Posts by Lady Lee

8

Most Creative Exit

by enigma1863 in

i was wondering what has been the most creative/dramatic way ex jws have left the religion.

has anyone ever faked their own death to start over?.

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

Glander read the rest. Some others have made great contributions to the discussion.

Yea that positive outlook can be hard sometimes to hold on to. There have been times when the most I could hang on to was the next minute. That is how I was doing emotionally before I left the JWs and my husband. When my pain kicks in and I finally give in and take the hydromorphine pill I have 30 minutes to hang on until it takes effect. So for those 30 minutes I am just hanging on.

But thiese things pass. Those moments and minutes and days will pass on and the things we thought would never end can go away if we do what we need to do to get beyond it.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

Thanks FHN yes There was an old church hymn that I vaguely remember "Count your many blessings one by one....." We need to do more of that

Really Grace what could he do? I guess he could have said No you can't come on. But caught off guard like that I think most people would open the door. Luke has issues that only he alone can solve. Maybe this will be a step for him.

Yes sammiessife. we have no idea what some people have gone through; their personal challenges. We can hope they find the strength to carry on.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

The sign language wasn't my thoughts. That was simple word for word translation of what someone else was saying.

Now I have my own voice.

I doubt Richard L would be listening to me. But my first thought is: What does he want? That woman would be close to your grandson's age. Really close. It is kind of late for him to show up to be a real father. Generally people don't change as they get older. (Well unless they get help) They get worse - well the bad ones get worse. Richard must be close ot 65. Yea my first thought is what does he want.

Grace you know my family. They are about as toxic as any family can get.

Coming out of that if there are things I can do to help other people then I feel like a real survivor; that I can take all those bad experiences and make something good out of it; that I have conquered where I came from.

What you say about me is valued greatly because you know this family. You know where I came from and what it was like in this family. Then on top of it we were dragged into a cult. Few of us left without major scars.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

Thanks donny

I was thinking.

I wonder how much the lack of personal poiwer that exists among cult members continues to affect people after they leave. Many JWs stay because they believe there is no where else to go. But that too is a powerless way to see it. It is as if they think the MUST have someone else direct their lives or they will wind up as the stereotypical ex-cult member that lives a life of debauchery.

When all you have known is that other people control you, pull your strings and you are somply the puppet on the end it can be a huge leap of faith to even begin to consider yu can be the director of your own lfe. I can certainly see that some people who believe they can't do it might be stuck right there.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

Just an aside from me

The past year has been very hard on my so I haven't neen here very much. Thank you to those who have reminded me that my voice counts.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

Getting back to you Rip

Your comments aren't off topic at all. We need to be able to understand what it is inside of us that makes us want to make things different. Failures are opportunities to learn what not to do the next time. They don't mean we should give up.

--------------------

Pickler

I am facing some big challenges, and I don't know if I have the ability to do what may need to be done. But some things you have to deal with, I know, but sometimes you are just tired.

I think there are some challenges we need to confront. Sometimes they are pretty big, where do I live, where do I work, getting abusers out of our lives, going back to school, changing careers, those kinds of things that are outside of us. Sometimes we need to break the big change into smaller changes first. When I left my second husband I had started buying things I would need when I moved into where ever it was that I was going to wind up. I stored them away and made myself ready to make that huge move (2000 km away). When I decided I wanted to go back to school I took two course just to see if I could do it (hadn't been in a classroom in 20 years and had not graduated high school and was thinking of going to college) But i passed those 2 courses and then enrolled full-time. The 2 courses showed me I could do it.

I am a lot harder when it comes to those challenges within me - like my health. I hate taking pills. Many are so big that I often gag on them. But I have learned over time that if I don't take those pills my pain levels will get out of control. I want to believe that I can control this on my own. But I have to learn - well am learning that there are some challenges in life that I have to accept. I do what I can to improve my life as much as possible - like taking my medication. It is called acceptance. I struggle with accepting that there are limitations on what I can do or what is reasonable to do. I am just now accepting that I can reduce my medications to twice a day with no real impact on my pain levels. But my limitation is that if I only take those two doses and I miss one or am late the pain kicks in. I am now accepting that I do need that third dose so that if I am late or I miss one my pain levels will not be shooting through the roof and be out of control.

--------------------

as for taking my wheelchair in the sky or under the sea -- I think I will pass on both and stay on solid ground. lol

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

rip

Lady Lee, resilience is a wonderful thing to have a long with choices. So in your experience does someone have to have someone 1st believe in them before they believe in themself?

That is a very good question. From the time we are babies we rely on someone outside of us to let us know which choice to make. A mother encouraging her baby to take those first few steps, regardless of the fear of falling, the parent of an even younger baby encouraging the baby to roll over or grab something close to them. The mother smiles and speaks encouragingly towards the baby. Later on we chase away the boogie man and let out children know they are safe, we tell them they can go to school and be away from is for the day. These kinds of life-long encouragements are a way of telling our children that we believe in them and that we know they can do what they want to do.

So what happens when babies and children don't get that?

Some people learned to get it from outside the home, teachers, friends, mentors they find along the way. What I have experienced in my own life was encouragement initially from 1 person letting me know that not making a choice was a choice. Sometimes the choice is between the bad thing you know and the possibility of stepping into an even worse situation you don't know. But it is still a choice to take the chance. With my friends encouragement I took that step into the unknown. From there I went back to school and got tremendous encouragement from doing far better then I ever expected. My teachers and profs were extremely encouraging to me. And that was the beginning of developing a belief in myself.

I have counseled hundreds of women over the years (just a handful of men though). Most had been severely abused either as children or as wives and often both. They never had anyone to encourage them. I saw that as one of my roles as a counselor. I was there to encourage them to make choices about their lives and to cheer them on, cry with them when they failed and encourage them to try again. Some had other people to encourage them. Many had never had that.

But there is something missing before I had that one person or before a woman wound up sitting in my office asking for help. Somewhere deep inside us there was a desire for something else, something better. In spite of never having the encouragement we found it within ourselves to take those first steps. Even babies and toddlers eventually learn to roll over or take those first few steps that give them a different perspective of the world.

I am sitting here with a book in front of me; Resilience: Discovering a New Strength at Times of Stress by Frederic Flach. He defines resilience as a necessary ingredient to dealing with stress. The inner flyleaf says:

Dr. Flach offers a two-step process of disruption-giving in to the stress- and reintegration-putting the pieces or our world back together but in a new, stronger, wider-based structure. Rather than providing an escape valve for moments of extreme crisis, resilience bolsters the continuous cycle of learning, unlearning, and adapting that is a necessary part of our personal growth
Building resilience is an on-going process: the minor everyday pressures of life will strengthen our resilient qualities, such as self-esteem, independence, and a sense of humor, so that we may weather truly shattering adversities with more equanimity. With resilience, we emerge from each event better "put together" and more qualifies to deal with greater challenges.

That is fairly simplistic because the aspects of resilience well he wrote a full book on it so it is a little more involved that than but we can start there and recognize those aspects within us that contribute to our developing resilience solidly enough to help us through whatever crisis we may face.

It is quite fascinating so maybe I should read the book and share what I learn from it.

5

C t Russell and jellyfish case

by Jaime l de Aragon in

c t russell and jellyfish case.

then he said, "i am like a jellyfish.

and he confessed that he said those things.. http://www.pastor-russell.com/misc/bde.html.

Lady Lee

In the book The Four Presidents of the Watch Tower Society Gruss

IN Apocalypse Delayed Penton states that Franz focussed so much on th eevils of homosexuality that many people thought he was fighting his own battles with it. He states:

On one occeasionin th e1970s, when a male worker was disfellowshipped and expelled from Bethel for pederasty [sexual activity between two males when one is a minor], the society's third president described his "seduction" in such graphic terms at the Bethel meal table that many present were revolted."
... Also under Knorr, in th elate 60s, a most noterious scandal occurred at the Brooklyn world headquarters when a large number of staff members were dismissed for homosexuality - p 36

Knorr did end the prohibition against Behelites and even all Witnesses bu getting married and helping to make the family a focus of the Christain congregation.

Franz, the 4th president never married.

45

It's a miserable life --- Really?

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i was at the check-out counter sitting in my wheelchair, listening to the customer behind me talk to the cashier.

he looks at her and says she looks tired.

she rings through one more of my purchases and she it has been a long day.

Lady Lee

LisaRose

Like you I suffer from chronic pain. It can wear you out and wear you down. If you let it. There are times I just want to cry from the pain. But I know I can't give in to it. If I do that it only gets worse. So I get busy doing something else so I don't have to think about it - well if I can. I am gettign better at recognizing when I am about to have a pain crisis when none of my usually strategies work. I have learned that sometimes it is okay to reach for the medication that will stop it although I don't like taking it. Yea I'm pretty stubborn. Sometimes I feel like I am at war with my body.

You are right. We have to be open to the positives that come our way - like me waking up to the the birds diving off the roof over my window.

What I find surprising here is that some people say that they think for some people it is impossible to change. It is like they are looking for reasons why people can't learn to enjoy life. They don't have the capacity for it. I guess I prefer to believe that we all have the capacity for joy, happiness and the ability to grow. Maybe we have that to different degrees. But I can't believe that some people just can't do something to see life a little differently that what they are used to.