The author, a young woman, has asked to remain anonymous as she left the religion only 1 month ago. She allowed me to edit which I will do sparingly since her raw style in so damned endearing . I have changed only 3 incorrect words for clarity. The few changes are in italics.
On the shoulders of exJW
So, I’ve thought a lot about how my story could be told: how can i explain it all, and still be totally concise? I’ve turned up in my head all kind of formulas, beautiful metaphors and touching words, but it all seems now useless.
I want to speak loud, honestly and frankly, without any detours; I hope this won’t get too long, but I know myself, chatty as I am!
So why would I do this in the first place, you might be asking. Well, I don’t think I know precisely neither. I’ve read a lot of ex-JW stories, many inspiring experiences, people full of courage, hope and undoubtedly very strong. And although I was still anxious, these examples really lighted my heart and for a moment, gave me some hope.
I won’t have the pretension to say that my story will have the same impact on the others, but I think that writing is more for me than for the others. Maybe it’s selfish, said that way; whatever, I need to do it, especially on the psychological level.
Tunisia 1934
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I don’t really know how to start this, so hum, let’s begin with the precise beginning.
My father was born in a little countryside town in Tunisia in 1934, and after the WW2, he went to France, trying hard to earn money and to start a new life. He was part of what we call today here in France the “Cols bleus” (blue collars), people that were working generally on harbors, building companies, and any other manufacture jobs. He used to be a qualified worker, welding cast iron for ships in the docklands of southern France, more precisely Marseille.
But still he was very miserable, feeling really empty, and he was born in a Muslim conservative family that made him hate god and that’s how in 1975, a couple of nice JWs came knocking into his door; they learned him how to read and in 1978 he got baptized. He was a fervent preacher, always keen on helping others, although he wasn’t that “soft touching” and sometimes he got really angry, but let’s blame it on severe crippling depression and his sincere love for the others.
And so, as he was coming back for holidays in Tunisia, he met my mother, when she was only 25, that was in 1997. She was touched by the “truth” that gave her also hope, her, an orphan young woman, the hope to see her parents in the paradise and she fell deeply in love with my father, her savor, her protector the one that saved her from committing suicide. He did fall in love with her too, and so started an extra-conjugal relationship that resulted in the birth, in the 21st of April 2000, of a little girl named Nour (light in Arabic). It was me.
My father got excommunicated soon after my birth but only 3 years later, he was integrated back in the organization and at approximately the same time, my mother got baptized.
Cozy JW Cocoon
We lived in Tunisia, surrounded by twenty / thirty (approximately, I don’t how much there’s of JWs in the whole country, some secret deep information) brothers and sisters that were fully a family to me, and I was the only child of the congregation, so I used to be cherished by the whole congregation, which made me a kind of a spoiled child, but let’s not talk about it haha. It was an over-protective cozy cocoon, but I didn’t mind it at that time, although I felt sometimes a bit sad because I wasn’t having friends of my age, and since I could not participate at the main school “forbidden” activities like christmas, easter, new year (I was in a French private school, which made me bilingual) but also muslim celebrations. I still remember me, in elementary school, having to watch all kids repeat and train for a christmas comedy play and me watching, all alone and apart, wondering what the hell was wrong with me. I felt so deeply lonely. And in the 3rd grade, the little shy and uncomfortable kid that I was got severely bullied, and that left some deep sequelae. That’s when I started developing that extrovert fizzy carapace, which made me gain some more friends in school.
Here comes middle school, when the girl enters puberty, new pack of feelings and she gets a bit far from this cocoon, trying hard to make a tiny hole into it. Little crushes from here to there, a bit rebellious, a lot curious, I was starting to annoy my dear parents.
Extra-Conjugal
But the worst was here to come : my mom cheated on my father for 2 years straight with another congregation brother ; they weren’t loving each other anymore, my mom was still young, and the age gap was even deeper. They thought many times of settlement divorce, but in vain, because of the consequences. So they continued living with each other, and the fights became a daily routine. And the story of her extra-conjugal relationship exploded in 2012 and I was the one who told the elders about it ; I was full of rage, anger and I even treated my mom of being a whore, a slut in front of everyone. I have exaggerated and amplified the whole story, but I wouldn’t even know now to explain exactly why. The result was her excommunication in the same year.
She moved on in France and I stayed with my old father there in Tunisia. I was again, alone and felt betrayed.
That’s how Jehovah’s witnesses came back into my life, again.
Missionaries
Some missionaries French couple started to follow me, made me study again and for the first time, the truth started to captivate my attention. It had something so refreshing. I began to be more active, to make again some links with the congregation, and got extreme when it came to my mom as I cut out every contact ever with her. She sent me many messages, mails, begging me to give her a sign and that broke my heart, literally, but I was really encouraged by the other JW's to stay strong in front of this challenge. I also wanted to save her, but that bugged me and I remember asking an elder “but if I cut any contact with her, how would I know if she’s really coming back for Jehovah or for me?” and I had a very unconvincing answer “Jehovah sees hearts, Jehovah knows”.
Reinstatement
Indeed, only one month later, my mother called us to announce that she spoke to the elders, and that she’s doing all the procedures to be reintegrated, and less than a year later she was. But she didn’t came back living with us, and I almost felt like I was being an orphan, because I was only seeing my mom twice a year, and my father because of his age, wasn’t able to take care of me.
Cutting
I started developing also a severe depression, something I wasn’t getting in the age of 13. I started cutting, and that’s when a couple of JWs, let’s call them G and S, rescued me and “adopted me”. I became their child, their daughter, and I was even calling them mommy and daddy. But my little sweetheart, things aren’t meant to be that way.
Not at all.
Crush
I had a very fusional relationship with S, an elder, which was seen as being a deep relationship: I was calling him almost every day for at least 1 hour and if not, we were constantly texting anyway. This friendship was like so fucking intense, and I started developing some deep feelings for him; no even more, I was crazily in love with him, and it took me two long years to get it. But I was discharging all of it, hiding it and burying it deep into the corners of mind, as I knew I was feeling something strong but I wasn’t able to put a word on it.
Baptized Struggle
Anyway, the congregation became, as it used to be before, my sweet cocoon in which I was trying hard to develop my personality. It was my family and my only benchmark, the only pillar on which my faith and personality was built on. And that’s how I became a zealous proclaimer in also 2013, and later in 2014, a sister.
I was seen as the child prodigy, the example of faith, although I was struggling following all the rules: I hardly prayed, unable to do it properly, I hardly read the bible, and also I had a major “problem” which was my bisexuality and many friendships were ruined because of these many “crushes” I had, and I struggled believing in god.
I recall the 5 year old me, drawing a drawing for Jehovah, waiting for him to come and pick it up and he obviously never did, that was when I think, the day that my faith actually died. I wanted to believe, but it’s not the way we do. You believe. You don’t have to try to.
Rebellious Discrete Revolution
The only thing that held me back, apart from the congregation and S, is that I loved the idea of saving people from doomsday: it made me feel important, I felt like I was making a change, I felt alive and existing through the eyes of the others. Like damn you have an impact on people lives, you aren’t that useless!
Also, the idea of living in clandestine conditions (Tunisia has a state official religion, Islam, and so the preaching work was under restrictions, because we were scared of the police, so were calling each other by surnames, calling with different telephones and using some ninja skills to preach) was so exciting, you know like a very secret resistance against an oppressor, we were leading a kind of rebellious discrete revolution.
Depressed Limp
But at the same time, my depression started getting even worse and praying wasn’t really helping, for this kind of conditions do not go away and heal that fast. I even went to a doctor who said “oh come on, you are young, you are always cheerful, why would you feel sad? It’ll get better with time, you’ll see!”
And it got me deeper into it, and even deeper, but I was blocking my ears, trying hard to not to listen to the alarm signs. My condition even got worse when I started having panic attacks in my fifteens, and the gap between the zealous sister and the depressed limp I was becoming was even bigger, that hole which led me to be even extreme on the two sides of the person I was. Eccentric, always so cheerful and happy.
Heart Crush
Only S and G knew about it, and talking of my deep feelings to especially S made me even closer to him. Everything was so intense. In parallel I started also developing another disease: Epilepsy.
I was even getting popular in school; I started even having the life I’ve always dreamt for myself.
Anyway, in july 2015, me and my father moved on in France to join my mother. And for the protection of all JWs there, I had to cut every contact (the only exception were 2/3 JW couples, and of course S&G)
But they were getting even more busy, according to them, and my only compass in life, S started calling less and less. I was leaving messages on skype and only getting answers many days later, or even weeks. My heart was crushed on the ground, in hundreds of pieces.
Silence Even Louder
I got even further from them, and my first love faded that way. I continued to fall into that infernal spiral, and that even pushed me to attempt suicide in 2016 (not only for this reason though, obviously). I was “popular” in my new high-school but no matter how much you’re surrounded by people, your silence is even louder. And I wasn’t feeling in my place in the new congregation, although they were all some really adorable and nice people. This just didn’t feel like… home?
Coming Out
Here’s when I started doubting, and I stopped repressing all these hidden in the closet feelings: I stopped preaching, made a come-out to some of my open-minded friends, started interrogating the existence of god, took some interest in philosophy, watched a LOT of apostates videos (like Lloyd Evans ones) and started developing my personality far away from that oppressing toxic cocoon, to open my wings and become a butterfly.
Considering Excommunication
When I came back in Tunisia in summer 2016 for holidays, I saw how much this wasn’t made for me anymore and that’s when I first considerate excommunication seriously, but this idea was so frightening. I even got on a fight with S, because I realized then that he had a very abusive and intrusive way of behaving, wanting to know everything about me, and he didn’t want to respect my privacy (I don’t think he’s doing it just to be mean, I think that he really cared about me, but just in the wrong way)
Love is freedom, some people say.
Set Free
And that really set me free. In March 2017, I started dating a person named Max. He transformed my fucking life and I began to taste freedom: I celebrated my first ever birthday, I started going out, attending some parties, laughing again, felt loved, beautiful for even some glimpses, had sex (ooh such a sin). And sometimes I even forgot my problems, as he was lightening a little part of my everyday life.
Sadly, because we were both dealing with depression, it started turning sour, and happiness wasn’t present in our relationship anymore, as we were taking different paths and that was the major reason of our breakup in December.
Post Breakup
After the breakup, I started thinking about my whole life, and I realized I couldn’t continue this anymore. I didn’t want to have the guilt of me being a deception to my fellow brothers and sisters, I didn’t want to live with that guilt of being a defeating daughter to my parents, especially to my father that is extremely ill, dealing with cancer with no hope of healing. I wanted him to know the true me, he deserved it. Everyone deserved to have the honest version of me, I had the duty to stop lying to everyone, and lying was like some rope around my neck.
I had to take also a revenge of my condition that removed from me a person I loved; this was my way of backing it up.
Pretty Earthquake
The same night, after my breakup I said to my parents that I wanted to get excommunicated, and that was a pretty earthquake for them. They knew for my boyfriend, but they really didn’t expect that from me (so did not the elders, who were seeing me every two months to check out if I wanted to leave him or not, which caused me each time panic attacks) since I’ve always been really docile and non-provocative about this subject (relatively, let’s say). The day after, I wrote a letter where I explained my reasons of wanting to leave out, and I gave it to the elders. My mother at the beginning reacted really bad, but my father really stayed for me “You are still my daughter whatever you’ll do, you think or believe. God gave us free will, and who am I to judge you? Although I have to admit that I’m a bit sad of thinking about the fact that I won’t see you later, after my resurrection in the paradise”.
Ingrate Selfish Spoiled
Two days later, I finally called S&G, after almost 6 months of not giving any news, to tell them about my decision and the reaction was absolutely what I expected: S got really angry, told me that I was just an influenced no personality girl, that I was spitting on Jehovah’s face after all he did to me, I was an ingrate selfish spoiled child, and I was going to see what will happen to me and when I’ll want to come back, it will be too late for me. His threats didn’t actually do anything for me and for the first time that night, I felt so free that I could fly, like a butterfly; nothing was holding me back in the JWs anymore. I had the confrontation with elders the following week and I got excommunicated. It all happened in a week, so fast: the thing that haunted me for years has been solved in a week; I can’t believe it even now.
Real Help
Finally my relationship wasn’t damaged by it, it even got stronger, I couldn’t explain how: showing them the true me really strengthened the connections. January month was also the month when I finally got the consequence of all this contained sadness and a breakdown followed, because I was so tired, after all of these years of fighting. I also called for help, a real help for my mental condition. It’s as we get deeper in the mud that it’s easier to fly higher, they said.
My parents understood what I felt like, and although sometimes we weren’t agreeing on some aspects, they stayed here and showed me love, and it’s way much more than I’ve ever expected from life. I’m really thankful for still having them, and not being shunned. The rest I do not care anymore.
I will get interned in a psychiatric hospital in the following days probably, but I don’t think this a sad thing, it’s something that must’ve happened many years ago, before the harm took this magnitude.
I’m taking a new step in my life, and it’s true that I’m still hobbling down, stumbling but I hope someday I’ll be able to walk kind of normally.
Life Isn't A Movie
Just if you are reading this and you are still too afraid of leaving, especially if you are young, listen : you might encounter some many problems, and maybe you’ll struggle with shunning but sometimes, I swear, it could be far better from what you’ve expected. When we’re anxious, we have a tendency of always making horrible scenarios, but life isn’t a movie so it won’t happen that way. Less dramatic I guess.
And sometimes, it might not end that bad.
Also if you are dealing with depression, or any of other disease, please, I beg you, try to do something, or get some help, and don’t let this condition eat much more of yourself. If it is caused by all the pressure you are holding on your shoulders because of being a JW, and the fear of losing your relatives and your friends, well just think about the life that there is on the other side of the wall built by cult indoctrination.
When I feel scared of that “other side of the wall” I always watch the ending scene of a movie (25th hour, produced by Spike Lee) that comforts me even more in the fact that I have chosen the right way, the right path.
Here’s a link if you’re interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9dw9BweRQk
Well here it’s 4:36 am and I’m really exhausted, and after 3191 words written (holy shit) and 4 hours spent writing, I’ll try to get some sleep.
Hope my English doesn’t suck that much.
-anonymous in France