I know writing here may not ever find its way to a reader other than myself, but even if one person finds it and feels not so alone in this religious deconstruction journey then I'm good with that.  

I mentioned in my first post that tithing was the first thread that I pulled in the unraveling of the nice and secure sweater I had woven myself in the church.  The second thread I pulled was church history.

Now we are taught church history in the church.  We are taught many many things that I'm finding simply aren't true or that were so watered down that now that I'm uncovering the details I feel like I've been really duped.  Now I'm usually a pretty good judge of character, but for some reason when it came to the church I was really quick to sweep a lot of what I had heard over the years as nonsense and just satan trying to cloud my mind to the truth.  Yes, I was that girl that would defend the church until my last breath.  Not anymore.

Searching only in good sources is also something that we are taught as members.  If a source, book/movie/magazine/newspaper etc etc, said something against what we were being taught at church it was automatically deemed "anti Mormon" and we'd be encouraged to look away and disregard that particular thing.  Little did I know that so many GOOD sources are out there that simply tell the truth and aren't written by satan and aren't "anti" they are simply just TRUE.

My first go-to was to hit the podcasts.  I love me a good podcast and am very excited when I find a good LDS deep dive podcast or something with true crime...but I digress.  I started listening to podcasts by women who by all accounts are members of the church in good standing but just have those lingering questions most members are afraid to ask like "what's the deal with polygamy?", or "why is this thing run by ALL men?", or "why can't women have the freaking Priesthood?".  Simple questions really but things that I didn't know the answers to and just swept them under the rug for way too long.  My favorite podcast is hosted by 2 women who are asking the hard questions and saying a lot of the hard things out loud.  They are not the reason I left the church but they are so wise and kind and really challenging the status quo.  This opened my eyes to feminism, more liberal thinking (which I was already pretty liberal) and thinking out side of the box about who God is.

All of these "good" sources led me to internet searches about Joseph Smith.  They led me to TikTok accounts about exmormons and books written by great theologians who are both in and out of the church.  These sources led me to the CES letters (yes, I know cliché), checking out the things written in the Gospel Topics Essays and watching documentaries and series' on TV about the church.  That's where the second thread unraveled.  Once tithing went and Joseph Smith went it wasn't hard to pull the rest and make my warm, cozy, comfortable church sweater a puddle of yarn on the floor.