Work Contest unburies pain

forsharry

not sure why i'm writing this really. i'm a grown woman and should be able to deal with these things in a more constructive way. and yet here i am... my job is doing a contest...bring in your prom photo and the neatest one will win a really cool prize (it's a weekly celebration for back-to-school around here - I'm in the newspaper business.) Well, of course, being raise a JW, I've never been to a dance. Heck, I never put on a formal gown till I got married... The other contest is school spirit...wear your school colors, bring in all of your high school memories. I have a yearbook. No sports, no groups...no spirit. Cause the world was going to end... I made a mention of no prom picture to my boss. (she knows I was once a JW.) She said, "Well...just bring in a Jehovah's Witness party picture." I don't have the internal strength to even verbalize that I never had or was ever invited to a JW party of any kind. I'm just feeling so incredibly left out and 'different/other' inside. I'm trying not to cry here, because how in the hell could I possibly explain to my coworkers what kinds of feelings this has brought up that I thought were good and buried? Just when I think I've left all that behind it all gets dredged up again...how do we move on? How can we forget what was done to us? The children of this cult?

eclipse

((((((Sherry))))))

Mum

In your case, I would adopt the "fake it till you make it" philosophy. Do you have a picture of yourself in high school. Just take it and change the background, use PhotoShop or another software program and put a pretty dress on yourself and pretend you had a normal life. No one needs to know the real story of your past. Make yourself into who you wanted to be. You can do it!

Regards,

SandraC

SWALKER

(((((Sorry)))))) What an unusual thing to have happen!!! We all have those few moments in life!

Hey, maybe you could just tell the truth and they'd throw an office party just for you!!!!! (Play up the angle that you need party pictures!)

Swalker

BrentR

I had the same thing happen when my daughter started soccer this spring. I saw how much she was having and the spirit of teamwork along with learning how to be a graceful winner and loser. For some strange reason that made me extremely angry that I was never alowed to play any organized sports when I was kid.

It's those little triggers we can never anticipate or plan for that just pop up and screw with us.

My JW mom actually had the nerve to ask if she could come see a game! I am still trying to fiqure that one out. She never allowed any of her three kids to play sports but wants to come watch her grand kid play. (WTF?)

aSphereisnotaCircle

"Well...just bring in a Jehovah's Witness party picture."

So you didn't tell her that JW's don't have parties either?

I think you can go two ways with this, you can bring in what highschoold memorabilia you have. as little as that may be.

Or you can turn it into the comedy of farces that it was. Bring in pics of you all dressed up at an assembly. Maybe you can find some old mags that you would have been peddling out in services at the time, and bring those in too. Show your workmates what the JW's were teaching and promoting at the time. And best of all, bring in the youth book, and let everyone have a big laugh over it.

The youth book would probably be more intertaining then all the other prom pics put together.

aSphereisnotaCircle

I'm just feeling so incredibly left out and 'different/other' inside

The society was very successful at making us feel different and no part of the world. How very very sad.

((((((((((((((((forsharry))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Junction-Guy

Hey Forsharry, I know how you feel. Certain situations like this have popped up in my life before, and I always felt really bad about it.

Now I see things different. I would use this as an opportunity to anti-witness. Let them know how much this cult robbed from you. As long as we XJW's keep pretending to other people that we had a "normal" childhood, then the world will never know just how destructive this cult it.

I wish you well.

sweetstuff

Hugs!

Most of us raised in the borg, have been in your shoes at least once. No prom pics, no grad pics, I didnt' even go to my graduation because they were holding it at a theatre and were playing the national anthem, considering I would have had to sit down in the front row in front of half my town, I decided to forgo it. Explaining to people can be very difficult, sometimes its easier to fake it as one poster said. Your photo albums were destroyed in a fire? (I know its lieing but telling the truth might be more than one can handle at the time)

When stuff like that gets me down I really try hard to remember the upside, I look hard and there is one, always. I love Xmas in a way most people who have always had it don't. I hear people complaining about it every year, meanwhile to me, its the absolute best thing ever. I get to watch my kids dress up for halloween and go trick or treating. I get up on a Sunday morning and make my kids breakfast and thank god I am not forced into attending some meeting that makes me want to fall asleep.

I try to remind myself that although these things will come up and they do suck, the alternative is much worse. I could still be ones of the masses oblivious to life outside the borg.

ex-nj-jw

((((((((((((((((((((((foresharry))))))))))))))))))))

I know how you feel. I have lived my childhood through my kids. I took millions of pictures and made such a big deal out of every function and sports game they were involved in, because I didn't have it as a child.

I think J-guy had a good idea. Use this as a anti-witness, so that others won't get sucked into this cult and the fairtale Jdubs like to spin.

Cry about it at home, then find a way to make fun of it. Tell everyone that will listen why you don't have prom pictures, why you don't have fond memories of high school when that should have been the best years of your life!

nj

Work Contest unburies pain

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