Part I: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/7/58849/1.ashx
Part II: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/7/58890/1.ashx
Thanks to all who have shown an interest in my story. Again, I hope it helps all of you who are in a similar situation that I was in only a few weeks ago. It's been a long journey and my story is about half-way through. By the way, there was poster on here named DIAMOND who seemed to be in a parallel situation as me. Anyone know what happened to him?
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The reason why I wanted to be a protector for my little brother was because of what happened to me and my older brother when we were kids.
You see, we had a cousin (about 5 years older than me) who was abusive toward me and my older brother (4 years older than me). This cousin was not a JW, by the way. Fortunately, I was never sexually abused by him (or anyone else). However, there is a strong possibilty he may have sexually abused my older brother (he definitely was very physically abusive toward my older brother. Unfortunately, my older brother (now an Elder) refuses to give details about what happened to him.
Learning To Be a Witness
I actually got used to not celebrating birthdays and holidays. The only thing difficult was explaining to my peers why I didn't get any gifts. You know the standard JW response: "We give gifts all year round. We don't need a designated day to give gifts."
Remember that family that was mentioned in Part One? They moved to the Poconos, remember? Well, it turns out that they were JW's. So, whenever we'd visit them, we'd go to their Kingdom Hall for the meetings. Oddly, this family didn't really "act" like most JW's. The father cursed frequently. The oldest of the ten children (a female) married a hippie-type. The oldest boy (there were two boys and 8 girls) was in a rock band. They didn't go to the meetings regularly if I recall correctly. Still, I loved that family. I think they live in Arizona now.
My first congregation was two blocks away. For whatever reason, my mom decided to go to a suburban congregation (about a seven minute drive from the house) after being at the first congregation for only a few months. This is where I met badwillie. He and I became great friends really fast. He was my "good" association. We have a comical chemistry that is matched by very few.
One day, at the age of 10 or 11, my family visited my original congregation. It was there that I ran into a former schoolmate. His name was Chris. I was so happy to see that there were actually other kids that I knew growing up who were also JW's! Chris and his mom invited me to go to Great Adventure (Six Flags). Yipeee!!!
The First Negative JW Experience
I go to Chris' house and spend the night (because early the next morning we were to go to Great Adventure). That night, Chris asks me what I would like to do (keep in mind were both only 10 or 11). I said, "Whatever." He asks me if I want to wrestle. I wasn't a wrestling fan but I said, "Okay". He excuses himself before we begin to wrestle. About two minutes later he returns. He is buck-naked with the exception of a sheer silk curtain wrapped around his waist! I said, "I don't want to wrestle!" He got dressed and we both never uttered a word about what happened. I just found out at my last Circuit Assembly from the woman who studied with my mom that Chris is a practicing homosexual. I can vouch that he had those tendancies AT LEAST as early as the age of 10.
BRIBES
I hated field service (still do)! But, one especially nice elder took great interest in me. He was a very sincere and caring man. Almost every Saturday I asked to work with him. Why? Because he would always take me to Friendly's afterward (it's a restaurant that specializes in ice cream!). Yes, service equated to food and fun afterward. As an adult, I used this same tactic with young ones in my congregation. Not to bribe them to go out in service, rather so that they can have fun and so that they and I wouldn't have to go door-to-door for two hours. ("11 o'clock is here. Who wants to go to Friendly's???")
My First Bible Reading
Being a kid, I never studied for the meetings. I was never prepared. Yet, they encouraged me to join the school. The Friendly's elder wrote out my entire talk for me. I practiced it over and over again. When the time came to give the talk, I was confident yet nervous. I went up on stage and did a pretty good job. The brother ended up counseling me, though, because I was chewing gum the entire time. I didn't even realize it. So much for encouragement. I ended up getting teased by my friends and adults alike. Going forward, I never chewed gum and gave a talk at the same time again! However, Friendly's elder would write my talks for me for my next several talks. I think he did this because my mom wasn't inculcating good study habits in me. The elder must have realized that if he didn't write the talks out for me then I'd never give a talk. When I was a young adult, I asked him why he would write my talks out for me. He said he was only giving me an outline of what to say. I told him I read his talks verbatim when I delivered them. Eventually, I learned how to write my own talks! LOL!
Tomorrow, Deaths of Loved Ones
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