How much social capital

[Thoughtful]

Did you lose or gain by resigning/coming out?

Among LDS?

Among Nevermos?

Spouseman thinks if we shop on Sunday or drink coffee, people will lose respect for us. I think outside the church they will neither care nor notice, and if they do notice, they will be indifferent about it. Sunday afternoon at Wal-Mart or coffee are not moral issues to them.

People in the church, I think, will cluck their tongues and pity or judge us, and feel especially tormented on behalf of my ILs.

[Just This Guy]

I'm in a rather religious (Christian) area but not the MorCor.

Amount the nevermo's the area, actually they tend to be more interested or friendly when I tell them I'm an exmo.

In the TBM circle, I really have no idea. For the most part, they have gone out of their way to ignore me. Of course, that started long before I was an Exmo. So I really don't care.

As far as Sunday's go, for DW and me, it is usually a morning of brunch and shopping. Getting out early to shop is great because the store are usually quite while everyone else is in church. Once churches gets out, places get busy. Afternoons we like to get out as much as we can. Take the kids to a park, or go to the stable to take our horse for a ride. DW says she prefers the church of the great blue dome and brunch much more than she ever did with Mormonism.

[Dravin]

Spouseman thinks if we shop on Sunday or drink coffee, people will lose respect for us.

The respect of those who will respect you less for drinking coffee or shopping on Sunday isn't worth very much in my mind.

I think outside the church they will neither care nor notice, and if they do notice, they will be indifferent about it. Sunday afternoon at Wal-Mart or coffee are not moral issues to them.

You may find some non-Mormons who think Sunday should be a day of rest and tut-tut about you shopping but they are going to be a rather small minority, most non-Mormons I've encountered who feel something about Sabbath observance tie it to church attendance not avoiding shopping.

[foolmeonce]

Great questions! Everyone's situation is very unique, but there's similar threads in a lot of them. For context, I live outside of MORCOR, had my fall out with local leaders in Houston (me, DW and at the time 4 primary aged kids all stopped going to church and it quickly got out why). I moved my wife and kids to Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW) 6 months later (unrelated but exceptionally well timed job transfer), and sent a letter to our families a few months after that. This was all in 2015-2016.

So with that said, my social capital with my immediate family has never been better. I'm a better father and husband outside then I ever was inside, I spend more quality time with the kids, and a lot less time sweating small stupid stuff.

Social capital with most of our Mormon friends in Houston died immediately, though there were a few people who were silently questioning that I was able to talk to and help them feel less crazy. I still try to keep up with them, but geographic distance makes that hard.

Social Capital with my extended family (brothers and parents) took a pretty hard hit. I'm the oldest, first to go on a mission, marry in the temple, 4 kids, really active in the church, etc. I have been the example, and now I'm suddenly the black sheep. I've lost all of my credibility, and I'm pretty sure the youngest brother will be getting the brass plates and gold ball. If I'm honest with myself, my relationship with my parents was rough before this change, but this sped things up things in the wrong direction with my mother. But on the upside, we've managed to keep things mostly civil. Conversations are superficial, but it's likely that they've always been that way and I just haven't noticed before. Maybe the big difference is now I really don't care what callings people have and how many times the wards have been split in NW Houston. This is one that will take time. I hope there will come a point when my brothers will start paying attention and will want answers. If not, then some of their kids will realize that we black sheep aren't at all miserable, so something must be up. If that happens, we'll be ready. We're definitely playing the long game on this.


Social Capital with DW extended family has gone through a big metamorphosis and improved in some areas, and declined in others. We've become close with two brothers and their wives who have left or are leaving. The relationship with the TBM sister took a pretty big hit though. At this point, they're talking again about kids mostly, never about religion.


Social capital with DFW Mormons is well into the negative territory. I have firmly placed us on the DNC list, and have scared off the missionaries. Why not just resign? Lots of reasons, but the biggest one is that I think that we can cause more cog dis by having our names plus our 4 kids on the rolls than by a single instance of a resignation. This way, our names are always there as a thorn in the side of the members, killing their attendance and HT records (not VT though, the monthly letter keeps coming and propping up the numbers). Now we have 1 unbaptized 8 year old, and will soon have an un-ordained 12 year old on the rolls, (not to mention a beehive who really seems to have been over looked by their reach out efforts. Go fig.) I'm a big fan of promoting small acts of COG DIS where I can to help others wake up if they want to.

Social capital with NEVER MOS has never been better and far outweighs the lost "friendships" from Houston. In my short 2 years in DFW, I've made better friendships, had more meaningful service, and have been more comfortable in my own skin then I ever have in my entire life. In Houston, I didn't know my NEVERMO neighbors (which was all but 1). Here, I know lots of them, hang out with them on weekend evenings with my wife, and genuinely enjoy being around them. Outside my neighborhood, I've developed friendships with other parents who have their kids in the same programs. Post Mormonism, I'm able to devote 100% of my service hours to serving my kids' organizations, which means that service and family time do not conflict. In my last years of faithful Mormonism, I really wanted to participate in cub scouts to be with my oldest kid, but I never could because I was stuck in EQ Presidencies or teaching primary. Now, we're in cub scouts because we like it, are with other kids who are in it because they like it, and I get to hang out with like minded parents who don't have to be told to "magnify their calling" but volunteer to make an organization they care about better.

In summary, the family part is really hard, what with breaking the eternal chain and all. But for me getting my kids out was the 100% priority. If that meant taking some collateral damage to other relationships I was fine with that if it meant getting my kids out of a cult (are we allowed to say that on NOM 2.0?). I'm lucky, I was able to navigate this without jeopardizing my marriage, in fact, our friendship has never been stronger and my kids are happy, especially my daughter who is allowed to choose her own style, and is not being told to focus on getting married and having kids

On the social side, eliminating assigned friendships and service requirements has been an amazing change that I didn't really anticipate and now highly recommend. I'll admit that it's really scary at first. The best analogy I have is that It's a forest fire that cleans out all of the dead wood. The new growth will take some time, but in this case, what does grow back can be way better than what it replaced.