are the things in life I can enjoy without feeling like I've sinned. As a single guy I can have sex with a woman and not feel guilty about it. As long as I am honest with you, I have no reason to be guilty. I can drink alcohol. As long as I am responsible and don't hurt anyone else, I have no reason to be guilty. I can enjoy Sundays without having to worry if I buy something, or if I use too much energy I might be sinning.

Plenty of other things like that. Things that people across the country don't worry about, yet many mormons do. I'm glad I don't worry about things like that. Instead I can focus on being a good person, and living a happy life.

Isn't not going to church the best thing ever?"

It's the little things you named that make life so good. Who wants eternal life if there's no coffee?

It is great. Even when I have bad days as we all do, I can feel greatful. Greatful that I have been given life. Perhaps by a creator, but most likely just by chance. I am even more lucky that I was born in America. It wasn't because I was more "righteous or for any other reason than luck. I was born in a good time period for modern medicine, and a higher level of tolerance by the country at large.

Since I have been given this gift, I have a choice what to do with it. Do I succumb to the dogma of the lDS faith, or do I live life to the fullest and help those around me be the best they can be as well? It has become an easy choice.

Or beer...or single malt...

Oh that just brings back a memory from way back in 1994...I was one year post divorce from my gay ex and was about to embark on a sexual relationship with someone. I was so amazed at myself that I didn't feel guilty. It really did surprise me.

For my own part I take pleasure in having the courage to seek truth at discretion, and uttering it when found. That Joseph Smith was a fraud, and the Mormon doctrines false was simply a by-product of caring that there is a reality to be discerned from myth and fantasy. This is what I relish. This is what gives me joy now. Glad I had the nuts to seek it out, and accept it.


HH. =)

I think the sex part is harder for women to let go of. The church REALLY drills it into girls that sex is evil. I remember certain girls who would feel so extremely guilty about things that girls outside the church don't feel. This girl I knew was a mormon whose goal who had bought into the anti-sex paranoia of the church to the fullest extent. She was dead set on not even kissing a guy until marriage. She got into a serious relationship with a friend of mine. They dated for 3 years starting in high school. They didn't even have sex, but as even mormon couples do they fooled around intently. It is only natural when you are with someone you love that long even if you aren't that sexually active. This about ruined her though. She truly bought into the notion that she was evil. Here is a girl who still hadn't had intercourse yet and had only even fooled around with 1 guy in her whole life. Yet because the church had drilled it into her so hard about how sinful sexual behavior was, it about ruined her. Granted you could blame her to a degree for buying into the church when other girls don't, but I put most of the blame on the church. You are raised in something from birth, it can have a crazy effect on you if you buy into it 100%.

...and leaving Utah for that matter is gaining the freedom to wear whatever I like and feel comfortable in.

I have a tendency to wear a nice comfy short cotton skirt and a shoulderless tube top whenever I go out, and nobody judges me harshly (or at all) for it; Outside the Morridor, I'm just accepted as just another normal woman.

Then back at home, I'm usually just chillin' in just a pair of cotton shorts (and I mean short) when the weather is hot, or sweat pants if the weather is cold, and that's it! Okay, also socks on my feet if, once again, the weather is cold.

No morg-bots around to lecture me about all that so-called "Modesty" BS.

I'll admit, though, I am one of the lucky few that had left the cult early enough that I was never forced into any garmies. But, I can't help but wonder if garments are in fact the main reason why Mormons keep pushing such restrictive body-coverage standards? Or are the Mormon leadership just taking part in the war on the natural human body just like the patriarchal big-three (Christianity, Judaism(?), and Islam), the leaders of the Victorian era, and any others that so obviously hate the human body in its natural form?

That's right. It is as simple as that. YOU can focus on living a good life and not stressing about doing something wrong when it wasn't wrong to begin with....drink responsibly,shop when you are able and have time, have sex with someone you care about and know the feeling is mutual.....I nevr got that the first sexual experience should be after marriage. I didn't teach my girls that. I just said be responsible and never be with someone just to be with them because they seem enamoured over you. You can cuddle with a dog or cat if you want something to hold.

1. No more garments

2. No more awful Sundays

3. Masturbation (or sex in general) without guilt

4. Genealogy because you're interested in your family, not because you have to dead-dunk your relatives.

5. Alcohol!...and not giving a shit if somebody sees you drink it.

6. Caffeine!...ditto for #5

7. Not having to perform mental gymnastics or live with cog dis 24/7

8. Did I mention no more garments?

9. Meeting Richard Packham

10. Being a part of exmormon.org and all the fantastic people here

No garmies (Yeah, DebbiePA, hideous!)

No constant life judgement. I choose to live my own life plan.

No scary temple ceremony. (pre-1990). Satan's "church"???

No snooty people ignoring a young 20-year-old.


Life is good as an exmormon!!!!

I married a Catholic girl and great uninhibited sex was always on the menu. I can only imagine the frustration I would have felt had I married a Mormon girl as a certified "horndog" back then...but then again, I'd never have made it into a temple anyways...