by Leopold theseconed 8 Replies latest jw experiences
Hey everyone my nice new friends.
I had my first visit with a therapist today. I was totally open with everything. No lightning strikes from heaven. Even Tony Morris can’t hurt me.
With your waking up. Go talk to someone. Be honest. The world doesn’t hate us. They love us. They want to help. Take the positives from being a JW and use it to move on. If your older no problem just pick up your feet. Shake the dust off and see where you can make a difference. What a wild ride.
I see a therapist too, it really helps to sit down with somebody once a week and just talk about what I'm going through or what I've gone through. I'm glad you took that step, a lot of people won't, they think there's something shameful about it or that they don't need the therapist to begin with. You're strong. Stay strong.
I believe this site is therapy for me ,don`t get me wrong I`m not knocking you guys for going to a professional therapist ,I just feel that people on this site know more about where I`m coming from than a non JW.
And I feel speaking my mind and getting feedback off all you guys has been a tremendous help to me .
Whatever works for you I say.
Take care .
I have family member about to start talks with counselor.
I went to a therapist 3 years before leaving. The therapist was a witness. She told me I would become a better elder for going through therapy. It did, it help me wakeup and leave. Lol. Still Totally ADD
Mental health professionals are very helpful in recovering from a cult mentality like jw's. I have to say that without their help, it would have taken me much, much longer to recover and reclaim my life after accepting ttatt!
just saying!
When I first left I was suicidal, a deep depression had me in its grip, and I was about to do away with myself.
A great Therapist helped me through this time, helped me keep depression away, and helped me recover form my near six decades in the Org/Cult.
She also identified that the Org/Cult was responsible for my mental condition. She saved my life.
No one who knew me would know any of this unless I told them, therefore it is always a great thing to do to encourage those leaving to see a Therapist, we simply do not know a person's inner turmoil. Though, a word of caution, not all in the profession understand the experience we have had, or how to deal with it, make sure your Therapist does.
Good move Leopold the seconded!
One of the things a fleeing JW or Ex JW needs to consider is that you are no longer being compelled to play the Societies 'short game'. That Armageddon is just around the corner. For over two thousand years it's always just been around the corner. The JW's have taken it to an extreme. For the Society it has been around the corner since they began publishing their literature.
I would say that most of us on this forum are mindful that we need to play the long game which means making plans to better ourselves in any and every way possible.....because we now understand that we live in the real world and our time is measured in decades and when we broke with the JW construct we had to rethink how we were going to live our lives.
Through education, real friendships, social connections you get to play the long game....... you play it with enthusiasm because you've only got one shot at life so make it a good one!
I found that most therapists, just like most people in general, just see JWs as another Christian religion of mostly "good people" and think being a JW is no different than being a Lutheran or Baptist or whatever but with a few strange ideas (holidays, transfusions, etc). They do not in anyway understand the Cult aspects of the JW Cult. The do not understand the emotional issues of trying to leave a "Hotel California" Cult. (.....you can never leave....)
Most therapists chose that line of work because they personally had issues and they are best at dealing with the issues that they had to resolve in their own lives.
