Tell us a little about yourself and your family.
I’m a 45 year old female. Married age 18 to another JW (PO’s son), became the mother of two wonderful children, girl and boy (now adults), divorced and DF’d when I was 33 years old and since 2008 married to my first love who used to be my classmate when I was 16 (but got kicked out of my life by my dad b/c he wasn’t a JW).
Were you a born in or a convert?
Born in.
Are your parents / family JWs?
My grandmother from father’s side, my parents, 2 of my 3 sisters and their husbands (one is an elder) and kids, my brother and his wife and children, and the wifes of my two uncles are all still JW (uncles both have faded, but their cult personas are still intact, unfortunately). One of my sisters never believed, so she was able to leave the cult fairly unharmed and is the only one who still has contact with everybody. My ex-husband left the cult a couple of months after I left him, b/c the elders wanted him to keep the children away from me. He kicked them out of his house and never set foot in a KH again. He never DA’d, nor did he get DF’d.
Lucky for me I have a strong bond with my grandmother’s brother and his family (the uncle, aunt and cousins of my father and all their families). They’ve never been JW’s and can’t understand the strange behavior of my parents and siblings. One of the cousins is like a brother to me and is planning to visit us in Spain this summer with his wife and son, so that makes me very happy!
How many generations have been JWs?
It started with my father’s mother who was converted in 1951. My grandfather never became a JW, he was very much against it but they stayed together until he died. My grandmother managed to raise her three sons as JW’s though, so their offspring grew up in the cult as well.
Family on my mother’s side never converted, although that grandmother had bible study around 1963 for a couple of months. She soon discovered that it was a cult and quit the study, but my mother was a teenager then and continued to study b/c she’d met my father at a circuit assembly…
Did you hold any position in the WTS? (MS, Elder etc...)
Nope, being a woman you know… I did auxiliary pioneer every now and then and my contributions at the Theocratic School were much appreciated and set as example how it should be done (quite embarrassing actually, since I never put a lot of effort in it…)
Did you *really* believe in the bible, in spirits (angels, demons)?
Yes, I really did. I made the HUGE mistake when I was 17 to throw ALL my Beatles records away (I did break them into pieces one by one….) because they were supposed to be demonic. When I couldn’t find one Beatles cassette with recordings of the ‘White Album’ (the most demonic album as you probably know J ) I was devastated and really thought demons had hid it! Years later I learned that my brother felt it was such a shame to destroy all that music, so he stole my cassette in order to save it from destruction!
I also believed in angels, but looking back I think demons were more realistic to me… weird!
Did you get baptised? When and why?
February 1 st 1986 in the Assembly hall in Heerenveen, Holland. Why? Eight months prior my father kicked my worldly boyfriend out of my life. Life felt meaningless to me after that, so what else could I do than make this whole ordeal worth something? (My dad promised me that he would break both my legs if I would ever meet my boyfriend again, and I believed him, so that was the end of a love very pure and honest). That’s why I got baptized, along with a lot of other teenagers in our congregation. I also hoped to become more part of ‘them’, since I always felt like an outsider, which seemed to work, but sadly it didn’t last very long.
What was the initial trigger that made you start questioning things?
My ex-husband. He was very critical and very often found things in the WT that didn’t make sense or was just inconsistent compared to other WT-teachings. The first time things got really bad was when we moved to a new congregation. He was recommended by the elders of our former cong. and was (still is) an excellent reader. So he immediately was appointed as WT-reader. But all of a sudden his name was gone from the list. He looked when he would have to read again, but his name was not on the list for two months ahead. So he went to an elder and asked why. The elder said that he was no longer of ‘irreproachable conduct’, so without notice he was deleted of the list. When he wanted to know WHY, at first the elders refused to answer, but later they told that ‘someone’ heard him say ‘something that was inappropriate’… And that was the whole base for deleting him as a WT-reader. Nothing but gossip, no two witnesses, and what he supposedly had said wasn’t even what he said. It took about two weeks of debating with the elders, with help from my then FIL who was PO in our former cong., and finally they gave in, apologized and sort of ‘reinstated’ him again as a WT-reader.
Later more things like that happened, in the same cong. They seemed to have their own set of rules.
The real eye-opener that there really was no love inside the JW-community was when an old sister died. She was my best friend, I loved her like my grandmother, she was 90 and her mother and siblings were the very first JW’s in that cong. She deserved respect, she endured WW2 as a JW and her sister and BIL were jailed during the war because of their faith. But at the end of her life the only people that looked after her every week were me and my family! We took her to the meetings and de CA’s, but I also went to the zoo with her and my children, which she really loved. She was such a wonderful human being (writing this I still cry for missing her, she’s passed away in 2000 but she’s always in my heart and thoughts). When she got injured because of an epileptic seizure and ended up in hospital, we had to ask the cong. if somebody could PLEASE help us out by visiting her. Nobody thought of it spontaneously, but it was too much for us to do on our own. My husband had a fulltime construction business to run, I took care of our two children and the house, we had all the obligations any JW has (meetings, FS, preparations etc.), and this sister was not only our sister but everybody in the congregation’s sister, even though we had a special bond with her.
Some brothers, MS!, bluntly refused. One brother said he didn’t want to visit her, since he didn’t like her. So much for the love of the ‘brotherhood’… One time I came to visit her in the hospital and there were two elders. They wanted me to leave! I refused, of course, but they felt it was ‘their time’. As if I wasn’t allowed to be there while they there! I told them that they needed to behave (at that time I really started to hate how elders put themselves ‘above’ others, so I didn’t accept a lot anymore from them) and that I was very pleased that they also visited our sister, but that their visit didn’t mean I had to back off!
Two weeks after that she passed away and my husband and I were her legal executors (by testament), so we made all the arrangements for her funeral and found ourselves up against the elders again when we wanted her coffin right in front of the platform during the funeral talk! They refused. Her coffin was allowed in the backroom, but not in the hall. So we told them that she had been one of the founders of that cong. (being a JW since the early 1930’s!), even of JW’s in the Netherlands! She was always sitting in front of the platform, so why not putting her coffin where it belonged, for the last time? After much debate and discussion they probably realized that we were going to put her coffin there anyway, no matter what, so they gave in. I still have pictures of her coffin in the KH right in front of the platform, and I’m still proud that we managed to do that for her!
But the attendance on the funeral was soooo low! We’ve sent announcements to Bethel in Emmen, to several CO’s, but nobody came, and we only received a short letter from Bethel and one card from a CO. And from our cong. there was just a handful of people, like she was a ‘nobody’. We’ve been eating pie (no cake, she wanted pie J ) for two weeks afterwards, since we had ordered way too much, expecting a lot more people!
That was the biggest eye-opener for me. No love, only empty words!
Where did you find information? Internet sites? Books?
Within the first year after I was DF’d in 2002 I started looking on the internet and was flabbergasted by what I found! On a Dutch discussion board I found Ray Franz’s Crisis of Conscience and that was the first time I truly understood that I had left a cult. After that I knew for sure that I would never return. The 2004 memorial was the very last time I’ve been inside a KH. There I gave the BOE a letter in which I summoned them to stay away from my children and telling them that I would never return, that I wanted them to destroy my publisher card. They, of course, never responded.
How difficult or painful was the process of leaving?
It was painful, since it was leaving everything I knew and loved. I had fallen in love with someone outside the JW’s, met him through the internet, so I left my nearly fifteen year old marriage, I let our children stay with their father, so I missed them awfully even though I was allowed to see them as much as they and I wanted and I lost my family, friends and social network. My biggest fear had always been to be alone and lonely, and all of a sudden I was alone and lonely… with just my new boyfriend to comfort me.
A bit sour is that in hindsight there was no need to be DF’d. My ex asked me if I would be honest with him, that if I slept with my new love I would tell him so that he could be ‘free to marry a sister’ again. And my intention has never been to hurt my ex, all I wanted was my freedom. So when I’d had sex with my new love I told him. He immediately called the elders to tell them, they called me within ten minutes and within days I was in a JC. I then still thought it was ‘the Truth’, so I felt it was ‘deserved’ that I would be DF’d, part of the choice I made to no longer wanting to be married to the father of my children. So I went to the JC-meeting, and confessed my sin and asked them to hurry up with their verdict, since my boyfriend was waiting in the car. They tried to convince me that there were better ways to handle this, that I could start a new life on my own without the new boyfriend, and still be a JW. They were actually not bad at all to me, they seemed to be willing to help me, but I wanted to be free of their interference in my life. I also had a very troubled relationship with my parents, so in a way I think, in retrospect, that it was sort of liberating that the status of being DF’d would be a good way to cut the ties to my parents.
When my ex decided to leave the JW’s three months later that caused a lot of mixed feelings for me. Of course I was happy that he stood up to the elders to let me keep the contact with my children, and I was also happy that he found a new woman and started to focus on building a new life with her… but she was a worldly woman… so my confession to him with me being DF’d as a result hadn’t been necessary! He wanted to be free to marry another JW-sister without being DF’d, but instead he decided to leave the cult himself and within months he was unmarried living together with this woman, smoking cigars, and when the elders came to his house because they heard rumors that he was living with a woman he bluntly denied it and lied about it. So why did I have to confess? If I knew what I know now I could have easily faded! (Only benefit is that I knew immediately who were my true friends… NONE).
Was it a big dramatic exit or a careful quiet fade?
See previous question. I heard from my ex and our children that a lot of people were crying in the KH when the announcement came that I no longer was a witness. All I thought about that was “crocodile tears”, as we are used to call insincere crying in Holland.
Did you convince anyone else to leave with you?
No I didn’t, but I’m glad my ex also left pretty soon after me, so our children got out in time as well.
How were your family relations affected by your decision?
I called the oldest of my sisters to tell her myself that I would be DF’d, but my ex had already called ALL my relatives and all my friends, so she never picked up the phone when the display of her phone said it was me. I’ve only seen my family at the funeral of my non-JW grandmother seven years ago. One big play in two acts: at the funeral home and at my parent’s house, where my new husband and I were invited to join them for coffee. It was just a show, for the non-JW relatives of my mother. They acted all like it was normal for us to be together, but I hadn’t seen them for years! The moment I said “we’re heading home again” their shutters fell down, cult personas kicked in and my brother and one of my sisters told me that things would remain the way they were, ‘no contact, we’ll wait until you get reinstated again’. At that time I only had contact with the one sister that never became a witness and with my youngest uncle. He faded and, at the time, had no problem with maintaining our relationship, which has always been very good. (Less than two years ago he heard from my mother, who found out through the internet, that I had become a witch, so he cut all ties and doesn’t want to talk to me anymore).
Were you or are you still being shunned by those who didn't leave?
I’m still being shunned, but I’ve recently had some email contact with my brother (see thread: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/members/private/271759/1/Mail-from-my-JW-brother).
How long have you now been out?
I was DF’d early February 2002, so that’s 12 years now.
Was there anything you looked forward to doing when you left?
Oh yes, I was performing as a singer/guitarist since 1999 in Irish pubs and have had some ‘counseling’ from the elders because of that. My then husband wouldn’t allow me to go out alone, he was afraid I would flirt (or worse) with other men. So I really looked forward to going out alone after I left him and the cult, I enjoyed meeting new people and I was a frequent visitor of all sorts of bars and pubs at the time. I even tried smoking, mostly on birthday parties when I drank too much… but I didn’t like it, so after two packages of cigarettes I quit again.
What are you most proud of achieving since you left?
That I learned to think for myself, that I got rid of the childish fear of demons, that I learned and now know how strong I am. I stand my ground and, even though I love my now husband very much, I’m a lot more independent than I was in my first marriage. And I’m proud that I had the nerve to follow my interest (which I already had as a child) in witchcraft, which taught me so much about nature and about taking good care of our planet and myself.
Is there anything you miss about life in the congregation?
Sometimes I think back and remember the atmosphere at the District assemblies. There was this feeling of ‘us’ against ‘the world’, like it was a ‘safe haven’… that feeling is one thing I sometimes miss, I haven’t found it elsewhere. And the convenience that you’ve always ‘belonged’ to a group of people. When you moved to another town you would immediately be part of a new congregation, therefore making new friends soon and because of the FS you’d get to know the neighbourhoods and streets in your new town very quickly. Having moved to Spain I sometimes miss that piece of convenience. I have to find new friends on my own and haven’t got a clue where I can find likeminded people. But I don’t miss it enough to join a church or any other organization again!
Red pill or blue pill? Do you regret waking up to reality at all?
Red pill definitely! I’m glad I discovered the true nature of the WTS, I escaped the Matrix they created and I’m happy I did.
Did you become an atheist or transfer your faith elsewhere?
I don’t believe in ‘God’ the way I used to, I believe in forces of nature, the feminine and masculine that’s in everything, even in every human, and like a lot of witches I call that ‘god and goddess’. In that way I ‘believe’ in a god and goddess, but not as in some ‘old guy and gal up there’ telling humans how to live their lives. And I also believe in ‘source’, some call that ‘God’ or ‘Universe’, I think there’s a source we all came from, as in pure energy. Beside that I became a witch, but to me that’s more a lifestyle than a faith, let alone religion. I also believe in spirits, guides and afterlife, but I’m not sure if that’s just a part or an extension of my subconscious or something outside of me… and I actually don’t care, I’m no longer searching for ‘the Truth’, I’m just living my life the way I want and the way I like it best.
How do you now feel about religion in general?
I don’t like religion, I think it’s a way to keep people scared and submissive to other power hungry people.
Do you feel any guilt celebrating Xmas or birthdays or doing any other JW "no-no"s?
At first it felt really awkward to celebrate Xmas and other holidays. But now I like it, although I don’t feel a ‘need’ to celebrate. Last year we didn’t celebrate because we were packing up to emigrate, so no Xmas, and it was okay for me. I haven’t celebrated Xmas with my oldest child for three years now, so I would like to arrange a nice joined celebration for this year’s Xmas.
I do still have an awkward feeling with my birthday. I usually don’t celebrate it, mostly it’s just a nice dinner with my husband and that’s it. When I turned 40 we rented a tent for the garden and invited lots of people, even had a DJ, since in Holland it’s a special birthday that is usually celebrated with a huge party. So I did, and I sort of liked it, but I hate it when they start singing birthday songs for me and I’m not feeling very comfortable with receiving gifts for my birthday. It’s still not really in my system to celebrate that occasion. I was the kind of girl who started to sing other songs inside my mind when kids at school celebrated another kid’s birthday, at my first job when I was 17/18 I refused to eat pie of colleagues that celebrated their birthday and when somebody found out it was my birthday and tried to congratulate me with it I kept my hands on my back to keep people from shaking them!
But otherwise I do like celebrating holidays, or witches festivities, and feel no guilt or awkwardness when I do.
Have you attended any face-to-face meetups of ex-JWs?
Yes, I have. In Holland I’ve been to several ex-JW meetups, my hubby even joined me, and every now and then I have email contact with a couple of people I’ve met there. I even organized one meetup at our house, which was very nice.
Describe your circle of friends - mostly other ex-JWs or regular people?
I don’t have a lot of friends, but most of them are regular people.
Do you tell people about your JW past?
I did, but I’ve recently decided to not tell new people about my past anymore, nor that I’m a witch. Not until there’s an established friendship that’s been proven.
Do you feel animosity or pity toward current JWs?
I’m not really sure. I’d like to say that I don’t, but I get sort of upset whenever I see a JW on the market with WT’s and Awakes or when I find a flyer at our gate. Last week there were JW’s in our neighbourhood and I felt huge relief that we were just going out shopping, so I wouldn’t have to encounter them! I don’t think it’s animosity or pity that I feel, it’s just that I don’t want to be confronted with them. They remind me of who I was years ago, and I don’t really like that.
How do you respond to witnesses when they call at your door?
Last time they called at our door was in our previous home and I told them to skip our door henceforth. But the second I closed the door I was shaking like a leaf! So I’d rather not have them at my door and if I’m able to know before I open the door that it’s JW’s I just don’t open.
Storm the barricades or tend to the wounded? (do you favor activism or support)
I prefer to tend the wounded… I’m always there to help people who need it and always have been, even as a JW (unfortunately some people tend to take advantage of that, so I’m a lot more cautious than I used to be).
What do you think is the most effective approach to reaching people still in?
I have no intention of purposefully trying to get people out. Everybody has their own path to follow and people are responsible for their own lives, it’s not my job to tell them how they should live their lives. Some JW’s are genuinely happy in their faith, and that’s okay.
Do you think the WTS can or should be destroyed, will continue on as-is or grow / change?
I have also no intention of destroying or trying to destroy the WTS, but I do warn people who are interested in its teachings to be very careful. Whether the WTS will continue or grow or change… I actually don’t think I really care. It is what it is, time will tell what it will be in the future.
How has your life been impacted by your JW past?
Immensely! Hadn’t my dad kicked my first boyfriend out of my life we would’ve been married for ages instead of five years. We would’ve gotten kids together, which we now don’t. Another thing is that I don’t have any education, never went to college. I started working age 16 and married at 18, pregnant at 19 and first baby born when I was 20 and then I quit my job. I was a stay-at-home mom for thirteen years, had no driver’s license and was fully depending on my then husband. If I’d had the opportunity to educate myself more, build a career, or what I really wanted back then was being a singer/songwriter and a performing artist… but that was nearly impossible being a JW, my life would’ve been completely different.
Are there things in your life you blame the WTS for?
Not really. My parents were the ones who made the stupid decisions, like keeping me home from kindergarten… I’ve never learned how to be a normal child, have been bullied a lot during my schooldays because of that. I think I was a ‘know-it-all’ as a child, but that’s the way JW’s teach their children… like they’re better than anybody else. On the other hand they take away your self esteem on so many levels, that you need that attitude of ‘being better’ to have at least some feeling that you’re worthy. It took me years to rebuild my self esteem after I got DF’d and still I have days that I feel like I’m a ‘nobody’ who hasn’t achieved anything really valuable in life… Luckily my never a JW-hubby tells me otherwise and supports me enormously!
JW upbringing - a protection or a curse?
A curse. That kind of upbringing expects you, as a born in, to be an adult when you’re still just a little child who needs to play, fantasize, dream and get to know the world on your own little childish way. The JW upbringing takes that away from children. Their innocence, open-mindedness, unprejudiced look at the world is shattered before a JW child can speak! And that’s a really bad thing in my opinion.
How do you fill your time now it's not filled with meetings and field service?
I spend a lot of time (way too much actually) on the internet. Reading a lot on JWN and since a couple of months also responding, hoping that I’m able to help others the way others helped me when I needed it after I left. I also love to play with my two doggies and spend hours cuddling the cat. I’m trying to live more ‘ecological’, so I make my own washing detergent, I make a lot of our own medical ‘stuff’ of herbs (ointments, tinctures, syrups, medicinal herbal tea mixes etc.), I make water kefir and milk kefir to drink, I like to knit and crochet, play guitar and sing, read books, help my hubby in our business and enjoy the life in Spain, working in the garden, harvesting oranges and lemons and drink a glass of wine or juice with my hubby on a nice terrace at the beach a couple of times a week, just to relax and enjoy our privileged life.
Do you still have an interest in JW beliefs and doctrines?
Not so much in the beliefs and doctrines, although I like to know what ‘new light’ they now believe in, but I’m more interested in other people’s experiences. How do people cope when they’re still in the cult and what are they going through when they get out. It’s a process of letting go, grief, hurt, anger, frustration and nearly any emotion you can think of. Five years or so ago I thought “I’m done, I’m ready with the whole JW/WTS-thing, it’s over and dealt with. Period”. So I quit posting on the Dutch discussion board, deleted my account on another Dutch forum and thought I could move on without looking back.
But I’ve discovered that when your family is still in and 33 years of your life have been dedicated to the cult and has been ingrained in everything you did, thought, wanted etc. it’s not so easy to stop thinking about it. So I’ve really tried to fight it within myself, but it only made my deny my past. And eventually that didn’t do me no good. That’s when I started reading on websites like JWFacts and JWStruggle and I allowed myself to accept my past as a JW, it is what it is. And I realized that I never really got to process my exit out of the cult. I was so busy building a new life, with a job, new friends, new relationship… It wasn’t until recently that I started to really work on all the emotions that I’ve never really let out. JWN has been a tremendous help to do that, so a big thank you to everybody for being there and sharing your thoughts and feelings!
How much of your time is still spent on JW related matters?
The last three months a lot, it’s a daily topic. But like I said in my previous answer, I’m now processing things that have been there for twelve years that I’ve never had (or taken) the time for. So now it’s a ‘hot’ issue, but I think that will be less in the near future when I’m emotionally ‘settled’ again.
What do you think of the ex-JW community?
I’m very grateful that there are so many ex-JW’s willing to share their thoughts, feelings and experiences. That’s a big help when you’re in that rollercoaster ride to get your sanity back and get out of the cult.
Do you see yourself still being associated with the ex-JW community in 5 or 10 years time?
Most definitely. As long as the WTS will be there, there will be people with anxiety and fears trying to figure out why they feel that way. And there will be people DF’d or DA’s, shunned and bullied, losing their families and friends. These people need the help of ‘experience experts’, and I will be there to offer my help whenever I can.
Do you fear the future?
Not at all. I look forward to the future, curious what I will experience, how things in my life will develop, if or when I’ll have grandchildren and there’s so much more I want to see and do!
What advice would you give to anyone starting the journey of leaving the WTS?
Learn to trust your instincts again and follow your heart. And know that you’re a lot stronger than you think, you will be able to handle anything on your path. Trust yourself!
What would you change in your life if you could go back and talk to yourself?
I’m not sure if I would want to change things. Everything that’s happened has made me the person that I am today. So of course I would live my life totally different if I started over with the knowledge that I have now, but it’s been a very interesting journey so far. Remember: it’s not the end point of a journey that’s important, it’s the journey itsself that gives you experience and knowledge!
Do you have any regrets about life since you left?
Not really. Every not so good decision had it’s positive side as well, so looking back I’m pretty satisfied and very, VERY, happy that I’m the one that made the decisions, good or bad, based on my own thoughts without any interference of the JW ‘mind police’.
Can we read your life-story anywhere? (links to online or books)
Nope. It’s always been a dream to write my story for others to read, but it’s still nothing but a dream… a vague ‘maybe someday’-plan…
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