One of the most difficult parts of leaving the church is to overcome the automatic emotional responses that have been trained in over the years.

It's one thing to study and come to the intellectual conclusion that the church isn't true. That realization can happen almost in an instant. But intellectual knowledge doesn't remove the automatic emotional responses that have been trained in over the years. It took me just one shelf-breaking night to realize the church wasn't true. But it was at least 9 months of emotional upheaval before I could trust my conclusions and stop living in emotional fear of being wrong.

Emotional responses like being moved by hearing a hymn, or by hearing someone bear a tearful testimony don't necessarily disappear when you stop believing. Intellectual knowledge won't take away the fear being wrong, or losing your family for all eternity. It won't take away the guilt over shopping on Sunday or drinking coffee, or removing your garments, or disappointing your mother. It won't take away your vulnerability to emotional manipulation.

And those feelings and fears are NOT evidence that the church is true. People who leave OTHER cults have the same types of feelings and responses to guilt and manipulation. Does that make THEIR old beliefs true? Are they sinning if they leave the JWs? Will the Hutterite woman who cuts her hair be cursed? Of course not. That's easy to see from the outside, but for them, it's scary to go against what they've been taught to fear. Similarly, they would look at the exmo who is afraid to remove their garments and think "Wow. What a cult." Sometimes it helps to try to see our strange Mormon rules and practices as an outsider would.

The part of your brain that feels the fear and the guilt is different than the part of your brain that intellectually knows the church isn't true. It was much harder for me to retrain the emotional part of my brain, and to move on. (Just a comment here, it was easier for my husband because he never was that vulnerable to guilt/fear, whereas emotional manipulation was part of how I was raised.)

What I did:

I had to interrupt and talk myself down when the old thought/emotional processes came up. The guilt, self-doubt, fear, or shame happens automatically. It's been programmed in to the emotional system for years and the only way to get it out is to confront and train it out. I had to do this process over and over again for EACH area of guilt/fear. And years later, I would find new buried emotional triggers, and I had to address them as they came up.

Example: I felt guilty for shopping or going to a movie on Sunday, maybe even a little afraid that something bad (like a car accident) might happen.

I had to make a conscious effort to interrupt and challenge those reactions. Every time.

I'd ask myself why I was afraid or feeling guilty. Was there really a God? And if not, the question of what I did on Sunday was completely moot.

And if there WAS a God, and He didn't communicate directly with me, why should I assume he talked to anyone else, or believe anything a church said about what he wanted me to do on a particular day? They lied about everything else. The Bible is also full of ridiculous rules and impossible stories, so it's unreliable as well.

Was it even reasonable or moral for an absentee (and possibly non-existent) God to dictate how I spent my day?

Was there anything actually bad, immoral, or harmful about going shopping or to a movie on Sunday?

Finally, why would the creator of the universe actually CARE what I did on Sunday? Is God a controlling narcissist that needs to be worshiped? It's just silly.

And THEN: I'd go shopping or go to that movie, and find out that nothing bad happened. I might actually have a good time. And the next time it would be be easier. Eventually, I enjoyed the fact that the stores are less busy, and the movie theaters are empty on Sunday. And I'd celebrate as I drove by churches with full parking lots, knowing that I wouldn't have to sit through 3 hours (or more) of BS. That guilt turned into JOY!

So that's the process: Challenge the feeling. Act according to your beliefs. Realize you're okay. And replace the old feeling with a new one. That's how you rewire the brain.


One last thought: I remember worrying that the guilt was 'the spirit' telling me I was doing wrong. I was really affected by a documentary about a woman who left the Hutterites and was scared to death to cut her hair for the first time, because that was not allowed in her former religion. Obviously, for anyone not raised in her cult, cutting one's hair is not a bad thing to do. But I could clearly see how her feelings of guilt and fear had been hijacked and used to control her, just as mine had. The FEELINGS are not evidence that what you are doing is wrong. They are evidence that you've been trained to feel bad for doing something.

Obviously, it's good to feel guilty for doing things that are ACTUALLY wrong. But to be emotionally healthy, you have to separate out what is ACTUALLY wrong from what is not.

When you leave the church, some people will try to use those easily triggered feelings of guilt and shame to control you. In fact, manipulation is a common practice in our society, that probably most people need to recognize and learn to resist. If you want to be in control of your own life, you can't let those feelings of misplaced guilt or unfounded fears to be used against you. It takes PRACTICE resisting manipulation to lay down healthy emotional responses in your brain. I'm still working on it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/2017 03:07PM by imaworkinonit.

Thank you for this post, imaworkinoit. You are one of my favorite posters!

You are right--the emotional aspects of leaving the cult have been more difficult than the intellectual knowledge that "of course it isn't true!" The realization can be in an instant, as you said. In my case it was an instant with each new lie I learned about. I got very angry, sometimes! All in all, learning the Truth was invigorating, because suddenly things made sense. It was also a huge relief! I'm much happier with the world, now, the way it really is. I can live with ambiguity, but not with lies. Not with abuse, either.

After 9 years out, I still struggle with the automatic responses. You give good advice and encouragement in your post!

The worst Mormon handicap for me is/was low self-esteem. You all know how women are treated in Mormonism. The priesthood-holding boys in my family were allowed to beat me, break my toys, and call me names. I was "a nothing", and not worth my parents' standing in to defend me. My only value was something way off in the future--to marry a returned missionary in the temple, and to multiply and replenish the Earth.

With no self-esteem, I didn't feel worthy of the boys I loved, and even turned down two proposals of marriage, because I was sure I would not measure up to their expectations. I chose someone more pathetic, who said he needed me, and would kill himself if I broke up with him. I barely knew him, and no one bothered to check up on his family. My parents threw me at him, because I was 25, and he was a returned missionary, so we had the perfect temple marriage. My husband beat me, and at the same time convinced me that it was ALL MY FAULT.

I had no self-esteem, and, along with cult prejudices, I believed that it was the woman's fault if a marriage went bad. I also believed that my brothers AND my husband AND the Mormon priesthood authorities could not all me wrong, with only stupid me being the only one who was right.

The Mormon cult certainly does make everything worse. My divorce freed me to go on and start a new life away from home and away from the cult. Yet, in the eyes of my TBM family and the Mormons, I was now a failure--a divorced single woman over 25.

It is true that the more vulnerable to emotional manipulation you are, the harder it is to undo the damages of the cult. I honestly believed my life was over. One night, I thought suicide was the only way out, because my TBM family would be disgraced and embarrassed if I got divorced. I would still be married to this woman-beating thug for all eternity. (I was eternally married to him, in the eyes of the cult, until the day I formally resigned.) For those months, my own life didn't matter to me, as much as The Church and my parent's not being disappointed in me. At the brink of suicide, I thought, "There's another way out! I want to live! I'll run away and get a divorce!"

But I wanted to live a different life--not that TBM life of being a victim.

Long story--but it does take some time and effort to talk yourself out of the worst emotional scars. I went to a psychiatrist for my PTSD. I got married to a more mellow TBM, and had children, and we all left Mormonism together (and then my husband left all of us) and I had a rewarding career, and my children and I are happy now.

Through it all, I never felt worthy of being loved. That definitely goes along with belonging to a cult that doesn't believe in unconditional love.

I had anxiety attacks in social situations. I thought I wasn't intelligent enough for my career, so I got a Master's, and took more classes after that. All those years, and I never felt deserving of success, so when it happened, I thought something must be wrong, somewhere. The Mormon leaders had cursed me with failure as a mother, plus financial failure for all of us--and that never did happen. It's like waiting for the other shoe to fall.... But, the good news is that it never does!

It's just Mormon VooDoo curses, and that is all!

I agree with imaworkinonit, that God is not a "controlling narcissist who needs to be worshipped."

The universe, our genetics, and our loved ones want us to be happy, and to live free of cult threats and fears and bullying. I hope everyone keeps on healing, and never gives up--it will happen!

Aw, thanks for the compliment!

I'm sorry for what you've been through. How damaging to a grow up with the mixed messages of being one of God's chosen generation, but also never being enough, no matter how hard we try. It primes people to accept blame and abuse.

Interesting what you said about the Masters degree. Been there, done that, and sometimes I still feel like an imposter in my field.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/28/2017 01:27AM by imaworkinonit.

Breeze, you are also a favorite of mine.

Your comments about your self-esteem were identical to my my own feelings. I couldn't believe my eyes that another woman felt the same way.

I was even phobic of getting lost or kidnapped, thinking no one would look for me.

Enormously valuable things were stolen from me, and I never called the police. Why would they help me, when they were busy with worthy people?

Maybe it's no accident that later in life I married a cop (RfM's Search n Rescue Guy).

Anyway, your post here is something I will keep and refer back to when I need strength.

Its tough to rewire, my mind is still automatic on so many things it's not even funny.

It takes time. I read your other post that sounded like some PTSD or panic attacks going on. I didn't respond there, because it's out of my depth. I think it takes special techniques and sometimes medication to help. But I know people who have overcome it.

I remember reading some posts on it where people said to focus just on one thing when an attack is coming on.

Hang in there! It gets better.

"Rewiring your emotional brain." I like that terminology. I've been calling it "un-brainwashing" myself.

There have been studies in learning theory, and they show that things (such as lists of random words) are more quickly forgotten if other information is put into the brain. It has been working for me. I have been memorizing poetry and prose and other information, to flush out all the fake scriptures, stupid couplets, Primary chants, and dreary Mormon hymn lyrics. If anything Mormon pops into my head, I quickly focus on something positive, and in the moment.

Meditation helps, too.

Mormon thoughts and emotions sneak up on you, so how do you know when you're having one? You feel depressed, hopeless, worthless. There's a dark cloud of doom-and-gloom descending over you. Run! Literally, exercise. Get away from the situation that is triggering these awful flashbacks.

I think of it as taking back my mind. I have already taken back my life, so it's probably easier for me, than it is for people who are still struggling with Mormonism on a daily basis. It will get easier for Adam, too. Yeah--never surrender!

Great ideas! Kind of like a healthier version of Packard's suggestion to sing a hymn when bad thoughts are creeping in.

He didn't that Mormonism promoted bad thoughts.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/28/2017 09:58AM by bohica.

> I have been memorizing poetry and
> prose and other information, to flush out all the
> fake scriptures, stupid couplets, Primary chants,
> and dreary Mormon hymn lyrics.

I did this too and for the same reasons. And I believe it really did help to rewrite my emotional brain.

Only possible difference is I focused more on music and lyrics. I'd find music that I really liked, look up the lyrics, and then write them down in a notebook. I used to sit in my room with headphones on and do this for hours. Go through the lyrics and the music over and over. IDK... we do weird things sometimes but I had an instinct and/or an intuitive feeling about going through this self-imposed 'therapy' and I really do think it helped.

Some years later I came across the actual studies which explain the underlying, scientific reasons why this might help.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/28/2017 11:52AM by bohica.

I'd be kind of interested if you ever come across links to the research you read, or similar information.

Music affects us on many levels, and when you combine words with it, the words sink deeper.

Your post makes me think about the power of making a personal soundtrack. I'd love to make an energy-packed soundtrack for exercise and housework. And another for calm and peace. Etc.

I have found sayings, quotes, and art that inspires me. I printed them out, bought some art, made some of my own. These are the words and images I see over and over everyday. It's been a huge help in changing my thought patterns.

I saw a therapist briefly after transferring from BYU to community college. She wasn't all that skilled/helpful, but she said my low self esteem, extreme sensitivity to rejection, and secrecy all were probably, in part, due to my mormon upbringing and the perfectionism that went along with that.

I'm somewhat better now, but it takes a lot of effort to shift those mentalities toward something healthier.

There is so much in this thread, from the OP and following comments, that resonates with me. There is still, after almost 16 years since I officially resigned and longer since I knew it wasn't what it claimed to be, emotional cult triggers that I don't even recognize. And what's funny is that my close friends and my therapist pick up on them really easily.

My kids are all in their 30s, my oldest almost 40. Yet that emotional response of feeling like a failure as a mother creeps in every time they have life problems. And they are all successful and hard working. The weirdest thing is that the things I feel most guilty about are things I did or taught them when they were growing up BECAUSE it was the mormon way. Because that's all I knew. That's the way I was supposed to raise and teach them. Then it's the mormon messages of inadequacy that beat me up. If any of that makes sense. I sometimes feel like I can't win.

One of my best friends will often say, "OK, we're going to have another of those conversations about the way it works in the real world. Gotta get you out of mormon brain mode."

And it really throws me because I'll think, "I'm not mormon brained. I've been away from that for years. I don't live around mormons, my kids aren't mormons, I have a good grasp on reality." But when they point it out, I can usually see it. I like the suggestions about replacing thoughts with poetry, songs, chants, self-talk, etc. Because I have also found that helps. But back to the original post, there really are emotional triggers no matter how much we intellectually know the truth. It can be a long struggle to disarm them all. Because we didn't know as mormon women how twisted our thinking could be. We didn't realize how clinically abnormal some of it was.

It's good that you have people in your life who can point out when you are thinking 'mormon-brained'. That's funny.

It's so hard to see your own messed up thinking. I'm lucky to have someone in my life who will interrupt me and point out when I slip into patterns of irrational self-criticism.

Back in the fifties and sixties before plastic twine came into use for ranchers baling grass and alfalfa they used "haywire."

Whenever the wire would snap off in the baler a tangled mess would ensue. Also after cutting open bales to feed livestock and tossing the wire aside huge haywire nests impossible to manage would grow. Most of these nests would be left to rust away in a few years.

So, imaworkinonit, I like your proactive approach to clearing out the haywire rather than just letting it gradually rust away.

I've tried. I still step on a stray wire here and there.

Cricket, that sounds like an analogy some G.A. would use at conference. "Back on the farm..." You should sell it to one of them. Oh wait. No farmers anymore. It would have to be an analogy that started with "back in law school..."

This is one of the best threads ever on RfM, imo. So much wisdom here!

Thank you, imaworkinonit. And to all who've shared their struggles and how you are healing mind and spirit.

Good to question painful thoughts.

Great post imaworkinonit.

Thanks for sharing some of your insights. :)