So, my story isn't the same as many here. I was a convert in (very young) adulthood and wasn't in nearly as long as many people here. But I still find myself negatively impacted by my time in the church in some ways.

The shaming within the church and my own feelings of regret and embarrassment after I realized it was all a play on my vulnerability (I was very depressed and new in a city at the time just out of college) still affect me sometimes. Any other converts who feel similarly?

Oh yes, that's me.

The cult snagged me when I got married. My BIC husband had declined to go on a mission, and decided instead to join the military. This kept things sort of okay with his parents, but once he announced our engagement, they pounced with a "how are you going to raise the kids?" campaign.

He still felt guilty about having doubts and I was looking for love and acceptance from a "real" family because my famiky of origin was so bad. We were young and lacked self-confidence. The cult is a brainwashing machine, and we got soaked.

Once we'd done the temple thing we just couldn't do it anymore. It was clear this could never be a thing we could honestly attest was true, good, or even entertaining, so we decided to be honest and crack open a beer.

25 years later my MIL is still trying to get us back in. The first five years were awful in terms of guilt and self-doubt in the face of the onslaught from husband's parents and church officials trying to love bomb us back. The longer we spent out, the better we felt about ourselves. I finally made peace with my unbelief, but it took time.

I have now become free from feeling any personal conflict over leaving, but have ongoing conflict in trying to have constructive relationships with TBM in-laws. For me, the cult is like plutonium. I have to keep my distance to stay safe. I only expose myself in little doses here and there.

Definitely. I’ve had years of therapy and yet there’s still a tiny doubt in my head. Outer darkness sounds scary. It’s like a big hallucination. You know it’s not real but it draws you in anyway.

I'm not sure that this is entirely negative, but my time as a Mormon completely soured me on religion, PERIOD. Once I realized that Mormonism was just a "made-up" religion, I couldn't seem to settle on ANY religion that wasn't "made-up" at some level.

I define myself as an apatheist. I don't know, and I don't care.

I like that. It's like an existential shrug. Don't know, don't care. Very nice.

No impact for me. Only my immediate family were members and they are all out, so I have no family pressures as some do. Biggest impact of my leaving was the loss of a well paying job but that was long enough ago to be ancient history. Life goes on. My main reason for being here is to keep up with what is happening within the Mormon world. Still living in a heavily Mormon area I find it useful if and when the topic arises which is getting less and less often with time and distance.