Yesterday I had a conversation which I mentioned on another thread but will detail more here.
I left the JWs when I was about 19 and drifted and was DF'd 5 years ago. I'm now 30. My issue always has been and still to this day was the fact that my mother basically disowned me. That has been an extremely difficult concept/doctrine for me to accept. However difficult it has been though, it is reality.
Recently she refused to attend my wedding and opened up a new kind of hurt inside me. It has brewed and festered. My mother continued to correspond with me via email and send me WT quotes, scriptures, etc. I returned fire with fire and began my anti-JW campaign, I sent numerous emails to her varying from exposing the falsehoods, scriptures, etc.
So yesterday I had a conversation with someone and connected very powerfully to what she said. She told me that I was carrying around a lot of negative energy around, a lot of negative baggage, and that I needed to STOP because it was making me unhappy and stressed. She told me that she believed that this religion controlled me more today than ever before in my life. (Funny my husband just had told me that my obsession was too much just the other day) So I said then what's the solution?
She told me the answer. I had never thought of it before. She said my trying to change my mother's beliefs was exactly what my mother was trying to do to me. That my preaching to her about how "wrong" her "true" religion was turns out to be equal. That I needed to write my mother a letter and simply state that from now on I would respect her religion, I would respect her beliefs and would respect her choices for her life. That I also would request respect for my life, choices, and beliefs. That as humans we do not have the power to change anyone and that should be left to God. To ask my mother to pray to Jehovah God and if anyone was capable of reaching my heart and making me change and become a JW that it would left up to Him. That I also was to pray to God and if anyone had the power to open her up to change her mind and beliefs, let it be God who does it.
The thing is, even if I don't prescribe to "let go and let God" it actually can work because she does believe that Jehovah is all powerful. So my answer is that I have to connect with her and tell her to pray and allow Jehovah to reach me if that is going to happen. To discontinue her emails and respect my choices. I am also going to stop. It's not my purpose in life to change her, to defend myself any longer.
It's difficult to leave your former life behind, but at this point my life is in the present and the future. I have a wonderful husband and a life, great friends. It's time I moved past banging my head against a brick wall. I can't allow myself to respond anymore, otherwise I'll end up insane from the irrationality. I've spent 10 years swimming upsteam and have committed to STOPping completely when it comes to my mother and her religion. From this point I am going to respect her and her religion.