I guess the one thing the turn the lightbulb on for me was when I was at a witness friends wedding. The elder giving the wedding talk said how the wedding rings had pagan backgrounds, but that JW's didn't recognize them like that. I thought "Wait a minute here!!". The main reason witnesses don't celebrate Christams, Halloween, Easter, and other holidays is because they say they have pagan origns. Then when a "worldly" person says that they don't recognize the pagan background and just like the family togetherness of the holiday, the witnesses say that's no excuse. The holidays still have pagan origins and are not right for Christians to celebrate. After that I really started looking at things in a different light. I started seeing things that really bothered me. Like not voting. They won't support their goverment, but they will take all the support the goverment will hand out.
Then other things started to bother me that happened before I was baptised. Like when I met this nice girl at a hall build. We started seeing each other and I made a few visits to her home to meet her parents. Next thing I know she won't return my phone calls. Then the brother I was studying with (the same one that gave the wedding talk) told me I had to stop seeing her because I wasn't baptised yet. Who are they to tell me who I can date. Another thing that really bothered me is how they made me swear I would keep going out in service before allowing me to get baptised. I mean this is my dedication to God, not to their rule system.
The straw that finally broke the camels back, happened when I moved away from home to a town where I knew no one. I started going to the meeting and made some friends, but was never invited over to socialize with the "brothers". Only recieved one phone call from the "brothers" in the 2 years I had been there. Then a caught the flu and was off work for 2 weeks and of course missed the meetings. Not one JW came to check on me, called to see why I was missing the meetings, or came to see how I was doing. The funny part is my co-workers and landlady both came to check on me and offered any help I needed. My landlady even brought me chicken soup. After getting better I went back to the meeting and the first thing I heard was "Where have you been, why have you been missing the meetings". Man, I felt like going off right there. But I controlled myself and just said I had been sick. I then met this amazing "worldly" girl and started dating her. Man you should have seen the brothers coming out of the woodwork then. All of them were trying to get me to stop dating her. Even my best friend tried to talk to me about it, but I think he was secretly happy for me. Shortly after that we had our Circuit Assembly. I remember sitting there alone, listening to the boring dribble coming from the stage and I said to myself. "That's it". And I just got up and left in the middle of the assembly. Never went back to a meeting again.
That was 8 years ago. I'm now married to that wonderful girl and I've never been happier with my life now that I'm out of the controlling cult.
Sorry if this was too long, but when you start thinking about it, so many things come to mind.
