Posts by Reopened Mind

59

How do I tell my husband?

by dissonance_resolved in

i'm a born in, baptized as a young teenager, whole family is jw.

i just recently woke up after the new understanding of the fds was announced and it seemed to me to smack of power-grabbing.

i started looking at all the websites we're not supposed to, and now i know why.

Reopened Mind

dissonance_resolved,

First of all, WELCOME to the board!!

My husband was a born-in and the PO when we exited together two years ago. When he expressed doubts about the flood of Noah's day being global, I offered to research the subject for him. (I had been lurking here and on other sites.) If your husband has any responsibilities in the congregation plus providing for your family he has precious little time to research.

Billy, Mouthy, and ding have advised to go slow. That is good advice. Time is on your side as you have probably figured out that Armageddon is not going to happen. Steve Hassan's books are excellent.

We have had to do a slow fade as we had grown boys and grandchildren; the other grandparents are staunch JWs. But the good news is that both our boys have also discovered "the truth about the truth" and are planning their own fade in good time.

As for me, the blood issue was the first thing I researched. The odd thing is I didn't have any doubts about refusing blood. You see, the day my second son was born we were told he would die without a blood transfusion. We steadfastly refused and he recovered dramatically. So for years we were convinced the Society was right-----until I stumbled upon www.ajwrb.org in 2007 and began reading.

The transition to a nonJW life will not be easy. We are interested in your continuing story.

Reopened Mind

68

POLL: How long did you remain a JW from point of baptism to leaving the KH

by Terry in

jw
friends

i was baptised --1963. left in 1978. fifteen years.

pre-baptism, another 5 years.

Reopened Mind

Baptised in 1973, 20 years old.

Studied for 5 years previous.

Began waking up in 2007.

Last meeting was the Memorial in 2011.

From baptism to last meeting = 38 years.

Reopened Mind

140

WT Society holds EXTREME Responsibility for 1975 and False Expectations

by flipper in

jw
friends

however- many jw's who have come into the jw organization from like 1985 forward virtually may have no knowledge of the wt society's 1975 debacle and false predictions of the end times or armageddon predictions.

just like in in the book 1984 by george orwell the wt society has a way of not only erasing it's history so no newer witnesses will be aware of their false predictions, but also they are re-writing their history as if those false predictions never happened.. so for those of you here who may have never read or heard of how whipped up into an emotional frenzy witnesses were in the years just before 1975 by the wt society claiming the end was any day now- this threads for you.

to see the pressure that was put on jw's by the wt society to get rid of everything before " armageddon " .

Reopened Mind

First of all, the Society has never been good at taking responsibility for their false prophecies expectations.

I was 20 in 1973 when I was baptised after having studied several books with girls I met at school. They had convinced me that the big A would be coming in 1975 by showing me "the signs of the last days" alongside the made-up WT chronology. I married in 1974 primarily to have someone to go through Armegeddon with. When 1975 came and went unevenfully the spin doctors and aplogists of the congregation went to work. "We know the season but not the day and hour." "Although Six thousand years of mankind's existence ended in 1975, we do not know how long Adam was alone before Eve was created." "We don't know Jehovah's timetable." etc., etc. Speculation pushed the date of the worldwide destruction back for at least 20 years. Within those next 20 years we had two boys, hubby had become a MS, then elder, I pioneered; in other words we had become deeply entrenched in WT world. We were so entangled that even if we had realized we had been duped it would have been extremely difficult to extricate ourselves from the organization.

As Smiddy says the 60's were a tumultous time with the threat of nuclear annihilation looming. It is easy to see how the WT grabbed hold of this opportunity to promote Armageddon. They just capitalized on the fear of the times to promote their own agenda. Now they have to settle by saying Armageddon is coming "soon", whatever that means.

Of course we finally did extricate ourselves from the organization. It took a move to a totally dysfunctional congregation, a newspaper article, the internet, along with our own nagging doubts to finally wake us up.

Reopened Mind

76

Whacky comments! What the craziest comment you've ever heard?

by toweragent in

jw
friends

last week a sister in my new hall made the following comment,.

"a brother once told me that it is better to be wrong with the organization, than to be right and be on your own without the organization.".

wow.

Reopened Mind

Not long after it became permissable to accept organ transplants one sister raised her hand at the Watchtower Study and commented, "Well, I would get a kidney transplant or I would get a liver transplant, but I wouldn't get a heart transplant." We wanted her to get a brain transplant.

Reopened Mind

41

Our Story

by Auntfancy in

jw
friends

hi everyone, i have been on here for a little while and haven't introduced myself to you.

i can't tell you how much all of you have helped me sort many things out in my mind.. i was raised in a very good christian home and married my hs sweetheart.

i left home and moved half way across the country with a husband and a brand new baby.

Reopened Mind

Aunt Fancy,

Your story is very similar to mine. My husband was a born-in and I was a convert and we left the organization together. He also served as an elder for many years as well as volunteering on the Regional Building Committee and various local remodeling projects. I see we are about the same age; my husband is 58 and I will be turning 60 next week.

At the beginning of our fade my husband read "Crisis of Conscience" with the idea of finding something wrong. When he finished he said he could identify with everything Ray wrote.

Do you have any children or grandchildren? We have two married boys whom we raised in the cult. We are in the process of a slow fade until their families are completely out.

When you realize that the WT is a multi-billion dollar publishing company you begin to understand why field service is put above everything else. We, too, experienced the lack of love when the man we were taking care of (a brother, by the way) died the week there was a district convention. The response from the "friends"? "Sorry, we are getting ready to go to the convention." Lucky for us my nonJW cousin and her husband came and sat with us and brought us dinners and gave us the support sorely lacking in the cult.

Best wishes on your recovery from cancer and from the cancerous cult.

Reopened Mind

191

What is your religious belief now?

by jwfacts in

i have a new poll at jwfacts.mobi/pollsarchive/ as i am very interested to see what people have moved on to believe.

as this is considered sensitive by some, you can answer anonymously at the jwfacts.mobi/pollsarchive/, or answer on this thread.

this is what i have created in the list, but feel free to add comments, corrections, or options i have missed.. .

Reopened Mind

Mostly I call myself Secular Humanist because I believe in the human spirit, not the holy spirit.

I am a member of the Unitarian Universalist Church. It is a liberal church with folks of all beliefs.

Like others here I will accept evidence as the basis for what I believe, but that can change as new facts come to light.

I do not believe in the supernatural, including god, creator, spirits, etc. as there is no concrete evidence to prove their existence.

Reopened Mind

34

Do Witnesses really want to go to the meetings?

by BU2B in

jw
friends

do witnesses really want to go to the meetings?

or do they just go because they feel they must to get into the new world.

or is it just peer pressure or pressure of elders?

Reopened Mind

In one of the Halls I attended there was a saying, "If you can go to the mall, you can go to the Hall; if you can go to the beach, you can go out and preach."

One hard-liner elder even said that unless you are in a coma or dead you should be at the meeting.

At another Hall one sister took it upon herself to call anyone who missed a meeting to "encourage" that one.

Did I really want to go to the meetings? I, too, felt relieved when the meeting was called off because of weather. O, and when we went on vacation we never went to a meeting.

Reopened Mind

62

Hello??

by franticfran in

jw
friends

i have just joined this website and just wanted to say hello to anyone out there.

i am so nervous,after thirty odd years in the "truth" i feel as though my husband and i have just walked into a room full of smiling strangers and we are just standing here hoping to god someone will come up and speak to us.

scared and excited and hoping to wake up one morning and not wonder what we do now???

Reopened Mind

Hello franticfran,

I am glad you found this discussion board. You will find a lot of help and support here.

My husband and I left the organization in our mid fifties. He was a born-in and I converted in my teens. He was the PO when he and I began learning "the truth about the truth". We have 2 married boys who also are in the process of leaving. Like you we were baptized in the 70's, my husband in 1970 and I in 1973. We gave our lives to that ungrateful publishing company. But O the feeling of freedom of mind! As others have said it is not too late to start over. Have you read Crisis of Conscience by Ray Franz?

If you have been visiting here for any length of time you probably know of jwfacts.com, freeminds.org, and the books by Steve Hassan.

Please share more of your story. We all love to read a good escape story.

Best wishes to you and your three lovely children.

Reopened Mind

34

Came clean to the wife and all is good!

by Comatose in

i have been reading steven hassan's books as well studying like never before.

my wife has seen the amount studying i am doing, just hasnt known what all subjects instudy.

over the last few weeks i've slowly shared certain things.

Reopened Mind

Comatose,

Glad to hear your success story! Please keep us posted on how this progresses.

My husband and I also exited together. We tip-toed around each other for a while as we built the courage to share our doubts with each other. Sites like JWN, freeminds.org, jwfacts.com and books by Steve Hassan and Ray Franz made our journey a no-brainer. Now that we know "the truth about the truth" there is no going back. By the way we were in our mid fifties when we began questioning the organization and had children and grandchildren who were in. All are out or on their way out now. I hope you and your wife are waking up earlier in life than we did.

All the best,

Reopened Mind

20

Newbie Again (Kinda Sorta)

by lostinnj83 in

i made my first post (which i have attached) more than 2.5 years ago.. sad to say i am still in the same situation.

still "physically in" but have mentally been gone for years.

i am still in my marriage and unfortunatly things have not gotten any better as far as me being able to help him see the light as far as the organization.. i am at a serious crossroad though because i am almost 30 years old, with no children.

Reopened Mind

lostinnj83,

Sounds like you are in a rut if nothing's changed in 21/2 years.

What is it you want to achieve?

Do you want to exit the cult?

Do you want to stay in your marriage?

Do you want to maintain a relationship with your parents and others in the congretaion?

Are you willing to accept the consequences of moving on with your life?

My husband and I exited together. We were in our mid fifties with grown children whom we raised in the cult and grandchildren. My husband was the PO when we began discussing our doubts. He could not see how the flood of Noah's day could have been a global event. I offered to research the subject for him. As I think you've found, discussing WT beliefs just causes the person to dig in their heels so as not to lose face. I second ABible Student's suggestion to read Steve Hassan's books. It is commendable that you are seeing a therapist. Is this someone who understands the mind control tactics of cults? Some experience with Jehovah's Witnesses would be even better.

When I had been married for only 7 years I thought we were not a good match either. I'm sure it was the organization that kept us together. Now I feel we are a perfect fit. Next month we will be celebrating 38 years together.

We were able to fade by moving 1000 miles away from Florida to Pennsylvania. Our two boys are in the process of fading themselves. Be patient. Time is on your side.

Reopened Mind