Hi Everyone. I've been so busy on other subjects and other people's interesting stories that I had not noticed that I had not posted my story on this forum yet. Kind of boring. The usual. My mom was introduced to the JW's when I was a baby, studied off and on for several years. Wasn't until we moved to another city and met a very nice older couple that studied with my parents. My dad was DF'd in 1972 for smoking. It was difficult because all the other JW kids would go around even at school and tell the other kids not to talk to me because our family was evil and disfellowshipped [Like other school kids would even know what that meant]
Fast forward to 1979, When I met a nice young brother that had just moved out west from back east. I was 15 at the time and he was 17 [I don't recommend that young by the way] . Love at first sight I guess and we were married 9 months later. Not before the elders of my KH pitched a royal fit tho. It was so bad because of rumors that we 'had to get married' that we had to go to another hall to be married. I remember one elder slamming his fist on our table and telling my dad that we had no right getting married at our young age and that we couldn't possibly know what love was and it was just lust and infatuation.
Funny thing about that elder. He moved back to the cong. several years later that Hubby & I were in. At first he didn't recognize us [It had been at least 15 years by then]. As I shook his hand, I reminded him what he had said and told him that Hubby & I had just celebrated our 15th anniversary and it was still just lust and that we stay together just to prove him WRONG!. Boy did he turn all shades of red & purple. I was joking of course. But his face was priceless. We will celebrate 34 yrs in Sept.
We had one kid, a lovely, great daughter [Gojira_101]. Didn't want to have any more because we were already pushing our luck with the Big 'A' around the corner. I can remember all of us saying, well at least she won't have to grow up in this rotten system and go to school. So 30 yrs later, she's is married herself now and they're doing great!
Hubby was able to regular pioneer for 1.5 yrs. Was an MS for 7 yrs and you wouldn't believe some of the 'crap' we had to put up with. I had a good paying job and was working full time so that Hubby could regualr pioneer, do you think the elders would be happy that a BROTHER was able to work only part time and pioneer? NO! I shouldn't have been the main support for the family. Then they told him that it appeared that I had lost my joy so they wanted him to work and study with me more so I could get my 'appreciation' back. Um, I'm miserable because these men were making our lives HELL. They kept dangling the carrot in front of Hubby to become an elder, but Gojira & I needed to get our service time up. So Gojira started regular pioneering. You can read that story on this topic: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/experiences/244665/1/One-experience-in-our-old-Kingdom-Hall-that-still-HAUNTS-me
I couldn't get my service time up anymore because I was working 60 hours a week.
So we got fed up with all the BS and moved to another state. I couldn't find any other office manager positions in the area we lived so I took a job at a dry-cleaners. In 2002 I was spraying waterproofing onto a jacket in a closed up room and couldn't breathe and almsot passed out. Instead of calling an ambulance the other workers just took me outside and said I would be fine. I wasn't! The chemical had burned the lining of my lungs and I developed Multiple Chemical Sensitivities and Asthma to the point that I could no longer work. Perfume, smoke, diesel fumes, dry-cleaning chemicals and especially anything with perclorethyelene in it. The minute I would walk into the KH, I would break out into a red rash on my chest and neck, my throat closes up and I start coughing and unable to breathe. I kept trying to go to meetings for the next several months. Even tried a circuit assembly and ended up in the first aid dept. with a brother who was an EMT. I was turning blue and could not breathe, almost killed me! I never tried to go to another meeting again.
When I tried explaining all this to my JW family, they could not understand the mental anguish I was going thru. To top it off, my own mother-in-law told me that I was going to die at the big 'A'. My little brother who is an elder and in the International building work doesn't talk to me. My sister has completely shunning me now [ http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/experiences/244524/1/Ive-just-been-Outted-by-my-own-sister
Because of my lung problems now, we had to move back to the Southwest, U.S.A. Got connected to a congregation here that is pretty nice, but same thing, they don't understand the situation. You can read some of my other posts of some things that have happened recently but it boiled down to we did not see any love from the cong. or our own family.
But we've learned TTATT from a dear friend of ours and we're happy and doing ok. And VERY happy to all be on this forum with you all
Sorry this is so long, but besides boring, I'm long winded and stuck at home
Love you all
K