Episodes

Episode 13 – Fernando Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:13] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we get to hear stories from people that have been silenced by controlling religions. I have a bunch of things that I’d like to talk to you guys about today but I’m going to save most of it until after the interview. There have been some exciting happenings here in the land of the show. And I’d like to share them with you so be sure to listen all the way through the podcast and I’ve got some interesting things I’ll tell you at the end. Today we’re going to learn about Fernando and what it’s like to live in the cold of Jehovah’s Witnesses but we’re also going to learn what it’s like to grow up knowing that your sexuality is condemned by the very faith that you’ve you know held up on a pedestal and that has been your whole life. So let’s just go ahead dive right in and get to know Fernando. My name is Fernando. I’m 28 years old. I was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and I am Sean. All right. So then Fernando How did you come to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the first place like were you exposed to it from birth or did you. Was there a certain age when maybe your parents started studying or something. I know when I was younger they they were studying to be Jehovah’s Witnesses. But as far as I can remember we were we were in the religion so I just hope I was born into it. Yeah I mean that makes sense especially if it’s at a young age. It doesn’t.

[00:01:43] You know there’s not much difference in being born technically born and if it’s all you really know the best way I say it’s like I don’t remember celebrating holidays. So I was born into it. Yeah that’s a pretty good way of delineating it. All right then well then how did your parents become Jehovah’s Witnesses. Well I’m not 100 percent sure on this answer. If it was my aunt or one of my uncles I introduced it to my dad. OK. She she lived in Mexico obviously when both of my parents came over from Mexico or back in the day. And so she had told my dad about this organization. And from what he would tell us he’d noticed the change in her and how she was behaving differently and he admired that from her. And so she has good luck to him. He at that time was here in the States my mom was still in Mexico and he started studying with a Jehovah’s Witness here. And so when she came over then she started studying with one. And that’s when they pass it along to their children at that point. Gotcha. That that story of a a spouse you know studying with Jehovah’s Witnesses and the changes that are seen in their life. You know that’s that’s one of the things they used to always say from the platform was you know if you had a quote unbelieving spouse you know maybe you could win them over just you know through your conduct and the changes in your life.

[00:03:24] So and you know it’s funny and I never thought about this and so now is like they always try to push the message on people when they’re preaching on people that are going through something they’re suffering from a situation in my parents case. I think it was a separation and the struggle of coming to a new country and trying to start from scratch. And I think that’s what they try to hold onto not hold on to but try to get to to them that hey we were preaching of a better life for you and your family you’ll be happy. So I just feel like they find those weaknesses and people are try to at least try to get to or get through to them with that. Well sure you don’t know how much they think that they not only target it but I think that people that have those vulnerabilities at whatever point in time they happen to run across a witness. I think that that that makes them vulnerable because because they are hurting. And maybe you know looking for something better. I mean let’s face it Jehovah’s Witnesses have a pretty good sales pitch. Yeah if you you know of course they don’t they don’t lead with the shunning but they they let you know you know if you come with us essentially you know your life will be better today because you know you’ll make all these changes and then you’re going to live forever in a paradise on earth. You’re going to see all dead relatives again. They’re going to come back. Everybody gets to be perfect. So you know when there’s a problem Perito Yeah it does sounds like a fairytale that people who are hurting are vulnerable fairytales and that makes sense.

[00:05:13] So then who were you you know as a kid. What did their religion mean to you as you started you know being exposed to it. Yeah. Well you know obviously growing up in there and like you said being taught that this is the best life you can have. I was completely convinced that we had the truth and growing up in a family that was very committed to the organization and serving Jehovah through this to this group. All we could do was devote our life all of our time and any decision that we made including myself as a kid you know obviously you have to be different. And so I had to sit people who are not in their organization that I was different and then bring up this you know tell them why. And that where they can join as well. So I was just completely convinced that we have the truth and that we were doing everything that we had to and that we had to get the message out. Yes so then what did what was the world view. How did you see the world around you. You know obviously you were different. That is a big thing for all of us. How did you see the world. What did it make you. How did it make you see the world. Well this is where I just think it’s fucked up because what I think we know looking back now what I thought about everybody was that everybody outside was helpless. They were in despair. And we had all the answers that they needed even though we were lying to ourselves.

[00:06:56] We didn’t have the answers that we needed at times but we had everything that they go through this organization. And they needed me to go tell them and after me trying to get to them or preaching to them and you know they decided not to go along with it or they weren’t interested. At that point the point of view of seeing them helpless and needing help turned to oh they’re evil. They must be some same people because they don’t want to hear the truth from God. And they had their opportunity. So that’s it. That was their chance going to be destroyed. And that’s it. They’re going to die. It’s fucking stupid and now that I think about it. And I say it out loud. But that’s that’s exactly what you’re taught. And so that’s what I always thought about people like oh I need to tell you what I have. And if you don’t agree with it that’s it. You’re a goner. Yeah. Fascinating how quick that supposed love you had for that person where you love him enough to bring something to better their life turns to almost a hatred it’s you know I love you. You said no. Well then screw you you know. Like die at Armageddon. You know how. How dare you divide the Word of God. Yeah. Yeah Jehovah brought me to you and you’re dumb enough not to listen. I mean it’s just it’s it’s so arrogant and it’s just so unloving toward the people that we were supposed to be showing love to. By going to their doors Yeah definitely. So then what was your childhood like. Let’s start at home.

[00:08:36] What was what was your childhood like there. Well you know I I always I like to think that I had a good childhood. You know we were always busy like I mentioned our growing up my dad was growing up in the rankings. Like I like to say in that organization he was a Ministerial Servant. My mom became a regular pioneer. He eventually became an elder. No I was still a kid and you know we were just always busy with that. But at the same time like I said I like to think it was a good childhood. But inside I always felt like I had to keep keep up maybe or keep proving myself that you know we are that good family in the church that we have to be even since being a kid my dad would tell us that you know we were the children of an elder and that everybody in the organization was watching how we were behaving. We had to be the example and how you know our actions as a family is also what helped him get to that position and sort of help them stay in that position. We have to continue this act of being a good family which I mean no no family is perfect. I can’t say that there is any crazy situations. Right. I mean it was just an act that we had to put forth. And so that was basically me I’m home as a kid was like OK what I have to do next to keep up with this is just exhausting as a kid. Yeah yeah. Say no pressure. Yeah.

[00:10:15] And the youngest youngest of three boys. So anything that they did and my older brothers that I had to do better more ten times harder I could see that I could definitely see that. Yeah I also kind of shows you you know from the beginning that is it’s all about appearances. Yeah everyone is watching you. You have to set the example. It’s just about what you put on on the outside. So then what about at school. You know how did how did people treat you at school or you know how did you feel at school. I know being a Jehovah’s Witness at school is not easy no definitely not. But like I said before you know I was comments I had a truce. So like I said we were taught to show that we were different so I tried. I tried to show that I was different. But at the same time I wouldn’t try the hardest at school. I know that they would tell us they’d like either books that they can see reading during lunch that they can ask questions about the book. I never did that. But I you know I definitely was kind of in my own zone at school. I tried to talk a little bit to everybody I knew that I couldn’t be friends with anybody at school so I never really tried to make any strong connections or friendships because we were allowed to have friends outside of the organization. And I would just try and I always honestly wouldn’t try to touch the subject of religion as much as I thought I had what was truth.

[00:11:48] I didn’t want to be pushed or pointed out at school for that I don’t know I just that when there’s a big twister because I was torn between wanting to be good and not being one like being the point or the subject of laughing or I don’t know the whole thing of being different than that your peers at school is definitely out. Anything that any kid wants or no nobody wants to stand up for the wrong reasons. Exactly. At the same time you know I had to explain to the people of death when they saw that I didn’t celebrate holidays because even from kindergarten or first grade you would have to leave during holiday projects or events. I would go to a library or if they had to color a snowman or Christmas stuff I had to color a racecar. And so it’s just like whole explaining to the kid that explaining to the teachers and some teachers not liking it. Some teachers being ok with it it’s a lot to deal as a kid. So again this is that whole thing of trying to keep up and being exhausted all the time. Yeah it is. It is a very tiring life to have to play this. It’s like you were given a role to play and you had to play that role everywhere you went regardless of how you felt about any of it. Exactly. So then what about at the Keenum Hall. How did that how did you feel at the Keenum Hall. Were you one of those kids who you know was all INSA given the talks and going out and service everything and knocking on doors or you know how did you feel about it.

[00:13:35] What was your progress like there. Well actually at first that was before the age of white taking on responsibility. Yeah I didn’t mind it at all. I did not mind it at all. I was like OK let’s go do this. But I always thought about it as a task like just get it over with. I wouldn’t I wouldn’t like be upset about going preaching and stuff. But at the same time I was always on edge. I remember as a kid hearing brothers giving talks about how our meetings were an oasis from the world and how that’s where we are after being exhausted. We go like retards spiritually and get ready for the next week or whatever. I never felt that I was always like well at school sometimes I feel like the kids were awesome and over here I feel like you guys are all either jerks or judging everybody but I always consider myself a spiritual kid and that was making good progress. And like I said this was like before getting baptized I guess because I got baptized 11. So I guess before that I was pretty good because I did not do much. But after that is where I was more on edge and I was more stressed out. I was even more exhausted or keeping up all these appearances basically because also inside I knew that I felt desperate that I didn’t agree with this but what else did you do at 11. So what then were you not agreeing with at the time.

[00:15:10] What were I always find it interesting to see what it is that you know makes you feel different about it. You know when they’re younger what was it for you well I just couldn’t even though I believe we did have the truth. I disagreed with the fact that we can’t be certain that everybody else is practicing religious religion just as zealous as we are that they’re wrong. I couldn’t believe that these people who are actually living decent lives and they’re not hurting anybody they’re not hurting themselves. There’s no way that God is going to destroy them. For them trying to worship God just the same way that we are. I never that never made sense to me. Like what if they’re reaching the same the same ending just a different path. Right. But there is no way. And based on what I saw it saw some of the kids were great and even like adults some adults were great. And sometimes I would hear even my family talking shit about other members of the organization like this is it a loving organization. It’s like remember one time at dinner they were talking I don’t remember who they were talking about but they were talking about a true family. And I think one of the kids was going through some hard time so there are obviously a lot of rumors that all the conversations that were happening and were talking so much shit. My older brother my middle brother she said What are you guys doing like at the dinner table. He said this is what we should be doing.

[00:16:45] However he came up to grub and be an elder so he just follow the same path it’s this whole thing of like judging other people and judging within the organization as well as like. So you’re telling me these people are outside of the organization are wrong. But people in the organization are also wrong sometimes. So how do we have the truth. Everybody’s wrong. Exactly. Nice. I guess we are the only perfect ones I guess are family but we’re not. That’s the biggest thing that stood out to me. This is like all the judging judging people within an hour. And that makes no sense. Yeah the judging is very serious. As Jehovah’s Witnesses we judged we judged everybody we judge everybody at the Kingdom Hall and like they would always have talks about watching our associations. And I remember when I was a kid that they would talk about it more. It seemed like at least to me more from the aspect of you said watch your associations with those on the outside of the organization. But as time went on it seemed like they got more and more to where they were like yeah yeah yeah it has to do with people on the outside but also we better we have to watch out even inside the congregation there could be ones who are bad associates and you just start getting to a point where you just can’t trust anybody actually. Who do I talk to. Yeah yeah just talk to yourself. But then again you can’t trust yourself because the hardest treacherous and who can know it’s so weak. So yeah they just get paranoid and every which way. So just read the Bible. Just read the Bible all the time well just read the Bible and read their publications that explain it.

[00:18:36] Yeah. So then so you say you got baptized at 11. Yeah. How did things I guess. Well I’ll ask you first you know how did things progress toward baptism like I guess why at 11 did you get baptized. Did you feel pressure or you know externally or internally. Yeah. Well you know like I said I was the youngest of three boys. I think my older brother got is 13. I think my other brother got back at 13 to 13 12 or something like that. And so after seeing them all think Oh man I’m getting left behind. And like I said it was like I wanted to be that spiritual kid that did better than my siblings and I had to prove that I was better. And you know they did. I don’t like to say that I was pressured into it but other kids my age were doing it and I was asked maybe three three times if I was thinking about it. So I mean I guess I was kind of pressured but I think it was more within myself of trying to keep up. Like I said before with the family right. That makes sense. Everybody was like already movin up I’m like oh man I’m still just the publisher. So let’s go ahead and do a lifetime commitment to love and let’s get in the water. So that’s that’s what happened and that’s what was on my mind when I decided to do that. Right.

[00:20:12] There’s you know there’s overt pressure which would be you know sometimes you know parents as I know parents have done this where they really do put pressure on the kid to get baptized constantly. Yeah and that’s awful. But there’s also this this covert pressure which is just this looming expectation. You know we all knew within us that especially as kids that at some point we’re going to have to do this thing we’re going to have to get baptized and then you start seeing other kids around your age or you know getting baptized maybe a little bit older or whatever but kind of start setting your own expectations too even if it’s not from the outside. You know if you if you hold off on the baptism it’s frowned upon too like there is this one girl at our Hall who I think it was already past like maybe even a month of high school and she hadn’t got baptized and things are said about her are so unfair. There is so firmly. No she’s not taking this lightly which is a good thing. Now that I think about it. But things that were said about her like oh why is she not getting baptized. I wonder what she’s doing at school. Or you know maybe her parents that didn’t have enough focus on her and her you know raising her or stuff like that. And that’s so unfair and so unfair about it now because she was I mean I don’t even know she gave out prizes and there are not. But I mean this is not a decision you take lightly. And obviously as 11 year old you don’t think about the consequences if you can’t stay within the organization because that’s one of my biggest regret. I would not have gotten baptized.

[00:22:00] I would definitely not and I would try to tell everybody else not to. Well until you’re older I really think the dark side of this decision is well sure that’s something that should not be allowed for kids do. And what’s crazy also is that Jehovah’s Witnesses bash Catholics for Baptists baptizing babies. Well how is this any different. Yeah. Children you know that have no real concept of the ramifications or the seriousness of it. Many of these people who are getting baptized are still playing with toys. So yeah Jesus didn’t get baptized till he was 30. But for some reason they have to push kids into it so to get them to keep the numbers up in the orientation. Got to get more members and ropa men. So then how. So after you got baptized how did things kind of progress. You know from there you’re 11. So how did things go from there as you went through you know your teenage years into young adulthood. Yeah. Well you know once I got into injured teenage years as soon as I could. Well my dad I guess I should admit that he was very active and helpful. And so my brothers were and Paul Bill. And so as soon as I could. I signed up. And here we were going to build almost every other weekend along with preaching and Family Study. And so we were always keeping up with that. We were on the landscaping crew which was hard work for like 13 14 year old kid. Yeah especially out here in Oklahoma and summertime it gets ridiculously hot.

[00:23:43] Also assemblies we volunteered to help with parking. We got there the day before for set up and clean up and we also helped during the whole thing to help with the cleaning. And so honestly I didn’t pay much attention to them because I didn’t have time because I was busy before during and after. Also as soon as I could I began auxiliary a pioneering auxillary really. I don’t know if I’m saying that right. I usually say that Spanish John Kerry pioneer Yeah. And so you know after that after a few months of doing that as soon as I could I became a regular pioneer and that was just a whole nother level of stress because you know we had to dedicate 75. It was when I became one 75 five 70 hours of preaching a month. Yeah they’ve changed it several times but it’s somewhere around there. Yeah. So you know now I was a pioneer at this time I think my brother was working on being a ministerial servant and my oldest brother was already one and my dad was the head elder of the congregation. And so at this time I also started thinking you know something is different about me. What what is making me feel different. And so you know the teenage years where you try. You kind of start discovering yourself a little bit more and so that’s when I started realizing you know why I’ve been feeling different all these years because I was gay. And so that added a whole another level of pressure. A whole nother level. Stress because obviously I knew that that was not acceptable.

[00:25:28] And so I think I was trying to push myself to do the most to counter that you know because I knew that I was doomed. Basically it is my waist because you know they say we don’t hate the gays but they can’t act on it or they can’t do anything else. Right. Right. You can you can you can have you can be gay you can’t act on yeah being gay or what you like. Like it’s OK to be it mentally but you can’t actually like ever express that in any way. Exactly. It’s really a mess. Yeah it is. And you know it’s the same thing about any other what they call sin like they hate us and they don’t hate the sinner basically right. But as soon as you commit the sender out like this I mean you are you are things that offend us and keep the elders right. Tell them what’s going on. But you know I always knew that I was like oh my gosh if I start talking about this to anybody you know within the congregation if you know something you’re supposed to confront the elders of your friends confess to something to you you know bring it up to them. Right. And so I was busting my ass trying to like make up for the fact that I knew that I was wrong on this aspect. But at the same time during my teenage years I did start watching porn. I discovered masturbation which was also things that are not allowed right. Every teenager does exactly. So I mean I came to the point where it was like OK let’s work even harder like double year.

[00:27:07] So then came along even preaching Saturday preaching. And I was I was I took middle school assignments. I took home school and school for high school and you know my parents gave me that option if I wanted to become a regular pioneer and that’s how that started. So I have really so. So they let you homeschool because you agreed to spend your time in the ministry. Yeah. Wow. Wow. And this was attending. Is was a bad school. It was one of the like drugs gangs. And you know that’s just the part of the city where we live and you know I really started seeing that in middle school. But I wanted out of there. I didn’t want to be there. And so I agreed to it. They wouldn’t take you out for your own safety or because you were exposed to bad things but only if you would agree to pioneer well that’s how it was presented to me. So I guess not. I just find that I just find that funny. You know it’s part of the witness way. It’s not a person. It’s about what the person does or whatever. So you know here you are their kid. And instead of taking you out because they’re concerned for your safety or even your your you know spirituality you know said air quotes spirituality because you’re so you know around these people who might be bad influences. They were more concerned that you spend more time knocking on doors for that organization than about her well-being. Exactly. And I think it was all about keeping up the appearance.

[00:28:46] Yes. Because I mean I guess they were getting to a point where we are all on the same page as family. We’re all working hard. We were all doing the most. So what can we do to send out even more. Yeah that’s how I felt about it. But once I started like into realizing I was gay and I started watching porn and discovering masturbation so I was doing that as well. You know I really started because there was always a conflict in my head. And you know I always felt like that I really fell into depression and I don’t know if I was just good at hiding it or everybody was good at ignoring it that it was never really had. Maybe a few times like Are you OK. That’s all I got. Yeah but also there’s no time there’s no time to ask because you’re always busy because lit the only night of the week that I have free was Thursday’s that was the only night that I had to up to do for myself. It felt like to me. Yeah. And so I don’t know if they’re I don’t know if they notice it or I don’t know. It crossed her mind or they’re just ignoring it to keep up appearances and accommodation but that that started to weigh down on me a lot in the teenage years.

[00:29:59] Well yeah I mean being a teenager is hard regardless of what’s going on in your life and then you know add add in something like you know being gay in the organization has to be has to be doubly hard because you know your sexuality isn’t something that you that you choose. You know I didn’t choose to be a heterosexual I just am but whatever you know it’s not. There’s no choice to be made there. And ans it’s such an integral part of who you are that you know to be told to feel like you did you probably didn’t just feel like something you were interested was wrong but that you were wrong. Yeah because it’s personal. It cuts closer than you know a person that’s I don’t know maybe as a little bit of a shoplifter or something like that that gets caught and gets disciplined in the congregation. You know they can stop shoplifting actually you know. But but this is this is personal. And so I’m sure that that added so much more pressure and then you know you’re in this family that’s you know you all we’re like I mean I don’t know your congregation but in any normal congregation you all would have been you know the superior family. You know that father the Pioneer Mother the kids that are all reaching out you’re doing all the things which is all they really care about is that you do all the things. Nobody nobody ever asks you in the organization who you really are as a person. They’re just concerned with what you do. And so that had to have just been tremendous pressure definitely. And it was an I never really thought about it because I knew no different until the teenage years. And so that’s that’s where I really like I said that’s when I noticed I started noticing. Right.

[00:32:15] And then like you said it sounds like you were kind of doubling down like you know. I know I’m doomed from a witness standpoint because I’m gay but maybe if I can do enough things in the organization. Did you think maybe like you could make up for it that way. Yeah yeah I sure did. I was like well you know maybe when God looks at my history they notice that I did a lot of things. OK. Right. Right. Hey look at least this guy has a good heart. He’s trying to do the right things. Yeah right. So then you know how did how did that progressed you know you did a homeschool thing. Did you how did life progressed after that. Well I mean it was well for. It took me years to finish by the way because it was hard it was hard than I am not one for education but I have also never thought too much of it. Sure. So that was put on the backburner for years until I finish it off later. But obviously we weren’t encouraged for college because it was frowned upon you know partially from my dad being an elder. Like oh we heard when somebody went to college from him. So I didn’t pursue any further education. I don’t know how it is in I don’t know if it’s like a Hispanic culture or an organization. I don’t know how it is. I didn’t know that it was different but you know you weren’t supposed to move out of your parents until you were intent to get married in a way just because they thought Oh here.

[00:33:58] So you know that’s easier for you to fall within say. That makes sense. I mean I don’t know Hispanic cultures typically the families are very close. Yeah. And so you know I didn’t move out. I obviously wasn’t thinking about getting married because I never thought about that as an option. Right. You know I was just very involved and I get busy. I get very busy in the organization at this point. I think maybe 19 or 20. Yes about 19 or 20. I think that’s when I was announced as a minister of as well. So I was a regular pioneer. I was a minister celebrant so and everybody else besides I was doing great. No I was active. I even went down to New Orleans to help with the Katrina you know rebuilding. Right. But as much as that that made me feel good. The Katrina rebuilding Glamis you’re doing some good. Sure. But I also didn’t feel content. I wasn’t full of this love and happiness that the organization promised and I think it was with the fact that I knew that I was wrong in their eyes for my sexuality. And so I didn’t know how to express myself. But in those days or so I really started working. I am an artist. So I do art on the side. And I really started doing some artwork. And now what I look back a lot of mine color is what I chose were black red and white and I have a bunch of pieces with these colors so I just started thinking of ways to get kind of express myself through that.

[00:35:54] And so for example one of them it was a face and there’s tape over the mouth and it’s so on. And there’s blood coming out of it. It was very dark and gory at the time. Right. But I didn’t even just over these to my family because of what the hell. What the hell. That’s almost so perfect representation of being shunned. It just struck me yeah yeah. And that one sold that one sold in California so it was their home. But I really started falling into my artwork. I was up till like I don’t know 2:00 in the morning several nights just working with my headphones on and just trying to get. I was looking for an outlet basically. So that was it. That was how I expressed myself when I couldn’t tell anybody how it’s really going. Yeah. Yeah I can I can I can see that as quite the expression you know whether it’s being shunned or being gay whatever it is that you can’t express that’s that’s really that’s really poignant. You mentioned I have to go back to something you mentioned you mentioned that you worked in the contract Katrina aid when you went down for that. I just have to ask did you did you ever. I don’t know if you ever knew who you were helping rebuild for or not. Did you ever work on anyone’s home or whatever that wasn’t a witness. No.

[00:37:18] There were eyewitnesses all the ones I know yeah they mentioned a story that they helped some person after they were done with the witness house but that was a one time thing that I heard about because obviously they only take care of their own right. And so I mean I don’t remember them saying that they help anybody else which they never have said but before. No they don’t. They don’t usually. Occasionally they’ll have an experience and in a magazine or something of where they may be you know it’ll be those who say like they helped somebody. Which kind of makes somebody on the outside some worldly person quote unquote and they’ll make it sound like they help lots of other people other than just witnesses. Yeah but they don’t they usually just there might be somebody who lived next door who just needed a small something or maybe somebody who has shown an interest in studying with the witnesses already. So maybe they’ll stop them and then they you know get baptized or something and then they’ll use that person as an experience or I wouldn’t put it past them just to make something up but because I know myself I was interviewed on stage at like circuit assemblies and stuff. And if if my story wasn’t sensational enough they would say Oh yeah they were pushing me to make things up. Yeah. They made me do that too because I was also interviewed several times. Oh and they just totally rearranged everything and took words out that you shouldn’t use this word like was not a bad word. Why do you want me to change my point of view. Right. And you know you obviously practice with the older or the whoever’s giving you the interview before the CEO comes.

[00:39:11] And then the circuit overseer comes in and you practice with them and then you practice you know on stage and he’s like you got to change everything. It’s like. All right tell me what to say. It interesting how many times should you have to practice telling the story you know that you know that last year I went back to attend Circuit Assembly here in Oklahoma. In English one. OK. And my boyfriend went with me and he was like why is she reading off a paper. They’re asking her for her experience where her interview is like why is she reading off a paper. And I had to wait and he was like well you can’t speak for yourself here. And you know I had to write it out. I didn’t want to say it out loud during the assembly and he just shot me a look like Yeah. Anything you say they tell you to say or they tell you how to say it even though it’s your story. I never really thought about that. That’s horrifying. Yeah. And then you know I might be jumping off a topic here but I never really I never really thought about it before you know because you don’t question. You don’t question. You’re not supposed to. Right. But that just when I told him that I was like fuck like I was never genuinely me. Nobody here is genuinely them right. They’re acting they’re saying they’re taught by what this organization is telling them.

[00:40:50] And the first time that I watched the Leah Remini Scientology thing show the first time I watched that we were on the couch watching this and I had a drink every time I watch the show I have a drinker like right now just next to me just got. But I was watching you know I like paused it and it would take him away. Oh man I was raised in the cold. I was like it had never never crossed my mind never crossed my mind that I was raised in a fucking court. And I told them was like you know they would always argue that because everything that they do is open to the public according to what they say. That’s how they fight that they’re not a cult. But the fact that you can’t look for information outside of their publications the fact that they’re hiding stuff from the members who probably have a good heart and think they’re doing the right thing. I’m. That’s a fucking cold. Ed my whole point of view changed because before that I felt very cautious about talking about it. Should organizations self. Yeah. And I always I always tell people they ask me I’m like oh no I had a good life. You know it just they don’t agree with us. I had to leave. But now I just sound like you know maybe I do think I like to believe that there are good people in that organization that believe that they’re doing the right thing because I was one of them. You know they’re sincere I said but the organization itself I’m like that that’s where it lies. Yeah that’s where it’s messed up and fucked up and it’s just I want info I want to go back and I just want to shake people.

[00:42:35] I just want to say people like fucking wake up. How do you not see this but I know I know. But we didn’t like it either. You know it’s so hard that I actually believe never. I can’t believe all the things that I that I overlooked and that I I just skirted right past me. It gets me mad with myself for not seeing it and that gets me mad for everybody else. It gets me and everybody else in house. It’s changing so much right now so I try to like keep up with what they’re saying because I want to know. Like people I know are thinking right and the way it has changed so much as I did reconnect with a friend who stopped going so they would be inactive right now. But you know we were talking about this thing like they’re kind of becoming mega church like they were very against. They would talk shit so much about like Life Church and stuff. I’m like OK they’re making their own music. They’re making their own move. We like little videos and movies and they’re going with everything all mine which other than them not have enough money for publications anymore because of others. You know whatever their cases. But they’re becoming a megachurch. And before they become a mega church they’re a mega cult. Like that’s a scary thought to think about. Well that is scary because you know I saw some of the new videos rather like you know instructions from the organization might not seem logical from a human standpoint but you must not question it. So you should be trained now not to question stuff.

[00:44:15] Yep what the hell is that leading to. They have a song called Listen obey and be blessed by one of the songs they sing. In fact I remember it being one of the I think it was maybe I don’t know. I mean I may totally be off base with this but I remember when we got the new songbook I think that really one of the first songs that we ever sang was Listen obey and be blessed. And I just remember as I was singing it thinking this is messed up. Yeah yeah I was still in but that there was something about that that just seemed really messed up and you know what else is fucked up. They preached that if you are in the world living outside the organization people will say that they’re unique in that clip for themselves but they really aren’t because they’re living by the devil rules right. So if you really want to prove a point and be unique you should be in this organization. You know what that’s like we just said they tell you to shut up and listen and don’t question. If you want to be unique. Come over here and look exactly like all the rest of the 8 million members all think alike act alike. Yeah. So then let’s let’s talk about how you got to that point. So. So you’re where we left. You are like 19 ish. Yeah about 19 right. So how did this you know. How did how did this transpire to where you know you go from 19 you know this young adult. You know how how did that play out.

[00:45:51] You know you know because right now at 19 you’re not just a witness you’re kind of like an uber witness. Here are extra special zealous witness. How do you how did you what was your path. From there well. Between 1921. I just continued with the whole the whole thing. Basically the whole show. Right. I just continued. Like later when I turn 21 that’s when I was introduced to alcohol which became my friend. At that time. You know so just between after that 19 agents continued with everything just kept going get my mouth shut. Basically I still live with my parents my older brothers. I think at the time by 21 they were already married. They were both already married. I believe I got that right this whole time frame like I think back now I can’t I can’t keep track of the years. I honestly like it was a bad joke. I was going to say how much of a friend was alcohol to you. Well I can’t remember it’s all fuzzy. No it’s not that. Like really like as a child like I just the whole experience of being in this organization. It’s one big long trip. No it is. It is. I was just teasing about that but like you were saying I know you were you were you were so incredibly busy and like you so. So there’s a movie. Don’t know if you know but there was a movie called Groundhog Day.

[00:47:33] And you know the premise premise of it essentially is that you wake up and every day is pretty much the same like you just keep eating the same day and as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses that’s almost what your life is like. Because every day you’re just doing these witness activities and you’re so busy that I mean what’s the difference between this Thursday and three Mondays ago. No not really. You know the faces stay the same the places stay the same. Nothing really changes that much. So it is hard to remember a lot of times what happened because it was just a big blur of the same. Yeah. You know that’s that’s hard to explain to people that have gone through that through this because I never really thought about that when to have mentioned that. Like out on my weeks with the same how much the separate them. Yeah I never thought about that until now. Yeah it kind of keeps you in a state of being numb. Yeah yeah that’s it. Yeah. It’s like either I talk here or talk there. You know taking the group out for service every weekend is the same thing. Yep you’re studying the same material over and over just a little bit differently you’re changing experiences. But yeah it is just the same stuff over and over it never changes. That’s funny. But getting back to your question you know yeah I turned 21 I started drinking quite heavily. Obviously people didn’t know or my parents didn’t know at least. Sure. I started to befriend people in the organization who are kind of on the same boat. And now that I look back I think that we just all didn’t agree with what the organization was teaching.

[00:49:29] And we found an outlet in alcohol that makes sense. Yes. No we’re not we were all together drinking we would have house parties and stuff. And yeah we did definitely overtreat when young and stupid or like normal people. Yeah I mean yeah exactly. But that’s I feel like that’s when I had the opportunity to kind of let my guard down a bit. Like when I can actually like some might be myself. I never came out to anybody in the organization as gay but if I had a question or I know jokingly would say oh that’s pretty funny that they’re teaching this or that like they just laugh it off. Right. So I think that that was just like a little outlet for us that we went through. And you know it was nice to have somebody there for that. It was a group of us that were there for this whole little you know time of the life that we were going through questioning stuff. But nice yeah. And those are probably some of the best times that I can think being in this organization. But it turned into some situations that just kinda turn into situations that eventually got to elders and it really just started a whole bunch of stuff because I don’t even know exactly what happened because honestly I would fall asleep a lot while drinking. So I don’t know if something had happened within the group. And so you know I was it was a sign that rigidness much but like I said it got to the elders and then the elders of certain people were all in different congregations. So it kind of spread.

[00:51:18] And it was several conversations that were involved. So the circuit overseer wasn’t Bob till apparently like he started jumping in for advice for the elders and stuff. Right. And so it really just stirred the pot and caused a lot of drama and they were in a way trying to protest against each other. Right. You know did they do this or do they do that. And my only answer this is when they sat me down the elder sat me down just like you know I was drinking I don’t know what they did. Here’s what I did. And that was always my answer because I was not one to throw somebody under the bus like that because one I honestly didn’t know what they were all doing and I’m not that person. So I to meet with them my judicial committee. I was announced as reapproved publicly. So from the stage obviously the let the conversation know that you fucked up but you should. You were right. I mean you know coming from this family that you know in a way I think we’re now the kind of royalty in the organization or the congregation. That was a big blow you know handle. Yeah. And so I was there when they announced me as reapproved because I had to be there from what they told me. And so I told you you had to be there yeah. They told me that I should attend and that would show even where repent was repentant of it. Gotcha. So you know that was humiliating you know hearing that from the states. How that impacts your family.

[00:52:59] Oh that was a whole another thing. You know they know hunkered down a bit a bit more. I was the only one there that they also knew that I was of age and we sat down and we talked about it my dad being an elder. He kind of was. Every time that I did something wrong it was kind of like he would slip was the role that we were talking from elder to Dad. Oh I know. Hard to know. Who I was talking to or what mode he was in. Right. But you know I came clean about the drinking. I did not come clean about the whole time I’m like watching porn and you know masturbating and all that stuff that I’m not supposed to be doing either. Right. So I did some a judicial committee about that though they asked me like 4000 times if there is more. Also I think at this time I mean I mean I was obviously sure that I was gay by you know they just basically sat me down let me know that I had another chance and that I shouldn’t waste it and that you know if it came down to me not being repentant you know I mean I had to leave. And so at this house was like where you know you know I was already public reapproved. We’re good. We’re on the same page. Let’s get better from here. And so I just want to know about anything else. Sure. Yeah.

[00:54:31] And so I did feel guilty as well because you know obviously we had all been working so hard for for this organization and I felt that and everybody you know I was still living under Medad house so I think he was actually removed as an elder for a few months because I was in his house. And if he can’t you know lead his own family how can he with a congregation if you can’t control every aspect of life at some within your house how awesomely lead the congregation. Exactly. And so I was good. I was good for a few months but then I started sneaking alcohol again. I actually got to the point where I had a bottle under my bed and they just didn’t know. But it was just that whole feeling of guilt and depression and you know being gay and knowing that that’s a whole other thing that’s going to be opened some day. And so I was like I kind of gave up in no way like the best Hung’s going to the meeting was like not having a responsibility not having to comment not to do anything. So I was OK with you know being reproved not being able to do anything. It was very different. It’s like a little vacation. Yeah it was. And you know like I said I started going back to my old ways for the drinking part. And obviously the porn as well. And I actually started sleeping around a few times just to see if I was gay. Coolac well how do I know I never tried any of this. Yeah yeah that’s got to go that’s that’s got to be harder on you internally too. Yeah.

[00:56:20] Yeah I’m the type of person that I’m not saying I’m this with that or I don’t like this without trying it or I’m going to test that out basically. Right. So I slept with women I slept with men and all that. Yeah yeah sure I’m gay Yeah that’s it. This is that. So you know I just it’s a whole double life that I was leading one of my family organization and one out of it though that added a whole other level of stress as I wasn’t being honest with anybody. Right. Those that got to react to them proving. So then how did that is that what eventually led you out or how did that how did that transpire. I mean from going from a person who’s under prove you know and already looked at a certain way. In other words you already got one strike against you. And then you know you’re going out and sleeping around and trying to trying to understand yourself. You know your own sexuality. How did that how did that eventually did that. Was that what led you out. You know I had always had that in the back of my mind that I had to get out that I couldn’t just keep up with this. But I wasn’t convinced at that point that I was doing it at that time. You know also I knew in the back of my mind. I have been living with my parents all these years. I don’t know how to adult. You know all a lot of jobs were part time jobs because I had to pioneer.

[00:57:59] And so I didn’t have the money at this point I don’t think I have my own car yet. So I was like I’m not ready to leave. And so I knew that that was was one of the deciding factors that I had to leave. But that wasn’t like the defining moment yet. That makes sense. Gotcha gotcha. So then how did that how did that transpire for you. Well you know like I said it was a lot of stuff going on at the same time which led to depression. And so there was a moment where my parents had to go out of town and I was just well it was one of those days where that depression hit me hard harder than any other day. I don’t remember why it was triggered but it got to the point where I was really really down on myself and I had drinking a lot and I actually attempted suicide. One night when I was alone I chugged a bottle and I took some some pills. I found that were prescribed to my mom. And so I just chugged a whole bunch. And at the time I had talked to I had already started talking to several people like I said I had been sleeping around and I had made some friends because I knew that if I left I needed somebody outside of this home. You have to have somebody to be there when you leave. Yeah yeah. And so I told these people is like hey I say I’m drunk. I sent them attacks. I think I sent two people text I think.

[00:59:32] And I don’t think I’m drunk and I just popped all these pills like so if you don’t hear from me that’s what’s happening. It’s just it’s just ridiculous. I can’t believe I did that. But. Well you obviously weren’t in your right frame of mind. Yeah. And so you know I did. I did wake up the next day they didn’t know where I lived. I never gave them my home because I didn’t live alone. So I wasn’t giving that to anybody. But they kept calling all night. But I did wake up the next day and even remember what time. But you know my body was hurting bad and I was like wow that was stupid. And that was the moment I was like I can’t be here before I get to this point again. So November of 2013 when that happened and that’s when I decided I had to get out the next day of that you know and I was kind of trying to prepare myself for moving out. I was starting to like look for people who needed a roommate. I was looking for a better job. I had my car at this point. Now so I had a car. I just needed somewhere to stay and I would also just always try to be telling myself you know it’s OK to leave. You have always question certain things. I’m just trying to like pretty much give myself a pep talk and telling myself you know this is why you’re leaving. It’s not just because you’re gay. Right.

[01:01:09] So I always thought about like you know the teachings about the 1914 forty thousand and obviously the points of view on homosexuality and blood transfusions which are the big ones and are starting and I suppose that you know we’ve never looked up information on this. I mean I’ve never looked up information on this just because we can’t look outside of what they’re giving us. So that was always in the back of my head too. At this point at least. But I knew that I knew that I shouldn’t look outside of their stuff so I never did. Sure. So you know this is just me trying to get ready to go and that didn’t happen until January 29th of 2014. A few days before that I had deleted almost I thought everybody from it I had a Facebook now very vocal because of the drinking. Yeah. It was not healthy. I don’t recommend it at all. You know shrug I’ll fight. Yeah. So I have made a Facebook post before that they say that I was gay and I had I didn’t have any friends but somebody I worked with saw it. One of my co-workers was also a Jehovah’s Witness and he showed it to him. So I didn’t really have much time to you know Don actually get ready and come out socially OK look I did the post. So numb to it. Get it over with. Yeah. And so one day I just didn’t go to work I had to work that morning at the coffee shop. I didn’t go to work. My parents had a meeting that night and I packed my car during the day. I know my dad was at work and my mom was in service.

[01:03:01] And so I packed my car that day and I just fit whatever I could I couldn’t hit my bed. So you know and I went to a restaurant and I was driving there from like I don’t know four till nine. I was just saying that rush hour is joining me Heppell Zano like myself up we can do this. We have to do this. You have good reasons for doing that. So let’s get it over with. So when they came out they hadn’t been back in the meeting yet so I went home. And my brother and my sister in law were living there at that time. My middle one them right yeah it was them. So I got home and you know they were waiting for me they had already known because the word spread fast and also. Yeah. So he texted me while I was at the restaurant he’s like So Hazans trolls like yeah it is. Was like whoa you know you need to talk to the elders. I was like I know like I know how this works. It’s so obvious. Yeah. And I think at this point he he was already an elder. My older brothers were already older at this time so I was the only one in the family that wasn’t doing anything spiritually like out of normal. Right. I wasn’t reproved anymore but I wasn’t pushing myself to do anything. So you know I get home and he’s asking me you know if I’m if I’m planning on leaving because he saw my car he saw my room that was empty. And I said well I don’t really have much of a choice you know.

[01:04:42] You know our dad’s going to respond. And so he’s like well make sure that you if you Julie to come back soon. And so we just hugged it out. My sister in law hugged me. And so I just waited in my room because I want to be in the living room with them. Obviously after that. But I just waited in my room and so my dad comes in from the meeting and he already knows what’s going on you. I think my brother called him and so actually I am when my mom comes in first. And she was devastated obviously. You know I was a baby. I was the one that is turning my back on the truth. And I was doing. So she just hugged me. We hugged for a long time. We both cried. And she just told me you know to come back soon as well because the end is near we know how that works. Yes been there for a long time. Yeah. And so here goes my dad. He sat me down or he sat down like in front of me and he started asking me questions and key even told me he’s like I’m not speaking to you as Dad I’m speaking to you as an elder and he said I need you to tell me what has happened. Have you acted on. And I was like well I will tell you that I have acted on things are all my you know sexuality and how they act on it and I’m not changing my mind on it. And you know how it is with the elders.

[01:06:15] I don’t know why but I think what. Oh I know. My dad was an elder. OK. OK. I don’t think I don’t remember he was not but you know he started asking me for a lot of details. Yes they always want all the details I’ve just heard so many stories about this and it was so comfortable and I was like I stopped them when he started asking me details and I said hey I don’t need to tell you details I’m telling you that I have acted on this what you call fornication has happened. I need to know. Yeah. I’m like you know I am gay. That’s right. I am and that’s not changing either. And he started lecturing me again on how you know this is the organization this is the truth and how you know God is a loving God and how I am disrespecting God. And he compared gay acts on demonic with demonic acts like it was the same as demonic acts and this and not and I stopped them again. I said OK do you want me to stay the night or do you give me until morning so I can leave. And so he just told me you have to the morning. And so that was the end of act. I did not want to go into details with him because I was obviously upset at this moment he was getting upset and he was I mean as a Jehovah’s Witness kid growing up with an older dad you don’t question anything you don’t say anything against. Right.

[01:07:45] So me telling him this to his face and telling him that I’m not changing he was getting really upset and I was getting upset and I was like we need us I need to stop the conversation before I get to a point where we’re both going to regret what we say. Yeah. And I just want to say I’m sorry. I’m just I’m sorry that your dad couldn’t be your dad in that conversation. You know he should have been. It’s just it’s indicative of what Jehovah’s Witnesses end up becoming. They play these roles and these roles become who they are. And he pretty much admitted as much to you by saying you know I’m not coming into this as your dad I’m coming into this as an elder. But but you deserved you deserved a dad than you deserve. Yeah. You didn’t deserve an elder in that situation. And I’m just sorry that you didn’t get that because that sucks. I was also expressed you know that and I agree I should not have. Yeah we all. We all have been there. And I mean I had it with my dad too. He played the role too at times or whatever but. Well actually I think that’s the only way he knew how to be. He didn’t know Dad really well. There had to be they’re going to be a dad. They have to be the dad that the organization was calling them right. And what better dad than an elder dad. I know. As a rule enforcer. Yeah for sure. So you know coming up the next morning I had my car parked and I knew that that night before the day before when I came out to them.

[01:09:30] I had been talking with somebody online about getting a room at his place but I wasn’t thinking right. End of February. And so I sent him a message and was like Hey so things have happened. And I told them what happened because I didn’t want him to think that I had to be like kicked out for some other reason and not in the room. Right. And so I thought I hate this and this happens. Is there any way that I can get in to the room now. Thankfully. Thank goodness. Think of the universe. He said yes like I had a room to stay in because I didn’t sing from Jehovah. Oh God shut your face. So you think gee I guess I don’t know. I don’t think. I just think the universe Webers out there great you’re out there. Right sure. Thankfully I got that I got I had a room to stay so I could move in that day. Then next day I was in between jobs and also thankfully that I was thankful that I got somebody to come help me get bad because I didn’t have a bed or I wouldn’t have had that I should say. So he had a truck and he helped me with that over but I mean I wasn’t at this moment I wasn’t proud of weaving. I was kind of more devastated like how can you get there. You know it’s tough. Yeah. And you know I did it breaking really. It is. It is. And I didn’t know how to adult.

[01:11:06] Like I said now in between jobs I didn’t know where I was going to come up with the money to pay for rent I started a job thankfully. And it’s been a great job. I work at a credit union and I’m still there today. I have I worked hard. Coming in I think I have to make this work I guess is it and you know it’s been that’s been that’s been great my friend one of my friends that I made outside of the organization got me the job and he knew them at the time to he. And so already I had already been seeing people from the world treating me better than the people from the organization had. Isn’t that amazing. You know and it’s just that kind of confirmed my decision. And I kept calling myself as like Hey you can be yourself. And that’s another thing I didn’t know what to do with my time. I had all this free time and I was like I would be at the meeting I’d be studying for the meeting I’d be preaching what do I do. So I didn’t know what to do with worthwhile. No I knew how to grocery shop. Thank goodness I know how to do laundry but like for bills I thought the rent was owed at the. I think what it is. And I don’t know why I thought it was like out in the middle of the month or something was like laid on my rent like look or I’ve never done this I never paid rent like so I’m embroidering things so it was just a wake up call.

[01:12:47] I was like How is this ok for me not to know this and not be topless like that’s not right. Yeah. You had no preparation for life you were just prepared to be a good job. Was that was it. Yep. And so that was just a big wakeup call. You know thankfully I’ve learned sometimes by bad mistakes. But I look and I’m good. I feel a lot better about myself now. You know also within two years I think I moved like six times because I couldn’t find a stable place. So you know I’m just thankful that I had somewhere to say you know I did like two months in one places without a bed. It was also the struggle till the straw one at this time. I was also in the mindset of everything they said I couldn’t do I’m going to do it 10 times harder. So nothing I help either. No it makes sense. And they set you up for that to some extent. They tell you that the people who leave you know go off and you know do all these things or whatever you know they kind of like set up this self-fulfilling prophecy to some extent yeah. And then you kind of feel like well if I leave then either a I might as well do whatever the heck I want any time. Because I mean I’m doomed anyway or whatever depending on how you feel at the time. Yeah. Or be apparently everybody in the outside the organization just acts in whatever way they want. And so I’m going to have to at least match that so I fit in. Because again. Yeah.

[01:14:35] Nobody wants to be different. Exactly. And you know speaking of like those that forecasting that they give about your life is going to be after you leave. Right. My dad did say that he was like you know a lot of Weisler for older homosexuals is AIDS that living alone and depressed. I mean and I never told my parents that I was depressed in the house. I never told them about that attempted suicide Tuesday. They don’t know. And just because I that’s probably when I felt most vulnerable. No not that I’m looking for that was when I was most disappointed with myself that I let myself get to that point. And I didn’t want to show him weakness. I don’t want to show them weakness. I don’t want them to be right and I’m always that person that’s going to try to prove me wrong. Right. Or if you tell me I can’t do something I’m going to show you how hard I can do something. Yeah. So that was how my whole mindset and I’m not that intense. Now with that kind of sound like a crazy person back then I said How loud. But no. To be honest the way you’re what you’re discussing it right now is kind of hit me because I kind of struggled with the the intensity of being told you know like here’s what you know here’s what you can do and here’s what you can’t do. You know I wanted to prove them wrong. Really bad. I just I think it is always kind of felt that way anyway.

[01:16:17] I never really had the I guess the opportunity to do a lot of things. But yeah there’s definitely there’s definitely something there as you’re talking about it it’s just striking me that they really I know I just have to think about that more. They really do a number on you as far as the way they they they treat you and the way that they limit you. Yeah it’s and like you said right when they tell you that your life is going to be this. Yeah there’s just still trying to control your life. Now Muli or so I was set on I’m going to do what they think I’m doing or experiment with it just like them say I’ve done it from Tom had this. And at the end of the day I know I’m fine. Right. And so you know I did a lot of experimenting sexually and a lot of intermittent drinking. Right. I eventually got to experiment a little bit with drugs which I was very timid about and I don’t recommend it for anybody. But I did. I did. And you know I didn’t fall into a cycle of like abusing any substances. You know I did drink a lot. You know still to that day. And I I I honestly wasn’t happy just because everybody that I knew wouldn’t talk to me. And that’s also one thing that’s hard to explain to people who have been through this like you were born to this everybody you knew growing up. It’s like they’re strangers. No no no it’s not. They’re strangers. It’s like they died or you died. It’s worse that because. Yeah.

[01:18:09] Because because you know that they’re there right. You know this is by choice. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s why I fight like even find art to explain the great now. I don’t know how to describe that feeling. It is. It is hard. And these are natural relationships. And so you know you’ll see somebody on Facebook or something that will post something about about how much they missed their mom and their mom died like 30 years ago. You know and it’s like yeah and like there’s a an innate need to have your parents the most humans have. I’m sure there may be some who somehow psychologically don’t have that need. But I think most people have that need to have their family to have you know those those roots the people that you grew up with are your roots. And to have all of that ripped away it is indescribable. Yeah that’s not something that a person who has not undergone that I don’t think can understand it’s like every let’s say everyone you know is on a bus and that bus just went off a cliff. Yeah and one shot everyone was gone. How would you feel. You know you would just be honestly it would be too big to even comprehend for most people. Yeah. And yet that is what shunning is like it’s like everyone you ever knew. Went off the cliff in that bus but then there’s like this weird thing where it’s almost like oh you know psych. It was a prank they didn’t really go off the edge of the cliff. They just drove off in that bus and left you.

[01:19:59] Yeah. You know it’s I don’t know. It’s really hard. It’s a mind fuck. It really is. It is. And you know like you said it you you have all your life before and you have all these years of you know your route to getting stronger and. And you have this you know you know where you come from. You know why you are this way because you were influenced by this person as a kid or I have this characteristic of my mom or this of my dad. Right. But in one day that’s on. All these years all these years of all this connecting and these relationships one one fucking day it’s gone. Yeah. So you’re left in limbo in a way like OK so what where my bike where’s my foundation. So and. And I I honestly when I came out I talked to a lot of the older older people from the gay community. And every one of them every single one of them told me this. You have to make your own. You decide your own family is and it’s not just blood family. Argosy it’s like people who push you. People who make you better people who are there to listen to you. And so like I said I had already several friends that have you know close to but I definitely needed more than you know. Like everybody that you had and so it’s just basically starting starting anew. Whether you like it or not that’s what it comes down to. Right. And you and you can replace the people in that you can get more people.

[01:21:45] You can never replace the family the family or whatever you just can’t you can’t find whatever that that voodoo is the family really has that that connection. There’s something that you know you’re going to have in a family that you can’t just usually find anywhere. And I’ll say I’m starting to realize that I’m I’m I’m having myself and my wife and I’ve been out now just over two years. Yeah. I’ll say that we are starting to have experiences with people that every once in a while we’ll be somewhere with a group of people. I don’t know playing games or just doing whatever and it just kind of feels like home. Yeah. And I think that’s what we’re all missing is home because home was taken away and I don’t know exactly how you define home but yeah maybe it’s different for different people but yeah home home is gone and it’s kind of indescribable. But everybody knows what home means exactly. And I think it’s just that feeling and the Bond family. Yeah. And you know I have met someone. Well I guess I’m getting ahead of myself. KIRBY That’s a question coming up. I think I did hold up all that well look at a question if you are just a conversation you can go ahead. No I was going to say you know like you mentioned it is it’s something that I feel like myself. I’ve been out for years now. So yeah for a year. And so I keep having the urge to meet people and making more connections.

[01:23:47] Yeah I am mesmerized by people and their stories and I’m always open to like I don’t know how to describe this I guess. I keep looking for connections. Like we said before like trying to replace but as much as you try to. Like you said there’s something about family that you can’t write. It’s kind of like if you’re running on a treadmill to get to your butt you’re in your mind your mind trying to get to the finish line but you’re on a treadmill is like as much as you’re doing you’re making good progress. It’s getting you nowhere to hide. And I say that out loud because I don’t like giving. I honestly don’t like giving my family or this organization any power. No and I will never shall. I try not to show weakness to any of them. But it’s not weakness. It’s just reality. Yeah. And I know that that’s what it is. But in my head I know it’s hard to think of it you know. But I don’t know. I’ve done a lot of research on you on Friends on people trying to make friends later in life and things like that. And a lot of the research really kind of seemed to show that you know when you’re young that’s when you form those bonds that typically kind of more are going to be the ones that last forever because you have the time to do so because you’re young and you have nothing else to do. You know or because you share a lot of experiences like you’re in school with people and you’re literally there every day or with family you know you’re coming home to the same house every day.

[01:25:40] You’re you know watching the same shows you’re doing the same activities. So you know later in life it’s hard to form relationships that can match. I don’t know the intensity or whatever of those early relationships not just because they were during your formative years but also because they were during years where you know you didn’t have a mortgage to pay and a family of maybe of your own and just other things that you have to do in life and then as adults we’re all busy and we’re all doing our own thing. Yeah. And so it’s just hard to get back to that place because that was a special time in your life that you just you can’t get again. That but it doesn’t. But it also doesn’t mean that you can’t find meaningful friendships and you know have a wonderful life. And let’s face it a lot of the people we grew up with weren’t the best and were pretty toxic anyway. So you know that’s sometimes because you grow up around those people you have these ties and connections to people that are actually pretty toxic and not not really very healthy. And sometimes shunning actually or having to leave them behind can be a little bit of a blessing. Yeah I agree. I agree with that just it’s just not easy. Yeah. All right well then. So back to your story then. Yes you are.

[01:27:17] You are saying that you know so you were leaving you had left your parents house and everything and you had said you know told your dad about and everyone knew that you were gay and that you had actually acted on your sexuality. So then were you did they call you to a judicial meeting. Or what did they do with you. Well that that’s a whole thing to I forgot about that. So yeah I I pretty much blew people off when I left the next day I didn’t text friends or people that I was really close to and I let them know why I left or why I had to leave. I know Hey I just came out as gay you know. I know what that means. But if you don’t want it to mean that let me know. So I did text that to several people. And you know same response from everyone’s like you know we just you know how it is you know that we serve God and you need to come back and things will be how it was. Bubble level baso. I only did that for a few though so once I started working at this credit union and so one of the elders they were trying to call me. The elders were trying to call me but I didn’t want to to them at one point when I guess they found out where I lived my parents didn’t know where I lived. I didn’t tell them since I felt like they didn’t need to. The ones are kicking you out. They left a sticky note on my car. I woke up in the morning going and you know getting ready for work and going into work and an elder have left sticking around the car asking for me to call him and I was creeped out. I mean how do they know.

[01:29:19] You know they obviously. So I was creeped out I blew it off I threw it away as whatever. I’m not talking to them. They don’t deserve. They don’t deserve my explanation. Sure. So you know the weeks went on. Well one time coming out of work we closed and we have security guard and two of us me and then a girl that worked with me. And I was walking out from the back where recently deal and my car are three elders and this is for anyone who’s listening who thinks all know that’s real. Like they do this stuff they go like stalk you and hunt you down if they want to. Yeah I was mad I was sad I didn’t know what to do or say. So the security guard did with me. He’s like they don’t like Friends. So he walked with me and the girl that I worked with. She turned her car on and faced us like she was in her car chasing us. She’s like she told me I will run them over if I need to because she knew she knew about that whole story right. So she was in her car and the security was with me and they talked to me like you know we really we really want you to come talk to us you know think about what you do into your family with you leaving. And I said I’m worried because if I did I piko somehow and I didn’t want to leave it that way with them either. So I was like OK OK.

[01:31:01] Well we will you meet with us on Tuesday and this day I was like Okay sure I’ll be there. So that was the end of that. They left in their cars and so I just went home. I was pissed. I was I was furious. Emily how dare you just do that. So I did it. I typed up a letter and I in the letter explained that my dad isn’t elder. So I had already talked to an elder. He talked to me as an elder in his own words and that I don’t talk to other elders about it. And I said it just to make things clear when you invite people to your organization you tell them to write their churches a letter saying that you’re not going to be a part of that church anymore you’re going to be part of a part of this organization. I said well here’s my letter to you that I no longer want to be in the organization and I don’t owe you any explanations. And so I said I dropped that off in their mailbox and I found out that two weeks later with her now because I don’t interrupt me as soon as possible so I don’t want to leave any doubt. And so they are not. Two weeks later from what I heard and that was the end of that that that was the that’s what sealed the deal. So you went the disassociation route.

[01:32:23] So did my wife and I I understand because otherwise you end up you end up having to play that game with them where you know if it wasn’t a judicial committee they would have just kept stalking you and things like that is just you know it’s one of those things that that shows that they are a colt is the the difficulty that there is in leaving. You can’t just walk away. Yeah. Yeah I mean some some people can walk away. Not one I remember. Right. Right. It’s a lot harder. You know there are there are fortunate people out there that are able to do that maybe have good relationships with their family or whatever that are able to tread that line. But yeah it’s it’s not always that easy. Yeah. In fact it often isn’t. And even if you do fade a lot of times there’s a lot of games you have to play to to keep up appearances so that so that you can keep your family so that you can talk to someone that you care about or whatever. So yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s an ugly thing. So after you disassociated what did you do. Did you just go on with your life. Did you ever hear from any of these people again or. Well you know I just I try to focus on myself. After that I mean all my life I couldn’t that’s selfish and that should be your focus. So I just focused on myself. I wanted to do better. I wanted to learn how to undo everything I need to do and be responsible. Yeah. I had my first holidays with my friends family which was mesmerizing to me. What did you celebrate. What was your first holiday. My first holiday I think was Halloween fun and so we got to do a whole face painting and everything.

[01:34:27] And then after that was Thanksgiving and Christmas. So that was just a whole new world for me. And they couldn’t believe that I had never done any of that. And I didn’t know what to do I would. What what was routine here like when the alter ego. Oh yeah. What’s the protocol here. How do we know whether what do I do. And I don’t know what to do. It was just for me but you know I get out of people. The only one that tried to reach out I think was me. I’m trying to remember who. If anybody tried to reach out to me. But ok. Yeah there was one girl. There was one girl who was close to her and her husband. And they sent me a message and they just told me they didn’t where had happened yet. Like they didn’t know details and they said that you know if I needed anything to let them know that they still love me and that you know obviously if I want to come back that would be the best thing to do. I don’t think you know the story so I told them and they didn’t respond anymore. So that was it. So I mean I tried to reach out to my brothers out then Metaxa in there. My middle brother like maybe a month later it wasn’t like anything personal. It was like hey guys how this document because I mean I didn’t take anything with me. I didn’t have my birth certificate. I didn’t have some other stuff I left at home. Right.

[01:36:11] And so I don’t even know if I have my birth certificate or any. Anyway just like stuff like that and I was asking him about a cellphone I have appearance on his cell phone. And I was paying for them and I couldn’t afford it anymore because of him. Obviously I had to do everything else on my own now. And so he’s like OK that’s fine. He said no. Just stop texting me. And he said you know you need to stop sending messages because you are out. And you know how this works. But this is necessary family business right. Yes. I mean I also. Yeah but it’s only necessarily a family business if they want something. Exactly. And so I was pissed. I got a new number. I didn’t have anybody’s number. So like fuck all. Yeah. So however I did send a few messages here and there to my oldest brother and he lives in a different state. And so I would just send them messages like hey is everybody OK. And the whole way that that started was because he asked a cousin of mine for my number because he had an accident at work and he wanted to let me know. So he sent me a text letting him letting me know that he had this accident at work and so I was just happy to hear something. I started to get as you know I got a gift card for him to send to them because him and his wife are in the hospital so that they might need something to eat.

[01:37:47] You know it’s not much that I have it here it is. And you know I had already done all this and I said I’m going to send somebody Deegan’s in your address. He said Well I don’t want anything from you. I said it’s nothing personal like nothing about religion. I said it’s just some money in case you need something at the hospital and then he said no no don’t you understand I really don’t want anything from you. I said why then why did you fucking text me. Yeah. And he said Well you know I just thought that you should know. I said well why should I know if I can do anything. And he said OK well that wasn’t my mistake I guess I shouldn’t have told you and so I was pissed off at that too. Obviously I had already done getting this fucking card of the money that I really couldn’t afford. What I was doing anyway. And he comes up with shit and so we left it at that. They he had called me before that too several months before that because I think I had forgotten to pay and didn’t forget I was behind one car payment for one month and I was waiting for my next paycheck to pay it. Well I guess the credit union had that loan I guess had contacted my dad because he was a I know just to see if he were going to make payments. Oh yeah. Well he called me for that and he told me hey you need to pay your. OK I’ll get it done this Friday. So we I had his number.

[01:39:19] His is the only number I still currently have and I try to send them a message from time to time. Just asking because I have middays. I’m like How do I know everybody’s good. Are they fine. Like my in-laws like my all my family my my grandparents are still living. Our job is one as well. I have a lot of aunts and uncles and so I just I would send a message like hey is anybody OK. And he would just say yes or yeah it’s fine. So I have that communication and that was that was enough for me like that’s fine. But then he stopped responding and it was after I was at the convention where they were talking about how Chunying is important. Yes. Last year or something they had a video and they basically said that the water. Yeah if you even answer the phone you’re giving them enough to where they know they won’t come back. Exactly right. So he stopped responding of course. And so I obviously come that very irritating because now I don’t have a way to know if they’re good or not. Right. And so I sent them a picture because I now have a boyfriend a partner. We’ve been together since 2013. Congratulations. Thank you. First up kids you know three girls and a boy. Oh yeah. I saw them picture last and the kids saying Hey since we’re not talking this is my family and we’re going to get married some day. And I wanted you to know so I said on that I never heard back from that either.

[01:41:11] And then I always have like some random dreams sometimes and makes me over think everything. And so I had a crazy dream that something had happened to them. So I send a message just like hey that’s where my she gets. And he didn’t respond. So I was irritated so I sent him a link to a news report of the four dollars a day that the organizations paid to not give up these files. And so I was on the fence about sending get but at the same time think they’re already treating me like an apostate let’s do it. So I said that’s a. And I said Hey I just want to show you this. This is not apostate information. I said this is a news report about this organization that you are a part of. And where do you think the 4000 dollars are coming from. And why would they not releasing these file and I sent that him. And I didn’t get a response from that either but I mean I was the only connection we had for just last year. Sure. Just to give a little for anyone who’s listening who doesn’t know because I know not everyone is an ex witness the what he’s talking about is there’s a court case in San Diego where there was a person who was sexually abused in the congregation. And essentially it’s the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses the court and they long story short refused to get well they gave up documents that were ordered by the court to turn over but they redacted pretty much any relevant information on it. They they blacked out basically the names of anyone in these files.

[01:43:03] So that’s essentially the information that they turned over was useless. The court got mad at Jehovah’s Witnesses as an organization told them that they had to turn over those documents with less redaction. So they were actually usable and the organization refused to the tune of the court fining them four thousand dollars per day for every day that they refused to turn over those files and in fact I believe that court case just settled and they did not well I guess they probably paid the 4000 dollars a day. But it was just in the settlements. So like. So they paid it. But no you know settlements are usually undisclosed. And you keep it all under wraps. But that’s that’s what’s being referred to here. Jehovah’s Witnesses will do anything to protect their appearance and that includes redacting the names of people who might be in fact they even have an internal database of suspected pedophiles that they refused to turn over. So so so that’s what Fernando here was sharing with his dad and of course his dad’s not going to want to hear any of that. Because actually I said that’s my brother. I don’t have that number. Oh ok my bad impersonator. Yeah they’re not going to want to know that because they don’t they’re just not they’re not. They claim to have the truth but they’re not interested in the truth. So it just is what it is. And they have a lot to lose if their eyes are open so it’s scary for them. So so then it sounds like you haven’t really spoken to anybody you know any any meaningful conversation with anybody. No no nothing. Hannah sounds.

[01:45:03] That’s that’s the norm. Yeah. No. Was it last year at the end of last year. I did try to reach out to friends or people I was really close to. I sent them a letter and I sent them a message on social media. Just let them know that I know. Not trying to convince him to get out. I am but I just told them you know hey guys everyone talk or I need something or is that I honestly feel like some people are trapped and I don’t know you know because I was I felt trapped. But I did. I’m like hey if you guys ever want to talk let me know if you guys want to hang out let me know if you need somewhere to stay for any reason. Let me know that you have somewhere to be. But you know I didn’t hear back from them or anything but I like to like how is that out there now. But other than that I haven’t had communication with anybody other friends or family. Yeah that’s the extent of shunning. I mean that’s that’s that’s what they do. Well let me ask you them were whether. So like you left you know being gay was a big part of the reason that you left. Yeah. What about. Where are you. Or was there anything that maybe you freed yourself mentally already some what has helped you you know after leaving.

[01:46:40] Were there any books or podcasts that helped you or were there any lessons you learned something that that maybe helped open your eyes to the realities of what was going on there. You know because there are a lot of people that are disfellowshipped for you know issues regarding conduct. Who then still though kind of believe they have the truth as your witnesses and that they just aren’t good enough for it or whatever. Where are you in that process and has there been anything that helped you through that. Honestly for for podcasting like books. I really don’t have anything particularly that help me. I think what woke me up was just an obviously true time. Not right off the bat by seeing saying that people were good. Like just seeing that there is kindness like obviously there’s bad people everywhere. I mean we all know that. But just seeing that there’s good hearted people who are more than willing to be there for you right who you do not have the strong relationship that you had with everybody else in the past. But they are there and they are willing to help. They’re willing to come together for something better than themselves or you know to better you that that’s him he was an eye opener because we were taught people were evil and they were out for themselves. And that’s just not the case. And really we were in the organization that was evil and out for itself. Yeah exactly. And so just seeing that and get to know people and hearing their stories and sharing my story that’s what made me realize I hate this was never that true right. We were completely wrong. That’s beautiful yeah. Just just the basic standpoint of you know just good general humanity. Yeah.

[01:48:49] Seeing the kindness and love in the world looking for the beauty in it there is a lot out there and we were given a much different version than that. So like. Right. Right away. That shows you were lied to. Yeah exactly. Well is there anything you would like people that have never been a witness to know about the religion that you had and are ready. I mean stay away. No. It’s I think of it as a trial in a way and I want people to know that like obviously I don’t want people to be rude to any witness that comes knocking on your door and it’s like hey get on my property like if you want to hear them or hear them out that’s fine but just know it it’s kind of a trap. They’re going to find your weakness and they’re gonna. That’s how they planned their preaching to you. You know like when I was in charge of getting the group out and service and field service. I would always you know mention this example and you try to find out what the trigger could be from the person. I would always recommend using the subject of resurrection just because who hasn’t suffered the loss of a loved one. Right. That in itself when I realized when I was out that I was doing that that I was fighting these people the people’s weakness for where they’re most vulnerable at work and we send our message to them that it’s going to get to them. That’s that’s so manipulative and I want people to know that they’re going to try to do that to you.

[01:50:42] They’re going to try to find a weakness and then later when you realize what it actually is. And if you know obviously if you don’t get brainwashed in the process but if you are open enough to see what it is you’re going to be trapped you’re going to be stuck in a situation you don’t want to. So you know stay away. I don’t know. I mean that’s I think that’s very good advice for anybody. What about your family of friends if you could say anything to them. Is there anything that you would say. Yeah. I mean I would definitely ask my family if they’re happy. I want to ask them if they’re happy with what they’re doing. You know if they’re treating me like I don’t exist is freeing them the content that they need spiritually like are they completely happy with their spirituality at this point. Or to my friends I would ask them what did I do to you. Like we have history. I know stuff about you that could get you out but I’m not doing the you know Mike. We all have sinned. It’s just different things. So I mean what was your bases on shunning me for doing something wrong in your eyes. Isn’t that a fascinating point. Because the they essentially Heavens if they believe in God and everything they have inserted themselves between you and God if you messed up instead of that being between you and God it’s between you and them. Exactly. There are intersecting there. You know interjecting themselves in the middle of that and that’s that’s just not fair. Yeah.

[01:52:41] Rick Scott but that’s how it is for them. Yeah it is well what’s something that you’ve learned since you’ve left that that’s really impacted your life for the better. Got any any good advice you’ve been given or or as you’ve learned to to do some adult thing. Honestly I tried to take myself too seriously I am very. We like to think that I’m very I don’t know I don’t brush things off but I try not to dwell on things as much as I used to. Just because going through the whole process and you know dwelling and everything bad that that brings you down and I’ve been at the lowest. So I don’t want ever to be I don’t want to ever be there again. So I always try to think OK so this is happening. It sucks. Is it the worst thing that’s happened. No. What can we do to make it better. You know so just trying to do better. I’m trying to better looking at the bright side of things obviously not to the point where I am overlooking the bad cause you have to acknowledge that there is bad and there’s still going to be bad situation. Yeah if you don’t acknowledge it you can’t. Yeah better. Yeah and that’s it. Like how am I going to make it better. And right now I’m at the point where like I said before I’m at the point where I’m open and we will talk about Jehovah’s Witnesses because before it wouldn’t even mention their name because I didn’t want people in family of them honestly. Yeah. So it’s a big step for you. Yeah definitely.

[01:54:26] And you know I’ve gotten my story out there. I with my Arrakis I do shows and I do sales. But I started the last year as well. You know portion of myself goes to a nonprofit organization here in Oklahoma City that’s called Three mom hugs. And this is for the LGBTQ community who don’t have a place to live because they’re kicked out or they don’t have family and they’re struggling to help some aid with like mental help and coughing mom hugs because a mom who is doing this organization. Her name is Sarah and she. She struggled with her side. Who came out as gay and they were really religious as well. I forget what religion they were and it all went to say the wrong one. She struggled and she just thought he was doomed. She thought he was going to hell. And she struggled for years about it until she came to terms that this is just what I was taught. This is not what it is. And so she wrote a book about this whole story and this whole journey. And she started this organization to help other mothers you know be there for their kids and if not for them to become mothers to kids that don’t have they are people that don’t have families. And so I’m at that point right now where I want to do more. I want to do more. I want to get back.

[01:55:57] And what better way to do that than with my art which is something that I am already passionate about and I think that’s where I’m at right now and my journey like what can I do to do what can I do to show my appreciation for all the people that I’ve met and have helped me. But how can I be that person for somebody else. And that’s beautiful. And that organization you say is called Free. Mom hugs. That is awesome. Yeah. That is that’s quite a story she has there. But but like you said it really hit me was just about how you see things now for I mean you know you’re not blind to the problems in life but when you see them you try to make them better. And I know when you’re in a Colts you know what is going to make things better is whatever promise whatever carrot they’re dangling. That is what will make things better. They don’t they don’t encourage you to really do a lot of self reflection and make your life better. They want you to to chase after whatever care they have for you so that they are the people who can make your life better if you continue to follow them. Yeah. And so I just think that is a beautiful lesson too to see that really you know this life is yours it’s not it doesn’t belong to somebody else and it’s up to you to determine the quality of that life and what you know the trajectory of it is and like you said it’s like your own life. You choose where to go with it where when I first left I didn’t know what to do with myself with that time.

[01:57:43] So now I don’t have enough time now I’m busy all the time which is great because I did I did like that part of the organization where I felt like I was helping somebody yeah. When I honestly thought we were but now I feel like I’m helping like I’m I’m preaching or in their way I’m spreading the truth which is being yourself. Do you don’t with that. Yeah no. That’s great. So then you’ve touched on it somber. So what do you enjoy about your new life. Well definitely all my family right now my kids my boyfriend. They bring so much joy for no damn reason sometimes they’re just sitting there watching TV and it’s like the best moment but I’m definitely that’s one of the biggest things I enjoy. I have some amazing amazing friends amazing support team. If I have a problem their group message or a phone call away and we will get together get it make it better. And that applies both ways. If they see something where their and I love trying new things whether that be new food which I eat too much. But I love trying new things going new places. Now that I can you know because before I even make a concert it wasn’t to be frowned upon. But the judges the elders like my dad would be like well what’s around that like what is crunchers known for sure you know drugs and this not so that’s another thing I’m falling in love and live music. I think it’s one of the best things in life. I I just like experiencing and that’s when I’m enjoying the most that I have the opportunity to do that now aren’t you glad that you didn’t put off experiencing life.

[01:59:49] And still you know something that was promised and held out by an organization like Jehovah’s witnesses you know. Yeah. I think that’s awesome you know you’re young you’ve got so much life ahead of you. You’ve you’ve got the whole world really is open to you and it’s just so awesome. You know that you’ve you’ve got know family now literally. And you know this is your family you’ve chosen and you’ve got friends that you know are there for you. You’ve got these experiences to have. I mean that sounds like a beautiful life that you’re living Yeah. Is there anything that you that you dream for is there. Is there anything that you kind of want for the future. Yeah and I I obviously want to expand more of my art. That’s always been my dream as a kid. I want to have my own studio. I want to have my own shows and you know that’s one of my biggest you know goals that I’ve had and I’m working on it. It’s just a lot of work. But that’s one of the things that I’m working on that’s one of my dreams to have my own little space to have people share not just what they’re making but I want to know why they’re making it and I want it to I want them to share so that everybody else can learn from what they are what they’ve gone through because that’s how I felt about my life. I feel like I share it. Like if you have a question for me I will tell you what happened and just because everybody can learn from everybody else.

[02:01:36] And if we just saw come sharing you know our stories and our past there is no way that you cannot benefit from that. And I haven’t said it’s like life is a canvas and everybody you adds another layer of pain that makes that beautiful masterpiece. So I want to keep sharing my story. I want people to share their story. I look forward to growing old too watching my kids grow up. I dream of being on the porch with my boyfriend were old and just having a drink and yelling at kids that sit on the grass. I have I mean out I hope I dream that someday I might talk to someone in my family. I mean I haven’t taken that completely out of my head. I want to leave that as a possibility even though it doesn’t look that way. But that would be wonderful. But the most obliges I plan on living my life as authentic as I can and I’m very very upfront. I don’t like if you like my friends or family friend opinion they know it’s going to be straight up. It’s going to be that and I also dream of one day being straight up with my family and just letting them know that they’re in the wrong and that they’re blinded. I hope that happens someday. I really do how the two men I want that for all of us I want you know I wish we could all get our families to see that. Yeah it’s tough but man that’s a that’s a beautiful picture you just painted for us all. Yeah I think I think that you’ve expressed it. So beautifully.

[02:03:31] I love that what you said about life being like this canvas and every person that you meet you know puts down that next layer of paint. And and you know at the end you have this masterpiece that’s beautiful. I’m really glad you expressed it in that way. That’s a really cool way of looking at life. I think that takes care of the questions that I had you know pretty much put down but I wanted to ask you something. You said you were talking about. Well how we learn from one another and there’s something you said earlier about the gay community and how you’ve talked to some of the older ones and it’s an you know I don’t know maybe I thought it was a fairly good comparison but you know when we left the organization like I kind of honestly I hope it’s not insensitive to compare to this but I felt like it was kind of like coming out because. Because like you said none of us were allowed to be ourselves. And so trying to find our authentic selves and honestly that’s still a search on some level to figure out who you are after spending so long in the cold. But one of the things you mentioned it was that you know because you know people especially of the older generation though obviously you’re a great example of the younger generation going through the same thing. But you know a lot of them were just thrown away you know by their families. And so I’m just can you touch on you know when you speak to these ones.

[02:05:24] Is there any wisdom that you’ve been able to glean from them as far as how they’ve gone on in their lives. Because I think that they probably have some truly great insights. Oh my God yeah. For me for people like us that are shunned that’s you know maybe maybe we got there through different paths but the results the same is there anything that you would care to share that you know you think maybe the listening audience you know might benefit from that you’ve learned from them. Yeah I mean pressure. I know right. But no probably one of the biggest things I took from them is don’t take life too seriously you know a lot of them. You’re right they haven’t thrown away for coming now at an older age or you know back in the day it was harder. Yeah no. And some points they told me stories about riots how they had to stand up against police for just being gay. And so that puts my aspect about my story. OK. I didn’t have it that bad you know. Yeah it’s so you know one of these that they also took away from them is that there’s always somebody out there who has it worse and you have the power to help. So if that’s the case that’s true. And I kept telling myself that like for example when I was moving house to house when I didn’t have a bit of singing for I was like at least I have this for at least I have as we get somebody out there does not have any of us at least I have my my car I have work. People don’t have that.

[02:07:18] So that’s probably the biggest thing that I’ve learned from them is to always remind yourself that somebody has it worse and you have it good. So make the most of it. That is really profound because it’s easy for us to get wrapped up in in what we don’t have and to fail to see what we do have. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate you sharing that because I think that that’s something that I think we know we can’t we can all learn from one another regardless of experiences. We all we all hurt the same and we can all heal the same as well. You know we can you can learn from one another. I love that. I’m really glad you shared that. I want to thank Fernando so much for talking to me about this. You did a great job man. I’m glad to have you as a friend now and I appreciate you being so vulnerable. I also want to make sure that I share with all the listeners that Fernando was actually a talented artist. He was really thoughtful pieces that often reflect his life. If you’d like to see what he does you can follow him on Instagram at Nando be 4 0 5. So that’s Nando short prefer Nando B as in his last initial and the number four or five Nando B 405 I’ll go ahead and link to it in the show notes. Also I will put a link on the show notes to free mom hugs the amazing charity that he mentioned. Please support Fernando by leaving him a message Shawn podcast Dom on the episodes page under his particular episode.

[02:09:04] You know we all need to support one another through this stuff. He can of course read and respond to the comments as well. As you know if you listen to the little episode I put out looking for help with supporting the show. You can also support the show by going to patriarch dot com slash fund and Sonning out there to help with the expenses of the show including some things we can do to find more people that need help. If you didn’t get that episode on the fact that I needed help then chances are you aren’t a subscriber. Let’s face it you should be. I didn’t announce that went anywhere. So go ahead subscribe and you’ll make sure that you never miss any of these the other way that I said that you can. How about leaving reviews on iTunes. I did get a few more and I’d love to get even more. Not just this podcast but also this J.W. life as well. I think I’ve had a few Jacobs leave me some one stars because of the two or between the two podcasts so let’s crush those 1 stars or some good 5 star reviews. All right so that’s enough housekeeping. Are you ready to hear what I told you about in the intro. What I said that I’d get to. So like I said there’s been some exciting things happening since my last official podcast I put out that call looking for people to support the show financially. I wanted to get some transcripts done of these episodes so that we can try to attract more people through search engine traffic and by doing so we can help more people.

[02:10:40] Well some of you stepped up and it looks like I should have enough to get them transcribed on an ongoing basis. I know I sent you all emails but I want to thank those who supported me by name here of course. First names only because you know I don’t know everybody’s situations and some may still technically be in the cult and I don’t want to give away too much identifying information. But thank you so much Adam Craig Daniel David Dirck. Matt Sherry and your families help support this. You know it really means a lot to me and someone will find this podcast and get help because of you. You may never know it. Heck I may never know it because for every person that gets help and reaches out to me I’m sure there are many others that I never hear from. You’ve done a truly good thing of course that doesn’t cover the back catalogue necessarily though there might be a little Starplus each month that I could have put towards it but then something amazing happened just two days after posting the episode looking for help. I came home from work to find two lawyer letters in my mailbox. Let me ask you how many times that you just show up at home and find a letter from a lawyer. Out of nowhere is it a good thing. Well it turns out that apparently my mom won some sort of settlement from a facility my dad was in before he died a few years back and apparently I was entitled to some small portion of that. You can’t imagine how shocked that was. My dad died virtually penniless.

[02:12:24] He was on disability because he neglected his body for so long. He ended up on dialysis. He flat out refused. My mom begged him over the years to get life insurance and he just flat out refused he wasn’t going to do it. Which is par for the course with them and ultimately he died because he decided to go off dialysis because his heart wasn’t doing so well anymore. Dialysis isn’t easy on a heart. Neither is the I don’t know 60 plus years of neglect. So I’m not really sure why she got the settlement. But as you can guess a part of that money is going to go to this catalog. I want to go ahead and use a portion of this money to get the back catalog transcribed. So thanks dad. Thanks for all the emotional abuse growing up for screaming at me on the phone for loving the gays and being an awful person because I dared to speak science over religious bigotry for shunning me not only before I left the court but also over the last year of your life and for this Chuck. You know I say that a little tongue in cheek. I mean that that is a part of the way I feel. But to be honest you know getting the check kind of messed with my mind a bit. You know it’s it’s absolutely going to support this cause that I’m involved in and that he would have been opposed to. But you know not not every person OK. Nobody is all good or all bad. And you know my dad could be fun when he was in a good mood.

[02:14:07] He would take us to ballgames as a kid. He was an intelligent guy. I mean you could sit there and watch Jeopardy or wheel of fortune or something like that and he would crush it from the couch for being as close minded as he was. He did have quite a bit of knowledge and even with his gross intolerance of anyone different than himself he did show some growth over the years and mellowed out a little bit. We had good times fishing and watching TV were the two things that he ever really seemed to get enjoyment from in life other than the adoration he would get as an elder in the Keenum Hall. My wife and I would take my dad fishing near the end of his life. I really reached out to them I tried to have a good relationship with him despite his his lack of cooperation. But in the end you know everybody wants a dad. My wife and I haven’t been fishing since he died a few years ago. So we took a portion of the money and bought fishing poles and went fishing for the first time. And that was pretty cool. We even went back to some places that we used to take him to. So you know I’m talking about this because it’s just a very real thing and it also illustrates the difficulties in this whole this whole thing. Everything that shunned is about you know to put it frankly it’s a mindfucked to have people that you are so close to shun you. It’s not true that people are all good or all bad. They’re just not. People are just people.

[02:15:41] Some are broken some are broken some are more messed up than others. Some look to grow some flat out refuse others you know might want to get better as a human but just never get the tools. So it’s I’m using money from his death to help fund my show. I felt it was right to share that on here. Now I’m going to sound like an infomercial but wait there’s more in my sincere desire to get this out to as many people as possible. I found that I could actually put my podcasts up on YouTube through the service that I pay to every month to host my audio files. So I started a YouTube channel called Sean podcast oneword. Imagine that. Now you can get my podcasts. You know as you get them normally and that’s probably best because however you’re getting them now you can probably download them and listen wherever you are. But you know by putting them on YouTube I’m finding a different audience. There are some people out there that just aren’t in the podcasts but they’ll listen to things on YouTube. So I noticed I was picking up some subscribers and that’s a that’s a really awesome thing. But let’s go more infomercial here. If you go there on YouTube and subscribe now you get a bonus. I actually did an in person video. Yes. You yourself can be exposed to my ugly mug on your computer or device of choice I’m labeling them as vid Casse so that you can just check those out if you want to. There’s a playlist there and you can just search for the video.

[02:17:28] A year ago I took a leap push myself way beyond my comfort zone and I started this J.W. life. My first podcast. So it’s almost exactly a year later just maybe a year and a week or two and I push myself to get in front of a camera and do some videos. I still have things that I’d like to add to this discussion about cults beyond helping others to tell their story here on the podcast. My videos will come out whenever I have something to say and the time to say it they’ll be about topics that I don’t feel or talked about as much. You know there are a lot of people who do videos about doctrine and you know I do care about the doctrine of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I do care about the latest happenings in the cold. I stay on top of those sometimes even through the use of other people’s videos but my you know my my voice I guess you would say are the the focus of my videos and even really these stories. I want to get to the heart of the matter. I want to talk about the experience what it’s like what it feels like to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses or in any kind of cult really. I want to talk about what it’s like not just when you’re in but also the things that we all face when we get out. And so subscribe to Sean podcast on YouTube and you’ll get my videos whenever they come out. No promises that the frequency on those podcasts is my main focus but I’ve already got a list forming of things I want to talk about.

[02:19:11] And like I said this is a free bonus. So what are you waiting for. Get yours today. You know like all the things I mentioned you’ll find the link in the show notes you can go to one podcast com you can find those notes on the episode page and you can actually probably depending on what app you’re using to listen to podcasts you can probably access the show notes right from the app. There’s usually a description of the episode and if you expand that you’ll be able to have links to anything that are mentioned or that the guest mentions on the podcast so you can go ahead. Subscribe right now. Probably from your app. You can also subscribe to the YouTube channel you can see songs that guests pick out. That meant something to them. You can create your own playlist of the songs to help you help yourself. You know because music means a lot sometimes through these journeys. You can also sign up right from your phone to support the show financially. You know everything is right there. So I just want to take a second and thank all of you so much for supporting this. We had the highest number of downloads this past month that we’ve ever had here on shunned. Heck people are still finding this J.W. life and starting their Episode 1 we just went over 10000 downloads when I released the last episode of shunned and now we’re well over 12000 at the time of this release and we also just went over 20000 downloads of this J.W. life. So there’s something here and you’re all a part of it.

[02:20:46] So share this stuff. It’s really helping people. So damn happy that I got 8 in this one. But I will go ahead and let you know that next month is an episode that’s very personal to me. I know this person and watched her grow up. She’s selling her story. Despite some consequences that could come from her doing so because she is not technically out yet. But you know there are stories that are too important not to sell. And hers is one of those. It involves sexual abuse inside the Colts a life that delved deep into drug abuse and ultimately redemption and freedom. I’m really excited to share that with everybody. So music for this episode was provided by Hollington bear. And let’s go ahead and send this out right. Love others do no harm and go be happy.

Mark Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:07] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we get to hear stories from people that have been silenced by controlling religion. Today we’re going across the pond in our first ever international episode to hear from Mark who has shunned by Jehovah’s Witnesses. Some of us from the jehovahs-witness.com forums know Mark as Pale Emperor there. That’s his handle Mark is a great guy. He has an adorable little girl. And at the end of this episode there’s a pleasant surprise for those who are unfamiliar with the recent happenings in Mark’s life so let’s just go ahead dive right in and meet Mark My name is Mark Jones. I’m 33 years old. I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I’m shunned. I’m Mark. So then how was it that you came about to be a Jehovah’s witness in the first place. Were you born Anna or did you come in later in life. I was born into the religion. My parents were my Petoskey given done background. My father came from a very strong Protestant family. When I say strong Protestant I mean he his parents his grandparents were very very heavily involved in a movement called the Orange Lodge. I don’t know if they had that America but in England it’s a very antique Catholic fraternity. Oh yeah. So I think in England in Liverpool and Ireland it’s a very very more anti Catholic than a normal.

[00:01:36] And my father even even when he was your hobbies witness hated Catholics on ice guess I suspect one of the reasons he got he was so willing to join the Jehovah’s Witnesses was because particularly in the elite literature they were very anti Catholic. Some of the scathing things they said about the Catholic Church. And I am aware that in the book studies family family worship I suppose you call it and he would if anything to do with Catholics he would bring up you know about the pope being involved with Hitler. And you know the revelation Balkwill talk about the Catholic Church being connected to all this and it wasn’t a year later when I realised when you look into that it wasn’t that it wasn’t that it wasn’t a clear cut. There wasn’t that the Catholic Church involved with Hitler as such it was a lot more to it than that. And there were others examples of the Catholic Church I’m hiding Jewish children and you don’t that China on a you know fight the Nazi regime but that was never mentioned in the Watchtower magazine. So my dad actually I was very very strong Protestant family. He came into it because he was initially opposed and his family to take turns chasing Jehovah’s Witnesses down the path. Naturally when they knocked on the door and they looked forward to witnesses knocking on the door so they could tell them where to go and chase them away. And as he told us the reason he became a Jehovah’s Witness was he was mean to somebody on the door.

[00:02:59] There is an old an old man on the Mount didn’t get angry with them back the man just looked kind of sad and said something like I only wanted to share something from the Bible with you but I hope you have a nice day and walked away and up and kind of made my dad feel bad and so he started accept magazines and eventually studying and of course they tell you things like you can see your dead parents again and you can see you know dead children again and Jehovah is going to kill all the bad people and that that kind of thing. But he warmed to him. My Mum became a Jehovah’s witness in the 70s. She was raised in foster homes here neighbours and sisters were raised in separate foster homes were splitting up as children. Their parents didn’t look after them at all. They did didn’t send the school they didn’t feed them and clothe them properly so they were raised in foster homes so they never really had parents and my mum had lots of stories about how she would she would come home from school and she would be cooking the dinner for her parents and she’d be doing the washing and the cleaning of the cooking and the ironing and the parents would spend all the money on drink. We did with half them whatsoever and in one of the foster homes when she was 15 so they knocked on the door was Jehovah’s Witness and she told them about you know God has a name on it and they gave her a book was called Paradise Lost Paradise. We gained which I will for the SJW who are active in them of literature you’ll notice the very graphic illustrations of native Armageddon and about this talked about people’s eyeballs rotting in their sockets and things like that. And even Yeah it’s it’s quite it’s quite.

[00:04:36] I mean my mum my mum always talked about us with fond memories and it wasn’t till I bought on eBay and when I was still a Jehovah’s Witness and I was going through what I couldn’t afford I noticed what Jesus had no beard in that book for some reason. And yet at that period of time the Watchtower Society were teaching that these didn’t have to be. I don’t know why it was. I actually I think it was because of that back in Rutherfords time rather forget it beards or even Jesus had to be bearded shaved. I think that’s why it was. Yeah it wouldn’t surprise me actually. And there was a copy of that book at my last kingdom hall library. I remember flicking through it and there’s a little girl and eldest daughter schmutz about nine and she would look up the book with me and I didn’t realize there was some there was what was coming up next with some graphic pictures. And one of the pictures was Armageddon that it was one of the one of the things that stuck in my head was a little girl with a doll falling into a hole because the gods got split the ground open and people are falling in this hole and that is a description where says their tongues will be ignored by worms and their flesh will fall off the bones and the eyeballs are on their socket.

[00:05:41] And there was a book for children you know and um my memory study with that book as a child she became a Jehovah’s Witness when she’s about 17 18 and her sister became a Jehovah’s Witness as well they stood at the same time and as it were to happen my mum and dad met in their accommodation they were in the same kind of home. And my mum sister and my dad brother also got married so they met. So the next thing you know you have you know the nicest brother two brothers maybe two sisters and so my cousins were also in the same accommodation as me which was nice. A lot of ways. But my family was so strongly and in oh I was gonna say the truth and I’m on a slow strong end of religion that they cut off everybody in their family who wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness. So I’ve got cousins out there I don’t know who they are but it’s too dark even now add on who the ants mice. Mike Mike my family literally there were strong and in the village but they wasn’t only families that go on Saturday and Sunday because we had there was five children of my family. Um um we didn’t drive we met my family were quite poor. So let go into the meetings the ministry met you were walk there she could walk half an hour to the meeting half an hour back again if he wanted to go in the ministry you walk to the Territory as well so people couldn’t give you a lift in their cars. There were seven of you. So you walk. And so it was really a drudge go on that on the ministry um no good we didn’t like it pretend we like it either we didn’t like at all. But you do it because you have to do. As you know Mike and what happened then was going to say something at. So yeah I mean we didn’t go out on Sunday.

[00:07:22] Ember that we got on Saturday we’d only get on Sunday if we didn’t go Saturday. What I thought was what we did and we look at all the families who went out Saturday on Sunday. We just wondered how the hell they did it. We didn’t know was dumb or why would you do it or did those other families maybe have cars that attacked us. Yeah yeah. Um um um yeah. I mean like I remember my neck next door as I saw my cousins look it might be two cousins lived next door. And they they didn’t drive either but they were a small family it was a it was my uncle mounty are my my two cousins and of course the people could give them lifts you know. And my my aunty was quite popular even now she everybody in Liverpool knows who my auntie is because she’s very personable she’s she’s very active. Being a full time pioneer since 1978 No I mean but of course she believed Armageddon was going to come before her. She’s still waiting for that but um right yeah. So that’s that’s that’s a secret background of my family here. Gotcha. So then so you know you personally you know being raised as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. What was the world view that you had. How did you see everything around you. I remember um at a very early age and I can remember I wished I was I to read as a child even when I couldn’t read.

[00:08:39] I like to look at pictures and books and listen to the cassette tapes and I was very always very curious and always very studious and I remember a magazine. I think it was cold. I’ve got it written down on the one second. It did it did it did it it did it ish bear with me sir. Sorry. Come on come on bring out what culture people go look it up here. But there was a magazine called enjoy life on earth forever. Oh yeah. And this is a magazine. I think I don’t know whether it’s 10 and 10 of the children. But what one. It was very it was mostly just pictures with little numbers with like the Bible says this and the Bible says that and that’s where I at the age of four I think must’ve been four years old. I learned that there’s this thing called demons and demons like to pretend to be your dead relatives. Demons are watching you and demons look like to you know to take us away from Jehovah. And I on another picture. Which which coincidentally my mother show my daughter the other day which which miss the situation of people and Armageddon being killed and it was a clear picture of people dying or struggling go running away in fear. And it was Jehovah will destroy all the bad people. And it was all it was just that there are things I remember I don’t remember anything else about the magazine but it speaks volumes the fact that even now 33 years old I remember that magazine and I only remember the demon part and Armageddon part. Well yeah it’s terrifying.

[00:10:03] Again as a kid so so out so straight away as a kid I thought wow I’ve got to be a Jehovah’s Witness I guess stay safe in this religion. And that was merely my only safety. I thought it was because Jehovah is looking after us. And I always felt very close to God. I was always talking to Jehovah ahead. I mean that’s probably Mathilde’s knife I think for as a kid I was always praying to Jehovah. And whenever something worked my way like it I was in school. If I was afraid of something and pray if I felt better. To me that was proof that Jehovah was true Jehovah hell yeah. But if it didn’t happen it was all Jehovah was probably give me the strength to get through it. So it was a win win situation for the religion you know. But my worldview was the world is evil the world is bad the world is made to look enticing to draw you away from Jehovah. Nobody really loves you. But Jehovah’s Witnesses you can’t trust anybody but Jehovah’s Witnesses and is pagan any other religion is worship and Satan. People who are nice to you aren’t really nice to you. They’re just pretending to be nice to you so you’ll stop being a Jehovah’s Witness.

[00:11:08] And there was an occasion where I was I was on the ministry and I was working with my auntie who I mentioned was very very popular with the children and she was so mean she’s a lovely lady I mean even as they still THINK SHE LOVELY LADY she knows her Bible butterfly but it’s watchtowers interpretation of the Bible and I’m a being on the daughter of men who were there when I was a child and somebody gave us an Easter egg that it simply Mador and this this woman was very friendly very nice and she had all these Easter eggs because she has all these grandchildren and he says he takes some easter eggs. She gave me Easter eggs and my my auntie said thank you and stuff. We walked into the door and she took off me and smashed on the floor. Because it’s an easter egg you know I look out and I think I see all the chocolates for Auntie was like oh it’s a pagan fertility symbol. She smashed on the floor with a feet and then and I will and I’m not even a stupid thing to do. She just chucked an egg you know. Yeah but that was the wealthy Adam to me that was absolutely normal. It was like yeah that’s you know you don’t mix the militants together as the woman was nice but unfortunately she’s way being Zaydan without knowing it. Yeah it was a black and white black and white there was there was no no leeway there was no but nobody was nice if they went to Jehovah’s Witness she might even get pregnant an egg of the demons. There you go. I always wonder even now if you are a powerful demon would you waste your time with a chocolate egg or second hand and you would think they would have better things to do. Exactly exactly. But all that knowledge and power. I mean even I’m white that’s why you know I started I became an atheist eventually because I thought erm if you if you had a demon why would you open and close doors and windows.

[00:12:47] Where would you how would you do that. Yeah. Make a rocking chair move or something yeah that’s because got I’ve got to say I mean I. Customers are pretty good pairs and if I was an evil demon I would probably materialize in front of the president the United States and say I’m going to possess your body and I rule the world. That’s what I would do if I was a demon. Some would say that has already happened with theU.S. it may be a good one with childhood like at home for you growing up as a witness. Actually looking back on my childhood I’m hoping a happy childhood. But I think that’s because I didn’t know I didn’t know we were poor because I was led and we didn’t make would not Jehovah’s Witness children but had met through non Jehovah’s Witness family. Everyone I knew was Joe’s witnesses and my best friend was my cousin who lived next door and we were all the same boat really and Amber all of my all of my clothes were second hand. The food we had was with it. My dad worked but my mom didn’t for some reason. And our family women didn’t work it was always No you stay home. So there wasn’t much food going around but there was enough our house looking back it wasn’t the best but at the time I didn’t realize that either you would. So we we were content we were we were happy you know we had no Christmas no birthdays. But again I didn’t miss them I never had them. I do remember the youth we we’d have.

[00:14:08] I don’t know what you call an America but in England we call them surprize days. So there’s meant to be a sort of shoot for birthdays or subsidy for Christmas. But you didn’t have anything to eat at well even then. We only had three of them in my whole life. I can remember three of them. I’ll bet you it affected me later in life because um when I left the Jehovah’s Witnesses it was difficult for me because I birthed it when it’s my birthday. I didn’t know what to do. I did. It did. I didn’t really feel like doing anything because it was never an important thing. I always will. Last Christmas I was the first time I did Christmas properly with my girlfriend my daughter my daughter and her daughter and I said to her I feel bad accepting a gift because if I accept a gift and to post it should I give you money or should I give you that. And she’s like No you just take the gift. I think I’m counting how many gifts I got how many gift she got nothing and do I buy a wealthier gift. It really was strange. Yeah it was. And it sounds it to people who had ever been Jehovah’s Witnesses A plumply sounds so strange but to me it was I don’t know what to do and unbirthday as well at my daughter’s birthday last year. And I did a birthday with me and her. And people were saying to me Oh and did you do this and did you do that. Say no I got a cake and choices and did you do that now.

[00:15:24] Done stunt on me I didn’t know what to do it either I’d it properly probably you know people who do Christmas and birthdays know what they do they had they had the family round they know what to cook who sit where what food you have where you buy that. So he’s from when you buy the toys. I did. I bought Christmas gifts literally two days before Christmas outwits apparently don’t do. You meant to do it week before. Oh I think there are a lot of people who buy his or her hair. And again. But on traditions and we never had those traditions. We don’t have any history to pull from. Exactly. And Amber I got a Christmas tree. The first time I had no idea how to put it up I’d managed to do it. Didn’t know how to decorate it. So me and my daughter Basey just made a mess of it and just put things on the tree. You know she’s 3 years old so she just said to her I was just for her hair. It was her first time doing it as well. But that will be normal for her growing up. But to me I had no no clue when I was being gone Mike and my friends who had been witnesses and asking them what you know what goes where. How do you do this.

[00:16:26] And then you went to my girlfriend’s house and she put her Christmas tree up with the tree she’s had for years and years and how little Gail knew exactly what to do and and it was nice in a way that my my daughter will will see this as normal but for me I’ll always be like a strange novelty that maybe in years to come it will become an honor for me. But still even now it doesn’t seem like a big deal you know. Right. It still seems like I’m and I’m I’m because I’m observing somebody else’s tradition. No I totally understand that. Yeah. It’s like you crash somebody else’s party. Yeah and that party doesn’t really mean much to you but you’ve got to figure out some way to have fun while you’re there. So yeah I mean I understand my wife and I have big traditions or anything either. But I think kind of the cool thing is that you know it’s with you and your daughter you know you can start your own tradition. You can make it whatever you want. Yes. So that’s pretty cool. But it’s hard when you don’t come from a background of that at all. Yeah. So now you know at home you you grew up poor. What was that like at home as far as like as Jehovah’s Witness activities went. Obviously Sivers wasn’t a big deal to you did you all have to do like family study all the time or were you all big into anything like that. The fun I was I was very interested in. I wouldn’t say I was the best Jehovah. Well certainly wasn’t the person I was with us. I was very interested in the Bible rounds. You know God and things and it always wonder what you went into was how magazines and they bring out like a fine point about a sad encounter.

[00:18:12] I thought wow so somebody in Bethel must have searched outside the Watchtower to get that information. So I would search outside information for the washed out. So I would look like Catholic encyclopedias and you’re not animals you know that Mark. You’re not supposed to do that. Which which I led. Very quickly they don’t like you do that because I was giving a talk. I used to it. I used to be the stand in to a guy you know I just enjoy giving talks. And I would research a talk within like 20 minutes of somebody say I’m not going to be that 10 up and I’d do a tour. And I brought out on the platform a quotation from a Catholic bishop and I always like to cite cite my sources when I was up there so it wasn’t just me saying something the Watchtower doesn’t do with the Lotus. Right. So and I quoted this Catholic bishop but I said something and then later on one of the elders approached me and said Did you find the information on the Watchtower Library. And I said no I found it on your little internet and was on like the Vatican website or something. And he was appalled he was horrified that I’d been I’d looked outside the washed out society seedy room and you know I actually looked up yeah. How terrible are unarmed. And he said and he asked me do you do this often. And I said Well I studied all the time. Are a lot of things you know. And I think they want to arrange a visit but I’d never materialized.

[00:19:33] But I realized yet they don’t like looking outside and growing up as a as a kid. I mean in England we have a thing called Aari and school which is religious education and is mandatory in England that they teach in religious education as a lesson. But my parents got me out of that. So I went through five years of high school without any religious education. So my aunt my own my entire world view of religion was from Watchtower literature. So anything I knew about Catholics was from watchtower. I knew about Muslims Mustafah Koreans Buddhists Jews was from Watchtower wasn’t from Jews it wasn’t from Buddhists it wasn’t from Muslims it was from what Watchtower said about them. So I was very studious when I started researching and looking and see what I’m looking at Christianity from other angles. It just gave me more questions because sometimes other religions would have an answer which makes more sense than what Watchtower says. And I got to the point where I stopped believing certain things the Watchtower was saying but I didn’t mention it like I didn’t believe shunning should happen. I absolutely did not agree with that at all simply because Jesus never did it right. And when they said about will they always bring our Fiskum into the INS. But Paul says remove the wicked one from among you. My first problem with that was realisable. Well Jesus overrides Paul but Paul says it it’s OK.

[00:20:58] Good you what Jesus said you know lived in a by yourself and you know Jesus didn’t run away from the Pharisees Jews didn’t run away from the devil when the devil spoke them more powerfully spoke to. And I always thought it’s it’s not that it’s not the actions of a village in the has the truth you know. If so I’ve got a I’ve got a a person I work with who believe the world is flat. I know nothing he says to me convinces me the world is flat because I know the world round right. And it would be ludicrous for someone to say to me don’t hang around with a guy because he might affect your mind. You think the world is flat you know Ratto dead. That was the shining side of Ed and a good showing. I had a problem with the hundred and forty four thousand. Nothing to do with them. 6 0 7 day be it wrong. I didn’t know that at the time. The whole hundred forty four thousand thing was as I read it. It was a symbolic book symbolic people but a literal number. I think as a white who’s deciding which is literal who deciding which is symbolic as a type of faithful and discreet slave. It’s exactly of an illustration and they take that one part of the verbiage and make that a literal thing and then point seven men and call them that. So yeah and hours after thought as well. If we’re honest that there’s been so many sincere people throughout throughout the ages who have been in different Christian religions like Martin Luther for example who’s very well educated and he never mentioned anything like that. You think he would have mentioned it. You think somebody would have stumbled across a Asuna on it.

[00:22:31] If if God wanted if that was a true teaching from God it would be very very clear. And also I thought this probably more than likely more than one hundred forty four thousand Christians in the first century. Oh yeah yeah that was that was always so messed up because we never we had no basis. You know what. No had ever been in the path. They just yelled it out of thin air. Yeah. And even now you know the numbers are going up out of the story and the numbers now. Well you know we know that’s that but now you have to go in the wrong way. And I do suspect that that’s because more people are aware that is probably a bogus teaching and they think they all go to hell. They think everyone’s go to heaven and they deal with the partaking of the emblems to be safe. I mean I’m an atheist myself but I do believe that Jesus was teaching that anybody goes to heaven if they accept and thus I think my belief now is when it was first hundred forty four thousand. I believe that Jesus is talking about literal Jews who are chosen to have a special job in heaven. That’s what I think is too but that’s that’s neither here nor there because I don’t believe the bible anyway. Yeah. So I was offered the times of the mike sorry. That’s OK. That’s OK. So. So. All right. So you kinda went through. You know at home. Kind of what it was like. What was it like. Now I know what school you got out of the Army classes.

[00:24:01] Yeah. How did it being a witness impact you in school. Other than that like like I know in the United States we have to we would have to salute the flag every morning. And so that was something we could never do. So literally every day of our lives as kids started out taking a stand against saluting the flag. So I’d like for you like how did it manifest itself in your school career. Well well well I was somewhat fortunate. We don’t have that nationalism that we Americans have we have in England we just can’t we don’t really care about the flag. I mean the where she’ll get maybe sing the national anthem but that’s very rare. You mean mostly but over the way is the national anthem in this country we don’t really care about what we had would be. Maybe you’ll have somebody visit in like like a religious person would visit the school and give a little lesson about God or something. And at the end they give a prayer. And anybody would just bowed ahead even though they’re not religious. And to be a teacher looking around to see who isn’t bound the head just to see if would being like you know disrespectful or something. And that was it. Book we were made to feel proud to do that. You made the. We were always made to feel like you know the the three Hebrews like Schudrich Michigan Abednego and likely didn’t bowed out of Idol and you’d feel kind of good inside because you know you’re standing up for your religion. But apart from that I was okay.

[00:25:27] The school was skills a kind of respectful towards religion they don’t skate again involved when it comes to religious matters. So personally you know that’s it can it can kick off all kinds of things. So the candidate were very respectful. I never went to them what they call assemblies and school every morning we’d have like the entire school would turn up in the hall. The school hall answered the cello headmaster would give a talk about something and then at the end they’d sing hymns. So I would say I wasn’t in them so I did. So what happened was the big announcements about school or school trips. I wouldn’t do anything about them because I wasn’t there you know or even like prize giving they get prizes like trophies or certificates and sometimes my name was called and I didn’t get them because I wasn’t there. That’s the way I stick out. I mean I was never bully from a religion. I was fortunate that I was never believed about it because there was a kid in my year whose parents were Jehovah’s Witnesses and he was kind of popular. He was in with the in crowd and he was in he was it eating grounded all that older boy. I don’t want you in an American public called them jocks over here to have eyes you know go a football and the fights and stuff and he was friends with them to normal pick on him because he is a Jehovah’s Witness but he’s tough Nomad. Nobody would make fun of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

[00:26:44] I got up out of it because I kind of avoided being bullied for religion because um I was very quick witted. I mean I mean I’ve done stand up comedy over here. So now the humor is something I’m good I can make people laugh and stuff. So I got out of difficult situations by making somebody look silly or by making them laugh. I’m a lot of people become a comedian. They got a situation with their wit that’s it so and that was it. So school was it was OK. I mean the only thing negative impact on me was that when it came to my friends because I mean my own friends that obviously the way Jehovah’s Witnesses but they were all like me we had we were geeks. Man we like to you like Magner Cheston sci fi and we thought we were cool but obviously we went home. And I would have liked to have seen an outside school van and they did. They all was hunger after school and I never I wasn’t there and I’d miss out on things they were talking about and I’m looking back I was pretty harmless stuff. You know it was like going to each other’s house playing console games and school ball or or even I just don’t know I’d be together or something. But obviously I was never allowed to do that with them. So I’m kind of missed out on that. Um and it’s this shameful thing is now as even now 33 years old they’re still friendly to them and I don’t know who they are where they are. So I could have had a really good friendship. Yeah that’s true yeah. And there was a distrust of anybody who wasn’t a witness like my parent.

[00:28:12] They knocked on my door to say do you want to come to my house for something. And my parents would tell them no. Because you know I’m allowed to go out with them and they’d be wonder why I’m the real reason is because I’m not a Jehovah’s Witness and that’s the reason right. And it’s a stupid reason because because some of them were Catholic some of them a Protestant some of them are atheists. Some of them you know tend to find something else but that never got in the way. But my religion did get in a way and that now I’m a disposed to be. We’re supposed to be the loving religion was supposed to be the good ones for example but here we are Antena of religion of separating people and not join it together. Now complete isolation exactly as such social isolation and and you know it you see in so many different things. Now when you look out you look back if you if you isolate people it breeds prejudice. You know the look of things did about North Korea for example that all isolated from the outside world. They’ve gotten crazy beliefs about the outside world. And they’ve got no way of knowing what the outside world is like and they just told what it’s like and that’s that’s what they think it’s like. And I always like North Korea like the Jehovah’s Witness mentality. No no absolutely. There’s a lot of similarities there. So so the North Korea for a for being in you know what Joe as witnesses was the actual kingdom hall like that while your little area.

[00:29:30] So how was life and your little North Korea in your little kingdom hall like The View. Did you have a lot of friends. How did you know. I know you said you liked giving talks. So did you enjoy your time at the Horler Melville. I had no friends and no friends. When I was when I am the king the war that I grew up in. There was lots of children of my age that this is about four or five years old. There’s lots of CHAUD. I think there was there’s a lot of families with children so there must have been about 25 children the same age as me which is a phenomenal amount to kids but what tends to happen which I’ve since learned is quite common with the Jehovah’s Witnesses around the world. Is there a social clicks. Oh yes. So you have the elders families and they’re all friends and there’s the mistake or servants and their families who are probably going to be friends with the elders and those people who just don’t really want to hang around with you which is fine. And then this is my family which is what we were poor and hopefully some of us views about association when we went by association. We were just not as nice as a regular in the ministry as other people were but I didn’t make an association that just met me but difficult to get out. You know I’m so I had I had no friends. I only have my brothers and sisters my cousins. And then when I I grew up and moved to a different conversation again I had no friends.

[00:30:59] The reason being I think the only way I think this could be is um that my sense of humor is very what’s that. This is why I don’t like a dry sense of humor has kind of um. If something’s obvious I’ll point it out and I’ll say you know yeah like for example a man’s accommodation I’m but three years ago there was a there was there was like two or three single brothers about their late 20s and they were single and every time a girl came up to the congregation they were always talking to this girl always told to her but none of them will ask her out because they’re both too nervous to ask her out. Right. And this girl is a pretty pretty girl. I mean nice person but she probably wait for somebody to ask her out. Everybody would say yes you know. But no one they can move about it. Right. Right. So I’ve said to one of these guys look either ask her out or leave her alone. And I wasn’t a horrible idea. I’m laughing so and I say Look married said Scott LBA. Just ask her Ebola. And then next thing I know these guys when I had her army because. Because out of sight like it is. You know. And I think also that I was very vocal in the sense if someone did something that I thought was hypocritical. I pointed out I’m not doing it to be to be malicious or anything it’s just you know we’ve all seen the same thing here.

[00:32:13] Why is nobody dealing with it like you’d have like an elder who would there’s a situation that will see which complication it was in an elder basically kissed somebody else’s girlfriend. This is as a married elder who kissed somebody else’s girlfriend he did a bit more than kissing. But it wasn’t sex it was something else. And he was reproved. And the woman was the scholarships and. And it came out later on that he was approved because his dad was a sacr Obasi. Well there you go. There you regardless of I was like you know I’ll go Woodhull’s this is a very good gossip and so we all knew what that we said what I did. I said you know I was out of a witness little party get together. I said to somebody in private. I said Well you know that’s not right rarely. It’s like the sacr overseer can override something like that and say oh no this guy just does reproving. If that’s the case then that does not mean Jehovah agrees with so so if George doesn’t agree with doing this guy a disservice he should be dealt with judicially. That’s what God wants to sweep it under the rug is going to help this guy because I was a believer that I believed you know he needed help. Yeah yeah. You were trying to do what you thought was the right thing. Yeah. The next thing. But then you find it when you when you have that kind of mentality if you’re if you’re honest with the way with what you think and you use humor.

[00:33:30] People don’t want to have morality because they think you know bad association or maybe he’s not spiritual just because he doesn’t know which he knows and play guitar with Kingdom songs like you see in the magazines. You know apparently that’s what we do. I mean this is. Oh yeah. We all sit around and are perfectly divided multicultural groups working wearing casual clothes our best casual clothes and singing Keenum songs. Let’s get the orange juice is always orange juice on the table. Yes. Yes. So how did how did it go. You know so you know being that outspoken and you know not really having a good circle of friends and everything how did it go as you as you started you know in your teenage years as you start to get it you know approaching adulthood. Know did you have plans to go to college. Were you hoping to go to. I guess your version of Batho which would be the branch or something or like yeah. What were your goals. What were you going for. How is life for you. My goals were to study in university. I didn’t know what I want to do first. And when I got to about 16 17 year old the high schools in England kind of give you the thing called options where you pick specific subjects you want to study in secondary school for the last two years. And I chose some said subject because I had hoped to become a vet because the kind of thing interested me. And I went to pay picked like no sports biology chemistry all these things.

[00:35:14] And then as the US progressed when I left school my grades weren’t good enough for university to study veterinary medicine but it was good enough to study to be a doctor to be to go to well not not initially where you could go and study these subjects and then progressed to medicine you know but they were good enough to get started on that. And I was glad I had an interest in that as well. So I started to pursue as I’m looking into courses what we call A-levels in England which is like the step below university to to get you into university to study medicine. And I was going down that road and then I start to get pressure from my family because Armageddon was going to come and any second you know was just around the corner and the elders were you know would randomly turn up to see how I was and they’d say you know how I have potential to be an elder potential to be a minister’s servant and it be such a shame to lose me to like the universe is of the world where they probably teach evolution you know basically just demonising the secondary education thing. Absolutely. They barely do it. They really they didn’t want me to go to university. I didn’t really have a reason why they didn’t tell me why exactly although looking back I can see why it was because obviously university they teach critical thought which they didn’t want me having. So I basically just scrapped the whole idea of studying medicine scrapped the whole idea going to university and I took a normal office job because I believed Armageddon would come the next couple of years and that was 17 years ago. So if you work it out I could have studied medicine qualified become a doctor.

[00:36:49] I’ve been practicing medicine for eight years by now so. So if you look at that way it’s like if any Jehovah’s Witnesses listen to this and who are hoping to study met them anything at university I’ll just tell you that they were telling me when I left school that Armageddon would be here and it isn’t and they were tell my dad’s and my granddad that Armageddon would be here before they leave school. And it isn’t here and it would be it would be foolish to um to Tinos just to presuppose that Armageddon would come within the next few years because the Bible says nobody knows nobody knows and so nobody knows. There’s nothing wrong with going to university expanding your mind and helping the human race by becoming a doctor or a scientist or something. Now for all we know you know I could have been used in Bethel as a doctor which they do. They did Jehovah’s Witness doctors now which is ironic right. Yeah. They tell you not to go to university. But then if you do qualify they they take you you know. So yeah because even they know that they need doctors. Yeah. You know they don’t want you to be one. Yeah. And they said they need lawyers. So then you you’re out of high school you’re you’re bypassing college you’ve gotten yourself an office job you said are you are you trying to pioneer or anything or are you just kind of live and live in life and now I’m just I’m not I’m just living life you know.

[00:38:16] It was the first when I first got a job and your first paycheck it’s like oh wow I feel better you know. So so you start enjoying it so. So my by this point in my life my my I have two sisters my sisters were popular because they chose witness guys wanted to date. There was a night there was a lot of parties happening in my teenage years. A lot of witness parties in my teenage years and early 20s my sisters were get invited because everybody fancies them and I get invited because my sisters know that if you put me in a room of people I don’t know I will know the whole room within an hour. I do think I wake the room. I go around like everybody I speak about and people I have a knack for connecting to people. I don’t know why that is. My sisters know that if I go with them I can get to know people and I can introduce them to people and I can get people you know where I can get parties. I’ve always been able to do that. You were there wing man. I was their wingman. Yeah. And it worked out well in some regards because there was some like you know there’s definitely a party scene in Liverpool but you would see things like sometimes you go to parties where they were very well it’s just a worldly book. There were very non Jehovah’s Witness you know who I am but I can’t remember two particular ones where one was some guy. His parents owned a garden centre and they went on holiday to America.

[00:39:33] And so while this whole garden centre was empty this guy decided to throw a massive party in this Garden Centre’s maze. It was a wasn’t just fantastic. And I remember there were people just making out with each other. There were people in the showroom pool with no clothes on. There was people ball probably having sex upstairs you know. And one was Amber one was an eldest son who is in one of these rooms which I assume they were having sex he was when there were two girls and their brawls were on the door handle outside. These are Jehovah’s Witnesses. But right now Berriman the Jehovah’s Witness Yuanqing of teens. Yeah. Now if I wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness I wouldn’t think of this I think well you know they’re doing what they want to do. But I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I wasn’t sheepish tricked but I also think Amanda Spatz and I and me and my sisters left that party after about two hours. We stayed two hours before we got up and we went to someone else’s house like you know and there’s not a party going on there. And the next day and the Kingdom Hall next day was a Sunday. One of the eldest started to visit all of us to see who was at the party what happened and who was with him and what happened and I just said I was there but I didn’t see nothing. I didn’t mention it was his son in the room with two girls iLevel death.

[00:40:50] But nothing came of that you know I mean I think I think to people from like Manchester which is like the next city where the two of them disfellowshipped there was maybe a few you know marking talks but nobody really got dealt with but there was definitely more than more than windows put it more than bad things going on there you know there was there was cigarettes alcohol sex marijuana that was all there. Not Jehovah’s Witnesses. Mark Oh yeah that stuff but you’d be surprised oh no I wouldn’t be surprised or Yeah. It’s funny how they outwardly projected their parents are being wholesome and clean but you have no idea what goes on in you know behind closed doors or at parties or whatever. There is a lot of stuff that goes on that people most witnesses have no idea what goes on within their own congregation. No I’ve always say even when I was waking up from the Jehovah’s Witnesses I used to say to people well I just wish people out there would be a Jehovah’s Witness. I don’t be one don’t sit on the fence you know because because if you want to go to parties like that and do that that’s absolutely fine if he want to. I’m not going to judge you for that able. But don’t pretend that it’s a God fearing Bible Jehovah’s Witness and do those things because that’s not what Jehovah’s Witnesses are meant to do. And I’ve got nothing. I have no problem with individual Jehovah’s Witnesses. It’s the Watchtower Society I don’t like but the individual Jehovah’s witnesses I believe are good people out there. They’re kids at 17 18 19. That’s what kids do right.

[00:42:28] I mean why if I wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness now my party I would have a lot more than what I did but that’s normal life that kind of thing happened but don’t pretend to be what you’re not. You know if you wanted that lifestyle going live it and don’t pretend that that was them that was that while. And then there’s another situation another party where this guy had epic party he vanished now lets go. Buddha finally had one party that was a little too Epica I think yeah I Umbers he left and um a an area in Liverpool called Butel which is a rough area of Liverpool. But what he would do he would have he had a house and he would empty his house of furniture and put it in a moving back side so that every room is how his empty and he would have a massive party in his house like all night and there were fantastic parties and I must know what to look for five of them. I remember that was I remember these parties because every time I went to one of his parties I always got the girl. I don’t even know why because he was popular. He would have like witnesses from Manchester London Birmingham Wales Scotland all coming to his parties because they knew his parties were good so you’d meet like people from all over the place where you’d never get a chance to meet these people otherwise if you weren’t invited his parties you and anybody he would you wouldn’t get to meet people you know. So I decided to enjoy those parties they were cool but then this guy obviously wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness he thought it was all crap. He was stuck in it because his parents were in it you know.

[00:43:58] So I never had a problem with him in the sense of he wasn’t pretending to be anything else he was just going along with it because he had to which I wish we can all relate to he’s disfellowshipped now. I haven’t seen him on Facebook or anything but um if he’s listening yeah yeah yeah some great parties mate. Thank you. Shout out to that brother. Yeah I do want to say his name yeah yeah yeah dad. So then how did how did your adulthood play out then you know before you ended up eventually leaving the religion I think you were married correct. Yes I know a little bit of yours story. Yes. How did all that transpire. How did that build up. Well there’s there’s an important thing happened just before that was that when I was team my father got cancer and died and the whole from from diagnosis until he died happened quite quickly it was and I think he was diagnosed with it. And by the time they found out it was oh it was Riddle thought was body. And about three months later he was dead. So those are pretty quick to deal. You had to could deal with that pretty quickly you know come to terms with that and what the effect the heart was. My family became even more strict with the religion because the only hope of seeing them again was to get through the new system. My sister was one of my sisters particularly and I’m convinced the only reason she’s Jehovah’s Witness is because she wants to see her dad again.

[00:45:17] I don’t I know she doesn’t agree with a lot of the teachings but the reason she thinks she will see him again if he stays a Jehovah’s Witness. And then I had like a mini crisis of faith during his sickness. And I thought was I used to think like it’s if God is real then why does he just step in and stop this stuff or why is the bottom again by now. You know and then after my dad died I contemplated leaving the religion. And then of course I was told to wait on Jehovah just just study more and put all the doubts the back of his mind. And then I visited Bethel in New York and I saw like all those smiling happy faces and people saying how wonderful it is to be here. We’re all happy and everything. And then I came back convinced it was the truth because of this so-called love they have amongst themselves which would later find out is all fake. So that that happened that then I visited another accommodation. A friend of mine but our friend is an elder son who was who was very very shy and he asked me to go with his family to give a talk and the conversation again was because I’m the guy who can speak to people and introduce you to them. That was about half that I went to. This other conversation. I met a woman who eventually I would date her and six months later I’m engaged and six months later married so married within a year of meeting a witch and the Jehovah’s Witness well is absolutely normal. Oh yeah I was married to my wife then for a month. Yeah. So yeah very very quick courtship there yeah.

[00:46:52] And you’ll know Michael at that um it’s not till you’re married and living together then you then you really know who you married to. Oh sure am as a witness. With the way they date and with the chaperones that you are my everything else like there’s no possible way of having any idea who it is that you’re really marrying. There’s no no. And you know I’m Amber I’m OK our courtship was she was very close to her family. If I’m on it her dad’s an elder. And from what I’ve seen when I was going out with her that her family were very close and they were like in the centre click of the congregation because all their friends were elders families and it was like Wow I’d never be able to speak to these people you know in this click normally. So I thought it was fantastic be this wonderful social circle I was at the Central. I know you were there with a chaperone all the time and stuff and then um something happened we got married and living together and after about a week things started that you start to notice things like um you know I don’t have a parent but in our case the only thing we had in common was our religion. But as a Jehovah’s Witness that’s a good enough reason you know that that’s what they tell you to look for as their quote spiritual qualities. You know do they go to meetings. Can they show up on time. Do they knock on doors. They thought that that’s what it’s all based on is just the commonality of the cult doctrine. Yeah.

[00:48:20] You know she didn’t like the fact that I had friends who weren’t Jehovah’s Witnesses from work. I’m even now my best friend as a gay man. And she didn’t like the fact that there’s a gay friend did that the fact that some my friends are women who aren’t witnesses because the Jehovah’s Witness mindset that automatically means I’m going to have sex with them doesn’t it. You know how you’ve just been you know that thing that they want to tell us that is more sex more than anybody else but you know because. And so there was that and then there’s things that stands out. Mean that she had health issues of her own which I didn’t know. She has OCD and severe OCD. She had a desire to see which would which would eventually turn into depression and she started self harming as well. And the reason was. Well I know now the reason was the pressure she was under to conform in a census. Now soon she got married. She couldn’t rely on her elder father to be the center of a social circle. Now she hatches out on her own her own family and she suddenly found herself not in the social clique anymore because she’s not an elder’s wife she’s not an elder. She’s so that that took it took a big toll on her. She too is you know trying to do more do more do more study more and more do all this. And she became very ill. I mean almost like that she wasn’t eating you look like a you know like anorexic or something.

[00:49:38] A lot of you know I don’t want to say a lot of those disorders. You know OCD is about control anxiety is about a lack of control. Eating disorders are often about control and you know when you’re in a cult and you have no control over your life then you’re trying to find it anywhere you can. Yeah those disorders are really pretty common among Jehovah’s Witnesses because the situation is so out of control. I had some OCD tendencies though nowhere. Beyond that OCD spectrum and a lot of anxiety and it was all because of being so out of control in the cult. Yeah. And you know since leaving you read out that there’s a high high volume of people who are Jehovah’s Witnesses who suffer from depression and suffer from self harm as well as the big one from my last complication I know personally I know 27 people out of 75 complications who are depressed. I know eight of them personally who were on medication for clinical depression. That’s quite a high volume of people for just one year. When it comes to self harm that’s not something I’m qualified to talk about but my my my my ex-wife did self harm at a time and also some of the friends in the occasions she would tell me who also self harm. I never really understood why on that basically it was born out of frustration. You know I just said there was no control in their lives that they had control over cutting themselves or bending themselves was was them taking control in some way. Well that’s not how it was explained to me by them.

[00:51:20] And you know that is that’s not something I would make light of that that’s a serious thing. And so yes. So we were married and then we were half hip per family. As I say was the eldest family and they were all friends with elders families and then we went on holiday to whales that they like going hiking and things and camping and stuff. And I we hide in a massive cottage and this a whale somewhere and there was me and me on my wife Heff family and two of the elders families. Now the two other elders I’m going to say are assholes they are. I would never hang around these guys in the real world the kind that are at fault. My Michael is Megan and that I think I think that is a qualification to be an elder. But I think I think it is a qualification and iambus sitting at the dinner table. I think I’ve told you about this in and online somewhere but sit around the dinner table said. And my father in law I started talking about a judicial committee he just been on and he was named to the person he named what it was they did and he talked all about the ins and outs of it and then his wife my mother in law said Yes well his wife he was always like this and his wife was always like that. So his wife knew the ins and outs of the judicial committee and then the other two elders there start talking about judicial rape and on and on they talked about judges not all three have been on the talking about things that I shouldn’t know about and their children shouldn’t know about.

[00:52:44] And why shouldn’t know about. So when you go I mean I’ve been on a judiciary committee myself and they say to you whatever said in this room stays in this room and we don’t tell anybody about it. If again any Jehovah’s Witness is listening. That is not true. I know things that I shouldn’t know about people from Alaska immigration. I did. I knew what it was like. Yeah. If if they if they knew that I know what what they did they would be mortified. And again and you want one comment that really hit home annoyed me was the Jewish judicial committee that all three of them have been on that they just had they said but the so and so you know he did this thorough. You can see he was repentant but we disfellowshipped him anyway and they all laughed. And that guy hasn’t come back to the religion and his family is shunning his family his life is destroyed by that religion. And they thought it was funny to disfellowshipped them because they wanted to get home or watch a football match and he still disfellowshipped now. I don’t know who he is. The way he is always doing like book. And that’s bad because you know shunning being shunned. You can have to cope with that or you can’t cope with it and if you can’t cope with that you in for a tough ride. You know you need support of people and especially from your family and his family. Shunning him. And it’s sad. So yeah I mean things will progress with the marriage and things didn’t go too well.

[00:54:06] I mean I did love. I did. She said she loved me but she didn’t really show it much. But I was committed to say well I’m married I’ll just stay my way to an end and the new system should be better I suppose. And that was that was what most I was committed to do when I start she started to be sectioned in hospital for self harm and anxiety and things and she’d we had it we had a baby girl and thought the pregnancy she was shunned because she says she did something and she was disfellowshipped and she was repentant she told the elders for that she did. And she was repentant about that she told the elders the same day and they disfellowshipped her anyway and I was on the Judiciary Committee where they said that the elder said and I said and I quote We can see your repentance but we must as fellowship you anyway to make you learn. Wow. So when when I read what time magazine is a lie where it says people are only just vanishing for being unrepentant or people only just finished for being prideful or hiding their sin. This wasn’t the case at all. And that was a massive thing for me I doubt that when a massive change at that if I wasn’t certain judicial committee or if I didn’t hear those words I may well have been still a Jehovah’s Witness the day because that set off a lot of a lot of thought in my head. I started to research the history of this organization. So she was shunned the entire pregnancy.

[00:55:25] She didn’t have any friends no family spoke to a shadow only person who spoke to her during the entire nine month pregnancy was made and she really hard. Yeah that’s got to be really tough. Yeah. And of course you know she said she that she’s not any any French who went Jehovah’s Witnesses because she was a good Jehovah’s Witness she had no worldly friends. So she had no way to tend to and she couldn’t talk to non Jehovah’s Witnesses when she disfellowshipped because she went to get reinstated. So she’s trying to do the best job she can be. And I remember a boat she was walking in the snow to the Kingdom Hall and people would drive past her and she’s like nine months pregnant you know and there was there was no there’s no common sense you know this this person is pregnant she’s there you know there is no love there’s no love. And eventually she was reinstated after the birth. She was reinstated. I know people are called to a hogan. Oh we’re so glad. Oh we love you was so wonderful was they both. This is the person who drove past you in the snow. You know this is if you see someone who’s who’s heavily pregnant walking in the rain or in the snow or carrying heavy shopping bags you don’t even have to know them you stop your car and you ask them. Give me a lift. Of course you have that common humanity and decency. Yeah. But this was like Jehovah’s Witnesses to another Jehovah’s Witness.

[00:56:44] But just because she and the people don’t even know why she was disfellowshipped so that even a the Charlena you know so obviously she was she was repentant anyway. Yes. Should an election now. So I said to her while she was being shunned I said to her you know I mean I was having a lot of doubts about the religion. I said look this is this is your opportunity now if we could just not go back you know I’ll not go back. And she said no I’ve got to go back to my family. I want sympathy. She didn’t say you got to go back true. You said I’ve got to go back on my family. I want my family back. Right. And when when she went to hospital to give birth I remember we deliberately left her blood card at home because if she has a blood transfusion she gets one. And if our daughter child needs one that she’ll have one. And I think her father showed up at the hospital and asked me to see a copy of the book of the document and the HLC people tended to do a really intrusive trying to see how she got a card with how she got card with her. And we said no no we’ve left our home. You know I drove home and got it and brought it home. And the HLC guys even brought blank copies with them to fill one in them and then cut the light so I said to my wife and secret Look if if if the child needs a blood transfusion I’ll say yes I’ll get disfellowshipped. And that’s what we’ll do what she said. OK. Because I can cope being shunned and she can’t so. So that was the plan.

[00:58:11] Unfortunately it did not. They didn’t come to that anyway the Beth went fine but it just shows you how much control religion has where you know we’re giving birth. We should be looking forward to our baby being born but instead we’re making a secret pacts about who’s going to be disfellowshipped if it comes to in a way how did something just help me whether she did. Fellowship Yeah yeah but she was still willing to stick to Jehovah’s Witness rules because she is to be the best hope that she can be to get reinstated. Yeah. And I can see that I give her family who wasn’t a part who shunned her through the entire pregnancy yet the that now is the time to show up when the baby is going to be born. Right. Yeah. And now the HLC cares and now the family cares just because the babies being born yet. Otherwise she could have died on the streets and they wouldn’t care. Wow that’s just awful. They’re so intrusive and so everything with them is so conditional. Yeah. But as things progressed I mean even when I when I was leaving the Colts and especially when I left the court would involve a Sully’s a more low life with my daughter as you as you know from the forum post I make they do try and get to they try and get to your children I think. And I think the only way the only way my mother for example can have access to my daughter since I’ve left was through my ex-wife. And so she’s been trying to make contact just to get access to my daughter.

[00:59:50] But of course every time she’s been with my daughter my daughter comes back and says things which only she would know if she’d been going to meetings you know Armageddon or Jehova not like you know you aren’t bothered about me but you’re bothered about seeing my daughter right. Right. But then for them when you do have it she comes back talking about Armageddon and demons she doesn’t come back talking about parties in the park you know. Right right. And it’s funny because you know what you’re describing there is kind of the opposite of the experience of a lot of people a lot of people who leave have kids and then their parents never have anything to do with those kids never see those kids their entire life their grandkids ever. They either go one way where they completely shun those grandkids. Which actually is a protection for those grandkids even though it’s still disgusting or they want to be involved and go through any means possible. But it’s only so that they can indoctrinate them. It’s not so that they can. Like you said take them to the park or to a party. Yeah. Yeah. But first my mom would be in contact with me for about a first couple of weeks when I first left the cult. She was in contact to talk about my daughter. And she seemed to be wanted. She seemed to want to get involved.

[01:01:14] But when she got wind that I when apostates or a so-called apostate um then that’s when she stepped up the shelling and then she didn’t bother with me or my daughter for a long long time and then it only recently came to to my knowledge that she’s been secretly seeing my daughter. That’s that’s another situation entirely but I’ve Artus I’ve as you know I had to take legal action to stop the stop here from just taking my daughter when she wants to. So yeah it’s it’s it’s part of the battle I’ve always I’ve always said if my if my ex-wife left the religion which she has done since which I’ll come to later am I would I wouldn’t bother with the actual community because the only way affects me is if my daughter goes missing and I want to know what she’s been taught and want to be in. So I should be washing my hands of the whole thing now but I’m not because the one thing am I’m heavily involved to be actually to become a Latina and also my they are still affecting my life and the sense of trying to get to my daughter and I don’t think my daughter would ever become a Jehovah’s Witness. But it’s still I don’t want to expose to so the teachings that they have because I don’t want a three year old girl to be like I was a three year old No. Armageddon is or no what Satan is or demons and things you know you just never know. I mean it’s a very powerful doctrine that I try. I mean there are a lot of people you would think would never become Jehovah’s Witnesses so you have to battle it and treat it seriously.

[01:02:39] Yeah and even even like something innocent like the cadence of fear videos they’re not innocent because they’re antigay thing and donate your money to this to the Watchtower Society and think it’s so uneven. Even some of the language they use I’ve known since starting university myself I’ve noticed some of the things the Watchtower Satti does. They like to insert their own little loaded language or not. They all adjectives like for example that they’ll say Are you a young one who’s wisely considering baptism if you even move the word baptism it just says are you a young one who’s considering baptism what they say are you wisely considering baptism right by. And they also say things like do you wisely destroy apostate literature. Right so they’re inserting a word there to make you see like this is what you should do. I I’m manipulating it’s manipulation. And at the time I never noticed it until it wasn’t till actually I started studying at university that I noticed that they do this because if you read like you on Wikipedia for example you’re not allowed to do that. You can’t you can’t insert your own little agenda inside and that it has to be referenced. You can’t try to manipulate somebodies thinking with the White House idea that they do it with children. Thing is. The comic books they do on the GW website. Now it’s just it’s they really all get to the young ones. Now they have to they have to because that’s the only growth they have. Yeah. They’re not getting anybody from knocking on doors anymore. No the growth is always from within. Now how did you how did you come to leave the religion in the first place. I mean like you mentioned that your marriage was kind of rocky.

[01:04:20] Your daughter is boring your wife. Yes. Fellowship. She was wanting to go back in. And I guess she did but how did you come to actually leave the religion. Basically I wasn’t happy but I should have been happy because I’m in the happiest village in the world on a town and I wasn’t happy. And I’m I’m quite a positive person. I don’t I don’t really get. I wouldn’t say I get depressed. I have moments where I like what I get fed up inside but I’m a depressive person but there was a time when my wife was in hospital for about four months. I was looking after my daughter by myself. And at this time the only time witnesses would speak to me was like always in the ministry more she going to ministry more to answer more you should study that. Can you do a stand and talk for meal at bent bromide. I’m working full time and I’m looking after my daughter by myself and I’m visiting hospital everyday and they’re still asking me to do more and more and more. Nobody is offering to help me. And they were more interested in how many hours I want on my report slip than they were and how am I doing with my daughter how am I doing on my own. And I would start I started to look on a forum. Jehovah’s Witness Stockholm and I would read on the Net a post that I read on there. Now I don’t know if that’s true for every every extra I was witness who goes on the book I would read the post on there and I would be terrified.

[01:05:45] I was terrified because I’m an apostate website and you know I went at first. Yeah I’m like I’m but I’m physically shaking after I’d been on there. And I pray to Jehovah to forgive me for looking at it but sometimes you do things like you know someone who is an ex Elder. Well Xico obviously and I think surely not an elder. No elders don’t leave this truth to the sacred overseer. Second I really wouldn’t leave this religion. They know they know better than that the day is done then so you think about it walk away to think why would a second obviously leave. No. If it’s the truth why they leave. See it thought. And you go back and you’d look like something else and then you know and they’d mention something you go into that can’t be true. We can’t know we can’t be involved the United Nations should. I know we’re not alive because the United Nations is part of the same Titanic system. Now the next thing you know there’s a letter. You see the letter. You know that they’ve joined the United Nations of an NGO and I thought well oh well it was just just kind of a lab card. Okay that’s okay. Now that stands out.

[01:06:44] Well if you want a library card you have to swear that you agree with the aims of the United Nations which of course we did that if we got up and said we agree with the nations we could disrupt ships you know and then somebody mentioned like you know an execution a body member who’s written a book and I thought well well well an execution a body member. So someone on a given a body left. Why would they leave. Oh it must be because he’s that he’s a bitter man. He must be bitter. There was something terrible and left. That’s what it is better he’s writing lies. And so it and I still didn’t read his book it was right friends crisis of conscience. And I everyone should read this book. Anyone who is a Jehovah’s Witness should read that book and everything on there is referenced. I was surprised at the tone of his writing he was very humble man. He doesn’t have any hatred whatsoever for the witnesses at all. He is basically just pointing out where they’ve gone wrong. And I do believe he was still a Bible believing man and he wasn’t an atheist or anything. And all the things he talked about he backed it up like he had them pairs of watchtowers he had quotes he had you know court transcripts and things. After reading that book I came away and there was no way I could go back to it because it would mean it would mean that I’d have to be dishonest of myself. And that there’s a saying which says when a when an honest man is proven wrong he’s either stopped being honest or he’s tough being wrong. And after reading I thought well you know I still believe in God but I don’t believe the Watchtower Society and I know what that meant. I’m but I even now remember I was in a park with my daughter and she was collecting pinecones and she seemed so happy in the sunshine.

[01:08:22] I’m sat there and I thought to myself I don’t believe this religion. And it was like a major fight somebody died. Amber she on that someone died. And I thought it’s not true this religion isn’t true. I had been involved there for 31 years and it’s all been for nothing. And this means that my family aren’t gonna speak to me and my grandparents either speak to me or my friends and you know it’s me. So I text a text message to my non Jehovah’s Witness friends who are my gay friend I told you about earlier and I said look I’m leaving the watchtowers I’m leaving the Jehovah’s Witnesses and he replied saying Are you sure you want to do this because he knew what that meant. He knew what will happens to people who live on said well if I stay in this religion just just because my family are there or just because it’s nice or it’s it’s a nice image it’s going to affect everything else it’ll affect you know I’m denying myself a university and deny my daughter a normal life and deny myself friends and now it really would be just selling yourself to an organisation to a cult. I would like to refer to as a call which I do believe it as well. At the time I said I still believed it was the closest thing to the truth which is the stupidest thing I’ve ever said of my life. I’m alone there. I think it’s the closest thing there is but I couldn’t I couldn’t tell my wife this for one thing she was in hospital.

[01:09:40] I’m sure she doesn’t need that right now so I kind of went along with it but I stopped going at the ministry for about a year. It had gone the mystery at all for a year and I was classed as inactive but I was still going to the meetings. I’m still answering OK. But I basically I land very quickly. That’s as long as you just say what they want to hear they’re happy. I’ll get up on a bluff him give a talk. I don’t believe aware of what I’m saying. But they were happy. I can say what they want to hear and at fine time nobody seemed to be worried about that they are more worried about the fact that it wasn’t going in the ministry. But I would give them an excuse like um we don’t drive or you know my daughter not very well. But no one you know. Then it came to the point where my sister in law was babysitting for us and I was at work and she was babysitting and I came back and she was acting weird. She says she made a wish took out the house she didn’t want to speak to me or anything strange because I was kind of my mama mama wife for close to matter to her brother and her white brother’s wife and holidays and things I thought strange kind of push out and stuff and then the next day I got a phone call and my my my nickname on the Jehovah’s Witness forum my people known as the pale emperor and an M and an elder called me and he says does the name Pale Emperor mean anything to you. I am been tired.

[01:11:03] I swore Mahad author Ahmad. None of this means. And I said I. I pretended a face. While the pale emperors AM is an album by Mala Manson I don’t think he’d know what that was and he said to me and he said. We’ve seen what you’ve written on those Web sites and we’re disgusted now. I’d written on the website at this point was that my first post was that you know I’m a fan I can go crazy in this religion and I’m so stressed out that I did that. That was all it was. I hadn’t Dyster religion as such I was just basically poor my heart out. And that was bad enough. The fact I’d visited and a Jehovah’s Witness forum or travellers form and posted my feelings about how I’m feeling with the religion that it’s not paire fact it’s not wonderful I’m so I feel so I’m going crazy. I don’t know what to do. And the acros witnesses bless Blessum but they’re very supportive. I got more support and one day of people I’d never met than I have had in 31 years and the as the witnesses they all gave me different. Some of them just said you know what I’m gonna tell you what to do but you know we’re thinking of you and you know just take it slow. Well there’s no one to. Nobody told me to leave. Nobody told me that there’s religion’s rubbish in this religion’s evil. No one said that. They just said you know take it easy try and you know look after yourself Look after your family and they’re very supportive.

[01:12:21] So this whole thing about apostates being you know drawn people after themselves is rubbish. I mean even myself now I’m I’m I’m a so-called apostate. I don’t care if people follow me. I don’t really care. I just want people to know the facts and then make up their mind about what what to do with it you know. Because if you if you know if you know the truth about this organization and still decide to be a part of it that’s fine. I don’t have a problem at all. The problem is when you get people who say well you own it you’re only an apostate because you know it’s the truth but you’re fighting against it. And that’s a flaw waiting to hear because because we know who killed we don’t work. If it was true I would be in it if it was true. I would be part of it but there’s only so many times you can forgive. Like a failed prophecy or a fair prediction or a new light on a far as I’m concerned every time they bring out new light it’s a new religion. I wasn’t baptized into the religion of what they’re teaching now. I wasn’t baptized into the. I wasn’t baptized. I wasn’t baptized believing on Obama generation. I would never have the truth. What happened so and then I was called the eldest son of pestered me by phone by e-mail by text. Now at this point I thought well you know it’s probably good time to leave so I ran a disused disassociation association letter and mailed it to the congregation. Persad Noble was I’d never see a coordinator.

[01:13:48] And I started getting more and more knocks on my door and stuff I just didn’t answer the door. I want to be left alone but they don’t leave you alone. They don’t let you leave. They don’t believe. And it became like in the end a thought well I’ll just meet with them to get them to go away. I met with one elder who seemed to be OK. I thought he was OK. I thought he’s a friend of mine. I met with him in a pub just just him on Husserl and he said to me that you know the organization has made mistakes but where the honest religion because we admit our mistakes which of course is true now they never admit anything. Yeah and he said of course he said look at the Catholic Church or their paedophile problem which I thought was I am crazy. Witness the Watchtower study has a huge paedophile problem as you and I know anybody listen and just ask Google the Australian wool commission and read all about that. And then he said well disassociate is a cowardly thing to do because it means that you know you’re not giving the elders their chance to turn to lovingly shepherd you or something like that which is complete rubbish. So that’s I said yeah so so he said to me look why did you come to the Kingdom Hall tomorrow with me and all that and just two elders just two elders and ten open to tell us your concerns and will sit with you and we’ll go through it and if you still want to disassociate then that’s fine.

[01:15:05] So I thought out I stupidly said Yes I’ll tell you I I know a lot of things I want to get off my chest. You try to Adam. Yeah with theU.N. with theU.N. connection with Charles Taylor Rossell selling medical wheat with you know lots of things that did all over the food with as you know in connection with Hitler. He tried to eat tried to curry favor with Hitler before the war but it backfired and then he became like an antique German Jehovah’s Witness suffering unnecessarily because of the Fed’s mismanagement. So that wants to be more out and then stand up. There’s roughly three elders there not two liturgist judicial committee they tricked me to tell you just a committee. Now I should have just walked out. But that I thought was about I’m here I’ve already disassociated a lot I want to say I sat there and for the first hour was just them trying to get me to admit that I believe the Bible and I believe that Jehovah’s God’s name and eventually ice. I said to them yes even though I didn’t really believe the by all the Bible I believe in God. I did know who God was. That’s when I was at this point. And I said I don’t know whether God is male or female or God as you know at the Trinity. I don’t know whether God is like you know a pantheon of gods I don’t know and they’re scoffing at this idea. I’m like look literally I have no idea. I don’t know what I believe anymore. And so I said yes I believe the Bible.

[01:16:26] I’ve said that and they said fine them we can get on with this with this with this meeting. And basically the next two hours was then they told my disassociated letter in front of me and they said well you know your actions are showing that you’re not humble and I’m not following you know the direction that Jesus has chosen because of course there’s no evidence that Jesus has chosen this. And they were saying you know you want to get ahead of Jehovah’s challe. Yes. And if you don’t accept the covenant if you don’t accept the governing body then that means that you know in the first century would you accept the Apostles. And I’m thinking Well well I would because I would see them do miracles with my Arvidson. What I would. And I know. And they said what the apostles got it wrong sometimes and I know but you know nobody. They didn’t they didn’t change their religion. When I said well the apostles didn’t disfellowshipped people who as you disagreed with the you know you have you have you know Paul the Apostle and Matthew disagreed on things they didn’t shoot each other one that no one didn’t get disfellowshipped yet they just kind of say yeah we disagree on some things but you know what else. And there was a scripture that I remember I think a comma which scripture at Imber Paul apostle Paul said you know some follow up Polis some follow me some follow somebody else but we all follow Christ like. So what that tells me personally I said to the elders is even back then there were different branches of Christianity popping up but it did matter because it all leads back to Jesus.

[01:17:48] That’s what the Bosnians and that’s what he was saying. Some follow Polis in his teaching of whether some follow me. So I’m saying well you know let’s say I become a born again Christian for example if I did. As far as I’m concerned I’m still in the teaching of Christ. That’s what they believe. So that’s not really an apostasy it’s just a difference of opinion. But they were like adamant that no no no it has to be the Watchtower Society. Now I bought along gum em reprints of Watchtower literature from the first era of similar things he said which which directly contradicts things they say now. And of course that’s considered to be old right. And because out of half the thing that’s apostasy and I think that’s the thing here I have their own publications from the era and even some of it even some as up to the 80s 1980s like you know. JEREMY SCHAAP never pass away that one. MARTIN four. And they said that that is now apostasy because it contradicts what we now teach book. But by saying in the book The Faithful and Discreet Slave printed this what they written. Well the Fed apparently was Jehovah’s mouthpiece. You know how kind of scary. Yeah. So so so if other thought was wrong about this could he be wrong about you know anything else. Could they go wrong about blood transfusions. Could they be wrong about you know Christmas and better. I mean I read somewhere a comma would have read it that would ban birthdays because he personally didn’t go into birthday party so he banned the about.

[01:19:15] Right. Sounds about right. I’m not sure where that’s true but it wouldn’t surprise me at all. No no. And I know the Fed also banned tipping your hats to women. He banned shaking hands. He banned singing Kingdom songs and they only the they came back in nor took over. Yeah. You couldn’t sing Kingdom songs. I didn’t hold out. Yeah that’s the same announcement Monday about birthdays. They also banned singing hymns like that. It was just you couldn’t. Those are tipping a hat to women or standing up when they enter a room is because it’s showing them what is it is showing too much respect to women. It’s like you should be shown respect to guard and the man as the head of the House and the women should be your subjection to you. He’s basically in his Etep in their caps men. Yeah. These are things that you know the ridiculous. This is the way they treat it. At It. It takes the whole it takes the love out of the whole thing that reading the Bible should be a joy. It should be something you enjoy. Do you go there to feel better. You know you had a bad day. You’re worried about something. You read the Bible. You feel better. Right. But you try to do that with Watchtower literature. You don’t feel that way. You feel worse and you feel like gladiatorial paradise. They claim it is. No it’s not.

[01:20:30] And it got to the point it got to the point where I literally thought even if even if this is the truth I don’t want to live in the new system because it would mean I’ve got I’ve got Tony Morris up in heaven the ruling the. It’s almost like a you know I’ve got to start I’ve still got to study the magazines are still going to preach to the people to be resurrected and then even if you do all the Jehovah is going to test you again. Yeah you’re thinking how and where are they going to go through all that again which means you know your relative who you love very much could then die because you didn’t pass the final test. But it’s ok because you’re over will erase your memory of a person. So I thought to myself well why bother. Why don’t I just enjoy my life now. I didn’t die at the end of it anyway so it just finished for apostasy on and. I was the subject of my wife left me. Even though I’ve been very supportive of a third illnesses and things she left me a lot of pressure from a father who is an elder UNDAN. And she left and she moved into her parents house and I kind of got with my life then for the for the first couple of months I went through a period of I didn’t know who I was. Did no one I believed didn’t know what my likes and dislikes were. I really did not know who I was. And I think this is a common thing. We believe a cult called up and told him how to think or what to think and told them what the world view is.

[01:21:53] I really didn’t know who I was so I kind of just threw myself into studying everything I study religion philosophy. I studied art history everything and anything that I didn’t understand I would look it up on multiple little different sources. I wouldn’t just look at one like the Watchtower Society would give you one side of an argument. I looked up counter arguments I looked at all of the history of why they would say that and I came to the conclusion that the Bible is a collection of books that agree with each other but they only agree with each other because they remove the ones that don’t agree with them. You know. Yeah I think was comes off nicely I think where they based the Catholic church got together and argued over which books should be and which shouldn’t be. I’ve read books that were removed. I have a book a home here. It’s like damn i didn’t know there was an apocalypse of Peter so Peter wrote a book or the apocalypse as well which contradicts John’s revelation. Oh I know that. Yeah I didn’t even notice myself until last week. There’s books and the Gospel of Thomas as gospel and that book is insane. Yeah there’s even a gospel of Judas. There is so many books now. I’m more than confident that most of the book to the Bible probably where I’ve written by the people I named after them and even if they where they would have been changed over the years for political reasons and things. And it’s.

[01:23:14] And it also doesn’t make sense that you’d have like what you would expect a book written by God or inspired by God would have information well above it’s time like you would be talking about physics and you certainly would mention Australia or North America but doesn’t mention names places doesn’t mention Scandinavia doesn’t mention Russia or anything like that it just mentions the Middle East. You know it never mentions that always got me well never mentions in all the rules about not committing adultery or men lying with men or it even mentions beach ideality but it never ever talks about not sexually abusing children. Yes like what are the most vulnerable among us. No they’re nowhere in there does it say. And you would think that the Nishant guide would be able to see that you know what this might be a problem. And I should address this directly like I do Beath reality never ever mentioned and that that was something that I always got to me. How was that overlooked. Yeah I’m a big one for me is slavery. Yeah nowhere nowhere in the Bible where you find a scripture that says slavery is bad. In fact you found the opposite you’ll find rules to say how to treat your slaves right. And even as even if you want to optional. Oh yes the old testament No no no. It’s meant in the New Testament too. Paul says you know slaves attend to your masters and you know your master should treat your slaves kindly and this is something that that that they say like oh well you see it is different being a slave if you want to Jehovah’s people because slaves were looked after.

[01:25:00] Well you read you read some of the books of Moses how you treat it like you could be a slave. You could be a slave with a stick. And if he doesn’t die the next day nothing happens. You don’t get punished as long as he doesn’t die. He can die a week later. What if he doesn’t have the next day that you know you’re okay and things like and you know you can. You can have sex with your women slaves and things and or under that do they say where some of that some some slaves voluntarily stayed with their masters and there was a thing where they nail easier to the door post like I looked into that I looked into that and I even asked a rabbi about this and you think about this let’s say for example you your wife and your children are all slaves to the same man. The man says to you you can my slave for seven years and will set you free if you want to keep keeping your wife and children what are you going to do. I know what I’d do Oh I’ll stay a slave please. I can have a wife. So of course you’re going to stay a slave Ana has nothing to do with being treated kindly could not be your slave even if you treat a kindly you must. And apparently God is fine with this you know. And of course you know that’s one way that’s how they treat you know you’re like slaves if you were if you were unfortunate enough to be a person captured in war or boy you’re in for a tough time you know because sometimes they would just kill everybody except for the young girls.

[01:26:23] Oh yeah they have to have somebody to rape. Yes. Of course on those things like I can’t remember the scripture that Mahad but you can look it up later Baer says you know when you go into battle and stuff to split open the pregnant bellies and all that smashed her head against the rocks baby’s heads. I think what’s in it and you see this god is pro-life. You’re going to the abortion but that’s OK. And you know this is nothing like abortion. You know I have my own beliefs on abortion but that’s something else. And on the subject entirely if you want to argue that God is against abortion if it’s if you’re saying you’re thinking abortion because of God. God kill David’s baby directly now. Now the scriptures where they go Well you know the soldiers go into battle probably shouldn’t have done that but you know they didn’t go out and say that they should do. God said that what would happen. And book out with no god kill day with baby he get. He used to miscarriage you know. So this as far as I’m concerned the God of the old testament as a monster. You want to get when you get to things like Jesus and stuff I think Jesus is more than likely probably just why is these a Jewish apostate doesn’t he. You’re looking he comes along with his own teachings. But again he wasn’t all that because a lot of things he said didn’t happen. You know I used fail prophecies which LATELINE MAY have to say oh well he meant this and he meant that. I don’t think he did.

[01:27:46] I think he’s a false prophet but um again that’s something else. Yeah. So basically what you’re saying is that you’re not going to go back to the truth anymore are you. No no I’m I’m I’m pretty much Bolle I’m an atheist now I read I read a lot of different religions. I stood I heavily studied Buddhism and Hinduism heavily because it was so fascinating to me. And I don’t agree with those religions but as parts of different religions that I think are useful. So there’s parts of Buddhism and Hinduism. Not that I don’t believe them to be true but there’s the seven ways of looking at the world and ways of looking at things which I think are useful. I read the God Delusion by Richard Dawkins and man that was a very good book that after I thought well I’ve got no I’ve no I have no right believing in and superstitious things I’ve no right believing in any god. And if God exists then he’s to blame for me not believing in it because it could be any reason to. So that was what really sealed it for me unless I had you know somebody appeared in front of me in front of my eyes and say they are God and give me proof. I will never become a just person. So yes when I left I started studying all kind of things I studied hypnotism and I actually am a qualified hypnotist. Now I can do all that. I’m not going to back me. You’re not going to make me bark like a dog.

[01:29:13] Then at the end of the Ottawa if I could do it over the telephone it could. No no. And I was nothing. The whole hypnosis thing I went to that when I went when I was studying it and I went to the classes and the hypnotist trainer said you know what are some of the misconceptions about hypnotism. So I put my hand up I said Look out. I was in a religion which said if you went in a trance a demon in your head and they were all like what a demon a pop in your head. Why would they say that I go. And like somebody said you know if you can look at the Bible and say maybe Jesus was doing that. You look at the myth that a mentalists an artists to magicians and you are famous who do things that Jesus did you don’t mean like your Pantelis example. I’ve seen Talla walk on water. It’s a trick. Yeah but he’s done it right. I don’t know how I don’t know how I did it. I’ve seen faith healers make somebody they thought they were like they had you know the demon inside them and that the faith healer does something and suddenly they don’t have a demon inside them and then this is explained by this there’s a popular magician in England called Devon Brown he’s a he’s a very good hypnotist and he does things like that. He copies everything Jesus that he can do. He can make.

[01:30:27] He even did one thing where he converted people he converted atheists to Christianity with a touch because he’s a very good him artist and something in the way he speaks he said something can touch them and they suddenly believe in God. And then afterwards he took away again but it just shows you how the human mind we don’t understand how it works but it can be manipulated you know definitely impressionable creatures. Yeah. So you know you’re learning these new things. You know since you’ve left is there is there anything that you’ve learned since you left that’s really impacted your life for the better. Is there anything that you know you don’t know how long have you been out now. I’m about two years now with this matter. Yeah that’s right. About fan timeline as I was. Is there anything that you’ve learned that really you know kind of helped you. I mean other than helping you get away from this cult. Is there anything that just helped you in your life for the better in a general sense. I would say my whole worldview now is to live and let live. Yeah people people have their own ideas on beliefs and just let them believe it unless it’s going to harm someone. That’s that’s something else but I really don’t really care what sort believes as long as they’re good people and that they treat people with respect. And it’s also may a massive thing that happens well as Miss feminism. I have a strong belief that women and men are equal and women. I met some women who are fantastic well educated OK. Oxford graduates who have very good teachers I’d say to them Well you know if you’re a Jehovah’s Witness they wouldn’t let you teach because you’re a woman which is ludicrous you know.

[01:32:02] So it’s like there was there was like really opened my eyes to the real world. So live after live let live attitude. I look at women in a different way now. There’s some really intelligent women there some people outsource it makes sense to get involved politically too. You have to be political in this day and age you have to be. It’s all very well saying I don’t vote because that would mean I’m voting. I’m maybe maybe this politician would bring in a policy of aggrieved later on but that’s that’s something else. But you have to be politically aware today because if you if you look at for example like World War Two with the Nazis invading left right and center it used to just sit there and let it happen. And you can’t you have to be involved you have to stand up and fight stuff like that. But that’s another thing I learned since Le’Veon as um you know sometimes people can’t be convinced because they don’t want to be convinced. When I speak to there’s a Web site called corer dot com where he’ll ask questions and you answer them I’m on the other way. I get like Jehovah’s Witnesses answer questions on there which you can tell they don’t know the whole truth. And sometimes you’ll comment on it and give them the truth and they don’t want to know. And you know you can you can apply all you want to keep going conversation but sometimes people don’t want to be a duck.

[01:33:19] They don’t want to be convinced sometimes they’re happy in their little religion and you know them if they feel safe in it and they don’t want to be moved from it and so you have to respect that too sometimes. It’s unfortunate but. Yeah. Yeah but I get back to that live and let live. Yes. Is there is there any way that your past life is still impacting you. Yeah I mean when I think about it everyday you know I think about this religion everyday and I wish I didn’t. I really wish it had kept up. It affects me everyday. Even when you read things in books about like controlling people like maybe you mean like an abusivee.V. to me like a newspaper article about an abusive abusive husband who beat his wife up and yet he sees similarities to religion. You’re like Oh he wouldn’t let his wife mix with anyone outside his family who wouldn’t let his wife read any magazines about this subject. Like yeah that’s exactly the same thing. Or you’ll read about like I mentioned earlier North Korea and North Korea. They have one news station one newspaper one leader who tells them what the truth is and that’s the truth. And they’re not allowed to question it because they be punished. So you noticed things around you and you and you can’t believe you were ever fooled by it. You can’t believe you ever involved and sometimes you feel ashamed that you’re involved it because you know some of the beliefs you have.

[01:34:40] It affects me mainly now because of my daughter because the witnesses are still trying to somehow influence that when it comes to because she sees them even now randomly Jehovah doesn’t like Christmas or Jehovah doesn’t like birthdays randomly should say she don’t know what your Hoeber is or who she says it is a set of sentences. But then I counter that straight away to say that’s OK he’s not real. And that’s it. Right. Oh she’ll say like Jehovah doesn’t like birthdays. That’s why I have to say to her what do you like birthdays. And she says yes. And I go so do I. And I say well that’s OK. I hope is not real. I’m at a book. But apart from that it only affects me because I know to say everywhere I go yeah. And you see these stupid Carter trying to get out your mind. See those cards. I’m lucky. National live somewhere where there aren’t many cards. Because now my heart would buy I would have a hard time not kicking him over every time I go on. You know the worst thing is lately they’ve had they been featuring the secret to family happiness. Yeah. What are you talking about. Family after family of a legend that has a truckload of destroying families and Eva Xiaobo. As I’ve met the life the royal family has been destroyed in some way. And this is the village Anna says Oh the secret to family happiness. The secret to finding happiness is all I’m concerned is don’t shoot each other. Yeah. Communicate. Yeah that’s a pretty good rule. Yeah. Yeah I mean did Kim anything when it comes to family. And I think if you have a disagreement communication you know if you and I had a disagreement we fell out. Right. I don’t think the communication.

[01:36:20] All you gotta do is talk to. Yeah or in the end. Live and let live. You don’t Savelyev agree on everything that’s okay. Exactly. I was going to ask you so you know you mentioned the family thing. So then if you could say anything to your family and friends that still shun you. There’s something that you could say to them what would you say. As I say to my family I would say I’m still the same person I was before except I’m just happier. I would say I would say I haven’t. I have no trouble with what you want to believe. I have I have no issue with you having a religion. I love you no matter what religion you are. It doesn’t matter to me. There’s no reason in the world I would have to shun you. There’s no reason no one could tell me to. No. Me too. Nobody could make me to have somebody dead. I would just tell them to something off. I would have to go. Why would I. And that is love. You know what. When you only see how weak is your love. If you only love somebody who agrees with you and is essentially a carbon copy or mirrors you in every way not love that’s control at best. I think I look I look at my and my little girl. I mean I mean I put it I put it to bed just before I ran I thought to myself if someone said to me I can’t give you eternal life in a perfect world. Right.

[01:37:50] As long as you show me this little girl forever. And in this perfect world she won’t be that. Well I would I would rather have I would rather have 50 more years of my life with hair and not be resurrected ever. I would rather have them in an imperfect world. I would want to live an imperfect world with my daughter and accept the fact that I will die one day but that would be a lot better I’ll be immeasurably happier today than living in a perfect world without a shadow. But what if Mark what if in the new system just like Joe lost his kids and was then given another set of kids later. What if that was OK. God killed the first you know allowed the first that to be killed but gave him another set a replacement set. So but what if you could abandon your daughter now and you would be given a random other children in this new perfect world so that you could forget all about her. I would hate that got it right. I get that messed up. Yeah. That the best they can come up with are even in jobs is that the best they could come up with is. Well I mean yeah God pretty much killed his kids but he gave them more kids later. You know it’s just it’s so horrifying. Yes. And you think let us take for example of jokes kids lie. I mean I’m a correctly I think a roof fell in on them. That’s not a nice death. That’s a bit terrifying. So they were terrified before they died. You had to.

[01:39:20] They had to go through terror for a while. Yeah. So talk to God to prove that God loves them. It’s got that insecure apparently could do something else you know couldn’t they wager something else. Why did it have to be that. Yeah. If he’s all powerful god you would think he could come up with a better wager. Well if it’s not powerful god there’s a lot more things he to. Yeah. If you think somebody ate some of his fruit. You know I mean that’s pretty much what it is. Let’s just really just does this kiss him on that tragic thing. Yeah. Right. Well so you’ve got is this new life now you’re free you’ve got your adorable little daughter. What are your dreams for this new life of yours. What are you hoping to do. Where you want to take it. But I’m I’m in university now part time I’m studying to be a therapist counselor for X court victims off which is which is a positive thing which is something I can relate to more that more so than the other students camp because I’ve actually been at a cult. So is that. And of course as a Ghazi’s hypnosis goes I’m hoping to include hypnotherapy with that. So there’s that side of it. Popham that I like my hobbies now I like photography and stuff and I through that I know a lot of models now which is cool. So I thought your home was written as I didn’t know many beautiful people. But like now I have a lot of beautiful friends now. So it’s. My girlfriends.

[01:40:52] I’m at Shindell I’ve been going out with them now since September it’s about five five or six months now things are going good. You know I mean I’ve had other girlfriends before. They didn’t work out too well. There’s always something I’ve got the label but this you know we have a lot of common religion doesn’t come into it. She she’s from a Catholic background but she’s not involved. She’s got the little girl herself. So religion is not the reason we’re together. We were together because we have the same likes and dislikes and we have the same you know ideas and you know what we disagree on many things too but that’s okay. Yeah yeah. You know it I mean her way of raising kids is different from mine but I don’t really I don’t want to get involved outside it that she does with her child way. But it’s so refreshing that you know you had somebody who you cause it. I know I know I know what she feels about me and I know what I feel about her and I know that the reason she’s with me is not because I knock on doors not because I give talks a lot because her dad is an elder. You know what. It’s there that I’m looking forward to a future where that goes much longer. And yeah just I’m just hoping to remain active in the GW community. I don’t consider myself an activist as such it’s Maura. I like that. You know I see what’s going on. I comment on it and make I make the occasional YouTube video when I have something to say.

[01:42:10] But that’s again I’m not trying to be John Setas interest. Yeah he’s got that locked down he’s got locked down. I mean I like the stuff he does. Yeah I do. So he does and I owe a lot to this man. I owe a lot to his work and particularly the be fetched Ofcom and Jehovah’s Witnesses tocome. Without without those websites Mannagh be lost. Yeah I agree. I agree. So what about your daughter. You have hopes for her for the future. You know what my only hope for her is that she’s happy. That’s all I actually say. Yeah I always say when might my ex-wife by the way has left the left the whole business as three weeks ago. And wouldn’t you know since she left her depression left as a man that yeah she did she still has OCD because that’s a clinical thing but it’s less than it was. So. So she’s not raising my daughter in as a witness either. So my daughter will have a normal upbringing. Well relatively normal. And I use the joke. But she being quite serious as well. I used that joke when she was going to the Kingdom Hall with a mom might say well you know I hope she’s older she’s a lesbian because that way the wet’s is one. So which is true. Yeah would never get that they were alone. But again like even if she if it if my daughter grew up to be sexual that really wouldn’t make a difference to me. And it’s so refreshing to be able to admit that yeah.

[01:43:35] You know that clearly doesn’t make a difference. As long as she’s happy as long as she’s safe AMCo that’s what you’re saying is that you hope your daughter grows up to be happy and you’ll love her whatever she does. Yeah that’s great that you know why it’s funny or sad that that would be a strange thing to say. Yeah and Jehovah’s Witnesses are none of our parents would have ever said that. No I know what it’s like even though I’m an atheist this doesn’t mean I don’t talk about religion at home anyway. So she doesn’t. She doesn’t have any religious instruction at all yet and is only 3 able. She grows up and stuff. I’m not going to talk about God and I’m not even going to tell her why there isn’t a god. The letter comes the conclusion not only on and if she did it if she decides to become a Jew or a Muslim or a Catholic a slut as long as she is Comstock inclusion on her own and she knows the ins and outs of it that’s fine. Well honestly I hope you become a Jehovah’s Witness of course. But yeah. But then of course if she got involved in that I would obviously tell which websites to read up on first so you know I don’t think she actually I don’t think that will never be around yielder. Yeah. So as long as she’s happy she’s healthy and she’s safe it’s all good and I believe and I don’t know if you want to say a name on here or not but you can give a shout out to your brother too who recently left.

[01:44:53] Yeah yeah my brother Daniel he left. He left the cult. He left about 3 months ago. Yeah but he didn’t. He didn’t do what I where he didn’t get active in the actual committee he does not even care. He just got on with life. He was going through a horrible time on. Was. He was. He tried to kill himself actually. But he was trying to he was trying to leave the Jehovah’s Witnesses. He stopped going to the meetings. He stopped going on the doors. He was getting hounded by elders. You know knock on his door people telling them you know you get your act together and come back to the truth and all this and he just wanted to. He just want to live as life as do his own thing and he actually tried to kill himself into the hospital. And after that he just wasn’t up. He was depressed for a while then you want to see him now. I mean I don’t I hardly see it now because he’s so active. He’s you have all of all things he’s interested in Chinese and he’s learning he’s taken Mandarin lessons. He’s actors in the Chinatown district of Liverpool just going out meeting people talking to people is like eating on dates with Chinese women. It’s like a different person a beautiful man. It’s amazing. I like that so often. Yeah he’s made about two postings on the forum you know. Actually it shows just a couple. But apart from that he’s not really interested in getting involved. He’s just like enjoying his life.

[01:46:13] So he’s got it just that he’s got his you know he plays mysterious instruments I say. I mean I saw I was in his house a few days ago and I said so as far as our I’m go said anything to you and now we said sometimes they try to ring me but don’t ask me phone so he isn’t he showing them he’s not there they’re trying to get in touch with him. But he doesn’t care because he’s like or them because I know because with the background that he had with them he needed to yes go on with his life. And yes he needs to be happy. And now you can tell them his iPod. Podcast’s famous. Yes I just had you know you know what Michael I don’t even he. He did not disfellowshipped that I know of. I think is he he disassociated. But then I think they they didn’t accept the letter or something involved where they wouldn’t accept the letter because they thought he wasn’t thinking clearly right. So when I say to him so are you just associated with this fellowship he says I’ve no idea how he does. All he knows if he’s free. It’s FREE AND HE’S DATING Chinese women and he’s speaking Chinese and he’s doing Chinese cooking. He’s like I don’t know what’s going on man he’s he’s happy so you know again that’s all you can wish for anybody right that’s left that’s it.

[01:47:29] Um I think he’s finding his feet you know he’s he’s just he’s doing what I did he’s looking to so many different subjects they’re finally finding out who he is what he likes and apparently he like Chinese women so that’s what whatever make a man have exactly exactly as you’re not hurting anybody oh no man I appreciate it. I think that that that was a really good interview. Is there anything that you would like to say that you know maybe I didn’t get to ask or get the cover. The only thing I would say is um if anyone I mean I don’t have any I don’t want to listen to this. If you do think you have the truth. I’m not I’m not trying to be provocative. If you think you have the truth then by all means look at different sides of the argument or someone says Oh I know something but Jehovah’s Witnesses that you don’t know well listen to what they have to say. If it’s a lie you’ll know it’s a lie. If it’s true that they should they should buckle up with evidence. If they don’t back up what evidence then I carry don’t listen to it but then I think 99 percent that actually WS cite their sources and so I do. I am not interested in and lies about the Watchtower Society. I’m not sure that the model. I don’t I don’t I don’t want people to leave because they’ve been lied to. But the most outstanding. So you’ll find a lot of extras Dedo abuse will always tell you where they got the information from. So if you have the truth. Make it your duty to make sure it is the truth. The Bible says you should test it to see if you are on the truth. Make sure azo are important things. That’s it. That’s it.

[01:48:59] So if someone says oh the Jehovah’s Witnesses are wrong about no one hundred forty four thousand well see why X Y. Why have they said that by all means try and convince them the opposite. Nolt. Listen to what they have to say. Surely if they’re saying that they’re wrong. You have blood on your hands I don’t need them again you should teach them. And personally I mean I know of all the extra doobies I’ve met. I don’t know any who hate Jehovah’s Witnesses as people. I don’t know any. I mean I I wouldn’t say hate by habit. I have a strong problem with the Watchtower Society and body I don’t hate Jehovah’s Witnesses. Why would I hate those ministers being deluded or deluded because they’ve been being fooled into being hurt you’ll stick them. They’re called victims and I was one of them. Yeah I did. I used to be afraid of apostacy afraid of apostates but you know if something is true you have nothing to fear. Absolutely nothing to fear. So again that new light that comes out well it’s only new light because somebody in Bethel is out there researching more. Which. Why can’t you do that. Why can’t you. If you’re given a if they’re given a body aren’t and spied on fallible. Neither you or I. So why is that opinion not worth more than yours. Right. So that’s all I had to say about that. But yeah I enjoyed this interview to make it’s been good.

[01:50:23] I want to thank Mark for making himself so available that you know he can come on here and tell his story even with the time difference and stayed out late you know telling this story to me as we got on the call. I want to thank Mark for the activism that he does making videos here and there I’ll put a link to his YouTube channel and the resources on the Web site. Mark has also begun Quora. Q You are a fan of some of you who may not know that’s a site where the general public can go and ask questions about things and get answers from experts on various subjects and you know Mark is a great fit there. He likes to get on there and help people understand the truth about the truth as we call it as Jehovah’s Witnesses are actually Jehovah’s Witnesses. If you’d like to continue the conversation you can go to the link in the description for this episode for my site. There you can leave comments for every person that’s interviewed. They’ll see the comments. They can reply you can spark a conversation with them. For some reason the links don’t show up in your podcast that you can go to shun podcasts dot com and on the episodes page you’ll see each one. You also have links for songs that each person chose to represent their journey resources that they mention ways to support the show. Not really just anything you might want or need. Oh and if you visit the site to leave them a comment or check out the resources that he mentioned. I thought I might be fine I’ll even include my favorite verse from the Book of Thomas. I think you’ll like it. It’s amazing.

[01:52:04] If you’d like to learn more about my story and the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses you can listen to my podcast series called ThisJ.W. life or find out more at thisjwlife.com if you’d like to support the podcast. You can do so in a few ways. First I love seeing comments and conversations on the show on podcast dot com website because it supports those that are being vulnerable and open and telling their stories. Second I love seeing five star reviews pop up on iTunes with great comments. It’s encouraging to see and it also helps lend credibility to what we’re doing here so that others might be able to find the show and get help. And finally there is no charge for the show. But if you’d like to make a voluntary contribution to the worldwide work that actually helps somebody and my data friends are going to get why I said it that way you can support the show financially by going to patreon.com/shunned on his 80 hour Eoin and for as little as a dollar a month you can help support the show. All musical support for the show is from Poddington Bear and next month we’ve got a great interview with Fernando. He’s a really fascinating story about being gay in the organization. And you know what that was like how he felt knowing that he was condemned by his very nature inside the cult. So joining us again in June and learn more about him. His journey out of the cult and how his life has gone after losing so much.

[01:53:39] So as always love others do no harm and go be happy.

Brenda Is Shunned By The FLDS.mp3

[00:00:12] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we get to hear stories from people that have been silenced by controlling religious today we’re going to hear from Brenda a woman that is shunned by the FLDS or if you’re unfamiliar the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints the FLDS are a fundamentalist group of religion that are more often known as the Mormons. They’re just a subset of that. They came to be early in the 20th century as a split from the Mormons occurred and they are known for their practice of polygamy which is one of the biggest reasons they split off originally the headquarters was located in Short Creek in Arizona. You’re going to hear many references to short Korek by Brenda. That’s the area she was from short Cricks Short Creek in doing some research and it appears that they have little colonies spread out in different areas of Arizona Utah North Dakota South Dakota Colorado Texas and even British Columbia. According to Wikipedia it is estimated that there are between six and 10000 members and they may even be developing colonies in Oklahoma California and the Mexican state of Sonora. I was a little bit familiar with who the LDS were. I’d seen shows on TV about them at times most notably about their leader Warren Jeffs. Warren Jeffs is their leader even today from prison as he’s serving a sentence of life plus 20 years for felony sexual assault.

[00:01:46] I couldn’t help but be reminded of the show on Hulu called The Handmaid’s Tale as I was listening to Brenda tell her story and apparently this struck a chord with Brenda during the interview so I’m sure there are a lot of things there and she will address during the interview that that are reminiscent you know sadly there are still places in this world even in the developed world where women are still treated this way. This story is amazing. I know that a lot of my listeners are former Jehovah’s Witnesses because you know that’s my background and this all kind of sprang from that. I know that what you’re about to hear is more extreme than what we lived as Jehovah’s Witnesses. But if you look back you know behind it all all the methods and manipulations are very familiar. There’s a lot of crossover that the extremity might be different but the tools and techniques used are often the same. For others this might just be a look in the lives that maybe they led as former members of theF.L. to ask themselves or you know maybe you’ve never been affiliated with any of this and it’s just opening your eyes and and shedding a light on something that that other people are going through and that you will be able to see in the future and have compassion for. So let’s go ahead and get into the interview. Let’s meet Brenda My name is Brendan Nicholson. I am 45 years old. I was an F LDS member. And now I am shamed. All right so then how was it that you came to be in the LDS my parents were actually members of the mainstream LDS church before I was born. And then my father met a man through his job in Southern California.

[00:03:45] He was working at the Boeing plant who was a member of theF.L. the S and through that he found out about the fundamentalist polygamist group there in southern Utah. And I can’t explain how they decided that but somehow he convinced my mother and they decided to convert to that and they moved us to from California to Utah. When I was a baby and so I wasn’t born into it but that’s I mean I didn’t remember anything before that that’s the only life I ever knew. Yeah. So yeah that is quite a quite a feat to I wonder how many people are converted into LDS. Is that something that that happens very often. So about the same year that my family converted another family converted out of Southern California. Also we had no connection with them. It was the Nicholson family and they had also been members of the LDS church. Only John Nicholson the father had somehow this is another story of an Monch Charlie sure how they worked that out. He had taken on a second wife that he met while they were still members of the LDS church so they got excommunicated and then he found out about the fundamentalists. And they also moved from California and joined the LDS and there were a couple other families that I knew of growing up that had converted around the same time. But as far as I know there were very few if any who converted beyond that time. So that was in the early 70s. They aren’t extremely welcoming of new people. You know they aren’t they don’t have a lot of trust for people.

[00:05:52] And the reality is when you if you lay out to people what they’re going to be required to give up there’s not a whole lot of people that are interested. There aren’t a lot of men that are looking for a second or third wife but they’re not really anxious to give up everything to get out. You know there’s other groups to join in a ways to go about that. So there’s not a lot of people that work. Got you. All right so then what was your growing up in this. What was the world view that this LDS religion gave you. I mean I know a little bit about it you know from some research I’ve done online you know Wikipedia and things like that but you know how did it make you see the world. Well basically we were taught that you know the few thousand members of the. At that point when I was growing up we just called it the work or the priesthood work. It didn’t become theF.L. and that stands for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. But we didn’t call it that until I was a little bit older. I think like in the 80s. But basically we were taught that the people who were members of our religion were the most favored of all God’s children. We had been brought there and preserved the entire foundation of the United States was put in place by God to provide a place where we could live our religion in freedom.

[00:07:32] You know a lot of people benefited from that but we were the focus of every historical event led was either inconsequential or on purpose to provide the way for us to live polygamy and follow God’s laws anyone who was not a member of our little group were either gentiles which was people who were never part of the group or didn’t ever believe or apostates and apostates or people who used to believe and leave and they were the absolute worst people in existence. They were considered traitors to God. And the worst people you could spend time around but even the Gentile world we were told they were out to get us. They were all under the control of the devil and the devil would use them in any way he could to stop the work of God to come after us the laws that were put in place were through the inspiration of the devil even laws like underage marriage child labor. That was the devil trying to keep us from being able to teach our kids to work you know and put them in the factories and whatever. So I had a very basically a lot of fear. Everything was there. Everyone was out to get us. The government wanted to come in and tear apart our families and throw our fathers in jail. And we were just had to hold on until the great distractions can wipe half awake. Wow. It’s so it’s so fascinating you know. You know I’m an ex Jehovah’s Witness and a lot of my audience were former members of that faith and so much of this rings true because you know we went through a lot of the same things that you know you had this evil world out there that you were to be in fear of you know fear ruled everything.

[00:09:31] And you know the same definitions you know I am an apostate according to Jehovah’s Witnesses the exact same things. You know we were to be in submission to the rules and laws and dictates of the world governments. But as long as it didn’t go against what they said was God’s law which was cause was Jehovah’s Witnesses law. Yes. Of course their own brand of it. So it’s it’s really fascinating to hear the similarities and just the way that these different so-called spin control and manipulate people through the exact same tactics. So you know there may be differences within the courts. Yeah but when I was in high school Warren Jeffs I remember Warren Jeffs tale telling us how there’s all these different false religions out there. And every one of them thinks they have the truth but how lucky and fortunate and blessed we were to really be the only ones with the truth. And I remember that little doubt popping up in my mind thinking that they all are saying the same thing. So how do I know. But you know everything you know all of the people you know are in this group so you might as well stick with it because what other choice do you have right. Now for you you were even coming into the room. Obviously you were a baby. But how did that impact you you know growing up you know it’s not you’re new into this group. So how do they view you or did you have a hard time kind of getting fitting in. Well when I was younger I mean my mother homeschooled us. We were extremely poor. You know for years my mother didn’t even have a driver’s license.

[00:11:38] And so being outsiders we grew up in Salt Lake. We just lived in a house in a normal neighborhood among the Gentiles. But we weren’t supposed to associate with the Gentiles so we didn’t fit into the world that we lived in. But I also came to understand that we didn’t really fit in to the world of the religion because when I started school at 12 I went to seventh grade. I found out that most of the people the people they already had their groups they had their their little and what it was is these girls that were my age. The people they played with were their own sisters you know they had sisters their same age from other mothers or they were friends with their aunts or their nieces because you have these huge families and you’re all having babies at the same time. And so they all had their family groups they had their friends they had the people they did with that their parents trusted. And there really was no place for an outsider to fit into that world. So that was hard. Also I did make some friends there were a few other families that were smaller families couples that only also had one mother our house only had one mother. They had fewer children and weren’t as integrated in these huge elite names that I did make friends with. But it was quite eye opening to me when I started school. I got put into a grade of a classroom was 24 students.

[00:13:20] There are 12 girls and boys and I was so excited I was going to have 11 best friends because we were all saints and we all grown up the same way and you know the whole religion teaches love and acceptance and we’re all equals. And it didn’t take me very long to realize that basically there is a wide gap between the principles of the gospel that we’re taught and what people were actually living and that was a real wakeup call for me. I had spent my life up to that point just hearing the stories going to church and listening to what was said and believing that this was really how it was because I had nothing to compare it with. So it was a lonely childhood I guess. I mean we had a large family ourselves. But it was. It was hard. I know my mother was always under a lot of stress and I honestly grew up not believing that my parents loved me. I mean I knew they they cared about me but I didn’t feel like they truly loved me and I and I spent a lot of time looking forward to the day when I’d get married because then somebody would love me because God would tell them they had to love me and that is interesting. You know first of all you see that in these cults it seems like there’s always cults within the cults really you know almost all of them are very klick ish and they they all I mean it’s human nature anyway to kind of segment off into groups is just what humans do as part of communities but you just see how it really gets down to the micro level in these cults when you know families become their own calls and Jehovah’s Witnesses had the same thing.

[00:15:19] We didn’t we didn’t have it nearly like what you’re talking about. I mean you’re happier you have an extreme version of that but it yes big families tended to dominate inside the organization. And it was very hard you know as an outsider to to make friends ever feel like you really fit in. And then you have even things like you know inside your own family like you said you felt this lack of love yeah. Well in another part of human nature is that I think we all tend to gravitate towards certain people. And so the more children you have. I mean my father had some definite favorites and it wasn’t me you know. Yeah. And so even you have that. And then you go out to the bigger world where you’re not a favorite and you don’t settle. And when you’re your life and your very salvation depends on being accepted and included. It’s really devastating to feel like you. You don’t know how to change enough or what you need to do to finally break into that inner circle. And it’s so hard because you have these inner circles and really everyone like you is that even with your parents. This disconnect you felt with the ultimately their love their highest love is for the church it’s for them. It’s not. It can’t be for you because you have already given that to something else. Jehovah’s Witnesses. And I’m probably going to butcher this but they had a principle of a gap a love. It was a word you’d think it was in the Greek scriptures and it was to be this it was a love based on principle.

[00:17:22] And when you think about a love based on principle it’s kind of like this. It’s kind of an unfeeling love it’s kind of utilitarian it’s like well you know I gave birth to you therefore I must love you right. It’s very scripted. There’s no real emotion wrong or humanity to it. This is the rule you must love me right now that’s not true love. Right it’s a very dead love. It’s and it’s very unfortunate so no I don’t have to ask your parents do you. Do you have any ideas. Like what. What do you think. If you had to speculate and if you don’t have an answer that’s fine too. But what do you think may have been behind them seeking this out. In other words like a lot of people will seek out very controlling religions because they feel out of control in their life and they’re looking for some sort of a structure that they think maybe will fix their problems. Was there was there something going on. Was there trauma maybe in your parent’s past or something that you think kind of attracted them to as far as I know. I don’t know of anything along those lines. My father was raised very much in the LDS church. Most of that side of the family still are to some degree or another still LDS. My mother was actually raised tend to think I think they were Lutheran but they never really I mean like in name only. She doesn’t remember when I told her she didn’t remember going to church or whatever. She married my father.

[00:19:09] Two weeks after she turned 18 she told me that her parents were not in favor of her marrying my father and so they just waited till after she was 18 and they couldn’t stop her and she also confided in me at one point when I was in high school a really long story but it came down to that she told me that her father had molested her when she was a child that she had at some point told her mother and her mother denied it and basically she was in trouble for having even made such accusations. Looking back on it now I think that that has shaped and coloured her life to a great degree. I mean I’ve learned a lot about the effects that being subjected to sexual abuse have on a child’s mind and on your entire life. Beyond that I when I was younger I thought well my parents were so amazingly faithful. I don’t know if I could have done that. You know having the freedom of of being a gentile and choosing to subject myself to this kind of life especially for my mother. But as time went on and then like it was after I got married my father was finally given his first plural wife. And she is like a year older than me and I remember how weird that was that my father was married to and sleeping with a girl because of caution on my eye and in my eyes she’s just this other girl that I went to school with his younger daughter. I’m the second oldest. My sisters four years older than me. And it was just so weird.

[00:20:57] And that was the closest I had been to seeing polygamy in real life I’d never been close to anyone when they got a new wife. I knew families that had two or three mothers but it’s been that way forever. And after watching him and the way he conducted himself the way he treated his younger wives and what he did to my mother. I have a hard time not thinking that he was all in it for the idea of I can sleep with a bunch of women and say God. And you know growing up in the LDS faith they already had the concept that polygamy was part of their religion and would be lived in the next life so why would it be wrong to go ahead and jump start that now. Yeah and don’t they do the wise you didn’t it’s how old was the first wife or second wife that he had gone well then when he married her. I’m trying to think she must have been in her early 20s in the AFL. There were like these waves they would go where they girls were getting married earlier and earlier and earlier when I was I don’t know maybe 11 or 12. I remember there was a girl that I became aware of that she had gotten married when she was 13 and I remember thinking oh that would be so nice. I’d only have a few more years and I’d be out of my father’s house.

[00:22:27] And then you’d have all these this rash of marriages and they seemed like they’ve got younger and younger girls and then something would happen and the leaders would decide well we’re not doing that and then they’d wait in the next group of girls didn’t start getting married until they were 19 20 21. You know they had been looked at as extreme old maid at one point and then it would go through the cycle again. So after I was married so my younger sisters didn’t get married until they were 20 21 and then it started working its way back down. You know by the time I left I heard about these young girls were getting married at 12 or 18 and it wasn’t something that had never happened before. So it wasn’t like a huge shock to me. At the same time by then I had a daughter who was that age and it terrified me to think of her being taken and given to some old man in a marriage and to be completely honest I kept thinking Yeah I know that they’re marrying these little children. That’s really what they were. But I’m sure that they’re not consummating the marriage. They’re just trying to get these girls into these faithful good girls into a good man’s home. So when everything comes apart and the government comes in to destroy us they’ll be protected I had no idea. Yeah. Yeah. Well you know because it’s it’s hard to. It really is hard to wrap your mind around. Just in doing research you know a little bit before I got on the call I was on your blog maybe which I’ll link to in the show notes but I think there was in one of your recent shows some images of a think she was 12 or 13 year old. Yeah. Yes. She had just turned 12. Yeah.

[00:24:34] And that’s just it’s just. Well it’s a child. Yeah. Yeah. It’s so disturbing. Just. And when you’re when you’re in that and you feel like here and you know that your entire salvation and the salvation of our children and everything in your life depends on you being faithful. You just can’t let your mind go to imagining these men that stand up before you in church and that you trust would do that to a child. You look at your own child and think oh no these are good men. They would never do that. They just put it in them from that. You can’t even comprehend that you just don’t let yourself think. No no no no. You know I think anyone in a court has a lot of cognitive dissonance and you know something like that you would it would be very hard to wrap your brain around your emotions around the fact that that was going on. Because it’s so natural Yeah. It’s a survival tactic really. Yeah can’t allow yourself to think that because it’s so contrary to you know it throws up all kinds of red flags. You and you get to think about it. So you just try not to think about it.

[00:25:46] What I read in maybe maybe this is an all of the because from what I guess from what I read the LDS Church has communities in lots of different cities not just in one particular area but that they were so so obviously because there are you know there’s a 50/50 chance of having a boy or a girl there’s going to be a point at which there’s not enough girls to go around for all of the men that would be in the organization. So they they go the boys at some points in the competition they do of course they never they never put it that way of course. You know we love these boys we would never send my way. But they choose to not follow the rules and we can’t let them be her to corrupt our innocent children whatever you like throwing a football or watching television or something like that. Clearly things just don’t kick them out. Absolutely yeah. You know it’s the boys that just get accused of that. The Lord revealed to the prophet that you had an immoral thought about a girl. Boom. Out you go. Oh wow. And you know there’s no way for you to to argue against that. Because what you’ve been taught your whole life is that’s God telling his prophet that you did that. So instead you internalize it and try to rack your brain. When did I do that. Was it this. And you start becoming your own worst critic and you just yourself implode. You can’t think you can’t function. It’s true. You know I’ve done some research and the whole world over within one percentage point. Birth rates are about 50 50 50. Right. So Mormon fundamentalism. You know Joseph Smith taught a man had to have a quorum of at least three wives to be an apostle I believe there are some different positions in the priesthood hierarchy that you have to have at least be a polygamist or have three wives or more.

[00:27:58] And to get to the highest degree of the celestial kingdom in the next life you have to have at least three wives and you think OK well that’s their beliefs but you have to then step back a minute and think okay that means that two thirds of the males born into these closed societies will not have a girl available for them to even have one wife. They’re all being taken right. And then you know I know one man who has 27 wives. I know my father had three. Warren Jeffs ended up with something like 80. And somewhere I wrote about that too where I listed how many of the wives when he married them they were under 18 you know and by age you’d have Hower. I think there are 20 23 of them under age marrying girls off they’re not old enough to vote. They can’t even have any say in their life in the politics that surround them. Not that we were allowed to do that anyway. How many of them they thought he married before they were old enough to drive you have to kind of put it in perspective in your mind. These girls were so trapped not just mentally and spiritually by the religion they were brought up in but by the laws because society as a whole does not see people as at that age as responsible enough to take on adult responsibilities or they are being married off to men three or four times their age. And they don’t have any rights when it comes down. Yeah that’s horrible. And then even when so I know Warren Jeffs is in prison. Yes.

[00:29:45] I don’t know was for 30 something years or something like that. And I don’t know how old he is. So he’s getting close to 60 I believe and they arrested him in August of 2006. So. And the other thing to mention here is that at least by the time I had left and I think it’s still the same no more marriages have been performed. He wouldn’t allow anyone else to do that. Oh it’s been 11 years. You’ve got members out there. These girls that are in their 30s with no no hope of ever being able to you know for them. They believe that being married and having children is their only value of ever having that happen. You’re not allowed to flirt with anybody you’re not allowed to have feelings. And these are grown women and men who are trapped in this environment and so on the one hand I’ve thought well that’s good. No more underage girls are getting married off. But they’ve torn people apart so much in the way the whole thing is organized or however you want to put it I have a very hard time believing that there isn’t huge amounts of abuse going on. You don’t have to have a spiritual marriage or anything to abuse people who you know or some pretty horrific rumors I can’t I can’t prove it’s true. But it fits.

[00:31:26] I mean with everything that I saw the stories I’ve heard the things I know that were going on that men were doing with you know you’ve got these men that have a handful of wives and they’re still molesting their daughters when they’re told they can’t have sex with their wives anymore they’re not going to because they know that that wife is also going to report. She understands that if they try the wife will tell on them now but you are going to create this hyper sexualized culture than for the men yes. And’s the men no longer are having sex with their wives because they’re their wives belong to Warren Jeffs now or he said Now sex so if you if you don’t qualify if you don’t follow the rules well enough then you get kicked out. I mean there’s been so many men that were sent away to repent and maybe you go and some by some miracle you figure stuff out enough that they allow you to come back but as soon as you get sent away then you’ve lost priesthood. And if you don’t have priesthood you have no right to hold onto your wives or children or your baptism or anything else that the church. You know that’s an ordinance right. So you know it back years ago they were really reorganizing families you know they’d kick a man out and then divide his wives and children up and marry them to other men. Now they don’t shortages. So they have caretakers and you’ll have some men. Sometimes it’s some young boy because you know at 12 you can get the priesthood and you now have more authority than any female so you’ll have your twelve year old boy put in charge of this household of women and children and women. So we left in March of 2012. And my husband and I had been found unworthy. So that meant that he no longer had the priesthood.

[00:33:37] Our marriage was no longer valid or baptisms we we weren’t members of the church and we were told by Lyle Jeffs in our meeting that now that we were no longer for anyone unworthy more than a handshake with your husband or wife or anyone would be adultery that would classify as adultery. And before long they qualified it even further and he said the handshake had last no more than three seconds. So you’ve got these men who have grown accustomed to having a group of women at their beck and call who are all desperate for some love and attention. They do you know each one of them is totally honed in on him and what he wants and what they can do when favor all of a sudden that’s all stripped away. And he’s not supposed to be doing anything right. So everyone’s desperate to gain their salvation. He knows he can’t go to his wives even if they’re all still living in the same house. They’re no longer allowed to do anything. If he does something with that wife he’s a huge risk even suggesting of her reporting in her letters that she has to send in that he was trying to be immoral because she’s got to confess or she could be sent out. He’s now in trouble. He understands that his wives know what is and isn’t OK. So instead they turned to these children who have been raised with no education. They don’t know how their own bodies work. They don’t know that they have any rights and they can easily because they’ve been taught to revere men and priesthood tell them the Lord told me this is what we’re supposed to.

[00:35:27] This is a preparation for the day when you’re when we’re allowed to have marriages again. All that kind of stuff I’ve actually heard stories of men doing these things meant yes. And these children don’t have a clue. They don’t feel like it’s right. But it got to a point where nothing happened in our lives felt right. Anymore you couldn’t use that as a determination. Do you know if you don’t yeah they take away or you trust in your own your own thoughts and feelings. That was something that we were taught to not trust our own hearts because the hardest treacherous who can know it. And so you know when you when you can strip a person from their own their own internal conscience essentially you can insert your influence to become their conscience. So it sounds like that’s what’s happened here. Absolutely yeah. Oh there’s a lot of stories I could tell but even if I didn’t give names if the people involved heard they’d know I was talking about and that they would not go well for me. It’s it’s sickening. It really is. And it was hard enough when I was part of it. But after I stepped away. So when I left I actually honestly believed that Warren Jeffs was still the most paramount on earth because they told they drilled into us everyday that he had perfected himself sitting there in prison and that we the people were the ones at fault for him still being held there because we were supposed to you know once we became worthy of God’s blessings.

[00:37:15] He would deliver a Warren from prison and we’d been told that each one of us held a key and we all had to be able to be worthy to unlock the prison that would let him free. And it was really hard for me because once I realized that there were no marriages with him in prison I had the realization that as long as he has in prison I didn’t have to fear that my husband was going to walk through the door with some young girl as a plural wife. And it’s really really hard to truly exert all the fervency of your soul when you feel like you’re praying against your own best interest. If he was there I was safe did I really want him out yet right. I wanted one more day of knowing that I was the only person in my husband’s life that I didn’t have to watch him revolve in love with some other woman or girl wrote and about it. But it does something to your psyche to feel like I I’m so weak that I’m not willing to live my own religion that I claim I believe in and my unwillingness to suffer a little bit or sacrifice is keeping our prophet trapped in prison. And it’s horrible the guilt that you feel. Isn’t that amazing how these people or groups these people who have victimized so many people somehow flip it all around so where they are the poor abused victim. It’s absolutely it’s mindblowing. So how. Let’s look at how how this kind of like develops so like you’re a kid and you’re in this organization this cult.

[00:39:12] How is it that they are drilling this into your head you know like what was your life like at home at school when you did eventually go to school or in the church like how did it how did all of that kind of coalesce to to strip you of all of that how did it indoctrinate you. What was that indoctrination process. Well you first of all any time you get involved in a culture or even some of the way a lot of the religions work they work hard to make sure that your religious dogma surrounds you in every area of your life. So like I say we didn’t do much with other people. When I was growing up you know until I was twelve or so. So we had our own. We were supposed to have our own Sunday schools. My father would read Bible stories or Book of Mormon stories and they drill into you know this is what happens to the wicked and this is how God feels about those who don’t follow his rules. And we you know they use fear. Absolutely. You know that we’d been told that the end of the world as we knew it was going to come on or before the year 2000. So you have that at home. And then you go to church and you hear that a whole lot more. And then I started school. They make they have their own private schools. They leave. Fill them with their teachers and our curriculum was 100 percent had to be approved and run through Warren Jeffs and his father Rulon Jeffs who was the prophet at that time.

[00:41:00] You know I had our books had pictures cut out of them or they buy one book and alter the pictures and black things out and then run off copies so that you didn’t see pictures of kids in short sleeves or girls doing things girls weren’t supposed to do. You know girls don’t have jobs they didn’t have careers. You were supposed to be a mother. The only and greatest aspiration a girl had was to become a worthy mother in Zion. That was it. And in school they had a shoot. I can’t remember I think it was like half hour 45 minute class our morning devotional that started we opened the school day with Warren Jeffs was the principal and he taught most high school classes. And so you’d have that well back up a little bit. We had been told they printed sermons of Leroy Johnson. He was the prophet before Rulon Jeffs whose prophet when I was a child and we had been told that every man should own a set of those and that they should have classes every morning and every night and read a sermon to their families and you’d just keep going through the books so you’d start your day. You’re supposed to have your personal prayers then you’d go have family prayer and listen to a sermon you had prayers at your meals you’d go to school. It opened with prayer. You sat through 45 minutes or however long of Warren Jeffs reading sermons. We were assigned to read two chapters of the book of mormon every night write out a lesson and then we discuss it and more in class the next day. You know you had prayer for lunch you had prayer for to end the school day. You had prayer when you got home.

[00:42:49] And everywhere you turned there were men in suits generally telling you the same story. Turning your heart to the prophet your wicked if you look at the boys or the boys look at the girls you’re supposed to treat each other like snakes dangerous snakes because they had arranged marriages they couldn’t have you liking a boy your own age. Some old men might want you and that would mess the whole system up. No Robert he isn’t who he really was. I remember yeah and I remember as I got older seeing things on the news or whatever where people were saying that the winner and the FLC asked for just chat and I was so offended. How dare they. How dare they say that. I had my choice and I chose to obey. And now I look at it and like you know that’s how blind Schley making them. They make you convinced to fight against your own survival and that you’re happy about it. You know it’s it’s amazing the similarities between all the. Is it so amazing that they that they can strip you’re your basic desires and humanity away from you like that. And then at the same time make you feel like you have your basic desires and matter. Exactly. It’s amazing because we did this thing being I mean I used to get offended when people would say people use it’s all Jehovah’s Witnesses. They would tell me that you’re brainwashed and brainwashed. I can I can leave the day if I can do anything I want. And it’s you know exactly. It’s so crazy.

[00:44:30] And look I go wow I so brainwashing you an old rain. I was a broken watch. And it’s it really is incredible the amount of power they have. It is the further it the more generations I’ve been doing some study about generational trauma and basically well it’s hard because for me I grew up in the Gentile world to some degree. There was our little family there the 13 houses on the street. I grew up in was my world. And we were surrounded by gentiles and we had things almost everyday to reassure us that the things we were being taught was true. We had some families on our street that refused to let their children talk to us because we were those gross polygamists. There was World was wicked. They were shunning us when we were really the righteous ones. So growing up. So then you didn’t. I guess I always thought that the Avoda as essentially had many campaigns that would you want to call it and that everyone lived kind of within those walls then that’s not true. No. When I was growing up we had of course the short creek we always call it short Creek. It’s the twin towns down on the border of southern Utah and northern Arizona. It’s actually the Tulsidas Hilldale Arizona side as Colorado City and it was a community. The church owned all the property. Every place every home built there every building everything was consecrated was church property which meant the church had the right to kick you out if they felt like you weren’t following the rules even if you built your own house.

[00:46:19] You turned it over to the church and they could take it. Everybody was okay with that because for years and years that was understood we all agreed with it but it never happened. You just grow up in your house and it was kind of like a formality. Yeah that’s Thurbert nothing’s ever gonna happen with it. So because the church owned all the property they also controlled who lived there so it was only people who were members of the church there weren’t walls around it. Not physical walls but those psychological walls are far more powerful. Oh yeah yeah. You said there were gentiles on your screen gentiles were outsiders right. Yes but I grew up in the Salt Lake Valley I didn’t grow up in community so there is the short Creek group. There was the salt lake group which there are fewer of us but we’re just scattered throughout the valley. Rulon Jeffs had a big piece of property there at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon. We used his home for the school. That’s where we had our meetings. It had a big wall around it and of course we always looked at it as being somewhat symbolic of the protection that that the church and God gave us that kept the bad people out we were safe there. And then there’s also a community in just over the border up north in Canada and they had more of their own community as well. But for those of us who grew up in Salt Lake we did grow up you know surrounded by the outside world.

[00:47:58] We went to the store with all the gentiles we know but in a way that actually was worse because you were in contact with it. It made it where you. You didn’t trust the people because you were taught to never trust them while they were your next door neighbors. I absolutely agree. Jehovah’s Witnesses are allowed to be in. You know we had normal quote normal lives. You know we went to public schools at times or we you know works in the world or whatever and you know we even went to you know football games or basketball games or to the park or whatever you know around other people. Yeah. But you were taught to see things in such a way that it always reinforced your beliefs you would see some kid acting out and oh well there you go see those world kids are not being disciplined they’re not being taught right that. And so yeah it really it really does create that prison of your own your own mind and your own emotions. Yeah. Well when I was a teenager we moved to a different house in a new neighborhood in Salt Lake and I and my younger sister went through the experience of having the old man. I mean I say old he had a son my age he is probably as early forties I have no idea maybe of 30s that we had in my window at night in the summer and that man would go in his room sometimes in his bedroom and flip on the light and be in there totally naked. You knew we were there and it terrified me. He would I mean that was the first time I’d ever seen a naked man especially in that condition. But it was just another reinforcement.

[00:49:54] Oh my word there right. That’s the kind of evil men that live in the world and the devil knew that we were these good girls and so he inspired that man to expose himself to us. And it just it just makes you isolate yourself even further. And there’s been a lot of talk lately about how we need to decriminalize polygamy because it being illegal is why people are isolated. You know these people would love to report abuse but they don’t dare because if they report abuse their dad will go to prison for being a polygamist. But all I can say having grown up in it I have never yet spoken to another person or woman whatever who ever voiced to me that they lived in fear of being prosecuted for polygamy. Never. Not one because it just doesn’t happen anymore. At this point I have had my own feelings. I’ve seen other people where the fear was that we can’t let this be be known what’s going on in our communities because then the world would say that that’s what we are and we’ve got to protect the image of the church and our prophet above all nuns. Oh it is. And I can remember as a Donald when I was living in short Creek later and watching the things going on and and hearing that rhetoric and thinking well what do you mean the world will think that’s who we are. That is who we are. And you think to change it. We’re just seeing it right.

[00:51:35] And the reality is it’s like I was trying to explain to someone so what you’re telling me is that people know that abuse is happening. They won’t report it because they don’t want Uncle whoever or dad to go to prison because they’re polygamists. Otherwise they would report the abuse. Do they not understand that if they report the abuse the guy is going to prison or should go to prison for sexually abusing children. It’s not about that they fear prosecution or persecution for polygamy. Polygamy is unsustainable especially in today’s world it is impossible for one man to support the other one man. I know men like my father even. And that’s a pretty small number. He had three wives. Right. Twenty three children. One man can’t make it can’t work a job that provides that many people with the necessities of life. And that’s you know and that’s looking at the financial end of it that while he’s trying to provide the financial end of life for that many people he’s not there to provide IMO Oceanus support. He’s not connected to those wives and children and a lot of men it’s like you know what when they go home. It’s this nonstop whining. This Wife wants that that wife wants that these kids are a problem and they just don’t know how to deal with it also. They’re happy to be off working. Yes. Yet you isolate yourself for several reasons. One they want to have their own private schools. They don’t want they will never have their children out and free in your world because that would put in their mind the idea that you know things like It’s OK to date it’s OK to wear pants for girls.

[00:53:34] It’s ok all of those things the world the ideas is what they’re protecting their children from. So even if polygamy was legal that’s not going to change. They’re not going to start sending their kids to public school. Warren Jeffs and men like him are not going to march there twelve year old up to the city hall and get a marriage license. None of that is going to change the welfare fraud is going to keep happening. Yes and the mist and the brains of each other aren’t in it. So isn’t it from what I read. So then the husband has one legal wife. Yes. Was in all of the I guess the sister wives then are essentially single mothers. And so then they apply for government assistance and get that and then I guess they all pull it together and yet support the household Exactly. So like you’ll have a man owns a business it’s a very profitable business. He makes a lot of money. That’s how he maintains his house and his fancy truck and all the cars in the House and whatever. He has one legal wife and sometimes they’ll even like send a bunch of young boys to work in one of their companies pull all their hours together and they’re not old enough to work there so they will cut a check in the name of the legal wife even though she never really sets foot in the building. But that way. That’s how they pay for it. It keeps the money out of the hands of these young boys. They’re told that they should do that to help support their father’s family and be good Priester people.

[00:55:14] And so the on his legal wife can show this income they rip. They file their taxes whatever. Then he has all these other wives and they’re groups of children who are being supported by him as far as they’re living in the house he pays for. He pays for their utilities. He makes sure they have a car. He provides their clothing and all of that but they don’t report any of that. They go and they as far as the government looks at it. They’re on equal footing with Mary who is truly a single mother who has to try to take care of her kids her house all those things but they show no income. They claim themselves as single mothers they they don’t report who the father is. Otherwise the father should be good being gone after for child support and that sort of thing. So then you have a house where the man’s bringing in the money you’ve got boys out very often working under age that brings in some more money and then the rest of the family is all on getting the maximum benefits they can as single mothers and children of single mothers who have no income. You mean they don’t have any other name that they don’t have a car. Yeah they all have a bunch of kids. Well I don’t even have a car. Look I have nothing in my name.

[00:56:40] And so they can get cash assistance sometimes and it’s it’s unfair it’s but they feel good about it because all these stupid laws you know that make it so kids can’t go to work we can’t put our kids in a coal mine when they’re 10. Those reps hired by the devil. So it’s OK if you as long as you don’t get caught if you can play the system because the Lord wants us to have the best of everything and the system is evil and ran by the devil anyways so taking them that you know how how can that be bad. Are you taking from the devil systems. Now. I’ve known men who you know they’ve got three wives and they’re not connected financially you know there as far as so you’ll have the man and his legal wife will rack up all the debt they can buy everything they want. File Bankruptcy. During that time the other wives have credit cards and they’re buying things so they still have credit and they’ll go on a cycle where between the three of them and they can each file bankruptcy every seven years. They’re just spending as much money as they can with no intent of paying it back and then filing bankruptcy. So you have a new set of you know you could file bankruptcy as a fan as whoever is bringing in all the credit every two or three years each one of you only doing it every seven. I mean I I remember talking to a man who showing people at the company this fancy new camera he bought. And people like how you can afford that. He’s like well the Lord wants us to have nice things. We’re following his laws and this is what I do. And he didn’t even feel guilty or any kind of shame in telling us all this is what I do. And people say oh wow that’s cool.

[00:58:40] And basically it’s just in so many areas. Every facet of it is unhealthy. Yeah that’s what I was going to say. I mean it seems honestly like I guess I would ask if you were to look back on that life was there are good times. Were there times where were there benefits to in any way were there. Well it was a habit that you look at it differently. Yeah when you’re in the middle of it you see everything from the lens of what you know. I remember as a child thinking Man I wish that we had a whole bunch of mothers because in my mind I’m picturing you know many copies of my mother who didn’t put together in my mind the fact that each of those mothers would then come with that eventually their own group of kids killed my mother was overwhelmed. You know she is trying to solve all of our clothes from scraps and pieces of fabric the outside gentile family members would send she is trying to figure out how to feed us all on next to nothing. She is trying to figure out what bills to pay to try to keep something from being cut off. I know several times we had our power cut off or our water cut off because we couldn’t afford the bill. She would be so tied up and so stressed out and I would think Man Too bad we don’t have more mothers because then I could just go to another mother to help me.

[01:00:18] And you have this idyllic picture in your mind of what polygamy is and you have all these mothers who love you and who will take care of you. So says one great big happy family and besides how awesome would it be to have like sisters that were your best friend that were your own age kids. I grew up lonely I didn’t have anybody my age I didn’t have friends. And so when I started to see the realities of what most if not all the polygamous homes were like. It was shocking to me. You’ve got always simmering under the surface at least under the surface sometimes it breaks into these big fights but that jealousy that competition between youths between mothers and you’ve got you know the man will pick a wife is his favorite. He treats her better the children of the other wives see that their mother is hurt and they hate the kids of that mother that is favored or the mother that gets it has a job and goes and buys her children all new shoes. But father says there’s no money for any of the other children to have shoes. And that causes rivalries and feelings between the wives. And when some other woman comes along and you felt like had a pretty good relationship with your husband and now he favors her and her kids get everything and your kids have been cast aside I’ve watched so many times as women take out their frustrations that they didn’t dare take out on their sister wife on that woman’s children. You treat them and you get popsicles and you only give to your kids. They’re her kids she got stuff before and it creates this hostile environment is very stressful.

[01:02:07] And you’re thinking about the notes in their bedrooms because they can’t deal with each other and the stress and each other’s children. So then you’ve got these hoards of children who really don’t you know they’ve got three four or five mothers but nobody who’s really engaged with them and helping them figure out and navigate life. You’ve got older siblings required to raise their younger siblings and there gets to be some resentment involved. They want to go do something fun instead they’re raising their sister. Why are there other mothers kids for her. You know a lot of people say oh I loved it. We grew up with this huge family. And so yeah there was that I didn’t grow up in a huge family. My mother ended up having ten children which is a pretty big family. You know we are all year. You know I didn’t have anybody my age. My older sister four years older. My next sister was three years younger. And you know there’s a lot of people will say it’s awesome. You know if I want to go on a trip with my husband if he wants to take me somewhere I don’t have to find a babysitter or worry about anything because I just leave my kids home with their other mothers. They don’t have to have their schedule interrupted. Everything is wonderful. But the reality that I witnessed was Yeah husband takes wife number two. He goes out yet the other wives all are jealous. They feel bad.

[01:03:42] They would love to go on a trip but they’re left on and a lot of times they take their frustration and their anger out on the children of that other wife that’s off having a party. And they’ll treat those children poorly or you know I don’t I won’t say that it can’t work and that there that is impossible. But from everything I’ve ever witnessed read all the people I’ve ever talked to I’ve never seen a case where it truly did work. I can’t see how it could. I assume that you know some situations are better than others and absolute. Maybe some people are just better equipped for better or more laid back or whatever. I don’t know. But the power dynamics there are just I mean there’s so many ways for that to go horribly wrong for everyone. And it’s all coming through this misogynistic patriarchal system that has already put women down about as far as they can go. Yeah. It’s just it’s I don’t know. Have you ever seen the. There’s a show called The Handmaids too. Yes I actually just finished watching that I had to watch it. And he said yes Família. I could imagine I had to move my wife was interested in watching it. She had a wisdom tooth surgery and she was like hey let’s you know this show has been clean let’s try to binge watch this while I’m down you know with my surgery. And I could I had to I could watch one episode and then I needed you know like I can binge this over the course of the Loban I’ve got to take a break because it is it is a heavy thing and I can’t and it hasn’t lived. You know it was you know of course it was so extreme.

[01:05:41] No I’m not saying that it was that extreme but so many of the elements of it. Yes. You know you’re left with you realize you haven’t breathed for a while you realize that you feel those anxiety coming back you feel those icy fear that grips your heart and you’re all of your insides turned into knots and it’s like I’ve been on the other side of that facial expression you know I’ve gone along through life. Well we women interacted with each other. All of us with our fake keep sweet smile pasted on our face that never quite makes it to your eyes. You know you got the smile on your lips but you look into each other’s eyes and there’s that pain and you have that understanding and acknowledgement that we’re all hurting that we’re smiling and this is our choice and they brought up and it was. Yeah I watched it it was really hard. And then there’s an episode I can’t remember ever. I actually just looked it up a few days ago and we watched the part but they were going to put these handmaids on display in front of the dignitaries from these other countries to show them they were happy. And they start calling off the Serena. Joy comes in and tells them to get rid of the damaged ones to send the damaged ones away. And I just because we were damaged you know they have physical damage. The rest of us it was psychological emotional damage. You didn’t smile enough. We can’t let people see you. You go back in the House. Kind of a thing. You know we’re going to put on display the women that can smile.

[01:07:26] No matter what. But then they started calling you know it was really striking to me when it first sunk in that like the main character is of a friend of Fred. She belongs to. You no longer have your own identity. You’re his property. But in the other scene they start calling out these names and they had of Warren of Lyle of John of Tim the woman in charge of these of these handmaid is Aunt Lydia and we were required to call women and we were Ben’s property and Aunt Lydia in the AFL this was a amazing woman who was the midwife who delivered all these babies. But it was just such a you know she wasn’t an evil person but it was like why did they have to call her Aunt Lydia and then you’ve got the you know the whole the connections of stuff it was just it was hard to get through. I cried a lot imagine you exude can’t imagine having lived something like that. And then you know what they say. The truth is stranger than fiction. You know I mean there’s so much at absolute you. This is heartbreaking. So did you even look at the similarities with the women you know the wives they had these strict rules and you were required to be there as part of this ordinance. You know that read the Bible verse amounts to try to impregnate the handmaid and she’s under all these strict requirements everybody is watching she has to follow the rules.

[01:09:09] And the men are sneaking around having a separate relationship not with the hand wives that handmaidens but they’re going to these parties where there’s drinking and drugs and I thought that’s so true on the outside there’s this this fake front of these righteous pure men and they try to make us all understand they’re the real victims. Have you ever tried dealing with the emotions of a bunch of women. I need a break you know to be able to have my prime rib dinner that my family can never have a bite of. And those type of things. It was it was the closest thing I’ve ever seen to any the cult culture and life and consequences being portrayed on film. So then you how did you do things progressed for you. You’ve been indoctrinated in this way and then you know you’re just a child but you know because you came in kind of differently. You’re lonely you don’t have this family with people of your own age. There’s you some separation there as you go through your teen years than you know. Are you anticipating you know like I know I know you talked about looking forward to getting married because then you would have have a love and it would just be for you it would be maybe the love that your parents didn’t give you. Yeah. When you when you’re you know going through your middle a mental age here mid teen years your middle teenage years and starting to approach you know that that I guess marriageable age at least at that time in the calls. You know what’s going through your head. How are you. How are you feeling as you get closer to that are you. Are you excited are you. You know how’s that feel.

[01:11:11] What is that like. Well I have to say I had extremely mixed feelings on it depending on the day or what my where my mind was. My older sister had gotten married and she married Rulon Jeffs son and that gave me a whole different window in to what it was actually be like to get married you know before it’s like this fairytale imagination of what I was going to do what my life be like. And then he was around and I didn’t I felt uncomfortable with how flirty and forward he acted toward me. And I had as at that point I had started noticing that married men were that way. Quite often you’d get the feeling that they were looking you over and sizing you up you know seeing where you might fit into their collection kind of that’s the feeling I would get. And it was uncomfortable. And yeah if a boy dared an unmarried boy dared look your way. There were severe consequences. You know you get sent away you could get corrected. It was like once you got married then your morals could all go out the window and it was OK. And so I would imagine that most girls had the same type of a thing and I know you didn’t very often dare voice it to anyone but you start building this mental blacklist of people you knew you weren’t allowed you. You hope to marry anyone or to set your heart on anyone. But I felt like it was OK.

[01:12:52] As I looked around I was making this mental list of who I hoped I would not be told to marry you know creepy uncle whoever that absolutely freak you out. You’re like how dare you be looking at me in that way. I know you’ve got two wives at home and if you married me I’d just be the next one in the collection while you’re out looking all the other girls right. And there are a lot of cases where sisters. Same person. And I did not want to marry my brother in law. He was like I didn’t want to. And so you have that the anticipation hoping you have on the one hand it could be good you could marry a nice guy. You might not be one of 30 wives so that you actually have an individual meaning to this man. And you know wrecking the family you know coming along as the new wife. And at the same time there was this whole list of things that you saw around you that go wrong. What if you married a guy that didn’t like you. What if you married a guy whose wives hated you and treated you bad. What if you got told to marry the father of a boy that you had a crush on in high school. How is that supposed to work. You know. So it became a lot more complex as I grew up and got older and you start to have a little bit better comprehension of what you’re actually facing and what your possibilities are. When I was younger I didn’t know anybody in the group I’d go to church look around and see all these very nice people and girls and their beautiful dresses.

[01:14:26] And it was just it almost felt like this you know you were part of this big community this big family. And that is the one thing that I miss is that you did feel like there’s always somebody that had your back or the church was always there. Anything really bad happened you have some backup or at least you believed you did. Then I watched things happen where that those things did happen and the church was like huh. You must have sinned go your way and figure it out. But it just the whole thing shifted in my mind. I started to see the world from a different lens. And I no longer believed that getting married was going to be the answer to all my problems. That is automatically God telling some man he had to love me and that he would right. There was a really scary scenarios out there that you didn’t know if you could be part of. And a lot of men you’d never seen in your life and never met you could be told you’re getting married to some guy and Shark Creek or Canada and they track you off. You meet the guy get married and all a sudden you’re sleeping with him and trying to fit into his family. No you you’re absolutely terrifying. I mean I can’t imagine this mostly at that age you know being you’re being pushed in that way. You know your life is clearly not your own. It belong to the church it belongs to the men and women whom you can be dropped off to some other man so you know that’s just there’s no stability.

[01:16:00] You don’t you know you want to believe there’s all these rules set out. And I for me I reached a point where it was just it was all too much when I was a teenager. At one point I got quite depressed. I actually attempted suicide. And when you get to that point in your life there’s no words to describe how disappointed you feel in yourself when you wake up the next morning you realize you can’t kill yourself right. You didn’t even succeed at that. But it did give me a new I thought OK. OK. I prayed so hard all my life. Apparently Heavenly Father protected me and didn’t allow my efforts to be successful so this must mean that he’s giving me another chance. I have to make this work. There’s no easy out for me. And so I double down and I thought Okay the one thing that’s awesome about the gospel is that there’s all these promises and they’re set in stone and we’re told that God does not lie. And he says if this then that. So all I have to do is make sure I the best of my ability to do all that if I’m going to be obedient. I’m going to submit myself to the priesthood I’m going to raise my kids right. I’m going to sacrifice everything. Anything that comes along I’m going to show God I’m going to make up for the mistakes the past I’m going to do this and that’s how I lived. You know you have to try to push the thoughts the doubts out of your mind. No you just I believe in God. Yes people you know.

[01:17:45] And that’s another thing I hear a lot from people who are in different religions. Well God is perfect on the church’s right. People have their weaknesses. So you can’t judge God based on what Brother so-and-so does. Yeah he gets up in front of the church and says he’s telling you what God wants but if he’s molesting his girls in the background that’s not God’s fault. It doesn’t change what he told you was true. I was really a mess. Yeah. Oh is it really messes with your mind. And there’s you can’t trust yourself. You just have to almost mechanically keep plugging along. What are the rules. What have I been told. Yes. I think about that. I just have to keep plowing straight ahead and ignore all the red flags that are jumping up. Those are the devil trying to internist out that doubling down thing is something that a lot of Jehovah’s Witnesses do at different times usually when they’re there dissonance kicks in and they’re starting to see that this isn’t what it was portrayed as. And it’s like we try we always tried to force ourselves to believe whatever it was. And yet you know if only I double down then then that will make everything OK. It’s essentially just escapism it’s escaping into into the activities of the church to try to distract your own mind from the realities. But you know with you you know you double down you know how does that progress then as as you know you eventually aid a little bit to the point where you do meet you know your eventual husband.

[01:19:24] Well when I was I’d say around I think I was better than I was about 12. My father was working at a company that where a lot of other men in the church worked. And so through that he met other people and the guys would have these evenings where they’d go to a park and the guys all get together and play baseball. And he couldn’t we never left the house. But if he went sometimes he would bring us and then your mother could sit and watch the guys play baseball some of the other men Brolsma their families and that gave us an opportunity to get out and see other people. And then we started going to some different gathering’s. There’s a man in the church who likes to put together things he would rent a roller skating rink. And we can all go. And it was just our people and we’d play music that was appropriate you know and course there are always adults and parents there to watch make sure boys and girls weren’t intermingling too closely or anything like that. But these gatherings we all went to a park. You know everybody brought their own picnic lunch or whatever on a weekend. And there is this huge gathering of people in the Salt Lake area and my parents got introduced to the Nicholson family. And it was they both of them mothers and a couple of their older girls taught at Alta Academy and so through getting to know their family they convinced my parents that they really should put us into school. And I think part of their motivation was that they saw that my mother was just totally overwhelmed.

[01:21:09] You know every time she is pregnant she got severe morning sickness the whole time as she is trying to do everything and be everything. And so not only did she would it be great for her to have that one burden removed but give us. I’m sure that they saw all of us extremely backward awkward children. Oh those poor things we need to socialize them somehow. So then we started going to school when I was in seventh grade and we became really good friends with the Nicholsons and so you know by the time from the time I was like twelve and their son David was 14 we interacted a lot our families together. And huge long story but then we both ended up working at the same machine shop together and we liked each other and we had to be really careful if you like someone you have to be sure that you’re willing to do whatever the Lord requires you to do. And my father became aware that we liked each other and it was a huge deal to him and in the end I went and talked to Uncle Rulon and poured my heart out to him about how I felt and why and that I really truly did want to do whatever God required of me and the hard time I’ve had growing up isolated and going to school and never having any friends and that life had been tough. And I wasn’t wanting to do anything wrong but I felt like I just no matter how hard I tried. I was always on the wrong end of things my dad was always upset with me and he was accusing me of every evil you could imagine.

[01:23:03] At one point I remember him telling me that he knew that I was no longer clean and pure he’d do that I was no longer a virgin. He didn’t know how many men I’d been with or how far I’d gone or who I’d been with. But he was just extremely disappointed in me and wanted me totally. I had to confess so that he could help me. I had never even held hands with a boy and it didn’t matter how many times I told him I haven’t done anything he would hang his head and shake his head at me and say things like I don’t understand. On top of all that you’ve done why you would lie about it. And that’s what actually brought me to the point of being suicidal because I felt like I had I couldn’t defend myself. It be one thing if I’d done something wrong. Yeah yeah. You can’t win and I felt like I couldn’t win. And you know I’d spent by that point five years in school having it drilled into my head that our fathers confidence in us was life that the prophet trusted our good fathers and us. And your father needed to have confidence in you. And when he went before the prophet said I have confidence in this son or daughter than the prophet would automatically have confidence in you and you know your life would be on the right track. And I couldn’t get my father to believe me. He was my priesthood head and he thought I was a whore and no matter how many times I told him I hadn’t done anything he wouldn’t believe it.

[01:24:42] And so it it ended up when I went to talk to Uncle rule and I finally I finally it took a long time to convince him to take me and he told me. When I asked him he said no he wouldn’t take me because Uncle Rulon didn’t want people like me in his home and that cut me so deep because I thought you don’t even know what kind of a person I am. I’ve I haven’t done anything wrong I’ve lived my whole life trying to do the right things and be a good priesthood girl. So then when we got there at the appointment he parks the car and said Now before we go in I want you to understand that when we get in there you need. And they mother Marilyn calls you back from my appointment. You need to stay in the living room where they would have you wait until I ask Uncle real and he says I didn’t dare tell him that I was bringing you and I need to ask him if it’s OK that you’re here and all I could think was Are you kidding me. If you truly believe that do you think it’s better that you brought me into his house and then ask forgiveness instead of asking him ahead of time. But it was so hurtful because I thought I’ve done nothing wrong. So at that point because I’d already been through it so many times with him he’d come down in my room and he’d make all these accusations and I’d plead my case and tell them I hadn’t done anything and he’d shake his head at me and that was all I could see in my mind.

[01:26:24] And so I thought this is not just my salvation or not just my life but my salvation on the line. I believed I was going to step in and speak to a man who communed with God and I needed to be able to be open and tell him everything I wanted. This whole burden off my chest. I wanted to know if I was wicked and what I needed to do to fix it or if I was okay. And I at that point couldn’t imagine how I could sit and pour my heart out with my father sitting there shaking his head at me lying got quiet. And so I mustered up all the bravery that I could find. And I said when we go in there I want to talk to him alone. And my father was so angry. He said that’s not right. And Uncle Roland’s not going to like it. And I was I felt like I was just at the end of my rope. I had nothing else to lose. Lesson will you at least just ask. So we went in and he got called back and he went back a few minutes later he walked out and said Uncle Ruland said to send you in. This isn’t right. And I remember thinking uncle ruling’s said How are you judging him and saying were right. You know who is the bad one. So overwhelmed. I felt like here I am 19 years old. I feel like my whole life was going in the toilet and I had to speak up.

[01:27:57] I couldn’t just let him accuse me of these things I had to to be able to have a chance to say my piece and I wanted to know from God if I was truly wicked and if I’d seen some way that I was unaware of. So I went in and I sat across the desk and poured out my heart told him all the sins I could ever think of that I’d ever committed. All the things I’d done wrong all about how David and I had been talking about how sometimes that night when I was overwhelmed I’d climb out my bedroom window and go for walks in my neighborhood. And David didn’t live too far away and one day he came driving by and saw me and we stood out on the street and talked in the middle of the night and how evil that was. I know and I apologized and I repented. And when it all came down to the end he told me that I hadn’t done anything wrong and that he understood how I felt and that in his position he had to ask girls when they came and said they were ready to be married which I had done like three months before this. He was he had asked us Do you have anyone in mind. He says I need I don’t need you to lie. It’s not about saying that the answer needs to always be No. He says sometimes girls are allowed by God to have some idea of where they’re going to go because maybe it makes it easier for them to accept where they’re headed. So I ask that yes. And then you need to tell me if you had anybody in mind or any of these kind of feelings or ideas.

[01:29:33] So then I can take it to God. And if you write wonderful we’re on the path we send you off where you need to go and if you’re wrong then you understand that it’s something you need to be able to get past. If you’re willing to accept Godswill and it was like the weight of the world was taken off my shoulders. God said I was OK. And in that moment it didn’t matter what my father thought or anybody else thought but the result of that was that that was on a Tuesday I believe I got married. David My were married a couple days later uncle Rulon said he took it to the Lord and he felt very good that that was where I belonged. And the problem with that was when I was ready to leave Ruland Jeffs office that day he said to me I don’t want you to tell your father what we talked about in here. He says I’ll take care of it. Don’t tell him this is none of his business which was like holy cow because he’s my priest head. But at the same time when I was like he wasn’t doing me any favors I just wanted to be taken care of. So I was like OK you know I was good with that. I didn’t really want to tell Father that I had told Uncle ruin everything or have him questioned me.

[01:31:06] But I don’t know if Uncle really never said anything I have no idea anything from that point on other than I found out just a few years ago that my father from that time on has told everyone that David and I had to get married because we had had sex and then asked to marry David and I was a virgin on my wedding night and I didn’t even know he was telling people that I was one of my younger sisters told me maybe a year or so ago. She’s like I just wonder what really happened with you and David because father always told us this and it was like someone stabbed me to the heart. Horrible. And I was like why. But that was another one of his favorite things that he would tell us anytime we were disobedient as little girls. He’d tell us that he needed us to be obedient otherwise how could he protect us when the mobs came and went. When the war started if we hadn’t been obedient he wouldn’t be allowed to. He wouldn’t have the power to protect us when men would drag us into the streets and rape us. That was his favorite thing to threaten us with. And as a child that’s what I grew up hearing all the time and then it came back to mind when I was older and had my own children I thought What on earth constant so even though it may have his mind go that way much less use it as a threat. Against us but so that’s how I ended up getting married. And it was not by any means the common experience of people in the Felty us.

[01:32:53] So you know not only that we actually liked each other before we got married but that you knew him you know and the fact that he got to be a first wife and on and on and on so life was actually good. You know when I first got married he did love me. And it was very comforting for me to know that it wasn’t just that the prophet told some poor guy to take me on as his wife. I knew that he would have chosen me by his own free will. And so I had so little self-confidence so little worth in my own eyes that that was it helped me immensely. To not feel you know I didn’t have to doubt that he wished he’d married somebody else or any of that kind of thing. Yeah that’s that’s got to be huge in the I mean for a person who has been devalued their whole life to finally feel like you have some value in the eyes of someone has to be huge. There’s not even a word. And it was it was a pivoting point in my life. But once again it was not. It also was not the fix all of my fears and problems because then once I was married and we and I came to understand the power of having an intimate relationship and how close you can become to someone how much it matters to you that they love you and that you mean something to them. I never even comprehended what it would be like to be married at least not at that level. And to think of him bringing other women or girls into his life and in his bed and knowing that he was having that relationship with anyone else it was just torture. And I just said I just can’t think about.

[01:34:50] I have to not look at it because this is my religion. This is what I signed up for. How can I say I believe it and then fight against it in my heart. And so it’s a good thing that generally men aren’t given a second wife too soon because I’ve got a lot of work to do on myself to be ready to truly be able to accept that. So in a life carried on we were plagues we had started having children. You were a mother. You thought you were. That’s what plagues shirt for polygamists but yell at us. Okay. You go into buying your legs anyway. Basically we’re living pretty normal lives as fundamentalist Mormons in in Gentile Salt Lake we had started having babies and you know they became my life. Men are so tied down you know they start having projects on Saturdays and he started getting involved in doing the sound room for meetings and my children were the one constant. And I also felt like it was a safe place for me to retreat to if I lived for my children and focus my life on them. No one that was my my job in life you know that was the measuring stick by which God would look if I was a good person and worthy to be protected when the distractions came if I was raising up a royal priesthood you know and righteous children. But also I felt like I had to start building some kind of a wall around my heart with the anticipation that time is going on it’s going to happen someday that David’s going to come home with another wife. And it was too painful too to think about.

[01:36:56] And so I started very much kind of isolating myself from it. I tried really hard not to enjoy our relationship too much because that would make her hurt too much. You know there’s kind of two two trains of thought that could apply to that and I had done one for a while. It was like I’m going to get the most out of my life with him as I can before it’s all ripped right and then I start to realize that that was going to hurt too bad. So I had to cut back I had to start guarding my heart. I had to make it where it didn’t matter to me so much whether or not he was around. And I had to have meaning in my life beyond our relationship. And by that point I mean all my children were getting older I was busted you homeschool selling all their clothes canning all the stuff that good women did. So that kind of made it an easy way to shift that direction. Just gonna stay busy and think about it. Exactly. You don’t think. And whatever happens it’s coming your way. You’re grateful for it but you don’t put any hope on seeing it again in the future. So so then you you basically drove into motherhood. So then how many kids did you in the end I ended up with six live births. I had my first three were each 20 months apart. And then I and I had some miscarriages in between.

[01:38:37] I had a really serious miscarriage that I lost 18 weeks and ended up going in and getting a D and C and at that time I was convinced that the doctors messed something up because I went. It took almost six years between my third child and my fourth child. I just didn’t get pregnant. Nothing was working. And that was really hard because that’s your that’s your worth. That’s your purpose. And I you and I had one of my sisters asked me one day what I thought I had done that the Lord wasn’t allowing me to have babies anymore and fulfill my purpose. And it was so hard because it wasn’t that I didn’t want them you know how in the Bible the Lord closed up people’s wounds all the time. I don’t know. As far as I knew I hadn’t done anything you know looking back now I’m pretty sure that most likely had a lot more to do with the stress that was in my life. There’s everything else but it was a really difficult period to get through. And then I had three more. So I have my oldest is a girl and then I have five boys which was kind of funny cause my mother had tan. She had nine girls and one boy and even that the makeup of my group of children was a source of mixed feelings because on the one hand I was going to someday have to give my daughter away to be the possession and belonging to some other man’s family. I no longer would have a connection you know it got to the point where Warren Jeffs was saying once you girls are married you don’t you shouldn’t be talking to your mothers anymore. And I really that was gonna hard you know.

[01:40:35] And so my five boys they would get married they’d end up with how many wives and all these kids they would always be part of my kingdom as long as my husband and I were together. That was our little kingdom growing and so I could hold onto them but at the same time boys were getting kicked out leaving all the time and is as much as I want to convince myself you had to face the reality that I don’t know how many of them will stick with it. How many of them I’m going to have to or I’ll be told to shun because their past is hazed and so it’s one of those things where you enjoy watching your kids grow up but you wish they didn’t. Because as long as there’s little you can protect them and keep them safe and they want to pass the time when there’s five you know who knows what digging up and I watched it happen I watched boys disappear. I heard stories of people who took their 13 14 15 year old boys and drove down to St George or Las Vegas and dropped him off at a gas station. They said they’re no longer there. They do just leave them no longer. I don’t try to contact me. There you go. And I knew I couldn’t do that even if my child decided to leave or got kicked out. There was no way I could. They had they had become my life. They were what I lived for. And so as time went on the rules started getting more strict Rulon Jeffs died and Warren took over entirely and started sending men away.

[01:42:12] You know we always been told that the wicked needed be weeded out from among us. We could Perfecta people but we never imagined basically that her stuff. I always pictured what’s going to happen in the resurrection after you die God sorts us out. I never pictured the church taking a man’s family away and sending him off to repent and that was terrifying to me when they sent someone off to repent. What does that mean. Is that their way is saying we kicked them out and basically drove them to Las Vegas and dropped them off and gas station. Well that’s what they do with young people I mean everything they do with the adult happening with adults. Okay so in April of 2000 five my father in law got sent away and his second wife had already left the church and moved away. His third wife was told to go live back at her father’s house. She took her few children with her. His first wife was my mother in law and we were moved into a bigger house and she was moved in with us and my husband. Her son became her caretaker and her priest had had mutton and the father in law where did he go. Does he just go out of the world. Much of things you know for some of them they had construction jobs and they just had they tell you. Tell him Go later they start time go far away. My father in law moved to Kanab which is like 20 miles maybe south of Colorado City.

[01:44:02] And he had a friend that let him use like a camper trailer and parked in an RV park. And that’s where he lived and got him a job at the dollar store. And my husband had been told to still go and try to be an encouragement to him. He was supposed to have no contact whatsoever with his former wives. Basically my husband David was the one family contact who was allowed to stay in his life and if he needed things that make sure he was taken care of. And he talked to him and his father told them he says I have no idea what I’ve done. They didn’t tell me you know in my mind I pictured they’d say you did this thing go even higher. But they said you have sinned some grievous sin you go repent and they say well what have I done. And they told you know what you’ve done or if you don’t know what you’ve done you go pray about it until the Lord reveals it and then you’re supposed to confess the sin and repent of it. And it brought to mind my father saying I know you’ve done these things when I hadn’t. What do you do you say never. Yes. The right sin. And it came to a point where later I found out what would happen is one person would talk about it happening or report something everything. This went on and I had a hard time with that and they’d mention someone else’s name and Lehrers you’d be like oh well he shouldn’t have done that and you might not have even been aware that you did it or that you hurt somebody feelings or whatever it was anything essentially to get you out.

[01:45:45] Basically yes. And he was a rare case. He was gone for a year and then he was allowed to come back and he was given back his two wives and their children. And shortly after that that Warren was arrested and there were no marriages on stuff. And then sadly he passed away from. Well he had gotten cancer. They had that pretty well taken care of but then he got mersa that gave him pneumonia and he passed away from that I to this day I guarantee you I watched his health deteriorate while he was you know 68 69 years old suddenly having everything he lived for torn from them and living in a cold drafty trailer working in a dollar store trying to figure out what he’d done wrong and the devastation that that causes. And I guarantee you when he came back he was much less likely to ask questions about anything he was told. Oh sure. And you know that was an example to all of us. It could happen to you. Boy you better not think the wrong thought got gotta tell me out of your ass you know. So a lot of people went a long ways away. There are people that you know they went wherever we didn’t know where they went. And you’d be gone long and all of a sudden someone would disappear and by you know by the 2005 and beyond that there were special places that were being set up and they were redeeming Zion and so sometimes you’d see someone else and disappear. Weber doesn’t work at the company anymore. And we all.

[01:47:26] Well for me I chose to think well I hope they went to a better place. I hope they got called Zion because you didn’t want to think that maybe they got kicked out and sent away. And it was extremely stressful and toxic environment when a man would be sent away know like from my father in law. He was told to go and repent and try to come back. Other men were told that their sins were so bad that they were now Sons of Perdition they had no hope. They couldn’t come back. But interestingly enough though they were told these people are not your family anymore you have no rights you should never touch them. The family was told to throw away any pictures or memories they had of their father. But the man was still informed that since they were used to be his family he should go out and work hard as he could and send as much money as he could back then take care of his well that some good. Then why did he do that. But they already eddying read that about you are you know. And if people watch septet great and we found out during the time that my mother in law lived with us there was a few times when David would get an envelope from Lyle Jeffs who was the bishop at the time with some money in it that had come from his father that he had sent money to give to his wives.

[01:48:55] And it wasn’t you know for a lot of people I’d never find this out but once he was then back in the fold and they could talk about it you know he was working hard living on next to nothing so he could send as much as he could not just to take care of his family but to prove that he still believed you know show them that he was still devoted and he wanted back. And you know they start comparing numbers and find out that he was sending back a lot of money and very little of it was making it to his family. The church was keeping most of it and some of it never made it to them at all. So the whole situation but if you’re on the inside if you’re deep in there and you’re dug in you don’t know those things. And if anybody tries to tell you that while you’ve been listening to the devil or the evil apostates the evil. And you know Warren Jeffs trained us very carefully to believe and understand that apostates are liars from the beginning and they can not tell the truth. They might tell you just like the devil they might tell you 99 truths to slip in that one sneaky lie so you can’t talk to them at all because they might really good. So again you know and it’s it’s horrible. The you get in this trap in your mind. It goes round round and round because the other thing they taught us was God and the prophet always and only do right. And when they started sending men away they gave us this big long sermon about not being guilty of the sin of sympathy against authority.

[01:50:39] If your father or some man that you held in high regard and you thought he was awesome guy all of a sudden get sent away and kicked out. Don’t you dare think. But he was a nice guy. Is there a mistake because you’re questioning God. You have to accept it. Never express any sympathy for what the Lord has done. And you know watch your own self that you’re not making mistakes that is going to get you tossed out next. And it reached a point where the only thing we felt like we could safely talk about was like the weather. Well it’s been really cold this week. Because everybody start you know people being told things in secret especially once there is the separation of the United Order and the non United Order. You couldn’t say anything even about the gospel because you might be saying something that person hadn’t heard about and everything had to come through proper authority and you could be severely punished sent away if you revealed even if it’s the truth. It was what God told you if you revealed that someone else instead of it going through the proper channels. So you just couldn’t talk about it. There’s something to really think about like going back to the Handmaid’s Tale. You know you see the handmaids go off and all they discuss is like you say you know pretty much the weather or something like that because everything else is too dangerous to talk about. And you’re not sure if that other person is joining like you or if you say the wrong thing if they’re going to go running and report you you’re just right. You have to walk that fine line. So apparently there was a there was some sort of a split that happened.

[01:52:26] Yes so in about 2010 it was announced that like Brigham Young stay we were going to have this Restoril process. They call it confirmations. Every person must write a confession letter and turn it in. And at first I said only our prophet read these and then it was like only R and the bishop probably needs while he was in prison by then. You know it was it just kind of started it started to fall apart to where it was like you had no idea who all was going to read this. But basically you’re supposed to write this long black list of every bad thing you’ve ever done in your life. Didn’t matter if you’d repented of it. They wanted you know you could say you felt like you repented of whatever but you had to tell it all. And I struggled with it because I felt like I’d never done anything terribly wrong and up to the point when I got married I already had god tell me all of that was OK. So do I right. You better come out with something. Well exactly and I better write it because I can’t pretend like I’m perfect. Before then we all know we’re not perfect. And I remember I struggled with it so hard because I had spent the last couple of years praying so fervently and pleading with heavenly father to give me that testimony that I was everything I was okay in his eyes. And I thought you know in my heart and in my soul I know that me and got are good and I’ve prayed about it.

[01:54:09] I’ve I’ve made mistakes but I feel I’ve I have confessed them to God I’ve repented of them. And the other thing we were taught that you know the Lord knows it’s not just Buhweju it’s the intent of your heart. You might do all the right things but you’re doing it because you want glory and that undoes all the good you did. And so in my mind I was thinking well I’ve worked really hard. Me and gotter did. And it’s not just that I’ve already confessed and worked through this. But he knows my heart he knows why I did those things. He knows how bad I was hurting and you want me just vomited out on a paper for who knows what men to read and know the intricate struggles I’ve been in my life. But you don’t want to know the good I’ve done for losing the burden that it is. And so I felt like OK. I’m confident that I am in the right place. I’m just going to trust in God and I’m going to write out my letter. And once you wrote out your letter if you know if you can festive anything terrible and you didn’t need repent didn’t get kicked out for it then they’d let you know when they come and do a reconfirmation you got rebaptized they reconfirmed all your blessings on your head and all of this you were you know the slate at that point was wiped clean.

[01:55:33] That was in preparation because the distractions were coming we needed to be pure enough to be lifted up and protected and get our profit out of prison and all that stuff but it really came down to was they now had a blacklist they could use to kick people out and hold over their heads and you never detected that that’s what it was but that’s what it was. And the next step was that they said you know the United Order is something they’ve been teaching it’s something Brigham Young taught her that Joe Smith taught Brigham Young actually tried to implement it in different communities. And now’s the time God says we have to do it and. And that means everything you own every penny that comes into your possession gets turned into the church and then the store house will give you back what you need. And we didn’t have much by then but we went through that and you had to fill out questionnaires you had to answer questions and then you had to go through and be judged interviewed and judged by men that were called to do that. And one of them was my father. And then Lyle Jeffs as the bishop. And then JohnM. Barlow when I went and if you had not been judged worthy by midnight on December 11th of 2000 eleven you were no longer a member of the church. So whether whether it was that you didn’t make it through the process or that you were found unworthy. That was it. And I was never the member smooth judging other judges. But by that point he’s seen I’ve raised these good children. He lived in my home in Vegas for a couple of years and he saw that we were good saints and that my children were these sweet obedient you know I he whatever feelings he may have had against me before he.

[01:57:29] I’m glad he lived with me because now he sees that we’re good people and so I actually didn’t feel worried because of that point I also didn’t know that he’d been telling everyone that David and I had to get married. So it was. Ignorance is bliss to some degree. And so that was a whole new process she had to go through. Our family got called on the last day on December 3 first. We went through it was I’ll never forget the experience. It felt so dark going in the office and answering the questions but still I felt 100 percent confident. I had prayed and I got that burning testimony that God said I was good and my husband had done the same thing. We had spent months agonizing over and praying and talking and it was a scary time but we both felt like we were good and then we were judged unworthy and my one son was judged unworthy. My two oldest children were worthy and my nine year old was worthy. My other two boys were or eight yet. And if you are eight that means you weren’t at the age of accountability you weren’t baptized as members and so you weren’t judged you were you know any sense you commit before then are on Jesus so or your parents. So as of midnight everything changed. My husband and I were no longer married. I understood when they started talking about I like that if we’re not members that means us our our marriage that does David want to have priesthood which means he can’t be our priest. It had that connection is gone. All of those things are baptisms.

[01:59:16] Everything is wiped out overnight becomes null and void and I was also I was I took comfort in feeling like I knew that we were going to be OK. And then we weren’t. And three of my children were. And by that point I had very little faith and trust in many of the men who were leaders and they wanted me to send my 18 year old daughter my 16 year old disabled son and my nine year old to meetings where I knew they would be told they weren’t allowed to tell me anything that happened or what was said. And it terrified me especially for my daughter. There were men and I you know looking back on it now I’m like It’s so crazy. I looked around I was like I wouldn’t trust that man along with my daughter. And yet he was found worthy and so what was I believing in did I believe in God or not. How did he let that slip through. Right. I touched my daughter and I told her that after she went they went that night and got rebaptized and another ordnances got ushered into the United Order and everything. And the next day before she went her meeting I talked to her and I told her I says Now I’m guessing that your meetings and whatever last night they probably told you that part of the requirements is to keep sacred things secret. And she is like yeah how did you know. I’m like I know how this works. So this and us your parents not being worthy. I’m sure that you’ve been told You can’t tell us anything that happens. She’s like yeah exactly.

[02:01:03] Nessa’s I need you to understand something. SS I need you whenever you go to a meeting or anything to be so prayerful and so alert and paying attention I says. And if you do that and there’s anything that gets said If any man tells you that you’re supposed to do something whatever it is if you feel uncomfortable with that then see sacred things should feel whole you should get that testimony that yes this is what God wants. If you don’t feel that that’s not sacred you can walk out. If you have to get up and walk out of a building and come home and you can tell me about that because you only have sacred things secret and she struggled with she like no I’m not supposed tell you I’m like I promise you this is how it works. Even though I knew that they would disagree with that but I was desperate and in my life that was really how God should work. And yet these men would disagree with it because they’ve got their ulterior motives. But I was telling her God’s truth. You know this is how it was and within a few weeks well start tearing our family apart. They all of a sudden had assignments that I couldn’t know about. They had meetings to go to the I couldn’t know what was said. They had reading assignments. And all this stuff and it got to a point where it was frustrating as a mother to be to go to my daughter who already struggled with not necessarily wanting to do everything she was told. You know how kids are.

[02:02:40] And I’d say anyone can help me do the dishes. Oh I can’t mother because Uncle Lyle gave us this assignment I have to do that. And all of a sudden you’re living in a house where you no longer have jurisdiction over the children that are living there reach. That’s insane. It was insane it at the stress levels went through the roof. David will still working in Los Vegas. They had moved our family back to short Creek but he still worked in Las Vegas which at that point was nice because after being married for 20 years it’s really hard to share space in a house without going for the automatic hug each other. When you see each other how we can’t handshake three seconds more than you would be it was adultry and we were desperately trying to work this out so I made it easier that he wasn’t in the same city with me all week. It just it was so hard and things started falling apart. And I my children would go to their meetings and come home and I could tell something was wrong but they wouldn’t tell me. And I knew them too well. You know I was like This is supposed to be higher laws and greater light. Why is it bothering my children. What are they saying to my kids. And one day it had been even worse and I finally cornered my daughter Amanda and I said what is going on.

[02:04:06] And she finally after making me promise I wouldn’t tell anyone told me that Lyle Jeffs had announced in their meeting the message that had been sent through Warren from God that God would no longer allow the unworthy to live among the worthy and risk them contaminating the pure. He had to make that more of a separation to protect the purity of the worthy and what that meant they were going to take my children from me. And I already had concerns about my father that he would try and one of David’s sisters had been creepily. Anyway things were going on that left me with no confidence that my children were safe. And they announced the same thing the next week in the meeting that I went to. And once I heard that heart all these struggles all the stuff that I had been working so hard you know as like you said you have to try to make yourself believe in you. You get the next thing thrown at you and instead of looking at it at face value and going that is crap. How do I rearrange things in my brain to make this piece fit. And you pray for a testimony of what they just told you because it doesn’t feel good. It doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t even fit with what you’ve been told your whole life but somehow for your own salvation you have to make that peace make sense. You have to believe that you have to accept it. And I’ve been doing that for all of this time. But that was it that crossed a line. It was a line I wasn’t willing to cross. And in my mind I was like Nobody takes my kids from me nobody. You can’t tell me that God doesn’t think I’m worthy. You mean who raised these kids to be good enough to be worthy.

[02:06:06] It was her right to continue. And I’ve seen families that were those guys were were found worthy and unlike those are some of the most dishonest rotten people I know. But I you my kids my end up living with them because they’re worthy by some strange measure. So you’re not alone. You were stoo in the religion though deemed unworthy. You were just like a third class something. Yes. And they started separated meetings. So they Worthy’s still went to the meeting. The big meeting hall at the same two o’clock time slot in the day their meetings sometimes go six or eight hours. Oh it was insane. The money would go to the Restoril meetings that were at 11:00 o’clock on Sunday mornings at a school that was just right across the street from where we were living and they were gone just start back over at the beginning. Teach us the articles of faith and we read the letter. And obviously we were just unclear on the basic concepts of our religion or they were going to you know you had to go to those meetings to show you were still trying and you had to write confession letters every week and all this stuff. So even though we weren’t members of the church we still had our meetings. They still wanted your tithing and your donation of course. Oh that was that you still really believe and there were hundreds and hundreds. You know I thought I’m not worthy. It’s going to be so humiliating to go walking over to meeting me and this handful of other people while everybody’s looking out the window.

[02:07:43] Oh sure enough I knew Brinda Nixon wasn’t going to make it. You know and he said there were. I went to a meeting I thought did anybody make it. Because most people I know were here at the Restoril meeting. So but by the time the next week. So I had gone to my eleven o’clock meeting that Sunday my children went to their two o’clock meeting. That went really long and that night my daughter told me what had been said. So I knew that they were going to announce it a week from then which made me at least think they’re not going to start Teran people apart for that week. I have to figure out what I’m going to do. I didn’t know for sure how my husband felt. I mean obviously he was shocked but I didn’t know who he was. You can’t really bring that up. So what do you think. Should we do it. You know because he could be totally on board even though he thought it was horrible and then he’s like you know go to the bishop I don’t know what to do my wife is questioning it and boom I’d be out there. So you had to be very careful he went to work for the week and through that week I decided that’s it. I we have to get out of here. Living there in town was utter hell as it was that the child abuse that I witnessed the animal torture the cruelty and the whole town was just falling apart.

[02:09:08] Now that so many men had been sent out and people were reassigned the women were so overwhelmed that nobody was really watching the children it was just it was a madhouse. And my children had been witnesses of some pretty awful stuff they’d been bullied or treated bad and I was like I have to get out. I cannot live here and I’m not going to stay and let someone take my children from me. But then I had to figure out so how do I do that. And of course I wanted for David and I and all of our children to leave together but that was a really touchy thing you had to delicately work your way through until you knew you’re on the same page. And you know we were and we spent hours every night during the week when he was gone we hardly got any sleep we’d be on the phone and I’d hide in a corner while we were living in a duplex. I had to make sure the people next door couldn’t hear what I was saying. But we had to talk about it. We decided we had to leave. And you know we were living in you EPRI and house on his property. That’s what they called the organization that held all the church’s property was united. My husband was working for a church owned and run business and we had seen we understood soon as people were aware that we were in opposition they would find a way to get rid of him at his job. They will try to kick us out of our house. And so we had to have things lined up so that we could survive.

[02:10:45] We kept our tax return that year and used it to put a deposit on a house to rent. My husband he had never had to fill out a resumé or go to a job interview because you just get told you work over here. You worked for this guy and do this job and so on top of being absolutely torn apart that we were leaving everything we knew and even though we felt like it was the right thing to do. That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. It didn’t mean we didn’t have questions. Are we sure were doing the right thing. And so it took us several weeks to find a house that would work for him to find a job and get things lined up. And at one point in our meeting they talked about how they’re doing the second round now of judging and how great this was my father was telling us this. He is running the meeting how awesome this was because there are many here in this meeting who’ve been through that second judging and who’ve been found worthy we just haven’t had the time yet to let you know. Basically there is hope. Everybody come back. Let’s go back through this next judging process keep repenting keep you know they keep holding that carried out you know in front of you. Yeah. My husband says one day after he says I don’t know do we’ve got it. He says Do you think we need to stay and go through the next round of judging and see maybe we’ll get in and then we’ll at least be with our kids. But by that point everything together. I was just done.

[02:12:25] I told him that in my opinion what we had already done was plenty to prove to Heavenly Father that we believed and that we wanted to do the right thing and that I wasn’t going to subject myself to that again but that if he really felt like he needed to then you know of course go ahead. But that I really wished and hoped that we could live together. I didn’t know how to make it in the Gentile world on my own. And he told me that he just needed to know that he was doing the right thing. And I was like Absolutely you do. But that in my mind I thought he’s he’s got that doubt. And if he decides to go and if he if they convince him to stay I’m going to have to do this on my own and I can’t tell him my thought process. I can’t tell him that I’m looking at our bank account and our credit card balance and trying to figure out how far I could get on a tank of gas and where I would head if I have to do this alone. I couldn’t sell him so that I couldn’t give him any indication that I would be willing to do that because if he made that choice I was going to need to wait till he headed to work in Las Vegas and then we had a big 15 passenger van I would load my kids and whatever I could in that and we would just go and it was terrifying at that point. I knew I had a lot of relatives that were Gentile’s.

[02:13:54] I had no way to contact them I didn’t know where anybody lived and I was trying to think what direction would I even go and you know once I get a tank of gas away if they realized he could cut off all access to the cards how far can I go and what would I do once I get there. Who do I talk to. I had no idea. I knew I had to leave. I had to protect my children from what I saw was happening and I ended up because my daughter had told me and then my son was unworthy. I needed his help. My oldest son has three palsy and he’s disabled and he operated on a much younger level and the one thing you could not trust him to do was keep his mouth shut. He couldn’t run doing them as my son and I would. We weren’t allowed to use the Internet at that point. David Abraham an air card that we could use for internet. We had to keep that secret from our kids and everybody and we’re looking at houses for rent and my son and I would go drive around we’d say Oh we’re gonna go to Walmart we went to Wal-Mart a lot in those days and you want to make sure nobody was still following you you’d watch for the people that had you know although the gods what they had positioned in the parking lot in a hurricane and whatever and do it you could to try to look as innocent as possible.

[02:15:23] You know maybe go ahead and stop at Walmart and then come out and go to the gas station and then try to in a roundabout way drive past the house and hopefully you know watch that nobody’s following you so they wouldn’t know what you’re doing. And so my daughter and my one son knew what we were going to do the rest of them did not. And there is so much stress and I had to try to I’d had a an old trailer where they’d put moving boxes because they had crews and when you know you’d be there one day and the crew would show up at the door and say Hi Uncle Carlisle says you’re moving somewhere else and here’s these van loads of girls and box you know the boys show up and drop off boxes and tape and bubble wrap. The girls that show up go through impact your entire house in no time flat and disappear. The boys true would come back haul your stuff wherever you were going next and the girls would come back in and clean and then they’d bring the next family and move it home. So they had a trailer of boxes that were like the community boxes and to try and not be too suspicious I’d go by and get a box or two because you do that you know if you had some you need to store tape to the store house and I was slowly packing everything I didn’t need and stacking it and where people couldn’t see it through the open windows trying to get ready.

[02:16:46] I was having to go look at houses I was trying to still interact in the community at a level that looked normal without letting anybody know what I was doing and my 9 year old was so clingy and I need to go on Warren and I were going to go my son to go look at houses and he’d hang on me and cry and I’m like I’ll promise I’ll be right back you gotta stay here. And it took me a couple of weeks before it finally hit me. But at 9 years old he had sat in that meeting and heard that he was going to be taken from us because we weren’t worthy. And at nine years old he had never said a word about it but he knew what was happening and he was desperately trying to get as much time and hugs from me as he could before they took him away. And I just hadn’t even comprehended what he was going through or that he understood it at that level. And I thought if he could keep that secret from me and you know then it starts coming back you start realizing how hurt he’s acted how clean he is that he’s suffering and you didn’t even recognize it. I was so tied up in my own worries. And I thought if he could keep that from me and hurt that bad and not tell me I can trust him to keep this secret. And I took him up in my room and talked to him and I said Morgan I know that in church they told you that they’re going to take you away and give you two or three parents and the tears started welling up in his eyes. And I said I want you to know that we’re going to move that’s not and I says we are finding a house. We’re packing up. We are we are going to move we aren’t going to stay here anymore. Tom you can’t tell anybody this.

[02:18:57] And he started crying and he says but mother I don’t want to end the fear that went through me. I never imagined you know he’d kept us silent. I never really thought that I was going to have to convince my 9 year old it was okay to stay with me. And I just I felt this desperation. I didn’t know what to do. And finally over. OK. I don’t know what I’ve got. I’ve got to work through this with him otherwise I can’t let him out of the house because he’s going to tell on us. And so I said I said Morgan what do you not want to do. And I came down to say he thought I was saying that we were packing up and leaving without them that somebody was going to take them away and we were ditched in town and leaving him in that. I just I started crying and I pulled him over and wrapped him up in my arms. I told him I would never let that happen. I will never let anyone take you from me. And he just we both sat there and cried our eyes out. But at that point I was like This is it. We have to get out of this hell hole. I don’t go jury. This was unreal. And if my child is suffering like that how many other children are going through that there have already been taken from their mothers and plot over here. And what that does to them psychologically and be told your parents aren’t worthy of you.

[02:20:32] So many of the children turned it around like what did I do wrong that I can’t be. Especially the ones that were unworthy and their mothers were oh you know to always blame themselves any way they do. You know so it was amazing to watch the transformation in him once he understood that he went back almost like with a snap of your fingers to being the happy bubbly little boy that I’d always known and that helped that contrast that instant contrast helped me realize how far he had sunk over the months that slow you know he was just sinking under the weight of why he was being told the church that God expected and I was like there was no going back for me I was like I don’t care what anybody says or does. I am taking my kids and we are out of here. And then the new fear came before we got out that I was going to get that phone call or have the crew show up at the door. You know that. Well the bishop called David and he’s sent away and we’re here because they do this often. We’re here to move you guys all out that way if he came back he couldn’t talk to me. They take your cell phone. They would move you and he’d come back to get his stuff they’d leave his stuff in the house. You can bet get his stuff and he didn’t know where you are so he couldn’t try to convince you to leave with him when he got kicked out. And I thought we have to get out. I just have to get out before they do that to us.

[02:22:05] We have to get out before that call comes because it could come any day. It was happening to people you never thought it would happen to you. And and then one day I was just desperate and I’m packing like crazy trying to figure it out. And the thought came to me that not everybody was this lucky. But for me David and I were on the same page. No one on the planet had a legal right to our children but us and as much as I believe that Warren Jeffs spoke for God the cops wouldn’t care. I programmed the Washington County Utah Sheriff’s office phone number into my phone and the Mojave County sheriff’s office phone number into my phone so that if it came to that I could call them because you know you can’t call the town cops. They work for the church and they would do everything they could to keep you there. And then it was like it was like the clouds parted and this light shone. I was like the Church only has as much power as I give them. They can’t force me to leave my husband. They can’t force my husband to leave me and go out into the world. We have a legal marriage. We legally are the parents and caretakers and everything of our own children. And I could look that man in the face and say no and there’s nothing he could do because before I was like What if they tried to force me. It was just like I had never thought that in my life that I could just say no. And the reason me you and I was like Oh my word.

[02:23:57] And all of a sudden I mean that was a huge lessening of the immediate concern that I had because I had those numbers at the ready. I told my children you had a track phone that was at home. I told them never answer the door. I don’t care if it’s on the line. I don’t care who it is. You don’t answer the door you stay in the house you keep locked and you’re even that they were also in this feeling of relief we were on our way out. We know they weren’t going to have to do these terrible things anymore. And yet what a horrible life to be living that they feel terrified of the people that are supposed to be their religious leaders that that someone might come and try to steal you away from your parents. And it wasn’t a a it was a valid concern and a real threat. That the hardest part was when you when you know you’re going to go and you’re rushing around secretly making preparations. And to try to hide it all. You’re acting like nothing’s happening. And so I would go to my father’s house. And I would talk to my mother like nothing had changed and I wanted so bad to grab hold of her and hold her in my arms and just as I understood how Morgan felt. I wanted to absorb every bit of her that I could because I knew that as soon as I walked away from that I would probably never see her or talk to her again in her lifetime or mine. But I couldn’t I couldn’t let on that anything was up.

[02:25:40] I had to pretend like I was going to see her tomorrow and the next day and the day after that for the rest of forever. And I couldn’t hug her I couldn’t tell her. It would just be it would raise red flags if I was to sit down out of the blue and tell her how much I loved her and how much I appreciated to watch. And for me you know I wanted to I wanted to just and moral. And I had to just smile and pretend like Yeah thanks for the Exar whatever you know knowing that I was going to be gone. And I and knowing as much as I knew I was doing the right thing. How bad that was going to hurt her. She would see it that I was lost while those apostates. She’d already had four of her children leave before that. And I knew how much it hurt her. My father always made sure she understood that it was her fault that her children hadn’t stayed faithful and therefore they had nothing to do with it. Oh no no no. Jeffs taught to show me a rebellious child and I’ll show you a rebellious mother. It was always the women’s fault. Men had no responsibility men weren’t the spiritual head of the whole thing. Well they were but it’s just like the prophet and the other you know Arnold you’re down in the hierarchy. They tell you what God what they can teach you but it’s your own fault if you don’t follow. Men men are there to teach women are there. That’s that.

[02:27:14] I mean that was our only purpose in life was to make sure that our children grew up right so if they didn’t certainly wasn’t the father’s fault he was way too busy to actually raise his 30 kids. That’s the mother’s job. But it was so painful that raking his day. Sometimes I just have to try not to think about her because there’s days when I look back and it’s hard to even comprehend that that was my life. It almost seems like a bad dream but I have no other memory of the childhood that was my life. I just have to take a deep breath OK. I can’t think about any more. It hurts all the pain comes back. But then the realization comes again. My mother is still in that absolute living hell. That stuff I broke away from. She’s still in it and it only got worse. I have four of my sisters. Her children you know my immediate sisters out there. My father’s second wife has 10 children and she got kicked out my father ended up kicked out later his second wife got kicked out and they left the second wife. Ten children with my mother to raise so they don’t have either of their biological parents. And my mother is tied down raising the children of the woman that came in and stole her husband and made her life miserable. But my mother is the absolute definition of a saint because she truly loved all of my father’s children as her own. She has raised them taking care of them. And I think that’s part I always hope that she’ll break free.

[02:29:02] But I know that that’s part of what’s holding her there. There’s no way she would abandon those children. Right. You know it’s kind of kind of missing the word Synchronicity is kind of synchronous with you know you weren’t going to abandon your children it’s the same thing you also had. Why blame her. Yeah yeah. You can’t you know they’re her flesh and blood. But she was she played the role of mother in their life more than anyone else. And how could she abandon them now. You know but that’s what makes it so frustrating. You know you get people that are like to see these people chose to do that. Look we talked to this woman. She said it’s what she wants. I’m like yeah I was on the other side of that face for years. I put on a smile. I would have told the entire world that this was my choice and that I was happy and to some degree. I wasn’t lying. I didn’t know what happiness felt like. Yeah you don’t you don’t have any experience with anything else so. Exactly. But just do just like you people in North Korea. I’m sure that they think they’re happy. They have no idea what life outside of North Korea is like Yeah they have no idea what they’re missing what they don’t know what they know the lens they’re looking through. No I’m doing good and I’m happy. But you know it was a couple I think is about a year and I’ve talked to a lot of people that’s pretty much that.

[02:30:34] It takes about a year before you start feel like you’re getting your feet under you after you leave. It took me a year before I dared wear pants. I just kept were in dresses or skirts because I needed to know that I was not going against God. And when I left I thought Warren Jeffs was still a good guy but here he was tucked away in prison. And of course nobody in their letters writes Lyle is treating your people really bad and life is miserable. You’re supposed to be encouraging the so I hadn’t ever said anything about how I felt. But on our way out my husband I I our two kids that were able wrote long letter saying this is what’s happening. Lyle is doing this to your people. It’s hell here. But it wasn’t until after I’d been out for a few months that I finally got hold of information the records and stuff and found out that Lyle was only carrying on what Warren had been doing for years. And he on top of everything else I can’t even describe the feeling of betrayal that that was. To realize that the man that I thought was God basically that I had trusted with everything was nothing more than a filthy perverted vile cruel man who had lied to me my whole life for his own benefit. And then to to you know it took time. It absolutely destroyed my world from under me. And it took time for me to work through that and comprehend what I was really facing and what my life had been and what he had done and what other men were around me all my life.

[02:32:14] And then you realize that here you are on the outside now you know the truth and you understand a whole new level. Why they require you to shun people who leave. My mother would not talk to me my sisters. You know I’ve I counted up one day. I started to realize I couldn’t remember the names of my nieces and nephews. I didn’t even try with like sister wives and their kids. But my own sisters my blood sisters. I couldn’t remember the names of their children. I was starting to forget. I sat down. I can’t keep. I can’t do this. I have to remember their names. Otherwise they become they become faceless even in my own memory. I can’t remember them and they’re in their living this hellish life. And so I list them out and I’ve got close to 50 direct nieces and Duret nephews each so almost a hundred people out there. Not to mention my sisters and my husband’s sisters and my mother and my friends and the entire community we looked at each other as a family. And you realize that all those people that you love and care about are still mental about and you can’t help them and you can’t tell them and you try and you write a blog and you make a documentary video and make comments all over the Facebook can you try to help people understand that when they say oh leave these poor good faithful devoted religious people alone that it’s a lie. Those women aren’t happy and they don’t know. You know it took after I’d been out for about a year. One day I went at our house.

[02:34:01] The mail came that put it in a box that was like down at the entrance to the neighborhood. You moved to Apple Valley which is six miles north of Short Creek so out my window I could watch my family drive past on the highway and there I was. I can talk to him. I’d go to the same stores they did and when they’d see me they run and hide. And it hurt. But I also understood I didn’t blame them because that was me. A few months ago you’ve seen a posse and they were poison to you. You had to get away. I went walking down to get the mail and it was the first time I had dared step outside my house in a short sleeved shirt. I didn’t wear my long underwear Imar and it had quite wide neck and then I was I was still wearing a skirt but it was more of a straight skirt. I went about my knees and split up the back. I mean this was like very evil clothing in my past. You stepped out and I was walking down to the male and the sun was out and that was there is kind of a cool fresh breeze and the sun and the and the breeze touched my skin skin. I had never seen the sun before. And I realized that I was. We were free. We had done it. My children were OK. Nobody had come and attacked us. We’d made it for a year we were kind of had our feet under us. David’s job was going okay.

[02:35:33] My children were adjusting and it was almost like the sun on my skin I don’t know how to even describe it but I thought Oh my word. This is what happy feels like. And it was like oh my skin tingled and I got goose bumps. And there was this feeling in my heart that just wellness like my word. This is happiness. And I’ve never experienced this before all those times I thought I was happy. You were totally over showered overshadowed by the fear and the dark and the anticipation of what the next thing was going to be. For the first time I felt pure happiness and I just started crying happy tears and thought everybody should have the chance to feel this. Everybody should experience this. Everybody should be able to make choices and you know it was a scary thing. When we first left we’re like David settle where do we want to go. And it absolutely stunned me because all my life you either live in short Creek Salt Lake or Canada you know immigrating to Canada Canada was not an easy thing that wasn’t really a choice unless you got married to someone there. But that was it. That’s where the saints lived. Now Salt Lake had been made off limits so the thought that you could just we could actually choose and decide and move anywhere we wanted was just like holy cow you go. And of course we ended up six miles outside of Short Creek because that’s all we could afford it. We couldn’t haul our stuff any further than that. That was our first big Liebe but you start to understand that not there’s huge freedom in making your own choices.

[02:37:32] But the flip side of that was that there’s a huge responsibility. Yeah I could choose to do this. And that’s my choice. That’s awesome. What if it doesn’t work. What if we made a mistake and we find out the church was true and now we’ve condemned our children to hell. What if all of this and before it was like Oh the church said you’re going to live here you’re going to work there you’re going to do these things and you obeyed. You didn’t have any choice but you obeyed. If it all worked out you knew that the Lord bless you for your obedience. If it didn’t work out you did what was right. The Lord must’ve thought you needed a test or a trial. Now it was on you. If you moved somewhere and things went to hell in a handbasket it was your fault. You made the wrong decision and it was like holy cow. What are we. How did you decide. We haven’t been taught how to reason things out or or you know it is like it took time before you could venture beyond what was still familiar and make choices that didn’t prematch fit within the confines of what you were used to. But once Rex passed that the world is the most incredible place and there are thousands and thousands of the most incredible and kind and compassionate and amazing and loving people and their Gentiles and their apostates and you start to realize that the people that you trusted the most were the most harmful to you and the least loving least kind.

[02:39:18] They looked at you as a tool and as a piece of property but you don’t have to be happy forever. Isn’t it amazing how all the things that they proclaims about people of the world were actually just projections of who they were it is and you know it as you start to recognize that you’re like oh sure enough here it is the devil is twisting things you know the world is called the righteous good things bad and bad things good and and I’m in that I’ve given myself to the devil and then all of a sudden you know this is actually the truth. Oh my word you I lied to my entire life. And those guys are still at it. And I got my little voice over here going guised you can do it you can’t get out and then you got all the big powerful leaders and religious leaders everywhere. And the women who are still trapped by their arms mind that get up and say Oh those are those evil wicked and bitter ex-wives. How can you trust them to tell the truth about what we’re living. I’m happy here. And you know the part they’re not saying yeah I don’t have a clue or 90 cents. My children are because they’ve taken them from me. My husband got kicked out. I get moved around but look at me. See this little smile on my lips. I’m happy. And this is my choice and you guys should leave us alone. And I’m like I’ve been on the other side of that. Their you will be burned and one they’ve never seen the other side. Amish they too because it’s awesome. I know.

[02:40:56] I know. Funny though they will say well you know how can you tell me how I feel on this side. But yet they’ve only had one experience out and they somehow devalue your experience as a person who has lived both sides know that you’re under the control the devil and you’re just speaking right now. But it just shows the power that men can have and the depths of depravity they can go to if they choose to use that power for evil. And you know I it’s hard sometimes get people to comprehend and understand why I’m against polygamy entirely especially religious polygamy and you get these people who are like yeah they that was what they wanted. I mean for some of these young girls that’s like the highest honor to get to marry that man. You know there was a higher up in the authority or whatnot. So I was speaking to a press conference up at the Capitol building about a year ago. I went to a press conference. They were going to debate House Bill 99 which would keep polygamy illegal instead of out anyway. I was there to say it needs to stay illegal to be on that side of it. And so I had a room full of you know reporters and whatnot. There wasn’t a lot of people but they one me get up and have my turn to speak. And so this is you know a lot of times you get that from people but not for some of these girls that was an honor or that’s what they wanted. And who are you to say that they can’t marry who they want.

[02:42:52] What if they did want to marry that man. And you know where but they say that they have a choice and they chose. And I said Look what I’d like all of you to do is take a minute and if you can picture a twelve year old girl or 13 14 15 you know young younger that you know maybe it’s your daughter maybe it’s your sister your niece your granddaughter whatever. Or just imagine the age group of sixth or seventh grader in your school. If one day you got the news from someone that hey did you hear Sue’s little Susie decided she wanted to be the fifth wife of Brother whoever who’s 60 you know 45. Isn’t that great. What is your gut reaction. Would you honestly be able to say well I guess that’s what Susie wanted. I’m sure there was no coercion in. I’m sure Susie didn’t want to finish school or get a driver’s license or maybe marry somebody her own age and it was amazing to watch the expression on the faces of the people in the room change as they actually pictured that because I think we all have somebody we can think of who I guess a lot of people say things like polygamous women are no different than us. They they aren’t trapped. They want to have choices. They whatever. And this is what they choose. Who do you think you are to go against that. And I like to say you’re right. And too often we look at you know you get so many people that say things like well I would never live it.

[02:44:46] I would never let my daughter live it. But if those guys want to arm who am I to stand in the way that’s their beliefs. So why wouldn’t you live it. Why don’t you let your daughter live it. The graph also includes can they see the grass. They never let you again. So they they have no idea what undue influence does to a person were. Those girls don’t want anything. They’re just doing what is. They’re just following a script there. There’s no one in them. Well there is. Well the reality is they’ve they’ve been told to want anything is evil. You have no desires or thoughts or feelings of your own. You do what you’re told to prescription. You. And so that you know as you know for all a lot of people a lot of women have been through the experience of having been cheated on or where you felt like you were cheated on you know for people that grew up in the Gentile world and dated maybe you were dating someone or there someone that you really liked and you found out they were Mesner Outhred or whatever was some other girl and that pain you feel like you were betrayed or. Many women have found out their husband was cheating on them. Plaintiveness women are no different. They have those same responses. Those are natural human reactions to that feeling of betrayal. But there is a benefit to being a polygamist and that is that you don’t have to you know how much time do you spend worrying and thinking Is my husband cheating on me as my boyfriend Shiomi.

[02:46:31] You don’t have to worry. You don’t even have to wonder because you invite them in to your living room and you can hear them in the bedroom down the hall. There’s no wonderment anymore. You get to be have a front row seat to what feels like your husband cheating on you. But at least you know where he is at and. They don’t feel any different. They do feel betrayed. And as you know that was very sarcastically put. It’s not a benefit. I’ve heard from many women as they were trying to work through it and accept it as I talk about how much it hurts to lay in bed alone at night and hear your husband having sex with someone else across the hall. Or to be wishing for some attention and some time and watch him only have time for the new wife or feel like you wish you could have a break from home and go on a trip. But it’s not your turn yet or he can’t afford to go to Hawaii five times and so whoever was lucky to go with him the one time the rest of you’re out of luck. It’s damaging and it’s extremely demoralizing. As a woman to not feel like there’s any kind of reciprocation or hope that you are required to give your everything all of your heart all of your devotion to your husband and he as he chooses will give you a little peace back but only if you’re good and only if you don’t piss him off and only if you’re not bitchy today because if you do any of those things then he will hold it over your head.

[02:48:19] And I’ve talked to women before that we’re just desperate for their husbands love and they’ve been told well if you know they’re like Well you always take marriage everywhere and you always want to sleep with her and I will well if you want me to treat you more like Mary maybe you should act more like Mary and you’re like can’t I be me and have you love me. And then if you go and go OK I’m going to act like Mary and he’s like that was a really low blow you shouldn’t just copy everything she does and don’t think is enough. There’s no way to win this yeah. You know and this is the reality of it. I’m not making this up. I in my mind I can travel back to so many conversations I’ve had with reasonable you can see how that happens. It’s not that you’re like well that makes sense that way. And you have to realize that growing up in polygamy though it does desensitize you to a point that you never allowed yourself to think about what your life could be like outside of that or for a lot of these girls you know they will brag about I’m the sixth generation of polygamists and my family line which is what that translates into is that in every area of their life from the time they were born they were surrounded by their accounts their older sisters their mothers their grandmothers all lived in this. They witnessed the truth of it that their mothers were sad that all those emotions were going on.

[02:49:54] They were the subject of the bitter reaction of the sister wife when they wanted something and they the sister wife took it out on me because my mom pissed her off you know. And they think that’s normal. They don’t know anything else. That’s just the way it is. They don’t know that there’s happiness beyond that. They don’t know that there’s anything beyond that. And I actually was talking with some people once because I thought I was shocked that there are people there are girls who will break free from a polygamist cult or at least not be in the arranged marriage strictness that will still when they you feel like they had a choice. They still went for polygamy and I’m like why. Why would any woman allow her husband to take on another wife much less that girl choose you know. And so I had thought about it a lot because I thought maybe there are people that that it that are happy in it and I don’t want to stop people if that’s truly what they’re happy with other then you still can’t control the harm it has for all the children that come into it. But I finally realized that I think I’ve got it figured out. When you grow up as part of the herd there is no bond really between you and your mother. There’s no bond real bond between you and your father. The children bond in their little groups so you have this young girl that grew up watching her mother’s all of you married the same man whatever. And her entire bond really was with her group of sisters they all grew up together they shared a room they went to school together. Everything they did they did as this grew.

[02:51:45] They’ve never in their lives. Been a witness to what a normal romantic intimate relationship can be between a man and a wife. That’s all hidden away to begin with. You know that’s not something you do publicly in front of the whole family. But also there’s a lot to be said you know you can’t be too affectionate to wife number two or the other five are going to really be on your case right. Not to mention that there’s just not time for you to develop a deep bond with one wife when you’re supposed to be taking care of multiple wives. So what happens is these girls grow up. They get married. They don’t know what to do in a house with two people. They miss that group of sisters that they bonded with. They’re going to have a hard time bonding with their husband because you don’t ever make a bond with men. They’re supposed to be off being good priest good guys and working and it’s the women and children that form the family unit and you pick and choose who you bond with there they don’t know how they don’t know how to have a healthy marriage relationship between two people. So they’re looking for that sister to come in and then like you know it’s fine you go off and do your thing husband because we’re going to have tea parties while you’re gone because that’s what our mothers did to deal with the fact that you were here and they don’t. It’s kind of like for me having that sudden realization that I was happy I they don’t know what they’re missing. They don’t know what it could be.

[02:53:27] I sat in a in a presentation at Sunstone a couple of years back where one of Winston Whitemark wives talked and he has had twenty seven wives. He has almost 150 children and she said how one day he came and was hanging out with her and said something along the lines of he just can’t imagine what his life would be like if he was stuck with just one of those women because they each you know played a part. They each provided something different that he wanted whatever. And she’s you know this was possibly kind of a funny story. She says she told him right back. She couldn’t imagine what she’d do if she was stuck with him all the time instead of you know one night out of a one night every 13 times a year or whatever it multiplies out to and I and people kind of laughed and I thought that is so sad. You’re in a you’ve been in this marriage for 20 years you have all these children together. And you can’t imagine being stuck with the guy more than a little bit you get. That’s not a relationship you’re missing out on the best of what marriage is supposed to be. The relationship seems to be I think what you driving is the relationship is with the sister wives. Yeah that’s the relationship there is no no real marriage. They’re just imitating this whole sister wife relationship that they have grown up with their entire lives. And that’s what it is. They don’t know how to have a relationship. They know how what a relationship should be with a man.

[02:55:14] And you know I’ve also heard plenty of stories that actually read the book that the Sister Wives family the Kody Brown family put out a couple months go read it and I was like oh here it is in black and white. They’re the ones that chose to put this book out here. But if you read it none of them are happy. You know they talked about how the best times they had together as Sister Wives and I read it many times I’ve heard it from many women. They get along just fine as long as he’s not in the picture. You know he goes on vacation or he’s gone on a job for a week the women all can band together and so together and cook and enjoy each other. But then he comes along and there’s no equality and then they’re against each other and they feel left out because he’s paying attention to her and I want to be the one he pays attention to. And that was something that I came to realize for myself in looking at the you know the future of living in polygamy was that I saw men had favorites. That was all there was to and they’d kick their few favorite children they had like this little nuclear family they created out of the many many people around them and it killed me to think of what was going to happen to me like what I watched happened to my mother.

[02:56:36] If when my husband got another wife and she became his favorite Am I got put out to pasture so to speak and I was just there and my good thing I did for him that he was so grateful that he had me for was that I did all the dishes and all the laundry and the yard work and took care of the kids and and did the cooking and the cleaning and that freed him up to spend time with his other wife or whatever and I thought it would kill me to watch him set me aside and someone else be his favorite. But the other side of it was I didn’t want him. I didn’t want to be the favorite either. I didn’t want to see some other soul go through life without having what she wanted. And I couldn’t see a way for all of us to have what we truly wanted and needed. I think you know there’s a reason why we use phrases like finding your soulmate or we’ll call our husband or wife our better half. We didn’t say Well she’s my she’s my better 30th you know you’re required to give 100 percent to him. He gives you a piece of the pie. And then there’s supposed to be divided among all the children and all of the. There is no man that has enough time or energy to truly nurture and raise that size with family even if you were independently wealthy and didn’t have to work. No. I sat through that Sunstone speech and I pulled out you know I was have my notebook and pen and I sat down did some quick math. So with 27 wives I think it worked out that you would get an if you were our rotation equal all things fair 13 times in a year I’d be here at night to sleep with your husband 13 times.

[02:58:33] Or whatever the number was it wasn’t very many and then I thought OK. He’s got 47 kids. I think I rounded it down a hundred and forty five hundred forty five kids. If he’d devoted a solid ten minutes to each one of those children so that they knew that hit they were heard and he connected with them. No potty breaks no meals no nothing end to end. Ten minutes of time for each of his children. It was like Oh were we’re like twenty five hours straight. And you know he can’t do that. He’s addressing them in groups. In fact with him it was interesting. I’m really not trying to pick on him but he’s a good example of some of these things. And that is that he is having so many children that he started naming them by the year they were born and all the babies born and let’s say that polio would’ve been like 90 for all these babies born in whatever year all get a name that starts be all in. So you had all these B names and then the next year it’s all the names or whatever name they choose. And it is like that’s it takes away your humanity you become part of a piece of that instead of your own person on your own two feet. You do take in this whole thing sounds like I mean you know there’s a lot of people marooned. But it’s pure in the good. Yeah it’s neglectful because you can’t be a parent to that many kids you can’t be a husband to that many wives. You nobody is getting what they want.

[03:00:25] I assume are are the men. I assume they’re unhappy. Well to see that’s the thing. There are I mean a lot of men will tell you why they have nothing to complain about. I’m the one they all come to. You know I need money for this. I need money for that. I want your attention. I want your love and I’m supposed to try to make everybody happy and it’s impossible and my life sucks. You women have it easy. You’re just worrying about yourself and your kids I have everybody to work worry about. And I there is absolutely merit to that. But I would have more sympathy for that if there are men that do. If he was honestly putting an effort into making sure everything was fair and equal and even that doesn’t work because different people have different needs at different times. So if you want to just cut and dry here’s the wall calendar we’re going go on this rotation you know for me. There was times in my life when I was going through a miscarriage or I was whatever was going on and I just felt like I needed my husband to see me and hear me and I wanted to to feel like he loved me and I was the only wife. So you’re going through the. Well let’s see your turn comes in another five days. Go find your sister what’s for comfort right. You know what I mean. But if. But then you also get the needy people who the husbands like. Well I’m trying to make sure everybody is OK.

[03:01:57] And this wife has super emotional so I’m going spend the next three days with her and everybody else is like well yes she’s emotional. But what about me that was supposed to be mine. That was you know there’s just no way to without somebody like her. Yeah. I mean men like to have actual relationships with women too so like they. There’s no way you can have any real relationship with any of the wives. I mean maybe he can have a. I mean he can have a favorite but even then with that many people he’s not going to be able to actually have you know intimate relations is more than just having sex with someone he can’t really have an intimate relationship with anybody. Yeah. And that’s true. And you know it’sa. So I read Carolyn Jessup’s book and she came up with. There’s a lot of good points she made in there too. And I watched an interview that she did. But she is talking about how her husband Meryl Jessep had his favorite wife and he also had certain of his children that for whatever reason he clicked with and that’s how we are as humans. You know people date a bunch of people and I’m like no that wasn’t a good match. That wasn’t you need to find somebody. The problem is that that happens in polygamy and everybody else by the luck of the draw you’re out. You didn’t click. You weren’t the one he connected with and it’s not your fault. We just don’t know. But you’re still stuck in your head and body you get a divorce. You can’t find somebody that’s a better fit.

[03:03:40] That’s that’s your lot. And we were also told that we should rejoice instead of having jealousy when our husband was with a sister wife. We were supposed to rejoice that they were being blessed and be so happy. And if your husband likes a different wife more than you wants to spend more time with her that’s not your business. You should be happy that he’s doing whatever he needs to make himself happy as long as he’s happy. Your concerned what you want is wicked. If it contradicts that and you out you don’t matter his happiness matters. So I think that the reality is if you could get men to be honest they do they connect with a certain wife and could be the first wife it might be the tenth wife whatever it is they find someone that they have that connection with and they it’s the same with a handful of children. I really think that we all can only handle so many people close to us. And they create you know they favor that that few kids they favor that one wife. And it seems out when I mean it’s like in Caroline’s book she talks about how Barbara was Meryl’s favorite wife. She always traveled with him and even though she had the lion’s share of his time she would about lose it probably because she’d she’d lose it when he was going to sleep with another one of his wives because she wanted to have a baby. You know it wasn’t that he loved her or that he wanted to spend time with her. That was his function in her life was to sire children.

[03:05:15] And he would go do that duty and then go back and that’s so hurtful for ever. I mean who wasn’t there. What happens to the women who are unable to bear children. No one making it does happen. It absolutely does happen. For one thing even if people aren’t outwardly doing it you know that society looks at you as oh I wonder what she did that law that the law won’t let her have children. But you know a lot of these big families end up with someone like that and you pray either you get a job since you don’t have children so as an adult. I mean this sounds really crass but it’s the reality of it. You don’t have a job. I mean you don’t have children. It’s going to be really hard for you to get any kind of welfare. So you’re an excellent candidate to get a job because then you can bring in money to help the family. You know if this other woman does then that’s really going to cut down on what food stamps she can get because now she’s employed instead of a single mother to be born. Yeah. You mean to be productive one way or the other if you can’t raise children then bring in money because also the things that matter. I look at my mother she I don’t know any other way to say other than she became the live in slave. My father no longer slept with her. It wasn’t about having sex and I remember thinking that too. Because to me is like great. So I’m beyond childbearing years.

[03:06:53] You don’t and you no longer have that duty took to procreate with me. I’m still your wife. You know do I mean nothing else. Many times it wasn’t about you you didn’t have to get to that you weren’t having sex you want that. That like you said the intimate relationship is far more. I mean it includes that. But it’s so much more than that. I want to have a chance to lay in the bed next to my husband and tell each other about our day. I feel that closeness and mother didn’t even get that. Well you’re beyond childbearing years. Never share your bed again. You just go sleep with these other women. And she was mean by the time I left she was teaching all of their children school and some of her grandchildren. A couple of my sisters sent her kids over there to get taught. She was making most if not all the meals doing the cleanup. She would round the kids up and clean the yard she’d catch up the laundry. And you know she became this robotic person she had to find her purpose in serving the family. And she had to in my opinion she has walled off her heart to not feel anymore. She’s walled off her mind to not think anymore. She’s just following directions and she will accept whatever good feelings. I can’t think of a word I want but you know that’s what she gets. That’s her life and she’s looking forward to the next life when she’ll get her reward. You can be happy then she’ll be happy. This is supposed to suck. Yeah.

[03:08:45] It’s a time of testing and trials and. And you just can’t complain about it. But this is what it’s supposed to be. If it was if it was easy you must be floating down downriver instead of fighting up the stream and so your dad is out though. Yes he got sent away. I don’t know how long ago. And I I haven’t talked to him for a long time I haven’t really wanted to. My mother as far as I can tell is still living in the Southern Utah area and still has her sister wives kids. So it’s pretty much as you David and your kids though are. Are you all out. Yes. We all left together and Nardy went back through anything once much back at this point. My five boys still live with us. My daughter started dating. We moved to Salt Lake about a year and a half after we left Fairfield. Yes. She started dating and she’s now engaged she’s going to get married in June. Congratulations. It’s very exciting yes. And she stayed in a Salt Lake with him. And in August of this year the rest of us moved to Washington state. David got a job transfer and we felt like it would be good just kind of a whole new environment. But since start over you know I have a whole new outlook on life because we grew up in Salt Lake and you know the worst year of my life were spent in short Creek and it’s been amazing to be here.

[03:10:33] So but you know it’s one of those things was like we’re doing good and you’ll have. I can’t believe we’ve made it this far and it’s almost two years and then you watch a movie and you go wow look at those people and a great big family get together in a union for Christmas or more like you know we moved here. David wanted to for him and I to go stay overnight out at the ocean that’s like two hour drive from here now is amazing. And I thought oh this is so great. I mean I love this. And then I start thinking but I’m leaving all my kids home. And I don’t know anybody. I don’t have a phone number. I can give them of who to call if they get in trouble. You know I can’t ask my sisters or my mom or my neighbors or even my daughter now check up on and make sure they’re doing OK. I mean they’re grown. I mean my youngest 10. I have my 23 year old that’s disabled a 21 year old still lives here with me. He also has his own life. There are 15 12 and 10. So it’s not like they’re little kids that are helpless. But you never know what could happen. And you start to realize how incredibly alone you are in the world because your entire society is gone and you’re doing OK as a family but you don’t have those outside connections I don’t have somebody up the street or across town that I can count on and say hey if my kids need something can you help them out. And that’s the thing I miss the most is you did have that do you.

[03:12:22] You lost your community you lost you tribe have you. Have you had any success. Like I mean you say you just moved I think in August so it hasn’t been that long. Have you I don’t know how you develop any kind of strategy for trying to develop friends I mean because it is difficult. The letter you get in life to start over like that it is harsh. You could struggle with it you know because we grew up in such a different world. How do you start eating everybody else’s dating people I went to high school with. Right. You don’t know anybody but I made some really good friends when I lived in Salt Lake. There were people that I worked with that are still there will always be very near and dear to my heart and good friends but you know they’re still Salt Lake. Work is a great college. And yeah I met some really good people I’ve become close friends of some of my professors. And that’s really awesome. Once again they’re all still back in Salt Lake. I just need to my husband has made acquaintances and some friends and stuff through his job. And my son is at that point now too. When we got up here in August I enrolled my three youngest in public school for the first time in their lives. And that was a hard one for me because you grew up here. I mean it wasn’t like I believed the church anymore but it’s still not easy to put your kids out there. You are amazed at how guilty I felt.

[03:14:01] Even though it didn’t make sense in my mind I felt guilty that I was handing over that part of their lives to someone else instead of me doing it. That was possibly my job. But I’m ashamed to say I was supposed to me by a job and I didn’t do very good damage damaged both mood and that’s what matters right. I did but it was you know when when my kids were younger the oldest ones I did really good with. And then they told us I was homeschooling them and then they told us to put them in the church school and it was a disaster. My kids picked up ideas and action. You know attitudes and stuff they’d never dealt with before. And then they shut other schools down we were supposed to go back to homeschooling but we had no money. We were living in Las Vegas. We couldn’t even afford to get a printer and the paper to print the curriculum out and we were stuck in the house 24/7. And my whole life I felt like I was doing laundry sewing cooking and all that stuff and just trying to keep them from going stir crazy. They didn’t want to do school. I didn’t wanted to school. And at that point I consoled myself with the thought that the distractions are turning any day now and math and science all that stuff. Who knows if our kids even need to learn. And the Lord could put that in their brain. They could have an instant knowledge. We have stories. You know God just gave people knowledge. That’s the easy part. God can fix that.

[03:15:36] My focus needs to be on raising them to be good faithful obedient sweet passionate. And I would focus on that. The rest we could fill in later. And then we moved then we left the church and just trying to keep our heads above water. I can think about how we didn’t do school but I was trying to help them adjust to a life of just us. You know we used to have a community and now it was us run was it and then we moved Salt Lake and I had to get in and I got a job outside of the home for the first time in 20 years. And I didn’t have the time and I didn’t feel like I could put them in public school. They were already bullied by the mainstream LDS kids there they’re. We were going to hell because we didn’t go to church. We were struggling with so much already. I couldn’t bring myself to do that. And so that was the next step. And I found the I was like I have I kept thinking well maybe what we’ll do is we’ll move up there and I’ll take a year and work with them all really hard and try and get them a little more up to grade level. So it’s not so hard. And then I’ll put them in school. Who are you kidding. You’re you’re you’re not going to do it right it’s not. They need someone besides me. I’ve been the person their entire life. Doing everything teach them everything. I felt like a be good for them to have that come from an outside source.

[03:17:05] And it would take some pressure off and give me more freedom to just be their mom and help us all work through this. I’d be at home making sure they’re okay I can communicate with the schools and we’re going to figure this out. And it was incredibly hard. My youngest didn’t he knew his letters but he didn’t know how to read yet. And it broke my heart. One day when he came to me he was looking for a video or something and wants me to read to him what this says and he said will you use your magical powers of reading. And I thought they really are magical powers and I have failed you by not teaching you should be able to read by now and though in my mind I could read I could lay out the whole thing of why we got where we are and that I had done the best I could. That didn’t change the fact that my child can’t read and I don’t have I’d failed him. You know my son that in a freshman in high school this year never even made all the way officially through second grade work and I dropped him in the 9th grade in high school. And it was overwhelming to me how I have failed these kids. This is cruel of me to do. And here I have not taught them I haven’t prepared them for the real world and all the excuses I know you don’t have to tell me.

[03:18:32] But I still fail them and I’ve up but I can’t I can’t fail him another year as hard as this is I have to let be this be the point where I say obviously I’m not succeeding here. It’s okay to let someone else help them go. And it was so hard. And I went and I met with a high school ended up horribly embarrassed as I end up in tears. I was so determined I wasn’t gonna cry. I did it anyway. Talking to the enrollment people and I’m like I am so sorry. I am asking you to take on more than you should ever have to take on. He’s 15 and he is so far behind and I don’t know what you’ll do. But in a time I it meant the world to me. If they’d be willing to take that on and if they could help them and I was so sorry I hadn’t done it and then I replayed that I’ve got one in high school one in middle school and one in elementary. I emailed all the teachers and said wrote a big old letter. So this is where we came from and I’m sorry that I haven’t done better. I’m sorry they are not up to speed. I feel like they’re bright. They want to learn and I know that’s important but just so that you’ve got it in the back of your mind if they’re backward if they’re awkward if they don’t know what they’re doing they really don’t. And they’ve never interacted with people outside of our family really their own age that never been in this setting. So if you could just keep that in mind.

[03:20:22] And I met with all of the teachers later a few months into the year they had like a parent teacher thing and with each one of them I told myself I am so sorry. And none of them felt like it was my fault. You know they have all been incredible people. You just gave them the best gift you could you gave them kids that really need to be taught. I mean they’re teachers. That’s what they do. That’s what they live for. And that’s what they told me. And like I say it’s one of those things where I can convince my mind you but are you just so much more stubborn. Shall I know this guilt. But I told them I says you know I so appreciate your patience with them and that you’re working with them. And I says you know if you ever get frustrated with them because they whatever is like please don’t take them. It’s my fault. You know touch me and I’ll do anything. And they were all just like what is wrong with this woman. We all feel that way at all. There you go. You think you just have to point out that what you’re what you’re saying right now and these are these feelings that are coming out of you are exactly how you were raised. It was all women’s fault. It was all the woman’s responsibility and it was all the women’s fault if not everything went perfect. So I mean of course you’re still going to feel that way even though you can intellectualize it. You know your emotions were built upon a system and formed in your formative years that you know you’re not going to be able to just shake based on some intellectual understanding Yeah basically.

[03:22:11] And it’s like I can make sense of it. But it didn’t change how I felt. And I just felt I had to apologize and it wasn’t just like it wasn’t just that I was trying to convince these people I was trying to convince myself. And I felt like I had failed. I’m looking at my kids and like I failed you and I failed you. And I am so sorry I did the best I could with what I had. And it wasn’t enough but I’m going to go to bat for you now. Don’t you worry I’m going to talk to your teachers. And you know we had a rumors anyway that my son’s high school that there were some kids going to come back with guns on Tuesday and the school emailed me that was all taken care of. And I’m like That’s great. And that’s wonderful. And that’s all lovely and I still kept all my kids home even though I knew that the very day was probably not the most dangerous day. CORSAN wait for things to die down if anyone is going to do anything but I couldn’t do it. And I called the schools and I’m like I’m sorry my child isn’t at school. And I kept him home because I’m freaked out. Sure I know you know I’m sure I was actually my son told me that in whatever class you know he wasn’t there on Tuesday but that he found out that only six people were. Obviously I wasn’t alone. That’s right. And you know you may have failed your kids.

[03:23:43] You know as you say and you couldn’t provide that education for them. But I hope that you can at least I hope that you can look at yourself and give yourself credit. And I know that’s hard to do. Probably coming from where you did because of my wife and I have been through a lot of the same things coming from where we came from. But give yourself credit for getting your kids out of a cult. I mean you maybe you didn’t teach them algebra but you gave them the most awesome gift in getting them out of that situation that you could have done. I mean the strength that it takes to question everything you’ve ever believed in and to take the steps to leave something that is so powerful. I mean the indoctrination of that call so toxic and so strong and to be able to to take that stands and to get yourself and your kids out an answer to create a new life when you don’t know how the world works. It’s terrifying. And you had kids we didn’t have kids. It’s terrifying. And you know I hope you can feel good about that even though not everything has worked out. You know maybe as as you would hope you know. Well I I do. Like I say I know I mean I’m not laboring under feelings of shame. I’ve been able to come to the point where I can accept that I really did do the best that I could.

[03:25:33] And yeah maybe I could have shot up for MAFF but but the other thing that has helped a lot is that the people here are so incredibly amazing and kind and wonderful and then I’ve been totally and completely blown away and I am more proud of my kids than I can even put into words. But I mean my son my youngest. He can read and he’ll read stuff to me and it’s amazing and he loves it and he’s getting quickly caught up. You know they just went ahead and put him in the right grade and they got people that are coming and helping him. And you know I owe those people huge debt of gratitude. My middle schooler I went to a thing a couple weeks ago because he’s on the honor roll. He had a six point three point six seven grade point average and in seventh grade and then he he’s come home with a couple of awards for citizenship because he’s doing all the right things as a person not just scholastically my 15 year old who just got dropped into ninth grade with less than a second grade no formal second grade education is doing amazing. He loves school and he has on his own. And this is the thing like I was like at his age I wouldn’t have been this brave or bold. He has gone and talked to all his teachers and he worked so hard. I kept telling you know you’re doing amazing. You know don’t beat yourself up if you’re not getting if you’re getting C’s. That’s incredible considering where you came from. But that wasn’t good enough for him.

[03:27:16] And he has gone and talked to all his teachers he went and stayed after did extra credit work redid some assignments and worked hard so that by the end of his first grade period I think I don’t know if it’s a thing it’s the semester they are do it different. I don’t know. He has all A’s and B’s and it’s just I’m like okay I didn’t mess you up you’re still okay and you’re going to be you know if they even if they were getting D I’d be like well this is what more can I expect. But they haven’t been able to do that. I mean it was like you don’t know eighth grade. That’s huge. You know it was huge. And I told David I like course on the other hand I’m start to think. Do they teach anybody in school. Because I thought we were going to be the teachers have made have been incredible. And I’ve been in contact communication with them. But the thing that matters. I mean the grades are awesome but the thing that matters the most is that I’m watching my kids become real people want to know that sounds weird but it doesn’t. You know we went through we went through it a degree of that when we first left you know the first time I went to the thrift store and I brought Homer a old VHS player and some 50 Cent Disney cartoons and I sat and watched their faces as they watched that stuff for the first time in their lives. And it was healing to me. They were happy. They’d laugh. They loved so you know they’d pick a favorite movie and we watched a hundred times and that was fine.

[03:29:00] And then as they started choosing what kind of music they liked not because I told them this is good music or this is what you should do. They listened to all kinds of stuff like you know I like this one right. And to discover that they had things they liked and they were allowed to like and they could choose who they were and what they wanted and the best part is so far they’ve all chosen to be amazing incredible good people and that’s what matters. And they’re happy when they’re made. And it’s like I’m like they have they have an opportunity that I could only dream of. Yes specially those three youngest they’re going to grow up. They already have but now they’re going to grow up in a much more normal quote unquote world. They don’t live in fear. You know you can give them everything that you’d ever heard as like I’m sorry. I just I love it. If you know tell me all about what you did in school today because I didn’t get to do that. I walked through the high school when I was getting my son signed up and the administrator lady there was so so sweet and she was like OK I was like you know this is the first time I’ve come inside. I mean I had gone to some college classes but this first time I’ve been in a public just like a regular old public school setting. Like well let’s take you for a tour and she walked me through the entire building showed me all of what they had available where he would be going what kind of classes. And it set me at ease. What are they. OK. He’s going to be OK.

[03:30:38] It’s all going to be OK. And at the same time I was like Oh my word to have the opportunity to do this stuff when I was a kid. And I was so thrilled to see them do it and make their choices you know and talk about what they want to be when they grow up. And the fact that they can do that they can choose it’s not well you just need to do whatever and whatever the prophet tells you that’s what you’re going to be. And if he decides to change his mind later you’ll do that too. They actually they have a life and it’s like I don’t going to live vicariously through you and someday when I know you’re all settled and there are some things I want to go back and do but it’s just incredible to watch them have a life on the ground like you. You must feel the. I think it’s beautiful because I’m just I’m watching you watch your children and you’re getting to take this immense joy and have gratitude for even the smallest thing that a lot of people you have. Well normal lives take for granted. You know you get to rejoice in all these little details. And I think that’s you know me you obviously missed out on a lot. I’m not saying this makes up for anything but yeah it’s an opportunity to have this beauty that most other people will never get to experience. There’s always a yin and yang to things. Yeah for sure.

[03:32:13] And you know now that we’ve gone through the really exciting parts I look back I learned a lot and it made me who I am what I go through again probably not and I’m not going to put myself or my kids in a position to be subjected to that kind of thing. But you know you asked me earlier was there good parts you couldn’t make good out of. But as far as if anybody was to ask me if I had any power in the world I would have to say no the good didn’t outweigh the bad. I made it okay. There are way too many that don’t know anyway despite the ban. Exactly. I didn’t become this because of what I went through. I came Ivan this in spite of it and a lot of people aren’t able to make that switch. They’re not able to make those connections. They never. Some people never get out. Oh you and others get out. You know I’ve seen so many young people that get out because they didn’t want to live it. They they wanted to watch movies they wanted to date girls and they get out but only physically them. They still believe and they honestly think they are apostates. They think they’re going to hell and that you can’t have real joy that way either. Yeah there’s at least there they’re out there making choices. But there’s always that cloud hanging over them that they think they’re wicked for doing it. That’s the saddest thing I’ve heard from people who have heard this podcast or did thisJ.W. like it was my story. And I heard from people who have been out of Jehovah’s Witnesses for decades who have never never looked at the mental side of it.

[03:34:11] They just wanted to have sex or whatever the case was they they didn’t want to live it behaviorally but mentally they were still in there that there’s a term that in the community we would call them p’o physically out mentally in. Yeah there are a lot of people who stay mentally in even years after leaving and it’s it’s just the saddest thing because they feel they still feel just like you said like their apostates. They feel shame they feel feel bad even though their they’re out. And I think that’s maybe one of the worst things to me. Well let me speak either way you’re not living to the full potential you could be. You’re not enjoying life. You’re not. You’re you’re the prisoner of someone else’s idea of what you should be. And even if you choose to do something you enjoy there’s guilt associated anger like. Well you know there is a price to pay for that. I it was really fun to go to that party and where I went to look gay and I wore pants but I don’t pay for that. It was fun but I’m going to pay for that. So let me ask you then. So you are out. You’re physically out mentally out cash. You’re Pomo. So you’ve got this you’ve got this new life your kids are starting to to. Dare I say flourish you know for you know being able to pull themselves up like this in this new scenario. So so you know you and David and the kids what are your what are your dreams what are you all.

[03:35:59] What are you individually or what do you want for your family what do you hope what are you hoping for your new life. Oh there’s so many things you know. Absolutely no one top of the list is for all my kids to be happy whatever that looks like. You know as far as temporal things I I’m hoping that we’ll be able to. Right now we’re renting and we’re looking toward buying. We didn’t know the area we didn’t dare just buy a house and be stuck in something. But we’re hoping to find a nice house preferably with like an acre or something where I can feel like we can actually put down roots. I spent so much of my life living in houses that I didn’t feel like were mine and you could be uprooted at any time I want to. I mean literally put down roots. I love to grow things and there’s been so many plants that I bought because I love that plant. I kept it in the pot because when we moved I was taken out with me and then they die and it would have been better if I’d put it in the ground at least let it out alive. You know I imagine my home being you know I’d love to have a guest room or to have my home be a place where it’s peaceful and tranquil and where people can come and visit and where my kids will always want to come back. And visit even as they go out and make their own lives in the world. And I recently I’ve been doing a lot of research on stuff.

[03:37:49] I’ve got so much going on but I just I feel this desperate push to do what I can to try to help other people. You know I have this incredible life. I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my life. But it’s hard to feel completely happy when you know the people you love and care about are trapped in hell. And so I’m trying to do research and put together for one thing like psychologic. There’s a lot of psychology about that wasn’t necessarily the studies weren’t done in space specifically to polygamy but they apply. This situation is why it makes it hard. Over here in polygamy I’m trying to pull together a bunch of that information to try to help people understand why they’re still struggling. You know they might be out physically and not mentally. They might be out physically and mentally but they’ve got all that baggage and all that noise in their head telling them that it was that they were wicked. It’s not that you were wicked. This is the way our brains work. This is what being in that situation did to you and if you can acknowledge that you can work through it and at least comprehend that it’s not the devil telling you you did wrong. You went through a hard experience. It really is. And then there are a lot of resources I’ve found just ways to try to help yourself work through it. You know whether it’s writing down how you feel and some of that stuff. My hope is to put together some in some semblance of order something that I can give to people or work with people and help them work make it through that path.

[03:39:32] You know I’m six years out. It took me a long time to reach out work to get here if I could help other people get through that transition quicker and get on to losing their lives. I would love that. And then there’s different news interviews and stories. There’s some interviews that were done by the Canadian authorities when they were deciding whether or not to legalize polygamy. And there’s some valuable testimony and stuff in there but it’s like all these long videos and I would like to put together a short a series of short documentaries where I address one issue at a time and hear all these people what they said about this issue and then tie it in with why that psychologically affects you and how it was applied and whatnot. Because I think you get it’s easier to get a lot of people’s attention if you can watch a video than reading off a page. And I don’t know about anybody else but I get on YouTube and you might start with a five minute video and before you know it you’ve watched all of them it’s been days and you learned something you know you know would you. I’m sure you don’t it’s just me. And then the other thing I’m working on is writing a book. I found it was part of what saved my life literally before I left. I turned to writing down how I felt because I couldn’t tell anyone. I it would be proof that the devil was controlling my mind and you know that I was having questions but I couldn’t deal with it anymore. It was so I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t see straight.

[03:41:23] I had to sort it out and make sense of how I was feeling what I was thinking. So I’d write it down and I burn it. So you’d find it and have proof that I was wicked. And it helped me get control of my thoughts and make sense and it helped me reach a point where like OK I’m not actually crazy. These things make sense but then it was also scary because they made sense but they they told me that what was going on wasn’t right you know in the church. Right but kind of like I was talking about writing down the names of my nieces and nephews. I’ve gone through times when at first I was like I’m just going to forget my life from before because it hurts too much. I can think about it. I can’t think about my family. I’m going to focus on my future and on my kids and on now. And that worked for a while. But then you start to realize that there is a lot of valuable information to be gleaned and that if we forget history we’re going to be bound to repeat it. And so as things came to my mind I started just writing it out for that I won’t forget. So I can make sense of it so that someday in the future if I end up with a grandchild or someone I know one you know I found this cool cold and I’m thinking about joining I I’m like oh wait I have some stories to help you change your mind. You know I felt like I was losing it.

[03:42:47] I was forgetting and that’s what I was trying to do but I couldn’t let it happen and so I’m trying to remember and it ends up that by the time I’d written out some of the stuff and trying to make sense of it and remember things. I’ve got like over 200000 thousand words down in my computer about my story. And so I thought you know like I made my documentary and published it. I’ve done my blog and I post things on Facebook and I’ve had a lot of people react positively some negatively. There’s been a lot of comments where people are like thank you for doing this or you put into words exactly how I felt and it was. And basically I was helping people work through their own emotions to have somebody be able to put it into words what they were feeling. And then there are a lot of people that private messaged me and say thank you for posting what you did. That’s exactly how I feel. I wanted to reach out. Thank you. But I don’t even like your comment because my family will see that I liked that and it will cause a problem. But I want you to know and I figured for all the people that are brave enough to do that how many more read it feel the same but don’t speak out. How many more. Read it and disagree but it planted that thought. That’s going to keep going in the back of their mind and there will be parallels in their life that doesn’t make them look out a different way.

[03:44:16] And so I thought if I could make a book or two because it’s huge amounts of information it would be a. You know I spent a lot time trying to explain things to people and I feel like I spent hours as you can tell now trying to explain that if I could put it in a concise way in a book it could reach so many more people and maybe help more people. And then I could use that as a foundation if you could read that and that resonated with you. If you have questions I want to help you with the next steps. I would like to do more. It’s like I think everybody should feel that happiness and I feel like there’s a path to doing that. And it’s not through religion in my opinion. It’s not through the AFL. Yes for sure. It’s through your own the power of your own thoughts in mind and you have to be able to get past that indoctrination and believe in yourself and love yourself and then you can start to have that that happiness. So that’s a I don’t have a job right now. Rock my ankle the end of 2015 and so the jobs that I used to do. I can no longer do. One of my dear friends in Utah told me that that was the universe hit me with a two by four because I was ignoring it and not doing what I should have been with my life. And it has definitely helped. And I was like yeah I can kind of see that. I kept thinking you know I’m doing these jobs but I felt this poll that I should be writing and trying to do stuff but money mattered.

[03:46:02] I had to help taking you know you mentally and losing you. Well no it was more of a. And I didn’t know I didn’t see it that way. It turned into being. I mean I agreed with the idea this the universe trying to kind of poke and say you should go into this kind of the whole gut feeling. And I’m like yeah I should. But I got to keep making money I got to take care of that. You know I got to help and there’s like you really should have something come up. I think I wish I could but I got to do this and once I broke my ankle there were no more debates. I was out of the scene. And it changed. It’s changed a lot of things in my life in my circumstances that have been immensely helpful even changing how I interact with my family. The person I was the person that had done everything and now I was the one that couldn’t do anything and everybody stepped up and that didn’t go away. You know my husband does a lot of dishes now. He he did all the cooking the meals and that didn’t stop. Now there’s more of a of a balance and it wasn’t his fault but he wasn’t doing it is just none of us ever thought of it any different now. It kind of hit a reset button but it also made it where I couldn’t do much else. And so I started doing more on trying to remember and write.

[03:47:34] You know I’m laying in bed I can’t get up because my ankles and a Casten or in a splint and so on the one hand I don’t have a job. But I feel like my life is almost an engrossed in what I feel like as more of my mission. I want to help people. I want to. I would love to believe down in my heart that something that I wrote or said or did was a catalyst to help someone else somewhere have that aha moment. This is what happiness feels like love more than anything. Yes that is beautiful. I would tell you that if you continue to put your story out there you will definitely help people whether they ever tell you or not. I mean I I’m just a guy sitting in his basement with a microphone who likes listening to podcasts. And so I thought people kept telling me I should write a book and I’m more of an auditory learner so I thought well I’ll create a podcast and I’ll tell my story. So I created the podcast. I told my story and I know for a fact that at least two people have left the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses because of that and. Yes. Yes. It feels so amazing. And so and those are again it’s like what you said which I thought was kind of a a beautiful insight that I guess I hadn’t really thought about which is that for every person that tells you it’s the whatever it was that you said or did help them or that they liked something that you had written. There are other people who may not hit that like button or may not ever tell you that it’s made an impact on.

[03:49:29] And they may not even make an impact today. It might be 10 years down the road something hit them suddenly and they say oh you know what that guy told me about that 10 years ago on some blog. You just then my know who it was or where they heard it but it stuck in their mind and it might be that it was a combination of what you said and five other things that happened over the next year and you’ll never know and they may never realize it and that’s not the part that matters to them is that I want to be part of the you know the resistance be part of the other side that’s helping people find their freedom. You can’t force it on people but when they’re ready they need the tools that can help them. Turn that crank in their mind and switch to flip the switch. Yeah well you can’t just think in a different light and you don’t know there are so many parallels and crossovers between all these different cults. So in fact I think the last interview I just did and released David had mentioned that it was Leah Remini his program on Scientology that really kind of struck him and made him realize that oh I’m in a cult because Jehovah’s Witnesses may not have exactly the same beliefs as Scientology but they have the same mechanisms. And I mean I’m just listening to your story here and I think that it helps to have someone from a different community in a different voice say the same basic thing in a different way than it does.

[03:51:16] And I’ll say I know that because shortly after we left I got on YouTube and it started with I’d always been fascinated with the Holocaust. Warren Jeffs taught us a sliver of it. And I then found out that most what he told us was pretty twisted Macbeth’s. I started watching some interviews of that and that led in to these interviews these people talking about a cult. And it’s so much easier. It’s safer I guess for your psychology for your psyche to watch something. You know I could watch something about a Jehovah’s Witness telling their story and I’m like okay. We already know they’re the bad guys. You know they’re crazy. We know there are. And so as you listen to it you’re going. How could anybody believe that this is insane and it’s so easy to condemn what they’re doing and then if you stick with it long enough at some point that little light comes out and you’re like wait a minute. That’s really no different than what I was doing. You know if a Jehovah’s Witness was to watch my testimony they’d be like Oh what an idiot she is and we’re holy cow we’re doing the same thing. We’ve got a different guy at the top but the process the thought control. There’s really no no big difference as it’s all the same. And so if you can find someone who’s not from where you came from you may have better success at breaking through that protection and you know crack through that protection you put around your thoughts because it’s OK to think that about Jehovah’s Witnesses. This is like a person who has been abused who would never stand up for themselves.

[03:53:08] But the move is someone else being abused and suddenly the impact of that really hits them they can be righteous or angry for that other person more than they can be for themselves. Yeah. And I even experienced something similar to that. There was a program I went through up in Salt Lake called the woww program women of worth. And so a bunch of women who all had been through hell some of them where they had struggled with addiction or whatever it was basically we all came through the door the first day broken some having been through our experiences and we would meet and you know we talk about things and the whole program was immensely helpful to me. But at one meeting we had where we all were supposed to share can you remember the basis of it. But when it came around the room to my turn it had struck me as like you know the one thing I’ve noticed and it’s the same thing that I am going to tell you about myself is that every one of us allowed to whatever degree you wild use that word allowed ourselves to be in horrible situations. We were being harmed in whatever way and we allowed that to go on. And the thing that finally made us act and change something was when we saw it affecting our children. We could deal with that. You all treat me like crap. I deserve that. You start treating my child like crap and Alderson’s like how dare you as a sew in in what we saw as being spurred into action to save our children.

[03:55:00] Our children saved us from what we were part of because we left for them and that saved our own sanity our own lives. You know you from one end of the spectrum to the other whatever bad thing you were part of because you left for your children you saved yourself also and you didn’t you know you’re like No it was my fault. When you are being bullied that when you watch your child being bullied it gives you a whole different perspective. And it’s you know that was with our children but it works the same with other people you know it’s just like you said you allow things in your own life or you won’t stand up for yourself. But when you see it happening to someone else see you it gives you a different perspective. For one thing. But being someone who has endured and you know how hurt that person feels being treated like that gives you the strength to be like How dare you do that to a person to stand up for that. Now also like a course I want stand up for myself. But then it helps kickstart that thought process in your mind. I don’t deserve that. There was one thing that they told us in that wild program that hit me really really hard because you know I’ve never had a lot of self confidence I have you know I hate cameras. On and on and on. I don’t like myself. I didn’t like you know I was always been fat always been ugly all you know the whole list of things.

[03:56:43] And one of the exercises we did was they said I think we had to write down things that we think of ourselves and it seems. It’s embarrassing if saying anything positive. I mean how vain could you be. And so the easier ones are the ones you’ve heard all your life is all the negatives. I’m ugly I’m fat. I’ve never been any good. I’m not smart. And you write it all down and then they tell us to imagine that you’re talking. Imagine your five the five year old version of yourself and imagine you’re talking to that 5 year old version of yourself. And what would you say to yourself at 5. Would you read off that list of things. And the reality is I start thinking about and like that’s the things I heard everyday. And there are it was killing me inside. And then you end up like I told David I said I would go think I’m ugly crying. I mean this is not that cute know little sniffle here wipe out at the corner of your eyes with your tissues is all out. Sobbing in a room full of people. When you finally go it’s okay to feel bad. It’s OK. That that hurt. And that’s ok. To finally realize that all those horrible things people said Hugh that they never should have said that and who what were they thinking to say that a five year old child and the whole point of it was that you need to be as gentle with yourself now as if you’re talking to that 5 year old child. Look at the things you do get caught if you got your favorite child. You did awesome on that.

[03:58:26] And to you know that was an extremely difficult process. You know the other thing response do is go up and look ourselves in the eyes in the mirror and say all these things good things you know tell yourself you’re beautiful and you’re a mate. I could not do it. I set a bathroom and I cried and I couldn’t do I felt like a liar. How could I not. That’s one thing. I was determined that I was not a liar. I would never lie. How could I lie to myself. And I sat there and cried because I wasn’t beautiful and I wasn’t amazing and I wasn’t any of those things. And I admit I’m still not quite where I feel like I can do that and feel entirely honest but I’ve made a lot of us. But to me it just went to show how damaging the things that we say are now even if we realize that you you like it when they make a mistake. Well that was stupid. You’re an idiot and you may not have meant that you were upset. It sticks and it matters to them. Oh you you did. When you grew up in a society where that is the attitude of the entire society especially towards girls then you know all I could think is I’m looking at myself I’m discovering all these things I’m realizing why I act the way I do I realizing why I struggle with these things. And so I got my associates degree in psychology. Myerson shut up last August right before we moved.

[04:00:07] I chose classes that I felt like applied to what I felt like I had to understand how this works. Why does this happen. I took abnormal psychology I took personality theory and through that I was like It’s not that I’m crazy. That’s what these things do. And if these circumstances made me this way can pretty well be sure that every other woman child that I knew in that religion is damaged in the same way that we can fix it if we can recognize it and make some changes. And it was. It was almost funny. I was in my psychology class you know here I am old enough to be the mother of everybody else in my class. And when she starts talking about learning about anxiety she starts to read down the list of the symptoms. And here I am 44 years old out of the church for like five years or four years whatever and I’m sitting in class and I start crying. I really don’t cry as much as I make as I make it sound just like all those years when I was in the church and I thought there was something wrong with me. I thought I was having a heart attack. I thought there was something physically wrong and I didn’t want to find out because I didn’t want to know if I dropped dead that was fine. In fact maybe it would release me from this torture sooner than those young men and anxiety attack real. And I hadn’t thought about it for years. But as she started describing it I remember that I basically lived in a state of anxiety attack for so long but then also I realized I haven’t done that for a while.

[04:02:16] And how nice that is. But even even that that little bit of knowledge and understanding that no you’re not about to have a heart attack. This is your body’s natural reaction to stress. You were having an anxiety attack and it’s not because you’re weak it is not because the devil whispering to you it’s all you trying to protect you from a danger that it can sense that it knows is harmful to you whether you can comprehend it in your mind or not. Yeah. No it’s I think that anyone who leaves code should be either taking a class in psychology or exposing themselves to it in some way because they will learn a lot about themselves and release themselves of a lot of pain associated with normal human behavior. And it is like oh you’re telling me this is normal. I was doing it was working right. You know it wasn’t wrong. And it really is it’s just another layer of peeling away that harm and those false narratives to understand. Now I wasn’t wrong for having an anxiety attack. It made sense with what I was living through. My mom was working. This is OK. And you know to to be armed with some knowledge it just helps you in every way to get through life. Yeah. As opposed to being isolated in a cold and having very little knowledge your book. Well exactly. You know I think I mentioned that Warren Jeffs had started saying that once you girls are married you shouldn’t be talking to your mothers.

[04:04:04] You know you absolutely shouldn’t be telling your husbands secrets or his family secrets to your mother if you have issues you go to your husband he’s your head. All that and even as a grown married woman I was like Well I mean I believe we need to do that. But my mother’s only real friend they have you know and I and I hated the thought of handing my daughter off and then thinking she couldn’t touch me if she needed to. But after I got out at all the pieces start falling into place and it made sense. I found out the stuff Warren Jeffs was doing and I thought I can imagine my daughter being in that position coming around coming back to me because I’m someone she trusts as her mother saying mother I know that these things that my husband is doing to me and having me do is righteous and that I need to be obedient. But I’m so uncomfortable with it and I feel bad because that must mean I’m wicked and her mother has her mother be like he’s doing what. Because I know. But she doesn’t know she doesn’t know how our own body works because we’re not supposed to teach there. Warren Jeffs was telling these very young girls that he was abusing that having an orgasm. Was that fullness of the Spirit of God that was the burning within and they could only get it in connection with him and they didn’t have a clue. You know view is was a physical follows exactly that is the way it works. He was having them do all kinds of unspeakable things. And I’ve been told I haven’t seen the letters but I have no reason to doubt it.

[04:05:57] I’ve been told that everybody had to keep writing their confession letters and here’s these little girls being directed to do things that their soul told them was wrong but their husband who is actually the prophet of God tells them this is right and righteous and they were writing confessional letters pleading for forgiveness because of how uncomfortable they felt doing the things he told them to do and they knew that it was what God wanted. And he was making a fight against their soul that was telling him this isn’t right you shouldn’t have to do this and he would just then drag him down even further and tell you you’re you have to shut out your own soul. You can’t have that anymore. And anyway the damage done by cults I don’t think we could even imagine or measure it in the research I’ve done I’ve seen where I can remember who it was. But there is a psychologist that said that if we could eliminate childhood trauma especially sexual trauma. But you know the different abuse neglect if you can eliminate childhood trauma the DSM manual which is now like about 700 pages of mouse tape. I got a copy from taking classes would become a pamphlet. I want to thank Brenda for making herself available to tell her story and for being so open and real about it all. I know it wasn’t likely easy to talk about all that if you’d like to continue the conversation. You can go to the link in the description for this episode from my site where you can leave comments for every person that is interviewed. They will see the comments and they can reply and you can spark a conversation with them.

[04:07:49] If for some reason the links don’t show up in your particular podcast app you can go to shun podcasts dot com and on the episodes page you’ll see each one with the link for commenting. You’ll also have links for the songs that each person chose to represent their journey which unfortunately I can’t play on here due to copyright issues. You also see links to different resources that are mentioned by each guest. Ways that you can support the show. Anything you might want or need is there on that page. Speaking of resources Brenda actually has a documentary out on the YouTube’s called if this is heaven. Give me hell. It’s another look into her story and you’ll see some photos and such in it if you’d like to learn more. It’s a 20 minute short documentary and it’s well worth the watch. So again it’s called if this is heaven. Give me hell. And it’s on YouTube and I’ll go ahead and place a link in the notes for this episode as well. For that she also has a blog that I’ve linked to if you’d like to keep up with some of the developments in the the cult of the LDS and you can learn more there as well and you know of course by now we all know the hashtag meta that’s trended throughout the world. But there is another hashtag hashtag me 3 written out Emmi H R E that refers to polygamy. And so if you want to support that you can maybe learn something from that. Or you know maybe that that’s you know I don’t know who’s listening.

[04:09:28] So maybe that’s part of your life as well. And that hashtag me 3 can help bring some awareness to what polygamists go through. If you’d like to learn more about my story and the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses you can listen to my podcast series called ThisJ.W. life or you can find more out at thisjwlife.com if you’d like to support this podcast. You can do so in a few ways. First I love seeing comments and conversations on the shud podcast dot com site because it supports those who are being so open and vulnerable and telling their stories you know before before every interview. People are nervous to sell their stories before even after they’ve done the interview before the week before when I tell them that their episode is going to come out. Usually people are nervous. You know it’s it’s scary to put yourself out there on some level. It’s very freeing but it’s also a little nerve wracking and you never know how it’s going to be received. So it really helps to see that that people can reflect your stories back to you that they’ve lived some of that as well to find that common ground and to just be encouraged by others so first and foremost that’s one of the ways to support the show. Second I love seeing five star reviews pop up on iTunes with great comments. It really helps lend credibility to what we’re doing here. It’s encouraging to me personally and it may help others define the show and get help that they might need as well.

[04:11:00] And finally you can support the show’s ongoing monthly cost financially by becoming a patron at patreon.com/shunned. If you want to help out that way there’s also a link on the Web site to the patriarch for this particular show. All musical support for the show is from Poddington Bear and next month we’ve got our first international interview as I interview a former member of Jehovah’s Witnesses from the United Kingdom. His name is Mark not just a great guy but he is also some of those who listen. If you’re familiar with the forum jehovahs-witness.com if you’re a member of that forum then you know Mark as pale imper on there. So join us again in June. Learn more about him his journey and even some things that recently happened as a surprise at the end. So as always love others do no harm and go be happy.

DJ Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:10] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we get to hear stories from people that have been silenced by controlling religion. Today we’re going to hear from D.J a guy that is shunned by Jehovah’s witnesses so that they don’t have to face the truth. Before we get started I wanted to introduce the new format. Some of you probably noticed that things have changed its arms from episode to episode. And honestly that’s because I’m trying to find the right mix here. When I was done doing my other podcast called this JW life where I told my personal story. I was contacted by others and people wanted me to help them tell their story. To be quite honest I wasn’t really ready for it. Telling my story was a big deal. I was kind of overwhelmed by it all to some extent. And so when others wanted me to help them to tell their stories I was doing it. But honestly I wasn’t that comfortable with it. So at first my goal was to keep myself out of the interview. I didn’t want to make this podcast about me. I just did one about me and that level of vulnerability was kind of tiring so I felt like I was thrown into an interviewer’s role but I wasn’t really comfortable with my abilities as an interviewer. It’s not something I’ve ever really done before so as a result I would remove my audio and produce more individual stories. Well over time some of the people that I interviewed asked me to be in the story with them.

[00:01:41] They said it would make them more comfortable but honestly it was making me more uncomfortable. Then came David in these last episodes and his story was so involved that I couldn’t edit it. I had to leave me in it and it kind of pushed me out there as an interviewer. I received some feedback from people that liked having me in it more. And I’ve been asked to be in it more by the people that I’ve interviewed. So now you’re stuck with me. I’m finding my voice as an interviewer I hope and people seem to like it so I’m going to try to go ahead and settle in here. Now I’m feeling more comfortable as an interviewer but I’m trying to stay out of the way as much as possible because I still want the focus to be on the person that I interview. I hope to add my own flavor in my own way. With this episode the podcast will go over 7000 downloads which is amazing to me. ThisJ.W. life my original podcast which covered my story and the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses has now gone over 18000 downloads so it’s exciting to know that these are making some sort of a difference and to hear feedback from people. So let’s go ahead and get into a story and afterword I’m going to give some more information that you’ll want to stick around for. My name’sD.J. I’m 27 years old. I was one of Joves witnesses and I am shen. How did you come to be one of Jehovah’s witnesses you know like what age were you were you born in. Did you come in later. How that how that developed.

[00:03:23] So I was actually born into the Jehovah’s Witness religion. So that was just a lifestyle that I had always known so that that would be making me a third generation member. So my my grandmother met a man in the 60s and she had my dad and I and his sister with a man and they were both worldly at the time so obviously worldly meaning somebody who doesn’t serve or bowed down or get baptized by water immersion to Jehovah or more importantly the Watchtower organization and its interpretation of the Bible. But these these were just two people that met each other had children and they were just they themselves trying to grasp you know the wonders of the world and questioning death. Why do we die. What happens to our dead loved ones. Is there life after death. So to the best of my knowledge and later in my life as I’ve come to find out that that man that she had met it was just a real you know real piece of shit. Basically he he was my dad’s real dad but my real grandfather and my grandma tried to make it made to work with him. But ultimately he wanted nothing to do with her or any any of his children. So later in the 60s she separated from that man and met my step grandfather. And he was he was in the war. And they would they would get to know each other and decide ultimately through friends eventually that they met that that they were gonna become one of Jehovah’s Jehovah’s Witnesses and raise their children. My dad and his his sister in that organization.

[00:05:17] So my dad was born into it you know basically born and raised in it at 2 years old he was introduced to it from his you know his parents. And so yeah he grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness. And that’s basically how I would be later introduced to my dad you know he made it sound growing up that he was never really into it. It was just kind of a formality. My grandma my grandfather was extremely possessive and often times you know physically and emotionally abusive. And he would later become an elder and he would still have courses. That’s just kind of the process the ladder you climb. Yeah. And my my grandma my grandfather was a pretty successful person. He owned his own business and my dad would grow up to work with him. And at a certain point as my dad was getting older both him and his sister started getting you know into trouble with bad association and and he would ultimately be you know his sister before him got baptized and he she was younger than him at the time but I think she was I don’t know 18 or 19 when she got disfellowshipped for having relations with an unbeliever of Jehovah’s Witnesses and she would later get disfellowshipped for her wrongdoing or unrepentant ness and she would never return. So it’s been 30 30 year almost 30 years now that she’s been out and my dad like I said he wasn’t baptized when his sister was and he ultimately made the choice to to leave as well and kind of do his own thing and be worldly and go off and live the life that he thought he was missing out on and it just didn’t.

[00:07:18] You know like I said my dad growing up. He went and he just made it seem like it was nothing he was really really interested into. You know he was just something that he had to do. So once he was out of you know the organization he moved to theL.A. area along the coast and he just spent a couple of years outside the organization Dušan is his own thing and at which point he ended up having my daughter my half sister with a woman and they went to stay together but they would share custody of of her. And then you know a year or two after that he would he would meet my mom outside of the Joves Witness organization and she was worldly and she was she was raised Catholic. So she was raised around religion herself. And when they met each other they would talk about beliefs often. And my dad was trying to tell her exactly how he grew up in the good things about the organization and no doubt you know you can’t blame her for when she found out exactly the ins and outs of the organization and what he was raised in. She she’s like What are you doing. You have the truth. So ultimately she would convince my dad to return and start studying but. Yes. So they were both out when they met. And she. She like I said would convince him to ultimately return and for them both to study so and would take into consideration at this time. Now I keep my mom’s pregnant with me. So I think that that was maybe a determining factor.

[00:09:07] Two of them just worry about evaluating their life situation and you know trying to understand their next move. So I think down the line. Yeah yeah. And I think it is more out of pressure. You know when people get to that point in their life where they have to re-evaluate their situation because they might not be in a good place and I know my dad told me that when he was outside of the organization he got a you know he dabbled in drugs and got into trouble and obviously their lives were the best that they could be and they had to say you know sit down and talk to each other about okay what are we going to do now we’re you know pregnant withD.J me. So they would return. And then like I said my mom was baptized with me and they would go to Vegas actually in a look. So they got married and then shortly after that they got baptized. Yeah. So then. So then were you baptized while she was pregnant. I believe so yeah. I believe yes she was she was still pregnant. They both got baptized together. Maybe there’s some way you could have gone back in an older baptism somehow. Yeah I never I never considered that maybe baptized twice a double dip it was invalid. OK. Yeah. All right so then that’s really interesting I think that there are a lot of people who when they have kids start to re-evaluate things and it’s fascinating that it happens to have been your mom.

[00:10:49] That was never a witness that you know got you guys back into your dad back into it. That’s that’s a unique course. So then so you know your parents are baptized obviously you you come into the world. You know what. What did it mean to you to be a Jehovah’s Witness back then. You know what. What was the world view you were given you know even as a little kid. Well like I said it was just something I always knew was just a way of life. That was the condition. You know into me unbeknownst. So this was typical. I just thought that every family was like this and I would later come to find out that that wasn’t the case when I would start school. So growing up you know before school I remember a lot of arguments a lot of verbal abuse from both ends of my parents just because of them going through this struggle of trying to make it work with a new child in this organization. My dad was starting his own business and. And at the time my mom and dad were both fighting for full custody of my half sister. So before school I remember you know my earliest memory was 2 years old and it was just extreme extreme arguments and verbal abuse and shouting and that’s just my earliest memories of my family before school so. But when I started school you know that’s when the indoctrination really kicked in because Jehovah’s Witnesses right off the bat you know if your parents are really trying they’re going to they’re going to help you understand that you’re one of Joves witnesses in how to stand up for your beliefs.

[00:12:44] So the first day of school I mean weeks before the first day of kindergarten I remember my mom sitting down with me and going over what would be my first demonstration essentially of walking up to my kindergarten teacher and telling him in front of the class and their parents that I was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and handing him you know a Jehovah’s Witness publication which I don’t exactly remember which one it was but it was probably life harder to get here by evolution or creation. So then I went straight into that I didn’t salute the flag and the reason why. And and just went into that whole mumbojumbo and standing up for my my faith. So you know my belief system right off the bat wow and you had to do that. Did you say in front of other kids and like their parents. Yeah absolutely. The orientation there’s Tom. Yeah exactly. So the first day you know all the kids are sitting around on the ground and you know you’d be introduced by the teacher and you’d stand up and say your name. And that’s when I had my little my book or whatever it was exactly I don’t I don’t remember but that’s what I would stand up and say you know I’mD.J. I’m one of Joves witnesses and you know I don’t salute the flag and you know in my mind it was just raising controversy right off the bat. Yeah it has a place for a kid that early. Right. And I remember pretty distinctively wondering why it necessarily hadn’t had to do that like that.

[00:14:23] Yeah but I didn’t really understand the ramifications of it to its fullest extent because I was so young but it did raise you know an eyebrow to me like you know why is this absolutely necessary. So it was and it was it was already a daunting enough task to stand up in front of all of those people that I didn’t know. You know that’s that that young. And right off the bat just kind of Varty chevin endowments throats like this is what to be expected from me. That’s yeah that’s you. Welcome to your life right. You mean as early as that you know. WILDER Yeah that’s right that’s right. I have to put on a kid and obviously like you said it didn’t have to be done that way that could have been done in private. That was just making a point and making a spectacle. Right. And I think looking back at it you know my mom always seemed to be that type of person where it was like all or nothing. You want to stand out and you know make a difference and stand up for your beliefs. She was a bit of an extremist and it that was just that it was just one of those things that was ingrained to me even before I started school weeks prior that we were going to sit down and make sure that everything was accordingly so that there was no hiccups and that it seemed like this was something that meant a lot to me that young when in actuality it didn’t. It was just something that was driven into my head. Wow.

[00:15:52] All right so then how did things progress you know at school or even you know like in the Keenum Hall how were how are things going back then. Well it’s so easy it’s with school the you know the introduction to each following school year would continue with the same familiar routine. Taking a stand for my beliefs in front of my new teacher first thing before each and every school year. You know while being in the public school system so this is this it became something that I would start to avoid if at all possible eventually praying that my mom would just forget to prepare me for that first day of school. And you know as a Jehovah’s Witness in school I was obligated to not only share with my school teacher that I don’t celebrate any holidays that you know obviously includes birthdays but explain to my new friends or acquaintances you know how as a Jehovah’s Witness as I was told not to call them friends so this didn’t seem to cause any issue with my teachers or schoolmates as well but I remember distinctively in the second grade that kind of changing for me. So it changed for me in the sense that I became aware that when there was holiday events or it was somebodies birthday I would be given extra work or go color in a different corner than where the activities were taking place or oftentimes being physically segregated from you know the other kids so as not to see the fun that they were having at somebodies birthday. So this is when I really started to wonder why I couldn’t be with my friends and basically having a vacation from the normal school day to you know laugh and play and eat cake.

[00:17:40] So you know as a young kid the only question I have questions that I started thinking about was why can it play with the other kids and more importantly why did they get cake and and why couldn’t I. So these these things I remember my mother trying her best to explain to me as a two year old that ultimately the reason why. Can I have cake is that it would upset God. So you know in my mind thinking back at that it’s like kids that young can’t reason know or have the concept of faith that you know I was a PEMRA. I was only projecting what was driven into my mind. I knew that it made my family happy. The yeah you know there in the Bible where it condemns cake Yeah it is so it’s so silly. So then how did things you know how are you doing. So obviously you know school is it is drama really. I mean it’s not not going to make you happy because you’re you know it’s just a place where you have to confront all of these issues that aren’t even your issue that your parents issues or issues of religion that they took on. What about. So you know you’re going to the Keenum Hall as this young person you know. What’s that like. How is that impacting you. Well I would see that you know the early stages that my parents would my parents would take us to as much meetings as possible. They were never extremely regular you know. Mind you they were in their early 20s.

[00:19:14] You know my mom had me when she was 19 years old so going through the school system I I remember my parents being the youngest people so a lot of kids thought my parents were actually my older brother sister. So going to going to meetings obviously in their 20s it was pretty inconsistent it was hit and miss. But it was almost that they you know preached do as I say not as I do. You know especially when it came to schools like you know take this huge stand for your belief. But you know we would be really hit and miss with meetings. And it really didn’t make sense. But what I realized was that the Kingdom Hall was a place where I actually could have some friends but these were by choice. Naturally they were just kind of almost arranged friendships because these were acceptable kids to associate with outside of you know anything else that you knew. So yeah. So the early days of you know being a kid in that organization that was 0 7 6 and 7 when you know my parents were already making me sit down and do the checkmarks like and yet pay attention in any form that I could like you know put a checkmark by God or Jesus or when we turn to the Bible those things if you know something to just preoccupy a child then I remember distinctively not wanting to you know essentially do that. I’d rather doodle or draw or color. And you know even at six or seven that’s not that that wasn’t acceptable.

[00:20:54] I remember being pulled out yanked by my arm outside and getting spanked because I wasn’t paying attention and apparently paying attention meant that I would have to be like I said when Jesus was announced from the stage Stager Jehovah I’d make checkmarks and that was what I was supposed to be doing not not color so I’d get it. And you know I get Spade’s I get in trouble if I wasn’t doing those things. Isn’t it amazing the the pressure that is put on kids to live up to something it’s kind of like you brought out like you know here you were having to like go to school and confront all of these things and yet your parents weren’t even a regular at the meetings you know you were taking more of a stand as a child than they were and of course your mom never even grew up in it. So she has no idea. Much like same with my parents. They grew up they didn’t grow up in it. So they had no idea what they were sending me to do every day. They had no concept of the stand I was being forced to take for them. And they I don’t know that they would have taken that stand. I don’t know if you know I mean you’d have to put them in that position. But right of course my parents were very regular and very militant. Sure. But you know it is funny just to see the the. No it’s not funny it’s sad to see the pressure put on these these young kids. So your year in the Kingdom Hall you know you’re starting to be indoctrinated really you know by just having to pay attention and you know they’re already kind of showing you you know that it’s works. You know this is a religion of works.

[00:22:45] It’s all about sitting there and making a checkmark when they say a word or something like that it’s not right. It’s not about who you are. It’s more about what you do. So then what was it you know at home you had said that before school year your parents were you know stressed out and fighting and establishing businesses and and you know getting involved in this cult that required a lot out of them. So how did that kind of progress at home. You know as you as you start getting into Year started getting a little older you know around and started going into your teenage years on hand for young adulthood. What was that progression at home like. Well you know it was it was really extremely hectic because my parents were still fighting for full custody. This was a battle that took a long time actually. And it you know on top of them trying to establish my dad my father’s business they were dealing with the court system and they’re also like you said programmed to believe that they were absolutely required to make as many of these meetings as possible be out in the field Ministry as well. This is this is something that is almost like a full time job within itself let alone raising three children because you know my parents ended up having another brother that’s five years younger than me. So now it’s me my brother and my sister living in this house. And it was my my childhood wasn’t extremely horrible by any stretch but it was just maybe it was I don’t know it but it didn’t seem like that.

[00:24:22] Yeah but there was a lot a lot of arguing verbal abuse and it was just being home was it. Oftentimes it was the best thing ever or the worst thing ever. It was never a real medium. It was just up or down and it was dependent on the mood of my parents that day. I understand I feel you there. Neira Yeah. All right. So then you know that was kind of volatile. How how were you progressed. Like were you making any progress. You know as as the years went by in the religion you know how did you you know progressed a baptism or you know what was that process like for you. Well I want to be baptized till I was about 17. So back end up going through the motions as a child my only in my mind did as much as my parents you know. Like I said it was something where it might be a Joerres when his parents can live by do as I say not as I do and my parents like I said we’re never really regular growing up. And it was something in my mind that I said well I’m only going to try as hard as you. So in meetings and stuff like that where were just formalities. For me it was just something that was required of me. So it was never anything that I really took to heart or anything that I really dove deep into wanting to understand because it was just a little too difficult for me to I understand some of the rules and regulations even at the youngest of ages.

[00:26:07] You know I don’t understand why even playing outside let alone kids from school I remember you know. You know about to be in middle school still in elementary school fifth grade having you know friends say Hey can I come over and they would come out with me to parent my parents car. You know as kids do it it just kind of sway their parents decision. And I would have my my buddy by me and I’d be like you know that can so-and-so come over and they would they would say you know my mom would say no. Not todayT.J. not today. And that was always something that was you know I did try over and over again. And you know once I would get home I would ask my mom why. So why can its own so come over. And I was just told yet again that as one of Joe’s witnesses that God did not approve of that type of association being that they were world. So I did it. I didn’t fully understand exactly what it was that made them so unworthy of my friendship. And so I was slightly confused to say the least. But after the following day or the weekend would pass after you know asking if that friend would come over. You know my my buddy would come up and ask you know why can’t I come over or if I can’t come to your house. Do you think you could come over to mine. And I knew in my you know in my mind that if my parents weren’t gonna allow a worldly person to come over to my house that there wasn’t a chance in hell that I’d be able to go to theirs.

[00:27:33] And this would affect my my relationships with kids at school because you know I would just imagine they’re there. Parents were aware of their child wanting to hang out with me or vice versa. And you know just being told me relaying that information to my buddy of why they can explain to them that they were actually his witness and that they didn’t believe me they believe the same things that my my parents did and that was unacceptable. I could just imagine them going back home and telling their parents that and how offended they must have been and probably told their kids like how about you avoid that person. Yeah it’s very arrogant. Yeah it is. And growing up I would just get to see more and more how Jehovah’s Witnesses are very entitled and they feel superior. So that was something that was starting to get ingrained into my mindset was like people just weren’t acceptable you know they were just they were just you know cogs in the world somebody that was there but not really. Absolutely. So then that you as you were growing up did you. It doesn’t sound like your parents were probably the type that they ever like auxillary pioneer or anything. Did you ever get you know drug through those processes. You know that when it happened until my mom would reach her mid 30s I think so. My dad growing up was never the spiritual head. And to this day never has one. Yeah.

[00:29:13] So he was always just somebody who was just so interesting because he was the Jehovah’s Witness before you know my mother you know growing up he knew exactly what it was that you were supposed to do to climb up the ladder. My dad you know from what he said some deep conversations that I had with him as I would start to drift away was that it was never something that he did either but he knew it as the truth. So in his mind that was good enough. And that was not the case with my mom. She always wanted him to be the spiritual head and pushing for you know family study and taking the sound field ministry. And it was it was it was like pulling teeth with my dad as much as it was for the kids to get ready for meeting or service. And my mom is always the driving force that that person that was really the one that got us going. So you know might like I said my mom my mom or dad didn’t really do anything and the truth as far as like extracurricular until my mom was in her mid mid 30s and she would start to auxillary and start going on service more and stuff like that. So then how would you have been then. Were you pushed into that as well or were you old enough to maybe not have to go along with everything. Yes so at this time you know I’ll jump to a role a little a little back again where. Yeah. So this was I don’t know. I had been 13 near 13 or so. But anyways right before I started middle school so my sister became increasingly more and more into boys you know as normal teens grow up you know girls do.

[00:30:58] And I remember on this one specific occasion. My I was just graduating like elementary school going into middle school and my parents said that I could have five of my friends within the organization go to Magic Mountain. They were going to take me to Magic Mountain. So they did a sleepover at my house. All the kids were over and the next morning my dad was coming home with you know our dog he had taken the dog to the vet the day before and he was he said that once he came back from the vet that morning he was going to pick up the dog and once he came back to drop off the dog to be OUTFRONT and ready to go so that he can just kind of pick us up. So I mean my buddies are all outside you know play and skateboarding and just doing whatever out front waiting for my dad to come home and it was like 8:00 in the morning or something like that. And as soon as he pulls up he gets the dog jumps out of the truck and then he left the truck running and we’re all still playing in the front yard. And when my dad was taking the dog inside a guy ran along the side of our house that was just waiting there jumped in my dad’s truck and virtually stole it right in front of us kids and we were like wait we thought it was a joke. I thought maybe it was a neighbor or somebody that my dad knew was just so confused.

[00:32:24] And he ends up going into the cul de sac and realizing it was a dead end and turning and hitting curbs and cars and just messing up the truck and long story short he ends up being chased by one of my neighbors and my dad in a car. And my neighbor was on a dirt bike and they ended up catching the guy and in my mind I was like oh my gosh I was so crazy. My dad’s brand new truck that he had just gotten was totaled. I was like I had my friends there and I was young enough to be like well this sucks. Like I mean it sucks for my parents that they had to do that but for me and my mind I was like well it sucks even more that now I can’t go to a magic minute with my friends and me and my dad my dad is you know cool as he was was like No absolutely not. That’s what insurance is for. Roof handled it with the cops. Yeah. And he ended up taking me to Magic Mountain with all of my friends. Lol that’s nice. Yeah. So it was cool it was a crazy start to the day to say the least. And so when we’re at magic note we’re having a great time and I remember distinctively my dad getting the phone call and he did not look happy. He just looked shocked. He was just like wow. And I was just like well you know he he pulled me sightlines is something about that track or what he’s like.

[00:33:39] We’re going to have to wrap this up soonA.J. And it was maybe like 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon and it was you know we still had a couple hours at the theme park in my mind. But now is being cut short but I was just happy that we were we got to go regardless. So. So on the way home I was thinking Oh the kids are gonna come back to my house and my dad’s like now we’re going to we’re going to have to drop them all off. We have something to attend to at home and where I would later find out once we got home is that as my sister was getting more and more the boys apparently while my mom was gone at work she was watching my little brother at home and she had been talking to a boy up the street. And apparently when she and my brother were there that boy that she had liked and had been talking to came over and my mom found out and they didn’t do anything. They were just you know they were young my sister was 16 at the time. And they just he came over and hung out. And my mom found out and boy was that a scene. It was yeah it was clearly evident growing up that my mom treated her different than my sister different than me and my brother and I think that she harbored harsh feelings towards my sister because she was technically not her child and that she helped fight for essentially and Bray’s this this girl was an easy process and my dad treated her differently. Might my sister as well differently but never in a way that made me or my brother Phil jealous. Like she got special treatment or anything but that. That was evident in my mind.

[00:35:18] That was my dad’s only daughter and you can tell how much she just loved her. But I think over the years my mom grew increasingly jealous of this and cannot wait for my sister you know to mess up. So once my mom found out she just lost her mind and she came into the house and was screaming at my sister throwing stuff out or hating her and calling her all kinds of names like you whore you’re gonna end up just like your mom and then that was just like it. And this was it. This wasn’t anything out of the ordinary for me. This was just another time that my mom was upset because this is how she treated us kids that young when she was upset there would be a lot of name calling. There’d be no physical abuse. And so my sister at this point had enough of it. At sixteen years old she realized because growing up to this point and this was just it. This is not how things were handled in my house. My dad was never physically abusive. He I don’t think he’s ever raised a hand to me or any of my siblings. And if he did it’s a race from my mind because it was nothing in comparison to him our mother you know handled disciplinary action. So once my my sister went through this with my mom for the last time she she was fed up and she actually ended up running away and that would be the last time that my sister would live with us.

[00:36:48] You know and I would see her for years because she ultimately went to move back in with her mom and wanted nothing to do with the organization or coming back home. Wow that’s pretty harsh. That’s that’s a hard so hard situation for you to watch. Watch your sister leave. Yeah. I mean it was hard on your parents too I’m sure. Yeah it was definitely hard on the family on multiple levels. But I know for me it was hard because my sister at the time was essentially my best friend you know we were only two years apart. And you know this was somebody I could be 100 percent myself around with my parents her other family was around to hold us to our witness beliefs and standards it was almost it almost seemed like an unspoken bond that we had of sharing mixed emotions about our faith being so young. But you know we just we’re essentially each other’s competence. So for her to just be uprooted that one day it was such an extreme day already on so many levels. And that was like the catalyst. It was just it just stood out in my mind as like it was just extreme circumstances. And it was really sad that that would be her last time you know ever coming back home or me getting home from school and her being there that was that was the end of that. Wow. Yeah that’s that’s hard hard. I’m sure it was really hard you know on her to to leave as well. You know it’s just I mean I’m sure you know in her mind in the moment it was just I’ve got to get away from crazy. Oh absolutely.

[00:38:33] But you know it’s tough. And I think she knew her options too because growing up like I said there was a lot of abuse in the family. And she she saw that my parents were having this in you know to face approach at raising their family in this organization where at home you know like on paper our family look like picture perfect you know to the hall or the organization but as soon as we’re back home you know that’s when the dragon was released. If any of us fell out of line and we didn’t do what we’re told and I think my sister knew her options at that time which was that she had you know her real mom that wasn’t a Jobs witness that was encouraging her to come live with her and get out of that environment. And she really she she took her mom up on that. And I couldn’t blame her. No. You know even to this day I I honestly to this day wished I had the you know the balls or the opportunity to do something like that myself at that age. But I I just remember thinking I wish I could have left to try. But like Good for you. Just keep running. That’s funny. You know I brought up you know for me as as a kid I can remember I always wanted to run away. I had nowhere to go to but man did I want to run away. If I I would sit there and try to make plans where could I go. You know I know where my grandparents live.

[00:40:09] I could go there but that’s not going to go over well. Yeah. And that’s a long law. It was you know like a 20 mile walk right. You know. But as a kid you know you you have no concept of some of that but I wonder how many kids there are out there that you know were born and raised Jehovah’s Witnesses where they just felt so out of control and they just they just wanted a break. They just wanted to get away to go somewhere. And I’m sure that you know those feelings are felt and shared by a lot of people. Yeah. And I think that’s a good point because I mean even at that age I remember distinctively that that’s when he would start in my mind that man I wish I could leave this. I don’t want this either. It’s causing us so much know personal pain. And I just didn’t understand why there was so much hypocrisy or double standards even at even at that age and in my mind that’s when it would start. Like there was that little seed that was planted at that point where in my mind I was like I started questioning more and more and started to do less and less of what my my mother was requiring of me. And that really started in middle school. You know I started to act differently. And you know as jobs when you’re not supposed to dress a certain way. But I was like really into skateboarding so I dressed like a skater and being told that I couldn’t wear you know a certain belt because it had studs on it or you know something as dumb as that.

[00:41:54] So I remember I’m like rolling up my belt and put it in my backpack and once I got to school I’d put it on and like and my sister would do this too. She would take clothes that she would want to wear like a you know a tube top or whatever it was in style and you know the you know the late 90s but we would essentially dress a certain way before school just a change into what we felt more comfortable in. We weren’t supposed to dress that way but I I wanted to make my friends you know I wanted to fit in essentially and I basically started to living somewhat of a double lifestyle at you know 13 13 years old and this would really be the time that I would start questioning my beliefs and justify my actions that went against my family’s beliefs and my mom would soon start to see that pattern and behavior and it was an obvious change and she thought that my dealings with the kids there were worldly. You know it was a worldly influence and it was a bit much. And she was she was right in that sense. It was I was definitely starting to change. And so I would only actually attend a year of middle school before being taken out to finish my education through an independent schooling system. So at this time my mom said like it’s just getting too much and I started becoming really independent and not wanting to do what was asked of me.

[00:43:24] And so she wanted to take me out of school and I was all for it actually because I thought to myself when she approached me with wanting to take me I thought to myself well I can’t I can’t live the lifestyle that I want in school. So it was too hard for me to be in school because you know I wanted to do certain things I wanted to hang out with certain people go to their house do go skateboarding with them. But these things weren’t allowed. I was just like well what’s the point. So yeah I wanted to get out of school because in my mind I was thinking well I’ll just get all my work done and have the rest of the day to do what interests me you know. So yeah. So I did a lot of what interests me skateboarding and a lot of our once you know I’d finish all of my school my schooling for that day. You know my mom would actually catch on to what I was doing which was I’d wake up super early get all of my work for that day. Done super early and then the minute the rest of the day I would just kind of do whatever I wanted to skateboard play video games. And I actually I at I started to actually absolutely love it. And you are live in a country. Yeah. Exactly. I felt like for once in my life I got some semblance of freedom like now. Now I have time my time and you know I and I viewed it that way because my my mom had started to go to work because my dad’s business was starting to fail. And so no one was really home to micromanage me anymore during the day and I absolutely loved it.

[00:44:57] And you know my mom eventually caught on to what I was doing and she thought I had too much free time on my hands. So she then advised me that I needed to make a schedule to go out in the ministry more so that I could quote unquote spend my time more wisely. So there goes the dream. Yes. So that was a pretty short lived. And that’s when I would actually for the first time be introduced to more activities within the organization. So I was about 14 15 when this happened. And. And so she said you know I needed to start making a weekly schedule and asked some kids that I grew up with that we’re at this point doing really well spiritually to ask them if I can go on service with them because they started pioneering and these were kids that I grew up with in the organization and they were the closest thing in my mind to the coolest kids that I knew that I could hang out with. So it wasn’t it wasn’t the end of the world for me to start going on service with them because in my mind I was like oh well we’ll hang out. And these were kids these were two brothers they were a little over a year apart and I believe one was baptized at 13 and the other one was at 14. So when I when I started hanging out with them it you know I was just like a wild there already baptized and in my mind I was like there’s no way I want to do that. And I didn’t really feel like hanging out with them all too much.

[00:46:25] But it seemed because it just seemed like they were a little too gung ho on the truth. You know when kids that are baptized that you know that young typically their parents are holier than thou and their children cannot do those things to appease their parents. And it was very evident to me that that that was the case. And you guys are the really I’m raising my hand right. Yeah. Go ahead. It’s me. That’s me. Yeah. In this wasn’t something that I faulted him for because it was weird how my mind my mindset started to change and it really started to mature as far as the way I process things and I became way more introspective when I started questioning things and looking at other people’s scenarios and not really faulting them form because they were so young that they weren’t even thinking about these things they were just going through the motions to make their parents happy and I could see right through it at the youngest of ages and that they weren’t really doing it for themselves. Even if they said they did but it was completely obvious how much praise and respect that they got from the older ones their parents and how most of the time even other kids for being driven spiritually at such a young age. But these two brothers that I had played with earlier in childhood they were at the time the most interesting kids that I could associate with in the organization. So I would start going out in the ministry with them a couple times during the week after my schooling. Just just so that my mom would stay off my case.

[00:47:59] So then how how do we get from this period of time. So you’re you know what right. You know 14 15 you Alan I think you said you were getting back you got baptized at 17. Right. So how do you go from you know the kid that is that is kind of on the outs that is perceptive enough to see that you know these other kids that got baptized super young and you know weren’t really as sincere as you know it appeared. What was the transition that got you from you know in those next couple of years to the point of being baptized. Well like I said I was home. I was being homeschooled and doing it going out in the field ministry door to door. More more and more often with these kids that were pioneering. So this was something that kind of grew on me because I really did start to enjoy their association. As far as the friendship that we started to cultivate. And it wasn’t necessarily about the truth or enjoying the film ministry that would that would kind of start to happen where I was like oh this isn’t the worst because I’m surrounded by my friends and we’re having a good time. Right. But what would really be the Catalyst’s of me pushing to get baptized. Was they had those two brothers that I mentioned. I would start to associate with into my teen years. They had a cousin and she was my age and she would come to visit all the time and meet her started to have an interest in each other.

[00:49:38] About 16 16 years old and essentially to make a long story short we would start to in so many words. Yeah. Even though we weren’t supposed to talk. And people were kind of privy to the fact that we were we’re texting and stuff like that. So once I got to the point where I I wanted to be able to date this person. She had already been baptized the kids that I was associating with are already baptized and I can see a difference. You know a mindset change in all of the kids that I started to associate with and their parents where at 16 years old you know they’re like well he should. He’s definitely old enough to get baptized. And you’re talking to my daughter but you’re not spiritually strong. So by me getting baptized it was 100 percent because I felt those the ramifications the negative ramifications of being that outskirt guy that did it and that wasn’t baptized. And more importantly I wanted to impress this girl’s parents and let them know like I’m taking this serious. Why are you telling me that some people get baptized not out of a dedication to to the Most High. But just a desire to please other people or because undue influence was you know it was put upon them or a hundred percent. You know I think I think I wonder how many kids that get baptized have any real like I don’t know. You know I guess the dedication that we were told we were supposed to have was kind of romanticized. Right.

[00:51:23] But you know I think most of us did it because we knew at a certain point we had to whether it was to please our parents or to date some boy or girl or to just fit in with our friends or not be looked down upon in the congregation. Yep. Yeah I think that was most of it is. Yeah. And I mean at that age too. You know I was when I was this age you know I was 17 when I got baptized but really I started being pushed at 16 to do it. And I just I didn’t want to I knew in my mind I didn’t want to because I knew how important it was and by important I mean important to everyone else. Yeah but it didn’t make sense to me. And at the time the truth really did it make sense to me because there is a lot of things in my mind that I just can’t get over. I was very privy to the hypocrisy with other families in the carnation. And like I said I just I saw right through. Kids getting baptized at that young of an age. And I was just like they’re not doing it for the right reasons. If I’m going to get baptized I’m going to do it on my own accord because it makes sense to me because that’s what baptism should be. Right. Right. Is your personal dedication to Jehovah. Little did I know that that dedication is actually to watch heart organization God himself. So yeah essentially I got baptized because I wanted to ultimately please my parents make them look good prove to the girl that I was talking to. That I I was serious.

[00:53:05] And her parents and everyone around me that their association would stop and dwindling with me because I wasn’t taking that stand for my faith. Yeah that’s that’s a tough period of life because you’re taking such an inauthentic step that has such huge ramifications later in life. So then how did how did this play out so you get baptized. You know you’ve got this girl. How do things start to how do things change after that. So at this time. So my. My mom my mom and dad were pretty big drinkers growing up and like I said they were they were they were young parents so they still partying a lot. They had their friends and they would go to barbecues and get all sauced up and I would see this all the time you know my parents would get in huge fights because you know someone said this and all the gossip and they’re all you know drinking and getting drunk and arguing about the dumbest things. When are you talking about women’s with these ladies. Yeah yeah. The ones that tell you how to live your life you don’t says right. Yeah. I saw this happening and like I said my parents were pretty heavy drinkers especially by witness standards. And my mom especially and now at this time in my life 16 years old 17 years old my mom had like I said went to work a couple years prior to that and she got into real estate because my dad’s business failed so they ended up getting declaring bankruptcy on that business. My dad was starting up another one.

[00:54:51] And so this was a really stressful time for my family yet again and my mom started doing real estate and she ended up actually becoming really really successful and becoming the breadwinner by far at this point in my life. And but along with that stress for her came even more and more drinking. So at the age of 16. Sixteen years old my mom was just a fool like raging alcoholic to where it was so bad that she ended up going to rehab for almost a year. And at this time I was thinking about my career choice and the friends that those two boys that you know that I was hanging out with at the time their dad had become a firefighter. So I was trying to just busy myself and get away from home as much as possible because it was super hectic. You know I’m you know getting to be 17 years old and I’m just saying that I don’t want to be home because it’s just so broken right now. My moms constantly drinking just not word. No one was in a good place at home and on a stark contrast my friends parents they were they were great people everything seemed happy happy go lucky. And I would just and you know basically force and indoctrination upon myself to busy myself so the ministry became just busy work for me but also because his dad their dad was a firefighter. I was thinking about my career choice and I was like Well he’s he’s a firefighter and he’s he’s a ministerial servant. He can do it. So I ended up with my two friends. His sons becoming a firefighter. Explorers and while my mom was in rehab that’s how I I.

[00:56:41] I just consumed my mind was going into this fire academy with these kids and it was basically like military camp. So I think in the back of my mind it was a sense of structure. It was a sense of discipline and it just kept me preoccupied. So I I did as much busy work as possible just so as not to fill the ramifications of the emotions that I was going through at that time. Got to keep busy so that you can keep distracted from everything going on. Yeah. I’m sorry to hear that about your mom. That’s that’s tough. Yeah. Now you know looking back at it it just it it didn’t surprise me with the way that my mom raised us that she would ultimately break down you know and get to such a low point where you would require intervention and ultimately like I said she was she was gone for a good portion of a year in you know outside of our town in theL.A. area going through rehab and just to find out that after I graduated from that fire academy that while she was in rehab she started smoking. And her mindset changed about the organization and she she didn’t want to come back to live like I said my mom was. I became very successful and so my parents had multiple homes and they had just built like a you know 4000 square foot home. And this was all weighing on my dad. Now who who had his own business. But it wasn’t generating that type of income that my mom was. But they were basically living off of what my mom’s savings had accumulated too.

[00:58:25] And also selling off properties to sustain that lifestyle while she was away. So this was weighing heavily on my dad. My brother was so young at the time he didn’t know what was going on and for me I just I could see right through it that you know when my mom was away her her mindset change she would she would send me letters and I would just toss them I would throw them away because I was just so upset with her. And I didn’t want to talk or I didn’t talk to her the whole time that she was gone. And yeah. And I found out through my dad that she had started smoking cigarettes and that she told my dad that she didn’t want to come back home that she was going to go live go into sober living with some people obviously weren’t Joe’s witnesses. And Ryan by far the worst association if you know you’re Joves witness to consider ex addicts living together. And so my mom getting out of rehab you know my dad was saying you know you got to come back. Yes. She she ended up being you know my dad ended up telling her like you can’t you can’t do this to our family. You have to come back and you know help raise the children and take care of responsibilities and she said she basically gave him an ultimatum saying well if we’re gonna make this work then I don’t want to move back to you know the city that we’re living in. And she wanted to live by the beach.

[00:59:53] So Margaret my mom ended up getting a place out here and where I currently live. And it’s right by the beach and it was a place that we grew up coming to nice kids and ultimately in her mind it may made her happy in this. She just needed a fresh start. So mind you I’m still living in Palmdale. My parents have this huge house and multiple properties in there. They’ve moved out here now and I’m still kind of in the fire academy and doing things out there and I didn’t really want to move. You know this was home to me. Right right. So a lot of the times I just stayed with my friends family that I was going on service with all the time because that to me was a stable environment. You know looking back at it I just I would rather be there instead of deal with all the ups and downs of what my parents were going through and ultimately they would be out here living and I would have that huge house to myself. And it was so lonely that I would just go back to my friends house you know. But after that my parents were forced to sell the home just because they ran out of savings and that would be ultimately the time that I would move out to you know towards the beach area with my parents for you know like two years or so. So I hate that I don’t want to digress too much but I have to ask. I don’t want to take the focus off of you but your mom who after so she starts doubting things right that she believed were the truth because she got away from it.

[01:01:37] His rehab which is which is something that as soon as you said that my ears perked up because that I have found over and over with people that if they can just get away from the indoctrination for some reason for my wife and I it was because we owed a bunch of money in taxes and we had to work all the time to pay off this huge debt that we owed. And so it was that time away where we were like wait a minute this doesn’t all add up. It’s like your brain can finally process this stuff you’ve been brainwashed with. So in this case it was actually an alcohol and drug rehab then that helped her to start waking up. But did she. What was her. Did she continue. Did she go back to quote the truth. Did she go back to the witnesses or did she kind of fade away. See this is where the story gets interesting is because now you know like you said I firmly believe that being my case too is when you take a step back. You’re able to think for yourself. You start to re-evaluate scenarios and doctrine and you’re able to critically think on these topics. And I think what what was happening with my mom while she was in rehab was she’s meeting people from all over with all types of belief systems and ideas and they’re testing hers.

[01:03:05] And I think what she finally felt for the first time was that certain things that she was doing were ultimately not making her happy and that could very well been the case of why she was in the place that she was in perhaps Alesso. So you know after she got out of rehab and my parents you know made amends and came together to live by the beach there would be a period of you know a little over a year where my mom was really stagnant. She was really working on her sobriety. She was you know we’re in a new hall out here by the beach and she was just she didn’t fully throw herself back in but just little tidbits and hit her Miss kind of again. But as regular as possible. But once she realized that she had to get a better grasp on her sobriety. Like most addicts they throw themselves wholeheartedly into something else. And she went straight into full time pioneering after that man. And to this day she’s been a full time pioneer for 11 years I want to say no. Which just goes to show that a lot of religious zealous zealousness zealotry a lot of it is just addiction. I mean there’s. Yeah you can be addicted to a religion or an ideology and throw yourself into that. Just like you can any substance it’s just it’s a great way to escape and Jehovah’s Witnesses have built their own entire other alternate reality to escape into some yeah absolutely. No I believe with I believe that whole heartedly that that that is the case. I mean it’s not it’s not only with Jehovah’s Witnesses that’s with anybody with an addiction. You know you quit alcohol you had to fill that that need that constant want with something else whether that’s cigarettes that’s energy drinks coffee. You know it’s one thing you replace one thing with another.

[01:05:06] Yeah then justify why it’s better than what you were doing. Yeah absolutely. Well I’m sorry to hear that the path she ended up taking. I was hoping there was there was a certain freedom story there. Yeah I wish. Yeah yeah. That poll is pretty strong though back to that you know the indoctrination. Right. And I mean they just have so much to keep you busy and so much so that you don’t have to think well. So then. All right. So then back to your story where did you go from from there. You know you’re living with the other family kind of. Yeah. And you end up moving to the beach with your family again. How do things progress from there. So from there I’m still talking to that original girl you know that my my friends had introduced me to it was their cousin and it was it wasn’t the worst thing for me to move back out here. And she helped me to understand the girl that I was talking to which we would later start to date. And this would be actually the time that we would because she would you know tell me you know maybe it’s not such a bad thing because the beach is great and I was like Yeah that is true and she lived relatively close to where I would be living. It was only maybe a 30 minute drive as opposed to an hour and a half of where she lived when I lived you know in the desert right.

[01:06:28] So when I moved when I moved to the beach it was now a shorter distance to each other. And I was just like Well okay that makes sense. And you know I was still talking to her at the time. I mean I moved in with my parents and you know started to get used to the the current geisha out here and boy was that a change. You know there is a stark contrast difference between the congregation that essentially was born and raised in four 16 years of my life. One congregation which I just came to know you know it had been had like virtually 200 publishers in it. And when we moved out to the beach it was a small carnation that had 64 alive and yes so that was a big change and getting used to the demographic. They were all older individuals. Nobody my age. And so I would try my best you know and be Riegler just as much as my parents were because I was living in their same under the same house as them. But at this time my mom started to see the closeness that I was you know start to have with this this girl and she would later start to like really try to catch me doing something wrong you know cause she knew I was I was texting her and she was always curious about what it was. And we we she would like check my phone and text messages and stuff like that. And I remember specifically this girl ended up sending me. So I guess you can say some somewhat lewd pictures and my mom found them and and she would then convince me that this girl was not somebody I needed to be talking to.

[01:08:16] That it was hurtful essentially. So I I pretty much sabotage sabotage that relationship with that girl essentially because my mom wanted me to have nothing to do with her. And it was just kind of a weird devastating point in my life. Yeah I don’t know what you do with that. Yes that’s that’s tough. You know your first relationship and so many witnessed parents end up being you know they they don’t trust their kids and they end up spying on them with key loggers on their computers or going down their phones or going through their rooms. My mom did a lot of that stuff. It’s really sad the lack of trust that’s there. So you know you’re you’re not only losing your girlfriend here but you’ve got this weird dynamic with your mom too where she’s influencing you in that way and Gorakhpur your stuff. Yeah. It was at a weird age too because you know around 17 years old I have my own job. You know at the time I was working at Target and I I absolutely hated it. But you know in my mind I was like I’m a grown I’m starting to become a grown man and have my own body. You bought a car and had a job and was doing essentially independent things yet still being very micromanaged. And the reason was because I was living under their roof and my mom said as long as you’re living under our roof you will do exactly as you’re told and you know essentially dictating how things we’re going to be to. Oh yeah the theory.

[01:10:03] So I at that point in my head at that point in time when I ended up breaking things off with this girl and I saw how how rigid my mom was on certain things but very lax on others. But this is especially with herself. I really started to think like OK well if I’m being manipulated in this organization then I’m going to start to manipulate the situation and that at that point 17 17 years old I made it like a basically a pact with myself that I was going to start looking out for me and only me and start to do things for myself that were unbeknownst to my parents to make progress to get out from underneath them and do my own thing. So I only worked at Target for a couple of months and then I got introduced to a brother in the local area and I was invited to come to a barbecue. And at that barbecue you know he got to know me where were all sitting in the spine. This this guy’s in as you know he’s maybe 31 years old and he you know we go up to his house and it was a bunch of younger kids in it little you know a little older mix as well but they were all really cool people. You know they were all into surfing and skating all the stuff that I loved him. We were hanging out and we were at his house. And it was a it was a really nice house.

[01:11:35] And I asked him what he did and he said he did pools and he asked me what I did and I said I worked at Target and that you know kind of kind of shied away from you know letting him know what I did because I I wasn’t too proud of it. You know everybody needs a job but in my mind I didn’t want that one. So he’s like well you’re going to do that forever. And I didn’t really know how to take that at first but I said No no I just I gotta I gotta make money somehow and right there on the spot he offered me a job and I took him up on the offer and so I shadowed him for about a month to learn the ins and outs of the industry and being a service tech and basically a month after that he gave me 60 accounts to manage on my own so I went from making virtually minimum wage to you know almost 4000 dollars a month at 17 years old knife. So yeah. So and that that to me. That to me was it just like I said at that age before this had all happened I had made that pact in my mind that I was going to look after myself. I was going to be independent and start making decisions for myself. And when I started making that type of money it really just went straight to my head like I just wanted to get out of my parents house as quickly as possible. So once my mom was privy to the you know the amount of money that I was making at that agent at the time. You know my parents and it need the money. But she would say you know. You’re going to you’re going to start paying rent.

[01:13:11] And in my mind I was thinking like I just started making good money. Like why can’t I just save this. I’m doing everything that you’re asking of me. And maybe that was a little selfish on my end. And you know she was telling me that it’s part of responsibility and I totally understand that. But you know I cannot go to college. I can do this or that. So I just thought Why can’t I just say the civil nest egg or something like that and apply it to my future. But Yanagida sucks to that you know the first time you start to rise above the first time you start to rise up somebody has to be you know standing there with their hand. You know Riseley your own parents to be like hey you’re finally you know you’re stuck you’re starting to get ahead in this game. Whereas mapi. Yes. It’s the I feel good. No it doesn’t and especially not in my parents case. So interiorly is because my parents were still living off of savings from my mom and that was dwindling. And I knew that. So in my mind I just thought well are they just siphoning a little off the top for me because it would help them out. Sure am I upset about that kind kinda because I realize that you know technically I’m still not of age you know and there require me to pay rent because I’m making good money. I didn’t really fully comprehend that or agree with that but I did it regardless. Sure but only for a limited amount of time before I would realize that I had to make a change to get out.

[01:14:38] And the only way that I saw that was by moving out. So I started hanging out with people more and more coming home less and less. And that’s when I would ultimately meet what would become my wife. At like a gathering with some Jehovah’s Witnesses and that’s when that’s when the story even gets more interesting is when I met this woman. I was 18 years old now and almost immediately we started talking and dating. So we dated for 6 months and then we were engaged for 6 months before we got married. So and at that time I was just making those steps to become more and more independent. And I think that the way that the witnesses outlined freedom and how you’re supposed to do as an individual is find a mate. Get married and start living your own life in this organization. And so that’s that’s essentially what I did as she she at the time was spiritual. She was an ancillary pioneering and I thought perfect this all. This is a double whammy. She’s you know she’s gorgeous and she’s very spiritual it’ll make my parents happy because obviously the girl that I was interested in before did it and that kind of drove a wedge between our relationship to the point where I had to stop because it was just too much to bear. You know and deal with. So with this girl it was perfect because you know she was adored by many Yeah. That would definitely help. In contrast to the circumstances with the other girl you know. Yeah.

[01:16:31] I’m sure she was happy that you found this this this other sister who was as you said adored by many Soden. Right. So you guys get married and. And life is happily ever after right. I wish that was the case. Yes so we ended up getting married. It was it was a really beautiful wedding actually and you know a lot of the brothers and sisters came together to help us out on a ranch of some friends of the family that a really nice home. And there ended up being like almost 400 people at our wedding. And it was it was beautiful. It was great. In the end that was the first time I had really seen the unity with in the Jehovah’s Witnesses like they really do come together and now that I come to think of it it was almost more so a reason to come together and party because there were so many elders paying years really faithful people at our wedding that you know looking back at the wedding video they were all completely sassed you know and I was very appreciative that they helped us out in so many ways with getting that you know preparing for the wedding. Right. And essentially it’s like the one and only time. Witnesses can kind of get unruly and out of hand so yes they look forward to it as much as anybody else. Yes. When you only have one thing to celebrate in life which is a wedding I mean there’s what else do witnesses celebrate. There isn’t much. So yeah yeah. So that that’s your time to show out. Right. Yeah.

[01:18:10] And so you know at the wedding I am you know I vowed to dedicate myself to this woman and I absolutely meant it. And I don’t think she fully understood and I wasn’t ready to divulge how I truly felt about things spiritually. And you know I was doing everything by the books you know as well as closely as possible and proving to people that I was a good association. I was doing my best while still maintaining a you know a full time job and more importantly wanting to provide for this woman. I wanted to give her anything that she would ever want because I that’s just what I wanted to do. I wanted to give it to somebody and. But she didn’t fully understand me and I didn’t fully understand her. Like we had basically only known each other for a year and before we decided to dedicate ourselves to each other so and we were so young and so young and naive and. But regardless you know we tried you know the our best to make it work in the first couple of years obviously for any marriage. It’s going to have its highs and lows its ups and downs but we did do our best. And you know there was there was a lot of good times that came out of trying to figure out navigate spirituality with another person. And this was the early days when I would start to just kind of throw tidbits of questions in. What do you think about this the research and this or that. My my wife at the time was somebody who was very reserved with her her beliefs like she would say well this is how I feel. That’s that.

[01:19:47] Like there’s no real sway like even if I don’t understand it it’s just what we do. And to me you know I wouldn’t really speak out about it because I don’t want to offend her or anybody to get an idea that I might be questioning things. So I really internalized everything and kept everything to myself for a good majority of the years that we were married. So yeah it was just it was it was a real interesting time to say the least. Yeah that’s it. That’s a heck of a strain on a marriage when you have this giant thing between you. Now is this religion that is is it just part of your life but is your life and is your identity. And then you know you don’t necessarily fully believe and your partner clearly fully believed. Right. She was all in so even if she didn’t understand which is the case with a lot of witnesses I think a lot of them don’t really even know what they believe. They just know that that’s what they’re supposed to believe absolutely and that was something that I had to come to terms with for myself and I could only imagine that anybody that can think introspectively or is it concerned about their own well-being would eventually come to that conclusion of starting to question things whether it’s good or bad it’s going to eventually lead to you know the process of evaluating or re-evaluating your situation. And what I what I notice even with my wife is that even you know being approached with the slightest of questioning they write it off like well we might not know this but that’s okay because we don’t have to.

[01:21:31] We do see the fundamentals and that’s good enough. And you know I might not be happy or understand it now but we will when the new scrolls come out or in the new system you know everything will be OK. And it’s like that’s not how my mind worked. And it would it would evidently become more and more you know increasingly obvious that those answers weren’t good enough for me. And so like I said I was doing Pooles at the time I was working for somebody else kind of as like a subcontractor now and. And that guy that initially gave me the job. He ended up retiring in his mid mid 30s and moving moving out of state. And he I told him when I had started working for him if there was any. Like if he decided to sell his business to give me first dibs at it. And I don’t know what I was thinking. I didn’t have the money set aside for that. Now he’s married. You know I had responsibilities and priorities. I didn’t have the savings that I could you know hey you get paid for the business or get a loan or whatever I was still really young. But when he decided to retire and move away he took into consideration how hard I worked for him. And he approached me and said that he he would sell me a portion of his business. And I said why would I would love to do that man. But I just I don’t have the funds.

[01:23:01] I’m I’m not going to get a loan like it just doesn’t make sense for me right now and he actually allowed me over time to pay it off. So what I did was I mean I cut him a check every month which was quite substantial for almost two years until I paid I paid it off. Then I owned I owned it outright. So that’s how I ended up acquiring my own business out of his he. Did you right because that could have gone out that could have gone a lot worse. Absolutely. And I still I still think him to this day you know and he really he really did me a favor because I never ended up finishing high school because at 17 years old like I said I was still doing the independent study program and going through the process of school and they kept you know I had transferred three different schools between where I used to live and to the beach and then at the beach at another school and they kept messing up on my credit. And I was making good money at that time. And I just thought to myself These people aren’t even doing their job. And this is time out of my day. I’m working full time. I’m running you know essentially a business in high school. And these people don’t know how to do their job. I’m not going to redo this work. And it was just a waste of my time. So in my mind I thought I don’t need a piece of paper to tell me who I am or who I’m going to become. And I was kind of strong headed about it but I ended up walking away and just diving into my business.

[01:24:29] And in the end it was for the better in my opinion. So I’m sure it would have been easy to be disillusioned when you’re. You seem to be doing better than the people who who are in charge of this education that are struggling to get things you know the basic things straight with your credit. Right. Yeah. It a little difficult for me to understand that you know and maybe that’s just a sign of where the school system’s at. But I saw right through it too and I just was like You know honestly this is you know in my personal opinion at a certain point high school just becomes more social and there is no social aspect of school for me at all. So I was like hey man this makes zero sense for me I just need to focus some itself. So then. So now you’re married and you’ve got this business you’ve got it paid off. And you’ve also got these doubts. So how does this end up progressing. Well the doubts started progressing more and more you know they became increasingly worse and worse over the years. But I still internalized it because I knew how my wife would act. I knew how my parents would approach it. You know I can never have a you know a debate with my father over doctrine because he himself didn’t really ever dive into it to fully understand it. It was just something he did as well. And the times that I would have you know debates are you know talks with my mom about doctrine.

[01:25:59] She was extremely vague and there was a lot that she didn’t know either and which was confusing because somebody who is a full time pioneer and she had been for some years at this time you would think that she’d be able to you know uphold the truth and its doctrine to the slightest amount of scrutiny. And that just wasn’t the case. So I kept getting the runaround and I wasn’t really expressing too much of what I was getting into with other people with my wife because I didn’t want her to worry about it. I didn’t want her to think that my fake faith was wavering in that sense. But I wanted answers I wanted clarification because I got to a point where I was like well the Bible says to make the truth your own. And I never had that opportunity. So I’m kind of doing things in reverse. I’m going back to square one. I want answers. And so after a couple of people I’ve talked to a couple of elders about certain topics my mom my mom Ben referred me to my grandfather. You know my dad’s dad who had been an elder for 30 plus years now at this time and we got into a lot of debates and some heated arguments and it wasn’t on my end it was on the end of my grandfather being upset that I came across information that didn’t coincide with the doctrine or the books or the publications that the organization produces so if anybody does any outside research that’s considered apostate research and it goes directly against the organization.

[01:27:28] And so my grandfather at a certain point said that he would have nothing to do with our discussions because of the fact that I was debating him with apostate research and we were talking about the the littlest things as far as the beginning of their religion. You know I don’t want to talk about that. No I don’t. Although I went I went all the way back to the founder you know talking about Charles Russell and getting into his life before you know all the way back into the late 80s hundreds and asking my grandfather did you know this and that and this and he’s like those things are true and I said well how do you know these and he’s like it we have all that information here. I forget the Big Green Book the Harmers book or the Yeah. One of the Insight yeah the insight book. And I read that thing back to back and I said and I highlighted things and I said it says it right here some of the things that I’m touching on. And he said Yeah they sure you know looking the best they could. But we have to. He’s like keep in keep in mind that this was the infancy of the Christian carnation and you know things have progressed and blah blah blah there’s oh it is a cop out there’s always a cop out. Yeah yeah. And it’s never it’s never an answer it’s always kind of a defense mech mechanism for you to just get exhausted about going round and round to where you just move on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s exactly what I saw with my grandfather and it got to the point where we were talking about what’s his name.

[01:29:03] Robert Rutherford Yeah yeah we’re talking about Rutherford and how you know I ask him about Beths or him. You know this was a place this is a place in San Diego where he thought it would be wise for him to own a mansion while we’re in the we’re in go into the cold war you know or the Depression the Great you had the great depression rather. And he’s live in this extravagant lifestyle in his cop out for doing that you know driving Cadillacs around and having this mansion was that this was a place that the patriarchs or princes would be able to become resurrected and come back and have a place to stay. So we have you know the leader of this organization living this lavish lifestyle off of the precious voluntary donations. I don’t even necessarily call him voluntary donations that people give to this organization to sustain its printing. Yet these these funds are being used illegitimate and for the benefit the benefit of his lifestyle. And it was just a slap in the face of people at that time where they were just people were starving you know. And and this and this is supposed to be God’s God’s. One note only mouthpiece the true organization. It just even from the infancy it was it was just so corrupt on so many levels. I can see now that it just and it makes sense how it progressed and all of the false predictions and you know my my grandfather just started shaking his head and saying that I sure had changed and I’m headed down a real scary path because you as you heard the you know what you were getting involved in.

[01:30:46] So it’s so sad that these people have devoted their entire lives and are so ego weakened and their identity is wrapped up in this thing that they don’t see and they don’t even know what it is. I learned more about the organization devoted my life to four decades and the two years after I left I ever knew when I was in it. Absolutely because you’re looking at it with a critical mind this time and it’s not necessarily that you’re looking for flaws but you’re looking for answers. Yeah. You’re looking for where things don’t absolutely make sense where you can make sense of it and we live in the age of technology it’s 2000 18. You know I think that that organization is like people that live in a town and only read that one newspaper. That’s the publication of The Watchtower Bible Tract Society is they only read those publications as fact and they never take their opportunity or the time to look at outside resources because they are told that that’s apostate literature and that’s not the case and you know the Internet is a place where it’s a cumulative mind a mass census so we’re able to determine what’sB.S. and what’s not based off of the massive Jocketty mindset. And so when you have X amount of people agreeing that this and this isn’t okay and this is correct then that’s just the facts I’m sorry but people don’t allow themselves to open their mind or to do that external research because they’re just so indoctrinated and they know how it’s going to look to others so they don’t do it.

[01:32:23] Oh yeah and they get comfortable with their beliefs you know and you don’t want anyone to question something you’re so comfortable with because it hurts now and you can’t. You can’t tolerate that pain because you you’re comfortable you don’t want to change you’ve been you know you’ve devoted so much of your life it’s sunk cost and you don’t want to change. So yeah. So you know you’re talking to your grandpa you’re you’re having these conversations that clearly aren’t going well. You’ve already been through it with your mom and dad. So where do how does this bill how does it build off this. So so backing up a little bit. So yeah basically it’s around the same time I was I was doing all of this debating with my grandfather and some of the brothers within the organization and a lot of my free time. I would ride dirt bikes like I was born and raised riding their bikes and stuff like that. And I remember going to basically a practice on the track out here in the local area and I ended up injuring my back really bad in compressing three vertebrate fracturing one in an accident. And at the time I was doing all of this you know debates with people and it wasn’t it wasn’t being argumentative and I say that in the slightest of terms as being a conversation of let’s figure this out you know and I have a question can you answer it. Well you know it has to be a debate with Brive. They’re not they can’t have a conversation. Right. There’s no end so yeah.

[01:34:03] So going through that I was going through that and once I got this back injury I had to go to the doctor they highly suggested that I did surgery. I cannot do that because I was the sole proprietor of this business and operator so I couldn’t take any time off. So I had to manage my pain. I was prescribed all of the all of these prescriptions like we’re talking Norco Soma Purkiss that you know Viken like the whole gamut because some of them didn’t work on me some did it then stopped working. And what I saw was they were you know extremely addictive and they definitely made me feel not myself. Like almost out of body kind of in a haze and not focused driven anymore than it was it was evident so at the time I was trying to make a transition where I thought like I was still going to pursue the fire career. Because owning my business I had enough free time to do more studies. So I went to OEM’s EMT school. And during this time in the program I was introduced to one of the instructors and we we got to talking about injuries and this and that pharmaceuticals because we were studying pharmacology and stuff like that. And he said he he said laughingly like oh ho ho ho why would anybody take these prescription drugs. He’s like well they just smoke a joint or something like that to that effect. And that was the first time I ever thought like really considered the use of marijuana or anything like that as a medicinal. I just always was told that it was you know the gateway drug that led you in to any other drug that you can think of.

[01:35:53] Mind you at this time I’m just dosed to the max on all of these prescription drugs. And so going to the school the schooling system you know he said that jokingly but he was kind of serious obviously so I did a lot of research and I looked into it and I realized that there was a lot of medicinal value in cannabis use. So yeah. So I mean people be people can have their view about it just like anything else. But what I saw in the greeting card Dacian was all of these elders wives elders themselves but especially the elders wives you know some of them would come to the Keenum also conked out. It was very evident that they were on prescription medication like pain meds where sometimes they when they were speaking it was you can even understand what they’re saying you know and these are the most spiritual people in the current Dacian people you should be looking up to that are on these prescription drug drugs. And it’s clearly evident. So when I decided for me you know that I wanted to try this. I didn’t tell anybody and this would go on for years. So I dropped all the pain pills and prescription pills and I would start using medicinal marijuana. And I got my my my recruit my license and all of that unbeknownst to my wife unbeknownst to my family no one knew. And I wanted to keep that way that way because I wanted to prove a point. It was yet the point that I wanted to make was it’s clearly evident that these people are using this drug these drugs these prescription drugs alcohol.

[01:37:33] I want to be under the mindset that I want to do something that helps me. And if it helps me great I’ll keep using it and it will end if it becomes evident to others then that is when you might have an issue. Right. So I started using it for years three years. In fact before I would even mention it to my wife because I eventually just felt guilty. You know my conscious just didn’t allow me to keep that from her any longer. But for three years she had no idea that I used it almost on a daily basis. I was running a very functional business that was growing each year. So there were no negative repercussions. We were very regular. And you know the ministry I was reading from the stage you know I had privileges. And once I told her that that’s what I was doing I mean I was shocked shock to her to have felt like I was keeping something from her. And I totally get that because I probably would have had the same feeling like wow that’s that’s kind of a big thing. Why wouldn’t you mention it but to me I wanted to prove something to myself first. Was it wasn’t it. If it was evident to somebody they would know and find out. And then it would be an issue. But I was able to manage it appropriately to where no one was the wiser. You know what I’m saying. Right. And like I said my conscious got the best of me and I felt like I was withholding some pretty important information from my wife to know.

[01:39:00] So once I let her know that that kind of started eating at her and she thought like oh I don’t know. I think I don’t think so and I try to show her all the research that I had found and where in the Bible doesn’t say anything about it. You know if we’re going to base our lives around the Bible then that’s it. Read the good book and see where it says not to. Go ahead. So you know and there’s a scripture in the Bible that said God gave every seed bearing fruit to mankind to enjoy it. So that’s how I justified it. Which was well you know if we’re gonna take the Bible literally this is how I literally perceive it. And I didn’t really care how anybody else did and nor was I you know asking anybody at that point. But my my wife ended up started feeling real guilty that I was hiding this from the conversation and I had privileges and she essentially wanted to go to the elders about two things at this time. She thought that we were we were like grieving God’s Holy Spirit we were lacking God’s Holy Spirit because at this time we started having more and more arguments at just about finances just life itself. It was very evident that you know with the relationship we have ups and downs but her mindset was when we have our downs that’s because we’re spiritually weak. We need to go talk to the brothers. Oh yeah yeah. So she used number one my marijuana usage as a catalyst.

[01:40:23] And number two there was a little bit of fooling around that we had done before we got married and she thought that we were grieving God’s Holy Spirit because we were keeping them from the Christian creation and the brothers. So not only did we get drug in to a judicial committee for what both me and my wife at the time had done prior to us getting married. But also the fact that I was using marijuana so it was just compounded so it wasn’t a good time to do both at once. But in my mind I was like well let’s knock it out of the park and I’m I’m not going to just bow down and say I’m going to stop but I’m going to try to prove a case. So we got our you know at this time we got privately reproves for what we had done prior to us getting married. But in that meeting we also mentioned the marijuana use and it wasn’t really that big of a deal. You know they really didn’t really touch on it. They shared a couple of scriptures and it was very vague and we left thinking like we left there thinking like well they didn’t touch on it too much and my wife was like yeah you know. But I still think that you should stop. So I did that for almost a year which was I just I stopped using it. And I was like well let’s see if things get better and with my with my pain it only got worse. It was basically the reason my used it was to go to sleep and stop tossing and turning. Get some good night’s sleep.

[01:41:59] And what I realized was like my health was starting to suffer suffer because I was only getting four hours of sleep every night. And so I started using again I told my wife after that time of not using it. I said I tried you know I tried to do prescription pills. I tried to stop and I found the best results while doing this. And you have to understand that it just works for me. You know something might work for me but maybe not for others. And I said the way that I look at it these chemical pills that are drive by man are way more harmful than something that’s natural. And they can still be managed appropriately. So once I kind of got on board with that she was OK with it. And that was pretty much it. And then the brother we got called back in to a meeting for the marijuana use. And this was because I still had privileges and at the time you still have privileges even though you run against the primary proof wouldn’t take those away. Yeah you’re right. Yeah I mean I guess that can differ from some some halls. But you know I was still saying there might have been a slight period of time where we didn’t have our commenting by Natomas. Yeah. After. I don’t know maybe five months it almost went back to normal like nothing had happened. Yeah. So you know I was reading the Watchtower saying prayer and stuff like that and helping with my ex and stuff like that. But after we went back to the brothers about them I want to use this is the original Hall that my parents moved us to when we came to the beach.

[01:43:41] So now it’s my family in that hall and me and my new wife in this hall. And we’re dealing with that committee about this marijuana use and virtually at the end of the day they’re like OK well there there are some people that do use it for medicinal purposes. Do not tell anyone about it. And you know everything was fine everything was fine. We left that meeting. They were under the assumption that I would be using it still it wasn’t an issue if I didn’t make it one. And I was happy I was I was ecstatic because it really truly did help me. And I felt like wow. I took a stand for something and you know it’s all working out. Then we start to associate with more friends in another congregation in the same town and they kind of sway us because we we were we were thinking about moving and this is when the circuit overseer came and said If you live here and you live in this this territory and your hall falls in this area you need to go to that hall. So he was basically driving and everybody said like if you live on the other side of town and you’re going to another hall on the other side of town that it’s not okay you need to go to the hall that is within your territory. Right. So we ended up moving to a different area down by the beach.

[01:45:00] We got a house down by the beach and now we were in that territory where all of our friends that we were making were they were our age because like I said that hall that we were in it was a bunch of old people nobody really to associate with. So we moved we moved halls and now I start to double down on my spirituality because things are on the up and up. The business is good. We got a house down by the beach. It was like literally five homes from the sand. And I’m like OK I got free time I start going to service more. We know we’re at this new home trying to you know make an impression and at a certain point that’s all it was. Now that I think about it about making advancements spiritually for me was always an image thing and how generalizations are based on image. Yeah and how people people perceive you you know and it’s often face value in a person. And so you know I was mean on the up and up. We were going to service more and just a couple of months into being at that new hall we decide to around Memorial season pioneer early Godzilla pioneer. And so we’re doing that and it took almost seven months for them to transfer my cards. Mine and my wife’s cards. Like a little less under two miles from one current geishas to the other. Yeah. And so when the cards finally came in there was a note on there of my marijuana use. Oh yeah. So I’m outside. We’re outside after meeting for field service and we’re out in front of the hall just kinda talking to some other friends making arrangements to the two of the others approach me and say you know they pull me aside and they want to talk to me.

[01:46:48] So my wife kind of looks at me funny and like I look at her like I don’t know what we’ll see. And so they pull me aside and they say you knowD.J. so we we got your cards in. That’s a good thing. And I was like wow yeah it is. That took a while. Like yeah we apologize for that. But what we did find when those cards were transferred is that it mentioned something about marijuana use and they said they didn’t ask me. They just said so you’re not doing that anymore. Right. They just assumed that I would have found my way to the right decision in their mind which was not to use it. Right. And I said No I’m still using it like it’s I made it evidently clear in the last you know I had a judicial committee about it and made it very clear in the last carnation that this would be an ongoing thing and everything was fine. And the brother specifically said not in my home. And I remember I remember that being the first thing the first moment from then on forward where I would start to throttle back on my spirituality because I was just you know I don’t get offended at all. It’s it’s it’s virtually impossible to offend me. I don’t even know how to put this or what words would be best fitting but I just couldn’t believe what had come out of this.

[01:48:11] Elders you know Malph because he was the Kobie of the carnation the presiding overseer basically the head honcho in charge and what I saw was these brothers perceive it to be in their hall. You know they’re there the managers of it. They’re the rucking you know they’re the boss hog. And I saw right through what he had said and it just did not sit well with me. And it wasn’t. Let’s get together and talk about it. It was not in my home which was clearly evident. He did not want to talk about it because he had a certain stance on it and he was not willing to waver or debate about it. So after that I told my wife what was going on. And she’s like don’t let it get you down like just only you and Jehovah know what works best for you and if it doesn’t bother you it doesn’t. You know it obviously doesn’t bother me anymore. Just do your thing and that would like I said be really the first thing where I would actively start throttling back on my my spirituality. So that was a big issue that I first started to have. So after that you know I stopped I stopped I mean I still was going to meetings regularly. Don’t get me wrong. It was just. Well I’m not going to do the extracurricular things I’m going to focus on my business. I’m gonna make all my meetings but I’m not going to I’m not going to be searching for any privileges. And I’m also not going to be going out in service more than I asked you to say quote unquote regular.

[01:49:39] So from that point it was just my head down my tail between my legs and I was just doing it as a formality to keep my wife happy and my parents. So yeah sounds like they didn’t offend you they just kind of took the wind out of your sails. Yeah. This kind of motivated you. Yeah because I couldn’t really fully understand how somebody can be so arrogant about such a touchy topic and not want to discuss it and just assume that they know better than they did. They proved that it was merely authoritarian. That’s what it was about. It was absolutely. Here you go. I’m the voice of authority. And I just told you no. And now you’re going to fall in line. Right. And I would definitely like to see. And you know I would see their point of view if there was an evident change in my personality my lifestyle. Sure. My this or that. And that was you know I hid it from everyone for years. So that was clearly evident that it wasn’t an issue. Oh but no one knows. Yeah yeah exactly. And if and if Jehovah knew then why was life going according to plan in my mind. Yes so that was that like I said you know. And from that point on I just kind of stuck to myself and did just the bare minimum to keep you know quote unquote regular and then I really had an issue like I started to have an issue with well what else is a gray area. Because I wanted to have facial hair for the longest time and I never really questioned or debated that as well.

[01:51:12] And I’m totally not the type of person that would do something out of spite of attention or wanting that type of attention. You know what I’m saying. Yeah. Yeah. But now we’re getting to the point where I was starting to miss more and more meetings. And me and my wife were getting along as well because of my perception of what the organization started to become in my mind. So I told her like I just don’t think it’s absolutely necessary that I need to go out in service every weekend or X amount of hours or do extracurricular things. And it started driving a wedge in our relationship at that time. So for me I was just like you know whatever I started growing a little bit of scruff. And I’ve always had really sensitive skin too. But that was 100 percent not the reason why I wanted to grow a beard it’s just for the longest time I always wished I could I just never understood why we couldn’t so because I don’t have another. Right. Right. So because I started going less and less to the hall. You know I started to grow this scruff and you know I come to what we come from work with scruff on my face in work clothes and I get those comments like you know brother scratching my chin like what’s this. It’s like I look down and I’m clearly in my work clothes. And that’s how it started and once I saw how much of a issue was was just like I don’t care I just started growing a beard and this included me just going to meetings with.

[01:52:45] It wasn’t a full full on beer like it is now but it was evident that it was a well. Well trimmed you know and kept the beard and that was an issue. And you know I got pulled aside and say well this this and this can’t happen for you knows that we’re doing that. And I said Well I’m not really reaching out to do those things so it doesn’t really apply to me. Don’t you think. And so I started to get a little bit more sarcastic with the brothers because I didn’t. I started to lose respect for them and the the way that they would approach things like you should know better or I know better. And that’s just that. And that’s not a bad right. You know settle well with me. So getting further along in my I guess my spiritual digression was me eventually I’m going to less and less meetings and telling my wife like there’s just some things. You know I started studying doctrine and mind you I hadn’t started doing any outside research really for that. Other than like you know finding more information about Russell or Rutherford that was about it. That was the gist of what outside resources that I would do on Google. Right. And I still didn’t touch any other information outside I really don’t. Into more of a doctrine. So when my wife would go to meetings I would stay at home in my office and get some work done. And while she was still gone instead of just watching TV which we didn’t have TV the whole time we were married.

[01:54:21] I would just stay in my office and do research within the organizations publications I get old publications from you know that they stopped printing and wanted to fade out because they were some misguided doctrine and they were trying to make sure that the public didn’t see what had been written before and stuff like that. And I was really diving in to what they had produced what they had published and things were just starting to fall apart for me within their own writings. Oh yeah. And that’s how it all started for me to eventually cease all meeting attendance service everything and you know really start growing a little bit of a longer beard. And I saw an immediate drop off with people stopping stopping associating with me. My parents started acting differently towards me. And especially my wife. That was the hardest part was we had multiple conversations about our spirituality and I’m not the man that she had met and I said I apologize about that. You’re absolutely right. You know there’s a lot of things that I was doubting even from the beginning that I should have been upfront and honest with you. But it was just too say this is too sensitive of a subject back then and you know it was just a lot to deal with. But now that I’m a little bit more established I have free time I get to dedicate that free time. However I see fit and I wanted answers and the answers that we’re finding were not sufficient enough for me to dedicate my time or devotion to this organization any longer. To the extent that they want and she lost a lot she lost all if not most all respect for me.

[01:56:06] Once I took that Stampfer just saying I doubt a lot of things I’m not going to meetings anymore with you. She would hold over my head like I stopped doing family study with her and she was like this at the very least that you can do with me and I said you know what if there’s one thing that the organization has taught me as it says to make the truth your own. And I said you should be doing that yourself because I’m doing that. And this is the resolve that I’m finding and it’s not that I don’t support you in what you want and what you would like to be doing but you should see my side of it and do the same for me which is I’m not pushing you down the path that I’m going in nor should you be doing the same to me. And at the end of the day this has no they should have no factor bearing on our relationship. This should be our own personal resolve with our spirituality. But that’s what the relationship is built on when you want to Jehovah’s Witnesses. Yeah. It’s one of the main chords very seriously. And that that that to me was the most devastating part was it was how the organization drives in two married couples lives that Jehovah comes first. And and at the end of the day if that’s what you believe in and you need that you know that driving force to make things make sense to you by all means. But at a certain point I realized that that is absolutely not the truth. Your family comes first.

[01:57:31] And most importantly your mate so in my mind I just thought well she’s not going to be accepting of how I view this religion and my mindset and my stance that I’m taking. So I’m going to go full force into my business. And that’s exactly what I did. I wanted to provide for her more and more. And like show her like look I’m not falling apart just because I have a difference of beliefs. If anything we’re become better and it wasn’t a more open meaning to be a materialistic thing but it was letting her know that you know I’m not falling apart you know I’m driven. I have a mindset and I wanted to prove that to her. Well yeah actually you know what you had said before too in addition to that was that she saw that when things weren’t going well for you guys she saw that as a lack of Holy Spirit. You know if you dive into your business and your business is doing well there’s Jehovah blessing you now. Right. You know it’s funny that you say that because that’s exactly how I perceived it which was if I was being if I was grieving God’s Holy Spirit and I was acting directly against what he commands us then why why why is it within the year the first year of me stop stop going to or attending meetings rather My business grew 50 percent in one year. So this was something that was clearly evident that was not the case because I always lived my life with the assumption that if I’m not doing exactly what I’m told things will just fall apart.

[01:59:07] And that’s not the case what the case was is when you actually use your mind and dedicate yourself to something and you have that driving force and you stick to it. It will always work out you know the better. And people can’t get people in the organization can’t understand that they just they throw caution to the wind and they throw up their hands and say well I’m going to let Jehovah take care of me. And they pray. You know it’s just hop out it is it is and it’s it’s OK it’s just stopped making sense for me. And I wanted to prove that to my wife you know. You know without words which is like well look tell me that I’m doing wrong. Right. And it still was never good enough for her. She you know she just wanted a spiritual head. And I get that and I can’t fault her for something like that because if she if that’s something that she ultimately thought I was then that was my fault. But what I can not get over was the fact that it was the determining factor or the make or break for our relationship because it got to the point where she just didn’t respect me at all. She would say disparaging comments to me about it to other people embarrassing things that were private. And yet. Yeah. And I think in her mind she justified it because she wanted to make me look bad to others even though even if others looking outside in would see that that wasn’t the case I was doing just fine not going but she would throw these little tidbits in to make me look kind of bad in a certain way.

[02:00:44] And you know I think she just did that out of a defense mechanism for her own sanity. But at the end of the day you know it wasn’t fair and you know it got to the point with our relationship where we stopped having any intimate relations with each other. And and it was because she just I can tell that she just never was into it anymore. And I after after about a year and a half of you know very hit and miss intimacy huge gaps in between you start to really question why am i even with this person. And that’s that’s when things started to really fall apart for our our relationship is she. She dove more into it and I drove more out of it. Yeah. And I think it was a bit of stubbornness on both of our parts. And so when she would dove more into it I dove more out of it. We were almost living separate lives at this point because she was just so dated with spiritual things. And I was initiated with you know pursuing other business opportunities and my business that are already in preexisting business and household projects like we were on completely different schedules. We would virtually just eat together. And it got to the point where we just barely saw each other so. And now we’re to the point where I’m questioning like why are we even together like if we could have made this work. You know I’m trying over and over like this.

[02:02:23] I’ll accept you for who you are just accept me for who I am and it just wasn’t ever good enough and I remember distinctively that what was it I think 2000 in 15 I was sitting at a bar waiting for one of my other friends to show up in this friend was a lifelong childhood friend. And he was he was born and raised in the new organization too. But he he started to have doubts like me too. So we would kind of have our own little secret meetings and just yeah and we would we would just talk about doctrine and this or that. What did you hear on this podcast and by and he was kind of like my outlet you know. Yeah. Which was somebody who I can share a mindset with of understanding of how the faith system works. This organization and the doubts that you could possibly have in why you can justify those things. So as I’m waiting for him to come have a beer with me. It was at a local bar in my my neighborhood I’m sitting there waiting for him and I get approached by this woman and she said Do you have a couple of minutes. I’d like to interview for something. And I said I mean what is it. I was kind of weird I was like What is this in regards to you. And she’s like well and she sits down and she has an iPod and she’s like I worked for you know like a commercial agency or this or that. And it only take three minutes of your time and in my mind I was like yeah whatever lady like whatever. But I was just too nice and I was just like sure whatever let’s do this.

[02:04:02] So she asked me all these questions and Bombon at the end she’s like I’m I know that you might think of it this is weird but I’m literally a talent scout. And I think that you would fit this role that we’re looking for. And I was just like OK like whatever so I give her my e-mail address I don’t think much of it. And you know two weeks later I get an e-mail saying that that she passed along that footage because she had a guy with a camera and passed along my footage of the interview to one of her superiors and that they would like me to come to a casting call. So unlike I went from sitting on a bar getting interviewed by this lady thinking she was crazy to and possibly being in some light commercial or something and I’m thinking well this is cool like that. I’m thinking like well why not. Like I have the extra free time you know while my wife still her thing like Why not try to see where this goes. And I remember getting an e-mail and I ended up eventually going to that casting call and it was for a Chevy commercial. And we do basically I get selected we do the shoe and then they air it nationally. And I was so stoked on it because I was just like this is so cool this is so Raddy was so random. I was excited for it and I was like telling my wife about it and she she just wasn’t having it like you could tell that she was just faking the funk. Yeah that’s that’s cool like. Because I was already going down a path that was making me more happy. Yeah.

[02:05:41] Like one thing after the other would be happening where these were opportunities that if I was grieving God’s Holy Spirit then why was everything being handed to me. Because it was just drawn in here. And that exactly and that’s and that’s exactly how my parents and her perceived it which was you know this is how it happens this is what you’re doing and blah blah blah. And so after after her not being like supportive of it I remember just being really bummed like man this was a cool opportunity for me and I was just really stoked on it and I would have hoped that you would have been at least somewhat excited you know with me and I wasn’t getting that from her. And so after that we are. Our relationship is just starting to go further further downhill and you know we’re living more and more separate lives and I ended up needing another girl through. Mind you this is another Jehovah’s Witness through a buddy who was another jobs witness as well down south. And I would go hang out with this buddy every now and then because it was just kind of an outlet like if I wanted to get away while you know my wife was with her super spiritual family in another town I would just go down south and hang out the beach with a buddy that I knew from down there. He was also a witness. I met you know one of his friends which was another sister in the organization. And then we started having more and more contact with each other.

[02:07:18] And at first it just started out with you know just random you know social media like laughing sending stuff and then it turned into more of a conversation. And I got I started getting to know this person and I looking back on it I think I was just trying to fill the void that I didn’t have any more with my wife where I was just like Yeah this this happened this was cool and you know I’m looking forward to doing this and that and you know just just random stuff. And then over time you know we started to develop I guess more and more of a relationship and I stopped and I thought to myself well this isn’t this isn’t right. Obviously like there was a real turning point where it turned into wow this person just kind of like filling my void of conversation that I don’t have with another woman which would have been my wife. And now this other girls giving me this attention and really interested in what I’m saying and vice versa. We’re in where we have a lot in common. Yeah. And then somewhere in between it turns you know somewhat romantic to where she’s wanting to like hang out and stuff like that I might not like that. This is not going to happen baba. And for a while I just wrote it off like there’s no way like I’m just go hang out with her. But mind you this is at a time in my relationship where me and my wife are virtually not talking. We were we were roommates at best. I was sleeping in my office for three months before it got to this point with this other lady.

[02:09:02] And it got to the point where I sat down my wife and I told her listen our intimacy has to change your view of where my spirituality has to change and you just have to understand that that’s just not where I want to be. But that does that should not affect our relationship together I want to make this work. This and that and she would she would say that she wanted to but she would never take the necessary actions to change. And I got to a point in my mind where I was just like I I can’t do this anymore you know. And I decided too that I was going to leave. I was going to leave her and then I wasn’t even necessarily thinking about this other girl that I was talking. I just was like well how am I going to do this. You know jobs when they’re told like once you’re married. The only way that you can remarry is if there is infidelity. And I thought well I was so upset with the organization at this point because of all of the judicial meetings and the vague understandings and there are vague answers rather in the way that my wife was starting to treat me because of my lack of spirituality not my lack of taking care of her. I was really upset how it just threw my life into a downward spiral mentally. And so I was just like well if if that’s how they want to play the game then that’s Harmon go out and so with this girl that I had been talking to. We ended up sleeping together and started a relationship.

[02:10:38] And I know my wife ended up finding out it told her what had been happening and she wanted to make it work. And mind you this relationship with this girl wasn’t even to the extent where I was just like oh I’m going to be with this girl for the rest of my life. It was the conversation had gotten to the point where me and her were under the understanding that we didn’t want to be Jehovah’s Witnesses anymore. And that’s a really weird place to be with somebody who is a Jehovah’s witness in the organization and you’re speaking to another one with kind of the same mindset of how can we get out of this. And I told her Well if I if I sleep with another person that in my mind was me doing my wife a favorite because number one it got me out immediately. It was just like the nail in the coffin and it allowed her squirt scriptural freedom to remarry. Yeah because a lot of people don’t start with jobs when he says that is the only way that scripturally a spouse can remarry and live another life with a happy life in that social construct or religion or that organization of they can never have another relationship for the rest of their lives. Right. You have a sexual relationship with someone else and it is admitted if you can get that if you keep that on the down low for the rest of your life and no one ever knows that your wife would have been stuck for eternity. Well yeah. However long life is you know not being able to ever marry again simply because of that. Yeah.

[02:12:17] And this was something that was not just a heat of the moment like passionate no idea or action. This was very very very methodical on my part. Now we’re talking about two years of a period where I tried everything that I could do with making it work with my wife maybe not spiritually but everything else under the sun. And just because of the sheer fact that I wasn’t the spiritual head that she wanted my whole my whole life went in a downward spiral as far as our relationship is concerned and I added get to the point where I was like well why are we together. I have different pursuits and goals and aspirations and so do you. And I got to this place that like I said it was very methodical on my part I thought well I’m not going to go through the process of separation or the divorce. And then having to one day call up her or my wife and say yep I had sex with somebody. Now you’re free like I couldn’t imagine doing that to her. So I thought I would rip off the bandaid and just get it done with. And that’s exactly what I did with that girl. That was that right. Yes. And so that you know me and my wife were married for seven years. Two of them two of the last year were really really hard to where I ultimately come to that decision. And what got interesting was it wasn’t what you wanted either. Absolutely not. No. I would have I don’t think people understand exactly what I was thinking because they never had the opportunity to have that conversation with me.

[02:13:51] It was when I got this fellowship with jobs when as soon as you’re disfellowshipped everybody has to write you off. You were shunned. They don’t talk to you. They don’t know your side of the story and what had happened. Because behind closed doors they didn’t know the in and out of my relationship with my wife. They just sawD.J. that it go to a meeting and he’s the reason but they don’t care about the truth they just care about appearances. Absolutely. And I was done with living that lifestyle which was I never felt myself when I looked in the mirror. I pictured somebody else and I was never that person. And it wasn’t that I made such drastic changes were completely changed and I wasn’t the same person. There was just little changes that I needed to do to make me happy. And that did not include getting more spiritual. So that meant getting more closer to my wife. That meant furthering our careers and getting to a happier medium that we didn’t have to be on the same page necessarily as far as spirituality was concerned in my mind because if that makes you happy go do it and I try to say that to her so many times like I don’t fault you for your belief systems. I will never judge you for it.

[02:14:57] But then it got to the point where she’s like Well I’m not going to I’m not going to raise you know if we have children I’m going to raise them in a divided household where you know their dad is in a Jehovah’s Witness and this or that was like in my mind I my I had to deal with the hand that was given me you know. And that’s the way I had to go out was obviously this relationship’s not working. I don’t want to be Jehovah’s Witness anymore. And I would have rather lived under a freeway overpass and go back. And that’s how strongly I felt was I could lose everything that I worked so hard for. And I would still be fine with the free mindset and independent thinking and the ability to have that independent thinking outside that organization and not the ties of a strained relationship anymore because it was just so mentally exhausting. Yeah. Once you’re done with that like there’s just no other way to be than just absolutely done like right. You will do anything to get away from it whatever the consequences are fine like you said if you have to go live under a bridge or whatever it just is what it is. And there is no choice. Once you know that that’s not what you want in your life it’s not like it’s something where you can you know kind of be I don’t know if kind of an all in thing. It’s very difficult to not. There are a lot of people out there and I’m sure maybe who were even listening to this who are physically in but mentally out you know most the album. All right. You know I think that if that’s if that’s what you want to do and you can do that like that takes a great deal of strength on its on its own front. You know it’s very difficult to live that right.

[02:16:52] And obviously some people can do it or choose to do it for family or whatever. And you know that’s awesome. If they can do it. But some people aren’t wired that way. There’s just no way. I don’t think there’s anything you know just for my personality type that could have kept me once I knew better. I just I had to be out but I’m just kind of an all or nothing person in certain ways you know. And we all have different personalities. So yeah I agree on the same type of person all or nothing and I think that that’s that might be something that people that have enough you know finding out from other people you know when I was out I didn’t know anybody. You know I was essentially a babe to the world and I didn’t have any friends. You know we’re not allowed to associate with quote unquote worldly people those that weren’t Jehovah’s Witnesses so I’m in I’m somebody now 26 years old has no friends or ideas of just how to function without that social construct because it’s all uprooted from you. So there is a good portion of a year where I got I was just heavily drinking you know because this is ultimately not what I wanted. I wanted my family. I wanted the things that I still had. Minus that scriptural you know mindset or that perception of religion. And it really did a devastating factor on my mind. But what I found was through talking to other people that I had to. I started meeting was how much courage it actually takes to do what you ultimately have to do to be happy.

[02:18:28] And I think that that’s that’s one thing that witnesses that end up ultimately just throwing up their hands saying I’m done. I’m out. It takes an extreme amount of courage and you do and you definitely have to be an all or nothing person to jump ship. You know you do. You know it takes a lot of effort to jump from you know a ship that’s already sailing to jump into the freezing water to swim back to shore to build a boat just to get back out in the water again. It takes a lot more effort than just to ride that ship. Oh yeah absolutely it takes it takes a lot of effort to do that and then you know I know for myself I was just very fortunate that my wife came along and jumped off the ship with me just right. You know things just worked that way. But it’s it’s still like it doesn’t matter. Like that’s how it’s like one of the ways you know it’s called when there is literally no easy way to leave right. You know it doesn’t matter if you if your spouse leaves with you if your spouse stays behind. If your if you have children who stay behind like or if you stay in physically but mentally you’re out like there’s just no real way. To leave the cold without it negatively impacting you in a very harsh way. Well absolutely. And that’s where that’s where it gets interesting too is that I had never been to scholarship before. You know I had only been privately reproves so I had never really understood the negative ramifications of being disfellowshipped.

[02:20:06] Now while I was still in the organization disfellowshipping was something that I always just did it really comprehend. But I think as a jobs witness we just put it to the back of our minds and think this is just what has to be done and you just write it off but once you’re actually disfellowshipped you get to understand exactly how mental mentally manipulating it is to shun somebody to where it’s almost built by design that the organization wants you to fail. And they’ll say up and down that they swear that that is not what they intend. But when you rip somebody’s social structure their friends and family the only things that they are able to know because of the rigid rules and regulations. Once all of those things are gone and you are tossed into this big vast world you can easily get lost. And like I said a year after we filed for divorce and I was I got a place on my own. I didn’t know anybody. What was I supposed to do after I was done working. All I did was drink because I numbed myself from all of the emotions that I was going through. And I had no outlet. As far as the social structure was concerned to talk to anybody. So I was just you know I’m my own worst enemy in my own head. And they you know they want you to fail and come crawling back.

[02:21:26] And I had it at a certain point make a re-evaluation of my circumstances and say I have to better myself for myself and prove everybody wrong and then make an example for other people that are considering it saying his life didn’t turn to shambles you know it turned into Jim’s. And I think more people have to have that mindset because the organization wants you to come groveling back and crawling on your knees and being battered so that you can understand what a loving organization is and they’re always going to be there with their arms wide open. But they don’t understand how negatively it affects one’s mental cognitive functions. Sure. The best revenge is a life well lived. So right. You know go out live a good life and show them that they’re wrong. I mean if that’s all you can do and I mean absolutely. You know this is the only life that we know we have as human beings. You know whatever a person believes other than that that’s fine. But you know the only thing that we can literally prove that we have is this life. And every every day that we get as a gift. And so you know what else is there to do but to make it the best you can. Why why would you choose to do anything else. So yeah so go have you know you have to go have a good life and and hopefully you know sometimes that that is a good example for others who who want to leave to you know way. You know I watched this personally even and their life didn’t fall apart. Well maybe there is something to this maybe there is something to leave in this organization. Right. And I think we’re definitely headed down that path.

[02:23:07] I think there’s a trend that’s happening where more people more and more people are leaving in their understanding that they have to get you know for the longest time the society didn’t necessarily say like don’t go seek professional help as far as therapy was concerned but pretty much so in so many words. Did you say that you know to avoid that thing because now being outside the organization I think it’s becoming more and more of a trend with people that have left that they understand that it can be so mentally devastating that they do have to bandage those wounds before that they can continue. Whether that’s joining a community of abuse or getting a hobby something to better themselves and not to mull over the past because it can be so destructive. And if you don’t treat it that way and that’s something that I had at you know spend some time learning and being out. But once you find a good source of people to surround yourself with that you know understand what it could have been like to be raised and are open to religious conversations. It does wonders for your mind. And that’s that’s all I can say for anybody who might be considering it inside their religion because I know there’s three stages for me. When I was inside doubting on the fence and then outside there all three different perspectives. And if you have the opportunity to go through those you really do have to you know possibly seek professional help or you get a group of people that are supportive and not just do it on your own. Yeah. You’re not going to be able to do it successfully all alone. It’s too it’s too big. Absolutely.

[02:24:52] It’s just too big. Yeah. So then. So you’ve been out now for what a couple of years. So approaching two years. OK. Ann’s have you. So then you know you know just because you’re disfellowshipped although shunning is the policy of Jehovah’s Witnesses at times not everyone’s family lives up to that policies. Have you ever heard from your family again or is that it. You know it’s funny that you mention that you know because it’s you know is taking care of some taxes it’s tax season over here and I was filling out this form. And I remember the last real conversation I had with my mother was right before I was announced. And she helped me with a tax form. And as you know that is such a weird thing to think about is the last conversation that you had with your parents. Like a real conversation was about you know business or finances not like how are you doing. You know the family see you. Yeah yeah. It’s just some business formalities that she was eating me with. And you know there has been times where I’ve seen them at family functions. But what such a trip and I do not understand this and I don’t think I ever will is that because me and my wife are no longer together. They still treat her as family. So if I’m going to a world family function like my mom’s grandparents like anniversary for instance which happened a couple months back. They showed up with another witness family that’s not related to our worldly family. And they brought my my ex-wife.

[02:26:42] So they are going on vacation with her. They’re traveling with her they’re bring her to family functions that normally we would have went together with but we’re not together anymore. And they’re treating her as like a replacement. And I don’t understand that. I think that I think that they feel I’ve seen this before. I think that they feel guilt that is that they didn’t do something right in raising you that made you the faithful witness husband that she should have had. And I think that they are trying to atone for it by essentially adopting her as your replacement. If it is so fucked up. It really is. It is. It’s so strange. I’ve seen it before. It’s really weird. It’s so weird that when worldly people I mean who’s going to use the world world just like because now that I’m outside everybody who I associated associate with outside the organization is quote unquote worldly to people inside the organization. But when I mention that and they see it and I show them pictures they’re just like what the hell are you that is so it doesn’t even make sense on so many levels that it’s just even weird to somebody who doesn’t really understand that you know if one is disfellowshipped and the spouse stays in that they can still maintain some relationship with the person. But they literally replaced me with her and she does absolutely everything with them still as if I had died. Well there you go.

[02:28:15] So witnesses believe that essentially your parents believe that you will die at Armageddon and they will lay on into this panda paradise and they think that I have literally seen people write this on line of experiences or heard it where their parents are pretty much of the mindset that well so you know job in the Bible he had all these kids and and God allowed Satan to destroy his children. But hey God gave Joe a whole nother bunch of children in later life. So okay so it’s ok. I mean sure he he lost Johnny and Suzy but he Yeend Mike in jail whatever you know don’t say it’s like. So it’s this is this really messed up thing. And there are a lot of witness parents out there who not only after their son or daughter leaves the organization will replace them like they’ve kind of done here with your ex-wife but they honestly somewhere in their deranged minds at this point think that well others in the new system just have replacement kids for the ones I lost. And I don’t even miss them any more. I mean it’s the most messed up detached narcissistic thing. And that is like dad is somehow like at the core of this this faith that they have that they can do that. It’s something I’ll never understand. You know it’s messed up. You can’t understand it because you got your humanity back. They still have their strip from them you know. And I don’t know it’s just mind blowing. Yeah. And you know at the end of the day it’s so interesting because I had a conversation with my now being outside you know I’m rekindling these relationships. Take for instance my sister. Take for instance my sister who you know ran away at 16.

[02:30:20] There was a huge gap in years where we barely talked or saw each other and she now has five boys I have five nephews and yeah it’s crazy. And it took me over a year to reach out to her to say I apologize for not contacting you when I was an adult. And I could easily came and saw my nephews and you know I contacted my aunt my my dad’s sister who was disfellowshipped when she was 19 and has been out for almost 30 years. I’m Wrekin only rekindling these relationships and it was strenuous at first because I have to admit and apologize for being a grown ass man not talking to somebody because they didn’t believe the same thing that I did and my family did but they probably understand they did. And they welcomed me back with open arms and they said there’s absolutely no need to apologize and they couldn’t be more supportive. And I you know I just talked to one of my aunts the other day and she was just like you know one thing I don’t understand is how your parents could even even if it was that you just had had an affair with your wife. You know my mom did that to my dad as well when they were married. The only difference was they they stuck it out and stayed Jehovah’s Witnesses. But now now because I don’t believe the same thing and I did the same thing. But it’s for completely different reasons. My mom and father shunning me because of something that they had went through. It doesn’t make any sense at all. No it doesn’t. It does.

[02:31:55] And the difference is is I chose not to stay with my wife because ultimately I knew it would be better for the both of us. I wanted to ruin her life and ruin mine. It was no one I couldn’t do that be spiritual anymore. Be a part of that organization. And I wanted to let her be free. And there were certain steps that have to be taken within that organization that you’re going to be you’re going to be the problem you’re going to be the reason why everything failed is because you took that media out and you didn’t want to make it work. And that’s just not the case and people will ever understand that. And that’s why I love you know what you’re doing is because you’re giving people that have left a voice to tell their side of the story so that if anybody should come stumbling across this that still might be in and might know that person they’re gonna be like oh wow there is a second side of the story you know. Yes I did think about it that way. But yes I don’t know the other side because you know I’ve always thought about you know doing this as a way to give a voice back to the voiceless because shunning is a way to shut people up. Yeah. And yes it absolutely is. You know here’s the other side of the story here’s the side that you’re not allowed to hear that you’re not allowed to think about. And there are a lot of other stories out there of people who who have never been heard. And it feels good to be heard and validated.

[02:33:24] And and I don’t know it’s just so it’s so gross what they do and trying to. They’re like little kids sticking their fingers in their ears and going la la la. You like it. You know it’s so immature and it really is and I’m so honored that you know people want to tell their stories with me. You know doing this right. And and put out that other side. It’s I don’t know it’s a really cool thing to be able to do. Absolutely and that’s that’s the way that I viewed it was I got so low and you know I you know on paper when I was married and part of that organization people outside looking in our life was perfect. And and you know I don’t blame them for the way that things looked at face value. But that absolutely wasn’t the case. And now being shown you know I essentially lost everything that I worked hard for. But what I still have left that the organization can’t take away from me is my voice and my side of the story. So I was like if anybody were to question theirs and you know whether there’s somebody who might know me or not. I want to give that person an outlet that I found to when I was wavering in my beliefs was listening to podcasts about religion and people how they left their faith. It’s not easy but what people have to understand is that you have to be methodical about it. If you’re being manipulated manipulate the situation back because you need to come out on top to sustain your sanity. And yeah.

[02:35:02] So things like this where people are telling their side of the story and how they navigated around those things. I think you know we’ll do wonders for increasing the amount of people that gain that courage to jump ship and swim back to shore and start start over fresh like they deserve to that’s very well said. So what would you like people to know. Like who have never been Jehovah’s Witnesses to know about the religion like if you could tell somebody out there who has never been a witness you know other than your story. Like is there anything that you think that they should know about this this cult. No. I mean you just said it perfectly. I think that the only thing that I would say is that it absolutely is a call and that took me some time even outside of the religion to come to the conclusion of believing and you know. You know Joves witnesses will say oh we don’t we don’t define ourselves as a call or accept that type of terminology but if anybody outside is looking at jobs witnesses like they’re just a fun loving group of well-dressed well-spoken people they’d be absolutely correct. But it’s not by choice. They’re robots that is just conditioned to parrot and project what they’re what they’re taught through the publications that they’re only allowed to read so that to me would define a call at its finest which is this is what you get to take in.

[02:36:26] And this is what you do and if you waver you were you are shunned and you know I was just talking to somebody the other day and I said Jehovah’s Witnesses are like the Hitler regime of our time which is you know essentially ethnically cleansing the Earth which is you don’t you don’t believe or support this war. We have nothing to do with you and this is the last time Jesus is you know coming to your door. I mean their greatest hope in life is that Jehovah God instituted the great war of Armageddon to kill billions of people and whilom off the face of the earth. Just so this band of eight million people so their lives can be made a little easier. Right. Well thick you know dystopia they think you know that that your only hope in life that the only thing you can look forward to is the destruction of literally everyone and everything around you so that you can go hug a panda on a paradise. Yeah yeah absolutely. And honestly that was one of the first things that went through my mind as far as really understanding what I was a part of when if people just had the people in the organization just had the ability to go from the very beginning the furthest back all the way to Adam and Eve and the great sand. You know they you know they were instructed not to do something. They did it and we all had to suffer. And we we are basically chess pawns in Gods game of proving his you know is saying the devil wrong. And along the line look at how many people have died because of this game and it’s just getting to the point where you know they’re saying oh we’re living in the times of the end.

[02:38:15] No we’ve always said that the only difference that is change is that we live in the age of technology and the availability to share information is becoming increasingly more and more available to people to where they’re able to see the ins and outs the good and bad of what’s going on. And of course the battle is going to be highlighted because it’s the most interesting. But you know take for instance you live in in gaining a second time like that was the end of the world. You know what I’m saying. Right. Wouldn’t you rather live today or show up in the Roman Coliseum. Yeah exactly. And people people don’t like to look at it like that. That to them was the end of the world they were they would probably rather die than live. And now we’re you know thrown are ugg boots on and walking to Starbucks and you know meter is going to come down from the sky. But apostates are talking badly about their religion. What a horrible time to live. It’s ridiculous. I just really wish that people would take a deeper look and re-evaluate their situation even at the smallest level. Like going like I said all the way back to the beginning and Adam and Eve and how it’s just all just a game between. If there is a God you know somebody who’s dominating his power. So the assertion of power now that you you are out. Is there anything that you’ve learned since being out that has really helped you grow.

[02:39:41] Is there anything that any books any podcasts videos anything that that has helped you grow as just a human being or just helped you kind of clear your mind of you know the past or understand it. Yeah you know what I what I learned about myself first of all being outside was I didn’t realize how much stress and anxiety that I had within the organization that it caused me. And people tend not to understand that while they’re in it’s that. Do you ever look at what you’re a part of as being the cause or the root of whatever suffering you may be going through. People don’t want to believe that that might be the case. But in mine absolutely was because after I went to Yeah after I went to that period after leaving there was a good year where I didn’t want to deal with my emotions and I just was heavily drinking and just numbing myself. But once I really started to take a stand and meet the right people that motivated me to just like to just do your thing start living for yourself and stop thinking about the past because you know it’ll just repeat itself. And once I started to re-evaluate what I wanted out of life whether it was doing this hobby or dedicating this time to that you really start at once you start living for yourself it’s like the illustration of you know in an airplane incident where if you know you’re supposed to put the mask on your face first before you can even help a child sitting next to you. So once you understand that you really ultimately have to take care of your well-being before you can be beneficial to anybody else that that’s when you start growing and for me I started to become more of a kind hearted understanding individual.

[02:41:27] That was a really humbled by the experience. And a lot of the help that I had along the way was you know listening to Joe Rogan and some of the scholars that he has on and then going diving deeper into those scholars. You know Lloyd Evans wrote you know in his book The Reluctant apostate where he goes he jumps in You know he used to be an elder I’m sure you’re familiar with him in. Oh yeah. Yeah. You get a you get a understanding you know if there’s any Jehovah’s Witnesses that might be listening to this they’re still in the faith like this is taking from a perspective of somebody who if you didn’t tell you that he wasn’t a jobs witness and you just heard his voice you would think that he still was because he debates in the utmost respect and uses only their publications. Oh the debate is very good and that’s yeah. And that’s what I love the most. When I was just kind it put dip in my foot into you know quote unquote apostate material was that he didn’t use any outside resources other than really diving into their own publications and pointing out key points. Well this is how can be perceived and that’s how they perceive it. But this is how it should be perceived. Don’t you agree. And maybe you don’t but in a lot of cases I did. So his book and his YouTube channel was very instrumental of me starting to dive deeper into the publications themselves within the organization.

[02:42:55] And then also Ray friends you know crisis of conscious conscious and you know things like that these are these are the catalysts things that I would recommend anybody that might be wavering or may be outside looking for a sense of purpose. It really does give you a good outlet to justify the feelings that you have. And there’s nothing better than you know just feeling good about how you feel about a search situation especially when everything everything’s stacked against you all the people that you know or knew think that you’re in the wrong. Even though in your mind you feel that you’re not. So you’ve obviously learned a lot you know gotten some new and fresh perspectives. What do you what do you enjoy about your new life. You know since you’ve been out. What I love about my new life is the fact that you know I work so much and I’m busy. I work six days a week and a lot of that had to do with just filling time that I had. Now a lot of it was a lot of free time. Now that would typically go towards you know dedication to my spirituality in meeting attendance. And once you have those that free time you can really dive into what you enjoy. You know there was a recent broadcast thatJ.W. put out that that I watched that was talking about the unnecessary things of life you know and they’re filling a bucket with rocks and there’s big rocks about like personal study Bible reading field ministry and all the little Roxanne’s all the bullshit that you’d rather do. And you know it’s like take out all these little rocks of the big rocks could fit in because they matter most. And then sprinkle in some what you want to do.

[02:44:41] But in actuality if you’re not doing what you want to do then you’re truly never going to be happy and you’re never you’re never in a progressive life you’re just going to be stagnant. And I think that that’s the worst place to fall into. Yeah. Agree. It’s the cause of a lot of depression anxiety and misery in life when you’re living an authentic life. It’s not what you really want to do right. It doesn’t have to be extreme and that’s how my parents are my my ex-wife would say is like what. What is so beneficial to you now that you justify not coming back. And it’s like you don’t understand it. It’s so many things on so many different levels that you’ll never understand because you’re not questioning the finer things and until you do that you will understand if I was just thinking about how they just they can never. You said they could never understand. There’s a there’s a moment when you wake up and you’re finally free. There’s a feeling of relief that comes with that. That yeah. You know we all want for our loved ones to feel someday. Absolutely. And it’s something that I would say sadly maybe for myself at least I felt like I think there’s there’s almost a high that comes with that that you can’t you can’t get again in life without. I guess going back to some other torture is prison. Right. And you know riding out the other side.

[02:46:22] But there’s a piece that you get when you can just wake up each day and realize that this is your life and what you do today is your decision and you’re not looking to somebody else to tell you what you should do how you should think how you should feel. I really wish you know I hope you know for your sake and for the sake of those that you love that that you know as witnesses we would always if we had friends or family who were disfellowshipped or whatever we would say well you know as long as there’s time in a system there’s time for them to come back. Right. Well I’ll flip that and say you know as long as there’s time in those people’s lives you know there’s there is time where you know who knows maybe statistically you know at least one more person from our past comes out and maybe someday we get to reunite with them. And so I try to hold out hope even even though you know it’s a total crap shoot. There’s no guarantees. You know who knows maybe someday we get to talk to some of those people again. Yeah absolutely. And you know I look forward to hopefully that time being sooner than later. There’s so many issues you know in the news that the organization is being criticized for. And it’s just becoming more and more prevalent not to people you know outside the organization obviously but to people inside to that there’s a lot of things that the organization is covering up and not making public for a reason.

[02:47:58] You know once once people start to wake up it’s going to be because of the scrutiny and the criticism that the organizations are under and it’s going to start lighting a small fire for people to really look at the inner workings of the governing body and the things that they’ve been involved with the past. A lot of people don’t know that you know the investments that they’ve made in military and you know been part of theU.N. even though we’re not supposed to be a part of this world. It’s just it’s one thing after the other. If people just did the slightest amount of research not not. And that’s the problem with the organization is every day they want to just drive in New information new white like you’re so over inundated with new information you never have a chance to take a step back. And it’s funny being outside of the organization. You would think that oh somebody would you know they would crawl back or find their way. And that being outside would make them feel like they need to study and learn. But in fact I thought that that would happen to me. In fact it’s driven further because I’ve had that time to be more introspective and look into these things. And it’s it’s making me more and more disgusted for even being ever associated with an organization that can call themselves the quote unquote truth and hold those people to those high expectations. It’s hard to look back and believe believe that you once were involved in this. You know this cult you kind of already touched on it a little bit. But I just wanted to ask you know if if you had a moment and you could say anything you wanted to your friends or family that show you what would you say is there anything that you’d like to tell them.

[02:49:43] I would just I would tell them to really sit down and think about what your intuition is telling you not what is what is expected of you because you can let that get carried away and it can become your life in your mindset. But once you start to really evaluate here your intuition and what you’re internalizing and let that speak to you it will it will guide you to what you should be doing. And I doubt that it’s what what what they think it is you know they just don’t allow themselves to to just tease the idea of questioning. And once you know I think that God gave us free will for a reason if you know God does exist. And if there’s one thing that the organization taught me it’s to fight for what I believe in and now it’s not that. Yeah I was I was founded a little curious that they would you know harp on the freewill we had but yet they would essentially take that freewill away through their policies and procedures. Yeah as an organization it’s very hypocritical. It is yeah very very much so. JR There’s your past life I guess. How does your past life affect you today. You know you’re a couple of years out. Not really that long when you compare it to the length of time that you spent in church and clearly you know I think all of us doing this podcast or listening to this podcast today or in some way still in a process of recovery that that it will probably last a lifetime.

[02:51:24] But is there any specific way anything right now that you kind of struggle with from it that I see honestly just coming to terms you know the fact that when I’m in the you know for whatever reason I don’t know why but when I meet new people inevitably religion in my past will come up you know just because that’s all I had known so long. And so when they come to find out that I was a part of that they say to me not because I live in this super crazy lifestyle that it is not in accord with the Bible they just straight up tell me you do not strike me as somebody who would ever be a Jehovah’s Witness. And I take that as a compliment now is because to be associated with such a like mindedness is not a good feeling once you’re outside of it when you realize how indoctrinated these people are. It’s almost like you are a robot. And so what I’ve learned being outside of it is to really think for yourself and apply critical thinking and reason with everything not just in you religious or spiritual spirituality it’s everything in life and that’s how you make good decisions in life is when you really criticize every aspect you question everything and come to a firm understanding that way it is just it’s priceless. I like that you said you. You’re not afraid or ashamed to make your story known because that’s been a big deal for myself and my wife and it’s just it’s one of those things that if you’re vulnerable and allow yourself to be vulnerable people respect that and you know they will have a greater understanding of.

[02:53:21] I mean let’s face it I think all of us that leave the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses are any cult that has people isolated we fit in but only to an extent. Right. You know there are a lot of social things that I don’t get. There are a lot of cultural references that maybe I don’t get I didn’t watch a lot of the popular movies and things like that and I may not get certain references. But when you are open enough to tell people your story they they gain a better understanding of you. And then it’s easier to make friends but you have to be willing to put yourself out there. And it’s the. It’s not easy to do. It’s definitely not easy to be in such a vulnerable vulnerable position. But what I understand is that I have nothing to lose and I’m not ashamed of my past I’m ashamed of what I had to do to get to where I’m at now especially being married and having to do it I had to do to her that Yeah that is something that will always haunt me because there’s a big stigma about that. There’s a big label about men or women that you know cheat on their spouse. But what I want people to understand is that that that you’re sometimes your hand is forced in a decision. And ultimately you have to make something that goes innately against your standards or morals because they put those things in place not because you want to just ruin somebodies life.

[02:54:51] And that’s what I think is most important for people exiting is to tell their story their side of the story that it’s not all that somebody just lost their mind and they lost their way and that they just don’t know what they want. It’s not the case you know and what you know people tend to forget is you know we’re not the same people over time and if you get married super young inevitably you guys are going to change you guys are going to grow together you’re going to grow apart. You know I mean even science says that all of the cells in our body replace themselves. You know something like 10 years. So technically you’re a completely new person. And unless you have somebody by your side who’s willing to stick through thick and thin and understand you guys don’t have to agree upon everything. But if you guys want to make it work you have to be a little wavering in what you might like or not like just for the sake of you know working it out with your spouse. Yeah you’re not Jehovah’s Witnesses put a an unnecessary burden on married couples that essentially they are to be carbon copies of one another. You know that they are to have this there to be unified in the cold essentially believes and and it’s so unfair because that’s just not a couple is typically two people who although they may have some similar interests. I like this. There is a quote I heard one time minutes if the two of you are exactly alike then one of you is not necessary. Right. And I really like that you know you want to be in a relationship with someone who brings something different to the party.

[02:56:39] You know you don’t want carbon copies but we were raised in an environment where you did want carbon copies you wanted other people to think like you and feel like you it everything. And it’s such an unfair unrealistic expectation. Yeah. And it really negatively impacts a lot of relationships. Absolutely and I know it might sound cliche but one of the quotes that really got me back to those struggling years was Kurt Cobain saying I’d rather people hate me for who I am than love me for who I’m not. And I thought that that was so fitting within that organization is that sometimes you find yourself just living a life that is not you and you come to that understanding and you’re just like I can’t do this anymore. And I would rather those people hate me for that than you know love me for who I was just perceiving myself to be in front of them. It’s the weirdest thing to explain. Absolutely. So now you’re you’ve got this new perspective now you appear to be you. What do you have any dreams for your new life. Is there anything in you got any plans in the works or anything that you’re hoping to achieve other than just has it. Yeah yeah. I mean other than just being happy everyday. Now I’ve done a lot of traveling which has been great. It’s been getting my mind off of a lot of things and seeing you know experiencing new places and that’s been really great. I’m getting into real estate so I’m going to be holding on to the business that I already have in just getting into something that I think that I would enjoy. And I never got to that availability.

[02:58:13] You know I was kind of thrust into the workforce just for the sake of being independent but I never really questioned exactly what I would rather be doing. Right. And I think with that line of job as far as pursuing real estate you would allow me to you know have a little bit more of a flexible schedule than I do now as well as you know. You know different amount of income to where it would allow that I could have more time off to do more extensive traveling and that’s essentially what I’m aiming for is leaving for you know months at a time if at all possible to different places to really take in different cultures and understand the world even more than I’m starting to you know know it as it is now. I love I love that that sounds awesome man that I cut you off. I don’t know if I cut you off. Oh no no no. Have you any other dreams you want to throw out there but I think that that’s that’s awesome. I’ve never been able to go out and experience different cultures. But in our business we work around people at towns who have been able to and just the lessons that they’ve told us that they’ve learned from doing so and the beautiful people and things they’ve been able to see in their travels. I mean in the end life is about experiences and you know to be able to have those experiences and have that shape a mold who you are. That’s one of the more beautiful things you can hope for in life. Absolutely. I couldn’t agree any more.

[02:59:52] I want to thankD.J for being so vulnerable and for telling his story. I also wanted to add something here to clarify something for people that might not be familiar with the policy of Jehovah’s Witnesses regarding divorce. WhatD.J says here is true and I know it sounds crazy but Jehovah’s Witnesses teach that the only real grounds for what they call quote scriptural divorce divorce that gives you scriptural grounds to remarry is adultery. That’s it. So you can get divorced for other reasons though honestly they frown on that. But maybe now let’s say that you were you were being abused or something like that that you were in physical danger. Of course there are always going to push you back toward the abuser as many times as they can but they will sometimes allow divorce for that. But when you get divorced whether you want to or not or whether they allow it or not but you’re not scripturally free to remarry as they see it unless it is due to adultery. If you do remarry you must prove that your former spouse has moved on sexually to someone else or you might face discipline within the congregation. You could be disfellowshipped or approved. And yes I’m serious about this. This is this is real life. A woman might get divorced because her husband beats her but her sexuality is forever linked to the abuser. And so he takes it elsewhere and admits to it or you know maybe remarries himself or something like that which would obviously show that he has moved on so you can hear howD.J doing what he did was uncomfortable for him. You can hear how he has regrets.

[03:01:36] Hopefully you can imagine the ridiculous pressure put on him by this cult pressure that neither served him nor his wife nor anyone involved. This whole issue of divorce in the court is super messy and dysfunctional but they see him as God’s law and he knows best. So surely that these rules that are clearly not fair and that don’t work and are very dysfunctional they must be best because they’re from God as they see it. If you want to leave a comment forD.J you can do so. Shunnedpodcast.com. Again shunnedpodcast.com just click on the episodes page and you’ll see historie there you can leave comments there. You can also see more information and links to resources there. will have the opportunity to respond to you too. So you know it’s encouraging when people interact after somebody has been so vulnerable to try to help others with their story. Now next month we have a story of an amazing woman named Brenda that escaped the LDS cult. For those who are unfamiliar FLDS stands for the Fundamentalist Latter-Day Saints. So it’s kind of like a fundamentalist Mormon denomination. Their leader Warren Jeffs is in prison as a convicted child molester and is currently serving a sentence of life plus 20 years. He still controls the group even from prison. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the show on Hulu called The Handmaid’s Tale but if you are then you’re familiar with the concept of a group that sees women as objects in just about every aspect of life.

[03:03:14] And in a world where women are reaching more and more for their rights and hashtags like me too are trending you know this is an interview that I think women will be really attracted to hearing. There are still places even in the United States where the culture of oppression of women dominates. Of course you know the interesting thing is that many women in this culture think they’re happy. And let’s not forget that you know it’s not healthy for the men either. This is the impacts of this group on their members of whether they be men or women. It’s fascinating but it’s also really frightening a look into a world that many of us cannot fathom but that is so real and hurting real people out there. So look for Brenda’s episode the first week of May if you haven’t already now would be a great time to subscribe so that you won’t miss it when it comes out. Now I’ve had people reach out to me asking if I have any ways to support the show financially. You can always support the show by leaving a positive review on iTunes that really helps because it helps get the word out so that you know more people can find it and maybe they can get help themselves. But I’ve also gone ahead and started a Patreon page where you can donate to the show now if you like. I do have ongoing costs. Every month that I put out there to keep this going you know don’t worry I’m not going to discontinue the show. I’m not going to be one of those people who threatens you. You know you know I can’t continue this show if you don’t donate.

[03:04:53] I’m not going to do that I hate that I’m going to do this show whether anyone pitches in or not because this is important to me. It’s important to the people that get to tell their stories and you know hopefully it’s important to you to as you listen. With that said there are ongoing costs and I’m taking a course in search engine optimization right now to try to help get this message out even more. Part of the SBO efforts could be having transcripts produced to help produce more contents on the site but it’s looking like that could costs anywhere between 30 and 50 dollars per episode to get that done. Depending on the length of the episode and that’s for a computer generated transcript that’s done with the program that’s not an actual human doing this. So you know that’s even a cheap way to get this done. I also pay for hosting for the audio of this podcast and also Jay stateJ.W. your life for the hosting of the Web sites. Spend time managing plugins responding to emails cutting out spam interviewing people producing audio of purchase microphones audio recorders I even purchased a new laptop because my old one was old and underpowered. So you know I’m all in on this. I will continue to be. This is not going anywhere. But if you choose to donate you don’t think I’m getting rich off this or anything. If you want to help defray the costs you can go to Patrie on dot com slash fund. Again that’s Patreon.com/shunned and you can sign up to become a donor if you like. I don’t have any rewards for you.

[03:06:36] There are options to set up rewards for people for donating. This podcast itself will have to be the reward for now it’s enough for me to keep up with already I don’t have time to create anything special on top of that. But you know if if you do choose to donate I really appreciate it and it does help defray the costs. I also had some t shirts made for this J.W. life that I wore on a visit to Brooklyn. That’s why I posted some pictures of myself from my wife wearing those shirts and there were people who liked it more like you know where can I get this shirt. I didn’t know that was really my story so I kind of felt weird selling shirts that other people would advertise just just my story on it. So I’m thinking about making some t shirts for shunned and you know if anyone has interest let me know I’m going to get some aid from my wife and see how they look first and then you know I’ll let you know that there could be another way to maybe support the show if I make a few dollars on a on a T-shirt sale. You know go to some measure of defraying costs but you know all that aside you know. Thank you so much for listening for supporting what I do here for the reviews on iTunes for the beautiful e-mails that I get from people for the comments that you give to people that I interview. That’s encouraging to me to see people get involved and support one another. Really just just for everything.

[03:08:12] I had no idea what power doing something like this could have in my own life and on the lives of those that get involved the lives of people who tell their story and then seem like they’re so much freer emotionally from from you know kind of walking up and unloading their baggage on some level this isn’t this isn’t just an audio program. It’s people’s real lives a slice of life that you know was silenced by these religious groups. And I’m glad that we can all come together and give this voice back to the voiceless so as always love others do no harm and go be happy.

Bonus Episode.mp3

[00:00:02] Welcome to the shunned podcast. This episode is actually a bonus episode. This is a little bit different. It’s really pretty much an excerpt from the pre interview that I did with David for his podcast. You’ve pretty much heard his whole story but there was well when I interview anyone. I don’t necessarily know their stories going in. Sometimes I know a little bit about them. Perhaps I’ve seen them on Instagram or Twitter or something maybe they have a little bit of a blog. There might be something I know at times other times I really go in completely blind. So when we were talking before his actual story while I was getting the levels together and just you know threw a little bit of chit chat he started. David started to tell me about this Steve B guy and things got real pretty quick and in that I felt like we had a conversation that was worth sharing that that maybe there were other people out there that might be helped by hearing some of what we shared together so I went ahead and extracted that excerpt from the preinterview. We actually ended up having a much longer conversation than even what you’re going to have here on this episode but I thought it was worth hearing especially for those who have been victims of abuse and you know of course any of us x Jehovah’s Witnesses can relate. So a lot of probably what you’ll hear here so go ahead and leave it to that and I hope you get something out of this. The Bee who was sort of predatorial was late.

[00:02:13] He’s probably in his 50s now but one of his things is he’s very Apostle Paul like taking young like that’s how it started was he was from New York and we were just some you know Minnesota kids and he’s like oh I’ll show you the world fluid out there my you my brother. And then the next time he thought well I want to show you the city more without. Not like Joan was drag but my younger brother just you by yourself. So that was when you’re in the big city is the only present I really know an out and out of of itself and it sucks cause as an adult you know I was 18 I should have been able. Like I felt so stupid and embarrassed and just frozen with fear. I should have been able to stand up for myself or use my voice or say it what what is this. But you know the power of church and trust in somebody who has influence over me you like whether or not you reached some arbitrary age. Adulthood is like I had nothing but boyish naivety and absolute trust in this person. It was unimaginable the scenario I found myself in and I froze and I did every. Even though I knew better. I really really tried to tell myself I was having strange dreams as what it was. You know you disassociated. That’s the psychological term you disassociate internally and and try to distance your brain is trying to distance you from what is happening. So it makes you feel like it’s a dream. It makes you feel it’s a protection.

[00:03:42] It’s like a built in failsafe for when something traumatic is happening and I go crazy because I just can’t like i’m cry a lot during this thing I know. But like just the fire inside. Like your whole body. If you’ve ever read those it you know it just instantly crumbles like I just thought I would absolutely implode like that for every second that stretched on. It could have been 10 minutes it could have been 20 years. I couldn’t I was so I just had nothing could have prepared me for that moment. Like all the prayers and like I just don’t know like it was some talisman over and over. Please stop please make us stop you know like nothing happened. Of course I of the awful outside. I also. Something you said. I just mean I’m not a therapist but you said that you you. You kind of blame yourself for. Or you said you know I was 18 and I should have been able to to stop it or whatever. And you know let me absolve you of that because that’s not that’s not true. The fact that predators groom people and this guy it sounds like is a professional at it. He had you in a situation where you were isolated he did something that you would have never expected. Freezing is a natural human response. We all have the flight or fight response and you don’t get to pick what it is that’s that your body naturally does and your mind naturally does in such a situation. So you know for some people yes they would fight. But that’s just that’s just a natural thing. It doesn’t mean that they chose that either.

[00:06:00] A person who flees even if that fleeing is to disassociate mentally to to leave their body essentially you know mentally that is that is just a natural response. And it’s not something that we have control over. I god I just I wish that it never happened to anybody. And I do fear that this guy I mean the way he invited you up there and all that like every time he’s ever come to Minnesota he usually brings a New Yorker where they’re big city folk and they don’t know the country like rural Minnesota come out in service with us once in these rural territories were every road is gravel and straight for miles. Like I think he travels with people a lot. I just wonder it’s usually like a young male traveling companion you like to meet the Barnabus and all that kind of like Apostle Paul. People like it when you’re in the truth because it feels like the apostle Paul. I’m thinking. Has any of these other guys like Was I an isolated incident like that which is that of itself. I’ve had emails with other people and I’m very clear like I said that’s why aren’t I thank you for your absolving me of it because I’m past that. But I still feel the I’m past it and I know it but knowing it and like is just one of those things and that’s why I don’t know actually intellectually knowing it and you’re emotionally feeling it exactly.

[00:07:33] Exactly because yeah that’s one of the things I always told Missy is you know like the part that sucks is we can sit and watch the Scientology stuff and she’ll talk about someone who is like 087. And I not having been raised in scientology I just get the sense of that comment means all of this was a person high up high ranking. And so I understand that that adds weight to the argument about to be presented. However that doesn’t impress me when a witness so if I hear somebody who went to Bethel or an ex elder there is this emotional like oh that’s the impressive thing because you are familiar with the sacrifices and time commitments it takes to get that far up and then you just feel like it’s when I ever stop being Can it just come like mindless information like as simple as 087 where I won’t be impressed that someone made it that far up or I won’t have those emotional responses to it. That that should be something that registers as simple as reading something I was not familiar with. Yeah I I don’t know if if you’re aware of this and I guess I I don’t know if this is helpful at all or not. It’s so. I know myself as a witness. I was pretty judgmental and as witness as we were taught that’s that everything we did was basically our choice.

[00:09:08] We were kind of conditioned control freaks to think that things that happened to us were things that we we wanted to happen because we made choices that led to those things and there are I used to always wonder I could never grasp why let’s say a battered woman would stay with her husband or there were instances where I’ve heard of people who were raped women let’s say in this case who were raped who then went back to that same man and then like dated that person. And I could never understand that. But what I’ve come to learn is that it’s kind of our brains way of trying to prove to ourselves that we did have control and that we wanted it. People tend to go back to their abuser because they’re trying to their brains subconsciously. It’s not a conscious thing it’s not a conscious choice but their brain is so traumatized it’s trying to set up scenarios whereby they go back to that person so that they can feel like yeah like I have control over that so that they can make it right so that they can maybe flip the script and you know from an outsider’s perspective it looks like you know well maybe you weren’t raped. I mean look at you you’re going back to this person and you know the witnesses would use the dog returning to its vomit or whatever crap script they use for that stuff. But it’s a natural human psychological phenomena. It is not a moral failing. It is it does not make a person a bad person. It makes a person a hurt person that is following a natural course. And that makes a lot of sense. It’s so funny because when I heard your story it just spoke to me so much that I got were like super similar like a lot of ways. But I also really like the heart which you came from. You know it felt like I’ll get into that when we tell the story more or less.

[00:11:22] But the idea that I thought God this is the person who went through what I went through but thought and felt so the humanity side of you like I don’t know if you were taking a personality test the common ENFP you know and like most witnesses you will find fall into that category of where we belong to the idealists whether it’s teacher the healer and stuff like that and sort them into a lie A.J. if I remember oh OK I may be wrong on that. Yeah I think it’s just interesting how like it’s weird because it’s a religion that brings a certain mindset it attracts a certain mindset and then it festers it further and then like whether you’d like you said about the dog returning to its vomit or there’s so many things that we do. Naturalise humans that I feel I know from myself. I was a young wild teen who wanted to push the envelope a lot you know rebellious and read Lord of the Rings and books like that and I listened to heavy metal music and you know I had a lot of that. But for me the funny part was I cared which also made it hurt a lot. Like what people thought did hurt. And you know I tried to think for myself and push the envelope and eventually my very first disfellowshipping. That’s kind of exactly what it was when I said you know what I’m not going to do anything like awful but having to just I’m just going to go out and just get my sense of self disfellowshipped almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

[00:12:55] So then I can start over at zero and like all this nonsense that where I am waffling between what my issues are will be clear cut and then it just climb climb the ladder that I wanted to hit that rock bottom so I could climb up. And then if you like until you identify that bottom for me the bottom like my wife you know she thinks like she loves that I was squeaky clean the stuff I did that pushed the envelope you know like for my first disfellowshipping it basically amounted to lose kont inducts which only is to sell shippable if there’s a pattern of it because you’re clearly not quite sure what it was. You know it’s just like you’re so squeaky clean. I’m thinking I know but like this is stuff I hated myself like I to watching my actions in my own hands like do things that you know just it’s put in you. Of course of course that’s how they control you. They make you feel shame that you’re a horrible human being over normal human things and that is how they get their claws in you. And you know once they have you feeling so terrible about yourself you have to turn to them for everything for you know what is right what is wrong because obviously you don’t know you’re a horrible person. So yeah I mean that’s that’s how they control you men. I don’t know I’m just I’m just so sorry. That’s you know you had to go through those things. I’m sorry that all of us had to go through all of these things. It’s part of the reason I guess I’m doing this podcast too.

[00:14:39] And the reason I told my own story was to shed a light on it because there is a good life out there and it’s not to be found in Jehovah’s Witnesses. People need to know that people need to be set free because there are a lot of people walking around feeling terrible about themselves and the implications of this. You know I guess I’m not sure how long you’ve been out but it still has an impact years later on people. I was just in fact I just got a new Facebook friend the other day. It was somebody that that I knew growing up and I don’t man I don’t know how long she’s been out but it’s probably been at least over a decade and she’s just now looking at the stuff and starting to wake up. You know she’s in house and she’s disfellowshipped she’s she’s living a different life. But it’s so hard to look at this stuff because it’s so traumatizing for most people that you know it takes a long time to even get enough distance from it where you can start to look at it. I know I have three brothers IRL two brothers and sisters three siblings still alive. And my brother just got married in October and his wife you know I right now I am finally comfortable enough and secure enough and I’m worthy enough to say no this was or I was wrong. You were in the wrong. You know this was wrong. This is failed by use the B. I was failed by you and I. Come and get me. You want to challenge it. I dare you to. You know you look yourself in the mirror and try to say it with a straight face it didn’t happen like this religion is wrong wrong wrong.

[00:16:35] And like I rail against this organization I told my brother Jonah I’m an apostate and he’s younger than me and he’s been out for over a decade but he’s just happy working. Being a businessman and living his life you choose tobacco and drinks all the time you know he’s a good guy he just has those habits that are you know I don’t want to I still live a clean life. I just am not a witness in my mind. But he like recoiled when I had just said I’m an apostate I’m quite an apostate. And I thought it was like I know I had slapped him because he’s and same thing about a brother Ruben like. These are people who have been out for over a decade and they look at me like when Ruben’s bride I have railed against that to her. I told her like how thankful I was just to be at this wedding because it’s the first wedding of any of my siblings. I was I was acting you know and that was a huge thing for me and I’m crying and I’m saying I’m so glad that I’m here for you guys I think Ruben found a really good mom and she’s like yeah. And we talked a little bit about religion I was like I said in religion I hate that I perpetrated that stuff. Misto real siblings real life going on and she’s like it’s OK. You’re here now. And I just can’t see why anyone would ever want to go back to that which really. Like what.

[00:17:47] So he thinks that he might have mentioned things to her where he still might believe it but these are people who have just grown so comfortable with. I’m going to smoke and drink and live what I want just knowing it’s wrong that I’m doing wrong and that I’m bad and I’m thinking no no no no no. Like you guys please look at stuff I will Baburova you books I will send you thing and I want them to like you just got married to this nice gal in a Lutheran church and she’s not like oh we have to wear church time forcing hers on you. And if you’re even hinting that down the line you want to go back to this. Been out for so long and the changes you’re going to have to make. I see that that’s going to be nothing but divisive and I don’t want them to for this especially you know like. And there will be problems in a marriage. But to bring this in is like you know destruction he. How can he even be thinking that because to me that’s like Ruben this religion has ripped our family to pieces and has done nothing but I don’t know. I think for him there’s a psychology that says until he was married you could never feel like he actually had the grounds to go back on and start over. Like what. I’m living in sin. What’s the what’s the point of going back to meetings but now that he’s got that he might be thinking about it. So when they told me you know apostate it was like I said well what interests me like I have a difference.

[00:19:06] I differ in my belief from that organization and I think it’s you don’t ever feel like you failed them they failed you and you you’re not you’re not living as you want and it’s bad and you’re wrong for it. They’re wrong. That’s the main thing is you need to understand it so I try to drop nuggets as I don’t know but doesn’t know how strong the indoctrination is. It is it is so strong that when you’re in it you never look at it because you’re told essentially not to look at it. Oh yeah. And then when you leave it you’re still not looking at it. And so that those feelings that shame that they implanted in you you still feel like a bad person here just because there are so many people I’ve met over the years that say and I remember we would meet them even when we were out knocking on doors and they would say well you know I studied with Jehovah’s Witnesses and you know mandos people they have the truth. But I just can’t live up to it. I just I just I just like to drink or smoke or whatever. And it’s the same thing it is. I mean you have witnesses active witnesses in good standing. That’s acts that behave in a human way. Whether that is the way they know the way they drink or you know some quote vice that they pick up or whether it’s the way they behave with the opposite sex or the same sex or whatever and they end up leaving because of the behavior but that’s a physical external thing. No one has addressed internally how they feel about it.

[00:20:57] And then here they are a decade later and they still feel internally the exact same way that they felt when they were sitting there in the Kingdom Hall being indoctrinated and it’s just it’s just amazing to look at humanity and how it can be manipulated. It’s really scary how it can be manipulated and I feel it I feel for your brother if that’s because it’s not a happy life. No. And I think he’s smart enough and he will win now and thank god. Honestly thank God like that. But you know my goodness that I am in the position I’m in now with the courage I have. And I know what I know and I own crisis of conscience even though I’m only halfway through it you know and I feel like I have a hard time reading it. It’s like I don’t want to finish. You know. Yes I get to a certain point and I say this is the nail in the coffin and then I look at how many pages are left I’m thinking good god there’s that much more to write about still like oh I can’t handle it right. I wouldn’t doubt it. A month later people have to go at their own pace so I’m not telling you what pace to go. But I will just encourage you a lot of people are kind of surprised that I guess how quickly I’ve been able to change my thoughts and feelings about some things that. Look Like. It’s a. See it was 2000 when I started when I got became suicidal and then it was 20 16 15 2015 when I left. So it took me you know quite a few years to start getting healthy emotionally and mentally.

[00:22:49] And then even then when we officially disassociated and left in September of 2015 I still on some levels thought they had the truth and kind of planned on kind of going out and being almost like an independent witness like just being I mean I wasn’t going to go to Keenum Hall or anything but I kind of still believed in a lot of the things and I’ll tell you I the only way that I know to do anything in my life the only way around is through. And that means for me if I’m going to get past something I have to. I literally immerse myself in it. And so every day when I would come home from work I would be on I hate even using the word apostate websites but I would be on different Web sites for Jehovah’s Witnesses reading and participating and asking questions and just diving in head first. Every day I got a crisis of conscience somebody had on YouTube and I ripped the audio from it and I would listen to it while I was at work. You can’t for me. I could not. The program slowly. Because every time I would get away from the deprogramming I would start thinking oh maybe they’re right. What about this. What about that. Yeah. And I just had to keep pushing until I examined everything so thoroughly that it has completely changed me as far as the way I see all of that stuff. And it’s a grieving process. It’s like anything else.

[00:24:40] I mean there’s going to be appointed time where you’re sad for everything you’ve lost there’s going to be another point in time where you are pissed off. Yes yeah. It’s I’m right there with you. I think my conversion was actually much swifter. It’s just that my life changed so quickly which I’ll get into that when we tell the story but I’m with you. And to me it’s just such a weighty happy book. Listen to a few podcasts which is also part of the interview. It’s just one of those things where the conversion of my mind was just such like even your podcast really really helped me a lot because like rey friends and like you I don’t know if you’ve ever listened to the critical thinker podcast. Yeah. Lady C. NJT 80. I right away knew. Oh. These were good witnesses. And I hate to use that term. Good or bad. But what I felt was the right. I was like Oh my goodness. A Bethyl like that impressed me. Now you’ve got my attention. Plus they just reek of people who aren’t bitter grinding axes railing away like there’s a lot of bitterness out there just for so so. But that wasn’t the message that was speaking to my heart it was. These guys are trying to help people and they have done. I know what research sounds like they’ve done their research and you could tell they are so lakes up sticky and he would and his first few podcasts JT and see what I liked about him whether it was like 10 minutes long. It was like a sort. It was like oh your bible study had such quick. Here’s the topic.

[00:26:18] We’re not going to get off topic and there’s a lot of topic and he just hit the approach shared a few like damning scriptures or things of their own from previous literature. And he thought reanimates that’s quite your list. After a 10 minute presentation of his against something the unwitnessed if you want to call it that. It was like I was left with an impression and then as they got into their longer like hour long podcasts like I thought these guys are they’re right they know what they’ve been through. And this is the guy who when he shares like the behind the scenes stuff happens at Bethyl or assembly halls and they count the money and pay payroll. And you start to realize oh man I know and what I loved about it too is I’m very rural Minnesota like I don’t want to say backwoods everybody else in my area’s backwoods hunting fishing Scandia. Blaze orange. All that I am different from my area which is one of the things that appeals to me about who I am but in my area I’m still not exposed to that. It’s good to hear that BTC and JT Who are you know very urban and have like well Kakuna most of the city folks just like to say it’s the same stuff everywhere and that’s awesome. I never thought about that perspective. But of course that makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah. Remove it from different perspectives and to see that it wasn’t just you. It was everywhere.

[00:27:39] Yeah and it wasn’t like well maybe if I lived in a hall where like when I went to New York I was like how many people like you have a year’s text and a bazillion languages up here. Be like how many people get in this hall. He goes It’s easy for him to be anonymous. I hate to go against him again. That’s just like grinds of course you could hide New York City just a few blocks over there is another kingdom hall and this would say I met this one now and people are always coming and going and all I used to go to the three o’clock meeting but work the schedule unless you could make an excuse for skipping out on the one o’clock and I just felt like such a tumbleweed. Like traveling around the world as he does and he’s never stayed in one place long enough to be appointed as a ministerial servant there just. I just. My gut tells me there’s others out there you know. I mean I can’t say for certain but I will tell you with 99 percent certainty that that guy what he did to you was crafted was well crafted and you don’t get to that point. I wouldn’t think on your first time that guy has done this before and he will and he may still do it. And that’s that’s a scary thought. Yeah. I don’t know that there’s a weirdness to it that like the analogy I always use is I don’t know which one is better and this is from an e-mail I first sent Steve when I was describing the thing is I think in his own weird way though to that he was partially I think he was gay first of all at nonpracticing gay and then the truth or the organization they make no allowance for that.

[00:29:18] So he was told put those feelings to bed will fix your brain and your system. So maybe he had been keeping it at bay and then he met some cheery eyed like naive boy like me enough where I think there is even though there was a good age difference. I do. It’s part of me says maybe I was this saw pray like because he was in a way in love with me and I was the one like I believe a lot of these guys are creeps to where I was I just don’t really want to say a special case. But like their expert profiles like where they can you can put them make a creep watch a bunch of kids at the playground and somehow they have this innate sense to say that’s the one who won’t tell anybody. You know that’s the loner kid that’s the one who you know just like I don’t know how. I can’t tell if it’s easier to be the one off and then say at least I took all of it. Or if it’s easier to digest by saying I was just another house in the dorms path of a tornado and like unfortunately there’s a lot of us out there. I think I think it’s just different. I don’t I don’t know that one is I mean statistically it’s better if it was only one person that he hurt. You know that’s from a various statistical way of looking at it. But you know in the end I think what matters most is not him but you know I think I just think it yeah. Part of me wants to see it burn to the ground though.

[00:30:57] Like I know I agree on. I because he’s still traveling out there and he has because he’s so likable and travelled so much he could literally quit his job live wherever he wanted and he would have just friends and couches to stay on the rest of his traveling wandering time any time you you mention him in any kingdom all they say oh wait. Can’t wait. He was back and I’m thinking if any of you people like I want to see like it’s one of the few things where I would chase it doggedly like just say you know like I don’t trust that the elders would ever help me anymore. You know they said they would I think it’s me. If I have to track him down and blast him and I could find his nephew on Instagram and just like I’ve told a few people where if if he didn’t know that when he went back to talk to you. It’s nice. I heard this about you were you know like I don’t know if that ever happened but a guy who travels like he does and him and the way he invites people to do things and the charisma and everything. I really don’t see him being a person who only did this to one person. Yeah. The you know the evidence the circumstantial evidence does not look good. I just I just don’t know what to say. I don’t want to chase this guy.

[00:32:24] Yeah that’s where things like that when I told the elders here even like lately as a social person I said well we had an issue come up and I went and talked to them about it and I said it’s the same stuff all over same stuff over because you know there was a situation that happened we got wind of it. We tried to alert them even though that this fellowship person that’s a scary thing where you say this is happening in your hall and they say you’re bitter we’re not going to hear your opinion because they can just broad stroke. It doesn’t matter. And when I went in I heard basically the guy was on the platform. I said he’s up there right now. So I stayed up to the meeting those cats are heroes. It’s the same garbage over and over and over like people you like a slap on the wrist nothing ever happens it’s like CNN and then that’s when they said wait wait wait. What tell us what the what do you mean with that. And so I called them this is what happened they said he never told us that. So right away I kind of said for their sake I was glad that they didn’t know that at least yeah. But then I went back to talk like well we’ll help you try and find him and when we left here we put this out and we can tell you this much we put on his publisher card like a little red flag that said shows an unusual interest in the young men and the congregation you know and a sense of that will follow him where he goes. Is there any way to follow him where he goes to know where he is like what if it doesn’t happen in a congregation.

[00:33:38] What if it’s some non witness kid that’s never going to approach an elder. So you won’t have a second witness like that and they’re like Well as you know good point you know that like. And they said well we will try and help you find them which I’m sure shut me up you know and got me out of their face. But I don’t know that it will ever really be done unless I do it myself and then the question of was it worth it. Where do I put my efforts that I feel. How much time do I want to invest just to get vengeance versus justice kind of thing. Well and I don’t know because it’s not just it’s not even just vengeance versus justice. It’s I’m sure you on some level want to protect the other kids other young people out there as well. You know. So I don’t I don’t know. I mean you’re essentially being put in a place as an investigator and you’re not necessarily equipped to do. I had my chance and I’m told them you’re you go home and I’ll when you as you though even at that I mean even if you went to the elders it would have been your word versus his. And he wasn’t going to cop to it. That’s true. And so even if you had done everything you could have in the in the moment unfortunately there are people out there that are very good doing very evil things ands I’m not saying it shouldn’t be pursued but I’m just saying that sometimes they are good enough at the games they play.

[00:35:37] To where they are ahead of where their victims would naturally be developmentally as far as trying to play that game with them to beat them. And I think that you know you know maybe you can go talk to you know like a real investigator or you know maybe you can go to the local police and talk to an investigator and say look you know how could I. Is there any way that I could because I’m worried that this is continuing to happen. How could this be pursued. Is there any way I could get information from someone or something I could do. I don’t know. I mean that’s a long shot. Sure. No. And that’s the thing that I don’t know. Like for me there’s there’s whether or not I have a form of recourse. I wanted someone to believe me. And then the thing was I went and I told the elders like of course of course when I went in I told the elders they said Oh we we we never had we never told us that David will look back the records because we thought we had talked to you and I said no because I came to the meeting and I said Well did he talk to you. Because I was surprised to still hear him commenting. I figure at least you would have a proof and been able to say he shouldn’t be allowed some privileges. But here he is current thing and I thought like he didn’t tell them anything and then I came to the others and I said What did he tell you in this very careful like elderly like we’re handling it. But he told us there was a closeness that he got misconstrued.

[00:37:13] And I thought OK so like. OK. So that’s what he told them. Got it. And maybe I felt like even that that was something I didn’t it raise a ruckus about. So he gave them at least they had a conversation where I just mean not putting a stop to it mean that it was a closeness misconstrued. I didn’t think so and I have the assertiveness now to say no that’s wrong. But the thing was I felt like no one came to me and I told this to the elders in the recent revisit of this like I was mad that none of you came to me no one whatever. I said where was my side. How come. How was I represented in his confession that shows something that I was OK like whether or not like David. How are you doing with all this. We know you’re disfellowshipped but it sounds like an awful thing that happened but I just felt like these guys and that’s the thing about where I live the kingdom how I’ve been. They literally knew my parents which had issues. So it’s like easy to just write me off as all David’s from that family tree and they’ve known me since I was a baby. And everything I’ve ever done has probably been Dragonair front of these guys the last 25 years Samael there’s I’m pretty sure with a few scenarios up then up and down. But I feel like I’m too easy for them to just write off because they’re familiar with it. And it was like you know just somebody like I don’t know I don’t even know what I wanted.

[00:38:34] I just felt I was ultimately they don’t they. They weren’t interested in pursuing it. No bungled situation after bungled situation after a bungled situation is all I have ever seen from these particular elders. And so it was for me like no and I’m thinking oh you’re telling me Jehovah has the pulse on his fingers and this kind of situation at least his way out of his control. I started to really have doubts that I thought there’s no way that he’s God or something was blocking his holy spirit from these people because this is just aren’t acceptable. There’s this God would be real like oh how appalled at what’s going to be like. Yeah but it’s a lot to take in your rally and like you said you’d go swings you have moments of nothing but heart and then you have moments of bitterness and you just say you know what like outside you I believe you. So I don’t I don’t you know I think those people are above their grade. You know they’re not yeah they’re not. It’s not within them to to to be that person. Jehovah’s Witnesses it seems like something that I’ve noticed is that honestly empathy has been stripped from them. They do not own empathy. They do not know what empathy is. They are so narcissistic and so caught up in their own things that they do not have the ability to take the perspective of anyone else. And which is I mean an easy definition of a narcissist is someone that cannot take the perspective of anyone else. And I mean I know I was like that for a long time.

[00:40:23] I had those tendencies. I was made like that. Honestly I was the product of two narcissists and raised in an environment full of narcissus and the organization strips your feelings that strips your humanity. And that’s why they can’t tolerate they can’t listen to other people’s perspectives. They have to call you an apostate. And they have to make you evil because they can’t listen to what you have to say it threatens the and’s systematically. It appears just this is just my armchair psychological professional opinion. Systematically they strip good human beings and they attract not great human beings who are Narcissus and they strip their empathy and basic humanity from them bit by bit over time. And then when they’re presented with something like what happened to you they can only think of themselves themself. The organization for Jehovah’s name in the reproach it would bring. And they cannot see you as a hurting human being that has come before them and address you as such. Yeah they don’t have the emotional tools. It has been taken from them and it’s a very sad thing that results in a lot of people being hurt. And I know that if I had continued in their religion or culture if I had continued in it as dead as I was inside I wish I could have been that old. Now listen to me now listen to my podcast. I am not that person that is not who I started in this world to be Jehovah’s Witnesses absolutely robbed me of that part of my humanity and it’s only six seven years to get it back. That’s amazing.

[00:42:38] It’s amazing to put it so eloquently like just like it’s what they do. It’s what opened my eyes which I think is why I can present it like that because it’s what I saw it was the thing that woke me up was whoa there isn’t any love here. These people are mean. They’re mean to the people they go to the door and knock on this person’s door and then say nasty hateful things about that person when they leave or want to live in that person’s house because it’s a nice house when Armageddon comes and kills them and their family they can’t even have any feeling for that person that they just talked to at the door. They just want their freaking house. How gross is that. Yeah. And the funny thing is I’ve never like to even hear that. Now I’m instantly appalled. I’ve heard that 10000 times before. You know and it did it upon me that then that is a shocking epiphany to realize that I probably once shared in such banter like ah it just that’s really I don’t know. It feels like someone you don’t know or recognize but like looking at old photos when you had maybe you know what all that hair got. Who is that young guy. Whatever it may be 50 years from now. Something totally unrecognizable. Yeah. It’s terrifying. I mean we clean houses and we clean nice homes. And I couldn’t have been standing on the doorstep of one of those people that we clean for one of these genuine nice people that we’ve gotten to know over all these years.

[00:44:28] And I could have gone up to their door with my little suit on my pretenses of love and presented them with a watchtower and awake magazine and maybe they weren’t interested and maybe they turned maybe they were having a bad day and turned me down kind of curtly or they just you know turned me down period and I could have walked away and wiped the dust off my feet. Gone my way. And you know just you know screw them they don’t want to hear this whatever it ends. Or just you know walked away and said well they’ll feel differently and when Armageddon comes won’t they. No sir. Those horrible things we used to say to ourselves. And those are nice people. And all I could have seen was oh they have a nice house and maybe when Jehovah kills them at Armageddon I can live there what an awful thing to even think. Yeah I hear they actually literally utter it at times walking away from a door. And I mean if that just doesn’t show them what they do to people. I mean to me that’s it. In a nutshell they completely strip you of your ability to see other human beings as human beings. They rob you of your ability to see your own self as a human being. And so you have no empathy for others you don’t have it for yourself either. And then you blame yourself for everything. I want to thank you for listening to David’s story today. Please subscribe so that you can get all of these stories automatically as they’re released. Each time please also show David and other support by going to my Web site.

[00:46:08] It’s shunned podcast dot com and if you go to the episodes page there you can leave a comment for any of the people who are telling their story. They can not only read but they can also respond to your comments. So just go to shunned podcasts dot com and go to the episodes page and you’ll see an individual post for each story and you can reply and comments on those stories. You can also find links to things on there that have helped each person as they were waking up and leaving the cult. If you want to hear my personal story you can listen to a podcast called this J.W. life or go to the Web site. This J.W. life. And that was my personal story. It’s a nine part series. And you can if you’re not familiar with the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses you can really learn a lot there about how they function what they teach. Alongside my personal story one final way to show support is to leave a review on iTunes. Just leaving a five star review leaving your personal comments. You know whatever it is that that impacted you this helps other people to find the podcast so that they can get the help that they might need as well. Now normally I release a new podcast at the beginning of every month. But coming up in March the beginning of the month happens to be my wife and I it’s our 18th anniversary so we will be celebrating that. And I’ve also spent a lot of time working on David’s story. So what I’m going to do is actually I’m going to skip.

[00:48:01] There will not be an episode at the beginning of March. And I know that may may be disappointing for some but I need to get some time. I’ve got a lot of people that want to be interviewed by the way. If you want to see your story go to shun podcast dot com click on the Contact page there fill out that form I’ll get it and we can work on getting your story together as well. But I need to get some interviews done so that I have more content so that I have more episodes to put out there along with the fact that you know my anniversary is coming up. We will be spending some time with that. It’s also just a busy time of year at the beginning of the year with taxes and everything else in our business. So yeah there will be no episode for March. I hate to break the news to you but there will be. We will have episodes again at the beginning of April and that will allow me some time to get some done so that I can maybe even get a little bit ahead. That would be nice. That’s kind of how I started. But other things have come up so I hate to break that news to you but we’ll see you again in April. And as I always end all these episodes love others do no harm and go be happy.

David Part 2.mp3

[00:00:01] Welcome to the shunned podcast. Today’s episode is the story of David. Now this episode and the ones that follow are going to be a little different. David had a lot to share. And so this episode is actually going to be his episode is going to be three parts. There will be two regular episodes and then I’m going to throw in a bonus episode as well. The bonus will consist of some things that we talked about really before we got to David’s story before we really started outlining everything and putting it in order. We had a conversation that I think was pretty important and that some people need to hear and I hope that it helps others. I will warn you that some of the story that we’re about to delve into is intense. It does deal with the matters of sexual abuse this is a very important topic. The Watchtower organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses has been under fire recently through some documents that showed up on a faith leak site. Through that story being picked up by Newsweek by the Daily Mail through the Australian Royal Commission through the process that were held at war with the world headquarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses in New York this is a topic that was not talked about inside of the organization as we were Jehovah’s Witnesses. This is something that for an organization that claims to be led by God was largely ignored and that it has taken outside influences to explain.

[00:01:51] For science as for psychologists for four therapists to get to the root of things like sexual abuse how it affects people how predators really are wired and and how they act. And for some reason the organization led by God supposedly claiming to be led by God did not understand this. However these things have come to light and this is a topic that needs to be discussed. It needs to be brought to light so that people can heal. And so that’s a lot of people can know that they’re not alone. So David was courageous enough to share his story so that he could help others feel less alone. And I want to. David was gracious enough to to do this so that I could share it with you. These episodes are going to be a little different. They’re not the normal way that stories are told on here. They will be more conversational. It will be a conversation between him and I and he’ll hopefully you’ll take away quite a bit from it. I hope that this information or this story that you don’t just come away with it let’s not boil it down to just being this one aspect you know aspect of sexual abuse and the conversations surrounding it. David lived a lifetime of experiences in just a short time. There is a lot to learn here David is a beautiful soul for allowing himself to be vulnerable and to express these things and then I mean you just see throughout his story that he’s a pretty awesome person a great human being. And sadly well maybe not sadly but there is a lot of the most sincere people in the organization known as Jehovah’s Witnesses that leave.

[00:03:49] There was something that I’ve noticed since getting out and that and learning the stories of people that it is a lot of the people who are the most heartfelt and sincere that end up leaving the organization known as the truth so I want to thank David for sharing his life with me so that I can share it with you. And without further ado let’s go ahead and get to David’s story. I’m not a high school. My family in 2002 moves away. The years of 2002 2003 and 2004 is like my introduction into young manhood if you will. And it’s also like it’s hard for me to put any of these pieces together because they’re all like a chessboard moving at the same time. But I just see that the whole thing a turbulent time a turbulent in terms of who am I. Where is my place in this. What am I doing. You know and then my family moved. I felt good because I was out from my mom’s watchful eye and I could be a young man. Hey I got a place of my own with some roommates and that was all very good. And some said material. Simultaneously happy happening was in 2003. That was when my dad died and I was living with the same roommates and that would have been October 30th 2003. Yeah and Lamber the elde I was getting ready for service and the elder had come by and there was during the CEO visit actually so he was there to do and they came up and told me that my dad had passed like eight thirty or something right before service. I just remember making my plans. Things are different today.

[00:05:40] I had calls with family and they were very sympathetic. But you know he was working on a car and that Jack slipped out and it killed him. And I just remember feeling like oh my dad’s gone. But there was this weirdness to it because I didn’t really know who I was supposed to be missing at that time. But I knew something of great magnitude had happened. And I remember also at the same time my girlfriend at the time was just he was on again off again uptown and it was such a crazy world for me because I was 19. And to be dating this girl I had never had a girlfriend before. I had no business dating. I didn’t know enough about who I was to actually pick a good partner. But here’s the funny thing. Like the witnesses put such stock in titles you know wear off. Her dad doesn’t like me. He doesn’t think I’m ready or mature enough say that to my Pioneer face. And then all of a sudden he has to say you know as dumb as that sounds. I was 19. He should have sat us down and said you’re an adult and you’re an adult. I can’t stop this. I don’t have to like it but there was like this I have to take a backseat because he’s spiritually ranks higher than me or something like some stupidity like that where these people had lived so much life they should have just said I don’t care. I know you’re an adult and I know you’ve got this title attached to your name. But spiritual qualifications do not make you a good partner for such as such.

[00:07:12] This isn’t you like I would probably rebell and get through it anyway but I just think that that was so crazy that I basically was able to tell people I was mature enough to be at 19 because I was a pioneer a questioner question you can’t question my immaturity of Jehovah approved me to this standing when in reality now I look back and I think you know the brothers in New York probably just got a letter recommended from my elders that says David wants to give use 60 or 70 hours of his time voluntarily I’m sure they said it’s great. Pat him on the head tell him yes he Jehovah approves. Like oh what else are they going to say. If there’s no privilege to it they’re just like he wants to give us his time yet you know placate him and think they prayed over your individual and Joe is like a holy spirit down upon your application so that you you were confirmed as a pioneer. Yeah. Makes you wonder if anyone’s ever been turned down and wants to give them that much time. Was their hideout. Many have yeah. Anyway so I’ve got that going on. And it was on again off again and I’m starting to get fed up with the whole dating this girl I’m mad. And I remember when my dad had passed away she got wind of it naturally is where it always spreads. It started sending me text about how sympathetic she was and she was so from class.

[00:08:39] And I remember at that time feeling like Please do not be using this as a springboard to get us back into each other where I can’t I’m volleyball right now because of this. And I would wish your well wishes. But like if this is something that’s going to just get us texting and talking again where I let my guard down and I get back into that mess that I just know is not what we need there. And what I need specifically that was like a turbulent time where I couldn’t tell what everything had an angle and I didn’t know of like what was going on in it. I missed you know I missed out on ever really getting to know my dad and he had thought he was anointed and I had heard like ran up to his death when we went to the funeral. It was like sitting there and they never talked about him being anointed and then you find out that like I guess they weren’t even taking his comments at the time of his death in his kingdom hall where he raised his hand they would just pass over him. I remember thinking what a nice witness you know where all his worldly brothers and sisters were there and they got to hear what you know Gary’s hope for the future was and how he viewed the world and God and spirituality and his path and his chosen life. And I felt like this the perfect thing what a good witness for all these family that I don’t really know. Their faces look the same.

[00:09:52] Their eyes look like my dad when they smile I can see that we’re family but I don’t know them like my mom and dad got divorced when I was young and they weren’t witnesses and they were his side which I live with her. So why would I. There was very little contact with them ever. But I still felt like I wanted to help them. And then now I realize if any of those people had like really known probably how my guy was you know his hope for the future and how the people viewed him up until his death it was kind of like I don’t know. I just cannot sit with me. Well that was portrayed as this thing at a funeral and like behind the scenes machinations that the hall was will move pretend like it doesn’t exist because we can’t trust his comments anymore. He’s too off the wall you know. Oh yeah. And I just felt so there’s a lot yeah I feel I just felt like between my Dad my girlfriend and everything else that was going crazy. My family had moved away. Steve A my greatest role model influence at that time. He lives about an hour and a half away. I still make pretty regular trips to visit him. And the good thing was that the girl I was dating was going to his hall so when I was visiting him. That’s how we kind of got close. The girl. But one that fell apart. Steve was still there and he’s like Ardy I’m sorry. We saw this happening but you know we thought we’d give you your jaw the length of leash to be your own man and learning who goes by. I wish you would have asked me what we could have thought about.

[00:11:18] He was an elder at her hall at the time in I just remember feeling that they had friends and store supported our this 2003 period also was the first time I went out to New York by myself. The very first time with Stevie was right after Stevie’s wedding and from the wedding the two of us went out there together and knowing without incident it ever happened. But then Steve said you know I’d like to bring it back where it’s just you know you and I and I can show you more the city and a longer thing. And when I went out there the second time everything went just normally as planned. You know we went out in service we met people we went to you know visited Bethel and all that. And then I remember this was the first incident where he had molested me. Was the night before the flight back home. We were in New York. I don’t remember the time or the days exactly but it was either July or August and it was just unbearably hot. We were sleeping on the floor of the apartment because I over the wood was cool but no sweat soaked into wood. So I was laying in my own sweat. And the fan was isolating and I had fallen asleep some time. I mean he was kind of up on the futon couch that put fold out nearby. But we were in this one room where we’re still just really really high and sometime in the middle in a war. I awoke I became awake and I was aware that his hand had slipped in like an open fly boxers like just like you’d slide it into your pocket I guess it was on my private parts.

[00:13:02] And I remember like just wanting to freak out and die but feeling like I got no answer I got nothing for this right now. Whatever is happening. Is beyond me and am I dreaming is this real. Is this like the heat nightmares or something. And I was so hot inside you like I was tingling No I really wanted to just implode like disappear. And I couldn’t I couldn’t even make sense of it. And I remember thinking has this been 10 seconds or 20 minutes. I have no idea I just kind of came to it it’s happening and it was like the most crazy thing you could think that someone I trusted in a in a year and like the big city is right outside I’m far from home. I’m here all alone. And this is the person I really like. You almost feel guilty for even thinking that this is real and happening to you. How could I say that about my friend Jane and naturalistic thing. But you feel it and you just thought go back to sleep go back to sleep go back to sleep. And I couldn’t move. And I couldn’t say no I couldn’t speak up. And I was afraid that he was going to hear like or just notice I was awake maybe my breathing was faster my heart was pounding so loud I thought for sure he could hear you can hear you know I’m up. He knows I’m awake. I’m going to be found out. If I can lay here pretend I’m asleep. You can just go on like it never happened or something.

[00:14:34] Remember that going to cut myself. No no no I understand. I remember the day like it kind of started to drift in the apartment I after I had rolled over I had kind of to my mind if I pulled it out that I mustered enough courage to just act like I had rolled over my mostly and kind of got to my stomach where it’s over it’s not happening anymore and I had just rolled over. I was out of the reach and I was everything else. But there isn’t like I didn’t go back to sleep and just lay there thinking I remember slowly becoming aware that like there was an awful leading feeling because of the heat and it was white but it wasn’t like visible I can just hear it for hours. And it started to take shape. And then other things in the rooms that take shape and then light blue light coming in then you can see everything. And I remember we went to the airport. He walked me down the terminal like he had paid for the ticket and got me out there and everything so I felt you know very I don’t know I felt very like I had to be grateful and gracious. But something had changed. And so I stand by and I walked away went to the plane. And then he called myself shortly thereafter and said what was with that. Yes we weird. You know they’re weird today and you leave and say goodbye. Give me a hug you just left me there at the one where like people without a ticket are allowed past the point and it’s called by Assad.

[00:16:07] I remember apologizing for acting weird and tried to pat Russia off as I’m like yeah I should have said goodbye like I was jilted what I should. I had every right to say Euroleague anything I would’ve wanted to do well within my rights to say or not say at that point. But I remember just giving him the easy Oh I just had a bad dream last night and I’m just going a bit off you know which. That was the point. I think that dream excuse entered my brain because that’s what I had passed off sure according to it. And I tried to convince myself for a long time that they were dreams and that it was just this maybe I was weird maybe there was something wrong with me. I don’t know if I’m gay or not. I don’t. I was aroused but I came to in that state. I don’t know how it was. Did you think I enjoyed it like this is like so messed up on a million levels and I don’t know. Nothing could have prepared me for what to do or how to feel or even that in my imagination. That would be a thing. And then are going to internalize it and it’s easier to think that if it’s you that you must do something then it is time to really give credence to the fact of how out of control that situation was and that someone else could do that to you. Yeah. And the thing is I like Kim too like you as a friend. You know what to think about someone you like. You think I must be wrong.

[00:17:40] They make me do good. There there. Personally I enjoy in every other moment of my life except for that. Well it’s a big one. You know that’s how a predator would groom someone. I remember thinking about it where nothing happened for a long long time and then my brother was getting baptized. I can remember the year but we were at a convention where we all know baptisms Jehovah’s Witnesses we bundle up together to share share beds and Jonah and his friend Ryan and also to our congregation were in one of the beds. We had a double clean young single guys called conventional splitting costs. And again Steve and I were in the same bed. And I remember like and remember this time it had been so long that I had really gotten good at convincing myself what had happened in New York was some sort of maybe dream right. You would surely have happened again since then. So at this point I was not afraid of that even being a possibility it was like a one off. And then that night the night before Jonas baptism started happening again in that bed. And I remember just again thinking freeze if I can find a convenient way to roll over at the sleep cars sluggishly just like make it stop make it stop and I’m praying to Jawaher that you know how someone pulled the fire alarm even if it’s a prank or have something an emergency.

[00:19:14] If I had any voice I would scream out in Ryan and John Boehner were in the bed next to me and we would cause a scene or maybe the most unlikely thing have a fire truck try to the building or a meteor or something. Make this stop and it’s happening again. And now that was the first moment the real dread of it confirmed the first one. Yeah and really reminded me that no this was the real thing. It’s real and it’s happening again. It was to get a conviction. And I remember at that point it was easy to move on. There was about Jonah he was getting baptized and so the attention was off of me. And I just wanted that I wanted invisibility of having the attention off of me. So all this was going on in my personal life and then I didn’t have a bad relationship. I must have all this right start. There’s worldly girls and I’m very curious and to be honest not produce sexually charged person I have a high drive and years ago the first time I looked through the baptism questions you the elders the third series they had asked me Was there anything that would prevent you from going back to getting baptized. Can you think of anything he said. Well I confessed to him that I had masturbated and had a problem with that and I remember that was terribly humiliating but also feeling like very proud that I had those words left my lips. I did the right thing and then he thanked me. He told me while that that’s something I nobody can ever know that that’s only you. That’s between you it’s a private matter and I would have had nothing to.

[00:21:05] So you’re coming forward as that shows me you’ve got a good heart and you’re honest beyond belief that you can go with free of getting caught like on your own. Confess something that personal. We’re going to do all we can to help you and we’re going to get you through this letter and I’ll talk to everybody else so we’ll see where your baptism stands this moment. I remember like a little bit later I got a call from him in my step dad took an they had turned to me and he said well he says that at this time you won’t be getting baptized David because of the issue of masturbation but he said because of your honesty you will go far in this organization and they want to help you get past it. And I always felt like that I hung on to that like all foreigners organization. The elders really like I did do the right thing. And I remember like this as a side tangent backwards. But the late are they can help me. Good. I’m going to be done with this. I’m sick of having a good period of seven days and then relapse and then you get it you know you feel like you’re making progress and it’s real accidents relapse and then it’s Oh you mean like every brother in the organization. Yes. And I would imagine to me I felt like I had the worst case in the world and there was another that not allowed to talk about it because you know everyone had aimed for it. Yes in my private life. This is going to sound awful but being completely honest like there were conventions where I was in that place for eight hours a day the convention bathroom. I didn’t care.

[00:22:41] I was very sexually charged as a young man and they can give them all that’s not off limits. They’re like we we we laugh about it. There will be a lot of witnesses if they hear this though just think oh I know right. Kind of what witness he was that bad witness who gave you that if you would even Sacko it. But my struggle was a real thing and I hated every time it was happening. Like I needed it and I wanted them to help me. And what they do they Xerox some garbage out of like a watchtower article 4B and then told me to beat the young people ass book. And I thought we I thought they were going to meet with me and we’ll pray over me or tell me about their personal experiences or something that would really help you know for days. There’s your answer. This is not a good friend. I could have printed off something like this at home. That’s their help. I remember very let down by that. And so like in my mind I thought Paul thanks everybody for all that help you like God loves a Xeroxed and stapled together five sheets of pages. Like I just felt like there was no one really cared to help me. They just wanted to say please don’t come back and tell us you still have this issue because we want about Tyce. That’s what they were hoping just put it behind you. Yeah let’s go forward. Not that I actually was struggling with something and the emotions hurt or anything.

[00:24:06] You know heaven forbid they they let you know that you’re not alone you know that those men could have on on a on a real level and let you know that it was something that they struggled with or whatever but instead they left you on an island and gave you a sterile article from Jehovah’s Witness propaganda. And the funny thing was though for who I was at that time as upset down there was I decided I was going to take it to heart and read the young people last book which to make matters worse starts off with this the Apostle Paul has an affliction in his flesh does what he doesn’t want it to do. He uses it was to do this but his flesh is weak and keeps doing that. And that was like mantra and I remember when one of the elders had asked me about that and I had said well the Apostle Paul he had a problem we don’t know what it was but his flesh was weak and he said that and the guy’s honest to god reaction was he laughed like chortle like a quick snort like I’m sure it was masturbation just not life. I mean I mean I’ve made this like I’ve taken your crummy article to heart here and that was part of it. That meant something to me was that even the Apostle Paul had a weakness in his flesh and me for having this weakness. Like I can take. I identify with something. And going like. I just felt I wasn’t taken serious and there was not the heart and tenderness that I felt should have been shown by a shepherd. Oh and for whatever that’s worth.

[00:25:38] Fast forward years later I pushed the boundaries. I was very good at not committing adultery or fornication because I did value my virginity but I was very into girls of course and that I let things happen were loose conduct and some kissing you know heavy petting that got out hand. I of course went and turned myself in to the elders about it and I remember feeling like this will be it for me. I finally get to learn my lesson and I told them everything. I hit rock bottom and they sent me out of the room Metcher judicial meeting and they asked me about it and they said everyone. I remember when they sent me out of the room. I went upstairs and the rest of the hall was dark because it was late at night. Lights were off they were using the hall meeting hall. They were just using the one room and I sat on the stairs just crying and eating everything and laid back like you know sitting on the stairs and laid back on the floor. I started looking up and in my mind I have a very like analog Anna analogy’s and visual mind and like interpreting things I remember seeing the exit sign lit up in bright red and then the speaker and the voice comes out of it in the Kingdom Hall and an air vent that moves the temperature of everything and I don’t like to air it is like Jehovah’s voice spearow the speaker is like his voice and you know all this is moving these elders right now and he’s using their voice and his Holy Spirit to guide this decision. And here’s the exit sign.

[00:27:12] I’m on my way out. They’re going to establish it. Me and I just do it in case of a. I went down and Millais summoned me back to the room and I just knew it. And then even though it wasn’t fornication or adultery. They told me it was loose contact that there was a pattern of and it wasn’t turning around or the conversion of it like I was. Instead of running from bad things the way Joseph did I was pushing the envelope getting as close as I could without crossing a line and such a pattern shows that you know I should be disfellowshipped and so I felt like I finally got what I deserve. But it was the it was the reset button I needed. It was the start over I had needed and I was I can learn. Now I can really feel like I can. I know Orlick instead of floundering in this middle ground I’ve bottomed out and I could start climbing back up rebuilding my life. It was just a crazy time because now this all Shippen everyone knew I was pretty popular in my house.

[00:28:16] A lot of the younger ones in the crowd and people don’t know there was weird things took as my best friend at one of the things that I find hard to as we had before I was disfellowshipped like he he and I had tried pot with one of the neighbor guys in a neighboring apartment complex once and I don’t like drugs or alcohol I’m very anti substance but you’re curious about these things and my buddy had told me that he had tried several things in the past like whippets and other likeT.G. experience stuff and I’m okay well if you do and I’ll go along I can learn. I remember doing it the first time I tried pot and I remember feeling this like I’m not a smoker. I don’t know how to inhale. So I did it wrong because this feeling this can’t be will all the rage is about. This is the dumbest thing ever and there is no joy there’s no joy in this. This is. This is not what everyone thinks is so funny and they all talk about it. So then later I talk and he is like whoa. Go try together make sure you in. We tried it again and it was the same thing and I was like that was when it really hit me like oh yeah this is just what it is. It sucks it’s like not it’s not for me. Drugs are not for me that’s just super relaxed thing like I don’t need the ultimate I have a good time. I felt better before all this and it’s new. There’s nothing about this that is worth pursuing or paying any extra money than being the normal non-smoker filled air I was breathing 20 minutes ago and that was when I made that decision. I remember I just fell shit also feeling like I never told him. You know I never felt like my soul ship was also paying for the state. He gets a fresh start here because now I’ve taken it and and you know that secrets goes with me and someone’s paid for my actions and it’s me and everyone gets a fresh start. Everyone gets a fresh slate.

[00:30:10] It’s crazy as that sounds. That’s how I felt like it was the absolute best thing for me that I could be disfellowshipped and just start over. Get back and like Paul everything’s forgiven everything’s back to square one. The reality of how my whole shipment went. There wasn’t much different. I eventually had a worldly girlfriend but it was never sexual again. But my virginity did still mean something to me and I remember trying to convert her all the time and talking about glitter and beatings and I also had a pretty full time job where I would show up to a lot of the meetings in my work uniform and have to go right back to it and the elders eventually you know they watch my pattern for like a year and a half and during that year and a half like I’m very into music and there’s a lot of songs that meant a lot to me and like you lose all your friends. Like I think my whole having that girlfriend at all was just you need a dope conversation someone to talk to you to go and see was more than anything because it wasn’t a sexual relationship. From what I remember just like there’s a song by Belle and Sebastian called the boy done again and that’s a brilliant listen it’s sad as heck. There’s a writer who says hang your head in shame and cry your life away and I can’t even tell you how many times. Like I would sit in my apartment singing that loudly just bawling and pounding my chest feeling like it was just anthemic.

[00:31:42] It was an anthem for me to feel like the boy didn’t run again. Hang my head in shame and cry my life away. And I just wanted it to be better. I wanted it to be better. I thought that what I was doing was going to pay for every war. But then I see them around town and they’ve all known me and they see me as well the girlfriend and I know that they assume that it’s a full relationship as if anyone else would have in the world. And I was thinking you know I see the pain in their faces and some of them have the courage to smile at me because they think encouraging me will keep me coming down the right path and some just give me that Teflon glass that slides past you and it never locks on at all. And then I feel like all this shunning and I’m hurting a lot of them are best friends and they’re hurting me they’re hurt I’m hurting them and this is the only time alive I was ever seriously they were ever pondered suicide. Was that first disfellowshipping. Because also in the apartment I lived in now Steve B lived in the apartment behind me. He had moved to Widener. He had contracted leukemia and like Minnesota has a lot of good health benefits and so he had made his home in New York. Now to Minnesota and lived in the apartment complex behind me and there was another incidence. I’ve already gone into a lot of detail on those incidents. So the third one largely the same but it happened in my apartment and raped.

[00:33:09] I was disfellowshipped but one day after he had left a note on my door or something and I went and I talked to him and I told him I brought it up. I said I’m going to bring this up so third time when this is when you are disfellowshipped This is what I am disfellowshipped. Well what happened was after you. Well there’s a weirdness to it too because the story goes it’s not the story of how it was. I was in my apartment and I left one day and I noticed these headlights behind me. Right. And so I would have no big deal. I went down to the gas station and I bought a porno mag and I was going to you know masturbate continue on my debauched ways and feel guilty and hate myself as was my partner. Sure. And that night I got a knock on the door and I had like a 13 inch TV with the VCR combo and the whole headphone jack right there. I had my headphones plugged in so I knew he being still a witness and a friend of mine and you want them to think I was just falling off the map was you wanting to hear of course that I was what I was watching and the knock on my door. I went and I answered it. He tells me. I don’t know what’s going on. It has got us like really bad headache and I’m not feeling well I think you’d be OK. Can I just sleep here. I’m not alone at all. And I hid behind my disfellowshipping watch and maybe I shouldn’t I should have had more courage. But at least I said no.

[00:34:42] I said no like I’m disfellowshipped you need to go back to your apartment. At least it came in handy for maybe the first time. Yes. You know and this was only the three incidents before that but more importantly I just thought well I went back to my bedroom remember thinking how did he know that I had any of this like he was like the next day he left and letters. I was trying to help you like typed up pomodoro like just use spurned me and turn me away when I went in with help that he was going to redeem me or save my soul from the pornography. So he must have followed me to the gas station. I started to realize Zami at that magazine I’ll buy it and then go. And now to my head that he was following me around and so like a couple nights later I decide to test it and see what limits he has or how far do you take this so I’d start driving around late at night. And then I start noticing there. Sure enough the headlights are following me and they’re legging back like they never get right behind me. They like turn after I’m about at the next block and I decide Well there’s a town like 45 minutes away. I’m in a really make him think What is he up to. Where’s he going you know so I started heading towards that town but the thrill of that chase and the fun of that game grew off about 20 minutes away.

[00:35:56] Those that are a circle back in a smaller county in between the two where he was stuck at a stoplight and as I circled back I gave him a very big recognizing wave that I knew it was his vehicle and then I started going back home. When I got home there was already a message on my phone from him long weepy and apologetic and saying it over across the bounds of our friendship and he was just worried and he was so out of line to follow me and he just worries he’s a stalker. Oh yeah. You mean that’s a thing. That’s why it’s like I’d struggle with knowing or not. When I was an isolated incident he was in love with me in some way. To have this level of its power all of was power. So you know what is the difference between the power of what he did to you when you were asleep and then of course he exercised his power over you when he was at the airport and he made you apologize and then he exercise his power. When he left a note on your door and tried to make you feel bad and then he exercised his power by stalking you and following you. Yeah that’s a terrifying person. It is not and I felt very good to the thought I had that could take voicemail was this cordless like little thing that he actually gave to me. He said Are you using this anymore. Do you like a landline phone.

[00:37:24] I said sure and my mom back and forth at the time would say hello hello like two or three guys before she’d call me and he was a computer programmer he like built computers and did hard drives and stuff and I’m not sure if this is possible or not but she says there would be times where I would hang up and she would hear a second hang up or like like the second pick up or maybe breathing that wasn’t me. As I was talking she thought she thought she could hear something Armande but I always assumed it was background noise on my end maybe and only later when she left. I thought I wonder if he had it where anytime I got a phone call. He was privy to it by pointing it up on his computer or something I had no idea. I mean heck this guy moved in to the apartment right behind you. It’s like that itself is a power move. That guy is. I’ve never even thought of it that way. He didn’t have to ask was he visibly sick. I mean not exactly he means he would think would have maybe I’m wrong I’m certainly no medical doctor but you would think he would have some sort of physical manifestations of not only the illness but the treatment. So was he. Well he was going to a guy and he knew the doctor’s name which you know I’m not I can’t confirm or deny but I believe he was sick he was seeing a specialist in Fergus Falls for like an hour away for doctor appointments and I do know that he like loved tennis and loved biking and he would go and play tennis with some of the other brothers out in the hall. And then he started to say once that was all he can do. I’m too tired to sleep all the next day he was just wiped out I guess.

[00:39:11] And so he was less and less. He was always sleeping it seemed like he started to be if not visibly like falling apart sick. He started to be less than what we knew him as so I’ve never questioned I guess his sickness. And eventually it went into full remission and the first thing he did was got out of Minnesota. When I went to Colorado and Washington and just how much he traveled I just always wondered was it some sick like love he had for me and being a witness makes no allowance for being gay. So he I don’t know. I felt like let’s let’s go ahead and establish he was sick. But what I know is that I fully consider Irma’s like you predator. Everywhere he moves where there are people going through what I had gone through unfortunately I was just like one of the houses in the tornado’s path so to speak. Why would why would he stop after you. I don’t know. I don’t know. I just felt like and I hate to say I was a special case because I know that sounds so messed up but I felt like all of this showed that he was maybe in love with me or had thought that more. I don’t know. I just feel like Zirus I don’t know. I don’t know. I have no idea I guess it’s hard for me to understand it you I as you. It’s not like you can ask him.

[00:40:28] You know that’s that’s part of the whole that’s part of the whole play you know is to leave you so leave your mind so blown that you can’t figure out what it is. God I hate him I hate him for he. And it’s hard for me to say that because I don’t want to see anyone because that in itself is I hope they have a power over me that makes me hate them. And I remember like I’m kind of close the book on him so I have to keep going back to. But I’ll come back to when I was disfellowshipped to my apartment and I was like suicidal for the first time in my life. I’m hurting my mom. My roommate sees me and I come to the meeting no one wants to look at that roommate but my neighbor apartment neighbor Steve Irwin sees me at all doing is hurting all of that and maybe I should just like just go down and lay on the railroad tracks in the middle of the night or something like hurt them all in one fell swoop. Get it over with and then they can just move on with their lives. I’ll be gone from him. Stop hurting them every time they see me you know I’ll at Wal-Mart or whatever the situation. I needed that I was hurting them with my disfellowshipping and it was like I wanted it to stop. I remember telling him this was like the last conversation we had when we were associates. I went over and talked to him and told him that I had had all these dreams and God being disfellowshipped is a mess in itself but having this guy behind me. And when he wrote that no I said he’s done with me.

[00:42:11] Who’s going to help me in the nearby cries and apologetically crossed the bounds and all that stuff. I said what I’m going to go do the olive branch day and now and I had it. We had a conversation about I don’t remember what everything else was but we were kind of doing a closure on our relationship and I thought well before that causes I have to bring up these dreams I’ve had you know. And I told him about these dreams I had had where he had been touching me. And I felt weird about them and for years I’ve thought there is something wrong with me having dreams of such a vile nature about my friends and confidants and someone I like and trust. And he told me at that time you have to have him put your mind at ease. They weren’t dreams. I really messed up and I crossed a line and were bawling and he’s telling me how sorry he is in these weeping on my shoulder and I’m holding in I’m saying it’s okay it’s okay. And this is what one of the sickest parts of my life right now is I call him the words just call in the elders tell them what you’ve done and all be forgiven and all be OK. Now I’m in mean I’d pay. I know what what he tells the elders doesn’t he’s in the situation I’m in now. It’s all gonna be better. Like you can’t hit rock bottom and not feel tremendous guilt over what you’ve done and that you’re trying to repair their relationship with Jehovah he tells me.

[00:43:27] He will if he’s so sorry he’s going to go to the elders and fix this and make it right and do do what was right in their shoes a little bit about my mental attitude to it even years they could this fellowship guy I’m thinking well if he just tells them these are the markets and over there they’re going to handle it correctly of course. And then I go to the next meeting and were sitting at the watchtower and the guy from the stage says brothers TV and I look over like war. And he raises his hand a microphone comes he gives his answer gives the mike back. And I remember like wanting to stand up and scream that guy shouldn’t be allowed to carve it like a war like I had no idea. It’s it’s weird now that I did it still does. But afterwards I grabbed the couple elders and said hey come Steve told me there was a thing that happened between you. Did he come to you. Like I see him commenting today. And did you. Did he come to you and tell you anything cause no one asked me like everybody’s guilty like no one asked me anything. First of all I just want a Furby came to you and they said I’m like very secretive elder language like terms like well we know it’s confidential but he did tell us there was a closeness that was misconstrued and and we’re handling it. And so I walked away satisfied with that answer. We’re now being awake makes me angry with myself angry with them and visibly sick that I should have said no. How about let’s go get him now and we can torture let’s just talk this out again because no one asked me.

[00:45:06] First of all how I was doing so. Now I look back and I know he didn’t tell me anything he didn’t tell them anything because they would have come to me even as a disfellowshipped person they would have wanted to confirm his confession and say this is what he told us. Is that true. And even if I was the lost sheep I felt like very hurt that my opinion didn’t matter. I was disfellowshipped. They got the faithful person to say. That’s the more important word. Even if they asked me they were never going to come to me so I kind of expected it like well because they didn’t ask me. Now I look back and see how flawed that is. They definitely should have asked me they should have come and said Lordship or not. How are you. Are you OK. Is that me at this lake DTV. We are like God like we had no idea like this was going on in your life and you know you’re usually scared. They did it. They wanted to handle the matter. That’s all that matters. And they took one side of it never confirming it with me which I now obviously know he mentioned nothing that would have equated to Paula. He maybe just confessed feelings and they celebrate with him shared a scripture and said You’re doing the best you can and then patted them on the head sent him his merry way and he’s allowed the comment at the next meeting.

[00:46:18] That’s the sickness of this lake now that I’m on the outside of it and I look at what I myself to do I like beside myself that this is the thing that happens and is allowed to happen and that I don’t know who it was because was this fellowship or just even a confession told one way if they said it’s satisfactory because you told us something so we’re going to assume that was everything you know is ludicrous to me. There’s no cross-examination or any investigation or asking anyone else. So all the details he chose to give up were the only ones that you guys have to act on. And that was the first note that I really was. Just so shipped but there’s no way it had. God has his fingers on the pulse of this organization like these elders like my mom and dad’s divorced my dad like docking the starship. They all got removed. These are some of them the same brothers are their older body and its bungled situation after a bungled situation after a bungled situation. This is a God’s organization. This is not God’s organization. However my heart was so wrapped up in it all I want to do is get reinstated. I never did I never I never could. You know the night I was feeling like I want to hurt them all at once but then get the hurt over rather than continually hurting them on called Steve a. And he was an elder in 84 correlation. His wife answered very nicely. He put humanity before. Procedure of day. Talk to you. You know I’m the linchpin that is my firmness tells Dave the error of his ways. He’ll stay. He knew that. Dave don’t do that. You’re not hurting anyone.

[00:48:04] That’s a selfish thing. However you’re feeling now it will pass. Just remember Jehovah knows you overseas and he can talk. Be off the ledge metaphorically in that sense it wasn’t an actual wedge but from my mind state of this is the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. I’m a very people person and I have no people and I’m hurting all the people I do care about. I can’t make myself better. I care. Eventually I kind of decided that if the witness is right or wrong you know they don’t get involved in wars they don’t gamble money away or you know hopefully you like the idea I had a can but they don’t get their fries and drink you know although we know that that’s not true either. Like the beer that your child abusers. So they’re good people to be around. How I thought so whatever I felt about this local elder body and maybe this is just something beyond them. This is the situation I do elsewhere. I want to be surrounded by these whether or not they have the right answers to eternal salvation. They’re good people and I should go back so I went back I got reinstated. Can I ask you before we get to your reinstatement. Can I ask you a couple questions please keep me on track as much as possible. It’s so hard. These are just a couple of things that I just wondered about. This is actually going to backtrack a little bit but. So you’re disfellowshipped and the elders like you went to them about the abuse.

[00:49:40] You had mentioned that I think you were out for at least a year and a half. Yes. During that time that year and a half to the elders ever did they meet with you. Did they try to encourage you. Did they do. Did you have interactions with the elders as part of your spiritual rehabilitation. No I had no I had to act first like they would. One of them would smile and nod at me because he knew it was good to encourage me and keep me coming you’ll give me that you know pat on the head. And so I remember that they would talk to me like at the back of the hall if I had a question or needed a book or when I had brought my girlfriend to a couple meetings they were like oh how are you. Great great. And they just lowballed Obama of course. To show that whatever David’s situation is we don’t want that to elevate you from attaining everlasting life. So there are those moments like that but I remember she fell. She went online read some things right away. And I wanted nothing to do with it. Like I thought no no no no you who are you trust me who live went through it I’m going through it right now or stuff you heard online. You have no idea about. And I can tell you what those sites say bitter apostates are just going to have their Gitter. Of course they’re meant to organization. They left the organization and their feelings are not their stories not mine. And I felt like I did what I could do with it.

[00:51:11] And so what the mind will do though. I mean those are just bitter apostates. But here I am a person who has been abused has been ignored I’m being shunned and no one of these supposed spiritual shepherds who the elders are supposed to be caring. And yet you have to initiate all of the conversation with them. In other words like because you’re not the first person to ask this question. And what I’m finding is that once you’re disfellowshipped the elders watch you but they don’t try to help you at all do they. They don’t know when I say hey like how are you doing. We care. We want to see you back and we want to help you they just leave you to your own vices don’t they. They leave you alone. They largely do. And the funny thing about it is like if I didn’t initiate like saying to them oh I’ll think about writing my letter what do I need to do. Oh I’m so glad you asked here in order to do Jumo as well Brooke. There’s the process that you go through to do that David. And how you to do this. That’s what a of us. You know it’s just like I wrote my letter. So then they talked to me a little bit more and the longer the back of the hall that I couldn’t they wrote this letter just reinvigorated by this. This is the one this is the letter that gets me back you know I was like that. And then what happened was I wrote him that letter.

[00:52:48] And at this time I was still working at top honors for a lot of it. And on Sunday that was my day to do the open to cause Sunday it is open until noon. But to get food ready and hot before noon I had to get to work at like 10 get all the hot table going you know neat beans. She saw us all that Taco Johns he stuff. And then I would puzzle after the Kingdom Hall like had to get that on before 10:00 o’clock. So the heating up couldn’t stay and hot and then it just heats up slowly where it’s ready to serve by you know at noon when I have that tend to new and it was leave temperature and lock it up go to the Kingdom Hall in my truck which aren’t uniform often unshaved and then right afterwards but back out and then it works 12 to. That was my open door closed. They you know it’s like a 14 hour day anyway. And in my letter they had said well we’d like you to come more with the appropriate attire. And sometimes you’re not sure if it’s a whole of it. And they even told me this is a test. We think you’re doing good and you’ve been here at all of that. So they recognize the effort that it must be taking from me to even get access to up in my work clothes like Guy your Boston to be here. And we appreciate that. However we want to see how bad you want it. That was basically the message. And they said keep coming a little bit more and try to write a letter get it like three months more.

[00:54:13] After working on a few things we told you to work out. So I went back and worked on most things and I wore a suit and I tried to shave as often as I could. Eventually we got reinstated. Much to my delight at that time. Wow. Well I appreciate you answering. And then I also just wanted to point out because it’s something you said I think you also alluded to the fact that you you may see it differently now and that even Steven A helps you to see it differently. But it needs it needs to be said that you weren’t hurting those people. So you’re disfellowshipped you weren’t hurting those people who were seeing you. You weren’t hurting anyone they were being hurt because they were buying into something that was hurting them. Well it wasn’t about you. It was all about them and their misplaced ideologies. And I know that now. But man like when your friends from childhood and you just see pain in their faces. It kills you. Yeah. And you take it all upon yourself because that’s what we were taught to do. It was all about us. Everything was our responsibility. And you were just horrible and that we’re hurting these people none of whom were actually trying to help you. Please you guys even like I felt very like like I was even covering over the scene. My friend was like I don’t to read about him. I’m taking. That’s my right now because I’m sure it has worked. So the fact that I was a sheriff is works but I’m paying for them. They’re being Matosi.

[00:55:57] I mean look at what you were taking on. You were taking on the things that you just mention the sins by you know being there with them. You were also taking on this shining thing and all the weight of the feelings of every person that saw you you were taking on complete solitude. You were taking on trying to make a living and still make these meetings and do all that and in all of this and you were taking on you’d already taken on this abuse by Stevie. So you’re just a dumping ground for everybody else’s stuff. Here you are disfellowshipped. You have these people that are supposed to be shepherds in the congregation the elders. And shame on those assholes for not ever reaching out to people who are hurt. I mean there is no organization that shoots their wounded like Jehovah’s Witnesses. They completely take people that are already broken and that are hurting and then they dump everything on them tell them that it’s all their fault. Blame the victim and then do absolutely nothing to help that person to get spiritually well as they see it like they don’t even though I guess honestly by leaving you alone that’s technically the healthiest thing if you were to just get out and be free of those Nazis. So it could actually work to your favor. But they’ve got you so programmed and you’re so devastated and you you’re so living in shame that you’re such a horrible person and these loving spiritual brothers can’t even lift a finger to reach out and say hey man like. All right. So here you are. Now you’re on the outside.

[00:57:58] Let’s help rehabilitate you. Let’s help see what we can do to help you overcome your problems to make you a better person. You know it’s like going to a doctor who looks at you and goes you know you got stage 4 cancer. Good luck to you. You know like that never tries to help you that never brings the medicine or the cure. They just leave you to sit in it and feel terrible. And then of course you know a person like you. And often it’s the people who are the most sincere and the most beautiful people are the people who are hurt the most because they truly do care and they take it all on and they feel horrible. And then there’s no one there to help them. You were sincere. You were trying to do all the right things. And they used every bit of your sincerity against you. And if that doesn’t show that Jehovah’s Witnesses are not the true religion they are not the truth. They are not. What did they say that Jesus said. By their love you will know them. They claim love as their identifying mark of true Christianity. I’m 35. Fuck them they have no love. They would not know love. All they know is narcissism they know control and control is the exact opposite of love. Control is not about the other person. Control is about what you want and imposing it on that other person. And it’s completely abusive and that is who Jehovah’s Witnesses are. So that’s my little soapbox. It’s one of the things that woke me up.

[00:59:40] That was one of the biggest things is when I looked around and I realized there is no love in this organization. It is all about them. They take and they take and they take and they never give you anything in return. And so there is no true love there. That’s the crazy thing is like recently. Like I like a lot of partners and like well writing things I play with words quite a bit. Yeah. Giraffe’s lately like since our first session recording I’ve taken to calling it Jehovah’s narcissist’s and I sing the old melody of a song and it makes me smile. But the thing is I realize now like to mix the people you know who are believers with what the organization is. It’s like how you said all of that and said there’s no love there’s no this new organization. If you stripped that they’ve given me a lot of reading material over the years that would be the extent of my friends who are believers. They have shown love in a lot of conditional and you can feel that real love exists with the people I knew inside the congregation. However when you look at the policies in place just for how the organization is run. That’s like saying I want to talk which arms my employees and my current like co-workers I should say actually cared about me. Do you think Taco John’s international knew anything of how many tacos I sold or what I was doing. No it’s the same way. It’s like they just well at least you are hogging the machine.

[01:01:22] Yeah yeah and at least good Taco Johns gave you money that you could use to do whatever you wanted with the Watchtower. Yeah they gave you reading material but what was that reading material. It was narcissistic propaganda. That’s all it was. Yeah. So even if read the material they gave you all about them. It’s crazy too because like all the reading material like years and years of it is little more than a recital of the same things they had me read at 8 years old. Of Cornell up to 225. Hey we’re going to recite this again. Oh yeah you’re still a terrible sinner you’re still a horrible person and they have to let you know that at every turn. What you’re saying. Nature is because that way you need them. If they can keep you down long enough you need them. And what is you know I love the actual story of Narcissus and you know where narcissism comes from you know and how this narcissist is so enamored with him. Enough him or her will say him nurses make it was him was so in love with his own reflection in the water he could do nothing but stare into it and so what did he do. That seems like fall in and drown or something and I think somehow he dies this horrible death because he can’t break away from admiring his own beauty and that is of his witnesses you know if you look even when Jehovah’s Witnesses talk amongst themselves sure oh brother isn’t this such a wonderful organization. How great are we. Like they could not pat themselves on the back more and do less.

[01:03:00] I was always bugged by the watchtowers because like I mentioned earlier where I liked the new light I liked the media stuff I liked something that my brain had to get creative in reasoning and have an agile mind to learn to grasp this new light rather than a whole hum recitals that we have heard over and like one of the things that made me the maddest was when they would waste a whole Watchtower article that was like this week we’ll be discussing or all the good we’ve done in this country and it was like literally paragraphs in a paragraph about patting themselves on the back for how they spread this work here and so and so yeah his calmness for an A B and C question that only three questions like this guy’s story. We understood it was a feel good story put it like the back page up in a way. Don’t waste my Watchtower stuff that I have to study with just feel good things you want to pat yourself on the back for me for that they can’t do that because part of any good colt is infantilizing people and dumbing things down and being so mind numbing that you literally are trained to turn your brain off. That is what they do. It is a way of manipulating people to do dumb things down so much to be so boring that people literally turn their brains off. That’s why you remember there was quote new lie and there was some new thing. It was like oh my god I finally feel awake and alive.

[01:04:30] There’s something to emulate me instead of being so bored that you’re just mindless automatons little robots that follow this cult and do what ever they say because god forbid you turn your brain on. They don’t. So that’s why it was so boring that that is all by design. That is all by design. It keeps you in a state of NARM so that you can’t feel and you can’t look around you and really ever find your way out. You’re just in the fog and can’t see anything else. Yeah well I’ve derailed that. No but I wanted to get back to your. You know I wanted to ask those questions and really herbes me that elders don’t do anything. I mean I guess I’m I’m glad in one way that they’re not really helping anyone so that maybe people will leave but it’s also sad because unfortunately some people do leave and they leave. Because they do commit suicide. And that’s that’s so sad. And that is one of those things where they say they disfellowshipped you because you weren’t repentant you weren’t sorry for what you did but then you see people literally kill themselves over it. Now how could they know. How could they say that you’re not sorry over it. When you then turn around and kill yourself. You know that is the ultimate I’m sorry. And I’ll say it again though like I like honestly like the last bit I’ll say I’m my disfellowshipping is that I was taking a personality test and I’m into that sort of part about the brain nature versus nurture and I was ENFP which is the champion and very hyper champion of causes that type a champion like Victor.

[01:06:32] But the champion stuff they get all and they go all year on something and they can get brazenly people to follow them on to their their cause. You can start and I love I could I start. I love the I love the passion. It was infectious people around me would get caught up in it and I was in the ENFP is extrovert and I took the test before my disfellowshipping. That part that determines you have all the questions it’s like. So it’s the only one that has a 20. It’s like a 20 questionnaire. And remember it was like 19 to 1 Etah Ayfer introvert. After my disfellowshipping and reinstatement I got into reading a lot more. And all of a sudden I don’t know if it’s just because age balances you out or the experience I went through said get used to being alone. And I was much more like eleven to maybe eight. And in that you know twelve eleven maybe eight or nine. You know I was much more I wasn’t an introvert because I get my charge off people but now I had a lot of introvert tendencies. I was okay being alone. I liked a book is a good time to be alone. I can be content by myself now. Disfellowshipping taught me that before I needed to be around people I needed to be around people I needed to be around people. And when I wasn’t. That is the singular only time in my life I have ever been even close to what I would call suicidal and I wasn’t like I don’t want to say I was I was depressed. And that was the thing.

[01:08:08] You know you’re curious about it that call to the void and it just I was mulling it more than it ever did. But it wasn’t like suicide or the sense of you know I want to try it but I was if it had made sense in my mind for the first time only during that period in my life of being disfellowshipped that first time now I understand. It’s scary that something like that can literally impact your personality so much. Yeah a push to the brink. Totally against my nature. That’s not who I am or what I would think. But I was driven there and it was a real place my mind had filed. And I just can’t believe that I look back now and a marvel that you know like they push you that far Jehovah’s loving organization pushed you that far. I don’t mean to laugh but yeah the absurdity of it can cause is exactly what gallows humor. Yeah it’s wow. It’s just it’s so sad. So so then. All right. So now back to your reinstatement so you get reinstated then. How did your life transform from there. The next part was rather quickly and I will try to do it as quickly as possible. I get reinstated and there’s a few friends you know people moved away. People my age got their own lives and spread apart as everyone does of any age when you reach that. But some had been disfellowshipped and left the organization some had stayed behind and the young kids that were my immediate young crew they were gone and like you know off doing stuff.

[01:09:48] But now there’s a slightly younger generation just coming up and I and brilliance that way I can be there stede a I can be a good example the fun young guy who takes an interest in younger ones. You know I’ll do that. So I started hanging out with people you know a good number of years younger than me and some of their previous friends were still there. One of whom was a girl who became my wife eventually. And I remember the night I got reinstated they said hey you know Dave let’s got a dry ice too. They were like best is Miranda and Jessica and I thought I couldn’t believe it. Like this quick they hang out actually spend time with me not just you know pat me on the back. What we’re glad to have you back look at the back of the kingdom holler. This is going to bubble out outside the walls of the hall. I get to hang out with my old friends again in the real world again. And we just got in a car ride talking music and caught up in what’s changed. You know we’ve missed a day of Garber’s will have your back and all that stuff. And that was when I realized like some of them weren’t there. But some of them were and that I had in my heart made up the decision I have to go back to my own self. None of the friends will ever be there still. If they hadn’t moved on or just want nothing to do with me that’s not why I’m coming back for them.

[01:11:10] But when they actually did I was shocked and surprised because I was convinced that everyone else had just written me off. I’d be this kind of anonymous member of the congregation who kind of comes and goes and I can say hi now at least. But the fact that it was it was by a certain circle of friends very open eyes. Glad to have you back. And the one girl she was a little on the young side when I had left or gotten disfellowshipped the first time she was being a couple years younger than me but she had confessed you know feelings for me before and you know I said I like to wait for you I don’t know and she’s that why I just hated that whole. We had to watch on the sidelines. You go to that first relationship just up and down and on again off again and I just felt so bad for you and in all your in all of your experiences she felt for me and you know had a big crush on me and I was attracted to her and I and in a state of mind that I was coming back. I didn’t think anyone would want to be around me. And here was someone who I had had before and am willing to have again. And now she’s actually old enough where she wants to hang around here tell her parents. I’d like to date him. She can do that as a responsible adult. So things progressed rather quickly and we were married within. I was reinstated the first time November 30th and our anniversary the following year was November 17th. So within under a year of being back I had gone through the dating engagement and marriage process recently disfellowshipped.

[01:12:42] People didn’t like that. And you know how sure are you about this. He’s only been back a little bit of time or after. So I got married relatively quickly. Looking at it now. It was it was what I wanted at the time what I wanted at the time though was it was part of the love bomb to about getting back you know rolling on back. Now all this love hits you everyone even the people I thought who would write me after I welcome back. But you know I’ll never be the same. When I saw that that was a worry of mine dissolved between certain ones I said oh great but then at the same time Miranda and the other one who was Jessica’s best friend at the time started to decide that she was just going to leave just walking away going inactive and we had tried like multiple times to reach out to her and save her and she was leaving to go with this man. We were like heartbroken that we were lost. Losing a friend of this sort. And there was like other friends of our circle had already left me and they picked up. So it’s really dwindling down the pool of ours. Our group people and now we lose this last one was kind of the glue that kept it together. But I think she even felt like I was a little bit that way. Well Newell you guys are probably going to start dating so I can kind of see that now so I can do what I want finally because you’ll have Dave you know. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:14:08] So she’s letting go and kind of passing the baton off of who’s going to be good friends and also sort of through that that really expurgated what our our friendship becoming an actual courtship because now we’re like the only you know three or so left from that original core. And one of them is leaving. So it really brought the two of us together and it was natural that we formed a closeness over the last at this friend and now we felt like it was just us. I went to there was a couple younger than us that we still hang out with but other than like it was like they were just going to come together in a few short years change such drought so drastically that we got really cross over all that you know we had that in common that we lost all the same friends and now I was back so things would steady out and she was a young girl and I was a young boy and we started dating and got married and they I felt like I had something to prove to everybody to cause like I want to let the record show when I was associate. Yes I had that role but it wasn’t a sexual relationship. Like don’t think I went out and lived as the barge life and now she’s giving herself to someone who’s not worth anything because it’s really too in myself. I had felt like everyone’s going to view me that way and I’m not going to be worth anything to myself if I’m not worth anything to their eyes. And so you feel this who is going to want me.

[01:15:28] I’ve been disfellowshipped and I know what I’ve done. They don’t know what I’ve done. I’m so soiled and I’ve lived in the world that if they knew that I had tried pot twice and you know they’re just going to like and I hated it. You know you feel those things and I have a word too often and they probably assume the worst. No one’s going to want me any more ever again. They will always I will always have an asterix of welcome him because he’s your brother again. Don’t ever trust him because he’s a person who did stuff that he’s untrustable right. And so the fact that I had friends left is someone well used to you you like me you would want to date me. It was like this I’m acting I’m going act now and it’s just us two left and we seem to do the last two Sindane people in the congregation of the similar age let’s get together and it was looking back now as it was I’m out of that relationship of course but there was such a bad choice for so many reasons. I should have taken a lot of time to not just be so glad that I had some friends who still did. Were willing to like me and be you know friends me first I should like when you’re expecting no one to ever take you again no one to look at you and view you as an honest person because you’ve been through that. Yeah. You take what you can get.

[01:16:45] You take what you kind of take what you can get and undo the pool of people who are dwindling but you know like when you look at like what someone is in a marriage partner like what your qualifications are. She was a young man who thought she had a lot more she’s different now and don’t want to make this why her and I were about a couple but just the one thing you know about the truth. I will say is that it shows the organization the cast I’m saying is they don’t. JT and Lady C say it a lot like they don’t teach you anything about how to evaluate a person. They ask you if you’re interested in dating someone another. How many hours in service do they do. OK so they move a lot of product. How spiritual someone is or how many hours in service or if it is in ministry. Is your pioneer you know or if not then you shouldn’t even consider such a print. It’s like you. Oh they don’t teach you how to talk about was his temper like or he can be obedient and show up at meetings on time and go out in service he can be places on time is not a qualification. Is this person really good marriage. Sure he does. The only thing you look for your spiritual I’m spiritual. You grew up in this. Ha I grew up in this how your family knows my family. We know as we know for two people. Each Other is probably well as anyone can know each other when you’ve got all this intertwined history and common friends and the history of losing those common friends you’re bonded and you feel it was like that makes sense.

[01:18:14] And then you’re attracted to one another and you’re young and you feel like all I need is to this will be the thing that Couture’s me. This will be what fixes me and makes me completely happy once I have this marriage in me. And she’s willing to forgive that I had all that disfellowshipped life. You know I’m just over the moon that anyone would still want me around and it’s not that you guys are compatible. No not at all. Believe me. I mean honestly after we left the conversation my wife and I had to have you know which is you know why are we in this relationship for real. Because you know we got married because you know we get married obviously we did care about each other genuinely but when you’re in the Colts the the reasons are the qualifications I guess that you are given to look for in a marriage may are not at all. What makes a good marriage. And you know what. The divorce rate is in Jehovah’s Witnesses but it has to be higher than even the national average because I have seen we’ve seen so many people like almost all the young people that we had grown up with. They got married. We get divorced. And oh yeah they were they were just getting married to have sex of course they were. That’s the only way you could have sex and they were normal young people with feelings. And I just remember you know even after we left we had to reexamine you know why are we in this relationship is this. Is this really what we want.

[01:19:52] Because I mean we broke down everything else in our lives so I mean we had a look at that too and you know this truly was what we want is what we want. But we had to consciously make that choice again because we realized that so much of what every aspect of our life was based on was if it wasn’t a lie it was just not a good and healthy foundation for whatever. And so we had a look at our own relationship and really examine that and have you know tough discussions because really I mean I guess every marriage probably goes through that anyway because you’re different at 20 or 30 than you are at 60. Like everybody changes like exact when it’s best. That’s that’s one of those things no one talks about anyway. It’s just the expectations of the different seasons of life and how people change throughout those. But you know that’s part of having a mature relationship a mature marriage. But you know we had to re-evaluate. And you know good for us. You know luckily for us you know we are where we wanted to be but I totally understand that a lot of people are not and it’s because the foundation that Jehovah’s witnesses give their members for a relationship. Yes so dysfunctional and it doesn’t. People really are so I mean no wonder you know I feel for you because you had that at the and for her really because it’s not fair to you. Oh my god yes. Because it was also it was set up on such a shaky foundation that was neither of yours fault wasn’t the fault of either of you that you were born into this Colts. Yes.

[01:21:38] That has such dysfunctional ways of being glad you said that too. Because like for me like I just feel as much as I’d love to say oh it’s all her. She had changed that wasn’t what I wanted at the time she was what I wanted. But what I eventually wanted change what she wants changed and everything changed. And the reality of it was it was changing further and further apart. Yeah. And when I got reinstated I do not many brothers left in the hall. And so I quickly like they give me privileges rather I was good readers. You can start reading at the Watchtower. You can start me or you can pray at the meetings over everything. And they kind of even well her dad was also the presiding overseer and he was here. There’s a long history there of course with any elder Neckar issuers don’t need was. But they are they basically told me Well you know you can’t be a ministerial servant until you know five years. I remember hearing that I thought well what did you mean five years like I’ve been raised. I can read I can do this. And I guess there’s an that’s the elders direction is there some arbitrary number that says five years until he could be in good standing because someone is really from the Bible is a five year you know five years you know there’s a five year waiting period mentioned in the Bible. I thought it was like seven and I could be released on the Jubilee Year or some other major bull. Yeah.

[01:23:15] They had to give me an earring and I could get rid of it when I wasn’t a slave after this. I don’t know. No seriously I shouldn’t make jokes because you and I it’s funny. But to someone listening has no idea like they make up a lie and there’s arbitrary rule isn’t a culture of it where I remember feeling like I’m more spiritual now and have a bit of my life like this is the idea I’m ready. This is the scene you’re looking at a ministerial circle wants to serve the congregation and that fact that they may be wait I felt like her you know because I know I knew I was never at the time I got reinstated. I was I literally pictured like the world Armageddon had to be around the corner and we were in like George Bush years. And I thought like oh man things are going to happen things are going to happen. Like yeah. Bush and Clinton and Bush again before that and then you know like it is just too much happening in to have your country be in the hands of two singular families for almost 26 years. This is this is at the boiling point right. And you think I got on the train and the doors closed and it cut my coat tails like I was the last person to see it. You know that was my mentality when I got reinstated was that I just got it. Thank goodness I got my act together in time just to beat those doors. You know.

[01:24:34] But I knew like in my mind I was that convinced the end was on its way and I was like I was a spiritual as I’ve ever been in my life. So there’s anyway. Fast forwarding through the marriage problems as most young people have stated that she is a kind of become different. And I remember having doubts and still I had told myself through my whole life this masturbation issue will cure itself once I’m married because then you’ll have a marriage me and you won’t need it right. Yeah. People you know. But anyway. So yes that’s why I’m hanging my hat on this marriage thing going that way. You you just blew me you nothing nothing I can’t handle. But we get into the marriage and it’s not what I had a lot of levels. And then we have conversations. And then the conversations come blow ups where then you want to avoid blow ups. So you start bringing topics up and your communication becomes signals. Body language is slamming doors and sending messages through non actual communication. And you feel like how did we get here. This is lame and this is not what I wanted. This is not how I wanted to spend my years as a married man. Well if I had a kid that would be that you know we’re going to keep. I always wanted kids you know and we have a baby. And that was about three years in the marriage. But I remember holding that innocent little child and that was another moment that kind of dawned on me from my awakening as there’s things I can’t say now. My then wife I just know you can never tell her you have a doubt here or there about this organization.

[01:26:14] She more habit she is third generation born in Die Hard. And we blast all these friends and she just seemed flummoxed that anyone would ever leave of their own. Don’t tell her any of these doubts whether it’s leaving the organization or meeting her or what the marriage is. But I remember looking at that little baby’s face and thinking this is a gift from God that will keep me engaged in this. I want to raise him right. Amina really a modern day keep me engaged in that kind of occasion and do the right thing for my kid. This may sound delicious it’s not exactly what I wanted but that’s OK because now I’ve got this precious thing to care for. And he will be the glue that keeps us together and I can draw myself into being a parent more than worrying about what the husband or wife connection itself is. And they’re also like when you have a kid something changes and you completely wear I remember holding that kid can’t remember it the delivery is happening. You’re scared. She needs a blood transfusion during this thing. Or what if the baby comes out. He’s not healthy. And I was like instantly I kind of knew I couldn’t voice certain doubts but in my mind I has I had learned about a scary amount of love in myself. I think I’ve got too much to love to ever say no.

[01:27:32] If this kid’s playing in the street and eventually needs like a blood transfusion because he get to buy a car I would have to say what everyone else in the hospital room being her dad was the presiding overseer and she would be saying this and then I know I would go order like the doctor in the hallway. So yeah I had to see that back there. I’ll tell you now save the life whatever you do and later that all Biyani they can get mad at me. I’ll be the one who violated God’s law but mind you it will at least be able to survive and his want to be his sent you know that would be mine and they can all be mad at me but I want him to live. And I’m kind of like you had that ability in you where you realize now like just a kid makes you different. You think like there’s nothing you wouldn’t do for him good or bad. And you know you realize that I think in my mind I’m still a die hard witness too. I have doubts but I also know that this kid has changed things. When they round us up for the concentration camps that they had told us was going to happen or had fearmonger into us. I thought I’m gonna go down in a hail of gunfire because I’m not going to be able to watch them put a gun to his head. I’m going to jump or try to grab someone near me or fight back like I’m going to watch my kid do that. I know if they separate us and please take me instead. Does doesn’t work. It’s definitely my option and I felt like that because I thought I can’t do this.

[01:28:54] I’ve got a kid and I knew this concentration camp thing I was just praying it would not happen in theU.S. because I knew I was too weak. I couldn’t do it. And so I started to realize his weaknesses and Hacketts voiced them. I can’t say this to my then wife like I don’t have the strength to look like I might renounce my faith if they give me a paper that says himin I think or live like you she would have left me right then and there. Just for saying something against the organization like that. But when you have a kid you start realizing your limits and say I can’t sign off. I would sign off on a blood transfusion. I would do anything I would sign renounce my faith. There’s nothing you can hold over me that would say choose this ideology over this physical being of help. Now that doesn’t go away. That was like part of my own cracks in the foundation realizing that they just it became. When you start having all of those things you can’t speak to your mate about a lot of things especially something as big as your religion you’re going you’re you’re you’re you’re doing nothing but furthering on like first of all it’s unfair to make myself think that this kid was going to keep my marriage together like that somehow his job to fix things between us. Yeah that rarely works. But you think you think of all this stuff and you just start realizing through your own thoughts now that you’re faced with your own. Like who am I as a parent. Who am I as a Jehovah’s Witness. Who am I as something bigger than yourself you have to think outside of. Yeah. And that was like Really.

[01:30:28] I mean I guess cracks in the foundation are starting to appear in my relationship with her. And I’ve just got stuff that I know I have to bite my tongue to pass. Like most people get pushed out the back of their mind and convince themselves that OK well don’t worry about that now don’t worry about that. Now when if he wants to go for football that’s not an implied that you can’t play football like god like how she’s going to say no and I’m gonna say maybe that would have a shot like show me the Bible. Like when he asked me Dad why can’t we in the Bible do it. I don’t have that good answer because I don’t think it exists. Like birthdays or something you could say was pagan. Maybe I could convince him. But this like you know he just wants to play sports. That’s it. You know why can’t I have you know this haircut or that third jeans or shirt with this logo on it. I’m thinking you no I don’t have good answers for a lot of the stuff. Maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a parent. But right now little kids little issues will just get through this. We’re what big star wars gets the vigil. Now you just want cut out to be a Jehovah’s Witness. That’s of was you’re actually being a good parent. And so there’s a lot of that going on. And then we had a second kid and a lot of the same stuff I just had to realize I was a very active dad like at assemblies.

[01:31:46] I really love the fact that I didn’t have to sit in there for the sessions and she not be a communicator very well but being good at getting a message to you whether it’s through silent treatment or just like huffing and they can’t off this kid. So it’s very good when you can do that and then like whether it’s grandparents or even random people at the convention sitting next to you like Ticknor or you want me to tip them. Should I take your kid for you and say I just hated asking for help. I was out day. How do you if she’s there even if it’s a language people speak and they learn as a survivor’s guilt if I just make a fuss about this I don’t have to handle it anymore. Someone will come in and save it. And that’s the dad I was was I was a very let’s do it let’s do it and I got to be walking down the halls every session like walking down the halls and seeing all the other dads and parents that use their salaries when you’re like hey we’re in the parents club we’re all out here you know in especially in cyber. We got child rearing and we’re trying to make it so those inside are distracted by our loud kids. That mothers could actually take notes because they don’t have arms full of babies and so I’m facilitating a good thing. Plus I get to walk in the halls I’m not enjoying the sunshine so much. Me and my kid are having a fun time. Let’s go upstairs and check in at that level you know.

[01:33:00] Let’s ride the elevator and you start to feel like you just don’t know. We became really fun for me to be that dad with the kid and we were one of the places we had assemblies was also a local a state baseball Hall of Fame. And so we grew up look at Buffalo baseballs and read names and what towns they were from. And I’m jealous we never had anything like that. And you just you know you’d grow it you’d get your arm. You get people who don’t talk to you and they’ve got their kid and they’re waiting out in the hallways at assemblies intervention because they got that year piece aired and they’re just not at you. But that’s like the not as a hello and a dismissal. And they know don’t linger around and talk you know. But then you get the ones who love you’re out here with your kid to you just go and you go and talk until you start to hear music and you’re like oh yeah I get into the song as it’s going to be lunch. But it’s so funny because when you had two kids. Now what if we could always take shifts before things really changed our relationship. Well we had two kids because it’s one of us is always going to have one or even worse both. You know we’re outnumbered now it’s even teens at least. And that’s got to be a strain on our relationship because I still was like in the doing a lot of that like I had a handle thing and I had to handle everything. She was a note taker and I wasn’t. So let me take notes. Would you take.

[01:34:25] I mean I got to go out in the hallways and do that stuff as well. But I also got very into bicycling and like cycling riding around miles and miles on my bike at this time in like 2009 or whatever and then bringing up children and so all the good races in bicycling are on Saturday or Sunday. So when you get to go out for like out of the sessions are take the kids with time or room time or room you can just check up dates on your phone. Who’s winning what race weekend after weekend there’s a good race going on. So it really I was kind of weak spiritually not giving it. I was thinking I was rather spend time with my kids in a time out room just doing my own thing and listening to all that stuff and is what helped her out. But after enough of that it just became expected. So I was always doing it and feeling like well no. It’s exhausting being a parent especially when you start to realize some of the beliefs a whole do. Some of them I don’t this part of this organization raise me but I stomach it because I’ve got all these other things and it was just a really confusing time in my life. Think young children. You know that’s interesting because I’ve heard people who I recently talked to somebody who was interested in this girl so he started it he wanted her. She was worldly and he was a witness and he wanted to have this relationship with her.

[01:35:58] So he started examining the teachings of Jehovah’s witnesses because of course you know he was trying to push her to become one and he wanted to make sure he did everything right as he was going to teach her. And it was the examination of his own beliefs that led him out. And then you know here you are you have kids and it’s the same thing now you’re like OK now I’m going to teach my kids this stuff. Now I have to think about this and now I have to examine these beliefs. Does this really add up. Being a witness was far. I was the only one that had to deal with my decision. And there a lot better for your kids and you start to look at everything you think God this is just like why not football why not even like the knowledgeable team you know like I just thought like because it’s a team and it’s a school like to me like I just mean like there’s too much here I kind of want better for my kids. But I a mate that won’t ever go along with that. Yeah. And I can’t even voice these things but they’re starting they’re just festering in me. And I did like you do with any doubts though and put them in the back of your mind and you just figured that’s just my struggle. And know I don’t worry about it now anyway. So it’s fine with us. You know like you assume the fire alarm is going to work because you’ve had a battery in it forever and you haven’t used it excessive. That’s not always the case. So then how did it progressed from there. Well child is awesome.

[01:37:29] So many things are awesome I have doubts. But like any good Christian I put them aside. What happens though that really turns my life around. It was I met a woman at a coffee shop in my local town and we were talking and I got to know a little bit about her story and I just felt like I didn’t know I was drawn to her. I was drawn to her out of the laugh and making her laugh was probably the it just bubbled out of her and it was the best reward you ever got for any joke you’ve ever said that someone laughed at this one. Hate it. Better than any payment of laughs. It was just it was the exact me. This is why I called Chalk’s keep telling here again here again here again. We became good friends and we started we realized we took our kids to the same day care. I creepily looked up like her last name from her kid’s name on the daycare roster and I found oh this is her and then I found her online and we started messaging like on Instagram and just I just she just was the lonely gal who had these kids was doing the best she could as a single mom. And I felt for that situation growing up with my mom as a single mom. And I was just like she just needs a friend and her husband cheated on her and had like is really messed up life right. It’s I want to show her that there’s good men out there. I know because I am one and that is not all that way and you’re in your 30s.

[01:38:57] But there’s a good life for you and you just needed a friend and someone to talk to. And I thought I could be that some juggling all this just being her friend and I like talking to her. She seemed to get me and she even asked me at one point like whoa what how you feel about flirting I know you’re in a relationship and everything and that’s why we proudly showed it to you. You’ve been down this road with your husband. Would you have been okay with that. Oh you’re right. And so we had like very mature conversations over and over. But yes we. There might be attraction to one another but we can’t go down that road it’s a road filled with regret and that’s not my purpose in being your friend. You know that we can we can never fulfill each other in that way. That doesn’t mean we can’t have conversations in good times and you know you share a coffee in the mornings and it was just like we grew close. Eventually my phone being and I’d get a message we’re starting to get mad every time it wasn’t her kid. That sounds awful but you do realize you’re falling in love. This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening. How did this happen to me. But whether it was my. Did you check the emotional qualifications first. No. No. In the back of my mind I was hoping she would come in and maybe find a good witness me and somebody because there are others like me of course. And I thought I could help.

[01:40:18] If nothing else she would see my example and maybe meet someone who would be like me because he was in the same. You know just all those crazy things helping someone is so funny because the way we view helping them is let us change everything about you. And then you’ll be worthy of our time is like no it’s you. This was the person not to who I got to be around and talk around. And I had maybe a hope because I wanted to fulfill but I didn’t care. Shira became a witness that was like the first time world. I didn’t want. I liked her as she was for who she was and it didn’t matter. If I thought her forever eternal happiness or the place to find a good man was amongst the witnesses I felt like they’re out there and I just want to be that friend to show you. Then we start adding more and more conversations about why it never happened how we know it can never happen. And eventually I put myself in a compromising situation. And again like is my pattern. I didn’t cross the line then and there. We went over to talk about it at that time was kind of like ultimatum like I can’t talk to you anymore because this is going too far too fast. We tried forever it seemed like to put the brakes on but then there is this. Well I still want to know if there is a magic between us and we shared a kiss and neck kiss was like just electric.

[01:41:46] The electricity in the touch it was everything I had ever wanted rather than the steel relationship I had had. And I fell. I went home and I just felt awful. I didn’t sleep much that night and I would get a message and I was hurt and can’t sleep. You know I had a cry. If you are about what we did we had it you know we shared that kiss. I know it’s on our mind too. And I said I’m not going to be some philanderer who just jumps between beds. I can’t play. Do you think we can have a future together. That’s I’m only interested in this if there’s a future and it was like Well yeah I would give you my all. All I ask you is I think compassion and that’s when I started to realize I’m me that I had. First of all the little guy was a baby still and he was starting the first downstairs. And I was still messaging and I was very relieved because I remember I get to go downstairs now to sleep with him in his room. There’s a food in there and I get to sleep with the baby which will put him at ease but. I just felt awful. I don’t want to share that bed. I don’t want to share their roofs. Having this conversation with someone else and knowing that I’m a person lately who anytime a message pings or goes off even if it’s my then wife I’m mad if it’s not this person and it’s like I’m all in with my heart. And now I’m starting to get my mind over and I haven’t yet given my body over.

[01:43:11] We shared the kiss but I’m starting to realize you’re fighting this and something’s just driving you and calling you and ultimately I’m I realized when they want to predict that march that I had to make a decision it wasn’t fair to either party. And the best thing I could do was be true to myself and say what I wanted but then have the strength and courage of my convictions. To do that and say like I can’t be with you and I’m going here. And one say it was a very swift. Every one of the witnesses was just shocked because it was literally like a train jumping tracks and pulled the lever. And I got off on this one. There was never any period of other communication like I wasn’t Flandry between beds that they couldn’t respected myself between then I would have hated who I was. I hated who I was what I was doing anyway. But I realized I needed a change and I really thought it recognized this is where I’m happy. Guy it’s going to hurt it’s gonna hurt and I want that happiness. But reaching out and taking it is going to hurt her hurt hurt hurt and it’s gonna hurt everyone in Iraq and I understand but I have to do this because it was for me for once. When I can have what I like. What I wanted and I wasn’t. After eight years of marriage and like this Roumi existence. We share a roof and we share bills and weeds.

[01:44:41] You sit on your phone over three feet away and I sit on my phone and we’re as separate as two people who are supposed to be together can ever be and I’m not happy with this. And about a month away from giving my first public talk as mysteriously as well like there’s a lot of pressure and a lot of life going on and I decided that I was changing my life up radically when I left that pretty much that night and the next the next day. And I never stayed in the old house again. I went over to my now wife Missy that was her place one of the meses and she was sure to fall asleep so nobody answered the door. And I went to my car slept in the parking lot behind the coffee shop where we had met and I didn’t get much sleep but that was really good that I didn’t have to just go between houses either I had a night in my car to just cry and think and pray and do all those things about what does this beat about who I am that I am doing this. What does this mean about who I am as my dad. Like am I just handing on the Sundheim thing or you’re another dad who isn’t going to be around for your kids you know and like nothing ever could have removed me from their lives before. And now I just it was it was the most conflicting. I can’t even describe it. If you were to tell me my own words like a time recording from now back then I would still think I was crazy and as I was going through it I thought it was crazy. I just knew it because my heart beat my only compass was pointing me that direction.

[01:46:22] And for the first time your heart was pointing you in a direction because if you think about it the relationship you had previous that wasn’t based on your heart what Jehovah’s Witnesses set up for relationships. It’s an intellectualising of it. It’s not about your heart. You’re not supposed to follow your heart. The hardest treacherous. You’re supposed to look at their spiritual qualifications their numbers and whether or not you know they’re going out in service for X amount of hours or how they’re meeting attendance is or whether or not they comment. You’re not your heart’s not involved nearly as much as your head is. And so yeah for the first time you were actually following your heart and and doing what you wanted to do instead of the default that was provided to you by an organization that does not have your best interests. And I won’t let myself completely off the hook and that in fact it was some arranged marriage. But this is my heart. That first marriage at the time. Sure. But I like the way you said nearly as much as your head. It’s an. But it’s you know there’s a table of emotions and spirituality and head at heart and everybody comes together and they meet and then they decide a decision. It’s like they don’t know. There’s a lot going on ever understanding yourself is a confusing thing ever. Sure. At any point. But you know when you’re young and you’re going through what I went through. Fresh off of a reinstatement. And then just as young as it was I probably wasn’t mature to fully know what I wanted.

[01:47:53] I never gave myself the time. Even when I was disfellowshipped a lot of people thought well that was your time to decide and you made the right decision. I was all guilt all the time because I felt like I’d never thought I was going to spend the rest of my life making it up to these friends and these people that I had hurt that if any one of them would still have me. I will give you my all just making it up to you. So I did. You know and it’s like it’s all guilt. There’s very little of it that’s genuine. Like you say in your podcast that no guilt being I did something wrong to shame being I am something wrong or I’m a bad person. I just do a bad thing. I am a bad thing. And I felt that was just my nature. I wasn’t happy that I was doing it. And here I was doing it again. But knowing this is actually my road to happiness. It’s gone. All I can do is rip the bandage off as quick as possible and get it over with. Like with everybody just sorry. This is it. We will work it out later on. My relationship with my children established and all this will happen. But thank God that I had missed you through it all. Because there were moments of like just grief my mom. Nobody understood and everybody always said I wanted to talk and my disfellowshipped brothers and sisters more talk to me and I didn’t trust them. I didn’t trust anyone.

[01:49:08] I felt like that was all David’s life just took a quick upheaval. Let’s tune in and get the juicy details. And I didn’t feel like anybody who sincerely wanted to help me. They just were happy to have you back in the club of this fellowship. People join the ranks of us imperfect ones rather than being David the golden child who stayed in that mind your mom’s favorite or any of that. And I felt like I can’t trust them I can’t trust. Elder I can’t trust any former experience I had. I could not trust. It seemed like I was just trusting my heart and I was so happy. And I instantly knew this and I hardly knew each other but there was like I was starting to feel confused and things like I felt were soulmates. This was the only way it makes sense because I couldn’t know someone better if I’d been friends with them for. You know like I’ve been married eight years. I hardly had any idea who the person was as what makes them tick. I just kind of knew how the process was going to take and predict it like weather patterns but I didn’t understand currents and air movements behind those very much at all. Sure. Missy and I if we had been friends for 20 years we couldn’t know each other better and it was just instant. And I felt its happiness laced with guilt. But it’s what I needed because ultimately the guilt will fade and the happiness will stay. And I am I’m all in on this. Like I love this person.

[01:50:30] We weren’t saying it at that time but I had known it and I had thought we were soul mates and she had told me she had talked to a psychic about me and certain details like he had. I was tall and I had no tattoos and dark hair and light eyes and that was all correct. Okay weird. And then he mentioned that you know you had the guy I was looking for that was a possible future had a ring. But he’s not married because it’s on his other hand and I routinely wore my wedding ring from the first marriage on my right hand. So when I play music like bass or wherever it doesn’t click. I’m a good guitar neck on the threats and so like little things like that where that’s crazy because that’s a it wasn’t like I was taking off my wedding ring to hide that I was married that. It was just I don’t like the sound it makes from my instruments and little details like that felt like that’s a decision I made were out of control of anyone and I’m starting to believe that we were drawn together and the universe has a plan for us. And I don’t know why I had to do it this way but some higher power made it happen and it was literally like miracles and things that we would hope for. It was wrapping itself around bending it to our will. Just to keep our happiness going. And that was the first time I realized that you know what miracles are is it’s literally love it it’s like positive vibes and good energy things happen for you when you start being happy you know. And like when you’re witness and things are going well.

[01:52:00] I always had this like complex where I thought I’m not fulfilling Jesus commandment. They said he would persecuted to you know like if they persecuted if they hate me they’ll hate you other things are going great for me. What am I doing wrong that I’m not being persecuted. I want some persecution. It’s a sick way of thinking that when stuff going well for you you know you just follow right. You just talked about what we were talking about you know back when we first started this conversation which is you didn’t try to control things you leave things just be. And you found happiness by doing so. Yeah. It’s the same thing. And I won’t go into too much of my marital life and relationship because she is worthy of a podcast all her own. It’s just she’s the best and the happiness I have in my life. I just want do a series on relationships. I would model every good thing after my messy and I’m completely happy about it. However the panic that was happening at a time like when people thought well what do you do. My mom thought I was on drugs and I was being accused of such crazy things that witnesses do not understand and they thought like I was doing this to make some plan to hurt my then wife Jessica like further and at that. Are you insane. I just want to be happy I don’t want to hurt you think I derive any pleasure forever. Do we miss that noise. It hurts. It hurts my boys. I’m feeling everybody in the hall. Everybody is don’t.

[01:53:30] There was a kid I felt that struck me about this like I had insane courage to actually do this but you guys want to make it like this evil thing and. If you think I’m not sorry about it because I’m going through things because I’ve met with the elders and they said well you don’t have to have this. We had a judicial meeting and they said you don’t have to have this you don’t you know there’s room for you can save this. I know that they keep wanting me to say wait scratch that I’ll go back to this dreary situation because then you guys more disciplined me. I wasn’t going to say it. I said no it doesn’t. It’s not for that I said I acted like I’m a cancer and everything I touch I just destroy. And I’m no good for anyone except for right now. I’m good at moving this one person and that’s what I want to do for the rest of my life. And they said all right well they inform me they were disfellowshipped me and they said David we see your business up about this. We see that you’re sorry about this but you know it doesn’t have to end this way and they won’t like stop trying to offer me that. And I said no and they said well we have to dispose of you. I said Fine you have no other bar you have seven days to appeal our decision in written form. It’s a crime wave that let’s just made. As I say your announcement and I don’t want to like on this is my decision.

[01:54:46] And they like this third like talking to each other as opposed to s he’s wanting to make a decision. What do we do. They’re like no on the policy says that we have to give you seven days even though we respect that you agree with our decision not to just waive that right for a viewing. We are we’re going to still give you the seven days and then you say well enough I come to the hall. I’m still a believer in my life. I just need to be with this person. I can be a witness coming to meetings and be with this person. So I’m asking a few questions like Well when I come to the meetings that my kids see me and they want to sit with me even Norby just how can I help them. Can they come over to me and my not allowed to know. That’s a good question. We’ll have to do some research. I’m feeling just like all these people who thought it didn’t hurt because I didn’t see it. I didn’t eat for days. I bawled Missy ball with me. She hated to see that. You think she felt good about the position she was in being this side of it and watching me just beat myself up. She would have to remind me to have a drink in the water that was just bags under my eyes. I’m sure I had cried every ounce of water out of me. It was awful. It was awful.

[01:56:04] But for the first time I was happy on my own terms and I was living on purpose like not an accident like I was born in this religion and accidentally happened. That was my happiness. I was doing it on my own terms. But I still want to do it. If that made sense I just was changing. Democrats salutes me my wife and I. You know I don’t know what the story is that goes around in the circles about why we left but it’s not like it was an easy decision as to disassociate everything that we knew behind. It’s not like it was something we just woke up one day and decide it’s just like it’s not like you woke up one day and we’re like hey you know what I want to leave my kids over here and go be with this person over here. And you know it’s just a whim. No it was a decision that was made over time. And there was a long back story there. It wasn’t even just about you and Missy. I mean you’re living with a wife where you can’t be who you are there either because you can’t discuss your doubts because you have this call that has interjected itself and woven itself into every fiber of your being. And so it takes time to break all that down. There’s so much backstory to any one that leaves or makes a decision like this voluntarily and then people look at you and judge you as though. Well you know look at all the people he’s hurting like you like you didn’t take that into account when you made that decision. You know the fact is don’t you. Go ahead. Go ahead.

[01:57:47] I’m just going say the fact that you are willing to endure all that pain and to take all that on shows exactly how much it meant to you that it was this. This was a huge deal that you were making. You were willing to risk it all for something that meant so much to you which you would think that you like them would applaud because they believe that they you know they gave up their relationships with their quote worldly relatives and family and they left. Fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters so that they could gain something in their cult. You’re doing the same thing on the way out. And yet she has some sort of respect for that. No they don’t. Nobody gets. I think that’s fine because I don’t need them to get it. I was more worried about this. I’m not going to be my dad. I’m not in my life. You know I need to still have a relationship with my boys and explain to them Mom loves you and I love you but we are not together anymore and that’s not anything to do with you and I were just really like pick up the pieces start building my life but letting them know that I’m with Missy and this is what makes me happy. This is a person who is more me than I am at times and it’s just fun to be with someone who gives every breath you draw energy rather than saps your energy and you just feel like this is joyous It’s joyous. It’s not what I wanted it’s not what I had planned. When I started but I do believe something guided us together we’re in a better place.

[01:59:24] And ultimately the fact that it led to my freedom from the cult. I really believe that. But the funny thing happened is it’s all the dichotomy of what it is to pick up those pieces and work out with the ex how you’re going to see your boys and finances and who gets what and going into a divorce. Imagine all that stress rates and I’m still a believing witness. I’m not going to meetings just because I don’t feel I’m good enough to be in the hall at a time so I go to a few odd ones here and there. And never show up wanting to know again. And I remember there was this one time where our I was over dropping the boys back off at their moms house and we had mentioned something happened. I remember I forget what the world event was but I want her know I get that you hate me but don’t think I’m ever out like against you guys. And being that witnesses truly pound their leg. Concentration camps could happen and you guys might be rounded up the Jehovah’s Witnesses will be persecuted. That was legit fear and I remember offering to her like you guys ever have to go into hiding like you can hide with us. Like I want you to know like I will let anyone hide my boys or hurt you like you guys could. And she laughed in my face. Obviously she knew her side might be different. They were my boys would say.

[02:00:48] But I remember thinking like I had I was I don’t derive pleasure from your situation but if if they start rounding up witnesses and I know my boys are part Asian like I’m going to want to reach out and help shield you from the local authorities or whoever will be chasing you. And she laughed and that was just the normal witness conversation as far as I was concerned. It just didn’t have the result I had hoped that she would recognize it. For that I still cared about the well-being of these individuals. Even if I didn’t want to personally say I I’ve known go endure your presence forever because that was not what I wanted. I just don’t want to see people in concentration camps no matter who they are. It gets so much less my boys. And she laughed. I felt hurt. I remember I came home and I told Misty and Misty was like that was the first y’all I realized now I’m talking to not win her seat. She looking at me like I’m I’m insane. And I just thought I had told her where you use your clothes. You can laugh like that. Now that we are like Don’t laugh this is going to happen. And when it does I told her that she did. You know they could hide out at you know whatever I’d help in any way I could. And that kind of was the moment where Misty said I laughed at David and then he was like Don’t laugh because he really believes this. Which means they really believe that. Which means he offered it to that woman who hates him which means it’s a very plausible thing to him right now. I’m going to start doing research and that’s when it all really began.

[02:02:25] After telling Misty about the concentration camp thing and the possibility of us being persecuted where they have to go into hiding as she thought I’m going to look online and see what these witnesses AKAs the stuff he’s telling me is just the you know hunky dory paradise. Everybody gets a panda and you get to eat oversized grapes and all that stuff. So she starts looking into it. And as you can imagine I am like first of all took a lot of strength just to make a decision on my own life. But then the person I’m weird makes me so happy I’m overlooking the fact that she’s got like paranormal ghost like movies the seasons of the episodes and she talks slightly and others others other stuff and I’m thinking army and like this goes against every fiber of my spiritual being that these things are in the house I’m in but I love you and you’re not asking me forcing me to watch them. She was understanding and patient about everything. The same mentality came in here when she starts work researching witnesses. She starts to ask was this true lesson. Oh because sometimes the apostates put it in a way that is true but it’s so brushed off the broad stroke on the negative side. So it does. It’s false on its face as well. Sure. It’s like. So I’d start saying no that’s not true and she’s telling me she’s looking at different sites or reading a book and she starts reading this article book by Anthony James called Knock knock who’s there the truth about Jehovah’s Witnesses. And she took a picture of it.

[02:03:54] And at this time everyone is so curious about her simply for that like I hate even use the term but that other woman factor that she’s getting creeper is from the Kingdom Hall who went Who is she. Well I’m I’ll find out on Facebook or if you’re blocked I’ll look it up and so everyone’s looking it up and she’s kind of a you want to you’ll let it leave us alone like stop driving by the House and trying to figure out you know they just leave us alone like I want to be happy and yet one only thing about me fired. So she asked she wanted to post a picture like this is what I’m listening to this entire Jehovah’s Witness book. Before she even put it up she asked me Would you be comfortable if I posted this picture and I said no. I decide I’m sorry please don’t. And she’s like Well do you want to read the book. I say no because he’s a bitter apostate who just his story is not mine and he’s just going to have nothing but bash. I know what’s on that book. And so I don’t need to listen to it. You can listen to it. I love you and I always like we have us and we don’t need to have a religion between us. But I don’t want it to be divisive between us either. Can we have that kind of agreement and you listen to the book. And she came back at me again and listen to it and really understand what it’s like language in me like great Crowden of friends.

[02:05:12] They’re always like terms that witnesses use that as a person know with no frame of reference here is it it sounds like you know that reading about is an oil business economics that you don’t have a business economics degree you like. This book is awful it just goes over my head. But she’s still respected that she didn’t post a picture when she was listening to the book and I like that she really respected my faith she always even as she is doing research and finding things out about my own faith that I don’t know yet. Instead of saying you need to see this or really like shoving its spoon feeding it down my throat she’s giving you all this leg space to operate in just be me and she knows I’m confused hurt and grieving and there’s a lot going on and she’s just that patient kind loving person who says OK. And I’m not ready for it. And then she asks the question now what does this mean in the book you said that. No. Will they just say that. Well yes but that’s the extreme version of it. He’s trying to dispel some of these things right. And then I’m getting more and more upset with my own like local creationists as it is. I don’t remember when it came about but we Sturr watchings the Leah Remini Scientology series and under Ciccolo. I’ve said it before I’ll say it again. She is like the Rosa Parks of this cult movement. Like if they all come toppling down and she is a large esposa and everything like this is the spark that’s going to start a spectrum fire.

[02:06:44] I don’t think she gets enough credit because the brilliance of that series was I’m okay with making fun of Scientology because they’re crazy you know. So I give myself license to sit and watch this program on faith when I want to give this book she had about my own faith. The same license now however and this is the brilliance of that shock is it. I would never let an apostate in my ruber on my phone or through alterable device. I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t want to hear it. I knew what it was about and I was scared of apostates and I didn’t want to hear it. Star watching the Leah Remini. Well yeah. That’s like inviting them in your living room. Come on in. Tell us about your faith you know. And so now she’s in the homes throughout the nation of a lot of people who would never let someone else of their own faith coming to their home. Talk about bad on it. And as we’re sitting there and that first statement rolls up on the screen about the Church of Scientology has this claim that might render Leah Remini are bitter apostates who left a lot of circumstances and were never really that good of members anyway. I’m thinking that could you could basically pick after Scientology on the bottom for what to do about contracts society. I would have indiscernible who would wrote that statement. It could have been typed up by anyone at Bethel as like oh my god. OK. Well I’m watching now anyway I’m watching.

[02:08:06] So we’ll see what happens when hear the stories of this crazy cause I want to hear about the guy leaving the planet and others you know stuff and the funny things of it. But as she’s talking about the people in her story and the stories I’m sitting there and I know Misty is more educated on my own faith in me probably with this book already and I’m starting to have those feelings again about I’m feeling things I can’t communicate to my me. I don’t want to know how much this is making my skin crawl because it’s familiar like I don’t ever want her to know that. Like when we look together and say yeah that’s crazy. Can you believe this what we’re seeing right now. And then I look back at a screen saying Good God she just even had no idea what I was. I kind of live that you know. And I tried to act normal just act like this is crazy to you not that it’s very familiar. And as it starts to really release us it will be another episode or another episode. Doors are Biskit are starting to really Krakow’s this disconnect disfellowshipped arm clearing the planet is a sweet term. You know when you’re helping the planet go clear and cytology that’s the same as like marauded language. Witnesses use the truth in the way or a low light in all that I’m just like many like you two twins. This is ridiculous to me. This is so similar. This is exactly something I went through the theology behind his name. But the processional like Don’t read anything from us former members. Okay. That’s exactly what I would say you know.

[02:09:32] This matches up almost 4 legs so eerie it was really eerie where then ever after enough of learning what a real Kalt was and being convinced Scientology was and then it had really really Hunzo uncanny similarities and things in common with my own faith. Well I’m out working one day I’ll give that book a listen. So I give the new James book a listen. And the first part is like memoir where he’s just telling his story. And even as he’s telling his story and very thinking’s Oh yeah well you’re a bad witness. You know you knew you were going into this and you’re going what do you expect. You know yeah your story stinks. You know by that feel for you and it’s clear for me to just say that you were a bad witness. You were never that strong. It’s no shock during the predicament you’re in. You know that’s what my judgment on witness mind was still saying through the memoir part I’m the victim. Yes. Then he gets to the part where he starts dismantling the beliefs. And I’m like oh OK exchange. Remember I remember how she hit me because I washed windows to work like any good Jehovah’s Witness. You know you pick something and you can do your own hours. Absolutely. And I was washing windows and I remember like getting to that part in the book. All right. I can’t work and listen anymore like this is sit in your car and kind of just take a few minutes and he got through all wives just a flawed system. And so my mind had already been like OK it’s it’s not the truth. It’s lies.

[02:11:06] It’s lies. OK I got that. It’s lies. I understand that it’s lies. And I hate that XYZ and thereafter go back to thank goodness but it’s imperfect men running off flawed system. And I accepted that. And then the very next chapter is now that we’ve dismantled the beliefs in and of themselves. Here’s the darker side. And he starts going into like what cults are with the bite model and I’m realizing I’m a guy now. I was ready to quit. It was a flawed belief system. I could handle that. These are imperfect men. You know they say as much right all themselves. But the fact that it was a cult and it had exerted control over me through theB.I tea and I just. It’s true it’s true it’s absolutely true and I think it was the last thing I wanted to admit. I could walk away from a faith realizing it’s not what it claims but the fact that they actually have a high moral agenda behind their group crushed me. I never wanted to say it was a cult. I wanted to say it was a perfect and I want to say it was flawed but there wasn’t that darker side of it. And that book really I remember just quitting work that day it’s a make of hours. And I came home crying and Misty was like I was raised in a cult. I have to admit that now I don’t. Last thing I ever want to admit there’s no joy you get from giving up that last vestige of that last ghost Ward.

[02:12:36] Yes it’s a perfect but it’s not a cult. It’s also it’s also a little bit of an ego hit to realize that somebody essentially pranked you that you were manipulated that somebody owns you in that way. It’s it took me a while before I could use a term called. Now I have no problem with that. But yeah it took me a little while before I could say the word cult because you know living in a cult is what those crazy bastards on TV. Did you see that that’s not me. That can’t be me. And then when you. But once I realized the manipulation and the things that were behind it the dark side like you said yeah I have no problem calling it a call now but it’s still those first times that I did. I mean it just like a gut punch just lies saying man like I gave decades on deck my life I wasted in someone else’s sick game. And and it’s something you can never get back. Which honestly is part of the reason I’m doing things like this podcast is because it’s I guess it’s just on some level my way of making something good out of it because otherwise it’s hard for me to accept that you know what else did I get out of that. Like it just took for me for all those years. Yes. Like I’ve gotta make something of this because otherwise I have a hard time processing processing it especially you know where I am now and seeing this is you know this is the only life that at least I have evidence of their being for me that I wasted what half of it in that.

[02:14:37] You know it’s it’s it’s a tough it’s a tough thing to come to terms with it is and I remember too like he is going through the book. Are you familiar with the book at all that the new James book. No I’ve never heard of this one. It’s own audible it’s good. Knock knock Who’s there. The truth about those witnesses is very good. And then he has a part in there where as he’s going through his dismantling of a bit like there’s some things that don’t resonate as strongly as that’s forgivable. Okay so the society did this. That’s forgivable. When he gets into the fact that like they were part of the United Nations. I was beside myself that they were registered members because I was raised with that book being some of my favorite pitchers in the world. The revelation book. I knew theU.N. was bad. I knew and then I’m thinking wait what. You know like I can if you didn’t understand a scripture. That’s one thing. Your mind wasn’t fully enlightened. The light Adiga. This is a deliberate action a political move and it disgusted me. And then you hear about the 1975 staff which like that they were buying they weren’t selling. They were like we always have heard 1975 be talked about in terms of the people who don’t like it were those who got greedy and sold. They’re both trying to get rich think they’re Bartletts. Then we heard about the ones who bought boats and bought the big houses thinking they all never have to pay off those loans because the end’s coming.

[02:16:02] That’s who was always portrayed to me were the better ones right. One his book said there were people who said what happened selling them. Selling my house. To give it to the society. Going give that money to the branch gonna send it to New York because I’m gonna finish the system pioneering good people who actually gave what they had and then when they became disillusioned that the society say sorry we were wrong here’s your house and boat back. Use all your materials. Heck no. They know they kept it all and I’m thinking now we’re talking rank and file good hearted people who are trying to do what was right not just misinterpreting the scripture like you had the power to release those funds back to them where you were wrong. Instead you shame them and you picked a few cherry picked examples of like someone maybe did sell their house or bought a bigger house thinking they want to have to pay it off and that person has right to be bitter but again they were only ever in that situation because of what you said. Like really killed me they didn’t really say those things. I know you know what’s crazy is actually as much as I’ve been on this like my family and everybody else and I recently had a discussion with my mom. My mom didn’t talk to me for her much through all this.

[02:17:15] I was on drugs and she want nothing to do with me and she said such things about she said them things about missing out really hurt and I just like actually your podcast this GW life helped me a lot when you would mention to your sister in law that your mom tried to smooth things over and her response was something like Why would I. You won’t talk to your son. Why would I want to have a relationship so I don’t either. That is exactly how it is like. And it’s not even about me leaving the faith that she wants to say that’s the reason she’s shunning me but like why would I want to do anything with you. If you are the greatest woman I’ve ever known. And now I’m married to is this way. Then why would I miss you to be your friend. Like I’m the greatest man she claims to have ever known and that you won’t talk to me please like so it became a very easy thing. However just recently my mom which is such a mess that situation because my family my sister got reinstated would be my mom really happy because now out of all the kids she’s raised. What you are the one was murdered of course but she’ll be in the paradise. And then my older brother is disfellowshipped so until he gets his act together he wanted my younger brothers to fellowship and until he gets his act together he probably won’t but my sister is back now and I’m in a ministerial servant about to give talks. So all this is her mindset. You know everything is good for her. Yes. However before before I do all of this. Even my sister kind.

[02:18:42] My mom comes down like cancer in 2014 I believe and we did like one of the last times we were all together as siblings was at this meeting where we think maybe mom’s going and she tells us all this stuff and I remember being a witness and treating them like it was fun sitting with them but also very condescending to how I sat around and talked to them and I thought they were all just like lost people and my sister and I wrote down together and she took it hard. Then she came back with me and the next trip she went down and I think the stress just got to her something but she had caved in on the ride one of these trips down dealing with her mom’s like stuff without me and she stopped about smokes so she starts smoking again. Right. The elders the local elders here show her mercy and say that she just needs to get her head right. They go to her house. They make calls on her to this day still saying well what can we do to get you to come back. Are you interested in this or that. It’s such a weird thing when I think of it. Now everything’s coming back to me ever once. I was out in service and I had no idea where my sister lived and I was at the door and my sister answers it and I called you know I roll my eyes. You are behind this door all day. I find you in service and instead of saying anything I just say hey for finished you work it no longer here. I have this book. She’d like to read it. Here you go. I kind of thrust the letter and then I start walking down the stairs.

[02:20:12] The guy I was with was he moved in after my glasses. And he won. He immediately started really happy about my and things and he was asked that I would say if you want to read it I tell him my dissociates sister. Then also she’s back home to. And it kind of became this thing where once she finally got back and then she just kind of started smoking again. Faded the elders know she smokes. They know a lot about her and they go over and they talk to her try to encourage her and I had already reengaged in the shunning. I hate to admit that but I started she’s living a life that’s not witness enough you or they have a slacker. You know Don label on her that says you’re disfellowshipped. I was taking the personal step and saying I’m not going to have much outside of this to do with her guy here I really hate saying that but anyway my mom still talking to her. Everyone’s talking to her because they view her as redeemable. They just got to get her to quit smoking and get coming to the Kingdom Hall again it should be fun. So they’re going through all the steps and then my life uproots right. I do all I do and I’m right away. A different case where I’m on drugs I’m evil. I did the unthinkable left the relationship and my mom walked up to me and then she still talking to my sister who’s living and I’m actually living a clean life you know the divorce Aguada as paper goes to the courts.

[02:21:47] My life was uprooted more suddenly than but you got divorced got remarried you’re living with someone I’m only married to you the only woman in my life and I don’t smoke or drink or gamble like Miles slaving away. I’m good clean person. And yet my mom won’t talk to me and my sister. She’s kind of in the middle of issues. I tell mom all time she’s being terrible do you do that like all of a sudden you are this evil person who Shonda and you’re just like dad. She won’t talk to you and then I go down to visit her as she lets me have cigarette breaks on her back porch. I come back in and she resumes talking to me just fine. And I’m thinking you know so there’s that family part of it that’s really confusing to me. I’m thinking far right. I don’t. You’re never going to be close to me and miss you anyway. But the double standard if you can talk to Julie cause she doesn’t have that label on her is ridiculous to me and enduring think that’s ridiculous. All of the siblings think it’s ridiculous that my mom would talk to her because she had faded even though clearly doing things against the witness way. But I was off the table as far as having communications and it’s like really really bizarre but we just she needed a ride somewhere recently so we had helped out. We got talking and I asked my mom you know we kind of mended some fences actually where we might not ever agree on a religion but we can maybe have a relationship with each other if she wants to do it and that’s the only cure for it.

[02:23:09] Like know who I am as a person and not like who you think I can be as a fixer upper if I just get back into religion. That’s off the table. Do you think my wife wants to be a she joins the religion that’s off the table just if you want to know who we are. That would be the basis of the relationship. But in this mending fences conversation where we kind of hash it out talk about Dad we talk about the elders. She tells me where she’s not happy with her current husband. She tells me all this other stuff and then I asked her Well what do you think happened in 1975 and she came in right around 1972 she was baptized but she says well we knew it was ending and this is the person who this is. This blows my mind. I’ve been thinking about this for like the last four days. She told me I went to Canada and I think I was right around 1973 74 or maybe and she goes and I heard a talk from brother Noor and Nathan HRN president of the society at the time in Canada at a convention she says he chastised people. We all knew the end was coming and he said what are you doing starting painting your house at this day and age and in this time in history like would you brag you know polished brass in the sinking Titanic or whatever. We shouldn’t be thinking about long terms like this. Your kids will never go to school. He gave some talk where they said all this stuff because 1975 was for sure the end.

[02:24:35] And she just told me this like 40 years ago and I was like what the president of the society at the time said that clearly. And she’s like yeah. And then she goes and I remember your dad and I were a little upset because shortly thereafter they started posting pictures and they sent pictures of like the Stanley Theatre being remodeled and the Kingdom half way. We were going to you know they told us not to paint houses because the end was coming in there and get this huge construction you know remodel going on like was it didn’t sit well with her that they were going to take on this huge expense in this giant endeavor of redoing this property. Not long after when they were the ones condemning the rank and file for beginning a long term project. And I was just dumb. I still am dumbfounded that you could hear a talk from the president say something in such clear terms. And she would. Mind you this is a fully indoctrinated woman to this day who still believes like every like she won’t. And I don’t get how she was able to put that to the back of her mind. But even at all these years later that kid that would never go to school has now been murdered and dead for almost 20 years. And her baby has gone through school and excuse me.

[02:25:51] It’s just to me that so long ago and you heard it in no uncertain terms and now you even know it like you heard it in no uncertain terms and you believe these people because while they’re imperfect she says in the Bible look at what they did give you an Korris God’s name and you have a lot of important things right. And I’m just like I can’t even I can’t imagine someone hearing that much. It’s mind blowing isn’t it. It just it just goes to show. Jehovah’s Witnesses could do any thing and still keep their members. Now they’ll lose some. There’s always going to be some attrition through these things but at some point I have a feeling they’re going to have to get rid of the year 1914 and I have a feeling that they’re going to do so they’ll do it quietly because you know time will go on and people continue to die and they will find ways around their doctrines and people will still believe it. Because again it gets down to what your mom said well look what they did give us or who else who else taught us Jehovah’s name. And it’s like Jehovah is not even an accurate translation of the word of the letters. It’s it’s all made up and it doesn’t matter to them because they’re on some level it fits some need that these people have and they are willing at this point I think it sunk cost. They’ve already put so much in it. They can’t afford to leave. Yeah that’s part of it. They think I can’t leave this because look I’ve already given so much to this. I mean it takes a lot of courage and it’s very hard to leave something like that to admit to yourself and to everyone else that you lived a lie and this. Yeah.

[02:27:55] And the thing is my mom she retreated deeper into the truth through all the trauma she went through in her life with losing her daughter and the husband. So she knew they really really went anywhere even knowing they got dissociative break or something that has that effect. She. They were there for her during those times. They were that’s what got her through those times. So it’s it’s her back now even if she’s unhappy with it and can see bigotry and can see double standards. I don’t think she ever will awake in that sense. But it’s funny because the thing is to like the saddest part is my mom is a lot like me in that she blames herself for everything and the society like has this thing about everybody else in our kingdom hall all his kids stating the truth. All their kids did and the truth stayed together. I got divorces and I got all these kids now on the fellowship and one who’s not. But basically she’s living a worldly life of sorts. No she’s not pretending to be a witness in any way and that doesn’t mean anything. What the good people are the people you raised but yet a witness mom sees herself as a failure. I failed as a parent because I couldn’t make my children ascribe to my belief system. And that is so sad.

[02:29:07] And then you get children like me and like anyone else with things I feel my mom because I couldn’t just buy any longer and it’s like you think a system that measures a parent’s success or failure solely based off of whether or not they join their religion they were born into a stay forever is like right there would be like if you were an accountant you know and you say if I can’t you know you might I couldn’t raise my kid to be an accountant I failed as a parent. Like this just ludicrous to me. There you know that you would expect that to be the same generationally. You’re correct. Well I mean I’m a good narcissist wants to churn out copies of himself and that’s what the organization teaches people to do. There’s a scripture in think proverbs An’s in the New World Translation that Jehovah’s Witnesses use it says train up a boy in the way in which he should go and he will not turn aside from it. Well I once heard in other translations. Instead of saying train up a boy. And the way in which he should go. Or maybe it’s in the way in which he should what it says in other translations it says train up a boy in the way in which he is bent. In other words. The difference is Jehovah’s Witnesses say train up a boy and the way in which he should go. Here is a prescribed way. This is the path and train up this boy to follow this path. Exactly. But there are other translations say train up a boy in the way in which he is bent. Or in other words in the way in which in that child’s strengths in the way that that child is used is instead of a prescribed path. It says OK look at that kid who is this child. What are his capabilities what are his strengths and weaknesses.

[02:31:05] Now let’s let’s hope this boy find the path that fits who he is instead of going along a one size fits all prescribe path. And that’s the difference between Jehovah’s Witnesses and a lot of other religions. Jehovah’s Witnesses have this one path and they believe that their children are to follow that path exactly and be little copies of themselves little mini me’s. And if they are not. If they fail to be able to live up to and be exactly what I am as the parent or as the organization then they are failures and I am a failure for not being able to get them to go exactly down that one specific path. And it’s very sad that the organization has even recently come out. I believe it was everyone’s favorite governing body member tight pants Tony Anthony Mora’s who came out and actually basically said that if your children fail to go down that prescribed path then you need to look at yourself and blame yourself and see what it was that you did wrong as a parent. That is disgusting. And it is the way that I mean if that’s not a cult. What is God you’ve been hearing it makes me so upset because you never want to wish evil on someone but something minor like I get some shampoo in your eyes. MORRIS You think you’re much more caring than I am I wish. But I really wish evil upon him. Now I understand. It’s it’s it’s so disgusting and it’s so twisted. And they watch that. Yeah I’ll watch that. Yeah. When it came out and I can’t remember it was in the last.

[02:33:04] I want to say in the last year too when when is this talk or this part was given. I just remember there was a lot of outrage in the Jehovah’s Witness community about you know just what a horrible thing that is to say to the parents of these ones and how it’s honestly kind of like using them as Jehovah’s Witnesses once again to get at their parents to say no to guilt their parents and to guilt these Jehovah’s Witnesses for leaving. Because look at what it’s going to do to their parents. Because we’ve now made them think that they’re horrible people because you turned out like you did. It’s just it’s so insidious and it’s so. It’s just it’s evil. It is truly evil. And that is it really is. I remember too when we stirred the governing body became more and more visible that we get to start seeing wow this is look they’re they’re so personable and they will mingle with the loans and you get to see them and I got to meet Geoffrey Jackson at one of the assembly that I was so proud of. You know I remember when we we get to be privy to what goes on at the annual meeting. And then when he got up there and did his you know tight pants around feeling like I kind of like the hipster Métro look actually I feel like that’s OK. But I’ll never forget afterwards. The like. My then wife Jessica and her sister in law at the time they were all talking like no.

[02:34:35] But they’re such comfortable pants should we should we not wear the yoga pants anymore and they’re already thinking about making life changes and I remember telling them like girls don’t be ridiculous like the dude you see his haircut. If I tried on stage with that haircut it was like wild off the back like like you tell that man to get a haircut before he’s going to tell you what to wear. Just like they do. They looked at me like I had no blasphemed. Basically by this remember thinking Don’t change your pattern no matter what you like. You know what. Discretion is where what you’re comfortable and you’re not going to the hall in that it’s like I felt like he was overstepping its bounds and had no freedom of speech to say such just looking how he himself looked on the platform that day. I thought yeah you know this is you just was really into that guy and see that guy. Is I’m not trying to use the word. I mean it’s a serious time not trying to use it as an insult. That guy is mentally ill. Well he is one of the most disconnected from reality. I think there is right think has problems and it’s obvious in all of these governing body members that have come out from behind the curtain. If you look at them I mean it’s Wizard of Oz you know pay no man pay no attention to the man behind the curtain because he’s just this little nothing. And that’s what they are. They have come out from behind the curtain and they have put their crazy on full display. And thankfully it’s woken some people up.

[02:36:11] But unfortunately so many people buy it which again shows that they’re not going to change and they can get their members to do whatever they want. They will buy into whatever next round of crazy they put out there. Yeah. So is that then woke you up. I mean ultimately this book ultimately I became fully awake by that book. But then I started listening like you’re a podcast you actually helped me a lot come not just from the fact that it’s one thing to say it’s a bad faith and it’s no longer for me. But then it’s another when you’re fully awake and you realize I want to pull the fire alarm and get everyone out that I can like that. When that happens it’s not just no longer not for me like that was because of podcasts like Um jt and Lady C they helped me a lot. I questioned the timing the critical thinkers stuff because right away these are probably two people who feel they wasted their lives because he was all the way up in Bethel and that he had given himself to really go on up in the organization and I hope that he never feels that way because what he was doing was actually building the credentials that I can listen to a podcast and say This isn’t some fake person just acting like a Jehovah’s Witness that wants to save their own message. Which do you believe any apostate could be a liar and all that this guys he knows the truth speak. He’s he’s got the language I was raised speaking.

[02:37:37] This is a legit person who’s legit experience and you can tell he’s research like I can hear it in his words that this person he had to do that path to build those credentials where someone like me who doesn’t want to hear necessarily just the bitterness but like crisis of conscience has a lot of heart. John Cedar’s has a lot of heart. Your podcast has a lot of heart. It’s not just rail against and bashing with. You’re just lookin for pitchforks and torches that mob mentality where the heart of people who were hurt and they did care and they just can’t unlearn the things they learned. That’s what spoke to me and I felt like GTM ADC. They come from. He raised raising Canada but maybe Michigan or DC now so I forget where they’re from but anywhere they live in a big city and I remember feeling like for me in my whole little town where all the elders knew me and hearing them from an urban area with a bigger congregations and lots of shifting moving parts in the city. I felt like very relieved that all this is not. It’s not just my local elders are a botched job like the organization the world over. It’s the same in the rural as it is in the city. This is how the organization is run and it was very nice to see that in an urban area they got the same problems they got the same. It’s not just a click because I live in an area where Renaults are aware that it’s all over. That’s that’s the witnesses as universal as they claim their love is their flaws are just as universal not lately. And that was really good for I heard that podcast and he’s so researched I would hear him break a point down.

[02:39:17] And you JT knows this stuff. You can just feel it through the words and then yours. Help me a lot from a personal journey because I had naturally like all of them even the little things like I had put on weight and my unhappy marriage. No surprise there. And now I’m keeping it off. And believe it or not masturbation is not a problem for me. It literally just dissolved once my mind was happy. It was like some anxious habit I was doing through all those years of unhappiness and I have a wife now who I respect as a person an individual and even when I was a witness I hated the way they treated women. I had known readers who were like awful I’m thinking get this guy off stage there are ten sisters in here who can read better than him you know and I’ve felt like what do you guys get this idea that women can’t speak up or you know even in the Bible that if they have a baby girl they’re unclean for twice as long instead of just like seven days. If it’s a boy 14 if it’s a girl. The Bible is a book that’s just horrid to women. You know. I started to feel really like it’s not a timeless book it’s not a book that has a lot of truth for me and I’m becoming fully awake and then I hear your story. Your podcast help me and I start to realize my own experiences tell me that there’s a spirituality by firmly believe it’s an individual pursuit. It was never ever ever meant to be institutionalized.

[02:40:40] You can talk to someone about your experiences and spiritual beliefs but like it’s your relationship with the creator. That’s all it ever is and it’s not meant to be chargit. You know I’m gonna let ever trusted again to any institution be it. Lutherans or Buddhists or Daoism kind of appeals to me but that’s more just a philosophy than a religion. And I feel like there’s a lot of just you know your yes your mantra that you say you know love others do no harm and go be happy like that’s just how I feel. And then I heard you talking about. You put on weight and you ask that through my fitness pal which I had to go through. And now the weight stays off. Now my bad habits I was never liked my anxious things have stayed off and I’m happily married and you get to realize what a happy marriage is and my life is infinitely better except for my kids are still being raised in this religion. However I’m so glad that they have me in their life because I think through through me and Mesi and exposing not like letting them see for themselves that my way of life is probably just not attractive enough on its own. Yes they’ll grow up and they should be wiser than I was and I don’t want them. I just sent an e-mail to their mom not long ago like basically saying I don’t want them baptized until they’re 18 if we can work that out. She didn’t respond but I thought there’s too much history of holding a young child to this forever. When they make their decision making at that point is ridiculous.

[02:42:10] There’s no way they can grasp that they won’t think the same later than they do now and then Gina respond. I thought like if they do you can believe what you believe but don’t shun them. You know what I don’t want them to ever feel like their no kids should know the pain of being treated like their dad when they’re still alive. Isn’t that that interesting. I was actually thinking about just that when you were talking earlier about how you know you had this first baby and you were holding this baby. This kid of yours and you were just thinking about you know how much you loved this new than a life that you know and I was thinking you know can you imagine then turning around and shunning them because no what think what you want with me. That was another thought. I always knew that we kind of made fun of my ex-wife and I just forgot the time when I was in that organization made fun of my mom because we knew she was talking to my disfellowshipped brothers and sisters. But every time she talked to us she was like oh I don’t really have any unnecessary communication with them but she always like that throw those disclaimers out you know like your overcompensation for how little you talk to them. Makes me believe that every time you talk like I was disfellowshipped once Mom I know that you have you in your own way. You hobnob and you justify all the excuses to do it. And then my then wife Jessica was very hard on the idea like yeah that’s not right.

[02:43:36] You know and I was like you know you revisit your families all in the organization. Well Sue Smith my son ever decides he’s going to do some. Well then we’ll see how you act. But in my back or mind I could never voice it. But I knew I don’t. I’m going for as much as we laugh about her trying to cover up that she’s talking. I’m probably going to be the same guy and just talk to him all the time because hobnobbing or whatever it is like because you lost support. Yes. I mean you haven’t yet had you. They didn’t do a successful job of rooting out your humanity in the cold. They didn’t. They didn’t destroy your. They didn’t deaden your feelings. They didn’t destroy who you were. And you know that’s something they do to most people. So I would say honestly including myself they had destroyed a large part of yes my sensitivity and made me very hard and dark so their god it’s funny when you hear it now because now I feel so free like I feel like you know when a plane crash goes down and everything burns up and all the bodies are you know everyone dead right. Yet they recover that little black box and can tell you what happens. Some part of me that humanity that little black box was recovered and I rebuilt myself and there’s a new clean around. And it’s just the best feeling to feel like God. The crash and burn hurt but now that you’re you again I mean for the first time in my life.

[02:45:09] It’s exactly like October I went to my brother my brother’s wedding and this is the first time he’s been married and I’ve missed every sibling’s wedding. This is the first time a Brabin Earthlings wedding because I was too high and mighty to not oh I heard through the grapevine mom that you know things that happened to my one brother was married and I never said Congratulations when’s your anniversary I’m glad to hear it for your heart. I hope you’re happy. I was just like oh good. Just one more call that Satan has in you that keeps you in his world. You know there was such condensation about it and to go there. I was beside myself with giddy joy and just tears all the time and apologizing. And even though these are ex witnesses so they get the game. My brother Ruben couldn’t be better. He was like dude don’t I get it. I’ve been stuck. That is the part is that we’re here to be happy with you that way. Thanks for having me here today. And you know there is that touch of hurt where there is no doubt in my mind. And I hate to say this like it matters it doesn’t. But I always knew growing up I was going to be the best man ever that Rubin’s wedding music gave me the best man. Right. And then our lives derailed. We fell out of contact. And I was just happy to be in attendance. You know yeah was ever something that weighed in the balance when it occurred to me as a child. Yes. So then.

[02:46:40] So you mentioned your children then are currently I guess they are with their mom the majority of the time. And maybe yeah we got the weekends and like extra time they have off from school and like somewhere I can get them for longer spurts if I wish. But I’m on basically the alternating weekend schedule. Gotcha. And so. So then they are are they primarily being raised then as witnesses currently. Well not here not here. They are over there. But my ex has actually gotten married too. So they’re struggling they live in a bigger city now and they miss their old home. They’re adjusting to a new man. Like you know one is for and he’s going to be for February. He’s pretty easy to well just because he’s so young still. No one who remembers everything now he’s 7 but he’s starting to exhibit some so he’s got some behavioral stuff that he’s an angry 7 year old. My parents got divorced. You’re young confused who the world does make sense and your mom tells you dad is not going to make it into paradise and you love your dad and you hate that that’s a thing. It’s she shouldn’t have to worry about that. So we tried to make very clear boundaries of like can I ask. Has that literally happened that has. That’s a true thing. Yeah. You. His mom has really told him that you want to be in paradise. Well someone has because they came they came to my house one time one visit and he was having a moment where I sat him down and talk we’ll go out with as well. What’s why are you acting this way.

[02:48:11] And he was you know crying until her dad. Are you going to be in the paradise. You know I say what. No I don’t. Misty was there as she cast that and thankfully because she’s got a really good way with that as well. Some people call her. Some people call it heaven. Some people you know make an eternal reward and I doubt whether his grandparents or his mom or whoever said it that even if it was just inferred that anyone who doesn’t go to them that’s why do you think that he says you don’t go to the meetings and I say right. You know that this the Bible say you have to go to meetings to make it in producer doesn’t say that God judges your heart. And I asked them what do you think of my heart my good man or a wicked man. And he’s a good man. Yeah. And only God can see that right. So he gets to make a decision. So whoever said I wasn’t going to they don’t get to make that decision. Only God knows my heart. And I think you know my heart when you smile and laugh that we were just like. It’s a messed up seem to think. To see those pictures that kids see and think oh my dad that could be him that could be them you know he’s not alcohol and I just feel for them. However the great thing is now we’ve established I are very good at like we’ve got a lot of counseling the two of us. And I want my kids to go to counseling.

[02:49:27] I want people to talk about their feelings and we will talk more and be open communication. There’s a lot and we’ve already got him where he’s excited about. We don’t tell him you have to talk about Christmas you’re celebrating Christmas with us but when he’s here. Like any kid it’s just normal. He jumps any wants to make Christmas tree crafts he wants to be which presents have my name on them and he knows that he’s to get birthday parties at me. And I asked him how that went. His mom said she’s not mad at me if I want to do it. She said OK I mean you’re obviously mad at me but I think that’s good because know if you want your kid first of all the onus is on her if she wants to enforce all those things especially the gray area stuff that witnesses teach like not just interpretations of the Bible but like the birthday stuff is like to why he can’t be a football you explain to him why he can’t have a beard if he wants one like you explain to him why. Yes it’s a suit but the cuffs around the ankles are too tight like honestly like. If you want that the onus is on you to explain it which hopefully will spur her to really do more research. And anyone who does enough research enough questions are raised and you start to realize much like I was realizing I don’t have a good answer for why I went to a blood transfusion or that I could ever shown him. I don’t have that answer. You know they don’t. It doesn’t. My heart says a different answer.

[02:50:48] And I just feel that is the tough questions are raised to a person that they have to think about maybe they can think about them and whether or not they ever wake up. I believe my boys through our household and I’ve fought and fought for some of their rights like at school he can do a gingerbread house. Coming up this season and we sat down I was doing at the conference as to their father away. But as the teachers asked us well what fast can they sing what can we do here. I actually got I won this argument out where I got them to say I want him to have a choice if he says he’s not comfortable singing a Christmas song Don’t make him do it but don’t just remove him from the classroom and he has to feel that you know he’s already dealing with a lot just moving there and everything in his life but that ostracism and now I’m not normal. It’s like giving him the choice and realizing he can use his voice and has the power of his own voice should give him a sense of I’m worthy. I’m important my voice matters and I will tell him there’s no there’s no harm in singing a song. It was a Christmas song. What’s a winter song is Jingle Bells say anything about Santa Baby Jesus or is it just wintery. Like like I want him to be able to use his mind and encourage critical thinking skills where eventually it’s going to poke holes through flimsy arguments rather quickly but I fear. I think that he’s there showing it.

[02:52:12] You know it’s easy to throw a kid wants candy and cake right but I want him not to feel like it’s just a reward if he says hi or happy birthday to a kid on his birthday. It’s classroom. I said the schools are separation of church and state anyway. They’re not going to be like our religious institution where beeg thought he had the bully removed. And then I kind of e-mail the teacher and teachers start this thing and I could hear on the other line you know she was just hating every second of it but kind of knew she was on the ropes so she had to agree she’s like. OK. He has a choice. If she if he has a choice or he doesn’t let him sing a Christmas song. Well we’re not on the same page. How do you feel and she would say but then she kind of had to say if he has the choice it’s just it’s not a religious institution that can’t be that damaging to anyone’s face. And so at least he’s big at the freedoms that I never had. You know the nation and either different. Yeah. Yeah. And I’m showing it to them in a way that like most witnesses when you leave want your life to fall in shambles you know and the fact that I have a good clean life attractive and things are going well. And it has nothing to do with blessings from Jehovah. I think that they’ll be really smart enough to just see that it speaks for itself or even if they decide they want to be witnesses. I hope that they decide it.

[02:53:37] If that’s what they want and then if they get themselves disfellowshipped and say oh geez Marcia treated me differently then dad who is the exact same he takes my fourth car he tells me he loves me and I could be whatever I wanted and he’s happy to just say spread your wings son you’re my son. And I just wanted to have kids to watch them grow. You know it becomes something more than what they were. That’s all I’m in this for you know. So what about you. What you have any dreams for your new life. I mean any goals for the future something that you and Missy or just you or looking forward to. Well goals. I just want to be happy I want to see the world I want to travel. I’ve got a dog now and we just got this puppy and I take our walks all the time. And I used to have a dog and it was a bad honor. I was terrible dog owner. He stayed outside. Is he going to be in the house because the allergies of like my in-laws when they would visit so he was outside all the time. I never walked him because it was literally go windows all day or go on. I did a bike ride I had to do things and then you come home and you’re something Craddock stealing your time. You know I was a bad business owner because it’s work work work all day and age being like I’ll leave this job half done and then come back and finish and like I get to be a good dog owner. I get to be a good business owner.

[02:55:01] I get to be better at the things I’m already doing in wanting to do because I can more fully invest myself and not feel like it’s a guilt you know how much time did do. Doing this activity like I’ve been taught to Bob bicycling as much as I have. They said wow you know how much this is by are you going to be a the. What’s the point and say Oh well then why why why why train as many hours as you need to. Well don’t you think those hours in the ministry would be better than you know like hours on a bicycle and stuff. And I just do I get to live and I can go to a movie and not worry if it’s like where radar has it’s like I’m an adult. And if it has nudity or whatever it may have I think I can handle it. You know I will walk out the same person that walked in and just say yes that was excessive our former opinion about or whatever. But when you if you just get to if you don’t want to just you you get to be me. I get to learn who I am. I’m a real dog hunter this time not just somebody who wanted a pet but never had the time to do it the right way before. Because it’s a responsibility. It’s a task and I had already felt over responsibility and task in her well that’s beautiful man.

[02:56:19] I mean ultimately it sounds like you found happiness and yet so you know you know like I think it’s an amazing place to be when you don’t have to have you know these future goals that you know you’re hoping like this will bring me happiness or some dream or something because you live in the dream you do your being who you want to be and you’re doing what you want to do. And you know that’s all any of us can hope for. And that’s exactly what Jehovah’s Witnesses steal from people so you have taken it all back. And I think I wish you the best and I think that that’s that’s a beautiful thing and you know just like I say at the end of every podcast I guess love others do no harm and go be happy. It sounds like your. Is the dream Oh I always had a hard time to like even going on vacations you know how when you go on vacations or there’s a kind of holiness towers stop. And my ex-wife. She was always somehow she has this balance but she’s die diehard at the same time where they have no problem not going to a meeting. But I would always have a guide we should be going it’s Sunday. You know we should be going you know we should we should do this and say well all vacation and it’s like you have a disconnect. Where does that come from. I wish I had that. And yet she’s someone who would never ever probably leave the organization and yet me as a person who felt guilty. Any time we traveled somewhere I should be at a meeting hour. Are we going to bring a suit just in case. And it’s and it’s like that’s my life now is I get to travel anywhere.

[02:58:00] I don’t care about me. It’s nice to not worry. Am I going to get my time in on this part of the month. That’s it’s just I’m living my life and on my own terms not on the mere accident. I was born into a faith that my mom decided she liked I want to thank you for listening to David story today. The final part of this story a bonus episode will be released next week in Please subscribe so that you can get it in all of these stories automatically as they’re released. Each time please also show David and other support by going to my Web site shunnedpodcast.com and if you go to the episodes page there you can leave a comment for any of the people who are telling their story. They can not only read but they can also respond to your comments. So just go to shun the podcast dot com and go to the episodes page and you’ll see an individual post for each story and you can reply and comments on those stories. You can also find links to things on there that have helped each person as they were waking up and leaving the cult if you want to hear my personal story. You can listen to a podcast called this JW life or go to the Web site thisjwlife.com. And that was my personal story. It’s a nine part series. And you can if you’re not familiar with the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses you can really learn a lot there about how they function what they teach.

[02:59:44] Alongside my personal story one find a way to show support is to leave a review on iTunes just leaving a five star review leaving your personal comments whatever it is that impacted you. This helps other people to find the podcast so that they can get the help that they might need as well. So I’ll send this one out the way I send them all out love others do no harm and go be happy.

David Part 1.mp3

[00:00:01] Welcome to the shunned podcast. Today’s episode is the story of David. Now this episode and the ones that follow are going to be a little different. David had a lot to share. And so this episode is actually going to be or his episode is going to be three parts. There will be two regular episodes and then I’m going to throw in a bonus episode as well. The bonus will consist of some things that we talked about really before we got to David’s story before we really started outlining everything and putting it in order. We had a conversation that I think was pretty important and that some people need to hear and I hope that it helps others. I will warn you that some of the story that we’re about to delve into is intense. It does deal with the matters of sexual abuse. This is a very important topic. The Watchtower organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses has been under fire recently through some documents that showed up on a faith Leak’s site. Through that story being picked up by Newsweek by the Daily Mail through the Australian Royal Commission through the process that were held at war with the world headquarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses in New York this is a topic that was not talked about inside of the organization as we were Jehovah’s Witnesses. This is something that for an organization that claims to be led by God was largely ignored and that it has taken outside influences to explain.

[00:01:51] For science as for psychologists for four therapists to get to the root of things like sexual abuse how it affects people how predators really are wired and and how they act. And for some reason the organization led by God supposedly claiming to be led by God did not understand this. However these things have come to light and this is a topic that needs to be discussed. It needs to be brought to light so that people can heal. And so that’s a lot of people can know that they’re not alone. So David was courageous enough to share his story so that he could help others feel less alone. And I want to. David was gracious enough to to do this so that I could share it with you. These episodes are going to be a little different. They’re not the normal way that stories are told on here. They will be more conversational. It will be a conversation between him and I and he’ll hopefully you’ll take away quite a bit from it. I hope that this information or this story that you don’t just come away with it. Let’s not boil it down to just being this one aspect. You know this aspect of sexual abuse and the conversations surrounding it. David lived a lifetime of experiences and just a short time. There is a lot to learn here. David is a beautiful soul for allowing himself to be vulnerable and to express these things and then I mean you just see throughout his story that he’s a pretty awesome person a great human being. And sadly. Well maybe not sadly but it is a lot of the most sincere people in the organization known as Jehovah’s Witnesses that leave.

[00:03:50] There was something that I’ve noticed since getting out and that and learning the stories of people that it is a lot of the people who are the most heartfelt and sincere that end up leaving the organization known as the truth so I want to thank David for sharing his life with me so that I can share it with you. And without further ado let’s go ahead and get to David’s story. My name is David. I’m 33 years old. I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I am shunned. All right so then David how do you come into the religion how how did that how do you find yourself in that situation. Well I was born in. So it’s all I really ever knew. And I remember when I was young like looking in my parents Bibles like my mom had a big big black one with the red on the binding of it and along the pages and I opened the inside cover and had her baptism. And she would always talk about being aloof and before and stuff but I just saw everything happening to them. That’s only a few years before I was born. Did it make sense that someone could not be just born into this and I felt so lucky that so then you got to be born in. How did your parents then say your mom. Think you said she was Lutheran. How did. How did she come into the religion. You know how that all originated and maybe your father too. How that came about. Well the way I understand it is my mom came in the religion because she was raised Luther.

[00:05:32] And when they were living up in northern Minnesota some people came to the door some nice people and I know them and I know their names and I’ve even like on separate occasions went up to them and thank them because of my way to my parents and so I wrote my spiritual grandparents but they came in her original goal was she was going to help these poor confused people so she brought them in it was going to share. No no box them up with her. King James Bible about redeeming their soul basically. And so she started to listen to them though and liked what they were saying. My dad he was a bit more skeptical and I’ve heard stories that like since then like the guy who came with his wife who studied with my mom was terrified of my dad at first because he stood in the doorway the whole time and he was actually taking in the information. He just wasn’t showing an eager spirit because he himself was shortly thereafter converted but he stood under this doorway with his arms crossed and right above it was hanging like his rifle gun. And so I was just terrified thinking oh man this guy just hates what I’m telling his wife and he’s not going to stand for it too long. So it’s funny that he was actually being converted in that doorway. So they both kind of were reached through the ministry work in the heyday of the 70s and before 75 to which is important. I think that they were in that mass spell of expansion. Yeah that makes sense. That was a big time because yes they loved 275 that’s when they were in there.

[00:07:08] So then what did it mean to you back then. You know who were you then. How do you feel about it. What was it to you. What did Jehovah’s Witnesses mean to you. Well when I was young my life had a lot of confusion because my parents eventually got divorced when I was still young and I don’t know this sound terrible that I’d actually don’t know how all that was when it happened. Just being young not wanting it to happen not understanding and there’s a lot of confusion that a young person could digest that. So but I remember my mom was teaching us mostly and my dad was around biodome and I hear the question again. I got Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah no problem. You know just what. Where were you. So you know your parents are witnesses. You are. And you’re what are you. How you know how. What did it mean to you. I mean did it when we can kind of incorporate the next question. What was the world view that the religion gave you. You know what. How did it how did it impact you. You know being a young witness well what it meant to me was that I just felt very lucky because I was born into what I was told was the one and only true religion. And so I thought God this just works out great. I just get all my other friends. They don’t know about Jehovah want to talk about Jehovah. They don’t know that there’s a paradise we can have tigers and they don’t know these things.

[00:08:37] And I remember feeling like how lucky I was. But I was also very scared. My world view could be like there were the people I liked and I felt like they won’t get to be there in my grandparents because my parents came in saw both grandpa and grandma on both sides. You know this is my family. What they don’t get to be there. I couldn’t. It was hard for me to reconcile that people I liked and seemed to be good. Still working to make it. I remember as a young kid in school was like first grade. There’s a boy named Gavin and he really he was just kind of trying to push the envelope more than anything like edgy conversion of morals. He was heavy but he liked that I didn’t say the Pledge of Allegiance. So one day he joined me and he said see it either. And he put his hand out of his heart and he just stood there looking at him. I felt so proud that I ran home and I was like time our oldest Gavin you know at school like I know he’s like school friends and we’re supposed to hang out with him but you don’t understand what he did today. He stood up for Jehovah. He did it. You see the Pledge of Allegiance.

[00:09:45] And then you still I get it now as an adult that he probably was just doing it to be edgy and shock value but to my mom she says it didn’t mean anything to me I just couldn’t make sense of it how I know I should be able to hang out with him now because he’s not young you know what he’s doing is trying to make change it’s just a friend and it wasn’t quite that way and then eventually you know my parents got divorced. Things changed a bit. But. Well then what was your childhood like at home. You know how how were you treated. Because it’s not like you just had parents you had parents who were Jehovah’s Witnesses so you know what was life like at home life was at home. Three I guess when is really young pretty easy. Pretty simple. My dad. Some of my earlier memories were signs of his abuse was starting to come out. And I remember things more as impressions like I remember the impression I got here. This was tied to that effect. And I don’t know years or dates but he was starting to be abusive and you know his temper was getting to where my mom couldn’t handle anymore so they were on the edge of splitsville. I remember the divorce took precedence over everything pretty much and I didn’t know why my dad couldn’t live with us anymore. I remember he came to the house with some pleas to get the rest of his things some time. And as a young person I was just fascinated that men in uniform with your shiny handcuffs and guns on their hip were at my house and then Dad grabbed his box and he left and I’m begging my mom like just give him another chance some time. Now I think it’s sitting in his garden. Part of it was because it was a temper issue and his abuse.

[00:11:36] There was an order for protection so he wasn’t allowed in like 500 feet of us and my mom’s way of acquiescing that was well years ago when your father and I came in truth. I actually went up to that meetings in our park Rapids which is a congregation like 45 minutes north of us. And so because the order of protection he can stay here in my town. And he would go to the meetings here and we would travel by 45 minutes to the Kingdom Hall. So that was my my mom kind of after everything hard happened with the divorce she just went like die hard as hard as I’ve ever seen. And I think that’s what’s her mission in life now. She’s willing to drive 45 minutes one way or an hour and half a drive time. This is back in the 90s when we had Tuesday night meeting Thursday night meeting ceremony service and Sunday mornings. And I just remember thinking like we would bring our book bags and we’d have a backpack full of round them on call around home close our lingo I guess play clothes is better than most of ours and that dress clothes and round home clothes that we’d stay in place with our families other. So I was building friendships and Wadena with my dad going there became more and more of like a distant memory where when I would see people like in the store even elders and guys who ignored me had felt like I should know them. Oh that’s a witness. And I just can’t remember the name.

[00:13:03] And it was very odd for me because I was in a sense going to a kind of half 45 minutes out of where I lived but my mom buried there. And because of her situation everyone was sharing you on you’re going through this poor thing and you got to divorce your husband was abusive and you’re just trying to do the best for your kids. She got that love bond as much as she also got the support of you’re in a new hall where you used to go years ago. And there’s that return to old friendship. You’ve got kids. So there’s that warmth of welcome that love bond as well and I just got all these new faces to elders and elders Gittel new fans. Anyone taking an interest in me and it was great. You know for not just being anonymous speak. Yeah yeah. I mean that makes sense. What happened to your dad. So he goes to the creation you know where you lived. I mean you know if there’s an IPO and things like that. Was he disfellowshipped. No it was actually my mom divorced him because he was abusive which was unscriptural so she and the others I guess tried to make amends like tried to keep them together which we’ll get into the elders qualifications as marriage counselors. Later I’m sure. But you know like two people dealing with serious issues before when I was trying to raise us four remaining kids you know before us even I had an older sister who I had never met. She ran away at 15. I was just a baby I had no memories of her at all. And like that was always she was like this legend of something I knew would never matter.

[00:14:49] Like oh that would be my sister you’re talking of. She ran away because my dad’s abuse she couldn’t take him. She hated him. They had very strong character and butted heads nonstop. She eventually just ran away. No no word from a mom where she was headed or anything. Very hard life for her son. Your dad wasn’t. So was your mom disfellowshipped. No not disfellowshipped. She was just like put it in that light. I don’t know if it was her proof even I haven’t. I’m very. The details were kept for me. I just know that the elders didn’t. They were also friends of my dad so they kind of took his side because she was getting a divorce on UN scriptural grounds even though he was abusive. But they everybody knew him as this great guy. He was a great guy to all of them. They never saw any abuse. They all thought that while she had it coming Malfi daughter we know what she was like and my mom just. My mom was just hell bent on this like idea. I’m not going to let one of these other boys grow up like I lost one daughter to you and your attitude that she’s got these remaining four. She is not going to be with him and even it was kind of like reproof but we’re advising you stay together. My mom said thanks for your advice.

[00:16:06] But no still divorced him and that’s what kind of put her in a way where she didn’t get a lot of sympathy or support from the local elders which I also think it made her made it easy for her to jump ship and go up to that kind of relationship. If it was 45 Maria that makes away yeah go go where nobody really knows you. To that extent or knows the current situation is so much. Yeah. And oddly even the people in the congregation north though didn’t know the extent because that’s kind of the area where they came in to the organization so they knew him and they knew her but they kind of knew enough to they were a little more I guess her side than his side. And they were sympathetic then rather than he was their body necessarily like he would have been at the Park Rapids that was that was I don’t know. It was like her side his side and somehow their bodies took a side. Oh yeah yeah yeah that’s yeah that’s how they work. So then you know you’re now going 45 minutes to this new creation. You know you’re a little kid and and so now you know you’re progressing into your teenage years. You know how how did how did life transpire you know how did how did life go as far as you know at school. You know at the Keenum Hall at home. How is being one of Jehovah’s Witnesses impacting all that. Well eventually along the way my dad. Now the divorce has happened. He always tried to be a part of our life right.

[00:17:40] He won all against the order for protection he was intercepted on the way through school like you some gifts or say you know don’t don’t tell your mom this is this came for me and when you come home with a skateboard she knows you need to go buy a skateboard. I remember this one skateboard he bought me or intercepted me in his car. It’s funny how my dad was such a strong character when I look back at him I can see where he could be stubborn and pigheaded and have a temporary. He is very sure he stopped me in his car like that you know like right in front of me is at the stop sign is they’ve already had the brain of the skateboard and he shows it to me. I just love head like blue and orange wheels. That was awesome. There’s the old Broadlawns but there is this union on the bottom. And I remember telling him that I can’t I can’t have it’s kind of you here. And he looked at me kind of rolled his eyes as they were like OK OK you know he’s being patient to kick out his knife and then starts scraping paint on the bottom right. And this is a little bit of a process. The other car ever starts coming up and they’re like what’s going on. And he just waves them around like he’s not moving his feet. You you go around fitness scratching and yelling and the bottom of the skateboard. And once it meets my standard where it’s not demonic now I bring it home and my mom looks at it and I remember when she like David and you know he can’t be doing this rage. She hated that she had a crush more like that but to her mind that’s what she had to do. Is he broken.

[00:19:10] He can’t be giving gifts like this. And when we first went the park Rachal there was a brother who took an interest in me with a bow and arrow and I was like Native Americans in archery and Robin Hood and just the middle like that kind of stuff. And I got a bowl for you what someone’s got to give me and it’s a Borio. And then you are still working in a house all showing an interest in me Mama. She’s always she’s just happy son was interested in her kids and helping out and she’s going through all that stuff. But then when the guy gets me along because he also knew my dad he says well don’t tell your mother this was from your dad and you want you to have it. He knew it couldn’t get it so he was like using subversive means through people and all contacts to still distort things to us. He was always trying he just wasn’t sure he didn’t have the skill set to be the dad that could have worked things out with my mom and be a dad that way. And eventually he gets remarried. So what happens to my dad is he gets remarried to another gown and because the divorce wasn’t scriptural this is his first you know love outside of the marriage bonds they meet with the wife his new wife that is she gets disfellowshipped when it comes his turn to meet with the elders he goes to the ones here with Dina who are also his buddies. And then he says something to the effect that like King David was sorry he did awful things and they parted him basically he gets no punishment.

[00:20:40] So his new wife gets disfellowshipped because she married someone who is technically not scripturally free to remarry. Yes but he being the guy who knows he’s not scripturally free to remarry skates. Yeah. That’s the thing is he gets in there it goes back to he could just rally against these local elders so much. But they I know them and they talk to me about this situation before and they said well you try to help a guy out. You’re all that comes back to bite because they gave my dad a break there and they admitted that they did it disfellowshipping there. What happens now is bird goes up to the third overseer. He says Wait what. The wife is our husband got to stay because he you guys this decision he wipes that judicial committee out of. None of them are elders anymore. So now they really think my mom and my side of the family is like that. They got axes to grind it away and yeah they lose their position. They kind of just become rank and file again and other people are promoted Hall’s kind of failure for a while. Eventually they do work their way back up where I think for sure. Two of the three I don’t even know if I know ever who the third one was on that meeting. But yeah two of the three are now elders again. They have been elders for years. It was just one of those situations where because so much of all calls by family and they feel like they’ve been on both ends of it receiving go.

[00:22:14] They got removed as it was their decision and they were giving a free pass and then when it came back to bite they like further than like my mom or my family. But now my dad’s remarried he goes to live where her whole is with the new wife and then retroactively he is disfellowshipped because the CEOs wife removed those elders meet with the ones who are disfellowshipped her and do what they say. So he meets with her elders and they say Utu Gairy you disfellowshipped. And now they’re both disfellowshipped living out of Wadena and my mom kind of sees that as an he’s moved down his life and Wadena is now open for us to return again. So we stop going to the park rapids meetings. Then we return back to our home congregation which after all the elder body and now their wives and they’re none too happy I think to see us again. I mean here comes drama you know how you know and then they’ve they’ve been some of them have been removed as elders and the family’s been impacted. Wow I’m sure they were shooting daggers when they saw you all walk in. Yeah pretty much. So then how did go you know for you at the new place. You know I don’t know how old you were at this time. Well this is kind of a part of my life back that gets to my teenage years. Elders who were removed are healthy locals are fine with anyone. I feel like I’m an outsider. Skateboard. I listen to music and I change my wall and they just think of me is weird.

[00:23:53] He’s that kid at every get together he’s outside playing hacky sack rather than shooting with the most elderly senior members of the congregation. So he’s if we’re taking a pause the next one to leave was higher on the radar. And I just knew that day back in the Devils game. I knew there was this person. I’ve always felt there was a perception of me that Blake Well like any other youth who lash out or act out alone. My mom didn’t know what to do. So she had a man in her life for a long time and I would think she was drama just completely anything that came up. I’m calling the elders to the elders dealt with us like we like you know they don’t want to come over and talk to you about your music or you’re really mad at your mom right now and so it’s like they were out there with chop talk to a girl. And the dad knew about and I was feel like I remember them not I not I don’t know if it was any of Ridgway heads. You know that’s that’s who she turned to because I think she went all in on the religion. Yeah. For her situation. And if it wasn’t going to help her in the stressful times. I don’t know. She gave it her. Also she expected her to save her and give that back a chance. Yeah. That was her relationship. It became her relationship that was so cute. Yeah absolutely. And then eventually Don she gets remarried in 98 and now I’m probably 14 going on 15.

[00:25:29] And no I don’t like the guy that never see my mom happy like this before. So you know you’re kind of like it and don’t have any affinity to him or closeness to him. No he he had a lot of issues himself I just never got completely comfortable with him it was more like my mom husband moved in with doesn’t he was he was a roommate of sorts more than a father figure at all. And because of his own issues I often she herself made comments about to take another kid growing up on know little kurumsal stuff like that where you just feel like even when he wasn’t around. My mom’s words and opinion of him really made me think look I don’t have any warm fuzzy toward this guy and if that’s how you will feel at all here and I just he just exists in our house. But that’s not fair. We’re going to put him or you in here. There he was we were he had he had issues that we could do like five podcasts on just him and he wanted back to me. I feel like this is the point where from a spiritual standpoint I didn’t like my hall and thou. I didn’t like my home life. And so I was at a point where I didn’t like what was going on at school I had friends as popular people like me a lot of Skeeter’s so we were all kind of outcasts. You know you find each other. We’re going to have if you’re a loner you at least had to fight. They’re loners. You don’t know let’s all be a group of people who are reviled.

[00:27:05] But yeah he’s looking for a community however they can find community. Yeah. So however there was a guy who moved into our kingdom hall Steve. A I would just call him he was probably the greatest influence in my life. He was the person who I would say kept me in the organization. I saw his example. I saw his. He was the first person who showed me that there is another way of anything. How to be how to act how did you know what a joke how to have fun. He made service fun. And I felt like that was a huge part. Before you can have a lot of the people you’re going to talk to you just have to have fun being now and other he moved to my hall and he went with a few blocks away. And this was in his mid 20s at the time I’m late 20s possibly. And he played guitar. I want to play guitar. He taught me how to play music and I love it. He had a skateboard. He wasn’t as good as me but you know you don’t see anyone else in the congregation who you with. Consider an adult having this type of toy. So he really made an impact on me being that he only lived like five houses away or blocks away I could just go and do I didn’t want to hear how my mom and her new husband. And I’d say hey let’s go over to Steve’s. So we just up and go.

[00:28:25] And that was like a refuge a home away from home big brother who at this time a real pleasantly big brother had been discipleship as well as my older sister so for being as far as kids who were around when my mom was remarried the second time to Kenny was it was mostly myself and my younger brother Donna and my nephew Zach. There’s too much story here. I don’t know where to go I have to go back. I missed a very important point. Okay glad. The reason my nephew Zach lived with us. Yeah it wasn’t that kind of jumped out at me. Yes my sister who obey and not abandon it ran away from home when we were young kids and I never really knew her. She lived a hard life on the streets and in 1994 she got in contact with my mom again from her pattern of life she had picked up HIV and that she was going to harm. I think we reached out because she realized for her it’s probably in line. So she moves back up to me and I saw that I get to meet the sister finally who is just. She was a really great influence on me. She could really help me. He was worldly as all get out but she really helped me. From a standpoint of my what I liked she was into what I was into and she wanted something for me that was what I wanted for me not just like whoa I want you to do this because that’s what I want for you. She kind of was whereas people who liked your spread your wings and that will fulfill you. So it’s really good to have that balance.

[00:30:12] But she moved first and then made way for her husband and two adoptive daughters that were his come up from Houston Texas after I got to meet her and the girls came. Then lastly the husband came and they lived in our little town for a while. And they were in the drugs and some very unsavory characters were always lurking around and eventually it ended in a murder where he killed her and my mom ended up taking in the two daughters who were at his adaptively and they at that point had one kid my nephew Zach wholely. So yeah. You know the three of them are not get the four of us and then three more come on board the two girls eventually a lot of thing came about where they were my mom wasn’t able to give them what they needed. And being is she kind of turned them over to the state because was too much they and all by herself having seven kids and these grandkids now living with you being that Zach was the only one really that was my sisters. At no state are you there. And then my mom got remarried eventually after that. So. Gotcha gotcha. Hear you cut you cut in a little bit cut in and out a little bit. The signal seemed to go or something but. So sure. I think I don’t want to say I like but I’m going to say it. I like that. You know this story has so much to it that you just kind of glossed over the fact that your sister was killed by her husband.

[00:32:02] I mean wow that is you know like like you it’s it’s so so much of a story here that I mean that alone is enough. I mean what I know you know I can’t speak for you but you know what kind of impact did it have on you. You know you know that your sister was killed. I mean it seemed like she she had come back. You know you finally get to meet this person in your life. Yeah. You know she’s having an impact on you a positive impact in this horrific thing happens. You know how was it. How did that impact you the way you felt. How did that. How was that viewed in the congregation you know because I know how witnesses can be about things where they were they comforting and supportive or everything. Well you know she just deserved got what she deserved. It’s a weird situation because when she came back in her life in 94 at first it was just her. And then when you rifled through someone and you know them like the same photos that you have of them and you just look at the same photos. This is my sister this my sister this Mrs. And then they come and they meet you and they smile like your other sister and they’re animate in the flesh in front of you. It’s like the scary thing is though all of that happened. I don’t mean to sound like I had glossed over it but that happened. I met her 94 and she was murdered in 96 when I was 10 to 12. So there was like it’s like more of a memory of a dream. Yeah.

[00:33:46] In my life where someone just kind of came and made a huge impact and slid it on. And I feel like it’s it’s the craziest thing to think about that I could have you know. And you know I would say don’t forget but it seems so brief. You have to remind yourself now because like the two daughters after the situation live with us remember Robert caravan all of us down to when she was beating Kenny. But then when they got married it just struck me that other girls weren’t there because they had kind of gone to foster care homes to the state’s care. My mom just kept my nephew Zach. And oh yeah it’s just it’s just very weird to remember that when this happened. And those memories they never got to be around him when they were actually married together I think that was like my memory is very jumbled in a lot of this. I mean I think since you were so there’s a lot you’re so young. You don’t do birthdays still like timelines are hard to keep. I was very in survival mode. Like I remember I just remember being maybe middle child syndrome or whatever you want to call it that like I always felt like. I remember once telling my mom called my older sister I don’t know and she ran away. So that makes you think Julie my my immediate oldest members remaining sister who I did know is only a girl after Rubin. He is now the oldest to. Will have to wait. He’s like the all male the housemen Jonas the baby and here I am in the middle like it was this you just entertain yourself.

[00:35:21] You feel you fall into yourself and you start finding like I don’t know you know how kids are I guess where they find their own. You make do with what you have and if you feel like your parents up against a lot. I knew my mom was part of the thing. I could do to help her was just not worth it be invisible. But I had a lot of humor and I was the glue that kept her work together. But I also was very good at trying not to ask for help or ask for needing anything. And that was that was part of my what I can do is you know does it make. Yeah I don’t make waves. I help heal and then they receive back and say you know there’s me you make jokes you make people laugh and I hear a conflict. So try and do what I could. But it’s it’s it’s a lot of demographic in any any family or household. Yeah. I mean what you’ve told me already is a lot of story in that there were just there are a lot of characters moving in and out of the story and there are a lot of there’s a lot of transition and there’s a lot of heavy stuff. And I think you know when it’s your life. You know I just kind of normal like I mean I know when I told my own story on my pug podcast there was something about when I actually you know I never really thought about it it was just my life and whatever.

[00:36:58] When I sat down and was actually writing some of it out and I was standing there for hours speaking about it you know just kind of hit me you know if somebody else had told me that story my own story would have probably given them a lot more compassion than I’d ever give in myself for it you know. And you know you have a lot in your story you know to this is a there is a lot of moving parts and you know you could just take this part of it or that part of it and segmented it off and it would have been it would have been tough. And you know when you add it all together. You know of course you were just trying to survive. Of course you were. I think I used the term dissociating earlier. You know I think part of being invisible is just kind of dissociating us and you know there’s a lot going on here and I’m just going to kinda be in my own little world and do my thing. You know occasionally I’ll pop in and try to make people happy or try to lighten you know a heavy mood. And it’s it’s a lot to carry. You know when you think back to a 10 12 year old kid you know that’s that’s a lot. So I’m just saying that you know you know of course you don’t remember all of these things of course you’re not going to remember the Tom lines man you had a lot going on. Yeah. You know that’s a lot. Yeah. It’s I don’t apologize for calling tangental let me come across. I always will.

[00:38:41] No no no apologies no apologies you’re presenting this in a very logical link. I’m about to say like one of those points from the theocratic Ministry School a logical coherent development. Now I have to edit my blood. But yeah like you know what you’re saying you’re telling it a very logical way. Man you just got it’s just you’ve got a lot going on there. And you know I guess what I’m kind of telling you is you know from an outsider’s perspective you have some has some compassion for yourself. You know you went through a lot. This is a lot of stuff for. You know we’re just up to here. You know you’re young adulthood I guess. You know it’s a lot of things for you to have had to deal with so you know don’t don’t be hard on yourself for how it’s presented yourself on the back for even being able to present that this well you know it’s there’s a lot of things here. And you should be commended for being able to create a cohesive story out of it and make something there. Well thank you. I do take I don’t know I take credit for it but I also feel like how can I not have a handle on things that happen to me and you know. So there’s some stuff that is like I know when I talk to my mothers sisters and they fill in things I’m like oh yeah. And so for what it’s worth I think I’m doing good Deshi remember as much as I do. I’m sure all the gaps are filled in I don’t know. It’d be just too much to even utter out loud.

[00:40:33] I just don’t know if someone else was telling me this story. I would look at them and say well you know it’s ridiculous. If this note you take that out take this out take this out and it still sounds like some Hollywood script that’s just too fantastical to ever be real but I went through it. It’s the it’s real. You’re not the only person who’s you know there’s a podcast I like to listen to. I mentioned on my podcast called The Mental Illness Happy Hour. And on it people tell their stories. And you’re not alone man like you know obviously hers has unique qualities we have the Colts of Jehovah’s Witnesses in it. But you’re not alone. There are so many people that go through so much and I don’t know. I just think you know. Good for you for you know being strong enough to make it through all that and whatever you can remember of it of course you can’t remember all of it. Nobody can we all. All of us can go back and get things you know filled in. But you know you should. Don’t. Don’t worry about how this is all coming off. Because I’ll tell you now this is coming off very well at least you know know from an outsider’s perspective. And it’s just it’s just a lot and you know. I know you just mentioned Steve so like I was a I’m sorry the. So so you know you’re just getting to that segment of your life so you know how did how did all that start to you know. I think I derailed you a little bit.

[00:42:24] Oh that’s good though. Oh I do. I do want to ask though you know how did the congregation react about your sister were they do they do what I assume. Well it’s this will leave you may be gutted to know and I don’t know the validity of it’s true or not but I wouldn’t put it past anyone. Once word got out that my sister had returned and she had wild piercings and tattoos and had lived basically just the street life she told her stories about getting to Texas was like I had to jump on a moving semis that I got into because it was obvious this guy is a creep you know like there were stories that were circulating around the hall someone came up to my sister was on some medication it wasn’t yet AIDS but it was HIV and she was taking a medication that was experimental and she would get sick occasionally. And like I know that she would get sick but there were some sisters in the hall who said that oh she was in there and we heard puking and then when we went in and looked there was a massive storm. We had to clean it up and we shouldn’t have to be the ones to clean up HIV over sickness or whatever. This is not a hospital where she is that kind of care she should stay home. They didn’t. It was not welcoming. So again a flip flop happened with my mom and sister we’re going up to Park Rapids with us and this is going to blow your mind because eventually the girls do get there.

[00:43:51] And so now it’s the four kids or five kids and my sister being reunited and then her two girls and there we were crammed in this car. I remember sitting on people’s laps like driving up to 45 minutes late. There was one that was a blizzard and it was so bad my mom was like couldn’t see the road. But my sister Kelly said she was going to just look out the window. She’s a artist I can see. And she was literally like voice guiding my mom like okay I can see the white light with her head out the window in the blizzard Amber thinking like just how happy I was that Kelly was here and she was being so heroic that we were all get home safely. And a 45 minute drive which lasted about an hour and a half and it was just like I remember things like that crammed into people’s laps and it was a new struggle and all that and I felt like now it’s really starting to get into me that the the elders and Dina and the sisters who they made this story up like I know my sister was sick and had her problems. And that would have been a bad thing if it was true. But she was also deeply embarrassed about her condition. Wouldn’t let us wash our clothes in with her load wouldn’t let us use her like toenail clippers and stuff like that. Like just very like she there’s no way she would have left a mess for somewhere else to clean up. Data just there. Yeah. They didn’t want her there. They didn’t like her there.

[00:45:21] They felt like they didn’t like my mom anyway and now they have just this old guard more like can’t we just have a normal day like I think is their approach and we want to park rapids and how much more loving reception rather than the people who have just known me or my family for 30 plus years. Said these guys were welcoming every time and they were happy to have Kelly even if they viewed it as her final days. Not knowing a murder would happen but just because she was sick with this thing ever felt like that made me feel much more spurned against the local connotation and like I did not have any warm fuzzy thinking about Wadena at that time. However that was that was how it went. My sister anyway. I preferred the northern migration just because she was the greatest and they were accepting of her. Did they show up. You know I don’t know if there was a memorial or a funeral or whatever the situation may have been. Did they you know show up and show support for you guys. They did they absolutely did. Once the death happened they came out and I think that has a way of just releasing anything even negative feelings you may feel justified in having her. And I feel like whatever the situation was they did come out in droves from her mom’s support. Good good.

[00:46:43] Yeah that’s that’s one of those instances where you can actually I mean as long as they were just doing it you know to be a good witness which some people do out of a sense of duty you know but that’s a place in life where you can start to see people’s humanity come out again. Yes. Yeah. You know that was really good. It was funny though to like just another tangent you don’t have to keep this up but my sister had such an impact on me simply in the way of life that she wanted me to experience days. And I remember having no agency or no voice as a young little child. I was just kind of part of the rank and file that operate in a household. We used to go to the video store and I would stare and stare and stare at like the Star Wars cover. I thought No Luke on the cover with his lightsaber just looks so awesome that I somehow a 10 year old earned a buck. I got a dollar and I went rented it without anyone’s permission. I just stared so long I couldn’t wait until I saw this movie. And I came home with it. My mom said well that’s that Star Wars. She was brought in at an era when that was popular and they would mention it from the platform. What is this ominous force. You know and so the measure is so she says no way not my house makes me take it back and feel ashamed. I just like the lady at the counter look at me just like you already. And I just remember like wanting to die and cry. I just slid it over and I said No I don’t need anymore. And I would never get my dollar back. I just had to return it. And then my sister had went to bat for me while I was gone.

[00:48:23] You know in this movie she had talked to my mom and said lives you know and you know she ran away and done what she wanted before she went Stockhausen’s and there’s nothing weird about it. There’s no guards there like demons. It’s just it’s just part of the sex fantasy sci fi thing you know. So then my mom softened a little under the. And I just remember like that was like the first time I can really really remember someone going to bat for me and saying you know my sister stood up and somehow they. I think the money just came from one of them now feeling bad but we went. We watched Star Wars and that was like a really off Emmy 10 year old boy. Right. That’s a big of life just watching hours on the left. But that my sister who I just met recently took a special interest in like stood up for me to enjoy this movie and then we loved them. Now we’re like one of my favorite things anyway. Yeah. That’s awesome man. Good for her and I’m sure it felt good for you to. It is really funny to talk about my sister I think about her because like for someone who just he basically came through your life so transiently me and only me had threatened to do these like two or three things that they were things that meant so much to me.

[00:49:39] It’s really like it just speaks to my heart my soul that she she came in touch stroke my face it will have the impact she had and then was gone but it was so like landmark moments in my life that would become like that love of Star Wars and like that laid the groundwork for when I met Steve he’s a star wars fan and he’s got the Lord of the Rings books which I don’t even want to read because there’s this word Lord and. And then slowly though you start to gain will be experienced through him running away and Steve was from New York so he experienced a much more than whatever. And these were the things that spoke to me was that I didn’t have to grow up get a pickup truck and just hunt deer. My whole life you know would be like this would the rural Minnesota if it’s not ice fishing and hunting it’s like where do you fit in. And I didn’t know that spoke to me. But that was the area I lived in and I didn’t know if it was because it who I really am. Or is it just because my dad wasn’t around so I never had that much male influence that says let’s get some guns and go Hunter you know kill stuff and I just felt like I don’t know if I am my more feminine maybe because my mom was always me and so I don’t have the machismo side or is it like. It’s not necessarily a feminist view a distorted view of masculinity that I’m sure you have been a sensitive guy. I didn’t know they could exist yet. My wife yeah. Every guy was supposed to never cry. Oh yeah. You know you have a firm handshake. I totally understand that.

[00:51:23] And there are segments of male society that I do not fit in because I’m not a guy who’s great with you know I’m not a hunter item. I’m in the same boat in a lot of ways you know. So I totally understand. And I think it’s the synchronicity of you know here. Yeah. Your sister floats into your life and has this impact and now you know here you are later in life and you know you need you need another Kelly. And in here Steve you know yeah Stephen A. And he’s there for you. Yeah and they both allowed me to be like listening to my heart and sensitive soul if that’s what was calling to me that was speaking to me for a reason if the star wars it was. See you play guitar. I want to play guitar. You know you had a rule ball kind of where he was a very spiritual. He moved to our congregation to help out. Yeah he had moved out from New York to help in a nearby area. But he felt like on this area things are good but I’m not doing all I want to go where they really need me. So we asked the CEO and the CEO said well after all that’s happened to Wadena you know there’s a bunch of young ones there. There’s a lot of confusion in this little direction there’s no good influences. Go to Wadena. So then he came to Agena and instead of being there is like anyone who would just be there to patch up work and obligatory this is the task I’ve give and so he was really kind.

[00:52:57] I remember hanging over his house and I just loved him and laugh at stuff that I had never heard people laugh at. He was like a sensitive soul. And he was different. He was different kind and nonjudgmental he didn’t know about my family or care about my family’s past like that meant anything about me. But I remember there was a time where someone had called on the phone we were over at his house hanging out. And that was like just get away because we do want to be near my mom and my stepdad Kenny at the time so we just would go Steve’s. And he left for a long time after school. He would come home from work. Oh yeah he was that kind of open door where it was really cool guy. And I remember we were hanging out though and he got off the phone and said I hate you guys this but that was some other people in the congregation that were more his age and he said they had players I forgot about hang out and then I know we were doing this but they have asked that you guys not be there you know. And I remember feeling like Redsox on those people who call and it took our evening away. They suck but more importantly like I was pretty used to it at this point of people thing you know basically scrambling for the kids table you know the adults are going to play now. But I wasn’t used to anyone having that level of compassion like you saw pain. He hated having to tell us that he even though he thought that the nights over there you know you didn’t.

[00:54:26] I just missed this guy cares and that was like a really big thing is to have someone just like to be around you. He like it either. Yeah yeah I’m here. Yeah. So anyway he just he just liked us and that was like the first person you know in this hall a long time that I felt like like to be around us and it just had to do it because all spiritually I can’t judge this person. Well yeah I mean you all have been down off the right word as pariah but do you all know the way your family moved around and you know all the stuff that was surrounding it. I mean it’s unfortunate but Jehovah’s Witnesses can be very hateful. And clicky and you know to go around feeling like you never fit in. As I experienced it as an adult when I was younger I did fit in. I was kind of like the oldest one and I guess I was the ring leader of our group at the hall or whatever. But you know when I was older and left that congregation and moved elsewhere I never fit in. And and it’s a very lonely place too. I think one of the loneliest feelings in the world is not to actually be truly alone but to be in a crowd of people and know that nobody there has your back or any interest in you. And so I understand what you’re saying there it’s very important to feel like you know somebody wants you to instead of. Yeah. And he was at that perfect bridge where he was a cool guy.

[00:56:12] So he was cool enough to get the young ones. Yeah but he was like he like me and he was an adult and he wanted to be around us just like I could go on and on about him and the impact he had but basically really continued the word that my sister had laid into the books I read the music I listened to all the things like universal he just he was a father figure when I hated my stepdad and I didn’t really know my real dad and he with a brother or my other brother was disfellowshipped and he was just everything and I meant a lot at that point my life. Now you did. MARTIN He was leader. He did it. I could go on about him but I should probably just wrap it up because it simply he was the best ever. He did everything for me. Yeah no that’s that’s beautiful that he showed up at that time and it could be that for you. I mean obviously he made a huge impact and I know man that’s just that that’s just a beautiful thing. It’s an it’s a shame that ultimately you know cults come in the way of things but good for him for being that person for you. You know when you needed it. And for for being that’s in it kind of it’s beautiful that he was that person. But doesn’t it also kind of almost in a way condemn everyone else on a level you know here a guy had a move there from somewhere else so that you could find one person you know. Yeah I never thought about it from that angle.

[00:58:01] I just knew that I was lucky to have him here at that point at that point in my life. I felt like George had given me that big brother no father. All those things that were being taken from Jesus by other brother was disfellowshipped and it was just so obvious his hand was in the matter. And even still a lot of good in me. And you missed the what I call mislike for whatever that’s worth. Well I think it’s cool but he put that as such a part of me wanted to be around him more than anything or anyone else in the world at that time. And it was like I was finding my place. The longer I stood near him I was finding my place and fitting more and more into what I call just like those whether he was in a lot of ways the laws that were just written across my heart like bull. This is this is something that’s written in my core. And I love that I can express it. I just didn’t know how I was going to say you know he didn’t he didn’t make you you. He just showed you that it was OK to be you. Yeah yeah. It showed me that there was a different way. It was okay to be yourself and seeing him as my personal miracle like that God put my life as a witness that everything really was probably a touchstone thing. I would say kept me in the organization. Now I had experienced something that I felt was miraculous and I was thankful for. And he was doing it and he was cool as all get out.

[00:59:40] And then when he got married I remember at that time he was you know starting to date this girl and I don’t think they were dating yet even. But it was a very charming story. But anyway long story short she was at our house and so was this Steve be from New York who came out to visit him in his new Minnesota sort of set up. Steve is visiting Steve a who’s already the greatest influence in my life and I get to meet the other person from New York. And then this girl’s coming over she’s visiting and Steve and her you know they just we’re talking like I was kind of cognizant of that you know feeling OK it might be something. Here she was from another Croatian village 60 miles away. But there was a time when she was going to leave and was rather late at night at 10 o’clock or whatever she still had our drive she goes out to her car. We think she’s gone. And then it comes back and says My car won’t start. And Steve just jumps up. All I’ll take you. And is that we are happy in the car. Eve is driving in the front seat with his girl he’s interested now in the middle seat was this guy who was traveling with Steve B at the time and came out from New York as well who were staying with her. There’s a breathalyzer and he was sleeping in the middle seat.

[01:00:59] And then Steve and I were in the back talking and I noticed that Steve had put him in the girl in the front were talking with their heads rather close and I could just see and see Steve and we start talking. There was a score between these two as well. Look at that are this close and have you noticed they’re talking about you and I like having to show it to whisper Steve’s got the music faded to the back so we can’t hear it. They have some up there late in the backseat of the van which was like his work van. You know he was a window washer as well. So that like he gave me the music that I play the books that I read and I became writer of my own music like he did and recorded an hour when he got married. He said Well I’ve got this you when they were currently building up to you or take over. And so I became a window washer as well and like a lot of my life is like just had his fingerprints are over who I am even if it was just him allowing me to be yo and then at that point I saw it as another miracle that here now on the very evening that they were having their long convert conversation that he had been taking her tell her that she had to work the next day so he was going to drive an hour out of the way an hour back just to give this girl a ride.

[01:02:16] And Steve and I were talking the actually all the while you know Weezer music a little too out and it was just like oh I’m not losing Steve I’m gaining this other Steve is now my spiritual Big Brother so I’ve really getting it cemented that Joe was not going to leave me destitute and having this this pattern of always being provided a spiritual Big Brother if you will is starting to really cement my mindset that I want to be a witness and be in this you know witness thing forever. And it was kind of when I went to New York with Steve be the first time with my brother Jonah we were out there and this is 82 and just after 9/11 too. So the city was a little different he said and there was more unity after the attack. Of course people tried to feel neighborly and compassion more so. But I feel like I would look at people and they tell me don’t look at it from the eyes and look at people. That’s just how I was being a Midwestern Minnesota boy. I would not say hello and they would start responding back on the subway. I started talking to this guy next to me and you know I am German in high school and he ended up working at some old German TV station out of New York and we started speaking German. And it was Steve B and his sister who really like saw this and I like these that you can go anywhere and there’s something just innocent and boyish charm about your persona that you can get people to open up. You can just they’re drawn to you. They want to talk to you like you’ve got a gift here where you want a gift of gab or whatever they were like they really were the first people that told me you need the pioneer.

[01:03:58] That was Steve was a pioneer and these people seeing the Minnesotan out of his setting in New York is still like drawing people who are normally closed art and don’t talk to each other on subways like that. Maybe they’re right so I might as well give this pioneering thing a shot. And it was just really kind of cementing me in cementing in that it’s going on so then so you’re on 18. Did you go back to Minnesota and pioneer. No I was baptized at 18 actually. Just like a month before Steve a marriage and then from the marriage Steve he gave the wedding talk. Now like the married couple went off and did their married life began. And from that get go. We had our bags packed. You just go with the baby. My brother and I write to New York. So I had only been about taste about a month but they were quickly shaping my goals for me gives me saying that you know you need to pioneer. Look at this child and something oh yeah I did that first month. But you know why not. You know maybe that is what they wanted. I’ll try it if nothing else. So I got back to Minnesota I was just like a week long visit in New York when I got back to Minnesota. I remember mentioning to my elders they started as they can auxillary did that for a while to make sure I could do it. And they had said Do it for a couple months and see if you still want to be a window washer. I had that like perfect employment where you can make your own hours and go on servers if you wanted.

[01:05:39] I had two roommates who were also oh by this point to my mom and Kenny decided they wanted a fresh start out of Wadena. So they moved away when I was 18 going on 19. Right around this time they. They got out like they went to Sioux Falls South Dakota and in an odd turn of events I stayed back so my family left me 15 rather then I moved out on my own right dating within a that I got I got a good thing got you at the window gave. I’m trying to start my own business in China. Get pioneering and I’m going to help this carrageenan. We just lost Steve a I’m gonna stay here and help out my roommates were like no other guys in the congregation obviously and my mom with her husband my stepdad Kenny my brother Jonah my nephew Zach all went to Sioux Falls South Dakota and I just decided I would stay behind I liked within and had the right goal for me so I was going to see it out rather than go with them. So then where are you where do you go from there. You know you’re not alone in this new Plaisir you’re pioneering living this you know bachelor life washing windows you got roommates and you know where did you go from there. Well my roommates actually the interesting thing was they said I could move in with them because the other roommate who was the original third was off at ministerial training school so he would be gone for three years.

[01:07:18] And so they just said well we’ve got space enough and he still had the room but they let me have like a guitar in the corner in a total full of clothes. Every day I would fall about my stuff and put it off in the corner again. And then all my other clothes were still in the garage because the garage was good enough for storage. I had only ever had one room everything I own fit one room in my house any way previous. So I just put around the garage and I remember like getting dressed for service in those early mornings where in the winter dress shirt was like so-called on your skin when you get the Santa Clause. And I would run out. I eventually learned that I should run out grab my suit out of the garage bring them into the house if they’re in the steamy room of the shower with me like they’ll warm up and then it’s not so bad getting dressed. You know the fact remains we got a place of our own. And the guy from ministerial services school he came back and said also you’re here now. And it just kind of worked out where they are you know they knew I was like a young entering manhood trying to do it through pioneering and so they made a lot of allowances for that. It wasn’t like an established business owner. GOODWYN Nawabshah yet but when you got those types of guys in I think my rant was that 120 POCs or something so I didn’t need a whole lot. I was just going about it Virgin I’ve got from there. Now that I no longer have you know mom breathing over my shoulder your parents are adults.

[01:08:47] When you’re a young person trying to spread my wings a little bit Steve and his wife Steve a they moved about an hour and a half away and I still would make regular visits to go visit them. And I started to take an interest in one of the girls in that congregation. And I remember the elders had warned me about this on this dating thing if you’re going to I was 19 but they were thinking it was too young and that I wasn’t ready yet that she wasn’t ready and they were right. And probably every count. But I was young I was 19 and I was ready to where I want to. And there is no one around to tell me I couldn’t anymore. So I had to place my own I had roommates. I was finding out about adulthood in everything and I started this relationship in the with us being young. We never got in serious trouble. But you know we either I ended up being removed as a pioneer so I never made that actual benchmark of getting the secret book you get for being a pioneer for one year. Yeah which made me dramatically sad because if you like took all my separate attempts to pioneer I would like well over a year consecutively so I figured I still don’t get the book and anyway so not that she distracted me. But I was young trying to find out what I wanted and didn’t really know which leads to you learning the truth. The authorization I should say they all they accepted it because they give you the space to make your mistakes.

[01:10:31] But then as we all know with eye witnesses when the relationship it working again at work. I was you know removed as a pioneer or whatever it is it just wasn’t exemplary. They are all these people who are in their nice you know like what is called passive aggressive like very Minnesotan way to just say well we never liked her we know we told just so like very I’m thinking Well where was all this information when you know. I don’t know if that’s a credit or a disservice to them but it’s one of those things where it’s true that one could save me from it or at least you let me learn it myself. I probably wouldn’t have listened. You never know what the right course is but sure. Anyway I had made some stumbles and falls and got myself removed as a pioneer. I remember the feeling of when I just went back to a pioneer instead of like this is what really touched me from Jennies episode was that simply being oh god fearing loving member of the congregation feels worthless. If you’ve ever been even a step above that you’ve gone out and you’ve come back to just rank and file it is like all you can imagine is you raise your hand to comment and people you think everyone’s just like. What’s wrong with him since the why is he not pioneering. What will he ever get back into it. It’s like you just feel like the pressure of do more do more do more and if you’ve done more of quit than never like Oh thank you so much for your service.

[01:12:01] We really appreciate the sacrifice there just like also at one point you were able to but now you’re not. What can you change to get back to that point. It’s like there’s never a thank you. No no thank you for your service. So then so I’m not trying to rush you but I do have somewhere to be at 2:00. OK. I don’t want to leave anything out from your story. Where where should we go next. You know you start pioneering again. No. Eventually I after being removed as a pioneer and struggling with some things and trying to navigate the waters of like life on my own. You know I had a job I was I also had a part time job at Target Johns and I was trying to build the windows up as it was doing both if I could. Then you just kind of you’re young and you’re just learning. And then I started to you know have pitfalls of elders would come and talk me more and more and you know the blinds would go down and you can’t go back to the situation right now. It was it was never like I was a good kid but I was I was struggling. My my friends were out everywhere else. My mom was somewhere else and everything else. And I was just trying to learn on my own and it wasn’t doings anything horrible I felt. But I just I felt horrible about some of the things I had done and they were largely minuscule.

[01:13:38] But anyway long story short I got to a point where I had said kind of within myself you know I had a couple of like worldly girls where we were kissing and such and I had some contact with other people who give you that. After my first relationship didn’t go well. I just remember getting in trouble being frustrated myself that why what’s wrong with me why can’t I get my act together in our lives. I’m very like girls are all I think about and I never never felt like there is anyone for me necessarily around in my area. Every knew my story from the previous one and there was a couple of good I was friends with a lot of girls too. And in my local corrugation there was one girl. But she was quite young for me at that point and I just felt like know I’m not going to ask anyone to eat for me like I’m. No I just I was a lost young man who in 2000 and 3 my dad died down there and we might have to do part one part two and you can salvage whatever audio is missing. Yes you are going to have Connally’s tourism in 2003 your dad died. How were you then. I was 19. That was like right around the time where after my first relationship ended. Even my ex she was like well I’m sorry about your dad. When she reached out to me at a start he’s don’t be a thing that you want to start up again because you’re showing compassion. It’s going to be this art again off again relationship. I don’t want to go through that with you again. And you know like just that and it was one of things where my mom had always been my life saving grace.

[01:15:25] I just loved it to death I took her side on every single thing in the world. I didn’t want to know my dad. I didn’t. I thought of him as what she thought of him as what I thought of him. I was only taught to I was only told things about him from her and people would see stories from within a Kingdom Hall they would say oh well we know your daddy is not the way your mom makes it sound and I’d be like right away like you guys know I’ve died. Believe me I’m well aware of how you think of my family. You’re on his side. Just discredit anything good they ever had to say about him. And then when he died I just remember sitting at his funeral and I this is so crazy so I’m forgetting so much more than going backwards. He after he was divorced from my mom got remarried wife gets a starship. He doesn’t initially elders who let him off the hook. They all get removed new Elder group meets with him. He is disfellowshipped. He comes back after a long time and when he comes back after a little bit of time he starts to say he’s anointed what really set my mom off that he thinks he’s wife. Yeah. So he starts the season knowing dead and he knew it because like something went with blood sausage when he was a kid and I don’t even know if that’s the real story or just my mom trying to make it seem so frivolous that it had no grounds and so now I see my dad as this like crazy.

[01:16:48] You know I don’t want anything to do with him. And then he dies and I went to the funeral and I was mourning him and I got to meet a lot of uncles and people who I didn’t know and the divorce. First of all kept me from knowing his side of the family and the religion as well kept me from knowing instead families. I’ve got all these people caring about me and telling me about my last that I they look like familiar faces because we share blood but I have no idea. And it’s just awful. The feeling of loss. I remember not crying not crying except for when I looked at my nephew Zach thinking he doesn’t get there nor his grandpa and I was so sad for Zach not an actually that I had lost my dad or that I knew enough to miss something that was now lost but where it really hit me was when his widow called me and said Well your father has a bunch of things he wants you kids to have an remember from where I live out to Jamestown North Dakota. Seemed like a world away and we went to go pick up stuff from the widow. A friend of mine in the creation and die. We drove out there loaded the van and we drove back. It was just like I was so dumbfounded with. She had some good stories about him and he was her husband and I just remember thinking Well first of all you were supposed to be this vile woman that her mom hated and that wasn’t quite so. And now I’m starting to think everything else.

[01:18:09] Maybe maybe the guys who were friends with my dad maybe it wasn’t quite so either. Not that I disbelieve. But I see she comes from a totally different relationship with him than anybody else. Maybe add some Sturton to anyone there. I had been ETN for like a full year. The order for protection was done and he had been reinstated. There was no reason I couldn’t talk to him. I didn’t invite him to my baptism I didn’t write a Kargar or anything to him. Then I just feel like now he’s gone and it hit me like that already. It was two and a half hours away or something. I think the drive and I feel like just like you know that’s not the end of the world. Two and a half hours away when I had that graph and there was nothing to drive an hour and a half there vaccine night three hours. And I really felt like I had failed him as a son and I just don’t you know even if he was a jerk I should have taken the time to investigate and find out for myself why I really really beat myself up for saying I should have proven he was a jerk to me rather than just a doorway and with you and to man on the side. And now I can’t investigate it at all. To even have the investigation. I feel like I was just robbed of having a father. He hated it. You were you were you were robbed that. I would say that the word should is a slippery slope.

[01:19:30] And that you were just a kid and so you didn’t have the tools at the time you know if you were who you were who you are today maybe you would oh yeah you would have reacted differently. Yeah but you can’t. Again I think it comes back to that that thing the Jehovah’s Witnesses teach us that everything is in our control that that that everything comes down to choice and you know you can blame yourself and say well you know why don’t I do things differently. But there’s a there’s a great quote that really helped me with some things that I had regrets about and the quote is something like acceptance is letting go of the hope that it could have been any different and that quote meant a lot to me because in retrospect I can look at things and say oh man you know I could have done this or I should have done that. But accepting it for what it was I was doing my best at that time. You David were doing the best that you could have done at the time as a kid and I understand having some regrets and wishing it was different but it couldn’t have been different because you were a kid and you could have done better. I’ve been through lots of therapy ever since the last couple years especially counselling and I have forgiven myself. Is this still a hard thing to feel like now. You know I just don’t know whether to give myself away. And actually like are at whole or side no I don’t know you’re not like I don’t want to push anything or even preach to you from but from my experience my new found spirituality.

[01:21:33] I actually there’s a psychic who had called my wife landed up for this thing and I went in super skeptical going to you know all that stuff scared the life. Oh heck yeah. Yes. And she was like within a few minutes she’s a Christian psychic who talked to the Archangel Michael protecting me in clearing the area. Any negative energies. And then she starts starting. And my dad’s just like I give pounding on the door to get through to me. And I just it was like it was one of those things where I felt like an all you had to say was goodness. And she didn’t know the situation like it was legit to me just a spiritual experience where some saw had broken through and told her that my my. He was sorry he wasn’t there for me and he was here in this life on this earth. He was messed up he had a lot of issues. He had things he couldn’t control and he hated when he couldn’t control things and she said that all these things you were saying and it was so him and she asked me about like other stuff and I just thought this is a legitimate psychic like this is there’s I mean I’ve always been with those types who knock on the door on whether or not there’s a creator spirit around. But what we would say demons any demon to be uncanny thing that you can’t explain it away. And that just that there’s something higher energy whatever you want to call it the source of life was not a single person sitting and judging people for their sins.

[01:23:02] But I feel like oh my god this was this is what I wanted to hear and it was very healing. And it was so authentic and it was just really really part of and part of the healing process for me. I know my gay counselor she told me it’s not your fault you were a kid and you were equipped and if your mom was you know actively poisoning this person you know you were against this person. What else are you supposed to do. Right. Well it’s. No body is all good or all bad to her. And obviously your dad did have some issues. But that is that does not define him as a totality of his existence. And I’m glad that you got to have that experience. And I mean I think we all want. You know we all want to to end on a better note. And I’m glad that I’m really glad that you’ve been able to you know get into therapy and and process some of this stuff because I mean you’ve been through a lot of heavy stuff and I’m just I’m not I’m happy that you got. I’m glad that you can see that. And again it comes back to that. Intellectually you can see that you you couldn’t have done any better but emotionally you still have emotions about it. You know I mean when my dad died I cried not for the dad that I lost but for the dad that I never had. Yeah. Because my dad wasn’t always great. And I think that’s you know that’s it’s only natural to have those feelings.

[01:24:59] And you know you can always look in hindsight you can always figure out how it could have gone better but you didn’t have the tools. And he was the adult in that situation. You know he could have reached out differently as well. He has some he you could say you just as easily say that he has a responsibility in the way things went. But you know what he probably didn’t have the tools either. No no. You know he was a product of whatever environment he came from or whatever biology or psychology that he naturally had. And you know in the end everybody in those situations was doing the best they could. Your mom was doing her best. You were doing your best. He was doing his best and everybody was working with what they had. And unfortunately sometimes our best still hurts. Yeah. You know that’s very profound. You know that’s that’s just all you can that’s all you can do. You know sometimes you give your best and and you’re still going to end up hurt. I want to thank you for listening to David story today. Part 2 will be released next week in Please subscribe so that you can get it in all of these stories automatically as they’re released. Each time please also show David and other support by going to my Web site. It’s shunned podcast dot com and if you go to the episodes page there you can leave a comment for any of the people who are telling their story. They can not only read but they can also respond to your comments.

[01:26:45] So just go to shunnedpodcast.com and go to the episodes page and you’ll see an individual post for each story and you can reply and comments on those stories. You can also find links to things on there that have helped each person as they were waking up and leaving the cult if you want to hear my personal story. You can listen to a podcast called thisJ.W. life or go to the Web site thisjwlife.com. And that was my personal story. It’s a nine part series. And you can if you’re not familiar with the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses you can really learn a lot there about how they function what they teach. Alongside my personal story one final way to show support is to leave a review on iTunes just leaving a five star review leaving your personal comments whatever it is that impacted you. This helps other people to find the podcast so that they can get the help that they might need as well. So I’ll send this one out the way I send them all out love others do no harm and go be happy.

Caleb Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:14] Welcome to the shunned podcast. Today we have the story of Caleb who took a stand and left the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses just 18 years of age. He’s a brave young man and he had to make very hard choices. So listen to his story and afterwork keep listening. I want to tell you what this young man is doing and how you can send him a message of support. Also there’s a special announcement after this story. So keep listening. My name is Caleb. I used to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I’m 19 and I am Sean I was born into the religion. I was baptized at 14 my parents my parents. My father was born in the religion as well. My mom got baptized at 16. She was related to some Jehovah’s Witnesses in the congregation. I was part of the Jersey Shore congregation in Pennsylvania. It’s kind of an odd name but for centralP.A. But yes she was related to some Jehovah’s Witnesses got studying and she got baptized A16. My dad was born in. And my grandfather and my grandmother were actually the ones that started kind of in our family. My grandfather he he was part of the Seabees battalion in Vietnam. He got sick he got drafted and then he decided to join. So he wouldn’t get put in as regular army infantry. So he went in as a construction worker and the Seabees battalion as a welder. I think I think he had gotten training before that to be a welder.

[00:02:09] But when he got back he was in California teaching firearms classes to soldiers. And then sometime after that he started working in the private sector I guess you could say. And he. One of his co-workers was a Joves witnesses and they kind of got started studying then it kind of went off to my grandmother it was kind of interesting. He said after that after he knew it was the truth he went out and he was telling other people. He worked with in the past about it. And it’s the truth. You got to get into it. Yeah. So they got they got into it and that kind of started my family to Joves witnesses while being a Joves witness. When you’re born and it’s your entire life. My mom you know as I said she got baptized when she was 16. She’d talk about when before that she went out with guys boys really when she was in middle school and elementary school and she had Christmas and everything. And she gave all that up when she was 16 obviously. But I didn’t know about that. So it really was nothing to me it but I took great pride in being one of Joe’s witnesses. When you are a Jehovah’s Witness it’s it’s kind of a contradiction in that it’s your entire world. But the organization is so small and you know it’s so small but you think they’re everywhere and that the world is is embracing are this giant force in the world. And so I I took great pride in being a Jehovah’s Witness and being a part of that force. And now our family the Tanners my last name is Tanner.

[00:03:53] They were well-known obviously in our congregation and the surrounding congregations but also on the circuit and even in the district we’re just well known as as being spiritual hardworking people we were tradespeople. You know we weren’t we weren’t business people or car dealers or anything on that level. But my grandfather was a welder. My dad is a welder. He teaches welding. So what I’m saying is we were all respected and my we all gave good talks. We were all just spiritual and we knew what we were doing. My grandfather he is an elder now he’s actually in the German congregation in centralP.A. He’s out preaching to Amish and whatnot but he was the service overseer. He was a lot of things probably life but he was the service overseer for a while in our creation. My dad was actually the Kobie the coordinator for quite some time after one of the other elders died. But yeah so they’re both respected elders. And so I was respected and I took great pride in that when I was Joe’s witness. I didn’t view the world as it is. It’s not black and white as I thought it was. It’s very complicated. I thought that every little natural disaster or everything that happened at theU.N. or between nations was due to this being near the end. Right. Every time every time someone got disfellowshipped or I heard about someone who I used to hang out with leaving you know I thought it was it was like a switch you know just OK. I’m not going to hang out with them anymore they’re obviously bad influence.

[00:05:44] And that also transferred to school when I was in elementary school. I actually told my friends at my friends at school that I couldn’t be friends with them because they weren’t going to be true friends like apparently the ones at the congregation were going to be isolated myself in middle school and high school not necessarily in interaction but in having deeper friendships. I didn’t really get to know the people I was around although I was out there with my friends and I’m connected to them now. The ones I had in highschool. But I definitely didn’t form deeper friendships with them. I wasn’t my best friend who’s my roommate now. I never I didn’t go to the movie theater even with him before I left. I wasn’t allowed. I tried to ask my parents but they wouldn’t even let me. I would get to know somebody to a certain point you know one of my peers but that wasn’t an end. That they would be limited to school. My school friend but when I left that area the person my best friend who was a Joves witness. His name is Trent. He was my friend outside of school. He was my best friend period. You know he’s the guy hang hung out with. He’s the guy I went to the movie theaters with or we went to. Kargi Asian football games or whatever he’s the guy I hung at his house by it when I was at school. You know those were kind of my school friends I can kind of push them off from being anything more than that. My childhood wasn’t bad.

[00:07:26] It was well I mean I thought it was normal. I knew it was I knew somewhat that it was different from the rest of the world. But it was a normal Jehovah’s Witness childhood. I thought but it wasn’t bad. I mean I can’t say I had a bad childhood. I had Lego’s. I had Transformers. I had everything I could dream of. Right. That’s all I needed. And if I had asked for one more thing Id be video games when I was a kid. But I mean other than that it was that it was I it was a good childhood. But like I said earlier I isolated myself in school from other kids. And when I was younger I mean I told kids that I couldn’t be friends with them so it wasn’t bad at home you know school I just salute the flag and whatnot at the meetings. I mean I was I had my first Bible reading at 8 age 8 I think and I was progressing you know I was when I left I was probably within the next year going to be a ministerial servant. So I was I was you know rapidly progressing and everybody like me I liked pretty much everybody. I didn’t have I didn’t have Christmas or 4th of July or whatever. And I mean something else. I didn’t. I guess you could say I didn’t know my family. My family was limited to my grandfather my grandmother who I’ve already brought up my mom and dad and my sister and that was pretty much it. I have an aunt who I know more now than I ever have.

[00:09:07] And I have an uncle on my mom’s side my aunts on my dad’s side. I have an uncle on my mom’s side that I know better than I ever have. You know but I didn’t know those sides of the family outside of Jehovah’s Witnesses. We’d go to family reunions. But it was they were like total strangers. And again I isolated myself I didn’t I talked to them but I didn’t you know go any deeper than that. Yeah. Eric never connected on any type of level. So I mean he could you could say that I suppose I suppose my car Ignatian people in my congregation became my family my entire social network. When I got to be about 12 although I was a Joves witness I’m still a normal boy. Right. So I started getting more into girls as I had puberty and I got into you know watching pornography and whatnot. And I felt totally guilty about doing that and eventually I got to start masturbating you know a little later on and that that was kind of the marking. If I look back at anything that was the mark of my teenage years because it’s totally it’s totally looked down upon. I mean anybody can look down on it but it’s like if you do this you’re not going to make it into paradise. You know if you keep doing this forever you’re you’re not going to get into paradise. And so I was always feeling guilty as a teenager because I was doing that I tried to quit. I tried to quit. I tried to quit.

[00:10:52] I even told my dad at one point and you know that helped for a while and then I got to the elders were asking me questions about baptism. And so I had three different sessions with the elders about going over the questions from my baptism and everything. And I was still doing it then you know I had a spurt there right before my baptism where I was doing all right. And after my baptism when I was doing all right. But then you know as soon as I had a relapse it was like overwhelming guilt. And I think that’s the one. Strike on my teenage years that I can really look back on and that would that would kind of play out somewhat before I leave you know up with how I live. My teenage years weren’t bad. I mean I as I got into high school peers other students they started to look at me a little better I could joke with a more. I was no longer picked on I was picked on a lot. In middle school. But yeah I was like the class clown I’m not the class clown in the yearbook but I was I should have claimed that title I mean come on. But definitely high school was a lot better than elementary or middle school. For me it was just a better time. But again overwhelming guilt over what I supposedly been doing wrong. I started to feel like I could never quit after I tried quitting so many times I actually got to the point where in my head I was like well I may not make it into paradise but maybe I can help somebody out in the ministry to get there.

[00:12:38] So yeah I was kind of like sacrificing myself in that way. And I had actually gone to the elders I filled out a regular pioneer application. Once I was well last September not just some tempera we just had the September before that I had filled out a regular pioneer application because that’s the beginning and there’s service here. And I just graduated and I couldn’t in my right mind tell them that I wasn’t having these problems you know. And so I actually told my dad again and you know trying to quit again. But I was almost a regular pioneer before I left. If it weren’t for that so I got my first job at 16. You know I’m like a normal being. There’s a brother there is a brother that we’re eating dinner with. And he said Yeah I’ve had a job all my life since I was 16 you know. Never have I not really had a job since I was 16. I was thinking I had you know I shall I be like him and get a job when I’m 16 and have a job. So I my first job was at 16 and I was working at a restaurant with a bunch other worldly guys. You know I was the only Joves went up there. I could joke the guys at work you know and they swore and they’d make dirty jokes and whatever was funny you know it was is fun to be around them. And it was hard work too. I worked in a restaurant where you moved you know you you did your job or you were gonna get yelled at.

[00:14:16] You don’t know bullshitting around home you know you hustle. And it was hard work. But we all still joke with each other and the only time I’d really gotten work done any kind of real work was at with my grandparents grandfather or with my dad or the Kaimal you know and so I could joke with these world guys and was fine. They didn’t. I didn’t have a significant impact on you know when I lean left or my decision to leave but it definitely changed something on how I viewed worldly people. In the summer of 2015 I was looking to complete for my school from my high school to graduate. At that time I had been a junior and in the fall there I was going to be a senior in high school. And I would have to complete a senior project. And so for my senior project I actually want to do something super easy that I would have to put very little work into. And that would not really affect much of my life. So I wanted to exhort pioneer. And so I filled out you know I did all the information for the school to apply for that. And I sat down with the principal and the vice principal and we talked about me auxillary pioneering how that would have some impact on the community how I could have some relation with the community in doing this because I was really a big focal point was our community interaction. And yes I talk with them and weighed the pros and cons they let me do it.

[00:16:03] And so over that summer I was able to exhibit a pioneer for two months I think it was July in August of 2015. I did that. And I actually Auxilio pioneered in my congregation jersey shore and also the Milton congregation. Miltonp.a And it’s funny cause I exalt pioneered with this this girl I won’t name her because she is out. This girl called Jen I exhilarate pioneered with Jen and we’re hitting it off like it was. It was awesome. We had a great time for those two months really pioneering together. She was done as well and she’d later leave she left to actually Jehovah’s Witnesses before I did. She’s a little younger than I am by 10. But yes I did that and that that’s kind of where I was at that point. I wanted to even in my school work. I wanted to incorporate Joe’s witnesses even on my senior project. I wanted to do that. And so come my senior year. That’s the mindset I was in my last year of high school. I got to figure out where I’m going what I’m going to do. I want to go to Bethel but I have two regular pioneer before I go to Beth. What am I going to do when I’m at Bethel. My my father and my mother. I think my mother still works there I’m sure. But they both work at a college in Williamsport Penn College. And so I could get free college. It wasn’t. It’s not. It was a trade school more than anything they wanted to be called a college. But my dad like I said he’s a welder. He teaches welding there at college.

[00:17:48] And so I wanted to get an associate’s degree in a trade which was not against the rules or even against file even against common thinking you know if you go for a trade if you go for a trade it’s all right. Right. But you go for something like Business Administration. That’s a little different. But if you go for a trade. Yeah that’s all right. So I was going to go for a two year degree in mechatronics which is like mechanical electrical electronic stuff that’s what I was going to do I decided that. And so going into my final year high school that’s kind of where I was headed. I knew what I was going to do and I wanted to get to Bethel. So that’s where I was at. Now there was a girl my at my school was very small. It was K through 12. Like 400 kids on campus at that time I was like 350 our classes are really small my class my graduating class was like 14 kids I think oh yeah I was the valedictorian but you know I didn’t get grades good enough to be a valedictorian in my opinion anyway. There is this girl really really pretty. Her name is Kaylee and she she started flirting with me. Kind of like the second half of the year second half of the school year which was crazy because you know I’m I’m nerdy Caleb over here. And so we started talking we’d snapchat each other and whatnot.

[00:19:21] You know after school and I’d kind of flirt back with her too because like I wasn’t going to have a relationship with her obviously but you know maybe I can I don’t know how as a guy you know out of my mind a Joves what this guy out of my mind you know I’ve kind of fought back a little bit. So we graduate I can skip to that we graduate. I present my senior project goes great I’m valedictorian. I give my speech at graduation. Yeah I can. I like telling people that yowes valedictory to my class. And then I just like to leave it there because my class was 14 kids some kind of leave and they can they can think of how many kids were my class on there. But yeah we we did that. And then my grandparents always want to take myself and my sister out to Wyoming and because that’s where they used to live that’s where my dad was born. He was born in I forget what hospital out there but they always went MIT to take us out there see Yellowstone visit some friends of theirs which I was talking about earlier. I’ll get into that. So we go on vacation was like four weeks we drive out to Wyoming and we see Yellowstone everything and we visit some friends of my grandparents out there a couple that my grandfather knew way back in the day before they were Jehovah’s Witnesses. And he actually got them to convert. And the husband actually doesn’t do anything about Joe’s witnesses anymore but the wife is like a regular pioneer she’s like in and but this entire time I’m talking to Caylee over snapchat. And we’re just talking to each other.

[00:21:03] But I’m a soldier I was 16 and I’m still I’m still you know wanting to do what’s right in their eyes and we get. And we’re out Wyoming and I just tell her if you’re not gonna be one of Joe’s witnesses out that’s why I was trying to do I was trying to convert her because I kind of wanted a relationship with her. And I just told her if you’re not going to be a Joe was nice I can’t keep talking to you anymore. And so we kind of cut things off but we got back from Wyoming and I started auxillary pioneering regularly. I had quit my job because I didn’t like it and I was going out Wyoming for four weeks and I just quit. And so we got back and I didn’t have a job for a few months I was running low on money so I got I went to work for a construction crew of Joves witnesses and I was working with them for a few months. And this is around probably around August. I started classes at Penn College for mechatronics and shoe. It was like residential electric and AC and whatever. It’s pretty fun doing all that but sometime around September October she gets in contact with me again Kaylee and we start talking a little bit more and eventually I come to the point where I’m like I really want to have a relationship with her and I got to figure out if this is the truth or not. So that’s kind of when that was kind of like the turning point I wasn’t going to give up the organization for her by it. I wasn’t.

[00:22:52] If the organization was not the truth I wasn’t going to give her up because of it. So so I decided to do more research. Basically I came to the point where I was like if this is the truth I’m a stick with it. If it’s not I’m going to stick with Caylee. That’s that’s the point I came to and I did my own research. And I remember sitting there late at night and all this is coming back to me now. I was sitting there in my bed. Door closed. I already knew the whole routine from years of looking up stuff I shouldn’t. And I was looking up videos on youtube of people examining the Bible and eventually I started watching religionvs. Evolution Debates and God versus evolution in debates. I had kind of make that made a pact with myself at the beginning that I wasn’t going to look up any apostate information from Joves witnesses. Right. So anything about Jehovah’s Witnesses I wanted to keep it to the Bible so that’s that’s kind of how I started my Exodus. You could say is because of her. And I grant her all that we’re not together anymore. But I kind of give her that in my life. She she turned my whole life around you know unbeknownst to her. I remember texting her some nights and just like freaking out because I’m finding that my entire life was a lie. You know it and just telling her that all this information I’m learning she’s nice. She may have not gotten a whole lot of it because I was just going off and often off and off just these long long ass text.

[00:24:39] But yeah it was just crazy time. And nobody knew. Nobody I knew I was going through this and I didn’t want them to know for a while it was all within a matter of weeks and it might have been fast tracked by Caylee’s influence their arm that I wanted to be with Caylee. It was within weeks actually within probably a week I knew it wasn’t the truth. But in weeks I made my decision that I no longer wanted to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. We were like four or five weeks. And I picked a day December 19th to tell my parents and my grandparents to my best friend Trent that I no longer wanted to be a Jehovah’s Witness. That was kind of the perfect day. College was out. So my parents college had just gotten out. My parents wouldn’t be busy and they could like take the next month and a half to kind of go through their is going to be a Joves witness anymore. Very quickly I decided not be a JOAs witness but those were kind of the early things December 19th rolls around and I’m scared as hell. I had told my grandparents I wanted to talk to them that night. I told my I told my mom early in the morning my plan was I was going to tell my parents. Then my grandparents and my best friend that night we’re gonna go out to see Star Wars Rogue One for the first time which is a great setting you know that you’re going to tell your best friend that you’re leaving the religion but that didn’t really work out.

[00:26:19] My dad was out cutting wood because we burned wood and he got real pissed off and as he does he gets angry a lot. And he came in the house all angry and sighs like Alright I’m not going to I’m not going to talk to you guys until late at night. And because I was going to talk to them that morning in the proper order. And so I figure out what time came around that I was going to go meet Tran. He was out in service is probably around three o’clock or something. I decide to get my grandparents tell my grandparents and go straight to my best friend. So I put bolt I put together this Manila packet full of information. You know everything I’d found right about the pyramids Noah’s Ark contradictions in the Bible. That’s about it. And I was going to give it to my friend Trent and I stuck it under the seat in my car. I told him I want to drive right. I went to night to be on my terms. I picked him up. We went to the movie theater saw Rogue One is pretty good but you know it’s kind of slow in the middle little bit. So you know we were friends right. Right up to the end right up till I told him we were friends and we were joking. Everything I was pretty calm about it but we the movie theater was Williams where we got in the car and he was like I told him at the beginning of the evening I want to tell you something very serious. I had done something like this before.

[00:27:48] You know I told him I want to tell you some don’t make me back out. So you knew what what to do. And so he was like OK what do you want to tell me. I was like How about we drive back up to the hall. His car was up there. And so we did. And I put it in park. The bad thing was which I didn’t really want to happen was he had to work that night so he would he wouldn’t have to go to work. After I told him this I really didn’t want that to happen but I just told him I said and you know this is very serious. I no longer want to be one of Joe’s witnesses and he kind of stopped trying. He’s I think right now he’s like 22 23. He’s a few years older than I am. He’s always been the person I looked up to. He’s always been my role model in life and. And he was asking me questions about it. You know very you start getting emotional. But he was asking me questions about and I pulled out a manila envelope and I said it then I said if you want to take that’s all I found right now if you want to take that take that with you. Look at things. That’s all your choice. And he declined. He wasn’t yet. And he started crying. He sat right there and cried in front of me. That mean I mean that’s fine. You know I tried to cry I’m not a crier but.

[00:29:17] Yeah he I told him all that I didn’t want to be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore. I’d been I’d been doing more research. And that’s just the conclusion I came to. And he cried. He told me Well I hope you get through this. I hope you change your mind. And he got out of the car. I called off work. He went home and he cried for another two hours. He still lived with his parents. And he told his parents everything he was with them for like another two hours crying over you know your best friend we’re brothers basically because every well every other guy in our congregation had left. Every every other boy around our age had left. And it was just us to you know it was very hard. After I pulled out I went to my grandparents and I sat down on my grandparents. We kind of bullshit it for a while and then I told them Well I’ve I’ve come to the conclusion I no longer want to be one of Joe’s witnesses and my grandfather is. I don’t look at it in the same now as I did. But he was like what. And he he just at the start asked me why why why do you feel this way and then he said it’s all it’s all one blur the whole night some blur or whatever conversations I had I had the same conversation pretty much three different times. It’s all a blur and he just said I would never give up my creator over you know whatever you found. And I didn’t. I didn’t present him with the information they’re both 70. I didn’t want to.

[00:30:57] I didn’t want to ruin the perfect life they built for themselves. I just want to say you know I’m out. I’ll tell you why if you want to know but I’m out. And that’s. That night December 19th is the last time my grandfather ever talked to me. And we were tight. We were sure we were. He was the other guy looked up to Trent and then my grandfather and he dropped me like a rock. He would pass me in the congregation. I still want to meetings after that for a little while. I’ll get into that but I had said passing in the Kingdom Hall and he passed right by me when I say a word and so that was really bad. My grandmother my grandmother the very next day or the day after the next day. Yeah. Because I told Mom one day and then the next evening was Tuesday we had our meeting. But she came up and she talked to us and everything. You know my grandfather didn’t. And so I went out to the car drove home. I had one more conversation get through. I told my parents that and we sat up I forget what time it was I know we went out to an early showing me and Trent because I had a lot to do that night. No surprise probably got home around 738 some like that.

[00:32:15] And we sat up till ten thirty probably a night talking about it and I was present my arguments and I pulled out my my envelope I still had and and showed him all the arguments we were looking up scriptures and everything as to as to what I’d found and whatever and they didn’t believe they believe anything I said you know my mom my mom for a good month and a half two months she thought there was something else up. She thought I did something else that may have made me want to leave. I wasn’t I wasn’t leaving because I knew it wasn’t the truth. You know I can leave for doctrinal Propp but um yeah. And so then we went to bed and I I can’t remember what the next day I did. I know I stayed up a little while I know I was up for a while that night but my at my parents were kind of like on their tippy toes you know they were kind of like touchy around me you know they were mad. They were just like you know there’s a problem that I can’t think of a term but they were cautious around me you know try not trying not to upset me or trip me or not. I wasn’t really pissed off or anything I just it was different after that. And so for the next month and a half or not a month and a half maybe the next month every week at least four or five times a week we me and my parents would stay up and I’d tell them I didn’t have a job at this point. I had quit with the construction company full of witnesses I was with because you know I knew I wouldn’t have a job there after I left. Um did I want to have that kind of conflict for them. So I had all the time in the world.

[00:34:04] I wasn’t pioneering anymore because you know that’s all up that’s all out the window. So all I was doing my dad downloaded watched our library which I still have on my laptop and all I did all day was watch debates and look up stuff on watched our library for weeks four weeks I did that and eventually I got into looking more in evolution. I really got into it and really got a better understanding of it so that I could argue and debate with people about it. But like I said earlier my friend Trent he went home and his dad was an elder a big a big wing arrogation and he called my dad. And Larry was his name. My dad’s name is James. Larry called my dad James and they Larry said he’d get another brother in the current station and they’d sit down they talk of me and so basically we picked a date and I went to the Kingdom Hall and we just talked everything I’d come up with you know a little more stuff that I’d come up with since I told everybody because I was doing so much research. Yeah this is this is probably around the end of December. I sat down with Larry and Monty in the congregation during our congregation library and we just talked about everything. I had looked up and there they were going through the normal routine that these two brothers they are not they’re not knowledgeable in evolution and stuff like that. They’re not trying to. Sorry not arguing with me. They were trying to help me come to a better understanding. And we’re looking at different scriptures and whatnot.

[00:35:54] Basically they didn’t convince me of anything. I told my mom I said if they convinced me. You know if they can change my thinking then that’s fine I’ll come back. But right now I’m like No I I don’t think this is the truth. And so I went and I went into those meetings with an open mind. The first meeting they didn’t really convinced me at all they said they’d do their own research and they’d come back and we had a second meeting. And that meeting got pretty heated because I that was probably like two weeks later I had been doing more research. Totally different subjects. Now I was really switch it up on and we had our second meeting and by the end of it they took away my kingdom Auchi which I had a key workingmen’s. They took that away and I bet they would have disfellowshipped me there. That’s how angry they were that we were yelling says you get pretty heated. But both of those meetings were about four hours long. Four and a half hours long. But again I had nothing better to do. This was on my break between semesters and I didn’t have a job. But then come the next semester next semester starts I have new classes and whatever. And I think Larry got in touch with a certain overseer or somebody did. And the circuit overseer he handpicked a brother from the circuit to kind of handle my case. His name’s Fred and he’s he’s pretty smart. He’s younger than the other guys. He’s probably about 55 or something. Somewhere around there a lot more knowledgeable.

[00:37:31] He’s done a lot more research on this kind of stuff. And he always gave great talks. The Sergant assembly but Fred was kind of in charge of my case and he picked another brother and we’re going to have another meeting and we did. And we talked about and love it. And mind you I had looked up by this time no apostate information. I was still working on the Bible. You know why the Bible is wrong. I was looking up you know some Bible stories contradictions between the Matthew Mark Luke and John. You know and Paul is a counselor tons of contradictions in there and historical contradictions between accounts in the Bible and what actually happened. Right six or sevenB.C. that’s bullshit umB.C. but yeah. So basically I went into that meeting and that was right. That was I think that was a Tuesday night. And we basically had to cut it short because or end ended because there was going to be the meeting. That was a good four and a half hours long. And I was basically hitting them with everything. Evolution contradictions in the Bible. Pyramids Noah’s Ark Noah’s flood and all that. And he actually came out of that meeting confused because the brother gave me some videos to watch. They weren’t Jehovah’s Witnesses videos. Believe it or not they were actually movies that were made by other religious groups about these kind of subjects and why evolution is wrong. Yeah. On YouTube that I came out of that meeting confused because I thought it explains some other stuff that I had problems with.

[00:39:16] I kinda figured that all of that would clear up once I did more research cause you know I just went home I looked up some of the things that they said and it wasn’t entirely accurate. I watched the videos the brother told me to watch. And it wasn’t really the stuff they said on evolution so long then joked debunked Jaso by then I’d had three meetings all being about four hours long and now at this point I felt comfortable. I said to myself Alright I think I’m going to start looking up stuff on Jehovah’s Witnesses. That’s when shit hit the fan. That’s when I got really pissed off really ticked off at this religion. I wasn’t mad at them I thought I actually told the brothers I still believed if the Bible were correct that this was the best religion to be and I actually told them that and I know I felt the sting of those words later on. But after those three meetings I started looking up you know. Child abuse among Joe’s witnesses blood transfusions. One of the things that really got me is how much they flip flopped on organ transplants blood transfusions blood fractions. The thing that really hit me was beards you know I mean why can’t I have a beard you know. So I started looking all this stuff up and me and Fred we had a conversation over the phone about child abuse and how the organization handles child abuse. This is really what took me off that and probably how many people have died from not having blood transfusions and I think I think our conversation on the phone is probably like an hour and a half about it.

[00:41:10] But I had excerpts from the elders book Shepherd the flock of God book and I knew they were accurate. The ones I had found out the PDAF because my dad was at work and I got I was able to get to his bag and I found a shepherd with a flock of God book and actually looked a Narron and checked it. So I knew they were accurate. I knew I could trust the version I had. And you know the policies their bullshit on and on how Jehovah’s Witnesses treat child abusers and that they actually get away. And I want to be a police officer now. So like that really irks me that cause all my life I had believed that Jehovah’s Witnesses have better morals in the world and they handle situations better than the world. But here here this worldly judicial system that we’re under in the United States handles child abuse better than better than the truth than God’s organization. You know that that really took me off. And by this point or maybe a little later I decided I want to be a police officer. Now I’d always wanted to be a police officer if I wasn’t a JOAs witnesses there. If I wasn’t a Jones witness either that or the Air Force fighter pilot. So we had our conversation on the phone and then talked to my parents and together they kind of orchestrated this idea. And now mind you I’m in college. You know I have my own schoolwork and my parents and Fred came up with the idea of giving me a paper assignment.

[00:42:46] They want me to write a paper on why Jehovah’s Witnesses believe they gain a few topics to cover why they believe what they do on a set of certain topics. Right. And. And they wanted me to reference articles from the Watchtower Library and whatnot and it’s supposed to be however long they wanted a reference page. You know they wanted the whole nine yards. I was like No this is unofficial. I’m not doing any kind of style. I should have my own stop. I’ve got my own work in school to do. But I did do the paper and by this time I was actually talking to a girl in Brooklyn. I was you know being a Jehovah’s Witness and losing your entire social network I had to revert to online dating and know anybody that I was talking to this girl in Brooklyn and very pretty. She is a Seventh Day Adventist but I was kind of sharing with you know could you do your own research. Her name was dorso. Could you do your own research Durso if you wanted to. You’re allowed to go to college they’re encouraged to go to college. They do a lot more humanitarian work for any type of people not just Joves Wences just kind of comparing things. And so what I learned from Torsella I actually put my paper.

[00:44:09] I compared the two religions and it was I think was like a a four page paper or a six page paper and two thirds of it was or a third of it was what Jehovah’s Witnesses believe lie and then the rest of it was why they’re wrong on them which was not which was not what the assignment was and that actually spurred my judicial committee meaning and I actually told him in the judicial committee meeting that this is not to be used as evidence in my meeting because I knew it was going to happen. You know it was bound to happen. I just told him this does not be used as evidence. This is just you know you sign this and I’m giving it to you to how I want it. And he actually actually told me he’s like why would you give this to me if it’s not to be. It’s in your judicial committee meeting which took me back a little but you kept his word he didn’t use it whenever that came around. But that kind of sparked that kind of sparked. Yeah. My judicial meeting sometime in February like mid February mid to end February I can remember the day I remember when I told my parents but I never took note of what day I decide to leave. We had the judicial meeting and I knew there’d be three elders right. I know it’ll be a long meeting. I put together an entire outline of all the things I was dedicated to covering in this meeting because I wanted I just wanted it kind of from my own records what was going on. So I made an outline and I went. I pulled into the driveway and there’s four cars. So there were actually four elders at my judicial meeting. All four elders that were kind of in my case and I went in and the judicial meeting lasted like 4 1/2 hours.

[00:46:15] Play as long as the other ones I think I know it wasn’t four and a half. It was almost four sorry. We talked about everything pretty much. You know we had already covered evolution and all that and that’s kind of the things those are kind of things that Fred really Fred was the leader of the room he really didn’t want to talk about those he wanted to talk about child abuse and why it felt that way. I was I was giving them scenarios like this we’re talking about child abuse a lot and how they handled it. I knew regardless of what they said. I knew what could happen with the current policies. You know they were trying to cumbered up and say you know it’s all good. You know not covering up the like. Soften it. You know it’s all good. You know we handle it appropriately and everything by it. I was given them scenarios like OK what ifs what if a man abused as a child here in this area and it comes out to the elders and because they’re saying how you know the elders will watch him. We’ll keep an eye out for make sure he’s not around any other kids. And but you know the police wouldn’t be notified if that wasn’t the law. And I just told them you know if a bit comes out of the elders that a man around here abused just a joke was when his child. They keep it under wraps day. And if it wasn’t a law around here I think MPW is the law. I’m not sure I looked that up at the time.

[00:47:46] But if wasn’t the law and it wasn’t brought to the police there’s no way you could watch him. He could. What if he moved to West Virginia or anywhere else in the States you know. He’s out of your purview. You could be anybody in the community. He could be could do anything else outside of your watch. And they were silent. Like they had nothing to say to that. I was completely owning the room but of course I was 41. You know they could they could interrupt me and they couldn’t you know literally blast me with all this information and I get to cover one thing they say. So who’s kind of an even in that way but I had an outline of what I want to talk about. And we talked about it and I brought all all the evidence I gathered. I had a giant folder. Man I had a tax record for the organization. I had I had proof that they were they were they had stocks in Boeing and Honeywell and these war machines right. You know I had I had stuff like that that I kind of I didn’t bring that up I don’t think because that’s not that’s kind of like information for me. No elders can take that and be like Oh you’re right. But I had run out of of the ship in the Fluck. They got a ship with the flock guidebook that I brought with me and Larry he’s sitting in there he’s like how do you get these. How do you get these. And I’m like Larry they’re on line there. They’re so easy to get. It’s unreal. Yeah. That they disfellowshipped me.

[00:49:21] They actually asked me to leave the room. It was so long are my judicial meeting. We had a bathroom break out there. Yeah. Now is a roomful older people so you know Blatters gets strained by 65. So you know obviously that would have happened but that’s how long it was. We had a bathroom break and then we came back we talked more and they told me leave. And it was like five minutes it took them five minutes. Like I thought it took them five minutes to make that. And I didn’t know what I was thinking. You know I actually came to the room was like wow five minutes night I thought it through in five minutes Xscape I got disfellowshipped for apostasy. Now what they got me on. They didn’t have anything on me except a Facebook post I posted to my friends and I made it public. Basically the title of the little blurb was I’m sorry again. And I guess I was kind of like an open letter to any girlfriends I had. Basically just telling them sorry for how big of a prick I was and how religious I was to them and whatever. And I didn’t name Jehovah’s Witnesses. And I didn’t name the organization. But I just said you know sometimes those kind of things rule your life. And I’m sorry that I was that way in school. That’s what they got me on. You know he kept his word he didn’t use the paper that I wrote against me because I made him not.

[00:51:01] But yeah they got me all one Facebook post and I got the sash of her posse. They would’ve gotten me on something else had it not been a Facebook post. After I got back after they told me you know what disfellowshipping you and I laughed. I gathered up all my evidence. Put it in a bag. I had to go to work that night because I was working third shift. So that’s how my night when nobody at work knew I made sure nobody at work knew I wasn’t what was previously Jehovah’s Witness for a while because I just went to see how I could interact with them. Without them knowing that and then I told them and you know they were supportive. But yeah I had work that night. After that let’s see I had a job. So I was getting know good income. So in college you know I still had a life that I was trying to build after that I was still living with my parents. My parents were still talking to me. My sister was still talking to me by anybody outside of that house was not wouldn’t talk to me. I found out a little while later after after her my disfellowshipping had kind of spread out among the circuit because I can only imagine it was kind of a shock because it came out of nowhere. You know it wasn’t like I stopped attending meetings. It was like in fact I was still attending meetings up until probably the second meeting I had with the elders. So I was still I was still kind of keeping up the facade.

[00:52:39] Among the people they didn’t know I was still I still my duties like at the time I was in charge like magazines. I wasn’t in charge of literature. I wasn’t I wasn’t in charge of literature. I was Arja territories and stuff like that. That’s right. That’s another fun fact. Before I left. Me and Trent we redid the territory for a congregation and I think even at the tail end like like even when I knew I wasn’t going to be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore I was still working on redoing the territory for the congregation faithfully you know doing them right just for them. Right. And so I still kind of had that I was still doing that even after even after the first meeting with the olders they kind of took that away with me from a pretty quick I couldn’t comment at the meeting or anything. Do any of that you know they said you’re not gonna do that. I paid attention more than ever before. You know at what the Jones what they were saying and I was looking to all of our scriptures than ever before but yeah they announced my disfellowshipping and my mom was like hey do you want to come with us. See it. I was like why would I do that. They’re basically executing me publicly. And I did tie into the meeting and a fun little story a few years before that I’d gotten training on handling sound right. And we had the whole tie in system and everything and you had to enter codes and dial a certain number to set it up and everything. And I was at home because I was you know quote unquote sick.

[00:54:26] And I went to stay home and my mom was with me. I was that young and we we’re going to die in a meeting and I typed in a phone number and then I entered the code for the sound system at the Kingdom Hall and so we were not only tied in the meeting but we were also broadcasting. So throughout the entire meeting anybody else tied in with us while we were at home were we’re hearing what we’re doing and we’re baking cookies. So yeah. So I. So I knew the code for that and everything. And so I tightened from my disfellowshipping using the broadcasting code and I muted myself. I didn’t I couldn’t I didn’t know what the tie in code was for just real listening. I couldn’t remember but I had that memorized and and I got disfellowshipped. It was I was kinda irritated with Larry because Larry announced it and there were like three announcements that night. And you know whatever was before it. And then Larry’s like and Caleb Tanner is no longer want to Jonas witnesses. On a brighter note like that’s how quick or quick it was like I said I’d put it. I got a little pissed off about that and I’m listening in. And that’s when the song comes around and I forget it was before the song or after the song I unmuted myself. And I said well there you have it folks or Shotton Snoddy you know I I wasn’t going to rock it for everybody or I did. I wasn’t going to come back on me.

[00:56:04] I you know wrecked a meeting for anybody tyddyn but that’s kind of like a fun thing for myself I could have done some Yes I just went through life there after that and it was I got back in touch with Austin. He’s my roommate because we really weren’t talking there after we graduated. We’re friends best friends in high school but we really didn’t talk after we graduated. And so we hung out some more. And I think we even went to the movies for like first time ever. I before before I left before I told my parents my grandparents my best friend that I no longer want to be a Joe was when I got back in touch with a girl named Sam and she her family is Joves on Ness’s she’s my age. She’s exactly six months older than me. She. But she went to meetings you know she kind of embraced it there for a while but then she kind of faded out and I stopped talking to her but I got back in touch with her again and so I was talking to her at the time. And I later texted her like we met and I didn’t tell her I didn’t want to be. Jones was a witness anymore. Then I texted her later hey you know I’ve made this decision. She kind of freaked out. It was a cool moment. But so I was I was kind of hanging out with her over the summer and sometime around August. And I we get back together and then Austyn I I kind of like Tolstoy was like hey what do you think about us moving in together.

[00:57:42] And he was up in Wilkes-Barre Scranton area which is like northeast about northeast of the state and he was at college there and he was I wasn’t really an option because you know I’m going to be going to college up there. But then like a week a week and a half later he text me back he’s like Hey call me. And we talked about just about moving in together. And he picked a college out near Pittsburgh for a reason aviation because the school he was out was so expensive and so he liked that and he was like think about it you know about moving out and being roommates. I was like oh wow that’s a big deal you know. But long story short I mean we decide to move out and we’re living our own some things I’ve learned since I left. People are evil people are worldly people are the world is not controlled by the devil you know what the world would be a very different place if it was you know Satan is not the root of the system of things. I was working at Frito-Lay when I left. And they’re so supportive there. I was told I was. I was so annoying. I was telling them all these different plans I had. And then a week later I’d tell them about different plans I’d made because you know I felt differently at that time a week to week. My plans changed and they were so supportive and I’d tell them everybody by the time I left everybody knew I had to leave because you know I moved by it.

[00:59:24] By the time I left everybody knew my shift and everybody was so supportive about it and I basically just found out that people are loving you know I can I can form lasting friendships with someone who’s not a job as witness. And people can have their own beliefs and their own feelings on things and that’s fine. I don’t have to shove my own beliefs down their throat. You know I don’t have to try and convince them I mean I’m open to a TV debate on any subject with anyone at any time but that doesn’t mean I should fight. I just learned that that I can be friends with with people that are not Jehovah’s Witnesses and that the world is a much better place than I thought it was. People are doing good things. You know the world is pretty fucked up by it. It’s not as bad as I thought it was. There’s there’s still hope. You know I’m an atheist. I don’t believe there’s a God if there is that be great. I really hope there’s an afterlife. That would be awesome. But if there isn’t. You know I’m I’m ready for that there’s a lot of things I enjoy about this life being free to talk to anybody I want to without bringing up Bosche Arawak that’s nice that I can pursue what I want to do. So I went to a police officer right. That’s fun. I mean I’m not saying being a police officer is always fun but like that’s fun pursuing something I really wanted to do. I wanted to I wanted to go to trade school in mechatronics degree because I wanted to do something that was kind of interesting when I was at Bethel.

[01:01:16] Yeah I was kind of really rooting for a position as a mechanic at walking for the printing department or or one of those traveling brothers that goes around and helps mean it’s for kingdom halls or being part of a permanent. It’s not called the RBC anymore whatever it is. I came here. I should know that I should know that because I’m under a year out. Right. Right. I don’t. But yeah I enjoy I enjoy the freedoms I have now and I’m actually going to basic training for the army here in January. I’m excited for that. I’m excited to join to get into the army. I kind of always wanted to be in the military. I thought that would be kind of cool. In contrast to my grandfather who you know didn’t want to be a soldier he wanted to be a construction worker worker but different stripes different folks whatever. But I’m just excited for the life ahead and for the friendships I’ll have. I enjoy living on my own relatively I mean I have a roommate that was on our own a whole new area a whole new. A whole new life. I mean don’t get me wrong I’m incredibly lonely. I mean when I’m home alone like I’ve been home alone for the past I don’t know. My roommate went to work at 2:00 for the past couple of hours. You know I had really nothing to do and it’s really lonely. And I expected to be lonely for quite awhile because you know when your whole social network goes down you’re going to be lonely.

[01:03:05] So don’t get me wrong I do get depressed sometimes but I know that’s not going to be that way forever. That’s that’s the other thing I learned. Life isn’t fair you know and nor is it nor is it going to be in the future. I mean that’s I had to grow up quick from who I was relying on my parents. You know I was making when I was working for that construction group I was working with I was only work and one day a week I’ll get like 60 bucks every week. And maybe 60 bucks a paycheck. I can’t even remember. So I was kind of relying on my parents a lot and going from that to telling my parents I don’t want to be a JOAs witness anymore. My mom’s like OK we need to sign your car over your name a little while later and you need to start thinking about after you graduate getting your own apartment. Like they started they started kind of you know get ready for us to push you out. And so you had to grow up quick. And when I say when I say I was at work telling them about a new plan each week I have a new plan every week. Nothing has been stable in my life for the past year. So I’ve had to come up with something new. Pretty much every week or every other week I see. You learn to grow up quick and you learn the minimum of course on my bragging or anything by it. I am not the man I was in early November I asked last Urla last November. I’m not the man I was entirely mad of my childhood.

[01:04:57] I’m not I’m not entirely angry with this entire situation. You know it sucks. You know it’s not right but I wouldn’t want to be anybody different. You know I’ve been through. I’ve you know before before I got out. No I could look at my grandfather. He was in Vietnam OK. And and he he is such a character right. I mean he’s funny he’s kind of funny. He’s kind of a jackass. But he is just his own person and everybody respected him for that. And then my dad he’s kind of his own person. He’s I mean he’s made his own you know made it into his own. But I wasn’t necessarily I was kind of living in their legacy. I was kind of living under them. So once I left I had something you know I mean it’s kind of a crazy something but you know that made me who I am. I mean that’s that’s a pro if anything of this whole situation. I’m I me I have mixed feelings about my family. I have mixed feelings. Well that’s pretty much it. I have no feelings when it comes to those in a creation I was with. They’re fine. They’re finally in their old life. That’s fine. I mean I miss them but I’m kind of angry at my family. I mean of course I mean this this you know early molten stage. You know I just got out by it. So I I can be a little angry but I mean if I could say things to them I don’t know what I’d say to my family.

[01:06:50] I now I’m in contact with my aunt. Her name is Lydia and she basically went through everything I did although in voluntarily she got disfellowshipped for something a long time ago and we actually stopped talking to her. I remember that I was I was younger and I had no understanding that but we actually stopped talking to her and um my grandfather did to my grandfather cut off his own daughter. So to my grandmother. So did my dad who’s her brother. We all just cut her off. My mom has never liked her. So I mean she knows my my aunt knows that too. That’s first thing we talked about was my mom and we got together. But having done that twice my my aunt got disfellowshipped and then she got reinstated and my family talks to her every once in a great while. And I don’t know if I’d say anything to them. I think it’d be really awkward if me and my parents started talking again and I think I just cost my grandfather out if I saw them again because for him to do that to cut off my aunt his own daughter and then bring her back into his life. He told me she has a kid. He’s 11. OK. And my grandfather told me he said the only reason we still talk to Lydia is because of her kid. We’re hoping that maybe something will click with him and he’ll become a Joves witness. That’s the only reason they talked to. And at all it’s despicable. And at the time I was like Yeah that makes sense that that’s how indoctrinated I was.

[01:08:51] You know that’s yeah that makes sense. You know I mean I had always viewed my aunt as some type a rebel you know a rebel that that I don’t know just a person that we only talk to when we had to right. And and now I think back that I told my aunt this that I told my aunt when my grandfather had said that you know she should know now. And I just would cost him out if I ever saw him again. For him to do that and bring her back and then drop me like a rock. After I told him I didn’t want to be a Joe’s witness he didn’t talk to me. Not a single word. I don’t know what his reasoning on that was maybe thought maybe I’d come back to him you know by just just for him to do that just ticks me off. My my grandmother I have a lot more respect for my grandmother than when she first all she actually talked to me afterwards. But she came up to me. I was still going to meetings. She came up to me probably after the first meeting with the lawyers and she she just told me like you know choose the best way you know choose the truth. And then she cried and she hugged me you know and you know I there were times during that whole experience that I felt unsure about myself. That maybe I had gotten it wrong. Maybe they do the truth. You know I was I was second guessing myself.

[01:10:37] And there were there was a time even when I was like Alright my mom for a for like two months after I told them that I wanted to leave my mom cried every other day probably. So there was a time where like my mom’s out in another part of the house crying and my dad kind of doing his own thing and I’m just like maybe I want to come back just to get her to stop crying just to get him to stop feeling that way. The only thing that the only thing that kept me in was that Caylee and I had had sex and I knew that if I came back and if I had if I had just given up all the research I was doing and just accepted that this was the truth I would have to tell the owners that we had sex that would all come out. And I’m going to be honest with that because you know and people can say whatever they want. OK. Well there you go. You left because you would have been disfellowshipped for fornication or whatever but that’s that’s the one thing that kept me from breaking down at that one moment at just to get my mom to stop crying. Now I’m living on my own. I have a job I’m paying my own bills paying my own rent. I’m looking for a career in law enforcement a career in the army you know I’m on my own. You know I have a relationship with my aunt side of the family that I’ve never really had a relationship with. They’re up in New York State and I have a relationship with my uncle on my mom’s side.

[01:12:34] Someone we haven’t talked to each other in person in quite a while but over Facebook and so I’m I mean I’m pretty good. Like I said I’m. I get lonely but I’m not. I’m certainly better than I was when I was a Joves when US and I don’t mean I don’t mean in regards to being happy or something. I mean I was I was happy when I was Johs when as you know ignorance is bliss. But but I’m I feel better about the person I am. And I know more about myself than I ever have. At 19 you know because I’ve been through you know what I’ve been through. I want to be a state trooper or work at the FBI I’d be kind of cool or some other federal like the DEA or ATF. Yes I’m like that unless I really like the military. I’m going in for military police. And by the time I get active duty because I’ll be go on. I’ll be going for training and I’ll come back in the reserves. I’m going to finish up a bachelors degree and then I’m gonna go active duty I’ll be an officer then. So I might just do that for the rest of my life if I like it. I don’t know. But yeah either state trooper or a big city likeL.A. or something like that or you know FBI you know some federal but you know I’m planning to make the most of it make the most of my life and do something that I can be proud of. That’s kind of why I’m joined the military.

[01:14:10] That’s kind of why I want to be a police officer something be proud of something that my kids can look up to me and be proud of me. And you know maybe they can kind of do what I’m doing or do their own thing. You know they’re free to do whatever but do something I can be proud of and respect myself for something that’s involved with my community and helping other people. So the song I picked a little more by machine gun Kelly there’s a line in it that he says it’s my favorite line and all the rap I’ve listened to he says they told me fight night I’m supposed to lose. So from my understanding boxing matches sometimes were fixed. And so this is kind of a callback to that. And that’s that’s my favorite line all rap because they told me that you know without Jehovah’s Witnesses what am I. You know that’s how I felt for a long time. And so you know that line they told me fight night I’m supposed to lose I’m not losing where I’m mad. You know I’m I’m in a better place. So in just a few weeks on January 20 30 Caleb was leaving for basic training. He’s chasing his goals joining the army and without any support from his immediate family. So go to shunnedpodcast.com click on episodes find Caleb’s episode here and you can leave a comment under his episode of encouragement. Now for a special announcement I recently recorded the story of David which will be our episode for February. However it’s going to be a little different. It’s also very involved. It’s quite a heavy story and it’s very raw at times.

[01:16:09] There was a lot to cover and the issues that were covered are very important particularly that sexual abuse with everything that’s going on within Jehovah’s Witnesses today with the two witness rule with the Australian Royal Commission and everything. So this is going to be more than one episode released one week after another in February. It’s also going to be released as a conversation between him and I see this as a very important episode. I encourage you to spread the word to other ex Jehovah’s witnesses or people who are shunned. Anyone that you think might be interested in learning how this how this aspect of things works within the organization. Additionally you know I just think that people need to hear this episode period. And so I encourage you to subscribe. That way you’ll get the next episodes automatically you won’t have to wait for maybe me to release an announcement on some site that you visit to see that is out. Please go ahead and subscribe. That way you’ll get them automatically. And you know I’m not going to make you wait. You know one episode of the beginning of February like I usually do and in one at the beginning of March or something like that I’m going to go ahead and release this story one part at a time I’m not sure how many it’s going to break down into as I edit it I’ll find out but it will be multiple parts and I’ll go ahead and release part one. You know one week in February and part two the next week. So that’s it’s not overwhelming but also so that you don’t have to wait to get the rest of the story.

[01:17:53] So I encourage you to do that. I hope that everyone is having a happy new year. You know we’re all trying to live life in this new world. Those of us who are shunned and I’ll see you in the next episode.

Mike Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:14] Welcome to shunned the monthly podcast where we expose the religions that use shunning as a method to coerce and control. These are real stories as told by the person that live them telling these stories takes courage and the strength to be vulnerable. After this week’s episode I encourage you to go to shunnedpodcast.com and leave a message for the person that told their story by commenting on their episode. I’ve told mine and it means a lot to hear from people that can relate. Each person will be able to read and respond to your messages of encouragement. Now let’s listen to this month’s real life story of being shown a mike twice over. And I was born and raised Joe’s with us. I’m actually not not not really Shunda because I’m inactive like I wasn’t disfellowshipped and I’ve never dissociated or anything but anyway I was born and raised in that so I never saw the outside world that much kid. My parents were actually both in the Navy and my mom had joined when she was pretty young I think but I think maybe when she left to finish high school so must be been 18 because from the way I was told the story which I’ve only been told the story by a handful of times but she had joined the Navy and I think same thing with my dad pretty much so my mom is like this white girl from like suburban Illinois or suburban Chicago Illinois. My dad is from San Antonio Texas.

[00:01:53] I grew up in the projects having eight brothers and sisters so very different worlds and then they they both join the Navy and our members and my dad told me that he would always check out my mom and that actually like. Like he would go out on a double date with these two other people and I think they end up being married too. And then we’ll actually find the time my dad was dating another girl and then my mom was being another guy. And then they would double date and they end up being together. I actually kind of crisscrossed it so they both kind of trailed off or whatever then my mom got married. My dad like I think early mid 80s they were living and living in Hawaii for I think maybe 3 or 4 years because they were stationed in Pearl Harbor and then my mom was just checking my mail one day and a Jehovah’s Witness just walked up on her and then gave her Be Live Forever book. I think it was and from the way that my mom told me that she read the whole thing in one night and she would look after that and I think I actually remember listening to an episode of years or something else and then that was a common experience that they would get a book and then they would they would read in one night or in a very short period of time and then fucking hooked. Hey hate so so then my mom started studying and my dad wasn’t completely sold on it. But I think after a while he kind of came around to it because part of that they were looking for a church anyway but they had gone to like just typical run of the mill Christian churches.

[00:03:16] And I think they saw that that other Christian churches don’t take it super seriously. But I went to a Jehovah’s Witness like you’re taking it superset it’s like like you aren’t playing around it like it isn’t like the whole week you’re sitting and doing whatever you want and then suddenly you come in say 20 Hail Marys like it’s not. It’s not that cut and dry. So I think that was what my parents on it and then they were like OK this seems like they’re actually playing by the book and then they start studying and they got baptized mid 80s late 80s moved back to Illinois where I am right now to the suburbs again where my mom is from. And then I was born and raised over here so I never I never knew anything outside of it much really. So I don’t remember thinking much of it as a kid because it just because that was the way I was raised like it doesn’t hit me. I remember when people would be like like oh I feel so bad for you because you know you never celebrate Christmas or your birthday blah blah whatever but to me that was just life. And I mean even still to this day like I’ve been out for about eight years now but still to this day I don’t celebrate my birthday. It’s weird for me to even celebrate other people’s birthdays like around the holiday time since it’s pretty much just me and my parents like in this area and my whole family is in Texas. I still will celebrate holidays unless I have a girlfriend and then I celebrate with her family. But like I still don’t celebrate any of these things.

[00:04:41] And it’s not because of any kind of superstition or because of the religion but I’m just not used to it especially birthdays like birthdays to me are still weird because I give so much attention on yourself and you I’m just not used to that because I mean I was never introduced to them as a kid. And I remember knowing that I was different because I was pretty obvious even though my kindergartner was because I’m out like I was saying the pledge during a thing in kindergarten. I think the only kid my class and I mean maybe one of like two or three kids in my entire school. So I mean it was like it wasn’t many of us and seem like we would make a big scene once we did that. So like like I knew I was different but I didn’t really I guess I believed it because I was that age and I just didn’t know what to think. Even here my parents are like pushing it on me every single day. Yeah I like it. Like it didn’t mean much to me but it was just a normal part of life growing up. I think I viewed the world exactly how they told me to and it was just everyone else was wrong. And I still kind of have that like inherent view of the world about me still. Yeah. Like I like everyone else is wrong everyone else’s centers and like like not exactly looking down on other people but just just pretty much that like the rest is wrong.

[00:06:00] And then you’re the one that has the answer your you like your group of people has the answer. Which I don’t think varies too much from other religions. But but it’s it’s just really emphasized in the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses. We would like to emphasize that you have the truth. Like I’ve even use that term which is which is a funny habit to break going on because like because it goes away after I didn’t even believe a thing about anymore I still call it the truth. But it was just because of conditioning because then else calls it bear as a witness. So I think going along with that point to. I know it’s all look like all the war games they would play and then not even know and live their light like light maybe a ad at a very high level likeC.T. Russell or like Judge Rutherford or something like that had expired using that terminology and then that was what what kind of bright everyone in. But now it’s just like subconscious and everyone just says like the truth as if like they’re 100 percent sure. I’m not sure other religions do that too. But yeah that was that was kind of how I saw it. Back then it was just the truth. Yeah. So I was never afraid of outsiders because I made it apparent that I was more curious because I mean like I was always like a little like class clown like a jokester kind of kid in a school. So like I would always play around with with other kids. I mean I mean me not saying the pledge or having to leave the room for like birthdays and stuff like that like it didn’t make me different.

[00:07:30] But I don’t think that other kids really treat me that poorly as a kid. I remember leaving the room when they would read Harry Potter. Once I was like fourth or fifth grade and I would just like draw and add and then play nowadays I’m a I’m a graphic designer so I guess I kind of built towards that. And I was always doodling in my Watchtower or whatever or just fly on the Ivailo like these you no paper that was taking notes on. So my parents were like relatively lenient lay low. They weren’t really super hard nosed about it like I had some friends growing up that did. I had one friend who his parents thought everything was demonized. They wouldn’t buy stuff from garage sales because they thought that like they would buy an old like a pepper grinder that had Baphomet in it. I’m not sure how that works but. Yeah. Like I never thought the outside world was was that big a threat. I mean if anything I’d want to want to have more friends so Deadman’s me whether they were witnesses or not. Like I know I did have this way of thinking. But even once I met friends as a kid I never try to push my faith on them. I never said that they were wrong but it was just kind of a way that you were taught. I never saw the outside threat or the outside world as a threat. I mean I was just more curious than anything I guess. So I had I had moved until like my third house as a kid maybe when I was about 9 years old.

[00:08:56] And then there was there was two kids who lived right down the street. One was two houses away away and then the other one was houses the way I remember I had went to the to the to the four house away kid. There was Carlos and get a Playstation here a bunch of games everything. And I remember the first thing I did was I went to the games and I was like alright I can play this I can play this I can’t play this I can play this I can’t play this like all mobile video games. And I remember that I think all he asked was like well why. And then I was just like huh yeah you’re right my parents aren’t here. And I mean I guess I did try to have this looming thing that Joe was watching me or something. But I was just like well. But I guess I just started playing playing violent video games. I forgot what the games were back then but I remember that that I play smack down a lot. Back in those days. But yeah me just playing stupid games and everything but that was. That was the point where I was like tainted by the outside world because he also listens like Eminem and like rap back in the day. So that was what got me into that culture too. And then once I learned of that culture than that I mean I like I wasn’t trying to be a witness part well yeah. Yeah. And that’s and that’s what I don’t understand about nowadays. I don’t know how people can still be jobi like.

[00:10:15] Like all you need to do is go to Google and then just google Jehovah’s Witnesses like like like the first link will beJ.W. dot org. But everything else is going to be some kind of criticism or some kind of like exposed video or something like Just go on google. Everyone has a smartphone. Everyone has a laptop or a computer or something or go to the library like research your religion from third party sources because I remember that they would pretty much preach tend not to look outside. And I was like Wait so you’re telling me that there is thousands of peer reviewed scientific journals. There is like there’s all this other evidence and information out there but we’re supposed to only read a handful of books from the last 150 years. No that’s a lie. That makes no sense to me. So yeah I like it but is anyone listening. That hasn’t gotten Google yet but I’m sure they did because they promised you know I remember one of the first times that I ever asked the question about like Africa what it was about. But I remember that I didn’t even get an answer because I think I asked the elder or it was my dad or something and whoever it was they told me and they’re like oh that’s just Satan planting a seed of doubt in your heart. And then what I first heard that I was like 14 or 15 years old and I was like This is bull shit like you’re really begging me to take them. And they’re like you know like sums up the year and I forgot what that question was.

[00:11:41] I wish I could remember but just just their response like this reeks of brainwashing you know my mom had tried to institute like a family study time and everything. I’m like Saturday at 2:00 o’clock. And I used to hate it so much. Like I mean like we hardly even did family dinner like I had a very isolated family and my dad would work he would. He would work third shift he would sleep in in the morning time and then he would just watch TV or just do like yardwork or whatever yesterday my mom would be on her computer. My mom has always been pretty technologically proficient and I got that from her. So both me and her I always use news like computers all the time growing up. My dad used to use a computer now Marty because he’s a he’s retired we don’t have a super close family. I mean we all still love each other and everything but we weren’t overly affectionate about it. Yeah. So they kind of like like they don’t force anything on me at home. I mean they watch what I did and and like my mom was like Okay. So it’s funny because I always tell people about how my mind was and and they kind of flipped shit about like the way my mom would react reaction back in the day because she would set up cameras to shoot set up like listening devices like just like little reporters just to see what I’m doing.

[00:12:59] And like I just always think I’m like if Jehovah is watching me and I’m judging me for what I’m doing then what’s the point of you watching me like if I don’t care what God is thinking of me then like what I care. My mom is reporting me. And like I actually have a thing. I prefer my mom more because she’s actually right there in front of me and she can take my ex by the way. But yes she used to like just watch everything I did and like I like it sounds bad but that was a normal part of life for me too. So even when I tell people like that story I’m just like yeah you know this my life growing up they’re like Are you serious. Your mom I did this live. So that was the only weird thing because I didn’t like like my dad was pretty chill. I’m actually I’m I’m I’m a hundred percent sure that my dad was a stoner when he was a teenager and he would listen to Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin I’m like Hendrix everything. And I actually kind of got that from him to blow up the music so much. But I’m I’m kind of a stoner nowadays. But yeah. So I think that he didn’t care as much what he did care but he just and he’s just a real chill guy. I guess that’s the best way to put it. So yeah. Like I never got it forced on me too much but I deftly. I mean like they always want me. So I do my Watchtower study. I could never miss a meeting. I could never miss going on a field service like I had to fake being sick so much as a kid just to get out of this.

[00:14:20] And so what people don’t understand about witnesses to is that you don’t get their weekend. We can sleep in and watch cartoons and eat cereal because if you have multiple congregations at the Kingdom Hall on Sunday then like you’re like you’re meeting could be at 9:00 in the morning 12:00 in the afternoon 3:00 in the afternoon and then if you have a 9:00a.m. meeting then Saturday morning you’re like waking up for field service and then Sunday morning you have a meeting. So it’s like you have no time to chill cause you go back to school on Monday. And that was like last for a year at a time or sometimes I’ll be meeting with what would be 12 or three and that was like a blessing until football season came around and would miss football. But yeah. So like my parents never missed meeting everyone in my skilled service. I would do my studies obviously like like no violent video games or even just the most innocuous stuff like they would like. They would mention like I remember I want to buy this shirt and this shirt. This is like really ironic thing that is just a major red flag when you look back on it. But I want to buy this shirt and this shirt. It said truth seekers it’s it like it said like something about truth dhikr isn’t that like there was a little paragraph of text you like super small text like Oh we are the ones that look Patru with them like blah blah whatever it was.

[00:15:34] I’m sorry Gerbrandt called academics back in the day you know and it looked like and then it was like a picture of a crane or something on it it was a thing like religious at all. And then I remember my dad was just like you know like you shouldn’t get this because people might get the wrong idea I’m like the wrong idea. Like if anything this like we call ourselves the truth. So this shirt should relate. You know like when LeBron James had that witness shirt. So it’s funny because my parents actually bought those shirts just but you know for the purpose of being a witness. Yeah which is funny. Yes. So I mean my parents are moderate. They were lean yeah except my mom she was a little bit more high strung. But I can understand why and why my mom would be. And it’s because like like your brother growing up and he went to school in Chicago and she got killed out here in the 70s. So I think I think I think her losing him is the reason why she clung to the religion why she was so overbridge overprotective about me. So I mean I can’t I can’t fault them too much because I mean my parents were doing were trying to do the right thing and they would do what they genuinely believed in. And this is just that me and them have different ideas of what’s right what’s wrong. My saving grace at the Kingdom Hall was that I was so like I said for the class clown. I feel like talking to people you know like okay so. So growing up I had had a few speech impediment. I still have my list now.

[00:17:06] But growing up I have like a stutter and that’s kind of why I can trip up on words sometimes I have to say like in between the words deaf the kind and slow myself down. But my saving grace at the hall was that I could talk to people and I actually like giving talks and I gave my first thought when I was five years old. It was just a Bible reading at a time because this was like 1995. So I just went up there and I had so much speech impediments like I would say Jehovah like de Hoba and I would try not stutter. I had my list but everything. So the one good thing about growing up a witness in the hall is that I broke my fear of speaking in front of people even though I had my speech impediments at a super early age. And I think they put my emphasis on my reading and like and like they put emphasis on education but only within the organization you know I mean like like as soon as the meeting was over as soon as we had a witness I was out of witness mode. I was just I mean I would still like kind of keep my composure but I would I would be playing with my friends joking around nothing to like lewd or like like I’ve seen back in the day but that was partly because I was around them too because at school. It was completely different story. My best trait as a witness was like was was was was giving talks. Sometimes I’ll be good out in service by the time we kind of did like it at all.

[00:18:27] I don’t think people thought too negatively or too negatively of me. I don’t think I was ever seen as like a bad influence maybe like. Like a few times because I was kind of making it a little bit more obvious toward my late teens. I was like not really following everything because I mean I just wouldn’t volunteer to hold my ex or rape. Actually I remember early on I actually liked holding of a microphone and then like passing it out because you might not be bored just sit there all day and night and listen to the same thing that we study two days ago with your family. I wasn’t I wasn’t seen as like as like the black sheep of the hall until I was reproved. I think when I was like 16 or 17 and then I got this fellowship when I was 18 and I think so I was never seen as like the black sheep until then. So life Galen Hall was was pretty decent. I mean you know it’s never mind sitting through an hour hour and a half old bible talk. But I mean having your friends afterwards like thankfully there was a bunch of kids and my whole and then that that made so much better I could only imagine going to a hall of like all people. So now you get to sit through like bible talk. But then you have to be the one kid amongst all these old people after that like this. Like that would be fun. So I had fun.

[00:19:41] But I mean at the same time what I look back on it like damn I could’ve been using that time even if it’s just a play to create more memories but I could’ve been you know like tinkering with like electronics or driving more or like building up my skill set or something else that I became interested in later on. I never saw the meetings as super negative but I also did want to be there either my witness life was completely separate from my real personal life or I meet her or how I would be at school or around my friend because like all my close friends knew that I was a witness by never led seep into into anything else I did. Because I mean you know like growing up I felt it was just a part of life. Like I never I never thought that was my entire life. And I remember my mom and I think a lot of witnesses have this term that they say double life like you’re leading a double life hand. Oh actually yeah. Like I remember like circuit Overseer’s I’m like people using that term back then but I used to think that was funny because they said that you were leading a double life where really you were just trying to lead your own life. Like there’s no double life like you acting different here at the hall. But I mean people also different at their jobs for how they do outside too. So yeah I never understood that terminology and that’s why they why they mention that I never saw it as as I Breaking Bad too much.

[00:21:06] But once I was so OK first time I was with the second person and talk about but but I’ll try anyway because because because it’s relevant by member because I have lost my virginity really early on I had like girlfriends when I was younger and everything. And you know I remember the first time I ever said but when I was like 10 years old. And then you think that you’re that you’re about to be smitten feels like feels the words come out of your mouth. But I’m like. But then later on I kept doing worse and worse stuff like I remember when I first had sex like like it did and it didn’t really faze me too much so I mean I knew it was like a big deal as far as your life goes but I never I never saw it as like being anything that Jehovah was just write me down for like like I did kind of feel like I could just go back to the hall and then just keep being good and then it would kind of offset that anyway. So so I was like so I had a girlfriend early on and I remember when like North Korea first started getting theU.S. to that world. This wasn’t the first time but I remember this was like I remember this was once it was it was in the news pretty heavy and around 2006 I met Kim Jong Il was talking about like bomb in theU.S. or whatever. Now like I may not I know better I would never made this mistake. But back then I was kind of just like super paranoid that the end was coming. You know like like 9/11 was five years before that.

[00:22:35] I remember once 9/11 happened like the way that that that this is teacher growing up is that like it that these things will happen and then the end will come. Or how the how the scripture goes I would have my head now but yes so. So once that happened once I heard that Kim Jong Il was like threatening theU.S. and it seemed like we were getting closer to war. I thought we were getting close to him again. And I remember like kind of just being super nervous everyday pressure because I was having sex with my girlfriend all the time. And I thought I was like Armageddon was coming and then I was going to be smitten and then you know I would die forever or whatever and out and I actually just came out to my parents and then I thought about everything I did. They like they had scheduled like meetings with the elders I’d tell them everything and then that was the first time that I was I was reproved. And I remember that left for about like well like not the actual reproves itself but just like my whole life zealousness had came back afterwards. And then like I like I take that serious for about a month after that are like a month after I first went to the elders and then I know I can kind of warm or out of bed or I just didn’t care that much like I did kind of believe it. But like I had this weird relationship with being a witness where I didn’t 100 percent believe it. But that was just kind of how I live my life. So so so that was just normal to me.

[00:24:04] So yeah I mean it was so it was kind of back to square one after that. But then once I was disfellowshipped. So like one of my best friends who I had quite grown up with since I was 9. So life like with my best friend was it was was getting married and he had like an out of date and everything and then I was just Falchion so I was trying really hard to get back so I could go to his wedding and then not be shunned. He like I think he was talking me through someone else like a sister or my mom or something. And then they told me I could go to his wedding if I want to well like wow wow. I was just fellowship. But I had I had chosen not to because I did cause I felt being a witness is a big popularity contest. And then and then if you’re not popular and then you show up around a popular person then them like their rap will take hits. So I don’t want to go to his wedding and make him look bad because to hear this this dispels a person showing up. So I’ve missed him going to going to look like my best friend’s wedding because I was disfellowshipped when I was 18. And yeah that was a really weird time because I was well what I’d switch high schools to like like halfway through so I was at new high school. I was out again shunned by people this was like toward the end of my high school career too. But like I had a girlfriend at the time to then and she wasn’t a witness off fiercely.

[00:25:26] So yeah it was it was it was a really weird time for me because I I was stunned by a lot people I didn’t know a lot of people at high school I was going to. And that kind of made me because I was a lot more outgoing and like I was more of a class clown like middle school. But but once I got to high school and then I change high schools and then I was in the process of being shunned to that kind of change my personality a lot actually because I mean if I still ahead if I still had the same kind of Christian life I did have a kid I’d be a comedian or something now. You know but like I do have that low spurts. But I also but like like I also see the part me come out that was kind of taught to me like midway through my heart. Where do my high school career was that. Just keep to yourself. Because like when you’re being shunned in this one place that you go to three times a week and then to like like you like you’re in high school where you were you don’t know anyone and you kind of have to make a name for yourself. But yeah all those things happened to me right around that time was probably the worst time that it could happen. Like like as far as as far as a like construct of time and like I’m like decisive time in your life where where we’re you we kind of mold your personality through those years. But I mean like I say I mean like I always say that I think I have a really unique perspective.

[00:26:45] I have two parents from completely different places who kind of brought us to the middle of nowhere as far as like where they’re from. And I have no family. I have no I have no like fallback plan. It’s pretty much just me. But even but even in that circumstance I still have had to leave leave the truth in and in the air quotes because I just didn’t. I just didn’t believe it. So even even even even through all that stuff happening at their high school I never felt obligated to stay or that that was my only my only method of making a making a life for myself. I’ve a lot of stuff to say about disfellowshipping like. I think most like I think most witnesses do. But it makes no sense that that your solution to the problem of someone committing like like a deadly center something is to completely shun them. Why shouldn’t I be the person that you’re trying to help the most. Like shit like shit like shunning makes no sense. I wonder why you wouldn’t be trying to offer words of encouragement or advice to someone who is in a position where they obviously stand and you kind of have to bring back to the light. I don’t know why do think that that’s an effective method. And it also to you I mean because Kazami isn’t married. Is there an instance in the Bible where Jesus is like sitting with like some Kassin.

[00:28:06] After I figure forget what he was doing with all my year of going to the Bible over and over and over again and remember anything anyone like I used to I used to be able to like to quote certain scriptures about remember much from the Bible anymore. But yeah I like as far as the shipping goes. I don’t understand why why that’s their solution to everything and also because okay so me myself. So I’m an actor right now. Like I was never disfellowshipped I was never I’d never dissociated myself. But what’s funny is that so I have a friend and his face. There was this fellowship in about five years ago and I remember my mom wasn’t talking to her at the time even though these were family friends. So no one was talking to her in the meanwhile. Like here I’d come along and I think I’d I’d like like I had my ears pierced at the time too. And like here I come along with facial hair ears pierced. Obviously not going to the hall and I can still talk to my witness friends because well not all my witness friends but I had a couple that that I’ll still talk to you and they don’t treat me differently. But like I just don’t talk to them what’s the point. I mean obviously it’s like I was doing this scholarship worthy things at the time and I and I still do. But I never I never took that route. So people didn’t view me as ever in that red area like I was in that gray area where I could still talk to witnesses. But meanwhile let me. But like me I’d like you here.

[00:29:30] Here is this girl who wants to come back who is just fellowship but they will talk to her even though she’s making an active effort to come back to the home. So it makes no sense and I don’t know anyone ever actually thought about objectively and also to like so. So like I get the line of logic that they’re coming to disfellowshipping being an option to lie. I get how they come to that point. But I think what happened was that at first they were like Okay we shouldn’t associate with these people so we shouldn’t be spending extra time with them. By the whole you know like treat them like a normal human being. But I think what happened is that since like being a witness is a big popularity contest like one person is like Okay well I’m not going to hang out with a person outside the home. And the next person is like Okay well that I’ve taught that person and the next person is like Okay well I’m I’m going to look at that person and then that’s pretty much what comes down to it. If there are witnesses like we’ll not even look at you sometimes and what you just gossip like even even so much as exchanging a smile like like kind of like shows or really on that person. So yeah like the whole concept of disfellowshipping just doesn’t make much sense to me. I think that if someone is in these dire straits as far as their faith bill goes then you should be helping to support that and not completely shutting people away. You watch you all and it feels like you’re invisible.

[00:30:54] Because people just look at you like unless maybe the elders would maybe come up to you and I talk to you sometimes if they want to have a talk and see how you’re doing. But that was only like every few weeks or like a month or whatever. I mean I was a fellowship for six or seven months. They say six months. But they rarely let you in right back in six months. It seems like because I remember people who were good it who would get the skill that I remember from that day. I would like I would I would look out six months now why. OK. They should be back around this time but it was always closer to seven eight months that people would would come back. And I mean I made a concerted effort to come back. I just never missed meetings never missed books studies. And like I said it was pretty much just to make my friends wedding which I still did make. And I mean it was. It was to get back on good terms with all these people too because you know I lost all my all my friends from childhood once I got disfellowshipped yeah. Once I came back after seven months it like like it did seem like it just got wiped away that that feeling of animosity. That feeling of invisibility. But yeah. In the meantime it doesn’t feel like you exist. Well you kind of just are just floating through this hole. And then they’ll spread a bump shoulders with you. No one’s even looking in your direction. You feel like a ghost.

[00:32:13] And I’m like not just not just the part where were where people should be helping you pisses me off about this whole thing but just but just how did make you feel like I mean like like no one should ever be made to feel that way even even in the outside world like that supposed to be so big and bad. No one treats you let me back anywhere at night unless you’re a criminal or or something of some sort. But I mean like like I gave into a normal human urge. And then the Bible didn’t agree with that. So therefore I’m assigned to the end is seen by everyone as as as left to begin with. I don’t think it is. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I remember some elders would would come to me maybe every so month just a checkup and then see I’m doing our thing. They would really ask me any questions. Well I mean they would ask me questions but it was like they had like a guide book of questions. I was like oh who is Jehovah to you and then like was kingdom of God like it’s not like the questions they they go over with you for baptism but it kind of ask you how are you doing. And then I mean like I’ve heard that they can’t just observe you and make sure that you make it to the hall that you’re doing your study I guess like a Bible other. I mean they wouldn’t talk to you weekly by any means or at every meeting. And I remember actually to once I had once I had gone to so what I had done is I started going to a nearby hall when I was this fellowship. I don’t know why I did this.

[00:33:43] Actually like if it was just because I got disfellowshipped or what but I went to a nearby hall where I knew a few people but I could more easily sit in the back there and not see everyone I knew so so so like I like I kind of took a back door to that whole experience but I don’t know why I did that. Like getting back out maybe because it was closer to my place. And I mean I think it was part that I didn’t want to see everyone that I knew knew very well. So I went to a new congregation and they had a book study there too. Because I mean I don’t think that I don’t think that that any disfellowshipped people would go to a book study anyone’s house. I mean I’m sure this some kind of like like arbitrary de facto rule about but yes so that was that was my experience. The biggest falls apart never really had elders come to me and then talk to me too much. They would ask me questions here and they’re just doing. I had to write a letter early on to the elders and I was kind of just showing your remorse for what you’ve done and I think you do have to kind of echo those life those same sentiments. And in the second letter that you sent I’ll remember every setting and the other letters besides that. But I remember sending a like Molly reinstatement letter and the first time out kind of like I was I was kind of rejected which was like at exactly six months.

[00:35:07] But then like a month after that they were like OK we’ll let you back in. And I don’t know what that was for like oh no alcohol is just too bad like it. Because I mean I was a good writer growing up too so I could I could imagine that even if I didn’t feel genuinely empathetic about the whole situation about life about about what I was what I had done I wonder how they would even determine that. But yeah I was I was I was rejected the first time the second time I got back. But like I said that was like two weeks after my friend had been married. So by that point I missed the mark but I was just trying to get back in any way so I can just see everyone again and talk to everyone. I don’t think they would come to you. I think even if they saw you coming every week if you didn’t talk to them first like you could be going backwards for three years and they still would let you back in. Like I mean I think that you need to go to them first and then tell them like hey like I want to come back. One thing that I want to mention too is that I would never be in that situation if I wasn’t baptized at 12:00. And the witness is always trying to champion this idea that like oh Catholics baptized their love like their children when they’re babies. But you know like you can think for yourself and then and then like you can get baptized when you want. But like I said a million times it’s a popularity contest.

[00:36:26] So if you’re friends getting baptized at ten or eleven which are different you got baptized like nine or eight like he’s like the golden boy. And I hear you are not baptized not able to be behind the Ligia counter at the hall and then give our magazines to people like you’re just you know you’re like like you’re a little upon the in the in the kingdom whole world. So I never got myself into these extremely emotionally upsetting conditions had never made this or had I never had my parents and everyone else makes the decisions for me when I was way too young to make this decision. And I think that they really need to like I mean if they were to reform the religion because I don’t think they’re Jehovah’s Witness like I should be completely done away with. I think everyone should believe what they want to do but like I think that every religion can needs an overhaul and they need to look back at their values and just take out these extremely archaic ways of dealing with people and yeah like it just doesn’t have any doesn’t have any grounding in the current day reality or with how people should be treating each other. It’s just completely outdated. It’s funny that I did all this work to get back that I mean by doing all this work I mean just going to the hall and being shot every hour or like three times a week. But once I came back was I was maybe 18 and a half or something like it was. It was Wiggily come back. I think my friend I got married in June and I came back before the summer and it was like 2008.

[00:38:11] So yeah. So I didn’t think I was going to go to college when I was in high school. And that’s part of being a witness to is that they tell you that you died that you shouldn’t go to college that you shouldn’t seek higher education because they preach they that you should be out there pretty much evangelizing and going door to door. And you know spreading the Good Word of Jehovah or whatever. So I did find out I would go to college. So for about maybe six months after high school I was working at a factory that would be up at like 4:00 in the morning. Be there at 5:00 work until 5:00 in the wintertime. Like you don’t even see the light of day and you work for minimum wage like criminals at a factory like yeah this is not the life for me. I mean like it was fun. I never had like I have like a bad experience other than I have had to wait for. But I did think that that taught me the value of good hard work back then. But yes I was working a job at a factory and I was like Okay this is not life to me. And I had always like I was always drawing.

[00:39:14] I was always like trying to do my own little illustrations everything so I picked up a little bit of like 8p.m. VSS once I was in high school but I never did anything too much with it other than I edited my Myspace profile page but I figured what I wanted to do was get into some kind of art like graphic design or something Urd or something work on computers. I was always on my on my laptop back in the day and then I had photoshop and I would like this mess around that little bit. Saavik I’m going to be a graphic designer. And I remember what it was like kind of a struggle with my parents to get them to go out to get them to let me go to school special with my mom losing her losing her brother in Chicago as a teenager. So I remember talking with them about moving out of the city and then going to the school out here where I was going to the first day the Art Institute and they were kind of they were kind of has 10 abide first special with loans which they were actually right about. I should’ve never signed away with it for loans. But I mean I’m glad that that that I went to school definitely because I mean that’s what I’ve kind of made it like like made a living out of so far as making websites and I like doing design for people. Yeah that was around the time when I was mentally out at that time. I remember what my thought process was actually though so. I do remember before I moved to the city I was going to this like local college by my house and I took a world religions course. And I remember my teacher was like this like maybe like at the oldest like like like 35 year old guy. And I think one of the first questions that he ever asked in the class was he was like do you take the Bible metaphorically or literally.

[00:41:08] And then my first response was Oh well like literally of course you know it’s the Bible. And then he was like Okay so then you believe that like a guy god like God two of every species of animal. Load them onto a boat and they’re floated out like this huge ocean that engulfed the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. And then I was like Well I mean what you put it that way then you know I guess and the like and I guess that my life that my freight car despite tumbling down from there. And I remember for a little bit because I could I got back and forth with majors a million times in my first year of college. And I remember at one point I want to get in to like something to do with religion like I want to study religion because it’s always been really interesting to me even once I was in high school. I remember thinking that Islam was like was was like super interesting. I just thought how like like like like I mean how hot how submission is one of the basic pillars of of of Islam. And then you need to completely dedicate yourself to the faith. I thought that was kind of relevant my experience. And I remember that once I once had once I had dropped my parents that I wanted to study religion in college. They were really has tell about it and I thought that was weird too because I’m like how this is weird because you know I mean if you guys think that what you have is the truth why are you so scared to look other places you know.

[00:42:30] And I mean and I eventually didn’t go for that but I was the last week courses at my age that I could take my religion I would take. So I think that was one of the first lessons by which really should my faith. I mean now that like not that my faith was strong to begin with but that was kind of just like reaffirming what I had always felt and oh that was on 18 19. And then once I moved to Chicago and I was going to college out here I just completely stopped going. I just never. And I remember once I would come out here with my mom and then we would like to look for places. I remember the kind of cold and cold looking for came how to go to you. And we had like like I drove past a couple. But I mean I still have I moved out here I just stopped going and I never thought twice about it. I never I was never I never felt bad. I never felt like oh like I need to pray or anything but I’ve been praying eight years. I haven’t I haven’t gone to the whole eight years. I’ve read a watchtower. Eight years. Yeah I just completely just left and then I remember lay out lay down remember my parents asked me if I would if I was going to the hall what I first moved out. But I remember when I first got my ears pierced I like Gage my ears a little bit. And I remember what I first curious.

[00:43:49] My theory is I called them late late late at night because of this but I was part of them and I’d seen them every week and at that point I was like I got some news for you guys. And then my dad thought I got someone pregnant at first and that I was like I no not that bad but I pierced my ears. And I think that you know obviously I know it was a big deal but I made my parents have always been a better time of. They’re like Okay well it world like he’s going do what he wants. And there was never that much that much push back on me. I mean we did have a bunch of arguments like him ever in my first few years of being inactive not about me being inactive but just kind of like debating religion and philosophy and stuff. And I made it but it was always hard to talk about that stuff because anyone who believes in God that’s like their trump card is like a because I mean I could say you know there’s no there’s no rock layers that show that there was a great global flood like this. No. Kind of like all archaeological remains that could back this up but they just say the Bible said it and then that’s that’s that’s all they have to say. They only to back up with science or anything else. Gave my ears curious after that was that was like that was like my next stage of kind of being out of it because I knew at that point I couldn’t go back to the hole with my ears pierced you know. And I even like growing facial hair.

[00:45:18] He was such a big thing. But yeah but like like that was what I was completely out was my first year working out which is when I was 20. And so imagine that I had been shunned as a witness and that I was might be kind of like some I’ve shunned again it’s about Bastardo and active. I just moved to a new city. I didn’t have a lot of friends and my second high school class was new there. And then I’m going to college to this college that wasn’t that wasn’t exactly like a college experience it wasn’t my dorm is where you have to associate with people. It was like you would go to class and leave. So I was like really I’m my own out here. I remember my first year. I mean I would just work. I would come home from work and then I would like watch the office and bingeing on and then that with a cream treat Netflix day. So I had a bit of I was like pretty alone back then. I still made the choice to leave the religion because I just knew it like it wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life. And and and I knew that I had to take a step back and then see it from from you know a wide angle lens and then see what I actually thought about in it in context with other religions and actual culture and see if it it kind of reflected what I want to do.

[00:46:32] But and that there was a look at the conclusion that I came to I knew that I did do something else with my life they always frame it like people want to leave the organization just to go like live like debaucheries life and it and it’s not that way. I think it’s just that they see anything outside of being witness as being at the bottom. So I mean my favorite part of being out of the organization is you know yeah just being able to experience life for what it is like being able to get drunk and then not going to sell it because I knew some some some early like well. So I knew a couple older brothers in the congregation back in the day who were actually fathers of my friends and they would they would get disfellowshipped for for getting drunk I cinemagraph think they would do anything other than that. But just what I overheard that sound like it was but yeah I mean yeah. Like I think my favorite part of I also not having to attend to this faith. Three times a week. And then outside add to your own personal study then outside of that go door to door. It just takes up so much time and it makes sense that like there’s lot of witnesses who just like make a living for themselves as like as like cleaners where they go to offices and clean their homes and clean up whatever witnesses just franchise out a business model for home cleaning. They would actually be be like like I’ll be super attractive for them. They’ll be funny like spelled like like low stereotype loafers for the pretty way this is bad. Anyway I think my favorite part.

[00:48:09] I’d say about not being a witness anymore is there also that I’m not a popularity contest anymore. Like I mean I’ve always been I’ve always reacted really adversely to any kind of popularity contest. Whether it was it was at a high school or on the Internet or anything and then that was how being a what this was it was just everyone trying to be holier than thou and like and and then you’re constantly having to keep up with this image of yourself that you have to like look good. Like before Jehovah or before the elders or circuit overseer or are at the assembly earlier conventions or something. So I’m just glad I can live my life the way I want to and not have you. I mean obviously people are going to judge you. I mean being a witness is like is is you’re under the scope 24/7 at being just 24/7 and then just being able to live my life and not have to feel bad for it. That’s the best part. And it sounds like it should be a word. I mean it’s not like this shouldn’t sound like a human right. It is a human right. The whole concept of the pursuit of happiness is a human right. And I mean I just drifted away from you because you have to live by these rules. You have to answer to these people. Education. Make it make a make a hint towards going the other way or else working in a gang to shun you to end and then going to put you out like play off the group. I mean it’s just such a such a like tribal mentality.

[00:49:42] I mean that’s that’s probably like light light light like the route of religion is just like living in these tribes and trying to come up with with a shared understandings of the world amongst everyone else. And then it just becomes a problem once you get your own human rights violated or you get your own humanity violated. And that’s why I feel like what happens with witnesses sometimes even though I think they’re good people I think they’re all like really great people I think they’re well-meaning. I think they’re just misguided. I think that like they just fell down this track. And also to like witnesses you love these tactics that other codes used. And it’s not like it’s as simple as looking up what is called The Bite Model. I think it is the end. And then and then just seeing some some of these tactics that they use on you to keep you in the street without you even knowing why. I mean the first time that I read about love bombing I was like wow this is exactly like like like being a witness is everyone’s just like oh like like we have such love for our fellow brothers and sisters. And then why they preach this whole concept of like a gap a which was a Hebrew word for brotherly love I think. But if you go the wrong way and that if you commit a deadly sentiment and then you just fellowship well all that goes out the window. All that brotherly unconditional love goes out the window. So the unconditional love. Have a condition. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. Like there’s a real life. Like a real strong divide of black and white in those terms.

[00:51:17] And I mean. And and as far as unconditional love it should never be that way. Yeah I was. That was kind of how that was just how it was. I mean no one ever saw anything outside of that was just how it was supposed to be my friends who were worldly. I’m still friends with nowadays. And as long as I don’t do anything terrible then will always be my friends I’m assuming you know as far as I’m crossed them or. Or you know yeah. Like life like commit some heinous crime. I wouldn’t expect them to ostracize me from their life. But yeah. But if you don’t believe in like I remember once I got that. That like that like seed of doubt planted in your heart by saying the statement told me when I was younger but I think that my second moment like that was when I was getting shot. So this was my first moment because this was before the previous one. But I remember I was going over the questions for baptism which is also just learning the answers and reciting them later. Like you don’t actually get stupid. Yeah but I remember getting to the question and it was like Do you believe that Jehovah’s kingdom is an actual place or like life or heart condition. And once I read that I was like a heart condition like like having something wrong with your heart. It’s not me. And I was young every time I like 12 and I still knew that and I was confused by that question.

[00:52:51] And I was going over it with my parents and then I think I was going over it with my mom and my mom like so my mom was always pretty like on the edge emotionally like she had depression and my anxiety growing up and why she just felt like crying. What I could answer that question. I always thought that was interesting because the like why the reason why she started crying was because she just like she thought I didn’t know the answer to a question which looks like a pretty basic question for being a witness. I just don’t understand the wording of it. I thought it meant a heart condition. And I remember that they called the elders because the elders were supposed to come and talk to me my three days on there something and then and then they were supposed to go with the questions with me. And then they’ve called them and they were like no he’s not ready blah blah whatever. And it had. And yeah like that put a major seed of doubt in my heart right there I was just like alright like all I have to do is is is is like recite these answers. But meanwhile you’re acting like me not being able to understand how this question is worded is like a deadly sin in itself. The more I think about it it impacts everything about me. I’m like I’m a super skeptical person and I think that was a byproduct of being a witness.

[00:54:20] Not that they teach you to be skeptical but you naturally become skeptical because so like being being a witness isn’t like being Amish or something like You look like you’re still living in a normal world mostly but you’re just being taught these like completely different things so I think that being a witness taught me to be skeptical because also I think what is about to is that it’s a kind of questioning big religion like Catholicism and like all those huge like Sexo Krrish of Christianity. And I think that it taught me to be skeptical. I will say that I got like I feel like always reading the Bible and always reading the watchtower and everything back the day Duffie did help my reading a lot because I remember I was reading from a very early age and I think it was as I think was because my parents always wanted me to follow along with watchtower and everything and then I had my book of bible stories. So I think that everything that I do nowadays is kind of shaped by it because yeah. Like I mean like I mentioned I’m a very skeptical person. I’m a very pessimistic person and I and I think that’s because being witness to because it’s kind of telling you that Satan runs the world and that kind of all hope is lost except for except for this one day that Jehovah should come down after you been being persecuted and the Great Tribulation but not until then are you going to actually like life ever feel true happiness. All this is just passing you know. So that kind of worldview kind of stuck with me. I have a very interesting view of religion. But I will say that I have came around recently and I’m still not religious but I do believe in some kind of higher power.

[00:56:09] I think that because one thing that that this has always point to as their proof of God is just how the universe and how the Earth is designed and how humans are designed and yeah everything is super amazing and we can’t understand it. But I mean we can’t just say how big space is right now. Like I mean if you’re trying to sit down and think about it like it’s ever expanding so you can never grasp how big space is like a like if you see a picture of of the sun next to the earth that you’re like holy crap that is just that is completely just dwarfs it. And then and then the sun as it is is a dwarf star I think too right. So like that’s a tiny light love like it like a tiny celestial body. In the grand scheme of things so I think there’s of things that we can’t understand and we’re not supposed to understand because we’re just humans like we’re like we’re a drop in the bucket as far as all time has gone. And I think that religion tried tries to tries to attribute motives and attribute some some like deeper meaning of things to the universe. By me I think I think that I think that we’re all kind of here by chance and I mean maybe there was some kind of higher power that that affected us and then kind of guided our evolution in the way that we went. But I think just this whole like black and white view of the world where someone just came down and then decided that they wanted to just arbitrarily make humankind and then have to follow his rules doesn’t doesn’t make any sense to me.

[00:57:45] But I think that the way that I look at everything I think I have a pretty like balanced view of everything I know that there’s two sides to every story. And like one thing it changed with me too was that you know I was never political at all like up until a year ago really and now I mean like all i do is listen to like political podcast and then like YouTube and everything. But growing up I never I was never the politics at all because that’s it. Yeah because you could because you’re completely removed maybe because because they’re so so their way of thinking is that why get card in politics of today’s world when we’re kind of just wait for Christ Kingdom you know. So that’s one thing that that kind of change me growing up but without completely broken from that. I don’t know what other things it’s really affected my everyday life. I mean I don’t think about it very often but once I can think about and talk about it I do love talking about it because it’s just it’s such a unique experience and it’s such a. Like I feel like I was kinda kinda like a blank slate when I first moved to Chicago because I was exploring a whole new world of just living the life on my own terms like. I think that that is the way that I look at everything. It is kind of shaped and and influenced by that in some way. I was always at the hip hop and that I know is that people of Chicago have been making blogs and stuff. I think that they were doing it right.

[00:59:18] I think that they were like putting out that that good content. So I so am I kind of have my small business for a few years and I mean now I’m more into the tech world. I do a lab by design and you design graphic design. I get more into that. What I try about my own company. I don’t think that I don’t think that being a witness stifled my like my life will to be an entrepreneur or to be anything else other than someone who goes door to door every morning. So I think I do have a lot of big plans a lot big dreams outside of being a witness. I don’t think that that’s ever going to affect what I do in the future. But I mean at the same time I do recognize that it has shaped me and it has molded me. I do think that I read you want to work in politics of some sort which is extremely ironic because you’re you know growing up I was not in politics at all. And I mean I I thought I was stupid when I was younger too. But I mean I want to get like I want to form some kind of business whether I make my own YouTube or like whether it’s like a new hip hop blog or just some kind of app idea. But I do want to do something that I can call my own the one day and hopefully it becomes hugely successful. And from there I was like I mean I would like to work in politics. I would like to work in my local community.

[01:00:38] And then from there I mean if it goes farther that too. Like working on like a higher office like at a state level that I’ll be okay with that too. I don’t like the way that politics are going nowadays and naive and just because of Trump but just because of how how everyone interacts with each other and I think coming from a religion where I’ve seen people be shunned and seen people kind of be ousted as the black sheep. I can see how that could happen in normal and normal society too. So I would like to do something to kind of kind of the kind of curb that like right now I kind of have to get my old life straightened out because you know also coming from being a witness. If you want to go to college then you can have a do so. All of that on your own terms. So that was why I took out loans because in high school I didn’t care about high school because I didn’t think what you kind of don’t think of that. That school matters that much. Because I mean you’re like cut it anyway you want but being a witness is and it’s like being in a doomsday cult because they’re constantly preaching to you that it’s coming soon and that at an end like we’re in the end times and whatnot. Yeah. Like I never took highschool too seriously and because of that I wasn’t able to do well. I really do super well in college. But I mean I know what my passion is.

[01:01:58] I know that I have a passion for design and I know how to make into a business. So from there I kind of just want to build upon that and then just do my own thing. And I mean it’s it’s kind of ironic that once I look back on it now that you know like I’ve been drawing since I was 5 4 years old and if I had known back then I would have made a living out of it. I would just tell my parents about them like a. But these meetings I’m a. My grandparents house or something. And if you guys want one to want to kick me out like like I just want to drive like work on designing things I want to be creative. And I’m like I’m excited to be a pushy parent and my kid because like I’ll be pushy on them but they’ll think me like like by the time that a teenager is like like like what is playing sports or having some kind of like talent or a hobby or play an instrument like I want to make sure that the time that my parents had me sitting at a meeting listening to like the same Bible talking points regurgitate over and over again I’m going to have them like like learn a skill. Families do as Wolf myself as I believe I can I’m I’m. I’m good. They had a big idea like. Like I can’t just work out like a simple 9 to 5 and then expect to make a big name for myself. I could kind of like work out my little building blocks towards that point.

[01:03:23] I mean I just want to come up with some kind of idea that it could be a home run that’s going to be like like whether it’s a successful app or like a or just any kind of a successful company. That’s just what I’m shooting for eventually. What I believe now I think that the Bible and God is just the metaphor for yourself and then trying to be God like is just trying to reach your highest form. So whether that be getting up and running at 5a.m. every morning or working at the business or working on your art or doing whatever it like. Usually we try to become a god but God and your own sense and then that includes being moral not harming other people but just achieving but just achieving the pinnacle of your happiness and your success should be what being a god is to everyone and you shouldn’t have to look to other people to determine what the terms of being a god are for you. Thank you for listening again. Feel free to leave a comment to today’s guest shunned podcast dot com on the post for this episode. Music is always an important way of marking the journey and often helps us to process feelings that we can’t express at the time. So visit the website to see the songs chosen by each guest to represent their personal journey. Speaking of music all music on this podcast has been performed by Poddington Bear if you appreciate this podcast. Please help others find it while leaving a five star review on iTunes which helps the show rank and get exposure. If you are shunned and want to tell your story email me through the contact form on the Web site or if you just want to say hi.

[01:05:11] Feel free to do the same. If you’d like to know more about me and the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses I encourage you to listen to my nine part series on the cult at thisjwlife.com we’re on the podcast called thisJ.W. life. Remember that those around you may be going through something like this and that you have no knowledge of. So give them the benefit of the doubt love others do no harm and go be happy.