Skip to main content

About Me

Hello, and welcome! My name is Daniel. 


I am married to a super awesome, amazing, incredible, beautiful, kind, ferociously loyal and protective, and inimitable woman. Her name is Emma. We met at Brigham Young University Idaho and married in 2012. In that time we have moved 7 times, lived in 3 states, had 4 children, made a drastic career change, and shared our story. She has been my rock through all of it. We are madly in love. We currently live in Utah where I work as a librarian.


We have 4 children. They are magical and utterly unpredictable. I love them. 



We are active members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You probably already guessed that by the squeaky clean pictures and the fact that we graduated from BYU-Idaho and live in Utah. 

 I bet you didn't guess that we are a Mixed Orientation Marriage (MOM). Yep. I'm an openly gay man who is an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and happily married to a woman. 

 And that's why this blog exists. To share my story, faith, opinions, daily life, and show that people like me really exist. That we are here. That we belong. We who are LGBTQ+ have a place in the Church. We have a role to play. We have an important work to do in the Kingdom of God that only we can accomplish. I want to add my voice to the many that have and are advocating to this end.

 DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions on this blog are strictly my own. They are not doctrine, policies, or stances of the Church nor are they a general representation of the LGBTQ+ community within the Church. Also, it is not my intention to tell others how they should live nor it is my intention to be looked at as the ideal in what choices an LGBTQ+ Church member should make or how they should live. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Let's Address the MOM in the Room

On August 24, 2012 I married the love of my life in the Manti Utah Temple. It is without a doubt one of the best days of my life. The two pictures below have come to be my absolute favorite from our wedding.  If you've never been to the Manti Utah Temple it is on top of a very large, very steep hill (you can see the full size of it in the first picture of this post). These pictures do not do justice to just how tall and steep it is. Our photographer caught these two candid shots while we were climbing back up the hill after taking some photos at the bottom. It was very difficult for Emma to walk up the hill in her wedding dress, and her feet kept slipping. It was very slow going, because we did not want her to fall and get a grass stain on her dress. I had to help push her up the hill and keep her from falling when she slipped.  Over the years these two pictures have become beautifully symbolic of our marriage.  Our marriage is what may be ca...
2 comments
Read more

Atwell Family Christmas Traditions

Christmas is a season FULL of tradition. Tradition is so important, because it brings people together. It provides opportunities to create memories. Traditions are an integral part of family culture, because it helps us feel a sense of belonging, safety, and love.  Growing up, both Emma and I spent Christmas with only our immediate families. We didn't travel to grandparents' homes or others. We didn't host or go to parties. Christmas was always a simple, small, intimate holiday spent at home with just my parents and siblings.  This tradition is something Emma and I have carried on with our family. We spent our very first Christmas in our 1-bedroom basement apartment. Just the two of us with our little Charlie Brown Christmas tree. We were between semesters at BYU-Idaho, and if you've ever been in Rexburg during the holidays it is practically a ghost town. All the students have gone home. Of the married students who lived in our complex we could have counted on one hand ...
Post a Comment
Read more

We Are Not Better Without You

September is suicide awareness month and last week was suicide awareness and prevention week. I do not feel adequate enough to talk about such an important topic, but I would be remiss to ignore it. I hope that what I share here is not hurtful in any way but filled with love and hope. Although I have gratefully not lost a family member to suicide, it has been close.  My grandmother (pictured below in her high school graduation picture) survived the Great Depression and Dust Bowl. For those of you who are not familiar with the Dust Bowl, it is considered one of the greatest environmental disasters in American History. If you want to learn more about it click here for a book I highly recommend. The city she was born and raised in was one of the worst affected areas. She is also a survivor of child sex abuse. I bring this up for context, but will not share more in this blog post about that. That's for another time.  In her adult life she struggled with the ramifica...
Post a Comment
Read more