In fact, you are in good company.

http://www.infidelguy.com/article75.html

http://enlightenment.supersaturated.com/essays/text/francesparker/blackatheism.html

http://www.upf.com/book.asp?id=LACKEF06

I don't see any reason to announce your belief or lack of a belief system to anyone, even if they ask. Most people don't really want to know, anyway. They just want confirmation and company in what they believe. Since you are married, however, your wife does need to know, and if she cannot respect your views there may possibly be unresolvable friction, even with a counselor’s help. Better to know now than later.

As you well know, Black folk can be VERY socially reactionary when it comes to religion, yet seem to live comfortably with the hypocrisy of ministers who are crooked or sexual predators. It's not just the Catholic Church that has the corner on that market.

There are many agnostics, atheists and just plain old uncommitted Black people, probably some in your wife's church, who are able to take the social aspect and leave the religious aspect at the altar.

I for one love gospel music, and if I go to a church it is for the musical entertainment value and positive mental attitude message. Very uplifting, and God's name doesn't need to be mentioned anywhere.

If the choir is no good and the minister is hellfire and damnation, my presence will not grace the premises.

The point is, I am an atheist, not agnostic, and the older I get the more of my kind I am meeting, IN the Black church and Black community, as we stop giving a damn what others think of us. Very comfortable just being, not proselytizing, and not trying to explain or defend our positions.

The distinction is important. If you are pro-life you are against war, against the death penalty and against abortion.

Not too many people fit into that category.

It's not enough to leave him, which you should do. You also need to be wary after you leave, because he may plead with you to take him back because he says he can change.

The thing is, since you have already pleaded and reasoned with him over this while you are still with him, that means he is too obtuse to see your point or he just doesn't care. If you let him back, the behavior will just start again.

Let him change for the next person.

Color Theory, I understand what you're saying, but she's already done what you're suggesting, and no one should have to daily have to defend what she says or does.

The boyfriend probably does have good qualities, but he also is the whole package, which includes the verbal abuse. And it IS abusive, tiring and emotionally wearing.

She needs to leave, and if he genuinely does change after she has left the situation, she can decide whether she wants to revisit it.

Gee Marc22309, you sure know a lot about both parents from what is clearly a confused young adult barely out of her teens. We can't really tell from this story what is real and what is the LW/child's perception, but one thing is clear: if the parents have stayed together there is a reason.

Perhaps mother would have liked to work outside the home but was left with the total child-rearing responsibilities, perhaps dad would have liked to have pursued some other career path but his wife and kids sucked up all his emotional energy and finances.

It is clear LW has only a rudimentary understanding of parent-child relationships herself (to be expected at such a young age), because the fact that she was premature has absolutely NOTHING to do with mother not "bonding", and most certainly would not explain her being closer to her father at a young age.

I think at this point she has been very wise to continue her therapy to gain a better understanding of herself and her wants and needs, because she has been busy up to this point trying to navigate her parents' needs. A good therapist can help LW to communicate with the parents while at the same time not be manipulated emotionally by them.

Such as, where is the father?

Such as, why in the hell would you leave a 17 year old in Nevada while you go to Washington state to find a house to rent for you and him when HE is the one who will be going to school there?

Such as, why are YOU going to Washington to get your son into a program that you never once say he's interested in?

Such as, you say YOUR plan was for him to complete school and travel, but at the same time you're trying to enroll him into a dive program.

And this just in the first paragraph.

If he has truly tried and is still talking about suicide he has problems beyond your ability to handle alone, and moving to different states where is has no friends or relatives (I assume) is not going to help things from his standpoint.

Kicking him to the curb is not the answer either, but you are toxic to him, and he won't improve until you recognize that he is a grown man.

and I certainly didn't expect to like it from the early reviews I read. It isn't JUST about a 40 year old woman with a younger man, which is what Accidentally seems to be.

Cox is funny, the other characters are funny, the situations are caricatures of real life (this IS a sit-com)and are funny.

Sure, a married woman of 40 might take a shower and go to bed naked with her husband, but this is a woman who has divorced a womanizing ex and is a bit neurotic about having missed out on the singles scene in her youth. She is not a cougar in the self-assured way the other older woman is.