I'm a relatively new Atheist. I read Christopher Hitchens' book, "God Is Not Great," last fall. It was a pretty surreal moment for me. I started off my reading as a devout Christian (and former Youth Pastor). I closed the book being totally convinced there was no God. But after reading it, I realized very quickly that I hadn't in fact believed for a very long time. Hitchens simply put to words what I had been feeling for a while. In January, I read Richard Dawkins', "The God Delusion," and every drop of theism was squeezed out like twisting a rag.
Ever since then, I'm almost re-learning how to live life. Every experience I have (experiences I've had my entire life) is like experiencing it for the first time. I am re-evaluating everything with the lens of atheism. It has been thrilling. But now I have to experience real pain for the first time as an Atheist.
I've always had a trouble relationship with my mother. From being a teenager, to going to college, to joining the ministry, to starting a family. She has always been a troubled woman, and my relationship with her has always been complicated. Now, as an atheist, I feel like I face my first real challenge with this new world view. In February, 3 days after my birthday, and on the same day that my wife and I finalized the adoption of our daughter, she attempted to commit suicide. She survived, but is not really doing that much better.
Now, this is nothing new with my very disturbed mother, but my experience with it has been. My faith had always been a great comfort to me when she would do something like this. But now I have no faith to hide behind, and I'm finding it difficult (as an atheist) to bounce back from this.
As a former Youth Pastor, my immediate circle of friends are still devoutly Christian and conservative. So they offer very little good advice apart from the frustratingly useless, "It's in God's hands." Thank you all for listening. I welcome any insight that you might have:)
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Hi jdoran, welcome.
I'm so sorry you're going through these difficulties. None of us is immune from them and we all must cope according to what works for each of us. You have given up your old coping mechanisms and now need to find new ones for your tool kit. There are many. You will succeed at finding them.
Understand, as much as you would like, you have no magic words to heal your mother. Are you blaming yourself for not being able to repair the damage she has, for not being able to be her savior?
Congratulations on lifting the veil of fantasy from your life. Welcome to the real world.
Sorry to hear about your mother. It sounds like she has had problems for a long time.
Hi JDoran. Yes. Welcome. Two other resources you might find helpful at this time in your journey is: The Clergy Project..a resource and support for those who are or were in Christian ministry I think...and Neil Carter's blog called Godless in Dixie (on The Friendly Atheist Pateos site). Sorry can't provide links as am on my phone..
I’m sorry to hear of your mother’s struggles. Like you my mother attempted suicide stating: “She wanted to be with the lord.” Fortunately, family friends cleaned up the blood before I arrived after a call from my panicked father. I’m glad they spared that scene from being imbedded in my memory. There were more repercussions in the following years. I truly understand your pain.
Your the first fellow Atheist I've encountered that shares this unfortunate experience.
Welcome to the world of reason!! I promise you will ultimately be happier living without the veil of theism clouding your vision.
I'm sorry about your mom. It is very challenging living with individuals who are suffering from mental illness.
In my life, and when I talk with patients who are suffering as you are, I remind them of three things.
1) The only person in this situation that you have any control over is yourself....You control how you respond to her issues. You can choose to let her actions affect you negatively, or you can choose to continue to live your life on your terms. Don't let her manipulate you.
2) You can only care as much as she does. It is perfectly ok to offer support and assistance, but if she chooses to ignore or refuse your help, stop offering. There is no sense in banging your head against a brick wall.
3) It's her illness, not yours. Far too often I see family and friends try to manage other individuals illnesses as if they were the one with it. What ever she is doing to deal with her problems, she is doing for a reason. Until she decides that she wants to change, she won't.
Remember, this advice is worth what you paid for it, but I hope it can help shed some light on your mom and your relationship with her.
Wise words.
I can relate a just a little. I had left the church by the time I found Christopher Hitchens’ by the God is not Great. It just served as more confirmation of my assessment. As a deacon, just leaving the church decimated my social life. Friends for twenty years dropped me like a hot potato.
As to your mother, I feel for you. Suicide runs in my wife’s family. She has lost her father and a younger brother. We were within hours of trying to intervene on her brother, but were too late. The only advice I can give is to get her some mental health treatment and don’t blame yourself. The family went through what if’s for a while. It doesn’t help.
Well, it's about you now. How do you cope? All I can say is the rights of passage are now fully revealed with the veil of the well-intentioned words of theism lifted. I don't think it's a total revelation to you, from reading your post, but what little comfort they might have provided to you before are certainly absent now. You just go forward with your life, anticipate which way it might take you with the facts you have and prepare for what unfolds from there. Things are simpler in the real world of secularism. I did not mean atheism. Once you become an atheist your next step is to become a secularist. Leave the soldiering for atheism to someone else who feels a need to swing a sword for it. You just need to be real and adjust for it without the baggage of championing atheism for yourself because you're already one of its conscripts by way of freedom of choice.
Remember this -
Atheism is the practice of arguing. Secularism is the practice of living without the argument of atheism. I am an atheist but live it as a secularist now. Theism was a struggle and you left it. Atheism is a harder struggle than that. Secularism is peaceful ground between the two and I think that's where you need to be. Focus on your life's real demands as they come. Your Mom is one of the tough ones. Talk about it with whomever you need to. Seek guidance from whatever support groups are available to you. You'll get through it.
Oh man I can feel your pain. I remember when the other shoe dropped for me. It's surreal. My whole world was upside down for like a week. God was in everything for me. He was with me all the time, my imaginary best friend.
My mom's a drug addict. She's been doing a lot better for the last couple years but there was a time right after my moment of clarity where I was sure I would find her dead. I would dread knocking on her door out of fear she wouldn't answer. Eventually I just did accept the reality of the situation. It's taken me years to find the bright side of life but it's happened. The biggest change for me was studying science. It's shown me how beautiful and complex and beyond my understanding the universe is and always will be. I find contentment and comfort in being a microscopic speck in gigantic ocean. But it took me a long long time to get there.
Welcome, jdoran. You'd be surprised how similar your circumstance is with mine. I was a southern bap. deacon that woke up with Hitchens' help a year and a half ago. My dad had died back in '09, and it had been enormously comforting back then to "know" he was in heaven and that I'd see him again. On waking up I had to deal with his death again through the clear eyed awareness that he was gone-gone, not just sort of gone. I, like you, took and still take great comfort in our actual place in the universe. One particularly comforting realization has come from Steven Pinker from Harvard. He points out that our behavior, idiosyncrises, thought processes and other key components of our nature have far less to do with our environment than our inherited DNA. Our parents are in many real ways living in you and me right now. In some profound ways my dad is me, along with the other half from my mom. His laugh, his curiosity, his mannerisms, his deep concern for others, all coming to life every morning in me. We are in a great stream of ancestors and they continue in a way in each of us. It's kind of Carl Sagan-ish, but it's a comforting thought to me. Also, Sam Harris' work on free will, or the lack there of, indicates that our very choices and decision making are driven by our DNA makeup. So your mom lives on in you, even if something unwanted occurs. Beyond that, all of humanity are our brothers and sisters in a sense, and all life on this planet are our literal cousins. We are part of the most epic tale imaginable. We continue the lives of those before us and will persist in the lives of those after us. It beats spending eternity on our knees praising a psychopathic tyrant in the eternal prison called heaven.
Welcome again to this forum. It is just the ticket for folks like you and me. I feel for you and wish the best for your mom, wife and new child.
I have been an atheist for a long long time. I never believed in any religion. Sorry to be harsh but as I lost my mother to suicide when I was 15 I think you should spent more time with her and try to get over it that way. Some of us aren't that fortunate.
The problem with dispensing with comforting lies is that we're left with often uncomfortable truths.
I have learned to appreciate the truth rather than seek comfort, myself. Were I in your position, I'd research her issues to my own satisfaction and try my best to understand what was happening.
Learning to be satisfied whether one is comforted or not is an important thing I've learned to do.
Comfort may never come, but satisfaction is a choice.
I'd recommend that you strive to put comfort-seeking aside and give pursuing knowledge and understanding to your own satisfaction a shot.
Maybe it'll work for you as well. Perhaps it might simply be a step toward something that might yet.
All the best to you irrespective!
Hi de ho! You're not alone. Anytime we suffer a loss, we grieve. That's human. I'm reminded of what a preacher said: 'With knowledge comes grieving.' Grieve with understanding. Grieving is a private experience. I can't eliminate your pain but I will support you in your struggle.
I've experienced a lot of pain, suffering, and loss in my life. I've also been an atheist my entire life. It can be incredibly difficult to get through hard times without the aid of some powerful, almighty God. Here's my advice though. Let yourself feel what you are feeling. You're allowed to be sad, to be angry, to be hurt. Don't push away negative emotions. Embrace them and then let them go when you're ready. Surround yourself with people you love and trust. Let them help you through hard times. It might be helpful for you to make at least one atheist friend. As a person with an atheist family and no friends who are super religious, I know I can go to them when things are hard and not be met with ineffective prayers, words that are meant to be comforting but infuriate the atheist within, and sentiments that make me feel like what I'm going through is being done to me on purpose. I can rant about all the ways religion frustrates me if I need to. I can have truly intellectual conversations. It's a relief to be able to just be yourself and to not have to worry about religion coming up. For someone like you, who grew up religious and is surrounded by religious people it's going to be harder. Coming on this forum was a good step, but if you can make a true atheist friend, I think it'll help you a lot. When my aunt died there was a Facebook group that was made to remember her and connect people who were grieving her loss. I couldn't bear to look at it because it was constantly filled with religious bullshit and everyone who knew her knew she was a proud atheist and her family was atheist as well. It seemed disrespectful to me and made me angry. They even tried to bring religion into her funeral which also made me furious. Religious people just don't understand how damaging their religion can be to a grieving atheist or an atheist who is suffering in some other way. They think that because religion helps them and gives them hope, atheists will also get that. I'd also suggest maybe getting a therapist if you don't have one already. They can give you some strategies on how to cope with the things life throws at you, or at the very least they're someone you can talk to and not have to hold back with. They can't judge you for being an atheist (if they do, find a new therapist). It can be hard to open up, but having someone you can just unload on can be really helpful. Lastly, I'd just tell you to remember to take care of yourself. Remember that you matter and sometimes you need to put yourself first. Try to do something that makes you happy every day, even if it's just watching a minute long video of a cat playing the piano. It doesn't matter what it is, just that it's something that makes you smile. I wish you the best and hope this helped some.
I forgot to mention that I also have experience with suicidal family members. My sister cut herself for many years and attempted suicide several times in her teen years. I felt a great deal of responsibility for her survival and safety and tried so hard to be there for her and to take away her means of hurting herself. It never worked. The sad truth is, if they want to die or hurt themselves, they will find a way. She was put in the hospital a few times, but unfortunately that mainly just taught her more ways to hide her cutting instruments. It was a horrible time, and it took a lot of time and therapy for me to realize that it was never my job to keep my sister safe and alive. I had to forgive myself and realize that I was powerless. As hard as it is to feel powerless, it's better if you can admit it to yourself and find a way to cope with that fact. My sister also had a psychotic break which was absolutely terrifying. I was terrified I'd never get my sister back. I blamed myself for letting her leave and lead the unhealthy lifestyle that led to the psychotic break, but once again I had to learn that it wasn't my fault and I was powerless. My dad is also clinically depressed, but hasn't attempted suicide yet. He constantly talks about it though and I do worry that eventually the pressure of supporting my family is going to drive him to suicide. My mom has also been suicidal and has attempted suicide, though it was before I was born. There have been more recent events, however. Her health has always been bad, but lately it has deteriorated to the point where she spends a lot of her time in bed feeling horribly sick and in pain, so she often becomes suicidal and I've had to listen to her crying and telling me how much she wants to die and asking me if I'd help her die. It's heartbreaking because I'm so close with my mom, because there's nothing I can do for her, and because I too suffer with suicidal thoughts because of my health and mental health. I guess all I can really offer as advice is be there for her as much as you can, but don't sacrifice your health and happiness for her. You have to take care of yourself in order to be able to take care of her. Let her know you love her as often as you can. Try to get her the mental health help she needs, but know that she may not accept it and if she does, it may not work. Mental illness is difficult. Clinical depression defies logic and is able to completely consume you until the very air you breathe is filled with suffocating despair. It's very good at convincing you that the world would be better off without you, that the people you love would be happier if you were dead. It's kind of hard to explain depression fully. There are times when it's just this tiny cloud that exists in the back of my mind and I only notice it now and then, and when I do I can easily blow it away. There are other times when it feels like I've put on some sort of suit that weighs down my entire body and fills me with despair. It's completely inescapable and it feels like the only way to truly be free is to die. Often times the only thing that has kept me alive is the knowledge that it would destroy my friends and family, and my mother would almost certainly commit suicide shortly after I did. We have a screwed up sort of suicide pact, my mother and I. I know that if I killed myself it would kill her, and she fears that if she kills herself it would kill me. I honestly don't know if I'd survive it or not. When things get really bad I try to tell her that I'll be okay whatever she decides, but I just don't know because I love my mom so much and the thought of living without her just destroys me. I know I'll have to eventually, but I want as much time as I can get. So I guess I've kind of been on both sides and all as an atheist. It's not easy, I'm not gonna lie, but it is possible. (Sorry these are so long)
Welcome to the real world. When you get your answers from a dusty old book that was written in the past, you live in the past. When you turn all your problems over to that past and ignore them by pretending time and magic will cure them, when you finally turn to meet your future you find them waiting for you and smiling back.
Everything is new now because you are moving forward. There are no road-maps to the journey ahead and unfortunately for you, you have spent many years living in the comfort of a myth that gave you all the answers and made your life easy and understandable.
Now you want people to give you answers. "Perhaps you need a Priest." he he he .... Old ways die hard. The journey is yours and no matter which path you take, you will learn from it. You will grow stronger as a human being. And most importantly, you will be amazed at all you can endure and accomplish when you are moving forward.
Nothing is written in stone. Life is a process and not a thing. You move forward by making a decision and then taking a step. The journey is yours.
Shae wrote: "It can be incredibly difficult to get through hard times without the aid of some powerful, almighty God."
I was raised "Christian" but never found comfort in religion. Understanding, truth, relatives and friends are the only comforters I have ever found useful and can only empathise with you, Jdoran.
It may depend on your geographical location and local culture, but I am in Scotland and can call on pastoral support from my local Humanist association...
https://www.humanism.scot/what-we-do/pastoral-support/
It seems harsh to suggest a google search, but that might be a way to get local face-to-face support from like-minded people.
The Clergy Project (mentioned by Eloande, above)...
http://clergyproject.org/
Recovering from religion....
https://www.recoveringfromreligion.org/
You are far from alone and there is help out there, if you can find something that suits. There are also independent, local humanist 'celebrants' who can sometimes help and orgs like this...
http://www.kcatheists.org/
Hi there jdoran. You are not alone. Have you heard of "The Clergy Project" ? It is located by web-link at: http://clergyproject.org/
Here is an extract from that site . . .
____________________________________
Welcome to The Clergy Project
Are you a religious professional who no longer
believes in the supernatural?
Have you remained in vocational ministry,
secretly hiding away your non-belief?
Are you struggling over where to go from here
with your life and career?
____________________________________
Maybe take a look-see at the site.
Plus if you have any specific issues you might have the courage to post them here, in another thread of your own creation.
There may be questions to which atheistic people have found a satisfactory answer, and can share with you. For example, you might have questions on science, evolution, counter apologetic, or whatever strikes you as a possible topic in which your fellow atheists might give you a 'leg-up'.
I enjoy watching "The Atheist Experience", a live TV presentation from Austin, TX. The content varies a lot, and depends upon who rings in, and what they bring up as a topic for discussion. I watch recordings of it on YouTube. Here's a web-link to one episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4ls5JCILjE
Because of the unscripted nature of the call-in part of the TV show, don't take any single episode as necessarily representative of the whole 'experience'.
You have an even more complicated set of circumstances with your poor ill and troubled mother. That is just the sort of thing which viewers ring 'The Atheist Experience' to mull over with the atheist hosts, (two per week, and it varies as to who's on).
I hope you may find some help in my post. If not I wish you all of the best anyway.
Cheers,
Mutorc S'yriah.
Hey, Mutorc, you are talking to a ghost. Jdroan made the OP 3 years ago. Haven't seen him since.
Oh !
@Mutorc
No biggie. Happens to folks all the time. LOL
My mother was religious but left me to make my own choice and after reading many of the "holy books" I became an atheist, my mother and I also had a rocky relationship throughout the years and that is never easy but you need to know one thing and one thing only if your mother does things like this it is NOT your fault and has nothing to do with the fact you have become an atheist.
Religion can be an easy crutch when things like this happen and not having dealt with this sort of reality can be harsh... my best advice in this situation is remember the best times you had with your mum and try not to think about the bad times, it will make things a little easier to bare.
Good luck and I hope that things improve for you, reality can be painful but it can also be extremely rewarding.
2015??? Really?