When I left for college I was a shattered child. I was a shell of person. Even though I was 18 too much had happened in my early life and then throughout my childhood, that left me immature and broken.

I barely survived that year. My dad would call to tell me how he was going to kill my mother or me or about his recent sexual encounter. I would call my mom occasionally hoping that she would finally tell me she loved me, only to be told how much she hated me and how horrible of a child I was.

I went to school. Kind of. I made some friends but they were not good friends. I got a job.

I was depressed though. Depressed. Alone. Hurting. Lost.

So I drank. I drank to get drunk. I drank to get numb.

I had lived in an environment that was so abusive and controlling and strict that when I moved 1500 miles away it was like a caged animal finally being set free. There were too many choices, too much noise, too much sadness, too much ache with in my mind that I had no self regulators. Instead I self sabotaged. (I can not even write that word without singing it in Beastie Boy fashion)

I tried to get help. I went to a Bishop and told him my story and asked him for help. He told me that I was trying to get attention and that he had heard this pity party before. I went to a counselor who told me I was making up what happened to me. (And people wonder why women and children don't come forward when they are being abused. I had left my situation and still no one believed me.)

As the year would progress I would pick worse friends and make horrible choices.

Then one day after attempting to overdose on Nyquil - my thought was if I took the whole box then I could fall asleep and die - that didn't work - so I decided I could cut my wrist.

It wasn't about death. It was about bleeding out the evil that I knew existed in my body. I had been poisoned by the abuse and if I could just bleed it would all be better.

My roommate figured it out. Mind you - I never talked to this girl and yet she was aware enough to notice what I had done. She somehow was able to call home and tell them what I had done and that I needed help.

A plane ticket was purchased and I was put on a flight back to Texas.

Those few days are very much a blur to me. I remember flying. I remember thinking that I needed to die. I remember dreading seeing my mother. She hated me and I knew it and I could not go another day if I had to live with her.

I remember waking up at my mom's. I remember calling a family friend who I don't know the last time I had talked to her and asking her to take me to a hospital because I needed help.

I don't remember what I said to her exactly but she did take me.

I don't remember much about the conversation with the doctor but I do remember when she looked at Lisa and asked her if she would be willing to take me in. She told Lisa that if I had to go back to my mothers I would be dead before the end of the week. I didn't threaten suicide. I told the doctor I wanted help but I didn't know what to do and I thought if I could be put in hospital someone could help me.

There was a pause and then Lisa looked at me and said that she would.

In that moment I had no idea the depth of sacrifice and the depth unconditional love that was being shown to me. All I felt was relief.

Lisa called my mom and told her I would be staying with her for awhile and asked if my mom could bring my things over.

My mom did. She drove over to Lisa's and threw all of my luggage out in the middle of the road.

Classic Judy.

Lisa took in a dysfunctional - barely held together 19 year old girl. She had two boys at the time one was a baby and the other 3 or 4? I had horrible communication skills. I doubt I had the maturity to really understand privacy, language, saying thank you or being helpful without being asked.

In other words, taking me on was a burden, but I never knew it. Ever.

She mothered me well. She communicated her expectations. She told me when I was doing something wrong. But it never felt personal. It was the first time in life that someone took me just as I was and loved me. She was in that moment - during those months - the Savior's hands in my life.

I don't remember how long I lived there because I would shortly move in with her aunt. A woman like Lisa.

Rita Reindl. That is her name. The woman who took me in after living at Lisa's. She is literally an angel.

Rita was in her 50's when I moved in and she regularly took in girls who were pregnant and not married. She would always have to tell people that I wasn't pregnant because everyone who knew her knew she took in pregnant girls, and Rita knows a lot of people!

She had rules and boundaries and she communicated everything so well, but I still felt lost a bit. I had been with Lisa long enough to feel less cloudy mentally and to be a little bit more purposeful in my life but I was still struggling so much.

Rita didn't miss a beat. I got a job. She helped me buy a car. She helped me financially a lot because I was so immature when it came to money. I was immature period, but I never knew it when I was around her.

I felt loved. I felt seen. She anticipated my needs. She asked questions, real - thoughtful - personal questions. She would get in what she called "mama hen" modes and would set me straight. But I loved it. She wasn't trying to control me or abuse me, she was "raising" me - she was trying to make me more than I was.

I moved back to Utah in March of 1997. When I moved I still owed Rita money and I would take what felt like centuries to pay her back. It would take a long time for me to "grow up". I would miss payments and not communicate but she was consistent. Her expectations and her love were consistent.

Lisa Lobue quite literally saved my life. She never thrust any of her values in my face or her opinions about religion or how I should handle my life. She bore her testimony to me in how she lived. She taught me and loved me more through action than through word.

Neither Rita or Lisa began the year of 1996 thinking of how they could completely change their life by taking in a broken 19 year old girl but they did it anyway. Their actions were selfless and healing.

I needed them. I don't think I could have verbalized it at the time but I did. I needed them and they saved me.

I am alive and who I am today because two Catholic women took in a crazy Mormon girl and loved her exactly how the Savior would.