I was a regular pioneer since age 16. Ministerial Servant at 20. Ministerial Training School at 23 assigned to South America. I was told I was the youngest missionary in the world among JW's. Elder at 24, Circuit Overseer at 26. For those who know the C.O. schedule, we have Monday all day, and Tuesday mornings off. I went in service on the those days or had special meetings. I taught Circuit Overseer school at the Branch office. I was robbed at gunpoint many times. I lived, breathed, and worshipped the best way I could. I am 43 now, and still a virgin since I was raised in the truth. I never gave in to temptation other than seeing a few pics online on one occasion, which I confessed to, and a girl I liked in my circuit gave me a peek of her chest since I had never seen that in person.No matter what anyone told me, I believed. And now I am learning that its all a cult? Its just so weird that even when I read some posts, I still get offended when someone criticizes the "Truth." THIS IS HARD TO DEAL WITH.
I am amazed at Seeker4, Oracle, Open MInd, Awakened at Gilead, Brother Cabeen, Minimus, I am forgetting others names, but the point is that they have the emotional fortitude. I get so mad at my family I yell when they say, "What is the most important thing? The Organization" But I need my family, I need my friends, I disagree that they are only my friends because of being JW. They care about me, they are just misled, so if I get DF'd, they will want me to come back to the truth. they don't view it as a cult. And if they came to their senses like I did, they would want my friendship. Its that we are trained not to talk with Df'd people for their own good.
Now my family is saying that I might have swelling in the brain, that's why I am acting weird. Every time I talk about the two-witness rule for child molestion proof, they get upset with me and tell me to wait on Jehovah.
But I still don't get how you all can not be suffering that much. I consider myself a normal guy, tough enough I guess, but I can't deal with all these emotions. I find it easier to go to the meeetings and I can even put all the lies out of my mind and comment sometimes and give my parts.
I live in a huge apartment complex with those walkways and nice grass, over 200 Witnesses live here, in fact, I bet more. We all walk around in our suits and service clothes and talk to each other like its Utopia.
So I just want to say again, PLEASE continue writing the good stuff. I mean I like the funny jokes about your avatars or whatever, but some of us NEED JWD bad. How can we come up with a plan to help people to reason? I have one formulated that I will post today.