lrkr-
It is hard to accept, but this is the price to pay for fading. Eventually, it becomes inevitable that you either have to come clean with who/what you are and doing with your life, or fake it, to keep the relationships going. It is not fair, but it is their game, their rules.
For the most part, I moved on years ago, DA'd, and did not care what anyone thought. In the end, that is still the case, but...it does not mean I would not want to have a relationship with some good JWs I know. I tried to do this recently, and failed, and yes, it still hurt.
My point is, even if I did not DA, the same eventuality would have taken place in time. I actually was very honest with this one friend right from the outset of our recent conversations, and especially so because I care about her. I know she sensed that there was more to the story that I was not mentioning, (I was not trying to keep anything hidden, the DA letter did just not occur to me anymore), but because she was suspicious, she kept digging, and found the letter on this site. That was the end of our short lived "new" relationship. In any case, even without the letter, enough would have been spoken about that would have likely made her avoid me anyway. The only way that could have been avoided, would have been to lie. I could not, and would not do that.
And yes, I did get the "what is your status?" question, (or some variation of it), also. This is a typical trigger phrase question that would have no meaning outside of the JW world, but has a very specific meanining within it. If you try to answer honestly, (in the non-JW literal sense), you may as well be saying you are "no longer one of JWs".
I will send you a PM. We did meet up in NY a few years ago.
d4g