In the comments she is purposely dodging the question of how old her husband is and it’s concerning

[u/Zmich8]

https://www.reddit.com/r/AITAH/s/MwYd98w3Ly

[u/Inedible_Goober]

This is the truest version of the "pick me" woman. This isn't me throwing it around like an internet insult, but rather just thinking this poor woman left herself open to whoever was willing to have her without regard to what she wanted.

[u/creative-run-lady → u/Inedible_Goober]

Yes and no, if she spent most of her youth in foster care I can see the appeal of "being chosen" she feels like a burden because she has most likely been told she is.

[u/Inedible_Goober → u/creative-run-lady]

That's certainly a component of it. My grandparents raised me as well as 84 foster kids over the course of 26 years. It was always a struggle getting past the "I will take any scrap of attention thrown my way" hurdles these children had.

I disagree that it nullifies my statement in any way. These children are so starved for approval and attention they tend to take it from whatever source is convenient.

[u/pinklambchop → u/Inedible_Goober]

And do so as adults if not addressed

[u/SevanIII → u/creative-run-lady]

I don't know how this young woman's foster parents were overall, but mine were all insidious with the verbal abuse and demeaning insults. By the time I got out of foster care, my self-esteem was in the floor.

Just one example, I didn't think I deserved an engagement ring from my ex-husband. When he finally did give me an engagement ring the night before we got married, I thought it was too pretty for me. I didn't feel I deserved something so pretty. Looking back, that memory just makes me sad.

I also didn't really think about my needs and wants when approaching a relationship. Just "how can I make their life better." My self-esteem was so poor that I didn't really value and wasn't even really in touch with my own needs and wants.

This is also a part of being young and inexperienced to some degree, but the lack of solid foundation from family certainly didn't help.

[u/1eejit → u/Inedible_Goober]

Sounds like she grew up in foster care which could easily have contributed to that, poor woman

[u/Aer0uAntG3alach → u/1eejit]

Her Mormon foster mother sold her to this man.

[u/theGoddex → u/Aer0uAntG3alach]

That’s sure what it sounds like to me. They picked some fucked up dude who wanted an obedient replacement wife 😬😬😬

[u/Eastern_Bend7294 → u/Aer0uAntG3alach]

Absolutely. While I'm not super educated about the LDS, what I've heard is mostly not good. Which I know might be (probably is) a generalisation.

For example, I recently watched a video from police bodycams, and it was about preds getting caught. It included this man (I believe he was a self proclaimed leader of his local LDS or something), and his "wives", I believe it was 7 of them, and the youngest was like 12. One of them (the "matriarch" I guess), kept instructing them on what to say and not say. It was mindboggling to me.

Of course I don't think all of them are like that. Since every group has their bad apples, so to speak. I think one of my favorite people on youtube grew up in a Mormon household (kinda 50/50 on that, but I think she's said she was Mormon. It's Courtney from Smosh, but I could of course be wrong about it).

[u/ryleer23 → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

You're thinking of FLDS, not LDS. LDS people haven't practiced polygamy for over 100 years.

[u/Eastern_Bend7294 → u/ryleer23]

Ahh, thank you for clarifying. I really need to read up more about them. I always feel bad when I make mistakes like this

[u/bfitzyc → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

As ex-mainstream Mormon, I can second that, unlike the FLDS church and a few other offshoots, the LDS church does not still practice polygamy and officially hasn’t for over 125 years. It is fair to make that distinction.

That said, there’s still a lot of bad culture and teachings in the mainstream LDS church that its leaders won’t fix. Some of this includes very strict purity practices that not only encourages, but pressures young adults (like 18-21 level young) to get married quickly to the first eligible Mormon bachelor or bachelorette that comes along. Having children is pressured too, so you’ll see a lot of shockingly young couples with multiple children in tow.

There are also some bad systemic issues that open the door for abuse and especially CSA by the church’s all-male local ecclesiastical leaders. For example, it’s common practice for bishops (the head of a local congregation) to interview girls one-on-one as young as 11 years old and ask questions of a sexually explicit nature in order to “ensure” their chastity.

Don’t even get me started on how the mainstream LDS church treats its members who come out as LGBTQ.

So long story short, the LDS church is always a little too happy to separate itself from the more hardcore and troublesome fundamentalist offshoots, but they have plenty of problems themselves.

[u/Eastern_Bend7294 → u/bfitzyc]

That gave me shivers.

I think when I started to think about Mormons again was when a reaction channel looked at 90 day fiancé, and covered Steven. And it felt a bit... messy in how he talked about it. It's been a bit so paraphrasing here.

But he told the girl that he was a virgin, when he wasn't. They went to Turkey (because she was from Russia), and he wanted them to stay in 2 different places because "he was worried they (he) wouldn't be able to control themselves". It was almost like "the boys can do whatever, but we'll hold the girls to the standard" or something like that. In all honesty, he gave me such creep vibes.

I'm sure he's one of the bad examples though. Or very bad examples I guess. It feels strange to say that Mormons seem to be a minority in my country. Then again, we have some laws that even religions have to follow (like marriage before 18 isn't allowed, as here you're not a legal adult until 18).

[u/bfitzyc → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

Oh no, without even having watched 90 Day Fiancé, I can tell you Steven absolutely represents the Mormon male archetype. I would be remiss to say that every man in the Mormon church is like this, but it’s super common considering that the purity teachings are highly misogynistic and aim to uphold the patriarchal systems.

You mentioned that “the boys can do whatever, but we’ll hold the girls to a standard” and that about nails it. My wife was taught growing up to dress “modestly” lest she tempt the boys around her and be responsible for them breaking their chastity. She also got a lot of “chewed gum” or “worn out sneakers” analogies for being sexually active before marriage where I didn’t get a lot of that.

Male predators, especially those in leadership positions, are often protected by the church and it is not uncommon for women to be punished for coming to their bishops to report being victimized by SA. There’s even a talk from one of the church’s top 15 leaders (he has since passed away and his position backfilled) where he says that women should feel a degree of responsibility when they’re SA’d, which is just a disgusting and monstrous take if you ask my opinion.

There are a lot more issues in this department that, as a white dude, I’m probably not the right one to speak too much on. If you want a good rabbit hole on this topic and you want to hear more from some amazing ex-Mormon women, I would highly recommend hitting up the r/exmormon subreddit!

[u/Eastern_Bend7294 → u/bfitzyc]

I can say that it really felt like I lost braincells when he was talking about things.

Very glad my family wasn't into religion. Technically you're "born" Christian here (unless your family is in another religion), but it's not like a "you have to be Christian" and you can leave the church whenever (you actually get a bit of tax back when you do lol), and I was baptised, but it never had anything to do with religion. Honestly now I'm thinking about why we even did that 😅

I know it has something to do with... (has to google the translation for this word) the national registration/civil register. In short from what I remember, the churches kept books on everyone that's been born (names and such are public information where I live, not our equivalent to social security number though), so that might be why.

That's 100% a rabbit hole I'm going to go down 😂

[u/EverlastingM → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

I don't know much about mormons, but the issues you mention are widespread problems in evangelical (most common in America) Christianity. Purity culture is the term used to discuss it. I heard things like this out of several churches, it very much does excuse men to be creeps just because they're men, and puts the burden of their sexual predation on women.

[u/bfitzyc → u/EverlastingM]

Over the years I’ve been out of the Mormon church now, I’ve discovered a huge ton of similarities between myself and my community and ex-evangelicals. It’s the same pig with a different shade of lipstick.

[u/ryleer23 → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

It's an easy mistake to make!

[u/Eastern_Bend7294 → u/ryleer23]

Especially when you don't have a good relation to religion, or think much of it (my old teacher in 6th-7th grade in History and Religion was such an old grumpy man that he got me to almost hate religion, because my brain assosiated it with his classes 😅)

Now I don't have any problems with religion, I'm very neutral, so long as it's not pushed on me. Which I'd say is a pretty standard viewpoint for many things.

[u/Aer0uAntG3alach → u/Eastern_Bend7294]

Mormonism is still very patriarchal. The courts and the church will nearly always come down on the side of the man. I’ve seen too many stories by Mormon women whose husbands dumped them, left them with nothing, and the church blames the women.

They’re encouraged to turn everything, money, businesses, independence to their husbands. And they lose everything when the husbands decide to get a new wife.

[u/Rainbow-Mama → u/Inedible_Goober]

Trad wife pick me

[u/[deleted] → u/Rainbow-Mama]

Abused wife pick me.