Postmormon Postmortem

Jess and Hannah
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Mormonism gave you a complete universe — with charts, diagrams, & a plan for everything. Leaving dismantles all of it at once. Postmormon Postmortem is hosted by Jess and Hannah, two women who left the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints & didn't find nearly enough people talking honestly about what that actually takes. We cover Mormon doctrine & the damage it does, Mormon true crime, the nervous system science of religious trauma, and the messy road to recovery. Whether you're freshly out, years removed, or just trying to understand someone you love — you're in the right place.

  1. -1 ДН.

    Leaving Mormonism – Why People Leave, What Happens to Families, and What Life Actually Looks Like on the Other Side

    A Mormon faith crisis is rarely a sudden decision. It's a gradual process of discovering information the church knew and didn't share — inside a system engineered to make every question feel like a moral failure. A Mormon faith crisis is rarely sudden. It's discovering information the church knew and withheld — inside a system that makes every question feel like a moral failure.   Common triggers: the full scope of Joseph Smith's polygamy; the DNA evidence against the Book of Mormon; the Book of Abraham papyri identified as a common funeral text; the November 2015 LGBTQ policy and its 41-month reversal; the $150 billion investment portfolio. Hannah walks through Dr. Marlene Winnell's five recovery phases from Leaving the Fold — Separation, Confusion, Avoidance, Intense Mixed Feelings, and Rebuilding — nonlinear, always beginning before the previous phases are complete. In Mormon culture you don't just lose a religion. You lose your community, your identity, and a cosmology with charts and diagrams for planetary rulership. Life on the other side: you get your Sundays back, your 10% back, and eventually — the question "what do I want?" For many, that question is revolutionary.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    1 ч. 11 мин.

  2. -2 ДН.

    David Archuleta Did Everything the LDS Church Asked. It Almost Killed Him.

    You were taught that your resistance was the problem. David Archuleta did everything the church asked — for thirty years. This is what that actually looks like from the inside. Jess and Hannah use David Archuleta's memoir Devout as a case study in what the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints produces — not as an accident, but as a predictable outcome — when its theology of priesthood authority and LGBTQ unworthiness runs through a real human life for three decades. This episode covers scrupulosity (the religious OCD subtype David describes, and why its symptoms are literally indistinguishable from faithfulness in a high-control environment), the priesthood structure that gave his father theological authority over his identity and career, and the November Policy — the 2015 handbook update that classified same-sex couples as apostates and barred their children from baptism. Russell Nelson called it revelation. There were documented suicides. Forty-one months later the reversal was also called revelation. No apology. No accounting. Just an updated handbook and an expectation that members receive it as further light. Russell Ballard told David it was the most in-depth conversation he'd ever had with a gay person. He was an apostle. He was setting policy. He had never asked. The compliance you were trained into wasn't a character flaw. It was exactly what the system was built to produce. Naming that isn't apostasy. It's just accuracy. Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem  Ad-free listening: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem  TikTok and Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem  Web: postmormonpostmortem.com CHAPTER NOTES 00:00 Introduction — a man in an airport, and what David Archuleta already knew about him  00:29 What this episode actually is — and what it isn't  03:49 The church's proof of concept: talent, faith, and really good hair  06:27 Three engagements and a framework that called it hope  09:17 Scrupulosity — when the symptoms of a disorder look like righteousness  11:26 Jeff Archuleta, priesthood authority, and the structure that made compliance holy  13:02 What priesthood theology actually means inside an LDS home  15:40 Unrighteous dominion: the doctrine with no enforcement mechanism  18:15 What the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints told gay members for decades  21:08 BYU's electroshock program and the reparative therapy years  24:33 The November Policy, the suicides, and the 41-month reversal  28:38 Nashville, the pandemic, and when dying starts to feel like the honest option  32:02 Russell Ballard had never had this conversation before. He was setting policy.  35:10 What you were trained to call obedience  36:02 What David's story shows — and what he heard when something finally broke

    38 мин.
  3. Why Mormon "Revelation" Arrives Right On Time

    5 АПР.

    Why Mormon "Revelation" Arrives Right On Time

    How the Mormon Church Turns Institutional Policy Into Divine Revelation — With Receipts   When the church shortened sacrament meeting for Palm Sunday 2026, they called it inspired. When they reversed the LGBTQ policy in 2019, also revelation. The mechanism has five steps. Here they are.   Jess and Hannah trace the five-step mechanism by which LDS institutional policy becomes divine revelation: identify a problem, trial a solution quietly, announce it as revelation, frame any revision as the Lord's timing, defend the change as sacred until the next change. The LGBTQ November Policy of 2015 classified same-sex married couples as apostates and barred their children from baptism. Its complete reversal 41 months later was also revelation. In the interval: resignations, torn families, and deaths by suicide. No apology was ever issued. The 2026 transgender handbook update applies the same designation used for those who have committed sexual abuse to transgender members. The Palm Sunday TikTok generated a live DARVO demonstration in the comments — Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender — that became one of the most instructive things they've ever seen in their mentions. If the schedule, the garments, the racial policy, and the LGBTQ policy all changed — what exactly was revealed in the first place?   In this episode: the five-step mechanism for converting LDS policy into revelation; the November 2015 LGBTQ Policy — full text, consequences, and 41-month reversal; DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender) as demonstrated live in LDS apologetics; the 2026 transgender handbook update and the designation it uses; the Palm Sunday sacrament meeting length change and the "inspired" framing; a timeline of LDS revelation reversals from polygamy to the 1978 racial priesthood ban to the LGBTQ policy — and what they collectively reveal about the revelation mechanism.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    41 мин.

  4. 29 МАР.

    Your Body Kept the Score: Somatic Healing After Leaving

    Why Your Body Stays Stuck in Fear After Leaving Mormonism — And What Actually Helps   You've left intellectually. Done the reading. So why does your body still brace when you disappoint an authority figure? Religious trauma doesn't live in your beliefs — it lives in your nervous system.   Drawing on Bessel van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score, Jess and Hannah explain why insight alone rarely completes healing after religious trauma. Mormon theology specifically conditioned children's nervous systems through omniscient surveillance (God always watching), eternal stakes (heaven and hell), and attachment wounds tied to worthiness — producing lasting physiological dysregulation that persists long after the beliefs are gone. The episode walks through four body-level approaches that actually work: EMDR, which Jess came to through a biking accident and found resolved years of stuck material in one or two sessions; TRE (Trauma Release Exercises), which she discovered on her living room floor out of desperation; rhythmic breathwork that directly engages the vagus nerve; and neurofeedback, which gave Hannah the first experience of genuine safety inside her own head. Your body isn't broken — it's running old software.   In this episode: Bessel van der Kolk's somatic theory of trauma and why it applies directly to religious harm; how LDS doctrine engineered nervous system dysregulation through surveillance, eternal stakes, and worthiness-based attachment; EMDR for religious trauma — what it is and what a session actually looks like; TRE (Trauma Release Exercises) and why the body tremors are the point; breathwork and polyvagal theory; neurofeedback and what "feeling safe" actually feels like when you've never had a baseline.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    37 мин.

  5. 22 МАР.

    Healing After Leaving Mormonism — Identity, Grief, Self-Trust, Relationships, and Joy

    At 17, Jess sat in sacrament meeting hiding bruises on her neck and did the math. She knew she would have to leave. This is the episode she and Hannah wish someone had handed them on the way out the door.    Leaving Mormonism isn't a swap of one belief system for another — it's the collapse of an entire existential architecture. The identity work that follows isn't recovery of a self that existed before; there was no pre-Mormon self. It's construction from scratch. Jess and Hannah cover the grief that ordinary frameworks can't hold (you're not just losing a religion — you're losing your community, your cosmology, and your entire social operating system); how to rebuild self-trust after decades of being trained to doubt your doubts; therapeutic approaches that work for religious trauma specifically; the relationships that survive deconstruction and the ones that don't; and what joy looks like when it's no longer tied to a cosmic scoreboard. This episode includes practical resources: the Mormon Mental Health Association therapist directory, the Secular Therapy Project, and the Religious Trauma Institute.   In this episode: why leaving Mormonism is an identity collapse rather than a belief change; grief frameworks that actually apply to religious deconstruction; IFS (Internal Family Systems), ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy), and Narrative Therapy for religious trauma; how to rebuild self-trust after being trained to doubt your instincts; which relationships survive deconstruction and why; the Mormon Mental Health Association, the Secular Therapy Project, and the Religious Trauma Institute as starting points for finding help.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    1 ч. 33 мин.

  6. 15 МАР.

    Built to Stay: How Leaving Mormonism Feels Impossible

    Why Leaving Mormonism Is So Hard — The Psychology of Identity, Belonging, Cognitive Dissonance, and Sunk Costs   Intelligent, thoughtful people stay in the Mormon church long after encountering evidence that should have sent them running. This is not a failure of intelligence. It's how belief architecture works.   This research-dense episode applies the psychology of belief directly to LDS institutional structure. Paul Harris on why children inherit belief before they can evaluate it — by the time questioning is possible, you're not in neutral territory, you're defending the foundations of your self. Robert Cialdini on commitment and consistency — temple covenants, mission service, and decades of public testimony-bearing create enormous psychological resistance to contradictory information. Leon Festinger on cognitive dissonance. Ziva Kunda on motivated reasoning. Dan Kahan on identity-protective cognition: when belief is identity-constitutive, threatening the belief feels like threatening the self. The sunk cost architecture of Mormonism is not accidental — missions, tithing, callings, and family relationships are all deliberately built inside the institution. If the people you love haven't left, this episode is why.   In this episode: Paul Harris on childhood belief inheritance and why questioning feels like self-betrayal; Robert Cialdini's commitment and consistency principle applied to temple covenants and missionary service; Leon Festinger's cognitive dissonance theory and how the church engineers it; Ziva Kunda's motivated reasoning research; Dan Kahan's identity-protective cognition framework; the sunk cost architecture of Mormonism — tithing, callings, missions, temple marriage — and why leaving feels financially, socially, and existentially catastrophic.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    1 ч. 18 мин.

  7. 10 МАР.

    Elder James E. Christensen - The Missionary Murder the Church and the Benson Family Buried

    Elder James E. Christensen was beaten for months and scalded to death in his bathtub by his mission companion in 1977. His killer, Douglas Beiger, served zero days in prison.   The case that made Hannah angry enough to start a podcast. James Christensen had permanent neurological damage from a childhood accident and desperately wanted to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. His companion Douglas Beiger beat him repeatedly over months, then held him in scalding water until he died of a massive brain hemorrhage. Judge Michael O'Shea said "sometimes sending someone to jail is not the best thing" and sent Beiger home to his parents. Louisville mission president Reed Benson — son of apostle Ezra Taft Benson, future prophet — testified for the defense. Mission assistant Reed Smith later wrote publicly: "The most blame goes to Mormonism itself — the false cultish system that propagates these pressures." Full primary source documentation is available to Patreon supporters.   In this episode: James Christensen's background and mission placement despite neurological disability; the pattern of abuse by companion Douglas Beiger over the course of their mission; the trial, Judge Michael O'Shea's sentencing decision, and the testimony of mission president Reed Benson; the institutional culture of mission obedience that made the abuse possible and intervention unlikely; Reed Smith's public statement on systemic blame; what the companion system structurally enables and what oversight it prevents.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    38 мин.

  8. 8 МАР.

    Why Your Mormon Family Can't Hear You — Three Institutional Mechanisms That Make Listening Impossible

    Your Mormon family isn't ignoring you because they don't love you. The church built three specific mechanisms that make hearing you institutionally impossible.   Jess and Hannah break down the architecture of institutional deafness in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The obedience-equals-morality framework means anyone reporting harm becomes the problem before they finish the sentence — Russell Nelson called doubters "lazy learners and lax disciples" in 2021 General Conference. The compelled certainty culture begins at age three at Fast and Testimony Meeting, where children are trained to say "I know" rather than "I believe" — Dallin Oaks literally taught that testimony is better gained on your feet than on your knees. And the systematic elimination of visible dissent, from the September Six in 1993 to Sam Young's 23-day hunger strike and subsequent excommunication in 2018, ensures that even when dissent works, the dissenter is removed. The exit looks sudden from the outside because doubt had to be processed in private — in secret browser tabs, in the dark, in your body.   In this episode: the obedience-equals-morality doctrine and why harm reports are structurally impossible to process; compelled certainty training from childhood through Fast and Testimony Meeting; the September Six (1993) and Sam Young's excommunication (2018) as case studies in how the church eliminates visible dissent; Noah Kahan's "The Great Divide" and why thousands of ex-Mormon children recognized their parents in it; why the exit looks sudden from the outside when the internal process took years.   Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/postmormonpostmortem Ad-free listening from $2/month: patreon.com/postmormonpostmortem TikTok & Instagram: @postmormonpostmortem postmormonpostmortem.com New episodes every Sunday at 9 AM — just in time for sacrament meeting.

    1 ч. 22 мин.
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Mormonism gave you a complete universe — with charts, diagrams, & a plan for everything. Leaving dismantles all of it at once. Postmormon Postmortem is hosted by Jess and Hannah, two women who left the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints & didn't find nearly enough people talking honestly about what that actually takes. We cover Mormon doctrine & the damage it does, Mormon true crime, the nervous system science of religious trauma, and the messy road to recovery. Whether you're freshly out, years removed, or just trying to understand someone you love — you're in the right place.

Информация

  • Автор
    Jess and Hannah
  • Годы выхода
    2 тыс.
  • Выпуски
    23
  • Ограничения
    С ненормативной лексикой
  • Авторские права
    © Jess and Hannah
  • Сайт подкаста
    Postmormon Postmortem

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