u/Safe_Use3325

So I did a guide on finding Ex-Muslims on Hinge here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmuslimr4r/s/Scb7rXd143

Now if you are a hijabi in real life, here's how to navigate dating so you don't confuse the Ex-Muslims into thinking your religious:

1. Download Hinge

2)Post your pictures without a hijab.

3. In real life make yourself look unrecognisable with no effort in your hijab and no makeup.

4. Then when you go on dates with your hair down, you won't get caught because you look completely different with your hijab on.

So I read through a few of the ex-muslim R4R posts and I was suprised to see a few people state that they want someone who's still a virgin. I heard a few people still believe in saving your virginity for marriage. One guy DM'd me with a long description of himself and within that description he mentioned that he has had no previous sexual experience. I didn't ask him if he had or not which can only make me assume women have asked him that question in the past so he's now using it as a selling point for dating.

I can understand not wanting to have sex with just anyone. Even I want to have it with someone meaningful that I have a deep, trusted bond with... so it's definitely going to take me a while to sleep with someone.

But to save it for marriage doesn't make sense to me. Especially if your in a long term relationship with someone that you trust and feel safe with. Virginity until marriage is a religious concept and ties with the act of sex as being shameful.

Do you still view sex as shameful or are there are other reasons why you might be avoiding zina?

Since I've recently been coming into these ex Muslim spaces, I've noticed quite a lot of people are child- free which is really nice for someone like me who's also child free.

I wonder why this is so common in the ex- Muslim community which leads me to ask you... when did you realise or at what age/ stage in life did you realise that you didn't want kids? Was this before or after you left the faith? Did leaving Islam have an impact on this at all?

For me, I've just never had a natural desire to have kids from day 1. A life of no children means more free time and more money which sounds very much appealing to me.

For those of you who never plan on coming out, what have been your coping strategies?

I was having an interesting discussion with some closeted ex- muslims and notice that some:

A) One to desperately come out one day and don't want to live this facade forever

B) People who plan on never coming out

I am B.

I am someone who wishes I could do more in life. More haram things 🤪 I can't help but feel like the rules I follow are so stupid and BS but I'm also never planning to come out. I don't think it's worth it for me personally. I would feel so incredibly guilty to come out because then in my mum's eyes....I would be going to hell. She would be so upset and so devastated and I can't let my Mum think that. We all know it's not true. Well I don't believe hell exists but it very much does so for my mother. A mother worries a lot but that's like probably the biggest thing I could make her worry about.

There's been a few coping strategies that have helped me along the way but the main two for me have been:

Gratitude- Just being grateful for what I have got. Yes there's more I want to do but ex- muslims in abusive families or third world countries would probably love to have my life. I've been making an effort to realise I actually don't have it the worst and making more time to sit with the things in my life that make me feel good.

Journalling- At the same time, we need to sit with our stressful thoughts and feelings and I am not encouraging toxic positivity. Journalling is so underrated. I love mindfulness to calm me down but journalling does an even better job. Your writing pace forces you to slow down your thoughts. An embarrassing confession is that I've been using ChatGPT to analyse my thoughts over the past year 😭 It was helpful to an extent but I've stopped doing that lately and I've been turning to journalling. Journalling turns you away from thinking analytical mode and to feeling mode. If you can feel more, you can then release more and find the solutions you need better because you are listening to yourself more. It definitely helps a lot with rumination and stress. AI has kinda not been helpful for me anymore because I noticed I just became too reliant on it for a quick fix or quick reassurance when in reality, things take time. You can't have all the answers straight away.

So my friend told me to download Reddit to find ex- Muslims. She was showing me all these posts of people putting themselves out there to find someone. I then read that some people successfully became in a relationship because of Reddit which is so awesome! But it does seem to be the only space for specifically ex-muslims to put themselves out there for each other.

I've actually spoken to a few people on ex- Muslim spaces who have told they have met up with people on Reddit as well which shows that it does happen.

I want to know your good stories, the bad stories etc. When I asked for advice on how to do it safely on my first post... people said just text for ages and take your time exchanging pictures to suss the vibe out. I honestly hate texting strangers on the Internet. Phone calls are better but in person is the best. Also does it not feel weird to you talking to someone for a while but not knowing what they look like? I don't like the idea of it. I might have 0 attraction to this person yet wasting my time building rapport. Then when it finally comes to the picture reveal, it will be really awkward to decline getting to know each other any longer because you've already built a false sense of chemistry through texts.

I've noticed though I'm mostly likely going to be entertaining someone on here that has a history of posting ex-muslim content dating all the way back to 5-7 years ago or someone I've seen appear in other ex- Muslim spaces such as Telegram groupchats. That would then give me the vibe that your not secretly a Muslim trying to dox me.