by Faithful-n-Discreet Wife 36 Replies latest jw friends
and cut my losses?.....i love him so much though....i just know he loves the organization more than he loves me. Please help.
It's a cult, honey. You have been through emotional abuse and you have to heal. He doesn't even know he's being abused...and IF he ever gets it, he'll still have years of recovery to go through.
You have to take care of you. Get the f*ck out now while you still have some self esteem.
WLG
Hello Faithful Wife,
I identify with the emotional turmoil you are going through, albieit from the other side of the fence. You see, my wife, in her defense, felt that the pressures of our marital problems was too much to handle emotionally. And I now don't fault her for that.
At the time, though, my life-long JW programming of staying in the marriage "at all costs" was strong,strong,strong. And as a consequence, I probably ended up pushing her away in various ways that I wish now I had not. This was partly due to my feelings of righteousness as a result of "sticking with it", regardless of the harsh realities of my marriage.
Yet, marriage is a very simple and very complex thing at times, and while there is much virtue in trying your damnedest to make your marriage work, I have also learned that sometimes love (or the desire and need to "be in love") is not enough to make it work.
All I recommend is that you have a clear conscience. In other words: Make sure YOU have a "relative" peace with the hard decisions that you will make.
Also, only YOU know YOUR circumstances. I also realize that the need to vent your feelings here (as I have done and am still doing) is quite natural and needed.
However, I have a word of caution: With all respect to our female posters here, while having your feelings validated is a very human need, please be wary of any "group-think" reactions and advice to divorce. I am sure that they sincerely mean well, but this is an emotionally vulnerable time for you, and only YOU can make this assessment of your marriage.
Regardless, whatever the outcome, please be assured that you DO have people who care for you and will help you get through this. I know this because it's happening to me.
Please take care of yourself,
Bourne
Very mature advise bourne, you use sound wisdom, i agree, but with a he aint gonna change added, because of his jw mentality, so faithful , you have to take it or leave it, and of course please get counseling, hope all will be well with you , agape, darrell
That's a sad story. Everyone dreams of true love and living happily ever after.
Agreeing with everyone else. As an elder, my job would have been to tell you to return to your husband. Everyone would smear on the words of how it will all be better this time. Honestly, in previous cases I've known, it will only get worse if you return trying to make it better. He, and his family, and the congregation that he has been in, will always blame YOU as the slutty, Satanic temptress that is ruining their precious non-worldly world. Divorce, fade, rebuild your relationship with your family and everyone you knew before all of this. Tell them what happened to you.
Clearly you love God and still have love for your husband. But he's using you and abusing you. SHAME ON HIM!
We all wish you the best.
His first priority will always be toward the organization, you will always be 2nd place, if even that.
Unless he is willing to see the light concerning this organization, you should leave, and divorce.
You will never, repeat NEVER have a normal marriage as long as he is a Jehovah's Witness.
Sorry, but that is the cold hard truth.
I wish you would have came here before you married him, we could have given you some good advice and personal insight.
i love him so much though....i just know he loves the organization more than he loves me. Please help.
It sound to me like you mean you lust him. You havent really described much to love about your relationship or religious experience as a wactower salesperson.
Theres lots of fish in the sea. Probably many with less baggage than your carp.
Are you able to take responsibility for your own actions that brought you to this situation? I think that is the best insurance policy from ending up in the same place again. You said you were in love with him after that first weekend. That's not love, that's lust. How can you love someone if you don't even know anything about them? You admitted you knew nothing about the religious beliefs of JW's and what you were in for but signed on just so you could be with this guy. You willingly gave over control of your life to others. Only you can take it back.
Cog
As you experienced when you first met him, this guy was yo yo ing between suppressing all his natural instincts and letting them flow. His head is in two places every minute of the day! He really is trying to satisfy at least two different psychologies - those he loves, his own and most oppressively the WTBTS. And so it is a fact that his persona is in perpetual conflict with his own biological/ psychological and spiritual lifestyle. It is impossible for any human to live through this indeterminately without tensions boiling over! He, like others , innately feels he is a different person than the WTBTS have convinced him to be, but is not being showed the respect by them to encourage him to do as his heart tells him. In fact your getting baptized to be with him was a denial of your own essence - I don't feel you believe it to be what it claims to be! Maybe you do? If not there will be issues of conflict that will arise where your position will not be as responsive as his. You will both feel this and it will erode your unity as a loving pair bond! You suggest it already has to some extent! I wonder if he guilt trips after his outbursts to an extent that renders him a depressive? It did so after he slept with you to the point where he even felt he had to marry you and work his butt off teaching you a new life! This is how massively controlled everything he thinks and feels is. He does not know how to escape the trap his head and soul feels. It drives him to breaking points he often controls, but the pressure keeps building till it inevitably blows! He is a slave to the cause and doesn't know how to deal with it! He is likely as distraught as you in many respects! But you should not place yourself in a situation you know to be volatile and likely to recur! IMHO the best thing for him is to get out and learn to be himself, which probably is a very loving guy. But his head has been morphed into something that cannot accept anything less than JW hardline complete subservience. When he sees examples in 'family' others of even minor non Bible behaviors it pisses him off because he is breaking his ass to sacrifice himself to it - as if somehow you're cheating at pretending to be a JW and God will know it and you won't get into paradise with him and do you realize he's investing all his emotion in you being there after Armageddon so please get in line and walk the walk till the day you die. And if he keeps feeling you fading, even in small things, it will burst his precariously balanced complex psychological framework which few can manage successfully! And I propose those that do are no success at all - just examples of circumstances working out for them! I'm not sure it could ever work but unless you can be you to him and he still wants you enough there will be conflict! If you communicate with him you must be yourself and speak what you believe so you are on equal terms. If he can't accept you with that it is never to be! Even if he did, the journey from where he is at right now will not be a simple one! But your choice - I hope you find a love that liberates evrything you feel and think! Oppression will inevitably fail! IMO ~Ray
I sense that you are very young, and when we are young we don't always think things through but go with our feelings of the moment. I agree with cognizant. It may not be what you want to hear though. I sense there was manipulation going on, on both sides. You pretended to be interested in the Org because you wanted him. You weren't truthful to him or to yourself.
We do have to pay the consequences of our actions and you are paying dearly. Learn from this experience. Please don't settle or be in denial; that somehow things will work out. Unless he is willing to change and ask for help he will continue to abuse. With God help it's possible to change but if he isn't willing to change there's nothing anyone can do.
Before my mother got married, a year ago, my brother and I had to have a very difficult conversation with her about our findings on her fiance. I remember her saying that she was praying about it. The thing is I believe that God did give her an answer loud and clear but she didn't want to hear it and married him anyway. She is paying the consequences and I feel for her.
I personally believe that God does come before everything or anyone. It makes for a better relationship with one's spouse and children because you want to please God and His will is that we show real love towards each other.
There's been a fair bit of personal dishonesty on both sides. It sounds like he WANTS to be a good Witness. But he loves sex, too. Who can blame him? It feels good, and it's fun. But I bet he's never admitted as much out loud to himself or to you.
On your side, you stuffed your misgivings down deep and joined FOR HIM. You have sublimated your naturally bubbly personality FOR HIM. Does he even realize who you are behind the facade of the stepford wife? Could he love you for YOU, regardless of his desires to be acceptable to the society? No matter how good the sex is, if you can't be yourself, what's the point?
There's a few things that have to happen here, if you decide to go back on your own terms. You have to be honest about who you are as a person both TO HIM and TO YOURSELF. Do you want "worldly" friends and relatives in your life? Then goshdarnit, start DOING IT.
Then he has to decide if he loves you better than his reputation at the hall.
Be ready to live with his choice.
