Does the sadness ever leave? (page 3)

OldSoul

Es brings up a good point, pc. If your periods of not feeling the highs or the lows gets to be protracted, don't be nervous about seeking professional help.

OldSoul

I've had pretty much a horrific 2005, but it's threads like this one that makes me count my lucky stars, as it were. I'm 33, and one of my best friends who I've known since I was five quit being an active JW not long after I did. Some of my better "worldly" friends from school and from the neighborhood who I couldn't be really good friends with cause of being a Jehovah-Kid are some of my best friends now. My best JW friend of 20 years who has shunned me for over 8 years, well his older brother who never got baptized and quit the religion around 18 years ago works for the neurology institute that treats me, I just ran into him and we exchanged phone numbers. As I've mentioned often, my JW family doesn't shun me, in fact we've never been closer. Yeah I have some reasons to be sad, and pc I'm sure your reasons are valid, but you never know, good things, really good things, could always be right around the corner (instead of Arm-and-getton).

pc

Just wanted to respond to everyone, I have learned much better manners since I faded from JW's.

jwfacts, evita,chris,Quentin,megadude,Biker, nowisee,es, and Cygnus.. Thanks for eveyones insights. As usual it is here where you get the most understanding and receptive responces.

Nowisee...How are you? We are all doing great, hope you are too!

eyeslice

I too understand how you feel.
Try this book
Stop Thinking, Start Living by Richard Carlson
I guess his basic argument is that 'we are what we think'.
Eyeslice

trevor

PC

It is a shame that you still miss the friends you had but it proves that you have a heart. I lost my friend and brother to the Jehovah’s Witness cult. We parted company 5 years ago. The poem below sums up how I feel about losing him.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

W. H. Auden

coffee_black

I think it gets better with time. I don't have sad days very often any more...but I do understand what you're talking about. I do seem to have a compulsion to check to see if anyone I knew as a jw has got out. It's kind of like surviving a war...and you look around to see who else made it through...

Coffee

OICU8it2

Everyone asks 'what might have been". Don't look back like that. It wasn't all bad was it? No one can say what might have been. There is so little time for life if lamenting the past too much. Your experiences have made you a better, wiser, kinder person. You can see thru that sort of thing now no matter what it is. Look ahead and enjoy the present. People, animals, this world is so amazing. I never saw it before. All I saw was bad. It is a struggle, but is so amazing the strength and character many people develop over time. Live. Love. Smile. Encourage others always. People can be so interesting and warm with a little kindness. Your friend, Carlton

onacruse

Not totally, at least in my experience.

For example, over the course of these last 2 weeks, I was working on a job and up the driveway comes a painter's van--and the painter was a man, a JW, who I've known for 40 years. I knew him and his wife before they were married, and, though I've been out of touch with him for many years, I shared in his pain as I read in the newspaper that he had lost one of his sons and daughters-in-law in a freak river accident several years ago.

Then along comes the builder--a fellow/JW I've known for 30 years. We looked at each other with no inconsiderable surprise, and he caught me up on some people, including what's been happening with my first wife.

Then along comes the sider--another fellow/JW, who I knew from his birth, as well as his entire family for 40 years.

So many memories, so many sad memories. So, in that respect, I'd say the sadness never totally goes away.

However, it did go away, at least in part, for this reason: All but one of these still active JWs, though they know full well that I'm disfellowshipped, talked freely with me; even, to a degree, with some enthusiasm and comraderie.

That did a little bit to alleviate my sadness at seeing these "former" friends for the first time in decades.

And, as I think about it, much of my sadness is of me for them: that they're still trapped in that brain-numbing life-sucking religion...and that I'm virtually powerless to help them get out of it.

tall penguin

trevor,
I love that Auden poem!

pc,
I hear ya! I've come to realize that the sadness, like other emotions, comes in waves. Eventually you learn to ride the waves like a master surfer! Sometimes you lose your balance and take a dive in the water. And sometimes you ride so well that you think that maybe, just maybe you'll be a good surfer after all.
Grief is a very deep emotion. It takes time to heal. And you're never "there." It never goes away fully. Hopefully, over time, there is some sun in between the rain clouds. And eventually, I do believe, the tears give way to joy.
tp

Doubtfully Yours

(((((pc)))))

I hope you're having a better day by the time you read these words.

DY

Does the sadness ever leave?

Share this