Personal History

My name is Samantha Jean Lee. I was born on February 15, 1992 at 2:48 am. My mom wrote in her journal that I was 8 pounds 6 ounces and 21 inches long. I became the youngest of five children when I was born, but that changed quickly. My mother died of cancer when I was ten months old, and my father remarried about eight months later to a woman with four boys of her own. My father and new mother had a baby girl when I was about three years old. In total, there are ten children in my family; there are seven boys and three girls. I am the second to youngest child.

I was quite a rambunctious little girl as I grew through my toddler years and into my young childhood. I always wanted to explore more than I already knew, and wanted to be just like my older brothers. Whatever they were doing, I wanted to do as well. When I was about three years old, my brothers got on their bikes and started riding down the street. Little did I know they were going over to someone’s house to do yard work, but I wanted to go with them, despite them telling me I could not come. As they rode away, I got on my plastic Barbie tricycle, and tried to follow them. Obviously they were a lot faster and bigger than me, so they left me in the dust. I was still determined to go with them, so I followed them down the street until I could not see them anymore. Of course, as a three year old, I could not tell where I was because I was not very familiar with my neighborhood yet, so I was lost. I did not panic, but my mom did; she came out looking for me and saw me down the street. She and my dad immediately got in the car and picked me up with panicked faces and stern voices.

I was adventurous; I loved to explore. When I was a toddler, my dad saw me run down the middle of the street and ran out to grab me so I would not get run over. I guess I just wanted to see what was down the street.

I got teased and played around with by my brothers all the time. I like to think that the experiences I had with them have made me into a tough girl. When I was first learning how to walk, my brothers would purposely trip me; my mom relates to me that she would get so angry with them, but I was as happy as a clam and it didn’t bother me. I always got left in the dust and they did not really include me with their friends or when they played video games or wrestled with each other. Now that I look back at this, I realize that all of that was rightly so; I understand what it was like to have a little sibling who just wanted to tag along.

I did not really get along with my little sister, Ann Marie, until I got out of high school. We butted heads all of the time; I would silently egg her on to make her mad, and she would yell and get angry with me, which used to get just her in trouble. I think my parents caught on that I was provoking her, and I eventually started getting in trouble too. Mind you, Ann Marie and I did play with dolls together. We did swim, laugh, play, and tease each other. But as I reached my teenage years, I felt like she was a nuisance, and I did not want to hang out with her anymore. I really feel bad about that now.

As I went through elementary school, I lived a pretty normal life that any American kid would live. I had a family who loved me, I loved to play soccer, I had a lot of friends, and I thought boys had cooties, even though I still chased them around the playground. I got into junior high school and realized that boys were not so bad, and that I actually even liked some! I always felt weird about dating boys until I met a boy named Dennis Bronson. I always thought he was my first love, but I realize now that it was such a pointless crush. We hung out a lot, and held hands here and there, but it did not really turn into anything special, which was probably a good thing, considering the fact that I was so young. I moved into high school and met a boy named Charlie Madden; he turned out to be bad news, so I forgot about him after a while. I dated here and there until the middle of my junior year in high school. I met a guy named Tim Hutson and we started dating. He made me very happy at the beginning; he was a breath of fresh air because I had been dating some not so cool guys who did not treat me right. But he did, and I grew very close to him. He made me laugh and I just felt normal around him, which was just what I wanted. After about six months of dating him, there were some red flags that I should have paid attention to that really showed that he was not that great of an influence on me. But I loved him, and I overlooked those things. We dated for a year and eight months until I went to college at BYU Idaho.

My senior year of high school, I joined ASB (Associated Student Body) which is basically student government, and met a lot of new friends. It seemed like I knew everyone in the school, including all of the staff and teachers, and they knew me. I was in charge of the athletics that our school was involved in. I loved being in ASB because I really got some insight as to what goes on behind the scenes of activities at school. I really enjoyed the time I spent helping with the school. My senior year was an exciting one; I won the title of “queen” at Winter Formal, had a great time at Prom with Tim, met so many new people, got to go to Grad Night at Dave and Buster’s, got to be a captain on the soccer team, and ran track with all of my really great friends. Life was great.

Life started to become difficult when it was time to choose where I was going to go to college. I had always wanted to go to BYU in Provo, but they had denied me. So now I had a choice between staying in California and going to California State University of Long Beach (CSULB) or going to BYU Idaho. At first, it did not even seem like a choice, so I decided to stay in California and go to CSULB. I was happy with this choice; now I could stay with my boyfriend Tim (who was still in high school at the time) and live with my family. But something inside of me kept nagging at me, telling me to go to BYU Idaho. My best friend, Leah, was attending that school, so I consulted a lot with her about it. It was a really difficult decision, a lot harder than I can even describe on paper, but I prayed a lot, fasted, and finally decided that it would be in my better interest to go to BYU Idaho. I broke up with Tim at the end of the summer, and headed up to Rexburg, Idaho with my best friend and our parents. Once we got there, my parents dropped us off, took off, and now we were alone. I will be honest and say that I hated it for the first week. I felt alone and scared and I realized that life was really starting; I wasn’t sure I was ready yet. Eventually, I started to love it in Rexburg, and I was excited because I met a new guy, Greg Livingston. Little did I know that this young man would be whom I would marry in a year.

Greg and I really got to know each other my first semester at college. He was the greatest guy I had ever met and I really felt comfortable around him. He made me happy, and I made him happy too. He was a returned missionary who went to Mexico City, and was from Park City, Utah. The thing that I really liked about him from the very beginning was that he really listened to me and cared what I had to say. After the fall semester, Greg went back to Park City to work and live at home while I stayed in Rexburg and kept going to school. That was a very hard time for us because we wanted to be together so badly. We saw each other on average every other weekend. It was a lot more than we expected we would see each other, but it just was not enough! Finally, the spring semester came, and Greg came back up to Rexburg to go back to school. I was up in Rexburg as well, and we finally got to see each other every single day.

About midway through the semester, Greg proposed to me, after several months of prayer and hopefulness that we would get married. He proposed in the best way that I could ever imagine. He took me to the sand dunes, and on one of the hills flowers spelled out “MARRY ME SAM?” Of course, I said yes! We are to be married on August 26, 2011 in the Newport Beach California Temple. I am so excited, and cannot wait for the next chapter in my life!