I come on here to get others perspective's on this issue, to which I have little access in my daily life. I appreciate feedback and comments, and the chance to vent anonymously about my experience with Mormonism.
Please, just don't attack my mental health.
I am in many respects a happy and healthy person, though I am constantly growing and changing and recognize that I am not perfect.
I work at a school, teach piano, tutor, do yoga and have lots of friends from many religious backgrounds. I am Ivy-league educated, speak five languages, and have travelled and lived in many countries of the world.
Please, when you say things like that, realize that you are saying them about a real-live human being!
I'm just a person with issues, like the rest of us.
And I have already been to therapy, thank you! Yes I am aware that I have a tendency to want to save people! I know about this! And it is nice to be reminded (vhainya) that I might be stuck in a pattern, but not nice to feel attacked.
You sound like a brilliant woman. Even the most brilliant get caught up in our emotions because we are all human and that's what humans do. We've all been there. Every single one of us here on RfM, so it is a good place come.
I hope you got some good perspective, and although you felt attacked, the same poster also suggested a good support group that could help you work these things out with people who are going through the same thing, based on her own experience.
The topic is emotionally charged for a lot of women here.. a lot of us have been at the point you are at right now, and a lot of us, myself included, didn't know when to walk away. I don't think anyone who responded did so out of anything other than concern for your situation. People's emotions may color how they come across, so just take what helps you and stay true to who you are.
You sound like a brilliant woman. Even the most brilliant get caught up in our emotions because we are all human and that's what humans do. We've all been there. Every single one of us here on RfM, so it is a good place come.
I hope you got some good perspective, and although you felt attacked, the same poster also suggested a good support group that could help you work these things out with people who are going through the same thing, based on her own experience.
The topic is emotionally charged for a lot of women here.. a lot of us have been at the point you are at right now, and a lot of us, myself included, didn't know when to walk away. I don't think anyone who responded did so out of anything other than concern for your situation. People's emotions may color how they come across, so just take what helps you and stay true to who you are.
You sound like a brilliant woman. Even the most brilliant get caught up in our emotions because we are all human and that's what humans do. We've all been there. Every single one of us here on RfM, so it is a good place come.
I hope you got some good perspective, and although you felt attacked, the same poster also suggested a good support group that could help you work these things out with people who are going through the same thing, based on her own experience.
The topic is emotionally charged for a lot of women here.. a lot of us have been at the point you are at right now, and a lot of us, myself included, didn't know when to walk away. I don't think anyone who responded did so out of anything other than concern for your situation. People's emotions may color how they come across, so just take what helps you and stay true to who you are.
I do appreciate it Vhainya. I know that no harm was meant, and that you all know first-hand how these relationships play out and have a strong basis for your perspectives.
And I probably will look up that organization saviorself mentioned.
I was surprised at various posts projecting that there is something co-dependent with you or that you are seeking drama in your relationship. I don't agree at all.
You sound very capable of complex reasoning, insight, boundaries,and the ability to tolerate differences in others. I don't agree that all difficult relationship must be immediately cast off, nor that being in relationship with someone's whose indoctrination causes them to deeply want you to change your thinking makes that person abusive. We're all that way!!!! That's what we all do!!! It's just that if the indoctrination the person wishes for you to also adopt is destructive it makes it dangerous to even consider it. But we all have huge divides from others which would not make a relationship necessarily abusive just because of that reason. Nor does it make your appreciation of the whole person "co-dependent." That is the nature of love. Struggling to love the whole person despite finding an area of the person's psyche you can't reconcile with what you expect of them. Any democrat who loves a republican would be in the same struggle, tug of war and exasperation--both sides would be.
The quality you bring to this is a very important relationship value--the fact that you don't immediately disconnect and discard the relationship assuming it's co-dependence or abuse. The inability to tolerate conflict, differences, frustration, and assume the answer is to discard the relationship exacts a cost so high in one's life that it's tragic. The idea that all relationships of this kind are abuse, brought upon yourself by a masochistic need, an emotional problem in yourself just isn't always true.
My impression is that you're working through and processing and weighing the values you hold--those of tolerance, seeking to continue connection rather than disconnecting in reaction to finding a dark place in someone you love. Practicing this, perfecting it, working through it, is actually a very valuable thing you're doing. It's healthy of you.
Ultimately, the fact your boyfriend needs you to believe doctrines that will prove fatal to your connection (which I do believe) is not the same as concluding therefore that having had the relationship at all was a sign of sickness. It's not. You'll learn life lessons about your capacity to love, your own needs, and how to resolve issues in your life into the future by engaging in this struggle honestly as you are doing.
I used the term "mental health" rather loosely, and in a way that is contrary to customary usage. It was not my intent to say that you are "mentally ill."
By way of background, at a time when I had been married 12 years, my spouse was seeing a psychologist for weekly counseling. The counselor decided that my spouse was at risk for suicide and recommended inpatient treatment at a mental health hospital. That resulted in six months of inpatient treatment.
During that time I had weekly counseling because the entire situation was adversely affecting my mental health. So I have become accustomed to using the term "mental health" to refer to situations where a person's thinking and attitude is causing them to act in ways that are not in the person's best interests. In my opinion, that describes what is happening with you, but to say there are mental health problems is not a good way to describe the situation.
Thank you, and sorry to have spouted like that. Interesting perspective on the mental health thing, doing things that aren't in one's best interest.
My mom is a psychologist, so all the mental health aspects of life are overly familiar to me, which is why I probably jumped too much at your post. I am not a huge fan of traditional psychoanalysis for this very reason - the pathologizing of otherwise typical patterns. I had it all the time growing up. These patterns usually work themselves out once the person gets tired of hurting themselves and makes a new choice. That's why I reiterated that I'm just a person living and growing.
Six months in inpatient for suicide is a long time. I hope it helped?
who is so different, that does not use the same methods of reason and understanding of the world that you do.
It's a huge challenge -- apparently very frustrating, also, to not be able to make any inroads into getting your Mormon boyfriend to "get it" ! Because it's not how you see the world, it appears to be "wrong" in some way, but it's just different.
When dealing with generational, cultural, traditional Mormons, you are dealing with their tribe, so to speak. It's foundation (World View) is very different than other people's. It reminds me of the Amish. The LDS people's were isolated and created a unique, insular society over a hundred years ago, that still functions quite well. Some are willing to step outside and leave their tribe and take the consequences, some are not. I think the majority are not willing to even consider it.
I have seen this same kind of dedication to the traditional, societal, cultural religious upbringing in many different religions. They may be functioning in the world, but they have a separateness that is not always apparent from the outside. Mormons refer to that as: in the world but not of the world. Mormons are certainly not the only religious peoples who practice this kind of mind set.
when you are satisfied that you cannot change this person or get them to see the world, your way, you will probably loose interest in them. Just my guess! :-)