I recently was at the hospital visiting a dfd relative having her first baby. A little background: Baby mama and daddy are dfd for having sex. Thankfully they have not rushed into marriage because of the little package that has come along 9 months after their "transgression." Some family members are sticking to the shunning and others have said, we want to be involved with the baby so we are going to use the necessary family biz to avoid the shunning. I am cool with the supportive relatives. The hard core ones just get on my nerves.
Anyway, the day the baby was born, I was in the room hanging out with baby, parents and other close family members when my SIL comes for a visit. She started sobbing very dramatically as soon as she walked in the room. No reason for it really, but hey, the day is all about her isn't it??? She is one of the ones trying to be hard core. Perhaps she felt guilty, I am not sure, but the drama was so inappropriate.
Then later comes my brother (her hubby). I have been feeling sorry for him because according to family members he is deeply depressed and I have been wondering if it is cognitive dissonance affecting him. I was curious to see if he would acknowledge me (barely) and then he just went and made an a**hole of himself in front of most of the family and nursing staff by saying over and over again that a broken femur (which he has had) hurts far worse than child birth (cause he would know?). I engaged him in some small talk to lessen the tension in the room and I got very rude dismissive treatment in return. He was barely polite to my boyfriend. Again, all behavior that would have been better left outside the hospital room.
JW family is so fun! Makes me glad I am being shunned by these people, as I find the lack of kindness and love in general to be a strain in the short run, I think I would go mad in the long run.
We did have some humor in the waiting room. JWs related to baby daddy were hanging out with my boyfriend and I. They didn't know I was once a dub so they kept trying subtle ways to witness. At one point one of them started a presentation right out of a meeting. I got up and walked off in the guise of stretching. I left my boyfriend behind. He is of Jewish decent and was once a Baptist minister (for approximately 20 years) and is now an atheist. He knows more about the Bible than a room full of average JWs and can and did handle himself. His approach was actually to avoid religion altogether and to ask some very deep questions to make the man reason. I think, at the very least, he really made the guy think for a brief period of time. Hopefully, he will do some research.
Of course, the most important part of the story is that baby & mama are doing great. Daddy is really doing a good job also. I have a new little angel to spoil!