Have you noticed that mormons feel a little superior to anyone facing illness or other personal problems?

My exmo sister was diagnosed with a very virile cancer and has told the exmo siblings, but sadly doesn't feel comfortable telling TBM siblings, nieces, or nephews because she knows they'll assume she's being punished for leaving the morg.

I've felt similarly whenever I've been ill. I haven't liked it when anyone and especially healthcare workers pressure me to go to religious advisors when what I want from them is scientific and humane healthcare assistance and time to rest and take care of myself.

Yesterday, someone on the board said that if I'm ever sick I need to seek "introspective study of psychology and mental processes to learn to be more enlightened and unbiased."

I've noticed that some healthcare workers, friends, and others give similar advice. What I say is if you think sick people owe it to you to be more noble and high minded than the general public, back off of this line of thinking if a blind or cancer patient seems resistant or disinterested in stepping up to take care of your problems and feelings above and beyond their own.

This is why Mormon (LDS)doctors are very dangerous. And should not be trusted. Ever. This is based on personal expierenced.

All things being equal, I prefer to stay away from mormon or holy roller-type doctors.

I do have a wonderful surgeon who has said she'd pray for me and a nurse at the eye clinic who has let me know about his religious faith. I still love both of these caregivers because they don't expect or pressure me to be religious and they're just expressing their support in ways that seem natural and caring.

The mortality rate for Mormons and spiritualists is identical to the general population's: 100%

I've noticed this a lot too. I've been chronically ill for many years and have been on the receiving end of this destructive thinking.

When my dad was first paralyzed the bishop and other members told my family that everything happens for a reason and god must want my dad and my family to learn a lesson.

Well fuck them.

Oh heavens yes!!!!! Its just another tool in their spiritual superiority deck. It is one of the reasons I had finally had enough. Its beyond ridiculous to blame someone when illness or difficult problems happen to them. But in doing so....a mo ensures that they really dont have to help them. The only thing they can do is tell them that if they were a better person, this would not have happened. I could not believe how many times I was told that while trying to divorce a man who cheated multiple times, abused and tried to kill me. One ward member that Id known since I was a child even told me this crap. She knew what a good person I was. Yet she sided with him saying that he wouldnt have done those things ....and that I must have done something to upset him. Unbelievable!!!!!!

As you know, you deserved better than that creep.

I hope you can recover as much as possible and have a happier life without him and possibly without that so-called friend who blamed you for his actions.

Good thoughts to you.

Everything good is from God or TSCC, never any other source. Everything not so good is your own fault because your are not faithful enough, humble enough, repentant enough, sincere enough, trying hard enough, paying enough, prayerful enough, diligent enough, good enough, etc.

Everything has always got to be because you need to learn some lesson because you're falling short in one or more aspects of your life. If you'll just pay, pray, and obey with greater fervor, you'll be just fine. Sweet baby Jeebus will make everything alright.

No, it's because sh*t happens. Sometimes random, sometimes deliberately. No explanation needed or wanted. Congratulations!... today was your day play the lottery of life where everyone wins something. Sometimes it's a chocolate éclair, sometimes it's a poop log. Sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug. It's what keeps life real.

In my studies of the philosophy of religions, "Everything happens for a reason" is called Just-world theory. Going down that path is folly. Every bad thing that happens becomes a punishment, and then we get puzzled as to how bad people get rich and have fun lives.

Reality=Things happen in random-looking patterns, yet the universe is firmly deterministic and the laws of nature are immutable.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/04/2013 11:29AM by rationalguy.

Your sister should tell your siblings that there were 12.5 million persons living with cancer in the US in 2012. Over thrice the number of active mormons.

But Mormons do turn this type of passive/aggressiveness into an art form.

And, they have a different line for active, faithful LDS people that have fatal diseases or face a difficult situation. In this case, the person must have been SO RIGHTEOUS that God is testing them as he did Job.

It boggles the mind.

And in case of terminal illnesses, God wanted the TBM "on the other side of the veil" to proselytize further.

I guess I was predistined to leave the church because of what I was born with. My punishment started 27 years in advance of leaving TSCC. What a crock, but I am sure there are people in my TBM family that believe it. Why did an LDS surgeon save my life if I was going to turn out this way? As the morons would tell it, it was because they all prayed and he was inspired, and the lord guided him, not because he was a darn good surgeon. Their attitude makes them have very little empathy. When you're TBM there's even more pressure because you must have been saved for some special mission.

The way they think is insane.

I also really hate the line people throw out about how god will not give you more than you can handle. I see that line most often from people that have had very few trials in life in comparison to others (not just me). So many good people have horrible things thrown at them in life and they certainly don't deserve it.

I'm not feeling sorry for myself, I think I've dealt with things pretty well. I live a fairly "normal" life on my own terms. Happy to live in a time where we have a lot of science that helps us battle birth defects, cancer, etc.

No higher power does it to you. Suffering is part of being a living being. Yes, other religions like to make suffering sound like a punishment for sinfulness, but after 30 years in the healthcare profession and having lived globally, mormons are the worst for blaming the patient or the victum. It is challenging enough to heal from an accident or illness and to have to overcome unwarrented guilt and doubt is cruel.

I always like to ask the TBM's what Christ would do. Never once did I get a response from one of them. But they would go away.

And people have dark skin because they have a blighted inherently evil soul ! Its in the (Original) Book of MORmON !

THAT is one of the MORmON lessons that people need to learn.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeJqjDp87rA

This attitude about "lessons to be learned" thru serious illness or trial is NOT limited to Mormons, believe me.

I have an advanced form of cancer that the statistics suggest will kill me within a couple of years. (Not that I'm going to let that get to me -- I'm fighting recurrence far beyond what anybody ever expected, and to date -- I'm beating the odds... but that's not my point)

My cancer clinic brought a cancer survivor/author, Lynn Eib, down from Pennsylvania to speak to a group of us. Most of those invited to the program were folks with cancer advanced enough that it can kill.

Turns out, Lynn Eib (a mainstream Protestant, NOT LDS) has also had a cancer that could have killed, though she beat the odds and is alive 20 years later.

But here is something important she said. I'm pulling this from her book 50 Days of Hope, but she talked about this in the retreat too:

"When I was in the hospital after my cancer surgery, a friend came into my room and told me God was going to teach me great things through my trial. I wanted to take that IV out of my arm, stab it into hers, and tell her, 'YOU get in this bed and learn great things from God, because I don't want to learn it this way.'

"Of course, I didn't actually say that to her. Instead I just smiled, and hoped she would leave very soon."


At the break, I heard lots of the other cancer patients in the room talking about this same thing. How they heard the same garbage, and how relieved they were to finally be able to reveal out in the open how angry they felt when they were told that.


I live in the south. I doubt there was a single other person in that room who was LDS, or ExMo.


But we ALL shared that same experience, no matter what our religious background (or lack thereof)...

Even though this experience of being told it's your fault you have cancer, or there are important lessons you must learn from your cancer, or whatever, is NOT unique to the LDS, some things definitely are.


I'll share one of mine with you. You are the one group of people that I think will be able to understand.


I have advanced Endometrial cancer. Cancer of the womb. Late last year, I had a tumor the size of a cantaloupe surgically removed from my body, via a hysterectomy. Pathological analysis of the cancer cells later revealed Grade 3 cancer cells -- the most aggressive kind.


Statistically, I have only a 40% chance of making it a full year after surgery without some form of recurrence of the cancer. I have only a 25% chance of making it two years after surgery without the cancer coming back.


And if it comes back, it will probably kill me. Less than 10% of all women whose endometrial cancer returns will recover from the return. The average amount of time a woman lives after the recurrence is diagnosed is about 12 very painful months.


(Don't worry -- I'm fighting this thing BIG TIME, and I plan on celebrating my one year Cancerversary by running my first 5K walk/run -- NOT in some doctor's office or hospital bed. I'm already registered for the race, and training for the event at a local gym. But that is NOT where I'm going with this.)


Here's my story, and I know you LDS folks will probably understand:


I live out in the country, but my cancer clinic is in a city about an hour away.


I had a 10 inch incision to remove that large tumor, and they put plenty of heavy staples in me to close me up. Two weeks later, I needed those staples removed, so my husband and I drove to the city to get them pulled.


It's expensive to drive into the city, so even though I hurt like crazy after all those staples were pulled out, not to mention still being very weak after major abdominal surgery, we felt like we had to stop at Costco for some needed produce and bandages and things.


So we stopped, and of course Costco has motorized buggies, so as weak as I was, I got one of them to use while shopping. After getting the buggy, I split from my husband so he could head to the pharmacy area while I headed to the produce area, and we could get out of the store as quick as possible.


I used to live in this city (before we bought our little place in the country), and I was a member of the ward there for 20 years. Which meant I knew pretty much all the ward members except for those who moved in after I left.


As I was shopping in Costco that day, I drove up to the little refrigerated cove where they keep the lettuce and delicate fruit. I knew as weak as I was, I could never navigate that motorized cart in the small refrigerated area, so I parked my cart as close to the entrance as I could, then slowly dismounted and walked in to get my lettuce and carrots.


The 10 pound bag of carrots was actually heavier than I was supposed to carry that close after surgery (my doctor's nurse would have had a hissy fit if she'd known I was carrying that bag of carrots, because less than an hour earlier, she was warning me not to carry much since my incision was not completely closed up yet).


But the only way I could get those carrots to my buggy was to carry them out, so I was doing that -- carefully as I could.


When I came out, I saw an old Bishop's counselor's wife there. She saw me struggling with the carrots, and she came up to me and took them from me, and put them in my buggy.


I was so relieved to have that help, because they were so heavy and my belly was burning in the area where the wound had not closed up yet.


But after she put the carrots in the buggy for me, she says Hello, and asks me what my problem was.


And I made the mistake of answering her.


I answered her that I'd just had a hysterectomy for cancer.


BIG MISTAKE !!!!!!!!!


You see, I'm one of these academic nerd types. It was very normal and natural for me to go to college for an EDUCATION (not an MRS. degree -- gasp!).


In fact, I didn't just get a 4 year degree. I went on to get two masters degrees and a Ph.D. !


And if that wasn't bad enough, I had the audacity to accept a full time teaching position at the university where I got my degree!


I did marry a wonderful man (a convert) in the temple (of course) after I got my first master's degree, and he supported me fully as I went further in my education, and even after I got the teaching job. Because he wasn't brought up in the BIC LDS culture, it didn't bother him that his wife was actually more educated than he was. He appreciated me (and still appreciates me) for who I am.


We tried to have children, but the same physical problem that eventually lead to my cancer also kept me from successfully carrying a child. I even had major surgery in the late 1980s, to try and increase my chance of having a child, but it didn't work.


So we remained childless.


You all already know how difficult it is when you are unable to have children, and you are a member of the LDS cult. That has been talked about on this website many times.


But it is 10 times worse, believe me, when you are an academically oriented woman (whose educational level far exceeds most of the men in the High Council and the Bishopric)...


I don't know how many times during those years that I was told that "if I'd just stay at home and take care of my house and husband, the children would naturally come."


It was MY FAULT I wasn't able to have children -- as Heavenly Father had commanded me to do -- because I was pursuing an education and a career...


Anyhow, back to that day at Costco...


I made the mistake of answering that sister's question honestly, by mentioning that I had just had a hysterectomy for cancer.


And she lit off on me like fireworks at a 4th of July event!


"If you had just stayed at home instead of going to the university and getting all that education, you would have children instead of cancer..." Yada, yada, yada...


I wasn't feeling very well anyway, and the incision was burning in the spot where it hadn't closed up yet, and the last thing I needed was to hear THAT GARBAGE thrown at me AGAIN.


I rode away as fast as I could, my vision clouded with tears.


To this day, I've never told my husband what happened. If I had told him that day, he probably would have gone back to find her, and give her a rather loud piece of his mind. But I just wanted to get out of there.


I've only told one other person what happened that day (a religious counselor at the clinic where I'm treated), because most people here in the non-LDS south just don't understand the significance of this on a former LDS woman...

I hope it helped you and I'm sure it helped many of the rest of us.

Take care.

Wow, what a total bitch that lady was, no compassion whatsoever!
I really feel for you, this is the mode so many of my TBM relatives operate in. They've toned it down lately, but I don't believe for a second that it is a permanent state.

As a childfree couple, I have wondered just when these kinds of comments would start. I know it's not a matter of IF, but just WHEN. A great deal of mormons don't know how to deal with someone who departs from the mormon One True LifeScript TM in some ways.
I struggle with some health issues that I don't share the extent of with even my immediate family because I know the kind of smug satisfactions many mormons would get knowing how the apostate is suffering.

I'm so sorry you ran into that idiot when you did. I'm glad her first instinct was to help with the carrots, but then mormon social skills deficit struck as soon as she started opening her mouth. :(

S'why I hate it.

A few years ago, I had an EQ president who loved quoting from the “Oath and Covenant of the Priesthood” (D&C 84) verse 33 “For whoso is faithful unto the obtaining these two priesthoods of which I have spoken, and the magnifying their calling, are sanctified by the Spirit unto the renewing of their bodies.” He said how the older leaders of the church exemplified the “renewing of their bodies” with their health at their advanced age. He said that he repeatedly saw righteousness in people displayed by their good health.
At that time, my brother (who was on his Stake High Council and was a temple worker) was dying of cancer.

Things Members said to me when I was sick.

So, what did you do to deserve this life threatening illness?

If you had more faith you wouldn't be sick. That blessing would have healed you.

God must really love you to give you more than one illness. (This from the stake president)

I refuse to ever discuss my health with anyone who's a mormon. Their thinking is incredibly sick. I wonder what they did to deserve such sick thinking.

As I have posted on here before, my very ill son ( mid twenties) has been on the receiving end of Mormon compassion.

The most memorable time was when he was in hospital, hooked up t a morphine drip and very sick indeed. The bishops wife came to see him and asked him if he blamed anyone for his illness.

Yes, he replied, the doctor who operated on home when he was in the MTC, after an incorrect, rushed diagnosis, and triggered off this catastrophic series of events.

That's your problem, she smugly replied, if you trusted your leaders and prayed and studied the scriptures you wouldn't need that morphine drip.

Sadly I brought him up too well to tell her to fuck off and I wasn't around to do it for him

Compassion-free, ignorant, superstitious b!tch.
K

I was infected with rheumatic fever nine months ago and it nearly kille me. My high school grades suffered, I was tired all the time, I could not pay attention to anything, and I had intense migraines. And the first thing someone tells me when I just started feeling normal two weeks ago, and someone in thethe church says I must have finally repented.

The nerve of these people.

It's sad how heartless and cruel people can be. So sorry to all of you that have had so many horrible things said to you when you were sick.

I got really sick & had to see a lot of different doctors. No one could figure out what was wrong with me so I was feeling sad and desperate about my situation.

I called my mom in tears looking for some comfort and she told me my illness was god's way of hitting me over the head with a 2x4. B*tch. We didn't talk for a long time after that.

Apparently my autistic son is my punishment for apostasy.

I think it's sad how heartless and cruel some people can be, especially if you don't fit the tiny mold of Mormonism. As I said in another thread, I think one of the most cruel things Mormons might say is that parents of a child who dies before the age of 8 should be happy that their child is now in the CK since they died before being held accountable for any sins.

Holy shit this thread is pissing me off. I hope you Mormons are reading this!!

I have fourth stage non-alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver. I have not had a drop to drink since 1993, and never drank much before that. After DNA testing, I discovered my multi-racial background (white, native american, sub-saharan african). I found my biological family and, it turns out, that almost EVERY female in one branch of the family has died of cirrhosis! None of them were drinkers. Genetics, NOT sin. but, of course, to be born into this "weak, multi-racial" family, I obviously wasn't too valiant in pre-existence.

Had one child, who died at birth. Church responses: "It's part of Heavenly Father's Plan." (Really? Please explain the part of "The Plan" that REQUIRES the death of my only child. Go on...Oooohhhh, we'll learn about that AFTER we die. Mmmmkay.) "There's a reason for everything." Well, duh. Action/equal opposite reaction, I get it. What does ANY of this have to do with the death of my son?

Now that I'm quite ill, it's because I have not "endured to the end." My apostacy caused my illness. The funnest part is that cirrhosis darkens your skin, so this very pale girl is getting much less "white and delightsome."LOL Proof, of course, of my non-pious nature.

As my hubby would say, "They're all messed up in the head." He is also grateful that we left TSCC BEFORE the bathroom cleaning patrol was started...