In the church, I have found that every member is a trusted confidant, so to speak, of the "sacred & special truths" the church body has chosen to believe. This special & unique belief system is not for the outside lay person. Because of this, I have found that "ego" in various forms is running rampant within the church, where specialness and exclusivity is the norm instead of inclusion, acceptance of all, and a more Christlike feeling one would think a good church going by the name of Jesus should aspire to. Where there is ego, there is great fear. I wonder why the church fears so much when the Lord is supposedly on their side???

My exit story is a little different. I was a 30+ year Mormon veteran, a returned missionary, eagle scout, son of a 3 time Bishop, BYU graduate, and descendant of a long line of stalwart immigrant farmers going back to the mid & late 1800's in Utah. It just so happened both of my parents died young (early 60s), so I had the opportunity to get out of the Morg & into a life I knew was much brighter, happier, & more sincere. I knew how the church would look upon me and my family as we started to instinctively scoot away from their "bad energy", subconscious control, cruel behind your back slander, judgment, and overall negative and "make your life hell" attitude that can sometimes accompany a former "died in the wool" overachievers exit (or most anyone for that matter).

So, with all that in mind, I began to use some kind of jedi mind tricks to phase myself out of the overachieving ward we were in without any backlash or hint of strangeness surrounding our flee from Hitler's army. And yes, sometimes we felt like Jews trying to escape Nazi Germany. You sometimes have to watch out for prying eyes, secret spies, and not trusting a soul still faithfully attending the church or they will tattle on you and the whole thing comes crashing down and then you find yourself threatening legal & police action which is not the preferred method of exiting anything in one's life.

I began to take my family out of town with me on "business" more and more on the weekends so that we were gone quite a bit. Yes, we did go out of town to various places, but never actually on any business. I did have a calling in the Elders Quorum so when it was my turn to lead that Sunday I'd still be there, but maybe once a month. Then, after many months of this, I told them we were going to be renting a small house in the city we were traveling to every weekend because it was becoming a more regular thing. The house and address I chose belonged to a friend of mine and the house appeared to be occupied, but it was in the process of being remodeled inside and was vacant. We appeared reluctant to need to move our church records, but "business" was business and I was needed on the weekends in this other town which was about 4 hours away and we didn't want to appear to be non church goers. So, the records were moved and we said goodbye to the overachieving people and their ward without much fanfare at all. Maybe they were happy to be rid of us because of our poor attendance and unorthodox methods?

My friend, who still got the mail at the house we were supposed to be staying in, began to get all kinds of notes and letters from the new ward who did indeed get our records. She would forward on the notes and we would laugh at the desperation as they tried to make contact with us. Now we were off the roll of our local ward and seemingly free to live our lives as we saw fit. If a local church member saw us when we were supposed to be out of town, then I guess we didn't go out of town THAT weekend and who knows about our schedule anymore and why should they care if we were not in their stewardship anymore???

After we never showed up in the fake new ward, I suppose our records went to SLC to be file under missing, lost, or escaped? Were we free at last? Well, our relatives, especially TBM in-laws (who are not yet dead), still get calls from a nice little old lady who's mission it is to track down "lost" people for the Mormon corporation. The in-laws are nice and don't give out our real address (we moved since the exit). Thank the good non-Mormon Lord!

It is such a shame that to be rid of the church is such an ordeal! Why? Why is the "only true church" such a bad sport when there's a break up? Can't we be friends? Jesus would still like me if I couldn't hang with him anymore because we grew apart! What don't they understand about "love your enemies" and better yet-- make no enemies?

This board has been a great way for myself & my wife to assist in our recovery from Mormonism. It has still taken many years to feel normal without the church in our lives. You feel like you need therapy sometimes and this board is always a way for us to feel like we are not bad people. Isn't it terrible that we feel this way? Why is that church such a menace?

Thanks for your time in reading my story & I hope I have offered you some kind of inspiration in your own exit attempts.