So yup after I posted that post at 5am, I woke up at 8am with hundreds (literally) of whatsapp chats, messages, Facebook messages and emails regarding my post. And it surprises me that till this day nobody has directed any hate towards me. The worst I got was some church elder telling my father that he knows how painful it is as a parent "whose child has strayed from God" and that "God can turn [me] around" (ikr 5,500 words of why I'm better off leaving the church and you read 5,500 words of why I'm sinful and unholy) Most of the messages were people sharing with me their personal experiences and how they relate to my post, which surprised me since everything seemed to be going well on the outside. Some complimented me on my bravery and some wished me well and hope that I'll recover from this incident soon. People have written blog posts about my blog post, shared my Facebook link to their friends and someone submitted it to some news website (not some well known news website la just a lame one). 

The thing is.. I didn't plan that post hahah. I literally came home from a late night out with friends and while showering decided that I should blog about it. Didn't plan my outline didn't spell check or format it properly, I just typed away for 1.5hours. (Yes I wrote it all in 90 mins) I'm still wondering why I suddenly felt so strongly about voicing this out, but others have been telling me that maybe it was God telling me that it's the right time to do it. I guess it must be true, since I've been nothing but blessed even more since then. Funny how everytime I think that I'm blessed beyond measure and that I'm contented with life the way it is right now, something even greater manages to come along and I am humbled and even more blessed. (Is that a thing? Is it blibically correct to be more blessed?) I'm not one to be overwhelmed easily, but the sincereity of everyone who messaged me was overwhelming, and I honestly couldn't remember how good it feels to forgive someone and to be forgiven. I've received so much love and support from my family, some church members I honestly did not think I'd have the support of, and my friends who helped spread the word of my post. It's been such a liberating and humbling experience and I think I learnt more from that than from going to Sunday school for years. 

Not everything is perfect though, people have been talking about how wayward I am, how I'm a rebellious teenager because I used a curse word and do unlawful things (eh in my defense it was only 1 curse word dyou know how much self-control and restraint I exercised) and how I couldn't possibly have been eloquent enough to write the post and I was doing it together with a group of people within church hoping to spark a rebellion of some sort. I've even gotten an email titled "some words of apology?" which contained a sentence "my intention isn't to be bellicose" (WTH is bellicose who uses that to apologise?!).  Honestly I'm more amused than angry at all these responses. I don't think these people even notice how ridiculous they are. I mean.. God can turn me around? Why? I don't wanna go back. Are you saying He made a mistake or something for me to end up here today? In fact I have no anger nor hatred at all towards them. Just plain amusement. Abit of pity too la but more of amusement.

Some people, including my father, have asked me why I refuse to meet up with anyone from church requestig to "discuss this further". Idk, maybe because there's nothing more to discuss? Nothing more that concerns you, actually. And the thing is that's the main reason why I wanted to write a public blog post about it instead of talking to someone. I can't count the number of times my words were twisted into something totally irrelevant which led to more people looking down on my actions. If I mentioned something taboo or sensitive, whatever I said was never mentioned again to anyone and they pretended like the problem didn't exist. Funny how some things spread when you don't want them to but remain within the 4 walls you uttered them in when you so desperately needed it to spread. The point is, talking about it to someone privately didn't seem to get me anywhere in the past, why should it now? Whoever I meet will then have the power to decide what they should do with my story, and I'm not sure I trust anyone from church to make that decision for me. That's why my tagboard's up, that's why I'm allowing anonymous comments and whatever. And replying them. I'm so sick of my words being censored, I want everyone to know what I really said. 

I think it's been quite an experience for my family too. Suddenly they see people ostracizing them, pretending not to know them anymore, while they witness other church members they were never really close to come up to them and offer their encouragement or emphathies. Quite amazing actually, how a few thousand words could open the eyes of my family and myself. 

So yup in summary I'm thankful for everyone who contacted me in the past 3 weeks and for the messages I've received (sorry if I haven't replied you, may have missed you out). Thankful for the experience and lessons I've learnt from this. 

But yeah I'm really quite tired of this LOL I mean, my replies to comments were getting kinda repetitive if you noticed. Not that I'm discouraging anyone from contacting me if they wanna, just that I wanna stop blogging about this already. 

ARGH all I wanted to blog about was that I realised why I don't look forward to the weekends anymore- because I enjoy myself everyday, and the people in my life ensured that the joy and freedom I could experience over the weekends became a daily thing for me and that if I think of it that way, is a real blessing for me because everyday is special to me now instead of just the weekends. ^-^

(Tsk, wrote paragraphs about something I didn't intend to talk about and then wrote a one sentence long paragraph about what I actually really wanted to say. And people actually think that I plan my blog posts very carefully hahaha)