Dear Crazy,
Everything said here is great advise (including the suggestion involving sexy lingerie). My perspective comes from another angle, however. No one in my family was a JW or even associating by the time I was exiting after 21+ years. So no one would have done anything but cheer for me if I had looked at this forum. OMG they would have Cheered-and-Danced!
But I had to find the clarity in my own motives before I could benefit from the wonderful healing available here. The tender and most vulnerable part of us is our desire to do what is right in our Father's eyes, our heavenly Father's eyes. But it is this very part of us, this tender and vulnerable conscience that has been invaded by a cancer --the cancer is our loyalty to the Organization.
I don't want to get bogged down in this cancer analogy too much beyond this: Jesus was dealing with spiritual cancer victims in his ministry, the Jewish people who had lost the sense of what the law could and couldn't do, should and shouldn't do. The Pharisees made them feel inadequate to please God or even know enough to please God. What he did was strengthen and affirm their inner love of right and of his Father's love for them. He strengthened and affirmed that they were children of Abraham if they actually did the works of Abraham (Abraham didn't know squat but he was open to learning). In fact this thought strengthened me l in the end to really set me free.
If our conscience is not free to answer to God ahead of the Corporation, then we are not children of Abraham--we cannot be followers of Christ. If you tell your husband that you want to follow Jesus from your heart and do so without fear then even if you go to meetings for a time or two the day will come when on your way there you will just stop midway and realize that you just can't do it any more. And, if you are like me, your prayers will become richer and more direct from then on.
I want to say one more thing that I found helpful when fears pressed me down. I told both myself and the elders-- and friends who worried about me that even if I were wrong in the directions my inquirey took me, my conviction could not be "unbelieved" by threats or ridicule or well-intentioned warnings. Because I felt better standing before God with a whole heart and a clear conscience.
If you tell this to your hubby perhaps he will feel better. But more than that, tell it to yourself to get strength for the road ahead.
