After being so close to getting a clue about the "Truth",my oldest sister is way back in it, deeper than ever.
I love Claire dearly, and I know that in her way, she loves me too.
I believe the problem in our relationship lies in that when it all comes down to it, at the end of the day, we don't really like each other very much anymore. This knowledge saddens me more than I can explain.
It wasn't always this way.
We did fight a lot as children. Perhaps it's the eight year age difference. Whatever it was, when I was younger, she alternately tried to mother me, and then ditch me when she hit her teens and didn't need a tag along.
Then when I reached my late teens, the mothering behavior returned. At times, it was a great help to me. During some of my darkest times in my depression, she would take me to her house to give me some refuge from the war between my parents.
The problem was that once I finished my teens, and eventually when I became a mother myself, she didn't know how to stop mothering me, leaving us in a struggle commonly only seen in a parent/child relationship.
Somewhere after all of that, though, we did manage to become friends.
At least I thought so.
I found out recently that she has lived for years with the mistaken assumption that I've always been jealous of her. Of her looks, of her popularity, and most of all, of her position as my Father's favorite.
I told her that this is not the case by any means, but I don't think she believed me.
Whether or not she believes me though, it is the truth. I don't envy her anything that she is, has, or the life she's living. Nothing on Earth or in Heaven, in fact, could get me to trade lives with her for even one day. Her life has not been an easy one.
I also told her that in order to be jealous, a person has to be unhappy with their own life, and that I am right now living the life I have always wanted.
In spite of the fact her childhood was no picnic, Claire grew up to be a loving, giving person. She has a magnetic personality. She commands any room that she enters from the moment she arrives. She is an extraordinary woman, adored by all who know her. I know that beneath all of her Watchtower posturing, she has a very good heart, and is one of the most generous souls I've ever known. These are the things I love about her.
That Watchtower posturing, though, is the source of our conflicts.
She was baptized at the age of 12, same as I was. She married a man who would later become an elder.
She was a regular pioneer for a time, and now serves effectively as the consummate Elders Wife. She is a real asset to her husband, who isn't big on people skills. She smoothes things over for him when they visit other congregations for him to give public talks. She makes friends instantly.
Fifteen years ago, she introduced me to the man who would become, years later, my first husband. She was the matron of honor at that wedding.
I am still astounded by the fact that she also agreed to stand up for me a second time when I married Justin, though she joked that maybe she shouldn't sign the marriage license or it would turn out like the first one.
She helped me plan my wedding to Justin, as well. She was totally accepting at the time of the remarriage, knowing how bad my first one really was. Even so, she was angry at me because I 'didn't tell the elders the whole story' and she believes to this day that if I had, "things would have been different."
I disagree. But more about that later.
Her husband even attended my second wedding as well, though he took major heat for it from his congregation and immediately after, severed all contact with me. This proved very confusing to my new husband, his parents, and most of all, my young daughter.
Claire has tried, for the most part to be "understanding" of my feelings about the organization because of my experiences. She makes sure to remind me of this at every opportunity. Though there has always been the undercurrent of disapproval (and her unsolicited opinions about my physical relationship with Justin prior to our wedding) and I could tell that she felt guilt that while she knew of my plans to divorce Mike before it happened, and my feelings for Justin, that she didn't go to the Elders and inform them.
She chose, instead, to keep her mouth shut at the time, because she knew in her heart that I was doing the right thing. She even went so far as to give me some promotional phone cards that came with an item she purchased, in case I "needed to make any long distance calls".
She knew full well who I would be calling.
She lived with that guilt for a long time, brought the subject up repeatedly. I believe that she finally unburdened herself to the elders about it, because of comments that she's made since the last time we discussed the issue.
Of course I told her all along that there was no need to feel guilty: The elders had been told, I had been disfellowshipped, so "justice had been served" as far as the congregation should be concerned.
Claire has always maintained that if I'd demanded a different judicial committee (outside the congregation where Mike's father was the P.O.) that I'd have gotten different results. That if I'd been up front with the elders about Mike's real behavior, that they'd have been more lenient.
I, on the other hand, did not want them to know the facts about the way Mike treated me, because I feared violent repercussions on his part if his behavior became public knowledge. He made it clear to me that it was important to him that his reputation remain intact. I kept in mind the phrase that my other sister, Jessica, had always told me about dealing with Mike: "Safety first."
When the inevitable disfellowshipping occurred, Claire told her husband, the family, and the elder body at her congregation flat out that she would not stop seeing me. She took a lot of flack for it, but basically told them that there was a child involved and that she wouldn't risk alienating me and losing contact with her niece.
I have appreciated that action. I always told her, though, that if she remained in the organization that the day would come when she would voluntarily stop seeing me. She denied it, but I have always known that it would happen, because the time would come when she would get tired of waiting for me to get reinstated.
I had an idea that my predictions were starting to come true when I got a phone call from Jessica, a few months back. Jessica left the organization long before I did, but is technically only listed as 'inactive'.
She told me that she had had a very upsetting conversation with Claire. A conversation that ended with her asking Claire to leave her house.
The conversation was about me. It went something like this:
Claire: "I've about had it with Lily. I've invested so much time and energy into her, but she's just not changing. I thought she'd be reinstated by now."
Jessica: "You know, if you said that about any of my friends that I wasn't related to, I'd be disgusted enough, But to hear you say that about Lily, that is unacceptable."
There was also great discussion about the fact that Claire doubted my diagnosis of M.S. and said that I was 'giving up' on things like driving and being independent too easily. Jessica asked her if she thought it would be better for me to cause a traffic accident, with Leah in the car, before I accepted my limitations?
On and on they went, until finally, Jessica asked Claire to leave. They have patched things up since, but with Jessica informing Claire that I would no longer be an accepted topic of conversation.
Time passed.
Claire and her husband travel a lot. They have no children to tie them down, so they are invariably jetting off to one place after another. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, of course. I only mention it because it predicted to me that they wouldn't be staying in this state forever: I knew that Claire's husband had often talked about moving away.
That's why I was not the least bit surprised when Claire returned this week from an extended trip down south to tell me that she had been looking at houses. She seemed surprised when the idea didn't faze me.
I had only seen her about three times in the previous couple of months. These visits had come after a six week silence between us (a rare thing) in which we really had nothing to say to each other. This was around the holidays.
This silence ended with a 'confrontation' on her part, in which she declared that she was sick of me being jealous of her (I had to restrain myself from laughing) and that she was stronger in her faith than ever, and that she thought I had celebrated Christmas just to hurt her.
I told her that my decision to celebrate the holidays had nothing at all to do with her, but I still don't think she believes me. I also asked her not to listen to gossip, when people tell her that I did something because of jealousy, to ask me. Because I could guarantee her that it was not the case, and that she would feel better if she knew my real reasons instead of making them up in her own head.
I told her that if our relationship was going to continue, she was going to have to stop nagging me about getting reinstated. I told her that I had never had a choice what religion to be, and that when I reached adulthood I decided that the Witness faith wasn't for me. I asked her to just view it that way, and she seemed to at least consider it.
But that has been the sticking point with her. She has gone from telling herself that I was 'stumbled' out of the faith to believing that I'm being 'stubborn' and that if I just talked to the elders, everything would magically be okay.
There have been times when she was having real doubts about the Organization. When I saw glimmers of hope that she might get free from it. She said things like "Is it my fault that Armageddon hasn't come and we've all been had?" and then later outright denied she ever said them.
Her faith has been reborn now, after this extended trip to another state. She is hoping to make a 'fresh start' there. I told her that I respected her decision, and that Justin and I had always said if she was going to be a Witness, then it made sense for her to be with people who supported that lifestyle.
To quote Justin, "Either do it, or don't."
I can respect her resolve if she wants to pursue this religion, as long as she can respect that I don't. But she can't.
We have been at an impasse, but still things went on for awhile longer. She began putting more pressure on me because she realized that I really don't want my daughter to grow up to be a Witness.
Still, things went on.
Then finally, this past week, it hit me. In one sickening moment, I saw in full daylight the person that my sister has become. The realization came clear as day with one short conversation, one which she initiated.
"Did you hear that so-and-so (who was a mutual friend when I was still in the organization) ran off and left her husband and left the Truth?"
"Yes, I know." I had known, in fact, that this event was going to take place before it actually did.
My sister, however, had heard it through the congregation gossip chain. I believe that she was feeling a bit uneasy because she had been the one who introduced the couple.
"I always said she had problems. Claire said, clucking her tongue. "I told him not to marry her."
"Claire, you don't know the facts. If you did, you wouldn't be discussing this with anyone."
"I do so. I know her, you didn't see them when they were dating..."
"Claire, I am not going to discuss this with you. You are just going to have to trust me, you don't have all the facts and you'd feel bad about what you're saying if you did. This is gossip, and it stops right now."
She looked at me as if I'd slapped her.
"Well, all right..." she said, audibly annoyed.
She changed the subject, all right. To the subject of her renewed faith, and how she realized that "Satan had planted seeds in her mind from all different directions, but that they didn't grow, because she wasn't fertile ground for them."
So, I was fertile ground for Satan, I think to myself. That was her point.
Then she continued, proclaiming the fact that she's learned how to "identify the Judas's in her life" who would try to corrupt her faith, and that it was "so nice to be with normal people" while she was on her trip.
Okay, so now she's called me a Judas, and insinuated that I'm not normal.
My heart starts to pound, my blood pressure is rising.
I decide to leave her alone with my daughter a few minutes and excuse myself. I go upstairs, sit on my bed and breathe deeply, trying to calm down. I grab my copy of The Four Agreements and read a few random pages.
I regained my composure after a few moments, and returned to the kitchen. The rest of our visit was spent on trivial topics. In truth, I hardly remember the discussion.
I have been troubled by the events of that afternoon ever since it occurred, and have been unable to think about much else.
It's sad to think that sisters who love each other so much, could come to dislike each other so much as well, because of the fact that one believes that there is only one right path through life, and that anyone who wants to vary and strike out on their own path is doomed to destruction, and becomes a possession of the devil.
I can see it every time I look in her eyes: the disapproval, the irritation. The outright anger at my 'attitude' of persisting in my belief that the Watchtower Society cannot offer me what I need to find my way through life.
The Society is her God: she will bow to its wishes and whims and contort herself into a pretzel to keep up with "present truth.' as they dictate it from day to day.
I however, am just trying to become a more tolerant, less judgmental person. A person who never feels the need to label any other living being "Judas".
"If this religion is the truth" I said to her, at the end of our discussion, "it should stand up to any questions that a person can ask about it."
"It does." she insisted. "If you ask long enough, and ask the right questions, it does."
Then, she brought up the definition of the term "Apostate."
I honestly don't know what she said next, but I know my daughter finally interrupted and the conversation stopped there. I was lost in my own head.
The right questions... I thought.
Those are exactly the questions that I asked. The answers that I found to those questions set me free. It saddens me to know that my sister does not like the person that I am, but I cannot change who I am to make her happy.
Just as she can't change who she is to make our relationship easier, neither can I. I think it's such a shame that she just can't accept me the way that I am, because I love her as she is, JW beliefs and all. It's sad that it can't work both ways.
Because nothing, not even love for my sister, can drag me back to the life, and the lies I've left behind.
I know many of you can relate to this...
My best to all
Essie
The Four Agreements:
Be Impeccable With Your Word
Don't Take Anything Personally
Don't Make Assumptions
Always Do Your Best