Did the rest of you find yourself bristling every time you got told what "we" do and don't believe? Maybe it was extra bad at my house because my mother honestly behaves as though her kids are all Sims she gets to control and decide for. When she said "we" and was speaking for ME, it would nearly break my brain.

One time I was home on a break from college and told my little sister I didn't believe in ghosts. Well, someone was sent to fetch one of the multiple copies of Mormon Doctrine and I was proven to be wrong about what "we" believe. The conversation ended with about six people sitting around a table all staring at me smugly because they had just proven ME wrong about what I believe.

None of them saw anything off about this. What a mind-f***.

I guess that explains how my completely lovable boyfriend turned into a completely despicable jerk after one month. Those letters were miserable. I think I finally quit writing when I got a letter saying, "you need to humble yourself, get down on your knees, and pray." (I'd have been fine with it if "and pray" wasn't the culmination of that statement.)

Even with my amazing strength of will - and being incredibly kewl, I was still that kind of self-righteous dick when I first came home.

He goes on and on talking about what the millennium will be like. He just talks like I'm about to agree with him. Fortunately, my mom realized she lost all power over me when I "came out of the closet" about my apostasy. Now she's kind of desperate. Every few years she'll say, "you know I still believe it, right?"

What a sea change.

It bothered me when I was pretending to believe. It bothers me even more now that I have resigned and openly state that I do not believe the same. My mother is always making comments insinuating that I still believe the doctrine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyenRCJ_4Ww

Sorry... all I could think about was the Borg from Star Trek when I read that.

It's equally aggravating when they say "But we don't DO that, we are Mormon." Not just as in when a Mormon is in a restaurant and the waitress offers them coffee and they reply "I don't drink coffee - I'm Mormon." That's bad enough. But my mom would use it for everything from skirt length to double piercings to tattoos to hair length on guys. "We don't wear our skirts short because we are Mormon" or "The prophet told us no tattoos - Mormons don't do that." All your actions and choices were controlled by what Mormons did and didn't do.

They don't realize it comes off either as 1) self-righteous or 2) as a child-like person who isn't "allowed" to choose their own diet. Not a positive impression either way.

What would be cool is if they could hear what people are thinking when they say that:

"Well goody two shoes for YOU! I'll just back away slowly before someone sics the misssionaries on me."