Hello all:
I’m new to this (or any) board and I’d like to introduce myself. I’ve been visiting this and H2O for about a month now, and it has been so therapeutic for me. I’ve been inactive for about 2 years except for Memorial and assemblies and those have only been for my sibling’s sake to help care for an aging parent.
I decided to join in and introduce myself because yesterday I read Ozzie’s great post on “Restrictions” on March 23 pm and got so worked up by past memories of my experience with DF’ing and going through the humiliation of “qualifying” for reinstatement. His post made such a good point to me I wanted to thank him and add a thought and a question. So I left the board to register to be able to answer his post and couldn’t get back into the topic again Sunday night due to some technical glitch. I got in today so I decided to first introduce myself with a little background…briefly I hope.. but probably not.
I’ve been very encouraged to read so many posts about why you have left the org. that I felt could have been written by me. I just had no idea there are so many out there with the same questions, hurts, feelings, frustrations, etc. etc. as I have as well, as so many abuses I would never have believed could possibly exist in “the truth”. A couple of years ago, when my non-witness husband commented that he doubted the org. was too pure to have molesters lurking for years I defended the org. vehemently saying Jehovah would not let them get away with it. He would cause them to be found out so as not to contaminate anyone.
Now I read so much about molesters, cover-ups, lies, abuses of power, I’m reeling in shock. Even tho’ I have not associated for a while, I guess I still am feeling the effects of the indoctrination of being raised from birth in “the truth”. I grew up hearing my parents say, “We never thought you would ever go to school… or to work… or get married… or have children” because the end is so close. I remember the hype of 10 years before 1975. I was of school age, very impressionable, and heard talks of the clock hands at 1 minute to 12 showing how close we were to the end and hearing my friends talk about it wondering if we were going to finish school that year. I was afraid to have children when I got married because of the scripture “woe to the pregnant woman and those nursing an infant” in the last days. 1975 came and the explanation that we, the r&f, were jumping the gun and misreading what the org. said. I believed it.
I got caught up in the “pioneer for Jehovah in the last days remaining” hype and then felt guilty for not enjoying it. I tried to be a good elder’s wife but found it increasingly difficult seeing hypocrisy in the elder ranks…but again felt guilty for being critical. I was disappointed by some friends in the congregation and unhappy in my marriage and got discouraged to the point of erring, confessing and being DF’d. I was in shock by the elder’s decision because I thought if you were, as the scriptures say, repentant and had turned away from your sin, you would be forgiven, but they felt, I guess, that I didn’t grovel enough. And again the indoctrination took over and I guess I felt that must be Jehovah’s decision because they pray for his guidance in deciding.
Anyway I continued to go to meetings, and feel the sting of being told to come in after the prayer, because that meant I had to walk up the middle of the aisle practically to the front to find a seat on the edge and by myself. Finally one kind elder suggested he would save me a couple of seats at the back (for myself alone). I continued sitting through the humiliation for over a year before I finally approached them for reinstatement, but even then I felt the sting of disapproval of those who sided with my ‘elder husband’. I then moved to a new area and felt good in my new congregation… that is until my son decided he just couldn’t take the pressure to pioneer straight from school and never felt he was good enough in the elder’s eyes or some of the ‘more spiritual minded youths”. He saw the good clean fun his friends from his part-time job were having and was disillusioned by the hypocrisy he saw.
Because of his association etc. and he expressed he didn’t want to be known as a JW anymore he was DA’d (never wrote an official letter) and I started to get more discouraged all over again. Often I would be stuck in the middle of an row during the meeting, silently crying about something being studied or discussed from the platform and couldn’t get up to leave because of not wanting all to see. I tried to see it in the light of the scriptures and the 1981 Watchtower on how family was to shun family members not living at home. My family all feel they are doing the right thing to help him come back and tried to convince me to do the same but I never could go along with it. I felt I would be abandoning my son, that he was out in the middle of the ocean without a life preserver and drowning. Sometimes the pressure to please the rest of my family, feeling guilty that I was being rebellious to Jehovah, and wondering why I couldn’t feel the same as the rest of the organization, would be so great I just cry all day. I couldn’t just ‘sit in the boat and watch him drown’, so I continued my association with him, went to his wedding, but still continued to go to meetings. Surprisingly I was never hounded for my association with my son, and especially was encouraged by my closest witness friends who supported me and felt the same way. They couldn’t turn there back on him or anyone else either. The more we talked about it the more I came to realize I was not alone. I was finding others who questioned and ignored the shunning practice…like elders who would have to sneak around to visit their DF’d children etc.
Then the “new light” on the ‘generation’ came out and I now I had to face the fact that all that I had been taught about ‘not growing old’ and ‘no need to put anything away for retirement’, or ‘you’re materialistic if you want to buy a nice house because we’re so close to the end’ was all wrong. How could this be?!!! I was convinced whatever the brothers said from the platform was directed by Jehovah.
Then I read R.Franz’s 2 books which opened my eyes to the misguidance from the GB, and the Gentile Times Reconsidered book which destroyed my last piece of foundation … the 607 to 1914 as 2520 years formula for Christ’s return and beginning of the end. That was my stronghold in believing this was “the truth.” I felt we were blessed to be privy to such wonderful understanding of these ancient prophecies and what a privilege to actually live in the time of the end and see the New Order be established and live forever not having to die. I went through the whole gauntlet of emotions…utter shock, complete sadness, indignation, anger and complete lack of trust in, and total disillusionment with the org. I feel so duped! I also felt like a load of guilt and pressure had been lifted off my shoulders…pressure to try and always defend the org. (and myself) was gone. But it still left me in the dilemma of not being able to explain my findings and reasons for no longer wanting to associate, because I’ve read story after story about those who have questioned these basic and essential teachings only to be DF’d. I can’t afford that right now because my family would feel compelled to shun and that would too painful to endure and I know how it would destroy certain family members who are, right now, just too emotionally delicate to deal losing me.
Basically that leaves me between the old rock and a hard place for now.
I am ever so thankful I have found a site like this one and couple others. Many of the members have been so encouraging to me even though their posts aren’t personally directed to me. It just feels good to know you all are out there. Thank you for taking the time to help so many like me. I spend a lot of time in tears sitting in front of this computer, but like I said it is so therapeutic right now.
Sorry for such a long-winded intro…I hope some of you didn’t nod off!
Thank you so much,
had-enough