An Atheist Reflects on Growing up as a Missionary Kid 

After deconstructing I can see mission work for what it truly is. It's modern day colonialism. As Christians we believed we were better than them. We went in with the intention to erase their beliefs and culture. The sad thing is we were blind to the damage we were causing. We genuinely believed we were helping. I look back on some of my experiences with a level of shame. I feel bad for teaching them what sin was and then telling them they were sinners. I was teaching them that their culture was bad. I know that at the time I truly believed I was sharing God's love with them but that doesn't make it right.

Another MK here 🙋🏾‍♀ my parents are international missionaries so we didn’t move to one country, we were constantly moving wherever God “told us.” One summer we moved 7 times lol I understand completely when you say it’s soooo rare to find someone who’s experienced that, all I have is my little sister, we are the only two who have left the church and, let me tell you - the darkest feeling is finding out all you lived for and believed in was a lie and that you pulled others into it with you. When I tell people about my life they think it’s incredible, so much travel, different languages, etc and that part is true, but it’s so hard to explain how hard it is to deconstruct a whole belief system you had no choice in having. I’m so much happier now, even though my loved ones think I’m going to hell. Thank you for this video ❤

I’m so glad you were able to share this. I was raised in a conservative Christian family and wanted to become a missionary and did a few trips. I wanted to do something practical so I went to school and from them started deconstructing my faith. Yes, share more stories. You can also talk about how mission work can be harmful to other cultures. I went on a secular trip to Peru and the tribe talked about the damage done from Christian missionaries infiltrating their culture.

I went to an evangelical college and contemplated becoming a missionary for many years. Now the thought of bombarding other cultures with foreign religious ideology makes me shudder. Also, most likely I would've brought a family into that scenario as well. I am so happy that I left christianity before I created such an unfair situation for a child. In fact, I'm glad that I left christianity before they guilted me into marriage and family, because as time went by I realized that I never wanted to bring a child into this world, period. So much harm was prevented by walking away...

Back when I was a Christian, I remember going to a women's conference and hearing women speak about being in the mission field. One lass had been born in Australia and moved with her missionary parents and older brothers to Pakistan. She was 5 when they went. She talked mostly positively about the experience but I remember her talking about how her brothers were allowed to do loads of stuff and she couldn't, simply because she's female. She talked about when she finally returned to Australia for university. She lived with her grandparents, her parents still in Pakistan. She looked quite nervous and laughed about having the realisation that at 19, she'd never crossed the street alone. Pre-mission she had been too young, and on mission she wasn't allowed to go anywhere without a chaperone. I was deeply horrified at this. After going through 15+years in therapy for my own trauma and stuff, I look back at her testimony and I can understand what horrified me. She was playing it of like "oh this is so funny" when her body language was screaming "I am traumatised by this". I honestly wonder how she managed her university years and doing just everyday things alone. I hope she's okay. (This was more than 20 years ago and I still think of her sometimes)

God, the attitude that certain personalities are "more christlike" really hits home. I despised every church camp, youth group, vacation bible school, and rally that I every went to. I was oversimulated, anxious, and miserable. I never really got "on fire for jesus" because I was too focused on not freaking out. I almost cried on some guy's porch when I was forced to go soul winning. You realize how culty it is in retrospect when it's obvious you were just fundamentally wrong for what they wanted from you. Thanks for telling your story.

I am also an MK turned agnostic atheist and I am really glad you decided to make this video. I was born on the mission field but we had a weird gap in missionary work right around puberty for like 4 years where my parents thought they were done being missionaries but ended up going back so I relate to the extra stain that a big transition adds to an already challenging time of changes. We did end up going back to the same country and since so much of my life was spent there it does feel like home and there are really good aspects of the experiences being an MK gave me. But I really appreciate that you wanted to share the difficulties and struggles of the standards MKs are held to and just how the strain of transitions and instability really impact us.

I grew up as a fundie church kid (thankfully not PK or MK), and the pressure/shame I felt because I couldn't be the outgoing beacon for Christ was so suffocating. Literally heard sermons on how being introverted/having social anxiety is a sin, and you're actually ashamed of God if you suffer from it. I'm slowly peeling away the layers of shame I was subjected to for years, and your and GMSkeptic's videos have really helped with that! So thanks!

I moved to Myanmar when I was 10 and move around SouthEast Asia throughout highschool and I relate so much to your experience. I had also had a bible teacher who fixated on celibacy. He had us read a passage about how sex ruins women, and write an essay response. I wrote my essay about why I was a feminist. I got a D. Your analysis made me realize so much about how I’ve been influenced by my upbringing. So much shame and anxiety is deeply engrained since childhood.

Wow, quite a story! I'm glad you survived that experience. Living a "perfect role-model life" is so destructive and exhausting. I don't miss any of that at all.

My aunt and uncle were missionaries in Kenya for several years, and all three of their kids are agnostic /atheist as adults. My aunt worked for FOTF when they got back. While I'm not a MK, I do know the feeling of EVERYONE you knew in childhood suddenly being completely different than you, because you've moved on religiously and they haven't. Almost everyone I was once close to is at the very least, a mainstream Christian. It's surreal being on the outside looking in.

PK here. Every time I hear another story, it helps my heart heal a little more. Echoing everyone else who was a ministry kid here in the comments section, thank you for sharing your story. It means more than we can say.

Thanks for speaking out about your experience! Both my parents were international MKs and had rough childhood experiences. Children were seen as getting in the way of the mission and they were both sent off to boarding school at a very young age (my mom was 5 and only saw her parents every two years). They still meet up with their former classmates decades later and talk about the emotional trauma they all experienced. They now identify as third culture kids- no culture feels like they fully belong.

Another MK turned agnostic atheist. There are dozens of us. Thank you so much for sharing your story. Mine sounds similar in a lot of ways, having moved from the Bible Bet USA to South America when I was 8 years old. Our mission team was full of “aunts” and “uncles,” but there was only one kid on the team who was close to my age. In retrospect, I think they probably have ASD, which would explain why we struggled to connect, and I felt very alone. Being on a pedestal, the only white kid at school and at church, made me very isolated as a kid. When I returned to the States as a 14 year old, I had nothing in common with anyone my age, and fell into a weird role in my church youth group as well, almost thinking I was special because my parents were missionaries. The first time I felt any kind of normalcy, like I could just be a person my age and connect with other people my age, was when I turned 18 and went to college. That’s also when I met people in the LGBTQIA+ community, and being an RA in the foreign exchange dorm, a lot of Muslims, Catholics, and people from many other religions and traditions. As soon as I met these people the edges of my fundamentalism started to fray, and I started assessing my faith and my childhood experience as thoroughly as I could. By the end of college, I has started my deconstruction journey. It’s been 10 years now, but watching yours and Drew’s videos have been wonderfully validating, and I can’t imagine how much easier it would have been to have them and this community back then. I know we both have a lot of trauma still to work through, and it means a lot to see you process this in front of your community here. Thank you again for sharing

Thank you so much for sharing this. I am also a former MK turned agnostic atheist and honestly I don't even talk about it with most people now because no one can really relate. We were aboard the MV Doulos with Operation Mobilization and I had been to 43 countries by the time I was 15, so I also couldn't relate to other MKs at my church who had been in one country and learned a language and a culture intimately. When we got back to the States when I was in high school I just felt like no one really understood what I had been through (and I'm an only child). I really appreciate you sharing your story, and I loved hearing your perspective and experience - there were a lot of parallels with my own!

I was raised in the Christian and Missionary Alliance, my dad was a pastor, then professor of Bible, and I went to school to be a missionary. I left the faith several years after graduating, never actually going overseas as a missionary. I relate to a lot of your story, and I'd love to hear more! One thing that really left me with a bad taste in college is when I had an interview with a missionary who asked me if I did my prayer and devotionals everyday, and he explained that missionaries have to be a cut above "normal" Christians spiritually. That felt weird and wrong.

Your story reminds me of a friend of mine, although she wasn't an MK her parents were Mormons and always tried really hard to shove it down her throat. But she was always different, especially as a goth and someone who could draw in a Tim Burton style really easily. She would post photos on social media saying spot the goth kid at church camp and even though she was trying to be funny, you could see how much she hated her life with her Mormon parents. Today, she's still a goth. She's always known who and what she was even though her parents tried to do everything they could to destroy that in the name of Mormonism. Oh, and she's also a mortician. Thank you for sharing your story with all of us, this was a really eye opening video and I had no idea about the experience of an MK. Really happy to see you got out of that!

Fellow MK turned atheist here … even tho I have a very different story/experience it’s interesting how it had a very similar effect on me as a person! Thanks for making this video!

As someone who was homeschooled, yet by those parents who were like a "normal American family", I relate to this a lot more than I thought I would. I am always trying to figure out the difference between what *I* want vs what others want for me. I struggle with letting people down and I have lived a lot of my life through what others expect of me. I am slowly learning, day by day, how to be myself. Thank you for sharing your story, it really resonated with me.

OMG I was listening to this on my headphones while cleaning. When you got to the part where you said you just couldn’t write the paper on the legalizing gay marriage debate, and cut away to “hmmmm I wonder why 🤔” I heard the rustling and yelled “IS SHE WAVING THE BISEXUAL FLAG?!” at my empty house before dashing to look at my screen. Happy to be right! 💙💜💕 Also, just awesome video. Thanks so much for making it!

This was so interesting and informative. I'd like to hear more about your MK experiences.

I'm so proud of you for sharing your story and experiences. My parents were missionaries and took 3 of my brothers on trips but thankfully by the time they had me they were no longer doing missions work because my parents saw the mental toll MKs had to deal with and my parents described many of them as "broken" because they'd be left at boarding schools for YEARS, rarely seeing their parents.

I really appreciate this video! I wasn't an MK but I grew up in a close-knit Christian community. The rose-colored way that people often talked about missions was one of the initial things that caused me to question Christianity and start deconstructing my beliefs. I went to a close-knit Christian school, and I can really relate to the things you talked about with purity culture and a few particular teachers who went a little *too* intense on the sexual shaming.

Girl I got you!!! Former MK (Brazil) and BJU grad, now atheist agnostic. I'm 55.

Interesting how they were more concerned that you’d be deconverted in a majority Christian United States than when you were out talking to non-Christians in Indonesia

i grew up as a missionary in indonesia as well and so many parts of this video rang true to me. i lived in the same place for my whole time there and went to the same school k-12th grade so i dont share your anxieties about moving. i had many positive experiences but the two things that had the biggest effect on me were extreme homophobia and purity culture. as a queer kid i was living in total isolation. aside from a few friends i couldnt risk telling anyone, especially not adults. the only adult support i had access to was from "good christians" who would treat my queerness like some kind of mental illness. and because homosexuality is illegal there its not like i could get any outside help. i just had to stay trapped and wait until i could graduate and go to college (providing my parents let me go to a secular college). it had long lasting damage on my mental health that im not sure i'll ever be able to undo.

I'm not an MK but I grew up in the evangelical church wanting to do missionary work. Looking back now, I was more into the idea of going new places and learning new things than I ever was about sharing any gospel. I currently live on the other side of the world as a free agent teaching English as a second language, and I'm loving it, no god required. I lost my faith in university but didn't openly admit it until a couple of years ago. Most of my family still doesn't know. I kinda don't want to say anything, because I still feel like at worst, I'd be even more of an outcast than I currently am, and at worst I'd cause my family (especially my mom) unnecessary anxiety about my soul and feelings of failure as a parent.

You did such a good job with this subject! I was not a MK, but grew up in a nearly cult-like evangelical environment and can relate to so many of your experiences and reactions (especially as a fellow introvert!). Thank you for doing so much emotional work to tell your story. I struggle with feeling alone for how I grew up, as well as the community I had to leave in order to save my own sanity. I appreciate you and really enjoy your style and depth of empathetic storytelling. ♥

Thank you so much for sharing your story! I've been searching for a story like this for awhile. I was raised as a missionary kid for my entire childhood. I didn't start processing the trauma I went through until recently, at the age of 24, due to the pressure to constantly portray my MK experience as perfect and ideal.

I grew up with parents who believed I should figure out what I believe when I'm old enough to really think about it for myself, rather than imposing something on me. And I'm endlessly grateful for that. Without the influence of Sunday school and weekly church services during my youth, I was quickly able to identify a whole host of things about God and the church that simply didn't add up to me. So I spent my adolescence as a content atheist, even often seeking out Christians to discuss God and try to understand how on earth they didn't see through it all like I did. Fast forward to 18 years old, just graduated, waiting tables at a chain restaurant. And I meet an awesome girl. Get to know each other, and I learn that she grew up going to some youth group and she wants me to come out sometime. Sure. What's the harm? The harm is I might meet some awesome people and start forgetting about or no longer caring about the objections I had to the whole God thing. I was so taken in by the people (and in hindsight, their creepy cultish politeness and pseudo-hospitality). Before I knew it I was leading small groups after the message every week, and shortly after that I fell into a worship leader role (despite being a terrible musician with poor rhythm and a mediocre at best singing voice). At the time I told myself God was guiding me and even though it didn't sound great to me, I felt that the message was still getting through and that's what matters. I self righteously felt that my "suffering" of being on a tiny plywood stage in front of 30-60 middle/high school kids playing embarrassing sounding music was a great act of worship. And that was validated by never receiving negative feedback about the music, which I now know is just because of the creepy politeness and cultish hospitality. Many of them were miserable as well, but felt it was their duty to just worship through it anyway. Anyhow. Got off track there. The point is that this youth group (non denominational, not connected to any particular church. Just a standalone youth group facility) was heavy into missions. The most righteous and godly thing you could do is ignore your next door neighbor in favor of hopping on a plane/bus and going far away from home to tell people they're evil sinners who deserve an eternity of hell, but if they want, they could just believe Jesus is their savior instead. At one time I was even starting to put my ducks in a row to go to Africa for a 9 month missions trip (despite having only done a couple of 1 week long domestic missions trips thus far). Actually, when I think about it now.. I never actually did a single thing to make that Africa trip a reality beyond TALKING about how I was going to do it to receive praise from other Christians who say they want to do stuff like that but won't actually do it. Fortunately, after about a decade working (for free) for a few different churches and youth groups, I started to distance from the people a little bit. And I was able to spend more time in church thinking and considering the ideas being taught, rather than always telling myself that "even though there are some bad parts about the Bible, being a Christian is about just loving each other. All those rules don't matter. Just love each other. That's what being a Christian is about." But when I again started questioning the teachings and why God would guide so many of his pastors to spend so much time harping on seemingly insignificant things, and essentially dehumanizing the people that do those things.... It started to dawn on me that loving each other wasn't really what Christianity is about. Maybe in theory.. But not in practice. Since my deconversion back into a position of "if there is a God, he's silent, and doesn't meaningfully or measurably interact with the world we live in, therefore I don't believe it makes sense to live as though he exists", ive consumed a large amount of scientific, philosophical, and theological debate. And with each passing day, I become less and less convinced that there is any possibility that the God of the bible (or perhaps any deity at all) exists in a way that matters to humans. Im glad that missionaries find purpose in their lives by doing what they think is right... But the world would objectively be a better place if they all focused all of their efforts on food/medicine/education for the impoverished, rather than wasting time, resources, and energy translating bibles and teaching biologically ignorant people that birth control is dangerous and teaching people that they're filthy sinners who deserve eternal torture because of something some fictional woman did a long long time ago. We have real tangible problems to solve in this world and God isn't doing it. We should focus our efforts on those problems. Not inventing new problems (like sin) and then selling the solution (Jesus).

I’d like to hear a pod cast where you and a Military Kid talk about similarities and differences. I’m not a military kid, but I remember hearing stories. Ie how all the western kids would gather at the embassy or a special school to socialize. Similar to how that mission compound served as a church.

I'm not a MK, but I did grow up in a community that expected me to be a living example of godlyness. I really appreciate this video and could relate to a lot 💜. Sending hugs

'the loud inner critic' (25:45) oh yes! I'm actually just writing about that right now, as I reflect on my own MK -> deconstruction story, for my soon to be released next video "reversing the missionary position"! so glad to have found your channel tonight; thank you! oh yes, and I SO relate to the 'emotionally taxing' part of making these videos (I call mine my 'testimony' - double meaning intended)! that's why I'm watching you tonight and not working on the first 'chapter' of my vid, as planned....

One of my best friends growing up was an mk (her family finishing their 2.5 year furlough and moving away (in what felt abrupt to me) was one of my first deep relational traumas) I believe she is still active in the faith but her father recently passed away unexpectedly and left her mom and younger siblings in a really tough spot. It's funny how much of the support network vanishes when someone who spends their whole life serving the church passes away and their family is now a financial liability instead of free labor.

When I hear stories like this I am grateful for my semi-practicing Catholic family. When I was a kid (am now in my 50s) skepticism was always accepted and making a yourself a priority was frequently supported. Though going to church was often exhausting (I don't miss it at all). I do remember feeling sorry for the fundamentalist Baptist kids down the road who went to church several times a week. I was particularly struck by your references to your introversion. I have often read that introverts have an especially difficult time in the evangelical community. It seems they're expected to be "on" continually, just bursting with energy every moment. I remember hearing an account of one introvert whose youth leader said he doubted whether she was really "saved" because she didn't appear very excited about it. My introversion was generally respected, and at least Catholicism does have an old contemplative tradition.

I was not a MK, but I was a shy, sensitive, introverted teen riddled with anxiety and self-doubt. I was drawn to evangelical Christianity by the idea that Jesus was my personal best friend who understood me, had a plan for me, and would see to it that I would be the person he wanted me to be. Before long, I would realize that my personality traits were unacceptable. My youth group was aggressively evangelical. I had no ability for “friendship” evangelism (which wasn’t friendship at all). I was told the Holy Spirit would give me boldness if I prayed for it. I was given a box of Jack Chick tracts to pass out. I couldn’t get past the lack of respect for people’s privacy and boundaries required for this activity. And I won’t start on the violent turmoil the belief of eternal conscious torment caused on the innermost core of my being or this would be a very long post. Evangelical Christianity, especially Calvinism, is not for the shy, tender hearted type.

You did a really great job! You and your husband’s channel have really helped me heal from some of my own religious trauma,

Thank you so much for sharing this. I wasn’t a MK but was a missionary in high school and college. After deconstructing my faith, I’ve been working on healing my inner child. My entire life I felt like I was a puppet for Christ, or that I only did the things that were expected of me. I’m still working through guilt and shame in my life today. Please share more stories!

Fellow former MK here! I've stumbled across some online support groups and it's been so helpful in my healing

When I watched your first video I was struck by several things, the perfection of those spiral curls, those rocking eyebrows, and your fingernails (they were black at the time). You are a gorgeous lady, and even more importantly you are strong, have a commitment to finding and sharing the truth in a balanced way, and you just seem kind!

I've been following you guys for a year now. I'm an MK who deconstructed, and I get what you feel about post deconstruction isolation. I also know very few MKs who have left the faith. I've found connection through online support groups, which has helped.

I grew up as a christian, I never went on mission trips as a child but I knew other kids that did and I always found it very strange from a young age. They'd come back with stories about how great they were for spreading the word of God and how they saved so many people and it just kind felt like they thought they were superior to everyone instead of being humbled by the experience of seeing those less fortunate.

I am a Christian, but I have always wondered and asked myself about missionary work in these remote places, and wondering if those remote places would even understand the concept of God, let alone their culture even being able to accept that sort of thing. Thank you for sharing this, because I’ve always wondered about what it is like in the missionary world putting yourself out there.

I'm not a MK but I am a PK that abandoned faith. I have never been happier nor have I looked back. I wish you the best in your journey

Thank you for sharing your experience as an MK. I am sorry for all the trauma you experienced. I hope that you will receive healing. I am a missionary in my own country, became a Christian from the Hindu religion. I am thankful that someone shared the Gospel with me. Have learnt alot these last years as I grow in my faith. People will disappoint you. No matter the faith. The passage that comes to my mind is I will never leave you nor forsake you. The Lord has been near to me in some of my darkest hours. He's the only One I can hold onto when trials come.

Thank you so much for sharing your story. I grew up fundamentalist evangelical and I relate so much to dealing with the loud inner voice as an adult now removed from religion. Your voice is necessary:)

I haven't finished the video yet, but I was also a missionary kid. We moved when I was 10 years old. It was the worst experience I have ever had and I have never talked with anyone who had a similar experience. This was an immediate click for me. (I'm 5'10 with curly hair btw, so relate to that about awkward teenage phase!)

It’s interesting to watch videos like this. I’m a Christian, and I can totally understand where you’re coming from. There always seems to be friction between Christians and non-Christians or people of different religions, however, by the end of the day, and despite our views on certain things, we should treat each other as if we’re all siblings (though not blood-related) and set aside the animosity. It’s eye-opening to hear your story as a former missionary. Christians are often encouraged to do missionary work, however it’s not as easy as other make it seem to be. Anyway, I wish you the best of luck.

Another MK here 😊 I’m agnostic and 🏳️‍🌈. Thanks for sharing! ❤️ It’s so good to hear your story. It’s really nice to know there are other MKs that can relate to the complex emotions (I struggle with the “negative” ones… haha pedestal effect). I don’t feel like I could talk about them around the MKs I grew up around because they’re still within that bubble.

The narrative style and delivery are very like Genetically Modified Skeptic. 😊 It is also an amazing story. Thanks!

I understand that religious people think they're doing others a favor by spreading their faith, but it just doesn't seem right to force one's beliefs on people from different cultures, especially recently contacted tribes. What is your take on that?

When you said "every mistake wasn't just a mistake, it was a life threatening sin" - I had to pause the video to let that resonate. I was an MK just barely- we came back to the US when I was still a baby. Growing up though my dad still raised us Christian, and because it was not a super extreme or radical version of it (though I have stepped away from even the level of extremity he had taught me), it's been difficult to pinpoint why my childhood and teenage years especially left me feeling the way it did. I think that attitude - making every tiny mistake into a huge deal - is a big reason why. It's not just that my boyfriend put his arm around my shoulder: it's that physical affection like that is a "slippery slope" (ugh) towards the ultimate sin like you said, premarital sex. Thanks for helping me unlock one more aspect of my upbringing that contributed to the mess of emotions I have about it now :')

I’m so proud of you girlie. Even though we were brought up quite similarly, I think you turned out to be such a remarkable human being capable of a lot of love and empathy. It’s great to see how many people you have inspired from this. ♥️

I’m a PK to a southern Baptist pastor/preacher and my childhood church had a huge focus on international missions. I went on a lot of short term mission trips and so did my father-some of my closest friends’ parents decided to be missionaries and it was HARD being the kid who was left behind in the US-I cannot fathom being a kid who moved across the world. I, too, have had issues with my identity and feeling/believing I am worthy of making my own decisions and living my own life. Religious trauma is so real! Thank you for sharing YOUR experience and your story-it is so refreshing and validating to hear a story that is so similar to mine (behind the perfectly manicured church facade). I do not really identify as a Christian anymore and am still deconstructing a lot of religious ideologies that no longer serve me and that harm/invalidate people. I guess ignostic/agnostic is where I currently most align. I am spiritual, but it’s so different. Sending you love and peace ❤

My mother once said, "98 percent of people say they masturbate, and two percent are compulsive liars."

Thanks for this! I am an adult MK and an atheist now. You have distilled so much of your/my experience into thirty minutes in this video! There are so many emotional aspects to explore, and I am working on becoming a fully functioning human. Of course everyone has work to do but as you say, MKs are hardly represented in culture and there isn't a template for healing.

Thank you for sharing your story! i wasn’t an MK, but I was a PK in a Christian Missionary Alliance church so even tho I wasn’t overseas it felt very similar. I was almost pressured into going into the mission field before the pandemic hit…. now i’ve distanced myself from the church, even my dad left. The church is so focused on “saving the children” that it so often forgets the needs of the children. it’s haunting.

Antibot, thank you for making this video. RU-vid is the only place that I've shared my deconversion story. And I did it anonymously. I've never been on missions, but I was born into the Christian faith. I got saved at age 13 and I started having doubts like a year after that. I thought it was an attack from the devil. This was in 1995 so I couldn't Google it, lol. But from 2014-2018 I critically examined my religious beliefs and I now identify as an agnostic atheist as well. It all really started when I was on RU-vid looking up The Way Of The Master. That ended up leading me to the Atheist Experience.

Wow ... amazing testimony. Thanks for sharing. It is not easy. I grew up in Africa. My parents grew up in a church established by French missionaries in my country. They were thankful that they thought them how to read and write. My parents married early and had 5 kids within 10 years and we all grew up in church. My dad became a passive Christian, I left religion soon after 18.

Growing up in what someone might call a third-world backwater, I used to meet so many foreign missionaries spreading their gospels (many of which belonged to pretty obscure denominations). They kind of creeped me out, but I also felt kind of bad for them even if I couldn't articulate why. It's very interesting hearing the story from the other side. Thank you for sharing! Edit: Also your pug looks like a shadow at the end, so cute!

I was a missionary kid! Not nearly to the extent that you were though. When I was younger than 10, my parents traveled to other countries for mission work. It was usually for a week to 3 months. They were leaders, so their presence I guess wasn’t always needed. Most notably we were in Venezuela before the most recent financial crisis. I am now deconstructed, and so much happier with my life.

Thanks so much. Just came across your channel. I was born and raised in same context you described. My parents were missionaries in Mapnduma and I flew through Wamena regularly to Sentani, to boarding school. I started that regular journey when I was 6 yrs old. My experience as an MK was way back in the '60s and '70s and the affects are still being worked through at this stage of my life. I have been in the process of reframing my worldview for quite some years and am grateful for your clear articulation of some of the traumas/affects of the MK experience. I think it would be interesting to compare notes between our different generational experiences of Irian Jaya.

Your story about MKs is very fascinating. I am glad to here your experience in Indonesia which actually is a Muslim country so I understand why missionaries travel there. I remember in Kitwe, Zambia where I grew up we had missionaries. I never understood it because most Zambians are Christians anyway but one major thing I noticed about missionaries is they were very gated. So we never got to play with MKs. We never met their kids. In Zambia it is normal for kids in the neighborhood to play together. They went into the rural area and came back in my neighborhood (which was upper middle class). There was a Zambian boy who was adopted and I don't think ever with played with him. I cannot even remember his name now. Lol. This was the late 1990s though so may be things have changed. I love the fact that you spoke about boarding schools because they are common private schools in Zambia. In Zambia most missionaries sent their kids to the American International School in the capital city. Some would send their kids to a school called Lechwe which was a private school but not a boarding school. To today I don't have a positive view of missionaries with due respect to your parents. I see it as Cultural imperialism especially the fact that I seldom met MKs who went to totally different schools and did not join us to play as kids. It was like we were in the same environment but lived in two different countries. Even at church I don't think I ever got to shake hands with missionaries who testified or attended my church sometimes.

Thanks so much for sharing your story! I also grew up in a high control environment, between my parents and my evangelical cult it really was a lot to unlearn. Even though I was never a MK, there was a lot of similarity and the differences were very informative, and in a weird way seem to shed a lot of light on my own experiences, it feels like seeing the "other side" - what it's like to be looked to as a leader and role model in the christian faith, which was something I always aspired to be when I was an evangelical christian in that environment, but certainly nowadays am glad I never became. I feel like your experience is in a lot of ways so complementary to mine, hence hearing all you have to say is so illuminating to me. You also share it in a way which also really makes it easy to understand and relate to, it's very immersive. Even though you relay it in a conversational way, I also feel like I'm being drawn into a story somehow. I think you have a knack for storytelling in a relatable way. Still, it sucks if it's from forced socialisation trauma and being forced to "share your testimony" all the time. I know these things that can be seen as strengths (like when kids come across really "mature" due to having to "grow up quickly") can often also be coping mechanisms from underlying trauma where religion and high control environments are involved so there can be a lot of bittersweetness in the things we learn in order to survive those environments, especially when people praise us for them. I'm speaking as a neuro-atypical who was so good at masking understanding that it took a seriously smart well-researched person I trusted completely in order to be myself in a way I never could before in order for us to piece together over years that I actually didn't understand the things I thought I did, or understand that true understanding wasn't just feigning competency and that "fake it till you make it" only applied to things like confidence, and that some things, like technical knowledge, at a high enough level one actually has to understand and not just give the right answers to questions about.

I didn’t grow up Christian and have never been a Christian but I really appreciate learning about your personal experience - you’re well spoken and thoughtful in your approach to sensitive topics. It’s super insightful and interesting.

I am a PK, and we definitely share a lot of the same issues with growing up that MKs seem too. A lot of pressure and gaslighting. It's taken me a long time to unravel things-- still working on it!

Just got chills. I was 1.5 when we went to Indonesia for likely the same mission aviation organization. My dad was a radio mechanic (never flew for the organization, but was a pilot), and we have a ton of stories from it. I was young enough when we got back that I don't have the same memories as you do, nor that of my brothers, but it's fascinating to see a more mature narrative on the experience. Love you guys, keep up the good work.

Wow! Just, wow. Such a moving story. Thank you for sharing. (I’m not an MK, but I am a PK which isn’t as bad, but still I can relate to some of this.) But it seems like you made it through all right- you seem like a smart, kind, levelheaded, lovely person despite everything you went through.

I wasn’t a missionary kid like most people, my parents weren’t missionaries, they weren’t even church people. I got into missionary work through my school when i was 12. I went to indigenous communities in my country when i was 13 with a bunch of other middle schoolers to save souls and spread the word. In year 12 i did home schooling and moved to Cambodia to do mission work. After i graduated i did my DTS at YWAM and went back out into the field. If you know anything about YWAM, you know that they don’t take one questioning their faith well. So when i started to question mission work and started to speak about the negative impact we may be having on these people we thought we were having i was basically kicked off of my team. That just forced my to deconstruct my faith. My entire teenage and early adult life was spent with these same people, believing the same things and doing what we thought was saving humanity. I never got to be a teenager. I have so much guilt about the colonial ideas i helped spread to indigenous people, and how disrespectful we were to the cultures of the people we were trying to save.

Thank you for sharing your journey with us. It isn't easy baring your soul like that and making yourself vulnerable for us. We appreciate it.

This was very interesting to listen to, you are a great storyteller. I am happy to hear that you are doing much better now and I wish you all the best.

I really appreciate your story. It was really interesting to listen to. As difficult and as emotionally taxing as you said it was to tell the story, I would have never been able to tell this. You presented it in a positive, forthright and interesting way. If found in my own personal struggles in life, that we are our usually harshest critics. I know the persona you present on this channel is probably a small and somewhat curated version of who you are - but the script preparation, along with your openness and honesty speak volumes about how successfully you are managing the challenges of your deconstruction along with the additional pressures doing it so publicly brings. Good job and I really look forward to seeing more of these stories!

Introvert solidarity! ✊😀

Thank You So Very Much For Sharing This Trauma: Love you And Keep it up, You're Not Alone...

I love the empathy towards Missionary Kids and towards yourself in this video

I moved from Australia to Kenya when I was 12 and started boarding school in Nairobi the day after we flew in. My family aren’t missionaries but they are very Christian. I can totally relate to the overwhelming experience that is going through (a difficult) puberty and moving to the other side of the world simultaneously. As an adult, I’m now deconstructing Christianity and figuring it out for myself. It’s a beautiful mess. Lots of love xx

Thank you for sharing. I always thought being an MK would be a cool way to see the world and be exposed to new ideas. Lol. Makes sense that I would be wrong when you really think about it, lol. Then again, I was never a Christian, so I don't think I can ever truly understand the way things work within that culture

Thank you so much for sharing your story! I’m currently working with perhaps the same mission in which you grew up, but in PNG. I’m a homeschool consultant and I appreciated your thoughts, as I really want to protect the mental wellbeing of the students I interact with.

Thank you for raising this issue and presenting both the joys and trauma of being a Mk. I am now 60 and did not move abroad, but moved location and schools regularly. I have felt neglected and traumatized from some aspect of MK childraring style but its also made me self reliant, adaptable and socialable. In terms of faith I think my MK experience lead me to become a atheist. Mk is definitely an area for reach but the parenting style does not just apply to MK. There is definately things that can be done to improve things for Mk so that the child needs can be acknowledged and met but I feel that this is needed firstly within a wider context where children relocating because of their parents jobs. There is a danger that MKs like myself who struggled with normal identity issues, overcoming childhood trauma, and finding their own belief put the blame for what is living pains at the feet of their parents , the church culture and God. I am a Mk who became a Atheist and now have found my own faith in God which is now relational rather than church culture or parentally given. Mks are given a very strong belief framework which can be experienced as librating or oppressive or both. I thing that having a strong belief framework given by parents is much better than the problem people have when they have no sense of a belief framework or community. and experience frequent dislocation in the way children of celebrities or career families do. Our modern day Culture in general has a problem with sex and how to get children through puberty so your correct the issue is not black or white its grey.

Thank you for your honest and empathetic narrative of your years as a Missionary Kid. I am so glad you’ve been able to gain freedom and equanimity since those years. Love your channel!

I'm late to this party, but also grew up as an MK. I have since left the church and am working on deconstructing. Also am no contact with my parents after coming out at as gay and that being handled horribly. I only know two other MKs who left the church and came out as queer, so finding your videos is amazing. Currently trying to work through all the issues I have from being raised that way. Probably the biggest is growing up knowing I was never my parents' top priority. I have since discovered I'm Autistic, and I can remember repeatedly being at events burned out with a migraine and on the edge of a meltdown and being told by my mom that I needed to suck it up because the ministry was important and we couldn't leave yet. A.k.a. it was more important than me being in physical or mental pain. I was depressed in high school and treated like I was just in a bad mood and needed to shake it off. I remember graduating college and struggling to find a job and my mother saying that if I couldn't find something, they would have to leave the mission field, with the thinly veiled implication being that I would be taking them away from God's important work and ruining everything. When I came out as gay, they harped repeatedly on how it made them look to have a queer child. My father has tried but can't forgive me for what he views as an abomination. My mom refuses to acknowledge any of the hard things growing on the mission field created for me and my brother. My brother is some shade of deeply closeted queer and a depressed mess who hates himself. But he's so indoctrinated that he can't leave, and the way he sees me as a result has strained our relationship to the point of barely existing. So yeah. All of that to say, there are others of us out here who walked away and are working through things. And seeing you on here talking about this stuff and being honest means a lot.

Your perspective on parenting as a group effort reminds me so much of my mother and her siblings. Her sisters pushed her into the satanic panic, modesty/purity culture, and hyper-controlling our entertainment options. I remember a cousin lecturing me about reading romance novels (that my mother had bought me) and threw my book away. It’s hard enough to have the inconsistency of one or two adults trying to figure things out. It was a constantly moving goal post in our family because we had a dozen of them.

I wasn’t an MK but I was raised in a very strict, insular Christian environment, and have dealt with a lot of the same trauma. Thank you for sharing your experience. This was a great video, and I really enjoyed it. I’d love to hear more about your MK experiences.

I really appreciate your sharing your story. I too am an MK (Brazil) so I can identify. My relationships with my other MK friends and Brazilian friends are strained by my liberal ideas. I can imagine how some of them would respond if I were to come out to them as an atheist. For me the biggest issue was thinking my parents’ ministry would be destroyed if I were not a “good MK”. I am now in my late 60s and can still feel that pressure.

I'm so glad missionary work and voluntourism in general are (slowly) becoming more widely mocked and scrutinized for the colonialist dog shit they are. For instance, I'm not sure the Sentinel Island story would've been received the same way even 10-20 years ago. I find missionary stories like yours and those of ex-Mormons very interesting.

Thanks for sharing your story. I was never an MK, but was a Christian for many years and then became an agnostic atheist about a year and a half ago. I greatly value hearing stories like yours as sometimes it brings new insights into the different traumas that religion can create. I look forward to your next video.

Not an MK, but i was a PK! i totally relate to a lotta the things you talked about in a different way while you were in the field, my upbringing was entirely focused on MY community, very specifically everything needed to be local, and important for this area but i had the same thing, that intense pressure to behave in a perfect way because my dad was the pastor every time i failed, i became paranoid i hated myself, and i only ever viewed myself as a huge screw up, someone who can never do anything right And in a lot of ways, i'm still there but its comforting to find more people who experienced what i experienced and know that i'm not alone Thank you, and Drew both for these

I was an MK in Japan. I’m glad my experience wasn’t as traumatic as yours. Although I experienced the same ideology, It wasn’t as concentrated and isolated as yours.

I'm technically an MK born in Tokyo under CBFMS (I think it's called CBOMS now) but my parents "failed" and moved back to the States when I was 5. The whole thing ruined my mom's life. By 14 I abandoned the hypocrisy, and got off easy. SO MANY kids had it worse than me, thanks for sharing!

I'm an MK too. My parents became missionaries when I was a toddler, welch is pretty standard I guess, but I had an interesting experience getting out of the missions space. A couple years before I moved out of my parents' home, my family actually moved "back" to work at one of the organization's home offices in the US. There was a whole campus there, with missionaries working in permanent admin positions and a constant stream of missionaries passing through for conferences, training, or unplanned furloughs (medical etc). There was also a youth group specifically for MKs, which I attended with my sister. It was cool to bond with the others over the strange experience of moving "back" "home" to a country that felt foreign, landing back into the secular world, and there were actually a lot of honest discussions of teen MKs struggling with their faith and with being held up on this MK pedestal. Of course most of them resolved their crises of faith, many going on to Bible college and/or into missions. And I didn't feel comfortable being completely honest there with how far my doubts had gone, because of the whole pseudo-family thing and how easily it could all get back to my parents... But it was still a cool space just for MKs, that honestly didn't feel judgy.

Thank you so much for sharing your story! It was good to hear the perspective of a mk as a JW kid who used to dream of going on missionary trips and look up to those families.

Although I was not a missionary kid (I attended a very small Catholic/Christian school from grades 1 through 7, and left due to a very traumatic series of events), this video and your story has helped me to further unpack some of my own religious trauma, so thank you for making this! Thank you for sharing

I wasn't a missionary but i did move to another city to join a church. I remember one time there was a University student lunch after church, and me and my friends were all studying at the time so we went along. We then got told that if we weren't going to mingle with new people then we had to leave. Despite not volunteering that day or the fact that we were all university students, because we were already part of the church, we were being told that if we didn't welcome new people that we couldn't be involved. This person also knew I had severe anxiety at the time and I am neurodivergent. It wasn't a strong point for me and approaching new people was especially hard. This is a great example of churches only wanting to welcome new people to get them to continue coming but once you're in, they treat you like crap and if you're not serving all the time, you're doing something wrong.

Thanks for sharing your story, beyond the almost robotic rote answers we hear from MKs on shows like Hams I have never heard what it is really like growing up in that community. Dredging through our pasts can be difficult but also ultimately rewarding. Another vote for more of this topic in the future. Be well.

I was raised Mormon and "missionary work" is a big piece. But it has bothered me most of my life. I caught the "share the gospel" bug for a few months when I was in early elementary school, and for one week in middle school, but ever since then, I couldn't help but feel really icky about missionary work. It felt rude to tell a stranger or a new friend what I thought was good for them and that they needed this. That they needed to sacrifice coffee and tea and extra ear piercings and self-expression and dedicate their life to an Orthodox religion. But it took 34 years to figure out it wasn't what I needed either. I thought it was true. Until I suddenly realized it wasn't. And purity culture sucks. My dad gave me those lectures all the time. I grew up to be a married sex-repulsed demisexual with sex-induced panic attacks.

I grew up as a missionary kid, and i no longer consider myself christian, but due to the embedded nature of the community I grew up in, i think Christianity is valuable to those who truly study it. I have a hard time criticizing every aspect of my specific upbringing but i love challenging the ethics of missionary work in general and i do think it does have a way to be done safely and with appropriate consent. Most missionaries are not what i would call healthy religious advocates.

PK support! Missionary kids always seemed like alternate reality versions of myself, walking straight out of another dimension. So similar in the role they played, yet from such a foreign world. There was always something about that tension between sameness and strangeness that made me uncomfortable around them, even when we were expected to act as friends when visits occured. I can never fully relate to your experience, but as someone who was still raised in the ministry, experienced a move from California to the Bible Belt at 14 because of "God's calling," and was similarly criticised for not fitting into the more extroverted (and shameless) parts of evangelism and fellowship, I at least see a glimpse. I would gladly welcome another video discussing the topic of kids raised in ministry generally, if you ever decide to steer in this direction again.

Wow my dad was also a missionary kid in Bandung. I was only an MK for a few years when I was very young, but it's pretty much the family business. I've been increasingly realizing how much these missionaries devalue the health and wellbeing of children in missionary families, and when something goes wrong they blame it on sin or say that it is a sacrifice that must be made for the gospel. Even though I was only a missionary kid for a few years, it harmed me and caused my parents to do things that harmed me, on top of the negative impact on local communities. Thanks for sharing your story, I wish this stuff was talked about critically more often.

thanks for sharing! i'm not an MK, but my mother is, so a lot of your story sounds familiar to what my mom has told me. her experience was much more positive, but it still tracks with what you said about boarding schools and locational consistency. the overwhelming majority of what you said about the missionary culture is also true about Christian culture in general, it seems. things like the obsession with sexual purity, the fear that's ingrained in you of the outside world, and introversion not being valued by hyper-evangelical Christians are not just true of missionaries. personally, i've been a Christian since birth, was raised in a Christian home, and i still happily classify myself as a follower and friend of Christ, but i've always been little at odds with the pervading American Christian culture. so much of that culture presents the world (and even the nature of God) in a way that just doesn't vibe with the evidence i've seen and my own experience.

It was both sad and clarifying to hear your story. When I was young I participated in arranging things for missionary kids so they could spend time together and share their experiences. As far as I understood it was at the time understood that life of a missinoary kid was not easy, and that especially cultural changes were not easy, and the organisation I used to participate in tried to ease the problems with support camps during summer holidays (during the visits to the home country). I just don't know how much good they actually did. One of my friend during my (university) student years was actually missionary kid. She sometimes talked about the challenges quite openly. On the other hand her sister talked much less about them. I knew other missionary kids as well (I sung in the choir with few younger ones), but not as well as her. Yet it was well known fact that many missionary kids found returning to home country especially hard and some later moved abroad. It was propably because many were brought up in Americanized international missionary schools and felt more at home in anglo-american culture than ours that is different. This was some 20 years ago though and I don't really know how things are now. My goddaughter is a missionary kid as well, but her family returned already when she turned six and her brothers were even younger. She remembers a little, but I don't think she knows the local language anymore. I think that was easier than being older when returning home country. However even her parents felt that missionary community was quite cloused up in there and it was not always easy to make real impact. However I could see them returning to the field, but only after the kids are adult.