Posted by:
Breeze
(
)
Date: November 05, 2016 04:46AM
Thanks for this thread. It makes me feel better about what happened to me. My husband totally abandoned me and our children, disappearing, and escaping child support and alimony. I was supporting the family, so I guess it was lucky that he didn't ask me for alimony.
When my husband's parents found out he had abandoned us, his mother (the dominant parent) called me, and all she said was, "I hope you don't expect anything from us." For the sake of the children, I swallowed my pride and asked them to keep contact with their grandchildren, because they were having a hard time. The children were little kids and toddlers, and loved Grandma and Grandpa. They did receive Christmas cards with $10.00. No letters or phone calls, or visits, though they owned a condo 5 miles from us.
I had to cut off all contact with my older brother who beat and tortured me all my life. In adulthood, the bullying was mostly verbal, but threatening, still. I had to keep him away from my children.
My other brother was a high priest, and financial clerk, and he and my parents bragged about his honesty. I think my parents knew, deep down, that he was a crook, and they allowed me to have my own legal representation in regard to their Wills. His wife was a gold-digger, and jealous, and tried to spread lies about me and my children, to discredit us, so her children would get more favors from my parents--and it worked.
The independence we learned, gave us the freedom to leave that dysfunctional family, after my parents died. The Mormons that are left in the family are shunning us, and we're glad of it. Now, they can't steal from us and lie to us anymore.
It's hard to let go! In our case, we're letting go of a dream that belonged to an older generation of Mormons--the large families of 8 children, plus the extended families of aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents and old-maid aunts, all living in the same neighborhood, and sharing the same cabins in the summers. Wealth was part of the dream. Temple marriages and no divorces. Women who didn't work outside the home. Men who became bishops, stake presidents, temple presidents, mission presidents, and general authorities.
We have a new dream. A divorced single mother CAN make it in the world. She CAN raise educated, successful, happy, honest, hard-working, loving children. We want to have fun, these days, and are less concerned with competing with social-climbers, and having to prove ourselves to people who's only authority is in the Mormon cult. One doesn't have to be born into wealth, but can be "self-made." Small families can be very loving and supportive of each other, helping put each other through college.
The old dream was one in which the good-old-boy Mormon geezers were top dog, and made all the rules, and took in all the money. Now, women are rising up, and so are children! My children had jobs as soon as they were old enough for a paper route, and they kept on working. Half of my Mormon cousins' kids, and my nieces and nephews turned out very badly, getting caught up in expensive drug habits, and a few committed suicide. My kids were the only ones not to go on missions. I was the only one who was divorced. We were separated by light-years from the Mormon mainstream. We had no choice but to let go and move on.