To Forgive Or Not To Forgive Your Abuser – The Unintended Fallout: Possible Emotional Abuse or Exploitation Of Your Codependent Friend or Family Member

To Forgive Or Not To Forgive Your Abuser – The Unintended Fallout: Possible Emotional Abuse or Exploitation Of Your Codependent Friend or Family Member

I was watching a video today by psychologist Dr. Ramani, who I like very much, and I agree with her most of the time.

I even agree with most of her comments in this particular recent video she made that I will be discussing in this post, but it brought to mind one over-looked aspect pertaining to volatile or abusive relationships.

In the video (link to that video here, and I will embed it below, the title is, “Is there virtue in forgiving a narcissist who doesn’t apologize?”), Dr. Ramani expressed that she pretty much disagrees with the concept that people should have to forgive others, or that forgiving others makes a person stronger, etc.

Dr. Ramani rightly points out in that video that continually forgiving pathologically narcissistic persons is a waste of your time, for various reasons I shall not explain here (you can watch her video for explanations). I do agree with her on that.

If someone in your life keeps hurting, abusing, or mistreating you, no matter how many times you’ve forgiven them and given them a second, third, etc, chance,
you need to accept the fact this person is more than likely NEVER going to change and that they merely view your willingness to always forgive him or her as a weakness to repeatedly exploit.
So cut that person from your life, or limit time around them.

It’s not that I disagree with Dr. Ramani’s comments in the video on the face of things, but, I am concerned for Codependents.

On a similar note, in years past, I’ve also read books or seen videos about how people can help their abused friends.

I’ve seen videos by women who divorced their abusive husbands who reel off a list of tips on how you, the friend, can be supportive towards the friend in the abusive marriage.

These videos, books, and online articles, contain lists of things to say or to avoid saying when trying to help someone who is currently in an abusive relationship or someone who was abused in childhood.

Many of these books, videos, and web pages (most by therapists, psychologists or recovered abusive victims) often stress that you, the friend, should just sit and listen to the friend – just validate the friend, do not give advice, judge, or criticize.

I am a recovered Codependent (I wrote a very, very long post about that here).

I am also an Introvert. Introverts naturally make better attentive listeners than Extroverts.

So, as someone who is an Introvert and a one-time Codependent, I was very adept at giving the sort of emotional support a lot of troubled people seek out and find comforting.

For over 35 years, due to the parenting of my mother and the guilt tripping-, sexist-, Codependent- pushing- teachings under “gender complementarianism” of the Southern Baptist church I was brought up in, I had no boundaries, I was not assertive, and it was implied it is my job or responsibility in life to rescue or help other people, whatever format that came in.

All of that was taught to me as I grew up under the false, gender complementarian assumption (and my mother and father bought into some of this thinking too) that God created women to be more caring than men, it would be un-feminine or selfish for a woman to have boundaries, and I was taught that it was women’s “duty” to be care-takers for the hurting.

For me, most often, the support and care-taking my Mom and church taught me to engage in came in the form of “Emotional Labor,” and it made my already bad mental health in years past even worse.

(I was diagnosed at a very young age with clinical depression, I also had anxiety disorders and had low self esteem for many years. I no longer have depression or low self esteem.)

If you are an abuse victim, or if you’ve been bullied at a job, or you were abused in a marriage, or you were sexually or physically abused as a child by a family member (or by a neighbor, or by whomever),
I know it can be helpful, now, as an adult, to sit and talk to an empathetic listener about it, it can feel so good for that listener to sit quietly while you do most of the talking, and for that person to validate you and your experiences.

It can be very healing and feel like a tremendous relief for that listener to refrain from victim blaming you, offering advice or platitudes.

It can help in the healing process for another adult to believe you and just offer non-judgmental emotional support as you relate your trauma and pain to them.

I realize all that.

But have you ever considered that the caring, non-judgmental, empathetic person you keep turning to, whether it’s a friend or a family member, might be highly codependent and your repeated use of that person as your emotional support system may be damaging to THAT PERSON?

Because I was that person, for over 35 years.

I was the sweet, caring, understanding, supportive listener that many people – co-workers on jobs, family, neighbors, friends –
would call, e-mail, snail mail, or text with their problems, because they KNEW I would always listen to them rant (for hours on end, if need be, over months and years), I would NEVER put time limits on their rants, and I would ALWAYS respond in a timely fashion to ranting or sad e-mails or texts.

I spent over 35 years giving a lot of non-qualified, no-strings-attached emotional support to a lot of emotionally wounded or abused people over my life.

Some of these people called or e-mailed me over job stress, health problems, troubled marriages, financial issues, or, they were single and were lonely – they couldn’t get a boyfriend (or girlfriend).

None of these people who called or texted me to complain or sob to me ever once considered how their regular, negative phone calls (or letters or face to face chats) were impacting me. For the ones who considered it, I suppose they didn’t care.

If you choose not to forgive your abuser, that is your choice to make, but…

Be aware that if you choose to not forgive but to also hold on to your hurt and anger, and to choose to ruminate on the abuse,
and should you choose to deal with and vent that anger and hurt by regularly calling your Codependent friend to listen to your rants or sobbing – you are abusing your Codependent friend or family member, which is not acceptable.

In all the years I granted emotional support to hurting people (including but not limited to co-workers who’d stop by my cubicle during work hours to bend my ear for an hour or more about their divorce or health problems), I was never once thanked.

The non-stop support I gave was never acknowledged. And giving that non-stop support was exhausting and taxing for me, as I know it can be for other Codependent persons.

A “thank you” once in awhile from these people who came to me to dump their problems on me would’ve been appreciated. I never got one.

Reciprocation would’ve been appreciated and helpful too, but the people who were abuse survivors, or assorted chronic complainers who used me to vent to, very rarely to never asked about ME and MY struggles in life.

The Obnoxious Abuse Survivor Community Is Targeting Julie Roys Again – this time begun by R L Stollar

The Obnoxious Abuse Survivor Community Is Targeting Julie Roys Again – this time the witch hunt was begun by R L Stollar

The “abuse survivor community” has taken their pitchforks out again, and again their pitchforks and torches are for journalist Julie Roys.

This time, the bullying is being carried out by a R L Stollar, a name I’ve seen on twitter off and on in the last few years.

I believe he originally began speaking out against harms caused by Christian homeschooling? Good on him for that (I mean that, that was not snark).

Beyond that, though, I’m not familiar with Stollar. He may have even tweeted a few things in the past I saw shared by others I follow on Twitter that I agreed with.

To Julie Anne (“Defend the Sheep” on twitter) – why are you  participating in this continued pile on?

(Edit: I believe Julie Anne “Liked” some of the comments in that thread, or I saw her share it on her Twitter account, which is how I became aware of it in the first place)

Why are you, Julie Anne, continuing to associate with people who behave this way?
I’m sorry if you feel that Roys did not credit you or friends of yours or whatever on older reportage she did (which she tried to discuss with you), but what is the deal with cozying up to the people singling her out every few weeks?

Anyway. Roys is being bullied online again, and this time it was started by Stollar.

Yes, I said “again” – see (Link): my previous post about this weird, disturbing anti-Roys obsession from the Amy Smiths, Ashley Easters, and other so-called abuse survivor advocates.

If you take note of this obnoxious behavior, as I did, (that is, noting their bullying and mob mentality where they target someone), some of them will erroneously misconstrue you as being a “Julie Roys Stan,” or use that as an ad hominem against you (see embedded tweets below for more on that).

Birth Control Movie

Now, the “abuse survivor community” is targeting Roys for having once appeared in a several years old (conservative created, I believe) movie about birth control and the sexual revolution.

I’ve not seen the movie they are referring to, but I did watch and listen to a clip of Roys presumably from the film (that clip located in a tweet by someone else here), and the comments Roys made were pretty conventional.

There was  nothing “far out” there by Roys in that clip, not unless, I suppose, you’re operating from a faulty, far left liberal paradigm, in which case pointing out that sexual behaviors with little- to- no boundaries can result in things like disease or other harmful ramifications will sound judgmental, fuddy duddy, and stodgy.

Speaking of which:

(Link): Monkeypox virus could become entrenched as new STD in the US – via ABC News (warning: auto-playing video file with audio on that page)

Excerpts:

The spread of monkeypox in the U.S. could represent the dawn of a new sexually transmitted disease, though some health officials say the virus that causes pimple-like bumps might yet be contained before it gets firmly established

By Mike Stobbe AP Medical Writer
July 22, 2022

… So far, more than 2,800 U.S. cases have been reported as part of an international outbreak that emerged two months ago. About 99% have been men who reported having sex with other men, health officials say.
— end excerpts —

Secular Criticisms of Birth Control and the Sexual Revolution

In the past year, a few secular books criticizing the consequences of the sexual revolution (including the role of the advent of birth control pills) have been published
(which I’ve blogged about here (Where the Sexual Revolution Went Wrong by Maria Albano) and here (The Sexual Revolution Has Backfired on Women by S. Moore),
so it’s not only those evangelicals all you hipster “Exvangelicals” despise pointing out the flaws and dangers with no-holds-barred sexual behavior.

In the past few years, more and more liberals and feminists have been speaking out about the excesses and harms of loose sexual behavior; these are just a couple of examples on my blog:

(Link): Why Sex-Positive Feminism is Falling Out of Fashion by S. Greenberg – excerpts via New York Times

(Link): Did Hell Freeze Over?: Liberal Rag Promotes Idea that Celibacy is Acceptable, and a Valid Life Choice / Re: 2016 Study Says Millennials Aren’t Having Much Sex

Progressives / Abuse Advocates Define Christianity to = Democrat Party, Progressive Values and Views

Many of the abuse advocates under consideration in this blog post I am discussing are politically driven (or some have left-leaning sympathies).

They conflate Christianity with leftism, progressive views, causes, and the Democratic Party, and reject anyone who doesn’t agree with all their socio-political views.

Here is my reaction to what got the ball rolling (tweet link – my comment – and here is a link to the original R L Stollar comment I was replying to):

Another witch hunt against Julie Roys by loving, tolerant progressive Christians 🙄
Is Amy Smith in on this one too, or did she put down her pitchfork this time?

You guys still using the goofy #EmptyThePews and #Exvangelical hash tags?#abuseSurvivorCommunity https://t.co/CY3wRfFQc7

— sololoner (@sololoner2) July 23, 2022

Link to Tweet embedded below.

As I told this guy, I'm not a "Julie Roys stan," but most abuse survivor advocates I've seen are more loyal to a leftist political agenda than in actually helping victims. It's gross.
They've been targeting Roys for a couple of months now. That's also gross.#ChurchToo #JulieRoys https://t.co/fciN2nsYJT

— sololoner (@sololoner2) July 23, 2022

So this Stollar guy initially did a tweet with a link to this page (also linked to below, with excerpt) at Right Wing Watch – of course he did.

Does Stollar ever follow sites with names like “Left Wing Watch” (i.e., any accounts that are critical of progressive ideology?) – probably not.

Woman Who Lost Leg to Rare Cancer on Track to Complete 102 Marathons in 102 Days

Woman Who Lost Leg to Rare Cancer on Track to Complete 102 Marathons in 102 Days

You’ll notice that rather than sit around indefinitely feeling sorry for herself, sliding into resentment, bitterness, spending every day griping, complaining about her situation, or blaming God (or whatever circumstance outside of herself) for her ordeal, or rather than trying to get attention via wanting others to endlessly pity her, she eventually decided to go on and live life – she enjoys running now.

Every one has bad things happen to them in life, and when those bad things happen, we do need to permit ourselves some time to grieve and feel anger about those things, but at some point, whether you sit in self pity and hold a victim mentality, or go forward to enjoy life in spite of that bad thing that happened, is a choice you make.

And nobody can force you into it.

(Link): Woman Who Lost Leg to Rare Cancer on Track to Complete 102 Marathons in 102 Days

April 15, 2022
by AP

BOSTON — Jacky Hunt-Broersma runs like a woman possessed. And in a way, she is: The amputee athlete is trying to run at least 102 marathons in 102 days.

Last month, a little more than two-thirds toward her goal of setting a new world record for back-to-back marathons, the South Africa native posted something on Twitter that got people talking.

“The first thing I did after my run today was take off my leg. Felt so good,” she tweeted. “Marathon 69 done. 31 marathons to go.”

…All on a carbon-fiber blade that’s been her left leg ever since she lost the real thing below the knee to a rare cancer.

“You make peace with pain,” she said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I think my pain threshold is probably quite high at the moment. It’s one step at a time.”

Are You Stuck in the “I’ll Feel Better When” Cycle? by Diana Hill, phD

Are You Stuck in the “I’ll Feel Better When” Cycle? by Diana Hill, phD

This article (below) makes a lot of sense. I sort of stumbled on to this sort of thinking on my own in the last few years.

It helps to be content in the present, and to live in the present, too.

If you sit around with the attitude that you cannot be happy unless or until “X” happens in your life, well, if “X” never comes to pass, you’re condemning yourself to a life time of misery.

If you worry too much about the future or sit around feeling sad about things from the past, you’re never going to be happy. I’d rather enjoy each day, rather than worry or fret about the past or the future.

I don’t want to arrive at the future, look back with regret, and see how much time I wasted each and every day ruminating on past disappointments, or that “X” never happened for me.

Of course, I still fail at this at times, but as I’m getting older, I’m getting a little better at living in the present – not worrying all the time about the future or feeling sad or angry about the past.

If you’re someone with depression, or a tendency to have a pessimistic personality or attitude, if you want to guarantee you’ll never move that depression or sour attitude even an inch and actually ever enjoy life, then, by all means, continue to fixate on what you don’t have in life, or feel like you were owed and never got – that will keep most people trapped in a bad attitude, or depression, rather than enjoying life.

(Link): Are You Stuck in the “I’ll Feel Better When” Cycle? by Diana Hill, phD

Excerpts:

October 2021

KEY POINTS

• • When it comes to big aspirations, it’s beneficial to reflect on the good within more minor accomplishments along the way.
  • Often people’s “feel better when” comes from their mind’s capacity to imagine what will happen in the future.
  • Know when good enough is good enough. Try not to waste energy on maximizing things that don’t matter.
    

    ---

    We are often caught in the trap of believing that we’ll feel better at some point in the future when life circumstances change. Clients will frequently tell me (and I’ve told myself):

“I’ll feel better when…”:

I’m done with school
I find my life’s partner
I have a baby
I’m less anxious
I lose weight
This work project is done
The pandemic is over

But what happens when that future never arrives, or if it does, you’ve already moved on to the next “I’ll feel better when?”

Being Bitter and Blaming Others Can Ruin Your Health by Elizabeth Cohen

Being Bitter and Blaming Others Can Ruin Your Health by Elizabeth Cohen

(Link): Being Bitter and Blaming Others Can Ruin Your Health

Excerpts:

August 2011
By Elizabeth Cohen, Senior Medical Correspondent

…Feeling persistently resentful toward other people — the boss who fired you, the spouse who cheated on you — can indeed affect your physical health, according to a new book, “Embitterment: Societal, psychological, and clinical perspectives.”

In fact, the negative power of feeling bitter is so strong that the authors call for the creation of a new diagnosis called PTED, or post-traumatic embitterment disorder, to describe people who can’t forgive others’ transgressions against them.

“Bitterness is a nasty solvent that erodes every good thing,” says Dr. Charles Raison, associate professor of psychiatry at Emory University School of Medicine and CNNHealth’s Mental Health expert doctor.

What bitterness does to your body

Feeling bitter interferes with the body’s hormonal and immune systems, according to Carsten Wrosch, an associate professor of psychology at Concordia University in Montreal and an author of a chapter in the new book.

Studies have shown that bitter, angry people have higher blood pressure and heart rate and are more likely to die of heart disease and other illnesses.

Thoughts on the NRO Essay “Advice For Incels” by Kevin D. Williamson

Thoughts on the NRO Essay “Advice For Incels” by Kevin D. Williamson

About me and this blog:

If you are new to my blog: I have been a conservative my entire life. I’ve never voted Democrat. I was a Republican until a few years ago. I am no longer in any political party.

I sometimes critique secular, left wing feminists on my blog (such as but not limited to (Link): this post and (Link): this one), but there are times when I believe other conservatives get feminists wrong, and feminists are actually correct on some issues.

I was brought up in a traditional values, conservative, Christian family where my parents brought me to Southern Baptist churches as I was growing up, where I was taught to believe in gender complementarianism, which I did for many years, until I finally realized how (Link): wrong and sexist complementarianism is.

Because I grew up as a complementarian, I am quite familiar with what they think and why they think as they do.

My current religious beliefs are somewhat “up in the air,” as I am waffling between being agnostic, (or a deist), and the Christian faith. (Note: I am not an atheist.)

I am by no means anti- Nuclear Family, anti- motherhood, or anti- marriage, though I do posit that many to most conservatives – especially the religious ones – have gone to un-biblical lengths and have turned the Nuclear Family, marriage, natalism, and motherhood and fatherhood into idols which is wrong of them.

— end introduction to me and this blog —

I saw a link to this essay go through my Twitter feed today:

(Link): Advice for Incels by Kevin D. Williamson

On one level, this essay – “Advice for Incels” was okay.

However, I think that while the guy who wrote it has his heart in the right place, I think he gets a lot of things wrong and is naive about how Baptist and conservative Protestant and evangelical churches are for adult singles.

I’ve spent the last several years on this blog covering these topics – I’d encourage Williamson and anyone who read his NRO piece to read the books  (Link): “Singled Out” by Field and Colon and  “Quitting Church” by Christian author Julia Duin for even more information.

‘It’s Not Me, It’s You’: A Loser’s Guide to Dealing with Rejection by The Guyliner

‘It’s Not Me, It’s You’: A Loser’s Guide to Dealing with Rejection by The Guyliner

(Link): ‘It’s not me, it’s you’: a loser’s guide to dealing with rejection by The Guyliner

Excerpts:

Advances in technology, and the urge to express ourselves as loudly as possible, mean rejection has never been so easy to dole out. Swiping left on Tinder, blocking on Twitter, marching to the polling booth: a firm no is never far away, but the bitter sting never fails to shock.

We’ve witnessed an unusually high level of public rejection over the last few turbulent weeks, from politicians discovering their posses were lacking compadres and feeling their ambition turn to ash in their mouths, to the much-maligned EU, sadly opening its Dear John letter from 52% of the UK, all calls going straight to voicemail.

Rejection can teach you a lot about yourself and those around you. “No” may never be music to your ears, but you can learn to take it with dignity. Or, at the very least, store up ample fuel for your revenge.

….On a dating app

“Why don’t they love me?” I’d cry when I was single, throwing myself on to a fainting couch whenever someone I’d contacted didn’t reciprocate.

Preacher Perry Noble Gives Advice to Adult Singles On How To Date and Marry Days Before Articles Say He’s Having Marriage Problems – Consider the Source

Preacher Perry Noble Gives Advice to Adult Singles On How To Date and Marry Days Before Articles Say He’s Having Marriage Problems – Consider the Source

As I’ve said before, Consider the Source when listening to dating advice.

On July 6th, Christian Post published a page with dating advice by pastor Perry Noble.

On July 8th, Christian Post published an article suggesting that Noble may have been fired from his church for, among other things, marital problems.

Why is a guy who is in the midst of having marital issues writing dating advice for singles? Please. Does the phoniness in contemporary Evangelical Land know no limits?

From what I’ve seen on the internet the last two, three days, Noble’s church is expected to announce tomorrow that he was fired, probably due to marital conflicts or alcoholism or something.

Men Aren’t Entitled to Sex: Crybaby Guy Throws Racist Fit at Woman Who Politely Refuses to Hook up by R K Bussel

Men Aren’t Entitled to Sex: Crybaby Guy Throws Racist Fit at Woman Who Politely Refuses to Hook up by R K Bussel

It sure does seem that a lot of guys think they are owed sex.

A lot of Christian men not only feel that they are entitled sex (once married), but both before and after marriage, they feel entitled to everything from women: they expect to have their egos stroked all the time, for instance.

Do you Christian men who arrogantly expect women to uplift you and tell you how great you are, ever consider encouraging women in your lives, whether they are single or married?

Women sometimes need or want some external validation, yet whiny men (including Christian ones) seldom consider giving any to women. They rudely assume God put women here only to meet men’s needs. Nope: it goes both ways.

Women have needs too. Women have days or phases in their lives when they get tired, discouraged, worn down and could use a kind word or a helping hand.

(Link):  Men Aren’t Etitled to Sex: Crybaby Guy Throws Racist fit at woman who Politely Refuses to Hook up by R K Bussel

Excerpts:

Even if he buys her dinner, even if she asks him out, even if she flirts—there’s no excuse for this behavior

…That he turned on a dime to insult her should tell us that he only saw her as an object he wanted available for his pleasure, whether to stroke his ego or stroke other body parts. The moment she rejects him, even though she doesn’t say a single negative thing toward him, he interprets that as pretty much the worst thing a woman could do to him. Her not wanting sex automatically means, in his mind, she’s basically an evil bitch who’s wasted his time.

Another obvious statement: her not wanting to have sex with him doesn’t automatically mean she didn’t like him, or didn’t have a good date. Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t, but by treating sex as the one and only arbiter of success, he turned what could have been a fun night into a nightmare.

Christians Advise Singles To Follow Certain Dating Advice But Then Shame, Criticize, or Punish Singles When That Advice Does Not Work

Christians Advise Singles To Follow Certain Dating Advice But Then Shame, Criticize, or Punish Singles When That Advice Does Not Work

A recent post I made, along with a comment left under it by a regular blog visitor (hello mikewchair2165!) got me to thinking of something I’ve noticed or experienced myself when visiting other Christian forums or blogs.

The previous post I refer to was this one:

(Link): “When Your Dad Dates Your Boyfriends”

I had remarked in that blog post that using faith to get a spouse simply does not work. It did not work for me. I grew up in an evangelical, Southern Baptist family and church environ, and I listened to or watched a lot of TV sermons by evangelicals and other types of Christians on Christian TV. I also read a lot of Christian publications that sometimes had articles about dating and marriage.

So, from my youth and into my 20s, I was exposed to a lot of evangelical views, teachings, and advice about dating, gender roles, how to get a spouse, and so forth. The vast majority of material and teachings I was exposed to conveyed the idea that a single adult who desires marriage should be passive and “trust God” to send him or her a spouse.

This was usually taught as, you should just go about your daily life, attend a local church, but trust God to send Mr. Right into your life.

As I am not a man, I can’t gauge exactly what kinds of teachings evangelicals give men on these subjects and how often – I didn’t pay as much attention to the stuff being specifically directed at men on some topics (depending on what the topic is), because I’m not a dude.

However, from what little I do remember, about any time I have paid attention when Baptist or evangelical Christians were telling single males how to get a wife, they usually stressed that the man should be very active, and go out trying to find a date.

Christians usually tell the men to get off their duffs and look for a wife because “he who finds a wife finds a good thing” (which is quoting some Bible verse). But, there was also a strain of teaching given to men, which is quite similar to what we women were taught, of, “Just pray and trust God, and God will send a suitable partner across your path, no effort is required on your part, effort shows  you are not trusting God.”

So I suppose some Baptist or evangelical men are also given the message that getting married is a very passive endeavor, with no effort on their part, it’s all up to God, which is also what Christian women are taught from the time they are girls.

As I am a lady, I will explain things from the woman’s view.

If you are an unmarried man (especially one who is over 30 years of age) who was brought up in a Baptist or evangelical church or family, you can weigh in and explain your experience in the comments below, how this stuff is taught to men, to give any visitors a more informed view, if you like.

The advice I heard from Christians growing up, on how and when to marry, (and all this was usually depicted as being “biblical” or “Bible based” advice, so of course if you are a sincere Christian, you want to do what is “biblical” and “pleasing to God”) is that you have to do X, Y, and Z, to get a spouse.

Sometimes, doing “X, Y, and Z” was presented as necessary, otherwise God would punish you by refusing to send you a husband.

That is, God will not send a godly, Christian husband to a woman, unless she does “X, Y, Z” and avoids doing “A, B, and C.” The particular advice here can vary.

Sometimes Christian advice about dating, marriage, and other issues is contradictory.

For example, because so many Christians are paranoid and fearful of, or despise, secular feminism, they will tell Christian single women,

“Do not be too independent. That will turn off men. You have to make the man feel as though you NEED him.”

On the other hand, Christians will tell single Christian women, “Don’t be TOO dependent on a man. You have to be independent, because being too dependent will turn a man off, you will be seen as too needy or clingy.”

So, the conflicting message to Christian single women is:

• Be independent, but at the same time, do not be independent.

In the physical appearance department, single Christian women are told: be pretty, but do not be pretty. We are told these conflicting messages:

• Men are visually oriented, so you must be thin and pretty to attract and keep a man. But, do not be pretty, lest you cause a brother in Christ to stumble and make him lust, and, remember, God loves you for your heart.

If I thought about it long enough, I could go on with other examples that are double standards, contradictions, and impossible to follow.

One teaching that is fairly consistent: Christians either out right say or imply that virginity is necessary for a Christian woman to get married. (I seldom to never hear Christians stress male virginity is necessary for a Christian man to “earn” a spouse.)

We women are told, or it is implied, God will not send a loving, nice, financially stable, Christian husband to a fornicator, so you best keep the skirt down and the legs together.

Never mind that over the years I have seen so many testimonies (on Christian shows!) of women who admit they slept around for decades, even working as call girls or strippers, even knowing it was sin, yet they later married a nice, Christian, middle class husband.

Anyway, other Christians may add other supposed qualities a Christian woman must possess before God will “permit her” to marry, or to “reward her with” a husband. Some Christians may tell a woman to “seek God first,” or “be content in God” before God will send you a spouse.

Other Christians will include all that stuff, or simply advise you to “trust in the Lord,” or “pray regularly for a spouse” or “have faith and believe, and it will come to pass in God’s timing.”

Some will tell a woman that she must pray regularly, read her Bible often, and volunteer at a charity.

Here’s the problem: you can sincerely follow all this supposed “godly” or “Bible based” advice on how to get a mate and still end up being single.

I know I followed all the advice and have never married, and I am over the age of 40 now.

When I began picking up on this around my mid or late 30s, and I started posting concerns, questions, and comments about these subjects on other Christian forums, blogs, and sites years ago, nobody had an answer.

A few people were sympathetic. They told me they were in a similar position.

However, more often than not, when I would point out,

• “I don’t get it. I had faith. I went to church, I trusted God, I read my Bible, lived a clean life style, truly believed God would provide, and I’m still a virgin. I did all the things I was told to do by Christians to get a spouse, but I am still single. What is going on, I don’t understand?” –

instead of receiving compassion and sympathy, which is the response I should have received, or else, I should have received serious responses to my issue, I would instead get shamed, criticized, attacked by both married and single Christians.