by minimus 35 Replies latest jw friends
I'm sure it was no surprise when I left the cult. I started publicly disagreeing with elders, missing meetings, handing in service reports with all zeros on them, and I threw the book study out of my home.
I'm not very good at hiding my feelings.
Walter
I think people were very shocked when I was disfellowshipped. I attending every meeting faithfully for years, don't recall any months when I was an 'irregular' publisher, and basically was a 'goody 2 shoes' all my life. I was becoming very unhappy and none of my romantic interests in the JW's worked out, I was lonely, so when I caught a bad case of bronchitis I missed meetings for about a month. Then it was beginning of December (I was 21 years old) when my office was having a Christmas party and the girls in the office talked me into attending. So I went to a Christmas party, danced for the first time ever, got drunk for the first time ever, kissed a co-worker, barfed in the bathroom, and was carried up the stairs to my apartment by a co-worker's boyfriend.
IT WAS THE BEST TIME EVER IN MY LIFE!!!!
Then because I worked with a JW co-worker who threatened to turn me in, I snuck in the back door of the Kingdom Hall to meet with the elders and they disfellowshipped me. Basically I said I'm not sorry because I don't want to be a Witness anymore. Then I started dating the guy I kissed at the party and lost my virginity a couple months later. BEST YEAR OF MY LIFE! GREAT MEMORIES!!!
Nobody noticed when I did attend, and nobody noticed that I left. Took the elders a year and a half to get around to visiting (pre-Memorial, of course) and we told them that things had been pretty peaceful without them so we'd like to keep it that way. Haven't seen them since (and that was a year and a half ago!). And as far as I know neither of us are disfellowshipped or disassociated. We still have a couple of Witness friends who would probably let us know if that happened (word spreads quickly in these parts).
I know we had it pretty easy in the departure area, and I really feel for those who were given a hard time about leaving. It helped that we had no family to give us grief over it.
Nina
Nina, you guys have perfected drifting, haven't you?
Yep! Just eased on out. It helped that Chris left 15 years before me, and we'd changed towns and congregations several times since then. Everyone was used to him not being at meetings and, as a femme sole, I was invisible, so leaving wasn't a problem.
Nina
i had not gone in real service for a few months. the three times i did go, i had just convinced my car group to go for breakfast instead of service.
i think it was more than obvious that i was totally bored at the meetings (but i went for my wife who dutifully takes notes). so bored that i would take out a pen and paper and note down all the non sequiturs coming from the platform or the WT. i even started bring cryptographic puzzles to the meetings, and writing python code on paper for fun. the microphone stoodges would stand close to me to see what i was playing at. lol. it probably got obvious a couple of times when i laughed out loud at something from the platform that no one else thought was funny.
snoopy elders wives would ask if i had been sick or away (for missing so many meetings) with a nice big smile on their faces. i would say no, i had been fine, but at home watching movies or reading. the smile left their faces pretty fast! some brothers would approach me and say: "you okay? you look tired." and i would say: "on the contrary! i have never been better!", with a big smile on my face. this was weeks before i handed in my letter. i wanted everyone i talked to, to remember the last thing i had said to them as being really positive. i threw in the odd doctrinal jab in a humorous way to some dubs in the hall, but it mostly always went over their heads.
i started dressing way more casual. and yet aparently when they made the announcement to the hall that i was "no longer one of jehovah's witnesses" it was a big shock. which i am glad it was. hopefully it made some people think for even just a minute.
Sapien, you played with them. I like it!
I think I have always been the same person. When I started dating my future husband I was a little bit more witnessy!
Anyway, The elders never bothered me to much growing up. Sly comments back and forth I over heard in "Where do "they" get the money for all those cars?" or "Do you think her skirt it too short and her top is to tight and low?" Ha ha ha! I was me through and through. I think the elders were a little afraid of me because I had a mind and I used it. Plus I said it out loud.
I was a fun and still am and I could throw the best Beer Bash known to mankind and never get caught! Only 1 bird died from the parties I would throw.
I am still that person but now I have kids so I have to be all adult like for awhile.
Brooke
I think with me everyone saw the wrirting on the wall. I changed, because I was sick of getting stepped on by them and their stupid games. Sometimes a person starts to finally stand up for themself, and that's what happened. I just stopped taking their constant crap, and started telling them what I really thought. It wasn't a very gradual change for me. One day the light just kind of turned on and I said "screw this". But, once that happened my meeting attendance and field service basicly curled up and died. I stopped talking to people, and then stopped coming all together.
It must have been a shock for some people. I was attending all the meetings and field service as much as I could the few months before I left. I just never really bought into the doctrines for like over ten years prior, as much as I tried. The last assembly I was at I just looked around at everyone during a prayer and had a total epiphany that I was surrounded by people that were living in a dream world. During that prayer I felt like I was completely alone even though I was surrounded by thousands of people. It was scary. I just told myself that I would find out the truth about this religion at that point and I began intensely studying the core doctrines. I found out that 607 B.C was bullshit and decided that by continuing as a dub I would be partly responsible for the actions of the organization. I DA'ed a month later.
GBL
