Posts by LostMyReligion

5

Necessary change; my distressing situation

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i just need to let everyone know that i need to change my screen name.

if you read my topic on "help!

my son wants to tell elders about me", then you know that i had an email from a board friend inadvertantly get into my family mail box, and was discovered by my jw son while visiting.

LostMyReligion

I just need to let everyone know that I need to change my screen name. If you read my topic on "Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me", then you know that I had an email from a board friend inadvertantly get into my family mail box, and was discovered by my JW son while visiting. He made a copy of it, and it contained my screen name, "LostMyReligion" . In order to cover myself somewhat, after being outed by him, I need to get rid of that name. I doubt he will come here, but just in case.

I am going to return to the name I first used when I posted briefly a couple of months ago. I changed to avoid gender confusion, but I will work around that. So from now on, I will be posting as "Truman". Too bad I have to lose my post count number, and return as a newbie, but oh well.

I have had some progress on the situation which precipitated this, and I will post it under that name. Thanks for your indulgence and understanding, everyone.

LMR (soon to be Truman)

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

Thanks Esther, I appreciate your support and suggestion.

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

All your comments have been very comforting to me, and helped me shore up my courage.

JT, I really like some of the points you have made. I need to remember that how I play the system (within the limits of keeping my own integrity) will determine the outcome, and I already know most of their moves. I need to get rid of the apprehension or taking on their projection of guilt, and face it like a chess match or poker game, I guess. Too bad, I have never been very good at chess, and I do not have a poker face!

I do need to know if he made a copy of the offending email, and it is now deleted permanently. Hope not.

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

LovesDubs,

If cybersex isn't really sex, than cyberapostasy isn't really apostasy. Sounds good to me, but will the elders buy it. The person who wrote me the email is known to me in the real world, but is unknown to my son, and unless he printed the letter, it is now deleted, so there is no proof. However, I really do not want to get into a war of "I say...you say"

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

Waiting, I just read your reply.

He is an adult 24 years old, married and lives on his own, a MS, and has no dirt I can use on him. He was always a model witness. The computer is in our house, but he and his wife sometimes get email on it, so they had free access. I do have private email for my correspondences, but this one got to the wrong one by mistake. However, as soon as he opened it and saw my name, he should have respected my privacy and not continued, and I told him this, but since he did it, the point doesn't seem to make much of an impact. Yes, I am married, and my husband knows of my activities. He has been inactive several years, and is still basically a believer. But he is willing to give me my freedom on this, though he does not understand or want to explore it himself. He too chastised our son for invasion of privacy, and told him not to back me into a corner.

I agree, the payback scenario, has a certain emotional appeal, but my goal in this above all is to keep a relationship with him. We have always been very close, but I know that now that is irrevocalby changed, even if we are able to manage a continuation of polite contact. It breaks my heart, but I have spent my life doing the right things for others at my own expense, and at this point, I feel the time has finally come for me to do something for myself, to save my mental and emothioal health which was going to pieces as a witness. He has the power in his hands to push this or not, I just have to deal, but I cannot deny my own self and get back into the box of the WT by abandoning my new way of thinking.

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

I really want to thank you all for your help. You have suggested many options which have merit. I have some serious contemplation to do to discover the appropriate amalgam of them which will be the best for me. The theocratic warfare approach certainly does have its appeal, but I am not very good at subterfuge, and I do feel a great need to be true to myself. However I also feel no obligation to reveal my inner life and private conversations to persons who have no right to pry into them. I will need to find the right balance of these two things. I would prefer to deflect any permnanent official actions, so maybe as some suggested, just generalities about struggling with faith will help. The trouble is that when I am face to face with elders, persons I know well, it is very difficult for me to maintain any kind of pretense. I will have to have very firm resolve.

During our conversation, I asked my son why I must be punished for nothing more than talking to people, reading, and thinking. He said I had broken my baptism vows. I then told him that I did not vow loyalty to the org., as in the post 1986 vows, since I was baptised in 1974. I explained about the change and the reasons for it. I think he was surprised, but overall it made no dent in his resolve. He feels it is a test of his integrity to do this, and said blood relations did not matter in it. Yes, Francoise, it does seem he displays a self-righteous streak that amazes me. However as others noted (JT I think) the whole behavior is a quite predictible manifestation of WT programming.

All my life, I have tried to do the right thing, and be a good sister. I feel like I have fallen off the edge of the earth, I cannot change what I know and feel now. Abd although learning it has caused much pain for me, I have gained freedom from imposed guilt and fear, which were grinding me into the ground emotionally for so long. How this will play out, time will tell, and probably very quickly. I'll let you know. Thanks again.

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

Thanks everyone for your support and suggestions.

I will carefully consider the options you offered. I am trying to keep my head together. I am right now visiting my other son who left JWs, and I have some comfort and support there. However there is much difficulty on the horizon.

Thanks again!

LMR

49

Help! Help! My son wants to tell elders about me

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i am floundering!.

today my jw son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw.

it contained very little, but enough to let him know that i was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings.

LostMyReligion

Help! Help!
I am floundering!

Today my JW son told me that he had seen an email in our family account written to me from an exjw. It contained very little, but enough to let him know that I was in contact with outsiders about my doubts and feelings. I have private email for these correspondences, but through an unknown to me circumstance, ended up is the regular email.

He has given me a week to confess and get help from the elders, or he will tell. If I do not renounce my doubts, I will surely be DF'd, or I can DA myself. He says he hopes I will change my mind. I told him that I would do most anything in the world for him, but I cannot sell my self. I have spoken not one word to anyone local except him. Still he feels it is the thing he must do to uphold his principles. We went back and forth for an hour or more. There is nothing to say to change his mind.

Any thoughts on how to deal and how to proceed would be helpful. I am becoming more frantic by the minute, as this hit me unexpectedly.

LostMyReligion (and about to lose my son)

28

Sat. Dist. Conv.--Cracking the whip!

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i have put in my final day at this year's test of posterior endurance---saturday at the district convention, 2001. i took quite a few notes today, because some had specifically asked about saturday's program.

i hope all will be suitably edified by them.

do not just listen to bits and pieces of the program, but to the whole thing.

LostMyReligion

Thanks to everyone who took the time to reply to my notes. I get a big kick out of reading your comments!

teejay,
Thanks so much for your kind words. Being a parent has been the real career of the first half of my life. When my younger son left the witnesses, I felt that I had failed, both to him and to Jehovah. In JW world, the only real measure of parental success is, "did they stay in the truth". Now, with my now found knowledge and perspective, I have not only received him back to me without judgement, but have been relieved of the burden of feeling a failure in my most important endeavor.He is a success, and was all along! We are both much happier. BTW, although their father has helped, I am their mother. Sorry about the confusion.

Copernicus,
It is mostly that way in our KH, a small core af TMS participants. (and soon to be one less---me) Our previous school overseer often ended up giving 1 or 2 of the student talks each week himself, because he could find no one to do it.

siveld,
Hi! It is my understanding from the conv., that the 5 minute reading talk in the new format will be material from the Bible of the WT magazine, and no extra comments, intro, or conclusion. Is seems designed to emphasis the development of accurate reading. They did not say much more about it than that.

LMR

28

Sat. Dist. Conv.--Cracking the whip!

by LostMyReligion in

jw
friends

i have put in my final day at this year's test of posterior endurance---saturday at the district convention, 2001. i took quite a few notes today, because some had specifically asked about saturday's program.

i hope all will be suitably edified by them.

do not just listen to bits and pieces of the program, but to the whole thing.

LostMyReligion

Thanks everyone for all the sympathy, empathy, and comments. Knowing I could share these notes with you and read your thoughts made it all a little more bearable.

teejay--
re: your comment on nudging and pinching a child to take notes. I never really pinched, but I did nudge and urge. Both of my children, ( the JW one and the one who walked away) say they had good childhoods, and do not feel scarred by that way of life. NOW, I am happy for the one who chose a different path, and hope he can live a fulfilling life without me trying to beat him with guilt for leaving. The JW one says he is happy as he is. He has always been a serious-minded, responsible person, even as a young child. I am glad he is satisfied with his life . Of course, knowing what I know now, I wish he could see the reality of the "truth". But as long as he and his wife are happy, I will stand by for the day they may become disillusioned.
Obviously, if I had young children now, I would do differently. (a believing mate would make it harder) But even as a witness, I tried to educate my children to look skeptically at various claims they may encounter, such as advertising or other persuasive materials. Of course, the "truth" was always an exception to this procedure.
I wish you the best with your daughter.

Lindy---
I had this thought too, they never even said,"Jehovah willing" about the Jan 2003 date for the new TMS. In fact, there was a noticeable decrease in the talk of the nearness of Armageddon.

ozziepost---
I wondered about lugging those books up to get marked, too. Sounds like a drag!

Amazing---
Aren't they all embellished to some extent. The couple of times I personally knew those who gave assembly experiences, the reality of their overall situation was of a distinctly different flavor than the experience might lead one to imagine.

Farkel--enjoyed your commentary!

Gosh, I really feel like I am a part of things here now. I have been insulted by You Know! Actually, as I said above, I took so many notes so I could share here; and I have never marked WTs, with a yellow marker or any other!

You Know---
I have been trying close to 30 years to hold onto my religion at these conventions. I guess I could try the "lost & found" department, but I think it would be an exercise in futility. I know for sure I won't find it from the speakers platform. But Thanks for your concern!

LMR