Topic : Black Sheep of the Family?

I'm sorry you had a bad experience with the lds religion but i don't think a bad experience is a good reason to judge an entire religion. Sometimes people forget the true meaning of their faith and put less important things at the top of their priority list. Being LDS is not bad just like being a part of any other faith is not bad. I did not mean to leave anyone with any other impression. Mormons are people, just like catholics, or any other religion. We are all people, we make mistakes. We can't change other people. It's your life and you make the best of it! Whether we talk to friends, go to couseling, to find answers to problems , we learn from life and hopefully move on as well. I am really sorry that you have had such a bad experience with mormons but i know that it wouldn't benefit you to judge people by their religion. I do know that if the people you had run into treated you badly, it's because they forgot what their faith is about and hopefully they've learned from it by now.  Any way it's up to you how you'll treat them but i would suggest not to pass the hate. Best of luck!

i am 32 years old, and am the youngest of 4 with three sisters. my mom has been married ,i believe six times, though my sisters have all been married to the same men for as long as i remember. they have all set examples i can either accept or reject. my emotions are soup, or maybe "spaghetti". my "favorite" sister is in a marriage that i dont think she appreciates. her husband, i believe does as much as he can without digging his own grave, but her affection has long become effete. they have six children; seven if you include me, i was here before they were and i was spoiled as much as they have been if not more. my mom did her best to raise me, sometimes with the structure of a family, but she is no good at relationships. we moved several times over the course of say eighteen years, and i never could take root in a school, church, or community for very long. i have become very good at disassociating myself for fear of having to move all over again.

i was fifteen when i dropped out of highschool, and i felt nothing but relief afterwards. i hated school. i could not juggle both academics and social-psychology. i think i felt that i could master the school work, but i had trouble being someone i felt my peers accepted, so i ultimately did nothing, but think. i was quiet with severe depression, and had alot of anger issues. i have long gotten over being angry at myself, and redirected those feelings toward Hollywood. i have come to the conclusion that kids get their personality and attitudes from "Hollywood", but i have never wanted to immitate "characters" i have seen on tv or in a movie, but that can be difficult since celebrities are multi-millionaires for exemplifying what "Hollywood" thinks our norms should be. often times "Hollywood" contradicts everything that our parents tried to instill in us, not to mention the peers we had in school who were proselytes of "Hollywood" that wanted everyone to conform to their idols, therefore also contradicting our parents.

be back.

I wouldnt necessarily call myself the black sheep of the family. But, I am unlike anyone that is close to me.

I'm basically a straight- A student, I have 2 brothers and 2 sister and they dont do as well. Mostly it's because their primary focus is their social lives and school and homework and all that takes the backseat.

I have friends but I dont go out every night and I really dont do much on the weekends, Im not into partying and all that stuff. I just dont see a need for all that. I have goals, Im a senior in high school and Im working hard to get into university. Of course, no one really understands this. Not even my parents who struggled in high school and didnt do the college thing. Another thing, I dont drive. Where I live you have to pay like 100 bucks for your license and I see it as unnecessary right now. My school is about 4 blocks from home and work is a relatively close distance away, I can walk.

I get bothered by my siblings and bugged by my parents to "just grow up".

My mom  fears my leaving for university thinking my social skills arent up to par

and Im sure my dad sits back and thinks I will be some kind of financial burden in the future.

I dont know what to do.

Im different from the rest and they just dont understand where Im coming from.

Sure, I wish that I had more time to hang out with friends, that I had places to go so I would need to know how to drive. But, that just isnt my life. I have different goals that have nothing to do with any of that. 

I like the article in the Onion, where everyone claims to be the Black Sheep of the family. Isn't this just about individuality? Surely, we all need to put distance between ourselves and our siblings in order to avoid being termed cloned. It's when this process is retarded that we see extreme visible manifestations:

Goth
Tattoos
Piercings
emo

And cries for help:

Why don't I fit in?
I hate myself?
nobody understands me?

It's enforced compliance that's the problem here. That stops people developing as individuals and penalises and deviation from the norm. How do you 'come out' as gay or lesbian in these circumstances.

No wonder there's a blacksheep subculture in sites like www.imablacksheep.com and others.

Over-parenting and love of the 'norm' is the problem here people.

  I came out at 16 and was shunned from the family for many years now that im in my late 30's

my younger brother came out and was welcomed in open arms and was his partner by our parents

I dont know why but i feel jelous because it is still very uncomfortable being around my perents if any one out there can offer advice on how to rebuild a relation ship with mom and dad it would be great