Conservative Christianity always felt like an itchy sweater I was forced to suffocate in with a million loose threads begging me to pull them. Eventually, I tugged one and soon the entire garment unraveled into a pool of wasted yarn.
I really tried to wear it.
I seriously tried to believe all the things I was supposed to believe,
pray the right prayers,
walk the impossible straight line,
and judge others outside of the church as “evil sinners fulfilling Satan’s agenda”.
Yet there was always a still, small, voice in my heart that whispered
“something isn’t right here.”
One of my earliest memories is of me pulling at a thread of the monstrous sweater. I must’ve been four or five years old when I asked my first question challenging my religion.
I simply asked my mom, “who created god?”
The idea that there was this all powerful father god who controls everything and watches us all absolutely made no sense to me. Where did this god come from? Where did he get his power? Who created this god? Did he create himself? And why is he so mean?
I thought he was scary and I was taught to fear him.
I was just a little girl learning about eternal fiery torture chambers, demons, and the possibility of being left behind by this god in the rapture for listening to Paula Abdul or saying a cuss word. All of this I learned against my will. My neural pathways were set before I even had a chance to learn how to regulate my nervous system.
But still, I wasn’t quite buying it all the way.
“Who created god?”
My mom answered in the way that most christians would answer this question.
Very confidently she sang a little tune of “He always was, he always is, and he always will be.”
This didn’t answer my question, didn’t make any sense, and it still doesn’t.
This moment would begin my life of asking questions about the religion, trying to see it the way I was supposed to, but ultimately being unable. To make matters worse, everyone around me seemed to be just fine in their itchy sweaters and they were not pulling at the threads.
Maybe you’ve had a similar experience. Maybe you felt crazy for having sensible thoughts because when you voiced them you were told you were wrong for thinking them in the first place. Maybe you learned quickly that it was safer to sit down, shut up, and pretend to be one of them.
You’re not alone.
There are millions of us who were quietly gaslit by a system that calls out anything that doesn’t fit its script. We pointed out contradictions and were told we were the ones being disruptive. We tried to ask honest questions and were told we were arrogant, sinful, or spiritually blind. That kind of steady dismissal rewires you. It makes you doubt yourself before you even finish the thought.
That doubt shows up as anxiety, shame, and a habit of apologizing for existing. It makes you second-guess your instincts and shrink parts of yourself that feel too loud or too human. But the thing about threads is this: once you start pulling, you can’t un-know what you’ve seen. The unraveling is painful. It’s also honest work.
If that itch is still there, if you’re tired of pretending and want to start untangling, here are three simple things you can do right now:
Ask the question out loud (to paper first). Write it down. Don’t edit. Let whatever comes up come up. Asking yourself, in writing, is a small act of permission. I remember giving myself permission to deconstruct this religion. It was scary but also liberating.
Name one belief that no longer fits. Call it what it is: fear, control, inherited guilt, and write one way it shows up in your life. Awareness makes choice possible.
Find one person or one source that won’t gaslight you. A forum, a book, a therapist, or an online community. Find someone who listens without trying to fix you with doctrine.
This space, Sin Blossoms, is for that kind of work: honest questions, practical tools, and the messy beauty of unraveling. If you’re done pretending the sweater fits, stay a while. Read, comment, or subscribe. We’re pulling at threads together.