Not Born-in, Not converted as adult. The In-Betweens

by Lady Lee 29 Replies latest jw friends

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  BFD

  I was 5 years old when my mom converted so I remember celebrating holidays and birthdays before that with my extended family. Everything changed rather quickly after 1965. However, my dad never became a JW. The most he ever did was read the Awake! magazine while on the throne. lol

  There were a few times that I was allowed to skip the Sunday meeting and go fishing with my father instead. But, like Dinah the guilt for making such a choice was not worth it after a while. Plus I had fears that Jah was going to sink our boat, too. The UBM and little homo forever lost at the bottom of the sea! lol

  Around Christmas time my mom would let my dad take us shopping to buy one gift. Eventually that stopped, too. As did visits to any of our extended "wordly" family. I know that it was the religion that eventually drove my father to leave his family.

  BFD
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  dinah

  (((((BFD))))))

  I'm glad your boat didn't sink.

  The guilt was BAD, wasn't it? I can only imagine what you went through.
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  Casper

  My oldest daughter is an "In-Between".

  She was 6 going on 7 when I became a witness. I'm sure she feels the same as all the above and I regret what my decision put her thru.

  I have apologised many times, but that doesn't give her back her childhood ...

  She used to post here, and is the one that showed me this site. I wish she would come back and add her opinion....

  Cas
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  Nosferatu

  I'm just barely an "in-between". My mother converted when I was five years old. I remember a couple of Xmasses and birthdays. My mother used the Xmas the year before as a good reason why we were giving it up. Here's what happened.
  
  My father got drunk. His sister came over and I was too 'shy' to say hello to her. My dad threatened me by saying "If you don't say hi, Santa will come and take all the presents away. I went off to my room crying, and my drunken dad took all the presents from under the tree and threw them into his bedroom. Then he came and got me to see that all the presents were gone from under the tree.
  
  That didn't stop me from wanting to celebrate Christmas. For the next three years or so on Christmas morning, I would look around the house hoping that Santa had hidden a present for me. Of course, there was nothing.
  
  When I was around 8 years old, I waited up to see Santa passing over my house. Again, nothing. And that's when I stopped believing.
  
  The worst was having my entire library of childrens books replaced by one book - My Book of Bible Studies. This happened at the point where I would enjoy bedtime stories. A few times I had asked for a different book like The Berenstein Bears, only to have it trumped by the hardcover yellow book. I got really tired of that damned book and thus got tired of bedtime stories.
  
  It wasn't horribly bad in school. I remember making a father's day present in Nursury School. The year after, I was forced to become friends with a JW kid named 'David'. I never really got along that well with him (I liked the girls more :) ) but I befriended him just to make my mother happy. I enjoyed staying home from school for Rememberance Day services and Xmas school plays and such. That was the part of "standing up for Jehovah" that was easy.
  
  It was all the doom and gloom of dying at armageddon and being scared of displeasing Jehovah that helped push me further into the org. The only thing I hated was the meetings. They were extremely boring and I tried to get out of them whenever possible. Before my dad started studying, it was pretty easy. I pissed off my mother many weekends by begging my dad to let me stay home. That all ended when he started studying when I was 12 years old.
  
  Present Day sucked. It was nowhere near as fun as Christmas was. The gifts I got were usually shitty, and they only came from my parents. Everyone else in the world gives gifts on Christmas and that included my extended family. They weren't going to go out of their way to celebrate "present day" in the middle of summer.
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  delilah

  My parents became witnesses when I was 10 years old. I remember being told that we would no longer be celebrating the holidays or visiting with my "worldly" relatives anymore.

  I cried my eyes out....and drew pictures of our house covered in christmas lights in the winter...my mom said, " You can't draw pictures like this anymore"....

  I remember the lady who studied with my mom, brought another lady over onetime, and her son stomped my tin dollhouse...

  OOH I hated those JW'S!!!!! I vowed I'd never stay a witness, nor marry a witness, and I didn't....

  It was terribly difficult to switch religions at 10 years old...it really hangs a number on kids!!
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  Lady Lee

  Wow such sad stories

  Having to give up so much that you knew was fun. Having to follow the code and be abnormal in school. Even giving up family members to "take a stand"

  I'm so glad you all escaped

  I know wen I left my girls were 13 and 9 and I went overboard with hoildays and presents - just trying to make up for what they lost
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  song19

  My mother started studying when I was 6 or 7. She started studying with my brother and me right away, regardless of my father’s opposition. He WAS very, very opposed, yet mom would always sneak in studies with us or sneak us to the meetings when he worked late.
  
  Believe it or not, and you’re going to gag when I say this, but I welcomed religion into my life. Although so little, I drew to it like white on rice. I had such a spiritual desire. No longer celebrating the holidays wasn’t an issue and living far away from extended family, my father was alone in his attempts to keep up the holidays. He was outnumbered. Although I can't say it didn't bother me entirely, I always had an ache in my heart buried deep inside. Now I realize that that ache was a longing to go back to celebrating, to be with my family... weird! But my parents always took us on a vacation in December, and we got plenty of stuff throughout the year, so I can't say I was deprived when it came to "material things".

  My mother always told me that I had to take a stand in school, that she couldn’t do it for me, since my father was opposed. So from grade 4 and on I was the class FREAK. But I loved taking that stand, “knowing” it was pleasing God. I know you’re all dry heaving right now. It was hard to do though. It saddens me now knowing that that stand I took, was for nothing. I isolated myself for nothing. I was hated for nothing. It was all for nothing.

  Also we enjoy the added burden of never having had a 'normal' social life and I suspect from what I have learned of early childhood socialization that some of us will forever be a bit socially damaged as a result.

  This describes me. I don’t have the ability to make friends. I don’t have the ability to speak well or to socialize. Throughout school and even up to now, I to this day do not have a best friend. Sadly, I think the closet thing I have to a girlfriend is my mother… now I am dry heaving. I am thankful I have my hubby. But the loneliness is intense, especially now since I am really alone without any prospects of new friends.
  
  Although I didn’t care that I stopped celebrating the holidays, the effects of being a witness have severely damaged my life, personality, and everything I could have been. (still trying to deal with the sadness and anger)

  As a side note, my father was baptised shortly after me... .great eh? LOL
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  MMae

  I was about 11. I'll give my parent's credit. They didn't force it on us. We all studied, and as a family took a vote. They made a point of assuring us that we would still have "special" times. I remember the week of our first "missed" Christmas. We kids awoke to a present for each of us at the bottom of our beds. Ice skates! We really cherished those, living in Alaska! (I think that was the last time we were given a present for no special reason!)

  Interestingly, my folks never became JWs. But they still used it as an excuse not to have B-days and X-mas! (Saved alot of money with 6 kids!) I was the only one that got baptised. Years later, one of my sisters also did. Neither of us are JWs now, though.

  My kids were raised as JWs until their pre-teens. My youngest saiys that it really bothers him that he doesn't have any sense of the magical feeling that holidays should arouse.
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  MMae

  Believe it or not, and you’re going to gag when I say this, but I welcomed religion into my life. Although so little, I drew to it like white on rice. I had such a spiritual desire. No longer celebrating the holidays wasn’t an issue ...I loved taking that stand, “knowing” it was pleasing God. I know you’re all dry heaving right now.

  That was me, too Song 19. By the way, my song was 88 (from the old song book.) "Living in Integrity" I think it was. "Oh judge me Lord, My Lord, Jehovah God, for in righteousness I've walked, and in integrity I've trod...."

  I really meant it. Of course the song was based on a Psalm, which I'm sure the writer truly meant, as well.

  Oh well. Even though being a JW meant nothing special to God, our love for Him, did.
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  boyzone

  I was 14 when my mum and dad were baptized together. I was the youngest of 4 kids and my older siblings had all left home so I remember christmas, birthdays etc. That all stopped when mum and dad started studying.

  The worst thing was that our close family was now divided. Mum and dad spent so much time at meetings, conventions and socialising with their new "friends" that they had little time for me. I was left by myself alot and I felt like a "truth" orphan. So despite being a good girl really, I went off the rails a bit at 15 and started to drink heavily, my grades slipped at school and I started to play truant. By the time I was 18 I was pregnant with my first child and living away from home. Then came the knock at the door.......

  To this day I can clearly remember why I listened when the knock came. It was because I KNEW my mum and dad would be pleased. Their lack of attention during my teenage years made me want to do what made them happy, then perhaps they would pay attention to me.

  Its the old adage...if you can't beat them, join them.