rowan

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Posts by rowan

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  43

  800 Infant Bodies Found in a Septic Tank at Roman Catholic Children's Home

  by cofty in

  1. social
  2. current

  796 infant skeletons have been found discarded in a septic tank at the former mother and baby home run by the catholic church in ireland between 1925 and 1961.. unwed mothers were sent these "magdelene asylums" to be treated like criminals.

  their babies - if they survived - were taken from them.

  if they did not survive their bodies were thrown into a septic tank and forgotton.

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  rowan

  How I LOATHE the Catholic Church. Mass murderers. All the while forbidding birth control in Ireland. Religion is poison.
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  54

  Would Your Family Stone You to Death?

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  ot law required jews to take the lead in stoning a family member who became apostate.. the watchtower has lamented the fact that the law of the land now forbids them from doing so.. if the law permitted it, as it does in some musim countries, and if the watchtower required it, would your family obey?.

  my parents are good people and i believe their love for me is genuine, but i think they would follow orders.. what about yours?.

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  rowan

  Yes, I believe they would. I know for a fact that my father would have kidnapped me from a hospital if I ever needed blood as a child. When instructed to shun me, they did so. Yes, they would. And my beloved father would be crying while doing so.
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  26

  My sister is getting df'd.....

  by Blttex in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  just found out that my little sister is getting df'd next week.

  her husband left her about a year ago got df'd and recently got a girl pregnant.

  my sister has had a hard time with the whole situation as you can imagine.

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  rowan

  Getting out while hot and young. The best thing that could have happened to her. She has your support. Welcome her to life in color.
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  45

  After leaving did the feeling go away?

  by committeechairman in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the feeling that you're never good enough.

  the feeling that you're wicked and evil.. .

  because i'd give anything not to feel this way.

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  rowan

  It is different for everyone. I have friends, and family members who are ex JWs, who often tell me, with the best intentions in mind, "to get over it, not to think about it, go on, live your successful, happy life, that will show them" etc...

  We all had it different, due to our personalities, how deep our parents were in, etc. The WT screwed me up good. It destroyed me, and I went on trying to live my life, but I was broken, and even though I have not been in for the last third of my life so far, the WT kept conditioning everything that I did.

  I was never abused as a child, but my feelings of deep shame, fear of being a monster, emotional dettachment to my children out of fear of abusing them/ letting them down, are all common of abuse survivors. I cannot just "not think of it". I actually did not think of it, it just permeated everything, this is an integral part of my psyche.

  Yes, it can get better. It does get better. My point is that it is different for everyone.
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  45

  After leaving did the feeling go away?

  by committeechairman in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the feeling that you're never good enough.

  the feeling that you're wicked and evil.. .

  because i'd give anything not to feel this way.

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  rowan

  I know I'm not evil but I still feel unworthy to live amongst normal humans.

  Punk, it reminds me of when I was just df', as a young girl, I could not even look up at the faces of the waiters at restaurants.
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  45

  After leaving did the feeling go away?

  by committeechairman in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the feeling that you're never good enough.

  the feeling that you're wicked and evil.. .

  because i'd give anything not to feel this way.

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  rowan

  I was born in, raised by hard core elderly parents, and on top of that got df in my early 20s. It is just now, with the help of an amazing therapist, and daily meditation that I have come to realize the depth of the damage. The easiest way that came to my mind to describe it, is to compare the way I perceive myself to the tiniest, dullest russian doll of the set. On top of feeling insignificant there's the self loathing. This mindset is how I operated in every esphere of life. It made my whole world small. It diminished my loved ones, for if they loved me, then by default there was something wrong with them. At work, I acquiesce to the short end of deals, terribly so, for my group of people, as I am a head of department, the perennial push over.

  Coming to this realization has been incredibly liberating. Still, it was just a realization. Staying suppressed is my default mode of operation and I still have to conciously reset and redirect my thoughts and behavior. But heck, this is a huge, huge breakthrough!

  So yes, it can be done. My soul was twisted steel, and I am getting better, after almost 15 years of my exit.
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  56

  Anyone recall asemblies actually being fun?

  by tim hooper in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  when i was a wee lad, there was a carnival atmosphere at assemblies as this old footage will show:.

  .

  http://www.britishpathe.com/video/witnesses-baptised/query/jehovahs+witnesses.

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  rowan

  They were fun once I turned 8, and then until around 14 yo. I remember the junk food, hot dogs and burgers, soda, cake, etc. It was the one time of the year we could eat all the junk we wanted, then, it was back to healthy foo. And cruising the huge soccer stadiums in Buenos Aires was awsome fun. I got to know every nookk and crany of the Velez Sarfield stadium playing hide and seek. River Plate stadium was too large, I got to explore it well, but I used to dislike getting stuck in the corridors. Seriously, the design of the building was such that when too many people were circulating at the same time, there was pedestrian traffic jam within the stadium (how there were no tragedies with the soccer hooligans slamming into each other I don't know). You could lose a good 30 min of the break in the jam. I still remember the smell in the stadiums, of burger patties being cooked, sweat, polyester, the subtle sniff of WT literature paper, and the hint of concrete overcooked urine which could not be cleaned off in spite of the dubs' scrubbing.

  The stadiums were too tough as a little kid. The one memory I have from that time is being oh so sick at the end of a 100.0 F plus day. I was puking, must have had a high fever, and was delirious (from what they told me later), remember they laid me down on the concrete at the end of the day, with a bucket in the step beneath, and started putting ice on my head. I remember calling for my parents, and some remaining older kids sitting above us laughing at me (now I question if I imagined that last part). My father had been working all day in the VIP quarters, and my mom never figured the 5 yo was getting heat stroke until I started puking in the evening.

  Then they built a huge convention hall for the DC conventions. Oh the joy. bo-ring. grey and square, with little sits in rows, with minimal padding. Like a huge Walmarttt store house, with capacity for 10,000 people. The smell was way worse than in the stadiums. No food arrangement by then. clogged letrines. Anyways, never mind. they sold it this year. It is back to the stadiums for the dubbies. I wonder how that is going to sit with the old timers. The poor old, cardiovascularly sick, arthritic dubs, roasting in the sun again. Makes me sick to think about it.
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  50

  Letter From My Mother: Moire insane Watchtower Rhetoric

  by confusedandalone in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  again, i apologize to any who think i may be going overboard posting these letters, but i am hoping that i can help prepare others for the type of bombardment that they may face when dealing with mentally diseased witness parents who have no idea just how much control this cult has over them:.

  august 19, 2013. dear <my name removed> & <my wifes name removed>, .

  i had the privilege of attending the convention this weekend for a second time and i must say that i enjoyed it more than the first.

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  rowan

  C&A, please keep posting. I have been enjoyed reading about your experiences. WOW, no child should be told that it was recommended their mother aborted them... sick.
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  42

  Bad Elder Stories

  by shamus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

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  what was the worst elder that you ever had to deal with?

  i will post my story in a second...

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  rowan

  oh the stories...

  we had a PO from hell 12 years ago at a central congo in Bs As. He was Bethel elder at the branch over there. he was this extremely neurotic sexually repressed individual who was not in love with his wife (who adored him, the poor thing) and went on sniffing by the young sister's skirts all the time. he would hound us if the skirts were 1/2 inch shorter than what met his approval. he would hug us. he would pinch our cheeks. sit too close when he was giving counsel and touch your knee, etc.

  He was a total hardliner legalistic SOB on a power trip, on steroids. he bullied the rest of the elders and for years he ran the congo like a tight ship. this created a lot of resentment and was his downfall in the end.

  There was a family in that congo, all brilliant, polyglotes, artistic. many of them where in the editing business. the father, non JW, was a tenor at the Opera House. they all had easy going, flamboyant personalities. Culturally rich and generous by nature. THe mother and each one of the children became a target of his harassment. If it was the clothing, or if they missed 15 seconds in one of the TM talks, or when they were dating, etc. He made the eldest sister of sister give an editor job at travel magazine because that was not an appropriate job for a dub according to him. she gave it up so she could keep up pioneering. The sons were tenors and he had a bone with the fact that they were studying at the conservatory (and it was deliciously funny to hear him try to oversing them with a falsetto during the songs. hehe, he was so jealous of their voices).

  The worst instance that I remember, which is nothing but an example of how this guy operated, is when a single sister in her late 40s, with no family inside or outside the congo had to undergo surgery and was struggling to make ends meet. He made the determination that the congo was NOT to help her in any way financial. A sweet elderly sister, who was 84 yo at the time, started a collection among some of the friends. totally informal and only among those of us who really cared for this nice sister (who always placed her home at the disposal of the congo for the book study, for field service, BTW). He got wind of this and hounded the old sister to the back room together with 2 more elders to tell her to stop it and that she was going against the elders' arrangements by doing the collection. The poor thing got out of that meeting crying.

  My family was viewed as materialistic, I was not a good example because I was going to uni and my hours were too short, but he had no problem taking advantage of my father's expertise and getting free medical care from him. Then I got disfellowshipped and we came to learn what was to be on the wrong side of the WT. He would intend to micromanage how us as a family interacted at home, he saw us eating at a restaurant one time and made a stink of it, he made a stink because my mother would leave the hall early to take me home (the hall was in a horrible violent neighbourhood of the city BTW). I applied for reinstatement at 10 monhts after I was DF. He would not hear of it because I missed a couple meetings (I had pneumonia), I did not study for the service meeting (I was DF and they would not give the Kingdom Ministry paper in the first place, when I mentioned that to him I got a blank stare). He was incensed that I was migrating to the USA and hence would be out of his jurisdiction. He told my father that it was obvious that I had advanced my trip "to get my way". In fact, I had posponed my trip in order to come over here already reinstated. My father, the meekest man I know, told my mom that he felt like punching him in the face after that. The guy had the nerve of continuing to seek FREE medical care with my father after that (yes, talk about entitlement). After he was politely told that there no appointments avalible a couple times he finally got the message that he was not welcome.

  He kept terrorizing people for 1 or 2 years after that. The rest of the BOE could not take it anymore and they maneuvered things to have him removed as PO. He resented it and changed to another congo. 1 year later he was cought at Bethel sniffing around documents that were not for him to see. He was kicked out from Bethel, stripped from being and elder and sent home in disgrace after 20 years in the branch. I did not feel sorry for him.
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  62

  My mother continues with these creepy letters

  by sosoconfused in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  as i continue to post these letters just to let people see what they can expect through a fade, i hope they are not annoying anyone.. if so please let me know and i will no longer post them.

  however i think these letters help you to see how cultish and crazy this religion causes people to become:.

  evening <name removed>,.

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  rowan

  I've been following your posts, Sosoconfused, these letters could have been written by parents, another hemisphere and culture away. yes, it's a cult.

  funny how the blame always lays at our feet, eh?