Are You A Better Person Now That You're Out of the "Truth"? (page 6)

mapleaf18

TOTALLY new here so pardon my rambling!

i'm much more relaxed now. have stopped going to meetings for over a year. (whew, what a BURDEN that was; me a single mom trying to work two jobs and be active at meetings/service)

my kids are grown now and making their own decisions (thankfully they have chosen not to be JWs). i feel bad for all the kid stuff they missed out on, though (holidays, etc)

i'm LIVING with the love of my life (gasp; horrors!) a worldly guy 10 years my junior who treats me like GOLD!! he's handy; can fix ANYTHING and actually WORKS for a living (totally opposite from the few and far between lazy "men" in the congregation who couldn't tie their own shoelaces; my elder dad included) plus he's gorgeous! no chance of that at the KH where you see horse-faced dudes paired up with knockout women just because of the 20-1 ratio (women to men)

was recently "visited" by two elders in my congregation (the lead elder has both kids in a psych hospital) wanting to know if i was going to marry this dude (of course not! i was in two JW marriages which were both HELL on wheels; i don't think i need to marry to prove anything)

i wrote a very brief letter of disassociation; i couldn't care less if i'm gossipped about by old women and mental basket cases.

haven't told my fairly elderly parents yet; it will probably kill them because my dad used to be a "special" pioneer and acts as a sub circuit overseer/still is a looked up to elder (although he never spent any time with myself or my sister in recreational activies--nothing but school, meetings and service); my mother is an emotional wreck and always has been on one medication after another.

i was always disgusted when "brothers" and "sisters" came up to me and said "oh your father bro. so and so is SOOOO wonderful; you're so FORTUNATE to have him as a father" and i thought, "if you only knew how awful and neglectful he really was." of course no parent is perfect, but dad towed the watchtower line to the HILT but NEVER provided any fun activities for us whatsoever. life was a total drudgery as a child, especially with my mother in and out of mental hospitals for "anxiety."

i can't help but think that if my mother was released from my very controlling dad and stopped being told that she was inadequate, unworthy, just needed to "do more" in the service, that she'd be a whole lot happier. but she is staunchly loyal although her life is miserable.

i also feel sorry for all the "old maids" in the KH who would dare not have a relationship outside of the WTS and so are doomed to live a life with their elderly parents; never experiencing real happiness.

kittyeatzjdubs

Definitely

I was in and out of therapist from the time i was 13 until i finally said....

i've actually lost weight and been able to carry on successful relationships. i was telling my boyfriend last night how the jdubz like to tell horror stories of people who left the organization and their life went totally downhill.

riiiiiiight.....

so we laughed and had another beer and smoked a cigarette.

minimus

WELCOME MAPLELEAF!!!!!!!!

candidlynuts

if i could just find my feet and start moving forward i think i'd be a better person.

tijkmo

plus he's gorgeous! no chance of that at the KH

oh........excuuuuse me

when i said no earlier it was because i was a nice and good person in the truth..i was genuinely regarded by all except those that were jealous as being loving understanding forgiving funny intelligent unselfish helpful hospitable merciful non-judgemental..someone told me a few days ago that a bro in another cong was asking how i was doing and he told him not very well...and he said thats sad cause a kinder guy would be hard to find...i know he wasnt just saying this...because hes right...but im not many of these things now because i am bitter resentful and broken...but i hope to be these things again in the not too distant future whatever if any organization i am a part of

tijkmo..of the moses was the meekest man who walked the earth cos he said so himself line of reasoning class

AuntieJane

Great Question, Minimus. How about posting this one every, say ...3-4 months?

Just giving you some sheet since you didn't get enuf already...BUT I REALLY WANT TO SAY ...

IT IS A REALLY GOOD QUESTION AS WE HAVE NEWBIES HERE WHO GOT THEIR CHANCE

TO SHARE THEIR STORIES! yay! Welcome to the new ones...I am impressed when exJWs share their

stories, it gives me hope that my family members will do the same SOME day.

swiftbreeze

I've been going through alot of different emotions but i do believe i'm better. This time last year i was a complete wreck, i hate to admit it but i often times i just wanted to go jump off a bridge...but things got better, although at the time i couldnt see no way out, i just had to stop trying to control everything and have an answer for everything, i learned to listen to the voice within. I was so nervous as a JW. sometimes i feel lazy, because i'm no longer towing the line, i get the feeling like i should be doing something. That "never enough" feeling creeps in. This board has been so helpful to me. I can actually open my mind now and live sometimes thats hard for me to accept...enjoying the moment...but i'm getting there

I am happier alot happier. Because I'm me...the real me, not some made up person that i'm told i should be.

mapleaf18

didn't mean to be insulting to any jw or former-jw guys with my comments, however, where i live (in upstate ny) the general population has women far out-numbering the men. you can just imagine how that is compounded to the Nth degree within the KH. there were so many 40-60 something women who had never been married or had a boyfriend because the men just weren't there. these women were all living with their aged parents in order to be "pleasing to jehovah" and not venturing outside the organization.

other than that there were either married couples who were together before coming to the KH or a smattering of ill-educated (can't blame them for that the way the WTS views education), oafish, domineering, inept, lazy, stubborn so-called men.

these were usually guys who were "raised in the truth"

i married two of them who just couldn't wait to use the iron fist (literally) of the headship principle.

i guess that doesn't say much about me other than the fact that i was indoctrinated from an early age; i attended my first meeting wehn i was 2 days old (i'm 46 yrs old). my mother said i was too young to be dragged out on a cold snowy november thursday night, but oh, no my special pioneer/elder dad INSISTED that i attend!! my birth put a serious crimp on their pioneering which i don't think they will ever be over.

orangefatcat

dearest Rat and Minimus, you are two of my nearest and dearest people on board and I would miss both of you if you ever left. Does it matter minimus you nearly gave me a heart attack when you were gone a long time. And so I had to take out my frustrations on the poor Rat. You should see the nice things I said about RAT.

Now to question at hand. Yes I am a better person since my departing the organization. Why you say. Because deep inside I was so unhappy in the org, but still believed it and thought it was just my own fears or perhaps I was fully applying my faith as I should have. But now that the real Terry is out of that "CoCoon' as my husband calls it and I have maturedd inwardly. I was alway a giving person and still am. But I am no longer frustrated at the lives of other witnesses who had or were masked in a facade.

I am good at precieving what makes people tick and I knew who to avoid and in fact I was very much so alone in my latter years in the organization. I only associated with my family. But even at times they were such a disappointment. My sister was two faced and my mother was also and would act lovey dovey with witnesses they really had no respect for. I seen this in alot of witnesses especially when they would gossip. I don't miss any of that live. I would n't stoop to the level of gossipping about others if I couldn't say it to their faces I wouldn't say it behind their backs. It was stressful trying to be a non participant in which others were cruel about some one else. I am not that way

So I am so much happier being who I am rather then being what the organization wanted me to be like.

I gained a new found freedom in my departure. What you see is what you get when it comes to me. I am a very gregarious person and love people and when you were like that in the organization people looked at you like who are you trying to suck up to. I wasn't anything like what people in the organization thought about me. I had nothing to prove to any of them. I have one very close friend for over 20 yrs. we were seperated for 7 years when she left the organizaiton and when I left we picked up where we left off as if it was just the next day and not 7 years.

I am indeed a better person now that I am out of that Cult.

Thank God

luv Orangefatct. Rat minimus doing CanCan

willyloman

Some wonderful posts, here. This is the WT's 'dirty little secret,' that most people are way better off without them.

Are You A Better Person Now That You're Out of the "Truth"?

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