by HappyBlessedFree 45 Replies latest jw experiences
Welcome HBF!
I came to the realization that the WTBTS the Society....promoted a death cult.
Billions were going to die at Armageddon. Thousands of JW's were going to die because they carried a suicide note on their person....... The NO BLOOD card.
After I understood how stupid the WTBTS was and how reckless they were with their followers .......my wife and I walked away in our early 20's.
Leaving is a no brainer.
Congrats on your freedom and welcome, HBF!
In early 2011, cognitive dissonance nearly killed me. I had six-week Intensive Out-Patient Hospitalization for severe, recurrent clinical depression and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. In early May, I had an emergency hospitalization due to toxicity from being over medicated for the same.
I walked out of a TMS/Bible Study meeting knowing that I just couldn't listen to their rhetoric one second longer. I spent six weeks on my living room couch going over all the doctrinal and personal issues that had arisen over my 42 years in-- I took issue with the misogyny toward women in the Bible and in the organization. All the murder and mayhem in the Old Testament in the name of righteous warfare sickened me. Accepting blood fractions but not whole blood parts made no sense to me. I had done a careful study of the newer Isaiah's Prophecy books and knew that the dates just didn't add up. I wrote a letter to NY and received a six-page reply that was just dancing around the topic and not directly answering the discrepancies. I thought the Revelation Climax Book with all its trumpet blasts was a crock, not to mention the idea of crossing things out and penciling in changes. We had to do this at Pioneer School too. They couldn't even keep up with doctrinal changes in the publications. In 2010 when they presented the overlapping generation doctrine at the District Convention, my first thought was, "That's crap."
My tipping point was both doctrinal and very personal. I absolutely knew that when I studied in the early to mid-70s the teaching on shunning was that, if a family member was disfellowshipped, you could still have "normal family relations", but could not talk about "spiritual things".
My son went through a traumatic break up with his JW wife. He was still acting out a year later, so they disfellowshipped him, but he was still living in our home. I knew that when he moved out, I was supposed to shun him. One faction of elders was saying that if we were back in Isreal, as a parent, I would have to be the one to throw the first stone, so there couldn't be any contact. The other faction was saying, that given my concerns for my son's mental health, I could visit and check in on him, but I shouldn't let that be known in the congregation. These were the elders that maintained contact with their disfellowshipped children-- such hypocrisy. One of the hardline elders had lost a son to suicide due to extreme shunning which was unthinkable to me.
We were taught that Jehovah would remove all pain and sorrow in the new system. I reasoned that the only way I could be happy in paradise forever would be to forget my husband (long-time faded JW/"apostate"), my daughter ("disassociated by her actions") and my son. If I wasn't a wife or mother, then who would that be in paradise? Certainly not me.
I chose my life with my family now over life in paradise. At least that's how I saw it at the time. I left a believer and learned TTATT about three months later.
Finding out about the GB's involvement in the UN and then the final straw was the ARC (Australian Royal Commission).
1971. I was 23..married to a born in who was pregnant. I faced up to the blood decision...and knew i would never refuse a transfusion for my wife, child or myself.
Then i admitted to myself i simply didnt believe in god..and wasn't going to waste any more of my life with a daft cult i had no interest in.
The lack of love within the org and the hypocrisy.
My spouse read Crisis of Conscience. That was it. Once you learn TTATT, it was over for us.
BEST DECISION WE EVER MADE!!!!
For me it was many things -
1. Use of 'Worldly' music at 2016 Convention final video (Audio Machines - Eternal Flame)
2. Use of purchased video footage of a woman in an 'immodest' dress
3. Elders Manual have a special provision for elders who fornicate but some time has passed and they are sorry
4. Asking the Malawi Brothers to be martyrs and the Mexico brothers to bribe officials to escape punishment
5. The Creation Book being full of misquotes
6. The UN membership scandal
7. The hiding of Childhood Sex Abuse
8. G. Losch's court record of denying anything to do with the WBTS
9. The Flood correspondence letters with the Branch (See jwfacts.com)
10. The change in policy related to organ transplants
11. Questions from readers banning what goes on in the bedroom (Oral sex) and then changing that 'policy' to don't ask / don't tell
12. Being appointed as Pioneer while having premarital sex / getting appointed as an MS while having looked at porn, getting appointed as an Elder while not stopping looking at porn. Getting removed and reappointed for looking at porn (see point 3. I should have not admitted it until some time had passed :-))
13. Higher education frowned upon and yet all the heavy's at the conventions including Chairman/Overseer of various departments all of the speakers ere college degree persons
14. Beards not being allowed in the USA and yet see them on many brothers in USA as rule depends on opinion of the CO and BOE
15. Asking for Money to get many hall built in 2015 and then turning around and consolidating halls (The great sell off)
16. Lying at annual meetings about why the reduction in Bethelites and Literature - (The Leaked 2016 Budget Meeting says it all
17. The convention accounting scam (I worked in accounting at circuit and regional) to see the videos on the web about it confirmed that the apostates were not lying but telling the truth
18. Reading the Book Crisis of Conscience
19. Giving awesome talks and doing phenomenal jobs on meeting parts and being told by the CO you are the most organized Secretary ever! (Meanwhile I'm masturbating to porn in my free time) This showed me there is no such thing as Holy Spirit hence my question of God being who I was taught he is versus who he may or may not be
20. Seeing all the real skulls and fossils at the Museum of History in Washington DC
21. Seeing how 'worldly' people are not that bad. And yes there are terrible people but for every bad thing in the news that a person does, I can name several JW's who have done those things as well. There are good people in every corner of the earth and there are terrible people in every corner of the earth.
22. Seeing my worldly relatives happy and enjoying their families and being good people
23. AtM III / AKA TPT - and his shopping spree at the local Liquor store (Nothing wrong with buying the Scotch - it's the principle of hypocrisy that was violated
24. No transparency on the CSA and no apology for the wrongs committed
25. Not releasing the dirt on the database of CS offenders the Headquarters keeps
26. The ARC videos
27. The Canadian courts testimony on Disfellowshipping - the JW lawyer testifying that normal family relations continue. OMG what a load of bull$hit
28. The 3 times I studied the Revelation book and tore my hair out trying to grasp the prophecies only to see the book get kicked to the curb as old light -
29. The blood fractions policy is total BS - I would rather them say no blood whatsoever / a compromise is as as good as blood and they can't man up and fix the unscriptural rule
30. Overlapping Generations and the Millions Now living will never die Magazine
31. Order to throw away all old literature to cover the tracts of old light
32. Sleeping Better than I ever have when doing less theocratically and not being under the mental stranglehold the JW cult has on people
33. See the cognitive dissonance from friends and relatives when i try to mention anything in passing
34. seeing the rampant alcohol abuse by Elders/Pioneer/Servants but because they are on the LDC and other Good Old Boys club areas they get a pass
35. No birthdays but wedding anniversaries and baby showers are ok (What about Job's children birthdays - there was no be-headings there)
36. God killing women and children and animals cause they were either in the way of his peoples land or because Adam and Eve screwed up so your child has to die and Bambi does to!
37. Visiting the bethel facilities in other countries and seeing that Alcohol is ok for lunch and dinner even on meeting nights
38. Plants that have always been poisonous and animals that have always been venomous Animals that kill their young, animals that have teeth designed for flesh, animals that have cancer and got cancer long before Adam and Eve
39. Barbara Anderson
40. Paul Grundy
41. Lloyd Evans/Cedars
42. Atlantis
43. Stillin
44. This Site
45. EXJW/Reddit
46. JWLEAKS
47. The kindness of you folks here on this site
48. Women treated as 2nd citizens
49. Emphasis on outward appearances being more important than being genuine
50. Worship of any shape or form should not be tiresome, exhausting, depressing.
I could write more but that is what ran thru my mind and as fast as I could type I wrote them down.
To make more sense of what woke me up, I'll give you a very brief back story. I had a sister a year older than me that passed away when she was five and a half years of age, she passed away in April 1973. Before her death mom hated the JWs with a passion. She was familiar with them because she has a cousin who is one. Anyways using my mother's grief as an opportunity, her cousin informed her of the 1975 lie, that being that in the fall of 1975 God would usher in his system of things and put an end to this old system of things. Also, and more importantly, she would be reunited with her baby girl that had passed away, because the dead would be resurrected. But the catch was that only baptized JWs and their minor children would survive the big A.
Going to the meetings as a kid, and even well into my teens I would suffer horrible nightmares, and they were always the same two dreams. At the time I couldn't figure out what would cause those dreams, and for the longest time I could never figure out why. The elders and my mother's explanation was that Satin was attacking me in my sleep, thus the reason for the nightmares. These were so bad that even when I closed my eyes (such as during a prayer) I would have flashes of these horrible scenes in my nightmares. They revolved around death.
Now to the part that work me up were actually two stages, and they both involved my eldest son. He was 5 years of age when one night he woke up screaming from a horrible nightmare. At first, he didn't want to tell me about it, but I told him that if he talked about it, it would help forget about it. When he told me about his dream, I was in utter shock, because word for word it was the exact dream that I suffered as a child.
Then a couple of months after that my son became gravely ill, so I rushed him to the ER, at first they thought he would require surgery. For the next eight hours, they wanted to observe him, and they admitted him to the hospital, and he spent a week there. So for a few hours, I was in full panic mode. I attempted to call up my local body of elders, but could never reach them, instead I talked to the wife of one of those elders, whom I thought was my friend. After telling her what was going on, her only reply was, "What do you EXPECT me to do about it?" When I heard the tone in her voice, I told her nothing and hung up the phone. I told my mother what was going on, she said she couldn't make it down (we lived about 2 hours away). Even though I later learned that she came right through my town twice when she went to visit my sister who lived 3 hours away. She didn't even bother stopping in to see us on either way through my town.
Fortunately, my son didn't need surgery, but for the next month, we had to keep him at home so he could get better and not come into any viral issues like someone's cold or any number of other issues. He did make a full recovery. Not once did anyone from my congregation came by or call to see how we were doing. The last meeting I attended, none one bothered to ask how we were doing, but rather that I better make sure I make it to the upcoming district convention. Something that was said to me, caused something to click in my head.
Shortly after that, I started my research on the Watchtower. I discovered many things, such as the many failed date settings, how they take the scriptures out of context, and many other things. I also figured out why I was plagued with nightmares, and that my son had the exact same dream, and it was for sure not Satin who was causing them. In case you don't know what I'm talking about, just look through all the pictures in their literature dealing with death and destruction. When it finally dawned on me that the "truth" was not the truth, I saw nothing but red, I was so pissed off, that I immediately threw away all my Watchtower literature, and wroke my dissociation letter. I did wait a couple of months before I sent it in because I didn't want to do that under the emotional state that I was in, after all once that decision was made known by the Watchtower, there was no going back.
Lack of love & hypocrisy in the congregation started things for me.
This /\ /\ /\. As others have also experienced, the total and complete lack of any measure of genuine love. And the total complete display of hypocrisy.
Watching a rich "brother" screw around and divorce two Witness wives, embezzle money from his work place, chronic drunkenness, tax fraud, insurance fraud, and lying and each time getting a pass by contributing large amounts of $$$ to the local kingdom hall eventually even being promoted up the ladder to elder.
Watching elders kids getting promoted up the ladder while they did nothing to deserve it. Being told by an elder I was "reprehensible" because I had been married more than once and so would never be appointed (now I just don't give a damn) but they always seem to come crying to me when they need FREE mechanic work, electrical work, computer work, or any other labor they are too stupid to learn how to do or too lazy, and then criticize me for telling them "NO"! Being condamned for working full time and saving money for the future so I could store my current labor in the form of those savings for a later date and not have to work as hard, now being debt free and "retired" comfortably at an age when I can fully enjoy my time. Being hit up for money for every last kingdom hall project and broke witness who "needs" money, told the money I give reflects my love for God. I must not love God because I do not give anything to the JDubs any more.
These and so much more.
Wow! Thank you all for sharing. It’s so fascinating how and what affects each person. So glad we are all free now! 🎉
