My mother was baptized when I was 4 my father was never baptised and never studied. To say that this religion has been a source of tension in the marriage is an understatement.
The organisation emasculates any unbelieving husband who has to thereafter bow to the edicts of the society on all matters. Witnesses rarely compromise and expect their spouses to fit in around them. Areas such as family discipline and family honour are taken away from them and there is no privacy since faults and failings are free to be discussed with elders.
My father wanted his children not to be different and to celebrate holidays and have full participation in assemblies at school. However the influence of the society is so insidious that we felt out of place and constantly desperate to be accepted. Since the organisation controled our friends and our mother it was easier to submit to their rules and gain approval than constantly rebel against it.
Where the organisation has provided the greatest area of friction has been in the shunning process. My father believes family are everything and yet the watchtower teaches that family is subservient to the organisation. The shunning policy had driven a wedge into the family between myself and my older sister and mother. My sister in particular has embraced the shunning policy and is in danger of being cut off from the family which is ironic considering she feels it is the other way.
I admire my father for sticking with the situation and I am glad that in later life we can show our appreciation.