July 19, 2024 • 44 mins
TW: Mentions of sexual assault, self-harm, and suicide.
Karina shares her story of growing up in Mormonism and what it's like realizing that your whole life has been a lie.
CES Letter (print): https://cesletter.org/
CES Letter (audio): https://archive.org/details/CESletter
Note: We are not experts--we are just humans with real-life experience.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Welcome brothers and sisters and othersiblings to the Peculiar People Podcast.
It's an ex -Mormon podcast.
I'm one of the co -hosts, Karina Vance.
And I am Sammi Earnest.
Welcome everyone.
Just before we start I do want to add alittle trigger warning
I won't go into detail on anything, butjust in case anybody needs to skip this
(00:24):
episode, totally fine.
But there will be mentions of sexualassault and then suicide and self harm.
So be aware if that bothers you.
And if not, thanks for joining us.
Yeah, definitely.
And make sure that if you need to skipthis episode, skip the episode.
(00:44):
We want you to be here only if you'recomfortable being here
So we decided that we're gonna just kindof dive right in.
This is our first episode, just giving alittle intros.
then Karina is going to share her exitstory this episode and I'll share mine
next episode.
(01:05):
So to begin, and I'm Sammi, I grew up inMichigan.
I was born into the covenant.
And if you're not familiar
Mormon terms, that just means that I was
born into the
I grew up in very Orthodox family.
My dad grew up in a very Orthodox familyand my mom was a convert in her twenties.
(01:30):
So it was just very strict household in alot of ways, but especially in religious
terms.
in Michigan, the Mormon community is quitesmall, but, it was definitely like pretty
steadfast and you were made to bepeculiar.
(01:54):
lots of, lots of times during my youthwhere I stood out in very weird ways among
my peers for sure.
so I went to BYU.
in Provo, Utah, as did Karina, that'swhere we met.
And then I served as a missionary for thechurch for 18 months in the Canada
(02:18):
-Toronto mission, Spanish speaking.
And I returned home from my mission in2018 and left the church in 2022.
But there was definitely some stuffstewing for quite some time before I left.
(02:39):
Yeah, it's definitely a long journey toget to that point, especially when it's
such a big decision to make.
Oh, definitely.
There's so much to unpack.
Yeah.
Um, so for me, um, I grew up in Indianaand then we moved down to Kentucky when I
was a kid, but I am the youngest of sixkids.
(02:59):
So it was a pretty big family.
And then I also had a lot of aunts anduncles and cousins who were Mormon.
Uh, my dad has 12 siblings and, uh, 11 ofthem are boys.
So my grandma loves to brag that she's got10 of her 11 sons are priesthood holders.
That's special.
(03:20):
has been like her big bragging point.
so I grew up around my family a lot, thetown that I was originally from, since
they had so many siblings and then myaunts and uncles also had so many kids.
The tiny school I went to was probablymostly my family.
(03:43):
my god.
So it wasn't, it wasn't a very Mormoncommunity, but there was a lot of us in
our little clan of people.
So I still feel like it was reallyprominent when I was a kid.
And so there were things that I likedabout it.
I liked having family and friends and likethe sense of community that comes with
(04:03):
being in a church.
And yeah, that's probably like the mainthing I miss honestly, was like default
friends that I could hang out with onevery Sunday.
But another thing that I enjoyed was thethings that I learned, not necessarily the
(04:24):
religious aspect and not all of it becausea lot of it is direct gender roles and
what I needed to be doing as a woman.
But some of the info that I was taught, atleast for my family, was really good.
And just in general, how to take care ofmyself and take care of my house that I
have now
you know, maybe a family one day if Idecide to have one.
(04:46):
so there was stuff that I liked and thenthe stuff that I didn't like.
If you haven't heard the shelf metaphor,basically you have your shelf of questions
or concerns or things that don't reallymake sense.
And then if you have a new thing, you putit up on the shelf and I would just tell
(05:07):
myself
It'll make sense later or if it doesn'tmake sense, whenever I get to heaven one
day, like Heavenly Father can explain itand then it'll all be good and it'll take
all my questions away.
And I probably started my shelf around thetime I got baptized because then it felt
(05:28):
real and I was a big perfectionist and Ifelt like I couldn't make mistakes.
So I got really bad anxiety.
feeling like if I made a choice that was asin that it was gonna stick with me
forever then and then I was terrified ofdoing basically anything because I didn't
(05:48):
want to get in trouble and I didn't wantto be taken away from my family.
Oof.
That is such a real fear.
to be like the one kid who got to heavenand everyone's up there and it was like
too bad, like you messed up too much,you're not gonna join us.
Yeah, no, for real.
I feel like so many people can relate tothat.
Like, there's so much weight on yourshoulders.
(06:10):
It doesn't matter who you are.
If you're a parent, if you're a child, ifyou know, you're a leader or not, like
there's so much weight on your shoulder tobe exactly how the church expects you to
be.
Because if not, you might as well justlike fuck your family.
Like, that or nothing.
well, I didn't get mental health helpuntil later, but definitely looking back,
(06:35):
I can tell I had a lot of anxiety for achild.
Definitely stemming from thatperfectionism and fear of making mistakes
because they were going to cause meeternal consequences.
And so the struggle for that startedyoung.
And then.
(06:56):
Then when I got older and I was ateenager, I realized that I was bisexual.
And at the time I didn't have a fullrealization of everything that came with
that because I don't know about you, butwhere I grew up, sexuality when I was a
kid just wasn't really talked
straight facts yeah no it was so so justlike country and we're all straight and we
(07:23):
don't care about anybody's rights yeah
Yeah, so I knew that it was wrong and Iknew that it was seen as a sin.
And I didn't come out when I was ateenager, none of the homophobia got
directed at me, but I would hear otherpeople talk about it in general.
And then I would internalize what they hadto say about it.
(07:46):
Whether that was feeling like, you know,if I acted on it, then I was going to
commit a sin second to murder, basically.
if I, or they would say things like, theyjust do it because they enjoy sinning
(08:09):
basically, which doesn't make sense, but,or, you know, they were confused, they
were led astray, they chose to be that wayand they just have to turn back on it.
And,
Yup
So I had internalized a lot of that and Ihad a lot of self -hatred.
And then probably around the time I was16, I started having self -harm habits
(08:32):
from just feeling like I was born amistake, basically.
man, I'm so sorry you went through that
Yeah, luckily I'm good now.
But, and then also when I was in highschool, I started spending my summers in
Utah.
I would live with one of my siblings andit was pretty fun, but there were other
(08:56):
times where I kind of realized howdifferent the Utah culture is from being a
Mormon anywhere else because their ownlittle bubble.
And everyone thinks the same way as them.
They all go to church together on Sunday.
And I really felt like I didn't fit inbecause I believe the same things that
(09:19):
they did, but just the way they did itdidn't make sense to me.
Because I felt like when I showed up onSunday that they were all watching to like
see who was going to be there.
And then talk about it, basically.
Yeah
felt like a righteousness contest.
(09:42):
And it made me uncomfortable because I waslike, you know, I'm moving to this place
where it's supposed to be a bunch ofpeople who have the same religious ideals
as me.
Like, hopefully that would be like thebest place to go because we all think the
same.
And then to feel like I didn't fit inthere, but also I didn't fit in back home
because I was like one of a few Mormonkids in school.
(10:04):
and you're definitely made to feel likeyou have to be different from them.
So I was like, well, I don't fit in eitherplace.
I don't know what to do.
Yeah, for sure.
And I would add that like moving to Utah,especially just once you're like a young
adult, basically in Mormonism, it's notjust like a righteousness contest.
It's a contest of like, be the one thatthe righteous guy is going to fall in love
(10:27):
with and marry in the temple.
Like you are always put out there to justbe a wife and a mother.
And so you have to like put on this like,I'm just so righteous.
I'm so worthy.
Make sure that all the guys are looking atme and noticing that I'm here at church
doing all the things and going to, youknow, the 15 different activities per week
(10:49):
that you have to go to as a Mormon becauseif you don't, then you're like not
fulfilling your legacy, basically.
Oh, it's so good.
I definitely felt like that when I went toBYU.
And I remember whenever I applied, I waslike, this is what I'm going to do.
(11:09):
All of my family went to BYU.
I'm going to be surrounded by Mormons.
I'm going to have all kinds of more datingopportunities so I can marry a Mormon boy.
And.
It was actually the only college I appliedto.
was like, if I don't get in, I don't knowwhat I'm going to do with my future,
because this is it.
But whenever I got there,
(11:32):
sorry.
I just realized, I don't think that eitherof us mentioned that we're both divorced.
Yeah, and that was kind of like thetimeline of that was go to BYU, get
married pretty quickly into like our early20s, and now we're both like mid late 20s
and divorced.
So that's how that went.
(11:58):
Yeah.
So by the time I got to BYU, I think alsoin Provo and in BYU itself, that culture
was so much worse.
Cause it wasn't just about being righteousor being faithful.
was also, at least for me at times, itfelt like a popularity contest.
(12:20):
You had to be modest, but you had to begood looking and you had to
talents and you had to have X, Y, and Zskills and you had to have all of this so
you could basically present yourself asthe best option on the market because
sure.
yeah, sorry, keep going.
Yeah, so many people went there to get aneducation, but also, you know, to find
(12:46):
marriage.
And so it was always feeling like you hadto be on and putting on your best.
And it was exhausting.
For sure, to get that MRS degree, the Mrs.
degree.
But yeah, I also feel like you coulddefinitely tell who were the Utah Mormons.
And coming, both of us, from places thatweren't Utah, it was ostracizing.
(13:13):
They are the ones, they all look the same,basically.
They got their hair curled perfectly.
do.
No, seriously.
like, it's like, I didn't fit into that.
I was never like one of the like, prettygirls.
I'm doing air quotes, like, never reallycared to do my makeup, do my hair or
(13:33):
anything like that.
And you go into this culture whereeveryone is like a show horse.
And the people who are, I don't know, Imean, like, I didn't get a ton of dates at
BYU, but the people who are, are thoseMormon perfect hair, perfect makeup.
people and so it is such a
(13:55):
Yeah.
And then like another thing when I went toBYU, that summer before was the first time
that I had been with a woman.
And I had so much shame about it becauseimmediately afterwards I was like, I
messed up.
Like, I am in deep trouble.
(14:17):
And if I do not fix this, then I am goingto just be screwed for the rest of my
And so when I got there, I immediately waslike, I need to get help because at the
time I still felt like it was somethingthat I could like fix or cure or make it
go away.
(14:38):
And so that was at the time that I startedseeking help from priesthood people in my
life.
And that's actually what opened the doorto me getting assaulted by some of them.
Yeah.
Basically,
it's super messed up, but it was under theguise of like, you had an experience with
(15:00):
a woman, now you need to have experienceswith men and then you will change your
mind.
Which didn't work.
But at the time I was like, I don't wantto do this, but I don't feel like I have
any other options.
Okay, where was this coming from?
Was this coming from like the top, likethe bishop, or was this coming from just
(15:23):
some rando, like single adult priesthoodholders, which by the way, priesthood
holders have no qualifications to begiving any sort of help.
It was leadership.
I will just leave it at
have a sexual experience with a man sothat you would un -queer yourself.
(15:46):
Okay, does that not break the law ofchastity?
it totally does.
But, but yeah, I went along with thesethings that I didn't want to do because I
felt like at the time that was my bestoption.
And,
I'm so sorry.
(16:06):
Yeah.
And so my that was freshman year and thencome winter semester freshman year.
I finally finally at the point where I waslike, I cannot keep doing this because it
was going to kill me.
And then so that winter I did try to takemy life.
(16:29):
Luckily, I'm still alive.
And then at that point, I was kind oflike, you know
If I am going to hell now for being thisway, I'm gonna choose that option because
I cannot keep living this way.
I wouldn't make it.
(16:51):
So that was definitely...
You'd think that I would leave the church,but I was still a full believer.
I just felt very broken.
Yeah, definitely.
I know what you mean.
So after that, had my sophomore year ofcollege and then my mental health got a
(17:13):
little better because I got myself out ofbad situations and I finally started going
to therapy and taking medicine as neededand didn't talk about anything that had
happened.
I didn't start getting therapy for thatuntil recently.
But it was my sophomore year that I met mynow ex -husband.
(17:36):
and we got engaged when I was 19.
And we had known each other for less thansix months when we got engaged.
I remember that.
Oh good god.
It was very fast.
And then we got married right before fallsemester started.
(17:57):
So we started dating in the winter.
We were married by the end of summer.
And it was like the beginning was good andwe were both Mormon.
We got married in the temple.
And I remember, so I got endowed the daybefore my wedding and then I had the
(18:18):
wedding ceremony.
the next day since I didn't go on amission.
And I don't know about you, but for me,having two back -to -back days of like,
here's your endowment ceremony for thefirst time, and also here's your first
time hearing the wedding ceremony, it wasreally overwhelming and I was honestly
(18:39):
left uncomfortable.
No, definitely.
I got endowed before my mission and Ialmost left the church before I left on my
mission, uncomfy.
So I cannot imagine.
Because the temple prep classes, they talkmore on like the doctrine side of what
(19:02):
people do in the temple, but they didn'tever explain like how any of the
ceremonies worked or like anything you hadto do.
And so when I went there the first time, Iwas like, this is low key, high key,
culty.
Yeah, no straight up it's a cult.
And I was like, this is what people aredoing?
(19:26):
Like every month when my parents go to thetemple, this, this is what they're doing?
Mm -hmm, yeah, no, I feel that too.
I'm like, everybody thinks this is normal,right?
Yeah, and then so I did that and it wasuncomfortable and then I went back the
next day and I got married and I rememberthe section of the marriage covenant that
(19:47):
you make where my husband promised tofollow God basically and then it was my
turn.
It was me promising to follow my husband,which made me even more uncomfortable
because
I was like, why can't we just both agreeto follow God and that should lead us in
the same direction?
(20:07):
Why do I have to defer to a man to leadhim, like have him lead
Yeah, the patriarchy.
yeah, so that was a big thing on my shelfbecause I thought that like that was going
to be the pinnacle, that it was going tolike make sense of a lot of stuff in my
life.
And then I got to the temple and all itdid was make me uncomfortable.
(20:32):
Man, that is so rough.
And that's all so much all at once.
I cannot imagine.
Yeah, it was a lot to take in.
And then after I got married, I will skipall of the marriage problems.
We can talk about that later, plus it'snot all church related.
(20:53):
But I went to a married ward soon afterthat and married wards were like the
singles wards.
But I found them even more annoyingbecause then instead of
Parading yourself around.
was also now I'm the best couple and we'regoing to make babies and do all this
stuff.
(21:14):
And at that point I was getting reallytired of living in Utah.
So even though I was still an activebelieving member, we stopped going to
church as often and I would just go enoughto meet the attendance requirement for
BYU.
Because if anyone doesn't know,
If you go to BYU, you have to have, Ithink it's like 80 % church attendance,
(21:40):
something like that.
And then every year you have an interviewwith your bishop and then they determine
if you're still worthy to go.
so, If you're righteous enough to go toschool.
So I did enough to still meet therequirements, but then I tried to avoid
all the extra activities because all theydid was make me uncomfortable.
(22:04):
And then, so now we're getting to the partwhere my child - WHAT?
What year was
I got married in 2017.
Okay, yeah yeah
in 2019 is when I formally decided that Iwas done.
And my husband, he was actually the onethat kind of started it.
(22:28):
So I'm grateful to him for that.
One day he basically came up to me and hesaid, hey, I was doing some research
online and I read this article and it mademe really question if the church was true
or not
And immediately I was like, what did youread?
(22:49):
Was it a church source?
Like, why, why were you doing this?
And he was like, yeah, you're not allowedto seek other sources.
And so I was in my mind, I was like, okay,here's my time to be the strong one.
Tell me what you read.
And hopefully I could like answer hisquestions and we would be good.
(23:11):
And he's like, okay,
I will let you read it on your own andthen we can come back and talk about it so
I don't have to tell you how to thinkabout it." I was like, cool.
So he sent me the link and it was the CES
Ooh, a doozy.
(23:31):
I haven't read it.
I've listened to part of it, but I likewas already well enough out of the church
by the time that I found out about it thatI was like, I'll probably listen to this
in passing at some time, you know, but I'mdone.
Yeah.
Yeah, it was really informative and he hassources listed for everything he says in
(23:53):
the letter.
And so it's kind of hard to argue whenhe's saying, you know, here's what
happened.
Here's like the historical document thatgoes with it.
And so I probably only got three sectionsinto it.
And I was like, turns out my life is alie.
And none of this is true.
And so that was like the moment where
(24:17):
If the history didn't match what they toldme it was, if the Book of Mormon wasn't a
true book of God like I thought it was,then there's no point in me staying,
especially when I've already had, youknow, long list my whole life of things
that hurt me and made me uncomfortable andmade me feel like I was less than.
(24:38):
And then you're going to tell me thatJoseph Smith didn't even, he wasn't how I
thought he was.
I was like, you know what?
We're done here.
Yeah, for real.
I feel like the CES letter drives so manypeople out of the church.
And I've seen even in like some of theFacebook groups that we're on together
(25:00):
that are like ex -Mormon Facebook groupsthat people will like write it on the
Relief Society chalkboard and stuff likethat.
It's great.
It's great.
We're doing the Lord's work.
Yeah, so I read that letter the summerbefore my senior year at BYU.
And I had realized that I was done and Ididn't think that it was true anymore.
(25:23):
But I was so close to being done with mydegree that I was like, I can deal with it
for another year.
I already had the interview, so I was justlike, it's fine.
We're just going to go.
But we decided to basically keep it asecret.
I had had a friend
earlier in college who had said that shedidn't believe the church was true and she
(25:46):
got kicked out of BYU and she yeah and shehad to start over at another college which
takes a lot more time and money so I waslike you know what I can I'll still go to
meet the requirement and I will just nottalk about it with anyone and just finish
my degree
Did your friend have to start over, startover?
(26:08):
She didn't get her credits?
Some of her stuff transferred, I don'tknow if you've looked into it, but a lot
of BYU classes don't transfer if you tryto go to another school.
And they have so many religion classesthat like all of those hours you put in,
(26:30):
you could maybe get one elective for them,you
Right, yeah.
That pisses me the fuck off.
Like, I - there was points where I wasthinking about transferring and I was
like, but it makes zero percent sense todo that.
Like, you lose so much.
That is so -
(26:52):
And after I had graduated, my ex -husbandactually transferred to a different
college.
And when he did, he lost a lot of what hehad done.
So I just decided I would finish.
And then once I had the diploma physicallyin my hand, then I would actually tell
people.
(27:14):
So I did finish school and then I told
my family that I had left in 2020.
I wasn't sure how to bring it up or how toannounce it, because it's not something
you just send in a group text.
So I.
(27:35):
Yeah, it does.
So I wrote them all a letter and it didn'tgo into detail on why I had left, but it
basically said, you know, I'm done withthe church, I don't believe it's true
anymore, I won't be going.
And then I was like, if you want to knowwhy keep reading.
If you don't want to know, then just goahead and finish the letter.
(27:56):
That's all I have to say.
And then I had a couple of paragraphs atthe end, just giving a general, like, I
don't think the history is true.
I don't like how they treat women, howthey've treated other groups of people,
like the racism, the homophobia, the listgoes
Mm -hmm.
And then I just sent it to them all oneday and there was a lot of backlash.
(28:21):
My parents didn't take it well at all.
They were really upset and even mad.
So that year was kind of rough becauseanytime I'd want to spend time with them,
that's what they would want to talk aboutto try to convince me that I was wrong.
(28:41):
or that I just wasn't seeing it right,that I was being let astray.
And it eventually got to the point that Ihad to pretty much ghost them.
And we didn't talk for about six monthsbecause I told them I wasn't gonna allow
them to talk to me that way, just in thesame way I didn't wanna attack them and
(29:01):
try to convince them that I thought thattheir faith wasn't true either.
I was like, just leave me alone.
And then if we can not talk aboutreligion,
then we don't have to talk about it and wecan move on.
And luckily it has gotten better.
it's still a huge part of my family'slife.
(29:23):
So I know it's something that they do alot.
So sometimes, you know, they still talkabout it because that's like a main hobby
for them.
But at least now we're to the point wherewe can just kind of respect the
differences and then not really dig intoit in discussion.
So I feel like we're at a good place
That's good.
That can be so rough.
(29:43):
Yeah, I have so much to say on that, butI'll probably save it for my exit story.
Families are tough.
And then, yeah, it is hard.
And I think some people don't realize whenyou leave a religion, it's not just
leaving the faith, especially with howtight knit Mormonism is.
(30:03):
You lose family members, you can losefriends, you can lose a whole community of
people just by deciding you don't believeit anymore.
Right.
And that's when the church is preachingthat family is the most central, the most
important.
It's everything.
And then if you leave the religion, yeah,bye Felicia.
(30:25):
it's the church, I would say, I think thechurch does help some families to be like
bound together in ways that are beautifulto them.
Sure.
But I also feel like it wrecks a lot morefamilies than it probably helps.
Yeah, especially when it creates such astrong like us versus them narrative.
(30:54):
But now out of my six siblings, I'd saythere's probably one or two that are still
in and then some of them have left orthey're more nuanced in their belief.
Some of them do totally different thingsnow, but.
I was definitely the first one to announceit that I was done.
(31:18):
And so I got a lot of backlash the firsttime.
So you're welcome, siblings, for takingthat bullet.
For real, for real.
That's interesting too.
have some of my siblings are out, some arein, some of them are kind of on the fence.
And I was definitely the most vocal aboutmy exit from the church and definitely
(31:45):
have received a lot of backlash from thatas well.
It's a role that someone has to take andwe took it and that's amazing.
we did
it definitely can suck in a lot of ways.
For sure.
So yeah, I have been out for five yearsnow.
A lot changes.
(32:08):
The main thing, you know, I got divorcedand I feel like I could do a whole episode
on that.
But I will say I'm grateful that he got meto this point.
I don't think I would have started toquestion the church if he didn't encourage
(32:28):
me
read and study on my own.
And there's definitely a lot of churchrelated things that played into it, but
also just life in general, becausemarriage is hard.
And I think when I first left, there was alot of anxiety and fear because you don't
(32:51):
know what you're going to do or whereyou're going to go now.
And I definitely had a period where I wasangry for things that had happened.
But I feel like now I've come to a prettygood place where I've made peace with my
beliefs now and feeling like I can talkabout it more without just getting upset
(33:11):
or getting mad about it.
So I felt like it was a good time for youto want to make a podcast because even if
it had been a year ago, I probably wouldnot have wanted to do it
perfect timing.
Look at that.
Yeah, of course.
I'm so glad that you're here with me anddoing this with me.
(33:31):
I think it's going to be great.
And I'm hopeful that we'll be able toreach a bunch of people and help them at
whatever stage they're in.
Yeah, it's really, it's such a tripleaving the church because I don't feel
like I fully recognized until I left thechurch that the church was my entire
personality.
(33:51):
It was everything I did.
Like the sheer amount of hours, you thinkabout like growing up, church was three
hours.
It changed to two when we were what?
Like in college, probably.
But then you also have mutual as a youth.
You have like the young kids activity daysas a child.
(34:14):
And then once you're in college, you haveInstitute and you have FHE and FHE family
home evening and all these like randomactivities that you're supposed to go to.
it literally, seminary, my gosh, there'sjust, it just like keeps on piling on.
And it literally.
(34:34):
takes up such a portion of your wakinghours that when it's not in your life,
holy shit, you have to figure out whatyou're gonna do with your time, how you're
going to function as a person in societywhen you have such little experience
(34:55):
functioning in society without the crutchof religion telling you exactly how to
act, exactly what to do.
And you have to like question literallyeverything.
Literally everything.
Do I believe this or was this justbrainwashed into me?
(35:17):
How do I feel about this action thatpeople do like drinking for example, or
like having sex outside of marriage?
Am I okay with that?
What do I think about like, one nightstands?
What do I think about having multiplepartners?
You know, like all these different things
You had zero space in Mormonism to fullyprocess all of those things, fully think
(35:42):
through all those things for yourselfbecause you're being told exactly what you
needed to believe, exactly how you neededto act.
And if you got out of line, then you gotreprimanded and you lost privileges.
And oof, it's just like so much all atonce that you are slapped with and
(36:03):
I'll say five years.
I'm looking forward to that because I'm atlike two years fully out now and there's
so much, so much that I've processedalready, but I so much more that I need to
process.
It definitely gets better with every year.
(36:23):
And now, I mean, I still think about thechurch often just because, you know, I was
a member for 22 years, but, you know, nowI have times where I don't think about it
and it's really relieving to know thatlike, their influence on how I think is
not gonna be permanent.
(36:46):
And it's really relieving and exciting toknow that you can go live your own life
and it's not always going to feel likeit's this cloud hanging in the background.
At least I don't know if you felt thatway, but at first it was kind of, I felt
like it was everywhere.
Yeah, there's like moments that if someoneasks me like, where did you go to college
(37:09):
or ask me something just random andMormonism comes up because you know, I
went to BYU Mormon college, I feel a sheeramount of embarrassment, like even just
admitting, I went to BYU or I grew upMormon, but then I'm like, and I'm not
Mormon anymore because people like, I grewup thinking
(37:30):
like that people thought Mormons were justlike the coolest, the coolest, most kind
people on the planet.
No, like some - okay, some people thinkthat, but most people think Mormons are
fucking weird because they are.
Like, and yeah.
I've met people that know nothing aboutit.
(37:51):
I know people that know a lot about it.
Some people will have a couple of Mormonfriends and be like, yeah, they were cool.
Or other people will be like, do you havelike five moms?
And then I'll have to be like, okay, realback.
yeah, that's so real.
That's so real.
guess it is, yeah, it's kind of all acrossthe board, but I think I just feel this
(38:13):
embarrassment.
Like if they know what I now know aboutMormonism, just all of the really shitty
stuff that has happened in the history ofthe church, the things that continue to
happen, treatment of women and all sortsof different groups.
Like, I don't want to be associated withthat, you know?
(38:35):
So yeah, it's just tricky, but Idefinitely, I've come a long way and you
have too.
And it's funny the other day when we werecatching up, I said something about like,
we don't even really know each other thatwell.
And you said something like, well, I'm notthe same person that I was when we met.
(38:55):
And I was like, girl, same.
Like, isn't it incredible how much we'vegrown?
We have come so far and it's huge to seethe differences.
There's so much that I look back at andI'm like, I give love to every version of
myself.
You have to, to be able to heal and moveforward.
(39:18):
like, damn girl, those were some roughtimes.
Goodness.
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
You were doing the best with what you knewat the time.
So you've got to give yourself a littlegrace.
And now you know better, so you can dobetter.
(39:41):
Right, exactly.
I hope that everyone listening takes thatto heart because you will go everywhere
you want to and you will grow in ways thatyou cannot even imagine.
You just kind of got to get through themessy middle to get there.
and it is a messy middle.
(40:03):
It is a mighty messy.
peculiar and meh - messy.
Yeah, for sure.
Well, yeah, thank you for sharing yourstory.
There's definitely a lot more things thatwe can go into detail on later.
I know there's already been topics thatwe've thrown around because there's all
(40:28):
kinds of reasons why people leave and thenthere's all kinds of complications that
come with it, whether you are male,female, non -binary, gay, straight
There's just a lot of messy topics thatmake sometimes being a Mormon harder.
(40:48):
Definitely.
Definitely.
There's a lot we could talk
Yeah, and we will keep talking about it.
So looking forward to next week's episode,I will be sharing my exit story.
And then from there, I think that we'regonna start diving into each of the topics
(41:12):
that were brought up during our exitstories.
And we'll go from there.
Just a little bit of housekeeping.
We're gonna get ourselves onto
social media in several ways.
We're going to create a Patreon.
on Patreon, there will be options to,subscribe, so we can make our podcasts a
(41:38):
little more, a little more official andput together.
Hopefully the audio isn't terrible onthese first several episodes that we have
without a lot of equipment.
but we appreciate any support that
you're willing to give as our listenersand you'll get special treatment as
(42:02):
Patreon subscribers.
If you're listening now just via audio onour Patreon, you'll be able to see our
beautiful faces and have real timereactions and so it'll be cool.
We're also interested in like gettingmerchandise and stuff like that, which
(42:23):
will be a perk of being
a patron.
So stay tuned for all that stuff.
We'll definitely post on social media oncewe have all those things put together.
So yeah.
And also if anyone listens to this andthey want to reach out, please do.
I would love to talk to you about theirstory or my story or whatever.
(42:48):
Because me talking about this is, it'spartially for me, but I also want other
people to know that if their story relatesin any way, that it's not just you.
And I will gladly be a listening ear ifanyone needs a friend.
because it's a lot to go through.
(43:09):
definitely same here.
And if that's just you wanting to likereach out and share your story with us,
that's great.
If you want us to share your story or ifyou want to be a guest on our podcast,
we'd love to have you.
We're open to anything.
And it is like, it's such a big deal toopen your mouth and talk about these
things, say these things out loud, becausethere's so many things that like, I didn't
(43:32):
realize how bat shit crazy.
so many things were that I experienced.
Once you start saying it out loud andpeople hear your story and validate you,
wow, it's just a totally different,totally different path you're gonna be
able to go down in your healing process.
(43:54):
So true.
So thanks guys.
Thanks for joining us.
Thanks for letting me talk.
Yeah, thank you so much for sharing yourstory.
We will see you next week.
See ya!
Bye!
Welcome brothers and sisters and othersiblings to the Peculiar People Podcast.
It's an ex -Mormon podcast.
I'm one of the co -hosts, Karina Vance.
And I am Sammi Earnest.
Welcome everyone.
Just before we start I do want to add alittle trigger warning
I won't go into detail on anything, butjust in case anybody needs to skip this
(00:24):
episode, totally fine.
But there will be mentions of sexualassault and then suicide and self harm.
So be aware if that bothers you.
And if not, thanks for joining us.
Yeah, definitely.
And make sure that if you need to skipthis episode, skip the episode.
(00:44):
We want you to be here only if you'recomfortable being here
So we decided that we're gonna just kindof dive right in.
This is our first episode, just giving alittle intros.
then Karina is going to share her exitstory this episode and I'll share mine
next episode.
(01:05):
So to begin, and I'm Sammi, I grew up inMichigan.
I was born into the covenant.
And if you're not familiar
Mormon terms, that just means that I was
born into the
I grew up in very Orthodox family.
My dad grew up in a very Orthodox familyand my mom was a convert in her twenties.
(01:30):
So it was just very strict household in alot of ways, but especially in religious
terms.
in Michigan, the Mormon community is quitesmall, but, it was definitely like pretty
steadfast and you were made to bepeculiar.
(01:54):
lots of, lots of times during my youthwhere I stood out in very weird ways among
my peers for sure.
so I went to BYU.
in Provo, Utah, as did Karina, that'swhere we met.
And then I served as a missionary for thechurch for 18 months in the Canada
(02:18):
-Toronto mission, Spanish speaking.
And I returned home from my mission in2018 and left the church in 2022.
But there was definitely some stuffstewing for quite some time before I left.
(02:39):
Yeah, it's definitely a long journey toget to that point, especially when it's
such a big decision to make.
Oh, definitely.
There's so much to unpack.
Yeah.
Um, so for me, um, I grew up in Indianaand then we moved down to Kentucky when I
was a kid, but I am the youngest of sixkids.
(02:59):
So it was a pretty big family.
And then I also had a lot of aunts anduncles and cousins who were Mormon.
Uh, my dad has 12 siblings and, uh, 11 ofthem are boys.
So my grandma loves to brag that she's got10 of her 11 sons are priesthood holders.
That's special.
(03:20):
has been like her big bragging point.
so I grew up around my family a lot, thetown that I was originally from, since
they had so many siblings and then myaunts and uncles also had so many kids.
The tiny school I went to was probablymostly my family.
(03:43):
my god.
So it wasn't, it wasn't a very Mormoncommunity, but there was a lot of us in
our little clan of people.
So I still feel like it was reallyprominent when I was a kid.
And so there were things that I likedabout it.
I liked having family and friends and likethe sense of community that comes with
(04:03):
being in a church.
And yeah, that's probably like the mainthing I miss honestly, was like default
friends that I could hang out with onevery Sunday.
But another thing that I enjoyed was thethings that I learned, not necessarily the
(04:24):
religious aspect and not all of it becausea lot of it is direct gender roles and
what I needed to be doing as a woman.
But some of the info that I was taught, atleast for my family, was really good.
And just in general, how to take care ofmyself and take care of my house that I
have now
you know, maybe a family one day if Idecide to have one.
(04:46):
so there was stuff that I liked and thenthe stuff that I didn't like.
If you haven't heard the shelf metaphor,basically you have your shelf of questions
or concerns or things that don't reallymake sense.
And then if you have a new thing, you putit up on the shelf and I would just tell
(05:07):
myself
It'll make sense later or if it doesn'tmake sense, whenever I get to heaven one
day, like Heavenly Father can explain itand then it'll all be good and it'll take
all my questions away.
And I probably started my shelf around thetime I got baptized because then it felt
(05:28):
real and I was a big perfectionist and Ifelt like I couldn't make mistakes.
So I got really bad anxiety.
feeling like if I made a choice that was asin that it was gonna stick with me
forever then and then I was terrified ofdoing basically anything because I didn't
(05:48):
want to get in trouble and I didn't wantto be taken away from my family.
Oof.
That is such a real fear.
to be like the one kid who got to heavenand everyone's up there and it was like
too bad, like you messed up too much,you're not gonna join us.
Yeah, no, for real.
I feel like so many people can relate tothat.
Like, there's so much weight on yourshoulders.
(06:10):
It doesn't matter who you are.
If you're a parent, if you're a child, ifyou know, you're a leader or not, like
there's so much weight on your shoulder tobe exactly how the church expects you to
be.
Because if not, you might as well justlike fuck your family.
Like, that or nothing.
well, I didn't get mental health helpuntil later, but definitely looking back,
(06:35):
I can tell I had a lot of anxiety for achild.
Definitely stemming from thatperfectionism and fear of making mistakes
because they were going to cause meeternal consequences.
And so the struggle for that startedyoung.
And then.
(06:56):
Then when I got older and I was ateenager, I realized that I was bisexual.
And at the time I didn't have a fullrealization of everything that came with
that because I don't know about you, butwhere I grew up, sexuality when I was a
kid just wasn't really talked
straight facts yeah no it was so so justlike country and we're all straight and we
(07:23):
don't care about anybody's rights yeah
Yeah, so I knew that it was wrong and Iknew that it was seen as a sin.
And I didn't come out when I was ateenager, none of the homophobia got
directed at me, but I would hear otherpeople talk about it in general.
And then I would internalize what they hadto say about it.
(07:46):
Whether that was feeling like, you know,if I acted on it, then I was going to
commit a sin second to murder, basically.
if I, or they would say things like, theyjust do it because they enjoy sinning
(08:09):
basically, which doesn't make sense, but,or, you know, they were confused, they
were led astray, they chose to be that wayand they just have to turn back on it.
And,
Yup
So I had internalized a lot of that and Ihad a lot of self -hatred.
And then probably around the time I was16, I started having self -harm habits
(08:32):
from just feeling like I was born amistake, basically.
man, I'm so sorry you went through that
Yeah, luckily I'm good now.
But, and then also when I was in highschool, I started spending my summers in
Utah.
I would live with one of my siblings andit was pretty fun, but there were other
(08:56):
times where I kind of realized howdifferent the Utah culture is from being a
Mormon anywhere else because their ownlittle bubble.
And everyone thinks the same way as them.
They all go to church together on Sunday.
And I really felt like I didn't fit inbecause I believe the same things that
(09:19):
they did, but just the way they did itdidn't make sense to me.
Because I felt like when I showed up onSunday that they were all watching to like
see who was going to be there.
And then talk about it, basically.
Yeah
felt like a righteousness contest.
(09:42):
And it made me uncomfortable because I waslike, you know, I'm moving to this place
where it's supposed to be a bunch ofpeople who have the same religious ideals
as me.
Like, hopefully that would be like thebest place to go because we all think the
same.
And then to feel like I didn't fit inthere, but also I didn't fit in back home
because I was like one of a few Mormonkids in school.
(10:04):
and you're definitely made to feel likeyou have to be different from them.
So I was like, well, I don't fit in eitherplace.
I don't know what to do.
Yeah, for sure.
And I would add that like moving to Utah,especially just once you're like a young
adult, basically in Mormonism, it's notjust like a righteousness contest.
It's a contest of like, be the one thatthe righteous guy is going to fall in love
(10:27):
with and marry in the temple.
Like you are always put out there to justbe a wife and a mother.
And so you have to like put on this like,I'm just so righteous.
I'm so worthy.
Make sure that all the guys are looking atme and noticing that I'm here at church
doing all the things and going to, youknow, the 15 different activities per week
(10:49):
that you have to go to as a Mormon becauseif you don't, then you're like not
fulfilling your legacy, basically.
Oh, it's so good.
I definitely felt like that when I went toBYU.
And I remember whenever I applied, I waslike, this is what I'm going to do.
(11:09):
All of my family went to BYU.
I'm going to be surrounded by Mormons.
I'm going to have all kinds of more datingopportunities so I can marry a Mormon boy.
And.
It was actually the only college I appliedto.
was like, if I don't get in, I don't knowwhat I'm going to do with my future,
because this is it.
But whenever I got there,
(11:32):
sorry.
I just realized, I don't think that eitherof us mentioned that we're both divorced.
Yeah, and that was kind of like thetimeline of that was go to BYU, get
married pretty quickly into like our early20s, and now we're both like mid late 20s
and divorced.
So that's how that went.
(11:58):
Yeah.
So by the time I got to BYU, I think alsoin Provo and in BYU itself, that culture
was so much worse.
Cause it wasn't just about being righteousor being faithful.
was also, at least for me at times, itfelt like a popularity contest.
(12:20):
You had to be modest, but you had to begood looking and you had to
talents and you had to have X, Y, and Zskills and you had to have all of this so
you could basically present yourself asthe best option on the market because
sure.
yeah, sorry, keep going.
Yeah, so many people went there to get aneducation, but also, you know, to find
(12:46):
marriage.
And so it was always feeling like you hadto be on and putting on your best.
And it was exhausting.
For sure, to get that MRS degree, the Mrs.
degree.
But yeah, I also feel like you coulddefinitely tell who were the Utah Mormons.
And coming, both of us, from places thatweren't Utah, it was ostracizing.
(13:13):
They are the ones, they all look the same,basically.
They got their hair curled perfectly.
do.
No, seriously.
like, it's like, I didn't fit into that.
I was never like one of the like, prettygirls.
I'm doing air quotes, like, never reallycared to do my makeup, do my hair or
(13:33):
anything like that.
And you go into this culture whereeveryone is like a show horse.
And the people who are, I don't know, Imean, like, I didn't get a ton of dates at
BYU, but the people who are, are thoseMormon perfect hair, perfect makeup.
people and so it is such a
(13:55):
Yeah.
And then like another thing when I went toBYU, that summer before was the first time
that I had been with a woman.
And I had so much shame about it becauseimmediately afterwards I was like, I
messed up.
Like, I am in deep trouble.
(14:17):
And if I do not fix this, then I am goingto just be screwed for the rest of my
And so when I got there, I immediately waslike, I need to get help because at the
time I still felt like it was somethingthat I could like fix or cure or make it
go away.
(14:38):
And so that was at the time that I startedseeking help from priesthood people in my
life.
And that's actually what opened the doorto me getting assaulted by some of them.
Yeah.
Basically,
it's super messed up, but it was under theguise of like, you had an experience with
(15:00):
a woman, now you need to have experienceswith men and then you will change your
mind.
Which didn't work.
But at the time I was like, I don't wantto do this, but I don't feel like I have
any other options.
Okay, where was this coming from?
Was this coming from like the top, likethe bishop, or was this coming from just
(15:23):
some rando, like single adult priesthoodholders, which by the way, priesthood
holders have no qualifications to begiving any sort of help.
It was leadership.
I will just leave it at
have a sexual experience with a man sothat you would un -queer yourself.
(15:46):
Okay, does that not break the law ofchastity?
it totally does.
But, but yeah, I went along with thesethings that I didn't want to do because I
felt like at the time that was my bestoption.
And,
I'm so sorry.
(16:06):
Yeah.
And so my that was freshman year and thencome winter semester freshman year.
I finally finally at the point where I waslike, I cannot keep doing this because it
was going to kill me.
And then so that winter I did try to takemy life.
(16:29):
Luckily, I'm still alive.
And then at that point, I was kind oflike, you know
If I am going to hell now for being thisway, I'm gonna choose that option because
I cannot keep living this way.
I wouldn't make it.
(16:51):
So that was definitely...
You'd think that I would leave the church,but I was still a full believer.
I just felt very broken.
Yeah, definitely.
I know what you mean.
So after that, had my sophomore year ofcollege and then my mental health got a
(17:13):
little better because I got myself out ofbad situations and I finally started going
to therapy and taking medicine as neededand didn't talk about anything that had
happened.
I didn't start getting therapy for thatuntil recently.
But it was my sophomore year that I met mynow ex -husband.
(17:36):
and we got engaged when I was 19.
And we had known each other for less thansix months when we got engaged.
I remember that.
Oh good god.
It was very fast.
And then we got married right before fallsemester started.
(17:57):
So we started dating in the winter.
We were married by the end of summer.
And it was like the beginning was good andwe were both Mormon.
We got married in the temple.
And I remember, so I got endowed the daybefore my wedding and then I had the
(18:18):
wedding ceremony.
the next day since I didn't go on amission.
And I don't know about you, but for me,having two back -to -back days of like,
here's your endowment ceremony for thefirst time, and also here's your first
time hearing the wedding ceremony, it wasreally overwhelming and I was honestly
(18:39):
left uncomfortable.
No, definitely.
I got endowed before my mission and Ialmost left the church before I left on my
mission, uncomfy.
So I cannot imagine.
Because the temple prep classes, they talkmore on like the doctrine side of what
(19:02):
people do in the temple, but they didn'tever explain like how any of the
ceremonies worked or like anything you hadto do.
And so when I went there the first time, Iwas like, this is low key, high key,
culty.
Yeah, no straight up it's a cult.
And I was like, this is what people aredoing?
(19:26):
Like every month when my parents go to thetemple, this, this is what they're doing?
Mm -hmm, yeah, no, I feel that too.
I'm like, everybody thinks this is normal,right?
Yeah, and then so I did that and it wasuncomfortable and then I went back the
next day and I got married and I rememberthe section of the marriage covenant that
(19:47):
you make where my husband promised tofollow God basically and then it was my
turn.
It was me promising to follow my husband,which made me even more uncomfortable
because
I was like, why can't we just both agreeto follow God and that should lead us in
the same direction?
(20:07):
Why do I have to defer to a man to leadhim, like have him lead
Yeah, the patriarchy.
yeah, so that was a big thing on my shelfbecause I thought that like that was going
to be the pinnacle, that it was going tolike make sense of a lot of stuff in my
life.
And then I got to the temple and all itdid was make me uncomfortable.
(20:32):
Man, that is so rough.
And that's all so much all at once.
I cannot imagine.
Yeah, it was a lot to take in.
And then after I got married, I will skipall of the marriage problems.
We can talk about that later, plus it'snot all church related.
(20:53):
But I went to a married ward soon afterthat and married wards were like the
singles wards.
But I found them even more annoyingbecause then instead of
Parading yourself around.
was also now I'm the best couple and we'regoing to make babies and do all this
stuff.
(21:14):
And at that point I was getting reallytired of living in Utah.
So even though I was still an activebelieving member, we stopped going to
church as often and I would just go enoughto meet the attendance requirement for
BYU.
Because if anyone doesn't know,
If you go to BYU, you have to have, Ithink it's like 80 % church attendance,
(21:40):
something like that.
And then every year you have an interviewwith your bishop and then they determine
if you're still worthy to go.
so, If you're righteous enough to go toschool.
So I did enough to still meet therequirements, but then I tried to avoid
all the extra activities because all theydid was make me uncomfortable.
(22:04):
And then, so now we're getting to the partwhere my child - WHAT?
What year was
I got married in 2017.
Okay, yeah yeah
in 2019 is when I formally decided that Iwas done.
And my husband, he was actually the onethat kind of started it.
(22:28):
So I'm grateful to him for that.
One day he basically came up to me and hesaid, hey, I was doing some research
online and I read this article and it mademe really question if the church was true
or not
And immediately I was like, what did youread?
(22:49):
Was it a church source?
Like, why, why were you doing this?
And he was like, yeah, you're not allowedto seek other sources.
And so I was in my mind, I was like, okay,here's my time to be the strong one.
Tell me what you read.
And hopefully I could like answer hisquestions and we would be good.
(23:11):
And he's like, okay,
I will let you read it on your own andthen we can come back and talk about it so
I don't have to tell you how to thinkabout it." I was like, cool.
So he sent me the link and it was the CES
Ooh, a doozy.
(23:31):
I haven't read it.
I've listened to part of it, but I likewas already well enough out of the church
by the time that I found out about it thatI was like, I'll probably listen to this
in passing at some time, you know, but I'mdone.
Yeah.
Yeah, it was really informative and he hassources listed for everything he says in
(23:53):
the letter.
And so it's kind of hard to argue whenhe's saying, you know, here's what
happened.
Here's like the historical document thatgoes with it.
And so I probably only got three sectionsinto it.
And I was like, turns out my life is alie.
And none of this is true.
And so that was like the moment where
(24:17):
If the history didn't match what they toldme it was, if the Book of Mormon wasn't a
true book of God like I thought it was,then there's no point in me staying,
especially when I've already had, youknow, long list my whole life of things
that hurt me and made me uncomfortable andmade me feel like I was less than.
(24:38):
And then you're going to tell me thatJoseph Smith didn't even, he wasn't how I
thought he was.
I was like, you know what?
We're done here.
Yeah, for real.
I feel like the CES letter drives so manypeople out of the church.
And I've seen even in like some of theFacebook groups that we're on together
(25:00):
that are like ex -Mormon Facebook groupsthat people will like write it on the
Relief Society chalkboard and stuff likethat.
It's great.
It's great.
We're doing the Lord's work.
Yeah, so I read that letter the summerbefore my senior year at BYU.
And I had realized that I was done and Ididn't think that it was true anymore.
(25:23):
But I was so close to being done with mydegree that I was like, I can deal with it
for another year.
I already had the interview, so I was justlike, it's fine.
We're just going to go.
But we decided to basically keep it asecret.
I had had a friend
earlier in college who had said that shedidn't believe the church was true and she
(25:46):
got kicked out of BYU and she yeah and shehad to start over at another college which
takes a lot more time and money so I waslike you know what I can I'll still go to
meet the requirement and I will just nottalk about it with anyone and just finish
my degree
Did your friend have to start over, startover?
(26:08):
She didn't get her credits?
Some of her stuff transferred, I don'tknow if you've looked into it, but a lot
of BYU classes don't transfer if you tryto go to another school.
And they have so many religion classesthat like all of those hours you put in,
(26:30):
you could maybe get one elective for them,you
Right, yeah.
That pisses me the fuck off.
Like, I - there was points where I wasthinking about transferring and I was
like, but it makes zero percent sense todo that.
Like, you lose so much.
That is so -
(26:52):
And after I had graduated, my ex -husbandactually transferred to a different
college.
And when he did, he lost a lot of what hehad done.
So I just decided I would finish.
And then once I had the diploma physicallyin my hand, then I would actually tell
people.
(27:14):
So I did finish school and then I told
my family that I had left in 2020.
I wasn't sure how to bring it up or how toannounce it, because it's not something
you just send in a group text.
So I.
(27:35):
Yeah, it does.
So I wrote them all a letter and it didn'tgo into detail on why I had left, but it
basically said, you know, I'm done withthe church, I don't believe it's true
anymore, I won't be going.
And then I was like, if you want to knowwhy keep reading.
If you don't want to know, then just goahead and finish the letter.
(27:56):
That's all I have to say.
And then I had a couple of paragraphs atthe end, just giving a general, like, I
don't think the history is true.
I don't like how they treat women, howthey've treated other groups of people,
like the racism, the homophobia, the listgoes
Mm -hmm.
And then I just sent it to them all oneday and there was a lot of backlash.
(28:21):
My parents didn't take it well at all.
They were really upset and even mad.
So that year was kind of rough becauseanytime I'd want to spend time with them,
that's what they would want to talk aboutto try to convince me that I was wrong.
(28:41):
or that I just wasn't seeing it right,that I was being let astray.
And it eventually got to the point that Ihad to pretty much ghost them.
And we didn't talk for about six monthsbecause I told them I wasn't gonna allow
them to talk to me that way, just in thesame way I didn't wanna attack them and
(29:01):
try to convince them that I thought thattheir faith wasn't true either.
I was like, just leave me alone.
And then if we can not talk aboutreligion,
then we don't have to talk about it and wecan move on.
And luckily it has gotten better.
it's still a huge part of my family'slife.
(29:23):
So I know it's something that they do alot.
So sometimes, you know, they still talkabout it because that's like a main hobby
for them.
But at least now we're to the point wherewe can just kind of respect the
differences and then not really dig intoit in discussion.
So I feel like we're at a good place
That's good.
That can be so rough.
(29:43):
Yeah, I have so much to say on that, butI'll probably save it for my exit story.
Families are tough.
And then, yeah, it is hard.
And I think some people don't realize whenyou leave a religion, it's not just
leaving the faith, especially with howtight knit Mormonism is.
(30:03):
You lose family members, you can losefriends, you can lose a whole community of
people just by deciding you don't believeit anymore.
Right.
And that's when the church is preachingthat family is the most central, the most
important.
It's everything.
And then if you leave the religion, yeah,bye Felicia.
(30:25):
it's the church, I would say, I think thechurch does help some families to be like
bound together in ways that are beautifulto them.
Sure.
But I also feel like it wrecks a lot morefamilies than it probably helps.
Yeah, especially when it creates such astrong like us versus them narrative.
(30:54):
But now out of my six siblings, I'd saythere's probably one or two that are still
in and then some of them have left orthey're more nuanced in their belief.
Some of them do totally different thingsnow, but.
I was definitely the first one to announceit that I was done.
(31:18):
And so I got a lot of backlash the firsttime.
So you're welcome, siblings, for takingthat bullet.
For real, for real.
That's interesting too.
have some of my siblings are out, some arein, some of them are kind of on the fence.
And I was definitely the most vocal aboutmy exit from the church and definitely
(31:45):
have received a lot of backlash from thatas well.
It's a role that someone has to take andwe took it and that's amazing.
we did
it definitely can suck in a lot of ways.
For sure.
So yeah, I have been out for five yearsnow.
A lot changes.
(32:08):
The main thing, you know, I got divorcedand I feel like I could do a whole episode
on that.
But I will say I'm grateful that he got meto this point.
I don't think I would have started toquestion the church if he didn't encourage
(32:28):
me
read and study on my own.
And there's definitely a lot of churchrelated things that played into it, but
also just life in general, becausemarriage is hard.
And I think when I first left, there was alot of anxiety and fear because you don't
(32:51):
know what you're going to do or whereyou're going to go now.
And I definitely had a period where I wasangry for things that had happened.
But I feel like now I've come to a prettygood place where I've made peace with my
beliefs now and feeling like I can talkabout it more without just getting upset
(33:11):
or getting mad about it.
So I felt like it was a good time for youto want to make a podcast because even if
it had been a year ago, I probably wouldnot have wanted to do it
perfect timing.
Look at that.
Yeah, of course.
I'm so glad that you're here with me anddoing this with me.
(33:31):
I think it's going to be great.
And I'm hopeful that we'll be able toreach a bunch of people and help them at
whatever stage they're in.
Yeah, it's really, it's such a tripleaving the church because I don't feel
like I fully recognized until I left thechurch that the church was my entire
personality.
(33:51):
It was everything I did.
Like the sheer amount of hours, you thinkabout like growing up, church was three
hours.
It changed to two when we were what?
Like in college, probably.
But then you also have mutual as a youth.
You have like the young kids activity daysas a child.
(34:14):
And then once you're in college, you haveInstitute and you have FHE and FHE family
home evening and all these like randomactivities that you're supposed to go to.
it literally, seminary, my gosh, there'sjust, it just like keeps on piling on.
And it literally.
(34:34):
takes up such a portion of your wakinghours that when it's not in your life,
holy shit, you have to figure out whatyou're gonna do with your time, how you're
going to function as a person in societywhen you have such little experience
(34:55):
functioning in society without the crutchof religion telling you exactly how to
act, exactly what to do.
And you have to like question literallyeverything.
Literally everything.
Do I believe this or was this justbrainwashed into me?
(35:17):
How do I feel about this action thatpeople do like drinking for example, or
like having sex outside of marriage?
Am I okay with that?
What do I think about like, one nightstands?
What do I think about having multiplepartners?
You know, like all these different things
You had zero space in Mormonism to fullyprocess all of those things, fully think
(35:42):
through all those things for yourselfbecause you're being told exactly what you
needed to believe, exactly how you neededto act.
And if you got out of line, then you gotreprimanded and you lost privileges.
And oof, it's just like so much all atonce that you are slapped with and
(36:03):
I'll say five years.
I'm looking forward to that because I'm atlike two years fully out now and there's
so much, so much that I've processedalready, but I so much more that I need to
process.
It definitely gets better with every year.
(36:23):
And now, I mean, I still think about thechurch often just because, you know, I was
a member for 22 years, but, you know, nowI have times where I don't think about it
and it's really relieving to know thatlike, their influence on how I think is
not gonna be permanent.
(36:46):
And it's really relieving and exciting toknow that you can go live your own life
and it's not always going to feel likeit's this cloud hanging in the background.
At least I don't know if you felt thatway, but at first it was kind of, I felt
like it was everywhere.
Yeah, there's like moments that if someoneasks me like, where did you go to college
(37:09):
or ask me something just random andMormonism comes up because you know, I
went to BYU Mormon college, I feel a sheeramount of embarrassment, like even just
admitting, I went to BYU or I grew upMormon, but then I'm like, and I'm not
Mormon anymore because people like, I grewup thinking
(37:30):
like that people thought Mormons were justlike the coolest, the coolest, most kind
people on the planet.
No, like some - okay, some people thinkthat, but most people think Mormons are
fucking weird because they are.
Like, and yeah.
I've met people that know nothing aboutit.
(37:51):
I know people that know a lot about it.
Some people will have a couple of Mormonfriends and be like, yeah, they were cool.
Or other people will be like, do you havelike five moms?
And then I'll have to be like, okay, realback.
yeah, that's so real.
That's so real.
guess it is, yeah, it's kind of all acrossthe board, but I think I just feel this
(38:13):
embarrassment.
Like if they know what I now know aboutMormonism, just all of the really shitty
stuff that has happened in the history ofthe church, the things that continue to
happen, treatment of women and all sortsof different groups.
Like, I don't want to be associated withthat, you know?
(38:35):
So yeah, it's just tricky, but Idefinitely, I've come a long way and you
have too.
And it's funny the other day when we werecatching up, I said something about like,
we don't even really know each other thatwell.
And you said something like, well, I'm notthe same person that I was when we met.
(38:55):
And I was like, girl, same.
Like, isn't it incredible how much we'vegrown?
We have come so far and it's huge to seethe differences.
There's so much that I look back at andI'm like, I give love to every version of
myself.
You have to, to be able to heal and moveforward.
(39:18):
like, damn girl, those were some roughtimes.
Goodness.
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
You were doing the best with what you knewat the time.
So you've got to give yourself a littlegrace.
And now you know better, so you can dobetter.
(39:41):
Right, exactly.
I hope that everyone listening takes thatto heart because you will go everywhere
you want to and you will grow in ways thatyou cannot even imagine.
You just kind of got to get through themessy middle to get there.
and it is a messy middle.
(40:03):
It is a mighty messy.
peculiar and meh - messy.
Yeah, for sure.
Well, yeah, thank you for sharing yourstory.
There's definitely a lot more things thatwe can go into detail on later.
I know there's already been topics thatwe've thrown around because there's all
(40:28):
kinds of reasons why people leave and thenthere's all kinds of complications that
come with it, whether you are male,female, non -binary, gay, straight
There's just a lot of messy topics thatmake sometimes being a Mormon harder.
(40:48):
Definitely.
Definitely.
There's a lot we could talk
Yeah, and we will keep talking about it.
So looking forward to next week's episode,I will be sharing my exit story.
And then from there, I think that we'regonna start diving into each of the topics
(41:12):
that were brought up during our exitstories.
And we'll go from there.
Just a little bit of housekeeping.
We're gonna get ourselves onto
social media in several ways.
We're going to create a Patreon.
on Patreon, there will be options to,subscribe, so we can make our podcasts a
(41:38):
little more, a little more official andput together.
Hopefully the audio isn't terrible onthese first several episodes that we have
without a lot of equipment.
but we appreciate any support that
you're willing to give as our listenersand you'll get special treatment as
(42:02):
Patreon subscribers.
If you're listening now just via audio onour Patreon, you'll be able to see our
beautiful faces and have real timereactions and so it'll be cool.
We're also interested in like gettingmerchandise and stuff like that, which
(42:23):
will be a perk of being
a patron.
So stay tuned for all that stuff.
We'll definitely post on social media oncewe have all those things put together.
So yeah.
And also if anyone listens to this andthey want to reach out, please do.
I would love to talk to you about theirstory or my story or whatever.
(42:48):
Because me talking about this is, it'spartially for me, but I also want other
people to know that if their story relatesin any way, that it's not just you.
And I will gladly be a listening ear ifanyone needs a friend.
because it's a lot to go through.
(43:09):
definitely same here.
And if that's just you wanting to likereach out and share your story with us,
that's great.
If you want us to share your story or ifyou want to be a guest on our podcast,
we'd love to have you.
We're open to anything.
And it is like, it's such a big deal toopen your mouth and talk about these
things, say these things out loud, becausethere's so many things that like, I didn't
(43:32):
realize how bat shit crazy.
so many things were that I experienced.
Once you start saying it out loud andpeople hear your story and validate you,
wow, it's just a totally different,totally different path you're gonna be
able to go down in your healing process.
(43:54):
So true.
So thanks guys.
Thanks for joining us.
Thanks for letting me talk.
Yeah, thank you so much for sharing yourstory.
We will see you next week.
See ya!
Bye!
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!