Transform into molly Mormon/Peter priesthood as soon as he/she walked through the church doors.

Oh and the ******* is bitch, asswipe, etc

My tbm wife, now ex, was just like that. Major sin for being late to church. How can you portray the perfect family if you show up late.

He was cheating on me, but if I didn't toe the line, he was angry. Everyone at church loved him and I always thought "they just don't have to live with him." If I ever missed a meeting, he gave me the silent treatment. If I drank diet coke or watched married with children on Sundays. THEN when he told me he was cheating, he told me that because I didn't attend all my meetings, left SM early because I had twins that were a lot of work (didn't want to sit on his lap, only mom's), that I had lowered his ability to resist temptation. Yep, it was all my fault. Sundays were hell.

The people in the ward loved him, the women especially. Those in unhappy marriages were envious or the divorcees.

He was good at being fake, but I'm over that now. He knew how to play the mormon social games. He put on a good show.

He has apologized to me for all that stuff now.

Never been to church with my spouse but my mom was this way to us as kid's. Total b*tch on Sunday mornings but when we walked through the foyer door's it was her time to shine.

Eat a sandwich. Count to 89. Problem solved. Hunger makes one hostile.

Heck, I had a non-TBM wife and she would do that.

We planned a dinner party with friends. She would jump down my throat if the slightest thing went wrong, and when the doorbell rang, she turned in to an angel. Everybody thought we were the happiest couple in town until the divorce.

She was a little on edge. But I wasn't the easiest guy to live with, either.

T-Bone

We were not Mormons, but he was a classic emotional abuser. Nice as pie when anyone else was around, but a monster when we (and our son) were alone.

This hit me like a tsunami one day when my son was about four. His father was ranting and raging at both of us about something - I don't remember what it was because he was ALWAYS carrying on about something.

Suddenly, the doorbell rang. It was the pest control guy, coming for the monthly spray-down of the house. Suddenly Hubby/Daddy turns into Mr. Nice Guy, affable and friendly as you please. When I saw my little boy being super-extroverted (for him) by telling jokes, showing off toys, doing everything he could think of to delay the bug guy's departure, I realized exactly what he was doing. Small as he was, he knew that the minute the bug guy was gone, Daddy would turn back into a monster again.

My little boy was far more perceptive at that point than I was.

One of the most miserable things to hear at parties (where, of course, Hubby would turn on the charm) was other women gushing to me about how lucky I was, to have such a SWEET husband.

SWEET, my great-aunt Priscilla. . .

Haha you sure brought back some memories. I remember every Sunday morning us kids would be sitting in the back seat of the car, mom in the passenger seat, and dad would still be in the house frantically doing a couple last minute things before running out to the car to get us to church. My mother being overcome with the spirit of Christ would sigh angrily and smash the back of her head into the headrest of her seat (what will the neighbors think if we don't make it to sacrament on time!?). We would always arrive in the chapel right in the nick of time, the switch would be flipped, and the performance was on.

Ohhh yeah. The Jekyll and Hyde moments.

How many times did my ex TBM spouse have me in tears in the car on the way there berating me for something that delayed our being on time? Of course I had myself and two little ones to get ready and could have used help.

I was good at asking for help for many years. When I did ask for help he reminded me over and over how he was helping me with "My Job" or "Doing me a Favor". He resented helping with the house or kids, because his job was earning a living and mowing the lawn.

It was ironic to walk into church after being yelled at with some lesson on how to treat your spouse.

RMM

Not me but one of my college professors hadn't lived with his spouse as man and wife for over a decade. They lived on separate floors in their house. But at church, everyone thought they had the perfect marriage and family. The kids had been begging them to divorce for years due to the tension at home. But the wife wanted to wait until the last kid had done his mission.

That's exactly how the plan played out. After the last missionary returned home and after the sacrament meeting was over where all the family spoke and presented themselves as righteous and happy, the divorce papers were filed. The ward was stunned and decided to rally behind the wife as the injured party because the husband was kicked out by wife and never got to defend himself. The husband was a lovely man but a convert so he, of course, was of lesser value. It was just a marriage that never should have happened in the first place.

I was fortunate enough to get out before I had a spouse, TBM or other.

However, my friend's mother growing up (the bishop's wife) had that Jekyll and Hyde thing going on. I'd spend the night with him Saturdays sometimes, and go with "the family" to church on Sunday morning. I only did it a few times, because the Sunday morning routine there was downright frightening. Mother (bishop's wife) running around screaming at her 5 kids, and me (the guest), often with profanity involved. Threats of physical violence if they didn't get ready on time, and very often the threats were carried out (she beat my friend with an aluminum pole once for a solid 10 minutes, because he hadn't taken a shower yet). Violently shoving kids around, literally kicking them if she thought they moved too slowly getting into the van. A constant stream of, "We have to be there on time and look good, because your father's the bishop" kinds of comments. Total chaos and violence and hatred.

Then the van would pull up in the church parking lot, mother would say before anyone got out, "OK happy faces everyone!", and she became the persona of ideal mormon womanhood.

It used to scare me. A lot.
She wound up in a mental health institution at age 55, and died there. I always wondered if she was nuts before she became bishop's wife and mother of 5, or if being bishop's wife and mother of 5 drove her nuts...?

Sounds like my stepmother. Sunday mornings were horrible. She'd wake me up, screaming that I needed to get my lazy ass out of bed and help since I "never did anything" and thought I was "a fucking princess". So basically my Sunday mornings involved feeding and dressing younger siblings while she spent two hours on her makeup and picking what to wear. Soon as we got to church it was perfect mother mode.

My teen years were a living hell because of that woman. And not a soul believed me, or they figured it wasn't their business. So I really just want to turn it back on her when she starts the lecturing about church. "You know, had you shown me even a modicum of Christian kindness growing up, MAYBE things would be different."

Never.

It was me... I was that person. I'm ashamed of it too.

My mother. Fake. Fake. Fake.

Yell at us, then answer the phone or open the door to her friends & act like nothing happened.

Don't most people have two personalities: the public one and the private one?

That was my TBM ex-husband, controlling and emotionally abusive, especially right before church, then appeared to be a nice guy once we walked through the foyer's door. At least the ward we attended would bring sacrament to those of us who were late, but even then as soon as he knew they would be out with the trays, it was time to perform.

Thankfully this was not me but I know of a member who loves to use her kids as show toys to present the perfect family picture.

But she threw one of them out of the house twice for being a pain in the neck teenager and the ward had to take care of them until another permanent place to live was arranged. Other family took them in both times.

You would never know this when it comes family reunions at church or the family photo shoot for their annual Christmas card.

But the perfect picture fools nobody.

for my ex. He still has his Jekyll and Hyde moments, just not about church.

For lurking in--no some people don't have 2 personalities. What you see is what you get with me. It doesn't always work well! My dad was the same way, as is my brother.

My Catholic MIL was nice to my face but slagged me off to others...been a nice quiet 9 years since she croaked....and BTW, her daughter doesn't miss her either.
RB

My father was like this. It' a good thing he was a workaholic and dedicated to the church. He wasn't around much because of that.


My mother was like this when my father wasn't around. Screaming, yelling, beating her kids. When my father walked into the door she would turn into the nicest codependent wife he could wish for.

He used to lecture his 6 kids for being so much work for his wife. Why did they have 6 kids? What the hell did they think?

Between my mother and my father, there was usually a terrorist on duty. I can't imagine treating anyone the way my parents treated their kids.

It got so predictable that I coined the phrase "typical Sunday
mood." There was something about Sunday that reminded her how
perfect things weren't. And, of course, it was because the rest
of us (me) were not being righteous enough.

Anyway, Sunday at home was a "walk on eggshells" experience.

I was conned into marrying a man who was a wife-beater (had assaulted his sister, several neighbors, and another girlfriend, but was sicky-sweet and always smiling around me. It really wasn't me that set him off, and I couldn't stop him, either. I was always ready on time, but the tension would mount. I was sick with strep and a fever, and told him I couldn't go to church, and he gave me a terrible beating. He always hit me where it wouldn't show, and I wore a sweater to cover my bruised arm, and makeup to hide my crying eyes.

We taught the Young Married Class together.