First a little background. I am a convert to the church, was baptised about 9 years ago. I met my husband at my baptism. We got married about 3 years later and we were sealed in 2006.
About 2.5 years ago we found out I was pregnant and we bought a house. Unfortunately had some rough times financially. First, my husband was supposed to get promoted, and while that did happen, it took his employer 6 months to start paying him at the new rate. Then his mom ran into some financial problems (of her own doing) and my husband wanted to help her out even though we really could not afford to.... he took money out of the account we save our tithing in (to pay once a year). Also when we moved he charged everything on a credit card (which we had the money for, but my husband said it was a better idea to charge and then pay it off), but because of the two above situations, that didn't happen. We were in pretty desperate situation and my husband told me I could not tell anyone what was going on. Basically we could barely afford any food, it was dangerous. We were payign tithing but my husband said he didn't want the church in his business. When I told him things like I had nothing to eat in the house, he pretty much told me to make do and since he was paying tithing it was supposed to work out and if it didn't it was my fault. I kept quiet about it hoping things would get better.
Then my husbands promotion came through finally, he also started getting a lot of OT and the baby was born. After I had the baby I got very very sick (thyroid problem). Even though he was making more, my husband would pay tithing, buy whatever he wanted (and tell me he "deserved" it because he was the one working, also he insisted he shouldn't have to share any overtime money he made), and then whatever was left I "should" be able to live on because he pays tithing. At the same time he still kept telling me ridiculous things like that I did not need to buy groceries every week, don't change the babies diaper too often cause diapers cost too much, don't take myself and/or the baby to the doctor cause he doesn't want to pay for it, I don't need any clothing that fits because I can just stay home in my pjs.... etc. He also would not do anything to help with the baby, not even change a diaper, so me leaving the baby with him and working on his off hours did not seem like a safe option to me. After awhile of this and feeling like me and the baby were honestly in danger, I told him to stop paying tithing. My husband told me this is what the church taught him to do so yeah my opinion of the church went down to nothing. Now I realize I should have gone to the bishop BIG TIME, but at the time I just was so overwhelmed and panicked.
After I did that the financial problems stopped because there was more money for my husband to blow on stuff.... BUT my husband told me if I ever went back to church he would divorce me. So I stopped going. I tried to tell the RS president what was going on and she told me I was going to lose my daughter forever if I didn't pay tithing. At this point I had pretty serious PPD on top of everything else. I was offended. Very offended. So then I stopped doing everything. Stopped praying, going to church, reading scriptures, wearing garments, etc. I couldn't feel God's love or the spirit in the situation I was in. I was also harboring a major grudge against the RS president but her and I have since worked it out. My testimony went from pretty strong to nothing and I am just now getting that back slowly.
Over time my husband has improved. He still won't really talk about what happened but he is much more helpful now and we have a budget now that for the most part he sticks to. But that budget doesn't include tithing. Honestly I am scared to tithe with my husband involved at this point. He needs different priorities and needs to understand that tithing does come with sacrifices. I can't say for sure that I would feel comfortable tithing with my husband involved. So basically I am breaking temple covenants but....... I dunno. I still don't feel particularly bad about it, because it was absolute desperation that I felt in protesting myself and my daughter.
So I went back to church recently after a year and a half away. I need it in my life. I know that. I am feeling the spirit consistently now and I am doing everything I can to maintain that. I am working on my testimony. I haven't broken any major commandments or anything, I just was very confused and stressed for a long time.
But I feel like the tithing is a looming issue that is going to come up sooner or later. Right now my husband is very inactive. He says he only went along with the church for me and makes comments about maybe he will start faking it again. I honestly am so lost. The bishop has no idea why I was inactive and has no idea what has gone on. Its 2.5 years worth of secrets I have kept that are eating me up inside. I really don't want to "tattle" on DH but at the same time this is really holding me back. I don't even know where to begin in talking to the bishop about all of this. And I am really afraid that he will not understand me. The RS president didn't. I'm really not trying to be disobedient by not paying tithing, I'm just trying to take care of myself. HELP?!?!
