SRs Story: Muslim Ex-Wife Speaks Out-2

28 Feb 2008

Subject: Islamic Experience

Dear Knowers,

I received responses today requesting that I write about more of my experiences. Thank you for your very kind messages and your interest. I would love to share experiences and answers to some of the questions that you asked, and I hope that it will be helpful.

I finished high school a semester early and left for college on my 18th birthday. During the very first semester I met "X" in a class. (I will refer to my moslem x-huband as X from now on.) Years later, he said that he liked me right away because I winked at him. I thought it strange that he would say that because I do not remember winking at him.

He had very good ideas in the class and they were impressive. I am an artist, so we worked on several projects together with great results. That is how we met.... We did not date till a year later, and we were not serious or engaged for yet another 2-3 years. I did not know that X was a Moslem; we never really talked about religion. He told me he was half Sweedish. His father was Sweedish he said, and his mother, Persian. I fell in love with him and we became engaged eventually. Once we were committed, he told me that I would have to convert to Islam to marry him because his family would never allow him to marry a non-Moslem. I thought I could do it for him. He assured me that we shared the same Old Testament. I thought Islam merely could not grasp the idea of the trinity, and I would see what it offered.. I did not know the story of Ishmael because Catholics (I was raised as) mainly study the life of Jesus. I only knew about Isaac. I would later learn the story of Hagar and Ishmael for the first time from a Moslem!

I thought that Islam might be enlightening so I decided to give it a try. I did not realize what a committment it was, but I really tried to be a good Moslem. It turns out that I never felt very comfortable about Islam from the beginning. I thought to myself that if Islam is true than I will feel enlightened. I never did feel enlightened and I did not ever feel it in my heart to be wonderous thing. I saw how X reacted to the embassy takeover in Teheran when I was pregnant with our first child. I thought perhaps he will lighten up someday. I became sick of regular insulting inferences to "unbelievers", Jews, Americans, my non-moslem friends, and to my own family eventually! He tried to make me think that my father was in the CIA (thus an enemy of the world). I became insulted and very hurt. I came to wonder why X had come here if he thought that way about all of us, something he could never answer satisfactorily.

When I was pregnant with our second child, X decided we must move to Iran after the baby was born. To keep the family unity, I went to Iran, against mine and my family's wishes. We took everything we had of value. I took everything that was important to me including precious family photos and keepsakes, most of which was left behind, when we returned nine months later. I was not very appreciative of the trip to Iran. On the first day there, his brother scheduled an outing for us. We went to a part of town where they were having a mass demonstration. Thousands of people paraded down the street with banners, shouting "Death to America" The stream did not end while we watched , and would not end until all the people in our vicinity would fall into it also. X's brother was in the army, and he watched my every expression. He wanted me to witness and someday tell the Americans about the hate they have for us; thinking I was sympathetic, when I was really bewildered.

The second day in Iran, we went to the Cemetary of the Martyrs to watch the bodies arrive on pick-up trucks and flat beds. Three - five bodies at a time arrived about every 5 minutes on a truck. They were wrapped in white fabric, ready for buriel, "martyred" in the Iran-Iraq War. They called it the "American Imposed War". Again, the brother wanted me to see, and he watched my expressions carefully.

That brother never ate at the table with the rest of the family while I was in Iran. He and his wife always sat on the floor to eat.

I was very disapointed that I had agreed to practice Islam and travel to Iran. X did not really like it in Iran after all. Life was much harder in Iran after the Revolution that brought in Ayatollah Khomeini. It was not the Iran he had bragged about incessantly to me. So we began making plans to return to the US, after he met with all the people he wanted to meet with while in Iran. Those people included Imams and Gov. Officials. It was my understanding that X was trying to get a Gov. contract to build solar villages in Iran. Nevertheless, he decided to return to the US since they did not give him the desired contract in Iran , nor one to work on from the US. He told me that they wanted him to live in Iran and receive a home and Gov. salary, but if he returned to the US, he should behave as a good moslem, and establish himself in the US for the day when Islam would reign supreme. (I always doubted that it would, thinking it a childish "pipe dream"), even though I knew by then, how much they really hated us.

After I finished reading The Koran, I wanted to tell X that I did not like Islam. However, I kept up the practice through my third child who was born after we returned to America. During part of the pregnancy, I lived with my Grandmother, but returned to X because of the hardship, resuming an Islamic lifestyle.

When my third child was 6 month old, X did not want us to go to my mother's house for Christmas any longer "because she had a dog". In Islam your prayers are not accepted if you have dog hair on you or your prayer space. I would therefore track dog hair into our house from hers, and his prayers would not be accepted.

I knew I must leave X to escape Islam, besides, I was very unhappy with him too. So I eventually gathered the required courage and gave him the news that I could no longer practice Isalm; that it was hypocritical of me to do so because I did not feel it in my heart. (A Sufi Muslim British convert once told me that you should feel Islam in your heart, and I took that to heart) X said that a moslem must obey Allah and follow only Islam no matter what. If you are not right with Islam in your heart, then you are doing something wrong, and you should try to correct it!. He had also often told me that the penalty was death to leave Islam. I knew by then that there is no compulsion in the religion, they will just kill you! Upon receiving the news of my denouncement, X raised his arm in the air as if to strike me, but then he stopped and walked away. The next morning before he left for an appointment, he spit on each of my cheeks. I left that day, but he filed for a divorce before I did, claiming I was unfaithful.

I hope that I can help with my experiences. I am so thankful to Briggitte Gabriel and thankful for the ACT! For America members because you know what is really happening.

SR