Nightmares

joelbear69

I had another one last night.

They all center around me seeing Jehovah's Witnesses from the past who i cared about
and still care about. Its always very surreal. I am trying to be their
friends again but there are always eerie circumstances that prevent it.

Last night, Chris, my best friend from childhood was in my nightmare.
I will always miss his friendship even though I have not seen him in 20 years.

Also in my dream were my friends Eddie and Cheri from Jacksonville.

I can list hundreds of people that are witnesses whom I love and will never
see again. Its like trying to get your mind to accept hundreds of deaths
of loved ones all at the same time.

The only witnesses who have stayed in contact with me are my parents, but I know
that they only do this hoping that I will return to the witnesses one day. There
is an agenda there, not simply love.

Its been 20 years. I still haven't moved on successfully from this trauma.

I will continue my efforts to find my real life.

Gregor

Hey, you old Homo! Don't know what happened but glad to see you back again.

I think a lot of us have had those kinds of 'mares. They kind of bring you down right after you awake but perspective soon returns with the daily cares of the now.

Younglove1999

I've had weird nightmares too.

And even once in a while I'll have a minor freak out about how my life is changing because of the decision I made to leave the org. I'm glad I did, but like today I was on the treadmill and I just started thinking of all the people I'm not going to see and who'll never get to see my daughter. Even though they're the ones ignoring me, it's just bittersweet I guess. Like how could they not want to see my daughter? it's bizarre.

of course usually those moments are followed by feelings of anger and annoyance towards these brainwashed former "friends" of mine.

joelbear69

bittersweet is I guess the best I will ever do with dealing with my past.

I really still have not learned to just accept and be who I am. So many
years of pretending broke my spirit and a spirit is hard to repair.

Socially I am still almost completely inept. I am terrified of counting on
people to be my friends because I don't think I can stand to lose people
any more. Of course, this leads to me losing more people out of my life.

Vicious cycle.

joelbear69

hey gregor,

who you calling old? :)

Gregor

touche'

JWdaughter

Hi Joel, sorry you have been having a rough time of it. I had nightmares for nearly 20 years after leaving. In my mid 30's I finally got over them. . .actually, it was after being on exJW boards for a few years and just talking it all out (No, I was not imagining the 'persecution' stories, and my nightmares reflected Malawi-like horror stories/concentration camp scenarios ).

The people that you will never see again will haunt you. . .I moved to an area that I know a dear friend of my JW youth lives in. I drove by their house. I wonder if I will see them, and if I do, how will I respond?? I literally have not seen them since I was 15. I am 41! I am thinking I will obsess about seeing them until I DO. Tempted to just walk up to their door and say "hi", but I know it would be weird. Especially since they likely won't say "hi" back!

I feel for you my friend. I hope you will soon put the nightmares behind you.

Love Shelly

Younglove1999

joel, I'm sorry you're having a rough time-

I know what you mean about feeling socially inept- as JW's we're not trained to actually make friends based on personal compatibility-we're expected to just like each other and socialize- I know there's more to it, but in a nutshell, that's usually how it is. We'd all sit around and ask each other the same stupid questions, "what are your goals?", "what privleges do you have in the hall?", "how did you learn the truth"? etc.

When my husband & I decided that we weren't going to stay JW's merely for the social aspect of it, we were (and are) determined to cultivate real friendships with people we've "known" for quite some time, but never took the step to really let them in because they were "wordly". So far, it's been great. But it's hard because I feel like I have to deliver my "A game", which is obviously a good thing when you're making friends because you want to surround yourself with people you like, but I'm just not used to it because in the truth, it didn't matter-as long as you maintained a certain apperance/life style, you'd have some resemblence of a social circle- for the most part anyways, it looked that way on paper, but as a lot of people here can attest to, it wasn't anything truly enjoyable or refreshing.

DeusMauzzim

I can relate to this, I also have these JW-nightmares once in a while. I'm always having a fight with my mom and she makes some JW-type-comment and I go totally, totally beserk. Then I suddenly wake up wondering about all the anger that is apparently still inside of me.

Wish you the best!

- Deus Mauzzim

joelbear69

youngglove, you really hit it on the head. i expect people to be my friends. this leads to disappoint almost 100% of the time. i trust the wrong people. i share too much information too fast. i am overly sensitive to their more hardened ways of dealing with people. i expect too much rigidly defined behavior from them. gosh, i'm still a Jehovah's Witness zombie. i really am. i'm going to a therapist now. i know that i have to insist on being me which is hard for me. attracting people to me will also be a challenge. scary stuff. i have had some success joining a board game group where we all have something in common. it has been hard for me to make gay friends. i had quite a few when i first came out. again, we all had that in common which bonded us together as a group. that lasted for about 10 years. then we all got in relationships, moved, made other friends who shared more in common, etc. and these friendships all disappeared about the time I was 40. The last 9 years have basically been limbo socially. time to start over once again. build on my base of board game friends and a couple of bear friends that i have.

Nightmares

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