by mind blown 33 Replies latest jw friends
Mom was always on demon hunts in the house
Same here - anything second-hand or sometimes even gifts could be suspect. Her paranoia stemmed from what she herself had seen/experienced/been taught from being a kid. Complicated background - not solely JW-related.
Absolutely. Nightmares abut demons attacking. Armageddon.
Then I figured out TTATT and guess what?
Havent had one since.
These stories didn't help my Asma attacks either, made me a very nervious child. I used to sleep with a sheet over my face because I thought demons were breathing on me. Turns out I was feeling air from an open vent.
Ha.....my mom too would go on those demon scouting exbiditions in our home too.
Blacksheep! Yes! And those table talk stories of demon attacks from friends of a friend of a friend of a freind. Aslo, getting attacked though purchasning furniture or things other people gave you.
I also remember being afraid of my pictures, dolls and furniture that the demons would make them come alive and attack me.
The leaders of the WTS. and its editorial staff had little empathy for the psychological sensitivity of children who were to read their articles.
What was printed was intensionally done to incite fear and stimulate the distribution of their published works, essentially making up a great part
of the corruption of the WTS. publishing house.
I was utterly terrorized by the Society growing up. Paralyzing fear, nightmares, and all of it -- in the extreme. I consider it nothing less than child abuse.
I was petrified of the dark even into adulthood. Demon hunts were common in my house when I was a kid and after I got married. Everything was a conduit for the demons. And yeah, Armageddon was always coming at night. I remember thunder storms being a catalyst for my mother to wake up us kids, screaming into our rooms to get up and come huddle with her on the couch because "this might be it". I, too remember the Holocaust lectures and being told that we might have to endure those things and even be beheaded.
Nice way to raise kids.
The pictures got to me, the stories about children being destroyed because of their parents. You know, even if you are good to your kids, they still know parents weaknesses-my dad was not a JW and my mom didn't get baptised until I was an adolescent. She smoked until I was 7 and she drank more than I thought was good even then. In the meantime, I had visions of concentration camps(that is how I interpreted persecution) and figured I'd be lucky to get my period before the new system. As I am now in menopause, that fear now seems to be unfounded;)
I feared for all of my school friends, knowing they were doomed. I worried I wouldn't be able to withstand them trying to get a confession out of me or whatever they might do to torment me. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I was a great reader and read vast amounts about Nazi Germany/Holocaust, Indian captives and other dramatic things that just fed my fears with jet fuel. I met a few holocaust survivors just to cap off that fear. I remember wondering if we would get tattoos.
I did have a horrific fear of persecution and used to daydream(daymare?) through meetings about what that could entail. I also remember seeing signs saying that " trespassers will be prosecuted". I was a kid-prosecuted/persecuted. I thought that persecution was kind of harsh for mere trespassing someones yard!
It is funny, I really NEVER had the sense that JWs would "win". And how right I was!
SORRY. After all that-I did not fear demons, or smurfs although one JW aunt was convinced she was tormented by them (I think it was the hooch). I remember being curious, but not very interested and pretty skeptical.
What was the Pink or Organge book my momma read to us at night (Paradise Lost?), I was young and those pictures of the child being sacrificed to Molech made good five year old nightmare material. I had dreams from an early age I was going to die at the big A. Why should children, kids from 3-7 have been subjected to the madness of brother Fred Franz and his demented kids books? Look back at all the books we read in our youth, a time to enjoy life, and is it any reason we had nightmares about Vultures eating dead carcasses, looking around to see if anyone survived it with you?
A stupid cat use to cry outside my window at night...use the scare the crap out of me...probably why I never liked cats for many years until I have two now!
