21: A Mormon Sexual Awakening with Kristi

[00:00:00] Hello Deconstructionists, this is Maggie the host of our podcast where we'll collectively share our stories and experiences of leaving high control religion, along with what it's been like for us to find new practices that help us feel good and confident in ourselves.

[00:00:48] I hope that hearing these stories reminds you that your deconstruction is valid and most of all that you are not alone on this journey. You are good, you are loved and you are worthy just as you are. Hello Deconstructionists, my guest today is Kristi who uses sheher pronouns,

[00:01:06] Kristi runs the Instagram account Kristi's Faith Journey. She is a late blooming by woman in a hetero passing marriage with two beautiful children. She has a love for reading, writing, and home

[00:01:15] renovation shows and her favorite thing to do is laugh. So thank you so much for being here, Kristi. I love talking with people coming out of the Mormon Church because our journeys are often

[00:01:26] so similar and it's been something that's been really eye-opening for me in my own deconstruction. We learned that you were crazy and you learned that we were crazy as evangelicals and so to see that

[00:01:37] our journeys out of church have been so similar and the process out has been so similar has been so helpful for me. So thanks for being here and walking alongside us all. You're welcome. I am truly

[00:01:48] honored to be here and it has been so interesting to me as I've talked to other people deconstructing from different religions, the similarities because I think a lot of Christian faith they don't view Mormon as Christians that's like a big thing and so it's interesting to see

[00:02:07] like the actual similarities of what other Christian faiths believe as well as like compared to what the Mormon Church believes because there's a lot of similarities in beliefs as well as a lot of similarities and things that we all have to deconstruct as we step out of those

[00:02:22] high-demand religion. Yeah totally and like we learned that our Christianity, our version of beliefs were right and you are the yours were right and like to come out of that feels the same.

[00:02:34] If he was exactly the same to deconstruct those I don't know those like systems of beliefs. Yeah oh yeah totally I mean the biggest thing that the more in church believes is we are the

[00:02:46] one to church like there isn't no other church that is true on this earth today so like having that similarity to other Christian religions is so and even not even Christian religion I'm sure that everybody who is in an organized religion they go there because they believe

[00:03:04] what is being taught is the truth and I can't discount everything as not the truth like at this point I don't know. Right. Yeah same and if it's to sit in the unknown is such a I mean in some ways

[00:03:18] it's scary but it's also like really relieving to just finally not have to have the right answer and that have to know or feel like you have the one true answer. Yeah exactly it's definitely

[00:03:29] had a hard moment but I think that's the biggest thing is I get to sit in this space where I can just be like I believe one thing one day and maybe the next day I have changed my mind because I

[00:03:40] found out something new or like that distance sit right or resonate with me anymore. Yeah the flexibility has been good because I feel like I don't know about your faith expansion or like you know exiting religion but mine going from this high-to-man religion or everything was like

[00:03:59] laid out for me and the path was kind of strict it's been nice to kind of discover like where I want my life to go and who I want to be and without that framework and those strict guidelines.

[00:04:13] Yeah I totally feel that what were some of the things in the Mormon Church that were laid out for you and you were supposed to follow a specific path. So in the Mormon Church you like so I grew up

[00:04:25] in the church so I was born in the church my parents you know raised me in the church and the first thing you hit is we believe that the age of accountability is age eight so you get baptized at age eight

[00:04:37] and then for men or boys I guess the year you turned 12 so like at age 11 you get ordained to the priesthood to like the first office of the priesthood for girls you're not ordained to anything

[00:04:51] you're just put in they call it young women's so like they have a youth program and so you're put with the other like you know proteins until your 18 years old and then you like graduate to

[00:05:06] relates this idea which is 18 until you die but like in that it's like baptism's your first thing that you have to hit then like when you become a youth like when you turn 12 you get to go to

[00:05:21] the temple for the first time and do baptisms for the dead so that's like your second thing you're supposed to hit and then you know you start dating you're supposed to date with the mindset

[00:05:31] of like your or going to get married and have babies like that is very much an underlying like this is the goal so you start dating at 16 your goals to get married have babies and then

[00:05:46] some people have omissions and that happens at age 18 and 19 for boys at 18 19 for girls and so you can choose to serve a mission so I see choose but for the boys it's years supposed to like

[00:06:00] it's kind of required so boys going into your mission at age 18 girls can choose to serve for 18 months at age 19 and then after that it's like you date and you find your spouse.

[00:06:14] If you go on a mission you get to take out your endowment in the temple which is like just the ceremony that we go through we make cabinets to God and then the last like step is

[00:06:26] when you find your eternal spouse if you've got an admission you get your endowment but if you don't go on a mission you have to wait until you're engaged to take out your endowment

[00:06:36] or you have to get special permission from like your bishop what is taking out your endowment so that's like the temple ceremony where I don't know if you know like Mormon tough special underwear we wear called garments so they have symbols on them so you go through the

[00:06:52] temple you get your garments and then you like make a bunch of promises to God you are making covenant and the covenants are like for example to uphold the love chastity which is like sexual

[00:07:05] purity so like no sex outside of marriage you're not even supposed to like think about other people in that way you covenant your like earthly possessions to the church basically they call it the

[00:07:19] love consecration so if the church like needs anything of yours for whatever reason they can have it oh my god I did not know that oh yeah that's the one that was really hard for me to

[00:07:31] wrap my mind around because the other covenant you're making straight with God basically because when you get your endowment even like the chastity one you're saying like I'm going to be sexually pure because like I'm promising God I'm going to be sexually pure like of course you're

[00:07:47] signifying it other comes into it but like since there's people that go through the temple single it's like a promise between you and God but the wording in the love consecration one is

[00:07:58] to the church instead of to God so you're not promising your earthly possession to God you're actually promising to touch so that one was really hard for me to like wrap my mind around I was totally chill like thinking promise it to God but

[00:08:12] I shouldn't say that actually like my endowment experience was like it was very it should have been a red flag to me but it wasn't because I was still so into everything like

[00:08:24] it just was very like anxiety and do things like I was having a panic attack like throughout the whole ceremony number one because you don't know what's going to happen you know the promises you're going to make before you go but you like don't know

[00:08:41] the sequence of events and you don't know like the symbolism and ceremonial stuff that go on in the temple because this is like your first time going through the temple right yeah yeah like slowly learning the language of modernism you're doing great I know it's I'm sorry if

[00:08:58] there's like a term I use that you do not understand but you just like call me out on it oh you're good since growing up in the church I'm like I speak a different language than everybody else

[00:09:07] know you're totally good and like we have this too and almost like every flavor like every denomination and Protestantism has like you know there's sort of like this big overall umbrella of like christianies and then each denomination has its own kind of christianies and so

[00:09:22] even like people who grew up similar to me I'll be like wait can you what's that word mean? so no you're good so the endowment is yeah your first time going like through the temple

[00:09:32] and then after your endowment you get sealed for time and all eternity to your spouse and it has to be a heterosexual marriage of course so it has to be a man and a woman because

[00:09:41] that's apparently that's helping us there's a little bit in this there but um and then after that like after you're go through free endowment you can go back and do endowments for the dead like proxib work for the dead and when I say that that means that

[00:10:00] people who did not receive their like ordinances or go through the temple you have to get permission I think there's like a timeframe but basically people can submit like names of family members so the church together worked done or like you can take family names of people who

[00:10:17] passed away to like get their work done so we do their baptism in the temple like if they've passed away and they weren't baptized and then we do their endowment if they were passed away

[00:10:26] and have an opportunity and then if they were married we do sealings as well for people who were married or like a couple in this life and the theology around that is that they will be

[00:10:39] able to choose whether to accept those things in heaven or not okay but they're all like considered saving ordinances like you're supposed to do all of them in order to reach the highest

[00:10:54] heaven. As I'm listening to you talk through these it's like I guess we didn't have baptisms for the dead but we certainly prayed for people like after they died something like I hope that

[00:11:05] they were saved or like I hope that in their last moments something happened whatever but like so many of these things we also believed we just didn't have like a formal ceremony for them and I feel like

[00:11:17] that's a way that we even jallicals looked at Mormonism and said like oh they're wrong they're crazy but like we believed so many similar things you know the Mormon church is so formal and I think

[00:11:30] that's something that can make people like as I've talked to more people coming out of the Mormon church I think it's something that can make it feel really hard to leave because you've like gone

[00:11:39] through these ceremonies or for boys at what age 16 12 I don't know if they're the priesthood one and 12 so like these 12 year olds are like I have been ordained by God in this way to like

[00:11:50] do God's work on earth of course that's going to be hard to walk away at some point or to like learn how to make your own decisions so yeah just the formality of the Mormon church I feel like

[00:12:00] kind of locks you in in a way that the evangelical church doesn't quite have. Even though we believe similar things you know. Yeah no that totally makes sense it's definitely interesting because in the Mormon church you're like discouraged from learning about like other religion obviously we have

[00:12:17] the truth so I would be like learn about other people's religion right? So as I've learned to Mormon like oh there are a ton of similarities it's just we like and I say we have then

[00:12:29] like the royal we of Mormon like we can get to like the extreme like I feel like it's very it's very formal and there's very much like formal steps. So then after you've married your job is to have

[00:12:42] baby than in dirt to the end like and keep all your equipment. Well okay I was thinking too about like this path for women women can't get the priesthood no right this is only for men

[00:12:54] for boys and then men so like even in the for a malady of the church like the way that the church works you're like under your father and then you have priesthood from your husband like it is

[00:13:08] designed for you not to be in it by yourself like you are designed to first be a child then be a bride then be a mother. Yeah so that they can do the same thing. Yeah basically yeah

[00:13:20] so like the teaching around the priesthood for women is they say that we have access to the priesthood because the priesthood is just another word for like the power of God. So like as women we

[00:13:31] have access to the power of God but we're not like given authority to use that power. Like in the church we do like blessings with the laying on a pan so like a priesthood holder will

[00:13:46] like put their hands on your having give you like a blessing and like women cannot do that. We can pray for people you know but we can't like give a formal priesthood sanction blessing and so it is

[00:13:58] kind of like you're under the authority of your dad and then under the authority of your husband and if you're single your bishop it's considered like the father of the Lord so you can go to him

[00:14:09] for like priesthood blessings or like other people in the congregation. So yeah it's interesting so women have access to the power of God we just don't have authority to do these formal things like we can't pass this sacrament which is communion. Right you know that's our very

[00:14:26] enough communion we call the sacrament and the 11 to 12 year old boys they get to pass it and then like the 14 year old get to bless it I think it might be the 16 year olds but like there's

[00:14:38] different roles that they get to do and women don't get to do that and women can't like bless people with the laying on the pan we can't give people they're called calling them the church

[00:14:48] but it's just basically like a job not paid job it's volunteer position but it's like to help the run the women's organization can submit names for people to be called to certain

[00:15:00] positions but it ultimately has to go through the bishopric so it'll have to go through a man so everything has to go through a man when you're a woman in the morning so fucking patriarchy oh it is yes

[00:15:12] I'm just gonna present and I did not realize like I knew it was patriarchal in the sense that like yes men had authority but I didn't realize how I want to say like suffocating it was until

[00:15:26] I became a mom to daughters and then I was like I don't want my daughters to like grow up where an 11 year old 12 year old boy has more authority than they do technically absolutely yeah well

[00:15:40] it's interesting I didn't see the patriarchy in my church growing up until I mean I saw it was like yes men can lead but because that's what God told us was how it should work so like

[00:15:53] it was patriarchy but it was good right because it's from God but then since leaving the church and looking back at my growing up church experience I'm like only men could pass communion

[00:16:04] only men could be elders only men could preach only men could hold any positions of decision-making power it was the same in our church too I just didn't see it until you know I could look back at

[00:16:17] it or like I could look at other churches and be like that's so patriarchal like it's built in the Mormon system right but it worked the same in ours I just couldn't see it right away you know

[00:16:27] oh yeah same here I mean I knew that it was like from God so it didn't necessarily like bother me and there are people with like horse stories about men abusing their authority in the church

[00:16:38] but I never had that like my dad has always been great and like my husband has always been great and I've never felt like I've had to like submit to like their will or anything like I've never

[00:16:48] felt like they've had like authority over me but I know that that's not everyone's experience and I know that I just wanted my daughters to not have that like I want them to be these independent

[00:17:01] I can do what I want I don't need permission from a man or anyone else like to you know do this thing so is that something that pushed you out of the church or pulled you out of the church or

[00:17:15] what were some of the reasons that you started to leave? So it's kind of interesting because the pandemic really affected my faith but there was like multiple reasons for that and one of them

[00:17:28] was I had my first child during 2020 so the whole like stick for women in the Mormon church is like motherhood is your ultimate calling there's been leadership quoting it as the highest and

[00:17:42] holy is calling for women it's supposed to be like super sacred super holy and I had a baby and like my experience just didn't fit the expectations that I was taught so like I had this

[00:17:57] little daughter and I felt like I was supposed to have like such a sacred experience and just like immediate like unconditional love and like I was supposed to feel so connected to God because

[00:18:09] this is what I'm supposed to do and just supposed to have babies and care for them and ball of luck and so it's yes I loved my daughter but I like went through postpartum to pressure

[00:18:19] I couldn't breastfeed we were in the pandemic so we weren't going to church we were doing zoom church which was like different and I was lucky to have a husband who could do the sacrament in our home

[00:18:32] I don't know what single women we're doing because they couldn't partake of the sacrament in their houses and yeah yeah so the pandemic just gave me enough distance from the like ritual of

[00:18:46] it all and like the habit of it all to like really evaluate like is this for me and is this how we want to raise my kid and it took me along like that kind of started my faith transition and then it

[00:18:58] took me probably like a year of really being like nuanced and like saying like okay I still believe this but I don't necessarily believe this anymore and at the time I can't remember how long after

[00:19:15] I had my daughter I was called to like be a teacher in like the relief societies when the women's organization but like I was going through all these like nuanced things I was teaching these

[00:19:24] lessons and I kept like just seeing things that I didn't agree with and then I was going to therapy because I was depressed and didn't want to like I don't know if you want to talk about this but I've

[00:19:34] been suicidal for a lot of my life like probably it started in like my late 10 years and so postpartum depression like made me suicidal again and so I was having me sought to like I'm obviously doing

[00:19:49] something wrong because motherhood isn't everything that everybody told me it was going to be and it's not this whole experience like supposed to feel sacred right mm-hmm and so like I was like

[00:20:00] maybe I'm doing something wrong like maybe I better off to just like die now and stop sending like you know what I'm saying so then I was like also teaching these lessons and struggling with all

[00:20:11] this stuff and then I had a therapist and we were talking about I had an experience in the high school when I turned 16 I was like so excited today. I was like I am such a good Mormon girl the boys are

[00:20:23] going to like ask me out like it's going to be so great and like that did not happen. I did not have boys interested in me at all and I was like pissed off because I was like I'm doing everything right

[00:20:34] like why are the boys coming? Like why is this not a blessing? Like at 16 they say not to like seriously day you're just supposed to like group date and like kind of figure out what you want and his partner

[00:20:44] you know and like then after like the boys start coming on for missions and like if you choose the permission after you come home like that's when you're supposed to get serious so no boys are dating me

[00:20:55] and I was like I kind of like slipped into like a depression I was like what's wrong with me like you know? Because again it was something that you were promised like if you do this

[00:21:04] if you follow these rules you're a good Mormon girl then these are the blessings that will come and so if they don't then it feels like what did I do wrong or like what did I miss or why isn't

[00:21:14] God fulfilling this promise in this way? Yeah 100% also you have to realize I grew up in Mormon headquarters like Salt Lake City, Utah that's where the Mormon Church is based. Yeah so all

[00:21:26] of my friends were Mormon technically. I had one friend who I think was baptized and then she stopped going to church like her family stopped going to church. So she was like my only friend that

[00:21:36] wasn't she was like Mormon adjacent. So all the rest of them were Mormon and they were all like very much like me like followed a rules ball of all and so like I was just disappointed that I wasn't

[00:21:49] like I had this friend group we had acquaintances and like all the LDS people we kind of knew each other you know and it's like how come no one's interested me how come no one dating me.

[00:22:01] So by the time I was like 17 me and my best friend were just pissed off like the man we were just mad at these boys that didn't want to date us so I remember distinctly we were in her car and

[00:22:16] we were just having like a pity party like talking about the drama of high school you remember it it sucked um and I don't know I can't remember like whose idea it was but eventually we were just like

[00:22:30] you know what we're just gonna get our first kiss all the way we're gonna kiss each other we care for each other like let's just do it. So we ended up having our first kiss together me and my best friend

[00:22:40] and she's a girl and that was like a no-no like same sex attraction as a big like no-no in the church it's a big sin well actually I don't think they consider this in anymore but when I was

[00:22:53] growing up it definitely was like I guess if you act on it it's considered a sin okay so the attraction would be okay but the kiss was not very subtle yeah which at this point I didn't think I was

[00:23:05] attracted to my best friend like I thought we were just depressed and we just wanted to get our first kiss all the way but that kiss led to I want to say like a nine month relationship where we

[00:23:16] were like we were just best friends in the public eye but like in private we were like making out and like you know crossing lines that we shouldn't cross according to the church and like

[00:23:28] ended up like having sex and like we really love each other but I had so much internalized homophobia that I was like that is not what this is like I'm not a same type of attraction

[00:23:40] I'm not like this is just me being deceived by saying giving into the urges of my body all this is bad it finally got to the point where I felt like I was living almost a double life and I was like

[00:23:53] okay do I choose to be more in still it or do we like ruin everything we've ever been taught and like actually try to have a relationship and we've talked about it and both of us decided no we're

[00:24:03] going to stay loyal to like the church and our beliefs so that led to like confessing our sin not seeing each other I didn't think our friendship was going to survive it did eventually like for a

[00:24:18] while we couldn't see each other but then we ended up being in like the same class in college and so we like reconnected and she ended up getting married first got married in the temple I was dating

[00:24:32] my husband by that point you know he wasn't my husband but I had met this boy and we had gone on a few dates and he ended up being my husband and I had like so much shame around that whole experience

[00:24:46] and I remember one of the reasons my husband got to be my husband was because we were laying on our living room floor you couldn't go into like I did not want to go into like bedrooms or private

[00:24:57] places with this man because I was like I already knew how good physical pleasure could feel and I was like we got to like draw some boundaries did we still cross lines yeah we did all this beyond

[00:25:09] this we did but at this particular time we were laying on our living room floor and it was like 2 a.m. and we were just talking and I felt like I needed to just tell him that I had had a relationship

[00:25:21] with a girl and so I told him he was like that's fine like you're cool now right you so want to get married as a temple you just want to like do all this church stuff and I was like yeah

[00:25:31] so he was like very understanding and chill with it and I never expected a guy to look like so parody culture in the church was like we were taught like if you break the love check the

[00:25:44] you're like a piece of artitude gum or like a flower that's petals have been ripped off so it was like even though I repented I still felt like I wasn't like healed I felt like I had gone through

[00:25:56] the motions of being forgiven but like in my heart I had not felt forgiven but I myself or by God like I still felt like I was just the worst person in the world yeah well those analogies are

[00:26:09] unduable right like the the chewed up piece of gum you can't untue a piece of gum and you can't put petals back on a flower so they tell you that like these things are irreversible you didn't gain

[00:26:23] something you didn't learn something about yourself and those experiences with a woman you lost a piece of yourself yeah which is just not true but that's what you would internalize of course yes

[00:26:35] fast word it's like 2021 I'm in therapy my therapist is she's an X men and night so she understands like coming out of religion as well and I'm telling her about my high school fleeing with my best friend and she's like Christy you realize you're bisexual right

[00:26:53] and I was like I had never never like thought that I was like bisexual like and I was just like why and she's like I don't want to put labels on you but I think that you are attracted to

[00:27:07] both men and women because why would you like carry on this relationship with your best friend that was like very much like a loving relationship you guys had a beautiful friendship and like obviously had love for each other and then you took it to like the physical level

[00:27:22] and still like really kind of about each other she was like I'm pretty sure your attracted to both gender's at least she's like you could be pan you could be you need to like figure this out

[00:27:32] and I was just like huh because I had never thought of I hadn't put it in those terms like I literally just thought I had been deceived by the devil and I was like doing the devil's work for

[00:27:46] like those nine months that I was with my friend. Well it's just not an option right it's like of course we're not gonna think about it what's not an option exactly the only thing that

[00:27:56] it could be as sin or like deceit exactly for me that's the only thing so I admire like there are queer Mormon people that are still in the church and they like have come out

[00:28:09] and I admire them so much because I could not do it so like after therapy I took a few months I grappled with it and then I was like you know what I'm bisexual like it just makes sense it

[00:28:20] clicks with me I feel like it resonates with my soul and so I was like I came out to my family first and my family's first question was are you going to stay married to your husband?

[00:28:33] Which there's a lot to unpack there but yes I was my therapist and I had talked through this she was like do you feel like you're a monogamous person or do you want to spare them at with girls

[00:28:44] or like you know and I had searched my soul and I was like no I'm I'll just admit to this I can barely handle one romantic relationship I do not know how people handle multiple romantic

[00:28:55] relationships at one time like I just don't have the bandwidth I don't think so I was like no I'm I'm pretty sure I'm like monogamous and like I love my husband we're gonna stay married

[00:29:06] so anyway that's what I told my family I think they were worried that we were gonna get like a divorce and then like we had a child and like I want to think that it's that and not that it's like

[00:29:16] your wrecking like your eternity because you're going to like break up your marriage. Well and also there's so much that comes with like your worth. Oh yeah. It comes from your marriage in a way and so I'm sure that that's been internalized by everybody.

[00:29:32] Yeah so then I came out as bisexual, also from media and I was still in the church of this time I was still like had my calling. I still wanted to be there but the only thing that

[00:29:45] was really keeping me there was that calling because I just loved it so much and their community obviously and wait your calling was working with relief ministry is that right? Relief society sorry. Yeah yeah yeah it's called relief society and basically my calling was

[00:30:00] I was teaching the 18 and older women on Sundays like the lessons on Sundays and they ended up releasing me like a month. I think it was like a month or two after I came out

[00:30:11] and I just I was so hurt because I didn't know if it was because I had come out or like if it was just my time or whatever but by this point I was just like you know what I think I'm just

[00:30:22] done like I tried to go back without having that calling and I realized that the calling was really like tethering me to like because I felt like I was making a difference. I felt like

[00:30:32] I was like opening these people's minds to like my nuanced ideas you know and then like I felt like they were like we don't want you to teach anymore. So I was very sad. So that kind of

[00:30:47] led to me like not attending anymore and then obviously not attending anymore led me to like look at my beliefs and like figure out what I believe because I'm a Mormon legacy like my

[00:31:01] grandparents or Mormon, my parents or Mormon but my cousins so my aunt and my old woman my mom's side there kids left the church I have cousin on my dad's side where they're all out of

[00:31:11] the church. So I was raised around this idea that my cousins have left the church and so we weren't going to be with them and haven't because your family can only be together forever if everybody

[00:31:25] follows the path. It's not that like you're separated forever how they explain it is if you hit the highest kingdom and you're in the highest kingdom then you can go visit other kingdoms of heaven

[00:31:36] but like your family and the well-working them who like have left the church or whatever they don't get to do that you like you have to choose to do them so anyway it's just like you're still not

[00:31:46] together all in the same place and I know for some people that's not a motivator because their family suck and like I totally get it my belief in that is like I'm still grappling with the idea of

[00:31:59] like is there God but if there is a God I don't think that they would make you live in heaven with people that you didn't want to live in heaven with that just doesn't make sense to me. You know

[00:32:10] things though anyway so I had two siblings leave the church before until then I left the church but I think my leaving the church has been harder on my parents because I have my children

[00:32:21] and I've also had to let go of these expectations because when you have a kid you kind of have expectations for them and like my church expectations were like oh when they turn eight they're

[00:32:28] going to be baptized then then they're going to like you know go through the temple and like all this stuff and to like that has been hard to let go of for sure those expectations of just like

[00:32:40] they're not going to grow up with the same milestones that I grew up with. Yeah if this is too personal or specific you don't have to answer but has your temple recommend expired?

[00:33:00] Yes. What was that like for you? That's like another like formal like I could just not go back to church but for you there was a point where you had to decide to go get this card renewed or not.

[00:33:14] So the temple and I have had a complicated relationship because my first experience was really like anxiety and dozing and I had panic attacks so like growing up in the church you hear people talk

[00:33:26] about the temple. I was like it's like heaven on earth and you just feel so at peace and you feel so close to God and so sacred and like all these things and like once again like that doesn't happen

[00:33:36] for me and so I felt like either I had something innately wrong in me or like this just wasn't everybody's experience but it's touted as this is how you're supposed to feel when you're in the temple

[00:33:49] so I had anxiety around the temple a lot so I wasn't really attending the temple. I ever since I went through the temple like after I got married I didn't consistently go through the

[00:34:00] temple which is you're supposed to but I could not I just you're supposed to consistently attend the temple and do temple work but I could not do it because I just had too much almost like PTSD

[00:34:12] I mean I don't throw that around loosely but there was this point in this air money where you're the first time you go through there's like a veil and you go through the veil and so my

[00:34:22] whole family went through the veil first so they could like greet me on the other side because going through the veil is like your entering heaven okay so like it's supposed to be like this

[00:34:31] beautiful spiritual experience of like this is how it's gonna be up you die like your family's going to create you in heaven if that makes sense yeah and the veil is like a physical veil like

[00:34:41] so my family left me I couldn't see them anymore and I'm like this is my first time in the temple and all my loved ones just like went before me like left me until I started like hyperventilating

[00:34:50] and crying and like the temple workers had to help me like you know do the ceremony because there's certain like things you have to do at the veil to like go through the veil and so it was like just

[00:35:03] hard like I had a panic attack with everyone left me and so since then the temple has been really hard for me because my body remembers that and like in the temple you're divided women's and

[00:35:15] on once I'd meant it on the other side so even if I go to the temple with my spouse I don't get to sit by them I don't get to see them until we go through the veil and we're reunited in the

[00:35:25] celestial room yeah so it was a thing of like I would have to bring out like a female friend to like sit by me and be with me the whole time and even then there's still that point in time

[00:35:35] where we're separated and so I couldn't get over like the being separated thing like I had severe separation anxiety in the temple and in real life I don't have that but no moments I did

[00:35:48] so the only thing that has bumped me out about not having my temple or the men and having it expire is we have friends who adopted a daughter there's the octavrimatrix they chose to get their

[00:36:04] adoptive daughter sealed to them so like ceilings are performed during marriage and then if you adopt a child or like something happens and like you need a child sealed to you for time and

[00:36:14] all eternity like that's another so like that's the biggest disappointment is like I was not able to be there for that experience and like that hurt and I don't even know if they know that we've

[00:36:26] like fully left now because we haven't had a sit down conversation I'm like hey we've us the church but we had to tell them like we're not going to be there and I it was just like wow and

[00:36:36] they're close friends and we just felt like we were disappointing them me and my husband both felt that way so that's been hard and then the other thing I kind of am afraid of so I'm

[00:36:47] the oldest of four siblings and two of them have left they left before I did time the third sibling to leave but if our last sibling ends up staying and getting married in the temple I will

[00:36:59] be sad that I won't be able to be at that wedding ceremony basically yeah they have changed the rules so when I got married if I chose to get married outside of the temple I would have had

[00:37:13] to wait a whole year to get sealed in the temple but now you can get married outside of the temple and you don't have that waiting period so I don't know if my sibling would choose like a civil ceremony

[00:37:24] and then a temple ceremony that could be a thing but yeah but still the idea that for them to get married in the church you wouldn't be able to be there I've heard other former Mormons express

[00:37:35] this same kind of sadness and grief around missing these big events for family and friends because they can't be in the temple yeah it's hard and that's like one of the things that upset me so much

[00:37:48] I mean there were family members from both sides of our families that weren't able to come to our wedding ceremony and so that hurt but we felt like we were choosing the right like we

[00:37:59] felt like we were doing the right thing and being an example to them so I have like these retro respective regrets I guess as an ex-mormon where I'm like man I really wish we would have just got

[00:38:10] married outside of the temple and had everybody attend I mean part of me wishes that I would have figured out I was queer like during high school and then maybe I could have had more experiences

[00:38:20] into dating one girl and then repenting and then committing to only dating boys it's just you have all these moments where you have to kind of I said regret but I shouldn't say like I regret

[00:38:31] it's just like I grieve the things that could have been had I left the church earlier there are just events that would have been easier and I feel like at this point in time

[00:38:44] I'm like in this weird space where I mean I just had another baby like four months ago and so I'm like back in that space of like wow I just had a baby and like I'm trying to figure out who I am

[00:38:56] as a mom to these two kids and like our marriage has changed since bringing kids into the marriage and like all this stuff and so it's like everything's in love oh and then on top of that it's like oh

[00:39:07] also your faith that you grew up and I think playing to your whole life like isn't making you feel good anymore so like you're just gonna piece out and like try to like deconstruct all this major stuff all the same time

[00:39:24] we often say that like when you pull one piece out everything just kind of crumbles and it's like oh my god my whole life is upside down and I can't piece any of it together right now yeah it's

[00:39:34] definitely Jenga because like the motherhood thing was definitely I mean before that I had to have disagreement with church stuff like the treatment of queer people has always been like something

[00:39:44] that how that made sense to me because I'm like so what if they want like the church is a big anti LGBTQ supporter and I remember from my childhood there was like this it was prop A and it

[00:39:57] was like legalizing gay marriage and health or near or whatever and like the church like came out with these statements and whatever and I was like it doesn't matter to me if two men or two women

[00:40:05] want to get married doesn't that invalidate my marriage I didn't realize what a big deal it was and so like that has always been a thing obviously I had my own queer awakening but I didn't know what that was

[00:40:16] and then I've had a very close friend who has been a friend since elementary school who is also raised in the church come out as transgender and that has like changed my views on what I was

[00:40:27] taught about transgender people growing up and then like the motherhood thing because she my views on all the things and then there was this whole like I don't know if another ex-mormon has told you about like the doctor and have had the mother but like we believe that

[00:40:41] God told me father and he also has like a female counterpart having my mother but like we're not supposed to talk about her and I think it was like 2021 might have been like 2020 I can't remember

[00:40:52] somewhere around there there was like a general authority that came out that was like don't speculate about how many mothers we don't talk about her and I had just become a mother and I was like

[00:41:01] that's the God I relate to right now that's the divine being that I like feel like I want to talk to not my dad I want to talk to them all you know what I'm saying and so it's not with another

[00:41:13] thing that really like they say breaking your shelf but like that broke my shelf I was just like oh not only are mortal women like kind of second class citizen of the church but even this apparently

[00:41:25] divine omnipresent like she's equal to God we can't talk about her either like we have afraid of her talk to her like you know it's just like these things are just not making sense

[00:41:37] and then I was just like the Jenga tower just started to like fall down and like I'm still sitting with some pieces on the table that I haven't picked up and like deconstructed because I don't have

[00:41:47] the bandwidth or like the time right now to really sit and like think about these things and so like I think the biggest thing that I've discovered is I'm just in this space of like I don't know

[00:41:57] and like those three words have so much power to me right now it's just like I can sit with people and I can listen to their experiences and I can just say I don't know anything about this experience

[00:42:09] and I can learn from their experiences and we are having this conversation and like you relate to some of what I've experienced because your religion was you know in the same ballpark we have the

[00:42:21] same beliefs maybe you're just in that have all the crazy like rituals that you have to go through and as I've like met with other x-mormant it's been very just refreshing and validating to be like

[00:42:35] okay like I am not the only one who has had these experiences or these thoughts or these feelings but there's also like you know how you have pressure to like be a certain way in the church

[00:42:48] I feel like there is pressure to be a certain way of the next Mormon and I'm trying to like not let that happen like I'm trying to be like okay well I don't have to like drink and I don't

[00:43:00] have to like have coffee and I don't have to like dress super revealing because I'm still very much to construct me like thoughts around my body and peer to culture and like nudity and like all

[00:43:14] that stuff so anyway it's just like I have to keep constantly remind myself there's no prescribed path to like exit. What you just take whatever path you want and you can take as long as you want

[00:43:27] it might be a lifetime for me who knows what you know. No I think it's a lifetime for everyone and I like to say that like I won't hold you to where you say you are today like if tomorrow

[00:43:38] it's different that's great this is just a snapshot of this long long deconstruction journey and some days it feels good and some days it feels hard and and you don't have to be anything

[00:43:50] you don't have to drink coffee but you can you don't have to drink alcohol but you can but you get to decide now and nobody gets to tell you what to do or what being

[00:43:59] X-Mormons should look like that's your journey in your decision. Yeah and those physical things are like the big things because I feel like those are the things people can see and it's like not

[00:44:11] everyone is going to be like so do you remember leaving like a god anymore but like people would be like oh so have you tried this drink or oh I see you're like wearing a cropped upper

[00:44:20] tank top. Yeah yeah there's this like do I look X-Mormon enough or like do I look queer enough or do I look? Yeah something enough and that can be a different kind of pressure like the same

[00:44:33] kind of pressure from the church to be the right version of something but we can get rid of all of that you can look out everyone and you are X-Mormon enough because that's how you identify right

[00:44:43] now as X-Mormon. That's it? Yeah and I think it's a testament to like how deeply religion affects you that you even have the thought to like am I enough in whatever stage of life

[00:44:54] I'm in, in whatever stage of faith journey I'm in because like so much of religion is like am I worthy enough so yeah I'm working through all that lovely fun stuff. Well thank you so much for

[00:45:07] sharing so much of your journey this has been such a delight and thank you for trusting me with your story and for trusting all my listeners I like to have people offer some kind of encouragement to

[00:45:18] listeners who are maybe a step behind you in deconstruction or where you are in deconstruction and could you just offer them a piece of encouragement before we go? Yeah I think the biggest

[00:45:29] thing for me is I just had to stay like I'm taking a stay by day and give yourself permission to do things give yourself permission to if you feel like drinking coffee or if you feel like you don't

[00:45:42] believe in God anymore or if you feel like you want to wear whatever you want to wear or get that tattoo or like whatever it is just give yourself permission to experiment and like really just take

[00:45:52] things day by day and you know something might resonate with you today and not resonate with you tomorrow and that's okay I am in the space of like change isn't bad changes good my mind can change

[00:46:06] minute to minute and I'm just trying to figure out who I am outside of religion and what I want my life to look like outside of religion and I know that those two questions are like massive but

[00:46:19] I can be a one person one day and one person the next day and like figure out the thing that I want to like keep you know Marie condo and how she's like throw it out if it doesn't bring you joy I keep asking

[00:46:29] myself like does this bring me joy and if it does I'm keeping it if it doesn't it's like oh yeah it doesn't matter what you know I think we as people who grew up in high demand religions we have this idea

[00:46:41] that like everything we do matters because we were taught that like if you slip up you're like off the path but I'm in the space where it's like not everything I do matters like in the grand scheme of things

[00:46:54] it doesn't matter so you just figure out what matters to you and take that and run with it yeah I love that thank you so much thank you for being here and thank you for sharing your story with us

[00:47:08] thanks for listening to another episode of Hello Deconstructionists if you enjoyed this episode or any others please like follow or subscribe to the podcast and if you feel like it leave us a

[00:47:18] review so other people know what this show is all about if you have any questions comments for parts of your own experience you'd like to share on the podcast you can email me at hello.deconst

[00:47:28] at jmail.com and as always you can find me over on instagram at hello under sport deconstructionists we're together we are building community post evangelicalism huge thank you to Amy Azara for

[00:47:39] writing their theme song for this podcast and when this sweet little box inevitably gets stuck in your head I hope it reminds you of this wonderful community that's here with you thanks to all our guests

[00:47:50] for sharing these parts of their stories with us and of course to you for listening see you next time