Go, Rach! Go, Rach! Catch 'em! When I first found out I was pregnant, I was absolutely terrified. Here I was, 16 years old, having not a clue in the world about anything, and I was pregnant. I felt very low about myself. I figured, "What kind of loser gets pregnant at the age of 16 years old? Why did it happen to me?"

Everything came and went. I ended up having a beautiful baby girl and placed her for adoption. I remember going back to school and being absolutely terrified: "I was pregnant two weeks ago, and here I am at school two weeks later, and I'm not pregnant anymore." I struggled with loving myself. I was dirty. I was unlovable. I was unwanted. No one would care about me because of what I did when I was 16 years old. I let that moment in time define me for several years. I was able to graduate high school, and I was excited to go to college, kind of have a fresh start and to make new friends, be able to do my thing, and not have my small town, being pregnant at 16, define me.

I was raised going to church. And when I went to college, even if I wasn't doing what I was supposed to be doing, that's somewhere where I found myself every Sunday was at church, because that's something my parents ingrained in me. I had a bishop, a leader. He came and he wanted to just talk to me one afternoon. And he took me into his office and he said, "How are you doing?" and just kind of got to know me a little bit. And that's just when I completely broke down and said, "If people knew about me and knew about the different things that I had done, that people would look down on me and think less of me because, 'oh, this girl got pregnant at 16 years old.' Like, who really does that?" He told me that Heavenly Father loved me and that He cared about me and what I was here to do on this earth. And that kind of gave me more purpose and direction, to say, "Hey, I'm not what I was when I was 16 years old."

It took me a long time to realize that it's not just mine alone to deal with, that my Heavenly Father and my Savior are there to help and listen and to love and care about me. There's always going to be those setbacks in my life to make me stumble back and think, "OK, I'm not as good as I thought I was." I went and saw this counselor. And just meeting with her, she helped me look at, "OK, look at how negatively you're talking about yourself. Is that realistic? Would you think that way about any other young woman who has gone through this in your life?" And she helped me think of who I was before this event had happened and who I had thought I was all these years. That was really helpful to have professional help.

There's been times in my life where I look around me and I think, "Heavenly Father is mindful of all these people, but what about me? What about me feeling so terrible about myself? Where is my Heavenly Father in all of this?" But when I take the time to actually think and ponder, because I know He has put people in my path to bless my life, and I feel so much better about myself today than I ever have before.