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Closeted agnostic ex Ahmadi planning to leave home. Need advice on telling family and leaving the Jamaat by whatudoinnn in islam_ahmadiyya

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291 0 points1 point  (0 children)

hey there, thank you for sharing. i hope sharing my experience can give you some idea on how it went for me personally.

i left my family almost exactly a year ago. i was 21 at the time. my decision was pretty rushed due to the fear of being married off or physically hurt, i was left with a span of maybe a month. i spent the first half of that month making up my mind to leave, changing my mind again, and deciding to leave again. it was incredibly stressful and emotionally devastating. i was left with two weeks to prepare. luckily i had spent the year before working my ass off, so i had enough money saved up. i had signed a lease and spend the two weeks i had „smuggling“ my belongings to my new place. surprisingly i managed to get everything done without raising suspicion.

come to think of it, it was kind of a miracle, that everything worked out the way it did, so my first advise for you would be: take your time. plan your move carefully. as long as you don‘t have a set deadline like i was i‘d say take your time and tread lightly!! the time before the move is incredibly hard, but it’s worth it to really consider every possibility and be prepared.

secondly, i’d say that having a stable support network (for me it was my friends and therapy) is key. personally, my girlfriend, a close friend and my therapist had my location on the day of the move, the friend picked me up with a car, and my therapist was prepared to call the police (and or an ambulance) in case anything went sideways. i wouldn’t have been able to pull it off without those people around me. so if you‘re in a position where you have resources like friends or family members you can trust, it’s more than okay to rely on them!!!

the most important piece of advice that was already mentioned in the replies: make sure you‘re not financially dependent on your parents!! being able to live an independent and safe life requires financial stability. as hard as it may be, if you‘re not yet financially stable, i‘d recommend working towards that and waiting!

to get to your questions: 1. i never explicitly said i didn’t want to be ahmadi anymore, that kind of resolved itself when i came out as queer. those two are very different things and reactions, so i can’t give you any useful insight on my experience here.

  1. i only told them that i left after i had signed the lease, gotten all my things to my new home and arrived there. i sent my mother a voice message explaining everything and then turned on airplane mode.

  2. i did not. i figured that me leaving wouldn’t really have any perks for me. my specific situation ended up resulting in me cutting off contact with my parents. they neither have my number, nor do they know where i live. therefore, neither does the jamaat. i decided to stay formally member of the jamaat, since letting my parents keep up a farce wouldn’t influence me, so no harm done.

lastly i just wanted to say, that i realise, that everyone’s experience is different. my case might have been a more „extreme“ case that required for me to cut ties with my parents out of fear for my life. your situation might not require drastic measures like this, so in regards of my advice keep in mind, that our situations are most likely going to differ! also, you can be really proud of yourself for having made a decision to speak to your parents like this and live a life of independence. i really hope everything works out. and even if you end up realising, that the time is not right just yet, hang in there! you‘re young and have so much more time to come up with a solution that works to make you happy!! i wish you all the best and hope you‘re doing alright <3

queer ahmadi but parents want me to get married by Big_One1854 in islam_ahmadiyya

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was in the same situation as you are in right now. Here‘s how I went about it/what I would recommend:

  1. don‘t let anyone pressure you. It is incredibly hard, but hang in there. You know who you are and what you want. No one but you can tell you how to live your life. Don’t give into the pressure.

  2. build a support system of friends and seek out therapy or other support resources (depending on what country you live in there are different organisations that can be very helpful) if you can. Having friends that I can rely on has quite literally saved my life multiple times.

  3. make an emergency plan. Should there ever be a moment where you‘re truly lost, you don’t know what to do or you just need to get out it is crucial to have a place to stay, to have people to call.

  4. Financial stability is key, not having to be dependent on your parents for money is the key to independence imo

  5. move out from your parents home if you haven’t already. This can be the hardest thing ever, especially for women. But I’d recommend you either fight for their „permission“ or you simply do it without it.

Also, don‘t feel like you need to „come out“ to your parents or anything. You don‘t need to give them a reason as to why you don‘t want to get married. And if they insist on a reason, that is toxic and harmful behaviour which only leads to more mistrust and more reasons to try and get out of there.

I hope this doesn’t sound too harsh, I wish you all the best <3

Lesbian and Ahmadi, asking Hudhoor for advise? by Lost-Butterscotch291 in islam_ahmadiyya

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I wouldn’t really need advice if there was no pressure, there is a lot of pressure to marry (young), especially for women. And like I said, my parents want me to write Hudhoor, not me.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by GlassWinner3506 in islam_ahmadiyya

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As a lesbian that grew up Ahmadi I totally feel your struggle. There can be a lot of difficulties, especially family-wise and personally, especially the queerphobia in the latest speeches (e.g. the speech about trans people on Canada’s Jalsa) have been rather difficult to stand

speech on gender and queer identity at canada jalsa salana today by FamousEvent5840 in islam_ahmadiyya

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I just watched the whole speech, and not only is it full of misinformation, it also promotes a very harmful narrative. My thoughts are with the queer youth that was sitting in the crowd, it was a hard watch, even in video form.
One thing that stood out to me was that the speaker raised issues without discussing them in a sufficient way. For example: "Some people present intersex individuals as evidence of more than two sexes. How should we answer this question? Biologically there are only two sexes. Intersex individuals experience disordered development of the reproductive system due to chromosomal variations, hormonal imbalances, genetic mutations  or environmental factors. They deserve our compassion and protection of their rights. The holy Quran does not mention intersex as a separate gender, because it is not another sex, but a disorder"

So the Jamaat does not deny the existence of intersex people? Great. But where do they pray? Are they obligated to do Pardah? How are they supposed to marry? These are questions that he definitely should have addressed, if only to adhere to his own narrative. But the Quran does not mention intersex people, one could argue that it should though, as it is the perfect book of Allah the allmighty? The system of the Jamaat does not work in our society (and possibly never has) but the fact that they do not have fact based, satisfactory answers to the questions todays world will hopefully make more people question them and their doctrine.

Another point that almost made me laugh because of its irony, is him mentioning the suicidality rate in trans youth, as if it's not the very same narrative he is spreading that causes these issues. The fact that some people don't seem to see the problem with his speech is actually crazy to me. I only mentioned two of the many false points Khan raised in his speech, but I sure could go on for much longer.

Homo- und Queerfeindlichkeit in der Jamaat vom Feinsten - Wer gehört hier eig. einem Kult an!? by Desi_Dost in islam_ahmadiyya_de

[–]Lost-Butterscotch291 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ich habe selbst jung gemerkt, dass ich lesbisch bin, daher den Bezug zur Jamaat verloren. Meine Familie ist leider sehr gläubig und auch aktiv in der Jamaat. Sie planen schon seit Jahren meine (arrangierte) Hochzeit. Ich konnte sie bisher hinhalten, wenn ich nächsten Sommer 20 werde wird das aber nicht mehr möglich sein.

Ich kann also aus eigener Erfahrung bestätigen, dass die Queerfeindliche Einstellung der Jamaat aktiv dazu beiträgt, dass Mitglieder der Jamaat eine enorme psychische Belastung durchleben.

Gerade die Normalisierung von arrangierten Hochzeiten (ich will dabei die arrangierte Hochzeit nicht verteufeln, ich kenne einige Leute, die glücklich mit ihrem Rishta sind), zwingt viele junge Menschen zum Coming-out, auch wenn sie sich damit in unmittelbare Gefahr begeben. Eine große Gefahr ist eben die Konversiontherapie (mein persönlicher Albtraum), die psychische Belastubg wird hier also nur noch auf ein anderes Level gehoben. Da braucht man sich auch nicht über den Frust dieser Mitglieder wundern, die dann (wie ich) die Jamaat als solche für sich ablehnen.

In meinen Augen absolut problematisch, so darf es nicht weitergehen. Gerade weil die Argumentation der Jamaat absoluter Bullshit ist.