Grab a magazine and cut out your dream wedding dress...make sure it's modest. Get a piece of paper and write down what you want your husband to be like; don't forget to include he must be a member of the church, hold the preisthood and also be a returned missionary. Make sure to also write down how many children you want; no less than one, ok? Now write about the kind of house you want to live in. When you're done, put it all in an envelope. Whenever you feel like you are straying from the path, pull it out to remind yourself about what you will receive if you remain clean, true, and worthy...

The above is basically what one of my YW leaders said during mutual that took place at her house. Even as a member then during that time about seven years ago, this activity was horrendous. I skipped looking for a wedding dress to cut out. All I did was write a few traits about what I'd like in a guy, then just sat there and listened to the other girls giggle and wiggle about what they wanted in their futures. Good for them, in a way, but I realized not one of them had any other desire than to be clean and of good morale so that their lord would lead a worthy husband to them. It's not so much what they said, but how they said it.

Of course, the leader asked why I wasn't doing the full activity and I said something about 'my future and dreams aren't something I can stick in an envelope to pull out on a rainy day''. Then she wanted to know how many children I wanted, at least, I said none.

Of course the other girls instantly sprung on that. "You don't mean that!" "When you meet the right guy, you'll change your mind" and that sort if thing. No thanks. I stuck to my answer and the rest of the time in that house left me sitting to myself as the others continued their activity a good distance away from me.

What kind of activities did you have that made it more clear to you just how brain-washy the church can be?

Geez, nothing like that comes to memory, but I may have forgotten. I did go to a London ward and my YW presidency were all young with degrees and independence, so that might have been the difference. The YW in my ward all wanted degrees and a good job before all that stuff, bar one girl.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/11/2013 07:21AM by newnuela.

I GOT ONE! MY YW. teacher gave this lesson about how men & women need each other.Using air & water as the illustration. And then gave a big pitch about how important it was to be a wife & mother! Than she pointed around the rm. asking each one,"what do u want to be?" A."A wife & a mother".-I must admitt I wasnt paying close attention...:-) So when she got to me,I spouted,"I want to make my mark in the world". Dropped Jawed she frantically looked in her book for an answer.She found none & was speechless.!

PS I have to add. Looking around the rm and seeing the disapproving looks made me feel guilty. And sad that I ruined her lesson. But at the same time I still hoped to make my mark. This was one of my first real clues of how they consciencely willfully MESS with YOUR LIFE!!

And yet the desire to put one's mark on the world is so very normal that only in something like the Mormon fake-world would it be considered out of the ordinary.

I remember making the lists of what your husband would be like. I never did.

One activity sticks out in my mind. It was at girls camp. We were given licorice ropes and told to wrap them around our arms and legs how far up we would let a boy touch. I thought it was lame and just ate my licorice. The other girls seemed to be into it, giggling and having fun.

to make young girls imagine letting a boy touch her.

Kind of odd for a church activity.

Maybe men should also do that.

On some future date I could pull out my envelope and read what I want in a wife.

What ? A nymphomaniac with an FFL who owns a large boat ?

But men in the church do make a list of what they want in a wife!

I had a very attractive roommate at Ricks college.
She said she felt like a prize cow at the fair. She'd graduated from HS in January and came up to school. She was a real go-getter but she also found she had a lot of dates she had to schedule around her homework (which came first for her).
She said more than one guy would pull out a list and question her on their first date: Can you cook and what do you cook? How many children do you want? Are you morally clean? How many boys have you kissed? Do you have a testimony? etc.

She did marry eventually, a decent sort of chap and I'm sure they're okay and still together.

Those that pulled out 'the list' were only dated once by her.

Wow ... well, that certainly wouldn't sit with me right, either. You pull out a list like you're shopping at a Dream Wife Mall and you're going to have yourself quite the woman to handle for that date...if it happened to me, haha.

BahBahBlacki Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Wow ... well, that certainly wouldn't sit with me
> right, either. You pull out a list like you're
> shopping at a Dream Wife Mall and you're going to
> have yourself quite the woman to handle for that
> date...if it happened to me, haha.


Actually, if it were me that date wouldn't last very long.

I did have something similar happen to me. At the encouragement of a friend, I went out on a date with a fellow that I must admit I wasn't too interested in to begin with. We hadn't been at the restaurant 20 minutes when the (somewhat recently widowed) fellow started telling me what a great mom I'd make for his two-year-old.

He knew next to nothing about me -- and when I told him that I didn't want kids, he told me he was sure that I would change my mind once I met his daughter.

On a first date.

We had already ordered food, which is the only reason I didn't walk down the stairs to the bus stop that led to my home after I'd excused myself to the restroom. I couldn't bring myself to just ditch him.

He spent the rest of our date telling me all about what a great catch he was. I am not kidding.

When we got back to my house, he said "When are we going out again?"

I replied that it seemed to me that we were looking for two very different things out of life at this time, and that I did not wish to see him again. I wished him the best finding the right person.

His reply? "You don't know what you're missing out on."

My reply, before I turned on my heel and went into the house: "Oh, yes. I do. You've told me all about how great you are all evening, so I can safely say I've made an informed decision."

One mutual activity, our leaders passed around a bag of candy bars . They told us to pick one out, but not to eat it yet.

After we all had a candy bar, they gave us each a piece of paper that corresponded with the one we'd chosen. The candy bars were supposed to represent our husbands.

One of the girls had a pack of lifesavers, so her husband was a gorgeous, beach blonde lifeguard, but not very smart. He was a good man, but she had to work outside the home because he didn't make very much money.

Another girl had an Idaho Spud. Her husband was a potato farmer from Idaho. He wasn't very good looking or sophisticated, but he was a hard worker and very righteous.

I had chosen a Charleston Chew and my paper said something like, "You married your husband because he's tall, dark and handsome. He has a huge word of wisdom problem though and chews tobacco daily. Because of this, he will never be able to take you to the temple."

Then we had a discussion about how we could deal with our husbands' flaws.

This is a realistic portrayal of marriage, because you have no choice in the matter and must do your best to deal with the random husband that falls in your lap.

Dissing Idaho Potato Farmers as not being very good looking or sophisticated! Blasphemy! I know some very wealthy Idaho potato farmers.....

As a Laurel group in Phoenix (about '98) we went to a David's Bridal store and tried on wedding dresses and then had to model the wedding dress while the leader took a photo of us. I've always been a big girl and the biggest size they had wouldn't quite fit. Under peer pressure I went out to model a dress that I was too fat for. I cried then and I cried all the way home.

That experience deepened my biggest fear that I was unattractive and would never get married. 15 years later and I'm almost over that experience and mindset. But if I marry, it will not be in a white dress, because of that activity!

Oh sweety, I'm so sorry! But hey, I don't want a white dress, either. Hooray! I hope you continue to heal, thank you for sharing you experience.

we had our temple night sleepover when I was 14 or 15. We basically did the same thing you just talked about but we also drove to the temple at night and promised each other that we would all have temple weddings to worthy RM's. One of the girls that was in our ward and who was there that night? Her family owned an ice cream emporium and so we of course also had ice cream.