Love Lives - How being a Jehovah’s Witness shapes your views on sex and dating, with Jodie Chapman

Episode Date: April 23, 2021

Support Millennial Love with a donation today: https://supporter.acast.com/millennialloveThis week, Olivia is joined by author Jodie Chapman to discuss how being a Jehovah’s Witness shapes your views on sex and dating.Jodie has just published her first book, a novel called Another Life, which tells the story of Nick and Anna, who meet when they’re young one summer and working at the same cinema. Nick and Anna come from two very different backgrounds, as we soon discover, with Anna having been raised as a Jehovah’s Witness, as Jodie was.On the show, Jodie speaks about leaving the faith as an adult and the many ways that her upbringing as a Witness shaped the way she thought about sex and relationships.The duo also talk about celibacy, how religion can act as a barrier in relationships, and misconceptions around Doomsday religions.Follow the show on Instagram at @millennial_loveSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/millenniallove. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This Giving Tuesday, the Center for Addiction and Mental Health is on a mission to make better mental health care for all a reality, and we've made incredible strides forward, breaking down stigma, improving access to care, and pioneering research breakthroughs. But now is the time to aim even higher. Together, we can create a world where no one is left behind. Donate at CAMH.ca from November 25th to December 3rd and your gift will be doubled for twice the impact. Hello and welcome to Millennial Love, a podcast from The Independent on everything to do with love, sexuality, identity, and more. This week, I'm thrilled to be joined by author Jodie Chapman. Jodie's debut novel, Another Life, tells the story of Nick and Anna, who meet when they're young one summer and working at the same

cinema. The thing is, Nick and Anna come from two very different backgrounds, as we soon discover. Anna is a Jehovah's Witness, as Jodie was. In this episode, Jodie spoke to me about how her own childhood influenced the plot of her novel novel and how her religious upbringing shaped the way she thought about sex and relationships. We also spoke about celibacy, how religion can act as a barrier in relationships and misconceptions around doomsday religions. Enjoy the show. Hi, Jodie. How are you? Hi, I'm good. Thanks, Olivia. how are you hi I'm good thanks Olivia how are you I'm good thank you thank you so much for coming on the show I'm so excited to talk to you I haven't actually spoken to anyone on the show about a novel for a long time um so it's a real treat we normally have people coming on talking about like memoirs and stuff but this is why I think your book is so interesting, because obviously it's heavily influenced by your own experiences, isn't it?

Absolutely. The book Another Life, it's a love story. It is marketed as a love story. But it's very much a story about love in general. And it explores romantic love but it also explores the bond between siblings and the bond between parent and child and the bond between husbands of wives themselves and the character of Anna she belongs to what you know I'll use shorthand a doomsday religion which is never actually named in the novel but it is heavily influenced by my own upbringing as a Jehovah's Witness and that is a faith that I was born into and I was in all my life until when I started having children when I was 29, 30, the doubts that I had always had sort of started coming back to the forefront of my mind. And I felt I had to engage with those in a way.

But the religion in the book, I never named the religion in the book out of respect to my family who are still active members of the faith. But it was such a, it's such an interesting, members of the faith um but it was such a it's such an interesting um I had a lot to draw on in my own experience of growing up because it is it is a faith that you can't step out of you can't include people who are outside the community in your life to any kind of meaningful extent really um so there's a lot of conflict there that I always thought would make a good novel so even though I mean the relationship in it is fictional

um but I have drawn on the conflict that I felt growing up as an unbeliever as a believer where I would have feelings for unbelievers. I want to I want to start off by talking a bit about your upbringing then because I think in order for listeners to understand the context within which the novel how it impacted your kind of day-to-day life when you were growing up so Jehovah's Witnesses are a religion that believe they're a Christian religion and they believe that any day the end of the world is coming and they have felt that that has been the narrative ever since the religion first came about in the late 1800s and they believe that the end of the world will come any day and the only Jehovah's Witnesses will pass through Armageddon which is the the judgment day everyone else

who has not listened to the message and has not become a witness will be destroyed. And this is something that they take extremely seriously. And the ministry, which is where you go from door to door and you knock on strangers doors and you preach to them this message is a huge part of the life of a witness. So I grew up with ministry being something I did every single weekend of my life. So my parents would take me from door to door. And we would spend an hour on a Saturday morning, preaching to people in the hope of getting them to listen to the message and ultimately save their life. Because obviously it's something that you're doing every single weekend, it forms such a huge part of your life that you have to, the faith, it's there every single day.

I mean, you pray before meals, you pray before bedtime, you have three meetings a week. When I was a child, you had three meetings a week when you were when I was a child you had three meetings a week you went to which was a Sunday morning a Tuesday evening and a Thursday evening and you would go to the local kingdom hall which is what witnesses call a church and you would listen to different talks and you would get advice there about how to overcome conversation stoppers how to keep people's interest mean, there was a lot of great training, to be honest, in terms of public speaking at these meetings. But the the narrative was always the end of the world is coming any day. And so that has such a huge effect on your life when you're growing up because it affects every decision. So education, you get the most basic level of education and that's meant to be it

you are not supposed to go to university is extremely frowned upon if you go to university and parents of people who do go to university would be spoken to within the congregation you know why why are you allowing your child to do this the end of the world is coming any day what is the point of seeking a career for ourselves when really our lives should be all about the message? This might sound like a daft question, but presumably if the education level was so basic, was there any degree of education about sex and relationships at all? I mean, sex ed within the general sector is already pretty lavish. I mean, sex ed within the general sector is already pretty lavish. It's only just been updated.

But I wonder if that was ever spoken about at all, or was it? How did that message come across? It was, but it was something that you were spoken about very freely from the platform at the Kingdom Hall at the meetings. So you would grow up, you'd be there with your parents as a family in the audience and you'd be listening. And they would always be talking about sex in terms of how um there's no premarital sex so you cannot have sex before marriage and you know they would frown upon masturbation homosexuality was absolutely unacceptable that's considered um evil and very much wrong um you know that when I say that it wouldn't it wouldn't be that they

would feel they wouldn't be hateful towards people who were gay um in the sense that you know for example the Westboro Baptist Church in America who pick it you know there would be none of that the Louis Theroux documentary that yeah there's there's none of there's none of that it's not hateful in that sense but it's absolutely unacceptable it's just flat out not allowed um so there would you'd go so there wouldn't be any kind of there wouldn't be any sunday school you would be there in the meeting and you just listen to things being spoken about and it you know it would be they would talk about sex and relationships in that way but it was very much fundamentalist so it followed the bible in terms of you had to be a virgin when you got married um you also you could not marry an unbeliever because god frowns

upon the yoking together of two people who are not of the same faith i mean you could marry an unbeliever but it would be frowned upon but you absolutely could not live with someone for example before you got married you have to get married so a lot of people get married young um and they would they would always you know I remember being a child it sounds so strange now that I'm not an active member of that community um and now I'm raising my own children it it blows my mind sometimes when I think about what I was told, I was always told that I would never grow up in this system, I would, by the time I was a grown-up, we would be in paradise, Armageddon would have come, we would have passed through

into paradise, I would never finish school, this is what the adults used to tell me, there was always in the back of my mind something like, okay, well, I when I see it I was quite a gobby kid and I would always you know second guess things and ask questions and I'd ask too many questions sometimes but it's really interesting you're you're taught the answers before you're old enough to start asking the questions so all these things I just absorbed because these are the things that the people that I loved most in the world were telling me. You know, you don't go to university, you don't seek a career and material aspirations for yourself because that's just that's selfish. That's what independent, worldly people do. Anyone who's not part of the community is worldly, a worldly person. There's a very specific lingo that you have when you're a witness

you talk about yourself and everyone else who's a believer as being in the truth so every single day you're constantly reaffirming to yourself that you are part of God's chosen people and that you are part of the truth and if you you know if you're telling someone a story and you say oh they screwed me over or something and then go well they're a worldly person aren't they that's what worldly people do they screw each other over so there was always this very very strong emphasis on how unbelievers will ultimately that they do not have your best interests at heart those friends at school they're not your really your friends they don't actually care about you the people within your bubble I mean they don't use the word bubble but the people within the truth is how they call it those are the people

who are really there for you and I grew up absorbing that sort of thinking it was very prevalent every single day you know there were I would look the same on the outside you know you would look at me and not think that there was anything different about me we look the same on the outside you know you would look at me and not think that there was anything different about me we dress the same as everyone else you know we go to school we go to work we have normal lives um but inside it is very different yeah and I think that's um the interesting parallel with Anna isn't it it's like from the outside you know you would never know she just looks like a normal girl who works in a cinema when, when Nick meets her. So I want to talk a bit about the dynamics in your household and how this

kind of influenced the way that you thought about love. You mentioned that you were like a gobby child. So when you, when you grew up and you started to become a teenager, like how much of, how much of things did you start to question? You know, you wrote in a piece recently about the dynamics in your household being very much like dictated by this idea of patriarchy. Did you did you kind of just go along with all of that? Was there a part of you that was resisting? And I suppose particularly when it came to dating, because because you do date as a teenager.

Right. And there's no sex before marriage, but you do date as a teenager right and there's no sex before marriage but you still date you you date witnesses hate the word date because they see that as a worldly word because to date is a very casual term um when actually you do not even entertain the idea of being in a relationship with someone until you are in a position where you are ready for marriage and so if you're 15 16 there's no dating then because you're not allowed to get married. When you're at school, you don't have a job. You can't afford a house for yourself. You know, you cannot go out with anyone. So it's very it's very firm about things like that. So before you get before you get married married you have to be in a certain position so before you even start thinking about going out with someone you have to be in a position

where you're relatively self-sufficient and you could you know look after each other um I I did always question it I always found um I went I've always questioned patriarchy I've never completely accepted it um because you know I I very much I love my parents very deeply. They had a very traditional gender roles. I think part of that is also the generation that they were. It was it was much more normal back then for there to be these very clearly delineated roles within the household. roles within the household um but I grew up always questioning it never never I think because my personality as well as I'm more like my dad who is who says what he thinks and he's quite outspoken and my mom is very silent anyway she's naturally she's a very quiet person and I'm I I'm definitely more like my dad than I am my mom So I would struggle with that because within their dynamics,

I would struggle to see how I could ever be like my mum because I naturally wasn't meek and submissive, which is very much how women are meant to be within the faith. And that's talked about a lot in the literature, in the talks that you listen to at Kingdom Halls. Whenever they're talking about the role of the husband and the wife the husband is the one that makes the decision always and the woman is meek and submissive she does not question her husband's authority even if you know they would say things like even where the woman even where the wife perhaps is more intelligent than the husband

she does not she knows that her god-given place is to just support him anyway even if he does something that she doesn't agree with and I I always struggled with that I because it just did not come naturally to me at the same time I desperately there was a part of me that desperately wanted to be like that because it was all I'd ever known and it was it's so much easier to fit in if you're able to just do those things naturally um so I always had this conflict within myself and that Anna is fictional I mean she it would be ridiculous for me to say she's absolutely not me because of course there's elements of my experience in there but I I deliberately didn't write from her perspective because I didn't want it to be autobiographical um but I did always

have that conflict where I would question these things and I would say but that doesn't feel right to me and I don't agree with that but at the same time I would be like oh why can't I just be why can't I just be like that why can't I just be quiet and just you know get along with it um so that was always something that I had within myself but there would be certain things I would question like for example women can wear trousers but they can't wear the trousers. They can't wear the trousers, literally and figuratively. They can't wear trousers to meetings and they can't wear trousers on the ministry when they're knocking on doors. They have to wear a dress or a skirt. And I would always be like, where does it say this in the Bible?

Every single rule I want to see in the Bible, because if that's how we have to live our lives you can't be adding extra rules in because otherwise how is that fair like anyone could then come up with a rule and everyone else has to obey it that's not right um but my but that questioning is not encouraged within the faith you are not encouraged to be questioning I think that's partly why university is discouraged because it teaches you to think for yourself and it teaches you to look all the at all the evidence and ultimately you're meant to just kind of follow the pattern of everyone who's come before you and not question things to question things is a you know who do you think you are getting getting above your station yeah god it's so it's really fascinating um you, you know, I think myself included, it's something that so few people really know that much about, I think, apart from like you mentioned Westboro Church, like those really extreme examples where it's like you just you think well why the book will be so fascinating to so many people because it just and again I like that you write from Nick's perspective because I think

it lends itself to the story to see Anna as like an outsider like that's kind of the way that it sets itself up but then as it goes along it's kind of it becomes a little bit more integrated. So you mentioned that people within your community get married very young um I know you got married when you were 21 so talk to me a bit about that how did you meet your husband and was that presumably that was the first relationship you were in and I guess you know you mentioned that no one really dates because the view is always to be in a relationship but like is there a period of of sort of just seeing if you guys can you know get along to get enough to get married like how quick is that process? Um yeah I mean it's different for different people like I got married at 21 which in the eyes of

quote-unquote worldly people is very young but within the faith itself it's not that's just totally normal age you know I knew 17 year olds 18 year olds who got married um so to me it was it was not especially it was not especially young and I think that's the thing isn't it you you you compare yourself with people that you know and what's what's known within your community so um I mean my husband and I we met when I was about 19 and you're not allowed to date in the sense that you can't go out on dates on your own so you're not meant to go out unchaperoned so you're meant to get to know each other within groups so you get together within groups of friends and you get you know you get one-on-one within a group scenario so that you're

not ever so that you're not ever tempted um and we we didn't always we didn't always stick to that to be honest um we we got to know each other through mutual friends but there were on occasions uh times where we would just go out on our own we went to the cinema which was also a no-no you're not meant to go to cinema because even though you're in public you know it's a dark space what's gonna go on and I remember we had to see the film Cold Mountain and we walked in as the trailers had started and it was like really busy bit really busy screening and I could see some seats at the back sort of kind of in the corner and I was like oh let's go up there so of course it's all dark the trailers are playing and we go up and we you know have to excuse me sorry we're just gonna get through there you know people are

like moving themselves and anyway in the row that we're pushing past are two elders from the hall and the elders are the group of men that are like in charge of things and and we had to like push past them to get to our seats and I just remember remember us just like laughing, like, oh my goodness, we're going to be in such big trouble because we're here at the cinema on our own. I mean, talking about it now, we were both like 20. It's crazy. It's so crazy. But it is that thing where that's how it goes in that community and you don't step out of that.

So we got to know each other um we got to know each other when friends were around we had a we had a big we had a big um group of mutual friends um so we went out for about two years two and a half years and then before we got married so which is actually quite a long time within that community to get to know each other. It's totally standard. And bearing in mind, we're not living with each other here. And so there's only a certain amount you still know each other. You don't actually know what the other person is like in terms of living with that person and seeing what they're like when the shutters are down and they're not on their best behavior all the time. they're not on their best behavior all the time but yeah the living together thing is really interesting because I've seen a lot of conversations generally about people talking about couples who move in together only after they got married I think it's like it's like a modern trend where

people actually just aren't living together until they do get married um but I I agree with you I think it makes I mean personally I'm I feel like you know there are too many surprises if you just move in with someone totally totally well actually that that first year that my husband and I were married like I would not want to repeat that for anything because because we'd never even lived away from our parents before we had no experience of being independent and and all of a sudden we're we're we're trying to deal with that like learning how you navigate life like buying your own food at a supermarket and paying your council tax and at the same time also getting to know each other on a day-in day-out basis and it's just oh my goodness it's so crazy yeah I mean you just you have to like get to know each other on a completely different level it's it just to me it's like you know it's it's a risk you know it sounds I suppose it sounds kind of chic in a way to be like oh yeah we're just

going to move in together now once we're married and it's all going to be you know glamorous and lovely but it's like really is it um so I know that having children of your own was like quite a big game changer for you in terms of the way that you viewed your life as a witness you have three sons now right that's right so yeah so what was it what was it about having your children that kind of triggered that change and perception for you so I always had doubts about it um when I say doubts I mean there were always there were always things that I thought I don't quite know about that or that doesn't sound right to me for example like the ban on on women wearing trousers and there were just certain little things that I justified to myself and just thought well that these things are bound to happen it's not going to be perfect it's not they're not going to have got everything

right because it's it is a man-made thing as well they're trying to do their best but of course there's going to be things that they don't quite get right but that will be sorted out one day you know when Armageddon comes and God restores the earth as to how it needs to be all these things will be sorted out so there's going to be quibbles but it was nothing big enough to rock the boat and but there were always certain things that I just didn't understand certain parts of the doctrine and I would really try like I would ask the elders within the congregation questions about the doctrines in an attempt to understand it because I just didn't see the proof in the bible for some of the beliefs and I really wanted to believe it I really wanted to prove it to myself

because as I said before about you know wanting to play that role it's so much easier if you can just believe what you're told it's so much easier if you can just go along with that because because the faith is so insular and I have a huge amount of respect for the faith still and all my family my friends who are still in it many of whom I no longer have anything to do with um I still have huge amount of love for them and respect for them so I don't never mean any disrespect to them or the community when I talk about it I'm just very much aware it's my experience and I think it's important that I'm able to own my experience and talk about it without them necessarily taking it personally as me dissing them um but having children just completely

changed my mindset because for years I just coasted along because it was the easy thing to do because what's the alternative I leave my entire community I leave all my family and all my friends who are witnesses I leave everything I've ever known and I essentially start again I mean that I'm quite a I'm quite an assertive person but even that for me was a bit like I don't know if I can if I can face that but then when I started having children that changed everything because all of a sudden I couldn't coast along anymore I was now responsible for teaching them how to live and it's not the kind of faith it's not the kind of you know certain Anglican faiths I think give you a lot of freedom in the sense that

you can live your life Monday to Saturday however you want and then you go to church on a Sunday and that is the extent of it and it's not a faith like that as I said before it's all consuming there is a rule whether official or unofficial for every aspect of your life from what color you dye your hair you know if you dyed your hair pink or blue you'd be spoken to that wouldn't be allowed because if you're going on the ministry knocking on people's doors you're presenting yourself you're presenting God's message you have to have natural hair color you know you can't wear certain things you can't do certain jobs so I wanted to be a film critic when I was younger I was talked out of that because I'd

have to watch films with sex and violence in which would be very inappropriate and you know your education the things you do for entertainment everything you can't really do a gap year because you'd be away from meetings and ministry for a whole year and why would you do that when the end of the world is coming and you need to be preaching the message and I just realized that having children I would have to bring them up in this way of life where I'm not allowed to pick and choose the rules that I follow you can't do that it's just flat out not allowed so I would have to for example um there's a rule on birthdays you're not allowed to celebrate your birthday so witnesses don't celebrate most

celebrations that that regular people celebrate they don't do Christmas Easter Valentine's Day bonfire night Halloween um or birthdays the only thing you can really celebrate is your wedding anniversary, which I always thought was a shame if you're single and you're not married, you don't get to celebrate anything, basically. And also an anniversary, to me, is the same as a birthday, you're commemorating the year since something happened. And I never understood the ban on birthdays, that never made sense to me. I always found the reasoning extremely flimsy. But I couldn't openly celebrate birthdays. And I didn't care about extremely flimsy but I couldn't openly celebrate birthdays and I didn't care about celebrating my birthday because I never had done so I couldn't miss what I'd never known

but I felt that with my children they would go to school and I would have to every September I'd have to go in and I have three kids so I'd have to do this with three different teachers every single year explain to them why they don't do birthdays why if children bring in sweets and treats because it's their birthday and they want to share them with their school friends my children can't have them my children can't write mother's day cards father's day cards they can't do anything Christmas related anything Easter related and some of these celebrations I agreed with why if you believed in the bible you couldn't celebrate but a lot of them I didn't and I just thought I would have to explain this talking as if I absolutely believe this. And I thought, I don't know what I believe. I have huge doubts and I still don't know what I think about meaning of life and God and all that.

And I thought I can't ban things from my children's life unless I completely agree with the ban. It's not my right to do that. And the fact that I have these doubts about this way of life would make it even worse, because in a way, I just saw it as a type of abuse of my role as a parent from my fear of stepping outside my community and questioning things would be preventing me from doing my job as a parent so it was very strange how as soon as I thought about it like that the decision was made for me I just thought well Jodie you have no choice now you have to step away from this because it's not about you anymore you don't get to just and it's funny this had always been my fear about having children. And for quite a lot of my twenties, I never wanted kids was because the thought of being so responsible for someone else and unable to just live my life, how I saw it terrified me. And now I had my children who I adored and who I love more than anything in the world I had to I had to do what was right for them

and I thought even if we kind of sit on the fringes of the faith and we go along and we have the community and we have our friends and our family and we you know we're kind of not massively in it I still couldn't celebrate birthdays I still couldn't do little things like that and I decided that it was although couldn't do little things like that. And I decided that it was, although they're silly little things, also for me to turn these things down, there needs to be a valid reason. Otherwise I'm lying to myself. I'm lying to my children. If God is there, I'm lying to God. And I'm lying to all my family and friends. So in the end, I felt I had no choice but to step away. research breakthroughs. But now is the time to aim even higher. Together, we can create a world where no one is left behind. Donate at CAMH.ca from November 25th to December 3rd, and your

gift will be doubled for twice the impact. Where can I get help hiring people with disabilities? There are hundreds of thousands of Canadians with disabilities who are ready to work, and many local organizations are available to help you find qualified candidates and make your workplace more accessible and inclusive. Visit Canada.ca slash right here to connect with one near you today. A message from the Government of Canada. It makes so much sense that it was when you had children that that kind of became the point when you decided that because I think so many people when they go through something as a child, you know, something that doesn't feel quite right with them, whether it's, you know, a religious belief or, you know, maybe you see the way that you're you don't like the way that

you're being parented or something I feel like whenever that person then has their own children if they do you see it as a kind of opportunity to like rectify it in a way and it's like taking control of it I mean I don't have kids so I'm just talking hypothetically but that is what I'm kind of understanding from what you're saying it definitely is and I think I just wanted my children to have freedom I wanted them not necessarily to do all of those things that they that I couldn't do and that if I stayed in the faith they couldn't do because some of the things you know just because I'm no longer an active member of that religion it doesn't mean that I've embraced every custom that was banned to me before that's been the wonderful thing now is that I'm living consciously I'm not just on

autopilot and I can pick and choose the things that I want to practice both within my family and within my home but the important thing to me is that my children have choice that they are raised with the ability to question things and that that's okay that it's okay to change your mind when you are presented with new evidence that that is actually the wonderful thing about being a human being that we have this conscious thought and that the decision that we made when we were a child we don't have to stick to that if actually our instinct and our gut is telling us no you need to listen to something else now it would be wrong to disregard that evidence and that those new instincts just to make everyone else's life i.e your family and

your friends just to make everyone else's life easier i.e. your family and your friends, just to make everyone else's life easier. I just think that that would be what kind of example would I be setting to my children if I lived my life in fear and was half living that life, if that makes sense, not fully embracing it. What kind of a life is that to live where you're not actually fully embracing the life that you have? How old are your sons now? So my eldest is eight and my second son is six and my youngest son is about to turn three. OK, so they're too young to be talking about sex and relationships too but I want to ask if that is something that you have thought about at all and how you will broach that subject with them when they do get to that age where they start

dating you know have you based on your own upbringing have you given that some consideration I have and I've actually I've told my eight-year-old um you know how babies are made I've already I've told him that because I don't want him I don't think it's right for the responsibility of that education to be at the mercy of his school friends I don't want him to find that information out from his school friends and now with you know how rampant porn is now I I think, I mean, I don't, having three sons, I don't want them to find out what sex is through porn because that's not really what sex is.

It's so performative and I'm not here to dis porn, but I do think that the easy availability of it in our culture now, I don't agree with that at all I think it I think that is fundamentally wrong that children are able to access these things and I don't want my children you know it would be ridiculous and naive of me to think that my sons are never going to see that because of course they will but I need I know that I need to get in there first so even separate from the aspect of religion and how I was brought up I think the time that children are growing up now is is far different to when I was a kid in the 80s and the 90s and it's it's my responsibility to react to that so I've already told him how

babies are made you know and I use I use the the technical words for the genitalia and just, just talking about it very matter of fact. And I'm not at all like, Ooh, you know, this, this way that people do with sex. Sometimes I think if you're in a very religious household, sometimes you just don't talk about it at all. And I don't want to be like that. I want to be a very open house. And I want to talk about these things with my sons and I'm sure they'll find it embarrassing talking about these things with their mum as they get older but I'm starting right now to talk about these things so that it's just normal I don't want anything to be taboo in my family of where they say I can't talk about that I want it to be open and honest

and then as they get older you know I've already made the decision for example that my that my boys aren't going to have iPhones. So when they go to school, they'll have a phone, but it will be very basic and they're not going to have access to Internet. And of course, they're going to be shown things by their school friends. But that's fine. You know, but as long as I'm I'm making sure that they're they're not addicted to their screens, because who knows what they're learning and absorbing through that way um you know so I suppose I am still going to be I do still think I'm going to be quite a strict parent in the sense that maybe a lot of parents in a religious upbringing have as well but I would rather I think as long as I go through it with the ethos of we can talk about everything then

that's fine and that that's the other thing is you know if my if my sons turn out to be gay I wouldn't have wanted to have raised them in an environment that would basically be shutting down that part of them and say no that's not acceptable um I I just don't I don't want that. I want my children to just grow up with the freedom really to think for themselves. And of course, I'm there as their parent, guiding them at the moment and telling them how I think the best way to live is. But ultimately, whenever they ask me questions about things, because they ask me questions all the time, they're both at that stage now, the older ones, I'm always I say what I think, and I say, well, what do you think? So that we're all talking about our opinions, and that we're all giving our

opinions, you know, just because I feel like this doesn't mean you have to feel like it, you can feel a different way. Because I never had that. And that's, that's not particular to my parents at all, or even the religion, I think that was quite normal for that generation as well. You do as you told, don't question things but also because I grew up within that faith where I was told the answers before I could ask the questions and so if I asked the questions it was like well you know this answer already why are you asking this question and I think questions were a really valid thing yeah I agree also I think it's interesting what you're saying about sex because you know what I think you're right I

think regardless of whether you grew up in a religious or conservative household families just don't talk about sex or at least they didn't I think now it's it's different um I think social media has really uh normalized the idea of talking about these things um at home but you know if god I mean I came from a very liberal family my family never spoke to me about sex ever the first time i learned about sex was again like from friends and it's stuff that people stories that people tell you and it's or it's you know putting a condom on a banana at school i think it's um yeah i think just talking openly about these things could solve a lot of problems just talking openly about these things could solve a lot of problems absolutely now we've got a bit of a deeper understanding about uh life as a witness I want to return to the book and the

relationship between Anna and Nick so what so just would you mind explaining a bit about um so we know a bit about Anna's background obviously but talk to me a bit about Nick and the kind of contrast between their two upbringings and and whether a relationship like that would be possible um and what the reaction to that would be like in real life within the faith yeah yeah um so so with Nick I wanted to, so he comes from a place of deep-seated trauma. And in the book, it goes into what happened to him when he was a child and how these very emotionally traumatic events shaped him as a person. And so a main part of Anna and Nick's relationship is that there isn't really a relationship because they're never properly able to voice what they think and how they feel about each other they're

always waiting for the other person to make the first move which I think is quite I think that's quite true to life I think for a lot of people um but from Anna's perspective this is obviously because of the faith that she's within and she knows that she's having feelings for an unbeliever which she really can't do and so although she's quite a forthright person that is what holds her back for Nick what holds him back is his trauma and he's never actually had somebody there who has been able to show him how to talk how to talk about his feelings how to deal with his trauma in the first place so I was interested in that from how these two people who come from very different lives and are actually two very different types of people fundamentally still have the same problem. They're unable to really voice how they feel. That relationship just would not have been allowed it's not allowed within the witness

community so as a witness you go to school and you go to work but you do not associate with what they call worldly people so you after work after school you go straight home you don't socialize you keep contact to an absolute bare minimum because your world really is everything within the faith and everything outside of it is you just don't go there. So Anna in the book is sort of pushing at these boundaries as she's getting to know Nick and having this kind of relationship with him. of relationship with him and she's there is a scene where he because he comes from a family life that wasn't particularly happy he is naturally averse to the idea of marriage and of having children and anything that's that kind of reeks of that sort of traditional role gender roles relationships really and for Anna of course within her faith that she has no choice if she stays within her faith it has to meet this traditional pattern and so for her he says that

he never wants to get married so she kind of knows that the relationship ultimately is never going to go anywhere and of course they're both incredibly young I mean she's like 19 and he's in his early 20s so to him it's like why are we even talking about this anyway we're both so young but to her it's like I have no other choice um so within the faith if you had a relationship with an unbeliever you would it would be very frowned upon and you would most likely be what's called marked which is where um at the kingdom hall there would be what's called marked, which is where at the Kingdom Hall, there would be what's called a marking talk where they would talk about a topic. So for example, if this was going on in the congregation, they would give a talk about how witnesses should not

have relationships with unbelievers. That is the wrong thing to do. The Bible says this, that you should be not yoked unevenly with unbelievers and so this is not allowed and although they wouldn't say the person's name within the talk who was guilty of this it would sort of be known who the person was and by giving this talk you're ultimately marking that person which means that people within the congregation should limit their contact with that person so someone could be in the religion and going to the meetings and only know these people within the faith but these people will draw away from them all the while that they are entertaining the idea of having a relationship with an unbeliever it's only if they were to end

that relationship that everyone within the faith would allow them to socialise with them again. So there was a you know, there is a very kind of tight system of control within that. So that relationship could happen, but they would absolutely have to get married. There could be no living together, no premarital sex, like absolutely not. And presumably, would Nick have to convert and become a witness and practice that um not necessarily um they could still get married it would still be very frowned upon and witnesses witness friends would be spoken to if they thought about going to the wedding for example because they would be showing their support for it by going to the wedding so it would most likely be a very quiet affair um you know they'd

just go to a registry office or something there wouldn't be a big party um and then ultimately the unbeliever it would always be encouraged that they should come along to meetings and have a bible study and ultimately become a witness and that that, that has happened. So I, so growing up, there were always stories of, of this happening that people would then come into what they called the truth later by studying. But also there were often, and it was usually if there was a couple who were married in this way, where one believed and one didn't, it would usually be the woman who was the believer and the man would be the unbeliever um it would it would be rare or much less frequent that it would be the other way around

I want to ask you a bit more generally about um how religion kind of influences relationships because we we have spoken about this a bit on the podcast before but I think you know a lot of the things you're talking about can be applied to people who are raised with any set of beliefs any religion you know I think for example I mentioned this before we started recording but like my family is Jewish and there was very much this kind of like unspoken uh promise that you know you marry a Jewish person obviously that that often hasn't happened in my family but that's kind of the expectation so it's like it's like you said it's like frowned upon um so when it comes to kind of navigating that do you have any do you have any advice for people who are kind of overcoming those cultural

hurdles and overcoming family disapproval of the person who they're in love with because that can obviously be an incredibly traumatizing experience because then you feel like you have to choose between your partner or your family yeah I mean I I find I find myself completely unqualified to give any kind of actual advice um but I mean for me stepping away from my community because of listening to how I how I really felt about things has been without a doubt you know one of well the hardest thing I've ever done um it's it's been extremely traumatic because it's not a faith that you can just really leave and still keep hold of all the relationships that you have with people inside of it um and so I have family and friends who have completely cut me off

and no longer have anything to do with me so I kind of feel that giving advice is something I just couldn't do because I think it's so personal and I know many witnesses for example and I'm sure it's the same with many religions who are within the faith who necessarily probably don't actually believe it or don't completely believe it have strong doubts but because it's so hard to leave and keep hold of the love of the people that you love that they just stay within it and they just ignore those doubts and they just stay quiet about it. So I don't judge those people at all, even though I've made the step of of stepping out. I don't think any less of those people because I know how hard it is. And I think that overcoming family disapproval is a very easy thing to talk about if you don't have experience of it.

But if you do, it's it's just so it's so personal I think for me all I can do is talk about my experience which is I'm glad I listened to my doubts because I feel that I'm now living life consciously in a way that I didn't and that the decisions that I make now I I give a lot more thought to them because I'm not constantly on autopilot and I'm always thinking about what I believe and what I think about a certain subject and if I feel like I'm in a way um without this sounding really disrespectful to my previous community I feel like I'm living life strangely for the first time because as a witness your life right now doesn't matter the life you will have a mortal life on a paradise earth after Armageddon that's the life you care

about and because I now no longer cling to that belief because I'm not sure of what I believe I'm embracing this life more and it feels it feels wonderful to be honest it feels it feels absolutely wonderful to be seeing things for the first time in a new way it feels it feels like the Truman Show without sounding really cheesy it fit I watched that again recently and it really struck me it was really emotional watching it because you have you have a choice you know if you've seen the film spoiler alert but if you've if you've seen the film Truman's standing on that staircase and he's he's touching the studio wall and he's got the film director the TV director Christoph talking to him and saying look stay you know you're not going to get hurt here we're going to look out for you you're fine you know he's he's saying even though

you know this isn't real just stay and you will have a better life and Truman ultimately walks out the door because he would rather find out for himself even if he does get hurt he would rather find out for himself what is truth what feels real to him what feels honest and that's very much how I feel I miss all of those people that I left behind and I wish I could still be with them but this is ultimately my life and just as I would never tell them how to live I can't tell my children how to live I can't it has to be our own individual decisions so I think I would say to someone in that situation you have to listen to your gut and listen to your instinct and try and trust that and hopefully the love that you have with your family and your friends will be stronger than the fear will be stronger than

what society thinks of you I mean that that's what you will always hope for your family, isn't it? That their love goes deeper than society. I think that's such a powerful metaphor and comparison to make for Truman Show. Cause like, you know, I think most people have seen that film and it's like, you immediately get it for people who might be feeling like they don't really

they can't relate but I think that is such a powerful way of putting it into perspective um it's time for our lessons in love segment so this is the part of the show where I ask every guest to share something they've learned from their previous relationship experiences Jodie what is your lesson in love do you have any new lessons to share um I would say what would I say I mean listen to your gut and instinct is definitely one but also I think for me what I have learned through relationships is that one of the most important things when you go into a relationship and the success of any relationship is that your expectations are the same so for you and the other person that you both have the same

expectations of what you want in terms of how you live your relationship or how you live your life I think fundamentally disappointment happens and relationships ultimately fail a lot of the time if one person has wildly different expectations to the other person I think if you can find a way to make sure that your expectations match personally I think that that is half the battle yeah that's so true I think that could be applied to anything as well because it could be something as big as you know whether or not you want children to something's like you know where do you want to live you know I think if you're not aligned on those things you need to you need to find out soon rather than get too deep in you know that you always have like a a meeting and be like right check check as unromantic as that sounds

I think that would probably eliminate a lot of pain for a lot of couples I think so and actually one thing I would add to that is I watched um a school of life a school of life uh youtube video I can't remember the guy who does it Alan someone Alan that's it yeah he's brilliant yeah he's got such a great voice and one thing he said which I thought was brilliant in terms of having a relationship with someone else is thinking of your partner as like a pie and dividing them up into different segments think of your ideal partner and all the different segments you know it could be a sense of humor it could be being kind all of these kind of things and think think to yourself you're never going to get someone that's a complete pie you're never going to meet

that person so really think about the segments of the pie that's a complete pie you're never going to meet that person so really think about the segments of the pie that are most important to you what are the parts that you are not willing to compromise on and then use that as a way of testing whether someone would actually be your ideal partner whether or not they have those essential segments I was when I watched that video I was like wow that's brilliant that could just solve so many problems oh my god I love that video, I was like, wow, that's brilliant. That could just solve so many problems. Oh my God, I love that. To incomplete pies. That's it for today.

Thank you so much for listening. If you're a new listener to this show, you can subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Acast or anywhere else. You can comment and leave us a rating too so that more people can find us. Keep up to date with everything to do with the show on Instagram. Just search Millennial Love.

See you soon. This Giving Tuesday, the Center for Addiction and Mental Health is on a mission to make better mental health care for all a reality. And we've made incredible strides forward, breaking down stigma, improving access to care, and pioneering research breakthroughs. But now is the time to aim even higher. Together, we can create a world where no one is left behind. Donate at CAMH.ca from November 25th to December 3rd, and your gift will be doubled for twice the impact.