Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
When I left I found an excellent Ex JW forum which was really of the caring, helping type and suited my needs better than those concerned with attacking the Society, which I do understand many have a need to do.
I am from the UK, but met another Ex JW lady on there from the USA. To cut a long story short, we have been married for three years now and I am living in the USA. I am not actually disfellowshipped, but my wife is, (very unjustly in my opinion, but glad she is out!) and she was a fourth generation witness, and it is her family we have the problems with.
My breakdown was the result of a few circumstances that came together at the same time. First, in the late 1990's I was asked to go to assist a nearby congregation in my city, and I went with the promise, that having done what 'Jehovah' asked me to, I would be, for want of a better word, 'blessed' for my move. Not so. It was a very bad move, for me and my children.... I got very stressed with it all.
Around this time too, I began to have a mid life crisis thing, which was very real and depressing for me.
Also my marriage of 20 some years was under strain.
All these things combined, as well as the constant...'you are never good enough, you are never doing enough' message that is constantly reinforced though the meetings and finally I broke.
You asked if the questions in my head were a factor. I dont know but I do know that when I was talking to people at their doors, I met some who I knew were very devout and totally convinced that God answered their prayers, and yet my belief was that they were going to perish for not accepting the Watchtower and Awake and acknowledging that the JWs had the truth? It seemed unjust and unloving that God would do such a thing. So maybe those thoughts were festering in my subconscious and affecting me more than I thought.
Looking back, I dont believe now that God ever answered a prayer, even those that I though he had answered could easily be otherwise, logically explained.
Sorry about the length of this post, and I tried to keep it short!
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
