Hi im from the uk im 42 years old , i was brought up as a witness from birth to 12 years of age i left the meetings with my parents ,
i had a wild youth was a bit of a rebel involving alcohol ,drugs , heavy metal and motorcycles , i was thrown out of home at 17 my sister was 14
and was discarded as my parents remarried and neither of there new partners wanted us (baggage) , anyway by the time i was married and 21
somebody spiked my pizza with lsd (cant remember the flavour ) and for the next 3 days i thought the world was ending , i called my dad and rambled some stuff to him ( cant remember exactly but the world was ending in my head) a little while later i got a witness call briefly , i found out where he lived and went and asked him for a bible , he suggested i have a bible study me and the wife took the offer and so it began again , i was baptised in 93 and went from strength to strength in the truth , aux pioneering , volunteered for everything , talks , cleaning , meeting parts etc was soon appointed and moved on giving public talks , assembly parts , shepparding calls etc , then in 1997 my wife fell down a kerb and damaged her cruciate ligaments several operations later and disabled ( by the way the brothers /sisters in the cong were great at this point ) my wife began to act odd 1n 1999 she tried to take her own life and over the next several years took 26 overdoses and spent much of her life in phychiatrict hospital in 2001 she was bi polar disorder type rapid cycling (not the common oh i feel a bit low type bi polar but the full blown rollercoaster ride bi polar) . the thing that struck me was i began to feel like a leper and despite a couple of close friends nobody in the cong or on the circuit( long time friends) seemed to care , i brouht up the kids on my own visiting my wife in hospital and caring for her at home , i felt so alone , when i used to take the kids to the meeting / assembly on my own i just got tutts and sad headshakes "she not come" ? my reply ussually " no shes not well, she is in bed" which she was , the lack of help weighed down on me i thought i could deal with anything and pushed on , thats whe the dreaded Deppression got me ( clinical deppression) i was still serving etc busy , one day i walked into a shop bought a packet of cigs and started smoking (i didnt want to smoke it was a cry for help) the j.c was soon arranged i was deleted reproved but told them i wanted to die , no help was given me i was made to look small and belittled in the j.c by an upstart elder newly appointed , i wasnt d/f but restricted etc so in 2002 i walked away from it all , i dont have a hatred for the organisation i just lost faith in it , my wife attends the very occasional meeting and gets a kingdom ministry , and sometimes gets the mags (if they can be bothered to bring them) we dont celebrate holidays (not sure what to do about that one yet) i still believe in a creator , but not sure where im headed yet .