I grew up as a witness and I basically had no friends outside the organization while growing up. After high school, I became a witness social bug and made many witness friends. As a witness I was always doing something with my friends, going canoing, wakeboarding on the lake, going to witness parties around the area, and I usually did something with my local witness friends every night of the week.
I had witness friends from all over the US because I travelled alot, and I always had people calling asking if I wanted to go out and do something and to book a date for a ski trip or a party. I thought it was great because I'd been a loner in High School where I didn't seem to fit in with anybody and then I had gotten out and become popular in the JW scheme of things.
Then I got disfellowshipped and it all ended. It was really hard to go from all those friends one week and always doing something every night to no friends at all. I had no worldly friends to fall back on so I tried hard to be a good witness and follow all the rules of being disfellowshipped and I was back within 6 months. My friends were all still there, but some of them had started having some doubts because of the way I'd been disfellowshipped. It was as if the elders were trying to make an example of me so others wouldn't follow my path.
A few of my better friends drifted out and like a good witness (ie. idiot) I didn't really talk to them much anymore. Those were the friends that had been the ones I hung out with every night. Things just weren't the same. There weren't any of those on the fence friends anymore, they were either signing up to pioneer or and reaching to be ministerial servants or they were fading away. It just wasn't as fun as it was before. I ended up getting disfellowshipped again and lived with a witness girl that had fallen out and got married to her. She was the only friend I had for years.
During my second stint of being disfellowshipped I read Franz' book "Crisis of Conscience" and that kickstarted my doubts. My wife said that we needed to come back and finally we did and we were both reinstated. Things had changed, all my old friends that were still dubs still ignored me as if I was df'd and people just didn't seem as friendly. The only thing we gained from being reinstated was being able to openly associate with our witness families. We felt no love from the witnesses any longer. When it was announced that I was reinstated the first time, people cried and hugged me and shook my hand in droves, I got letters and phone calls of congratulation. But the second time I was reinstated, I got maybe 2 handshakes and the majority didn't seem to notice that we weren't disfellowshipped any more.
Anyways, we both drifted out last year after the DC and haven't been back since. The only friends I have at the moment are my wife and my family. I do kind of miss having friends sometimes, but I think it's better having no friends than being a JW now that I know the Truth about the "truth".
