be toxic.

Amy Lloyd [00:46:44] Yeah, they can be.

John Dehlin [00:46:45] Okay. That's a lot of chastity.

Amy Lloyd [00:46:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:47] Word of wisdom.

Amy Lloyd [00:46:48] Word of wisdom. You know, again, they saw. They saw me drinking coffee. You know, no coffee, no tea, no alcohol. Those are kind of the main ones. There's other stuff in there, but those are the ones they focus on in.

John Dehlin [00:47:00] In Texas, no tea is a different thing than maybe in other states.

Amy Lloyd [00:47:03] Texans love their sweet tea.

John Dehlin [00:47:05] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:47:05] Love their sweet tea.

John Dehlin [00:47:06] Ye.

Amy Lloyd [00:47:07] Yeah. So I mean, I just told them, look, it's a health code and people have their own beliefs and people can. I don't personally believe that it's wrong, of course, if you. I don't condone underage drinking. So if you choose to do that, you need to be 21, it needs to be legal. But, you know, and you always need to drink responsibly if you choose to do that. But an adult drinking responsibly is not morally wrong. And I don't believe that drinking coffee is morally wrong. So I would have those talks with them sometimes too. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:47:39] And what about your sensitivities towards scrupulosity and anxiety that you had developed from the person you knew?

Amy Lloyd [00:47:48] Right. That was something I was very concerned about.

John Dehlin [00:47:51] Particularly benign. Righteousness can become.

Amy Lloyd [00:47:54] Yeah. Can really become a problem and things that most people wouldn't internalize or wouldn't let that affect them that much for certain personalities or maybe. And I worried that maybe there's, you know, certain personalities or if you have, you know, a predisposition genetically for, for OCD or for anxiety, extreme anxiety, something like that. I worried a lot about how some of that messaging, even if it's not delivered with the intent to cause anxiety, it might be internalized that way. And I worried about that, particularly with one of my sons who I felt, who I felt was a little bit just so earnest and just so wanting to do the right thing all the time, which is a great quality. But I worried about that maybe becoming a problem. So yeah, it was something that I kind of tried to keep a close watch on, especially as they heard these messages.

John Dehlin [00:48:47] How about one on one personal interviews for young 12, 13, 14 year olds?

Amy Lloyd [00:48:54] That one is interesting. I actually met with the bishop of their ward. I asked for a meeting and he was wonderful.

John Dehlin [00:49:04] What's the tradition before you talk about that conversation?

Amy Lloyd [00:49:07] That they have worthiness interviews regularly? I guess once a year, probably with the bishop.

John Dehlin [00:49:13] Might be twice a year.

Margi Dehlin [00:49:14] Is it?

John Dehlin [00:49:14] And it can start at 8 years old, but then 12 typically, right? 11 to 12.

Amy Lloyd [00:49:19] Yeah, yeah. Picks up 11 to 12. And that they have these kind of yearly bishop interviews to talk about their worthiness and to kind of, you know, keep tabs on that part. And they can, with a bishop who chooses to take it this way, be very uncomfortable. And they can ask very invasive questions. Do you masturbate? Do you, you know, all of these things that are highly inappropriate in my opinion to be asking. So I actually did meet, especially in

John Dehlin [00:49:46] a one on one adult with the 12 year old girl kind of context.

Amy Lloyd [00:49:51] Yeah. Or 12 year old boy, either way. Yeah. So I did ask to meet with the bishop and I had a long conversation with him and I just said, look, like I'm not, I know that I don't have. I know that part of the bummer part of divorce is that you, you do lose control of what happens with your kids half the time. Like you just do. And it's a bummer. And it's, it's part of it. And I said I know that and I know that there's nothing I can do about that. I'm asking you to please not ask those invasive questions of my kids. And I would, I would like to have no questions on masturbation and law of chastity stuff. I don't think it's Appropriate. And he was very kind and he told me that he would keep. Keep his interviews high level and that he would not go. That he would not delve into that. So I'm. I'm hoping that that is what happened. I think it is. I don't think that there have been any interviews like that with my kids. I, of course, don't know for sure, but that's how I handled that. I actually requested to meet with the bishop and asked him specifically not to go there with his interviews, and he was happy to do that.

John Dehlin [00:50:58] Margi, I want to let you give her a chance to respond to any teachings that might come to your mind, but I don't want to put you on the spot. There is kind of a history of teachings around race that some of that doctrine is still very much present in the Book of Mormon, the Book of Moses and the Book of Abraham and the Doctrine and Covenants. Do you want to talk about race in Mormonism at all?

Amy Lloyd [00:51:20] Yeah. I don't remember the context for this or why it came up, but I do remember showing them the verse in the Book of Mormon that talks about black skin being a curse. And I told them that that's absolutely not true, that that's absolutely wrong. And they were like, yeah, that's not okay. So they again, just made sure that they knew that I knew that I did not believe that, that I didn't think that that was true, that that was right. And they said that they didn't think that was right either. So it's. And again, like, I don't know how much that verse. That verse is probably skipped over a lot, I would guess now, but it is still in there. So.

John Dehlin [00:51:58] Yeah, for sure.

Amy Lloyd [00:51:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:59] The whole Curse of Cain thing is in every scripture Joseph Smith teaches.

Margi Dehlin [00:52:03] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:52:03] And I don't. I guess I don't know for sure. I haven't been to church, at least not with. Except for, you know, when my kids are doing something in 15 years. So I don't know, maybe they don't ever talk about that anymore at church. I don't know. I'm hoping that they don't. But I do know that it's there. And if they're reading their scriptures on their own, they'll come across it at some point. Right. It hasn't been taken out, so.

John Dehlin [00:52:22] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:52:23] Yeah, I don't like that one.

Margi Dehlin [00:52:25] I'm noticing how often in your descriptions your inner voice is, you know, showing up as advocating for your kids. I just want to say thank you, which is just. It's really amazing. To see.

Amy Lloyd [00:52:45] Thank you. I think they thought it was annoying sometimes.

Margi Dehlin [00:52:49] Yeah. Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:52:51] But yeah, that is what my motivation was all of the time was what is going to be healthy for my boys. I want to make sure that they. I really. It was so important to me to make sure that they knew that they got to choose when the time come. When the time came. Oh. Another thing that I did that I kind of did purposefully was, you know, I don't attend any kind of church now, but I didn't want them to think that it was either be Mormon or be nothing. And because people have different levels of interest in being religious and particularly with one of my sons, he has a high level of interest in that. And so I wanted him to know that there were other options.

John Dehlin [00:53:37] You should ask Joel Osteen.

Amy Lloyd [00:53:39] Oh, man. I specifically did not want to take him to Joel Osteen's church. Although my office building is right by his chapel. It's like. Right. We share a parking garage.

Margi Dehlin [00:53:47] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:53:47] So I am chapel.

John Dehlin [00:53:49] That's my church. Yes.

Amy Lloyd [00:53:50] His giant mega auditorium used to be

John Dehlin [00:53:53] where the Houston Rockets played. That's what his chapel is.

Amy Lloyd [00:53:57] Yeah, exactly. Well, my office building is the tall building right behind that.

Margi Dehlin [00:54:01] So.

John Dehlin [00:54:02] Used to be called the Summit, by the way, back when I was in Houston.

Margi Dehlin [00:54:06] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:54:06] So I have not been to one of his sermons, but that is not the one that I chose to take my kids to. I found a non denominational church in Katy and we would go not every, not every week, but regularly I would take them to that church so that they would just know that they're. Here's another option. There are other options out there. If this doesn't resonate with you, but you want something, you want another kind of church.

Margi Dehlin [00:54:32] Okay. So one other question that comes to mind for me is around the theme, like listening to your inner voice. And I know this is a theme for you, I think oftentimes in high demand religions. Definitely within Mormonism, there's this idea of you're listening to other people. It's a very external relationship as opposed to kind of that idea of listening to yourself. So I'm curious, how did you provide moments for your boys to practice that or to exercise that? For me, it's coming up a little bit in giving them a choice. Just allowing them to know there is a choice allows for them to actually have a feeling like to weigh different things and hopefully to notice kind of what they feel. But I just wanted to touch because I do think that is something that is different that you're offering likely Than, say, a traditional Mormon upbringing. So do you want to speak to that at all? Sure.

Letting Kids Choose Their Own Religious Path

Amy Lloyd [00:55:39] I don't know why this is the first thing that popped into my head, but the first thing that I thought of was around seminary. And it almost seems opposite at first because I actually didn't allow them to do seminary when they were. When they were home with me. And so they ended up going half the time and then doing home study on the other. On the other parts. And so that almost kind of seems like I'm not giving them that choice. But the way I talked to them about that, about that was, listen, I don't agree with a lot of what I know is going to be taught. And so you are free to do what you want when you're at dad's house, depending on what he agrees with. But when you're home with me, we're not gonna do seminary.

John Dehlin [00:56:23] But is it the indoctrination elements of seminary?

Amy Lloyd [00:56:27] That's the indoctrination elements, yes, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:56:29] That's the indoctrination. I mean, other than the mission, it's hard to beat the indoctrination of seminary.

Amy Lloyd [00:56:36] Right, right. And maybe that's partly why I ended up ultimately being able to. I mean. Cause I didn't go to seminary. Cause that was one thing that my parents at the time, you know, I grew up doing music and I was in the jazz band. I played the piano in the jazz band in high school, and it met before school. So it was a choice for me to do jazz band, which I really wanted to do, or to do seminary. And we inquired about doing home study. And they didn't have that at the time or wouldn't allow me to do it at the time. So, yeah, I don't know. Like, maybe things would have been different had I gone to seminary. I don't know. But maybe this is a PSA for Mormons listening to make sure their kids do go to seminary.

John Dehlin [00:57:14] Or maybe you would have felt more strongly if you didn't, if that's possible too. Because I was taught that black people were less valiant in the pre. Existence, and that's why they were given black skin in my Katie Moorman seminary ward.

Amy Lloyd [00:57:26] Yeah, that's actually a good point. So it's possible that I would have come across some things that rubbed me so wrong that I kind of came to my conclusion sooner. That's. That's a good point. I do know from. A friend of mine was one of the seminary teachers, and she told me that Noah had asked about polygamy during. During seminary once. And he. So I kind of did know there came a point, and it's probably because I was. I don't know, there came a point where they wouldn't. They didn't talk to me a whole lot about church stuff. I think they just maybe didn't want to go there. I don't know. So I didn't know that he was bothered by that or that he had, you know, asked. We had talked about it a little bit, but he. I kind of found out from her that he did ask about it. So I thought that was interesting.

John Dehlin [00:58:11] I just realized Mormon seminary is a place where you're taught stuff you should never be taught and you're not taught stuff that you absolutely should be taught.

Amy Lloyd [00:58:21] That's probably true in terms of what

John Dehlin [00:58:25] they don't tell you that. You know, informed consent, that kind of thing. Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [00:58:28] So what I told them regarding seminary was that even though you're not going to go, when you're home with me, you will absolutely be able to choose to do home study if you want to. That choice is yours. I kind of use it as an opportunity for, you know, I am your mom and it's my job to teach you. And so I'm teaching you what I believe is right. And when you are 18, you are going to be able to make your own choices. And so I kind of would use that as another opportunity for when the time is appropriate, they can make their own choices on this stuff. As far as specifically listening to their inner voice, I think that would just kind of come up in conversation sometimes. I would try to be like, yes, like, you can. You can listen to that. And I just tried to support the things that they wanted to do. But that is an area, actually, and I've kind of thought about this afterward, like, lately, that maybe I wish I had done a little bit differently is that I kind of wish that I had done, like, almost kept family home evening and just. But done like a secular, not secular lesson, but just like a lesson on, like, good morals or values that wasn't necessarily religious or not, but. And then you could kind of get stuff like through like that, that kind of more intentionally. Right. You could do one week where you do talk about what does it mean to have a good inner voice? Like, what does it mean to listen to that? What does it mean to another week? What does it mean to be honest, another week? What do good. What do healthy relationships look like? What do unhealthy relationships look like? So that if I were to do it again, might be something That I kind of wish I had done. I tried to incorporate that stuff, but maybe having like a set time every week where you do that would have been good.

Moving from Partnership Parenting to Co-Parenting

Margi Dehlin [01:00:06] Another question I have for you is just if you have a memory or. Yeah. A reflection about moving from a place where you're in partnership parenting.

Amy Lloyd [01:00:24] So you're.

Margi Dehlin [01:00:25] I mean, this is probably a generalization, but let's just say you have someone to talk to if there's an issue coming up with your child, or that there's this scent, too. Like, I'm a little bit alone.

Amy Lloyd [01:00:39] Like, it's.

Margi Dehlin [01:00:40] It's kind of all on me to figure this out. That shift from. Yeah. Being in partnership to kind of on my time when they're with me. I've got to figure this out, because guess what? It's just me.

Amy Lloyd [01:00:53] Right.

John Dehlin [01:00:53] Right.

Amy Lloyd [01:00:55] That was hard. I would say that that was one of the most challenging parts about this, because not only are you trying to do all of that with less time than you would normally have, but you're also trying to do it while maintaining respect for what, you know, they're hearing on the other side. And you don't want to put them. You're also trying to do it without making them feel like they're in the middle of anything. So there were things that I would let go because just in the effort of not wanting to make them feel defensive or not wanting them to feel like they were in the middle, it was really tricky. And it was. It was a little bit stressful because I felt like I don't have that much time. And some of the things, too, were things that I didn't really want to have to talk about that with them until they were older because I felt like it wasn't really age appropriate. But then I started staring down BYU applications and mission age, and I felt a little bit forced into having conversations that I would, on my own, have wanted to have when he was a little older. But it's important to have these discussions before they make big decisions for their lives. Right. So that, I felt, I thought was really hard. And a lot of times, one topic of conversation bleeds so easily into another and kind of spiderwebs out into this other issue. And we had a number of conversations that kind of went off the rails and were very frustrating. And so I had to kind of step back and let's take a pause and figure out a different way to do it.

John Dehlin [01:02:32] Do you want to talk about those or not?

Amy Lloyd [01:02:34] Yeah. Well, so some of them were like. One was. At some point, he did ask me about polygamy. And he knew that that was always something I didn't like and just patriarchy in general. And so he talked to me about. We talked about polygamy, and he would kind of start giving me some of these answers that I knew he had been given by someone at church. Right. Well, it was just because they lost so many men in the war that they needed to take care of the women. And I'd be like, actually, that's not true. If you look at census data. So we would kind of talk about that. If you look at the census data from that time, there were not more women than there were men. A lot of times it wasn't just taking care of the widows. It was. They were also having children with them, like they were. And also, by the way, it's absolutely possible to take care of a widow without marrying her.

Margi Dehlin [01:03:21] That's.

Amy Lloyd [01:03:22] That's an option on the table, as it turns out. Yeah, as it turns out, you actually don't have to marry somebody in order to help provide for them. You know, just things like that. But admittedly, like, I'm very passionate about this stuff, and so it was really easy for me to kind of get worked up and to hear. And this is just me, you know, being willing to say, like, what I did wrong, too. It's. I would. I would get kind of really passionate about this stuff to where I think it made him not want to talk to me about stuff anymore because I was. He knew. He knew he was, like, really in for a conversation if he, like, opened the can of worms. Right. And so then I had to try to really walk it back and figure out a better way to do it. But, yeah, polygamy was definitely a big one and just kind of dispelling the reasons that they give, which just are not based in fact at all. Then the priesthood ban was another issue that we talked about, and that's one that he has never been comfortable with at all. And I think the kind of crux of a lot of those conversations for me with my kids was just, I don't want you to justify things that you know are wrong. And that, I guess, comes back to your inner voice question that is a really good example of when I would talk to them about trusting their inner voice, because I did make a really specific effort on things like that to say there is a reason that you don't like that, and it's because, you know inside that it's wrong, and you need to trust that it's okay to trust that. And I happen to agree with you. I also agree that it's wrong. It was never okay to have that priesthood band that did not come from God. And so those were times where I did try to bring it back to trusting your inner voice. But it gets tricky, doesn't it? Because then the inner voice is also, what am I feeling the spirit about the Book of Mormon and does that mean it's true? And so I really try to talk to them about the difference between relying on feelings for external truth versus relying on feelings for internal truths. And I talk about that in the letter. That will kind of get to at some point, but yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:28] Were there parts of your story you wanted to tell before we got to the letter?

Amy Lloyd [01:05:34] I don't think so. I think we.

John Dehlin [01:05:36] No, I'm not trying to rush it.

Amy Lloyd [01:05:37] Yeah, no, that's okay.

John Dehlin [01:05:38] I want to tread lightly on what you did and didn't want to talk about.

Amy Lloyd [01:05:42] Yeah, nothing comes to mind like right now. So, yeah, I think that's. I think that's.

John Dehlin [01:05:49] So how many years have you been raising your shared kids with your ex husband after divorce?

Amy Lloyd [01:05:58] So they were three and five when we divorced and they are 17 and 19 now.

John Dehlin [01:06:02] So you got them through high school?

Amy Lloyd [01:06:05] Basically, yeah, basically. My second son is a senior.

John Dehlin [01:06:09] So you're a veteran. You did it.

Amy Lloyd [01:06:12] I did it.

John Dehlin [01:06:13] Okay.

Amy Lloyd [01:06:14] Getting there. And they're good boys. They are good, good boys.

John Dehlin [01:06:16] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:06:16] So.

John Dehlin [01:06:18] And I guess their status with the church is something we wouldn't talk about here.

Amy Lloyd [01:06:22] I don't want to talk about that. No, I feel like that gets into telling their story and especially with my whole big thing with them being informed consent, I want to make sure that I am not treading on that at all. So, yeah, I don't want to go there. I will talk about how I talked about these things with them and how I went about giving them informed consent so that they can make those decisions ultimately. But yeah, as of now, my 19 year old is a sophomore in college. He's playing basketball at his college. He's really excited. So as of right now, he's not on a mission, but I don't know that he's ruled it out either. And then my 17 year old is not yet 18, so he'll have that decision on baptism to make once he turns 18. But yeah, I don't really want to comment on their feelings about that.

John Dehlin [01:07:10] So before we go to the letter, you have a question, Margi?

Margi Dehlin [01:07:13] Yeah, I just wanted to ask you. Well, it's a couple questions, but the first one being, you know, thinking about it now, what are some things that you're most proud of when it comes to your, you know, parenting in this situation as it was kind of given and you had to live it? Are there things that stand out that

Amy Lloyd [01:07:35] you're like, Like, I'm really proud of that, yes. I'm really proud that as anytime that I was aware of it, I went to and supported them at their church activities. I supported them at all their primary activities. Anytime they gave a talk, I am proud of that. And I am proud that they always knew they had the support of their mom. And I tried to make it very clear. I talked to them regularly about how these were their decisions to make. They don't have to have the same beliefs, including they don't have to have. Have the same beliefs as me. And I wanted to make sure that they knew that that was clear. And I'm proud of that. I'm proud that I spent a lot of time talking to them about just values in general so they would know that whether you're religious or not, and no matter what church you go to, these are good values to have and you should be a kind person, you should be a compassionate person, you should be an inclusive person. We talked about that. Something else I'm proud of is something we'll get to, which is. Which is how I eventually went about. Once I realized that these conversations could kind of go off the rails easily, I did step back and I got really reflective with myself and I thought, okay, like, I. I can't let it get that passionate. And it's hard for me to do that because I do feel passionately about things. So how can I do this to where I'm still giving the information that I feel like they need to be able to make these decisions themselves while also not making it crazy? And so I came up with a plan to have 30 minute discussions just once a week. 30 minutes a week. And I talked to my son about it in terms of, you know, think about how much time you spend at church or doing seminary, how many hours a week is that? And I'm only asking for half. I'm asking for half an hour. That's it. I'm not even asking for an equal amount of time, but it's fair for you to kind of hear me out. And I want you to be able to understand why I made the choices I made. It's important to me to be. To have my. To have you understand why I made these choices. And you don't have to agree with them. You don't have to reach the same conclusion. But I do think it's important for you to have informed consent. And I taught him what informed consent meant in that context. And I said, once you have that, I absolutely support whatever decision you want to make, as long as you don't use it either way. Like, to be exclusive of family members. I want you to always keep that as a priority. So I am proud of that, because I even went, like, we would set a timer on the conversations, and if I was mid sentence, when that timer went off, I stopped talking, and we just went kind of one topic at a time. And I think that that was a really much more helpful way to do it, because it didn't even allow it to be. To get too overwhelming, because there was a time limit on it, and he knew there was a time limit on it. And I made that promise that I would stop talking no matter what I was saying at 30 minutes. And if he wanted to keep going, if he wanted to kind of finish the conversation, we would. If he didn't, we wouldn't. And there were weeks where I stopped mid sentence, and the conversation ended. And then there were weeks where he was like, well, no, let's kind of finish talking about this. So I really tried to let him be in charge of that conversation. So I'm proud of that. And I also. One thing that one of my kids had become interested in was just researching a lot of different religions, just kind of became interested in that. And he had come across the CES letter, but it was too long. He was like, I don't want to read 150 pages. He was not interested in that. So I went through and I created a summary document of each section that was just. I think it's like eight or ten pages total so that they could read something that kind of gave them the gist. These are the things that people typically will have an issue with. And just if you want to know more about it, information is out there. You can look into it further if you want to, but at least, you know, kind of the basics so that you're not making these important decisions. You know, information.

John Dehlin [01:11:46] You created a CES letter for teens, basically.

Amy Lloyd [01:11:49] Yeah. Like a Cliff Notes.

John Dehlin [01:11:50] I know I'm gonna get hundreds of people emailing me asking for a copy.

Amy Lloyd [01:11:55] Whoever wants it can have it.

John Dehlin [01:11:56] Okay, so you'll share the document with us, and we'll make sure Maven and Julia include that in the show notes.

Amy Lloyd [01:12:03] Absolutely. Happy to do it.

John Dehlin [01:12:04] Okay.

Amy Lloyd [01:12:04] Yeah. And I tried to put, like, some kind of teenage examples in there. Like when I was talking about the Book of Mormon and anachronisms, I said in there, I said, an anachronism is something that's not. That shouldn't be there. That is like, for example, with the Book of Mormon, like horses, steel, silk, wool, all of these things were not in that time period that the Book of Mormon supposedly took place. People don't normally know that because we're not historians, we're not anthropologists. And so we wouldn't know that. So we wouldn't think anything of it. But it would be like reading a book that supposedly took place in the 1800s, but all the characters are watching TV and talking on cell phones. You would know immediately that that book didn't take place in the 1800s because there's no way for them to have the characters be doing that. So it's that obvious. It's just that we don't know because we're not anthropologists. So things like that. I tried to kind of use teenage friendly examples to kind of make it a little bit more digestible.

John Dehlin [01:13:00] We need to. I need to read it. We need to share it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:13:04] Happy to do it.

John Dehlin [01:13:05] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:13:08] So

John Dehlin [01:13:10] there is a letter you wanted to read, which I think represents a form of communication you're proud of with your kids. Do you want to start by telling us about the mistakes you made prior so that people can learn both from your mistakes and the things you did? Right.

Amy Lloyd [01:13:28] I would say just letting my.

John Dehlin [01:13:31] So this is like TikTok clip. What not to do when you've left the church, but you share kids with a believing Mormon parent. What not to do. Take one.

Amy Lloyd [01:13:40] Amy would.

Margi Dehlin [01:13:40] What does not work.

Amy Lloyd [01:13:42] What does not work is getting too passionate about the issues. Like, if you have an issue you're passionate about, it's so hard because you know so much about it. But frankly, they don't even care about some of the stuff you care about. And it might not even be important to them. So I would say that was kind of my number one, was allowing conversations to get a little too passionate. That was number one. And I would say that that's my biggest one. And then the other one I was.

John Dehlin [01:14:15] I remember trying to teach our children about, like, the Book of Abraham, and they're like, they don't care. 8 and 10. And I'm like, now listen, there was a papyrus that was discovered in a museum. And we're like, at the time, same swing set. And they're just like, you know, they're smart, but I mean.

Margi Dehlin [01:14:35] Yeah, that's like an Example of, like, this is about me.

Amy Lloyd [01:14:40] Yeah, exactly, exactly. And I do think there were times where I made it about me and I tried really hard not to, but that. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:14:49] Okay. Polyandry is when you. Oh, my gosh, eight year old is like, can I have a WI piece?

Amy Lloyd [01:14:56] Okay. Can we pause for a minute and talk a little bit about polyandry? Because I have thoughts on this. So. Okay. Obviously, you guys know I've said it several times that polygamy has been one of my biggest issues. Right. What I find interesting, and by interesting, I mean really annoying, is I feel like for so many people, they're not okay with polygamy, Right? Like, everyone's like, yeah, that's uncomfortable. Like, they're uncomfortable with it, but. But. But they're. It's not deal breaker level for them until they learn about polyandry, and then suddenly that's the deal breaker. And I find that really frustrating because I feel like what that says is that we're okay tolerating it if it's only women who are being harmed, but as soon as men are also being harmed by it, like, that's a bridge too far. And I find that to be fair. Am I, like, am I reading too much into that, or do you guys find that, like. I find that to be very frustrating when polyandry ends up being the deal breaker because it was extremely harmful. Even if polyandry was never part of the mix, it still would have been horrific. It was still harmful. It was still horrible.

Margi Dehlin [01:16:03] Yeah. Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:16:05] And that's something that I just find very frustrating. If I'm being very generous, maybe it's because that there's, like, no way to square that, even with the religious justification that was given. But I don't actually think that's why. I think it's just because ultimately, when it's only women being harmed by something, it's not that you like it. Like, you might still not like it and you might agree that, yeah, that isn't great, but you're still not willing to let it be a deal breaker until it's also harmful to the men.

John Dehlin [01:16:36] There's something sexist about that.

Margi Dehlin [01:16:38] Yes, 100% for sure.

John Dehlin [01:16:39] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:16:40] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:16:40] Okay. Sorry. That was an aside. We hear you. Thank you. Thank you for acknowledging 100%. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:16:48] So back to.

Amy Lloyd [01:16:49] And that's an example of how I probably got carried away sometimes when I was talking to my kids,

John Dehlin [01:16:57] like, feminism, polyandry, Come on.

Margi Dehlin [01:17:00] You're like, am I the only one?

Amy Lloyd [01:17:02] Totally. You hear me? Do not accept my name. Am I The only one.

Margi Dehlin [01:17:06] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:17:06] And they're like Taylor Swift.

Margi Dehlin [01:17:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:17:08] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:17:09] I did take them to the Taylor Swift Eras concert. So I did that. Right. That was one thing I did very right.

Margi Dehlin [01:17:14] That is something to celebrate. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:17:17] Okay. So what else did you not do? Right. Anything else, I would say.

Amy Lloyd [01:17:22] The other thing that comes to mind is the timing of it was so tricky because some of these things, I didn't want to be talking about polyandry with them. Right. Like, why do they need to know about that yet? However, it's like, when do you introduce these things? Like, when do you talk about this stuff? And so I feel like maybe I should have started a little sooner with some of the, like, actual issues,

Margi Dehlin [01:17:48] like

Amy Lloyd [01:17:48] the historical issues, but at the same. So. Because it ended up kind of feeling like a cram at the end. I don't know. But. But again, part of me is just kind of like I felt like I was also beholden to the. To a system that was kind of making some of the choices for me, and I couldn't really do anything about that.

Margi Dehlin [01:18:05] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:18:06] So maybe starting a little bit sooner. Except I also didn't want to start sooner because I didn't really feel like it was age appropriate. So I don't know. There's that. And then maybe just kind of what I mentioned before, where I kind of wish I had done those kind of weekly family nights where I had a topic that I talked about every week. I think that might have been really, really helpful. So just in general, for parenting in general, I feel like that would be a cool thing to do with your kids. So I kind of wish I had done that.

John Dehlin [01:18:34] So maybe don't make your issues, their issues. Don't flood them with excessive information and emotion. Use your time to give positive instruction instead of purely antagonistic instruction.

Margi Dehlin [01:18:52] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:18:52] And it wasn't purely antagonistic at all. And I really did make an effort for it to not be antagonistic. And I don't think it was antagonistic. I think that there were times where it just got overly emotional. I don't feel like I was antagonistic at that point. But, yeah, it's hard, right?

Margi Dehlin [01:19:11] It is hard.

Amy Lloyd [01:19:12] It's hard. And I feel like I did the best I could and I really didn't have any kind of blueprint to go by. And so I'm proud of that. I'm proud that I did it. I'm proud that I feel like we ended in a good place. And one thing I'm really proud of is that I did make sure that they knew that their Choices were their choices, even if they did not end up agreeing with my choices. But that is okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:19:31] That's so big.

Amy Lloyd [01:19:32] Yeah. And I just told them the big thing to me is that we are always close and that we are always included in each other's lives, in all of our life events. And I think that they grew up knowing that and prioritizing that as well.

John Dehlin [01:19:49] Yeah. Because two mistakes that I see ex Mormons often make with their kids is they unintentionally pass on this model of conditional love because it was, you know, we'll only fully love you if you're faithful in the church, but then it can easily switch to unless you leave the church, unless you lose your faith in Mormonism and care about all this history and share all the same social justice passions that I share, then you're a disappointment and I don't love you as much. And how is that much different?

Amy Lloyd [01:20:25] It's not right.

John Dehlin [01:20:26] In terms of conditional love. So if a kid does choose to go on a mission or get married in the temple, shouldn't they have our unconditional love? I know it's gonna be painful. It's gonna be hard to be excluded. You're gonna be afraid. But isn't unconditional love kind of part one of Eyes on the Prize?

Amy Lloyd [01:20:44] Yeah, sure is.

John Dehlin [01:20:45] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:20:45] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:20:46] And then the second part is sort of like overcorrecting where they had too much control. They didn't listen to their inner voice. And so you want to nurture them and have them listen to their inner voice and be self guided and not be controlled by a high demand sort of system. But sometimes ex Mormons can just as easily create that on the other side, I think. And instead of the church being the inner voice that, you know, instead of the church suppressing their inner voice, sometimes ex Mormon parents want to be their kids, the authority. Authority and not allow their kids to develop their own inner voice. You can overcorrect, right?

Margi Dehlin [01:21:41] Sure.

Amy Lloyd [01:21:42] And that wouldn't be good either.

John Dehlin [01:21:43] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:21:45] Another thing I just kind of was thinking about that I did try to do was I tried really hard to find commonalities and to express commonalities to them with their dad wherever I saw them. So if there was something that, and I can't even think of an example off the top of my head, but something like I would just try very hard to find way to find times to say, oh, I totally agree with your dad on that, like that's a really great idea, or you know what I mean? I tried really hard to do things like that.

Margi Dehlin [01:22:15] Because.

Amy Lloyd [01:22:15] Cause I knew that they felt like it wasn't as amicable as I would have wanted it to be. And that sucks. Like, that really sucked. And I'm sure that was super hard for them. And I tried very hard to keep them from seeing the parts of our relationship that were not amicable. But I imagine they still saw some of it, and I really wanted them to. They already knew that we were on different pages with the religion stuff. And so I did try to find ways to let them know that there are things we're on the same page about. And so that was something that.

John Dehlin [01:22:52] Probably a lot of things are so brilliant, but sometimes our brains are wired to only really focus on the differences.

Amy Lloyd [01:22:58] Yeah. So I tried really hard not to do that.

John Dehlin [01:23:00] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:23:00] Which is amazing. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:23:02] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:23:03] And I hope they felt it. You know, sometimes you just don't know what they take in versus what you think you're putting out there. So I hope they felt that.

Margi Dehlin [01:23:11] I just want to recognize, like, as you're talking about that time. You know, it's one thing to transition away from, like, a high. A high control religion. It's another thing to simultaneously be grieving the loss of. Even if it's, you know, a relationship that, you know, isn't. Isn't something that is nurturing to you anymore or if it ever was, you know, but also, like a dream life or a dream security, like to be sort of grieving simultaneously while also working full time, having the. Like, juggling and having as full of a life as you need to when you're kind of single momming it. You know, it's like trying to build

John Dehlin [01:24:01] a plane while flying it.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:02] It is. And so those conversations where you're like, wow, I was. You know, I maybe had more emotion than ideally I would have wanted in those conversations with my kids. It's sort of like, you know, that was grief. Oh, yes. That's what that was. And where is it supposed to go? It can't go any place at work you don't have, you know, your days are stacked full.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:26] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:26] There's no.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:26] You know, it was grief, and it was. And it was triggers, and it was, you know, all kinds of things like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:35] Yeah. And having, like, a soft nest for that, too. Of like.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:38] Well, of course. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:40] Well, of course it would have shown up.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:42] Yeah. I try. I try to give myself grace where that's concerned.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:46] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:47] It's hard because you only have one shot at raising your kids right.

Margi Dehlin [01:24:50] So.

Amy Lloyd [01:24:51] So that's hard. But I do I do really try. And another thing I did that I'm proud of is that I apologize when I needed to apologize. Oh, I love that. And I hope that they. I think that they did. I think that they appreciated that when. And there were times where I needed to apologize where. I know I kind of. I probably overstepped. I probably shouldn't have said that. I probably, you know, and I wanted to know them, to know that that was okay to do that. So you need. It's okay to apologize when you mess up. It's okay to mess up. Yeah, right. Right. Yeah, exactly. And I was also really lucky. I had a lot of support. I mean, I'm obsessed with my parents. I can't say enough good things about them. Like, I had a lot of support with my parents even in the, you know, they would come out, they would fly from across the country regularly to help me with the boys. They were, you know, they lived in California and we live in Texas, and they were at more little league games and more soccer games and more basketball games than any. Than any. So many grandparents that even live in the area. And they have a really close bond with my boys, and that was really important to me. And they had really strong examples with both of them. And they have been listening ears for my boys. And that's been incredible. You know, I would have to, you know, in accounting, you have closes that you're working late hours, you know, on the quarters especially. And generally I had pretty good hours with work, but once a quarter, I had quarter closes. And they. It was busy. I don't have any family in Texas, and my parents would fly out every quarter to help me with quarter closes to help me with the kids. Like, that's so incredible. And so I had a lot of support there. You know, I've mentioned my friends from church, from my ward that we have maintained. We chat daily on our group chat and we used to do monthly dinners where we saw each other every single month for dinner. We've been through not just mine, but couple of other of their divorces. We've been through divorces together. We've been through losing parents together. We've been through, you know, all of our kids growing up together. And we've been an incredible support for each other.

Margi Dehlin [01:26:58] Wow.

Amy Lloyd [01:26:59] And so building a really good support network outside of your kids was life saving for me, especially since I don't live by family. That was so important. And then friends that I made outside of the church too, after leaving the, you know, I think I mentioned one of them, but Another friend at work that I am so close to. I call her my soulmate sometimes. And we just are on the same page with so many things. And we talk, and she's now kind of moved away, but we talk almost every day on our way to work. Like, it's just. I have a really good network of support. And then now with my husband, I'm remarried now. Remarried about five years ago. And, you know, he's wonderful. So I have the support of him and his family. And so I feel like I have a lot of support. But, yes, there were a lot of times during those years where I felt like I was experiencing grief. And I was trying to process

Margi Dehlin [01:27:51] a

Amy Lloyd [01:27:51] lot of grief and recovery from things that. That I found that I felt were traumatic. And that was hard to do.

Margi Dehlin [01:27:59] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:28:01] And I did probably put some of that on my kids when I shouldn't have, so.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:05] As we do.

Amy Lloyd [01:28:06] Yeah. I really like the Julie Hanks quote where she says, everybody messes up. Messes. Messes up their kids, but the important thing is not to do it on purpose. And I can say that I never did it on purpose.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:19] So. Yes. And also, like, own it.

Amy Lloyd [01:28:21] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:22] And apologize and then try and correct. Or get more support or. Yeah, I love that.

Amy Lloyd [01:28:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:28:30] Beautiful. Okay, so now we've talked about ways you can kind of do things wrong or the lessons you've learned. Give us the background, the context of this letter that you wanted to read, and then we can read it.

A Letter Written for a Son's College Applications

Amy Lloyd [01:28:44] So after. So a couple of years ago, my oldest was a senior in high school, and he was doing his college applications. He wanted to apply to BYU and Texas A and M and a couple of other schools. So I helped him with all of those. That's another thing I'm proud of. I was very supportive of him applying to byu, and I, you know, helped him with all of that. In fact, my husband and I even joked with him. We said, you should make sure you write an essay on how your mom is inactive and your dad is not a member, because you will be a shoo in. They will be like, get this kid to BYU pronto. And he actually did incorporate that into one of his essays. Smart boy. So I think he would have gotten in anyways. But he did get in, so maybe that helped. Anyway, so we were doing college applications and all that stuff. And then, of course, he was a senior in high school, so he's almost 18. And so a mission decision was going to be coming up, and where do you go to school is coming up. So it was at that point where I felt like I was out of time for having some of these conversations that I felt were important to have with him so that he would have informed consent on what decisions to make. And so a couple of, you know, we'd had. I kind of tried to have these conversations, and like I mentioned earlier, they. They were just. They didn't have a clear direction, and they very quickly got too emotional and were frustrating. And so that's when I kind of stepped back and came up with this kind of plan of going through my. My Cliff Notes version of the CES letter kind of topic by topic in a 30 minute, like, just session that was in his control. So this letter that I wrote was kind of teeing up these sessions, and it was explaining to him why I wanted to have these conversations with him. And I'm sharing this with permission, by the way. But it was our first. The first of the 30 minute sessions that we had. I started by reading this letter and then kind of the accompanying, like, setting up the. Before we went topic by topic the following week. So do you want me to just go ahead and read it?

John Dehlin [01:31:01] Yeah. So you wrote this for your son?

Amy Lloyd [01:31:04] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:31:05] At what age?

Amy Lloyd [01:31:06] He would have been 17. He was a senior. It was the spring of his senior year, so he would have been 17, almost 18.

John Dehlin [01:31:13] And your intent for writing this was

Amy Lloyd [01:31:16] so that he understood why I wanted to have these discussions with him that might be kind of hard for him to hear, and so that he would understand why I wanted to have them before he made some big decisions in his life.

John Dehlin [01:31:29] Okay.

Amy Lloyd [01:31:30] So, yeah, the whole basis was just so that he would have informed consent.

John Dehlin [01:31:34] And so now you're gonna read the letter you wrote for your son?

Amy Lloyd [01:31:38] Yes.

Reading the Letter Aloud and Reflecting

John Dehlin [01:31:39] All right.

Amy Lloyd [01:31:39] Okay. Dear Noah, first and most importantly, please know how much I love you. I cannot emphasize that enough. I have loved you since the very moment I knew of your existence, and I have loved you every single second since. You and your brothers are the best things that have happened or will ever happen to me. And nothing is more important to me than the three of you and your happiness. I want you to have a wonderful, full, authentic life, full of happiness and love and inner peace. I also want you to know that I understand the difficult position you are in. I know that it is really difficult to feel like you are stuck in the middle between two different belief systems. That's hard. Here's the thing, though. Even within the same belief system, people have a wide range of personal beliefs and applications of those beliefs. So no matter what you choose, it will still come down to what resonates with you personally. And no one can decide any of that except for you. And that can also change over time as you go throughout your life. It did for me, and it does for many people. The point is that you have the right to believe whatever you want to believe, regardless of who else in your life believes it. You could even choose something completely different from anyone else. The reason I feel it is so important to talk to you about these things is that you are coming to an age where you have some big life decisions to make. I don't say that to put any kind of pressure on you, but it's just the reality of the situation. And even though very few decisions in life are permanent and you have the right to change your mind about things later, it is always best to make decisions with as much information as possible. Particularly decisions that will affect your life in such profound ways. Finally, I want you to know that I support your right to make whatever decision is right for you. This doesn't necessarily mean I will always agree with your decisions. Hopefully I will. But my love for you can never be affected by what decisions you make for your own life. And I want for us to always be close regardless. However, it is not okay for you to make important decisions based on partial information. It's important to keep an open mind, be willing to listen and learn from all sides and then make informed choices and always listen to yourself and trust yourself. Your own inner voice can help guide you in living your own best life. While feelings are not a good way to determine external truth, more on that later. Your own feelings are a great way to determine internal truth. What is important to you, what resonates with you, how you feel about things, what you want for your life. Listen to yourself and trust your own inner voice. And be brave in following your own inner voice. As we go through our discussions every week, please know that I have your best interest in mind. It is my job as your mom to teach you and guide you. I would never want to withhold information from you that may affect how you feel or what choices you make. Although some of these conversations might be hard for you, please know that doesn't mean they aren't right or important to have. The last thing I would want is for you to find out about things later in your life and then know that I knew and didn't tell you about them. That wouldn't be fair at all. I will try my very best to make our discussions informative but not overwhelming. But there is a lot of stuff to cover and I do feel very passionately about all of this, so be patient with me too, honey. I am doing my best and I love you so much. Love, Mom. So I read that first and then.

John Dehlin [01:34:53] Did you read it to him?

Amy Lloyd [01:34:54] I read it to him and then I gave it to him so that he could have it. But I really wanted to make that

John Dehlin [01:34:59] choice, to write it it and then to read it to him.

Amy Lloyd [01:35:02] Yeah, I chose to do that because I really wanted him to hear every word. And not that I didn't trust him to read it, I think he would have, but I really wanted him to hear how I wanted him to hear the love that I have for him as I was reading it. And I wanted him to feel that it was important. So I read it to him. And then I had kind of another, not really a letter, but just the little thing that I put together on investigating the church and its truth claims. And so I kind of went through that with him as well. And that's. I start with a few quotes by, you know, apostles and even a prophet where, you know, quotes that we've kind of heard before, like, the first is by George A. Smith. It says, if a faith will not bear to be investigated, if its preachers and professors are afraid to have it examined, their foundation must be very well week. And then another, the J. Reuben Clark one about if we have the truth, it cannot be harmed by investigation. If we have not the truth, it ought to be harmed. And then this one's actually my favorite one that I had just come across recently by Hugh B. Brown, who was a member of the first presidency in the 60s. Have you heard this one? He says, the honest investigator must be prepared to follow wherever the search of truth may lead. Truth is often found in the most unexpected places. He must, with fearless and open mind, insist that facts are far more important than any cherished mistaken beliefs, no matter how unpleasant the facts or how delightful the beliefs. So I wanted to start with that to kind of help get him comfortable. And I didn't. I didn't want him to have the guilt that I had initially had about looking into things in the first place. I wanted him to know, it's okay, you can do that. You have every right to do that. And here are some examples of apostles of. Of the Mormon Church who agree that you have the right to do that. So then I have a little thing where I explain what informed consent is. I also have a little paragraph.

John Dehlin [01:36:59] Do you mind reading that really quick?

Amy Lloyd [01:37:00] Sure, yeah. So here's a section on informed consent. You have the right to know sufficient information, positive and negative, prior to making important decisions. Limiting information or only presenting the good and omitting problematic information is not ethical or honest. You should never be made to feel guilty or wrong simply for researching or seeking information. You also have the right to get information from any source. You can discern for yourself whether that source is valid. This can be done by corroboration with various sources, cross checking to source documents, etc. One website that I found to be helpful is mormonthink.com it's a non biased collection of various issues and it presents both sides of each issue and includes direct links to sources such as the church's website. And then I have do you want me to just keep going? It's a couple more paragraphs on this. Then I have a paragraph on anti Quote anti Mormon sources I said Often the term anti Mormon is thrown around to discourage people from reading or listening to anything that is not positive about the church. This is simply not appropriate. Just because someone or something points out a negative aspect about the church, that does not make them anti Mormon and it does not automatically discount what they have to say. Even if someone is angry about something, that does not automatically disqualify them from being listened to, maybe they have a valid reason for feeling angry. Also, disagreeing with the church does not make one anti Mormon any more than disagreeing with any other faith makes one anti. For example, you would never call someone an anti Semite just because an anti Semite just because they don't agree with the Jewish faith. And calling someone that for that reason would be extremely offensive and inappropriate. So I kind of wanted to neuter the term anti Mormon a little bit and help them understand like, you know, Christians aren't Jewish, but you wouldn't call them an anti Semite. Like that's. That doesn't make any sense. Like just because you don't agree with something doesn't make you anti. And then the last paragraph of this kind of setup discussion is about feeling negative feelings. While researching, I said a lot of this information will be new to you and it may be contrary to things that you have learned in church. This will naturally make you feel uncomfortable or negative feelings. This is completely normal. It can be hard to have our beliefs challenged. We are sometimes taught that negative feelings are warnings from the spirit or that they come from the adversary. Please understand that this is not true. Any information that challenges our worldview is going to make us feel this way. It is completely normal. For example, when you were a kid and you asked Me to tell you directly about the truth about Santa. You were sad. Learning the truth made you feel badly, but that didn't make it not true. And even though that was hard at the time, it was better to know the truth once you were ready to hear it. Also, we will often learn of awful things that happened in history. It naturally makes us feel negative emotions when we learn about atrocities, but it doesn't mean they didn't happen. So that was just kind of my setup.

John Dehlin [01:39:44] That's really good stuff.

Amy Lloyd [01:39:45] Thank you. I wanted to try to cut off some of the things that would make him feel hesitant about these conversations.

Margi Dehlin [01:39:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:39:56] So, yeah, there needs to be, like, in addition to this, there needs to be, like, children's books. Yeah. You know.

Margi Dehlin [01:40:03] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:40:03] Just kind of educating.

Amy Lloyd [01:40:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:40:05] Telling true stories.

Amy Lloyd [01:40:07] Right, Right. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:40:11] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:40:13] So, yeah, that was the first of our 30 minute discussion. And it didn't take 30 minutes, it took 10. But I told him, like, that's a lot. I know. That's kind of a lot to digest. So we're gonna start next week. Like, we'll kind of let this be the only one. And so that was kind of the first of those discussions that we had every week.

Discussing Church History With a Believing Child

John Dehlin [01:40:30] And how many CES Letter for Teens discussions did you end up having with your son?

Amy Lloyd [01:40:36] Oh, let's see how many sections I have.

Margi Dehlin [01:40:38] Let me see what I have here.

Amy Lloyd [01:40:40] I did it section by section. So there's a Book of Mormon section, a Book of Mormon translation section, the first vision, Book of Abraham, polygamy and polyandry prophets, which I should have just called polygamy, because as we discussed before. That's bad enough. Kinderhook plates and translator claims testimony and spiritual witnesses, priesthood restoration witnesses, temples and freemasonry, science and other concerns. So 12, something like that. 12 or 13.

John Dehlin [01:41:12] These are discussions of a different sort.

Amy Lloyd [01:41:14] Yeah, we did not actually end up doing all 12 or 13. At one point. I think we probably did probably eight or nine. And then he was like, mom, I think I'm good. I think I'm good. And I said, that's fine. I would like for you to read the rest of it. We don't have to have the discussions anymore, but I would like for you to read the rest of it. And he promised he would. I assume he did. I don't know for sure, but. And then I had kind of a list at the end where it was. Because the CES letter really is focused on historical truth claim times for the most part.

John Dehlin [01:41:47] So it didn't get into social justice.

Amy Lloyd [01:41:49] Right. It doesn't talk about any of the social justice, racism. So I wanted to. So I do have like a list at the end of kind of other concerns of mine that don't fall into that, you know, historical evidence to your own voice. Yeah, I think I drilled that one into. Into them very hard as they were growing up. That one he got so.

Margi Dehlin [01:42:09] Yeah, there's just love all over that.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:13] Yes. I hope that's how it was received. Yeah, I hope that's how it was received.

Margi Dehlin [01:42:18] So thoughtful and amazing writing.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:20] Thank you as well.

John Dehlin [01:42:21] Yeah, we need to create a website for you.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:23] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:42:24] All right. Hey, go ahead, think of a name.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:27] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:42:29] Youth ces. Letter for youth. Yeah, we'll figure that out.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:33] Letter to my son. There's a letter to my wife. It could be a letter to my son.

John Dehlin [01:42:36] Yes. Letter to my kid. Could be that.

Margi Dehlin [01:42:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:42:38] Letter to my son. I love it. Okay, wait, we gotta grab that before

Amy Lloyd [01:42:44] this, the first time I know this.

John Dehlin [01:42:46] Oh, yeah, the apologists are gonna grab

Margi Dehlin [01:42:48] that if we don't.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:49] Good call, good call.

John Dehlin [01:42:49] Letter to my son.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:50] Yeah, we should.

John Dehlin [01:42:51] Okay. Letter to my son. But what about daughters? I guess, you know.

Amy Lloyd [01:42:54] Yeah, that's true. It could be either letter to my child. We'll say letter to my child or dear child, something like that.

John Dehlin [01:42:59] Okay. All right.

Amy Lloyd [01:43:00] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:43:01] And you, there's probably a lot of this you can't talk about, but like from the non believing parents perspective, sharing 16 lessons with their kid who has a believing parent who's an ex spouse, could be terrifying. It could be angering to the believing parents. It could have consequences if the non believing. If the believing parent finds out that the non believing parent had these discussions with their mutual child. Anything you want to say about that?

Amy Lloyd [01:43:41] Yeah, I didn't worry a whole lot about it for a couple of reasons. Number one, I have every right to teach my child and just like he has every right to teach his child. And I was very intentional about not trying to keep. I didn't. I never tried to prevent him from taking them to church. I never tried to prevent any of that stuff. And our divorce decree is very clear that we each have the right to religious. To direct the religious and moral instruction of the kids on our own possession time. And I was not doing anything outside of that. I also don't feel like I was doing this in any kind of mean spirited way. I feel like I kept it very respectful and all about love and informed consent and that's how I presented it to my kids. And also it's probably part of the reason why I waited as long as I did, because he was 17. So, I mean, he was turning 18 in a few months, and he's not under any kind of, you know, custodial arrangement anymore. But also, we had already had that legal deposition with bishops that didn't go the way he, I think, expected it to go, where it was made very clear by the bishops, by both of them, that I wasn't doing anything that was impeding his right to teach them, but I also have the right to teach them. So I didn't worry about it a whole lot. I don't actually know if he knows that I had these discussions or not, but it's. There's nothing. I didn't do anything wrong in having them, so I didn't really worry about it.

John Dehlin [01:45:18] One interesting question is ask what the right age is to have that conversation, because 17 might feel a lot different than 10. You know what I mean?

Amy Lloyd [01:45:26] Right. And that was my struggle because I did want to wait as long as possible. I probably would have had it later than 17, but I felt like I was out of time. Because he had to decide where he wanted to go to school. He had to decide whether he. Whether or when he wanted to go on a mission. And those decisions, you need to have a certain amount of informed consent, and you're never going to know everything. Right. Like, it's been 15 years, and I'm obsessed with Mormon history, and there's still stuff that I learn about it all the time that I didn't know. Yes. I love that series, but that's what makes it so fascinating. Like, I love it. I'm like, I love it so much. It's like, such a passion of mine. Like, I just am really interested in it. And there's still stuff that I, you know, I read books on it all the time. I just. It's really an interest of mine, and I'm still learning stuff, so there's no way to know everything before you make decisions. But I do feel like these discussions were successful not because he decided not to be part of the church, but because I feel like he has an acceptable amount and a sufficient amount of informed consent to make that decision for himself and to decide what he wants to do. And I do feel confident that no matter what he ultimately decides that it's. It's an informed choice.

Margi Dehlin [01:46:44] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:46:44] And so I do consider it to be successful because of that.

Margi Dehlin [01:46:47] Yeah, I can see that.

Amy Lloyd [01:46:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:46:52] Beautiful.

Margi Dehlin [01:46:53] So beautiful.

John Dehlin [01:46:54] Yeah. I can't wait to put that website up.

Amy Lloyd [01:46:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:46:56] Share with lots of people.

Amy Lloyd [01:46:57] Hopefully it's good Hopefully Jeremy Reynolds doesn't get mad at me. I do mention his name. I do give him cred. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:47:05] Yeah, that's great. Okay, so what else? I guess. I guess let's tie up the parenting thing. And I guess there's a little bit about, like, you.

Amy Lloyd [01:47:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:47:21] And like, rebuilding a lot. Because there's a lot of women out there who are just, you know, their spouse left with them, but either way, or they're divorced and there's like, rebuilding their own life.

Amy Lloyd [01:47:32] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:47:33] Which maybe we won't be able to get to as in depth just because of time. Anything you want to say to close out the parenting portion of this part? Two?

Amy Lloyd [01:47:43] No, I don't think so. I think we covered it pretty well, and I'll certainly be happy to put the document up. So if people want to read the actual part of it. Some of it is some sections were more interesting to me than others, and so I didn't necessarily. Someone might want to expand on some of it. Some of it was really short. The Book of Mormon one ends up being a page summary, but the first vision one was super short. So I tried to just kind of give the basic gist. But yeah, we don't need to necessarily talk about the specific sections. We can just put them in the notes and let people read them on their own.

John Dehlin [01:48:16] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:48:17] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:48:17] And what name did we decide on for the website?

Amy Lloyd [01:48:20] Letter to my Child.

John Dehlin [01:48:21] Letter to my child.

Amy Lloyd [01:48:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:48:22] Letter to my child. Okay.

Amy Lloyd [01:48:24] I don't know.

John Dehlin [01:48:25] I'll get it set up right now as we're finishing up the interview. I'll do it here on the side.

Amy Lloyd [01:48:29] Okay. Just sounds good.

John Dehlin [01:48:31] Okay. Kind of kidding. Okay. So, well, let's talk about rebuilding Amy. Yeah. Is a way to kind of conclude. Is there a semi happy ending or a happy ending for you?

Finding Confidence and Peace After Leaving the Church

Amy Lloyd [01:48:42] Absolutely. Very happy ending. One thing that I feel very, very grateful for is that I have not regretted a second of. You know, I'm very confident that the divorce was the right thing to do for me and for my kids and leaving the church was the right thing to do. And I've not regretted either at all. And that's a very liberating feeling that day that I had where I was in fervent prayer talking about this and where I got my answer of my epiphany of, you can choose what you believe. That day I put down all of the cognitive dissonance that had been building up in me for 28 years, and I have never had to pick it up again. And. And to live without that cognitive dissonance. Is an amazing feeling that by itself has made it totally worth it. And I just love the freedom of thought that comes with valuing your own voice. And I just love being able to have discussions about it. Like, a few months ago, my husband and I were at lunch and we were about talking just, we were talking about reincarnation, like, random stuff. And it's not, I'm not even stating that I believe in reincarnation, but it was fun to be able to, like, talk about different ideas without having a general authority quote lobbed your way. Or without. Well, we know that's not true because blah, blah, blah, like, I love that I don't have answers and I love, I don't feel the need to have answers. And I love that when I hear something, I don't have to find a way in my brain to make it okay if it doesn't feel okay to me. I love that I can be like, oh, I don't agree with that. Let's move on. Like, or let's talk about it or what? You know, I just. There's a freedom of thought that comes with, not with no longer being attached to a dogma that really doesn't resonate with you. And I, I love that aspect of it. So I love kind of thinking about the scriptures, maybe in different ways. I like viewing them more as kind of allegories and symbolism. And I love finding it in there and including the Book of Mormon, by the way. I think there are some great passages in there that you can really have interesting conversations around. And I don't discount them as having some value. Like, I think all of that has a lot of value. I don't think it means it has to be literally true in order to be something that you like talking about or something that resonates with you personally. And I love the freedom to feel like, yeah, I get to, I do get to pick and choose. I can do that all day long. And, you know, so many people are like, you can't be a cafeteria Mormon or Lutheran or what? Actually, I can, because I do. So, like, like, watch. Watch me do it. Yeah, here's how you do that. But yeah, I, I love that. I love that I get to pick ideas. And you know, I mentioned before, do I think, I don't think there's any universe where a God exists and a heaven exists, where he's not going to allow anybody to be with their loved ones. I just don't believe that. Or I don't know how I said it. I believe that you will Anybody will be able to be with their loved ones. And I think most people do believe that. And I don't feel like I have to. I don't know it. Prove it out. I just. That's. That's how I feel. I think I will always be with my three kiddos. I think I will be with my husband. I think I will be with my parents. I think I will be with my loved ones. I don't think God's going to keep me from that. I don't think he's going to punish me for listening to myself and for listening to what resonated with me and for using the brain that he gave me to weigh evidence and to look into things and to. I don't even necessarily know, like, how I view God anymore. Like, probably more of, like a force than an actual being. I don't even know that. But I don't feel the need to know that either. Like, it's actually okay. The one thing that I do know, the faith in God that I have held onto is that in whatever form God takes, it's good and loving and kind and compassionate. And that's kind of enough for me. And I don't know, I love that freedom of thought. It feels. It feels so good to be able to just go through your life and be a good person. And you don't have to do it because of a specific dogma. You don't have to do it because you're afraid of punishment. You don't have to do it because you're afraid you won't be with your family unless you do. So, yeah, I love that challenges are. That maybe. Maybe I don't get to speak as freely with all of the people I love as I would like to. And that's a bummer. But I'm trying to. I'm trying to learn that not every relationship needs to have every facet of that. And that's okay. That doesn't mean that you're not close. It doesn't mean that you don't love each other. So I'm trying to be okay with that, too. But, yeah, I don't know. I love thinking about things in another way. Like, I thought about even the Ten Commandments and how kind of my views on that are different now. Like the commandment to not take the Lord's name in vain. I think about what that means to me now. And I don't think it has anything to do with saying OMG or with, you know, swearing or anything that I was kind of taught that that meant I think it has everything to do with doing things or getting someone else to do things in the name of God that maybe are not okay. And I think the biggest offenders of that commandment are religious people, religious leaders, I should say, or people who fly planes into buildings in the name of God. I think that's a great example of taking the Lord's name in vain. I don't think it's about, you know, a Valley girl saying, oh my God. You know, I just. I think about what I think God would be like in whatever form God takes. Do I think he would care about that or do I think he would care about his name being used for abusive purposes or to manipulate people into doing what they want? That's what I think he would care about. So just things like that. I love being able to have these types of thoughts and conversations with people. So. Yeah. And things are good. And I've worked out the working mom thing and it's working great. And. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:11] So, yeah. I'm curious, are there a couple values that you really connect with these days?

Amy Lloyd [01:55:20] Yeah, I think honesty, the real big one for me, and inclusion and kindness and compassion. Those, I think are the big ones, you know?

Margi Dehlin [01:55:38] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [01:55:38] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:39] And then I was curious just how it has felt for you. Let's just say like almost in a. I don't want to like over dramatize it with words, but like in this new place, let's just say having a new relationship and now like another small. Yeah, right. Like life in your hands. But. But you're in a new place doing that, right?

Amy Lloyd [01:56:10] Yeah, it's. It's interesting and I'm. And I'm really grateful for that. I'm really grateful for the opportunity. It'll be interesting to see, like I'll be raising my little guy with. No, we're not planning on raising him with religion and we'll just be raising him with good values and with, you know, being a good person and. And ultimately it will be his decision to make as well. Maybe he'll choose to join a religion later, but, you know, that'll be up to him. And it's really interesting to have the perspective of having, you know, almost grown kids and then this little toddler. And it's fun to see their interaction together and it's fun to see their bond together. So. Yeah, that's something that's really interesting too. I like to just reminded me about with other religions, you know, Noah right now is going to a school that is a Lutheran school, and that's because he got A scholarship to play basketball. So he's doing that. And I love it because their campus pastor is a female, and I love that. And so I love that he'll, you know, see that and really get the benefit of that. But, yeah, and this relationship I'm in now, my husband is so supportive and so loving, and we are on the same page with all of that stuff, which feels really, really nice. So we don't have that kind of tension.

Dating and Relationships in a Post-Mormon Life

John Dehlin [01:57:34] For post Mormon women or men who are thinking, how do I even approach the world of dating? Can I ever find a moral, ethical, good, kind person who wasn't raised lds? Do you want to provide any hope or tips or tricks?

Amy Lloyd [01:57:55] The answer is a resounding yes. My husband is wonderful. And he was. He was raised Methodist, but he kind of, as a teenage, hasn't really been religious since he was a teenager. And he's the most. He is wonderful. He owns his stuff and he, you know, we work on what needs to work on. It's not like our marriage is perfect, but he's. I trust him and I know I can count on him. And there's, you know, both of us are willing to work on the things we need to work on, and there's a lot of accountability and there's a lot of acknowledgment of each other's feelings and. Yes. And he is a. Such a good man. Such a good man.

John Dehlin [01:58:39] And is there such a thing as a better fit in a marriage?

Amy Lloyd [01:58:43] Absolutely. Compatibility is actually a thing, and it should actually be considered.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:50] And even this idea of a good divorce, you know.

Amy Lloyd [01:58:54] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:56] As messy as it can be.

Amy Lloyd [01:58:59] Yeah. I mean, there are a lot of ways that I wish I had. That my divorce had gone better, for sure.

Margi Dehlin [01:59:06] You could have controlled maybe.

Amy Lloyd [01:59:07] Yeah. There's a lot that's just out of your control when it's, you know, you can only control your part of things.

Margi Dehlin [01:59:12] So.

Amy Lloyd [01:59:13] But, yeah, we're working on it. We're getting there. And I think, in spite of everything, we've raised two really great kids. Yeah, they are really, really great kids.

Margi Dehlin [01:59:22] Yes. And to be clear, maybe not good divorce, referring to the process of divorce. Right.

Amy Lloyd [01:59:30] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:59:30] But maybe to the result of the life that you get as a result

Amy Lloyd [01:59:39] of post divorce can be wonderful.

Margi Dehlin [01:59:42] Right. Like, there are endings that should be. There just should be endings to things. And I think that is a very important thing to hold with the difficulty of it, because sometimes I think we still can hold a bit of judgment.

Amy Lloyd [01:59:59] Yes, that's definitely true. And I said this earlier, too, but there's nothing I would do differently if it meant not having my Noah and Sam. And so I don't regret what happened. And I absolutely know that it was the right thing for it to end when it did. But now I. I wouldn't trade the beautiful boys we have out of it for anything.

Margi Dehlin [02:00:19] So.

Amy Lloyd [02:00:20] Absolutely. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:00:26] And I guess there's this. One of the things I'm frustrated about with marriage is the whole either till death do you part or even the eternal marriage expectation because, number one, that builds so much pressure. Number two, it's not even 50% realistic for so many people. But then also if you fail. I think part of the reason why divorces can get so ugly is because everybody feels like everybody's watching and everybody is let down and you're a failure, so you got to blame the other person. And then you're throwing hand grenades at each other to try and preserve how you appear to people and make the other person look like they're the reason so you don't look like you failed. And why. It's weird because you don't want to be in a society where like divorce is encouraged. You know, you don't want it to

Amy Lloyd [02:01:25] be no big deal. But at the same time, it maybe does get to. It gets built up so much that it becomes unnecessarily damaging when. And the marriages end because of that, because defenses are up. It's actually interesting, when you were talking, it made me think of my attorney who told me he's not Mormon. He told me that the worst divorces that he has had have been Mormon divorces.

Margi Dehlin [02:01:49] Yes, I've heard that.

Amy Lloyd [02:01:50] Yeah. And I think that's anecdotal. Yeah, that's anecdotal. That's just his experience. But he told me that that was the worst ones he had were Mormon. And I think it is because there's so much in that that not only that, there's so much implication when you get divorced. So it's not just, you know, and that's hard. That's hard.

Margi Dehlin [02:02:12] Yeah.

Amy Lloyd [02:02:13] And one thing, you know, we hear messages, one of the talks that I heard that when I was kind of starting to be on my way out that I really didn't like. What really made me uncomfortable was President Nelson. I don't think he was President Nelson at the time. I think he was the first counselor, but he gave a talk on marriage and how non temple marriage was. He used the word inferior. Inferior to other marriages. And when you are hearing which, first of all, I didn't like that because here I was in a temple marriage that was imploding at the time, and I knew of many lovely couples who were not married in the temple who did not have inferior marriages. Their marriages were great. So I never liked that anyways. Even though even in my Mormon days, I wouldn't. In my believing Mormon days, I wouldn't have liked that language. But I certainly didn't like it then, and obviously I don't like it now. I do not view my current non Mormon, non temple marriage as inferior in any way. But I do think that when you are hearing those messages that temple marriages are superior, they are better than all the other ones. It does create so much pressure, especially for when they don't work out. And it does create heightened. All these heightened feelings that. Yeah. Can make it a lot worse than it needs to be.

John Dehlin [02:03:30] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So somehow we've got to just find a way to destigmatize divorce.

Amy Lloyd [02:03:35] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:03:35] And say marriages. Marriages can be very useful, especially if there's kids involved. And lots of marriages or multiple marriages can be beneficial, you know, until you. Not at the same time, but. But to allow you to find the right fit, you know, or wait. Or just freaking weight.

Amy Lloyd [02:03:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:03:58] Till you're in your 30s or 40s.

Margi Dehlin [02:04:00] And also, maybe you don't want to get married. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:04:03] Maybe it's okay not to get married at all.

Amy Lloyd [02:04:04] That's also a valid option.

Margi Dehlin [02:04:05] For sure.

John Dehlin [02:04:05] For sure. Yeah. Yeah. Because why? What's wrong with giving it a good X number of years? And then if it's not working out, saying, hey, let's part as the best friends or the best relationship that we can, and we still share these kids.

Amy Lloyd [02:04:25] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:04:25] That's what I'm talking about. That's what I was trying messily when I asked about the good divorce or the. Just because I do think because the stakes are so high, because the judgment of the stigma. I think it can take a lot of courage to be able to say, hey, I think this may not be working. And now an act of love might be to just acknowledge that fact and to let each other go.

Amy Lloyd [02:04:54] Right. Absolutely. And that's not to say to your earlier point that we want to be flippant about marriage either. Of course not. Like. And of course it does take commitment. And you're not always gonna. It's not always gonna be easy and you're gonna have hard times, but it's not, you know, when it's more than just not making it through, when it's more than a rough patch and it's clear that it is actually harmful to stay together then. Yeah. Like, it doesn't need to be this crazy, horrible thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:05:24] Beautiful. Yeah. And I guess. I guess I want to end by saying you give the impression that there's a healthy, happy life for you and for your children after a Mormon divorce.

Amy Lloyd [02:05:40] Yes, there absolutely is. Absolutely. Yep. That's a good way to sum it up.

John Dehlin [02:05:46] And you're bearing your testimony to that in that regard.

Amy Lloyd [02:05:49] Yes. There is life afterwards, and there is good life afterwards. Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:05:54] Yeah. Well, this has been lovely. Margi, yes or no? Agree or disagree?

Closing Reflections and Gratitude

Margi Dehlin [02:05:59] Yeah. I'm so grateful I was here.

John Dehlin [02:06:01] Yeah. Amy Lloyd, thank you so much.

Amy Lloyd [02:06:03] Thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity.

John Dehlin [02:06:06] And because I have ADHD at some level, I've created the website lettertomychild.net it is currently live. I've given you the login.

Amy Lloyd [02:06:15] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:06:16] And you'll be able to start building it and it'll be ready by the time this episode comes out.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:21] Okay.

Amy Lloyd [02:06:21] I'll have to learn how to do any of that, whatever that means. Thank you so much.

John Dehlin [02:06:28] Okay. But when you are tempted to email and say where. Where is her letter and where is the CS letter for teens, go to first. Go to lettertomychild.net and maybe we offer

Margi Dehlin [02:06:43] Amy some support to have that going with all of Amy's free time to

John Dehlin [02:06:50] start, she said, how do I be a part of what y' all are doing?

Amy Lloyd [02:06:54] I would be honored to be a part of things.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:57] Thanks.

Amy Lloyd [02:06:57] I'm here for it.

John Dehlin [02:06:58] That's good.

Amy Lloyd [02:07:00] I just might need a little, like, help direction.

John Dehlin [02:07:01] Strap in. Amy Lloyd.

Margi Dehlin [02:07:03] You have to be careful what you ask exactly.

John Dehlin [02:07:07] With the delins. Be careful what you ask for. No. Thanks for a lovely, lovely. I hope to meet your kids someday and I love. They're wonderful. I want to hear how their paths and journeys end.

Amy Lloyd [02:07:19] Okay, I will.

John Dehlin [02:07:20] Please stay in touch. And thank you so much. If people want to reach out to you, do you want to give them?

Amy Lloyd [02:07:26] Yeah, they can email me. My email is amyloid 1, 2, 3. It's L, L, O, Y, D and a M, Y For Amy. Amy Lloyd, 123. Mail. Feel free to reach out.

John Dehlin [02:07:38] All right, beautiful. Well, thanks so much, Margi, for being a part of this episode. It's always lovely to have you. It's never as good without you.

Margi Dehlin [02:07:48] Thanks. Thank you.

John Dehlin [02:07:50] Yeah. And thanks to everyone for joining us today on Mormon Stories. Thanks to Julia for the time codes and show notes, Maven for the post production, Brooklyn for the editing, Gerardo for the thumbnails and strategic support Clint and Carrie for the board and all the other people that make this possible, especially the donors. And if you value this content and want to see it continue, we would just ask that you consider becoming a monthly donor. At mormonstories.org, there's a donor button. Click on it to become a monthly donor and we will provide you with valuable content for as long as people are willing to support. If you can't support us financially, or even if you can, other ways to support us are to subscribe to our YouTube channel, subscribe on Facebook, on TikTok, on Instagram, share these episodes with as many people as you can, comment on them. That helps with the algorithm and just spread the word and let people know and email us your feedback or ideas. Comments on the social media platforms are the best way to give us feedback. We also welcome your emails@mormonstoriesmail.com and I'll do my best to read them and respond. So anyway, be good to each other, be kind to each other, Informed consent, thumbs up for adults, but especially for teens and children. And we'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories. Take care. Thanks everybody.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.