by Mulan 30 Replies latest jw friends
I've experienced a little of the same w/my family, where they don't understand how deeply my 10 years as a JW affected me. So I don't talk about it with them a whole lot anymore. They're just glad I'm out.
Being involved in a high-control group is something that most people probably have difficulty understanding or relating to.
Amen!
Lets eat!
I have been reading this board for a few years. Mulan, you are one of my favorite posters. I have mixed feelings about what your DIL said. I see those of you here, who exhibit signs of shedding the cloak of jw's, then *kabam* you revert back to blinded wolves in line for slaughter. Many who have been posting for years, still carry much hurt and pain. The inabliity to get on with your lives is the number one sign of this. May I suggest that you, quit posting and reading for awhile. Go out and explore the real world, without the safety cloak of this board. I feel that many of you still have much growing to do, and don't even know it. On the other hand, those who have been out for years, have much knowledge they can pass on. And the comfort of releasing your mind to "those that can understand" is needed by all.
So what is the answer here? When do you move on? Can you ever move on? Will you always be stuck 50 years from now on an ex-jw board rehashing, and rehashing? When does it ever end? Why did I choose now to start posting, just when I realized how addictive this board is?
I think the main thing is she was accepting of Mulan's answer. It is hard for those who never experince the whole jw thing to understand how and ex-jw might feel.
I am encourgaed by the fact that she is a Christian with strong faith. It's always nice seeing that people don't have to be jws to possess faith.
Hi Mulan,
I wonder if your daughter-in-law's discomfort might be because she feels that your denial of the JW supernatural/metaphysical fables threaten HER belief in her own supernatural/metaphysical fables.
Her desire that you "move on" is intended to make things easier for her.
I'm sure there are similar people who wish that holocaust survivors, mugging victims and former hostages would just "get over it" too. It is something that the everyday American suburban housewife or businessman cannot get her/his mind around. Probably it would be more honest if they just said, "Please don't talk about your life experiences in my presence. I can't handle it."
Mulan,
I'm glad you posted this and let us bat it around a little bit. Sometimes people come at us from an unexpected angle on these issues.
Your DIL said:
So many of you are still so bitter and angry, and have lost your faith in anything
I don't know you Mulan, but you don't come across as "bitter and angry" to me. Has your DIL been reading this or other ex-JW boards? How does she come to this conclusion, since it's not in your or your husband's nature to display bitterness or anger? I just have to smile when someone who doesn't understand the nature of what we've been through (especially people like you, Marilyn, who were inside this high-control group for 46 years) tell us how we should behave. I would have guessed she was "Christian" even before you telling me, based on her comment. I don't hold it against her since I don't know her, but I just wonder where this she gets this info that we are "bitter and angry".
Then sameolme said within one post:
I have been reading this board for a few years. <snip>…. May I suggest that you, quit posting and reading for awhile. Go out and explore the real world, without the safety cloak of this board.
This board has only been here three years. Anyhow -- what makes sameolme suggest that someone else should get off the board, while he/she can stay on? This kind of directing of what others should or shouldn't do is paternalistic and JW-like, in my opinion. Mulan (as far as I am able to tell from reading this board) does have a real life outside this board. To suggest to us that we're somehow using this board as a crutch or a hiding place from reality is insulting.
This board helps us get through the very serious issues of having been a JW (along with some of the funnier issues like silly kingdom songs), and as such when we can express these things and hear the affirmation from others that indeed, our experience inside the JW's was not unique, HELPS us as we try to decompress from the experience and share in life in "the real world".
Everybody decompresses at their own rate. I just hate being told by people who "know better" when is the right time to "move on". That's a decision for each member of this board to make (or not make).
Will you always be stuck 50 years from now on an ex-jw board rehashing, and rehashing? When does it ever end?
The guilt, the guilt, and the guilt. It's all in the guilt, which controls all. The WT has control by guilt all wrapped up.
Fair enough points made here but I think for many it's the Borg which is still retaining some control over unwilling victims. For many, Mrs Ozzie and I included, the Borg still figures a little in our lives because of family members. If you are daily faced with shunning from family, it's only natural to have thoughts about the Borg!!
For us, we had moved on, having a very wide circle of new friends (100 Xmas cards last year) but the Borg sent it's Bethel henchmen to tell us, Ah-hah, we've still gotcha!
Our desire is to help still others to learn the evil truth about "the Troof". Many have responded.
But in other ways I think Mulans SIL has a good point to make. Thanks for sharing, Mulan.
Cheers, Ozzie
I don't know you Mulan, but you don't come across as "bitter and angry" to me. Has your DIL been reading this or other ex-JW boards? How does she come to this conclusion, since it's not in your or your husband's nature to display bitterness or anger?
Good point. She knows several of our friends who are ex, and are still bitter and angry. That's how she framed her opinion.
It's pretty easy to let the religion go. The hard part is when you have family that is still in, in my case my whole family. Today at work my boss asked me if I had called my Mom to wish her a happy Mothers Day. It was the simplest question but it opened up so many feelings. Most of the time I'm fine with it but having grown up a JW does color many things in my life. It's like growing up poor or rich or an only child or in a big family. It is part of who you are and always will be. els
