A Friend's Exit Story

I don't know about you, but I LOVE ex-Mormon exit stories. We all have one that's dramatically different from everyone else's...and yet they're all so amazingly the same.

This one comes from an anonymous former Mormon who has been through a number of inconceivable struggles, and I feel incredibly privileged that she allowed me to read it, let alone share it with you. I do so because she has suffered in ways that perhaps some of you can relate to and understand better than I can, and we all need to know someone else has been there.

So without any further ado: An Amazing Exit Experience.

LEAVING THE BOX 

I was born & raised LDS, a sixth generation Mormon, a direct descendant of Parley P. Pratt (a yucky man) on one side. I am the fourth of five children. My Dad was a convert to the church early in my parents' marriage and they were sealed in the temple long before I was ever born. My childhood was sheltered but generally good. I mostly grew up in Idaho but we lived in Utah some too. I was a very "good girl" - I tried really hard to do what was right & to be obedient.

I think the first time I remember having a question about the church was when I was eight yrs. old. I remember asking my Mom if I had to get baptized or could I wait. I told her I didn't KNOW the church was true. She was shocked at my question, & I was baptized but not necessarily by my own choice. Note: I don't blame my parents for anything, so keep that in mind as you read. I think they did the best they could do based on what they knew & believed at the time.

Growing up, I never really fit in with the other kids my age. I was VERY SHY, quiet & introverted. When I was 16 I got my Patriarchal Blessing. I didn't tell anyone what it said. The following Sunday I was waiting in the hallway of the church with all of the other YW to go to YW's classes. Apparently we all had our blessings done around the same time, because the other girls were talking about what their blessings said. I was shocked to discover that mine was exactly WORD FOR WORD the same as theirs! I was so angry! I told my Mom that Heavenly Father must not care about me very much or I would have a blessing that was just for me, instead of having one that was generic! She told me that if we are righteous we are all entitled to the same blessings. She couldn't really console me at all on this topic & I never forgot this.

I did four years of Seminary; I was my Seminary teacher's prize student. I read the Book of Mormon many times, prayed hard, & got no answer about its truthfulness. My Seminary teacher told me that the reason I didn't get the burning in the bosom was because (& I quote), "You ALREADY KNOW IT'S TRUE!!" For some odd reason that made me feel special.

When I was 18 I married someone I really did not know. He was a so-called "worthy Priesthood holder" who wanted me to be a stay-at-home wife & bear his children. He told me he had a revelation that I was to marry him (he'd had "a vision".) When I was eight (he was 16) he told me that if my sister wouldn't marry him, he wanted me to marry him. Boy was I flattered, as a little kid, I didn't know that was just nasty & weird!! However, it stayed in my brain. Growing up, I heard my Mom talk about how wonderful this guy was & how she'd love to have him as a son-in-law some day. (Again, I don't blame her.) I was a people-pleaser, so you can guess how this affected me.

My ex’s Stake president referred to him as a "spiritual giant" & had told him he would one day be a stake president himself. (That didn't happen.) I mention this because a lot of people were fooled by my ex. When we married, he was 26, divorced, & had two kids. (His ex-wife was a convert who had realized she was gay, so she left him & the church.) He sexually assaulted me a few days before we married but I was scared & very embarrassed so I didn't tell a soul. I thought it must have been my fault somehow. I felt OBLIGATED to marry him because of this, because I was not clean & pure anymore. We went to the Temple & were sealed. I felt very UNWORTHY, but he didn't even feel bad about what he did. I was surprised that when we went into the Temple no one had a revelation that he was unworthy!! I cried all night long on my pathetic sealing night, knowing I had made a big mistake in marrying him, but I was too scared to tell anyone. This was the beginning of a 16 year long marriage to an abusive, horrible, con-man. He was abusive to me in every possible way, emotionally, physically, economically, & sexually.

We moved right after we were married & I got pregnant 3 months later. He lost his job 4 months after we married, & didn't try to get another job. We were dirt poor, & I mean poorer than most people ever experience here in the USA. We had no phone, one barely working car, no money, no food, & on top of that, I had never been away from my family before so I suffered horrible home sickness. We lived in a literal shack (rent $40 a month) that was condemned & torn down after we moved out of it.

I went to my Bishop and confessed my sexual "sins" (of being sexually assaulted) during a temple recommend interview. I took full responsibility for what my ex had done to me, as if it were my fault, & the Bishop never really knew the TRUTH of what happened. My ex didn’t want me to talk to anyone about anything that he perceived as private.

I had my first baby in 1992 at age 19. I had my second baby two yrs. later at 21. Then at 22, my step-kids moved in with us. I had never even met them before (they were ages nine & seven at the time) because their Mom had moved away & kept the kids away from my ex. He hadn’t seen them in 4.5 years. I was too young to be raising four kids, & I didn't know what I was doing. It was really hard on me. My ex was abusive to the kids as well as to me - I saved them several times from being beaten half to death by him. (There were a few times I thought he was going to kill his kids.)

I was pregnant a total of ten times; I miscarried five times. I had priesthood blessings that stated the babies/pregnancies would be healthy & well... blah blah blah…. only to lose half of them. I really started to question the power of the Priesthood, however, thanks to the double-bind, I believed I must not be righteous enough for those blessings!!! Of course, it was my fault somehow, right??

In 1999 my firstborn child was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. I asked for a blessing of healing for her from the missionaries, who told me they could not do it, & I needed to ask my Home Teachers. I asked the Home Teachers, who would not give her a blessing of healing, but he just asked for “God's will to be done”. My Dad & some other P. holders gave her a blessing, but again, all they said was, “God's will be done” (not blessing her to be healed). Then the Stake President said he had a revelation that it was her time to go. I just remember thinking that if these men REALLY had the ability to heal AS CHRIST DID, WHY would they not use that power to save a six year old whose faith was purer than anyone else's??? (She never doubted she'd be healed & never once complained.) I came to the conclusion that the reason they didn't do it was because they COULDN'T do it. Jesus didn't say "no" to anyone when people asked Him for a healing. He didn't tell people it was their time to go! My daughter died at age six & it changed my life forever. I never believed 100% in the church after that, I felt for the first time that I really didn't KNOW anything, & it scared the living hell out of me. My Patriarchal blessing did not have ONE SINGLE THING in it to help me through my daughter's death. Not one. And I combed through it over and over again, just looking for one little thing to comfort me.

I really wanted a divorce after my daughter died. I went to my many different bishops throughout the years as we moved around, they all told me I needed to work out my marriage & try to be a BETTER WIFE (even after my ex had hit me in the face!). I had a Stake President who told me that it would be a sin for me to leave my husband & that we did NOT NEED LOVE to make our marriage work!! After years of suffering I stopped talking to anyone about what was going on at home. Most people had no idea.

My ex was called to be a counselor to the Bishop in the second to last ward we were in. I told the Bishop I didn't think he was worthy of being a Counselor & he said, "All the wives say that!" (Wow, really? Maybe someone should start listening to the wives! Maybe they know something!!) I really thought it was nuts that no one ever had any inspiration or revelation about my ex, he was respected & liked (he is an amazing manipulator) up until the last ward we were in together. When we first moved to that ward we had a really good Bishop (who was released from that calling during our six years there). I think that Bishop could see my ex wasn't such a Peter Priesthood. He also listened to me when I told him I was tired of Primary callings. (I had taught nursery/primary for most of my married church years.)

All of these things led me in the direction that would eventually get me out of the church. In 2005 I was pregnant with my fifth child & doing three callings. This was the ward we lived in the longest, & for the first time ever I wasn't working in the Primary. I taught the 12 & 13 year old Sunday school class (averaging 15-22 kids a week), visiting teaching, & taught the Enrichment lessons once a month. (I think there was one more calling but I can't remember what it was now.) Our NEW Bishop (not the one I liked) called me to play the piano in RS at this time. I felt that God had nothing to do with callings. If God was involved He would know I couldn't handle four+ callings on top of being pregnant, raising four kids (my oldest step-child had moved out by this time), & being completely miserable in my marriage! I didn't think Mormon men had access to any revelation at this point.

Right around this time, my Mom had told me about a book she thought I should read called An Insider's View of Mormon Origins by Grant Palmer. (My youngest brother had recommended it to her.) I thought if the church is really true it won't matter what I read because if the church is "true", it will still be true! I think I was on chapter three in this book when I realized I was DONE being a Mormon! My ex resigned with me June of 2005. He wasn't doing his callings anymore, he was skipping classes & flirting with other women in the hallway during meetings (always a habit of his), & he was tired of being pressured to do his callings. We resigned five months before my last baby was born.

Also around this same time my step-son was caught molesting my daughter so my ex kicked him out of the house (he sent him to live with his mother). The Bishop & the whole ward sided with the step-son, saying that I was lying about what had happened & that I was just trying to destroy his testimony! I found out that the other LDS kids, including the Bishop’s kids, were harassing my daughter on the school bus telling her she was lying, & she was just trying to cause trouble for my step-son! Interesting but I never heard any slander towards my ex, it was just ALL MY FAULT.

After resigning from the church, I went to non-LDS therapy on my own, against my ex's wishes, & ten months after I started therapy, I realized I wasn't a crazy person & my ex WAS abusive (& it wasn’t MY FAULT!). I left him, everything WE owned, & I moved back home where my parents live. I got on an airplane with my four daughters, only $200 to my name, our clothes, & left everything else behind. I started my life over. I live in the SAME town where I grew up which is very difficult because of how saturated this area is with LDS & also that every time I go into the schools, post office, grocery store, etc. I see people I knew when I was growing up. (We live in a small town with FOUR LDS chapels. VERY SATURATED.)

I don't know how long it will take me to really fully recover from Mormonism. I don't know when I will truly learn how to reason like other people do. I am convinced that brainwashing stays with you for a long time. I feel angry when I see how unfairly I was treated as a female in the church. I hate how women are disregarded in the church! I still struggle with trusting myself & trusting my own intuition, & being logical. I still find that I am too trusting of other people when I shouldn't be. I made so many very important decisions in my life based on WHAT OTHER PEOPLE TOLD ME, & I trusted priesthood holders more than myself, which caused me a lot of grief!!

I went through hell to get my divorce, my ex stalked me & bought me a GRAVE. I had a few years of classes & therapy at the women's shelter, which changed my life. My ex moved away & rarely sees the kids now & I'm re-married to a wonderful man who truly sees men & women as EQUAL. That is amazing to me right there. He has never once made me feel like I am less than he is.

 Thank you for being interested in my story. I hope this isn't too choppy or confusing, I never went to college or took any writing classes.

 
No, my dear, neither choppy nor confusing. Just amazing. Thank you for your example, your strength, and your commitment to your children and your sanity. Thank you to your new, wonderful husband. Thank you for sharing this. May it be a strength for someone in need.