u/2oldforthissilliness

My wife wants a book for a trip she will soon take. I'm overwhelmed by the challenge of recommending a book. This opportunity may not happen again and I don't want to get this wrong. I would ideally like to find one that ignites in her a desire for more reading. Her vocabulary comprehension is high school level.

I think fiction would be my first choice for her based on what she likes on television, but biographies interest her also. She does not like horror, voilence, or complex intrigue. SciFi is not a great idea. She likes family themed movies. Bawdy comedies are out as are stories with multiple subplots, relationships,and characters. International themed stories could work.

My reading interests are probably the complete opposite of what she would like. I'm stuck. I would appreciate any suggestions. Thank you.

The app is back to functioning as intended after weeks or maybe even months of buggy performance. Basically the swipe back feature was not working properly, iykyk. This is a huge fix, considering how rage inducing the problem was. I would buy you all a pizza if I could.

tldr, a life wasted on magical thinking and then restored thanks to reason, logic, and science

I, 67m, grew up very strict Catholic in a family of horrific abuse with religious nutter parents. I ran away to the military to escape that hell and fell into the love-bombing arms of the Charismatic movement like Faith Chapel. (Frequent duty station transfers enabled me to seek out different denominations, though always evangelical.) The whole speaking in tongues thing turned me off as fakery, even though that was my on ramp into "getting saved" which I was completely seduced by.

Next I got transferred and switched into the Conservative Baptist thing. I did not know anything about the different Baptist denominations, but looking back now I don't think any of them believe differently, they just have administrative differences. This is when I became a serious student and lover of the KJV bible. My self administered brainwashing began there. Soul winning was heavily emphasized. All of the most toxic Christian beliefs took root then; biblical literalism and infallability, garden of eden and Noah's ark nonsense, Daniel in the lion's den, angels and demons, miracles, the road to Damascus, new testament authorship deception, you know the list...

Then I moved again and discovered the Assembly of God and United Pentecostal Church. Even though I could never fully embrace the whole tongues silliness, I was drawn in by the music and manufactured enthusiasm of these two sects. I moved again after one year of going to both of these churches and never went to them again.

My final and longest lasting denomination was the Independent Fundamental Baptist church. This is where I really fell in deep and hard. I was married by that time and my wife also liked this church. It was her first entry into Protestant salvation after an abusive Catholic upbringing and subsequent life of no church. I spent ten years in IFB churches before I stopped going even though I held onto some forms of Christian belief for another ten years. During my time in the IFB I perfected my indoctrination with intensive and extensive bible knowledge.

I wish I had begun my deconstruction sooner and with more fervor, but my head just did not live in that world. I was so completely imprisoned by the normalcy of religion and the concept of a God that it never entered my mind to not believe. However, once I renounced church attendance in favor of a personal, unstructured faith, I allowed myself to doubt and question religion as a whole. The edifice began to crumble slowly at first, ending in a complete collapse of belief and ultimate freedom from the mental bondage of all Gods and spiritual systems. Science and secular education were great examples that helped me understand the importance of expertise in history, medicine and other fields that the bible claims authority over with no evidence stronger than Trust Me, bro.

I've never been happier and more at peace in my life. Sadly, my second wife is a nominal Catholic who does not understand this change in my spiritual life. I am saddened that she feels hurt by my disbelief in God and religion. I don't know how to fix that. I never asked or planned to be indoctrinated as a child into the false hope of all religions which held me captive for decades, and I never expected that I would one day rejoice at being a non-believer, but here I am, praise be to Dawg.

I dont really hate the dreams, because they are so bizarre and I forget them quickly, but omg it seems unnatural to have such freaky dreams. I was a heavy user for so long that I don't know what normal dreams are, because I never had dreams when I was vape/smoking. Now every night I'm dreaming some science fiction horror movie where I'm always trapped in some no-win situation in my life. I wish it would end, but on the other hand these brain movies are kind of cool, even though they do freak me the fuck out.