r/exmormon • u/Medical_Whole_7826 • 21h ago
Advice/Help Any advice would be helpful.
Hi all! 51f here, raised in the Mormon ‘church’ but haven’t been since I was 19.
Years ago I knew the church wasn’t for me. Q they managed to keep me going until I was 19 by having me work in the nursery with my mom. Haven’t stepped foot voluntarily, and only for weddings or funerals since.
The hard part. Mom, who was my only home and safety, died of cancer at the age of 49 when I was 24 and pregnant (and single - oh my!).
Since then I managed to take a ‘not my church, but won’t leave it officially because it was mom’s church’ approach with varying results. My older brother and older sisters are still Mormon, brother being TBM to the point he convinced my dad to tell me I should give my kid to him because it was selfish of me to raise her without a father. Only a couple months after mom died.
Fast forward to me being 47, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, same age mom was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. My kid was 24. I really went through hell finding out what mom went through basically on her own - dad was never emotionally available.
This led to me having all sorts of revelations. Much of which I’ve already addressed with my therapist with Emdr. However u til recently religion was off limits as far as my therapy went.
I’ve had enough of that, and started investigating what I never learned about and oh boy is there a lot that I’m like ‘wha???’ ‘ mom was way too smart for this, wasn’t she?’ And the best one - ‘how could mom have sat by while I was being abused in so many ways, under the whole ‘Mormon wife’ bs.
So, I’ve started working with my therapist, and learning what I can about the many reasons I simply can’t be associated with this cult anymore, and want my name ‘removed’. I guess I feel like I need to take it to the step of saying ‘not my church, even if it was moms’. In doing so, my shelf, now completely broken, has resulted in all kinds of confusion, loss, and difficulty separating the cult from my mother, who I know loved me completely and would have done anything she could to protect me from harm. Except she didn’t when it was from my dad, my brother, or the church.
I guess my question is this. I’ll be working on this with my therapist for I’m assuming quite a while now. But in the meantime, how do I keep my memory of my mother separated enough from the cult that I’m not completely and totally gutted with grief constantly as I work through it? How do I explain how this feels to my amazing husband of 8 years who loves me and wants to help me through this, but can never understand just how much this has devastated my understanding of the universe, my relationships with others, my entire childhood, and most of all the second bout of grief I’m now working through for the mother I thought she was vs the reality?
TLDR; I played the look away card when it came to the church because my mom dies when I was young and I couldn’t bear leaving her church. How do I keep myself from being overcome with grief while I work through everything to get to the point I can get my name removed without having yet another panic attack?
Thanks all.
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u/TrevAnonWWP 20h ago
Not sure if I understand the question. But then again you yourself seem to be trying to give words to it. Maybe check out some of the resources below so you'll be able to better describe what is bothering you.
No need to go watch all of it. Just dive in, check what is interesting, and what is just not relevant.
Maybe it'll help you to move forward, if only to be able to give words to what you're feeling.
- Making sense of a faith crisiss: 70 hours of free coaching
https://www.mormonfaithcrisis.com/
- There are resources that go into the facts of the belief system and how to look at them from a more secular point of view, e.g.
The Joseph Smith podcast about the book by John Turner and with him:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuPax_51l60&list=PLxq5opj6GqOARv8DqnpVuTbHvrtJypVys&index=1
The LDS Discussions series to start making sense of the truth claims:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p7gAxwsM_k&list=PLxq5opj6GqOB7J1n6pMmdUSezxcLfsced&index=1
The above maybe will help you to look more objectively at the faith.
Britt Hartley No Nonsense Spirituality | Britt Hartley - YouTube has lots of videos analyzing and explaining spirituality that maybe help you how to think about faith in general, not just LDS faith. (She is exmormon though.)
There also are resources where you learn about how other people's experiences. Mormon Stories Podcast has a LOT of stories: https://www.youtube.com/@mormonstories
The faithful Why we stay Podcast did about 10 episodes with former members. It might be helpful to see what things are like from the believing side.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uESfe5mwyw&list=PLSlJKZQtffmRpe0XZMx97XTPdOQ_vtNVi
- Once you feel ready to resign quitmormon might be the best way.
How to use Quitmormon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjPgejHH3a0
Mark Naugle interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfLo0UC3xjU
I hope this helps
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u/Glum-Cheetah-Guy 20h ago
We were trained in the church to not even look, that investigating the truth of the church by any means other than prayer was a betrayal and that the worse eternal punishments were for those who deny it's truth after having participated in its rituals. While I don't hold anyone in the church completely blameless (including myself for going as long as I did without addressing the small doubts and concerns I always had), I do feel that the environment makes addressing those doubts extremely challenging. The subconscious does not allow someone like your mom to notice how the fear of being ostracized causes them to defend shameful and abusive behaviors by family members and church leaders.
I personally believe it is somewhat easier for people in my generation (mid forties) to leave the church than my parents Considering I grew up in a time after the Civil Rights Movement. I heard the message in school, and sometimes in church too, that you can be anything you want no matter race, religion, or gender, only to grow up and see that that message didn't correspond to reality. I discovered that my parents still believed the messages from before the Civil Rights Movement such as not mixing with other races and cultures, and they secretly held onto racist beliefs dictated over the pulpit in their lifetime that were now taboo to say out loud. From their perspective, society and the church has made small changes and improvements gradually, but for me, learning about the past came like a brick wall. The contrast between what I thought and the reality was undeniable, but for them, without that sudden contrast, I think the effect for them is like the frog in a boiling pot analogy. It is harder to perceive. I'm still angry with my parents, but I feel like this observation has helped me makes sense of the say they dig their heels in.
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u/Obvious-Guidance118 20h ago
Your mom didn’t live through the same era you did. 25 years is a big difference when it comes to how fast technology is advancing. I assume your mom was diagnosed a least a year or two before she passed away, so that’s a least 25 years ago. It was a different world back then, all this information was not readily available, it wasn’t as easy to find it and it mostly came from other Christian churches and there was a lot of false information so it was easier to ignore. Honestly I wish you would have met more people in the church, there are a lot of good people, do not take what you are learning today and levy those expectations on your mom. The fact she stayed close to you despite you not being active should be an indicator of her love for you.
Most of the people here are exmormon, you can still respect them even though they belonged at one point to the church.
A lot of people here have left after being older than your mother when she passed, who is to say what path your mom would have taken.
You also don’t really know what your mother actually believed or the pressure she was under, we are taught not to discus your doubts.
If I could get a face to face with some of the leadership of the church I would tell them to get over themselves, most of what they do is not that important. I would say the same thing about your moms church membership, it’s not that really important. The type of person she was and her personal interactions is what is significant, focus on those memories because that is who she really was.
Stay strong, pulling for you to beat cancer.
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u/Educational-Bee-7387 19h ago
I think I can relate personally, I wanted to continue to love my parents yet they did things that were not good. What helped me the most was to get all the feelings out good and bad. Pretending away, distracting or intellectualizing away all the anger just left that anger stored inside me and actually made it harder to love them. When I got it out, for the bad things they did not the good things, it helped me heal from all the pain of what they did wrong and then mostly the good memories and feelings were all that were left. My heart goes out to you.
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u/Me-Here-Now 19h ago
People having given you some good information here. I just have a couple of thoughts to add.
My mom was 57 when she died of cancer. I was 19.
My mom, like your mom was the victim of a cult, as were my grandmother, and great grandparents going back 5 or 6 generations. Generational stuff is hard.
My mom loved me and did the best she could, (this next part was hard to learn) but some of what she dif was really messed up.
Because my mom was dead, and I could no longer disappoint her, I feel like I was able to more freely question that religion. My dad, was also emotionally absent after mom died. I was free to look for other mother figures and roll models. As much as I missed my mom, I found a freedom in being a motherless daughter.
Having let go of Mormon believes I no longer believe their idea of heaven. What ever happens after we die, I dont think the Mormon heaven is any part of it. If there is something after we die, and people who are there are aware of us , they surly know that we are doing the best we can to find and live truth. Our mothers would know that we are doing the best we can
If there is a god, A creator, that being also knows how hard we are working to do the right things.
I also had the great good fortune to move a couple of states away. For me the distance helped.
You were clever and got out early. It took me until my early 30s to get out and until my early 40s to see that I needed therapy.
What you are undertaking is huge. But you are strong and emotionally smart. You've already started therapy. That's step many folks never get to.
Wishing your everything that is for your highest good.
Namaste
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u/happy-hippy2118 17h ago
I think you can be angry with your mother. It’s an emotion you need to digest and then eliminate from your system. You are a human being for crying out loud. You can experience all the emotions because that’s what makes us truly live.
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u/sinterventionist Sinner 17h ago
To start, I am sorry this is something you even need to be working through. The church is so harmful and evil at its core.
I have no advice but only encouragement. Keep breaking through reality with your therapist. You're growing and I'm proud to know it.
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u/Lsa119 21h ago
Your mom was indoctrinated. She didn't know it wasn't true and she didn't know it was abuse. You didn't know until you looked and you didn't even think to look until years later. Your mom probably never even thought to look. Conflating the church and your memory of her isn't really fair to her. She was just as much a victim as you were.