588: Laura Roper Andreasen - Granddaughter of LDS Apostle M. Russell Ballard Pt. 1

Mormon Stories Podcast

Dr. John Dehlin

Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 5.2K Ratings

🗓️ 18 November 2015

⏱️ 119 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Laura Roper Andreasen is the granddaughter of LDS Apostle M. Russell Ballard. Recently Laura resigned her membership in the LDS Church after struggling unsuccessfully for decades to find happiness and health as an active, believing Latter-day Saint (e.g., serving an LDS mission, marrying in the temple, having children). In this vulnerable, thoughtful, respectful, and heartfelt two-part interview, Laura discusses the following:

The deep love and respect she has for her parents, grandparents, and Mormon heritage.
Her struggles as a child, teenager, and adult with:
- What she experienced to be a culture of perfectionism and shame in the LDS church.
- A family and church culture of avoiding emotional vulnerability and the open discussion of difficult topics.
- The added difficulty/burden/pressure of being a direct descendant of Hyrum Smith and the grandchild of an LDS Apostle (within LDS culture).
Her struggle with low self worth, depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation for multiple decades.
Her complex relationship with Grandpa Ballard, who (from her perspective) struggled to balance his role as an apostle with his role as grandfather.
Her perspective on what it is like to be an LDS Apostle, answering many questions for Mormon Stories listeners.
Her reasons for leaving the LDS Church after being unable to find joy within it.

To read from Laura's blog, click here.

Part 1 (Laura's Story):

Part 2 (Q&A):

Transcript

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0:00.0	Mormon Stories is a production of the Open Stories Foundation and relies solely
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0:28.6	Thanks for your support.
0:51.6	Hello and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host John
0:55.8	Delin. It is November 17th 2015. It is 847 AM mountain time and I'm very
1:04.9	excited to have today's guest with us. So our guest for today is Laura.
1:16.3	Laura tell us how to pronounce your full name. Laura and Jason. Laura and
1:20.6	Jason. Okay. And I guess, you know, I guess, you know, the way we're
1:28.0	building this and what's sort of worth mentioning right at the top of the
1:31.9	podcast is that Laura is the granddaughter of Emmerosel Ballard who is one of the
1:38.9	senior apostles for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And the way
1:44.0	this interview came about is pretty straightforward. I was going through my
1:48.7	messages on Facebook and Laura had reached out to me and expressed just sort of
1:55.5	said she had an interesting story and expressed an interest possibly in
2:00.8	talking about it. And so that's really as complex or as simple as this podcast
2:08.9	is or at least how it came about. So Laura, we're gonna sort of do a deep dive
2:14.9	today but welcome to to more of a story spot cast I should say. All right, thank
	...

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