Most people fade away peacefully and successfully so I can't see why you can't do the same, they may bother you at first but will sooner or later leave you alone. As long as you don't say anything to make them believe you are an apostate.
Desperately seeking fade
by 5thGeneration 12 Replies latest jw friends
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itsallgoodnow
I'm doing it just fine. You just have to stop caring about what they might think of your reduced activity. Eventually, I'll go all the way with that.
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willyloman
We planned a slow, gradual fade, starting with a rather abrupt change of congos that I hoped would make people think we had issues with some of the personnel in the old hall, went regularly to the new one for awhile and then started missing meetings by playing the "poor health" card, then changed congos again. Our plan at that congo was to systematically miss about 2/3 or 3/4 of all the meetings for a couple of months and then drop to one a month for a couple of months and then just disappear.
But we could not sustain the duplicity. The more meetings we missed, the more we realized how restful and sweet a "normal" life could be. And when we did go, it was sheer torture, listening to bs we now knew was not true. It just wore us out, sitting there grinding our teeth and making snide notes in the margins.
So when the secretary of congo no. 2 violated the WTS rules and sent our cards and a letter to the congo we SAID we were moving to (instead of waiting for them to contact him, as is protocol), we figured, why the hell go?
Sure enough, about a month later the sec'y of congo no. 3 called to see if our cards were sent to him by mistake. We played the poor health card to the max and said when we recuperated we'd surely be there, so hold onto those cards.
Then we screened our calls for a month or so and just didn't answer if we weren't certain who it was. Not one message was left. That was more than 2 years ago. During that time, only one elder ever came to our door, chatted briefly and left. And he was from congo no. 1, just an "old friend" dropping by to see how we were.
I attribute our successful (so far) fade to the fact that no one is quite sure whose jurisdiction we're in, among others.
It is not a precise science. And it depends greatly on your personal circumstances, your family and business ties, and so forth. Good luck on our journey.