MK forum

D, can I say, me too? Wish I didn't feel the need for approval so much. It's very stressful. I have a gigantic need for socialization, connection . . .but it's exhausting. And hearing from strong-minded people wearys me. The giving tree goes dry most days, as soon as I'm done work.

Kudos to you MKs who have survived. We tend to feature people in the media who have survived a fire or getting lost in the snow for days, etc.

Yet the thousands of MKs from ntm and other mission agencies are just expected to carry on in life after traumas experienced overseas. Even if ntm hadn't been criminal enough to abuse and molest the children of its members, it is not an easy thing to be thrust into a different culture and country. But the fact that ntm and others also molested children under the spiritual guise of reaching the nations is horrid.

Thank you for no longer being silent.... even after growing up in a culture where you had to constantly seek approval. I admire your courage to stand..... the will you have to face each day.

Keep hanging in there please.

dbarney looking for approval is something that drives many of us. Often to do things we really don't want to do. After being around for 70 years wow, is that old, I have found I had to approve of my self. I began really looking at that person called me. It has taken me a number of years to get to the point where I can say I like me. The first time I made myself say it I did not believe it. But after awhile it became true to me, it didn't matter that other people did at times tell me how great they thought I was I didn't believe it until I had told myself many time That me is a person to like. I have come to the place where like here I have even admitted it in public.

dbarney and Allbetter you really are great people, like yourselves like we like you. Don't listen to those who are always putting you down.

Yep been there do that too. I think most people grow out of it as they gain independence from their childhood, but it would seem MKs seem to less.
I wonder if that was because it became so ingrained in us to seek approval and love, yet it was almost rationed and dealt out in illogical fashion, that it became a pattern in life.
I'll ask the ever wise Mrs Bemused, I'm sure she will shed some light on it.

What a heavy load to carry on our small shoulders.

I know, because I carried it too.

No open rebellion for me. No, never.

I still hide the wine rack when my parents come to visit. And I am 63 years old.

Is it reveal your age night? 44 for me

Sadly, a BJU grad is pastor of my parents little home church. I know it's a little thing, but it's upsetting for me to see my mom back wearing skirts to every service, even in this polar weather.

BJU grads ruled PNG, and many other little fiefdoms
Bill Sheepherder led to a wave of homeschooling fanatics (who now have vigilante grandchildren )
Uganda is a nightmare.
Hundreds of missionaries have toiled in the Phillipines and the sex trafficking has exponentially risen

I'm afraid to have influence, and afraid not to have influence.