Silent Disconnection

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
This is something I posted on ESMB back in 2017. I'll paste it in full with the link. The second post in this small thread is from one of my brothers and the last line is:

The ultimate "religious" irony though is that the instant the Kool-Aider comes out from the cult’s influence and starts to look at real truths and real life is the instant we will both forgive utterly. And love regardless.

Silent Disconnection
If you are in any way critical of scientology (beyond your own thoughts) there is a fair chance you will experience disconnection. A scientologist is not allowed to question, no matter that they feel they are the best people on the planet at communicating. So if a friend or family member speaks out about their experiences in a negative way, they must be shunned, there is no choice. Scientology says that if you leave you will "lose your eternal salvation" and die lonely and in the dark.

Cutting contact with another because they have a different point of view is a form of attempted control and there are many thousands of people who have heard those words “You attacked my religion!” as a reason for another turning their back on you. OK fair enough, if your religion decrees that you must not question or look beyond it’s boundaries of thought, then that is a choice you make. I personally have no problem with people making their choices, following their journey’s path – as long as they don’t harm others in the process.

The trouble is that scientology doesn’t let it go at that. It is certainly not a true religion, it is a corporation in disguise for tax purposes, and it does harm people.

I had my 'visible' disconnection in early 2008 not long after I started telling my story on the Ex Scientologists Message Board after many years of being "under the radar". I was told to stop posting. Well that doesn’t sit well with me and I was not about to be controlled in what I talked about and how, especially as the telling of my story was so life changing and healing. That is a long time ago, and in that time there has been no contact except very briefly on two occasions, one being included in a family text about a death and another a greeting at a wedding, when the person concerned had to pretend “all was well” to maintain the pretense that “we just had an argument”. Yes, that is the 'public' excuse for almost a decade of no contact, no answers to letters, emails or gifts.

As much as it broke my heart to lose them, I could live with the choices my family member made, in the hope that one day they would begin to question some of the silent and unacknowledged desperation they live with deep inside. I understand the invisible pressure they suffer, I was once in their shoes. And I would be/am here for them if and when that day happens.

However the next stage began a few years ago, the deliberate plan to make sure that as many as possible of my close and extended family would also disconnect or distance themselves from me, including my children. I have no idea what set this off other than as a possible distraction, the old scapegoat thing. This was my 'silent' disconnection.

It was made easier by the fact that I have never really had the chance to get to know my siblings and their families, we lived in different countries or states in Australia. Scientology believes that I am a “suppressive person” because I became a critic and therefore am responsible for anything bad that happens to them (yes!) and that I am a secret wicked criminal. It would be funny if it wasn’t so heartbreaking in reality.

It is easy to spread lies, manipulate emotions and wage a campaign against someone who doesn’t even know it is happening and is never asked about anything or given a chance to speak, if you sincerely believe that you are doing it for “the greatest good”. Normal morality and truth doesn’t even get a look in, it’s like a shutter comes down to form a tunnel vision of the desired outcome. Which is to make someone an outcast and therefore punish them for the crime of speaking, and cover up any wrongs they themselves have done. No lie is too big, no nasty manipulation too great, money is spent maintaining the appearance of being a ‘loving and successful family member’ who must be believed. That is scientology indoctrination.

The period of my life a few years ago when this happened was dreadful and I still find it hard to come to terms with. During this time my ex husband and both my parents died and I had two major surgeries. I had support from only a few brave family members (and many wonderful friends), the rest have not contacted me since then and even blocked me on Facebook without warning or cause. (I don't care about Facebook, it was the only visible and unnecessary event.) I have since learned the scope of some of the lies that were told and I can only shake my head. Surely someone would at least question or wonder?

It is what it is. Three generations of my four generation scientology family were children brought up within the disabling thought patterns of scientology and I understand that it’s sometimes easier to just keep your head down and go along with the crowd. If the core of a family is shattered by not allowing contact, then it is destroyed. No matter the outward appearance of normality, when you have to be careful of what you say then that internal dissonance has long term effects on an individual, which makes me sad.

My father brought scientology into our lives and in the years before he passed he often told me how proud he was at my courage in speaking out. Dad knew the score and he couldn't rock the boat, he was still in circumstances where scientology had control. He resisted attempts to get him to disconnect and maintained constant contact anyway, which was also brave of him. Mum was the same. I know my parent's greatest wish was for the family to be reunited, however faint a hope that seems. However I believe that love is stronger than evil.
 
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Free to shine

Smelling the roses
Actually I'll put the second post here too, it's powerful.
Silent but sometimes deadly.
Disconnected in name only but in fact very connected, through others, with intent to destroy the infidels as passionately as any fundamentalist.
As a 30 year ex (Apollo and before) I came into this field of fire, as FTS’s brother, and can attest that this part of the story is only the tip of a huge black caustic iceberg.
I was around the fringes for this whole process including when the disconnection turned sour. From years of passive avoidance to hateful and quite intentional destruction of relationships with other mislead-able family members — into the next generation.
Years later the family is still being manipulated and kept apart with a campaign of discrediting, poisoning and politics. Rarely outright lies, too obvious. But insidious and persistent enough to be very effective.
The casualties include our Father, who paid to keep the peace with emotional pain and pretense for the remainder of his life. Which was in effect arguably actually truncated by the person in question – that being a mere matter of “dropping the body”.
Although I’d had a distant but co-tolerant relationship with the poor Kool-Aid addict perpetrating all this, it ended absolutely that afternoon when I interrupted a lobbying phone call, pitching me on how bad FTS was, by saying I was supportive and there for my sister. Click. Absolute silence, ever since.
But that hasn’t stopped the active campaign (via others of course) with propaganda of hate and innuendo. I expect it will never cease, fanatics with something righteous to prove are like that. Not being able to demonstrate in life how good they are without faking it, they try and belittle others as being the real baddies, faked also.
The two biggest ironies with this type of fallout are that (a) the quest for total freedom results in total imprisonment. Including captivity within a web of deceit for non-connected family; and (b) that their other holy grail of TWO-way communication is the exact thing they don’t do. To fix anything ever.
Yet under cover of radio silence, they'll gleefully wage a proxy or undercover war just like any religious pogrom or crusade. But sneaky.
The ultimate "religious" irony though is that the instant the Kool-Aider comes out from the cult’s influence and starts to look at real truths and real life is the instant we will both forgive utterly. And love regardless.
 

Glenda

Well-known member
Thank you for bringing these posts over to this board FTS. It is heart-breaking stuff and almost incomprehensible because it is so shadowy and dark.

I was talking to someone recently, discussing another cult that practices shunning. They said that someone they know has not had contact with loved family for about 20 years because they dared leave the JW's and start a new life as a non-believer. It is so easy to say those words" "no contact for 20 years with family". But when you stop and just think about it, the severity of that because of what people believe...it leaves me speechless.

The person I was talking to and I ended up just sitting there unable to say anything. We both sort of shook our heads in a state of mild shock, trying to make sense of this cruelty. We couldn't. I can't make sense of it. It's like the core things that lovingly bind humans together, attach them in normal ways, is heavily violated. It is so fucking twisted. I had a "difficult" relationship with my mother, all my life. But near the end of her life there was this powerful attachment that was unbreakable. Unless some deluded highly misconceived beliefs were injected into that, nothing could have broken the invisible attachment I had with mum. It's called love. It's called respect. It's called decency. It's called a whole lot stuff that humans live by, often without thinking about it, and often un-named. And scientology rips that apart.
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
Thank you dear Glenda. There are almost no words, despite what I wrote, to describe what happens. I'm so glad my dad defied it just as silently and we were able to talk frankly and lovingly before his death though we were in different states. Mum had dementia so that wasn't possible, but he spoke on her behalf.
 

Pseudonym

Well-known member
Scientology is the antithesis of itself contrary to every claim it makes as beneficial using bait and switch gaslighting. How many people are out there right now wanting their family members back in their lives? How many friendships subverted? How many lives derailed? It is mind boggling how much damage scientology does hiding behind a religious cloaking curtain. It's like George Orwell's 1984. For real.
 

Jenyfurrr

Member
Well, my disconnection story is nowhere near as heart wrenching as those who were in, but it was shocking just by how quickly and abruptly it happened.

I got onto the blogs and ESMB1 around 2013 whilst figuring out the craziness surrounding my hubby's Scio employer. My eldest son’s (24 now) close friend had been crashing at our house a lot when he was working on the road. So though we lived an hour apart, he was coming over bi-weekly much of the time and even if I was the only one home, he’d sit and talk to me about life as he had since he was 11-12yrs old. (My bonus son... he’d been through a lot, Dx’d as ADHD and poss bipolar as a teen, family a dysfunctional mess so he’d “run away” then always show up at our place.)

Well one day he confided in me that his girlfriend of a year was a scientologist. He’d seen and heard what we went through with hubby’s ex-employer and said it was “batshit crazy!” I’d told him before how much of it was very typical to scientology. So he knew it was a big deal. I’d shown him the websites before and he was intrigued.

But anyway, back to our talk... I told him I knew they were getting serious and because I’d spoken out publicly (I posted things on my FB after all that happened to us and a few of hubby’s former coworkers and boss’ wife saw them - and that’s while we were still in Orange County living near him. His GF’s family is multi-generation scio in the LA area) if he got involved, they’d make him disconnect. I also warned him that her family was not going to be ok with him continuing at our old church and not getting involved w/co$. He said, “That’ll never happen, they know and love me and you’re my second mom, so don’t even worry about THAT!” So our conversation concluded with me talking about a few articles and my sending him the links via text.

In following months we’d see him less and less. Though he did come out with his girlfriend for one visit and everything was normal/fun. Then suddenly he went totally silent. I tried texting to see when we’d see him next and nothing. I ended up in the hospital and still nada - his mom and sister both came to see me and when I’d ask about him they’d get weird.

After total radio silence for over a month, I asked his family point blank if he was upset with me about something. (I hadn’t mentioned scientology since that last talk, either.) They told me he wasn’t interacting with a lot of people and was suddenly up in LA at his girlfriends house a lot and pretty much living there. I asked if he got involved in co$ with his GF. His mom said she thought so and his sister admitted he’d talked about them getting him to take out a loan for a $2-3k to do this “detox thing with a sauna” and some classes. But they also said his gf signed up to be a counselor (auditor) and she was not home much so he wanted to be around up there to see her. Mind you, these two were 19 & 20 at the time. So essentially, I knew that he’d been involved since shortly after we spoke, gotten involved eyes-open, done his Purif and Life Repair (along with other classes they didn’t know the name of, started working for a Scientologist AND disconnected all in the space of 3-4mos. It was jarring!

I wrote him a very direct text telling him I know he was disconnecting from me and I was baffled as just months prior he’d said that would never happen. I reminded him I’d always be here when he got out, I love him and that if what I showed him before wasn’t true, then why was he taking out loans and disconnection just months later? And if my info was right about those two things, at some point he’d need to face the fact the other stuff (abuse, it being a big con, etc.) was just as true.

It’s now been about 4yrs. He’s got a child now. Interestingly he left the scio employer, they moved out and moved to an area at least an hour from the nearest org and haven’t been involved. She hasn’t gone back to work as an auditor either. From what I hear they don’t see her family a TON and are now seeing his much more again. They got some hand-me-downs from me when the baby came, it was unsaid where they came from but they knew... then someone sent them a small gift without a card and they asked if it was me and asked how I was.

They haven’t and won’t vaccinate their child and hold onto many of the beliefs, but are living in the “Wog” world for the most part. I’ve heard her family is prominent (she’s 3rd gen... parents and grandparents are in, Grandparents are HARD CORE) so my guess is they’re distancing themselves but being careful so they can be in contact w/her family. I have hope we’ll reconnect in the future... but it’s scary how insidious it is, even for someone young and vulnerable but who has the information that we’d think would inoculate most from joining.

I’ve sent things for the baby, they’re accepted and no one mentions who they’re from... “A friend sent this to you and said to let you know baby’s gorgeous and you’re missed” and nothings been refused/sent back. So I just hope that precious little baby that seemed to be the impetus for their distancing themselves from the cult will cause them to eventually be brave enough to fully walk away, but in the meantime, I’m at least relieved they’re not actively involved or working there now.
 

Enthetan

Veteran of the Psychic Wars
Well one day he confided in me that his girlfriend of a year was a scientologist. He’d seen and heard what we went through with hubby’s ex-employer and said it was “batshit crazy!” I’d told him before how much of it was very typical to scientology. So he knew it was a big deal. I’d shown him the websites before and he was intrigued.
Young guy will do a lot for a girl he's in love with.

That they are distancing themselves from the org is a good sign. It's possible they are not seeing you because they don't want to risk OSA issues.
 
O

Out Ethics

Guest
It would be great to hear other stories of disconnection!
I hope we don't hear any more stories of Disconnection with Scientology. I am hopeful things will change with all of the exposure about it in the media and out there on the internet thanks to Mike Rinder, Leah Remini, Karen De La Carriere, Jeff Augustine, Chris Shelton, Tory Magoo, Karen Presley, Jon Atack, Gerry Armstrong, Ron Miscavige Senior, Jenna Miscavige and so many others. I am very grateful for what they have done.

Disconnection happens out there in the real wog world all of the time. I have had to use it.

I have found out that if you disagree with someone that has control over something, they can do things to you that you will not have control over. You will have to disconnect when the playing field is not fair. It is for your best interest and your higher good.

People can be toxic and that is a time to disconnect. When they no longer serve your higher self and they bring you down or make less of you.

Disconnection is useful in some situations. Disconnection can save your sanity and your life. A little dab will do you and how you handle it is what matters most. You don't have to be cruel and inhumane about it.

If anyone disconnects from me over Scientology, I will just wish them well and ignore them.

Disconnection over a religion or political party is only a form of bad control. Disconnection only makes the weak weaker.
 
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O

Out Ethics

Guest
These stories are so sad :-(
Yes, they are sad.

If the people that have been disconnected from due to family still stuck in Scientology, it is an opportunity to grow and reach higher limits of understanding of life, oneself and others and it can be a very valuable experience. It truly can.

We don't own anyone and no one can force anyone to believe anything. This goes for Scientologists.

We truly have the freedom to be anything we want to be. Not everyone will like that. It is okay.

I believe if I have one person in my life that allows me to be who I am with no strings attached, I am very lucky.

And I do.
 
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Vumba

Active member
This is something I posted on ESMB back in 2017. I'll paste it in full with the link. The second post in this small thread is from one of my brothers and the last line is:

The ultimate "religious" irony though is that the instant the Kool-Aider comes out from the cult’s influence and starts to look at real truths and real life is the instant we will both forgive utterly. And love regardless.

Silent Disconnection
Hi lovely, still think of you often and hold you in the palm of my hand. As you know I knew your family quite well, so feel some if your loss. Keep on being the lovely person you are xx❤
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
Hi lovely, still think of you often and hold you in the palm of my hand. As you know I knew your family quite well, so feel some if your loss. Keep on being the lovely person you are xx❤
And the same to you!! Thanks, yes doing fine my friend. :flowers2: The situation is much the same but I am an optimist, things always change. I've learnt in the last years that taking care of yourself is really the key to so much. Other people do what they do, we can only be the best we can be and remember to smell the roses.
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
Well, my disconnection story is nowhere near as heart wrenching as those who were in, but it was shocking just by how quickly and abruptly it happened.

I got onto the blogs and ESMB1 around 2013 whilst figuring out the craziness surrounding my hubby's Scio employer. My eldest son’s (24 now) close friend had been crashing at our house a lot when he was working on the road. So though we lived an hour apart, he was coming over bi-weekly much of the time and even if I was the only one home, he’d sit and talk to me about life as he had since he was 11-12yrs old. (My bonus son... he’d been through a lot, Dx’d as ADHD and poss bipolar as a teen, family a dysfunctional mess so he’d “run away” then always show up at our place.)

Well one day he confided in me that his girlfriend of a year was a scientologist. He’d seen and heard what we went through with hubby’s ex-employer and said it was “batshit crazy!” I’d told him before how much of it was very typical to scientology. So he knew it was a big deal. I’d shown him the websites before and he was intrigued.

But anyway, back to our talk... I told him I knew they were getting serious and because I’d spoken out publicly (I posted things on my FB after all that happened to us and a few of hubby’s former coworkers and boss’ wife saw them - and that’s while we were still in Orange County living near him. His GF’s family is multi-generation scio in the LA area) if he got involved, they’d make him disconnect. I also warned him that her family was not going to be ok with him continuing at our old church and not getting involved w/co$. He said, “That’ll never happen, they know and love me and you’re my second mom, so don’t even worry about THAT!” So our conversation concluded with me talking about a few articles and my sending him the links via text.

In following months we’d see him less and less. Though he did come out with his girlfriend for one visit and everything was normal/fun. Then suddenly he went totally silent. I tried texting to see when we’d see him next and nothing. I ended up in the hospital and still nada - his mom and sister both came to see me and when I’d ask about him they’d get weird.

After total radio silence for over a month, I asked his family point blank if he was upset with me about something. (I hadn’t mentioned scientology since that last talk, either.) They told me he wasn’t interacting with a lot of people and was suddenly up in LA at his girlfriends house a lot and pretty much living there. I asked if he got involved in co$ with his GF. His mom said she thought so and his sister admitted he’d talked about them getting him to take out a loan for a $2-3k to do this “detox thing with a sauna” and some classes. But they also said his gf signed up to be a counselor (auditor) and she was not home much so he wanted to be around up there to see her. Mind you, these two were 19 & 20 at the time. So essentially, I knew that he’d been involved since shortly after we spoke, gotten involved eyes-open, done his Purif and Life Repair (along with other classes they didn’t know the name of, started working for a Scientologist AND disconnected all in the space of 3-4mos. It was jarring!

I wrote him a very direct text telling him I know he was disconnecting from me and I was baffled as just months prior he’d said that would never happen. I reminded him I’d always be here when he got out, I love him and that if what I showed him before wasn’t true, then why was he taking out loans and disconnection just months later? And if my info was right about those two things, at some point he’d need to face the fact the other stuff (abuse, it being a big con, etc.) was just as true.

It’s now been about 4yrs. He’s got a child now. Interestingly he left the scio employer, they moved out and moved to an area at least an hour from the nearest org and haven’t been involved. She hasn’t gone back to work as an auditor either. From what I hear they don’t see her family a TON and are now seeing his much more again. They got some hand-me-downs from me when the baby came, it was unsaid where they came from but they knew... then someone sent them a small gift without a card and they asked if it was me and asked how I was.

They haven’t and won’t vaccinate their child and hold onto many of the beliefs, but are living in the “Wog” world for the most part. I’ve heard her family is prominent (she’s 3rd gen... parents and grandparents are in, Grandparents are HARD CORE) so my guess is they’re distancing themselves but being careful so they can be in contact w/her family. I have hope we’ll reconnect in the future... but it’s scary how insidious it is, even for someone young and vulnerable but who has the information that we’d think would inoculate most from joining.

I’ve sent things for the baby, they’re accepted and no one mentions who they’re from... “A friend sent this to you and said to let you know baby’s gorgeous and you’re missed” and nothings been refused/sent back. So I just hope that precious little baby that seemed to be the impetus for their distancing themselves from the cult will cause them to eventually be brave enough to fully walk away, but in the meantime, I’m at least relieved they’re not actively involved or working there now.
Thanks so much for your story. You did the right things, hard as it is. And it is so much harder with a generational family involved! Here's to him finding his way back. :arose:
 

Glenda

Well-known member
In the big world disconnection is used and is often referred to as "no contact". Often used when true abusive relationships exist. Violence, toxic manipulation and the like are often reasons behind going "no contact". Yes I have used it in my post-scientology life. But this is different from disconnection - or shunning as it is called in other religions.

"No contact", is, hopefully, about using healthy boundaries. I say "hopefully" because I suspect it can be used very wrongly ie. a big fat tantrum throwing mess if someone is acting like a three-year-old who isn't getting their own way. Disconnection (or shunning) is different in that it is about beliefs. No parent, no child, can comfortably face the rejection and sense of abandonment that true disconnection/shunning inflicts. It isn't rational, or within the parameters of decent human behaviour, to hurl a family member (or loved one) out of a life just because that person is no longer wanting to be part of a particular group & wishes to no longer abide by the rules/control mechanisms of that group.

"No contact" is more about personal behaviour. The guy who stalks, who cheats and lies, the woman who is always getting pissed and trying to steal others boyfriends, etc., etc. Toxic human behaviour which humans have been acting out forever in various ways. Disconnection/shunning is about deeper things than that. It is about almost saying "you are dead to me because you won't tow the line and believe what I know to be righteous. You are dead to me because I have to think that way because that is what I am programmed/conditioned to think." Way different to getting a toxic person out of one's life using "no contact".

Disconnection (and shunning) are practices done to conform with set down rules of groups doctrine. Going "no contact" is done in a very personal way, based on one's own formulated values.
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
Thanks for writing that Glenda, totally agree. There is a world of difference between close family members who are suddenly ripped apart because one of them is brave enough to disagree with scientology and the sometimes necessary 'no contact'. Totally no comparison. One minute you can have a lovely close relationship but cross that line of saying "I don't agree" and that is that, no matter the true feelings of the person doing the disconnecting. They just go into shut-down, I know because I did it back in the day. They have no choice in their eyes, their complete life and future is at stake to stay in scientology. It is despicable, cruel to all concerned and personally I hope we DO hear a lot more disconnection stories here. Even writing about it can help, because it is not the fault of the person being disconnected from!
 
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kaiser

Active member
Those are very sad experiences and memories. I am sorry for everyone who had to go through that.

For me, instead of waiting for people to become distant from me because I no longer went to the org, no longer picked up the phone, no longer wanted to have anything to do with anyone, I was the one disconnecting from everyone who was in. This was my way of staying in control and feeling empowered. I still have family who are in and it's really hard to see that. They have been in for over 20 years now and they are still hard core. They make living by selling scientology. I don't think they could quit even if they wanted to.
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
What I have observed over the years is that people leave scientology when a personal crisis becomes so demanding that it brings the needed courage to make a change. When the inherent injustices are so overwhelming that it feels life and death almost. Luckily scientology tends to provide these scenarios readily, Comm Evs, KRs, idiotic pressure and manipulation. The more hard core, the bigger the crisis needs to be, yet surprisingly people that you never thought would leave, do. Until then you have done the right thing by protecting yourself.
 

Free to shine

Smelling the roses
This is already posted elsewhere, however it's a truly powerful statement by Mike Rinder and Leah Remini about family disconnection and very relevant to this thread.
The Inhumanity of scientology

A small quote:
I implore those that are in, who might be reading this – you have this life to make things right: stop this bullshit of sacrificing your relationships for a cult that is destroying you and your family unit. Call your mother, call your sister before it is too late. Whether it’s scientology, or any other extremist ideology, life is too short. It is not noble to shun your own child, it’s reprehensible. For scientologists, they believe this is not such a big deal as they will find this child in another lifetime. Well, have you met your children, your mother, or father from an earlier lifetime in this life? No, you haven’t. Wake. The. Fuck. Up. Your children need you, your parents want to know their grandchildren and you are missing out on a life with them and you are robbing them of knowing some pretty great people.
 
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