It's too much of a coincidence that we all feel this way about dating. The only big thing we have in common is our Worldwide background. It's like how my parents met. Dad went to the Feast of Tabernacles looking to find a woman, and Mom was vulnerable and lonely and so they got married three months later. But that's what you did in Worldwide. Sudden marriages were no big deal even in the late 90s when I was still in it. I was so isolated from other people because of all the activity restrictions that I had and very few normal social experiences, that church stuff reinforced the idea that we were all we had and we'd better learn to stick together.

Sometimes I'll talk to a guy and things will go well and I start feeling that loooove thing and then I think, "no, once he finds out what I'm really like, he'll bail on me." I don't want to show anyone what I'm really like because who would understand it besides people from Worldwide? Then I'm filled with guilt for having "wrong thoughts" and being "of the world" and I berate myself and hate myself more, and it just goes on and on and on. I'm so inhibited that I've never even kissed anyone, and I'm 24 years old. It seemed better not to do anything romantic while I was in Worldwide. There was a lot of tacit approval for kids who never dated (even though dating is a normal and probably pretty healthy part of human development), as long as you are comfortable with it. I wasn't ready for it, though, and now I feel so nervous about it that I don't even try to go out with anyone.

One of the messages I always got from church was that "everybody else was better than me." If I was in the Sabbath band, then somebody else was doing Special Music and that was better. If I did Adopt-A-Highway (picking up trash along two miles of a four-lane road) then that was good, but the people who did prayer walks around neighborhoods and went to small group meetings were much more holy. I could teach youth classes, but I was no missionary and I'm sure I didn't witness enough to suit anybody's taste. My clothes weren't nice enough, I sucked at even Y.O.U. sports, I was fat, and I didn't volunteer for enough special programs. I felt horrible for being so lazy and worthless, and who could love someone like that? I knew how to work hard, and that's what I did when I thought I had found love, but it always fell apart because I worked on the wrong things.

No amount of work can force love into being. I didn't know any grace or forgiveness. I only knew how to be good and atone for every imagined sin I ever committed. I assumed that love was unattainable and just some pacifier for the weak. So I don't date and I have few friends and it's been hard to forgive my family, and I hate myself so much that I nearly died because of it. I don't blame Worldwide for everything bad that has happened to me,1 but the isolation I felt--from the world and even from other Worldwide members--has struck a blow to my self-worth that's been hard to overcome. I could deal with the food laws, the Sabbath laws, the Holy Days. That was just what I did. Dating, though, seems like something I should have done but never got a chance to do. My experience has made me love guys who are all wrong for me just because they're there. And they were mainly church guys, because they were "more pure and righteous."

Romantic love is a very important part of life, but my friends and I are too shell-shocked to deal with it. Worldwide taught that there was always something to do besides love somebody--sell fruit and candy for fundraisers, dance chastely, have sing-alongs, read dozens and dozens of books and booklets, pray, play Y.O.U. sports, pick up trash, go to Bible study, go to Holy Days, read food labels, clean up the house properly for the Sabbath, honor your parents, honor your elders, talk to people you didn't like, have potlucks, go to District Weekends. Throw in a little school and/or work, and you've got a full life. No romance required. But there were the teenage pregnancies and whirlwind marriages with babies born six months later and divorces kept quiet but not completely secret. Worldwide was better than most churches at keeping its youth firmly separated--or maybe that was just our little group. It seems like a lot of people I knew who grew up in Worldwide are completely dissatisfied with their romantic relationships--somehow they were able to date, but they were just as unsuccessful as we were. They just had different problems. I can't help feeling that other churches don't make people feel this way. We were different. They were right when they told us that. They made us different--not better, not chosen--just different.

Sometimes I feel naïve for thinking that love is possible, that someday I'll meet someone who I can be happy with. Then I revise that thought when I realize that Worldwide has made me bitter, but that's not my ultimate fate. I don't think I was put on earth to suffer, and just like I've gotten over other phobias, I can probably get over my dating phobia, too. I can't believe how many people from Worldwide have problems. The more I think about it, the more I realize that we were damaged and hurt from our experience, and our shared disappointment in love points to our shared experience in a "church" that never bothered to teach us that we were worthy of love, and that God said we are worthy of love. God is love--so how can a church who claims to preach God's word leave out the message about love? I knew the three Greek words for love long before I studied Greek in college, but I didn't really learn much about it. All of the Worldwide kids I know have had real struggles with this topic, and I've tried to unsnarl all the reasons behind it, but I just get more confused about it than before. We're all out, but a part of us is still back there, struggling with hang-ups God never wanted us to have. We can eat pork and put up Christmas lights and go out every Friday night if we want, but we still can't date. That's powerful control.

I've clicked through many pages in your site and I've found it inspiring--it's good to hear other people speak out. It's encouraging to know that other people are getting through what I'm getting through and they're willing to talk about it.

By Renae - Child Survivor of WCG
November 4, 2002

Note from ESN: It is very common for child survivors to have many problems with trust and to not comprehend what real love is, nor to recognize the difference between a healthy relationship and an unhealthy one. This is due to the programming that was placed in their minds at a young age. After exiting, these lies need to be rooted out and replaced with the truth.

Footnote by ESN:

1 Worldwide Church of God (which was never a "church") is indeed to blame for these types of problems. But survivors were taught to blame themselves instead of holding the perpetrators responsible.

For Child Survivors Who Feel Hopeless and Discouraged Regarding Love

Understanding Mind Control and Exploitive Groups

Articles For Those Who Were Emotionally and Spiritually Abused

Back to Stories and Testimonies From Child Survivors