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This is really good advice. Thank you for commenting. You're right, in the long term this will be much better for me and the kids. I can't invite the ex-in-laws over or anything. They live hundreds of miles away. I think I will just try to maintain friendly casual interactions. Someday they may ask, but until then it's probably a good idea to keep out of it.

Thanks for sharing your observations in a kind way. This seems very good advice. Now that we are no longer married I need to focus on my life and children and on moving on. While I honestly don't feel any anger toward her, I think your bigger point here is that this is not really any of my business any more. That's a freeing thought.

True. I guess the point I was trying to make (poorly) was that merely being subject to the attraction does not make the person evil (or even sinful) per se.

I've posted my story here before but am in a new phase, facing new difficult decisions. I am divorced (it's only been final for two weeks). It took over eight months for the true reasons behind my ex-husband's insistence on the divorce to come out. I found out through my bishop that my ex is having an emotional affair that had, at least for a time, become physical. He also has a mood disorder and has determined that God told him to divorce me and that God wants his new love interest to divorce her husband as well (both affair partners have several children at home). I could do nothing to change his mind about divorcing me, but I took everyone's great advice and used an experienced lawyer to help me retain primary custody and I was awarded a minimal amount of child support (my income is greater than his). Now that I am divorced, I am trying to begin the healing process for myself, especially trying to work through the feelings of betrayal and rejection and the hurt of some of the nasty things he did and said during the divorce process. He continues to try to control and manipulate me, but I have a great bishop and a helpful therapist, so I am learning to set boundaries between us. So finally, on to my question. I have seen evidence of the manipulation and emotional abuse my ex is inflicting on the other woman (her husband found some emails between them and shared that with my bishop). Even though her family has tried to stage a couple of interventions to wake her up to the manipulation and control, she believes the "revelations from God" my ex is basing this whole affair on and for now at least is still pursuing a divorce from her husband, who sees her as tragically brainwashed and still wants to save the marriage. All of this seems fueled by my ex's mental illness, although in his day-to-day interactions at work and elsewhere he can play the part of a very friendly, generous and competent person. My ex's family knows he has a mood disorder, but they have believed his story that our divorce is just a result of me being very difficult to live with and emotionally abusive (wildly untrue). We have never been very close to his siblings (parents are not alive) as they are all very independent, so through this whole process I have not been in contact with any of them although one sister-in-law reached out briefly through text to say she knows how hard this must be and she hopes we can stay in touch. At this point, I am wondering if I should reach out to her and fill her in on the affair situation and the revelations he claims to have had. Her husband is a medical doctor and in a bishopric and they are a very active LDS family. My motivation would be to hopefully show them the truth behind what he's doing so they can try to help him see he needs to get professional help for the mental illness and encourage him to leave this other married woman alone. Should I reach out to my ex's family to at least try to help minimize the damage being done? My main reasons for not talking to his family before are 1) trying to make sure my own motives are pure and not fueled by vindictiveness or hurt and 2) I am concerned it could cause him to lash out more at me and further damage the co-parenting relationship I am trying to build with him. But he has been suicidal, too, and if her family succeeds in getting her to leave him, I believe it is a strong possibility he will hurt himself. I don't know what to do. This is my children's father and the repercussions of his choices and my decisions about how to respond to all of this will have lasting impact on everyone's lives.

@bethejoy, you are handling this very difficult situation with remarkable grace and humility. You are exemplary.

I'm very sorry you had to go through everything (and still are going through it). But I'm very glad to hear you got a lawyer. So often, that advice is brushed aside until it's too late, and the wife and kids end up in poverty as a result. You honestly sound very aware of the impact this process is having on you. I've met lots and lots and lots of divorced people, and one thing they tend to have in common, is to one extent or another, they have a bunch of strong negative emotions and things to say about their exes. Some of them are good at not letting it out, some try hard and then it erupts like a volcano, some dress it up in nice friendly terms ("I probably am the most responsible for the divorce, but he [insert laundry list]".) But I guess everyone has it. If you do choose to stay in touch with the sister-in-law, and you guys stay friends and talk about stuff, you can probably expect at least once to have some sort of vindictiveness-fuelled thing to say. You're human. I think we're hard-wired to do it. Maybe just be aware of the possibility, maybe just share this worry with the SIL, and if you find yourself doing it, be transparent and ask forgiveness. But yeah, I would consider preserving the relationship with SIL. "Thank you so much for the text. I'd like that too, but it'll probably be a while before I can have a decent conversation without a bunch of grief and anger bursting out. Maybe we could try lunch in a month?" (or something like that) Don't give his suicidal melodrama a second's thought or lose a second's sleep over it. If he has you on the phone and is talking about method and timeframe, hang up and call 911, then wash your hands of it. f he sends an email or text, don't reply and just hand them over to the police. "Hi, I thought you folks might want to know my ex-husband sent me this. I'm just going to give it to you, and it's up to you if you act on it or not." Otherwise, just don't bother with it. As you probably know, once he discovers what he can do to get you to respond, he'll do it more often.

I think you should preserve your relationship with your in-laws for its own sake; especially since the one sister-in-law has already reached out. Invite them over with their families one evening when you have your kids. But no, I wouldn't dish out on your ex's problems unless they ask. If you seem too eager, it will just confirm in their minds the horror stories he has been telling about you. The best thing you can do right now is keep the lines of communication open and show them that, whatever he might be saying, you're actually the same one. "Bend over backwards to show you're the sane one" is the advice I've traditionally given my divorce clients. It can be emotionally and physically (and sometimes financially) taxing; but given enough time, it always pays off in the end. Always.

That is probably true. But it is irrelevant. Whether the inclusion of a normalized homosexual lifestyle in a children's show is by intentional design or not doesn't change anything. Edit: Also...it may not be by design of the movie makers and/or the production company. But you can bet yer boots it's by design of someone altogether more sinister. The one who actually has "the agenda".

Let me assure you that you and Jesus will understand each other perfectly when that day comes, more perfectly than you have ever understood any conversation you have ever had. I expect that your conversation will be hear to heart and could even by unspoken. He will just know, as will you.

Evidence that God answers prayers!

It depends; I generally agree that boisterous boycotts don't work-but personal choice does. I refuse to watch shows like Will and Grace or movies like Brokeback Mountain, if everyone did the same things would change. We should all remember the analogy of the frog in the boiling pot of water.

The Book of Mormon was written and compiled by prophets who saw our day and it has been written for our day. This being the case, I would hope, or think, that it has something to say about the great problems of our day. What I’ve done here is to compile my list of what I think are the ten greatest problems of our day, and then searched for scriptures from the Book of Mormon that might relate to these problems, either as a description of the problem or a possible solution to it. I hope you might feel inclined to add your own list of modern day problems, coupled with scriptural references from the Book of Mormon that either describe or address those problems, or alternatively, add to/correct/amend this list Nuclear catastrophe - Mormon 6 and Ether 15 Global warming and climate change – Helaman 11, 3 Nephi 8, Ether 9:30 - 35 Failing governments and loss of faith in government – Alma 51, 60, 3 Nephi 7, Helaman 1, 4, 6 , Ether 8 - 11 Communism - Nothing War – Mostly in Alma 43 - 62 Religious extremism – Alma 1, 14, 35 Declining faith in God – Alma 5, Moroni 7, 4th Nephi Greed, pride and selfishness – Jacob 2, Mosiah 2, 4, 3rd Nephi 12 – 14, Moroni 10 Growing inequality Alma 32, Jacob 2, Alma 1 Globalisation, corporatisation, and the commoditisation of everything - Nothing Of course, this is all based on the assumption that, having seen our day, and its problems, the compilers and authors of the books of Mormon would say something specifically to address these problems. Its equally reasonable to assume that the authors and compilers worked on a different assumption, eg, that building faith in Christ was the best way to deal with any and every kind of problem that we in the latter days would face. This is something that the Book of Mormon does extremely well.

Funniest thing my family has ever done to me 1. I graduated. Got a job as a prof. My mother asked me to get a house so she could live with me. Fine. Got house. My mother then told me, that next step was I would adopt from China and she would come and raise the child. I said, no. Mother never came, not even to visit. Not even once. Me alone in big house. Thanks Mom. 2. Last night, my nonmember sister, tried to make me feel better that women do not have the priesthood. Don't worry, she said, membership will inevitably decline and they will have to give woman the priesthood. 3. They gave me 5 Billy Joel albums for my birthday. I hate Billy Joel. When I plan my funeral, I am going to come up with a mandatory dress code. Everyone in clown costumes!

African safari!!

I want to take my wife to see Temple Square in Christmas lights and take her to do a live session.

That is so kind of you, @Jane_Doe. Right after my bishop informed me of the affair, I distinctly remember feeling strongly that I could not judge them because I didnt want to be guilty of unrighteous judgment myself. The gift of not completely falling apart through all this and having any kind of peace has come directly from God. He answers prayers and He has been teaching me every step of the way. I feel so blessed

Thanks for sharing your personal experience with this. It helps me think about this with a longer term perspective. Especially to think of the impact my actions now will have on my kids as they grow up and witness more of the consequences of their father's choices. If he turns around or starts making better choices, that will be great for my kids. And if he keeps going down this path, that's all the more reason they need me to be peaceful and healthy.

Again, these are great comments. Thanks for giving me good ideas for handling some of this. In terms of the suicidality, I have boundaries between us now. We only talk about the kids, so if he's verbalizing this threat still, it's with other people. I wouldn't know about it until after the fact. By the way, I think you were the first person who told me I needed to get a lawyer, Neurotypical, when I first posted at the beginning of this process. It took a few more months and five or six other people insisting I see a lawyer, including my bishop, before I finally realized the importance of it. Thank you for caring enough to start me thinking about that.

I have no intention of encouraging manipulation or force. Sometimes, I think if someone close to him that he respects can talk to him, it might help him open his eyes. No one that is close to him knows about this affair except my bishop and a few of my close friends. I can see how this really boils down to his agency, though, and you're probably right that I am being naive to think someone talking to him could make much of a difference at this point. My worries for the other woman being victimized in a similar fashion as I was, I guess, are misplaced. She's a grown woman making her own choices too. Thanks for your input.

Clown costume revenge/payback = perfect!

Just a quick glance of your post and I noticed nuclear catastrophe/war. Isaiah and Nephi come to mind. 2 Nephi chapter 13 is relevant, but: The Nephites likened the scriptures (especially Isaiah) to themselves being covenant people. We, also being covenant people can liken their writings to ourselves, too.

That's just it. We don't consciously desire the effect; but we consciously indulge in the actions that create the effect; thus turning ourselves into something we never thought we would or could become.

https://thesundaypews.wordpress.com/2017/02/11/bishop-calls-for-pew-to-be-cut-in-half-after-sac-mtg-territory-dispute/ Pew in chapel to be cut in half.

I disagree. The attraction is, indeed "evil". The distinction is that the person facing the temptation is not inherently evil for being tempted. But a temptation itself is the core of evil. Temptation is of the devil. Pure, straight up, unquestionably evil. It is something designed to drive us from God. That is implicit in the very meaning of the word. Otherwise it wouldn't be labeled a temptation.

In my humble opinion you shouldn't contact her unless you are prepared to face the consequences of that action. Your number one priority right now is taking care of yourself and your children. He is your ex-husband now and even though I completely understand and I can empathize to the fact that he is also the father of your children and you want to ensure he doesn't hurt himself, I don't believe going through the sister in-law route will help in any way but quite the contrary, make matters even worse between you two. Contact the authorities if he is suicidal. Hope you don't take this the wrong way but your comment of "encourage him to leave this other married woman alone" speaks volumes to me. Now, I do understand where you are coming from and I can only imagine how hurt you must feel about all this but I must also point out that it seems to me that you want someone to convince him to leave the other woman alone because you still very hurt, but careful with that. This means you are now crossing a boundary that I am not sure you should be crossing since he is no longer your husband. He is your ex, and whatever choices he wants to make with a single or married woman (right or wrong choices) is not longer something you should be involved with. You cannot and should not control his choices from now on. It takes a while to adjust to the fact that he is your ex, that's completely understandable. But please keep in mind that his relationship with you is ONLY about the children. Whatever choices he is making, has nothing to do with you. I know it must be hard to let go but sometimes holding on hurts more. I wish you and your children all the best.

I'm not quite sure how one comes to this conclusion. Saying something like, "I didn't choose to have a messy house, I just chose to never clean it, never put anything away, etc" rings very, very false to me.

Kudos for taking all the steps you have thus far. May I suggest that talking to your therapist about your question would also be a good idea? But if you really want the opinion of an untrained stranger of the internet: you cannot force or manipulate your ex into seeking help for his mental illness. Neither can his siblings. Trying to do so will only backfire. He has been told about his illness, he lives the consequences of it daily, he makes choices to feed it, and he's the only one who can make the choice to seek help. Another thing I saw in your post: "But he has been suicidal, too, and if her family succeeds in getting her to leave him, I believe it is a strong possibility he will hurt himself." This is you being manipulated by him. Yes, it may be true that he'll go suicidal, but that is his poor choice to react poorly to a situation-- you weren't his keeper as his wife and certainly not now. If/when he and this women break up, you can alert people to be on watch then. In the meantime, don't stop living your lives and healing based on his manipulative threat.

Interestingly, I shared this with my wife, who did not find it funny because she is aware of situations where something like this actually happened, and people left the church over arguments about whose pew is whose.

The bishop had so much wisdom.

There are so many wonderful museums in Paris. Several years ago my sisters, my mother, and I did a girls trip to Paris. We went to the Louvre, Musee d' Orsay (yes, it is in a beautiful old train station), the Rodin Museum, and Musee de Orangerie, to name a few. I had been to Paris several times before, but this one was special--one of the last trips made with my mother before her Alzheimer's set in. I'd go back in a heart beat!!

We sat in the same pew for years, probably left side, fourth row. Then my mom got a calling that kept her from getting to Sacrament meeting until it just began, so we switched to last row of the overflow section. No one really wanted our new seats.

I think the difference is the left tends to have saviors rather than ideas. This is because progressivism requires a benevolent dictator to force everyone to be nice to each other, distribute wealth and resources fairly, etc. So they cling to leaders. That's wy Bill Clinton is revered, and why they already per-selected Hillary as the DNC pick for president, and why people liked Bernie, even if they had no idea what his actual plan was other than rich people will pay for my stuff. And it's why they were shocked that they lost. How can you lose against the perfect candidate? Especially when the other candidate is so flawed personally? Republicans, rather, look to ideology, regardless of leadership, so you get 10+ candidates all with varying ideas on how to solve various problems. Trump happened to resonate with the ideas that both parties were ignoring. The RNC was making excuses as to why Trump was winning, rather than looking at why people chose him. And he isn't a "savior" like DNC leaders are seen as. He just had the right message, one that the rest of the Republicans refused to address.

Being familiar with the Brain Games show and having studied psychology (which included reading studies, participating as a subject in studies, and carrying out a few small real-world projects on my own), I'd say these people reacted this way naturally. Think about it this way: if a group of people who, as far as you know, are strangers to each other all react in the same way to some sort of stimulus, would you sooner assume that there was some reason for it or that they had all colluded beforehand to get you to act strangely?

That makes sense. You take ALL the time you two need.

I can understand. I hope you and your husband have much happiness together. All my best to both of you.

I think I don't a problem with anything you just wrote. I especially don't have a problem with you saying what you think about it (or, haha, anyone else disagreeing).

"Fetch a chainsaw", huh? They should have flipped a coin, too. Flippin' fetchers.

See a football match at Old Trafford, preferably against a top tier team, but any game would be cool. Tour London. Visit Europe (actually doing that later this year).

I believe that heterosexuals talk way more about homosexuality than evil homosexuals trying to push their agenda. So they see "gayness" even in the alphabet soup.

lol, really now. http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2017/02/16/courtney-stodden-says-shes-bisexual-is-open-to-dating-woman-after-split.html Come on. How many stars are now suddenly "bi-sexual"? How many models are now suddenly "bi-sexual", i.e. having homosexual relationships. The fact is we absolutely have 0 clue as to why some people have feelings for the same sex while others don't. No one has proven that it's something you are born with-but it is a convenient excuse to normalize it and prevent others from opposing the behavior (i.e. how dare you disagree with someone who is born like that, you evil person!!!). I don't care if it is something you are "born with" or not (my guess is that it's like most things, a combination of factors not a single factor), but the fact remains that the more it is normalized the more that individuals will accept the behavior and consequently "try it out". This isn't rocket science. If there is a social stigma against homosexual behavior than regardless of whether you have homosexual thoughts you will be less inclined to act it out-if there isn't a social stigma against it then yes you will be more inclined to act it out. Does anyone really think that if we had the culture of 25 years ago that Ms. Stodden would explore a homosexual relationship? So yes, it is social programming; kids see homosexual behavior in cartoons and movies, they get to be a teenager and a boy develops a man-crush on another dude (star football player, whatever) . . .now he thinks he's homosexual and of course has to "try it out"-when all it actually might be is just the fleetings of youth, i.e. a kid who idolizes another kid. That is what culture is about-teaching the next generation the proper way to act, behave and think-not this anything goes, if it feels good do-it attitude.

You didn't. You typed it because it gave you a chance to vent your feelings and demonstrate what you believe to be your virtue, not because there was the least little provocation for you to do so.

?? Really. No the reality of the world is not that we live in a multi-cultural world. You need to get out more. The only "multi-Cultural" societies are the "modern" western world. Go to South America, go to Africa, go to China, go to India. They take your multi-cultural world, chew it up and spit it out in your face. Multiculturalism is nothing more than a facade to destroy Western Culture,aka traditional white culture. Yeah, so what, I'm white, I like the culture I grew up in, I'd like to keep it that way. If I grew up in India-I'd like that culture, if I grew up in South America I'd like that culture. There is nothing wrong with taking pride in your heritage and wanting to promulgate that heritage and culture to the next generation. But b/c of certain concerted powers, taking pride in your culture now means your a "bigot" (if you are white-it's okay to take pride in it if your Asian, Indian, Mexican, etc.) . You really need to read more, there is absolutely a concerted effort towards a one-world, globalized New World Order and it begins with destroying the culture that created the liberties and freedoms we have in the country. And yes homosexual behavior is against the teaching of the Church, so yes decrying media depictions of it is 100% in line with our teaching and in fact it's a shame that as a people we have become so ashamed of saying that it's wrong b/c we don't want to be labeled a "bigot". If you actually study the teachings, the Church absolutely appreciates different cultures . . .but you simply as a society cannot have a cohesive society when everyone shares a different culture. What about this do people not understand? You will have more strife, more problems, more issues the more "diverse" the population becomes . . .why b/c you have a clash of cultures. And unless and until every becomes libertarian (and I don't see that happening), each culture will use the power of the government to enforce their version of morality upon the rest. And that is the problem, I've lived in and seen how others cultures run their governments and government is always used to enforce one version of morality (even though it shouldn't). It's fine to have multi-cultural wards, every one is fine . . .why b/c it doesn't involve power or coercion, but I guarantee you there is strife. And yes, people self-segregate so in practical real life there is no such thing as multiculturalism. In business, you have a business culture, if you don't fit in with the business culture-you leave or you are fired. A while back I remember the Church saying they were adopting the meetings to wards in Africa-it's great to see an appreciating for that culture and adopting the structure of the Church to accommodate that part of the world. The multiculturalism push in the US really started in the 70s and it has been getting worse since thing. For example, my kid had an assignment from school where they listed great 1st moments in space. You know what they listed? The first Indian-American in space, the first African-American in space, the first woman in space, etc. What a bunch of crap. Those aren't great first in space. You are actually causing more strife by pushing this. Why no list, the 1st man on the moon, the 1st spacewalk, the 1st satellite, the 1st telescope, etc. Who gives a rip who made it happen, black, white, male/female-it doesn't matter, what matters is that someone built a telescope, that someone did a spacewalk, etc. Things that actually mean something to human progress rather than social engineering crap.

I've been a subscriber to Paul Johnson Watson before he joined Infowars. My kids watch his vids so I had to keep tabs of the guy. I generally like his views except for a few things like mental illness.

I don't consider pro-life in conflict with the death penalty. One is innocent, the other had their day in court. The hypocrisy of the Republicans is their claim of being the party of small government while consistently on a spending race with the Democrats and the expansion of government.

This will depend entirely on Trump and if he delivers on that economic prosperity and law enforcement that he promised.

Add to this full-fledged banquets served at starvation awareness conferences, or smoking while protesting air pollution, wearing a hijab at a feminist rally, or fighting with by-standers while marching for peace, or flying in jets to go speak out against the use of fossil fuels, or wearing store-bought clothes and jewelry and talking on smart phones at an anti-capitalist rally, or surrounded by armed body guards while assailing the 2nd Amendment, or purchasing placards and markers from Walmart to protest Walmart, and on and on. I am convinced that hypocrisy is a way of life for a certain political orientation. Thanks, -Wade Englund-

If you'd like to check out some other translations, try https://www.biblegateway.com/.

There are, and we aren't banned from checking out some of the other translations as study aids. I think the New International Version and the New Revised Standard Version are pretty well respected.

Generally speaking, perhaps everyone needs a chill pill. Sometimes, people aren't looking for attention or sympathy. They turn to the internet because they don't have anyone else to turn to, and perhaps being kind is way more important than being right.

I'm in your same boat, sort of. My school student does everything you described plus Track & Field and the occasional Student Govt. thing. He is trucking right along and excelling at it. I drive him to seminary each morning, mutual and YM's basketball for the past couple of Saturdays. Some kids can maintain this pace, others can't, no different then adults. I put myself and my wife in the category of workhorses. As such, our kids are conditioned the same way now, so this pace is pretty much how we live, it is normal and not a nightmare we squeak by with. So... how do we survive, rather how does he survive? For us: 1. Something has to give: In our case, Sunday church and seminary* are not options. Goofing around Mutual activities, no purpose, often are not attended. Eagle Scout has been placed on the back burner. 2. Time Off: When he requests alone time, time with his friends, we drive him places... we give it to him. Meaning he "works hard, so he plays hard". 3. Homework at School: Think of incorporating a "study hall" period into their day so they can get some home work done at school. 4. Seminary: we usually miss one day a week, this is his sleep in day and catch up day, mine too. We don't want him to hate getting up, this is a simple compromise. 5. Financial Rewards: He is paid for good grades. He is paid for excelling at other odd activities too. We pay very little for manual labor (you want to eat, lets work) and a lot for using his brain. So to him there is an instant reward system in play that he enjoys. Other than that, kids are resilient and will rise to the occasion. Considering all other events, trials and circumstances that other youth around the world face on a daily basis, his life is a piece of cake. He understands this and is grateful for it.