12/08/2025
Growing up in the Old Order Amish, we were not allowed to have a cell phone to text our family and friends, if we are a member of the church or a younger child. The only time some are allowed to have a cell phone is when we are in Rumspringa, which is between the ages 16 to lower 20's, it depends. And IF our parents allow us to have a cell phone, then there is restrictions to it. Usually it cannot be out in the open, in front of our siblings. For me and my brothers, we were not allowed to have a cell phone at all. But of course, we did have a cell phone, so we would always hide it completely from our parents. I had a cell phone since age 17 and my parents never found out until I was 21, when I moved out of my parents' house. My brothers and I would go to Walmart and we would buy a cheap flip-phone, that doesn't usually have internet, and we would use it to text each other and we would also Bluetooth songs to each other, so we had music, which of course, we only listened to music when our parents were not around. So in that time of Rumspringa, most of the youth in the Amish community that I came from, have cell phones, whether they're allowed to or not. And the only other people that have a cell phone is adults that have a business. My family had a business, so we had a cell phone, but it was only used for business purposes. And there might have been one or two other churches in our community that were more lenient, that allowed their members to have a certain type of cell phone that is not supposed to have internet. Every family in our community has a landline phone, which is of course, completely different from a cell phone. So we could call anybody that we wanted to, but we couldn't text each other and the landline phone had to be outside of the house, so sometimes the weather wasn't nice and therefore, we wouldn't usually call our friends and family unless there was a reason.
Not being able to text friends and family, or email them, or have a phone in the house where it's convenient to call, because of that, there's other ways that Amish people keep up with friends and family, such as: family gatherings quite frequently and writing letters. ✍️
Writing letters in the Amish is quite common. Sometimes we would write letters to family, usually that would be the women. There is a church newsletter that is for our community and there would be 'get well showers' in there for people that are hurt, or something like that and then people from our community would send a card or sometimes write a letter to those people. Then there's also something called 'circle letters' that is very common in the Amish. Most women in the Amish are in at least one or more circle letters. A circle letter is where a bunch of the women would take turns writing a letter and putting it into an envelope and then it would get passed around, each person has to send it to the next person on the list, there might be a total of 5 to 10 women and when the letter comes back to you, then you have to take out your old letter and replace it with a new letter, that way it's continually new letters for everyone who gets the envelope. My mom is in a circle letter with her cousins (the women). When I was Amish, I was in a sisterless circle letter for a little while. This was only for Amish women and girls who did not have any sisters, from several different States and one from Canada and we would write letters, put it in the envelope and send it off to the next person in line. Even after I left the Amish, I was still in this circle letter, until about a year ago, I backed out. (I backed out for a reason that I will not be explaining).
Another thing that is common in the Amish is for them to find a birthday twin who is Amish from any community and they would write letters to each other. If you don't know what a birthday twin is, it just means it is another person who is born on the exact same day and year as you were. I remember when I was Amish, I wanted to find out who my birthday twin was in the Amish, and I went through our entire Amish community directory, just to find 2 boys, no girls! It wouldn't have been appropriate to write a letter to the boys, so I was disappointed, but I did have a second cousin who was born the day before I was, she was the closest to a birthday twin that I could find and we sometimes sent a birthday card to each other.
Since I have been shunned by my family, since leaving the Amish, I write letters to them a few times every year. My grandmother, married brothers, a few cousins and aunts have written a letter back to me, but my parents have never written back to me. I used to love writing letters to friends sometimes, when I was Amish, but now that I left, I have to be very careful about what I write to them, so I don't really like it as much now.
Amish people usually get envelopes in the mailbox almost daily, because they can't have electronic bills, it has to be paper. They can't get emails or any such things, it all has to be on paper. They also send a lot of greeting cards to each other, because once again, they can't just text their long distance family a Merry Christmas or a Happy Birthday.
