My depression has affected me enough to the point
that I felt like I wasn't good enough, that I
was worth nothing.
And somehow, I felt like no one understood me.
I felt alone.
I felt in distress.
And it proceeded on and continued on from high school
into my marriage.
And I married my high school sweetheart.
So he saw this whole process.
I found out I was undocumented in high school
when I was applying for college credit classes.
And they asked for a Social Security number.
And of course, I asked my mom, and I didn't have one.
So just thinking, "How am I going to pay for school?
How am I going to work?"
terrified me.
So there's a lot of emotions going on.
But I have learned that what saved me in my life
is the temples.
I go there constantly.
I feel like it's the closest I can be with my Father,
is going to the temples.
And I feel like only in the temple, in my darkest times,
I've been able to feel my Savior and feel
my family on the other side.
I felt like I lost who I was.
And I had no worth to myself because I also
came to a point in my life that I just wanted to end my life.
I thought, "There's no point for me to continue on."
And in the temple, I think we learned our true potential.
And every time I go to the temple,
I've had to remind myself who I was
and all the potential that I had,
because I knew Satan was trying to bring me down.
I knew he was trying to break me down.
I would somehow go into, like, a corner and just cry.
And my kids would see me, and so they would cry.
And It came to the point that every time I
cried, whether it was for the Spirit or not,
they begged me to stop crying, because I cried daily
for everything, anything.
It didn't matter what it was.
I felt like a bird trapped in a cage,
and I could not get out no matter what I did.
And I remember I was in the kitchen.
And I remember seeing the knives just there,
and I remember just standing.
And I felt like somebody was telling me to go--"Just end
your life.
This is it.
Just do it."
And I remember going over there.
And I thought to myself, "Sheina, don't do this.
You know better.
You're a mother."
And I remember grabbing it, and I was just holding in my hand.
And my husband was upstairs in the room doing something.
And I just remember crying.
And I freaked out so much that I yelled for my husband for help
while I was holding the knife in my hand.
And of course, he ran to my aid, and he helped me.
And I was so weak that he held me.
He basically cradled me.
And he took me to the couch, and he took out
my patriarchal blessing.
And he read the patriarchal blessing all night,
three times.
He read it to me so that he realized
that there's a plan for me, that I'm worth something.
Everyone has trials in life, but everybody has a great potential
as well.
That was a great help to me that day at conference.
Listening to his talk--it was very needed.
Number one, I think I had to forgive myself for everything
that I've done.
Yes, I've confessed and I've repented.
But somehow, I still wasn't forgiving myself.
And I think that that's the problem.
If there is a problem, and you feel
like you've done everything on your part
to be OK with the Lord and be in tune
with Him, no matter how much scripture time you have
or how many times you go to the temple,
it's much more than that.
It has something to do with yourself.
Yourself.
You have to look past everything,
and you yourself have to forgive yourself for everything,
because the Lord already did that.
I think I love myself more than I've ever loved myself before,
because I've forgiven myself for a lot of things.
You count your blessings every single day.
And by counting my blessings every single day
and seeing that He has done everything for me,
I feel like He walks with me.
I feel like He's inside me.
He's embedded in me.
He whispers to me.
I feel Him so close.
I see Him in every single thing that I do in my life,
from the people that I interact with to the talks that I hear
on Sunday, conference, the books that I read,
the friends that I have--just every single thing that I see
that is positive, I see the Lord there.
And I feel like that has helped me a whole lot, because I
feel like John the Beloved.
I'm beloved.
He loves me so much.
Somehow I feel like the struggles and the trials
that we go through make us become champions in life.
We become stronger, and you feel like, "Wow, the Lord's
been chipping at me.
He loves me so much--diamond in the rough.
He loves me so much, He turned me into this beautiful person."
I know that my Savior lives.
I know that He loves me dearly.
He is my best friend.
I know He has never left me.
He has been with me through every struggle and trial,
happiness, anguish, excitement.
Every single thing testifies of Him.
The gospel has helped me understand who He is
and who He expects me to be, because He died for me.
The Atonement is real.
Repent.
It's never too late.
This is the simple fact that you can do anything through Christ.
That's it.
It's just, anything through Christ,
you can overcome even if, to you, it's the hardest thing.
You can overcome it.
Nothing's impossible.