How to Deal with Shunners Part I. It Is They Who are Afraid

by jst2laws 49 Replies latest jw experiences

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  jst2laws

  Toreador,

  I run in to some JWs and they cant get away fast enough and others will be really friendly

  Yeah. Sometimes they slip up and realize it later. A couple of weeks ago I had an ex-elder smile and greet me as we passed in the hardware store. I have a full beard now so he must have thought he knew me but wasn't sure who I was. (hehe). But at least he knows I was glad to say hello to him knowing exactly who he was. Shotgun

  Sometimes I think ones who have been df'd or da'd have it better in that no one tries to stuff the WT crap down their throat and if they do you can reply in kind with anti-truth serum.

  Shotgun, overall it is best to be free to be yourself, DF'd or DA'd. But the price is steep. I can no longer live a lie so I suffer the loss of my family, all in the JW system. But giving up the lie to live true is, in my mind, the only way to go. My family has rejected me, not because of what I have chosen as they would like to think, but because they have chosen to blindly submit to men (the governing body in NY) who claim to represent God. Yet, I will still try to accomodate them as much as possible hoping they will examine the Watchtower Publishing Company/real estate empire/mind controlling cult for what it is (not that I have an opinion). Mulan

  But, we aren't df'd either.................yet. In time, we will see what happens.

  Unbelievable. As long as it does not stifle you, it matters little. We are glad it is over so we can be ourselves. (Poor Mulan and Bigred, the stifled ones, NOT ) jst2laws Outnfree, Just saw you comments. Please wait until tomorrow for a response.
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  hemp lover

  Very interesting thread, Jst2Laws. I liked your approach with the guy at the construction site.

  I rarely see people I used to know, but I ran into someone who used to be a very good friend at the grocery store several months ago. I saw her first and thought about walking the other way, but I just couldn't. I've missed her so much the last six years - I even dream about her quite often.

  She was talking to her friend, another JW ex-acquaintance of mine, but we weren't very close. I stood in her eyeline behind her friend with a huge smile on my face and waited for her to see me. When she did, there was a momentary shocked pause and then she responded with a huge smile of her own. We all chatted and caught up on the latest re: our families for about ten minutes. I told her I dreamt about her often and she told me she thinks about me all the time.

  She said it with such sadness in her voice that I felt compelled to tell her how happy I am now and that the last six years have been the best of my life. They both looked so surprised at that. When we parted, I handed her my business card with my email address on it and said, "I hope you'll contact me some day, but if I don't hear from you, I hope you have a great life." I haven't heard from her, but I feel very strongly that she wouldn't throw it away, so who knows... maybe someday.
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  hemp lover

  Guilt?
  

  JW wife pressure?

  Latest WT talks focusing on ex-JWs?

  Betcha it was all three. I'm so glad he called you again, Megadude, but I wouldn't be surprised if he goes back and forth on you, depending on the outside pressures. Flip-flopper... Do you think he snuck out without the wife knowing when he met you for a beer?
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  outnfree

  Steve,

  I just thought of another experience:

  I have a dear friend who is still in. There were three of us who were close, and I joined our DF'd friend out in the world when I DA'd myself. DF'd friend had a kidney transplant last year and JW friend was very concerned about her illness, so I sent JW friend flowers for Sisters' Day with a card letting her know DF'd friend had a successful transplant.

  This year, DF'd friend was going to have knee replacement surgery so I used my concern over her possible surgeon as an excuse to visit JW friend's home. I knew she likely would not speak to me (she takes a VERY hard line on shunning), but her son (I assume still unbaptized) greeted me warmly and asked his mother for the name of the surgeon NOT to use. I could hear her husband asking, "You're not even going to say HELLO to her?" through the open window, but I expected that. I really just wanted my friend to know that I was still there, that I still cared, and that I would be open to resuming our friendship if and when she's ever ready to do so. She spent time not only writing a note on who NOT to use for orthopedic surgery, but also wrote the name, address and telephone number of a surgeon she highly recommended. That she bothered to look all that up demonstrated the love she still carries in her heart for the two of us. Her son told me it was very nice to see me again. So that was nice to hear.

  Now I have to figure out how I let her know NEXT YEAR that we're still out here waiting in the wings for her whenever she's ready to contact us. Any idea for my next ploy? ;)

  out
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  MegaDude

  Do you think he snuck out without the wife knowing when he met you for a beer?

  I think she was out of town, to be quite honest.
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  Corvin

  When I was a teen in the org, I had a best friend, James, also in the org. We worked together, hung out together, chased girls together, did everything together (cept for showering and sleeping that is). We always had incredible rapport and he was never "strong in the truth" as they say. Even after we became adults and each got married, we continued our friendship, our hanging out. I was baptized at 16. He finally took the dip long after he was married and in his late 20's.

  The last time I talked to him was just before I was df'd in 1990.

  My daughter, Nancy, is best friends with James' neice, Candice. Nancy was going on a desert trip with them and I dropped her off at his house. There he was, like he'd never aged a day, just a little grey and heavier is all. His brother, Alex was there. We always shared a laugh. I got out of my car and walked up to him. He shook my hand and said I looked like Kevin Spacey. We laughed just like we always did. It felt good because there was always such love between us, such friendship. There we were, all together again, our faces beaming at seeing each other after all these years, unable to erase the good times in our hearts and minds. It was like we'd never lost contact and it was like standing in the sunshine again after a long winter. We breifly caught up on 14 years, and he told me he had not been to a meeting in years cept for memorial. He was inactive and doing the fade more or less.

  He mentioned he liked scotch. Turns out we had both acquired a taste for scotch over the years and I suggested that we get together over a bottle of Glenn-something and have dinner or whatever. Suddenly the mood shifted. Guess what he said to me.

  "I'm sorry, Corvin, but I wouldn't feel comfortable doing that because, you know, you are disfellowshipped and all . . ."

  Yep. It's conditioning, it's sick and it can hurt. I do not want my kids within five city blocks of a effing JW.

  Corvin
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  Corvin

  Shunners are conditioned to be treacherous. See farkel's thread on the scorpion and the toad.

  Nancy was named after a sister we were close to when I was still married to Nancy's mother and still in the org. We were all very close to the entire family. The corrupt old cow is one of the meddling sisters that persuaded my ex to give me the ultimatum: "get reinstated or I am divorcing your arse." She, in reality hates her husband, hates men and authority and general and constantly mutters under her breath about other JW?s in the congregation. Real negative, bitter and vindictive old cow.

  She works for the same company as my current wife, Mary, as a checker. She was also sitting ringside in the courtroom with her flower-print field service dress, book bag and Watchtowers in hand while my ex-wife showed letters to the judge full of lies written by those sweet loving JW's in her congregation.

  Me and my son, Beau, went to the grocery store the other night to get stuff for dinner. There was Nancy, my daughter's namesake, standing at the checkout counter. I felt mischievous and got in her line. She did not notice me till I was next to have my groceries scanned. She tensed and figured I was going to blast her publicly and embarrass her. I was tempted, but instead I made her fulfill her role as the courteous Albertson's checker she was obligated to be. I was determined that she would not shun me, but instead talk really really nice to me. I said, " hello, how are you?", very warmly and enthusiastically. Beau grinned knowing what I was up to. She returned the greeting to save face in front of those behind me in line. When she finished scanning my groceries, I pulled a pack of smokes out of my shirt pocket and asked her to go fetch me some just like'em. She stopped breathing , visibly offended, and called to a bagger to get them. I thanked her kindly, she circled the savings on my receipt, told me to have a nice night, and I walked off very content and satisfied.

  Kindness is good.

  Corvin
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  franklin J

  yes, I agree. They are afraid of us.

  Although I was never officially disfellowshipped ( not that they did not try ); I was ---and continue to be shunned. After my college years and establishing my career in New York City; I came back to my home town with a lovely (non JW) wife and kids. We bought a very nice home and established ourselves in the community. We made friends; became very active in the PTA with the schools; active in the local civic group; every thing that JWs do not do. It is a small town and when I am with my kids in the down town area; the very JW "friends" I grew up with who see me will cross the street to avoid speaking to me .

  When I have come face to face with anyone and smile and say hello and introduce my wife and kids; they politely say hello and rush off. I have explained to my wife that these particular "friends" had been very good freinds of my parents; had been at their table many times for dinner. She has come to accept their treatment of me and the rest of my family and is still perplexed by it.

  It is almost as if my success at life ( AFTER I so blatantly left the JWs) is something that they will not accept. I did not beome a drug addict when going to college. I did marry a "Wordly girl" and had my marriage ceremony in a Catholic Church: but the marriage is solid and DID NOT end in divorce ( and my wordly wife could set quite an example to some of those Elders wives). Many of my old JW friends have had bad marriages , and their lives are a mess. They still attend meetings and continue in that lifestyle. Something is wrong; if not with the religious beliefs; with the people who practice them.

  None of this bothers me at all; my life is secure and this JW shunning has become a form of amusement to me and me wife.

  However, what did disturb me is when my Dad, a former elder and one ot the builders of the Kingdom Hall we attended; passed on 18 months ago. He was elderly; and although he andmy mother left that religion with me 20 years ago; they tried to keep in touch with their old JW friends. It did not work and they moved on socially and made new non JW friends; just as I did. When he passed on , I informed the local Presiding Overseer ; who had been an elder with my father. I explained to him that there had been so many friends of my parents that I am sure would want to know.

  NO ONE ever called my surviving elderly mother to offer any condolences; much less attend Dads service. That to me was the coldest cruelest response. That one act of unkindness set such a NEGATIVE expample of Jehovahs Witnesses to my wife and her very large extended Catholic family. For all the door to door activities of JWs; an act such as this is very BAD PUBLIC RELATIONS to the very "wordly" masses of which they are so desperetly trying to convert and impress with their own measure of Christianity..

  Are they afraid of us? Yes, to a certain extent I believe they are; more of what we can accomplish and attain without their contol.

  Afraid that those of us who move on with our lives are proof to them that they; despite their devotions, can have doubts that their belief is NOT an absolute truth. Afraid that they may realize that they are wasting their lives; aftraid to realize all the missed opportunity they have passed by in devotion to this mindless belief. Yes, we make them afraid.

  But I also believe it is a certain kind of mentality of person who follows these beliefs blindly. The Jehovahs Witness belief IS NOT for intelligent minds who can think for themselves.
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  Mulan

  "I'm sorry, Corvin, but I wouldn't feel comfortable doing that because, you know, you are disfellowshipped and all . . ."

  Corvin, Don't feel too bad about that. When you are fading, and don't want to be df'd, you don't associate with df'd people. It's a hard thing to put behind you.

  I remember a couple of years ago, a couple who at the time, were new to this board, were inquiring if anyone knew others in their area. I did, and referred the two families to each other. The couple from the board, were uncomfortable about getting together with the other ones because they were disfellowshipped. A few months later, they did anyway. But at first there was a bit of fear. It took time.

  If they want to tell you who they are, I am pretty sure they will see this thread. You might be surprised.
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  Princess

  I am really enjoying all your experiences.

  I can't think of any good shunning experiences!

  I have seen an elder's wife around town a few times. She hadn't seen my son since he was born and never had seen my daughter. I noticed her watching us and smiling one day in front of a shopping area. I caught her eye and smiled and she turned and moved on. I thought it was sad for her but it didn't really bother me. A week or two later I saw her 20 something daughter at the gym and she stopped and said hi to me and the kids for the first time.

  I think living well is the best revenge. They are all told stories of how apostates are miserable and sad and their lives go to crap after they leave "Jehovah's Organization". Steve and I drive vehicles with our company name on the side. Our company is doing so much better now than when we were dubs and that is quite obvious. We are very visible which is probably why I rarely see dubs around. They catch site of my car and run for it. On the off chance that I do see them, I always give them a big grin.

  It's good to be happy.