Mish Story...Part 3 of 3

Kent Allen – a family friend, a family therapist, and the first in an extensive string of angels placed in my life – re-arranged his entire schedule to meet with me the very afternoon I returned home. As we were talking, he pointed out a truly amazing scripture: “And if men come unto me I will show them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.” 

“Nathan,” he assured me, “You have come unto him. You showed the Lord that you were willing, ready, and worthy to serve Him, and now He has shown you a weakness. He will make it strong for you.”

This hit me harder than any scripture had before in my life, and I saw the first glimmer of hope I’d seen in several long days, because I knew it to be true. In the months to follow, I met with Kent numerous times. He and my family doctor diagnosed me with a chronic form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Kent guided me through the burdensome ordeal of balancing the chemicals in my body and, a much more arduous task; starting my life anew. I had a plan for the next two years of my life that would no longer come to fruition. Though it would be exasperating at times, and the anxiety never really went away, I needed to move on with my life. I had to come up with an entirely different plan and take it all day-by-day.

The first step toward moving on was finding employment to keep myself from wallowing my time away. I was in no frame of mind to go job-searching, so my dad called a few friends, and I eventually found myself employed in the marketing department of a great local company. During my first week, I was assigned to travel with a woman named Kimberly Kemp to clients around Northern Utah. I didn’t know her at all, so our car ride was destined to be quiet one—or so I thought. In all reality, the trip led me to another saving angel: Kimberly herself. Kimberly had undergone great trials in the past few years, including some very similar anxiety. The two of us clicked, and we never found ourselves without something to say. She helped me realize that despite my trials, I was still loved and still had the opportunity to become a great man—mission or not. Though I only kept that job for a few short months, until I started school again, the many times Kimberly and I conversed changed my life forever.

People with similar situations seemed to come out of the woodwork. One friend, whom I’d known during my first year of college, brought me great comfort when he told me of his experiences serving a mission. He also experienced anxiety that was was horribly debilitating, and he, too, was sent home to take care of it, but not until after he had been in the mission field for quite some time. He not only knew what I was going through and proved to me that life does go on, but he showed me I could still prosper. This man’s amazing strength and attitude was an example to me as I suffered through the first months of re-building a shattered life.

Despite innumerable thoughtless comments from some people in the community such as “Why are you not on a mission?” or “It’s obviously too easy for missionaries to come home these days,” more people were understanding and supportive. Countless other guardian angels entered my life over the next few months. My wonderfully supportive family helped buoy me up; my great friends, both old and new, gave me the camaraderie I needed; and sweet children in my good friend’s pre-school class gave me a little taste of joy each time I volunteered at the school. The generosity and kindness of these incredible individuals helped me to overcome my own personal tragedy—a tragedy I thought would never end.

People always seem to call missions the best two years of their lives. Though I intended to spend the best two years teaching the people of Oslo, Norway, the growth and knowledge I gained of myself and those around me at home in Ogden, Utah, has superseded anything I could’ve learned on a proselyting mission. Every year, thousands of young men serve two years as missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I served a four-day mission and grew leaps and bounds over the following two years – my best two years. Not unlike the poem by Robert Frost:

I shall be telling this with a sigh 

Somewhere in ages and ages hence: 

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.