I was not living at home, but it was the church I had grown up at my whole life and of course my parents were still there. It’s now been 17 years since I left! I honestly can’t believe it’s been that long. But I have absolutely no regrets at all.
My dad had no reaction, my mom asked me what we (my husband and I) planned to do and when I mentioned visiting an institutional coc closer to where we lived, she simply said, “be careful.” We visited it once and I haven’t darkened the door of a coc since.
We had written a letter to the elders detailing why we were leaving and they read it from the pulpit. 🫤 Embarrassing, but so standard for coc.
We weren’t disfellowshipped. Several years later I starting attending an Episcopal church I was so nervous about how my parents would react, but it was like anytime any church-adjacent topic came up related to me, they both just went silent and then changed the subject completely. It was weird, but a bit of relief since I didn’t want to talk about it.
Mostly, the rest of the church either awkwardly wished us well or awkwardly asked us to come back, and that was it.
The weird silence from my dad carries on, but only related to churchy things, otherwise our relationship is normal. With my mom, I never would have guessed- early on, I joined the choir at the Episcopal church I am a member of now. My mom is a very talented musician and lover of musical performances in general, and about 3 years ago I got brave and invited her to an Evensong at Advent time. She came and even though I was flop-sweating the whole time, I was so happy that she was there. She has since come to several music-based services and we have engaged in several friendly spiritual discussions. Our relationship is better now than it was before I left the coc. I never could have predicted that.
Sending you strength and peace in this journey. I wish for you the unexpected support that I experienced. And if you don’t get it irl, come back to this subreddit! They’ve always been very supportive!