Hello Hello Hello hell...

mommy

I thought I would be the one to start this one This is one in a long list, if your wondering why it si in the sex forum ....well ask Redhorsewoman or waiting I am sure they know better than I.
This is for all the newbies to jump on in and say well, hell...hello! I am thinking not to many will answer this thread but many new ones are here now. It is for all to share a little about themseleves.
I am en ex jw have been out for about 8 years....still have family in...still have heartache. But one thing is for sure I am a more happy and free now than I was before.
We are a tight little group here and most of us want to keep it that way. So if you are a newbie join on in and let us get to know you before you start spouting anti jw sentements We have plenty of our own but it gets old after awhile.
Welcome and we hope you enjoy the site
wendy/mommy

nogs

well i met you last night and feel you are right, read you response on robot's and liked it, I too am a fornicator, soon to be living with my boyfiend, it doesn't feel wrong for me to be with him and it feels right because I love him, well on the subject of Oral sex, which many think is wrong and i'm sure JW's teach is wrong, but i do it and enjoy it, i think that if you can something that obsviously gives someone so much pleasure how wrong can it be, as long as both parties are agreeable to it. I don't think i will ever get married to him as making it "proper" doesn't mean a damn thing to me, thank goodness I can have a normal sexual relationship (with orgasms) without feeling it to be acomplete sin. My sypathies go out to others with a troubled conscience in this matter

Love to all in the forun Nogs xxxxxxx

outnfree

Hi. I'm an ex-JW (it still THRILLS me to say that, I'm so newly gone!!!) who disassociated herself earlier this month.
My story with the Witnesses began when I was a pre-teen. I used to take the magazines regularly from a cute little red-headed boy. I was a spiritual person who went to Sunday School at my father's church (Reformed) as a toddler, began walking to church on my own in second grade, but decided not to make my confirmation in my mother's church (Lutheran) when 14 because I couldn't wrap my mind around the Trinity. Visited a synagogue (Judaism being the basis of the Christian faith), moved on to Catholicism (didn't they claim to be the One True Faith?), but didn't embrace either. (Although I had some fun times in CYO!)
My sister's husband worked with a Witness HVAC man, and introduced her and me to some of the teachings. Hey! Here was a religion that didn't teach the Trinity! My sister was liking what she heard, but I was busy being social at high school and at CYO. They divorced, but my sister continued her study.
At the end of my senior year in high school, my best friend and I started studying with the mother of one of her friends. We were amazed at what we learned from the Bible! But she met her husband within the year (still married, 26 years later!) and I met mine the year after (23 years & counting) and we both chose our "worldly" husbands over Jehovah (and/or his Organization) at the time. We had learned that there was no hell, just death, and we were willing to live with the knowledge that our end would be oblivion at Armageddon in order to keep our husbands-to-be while we were in THIS system.

Well, both of us were just fine with that, until we had children. Now we were responsible for their lives as well. My friend had hers first. Married to a Catholic, as was I, she resumed going to Mass. But she REALLY disliked the constant requests for money when they were struggling! A few years later, she took up with the Witnesses again, invited me to her baptism, where she reunited me with our study conductor from our high school days, all in an effort to inspire me to join her in the faith.

Her efforts were for naught UNTIL I had my daughter. Who was baptized in the Catholic faith with the proviso established by me that her religious upbringing would be my hubby's responsibility since there were too many "things Catholic" that I disbelieved (scorned, even?). Well, that lasted less than a year! My husband took up playing tennis on Sunday mornings, and I phoned the local Kingdom Hall looking for a study.

It took me another five years or so to actually reach the point of dedication and baptism. I was a smoker and LIKED it, even though I smoked little -- just couldn't give up those last 6 cigs/day!!! Finally quit and made the move. Husband threatened me with divorce, but I just bore up under that persecution and forged ahead anyway! (We ARE still married -- he truly DOES love ME, [WT]warts and all!)
By this point, I have three children, with the youngest about 4 months old at my baptism. (Girl, girl, boy, and now I have my grand-niece as my ward.)

---------
SIDEBAR: Before my baptism, while pregnant with my son, I find out
from my ob/gyn that the Rhogam I have taken with each of my previous pregnancies is a blood product (I am Rh negative and my husband is O positive, so all my babies are at risk for hemolytic disease which this immunoglobulin can prevent). Now I have to decide whether or not to take said product. I do research. Must've missed the footnote that mentioned that taking Rhogam was a conscience matter, because all I find is "NO!" and suggestions as to how eating the pith of an orange can help prevent a jaundiced baby. Jaundice is the mildest problem for a baby with hemolytic disease, for those of you unfamiliar. Most severe? Stillbirth. Middling to high? Mental retardation. 'Nough said!
I am a balanced, thinking person, however. So my decision was to take the Rhogam shots during this pregnancy. After all, my husband did not know that my new religion would put THIS baby at risk, when I had taken preventive measures with the others. However, once this baby was born (we had decided we wanted no others), I would decline the post-partum shot that would have protected future children from being attacked by my immune system. I would have to be VIGILANT about birth control.
Dontcha know that two years later blood fractions such as Rhogam were now a "conscience matter"?! I was HOT! I couldn't understand how something that was WRONG two years before, over which I had STRUGGLED so badly, was now ok. I waited for the CO's visit to ask him how this could be? His [very unsatisfactory] attitude was, So what? It's now a matter of conscience. (My first taste of "new light" and I wasn't AWAKE enough -- lol -- to realize that I was experiencing my first dissonance.) I then wrote to the Society -- "abstain from blood" doesn't mean "abstain from blood?" -- but an elder to whom I showed my letter convinced me not to send it. He was an HLC member, and he sweet-talked me by suggesting that I had done what I thought was right according to my Bible-trained conscience when pregnant with my son, others were now going to do the same thing if the issue came up on these other blood fractions. Wasn't that ok? Well, I still was mad, and did understand on some level that I had felt free to make the decision I had because I WASN'T YET one of Jehovah's Witnesses -- if I had been, I'd have declined the Rhogam and boy, then I'd REALLY have been ANGRY at the New Light. But, I let it go. (Obviously, not completely ... there's still residual bitterness!)
----------

Daddy wasn't happy that Mommy's in the cult, but neither did he want to babysit the young 'uns on Sunday mornings for 3 hours, so they got to come to the meetings with me. I started out only attending one evening meeting/week -- the book study, so we were not gone too often or too late. We also went out in service during the week, while Daddy was at work, so as not to cramp our weekends. I was BALANCED!!!
I was happy! With three little ones at home, I didn't get too much adult converstaion, and now I had a built-in social set. Also, I had that spiritual side to feed, and the study materials, etc. are just dandy! I liked to read, I was a good student, I was usually PREPARED TO PARTICIPATE!

I liked to read so much, that I went to my local library to borrow James Penton's book on how wonderfully the Witnesses in the States and Canada have served the cause of religious freedom through the courts. (This was a publication referenced by the Society and approved by them for reading by JW's, so I was ok to do that.) However, there was one other publication on the shelf under the category Jehovah's Witnesses -- it was the now out-of-print book by Barbara Harrison Grizzuti from which excerpts can be found at a freeminds.org link. I read it, and the part about Arnold was what stayed with me all these years. The entire book shook me up pretty good. I thought it was a bit too strident, but it seemed well researched and "true", and I began having MORE doubts.

BUT my best friend the Witness from teenage years massaged me right back in, telling me that my faith was shaken because of reading that nasty apostate literature, and that's why we're warned not to, etc., etc. So I submerged my dissonant feelings once again because if I left, I'd be leaving her, too, and we had such a lovely history!!!
And besides, the Jehovah's Witnesses I knew were such kind, honest, loving people (REALLY true -- I'm not being sarcastic) who didn't resemble the people that the book I'd read described. And my children were learning solid Christian morals. And I was COMFORTABLE there -- I was good at meeting the requirements of my religion.

Moved back to the States. Came to the new congregation with a good record card for a sister with three kids and an unbelieving mate. Regular in field service. Right off, I participated -- it's just my style -- I'm verbal, in case you haven't noticed, LOL. Assigned to the book study at the Hall conducted by the PO -- who likes to get to know new ones that way -- but which is closest to my home anyway. I LIKE the P.O. He's an intelligent, educated, pretty well-rounded man.
My kids, however, find him intimidating. (Maybe they have better instincts than I do!) Anyway a couple of years go by, and my husband is resigned to the fact that the kids WANT to attend meetings with me, and so the at-home persecution lessens. More years go by and the kids NO LONGER WANT to attend meetings with me, so I'm bummed out, and they feel guilty [for hurting ME].
My oldest no longer wants to study at home with me, either. So, I ask if she'd like to study with somebody else. She comes up with two candidates. (I'm figuring maybe she just feels like she's heard everything Mom has to say and needs a fresh viewpoint to stimulate her in new ways.) Following good theocratic order, I run the plan by the Service Overseer. He informs me that the elders will need to meet on it, because it's the Society's recommendation that parents study with their own children. I explain that she doesn't WANT to study with me. He promises to get back to me.
A week or so later, out in service with the brother, he informs me that the elders feel that I should continue to conduct the study with my daughter. The sister who had already conducted one study with her, upon hearing of the elders' decision, and being theocratic, will not THINK of going against this pronouncement. I remember being ready to cry, because I knew that my daughter would NOT progress with me in charge. SECOND B-I-G DOSE of the TIGHT CONTROL these men were exercising over my life. I surrendered to their authority, but my daughter didn't! [Hurray for her! She didn't see why THEY could tell we two grown-up women what to do and we had to listen, even though between us we thought we were doing the right thing! And, FYI, she only reluctantly tolerated family studies after that out of love and respect for ME, but NEVER AGAIN for the organization.] Sadly, my daughter was lost. She, who never felt right going to sleep without praying first to let God know about her day, stopped praying altogether and got the impression that God was "mean". "Hard". She still feels that way today.

Well, family studies WERE conducted, but they were so AWFUL. None of the kids wanted to be there, I would get frustrated because they would be uncooperative -- but it was my DUTY as the spiritual Head of the Household, ad nauseum. They began missing assemblies and special days (couldn't demand they come -- Dad always gave them an out) and I began to feel worthless. Couldn't even make disciples in my own household! Not one out of four!!! I would cringe during the "youth part" of each program.

Auxiliary Pioneered twice (during Kingdom News distributions) to try to build myself back up. Didn't help much.

Supported the CO visits going out in service mid-week and helping make that 100% of publishers out in service goal for the Saturday morning. (Is it my imagination or is the quality of the CO's getting poorer and poorer? The last one for our circuit I found to be smug and deceitful. The one before that had a large ego, pleasantly wrapped.)Didn't help much more.

Finally, I began missing meetings. I skipped the TMS/Svc Meetings most often because I hated to be reminded about what I was NOT doing. Never good enough! Never ENOUGH period! I remember the talk "Elijah was a Man Like Us" talking about discouragement in our assignments. I wept. I did NOT find it encouraging at all. To me, it just emphasized that I was NOT DOING ENOUGH PERSONALLY, HAD FAILED IN TRAINING MY CHILDREN, HAD NO OTHER PROGRESSIVE BIBLE STUDIES, DIDN'T SEEM TO BE A GOOD TEACHER, WASN'T A GOOD WIFE (too much conflict re: holidays, etc), DIDN'T KEEP MY HOUSE CLEAN ENOUGH (must be holy because Jehovah is holy) OR MY YARD TIDY ENOUGH, ETC., ETC.

THEN came changes in doctrine. Remember, I was Sister Always Prepared. I KNEW my Bible. I KNEW my WT doctrines. I began to sense the contradictions. I remember getting all excited because I could tell my Best Witness friend (who had by now become inactive after her daughter was disfellowshipped for smoking and the friends virtually shunned her and her son -- both still in good standing) that she needn't worry about her daughter's fate, because a Watchtower article had said that some OUTSIDE of Jehovah's organization, if they had the right heart condition (which I was sure her daughter had), would not perish at Armageddon. To my dismay, another meeting part not too much later seemed to negate that understanding -- I think it was in a KM. Then, the "generation" fiasco. I think I was the person who answered the paragraph explaining the new understanding at my Hall. But even though I parroted the New Line which I UNDERSTOOD, I didn't BELIEVE that this could be right. It seemed to me that it tore at our special status as to being "in the know" about events leading to the "new system".
I started missing more and more meetings.

-----------
SIDEBAR
Meanwhile, I had developped two VERY close friendships in my new U.S. hall. And while I was going through my own pain and doubts, so was one of my two friends. She was reproved. When I asked how I was to treat her (never having had a friend who was reproved before) I was told by my PO that the reproof WAS the punishment, therefore I was to treat her as my "sister" just as I had before. To me, that was great! All I needed to hear! We could just keep on, keepin' on.
But there was more going on in her life that I didn't know. And so SHE began missing meetings. And when I called her on it, she told me she was happier AWAY from the organization. I couldn't FATHOM that.
After all, doesn't the Society reinforce constantly how miserable we'll be outside?

But now she was the SECOND person I was close to who felt that way.
And soon my sister-in-law became inactive and was the third.

Meanwhile, our other friend and I clucked over this sad state of affairs! We tried to encourage her back in, but eventually, our friend got disfellowshipped. And, being good little theocratic order followers, we shunned her. (But we tried REALLY HARD not to shun her kids!)

--------------
On another plane, that is, outside the Watchtower realm, other things are happening in my life. I have a close cousin who gets back in contact with me after years of being incommunicado, because she has become a Christian and knows she can share spiritual things with me.
I am SO happy to have her back in my life. But her questions and assertions make me examine why I believe what I believe. I think I have much to teach her and share with her. And I do. But I am not so arrogant (Thank Jehovah!) that I am not willing to learn what she can teach me.

That attitude just keeps getting me in trouble! The Bible study I conducted with my daughter's classmate's very knowledgeable and spiritual Catholic mother (the antithesis of most "missal" Catholics) would NOT have met the Society's standards. I read from her books, she read from mine, we held hands as I prayed, I read her research, she read mine.... all until the CO came with me on a visit and told me that the study was a waste of time because she just wasn't humble enough.

As if reading HER apostate literature wasn't enough, I found an old classmate through an alumni page and he is now an elder at an evangelical Christian church and works for a missionary organization.
While we caught up on our lives since high school, I told my JW story. He e-mailed me back that he was concerned for me, after having investigated the official website, speaking with others in his organization and reading a few books on Jehovah's Witnesses. This man has been a dear friend who REALLY loves me since junior high school and vice versa. So when he told me what publications he had read, and gently expressed concern, I felt it imperative that I become an apologist for the Society. Which I did.

Except I didn't. Because the more I researched, the more my story sounds like most everyone else's on this board -- I found the deceit, lies, and wickedness that emanated from the power-hungry elitists in Brooklyn. Some Scriptural arguments made by the cult-bashers I could refute, but then came my trip (finally -- I had been afraid for more than a year to even visit) to Beyond Jehovah's Witnesses. Which led me to Ray Franz' books. And then more web searching led me to freeminds.org and this board to name a few.

Because of the above, I think I have literally been PRAYED out of the Organization. These people all prayed for my deliverance. I prayed myself to know if what I believed was wrong, if I was serving Jehovah acceptably and if not, that I should be shown how to do so. I'm still not sure where I'm going. But I DO still believe that there's a God guiding my journey.

Anyway, I tried to just fade away, so that I could have contact with my remaining best friend "inside", but push came to shove earlier this month and I just decided to DA myself.

***

You will all be surprised to know that my DA letter was a single page long!

THANK YOU ALL FOR BEING HERE. IT IS SUCH A RELIEF TO TALK TO PEOPLE WHO U N D E R S T A N D ...

outnfree

Simon

Glad your out'n'free now outnfree, thanks for sharing your experiences with us. I'm sure a lot of people will identify with it.

'Ex' is more more enjoyable than 'Active' ever was isn't it !

Cassiline

((( Out )))

I have not had the pleasure of reading your story prior, although we have spoken briefly on the phone of your history. Thank you so much for sharing with us, I am so happy that you continued to research and are now here with us sharing your insights.

Hugs lady, you fought some battles and I am proud to call you friend.

Love

Cassi

SealingSalamander

Hi!

I'm not going to get into a whole lot of stuff right now (want to have more to share as time goes on), but I'll give the basix. I was brought in at 8. Had next to no religious experience before that, however, my mom was an on-again-off-again before this. My sis was 16 at the time. I took to it like a duck to water (finally, if I studied hard enough, and got all the answers right, I could get the approval I craved.) At 10, we moved from our medium sized town to the boonies.BTW, though dad got baptized during the dark ages, he refused to suit up and play ball. Anyway, because of our happy home life (sarcastic), and poverty, and lack of head of household, we became the pariahs of our new congregation. Much unhappiness ensued... about 5 or so years later, one of the prominent families in the cong. we had come from up and opens a dance studio, wins several competitions, etc. They entice a family in our 'home' KH to join and even more unhappiness ensued. Here we had been told that any worldly ambition was wrong, we had to give up our dreams, yet these people could do what they d*** well pleased and get plaudits for it. (Maybe the fact that they mostly bankrolled the new KH in the other town had something to do with it?) This was the beginning of the end. We were majorly stumbled, yet we hung in for about 5 more years. When we moved back to the medium sized town,I started studying with an elder's wife. They had visions of me being a pioneer and I almost got baptized. Fortunately I didn't, but where the JWs left off brainwashing, my father and stepmom stepped in with intense demoralization. Anyway, though other stuff has happened that I might share at another time, that's the basix. I am still dealing with depression and some self-esteem issues, but now I'm determined to live my life and pursue my dreams instead of following someone else's.

looky

Been on here for months and im also on fb under the same name, but dont have many friend on here.

i was born into the cult!

I have two children and we live in london

i faded out

i left because i didnt believe and looked around me in the cong and just saw people who were needy or had problems!

i have been gone 11 yrs

im out and glad!

Ding

Hi, Looky.

dainy

Hi,

I am a JW sister from the Philippines.

Been here for almost a couple of years now.. but don't have / find any friends here.. got 3 grown daughters all baptized JW, just have my Auxiliary Pioneering last March 2012, and now back to regular publisher.. have fb named nido_abareta.. hope to find JW friends here .. looking forward to hear from our bros and sisters out there... agape

Iamallcool

We are evil apostates here.

Hello Hello Hello hell...

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