Episodes

Episode Twenty – Tamara is shunned by Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:40] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose religions that you shunning is a tool to control people we have a great look into the narcissism displayed by many of Jehovah’s Witnesses. The tone deaf way in which they react to others around them while they’re while they sit around admiring their own beauty. You know I don’t know if you know the myth of Narcissus but it’s about a man named Narcissus that’s so beautiful. He’s followed by admirers different admirers depending on the version of the story you get essentially Narcissus ends up being very rude to those that admire him and his beauty. So he is taken to a lake where he sees his reflection and he is coerced to sit there admiring himself in that reflection unable to pull away and unable to have the object of his desire. He ultimately either melted away into the flower that now bears the name Narcissus or he committed suicide Narcissus can’t really take the perspective of others they can’t see outside of themselves. It’s my assertion that Jehovah’s Witnesses both attract and create narcissists they view people as objects not people with their own feelings and perspectives only their thoughts and feelings matter and everything is about being right. And of course they’re always the horns in the right at best. Others are a problem to be fixed or dealt with. If you think about it the God Jehovah that they worship according to their doctrine is going to come and kill roughly 8 billion people in a mass genocide just so Jehovah’s Witnesses can live on earth in peace and harmony. It’s a literally wipe out the mass of humanity so that you can live as you wish without others around all bothering you is the epitome of narcissism through this story you’re going to meet to mirror a young girl showing up through all of this and and who came out as a strong woman not just strong enough to make it through but strong enough to tell her story. And this is a fresh story too. This is something that happened just earlier this year and something that she told to me just months after it all happened. Stay ahead of these interviews by several months. So I actually recorded this months many months ago. So stick around after the interview. You’re going to hear how the podcast is doing what next month’s episode is going to be about. I’ve decided I’m going to start giving you some highlights from the show and podcast group that I have on Facebook and what’s going on there. So without further ado let’s meet Tamara mirror my name’s Tamara.

[00:03:21] I’m 27 years old. I was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and I am shunned right.

[00:03:29] So then how did you become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the first place.

[00:03:33] Were you born in.

[00:03:34] Or did you come in later was born and raised Jehovah’s Witnesses gotcha.

[00:03:43] How many generations does that go back.

[00:03:48] 5 goes back five generations.

[00:03:51] Wow. Yeah. So. So you have deep roots then.

[00:03:56] Yes they do.

[00:03:58] So then I guess you know that means. So obviously your parents were born in as well.

[00:04:03] No. Mom. She. She was raised in it from the age of 3.

[00:04:13] And my dad didn’t come into it until he was later in his life around the age of 21.

[00:04:21] So then how did that come about. Do you know the story at all.

[00:04:26] With my mom and my grandmother had always been exposed to it but she didn’t get baptized until she was 19 and my mom was around three at that time with my dad. He and his parents started studying Jehovah’s Witnesses and he was living a life of extreme drugs and alcohol and he was looking for something more than that so he started studying with his parents.

[00:04:54] Gotcha. I think a lot of times people have issues in life and then they you know kind of find find Jehovah’s Witnesses and turn to that you can be just as addicted to a religion or an ideology as you can to drugs and alcohol they can kind of take over your life. Then so then you know being born and raised a Witness yourself. What was the world view that it gave you as a as a child growing up.

[00:05:30] Well I lived a very isolated life. I even lived in an isolated community. I was raised in this tiny little town that had one street on it is called Main Street. I went and had a grocery store and the other end had a home hardware. And so the school had like 300 kids and and my congregation at the Kingdom Hall only had 15 people in it.

[00:05:59] Wow that’s a book study for most people.

[00:06:03] Exactly. It was it was tiny. So in the beginning years I didn’t mind know going to school and being different because I got so much attention for it it was so praised and it was. It was a good thing. So I didn’t I didn’t start changing me. My view on how I seen the world until I got into my teens and actually realized that I was different.

[00:06:36] Gotcha. So then you say that you were praised for it. That’s kind of the I guess the opposite of a lot of people’s experiences. Why in school were you praised for what did what did people kind of admire them about. Was it that you were just being praised by your family and you know the witnesses in this small kingdom hall or were you actually getting praise at school or from your classmates or teachers. It was.

[00:07:07] It was definitely a little of both. And I was always a strong minded kid and I was just like my classmates. There was only you know a small number of us and so they. They were always.

[00:07:25] Good to me and my teachers were always you know praising me for standing up for myself and being strong minded and and stuff like that. So they were always very accommodating because like every other Jehovah’s Witness you know you don’t stand for the anthem and you don’t participate in any of the holiday celebrations. And so they were always extremely accommodating to me.

[00:07:51] Well that’s nice.

[00:07:53] Yeah and you can kind of see to Jehovah’s witnesses give their kids the I guess the opportunity to be strong and to take stands for things. I mean you kind of have to. Yeah it’s not really so optional but yeah. I guess if you’re you’re looking for qualities that the religion can give people that is you know the ability to stand out to be different. Obviously again it’s it’s not really necessarily always by choice but you know that is a positive and then of course you know later in life if a person takes a stand and uses those same qualities against the religion it’s a whole nother ballgame.

[00:08:44] Yeah. That’s what happened to me.

[00:08:46] Sure of course. So then. So it sounds like school was was pretty good.

[00:08:54] What was it like at home for you growing up in the religion was boring.

[00:09:07] It was very boring. But when I at the age that I started school would have been around 5 years old.

[00:09:14] My dad got very sick with chronic migraines which rendered him bedridden for the majority of my life at home. So we had that to deal with and and Mom had her depression to deal with. So we weren’t the family that at that period of time we weren’t always the family that made it to all the meetings or went in service my mom followed the rules to the letter of course. So our TV was in. I was raised on Little House On The Prairie and animal documentaries. Our music was you know old school music there was never any. We were never exposed to any swearing or any kind of insinuate in insinuating material of any kind. It was. It was very strict. My life revolved around just being at home school is kind of the only escape from that so it sounds like you were.

[00:10:33] I mean I can only imagine how isolating that is. You know to be isolated in a small community and then to even be isolated at school and then it sounds like at home. I mean you had very little contact with the outside world.

[00:10:48] Very little. Yes. Because there were other kids in our hall as well there was three other kids. But they were a lot younger than me too. So we didn’t get out and do things. We were always just a home. And you know the highlight of our year was when our aunts came to visit because they would take us to a movie or a sleigh ride whatever time of the year they come. They plan an adventure for us. And that was our one time De.

[00:11:19] Get out and see the world.

[00:11:21] And was it just you. As far as the children goes. Or did you. Did you have any siblings.

[00:11:27] Yeah I had a I had a younger sister. She was four years younger than me. She just passed last year.

[00:11:35] Okay. I’m sorry to hear that.

[00:11:39] That’s that’s too young.

[00:11:43] How were you treated then. So you don’t really want to just gloss all over your past that but I know that’s part of your story. So how did you know you’re at home. You’re isolated like this. It sounds like so what about at the Kingdom Hall. It sounds like you said that you weren’t super regular. Was such a small congregation. I would assume that everyone takes on maybe bigger roles when they are there for you. What did that. What did that look like.

[00:12:21] Well after after a couple years we did we did get regular at the meetings and in pretty involved in the congregation their responsibilities were a lot heavier at that point I mean you were given a talk or I was given a talk at least every second to third week and then a demonstration for every meeting. So there is a lot but there was a lot of disconnect in the congregation nobody really cared.

[00:12:53] Really. Yeah I know.

[00:12:56] How can you. That’s hard to grasp because you know it’s such a small congregation it’s like you would think that everybody cares tremendously because you know it.

[00:13:10] You would think. But all it did was generate a lot of drama because you’re so close to these people all the time when they do want to get involved in your life. It’s it’s because they want to counsel you and your shoes being too tall or being too low or your makeup or whatever it was always. They always involve themselves in the things that didn’t really matter. And then they didn’t pay attention to anything else. Like for an example my dad didn’t go to the meetings at all. He never got out of bed. But every single meeting at that point we had three meetings a week and every single meeting they’d say Oh your father’s not here. He must be sick. Well yes he has been for the last ten years. And every single meeting it was the same thing over and over again. Nobody paid attention.

[00:14:11] That is so fascinating. I think that you really summed up a lot of what it is to live in the cult just in the statement that they pay attention to the things that don’t really matter. You know like your shoes or your the length of your dress or whatever. Exactly. Yeah. But when it comes to caring about actual human beings that’s not that’s not really there because I don’t know if it were me and I knew this guy that seems to not get out of bed for 10 years and isn’t at the meeting I would be trying to help that guy you know find out what’s right. You know what can we do to help him. You would you would think that these loving quote shepherds or whatever would be out there trying to help him or in some way or help helping you or your mom or your sister because that’s just a hard situation.

[00:15:17] Well their way of helping is inviting you in service.

[00:15:21] Yes. Because that’s all that really matters.

[00:15:24] They fix everything in their heads. That’s how they were we’re helping we’ll get the kids out a house we’ll invite them in service. And that was just the extent of it. Wow.

[00:15:38] Wow. And it is interesting that even in such a small congregation people were still reflective of what you see in the larger congregation. I mean there’s a larger kingdom halls there.

[00:15:49] Clicks I guess you couldn’t have too many clicks out of 15 people but they’re quite often division. Yeah. It’s an issue that come up it would kind of divide at half every time I was usually the center of the TV.

[00:16:06] You were the only I think didn’t you say that you’re pretty much the oldest of the young people. Yes. So there you go. Yeah.

[00:16:12] You’re you’re going to be the center of everyone’s attention you’re the next the next big hope for them is that they can get you to be whatever it is you know they’re trying to mold you into. Yeah. That’s that’s a lot of pressure how did then how did things kind of. It. Let’s talk about how did you feel you know what were what were your feelings as you were going through all this. You know you kind of said that in school you kind of felt I guess maybe a little praised for things but you know otherwise you know you said that you’re kind of the center of this sometimes negative attention. How were you feeling at home and how are you feeling at school or at the Kingdom Hall.

[00:17:00] When I get into grades five six that’s when my view on everything started to change. So I I got curious about know what all the other kids were doing in the music they were listening to the sports they got to play and I wanted to experience things like all the other kids but it created a division. You know I got angry because I couldn’t do it.

[00:17:28] So my family and the congregation viewed me as rebellious. So they see you starting to go one way and they just load the pressure and expectations on you to keep you distracted.

[00:17:44] That didn’t work. I got pulled out of school. Oh really. Yeah. You say. When was this. You got pulled out. I was halfway through grade nine. Wow.

[00:17:56] And were you then. If you want to get into that yet. Is that when you when did you get baptized. How did that progress as far as you know. Because you know you’re starting to be this quote rebellious kid who wants to have a little fun.

[00:18:17] Yeah you know harmless fun and yet you know eventually you I’m sure did end up getting baptized. How did all how did that go as you went through your teenage years.

[00:18:29] Well I had no choice to get baptized. And how that word was there was an elder in our congregation at the time. And because you’re I mean it’s such a small car. You work with the same people every day in service. And so we quite often got left in the car by ourselves.

[00:18:51] Well somebody went to do a study. So I’d be stuck in the car for about an hour with this elder and he would pull out the book and he would ask me the questions and he would drill me on all the questions I’d have to answer them. And then at the end of it he would say see you know all the answers so when do you want to book the meeting to start going over the questions. And finally it just got too much and I said OK well we’ll do it. You know when do you want to do it. How old were you then 16.

[00:19:28] That’s such a good a hard line way to go about it. I mean you were truly a captive mean captive in a car getting grilled by an elder. There’s there’s not much you can do. Get away from that. You’re stuck. Yeah. That’s so. Did you feel. I don’t know I’m just trying to put myself in your shoes. I think I might have felt not only lonely but just trapped maybe even early in a car.

[00:20:03] And I’ve always been a pleaser. Yeah you know I always wanted to make people happy. Yeah.

[00:20:10] Though when people put expectations on me it was a lot of pressure because they just wanted to make them happy. So that was that was the majority of my life in. In the Kingdom Hall is just just meeting expectations all the time yeah you’re almost like a little performer.

[00:20:31] Yes. Yeah. Here’s your stage here’s your roll. Now go do it. You know that’s that’s your life. Yeah. When you were taken out of school I would imagine that must have been a huge change for you because that was your one escape. That was your one outlet. Yes.

[00:20:51] It was the kids at school they would they would bring me a change of clothes everyday.

[00:20:58] So when I got to school I could wear more modern things like everybody else saying stick out is different so much and they would bring me magazines so I could you know keep up on the celebrity drama like everybody else.

[00:21:11] So they did that for me and you know I was I was told that they were no they were going to die. And you know they were you know influenced by Satan. And I truly believed that they were good people they were good people I still I still talk to them did you know they were friendships that lasted you know up until now and you just get stuck in the middle.

[00:21:38] Yeah. I mean that’s that’s honestly a really sweet and beautiful thing that those kids were doing. That’s that’s really that’s amazing.

[00:21:49] Yeah I mean you know usually kids see another kid who’s different and they seize upon that opportunity to bully them or whatever to make themselves feel better. But here these kids were actually trying to help you. Yes. That’s why I’ve never never heard that. That’s that’s an amazing piece of the story.

[00:22:14] I was lucky to have that. Yeah but it it got taken away once once my parents found out.

[00:22:23] Yeah. So then you said that was in like the 9th grade.

[00:22:25] Yeah. Halfway through grade nine.

[00:22:28] So how old are you then like 14 ish I guess. Yeah 14. Yeah.

[00:22:37] So then you start this homeschool program. Can you tell us anything about the type of homeschool that you did.

[00:22:48] This type of home schooling should not be allowed but it was called new system school. So in order to get enrolled in this program you have to have letters signed by elders stating that you are an active part of the congregation before you can even get the curriculum.

[00:23:11] Then and then once you get it health class is the young people ask book your history class is either the Proclaimers book or the revelation book your science class is the evolution book it goes on and on.

[00:23:33] I think you mean the creation bug. Yeah. I’m just teasing. Because of course it’s not really about evolution.

[00:23:41] No that’s that’s. That would give a person a very distorted outlook of the world if that’s all that they read.

[00:23:49] Yeah. So the only class that didn’t involve the publications that were given was their math class was it.

[00:24:04] And is that just basically. Probably like a remedial math.

[00:24:08] I would assume that it’s not the high of any flexing multiplication. Yeah just basic basics.

[00:24:17] Yeah I am really surprised that that is that mutates criteria I wonder I kind of wonder how they get around that ala new I know.

[00:24:35] Yeah. It’s intense because your service time counts for credits and you’re meeting times spent at the meetings and your meeting preparation count for credits as well so your life is Jehovah’s Witness bubble.

[00:24:55] Does your ex those two that you learn about. That’s all you study. That’s all you live.

[00:25:02] I would imagine that you must have felt pretty desperate to get away from it at times because that’s just a lot of Jehovah’s Witness indoctrination. That’s just a lot.

[00:25:11] It’s a lot. But you know after two years of that just gave in to it. Yeah my only way out was to to progress to the things that you’re allowed to like. Pioneering and foreign language and that is the path they took so then did you do.

[00:25:40] Did you just pioneer. Or did you actually learn a foreign language.

[00:25:44] Yes I did. I regular pioneered and went to pioneer school. And after that I joined the Chinese congregation at the same time I was part of the sign language and Spanish courses as well.

[00:26:03] You’re a young go getter.

[00:26:06] Yeah but it was the only thing that I was allowed to excel at. Sure it was the only thing I was allowed to do that allowed me to move forward in any direction.

[00:26:18] Did you did you have to move away. I mean I would. I don’t know. I’m just picturing this little Main Street town. Like were the people with these foreign languages. Did you have to move away.

[00:26:31] Yes I did. I traveled back and forth for a while Halifax and then I just moved to Halifax and how far away did that get you from.

[00:26:46] You know where you had grown up.

[00:26:48] Now in half Yeah that’s nice.

[00:26:52] You know a little a little breathing room at least a buffer zone.

[00:26:57] Yes but that was that was the beginning of my way out.

[00:27:01] Yeah. I was working at home too so I was home schooled and pioneering and and I managed a call center from home that night.

[00:27:13] A little workaholic. Really. That’s a lot on your plate.

[00:27:18] It was but it didn’t allow me out of the bubble.

[00:27:22] Yeah you get to work outside of the home or these was this call center was it somehow witnesses. It was mostly most of the workers were witnesses.

[00:27:36] Really. Yeah. A lot of the workers or witnesses.

[00:27:40] Wow. And so I guess they all worked from home and maybe had contracts to do like phone customer service representation or something like that.

[00:27:49] Yes wow.

[00:27:52] I did not know that that existed. That’s a new one on me. Interesting. I can see the need for it. I can see why they would like that. That type of work. Yeah. So then how did things you know go from there.

[00:28:11] I when I was a small town girl and moved to tell the facts which was like the big city to me and that was that was the beginning of of my way out. At that point I met people in the congregation that you know were on their way out too and they just got involved with them and I wanted to see the world and experience things and and so I did it.

[00:28:46] So yeah you kind of like Sawyer you know a crack wall and went for it.

[00:28:53] Yes. You were in that prison cell and there was a crack and you were using a spoon to dig it out.

[00:29:02] He said How did that play out.

[00:29:06] You know I mean that that’s a pretty big events in your life. How were you influenced to do that or how did that work. You know who are these people and how they work out for you.

[00:29:19] It was.

[00:29:20] How did you even find these people. How did you even know it’s it’s hard to know how far to push it even on your own and then did you just see people who were kind of on the fringe and kind of follow them actually actually it was it was an accident.

[00:29:38] Actually was kind of a traumatic experience it was. It was an accident but I had gotten a roommate at that point another another young girl in the congregation and she liked this this young man in the hall and so of course the rules are you never go there by yourself. He invited her over for a movie night so she brought me along and he ended up drugging our drinks and. Pretty much rendered unconscious. We woke up with cigarette burns on parts of our bodies that we should not have had them. And so what we did was we kept quiet for a little while about it but then we found out that it was happening to two other girls in other congregations by the same person.

[00:30:34] So we took took pictures. I mean they I mean the burns were bad enough we ended up in the hospital and so we had taken pictures you know very discrete pictures we went for an elders meeting and they told us that the pictures weren’t enough evidence. You know it could be anybody. So they needed us to show them the physical evidence which neither one of us would do. So nothing was done. He was promptly flown out to live in. I think he went to Las Vegas actually his family flown him to Las Vegas and he’s he’s never come back.

[00:31:19] So they literally so they literally had no Jehovah’s Witnesses like to like to go by this two witness rule where there has to be two witnesses to any of these types of events two. Yes give them any validity. Right. They literally have two witnesses and photographic evidence. And they just kind of tell you to piss off. Yeah that is horrifying.

[00:31:53] Yeah it was awful. I am so sorry that you had to go through that. That that is sickening.

[00:32:02] It’s not only violating enough this monster did but then to sit in a room full of three monsters.

[00:32:13] Yes. Yes definitely. And it was a touchy subject. Yeah.

[00:32:18] And so you have someone saying well just show us what he did. Well we can’t. Like we’re not going to do that for you. Like here’s the pictures.

[00:32:27] Yeah. Is that the fact that they would even ask you to do that. That is is quite frankly rather predatory behavior itself. That’s horrific. I my mind is blown. That is awful. I mean I know.

[00:32:46] You know I hear stories but I’ve never.

[00:32:51] I don’t think I’ve ever had them ask you to you know show that kind of evidence. Yeah that’s might be a new one on me I’m sure.

[00:33:01] I’m sure there’s somebody who is going to listen. He was like Oh yeah. That happens all the time and probably knows a lot of examples.

[00:33:07] But they call themselves Jehovah’s organization and they’re directed by God. What. That’s that’s horrifying. So then how did how did you go on from that. I mean that’s where did that take you.

[00:33:25] You know after something like that Welsh very shortly after that happened we had another friend a very close friend and he was quite obviously gay. But he had never acted on it but it was bothering him.

[00:33:45] We know of course the rules are you know if something is wrong then you go to the elders and tell the elders and they’ll help you he went to the elders in and told them that you know he believed that he was gay. Yeah. And acted on it. But you know this is who he was. And they immediately disfellowshipped him really.

[00:34:08] Yeah.

[00:34:09] Just for the thought and not the action.

[00:34:13] Yes

[00:34:14] I’m the elders in the congregation at that time didn’t understand. And there were after that had happened. He wasn’t reinstated but there were a lot of elders meetings on the island teaching them how to better deal with those situations.

[00:34:33] But

[00:34:33] it didn’t help him any. It didn’t help him any and so he tried to commit suicide after he was disfellowshipped. So we found him and we we took him in and he lived with us.

[00:34:48] But

[00:34:48] he was disfellowshipped so we we got the scholarship to because we weren’t going to back down at that point we had already been no nobody was there to help us.

[00:35:08] We were you know pretty much slapped in the face with our elders meeting you know not long before that. And then this young man was treated so unfairly that we just put our foot down and we’re like No so.

[00:35:22] So the guy who’s drugging and raping women all right.

[00:35:29] Yeah you know that. We’re going to let him roam free in the organization.

[00:35:33] The guy that has homosexual thoughts. We’re going to this fellowship him then the two girls who were violated by this first guy who are kind hearted sweet gentle people and take in this guy who has tried to commit suicide to help him. You know these these shepherds the undermining your efforts and fellow shipping you so you’ll be shunned to and then all the while you know it’s really you all where the shepherds you all were the ones who were caring for someone or something that’s it’s just it’s really you know when you get to the the core of what the organization is and the power that is wielded by these men in these positions. It’s it’s really frightening and it’s and it’s really just a disgusting display of what humans can do when they’re given too much power.

[00:36:42] Yes. Yes I am I am.

[00:36:47] I am sorry that that’s though the way it went for everyone involved there. That’s just terrible so may I ask whatever happened to this guy. If you can say I mean I know it’s not his story but yeah I believe that he did get reinstated.

[00:37:06] And if I’m correct it it happened a couple of times.

[00:37:10] I’m he said he suffered from some mental illness and his family was everything. He was very very close with his family it was everything to him so when he lost it he couldn’t deal with it or so he he keeps going back and keeps going back.

[00:37:31] Yeah I imagine that’s much of that mental illness is brought on by the fact that he’s being so inauthentic he’s not if he’s gay then great you know be that. But he’s trying to suppress who he is and he’s trying to be somebody he’s not. Yes to keep family and that will cause mental illness. Yeah. Wow.

[00:37:52] Well you know. Back to you. You know and I guess you know this. There was this other girl as well. How did you all how did life progressed for you all. You know from there.

[00:38:04] Well I haven’t I haven’t been in contact with her since then though I have I have creature Facebook and she had been dating somebody and during that time and they’ve gotten married and and her her life looks good. She she’s living a good life the way that she wanted to.

[00:38:25] She’s still a witness do you think or.

[00:38:26] No she’s not. You go into her parents at an assembly a couple years ago two years ago in I’m glad she found freedom and an authentic life.

[00:38:38] So then that leaves you. So where did you go from there.

[00:38:44] Disfellowshipped and my parents gave me. I believe it was something like a week to find a place to live. And I answered to a newspaper an article somebody had posted that they were looking for a roommate. Ended up in a very bad situation it turned out to be a crack house.

[00:39:10] So I know I have no outside world experience whatsoever but what I’m dealing with so I I took off I grabbed a bus and I ended up in Halifax back in Halifax as the first bus that was leaving that’s where it took me and I called my dad.

[00:39:36] At that point and and I told him you know I’m I’m sitting in front of McDonald’s where I am I slept on the sidewalk beside McDonald’s for a couple of days because they gave out free coffee in the morning so yeah I called him and.

[00:39:54] I know I’m crying.

[00:39:56] And I tell him you know where I am and what’s happened and I said I just I need to come home. I need somewhere safe to sleep I need to get back on my feet I’ll do anything you know with this going on bag and you know I’ll go to all the meetings and you know I’ll I’ll do it all. And his response to me was You can’t come home until the elders tell me that you can come home so you need to call them.

[00:40:22] And he gave me a list of phone numbers well I called them unlike you you have to tell him that I can come home.

[00:40:35] I’ll go to the meetings I’ll do whatever and they say no you’re just in a desperate situation and you’re just saying what you need to do you’re not really sorry. I’m like yes obviously I mean you should go home.

[00:40:50] But no no. That didn’t work.

[00:40:54] Was your dad an Elder.

[00:40:56] Yes. So he was worried about his position.

[00:41:00] He had gotten better at that point just as I had gotten disfellowshipped. Have my dad had a boat for years. Well where he had a break from his migraines. So he quickly became an Elder and pioneered and got extremely extremely faithful so he left me there.

[00:41:29] It’s really hard to hear the. I mean I’m sure it’s even harder to live the abandonment you know by these these people that you know you think are your your loved ones are supposed shepherds in the congregation who are supposed to love you and care for you. And you know it’s just time after time when you’ve needed any of these people. They just abandoned you and that’s that’s just that’s horror horrifying. So you know your guess at this point your Where does that leave you. You’re just homeless in Halifax.

[00:42:11] Is that it. Well I found I found a boyfriend I guess and I found a guy that I liked and he.

[00:42:21] He immediately offered for me to move in with him.

[00:42:24] And I’m not a smart idea but that’s what I did. And he’s the father of my children. And and I stayed with him for for a number of for a number of years.

[00:42:40] What was that like. I mean you said it was not a smart idea. Was it a bad relationship or.

[00:42:46] Yeah I was in it. It was an extremely abusive relationship.

[00:42:54] But I was the the way Jehovah’s Witnesses raise you as you make it work. You figure out how to make it work. You just don’t give up on relationships. You fix it. So I tried to fix it.

[00:43:16] It didn’t it didn’t work.

[00:43:19] Yeah you know they teach you they give these examples many of which are probably fake of you know people their spouse over without a word through their conduct their fine conduct especially as a woman. Yes that’s how it’s portrayed. Essentially if your husband’s beating you just be a fine example of a Christian. Jehovah’s Witness wife and you know magically you know 20 years later he might change. It’s really such a bleak outlook. And I think that you know a point you made it touches on just the fact you know Jehovah’s Witnesses teach you just kind of to grin and bear it. And I think that that’s what you were doing your whole life. And what most of us probably did as young witnesses we didn’t have a choice. We were just grinning and bearing it. We were doing what was expected of us and doing what we could to survive.

[00:44:24] So so that pattern just plays out there was there was a period of time where you know of course I missed my family.

[00:44:35] So this this man that I was with he he started his death actually started studying and we we went to the meetings just so that because when they see me making an effort they would have minimal amount of contact with me.

[00:44:51] Of course the contact was usually just two to lecture me on how I could be a better housewife but still contact. I mean it didn’t last very long.

[00:45:04] It lasted a couple of months but we did.

[00:45:09] We did do that for a little while and of course then everybody had hope. You know it’s going to convert him and and everything was going to be great. They were going to help fix them and. Then they knew what was happening in the home. But you know Jehovah was gonna fix that once once again.

[00:45:32] It’s not like they were going to call an outside organization and say come help this person or her children who are living in an abusive environment.

[00:45:45] No at average at every chance Jehovah’s Witnesses have they fail to actually help a human being. Yeah it’s it’s so mindblowing how they how they do that.

[00:46:03] So this was all this was all before I had the girls too. I left him. I left him just a couple months after I had my first daughter.

[00:46:13] Oh OK. I got reinstated at that point. Really. Yes.

[00:46:24] How. What was that process like. As far as you know going through the reinstatement process. Did you just you know tell them you were sorry. Like the prodigal son and they accepted you back immediately.

[00:46:37] Yeah. You fake it till you make it.

[00:46:40] Right. Well I I had a young I had a baby girl and I was pregnant with it with another one and I had left. This man and he was the only person I had in my life and I didn’t have my family I had him and that was it. There was nobody else I. He didn’t allow me to to leave that bubble either. Yeah I left him there was nobody. And I was like well I need my family. So I went to my doctor my doctor is like well what do you what do you need. What do you need me to do. And I said I need my family. So he actually wrote a prescription to the elders that I needed family contact for my mental health he did do that for me good for whom he got pretty good at it and it worked.

[00:47:33] Wow really day by day they did that. Yeah.

[00:47:40] I mean they I mean I couldn’t go out and go for supper with my family and whatnot but my mom could come over and help me out and stuff like that. So the reinstatement process was really just faking it.

[00:47:56] I have sent in my letter for reinstatement after three months and did the the interview that they do where they ask you a million questions that don’t need to like. I suffered from a serious drug addiction during those years and it was in later years where you were with this man or during the years after him.

[00:48:26] Yes I know that the years I was with him. OK. And then when I got pregnant with my daughter I I got I got clean at that point.

[00:48:33] So then you have you. You were kind of escaping probably through that.

[00:48:39] Yes. That was just it just you didn’t think about it. You were just numb.

[00:48:43] Oh yeah of course. I mean you know you’ve been trapped your whole life you know you do anything you can to get out.

[00:48:51] So they ask you questions like drugs. Did you do. And how much of it did you do. Well don’t know.

[00:49:03] I just took whatever was available like how many partners did you have in the trust. All these questions. This just make no sense. And so I just I just kept telling them like I don’t know the answers to your questions.

[00:49:23] There’s no one answer.

[00:49:26] It’s not like you were keeping a log you know just in case the elders need this later. I’m going to keep a log. Everything that I do so that they can have control complete control over me later.

[00:49:41] So I mean I guess I mean they were satisfied enough with with the efforts that I had made in the three month period and they they said they would reinstate me but they lost my records. So it took an additional three months to reinstate me.

[00:50:04] Well that’s interesting. I wonder if they really lost your records. I know because I’ve never heard of anybody getting things that I was thinking the same thing. Yeah I’ve never heard of anybody getting reinstated after just three months. I mean usually it’s a minimum six month process.

[00:50:21] Well I was trying. I was trying to get in before I had the baby so that my family could help me out. I’m actually one of the elders meetings I had I was in labor the elders meeting one of the last ones I had. Why.

[00:50:41] Well I was in labor. I delivered a baby about three hours after that elders meeting I don’t even know what to say to that.

[00:50:51] I was like you better reinstate me because this is some serious effort that’s right here.

[00:50:57] I can only imagine the stress that you were under too. Yeah probably what induced it really. Noses.

[00:51:04] Yeah that could absolutely be an so when did you get reinstated.

[00:51:12] Was it after the baby was born.

[00:51:14] Yes. Just after my dad. After the elders meeting my dad drove me to the hospital drop me off at the doors. Have a nice night.

[00:51:26] I’ll see you in the morning I went in there by myself.

[00:51:34] It felt really bad. Yes I do too. That’s horrible.

[00:51:39] I mean they’re just so they’re so inhuman. It’s awful. Yeah it makes me think of I’m blanking. Was itD.J. some somebody that I interviewed who wanted to get reinstated essentially because he had a friend who his best friend was getting married. And of course I don’t think that that worked out. It’s like they they know that there’s some event coming up and somehow you never quite get reinstated and it’s now ever. Now they have to punish you that one last time. They have to stick it to you in some way so they can get their power trip. So then you’re here. You give birth to your second child. You said you were reinstated not long after that.

[00:52:45] So maybe a month a week.

[00:52:48] So then where where did that take you in life after that. Where did Where do you go.

[00:52:55] I was reinstated probably a period of two months before I left again. Directly after my reinstatement which wasn’t that long ago my mom and sister were diagnosed in the same week with two different very aggressive cancers so they needed to.

[00:53:26] They needed to move to be closer to their treatments. And I didn’t have a car. No. Doesn’t even sell diapers like we’re a small community here. So I needed to move somewhere where I’d have help and I couldn’t move with them because that’s where my children’s father lives and he doesn’t. He doesn’t know where I am. They couldn’t risk and finding out. So my my family moved. I moved.

[00:54:00] Forty five minutes away from them.

[00:54:04] All right. And so then you move into this new place.

[00:54:08] And I stopped going to meetings. Nice reading.

[00:54:11] Gotcha. So you were kind of fading or trying to get my chance to get out.

[00:54:17] Yeah. This is my chance.

[00:54:20] Sure. So then how did things progress with the fade or with your you know your family.

[00:54:26] I mean that’s. This seems like the hits just keep coming. You know now your sister and your mom are diagnosed with cancer. How how did all this progressed I mean your search for freedom in this new place and then yet you have this family that you love that is going through these hard times.

[00:54:47] They were too distracted to be too bothered my change in my choice on how to raise my children and live my life and what was that what was that change or what was you know what if they were paying attention I mean what were you what was the change what were you doing differently you know in this new place I am.

[00:55:15] I severed all contact with any any Jehovah’s Witnesses and I started looking into childcare I wanted to get a job and go to school and I got in trouble with that with my father a little later on. After things settled but I started celebrating holidays for the first time this has been my first year actually. Actually really celebrating any holidays and awesome. Congratulations. Yeah it’s been exciting. Yeah yeah. So the only thing they realized or noticed was that I wasn’t going to the meetings but um they were so distracted with what was going on that they just let it go for a little while until things got to the end for them with the hospital stays and stuff.

[00:56:10] And that’s when I was obviously pretty disconnected from the family. But they kind of put their foot down with me. Tyler had it for a little while but.

[00:56:25] They. So first of all I have to go back to something that’s sticking in my mind so your dad got on you later on for him for wanting to go to school and get a job and such like. How were you supposed to support these kids. I mean what what else were you supposed to do.

[00:56:46] What was the alternative. I’m supposed to go to meetings and find a brother to to support me.

[00:56:54] OK. Right.

[00:56:56] Yeah. That’s what I’m supposed to do.

[00:56:59] Well I mean that’s not even that’s not immediate. You have to support yourself somehow. You gotta eat. That’s that’s no. It just has such an unrealistic view of life. So then you said you know getting back to your family. So you said that they kind of shut you out or whatever. What did they do they you know kind of see your face and start shunning you. Or did they just limit contact or you know what happened. Because I mean you weren’t disfellowshipped. Yeah it was a little.

[00:57:37] With Mom it was obvious.

[00:57:41] You know my dad when I was in the hospital my sister was third there.

[00:57:52] It’s easier with my sister. She was the first to pass. She she passed last May. So I stayed at the hospital with her and nobody offered me a drive.

[00:58:07] You know I lived an hour away. Nobody out asked me where the kids were if I needed help with the kids. When it came to nighttime nobody offered me a bed to sleep in at the hospital to find somewhere else to go.

[00:58:25] And pretty much look after myself.

[00:58:31] And again you’re not disfellowshipped. No I mean not that even being this fellowship is an excuse for you know that kind of type of behavior and treatment of another human being especially in such a time of grief and no concern. There is no excuse for that but um but you know even Jehovah’s Witnesses who might do that.

[00:58:56] If someone was disfellowshipped you’re not disfellowshipped and they are using your new life or whatever to treat you so badly.

[00:59:09] And this time one of my one of my older friends I’m she was one of the girls in our congregation that I grew up. She’s a few years younger than me and she lived close to the hospital so she offered for me to be able to stay with her since nobody would let me stay at the hospital. OK.

[00:59:30] So after a night her family convinced her that you know I was worldly and I got kicked out on the street in the middle of the night.

[00:59:39] I believe it was around eleven thirty at night just threw you out. They just threw me out. Where where were your kids during all this. Actually my cousin. I have them. OK. Yeah. OK.

[00:59:56] My cousin had them for taking care of them for the week that I was there and I had to call you know I didn’t really know this person really well at this point.

[01:00:09] I had met her a couple of times and I called her up in the middle of the night and I told her what had happened and she said Give me 15 minutes and you’re gonna stay with me. And I hadn’t eaten nobody was offering me any food. I had no money. She took me out and got me a hot meal and took me in for the last couple of days of all of that good for her for being here.

[01:00:37] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:00:41] So then this was it. You said the last couple of days was. Was this the wine down of your sisters battle with cancer.

[01:00:49] Yes. Yes. She stayed there until until she passed. There was an overwhelming amount of people I have never witnessed such a level of disrespect. My life as was demonstrated. All those Jehovah’s Witnesses at the time we were on the palliative care unit. So there’s like a kitchen and there’s two family rooms and you know there’s about 10 other rooms with people and their families that they’re passing when my sister was up there there was at least 30 to 40 people at any given time. They just took over the whole floor you know all the other families had nowhere to sit. They know where to put their food in the kitchen. They had their kids running everywhere. Just this massive amount of noise and melodies being sung all of the time.

[01:01:54] Oh my God.

[01:01:58] It was of course I’m the worldly one and my aunt who is there with me she she was an inactive witness either.

[01:02:11] So we spent the majority of our time you know down the hallway there’s there’s so jealous what is there so tone deaf to other human beings to social norms.

[01:02:26] They’re so narcissistic they just think they can’t them that other people wouldn’t like them taking over a whole floor and saying Jehovah’s praises Three Kingdoms songs you know while other human beings are dying with their family trying to have their last moments their way.

[01:02:50] Yeah that’s it as it was it was a sad thing too to be witness to you know I spent a good majority of my time apologizing to their families you know because I am you know finding a little corner to sit in down the hallway because there’s no room for me either you know I’m just you know this is my sister that’s in there and I feel like I I need to apologize for them for this.

[01:03:22] Yeah no I understand that. Just as an aside I remember when I when I was a witness for a lot of my life. We didn’t have to travel to conventions because they were held in our city. But at a point we we started having to travel and I actually stopped staying at any of the approved hotels that were on the lists because I couldn’t stand the behavior of Jehovah’s Witnesses the hotels.

[01:03:49] I was so sickened by it that I would just go get my own hotel somewhere else and not be around any of them. They just they have no idea you know how they pump themselves up in their assemblies and conventions as to how you know how everyone wishes basically they could be like that. This isn’t their behavior but it’s not true. It’s it’s it’s completely fabricated. Their behavior is is deplorable. So yeah I I can only imagine you know here I am talking about my experience at a convention. I can only imagine I’m just so sorry that you know in this time I have to apologize for the behavior of these people during such a serious and no one time moment and everybody is there because they’re nosy.

[01:04:46] Of course there is no. It’s the place to be sitting around joking laughing and it’s happy go lucky.

[01:04:56] They’re so respectful. It is. It is.

[01:05:00] And they have to put on the facade that look. Jehovah’s people are so happy. Even the face in the face of such tragedy. Because you know we have this hope. Please tell me that they weren’t preaching to the other people who were there.

[01:05:23] Not that I noticed. OK. I just I can just I mean they’re just so tone deaf.

[01:05:29] I mean I know that they they look up like certificate you know like they’ll see like obituaries and and they’ll send people stuff it’s just so horrifying. I just I just hope that they weren’t doing anything like that they’re in the palliative care unit. I mean I’m sorry I’m so sorry that it put DVDs and just about every family room and kitchen where they did it. Oh. So then how did things.

[01:06:06] How did things go. You know I mean obviously you know we we know how this story ends. Yes. For your sister. But how how does that you know transpire how we’re you know it seems like you weren’t treated very well leading up to it. How were you treated as that was going down or is as you know afterward.

[01:06:27] How did they treat you so fake like after my sister passed they cared for all about 15 minutes. Maybe not even that. I went in to say goodbye to my sister because it was it was time the nurses said but I didn’t make it back down the hallway in time. She had passed by the time I walked into the room so I was in shock and I come out of the room and I just kind of laid down on the floor. I just couldn’t breathe. So everybody is is pulling on me. I’m not the type person that likes to be touched. I don’t do physical contact and they’re all choking me they’re pulling on my clothes and you know. Are you OK. They’re asking me over and over again and they reach up to this crowd of people and I grab onto my aunt’s hand and that’s when she knew it was time to step in. My aunt is the most easygoing person you will ever meet in your life. Just go with the flow. Quiet chilled out person. She went into full on Hulk mode. Witnesses fly in every direction down the hallway and then they didn’t care. I never heard from another one again. Not a message. Not a not a visit not a phone call not nothing.

[01:07:59] You see them at the memorial or whatever.

[01:08:03] I didn’t. I had completely stopped everything. You know Bubba. Two months before she passed. So I never I never was in a situation to encounter them again at the elders.

[01:08:17] Up

[01:08:17] until that point we’re trying to call on me visit me but I never seen or heard of them again after my sister.

[01:08:31] When

[01:08:31] I said memorial I didn’t mean the memorial that they all energies I’m so I’m at the memorial of your sister. Oh

[01:08:38] my goodness. That was that was that was wild. Yeah I seen them. At the service. I I waited outside until just before it started and there was zero emotional connection whatsoever. I mean they use it. They use the service not to remember the person but to recruit people. It’s a sales pitch. Who is the big recruitment right did it. Everybody was high as kites self medicated on whatever it was. It was a mess. Although all the witnesses were high on their prescriptions and just making a scene.

[01:09:29] It was.

[01:09:31] There is a lot of prescription abuse.

[01:09:35] Oh

[01:09:36] it was.

[01:09:37] It

[01:09:37] was a scene I mean what kind of scene what do you know where they just.

[01:09:44] Well

[01:09:44] besides the over overdramatic grieving very loud and you know they’re walking around talking to people and they’re just no one. One lady came up to my aunt and she’s so high and she’s like touching her hair and she’s like Oh your hair is so soft and like she’s walking around doing this to everybody.

[01:10:15] Hi I’m if we couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

[01:10:20] So.

[01:10:21] So you did at least OK so it was not what you would have wanted. No but you at least got to say goodbye I guess.

[01:10:35] Yes I did get to attend my sister’s burial. OK. I got cut off more with mom. As things progressed with me. I was I was cut off a lot more with my sister. I did have a little more leeway.

[01:10:56] OK. All right. So then how did how long after you because your mom and your sister were diagnosed at roughly the same time correct.

[01:11:08] Yeah. You were diagnosed just three days apart.

[01:11:11] OK. So then how did things how did things transpire after this went down with your sister.

[01:11:24] Well my sister passed and me and my mom passed in January and this is of what year last year May of last year May of last year and then January of this year.

[01:11:38] Yes. Wow this is so fresh. Yes. OK.

[01:11:45] So after my sister passed my mom the same depression she did when when we were kids just living for paradise.

[01:12:00] Spiral she lived on repeat again.

[01:12:05] When. When dad was sick. My mom everyday would say we just have to make it to tomorrow. Cause the Paradise might be here tomorrow right. And that’s how she lived her life that’s how we all.

[01:12:19] That’s how we all lived it. And so when my sister passed she she went back to that again where she just didn’t care about anything else on the outside world. You just have to make it to tomorrow. Because Will the paradise.

[01:12:37] We’ll be here. He was hoping that for herself as well. You know with her candidate.

[01:12:43] Yeah yeah.

[01:12:46] But then she. Then there was a lot of pressure on me.

[01:12:51] Of course you know when my sister was passing and I went into to see her the last day. You know she.

[01:12:58] She grabs my hand and she says you know promise me you’ll be in the new system. Promise me you’ll be there too.

[01:13:07] Because she knows that I am not participating.

[01:13:11] So mom grabbed on to that there is a lot there’s quite a bit of pressure for a little while until she got distracted again.

[01:13:26] Senior elders at one point after that after my sister passed I made some friends in the community here which was big for me I’d never had friends before. And after she passed I mean I hadn’t paid my bills I had done my taxes I had and I just dropped everything and do any of the things they needed to. So one friend stopped in and helped me get that done and another friend showed up with a carload full of groceries and to help me out. And well they are here. The elders knock on my door and and not to ask me if I’m okay or if I need anything but to simply ask me if they’re able to reach me on my cell phone.

[01:14:11] How else could they get a hold of me if there was ever you know a natural disaster or something. Where would I go and what phone numbers could they use to track me down.

[01:14:24] This was not the time and shut it down.

[01:14:26] But that’s when I really realized I had made the right decision.

[01:14:39] Yeah I mean you’re you’re in a house with people Carrie what about you for the first time. Yes.

[01:14:48] Yeah. Who truly care yes. I think I know I’ve I’ve had many of those moments since leaving as well. The stuff we were told about the people on the outside is just not necessarily true at all.

[01:15:03] And I’m I mean it’s amazing to see the difference.

[01:15:11] What real love looks like and the conditional fake for a parent’s love that we grew up with.

[01:15:24] So then how did things go from there.

[01:15:29] I mean you’ve got these friends who are helping you now but your mom is still sick and yet probably expecting you to be this witness.

[01:15:47] They were distracted. They they got extremely faithful because know and I would never I never wanted to take that away from them because this hope of paradises is what got them through. It’s what made Mom not scared. It made her OK. Sure. So that’s one. One good thing it I didn’t share that that hope or belief but it made her OK. But they got so distracted in their own life and the they were tired of seeing the decisions that I was making.

[01:16:29] So you know they they would come in and visit the kids sometimes or we would talk a little bit but they knew what was going on.

[01:16:42] They didn’t ask questions there isn’t a whole lot to talk about. It was. It was tricky.

[01:16:47] It was a tricky situation. I think I think mostly the elders maybe they left me alone because they didn’t want to disfellowshipped me. Well my mom was alive.

[01:17:03] OK.

[01:17:06] It was obvious you know people accidentally tag you and things on Facebook. So yeah it’s hard at all party hall over Facebook you know.

[01:17:18] Yeah somebody on tag me quick so they they seem based they seen what was going on. Dad didn’t really put his foot down with me until mom was in the hospital. When my sister passed I had decided I had so much regret.

[01:17:47] For not standing up for my right to be part of the family. This is my sister. This is my time to grieve. I have rights and I didn’t stand up for them. I let them all be taken away. I had a lot of regret over that no I should’ve just stood up and told people to go home. But I didn’t. Because I felt you know small guy had you know my life choice maybe less than I guess I viewed myself at that point.

[01:18:21] And then they make you feel small your whole life. Yeah you’re not supposed to even fight. You don’t follow your heart don’t lean on your own understanding. Yeah it’s a group think type thing. So you had no chance and when there.

[01:18:35] Yeah. When there’s 35 and 40 of them and just one to me I just didn’t stand up from you and you knew that you’re you know had you stood up and told them that.

[01:18:47] Let’s say you did solemn to leave.

[01:18:48] I mean you’re your sister and your mom and your dad would have disagreed with you. So you know you were voiceless and powerless in that situation.

[01:18:58] Yeah.

[01:18:59] Yeah during that time I got more determined and more confident in my choices. And I told myself that not this time not this time.

[01:19:15] Well I guess I just walked over this. This is my right now I’m gonna stand up for myself and and I did real good for about three days. Treatment was even worse this time.

[01:19:32] You know they I didn’t allow so many people to be there so there was a group of about people you know they all brought in food and eat it in front of you and you know you were allowed to eat any of it and when the doctors came out to give they would take me aside and give me updates because I was a little more emotionally stable at that point for them to give me more information. Sure.

[01:20:01] They came to me quite a bit so I would come over to update people and they would put their hand up and say No I’m sorry I don’t want to speak to you I’ll wait for your father to update us. Yeah. I was traveling back and forth every day on the bus on Metro Transit because I had come back to look after my girls because my cousin they had a job to work in the morning so somebody had to be with the kids in the early morning hours.

[01:20:27] And then when they got back I’d catch the bus back in no of course nobody’s going to offer to pick you up from the bus station and you can nobody’s going to offer to you know where your kids and nobody cared of course there is no bed yet again for me to sleep in so my aunts they kindly arranged for me to stay in a hotel because I stayed two nights two nights. I didn’t have to travel back. So they put me up because nobody gave me a bed to sleep in a bottle.

[01:21:02] So because I was talking to the doctors. Like when I would see them come out I would go and find them and say OK update me. And so they started reading me scriptures about being obedient to your parents they felt I was overstepping my father I’m not letting him take the lead.

[01:21:30] How did you not stab. Oh I want him. That’s my eyes did I. My answers. Yeah. Shooting daggers. Oh my God. It is here it is. It’s overcast so insane.

[01:21:48] It was bad and nobody would let me be in the room alone with mom oh somebody would always follow me and nobody would leave me alone with her.

[01:21:56] What were you going to do like convince her to leave. Quote The truth at the end or something. I mean they’re so weak.

[01:22:07] Well I don’t know. But no they wouldn’t.

[01:22:11] One of the one of the regular pioneers actually that was there that wouldn’t leave because she self entitled herself is my mother’s best friend which my mom told me everything. I knew that that was true but. I wrote my mother song. Like my mom went into the hospital she because it was her wish to be medicated and unaware of what was going on. She was in a state of unconscious fruit for the whole time. But this regular pioneer sister wrote her a song. She does. She can’t sing and she also is not musically inclined but she wrote my mom a song can you. Can you guess what what song is you. She wrote it to she stripped the lyrics and put her own lyrics on this on this song. Oh I.

[01:23:07] I could.

[01:23:09] I have no idea.

[01:23:12] Use the National Anthem. What. I’m not lying.

[01:23:17] She used and this is the Canadian national anthem correct.

[01:23:21] Yeah so. Oh Canada. Yes. She she wrote my mom.

[01:23:33] There could be a way.

[01:23:37] I’ve never experience anything. So obviously at this point I’m obviously upset with how I’m being treated. You know I’m left you can’t be alone mom. And then I’m left to sit in a room by myself until it’s time to go home. It is just people are reading me scriptures and my dad obviously sees my irritation and so he takes me aside. What’s your problem. So I tell him No I’m fed up with this. You know people are are blatantly you know disrespecting me in this situation. And then I go on to explain the things that have incited diamond. He just looked me right in the face and he said you know that you’re treated this way because you are worldly.

[01:24:44] And if I was to ask anybody to go home it would be you I just broke down and that’s when I gave up my fight to stand up for my rights. For that that split second I gave up sure what we’re fighting for at that point I was I was fighting.

[01:25:12] You know look I promised myself that I was going to stand up and be strong and stick up for myself. And I did that with Mom. Up until that point you know go ahead and read me your scriptures. But you know I’m not No I didn’t stand down if I want to go in and see my mom when I want to see my mom I’m gonna do it. And you know I I was I fought for my rights.

[01:25:38] When my dad said that gave up more of course. I mean what’s left.

[01:25:47] You know I think that there is nothing. There is nothing left.

[01:25:52] Yeah. He just took the air out of the room there. I mean there’s are you going to take in your own.

[01:25:59] Yeah in a vacuum.

[01:26:01] As God it broke me that that one sends you know I just I couldn’t wrap my brain around it to justify this level of cruelty because I’ve been labeled as as worldly just no.

[01:26:25] You know maybe in your eyes I am but I’m still her daughter I’m still a child and you’re still his daughter. Yeah you know. Yeah.

[01:26:41] Either I don’t even know what to say to that that’s just there. They’re just it’s just mind blowing how the basic humanity you know even animals no talk about you know you talk about being like a mama bear or something like you know.

[01:27:03] You know ladies we’ll talk about that you know.

[01:27:08] Certainly there are animals who eat their young. You can’t say all animals are great parents. I’m not going to anthropomorphize them but certainly.

[01:27:21] Yeah.

[01:27:22] You expect more from human parents. Yeah. And. Have a right to expect more.

[01:27:34] That level of I just don’t see it coming. I didn’t know if you don’t want to really talk to me. No that’s okay.

[01:27:45] But to just me to go home so dehumanizing.

[01:27:51] Yeah then then then mom passed away the next night now we’re you there for that or had you know just that when you when you say you gave up you just you just left.

[01:28:04] I went home and I turned my phone off.

[01:28:09] Oh no.

[01:28:12] The doctor said that they would call me if I needed to come during the night and of course my cousin if I woke them up at 2 o’clock in the morning and said Take me. I mean they would have done it.

[01:28:22] Sure. I went home and turned my phone off and I can’t say I can’t say I blame you.

[01:28:32] I mean that so my dad decided to talk to me.

[01:28:38] After that he called me the next morning after mom passed he said and get her stuff I’m going to give it away and of course how long.

[01:28:56] How old is he now at the door with their hands out right.

[01:29:00] Yeah. So how long.

[01:29:02] Well after was this 16 hours.

[01:29:08] He’s ready to get rid of all her stuff and the witnesses are there with their hands out.

[01:29:13] That’s what happened with my sister when she passed her husband was ready the next morning. We packed up her stuff really brought it all back to my house.

[01:29:23] Every bit of it I mean I’m after mom passed I mean I’m dealing with people’s toothbrushes and underwear.

[01:29:30] They packed it all up and put it in my living room they can treat me this way.

[01:29:41] But when they need me to marry strong one into me to get stuff done and just give it to her.

[01:29:48] So he called me up the next morning and said come get it. So I drove in there and packed it all up and brought it here. I didn’t live here stay with my cousin for a week. Because there is no room for me to live here.

[01:30:07] Until I could get it stored away and sorted and worded and all that Jehovah’s Witness is a really good at contacting you when they need you for something. If you’re a person who can get anything done at all. Yeah they they they see you. That’s the one time in life they see you they see who is that guy or that girl can get stuff done they have money or they have a business and they can hire or whatever and like a true narcissist it’s all about them and what they need.

[01:30:47] And so boom they’re drawn to you like a magnet.

[01:30:50] Yes wow.

[01:30:54] So what did you do from there. I mean how did things go with your relationship with your dad and I mean it was that just a header.

[01:31:05] Well couple weeks after I called up my dad and nobody else was answering their phone and so I was excited because the daycare has or the child care had gone through for me to actually start going to work in six months time everything’s set up it’s ready to go I’m going to. So I was excited. Nice. I am considering all the crap that’s happened. You know I finally had a happy moment. And so I called my dad and I was like you know things are good and they just I just wanted to tell you that things. Things are good. And I got a huge lecture on how I’m killing his grandchildren and I need to go to the meetings because a brother will marry me. Take care of me and that’s what’s most important. Had very little contact after that.

[01:32:13] With my own family. There was kind of a.

[01:32:20] A car driving by my own family.

[01:32:29] There was this where there really wasn’t much to say anymore than it was before my wife and I had ever disassociated. It was even before. I think we had seen my disfellowshipped brother and made that choice and took that stand. I think that could kind of tell that we just weren’t really into it anymore we weren’t into the whole Witness thing. We were we were pulling away and they just there was just nothing to talk about anymore like it. That’s all they have. So they don’t care about anyone or anything beyond that beyond what they’re doing at the Kingdom Hall or whatever. So there’s just there’s just nothing to say it’s just done it died became so obsessed.

[01:33:30] Yeah because of his hope he’s going to see them again.

[01:33:35] So he needs to be faithful as you know he needs to follow the rules right to the letter and just be there.

[01:33:48] It just gave nothing else to talk about like you said so then what have you done that would have been mean.

[01:33:57] So you set goals. Yeah a couple months ago. Wow. So what has transpired in these last few months. How is Ben.

[01:34:13] Well there’s been a lot of therapy involved.

[01:34:15] Good for you. Therapy is very important.

[01:34:19] Yeah it has been it has been but I recently found out that dad buried mom a couple of weeks ago.

[01:34:33] Never told me now yeah I guess I didn’t even think about that.

[01:34:39] So did you. That’s horrific. Did you go to a memorial for it.

[01:34:45] Or were you even told about it or anything.

[01:34:47] I went to the service you dig into the service for your mom. I did go to the service. Oh yeah. And I’m golf more as. It was the same thing very impersonal with my sister. The burial was was very personal. Because it was just the family there and it.

[01:35:08] I don’t know. Symbolic in some way I guess it was just quiet. Was it a recruitment scene. Nosy people it wasn’t there was just awesome. And so I was just waiting to have that with mom and he just went ahead and buried earned in Tony I’m sorry.

[01:35:31] That’s horrible. Yeah it’s um it’s you know I’ve thought of every possible.

[01:35:40] Because he’s just he thinks he’s going to see her again really soon.

[01:35:44] Right. The burial wasn’t important to him. It did. He didn’t need to be there. He wasn’t there himself. No he wasn’t even that wow. He wasn’t even there. No he just gave the OK for my grandfather to bury her. I mean he could have just texted me and told me the time. Yeah. Do you even know where she was buried with my sister. OK.

[01:36:17] Yes so you can. You can visit I guess.

[01:36:22] But it’s just when you have your your mind set on how it’s going to be.

[01:36:27] I was like this is like I could picture it like this. This because I hadn’t cried or grieved or you know this was going to be my time to just let it go. Yeah. He took he took that from me and never said another word to me.

[01:36:48] A word um aunt had told me she’s worked up about half in me all near death so she just spit it out.

[01:37:04] Oh by the way she.

[01:37:07] Oh man I’d like. I’ve heard of this. I’ve heard I’ve actually read on forums where I guess maybe even beyond this they were people didn’t even know that a parent died and they just. Yeah yeah. And then I just find out later there’s someone else because nobody tells them I.

[01:37:35] I can’t. I don’t even know.

[01:37:37] I don’t I had never heard of anything like that before.

[01:37:44] Yeah I was. My dad died two and a half something like that two and a quarter years ago something like that and I was stunned at the time and I was able to go to my mom let me come to hospice to see him. But one last time but as soon as I left hospice that was it. Like I wasn’t I wasn’t going to be invited to the memorial or anything like that. I mean I didn’t know that at the time but you know that’s just how it was going to be. So no they don’t. Jehovah’s Witnesses. Rob you of the ability to grieve properly. Yeah. I remember when my. I’m honestly I’m kind of weird around death. I don’t. It’s something I still yes processing myself you know when you grow up in the coal you don’t think you’re ever going to die. It’s like somebody told me at 38 years old that I’m going to die you know someday like that.

[01:38:55] Oh that’s so weird. For anyone listening who was never a witness. But when you buy into that.

[01:39:02] Like I never even thought about death as a possibility. We weren’t supposed to die. The world was going to end and we were going to walk into a little paradise and it feel like Adam and Eve or you know back in the day. But some no one of the things that my I have one person that I cared about died when I was a kid and that was my grandfather and he was never a witness. He was just a good dude. And remember you know going to the viewing and things like that and how emotional it was I remember afterward being able to go back to my grandparents house with family around and we sat around and we you know we told stories and we laughed and we cried and there’s a there’s a catharsis in that and there’s a catharsis in being able to you know I would go back to my grandmother’s house and my grandpa wasn’t there and somehow I think that helps you. I was just a kid but it helps me you know kind of grass what had truly happened and when you’re shunned you get none of that. We never got to go back and see my dad’s chair empty. I never ever got to talk to a family member again and reminisce about the good times or even the bad times. You know they just that possibility doesn’t exist and it’s just the most Jehovah’s Witnesses. Are pretty inhuman already and then they they just take away that last aspect of dignity and humanity in the most personal of situations. And it’s just. There just really aren’t words to describe that and I’m sorry for. I’m sorry that so much was taken from you.

[01:41:13] And that just seems hollow.

[01:41:19] And they are they strip you they strip you of all your rights. You know you’re no longer a family member you’re.

[01:41:29] Somebody described it as being a ghost and yeah you’re ghosted. You just they just disappear one day and think that on some level we’re used to that. Maybe. I don’t know. I can’t speak for you. You had such a small cluster of people around you as as a witness growing up. You know I grew up in a large congregation and I was used to just you know people come and people go like me. I had so many friends who got disfellowshipped and just disappeared and I didn’t know what happened so on and so I guess for me death was kind of the same. They just disappeared. I’m just used to that. But not normal.

[01:42:22] No. No it’s not normal at all. And I’m I’m so glad that you have a therapist who I guess knows what normal is around this stuff.

[01:42:35] Yeah you know. Yeah.

[01:42:37] And it was good for my kids too because I reached out to a lot of people and I was four years old. So she’s my oldest and she she understood what happened to some degree I needed to have that conversation with her and of course there’s a a room full of people all telling their children that you know my mom is just sleeping. She’s gone to sleep. She’ll be back in paradise. That’s what they’re telling all these kids.

[01:43:11] And so I had reached out to two specialists on how to deal with this properly.

[01:43:20] And so she she was there visiting me at the at the hospital and mom and my mom and she comes out to talk to me and she said and I’m asking her you know what do I. What do I say. And she says Just promise me that you won’t tell your children that she’s sleeping.

[01:43:39] Wow.

[01:43:42] Because every time your child goes to sleep they’re going to think that they’re not going to wake up.

[01:43:48] Oh my gosh I never thought about that.

[01:43:52] Yeah neither had I. So you have to really I really had to to rewire that witness thinking at that point to handle things properly with the kids.

[01:44:08] And that’s why the burial list was so devastating to me too. It’s. It’s good for kids at that age too. I understand there. They’re gone. Yeah they can. They can see it. And then they understand it. Yes. And then that was taken away from my kids to my kids.

[01:44:33] I’m not going to say that I did anything wrong but in their eyes I did do something wrong and hence I was cut out of the picture. But my children didn’t do anything right. It is pretty pretty and unfair to them. But I hadn’t I hadn’t realized until you know I was talking to these people with these these Jehovah’s Witness children they’re told and how detrimental it can be I never even thought about some of those aspects.

[01:45:14] So then you know like officially out or what is your and they haven’t disfellowshipped me.

[01:45:30] I am viewed as such. I there’s no there’s no contact or you. My dad my dad treats me as such an he made quite obvious over the last month.

[01:45:45] But the I am now that everything’s done and settled you know I finally feel free.

[01:45:56] Yeah. Now I’m going to do do what I want to do.

[01:46:04] Going to raise my kids the way I want to raise my kids and not feel guilty or pressured for it.

[01:46:11] An is there anything you know what are you and I know I gave you a list of questions and I know you’ve worked pretty hard on some of the answers. Yes. Is there anything you know I’d like to talk to you now about. You know where you want to go going forward. But yes. But you know is there anything that that I that you want to touch on like why others would think you left or what you’d like people to know about the religion or anything. I mean this is also fresh.

[01:46:51] There’s some of these questions you know I don’t know if you’ve had enough distance to to process some of this stuff no.

[01:47:05] No. Mostly the point that I had wanted to make from all this is is either people that are leaving or have left or right. No witnesses is just as to stand up for yourself don’t let them know you back down from one second and they will take everything no date despite what they say. We still have rights. We can. You can fight it.

[01:47:39] That’s so true. They just the things I remember there was a point where I realized that pretty much what you said they’ll take everything they just Jehovah’s Witnesses just take and take and take and so you have nothing left and they never give you anything in return.

[01:48:00] They make you feel guilty for it. You know I’ve been constantly tiptoeing around my dad’s feelings. I should have stood up and asked him where Mom was because they didn’t bury her right away. I should have called up and and demanded the answers that I deserved an. And then I would have been there if I had stood up for myself but instead I just took the shunning and kept quiet so that I didn’t didn’t hurt his feelings. That make me uncomfortable and because of that I lost my rights because I didn’t stand up. There was no fixing that now I know I’ll move forward from that.

[01:48:44] Other people haven’t been there yet. Know I hope that nobody does. But can you can fight for it. Yeah.

[01:48:55] Do you think that’s you think that your dad would have told you I think.

[01:49:03] Yeah. If I had. If I hadn’t confronted him and said you know where is mom and asked him direct questions he would have answered them.

[01:49:11] OK. OK. All right. Yeah.

[01:49:14] I just I just wondered how he probably would have. He probably would have answered them but he wasn’t going to initiate any kind of conversation with me and so I just let it go. I just trusted that with something of that gravity that he would tell me when it was time.

[01:49:32] Oh well of course. Yes of course you would.

[01:49:35] I didn’t expect the shunning to go to that extent. Right. Right. I had never heard of it before. I know I didn’t know that that it had happened to anybody else so I didn’t see it coming in. Sure. Well let’s just let it happen.

[01:49:52] This is this is this is a great warning to other people. Yes. Now they can they can know that you know. Yes. This is as far as it can go. You know they they can I’m sure there’s some way you can even go farther.

[01:50:08] Like I said some people never even take it from you. They will. Yeah yeah yeah that’s true.

[01:50:13] They’ll take it all. Yeah.

[01:50:16] Well I’m so sorry that so much was taken from you. You know it’s not fair. And there’s really no there’s just give you a hug if I was there. There’s just not words that can really even touch you know the breadth of this experience. But you do have this new freedom like you said you are finally set free. I will say that you know for all of us as long as you have family that’s in there is always like this.

[01:50:59] This tie it’s it’s hard to ever I guess truly be set free. I mean I guess nobody’s ever free from anything in life 100 percent.

[01:51:10] But the freedom that you get is just so it’s just so so amazing. When you realize that your life is finally yours Yeah there’s no expectations.

[01:51:27] Yeah. Well you put on you were.

[01:51:30] Yeah you know that’s gone and it’s pretty great.

[01:51:35] Yeah. So where are you now and what’s what do you want out of your life now.

[01:51:44] Want to figure out who I am and what I like. You know now that I know that I’m allowed to do that I’ve given myself the freedom to do that. You know what. I walked into my therapy one day and started off.

[01:51:59] And she said you know tell me who you are and what you like and let’s start there and I just look at her and I got nothing to say and I just think for a minute and I said well I love my children I know that and that’s all I could come up with.

[01:52:21] I didn’t know what I like to do or you know who I was I never got to just explore that in. So that’s that’s what I want and I want to give that freedom to my children. I want to get to that place and and share that with them. It’s it’s it’s not easy for the first little while you know I felt so guilty for a long time that it was so bad that during the day I had to take pictures of everything I did in the day and my children. Everything I did I took a picture of it so that at the end of the day I could look back and say Oh yeah well I did this good. And that was good. And I realized that I did something good in the day because when you’re not living the witness lifestyle you’ve you feel like you’re not you know those expectations are being met so you can feel less than or like you’re not accomplishing what you’re supposed to. Need to change that. And realize that I can do good.

[01:53:29] Outside of that absolutely.

[01:53:36] I mean I’ve been out now for two and a half years I can say that I still feel somewhat like what you’re saying.

[01:53:45] You know trying to figure out who you are and what you want what you like what you don’t like. You know there’s there’s this whole world to explore out there and it’s exciting. It’s scary at times but know you just as you go through this process and you discover these things. I mean it’s just just amazing. You know what actually is in this world and what we can experience. And high as we can get out of life. That we’re just never there was just never around in the environments that we grew up in. There was just no there was never any true joy.

[01:54:32] No. And you can have that now. And and this is so amazing. Any time I hear of somebody who gets out and they have kids and they can give their kids you know that more from the beginning of life.

[01:54:48] Yeah man that’s just to give them that leg up.

[01:54:52] It’s funny too because it’s so exciting for me to like my my daughter just we just celebrated her her birthday and she’s she’s four now but this is the first time actually you know celebrating it. And it was the most exciting thing. It was just so much fun that my my friends stages they kept laughing at me for one I had no idea how to do a birthday party. I never done Oh thing. I never experienced one so what am I doing here. They thought it was hilarious and then the excitement that comes from it. They just they thought it was almost comical to watch me try these things for the first time. But beautiful. It’s fun. Yeah yeah yeah.

[01:55:37] It’s beautiful to be able to No. Even it you say you. Twenty five I think. Twenty seven. Twenty seven. You know to be able to even at twenty seven whether you’re twenty seven or. I think my wife was thirty six when she had her first birthday. Like those things are just there’s so much fun. It’s a memory and I kind of think it’s cool because when you’re an adult you get to remember it like my wife.

[01:56:09] You remember her first birthday. You know how many can say that. Yeah.

[01:56:16] I know. So you’ll get to do that too. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:56:23] You know it is awkward at first. Try to figure out how to do this stuff. But the cool thing is you don’t get it. You can do it how you want. You don’t have to. You don’t have like a family tradition that you need to stick to or some not. It’s yours. Do what you wanted.

[01:56:43] The problem is I would overthink it so much. Like with the birthday situation I would know. Then I was feeling bad for all the other kids because all the other kids aren’t getting a present too. Oh yeah yeah. So I’m like well this doesn’t exactly seem fair. You know I’m just overthinking every aspect of a birthday. My friends thought it was absolutely hilarious.

[01:57:05] Oh sure it is from the outside. Yeah.

[01:57:10] I just don’t get it. Yes absolutely. Absolutely.

[01:57:15] I agree with you. You know that whole like. Well wait a minute. What about the other kids. They’re not getting a gift.

[01:57:25] No.

[01:57:26] At my wife’s first birthday party I had gift. We invited a bunch of people mostly people that we cleaned for and some new friends. We amazed that we had been out and we rented a place and we invited all these people and like we had like 70 people show up.

[01:57:50] You know they had kids and I’m like you know this is my wife’s first birthday. They’re going to you know these kids are going to see my wife opening presents and stuff that that people got her so I had little gift bags made for all the kids so that all the kids would have something because I don’t know how this works and you know I mean it’s cool that kids kids don’t always expect something in life but you know you don’t you don’t know that. And I wanted them to have fun and walk away with something to know. And so here it is my wife’s birthday party and I spent all kinds of money you know do you know.

[01:58:30] Yeah I almost did the same thing. You know I wanted to have a little something for everybody and make friends there.

[01:58:35] You know they step in you know thankful for them and they’re like No they’re getting cake that is their president. They get cake. They will be happy.

[01:58:44] Yes. Now I totally get it. I totally get it. And every time that somebody is birthday I want to buy them something and it’s like you know what I can’t afford to buy everybody. It’s you know it’s it is an interesting foray into the real world to see how things work.

[01:59:04] And it’s definitely a learning experience.

[01:59:09] It is. It is. But there’s so much good that comes from it.

[01:59:14] Not all good. I mean I’m sure you know there’s been things that you have to learn that are a little you know you might have anxiety around just because you don’t know what you don’t know yet. At least that’s me because I have a lot of anxiety naturally anyway.

[01:59:30] I’m an over thinker but yeah it’s just there’s just so much that you’re going to get to experience and and you’re gonna get to experience so much through your kids. I’m just really excited for you. I think that it’s it’s great that you have this opportunity finally you know to to be able to be you and to live your own life it’s pretty great.

[01:59:59] I want to thank Tamara for being brave enough to put her story out there so soon for being open to sharing some really tough things. And honestly I couldn’t be happier that she’s finally found freedom from such a bleak and somewhat oppressive in ways you know outlook you’d like to send messages of support to Tamara. You can do so by going to my Web site that shunned podcast dot com and you can leave a comment for there on the episodes page. You can also find the resources that were mentioned in the episode there and the video for the song that she chose to represent her journey facts. You should be able to on your podcast out. You can probably find those same resources if you look there right now. That’s not the only place that you can comment on the episode. We also have a Facebook group called shunned podcast where we have people discussing episodes and their own lives and I try to do things to encourage members to find good things in life and to grow. As I stated earlier I want to give you some highlights of the past month in there just to kind of give you an idea of the supportive group that’s forming Wednesday we post things that we’re happy about in life this week and every weekend we post things that we’re doing for ourselves as part of self care something that we were never really taught to do in these calls. This month we’ve shared our Halloween costumes a lot a lot of really cool things in there. Pumpkins that we carved I made an announcement in there of a new project that I’m working on as well for the SJW community. We’ve also had one of our own that was just disfellowshipped. And unfortunately he’s now been officially shunned as well. And we rallied around him. So things are happening in there. And my goal is to keep it more about us as individuals and our stories and supporting one another than just you know kind of keeping it the latest Jacob stuff. There are plenty of groups for that if that’s if that’s what you want but this is kind of about us as human beings if that sounds like something that you’d be interested in. Head to Facebook. Look up the group called shun the podcast. You’ll see the logo there and just apply to join and I’ll approve you. You can also find the podcast on YouTube under the Channel called shunnedpodcast one word. And also on Instagram at shun podcast. Again one word. And on Twitter at shun podcast. Again one way you’d like to hear my story and a great insight into how the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses works. You can do so at the podcast called this SJW life. Also found at thisjwlife.com we haven’t really had any new Patriot supporters for the past couple of months. But I want to take the time to seriously think that people that really helped me make this show possible by supporting it financially Schoen takes not just work and time but there are also costs involved in getting the audio hosted on the website and getting transcripts keeping the equipment working all that kind of stuff you can show support for the show for as little as a dollar a month. And it means the world to me to know that others are in this with me. It’s encouraging to see people that want to support what I’m doing here. You can do so at Patriot and dot com slash shunned if you’re so inclined. And another great way to support the show. Both the shun podcast and also thisJ.W. life. Both can use it. Just go over to iTunes and leave a five star review for them. It helps them get found in the searches on there so that more people can find it and the more people that find it the more people that can be helped by these five cars next month I’m going to have a fascinating interview. I’m pretty excited about this one as well. It’s with someone that will be kept anonymous as long as she wishes to be kept that way. This person grew up in a small racist cult that was essentially a family cult. You might say it was kind of a white supremacist call and doctrine but it wasn’t you know it wasn’t with the intense hatred and and the violence that sometimes is attributed to those groups. But you know the doctrine itself you know was kind of in that realm. But what what you really going to see in there along with that is just how a cult forms how it starts. I was just amazed when I was doing the interview. It’s it’s a look into the seed of a cult how it can grow from one person to one person’s ideas. And it’s really fascinating. And I think this is an important episode not just because that but also because behind it is a woman that has been through so much and that is a beautiful person that shines through all the ugliness in her past we’re going to close out this episode with the song no hell yet by fair voyeur. And you can find a link to her song to the page on Page for the show to resources that were mentioned and more not just on the Web site but if you’re listening on a podcast app you can probably get it all in the app by looking at the description as well as we end all episodes love others do no harm. And go be happy. Go.

Episode Nineteen – Lyndi is shunned by Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:41] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose the religions that use shunning as a tool to control people. Today I have an interview that I did with Lyndi. She’s a truly amazing woman that has a lot of insight into a lot of things. And I’m sure those are hard won lessons. You know kind of living a trying life. You’re going to hear a story about a young marriage in the witnesses a story that unfortunately echoes many others. You also hear a mother’s struggles after becoming a mom and suffering postpartum depression and then the spiral that led to her waking up and leaving the court behind. You’re also going to hear what it’s like to have your own daughter show on you and you’re going to learn what she’s done to try to reach her daughter someday.

[00:01:26] So let’s go ahead and get to know Lyndi. My name is Lindy.

[00:01:32] I was I am forty three years old. I was a Jehovah’s Witness. And now I am shunned.

[00:01:39] All right Lyndi so then how did you come to be a Jehovah’s witness in the first place. What age did that happen.

[00:01:46] Well it happened when I was 10 years old. I’ve kind of thought back to this of what attracted my mom to the religion. And one factor was she had grown up in the same town for most of her life. And then she met my stepdad and he did land leasing and sold right away to land so he moved around like every six months to two years. And so immediately after they were married we moved to a different area where she didn’t have her family around. And also when she was young she was like 19. Her 15 year old sister. Died in a car accident. And I remember her saying everybody told her well God needed an angel and that never really made sense to her. So I think that she was drawn to it just for the teaching of the resurrection and that made a lot more sense than what she was taught. So we moved to this new area and I was in school with fourth grade with a boy named Jason and my little sister was in first grade with his sister and my mom approached their mother and asked if she wanted to help her with a Christmas party. And that mother said well I can’t because I’m a Jehovah’s Witness. Would you like to know more about that. My mom said sure. So she started studying with her. And I would say within a year my mom was baptized. She rushed into the baptism because she was pregnant with my youngest sister her fourth child. And she had the arch negative blood factor. And there was a good chance the baby would need a blood transfusion. So she went ahead and got baptized so she could refuse it on the grounds of being a Jehovah’s Witness and she had a home birth. So it wouldn’t be forced upon her.

[00:03:42] And she was like Yeah it really sinks in on how how much mind control was there already for her to be willing to let her the baby die in generalities that. I know why she would in full force. So. So that that’s my baby sister was OK. Luckily that seemed like you know Jehovah protecting her.

[00:04:04] That’s kind of what the thought was. So that kind of strengthened it and from my perspective the family the mother and the two kids would come over and study with me and my sister would do the Bible story Balkan. The

[00:04:19] 10 year old boy Jason was the nicest boy I had ever met in my life because he’d study with me and you know say so you know who created out of an even I would say Jehovah Niego. Good job. You know it was like wow I never had a boy so nice you know and encouraging everybody at the meetings were so nice. Then the whole thing with the Paradise was like extremely enticing to a 10 year old. And. And. And I thought I mean I was wholeheartedly immediately as well like it just sounded so good and they felt lucky to know it.

[00:04:55] And and we were just yeah immediately and yeah.

[00:05:00] Sounds like it. I mean you know obviously your mom went in full force but you even had a peer who you know to to help you along. That’s that’s a very hard thing to resist. Yes. So then what did it mean to you back then. You know you’re studying with this this other boy and you know the the Paradise sounds so nice. Did. How did that change your life. Because you know you’re 10 years old and you were in the quote world and now you’re going this new direction.

[00:05:36] Well like I remember finding out you know we couldn’t celebrate holidays and that was like really disappointing.

[00:05:43] But my mom said like she never liked the holidays anyway there were so much stress and pressure. And you’re just giving gifts for no good reason. And now we all have you know plenty of other times that we get GEF. So it’s like well okay I can I can deal with that. And then when I found out you know I made Jova sad and upset if we did holidays I was like OK I’m done with holidays and my real father picked up me and my sister.

[00:06:14] I think it was like her seventh birthday and he took us to his sisters house to have a surprise party. And I locked her and I in the bathroom crying hysterically and would not come out because I did not want to make Jehovah angry and him like kill us. So it was like that immediate to that I was willing to give up everything because I would you know because the promise of paradise. And I remember right from the get go it was coming soon like I was coming so yeah. Yes. So it was like it didn’t even seem like a big sacrifice really to me at that time because you know I we were just lucky that we found out about it. Like just in time in the end was coming and you know having the elephant and the dolphin and the lion were going to definitely make up for missing the holiday. But but immediately to my grandparents when they heard about this they told my mom like this is a cult.

[00:07:14] And I remember them coming to visit one holiday which really made my mom mad because they were like coming just to try to you know basically like satan trying to stumbler and she was very mad and offended that they called it a cult. And. My grandparents tried to get us to celebrate me and my sister wouldn’t. But my step dad and little brother did so like dad an immediate divide on the family you know like right from the get go.

[00:07:43] And all my relatives I started to see as bad and you know tried to trick us and stuff like that.

[00:07:49] So it was very quickly up very quickly my whole entire universe changed and everything good about my own personality or what I thought were my you know good things like loving animals and loving babies and being just myself wasn’t good enough anymore and all the goals that we had you know put on us by the religion really took hold and I really went for those things to please everybody.

[00:08:17] Wow that’s a really interesting point you make there. And you know what a healthy outlook it is to accept yourself as you are and to love yourself for the good qualities that you have in him suddenly to be thrust into an environment where Oh yeah none of that matters. All that matters is that you perform these certain steps or do these certain things or be what we want you to be and then all the sudden you’re no longer okay you’re not good enough that that’s an interesting point you know to to experience that even as a 10 year old you know.

[00:08:56] Yeah yeah it is. And also the whole thing of our family dynamic being wrong like it’s already hard having stepfamilies and all that but to have immediately the separation of my stepdad from my mom my mom got a lot of extra attention because she was with an unbelieving mate and she would you know get a lot of commendation for going to the assemblies with us and not him and like I could see she got a lot of good and I know what the word is good feedback reinforcement like you know just what she needed to do to make yourself feel better about moving around. You know immediate recognition for her sacrifices and how hard it was. And things like that. So are our whole family really changed in a huge way and just got like really I feel like so dysfunctional and I would always envy the families that were all in the truth. You know they seem to have a great time at assemblies and we were miserable at assemblies and all that kind of thing. So I definitely had the goal of. That’s the kind of family I wanted in the future is like everybody in the religion and the truth and that would just be so fabulous. Like I always imagine that just as the perfect family life with everybody goes the assembly happy and you know that facade that they put on. That’s what I wanted.

[00:10:22] That you know that makes sense. Now how did you how did your stepdad handle it you know because this is a huge change very quickly. So I mean you know you were just kids you may not be privy to what that was like for him. But you know any insights there as to how I mean because that’s got to be insane to watch your wife you know just suddenly flip a switch and change so much and then you’re you know your daughter’s following along you know. Yeah weekly your stepdaughter.

[00:10:55] Yeah. At first he would he he wouldn’t go or anything so my little brother and sister they got to have birthdays and Christmas and he would spoil them like in a huge way.

[00:11:05] So that made a lot of tension for me and my other sister. You know he would be on my mom’s side and they would be on that side. But eventually you’d go to some meetings and you know he thought the idea of women being submissive and you know her trying to win him over without a word.

[00:11:25] You know he would kind of like aren’t you supposed to be doing this or she kind of got irritated when he started like learning more about how she’s supposed to behave but like we moved around a lot so different places would have different vibes. But a lot of times somebody would come and study with them. And you know he never ended up getting baptized.

[00:11:48] He always got to do like basically whatever he wanted to do with everybody soul treating him really really nice plus he had a decent job with decent money.

[00:11:57] So he was able to do more for people you know and he ended up he hired a lot of Jehovah’s Witnesses so I feel like he was almost treated better than any Jehovah’s Witness was. He got away with a lot. You know what I mean.

[00:12:13] Yeah he got a lot of fans he got to ride your sides of the fence I guess major fence right.

[00:12:18] Yes. And that and toward toward the time that I was waking up I would find things out.

[00:12:27] And I thought you know he could really help our family you know like come back together. This could be really good. So I would tell them things I learned and he was the type of person that would defend them to the death even though he had no idea what he was talking about. He would say what I was saying wasn’t true. That’s not what they say. I could send them links to show them. That’s exactly what they say and they’ll be like nope.

[00:12:49] So and then ended up like he was really brainwashed by it but he still never committed to it. So it’s really bizarre.

[00:12:57] Some of the most dangerous people out there are the people who never fully committed. So they don’t know what it was really like. So use adamin comments often under you know news articles that criticize Jehovah’s Witnesses or youtube videos or whatever. You’ll see these people who they they were they weren’t good Jehovah’s Witnesses. I mean there’s just all there was to it. They were Jehovah’s Witnesses wouldn’t claim them. But yes if it came time for you know to defend Jehovah’s witnesses they would step up and defend them with these stories that aren’t accurate that simply are not an accurate portrayal of life as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses because they weren’t fully committed.

[00:13:41] Exactly. They never had the same pressure and they never had the same expectations and they always got love bomb there. So right right. Yeah. It was a frustrating situation. And my sisters my all my siblings never got fully in. So for a long time they were kind of fence writers too like they just thought they weren’t good enough to be in it you know in their own minds. They’re like I know it’s the truth. But I just don’t feel like I can live up to it. But eventually as they got older and I spoke to them and they did some of their own research they kind of realized like oh well there’s a whole bunch of things that aren’t right. And I had to do with their own experiences and their own journeys to. But they still every Jehovah’s Witness though you know we grew up knowing as a family still talk to them and not me. So of course yes. So that’s the way it goes. You confided in them. Yeah exactly. Fourteen year old then.

[00:14:39] So how did things progressed from that time you know you’re 10 years old you’re starting to study. You get baptized at 14. You know what was kind of the trajectory there as far as you know life went.

[00:14:53] Because I mean it seems like you bought the world view very quickly that the witnesses gave you because you were seeing your your family and outsiders as you know these scary people who were trying to rip you away from the truth. What about you know at school or at the meetings you know how was life going for you and this interim time where you’re building up and progressing toward baptism.

[00:15:18] Well so like with my relatives since we started moving around a lot we didn’t really have a chance to see them a lot.

[00:15:24] So that was kind of you know not a huge issue we weren’t around to do much with anybody. So we just knew like I just knew in my head they would try to like trick me up with questions or you know I just wasn’t close to them. That was the bottom line. It was like they didn’t really count as family.

[00:15:41] Now we had this new family and as we moved around it was nice to go somewhere and have an instant family like within a week of moving somewhere new. We would have like a sleepover with friends you know. So that part seemed pretty lucky. And I was home schooled and part of that was like the only entertainment I had it was going out in service.

[00:16:06] Basically it was either home doing things taking care of the kids I remember your wife’s interview she was similar where she took care of my younger sister was 10 years younger so I took care of her a lot studied with her. I always had a nice sister in the hall that would come and study with me. So I like having that.

[00:16:23] So like you know for our lifestyle moving around a lot it did bring a lot of comfort to have this you know attention from people and friends immediately.

[00:16:35] So so I felt very committed and then all the people you know that go out in service all the time they’re role into it and that would be my outlet is going on service a few times a week. So I try to. I don’t remember if it was called Ishola pioneer when you were before you were baptized but I would try to do that and then when I was baptized I would auxillary pioneer and just that was my social life too. So I didn’t have any other viewpoints really from school or anything like that.

[00:17:03] Yeah. Oh something you touched on with homeschooling really struck me and I’ve always seen homeschooling you know parents who talk about doing it as a way to protect their children. But what I never really realized is so as that child because they have essentially a major life that much more closed off now when you go to things like the meetings or out in field service to knock on doors like those things now carry even more. What. No wait.

[00:17:37] They’re more special because that’s the only place you’re going to get any socializing. Yes I guess I hadn’t really thought about it from that perspective. Not only are they isolating you but in doing so they are propping up or making bigger these other aspects of life that they want you to see because those are the only things that have any you know provide any stimulus to your life.

[00:18:04] Yes. And then. And then another odd part of it is my stepdad who he wasn’t really all the way and so he wouldn’t let me go out in service every day I would have gone everyday if I thought of just you know to get out the house. Yeah but he would only let me go like twice a week. So of course with a kid that makes you want to do it more you know like Oh when I’m older I’m gonna pioneer you know because now I’m not allowed to but when I’m allowed to go out all the time. So so funny what they say no to a kid makes them want to do it.

[00:18:36] Oh yeah yeah. And usually you know usually when that spoken that’s spoken in talk context you know don’t tell your daughter not to date that guy because of course she’s going to want to date that guy right. You know that bad boy or whatever.

[00:18:50] Once it hits it’s field service failed. With my. That was my exciting time.

[00:18:56] Also during that time like I was trying to get well that was like at 14 I got baptized and we lived in Massachusetts and I really had the goal in mind of marrying this 10 year old that I had met Jason.

[00:19:11] I his family was all in. They seemed so nice and they had it all together and I knew I had to be very spiritual to you know be able to marry him. So that was one of the things at the forefront of my mind at all times is like I have to be good enough to win. You know Jehovah’s Witness boy with an older dad and all this.

[00:19:33] So you know you had to really keep your standards up because there were a lot of spiritual girls that would be in this path. And I had to be on that level. Yes.

[00:19:44] And and I would pray all the time like you know I wasn’t really seeing my real dad Marge because you know he wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness. You tried to get us to celebrate holidays.

[00:19:55] You know the nerve of him he would still send us presents like Christmas presents doesn’t he know we don’t celebrate. You know of course I’d be happy to get presents but also like you know I have to have that attitude of like he’s just not respecting me. But having and then having a step dad that wasn’t my first Jehova was like my real dad to me you know. So I would I would sometimes pray like all day just like almost like you know your own little phone call to someone who will listen. And I can’t even imagine like the stuff I used to say could reflect his teenage rantings fires while I’m doing laundry. Please help me to be loving to my family and not mind you know doing this I want to be a good daughter and I mean it was just a constant thing.

[00:20:43] So being lonely and homeschooled and all that made me really you know make Jehovah something different in my mind than even what the average Jehovah’s Witness does. Right.

[00:20:56] But also you were you were super sincere. You can see through all of this that you you really believe this. This was it for you. Yes absolutely. And you were making plans. You know early on to get married and you know all these things that have this this cohesive family where everybody was a witness and. Yes. Yeah. So then how did things progressed as you went through your teenage years into young adulthood. How did things go well.

[00:21:26] So I ended up moving to Ohio where Jason lived.

[00:21:31] And I became a nanny for a family that went to fall lived with them and I started like officially dating Jason I think we were 17 very very young.

[00:21:42] We got engaged when he was still in school which is kind of hilarious. I think we dated a year and then we got married. I think we were 19. It’s so hard to remember ages. It’s it’s bizarre trying to think back and I don’t remember the exact year but I’m pretty sure we were both just 19 when we got married. So you know I I set my goals and I attain them.

[00:22:09] And I was so excited to finally have this you know wonderful family life and everything that I thought it was going to be as a Jehovah’s Witness and people would always call him little Jesus like he was always so nice to everybody.

[00:22:23] Yes yes yes he was that in the creation of a small hall so you know all of our friends around our age were really close. It was a fun group we really liked hanging out together that was like what I would say is the fun times my youth you know I had more freedom than I’d ever had being a nanny and had a car and got to go to Jason’s family on the weekends and stuff like that. So that that time period seemed like like I don’t know like life was going good it was going where I should go. And then after we got married of course we stopped hanging out with people like when you don’t need a chaperone everywhere you go. You don’t have as many friends being out and everybody else is doing their own thing with getting married and stuff like that. Like I think within two years almost every young person in our age was married at that kingdom hall. And I started seeing like the things that weren’t so good. Like we go to the meeting and I had.

[00:23:25] Step by myself most of the time because he had you know the sound to do or the books or the territories or you know whatever responsibilities it have.

[00:23:35] And sometimes I would look around for him and I couldn’t even find him. And I found out he would like hide in the bathroom stall like he was so he had so much pressure on him all his life to be this perfect that he he was really stressed out. And I did not see that after assemblies like during the whole assembly he would get really down on himself and feel like we weren’t doing enough. We weren’t doing enough personal study we weren’t doing enough service and you know it was you it was a reason not to. Yes. Yes. It was not what I had envisioned and we were very poor because he worked for his family and you know there just a lot of the brothers work for them and there wasn’t a lot of money. So he actually was able to get a job with my stepdad doing the oil and gas. At that time most cell phones with cell phone land leasing.

[00:24:30] So we moved from Ohio to Texas which was like a shock to everybody.

[00:24:36] You know Jason was a ministerial servant and moving up the ladder there and it’s very upsetting for his mother.

[00:24:42] And you know just it was a big upset and I think people really thought he made a big mistake with me because you know otherwise he wouldn’t have done this.

[00:24:53] You know I was we were definitely felt very judged at that time.

[00:24:57] But you’re taking little Jesus away.

[00:25:00] Now know a lot of nerve and he has a lot of family there around that area. So you know there was a lot of people. So we ended up moving and going to a new hall and that was the first time in his life he’d ever gone to a new hall. And it was a big hall in Texas with a few congregations there and you know instead of like I think our hall in Ohio like 70 people and this one had probably like 230. And you know we weren’t love bombed you know we were already in it. And people weren’t that friendly and it was really bizarre to him I had seen that already with moving around that not all halls are the same and same love and stuff but I think it really affected them and not being a ministerial servant like he he had a hard time just sitting there at the meetings like hello. That’s what I’ve been doing all my life it’s not so fun listening to the same thing over and over. But but but it really was a struggle for him. So we ended up settling in Oklahoma. He my dad had some work there and then we ended up he quit working for my dad and started a business with another brother so we could just stay put.

[00:26:13] And he did quickly you know make him a sterile servant again there and you know started working toward that goal again and felt better about himself. But still the constant you know depression and pressure of not feeling good enough. And I also felt like we never really could communicate because.

[00:26:32] I’m a very open person and you know you marry someone they’re supposed to be your best friend. So I would like confessed to him things like from when I was a kid things that I would do like sometimes. Me and my sisters would just yell crosswords at each other just for fun. Like yeah I buy and.

[00:26:52] And you would just be like like look at me like oh my gosh I was like did you ever do I mean really. No. No. And then like.

[00:27:03] All situations would come up and I try to talk to him and he’d get out the bound volumes to you know give me counsel and oh it would be so annoying to me because it’s not being real. Like like our life it was either silence or mock assembly part. It seemed like like I was supposed to be like Oh well thank you. Chilling me this dear husband you know. And so it felt like very not real. So that was a struggle but you know the end is coming. It really doesn’t matter who you marry soon you’re going to look like Adam and Eve and be perfect so you just hang in there and soon everything will be fine. You know that was kind of what I was betting on at that time just hanging in there.

[00:27:49] Yeah I can’t say I kind of feel for him because it seems like he was never allowed to be himself. I mean now. OK. None of us were in the cold. Yeah. All of us to varying degrees had to stifle who we were. But it really sounds like his life kind of was you know like an assembly part and that he just you know did the Watchtower thing always with death you know like you were saying you know you wanted to be real. And it almost sounds like you didn’t have anything else. He was just like a little robot which is very sad. It is. Yeah. I can identify with some of that myself a little bit still. I always struggled with. I would always beat myself up for cussing. That was a big thing that I struggle with as a kid. But I knew better than to do it around my parents or at the meetings. But you know I always struggle with that. But you see it seems like he just he just bodied on a level that was yeah. Just just very very sad. I hope I don’t know what the situation is right now but I hope someday he finds who he is.

[00:29:08] Because if I do to have and we’ll go and do it more as the story goes on because you know we had a child together so you know I still do know what his life is like and you know yeah. And it’s definitely just stifling emotionally and every other way having that pressure on you at all times and I’ve found it is.

[00:29:31] And I found like so much was just fake like one time we went to the meeting and it was all icy and staffin and I had my heels on and stuff but he jumped out of the car and I got out and I was like whoa. And he ran to help other sisters. Because. When he. Supposedly I flipped and I was so irritated you know. But it was like I don’t know who he was knifed as nice to me as he was to everybody else. And even when we were divorced still you know somewhat nice to me like he couldn’t really. He was never real but it did always seem like he was exactly though exactly what the cult told him to be like. Some people said well you guys were extreme like I was extreme also when I was in but I did not take anything further than what they told us to do. You know. Yeah. He was the perfect good Jehovah’s Witness. And he wasn’t taking things too far as far as what we were told to do.

[00:30:30] He just did what he got to do. You know got him hiding in a bathroom because he’s under so much pressure he’s freaking out depressed and yet there’s hardly any time to do anything.

[00:30:41] You go to work come home eat dinner or work. And then he’d have to like prepare for the meeting and then after the meeting come home and count the money and do that. I mean he always had all his life was consumed by stuff they were having him do and he would always say yes. So it was it was very consuming. But he loved he loved it because you know like I remember you said in your story and me saying like that’s where you got all your self-esteem. Yeah. So without that he did not even know how to be.

[00:31:17] Do you only exist in the eyes of others. Yeah in the eyes of the cold. So you can’t you can’t risk having cursing fights with no siblings because if you were to get caught and you were home to get in trouble then you could lose your entire identity. And that’s terrifying.

[00:31:39] It is. And one other story that was just hilarious like me and my little sister she was very like me just roll like boisterous and to me to me funny some people don’t find us funny but we do. But one time we were talking and we were like What is the worst thing somebody ever called you and like you know Kobe like the B word or something like that. And Jason was like one time when I was 13 my mom called me a little jerk and we just started. Like who. Like that’s.

[00:32:18] A bad thing.

[00:32:19] And he was like almost in tears and so so because of this you know what he viewed marriage to be and how I would treat him and respect him and all that. And I was more like real. I think I was a very big disappointment to him. And I made him cry a few times just by being myself being funny not taking things so serious. But yeah on the like. The bottom line is I really do feel for him. I really do hope that someday he finds the kind of freedom in life to be himself.

[00:32:52] I do know that dude needs a hug. Yes this is something real. That’s that’s yes that’s very very very sad. So how did things you know progressed.

[00:33:05] You know I’m gay. Well this is where it gets interesting.

[00:33:09] So it actually had a couple miscarriages and you know been being in the call all the meetings and all that. It was very lonely and boring. And he was always you know at the sound booth or stuff I didn’t even have him to sit by with the meeting. So I thought you know I would be so nice have a baby and when when I was younger and my little sister was a baby I used to walk around the conventions and I used to pretend people would think she was my kid which you know would be ridiculous because I was eleven but it was fun to have that kind of attention and the little baby to hang out with. So I finally got pregnant and Oklahoma with my daughter. And I was so excited.

[00:33:52] I was worried about Miss caring but this one went along fine and my mom and had home births and my sister at home births and we we didn’t have insurance and felt like a home birth would be a good way to go. So we found a midwife in the phone Volcan started going to her and she was a little odd which is pretty normal for you know some midwives to be a little Bentley holistic or you know just a little bit weird. She had like six kids. And you know what. She was just our midwife so we went with her and we told her about being Jehovah’s Witnesses and how we would take blood if that became an issue and she said that was fine and everything and everything was going along okay.

[00:34:35] And I was like seven months. I went to our office and she was feeling my abdomen and she said you know the baby’s not head down yet and we kind of expect that.

[00:34:45] But I can feel her head over on the side and let me see oh your baby doesn’t have a skull like what. And she she was like Yeah I don’t feel schol but don’t worry they can live a few hours. They’re not that ugly. Let me show you in this book. And I was just like oh yeah what it’s like I was immediately like just totally freaked out crying. I laughed at my mom followed me. She was with me at that appointment. We got in the car she said let’s just go and get an ultrasound and figure something out.

[00:35:22] She called around and got an ultrasound place to open that night and just meet us there. I was you know hysterical and a mess. And we went to the ultrasound. Found out having a girl and she was fine and her head was down. So it was very bizarre that you would even say that. So yeah just weird. So I was like I’m not going back to her. She emailed a few times and I told her no I not going back she goes You won’t get your money back I don’t care. We’re not coming back to you. And she’d also an odd thing is she would tell me like because I was smiling like we might have to induce which was really weird because you don’t do so with a home birth. You don’t you know that’s dangerous. So my mom always thought that was weird so so I ended up having to try to find another midwife and I did. And we told her the story of what happened and she goes oh well she is that lady we’re going to she’s a Wiccan she’s a witch. And that sent shivers up my spine like I still I don’t know for a fact but I feel like she was going to try to take the baby. I feel like she she had something about us being Jehovah’s Witnesses and was thinking she would because she had mentioned she couldn’t get pregnant. She really wanted more babies. I don’t know. It was very strange. I still don’t know the real answer or if that was going to happen but that’s how it made me feel like regardless of whether she was a Wiccan or not.

[00:36:51] There was something wrong there.

[00:36:53] Yeah there is something there every year. Yeah. And I have nothing against Wicken or you know different types of spirituality. But at that time it’s just like you know it seems like the opposite of Jehovah’s Witnesses would be that. And and it did seem like something was off. So so that was very stressful and I ended up finding the new midwife. But but the day I went into labor her assistant came in I never met her and she’s the one who like was there when she was first checking so it just everything was very stressful because it was uncomfortable and my Labor ended up being over 24 hours. Her head was turned the wrong way so it was back Labor. I did not sleep. It was basically it was traumatic. And no drugs. You know I had her at home.

[00:37:41] So when she finally you know when she finally came out and they put her on my lap I was I don’t even I can’t even explain like how I feel. I was I was like out of my mind at that point. And I was just like what do I do with it. I didn’t even have that. Like oh my gosh my baby I was just so like I was like just get it out.

[00:38:02] You know it was very very traumatic. And then she ended up being a very stressed out baby probably from everything that I had gone through. Oh an important fact is during that time it was an 89 98 sorry 98 that is when they had a little snippet in the Watchtower about well it appears that the generation of 1914 that would know by no means pass away. We have new light on that and new understanding. We can’t say that that’s the generation that won’t pass away and that people living then will still be alive.

[00:38:39] You know they had a little part and I remember sitting at the meeting and asking Jason like does this mean like you know people like my great grandma will still be alive. Is that what they’re saying. Yeah yeah. And almost like went over everybody’s head I felt. But I thought what. You know that was what I was taught from the get go I was worried the whole time I was pregnant that Armageddon would come and I would have to hike up mountains.

[00:39:02] Being pregnant you know what I mean like that with Saddam there to pretty slightly dead. They really did.

[00:39:10] And that’s the thing we’ve always used as a prophecy to pinpoint when the end is going to come.

[00:39:19] Mary how can you really say that we’re not saying that why.

[00:39:23] But that hit me I think really hard and I didn’t even know it so. So after the traumatic birth and everything. She also had Kaleck from 7 to 11 every night she would scream the pressure right from the get go bring her to a convention a week later which I did. She needs to be out in service from the get go you know Bible Training. There’s not too soon a time to start that. And it was I felt so much pressure. And I also did not want to take her own service. And I started worrying that you know like she was so little and fragile like she could die. Anything could happen you know babies you know they can just fall and die. And like I was I didn’t want to take her out in the car and and I just felt very stressed out and I wasn’t sleeping at all because she was you know high strung and crying a lot. And I started this was postpartum depression which I did not know. I started feeling like something was wrong with me. I was not good enough for some reason I just did not feel like being a Jehovah’s Witness anymore. I did not feel like having this pressure on me anymore. I could not handle it. But she would be better off without me because having a mother like that like that that is just terrible for her to have a mother like that you know to have someone who doesn’t want to commit to Jehovah and do everything they’re supposed to do. So I mean thinking back to that time like it was just I was I was crazy I would say I just lost it like I was not myself. I could not sit still and watch a movie. I could not read a book. My mind was racing all the time. And now I realize like I was going through like a manic episode.

[00:41:17] Oh is potentially ignorant question coming out. I have to admit I don’t know a lot about postpartum depression. And obviously people can can experience that who were never Jehovah’s Witnesses.

[00:41:35] But yes I think that I just wanted to ask do you think that because you keep mentioning this pressure to to be this good witness do you think that it was at least partially brought on by the fact that you were one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and had this this huge weight of you know bringing a life into this world that is going to end any day now and having to you know essentially not literally but baptize this little baby into this. This thing that was so big it required so much you know do you think that that added pressure maybe was what triggered it. Or is that not how it works.

[00:42:28] Well from what I understand now like a lot of times traumatic births what pushed somebody into it and it’s it’s really a lot about hormones a lot of her. Oh yeah a lot of people go through it for various reasons but for sure the whole stress of being a perfect Jehovah’s Witness to be a perfect mom was always there. And that’s what led me to make the bad decisions that I made from that point on. So so that postpartum depression happened just because that can happen. But also I did not get help because I didn’t address the postpartum depression. It was I internalized it all as just being a bad witness. Like not being good enough and I hadn’t done anything bad but because I felt in my own heart and mind something was different that that is what I attribute it everything to. Not. Not that you know that I was going through something medically you know.

[00:43:31] Yes yes. Yeah. Oh yeah. Back to being a witness because that dominates everything in her entire life you know.

[00:43:38] Yes yes so.

[00:43:42] So I was going through that and I fell out of my mind. And I knew Jason and my daughter they would be better off without me. Like I almost was suicidal but I didn’t feel right about that. And I just felt like I couldn’t be a Jehovah’s Witness again. And because I knew the rules like I’m such a rule follower that I did it to a T. I knew that you would have to commit adultery to be able to be free from your marriage. So I did that which is embarrassing and shameful to admit. But it was seriously for the purpose of like I wasn’t trying to find a boyfriend or anything but I started talking to someone on the evil wicked computer internet in hell back then it was like such warnings. You know and I remember just getting a little ping at night and like talking to someone telling me you know my struggle and them being compassionate. And so it was not easy to find somebody to you know just basically get me out of the situation and so would be free to remarry. And yeah.

[00:44:54] So I will live it. Let me acknowledge that. If you’ve already you know I know you say you’re embarrassed and you feel ashamed to say this but what was it that you found online when you talk to that person was that you found someone new. Yes you did break a rule. But you found someone who actually listened to you and gave you some emotional support in a situation. You know postpartum depression is is overwhelming for any woman who experiences it. But when you experience it in a culture where there is very little emotional health. You know I mean it sounds like you know your husband probably wasn’t able to give you much. Not at all. It doesn’t sound like he sounded like he was a desert emotionally and you know you’re in a an organization that you didn’t ask you. How they handled you know. I know I’ve heard stories let’s just say of women I mean my mom even had a miscarriage or two in the organization. And the way that some people in the congregation address that is just horrific. Like you know what should you be sad. You know you’ve got the hope in all this stuff. So they’re really emotionally invalidating you. So you know I can only imagine in that in that circumstance you know what you did was a very human thing to do. It’s not something to destroy yourself over because it’s it’s an awful place. You didn’t ask to be put in that position. You didn’t ask to have postpartum depression. You didn’t ask you know for this traumatic birth you know these are just things that happened. And you know sometimes things in life happen and don’t have to be. Unfortunately we came from a society where everything was moralized. Yes everything was you’re a bad person which is what shame is you know shame guilt as I did a bad thing. Shame is I’m a bad person. And you know what you did. You know obviously you get to feel how you feel. You know if you don’t feel good about it that’s fine. But you know for yourself. But I just I just wanted to put it out there that you know what you did was a very human thing you know. And one of the things that I had to learn you know when I left was to be able to have compassion for myself for being a human being. And you know not always making the 100 percent perfect decision according to their rules from the environment that we grew up in. So yes I just I was I hope you can hear that.

[00:47:42] I do. I really really do.

[00:47:44] And I really I look back and I don’t A. I don’t blame myself but I do take accountability. You know what. Yeah right. Yeah yeah but the ability for what you do. Right yeah. Yes.

[00:47:54] Yeah that’s right.

[00:47:55] But like I’ve told you some of my friends about this and they’re they’re cracked up like yours that Gerald Ford you had to get out the way they said.

[00:48:05] True for all of us like the self-fulfilling prophecies the self-fulfilling self-destruction like all of that we do to ourselves because that’s what they said. They said you would meet somebody on the internet if you spend time on the big bad internet.

[00:48:20] And that’s how most people cheat on their spouse. So I had a handbook of how to do it.

[00:48:26] You know what I mean I know that’s going to happen because they know they produce human beings without any emotional intelligence or support or celebrity or anything like that. They know what they produce and they know what the outcomes are going to be. You know that’s why they tell you not to read apostate literature because they know that they’re full of it and if you read it that you would see it. So yes you know it’s it’s they do set those things out very well.

[00:48:56] Yes. Yes. And immediately like immediately I told my husband well I cheated on you. So now you’re free to remarry. And you know he was he was upset and like that day. You know like I just being really mattered. And I just thought you know I I just thought well good now you know you’re free. I did it. I took I took the bullet on this one. So find somebody good and marry them. You know I really just felt like that gets me out of the picture so that you guys can be OK. And I remember I even asked my mother to adopt my daughter. She was only 8 months old.

[00:49:39] Like you know it was just like thinking back this is insanity.

[00:49:44] Like I would never behave like that under normal circumstances. But but yeah all the pressure of that. So then so then I moved out and I was still getting my daughter.

[00:49:55] Like when he went to work but very quickly that changed and he started taking her to other witnesses who were told not to let me see her. So immediately she was taken from me my mom was totally supportive and that my mom thought I needed to talk to a therapist.

[00:50:11] But of course a Jehovah’s Witness therapist. So this was in Oklahoma. She lived in Arizona and she flew me out to Loflin Nevada which is near where she lived and had this Jehovah’s Witness therapist meet with me. Now she wouldn’t talk to me because I was bad at that point. And she like dropped me off at this hotel stay with me you’re my mom.

[00:50:35] Oh ok yeah. So she was Sherman. She was helping already. Okay.

[00:50:40] So during this time like I’m stuck at a hotel a gambling hotel casino and Loflin Nevada.

[00:50:48] And these are things I’d never seen before.

[00:50:51] So I did a little gambling you know I did like all these I’m bad now right. So I might as well do bad things then. And I got a little tattoo of sun moon and stars because overall even with all this craziness I felt freedom for the first time in my life like the sun moon and stars had all been handed to me like it did have a meaning to me. Even that soon I still felt so guilty so bad and so worthy of destruction and death. But but there was something about it that just felt so right to so.

[00:51:30] So I talked to the therapist basically he saw that I had a lot of issues with my mother because she was always very you know controlling and she was the one that I tried to please all my life but I could never please her. There she was. She’s that type of mom and. And.

[00:51:48] My ex came with the baby or my husband at the time came with the baby and he actually said to me like I showed him my tattoo. Like I’m very transparent GOP. I showed him my tattoo and he actually said. Well I’m going to kiss you there someday when you come back to Jehovah. And I said nope nope I’m not like. That wasn’t even an option I didn’t want him to have hope. It was it was such a bizarre place to be mentally like I felt like I was fighting for my own life. You know like I found a taste of freedom and that’s what I wanted. And. I was it was very strange. So I told my mom wait nope I’m not going back. Why she thought this would happen. I would just go back and it would just be sex just like that. And so what she did was left to me in Loflin Nevada by myself wife. No I had like I don’t even know if I had 20 Bob. I don’t even know she went home to Arizona. I had to fly out and Vegas an hour and a half away to get back to Oklahoma where I had a job and she abandoned me there. She did not care what happened to me. If I died I died. I mean it was like such awful feeling like I felt truly abandoned and unloved and uncared about in the biggest way. So I ended up calling a cab company and I told them pretty much what happened and I’m stock and I only have 20 dollars and they ended up getting somebody off duty to come pick me up which was really scary because it was a man and I felt like he was going to rape me.

[00:53:30] You know what I mean you just think those bad things are always happening.

[00:53:34] Like I was you know it’s right from our ground zero holds a fear of the outsiders.

[00:53:42] So yes I I be raised and murdered. Of course. Yeah. And he picked me up early so we had like two hours in Vegas and like I had to go the car with him and go in a casino. I was really scared. And I I didn’t even hardly talk I was just like kind of hovering in the corner of his car. I’m sure he could tell I something’s wrong. And he did not do anything to me. You know he did take me back to the airport and I did make it. But that always will hurt when I think about it like that my mom really did not care what happened to me.

[00:54:17] I was abandoned in Loflin Nevada with nothing would that would hurt anybody that’s awful. Yeah that and that sets the tone pretty much for how you’re treated once you’re shot and you know you’re just thrown away like common trash. Yeah you and I I wrote a disassociation letter I confessed everything that I did.

[00:54:38] And turned it on. And a few times the elders came and tried to talk to me and I just wouldn’t talk to them. I knew that they would ask no personal questions and stuff then. Now I know how bad it really is when they do that. But I just felt like I don’t want to be one so I’m not going to talk to them.

[00:54:54] They’re probably just been further traumatizing.

[00:54:57] Yes I can see that now. I didn’t. I definitely had good instincts to avoid that whole year. So. So I of course everything went downhill like I had immature roommates that this. This boy this guy that I had slept with like knew like they were all I was 24 and they were all like 1920. Like recently out of high school and like this group and like they I was almost like I was very interesting to them because I was 24 with a child.

[00:55:30] And getting divorced yet I was so immature as far as just experience goes or knowing anything like like I mean I was I was very they loved like asking me things basically like laughing at me because I was so unaware of things. But you know as a little bit it was like two months of high school that I never got. Right there. That’s what I hope like I was in that fell apart. You know the roommates weren’t responsible and all this stuff and I ended up calling my real dad and asking him if I could move in with him and he said yes so I moved to Kansas which wasn’t too far. And Jason ended up filing for divorce. And just full custody and I didn’t find anything. I just went and signed it like I had no fight for myself. You know I knew I was unworthy and that’s it. And I’m just getting what I deserve. So I signed her over to Hamen. That was it. And he ended up moving back to Ohio with his family. So. So. The. Reality like my whole manic. Part kind of started dwindling like reality was. And I I only can think of how I felt like I was in a movie like I felt like everything was not real. Like nothing I counted. Nothing was real. Nothing mattered because we’re all going to die.

[00:57:00] And I felt like I knew we were all going to be killed any day now. But I couldn’t even help these people anymore. I couldn’t explain it to them. Like what am I supposed to say like you should be a Jehovah’s Witness. But I’m not being a Jehovah’s Witness. But we’re all gonna die. And I was driving to work one day and I heard.

[00:57:16] Ad on the radio for a place that was called Charter as a charter mental hospital and they said you know you can come here and you know if you need help we’re here for you and I just drove straight there and I went in the waiting room and I heard them talking on the phone to someone like yes we have her here. We’ll hold her here. I thought they were talking to my dad about me immediately like they could just see I was crazy but it wasn’t that. So I met with somebody. I told them everything I did like. I felt so much guilt. That’s not even funny. I’m a whore I’m a harlot I’m I’m following Satan. I just like everything I was told I was. That’s what I believed. You know and I’m as good as dead.

[00:58:01] And they referred me to another therapist that I went to an you know therapist don’t usually have a good hold on. You know leaving a religion like that. So I felt like she gave me some good advice. But you know not not exactly what I needed but I don’t know that anybody could like it’s a journey that you have to go on and I think that’s why this ex Jehovah’s Witness community is so important because this is what I needed. You know having people like us talking you through and telling you it’s going to be OK and you’re not crazy but. But that therapist did talk to Jason and said I think what’s wrong with her. She is mourning for her daughter like she needs to see her daughter at that point he hadn’t let me see. So. So he agreed and I was able to get her and she was 2 at the time and just it was just so nice.

[00:59:00] Like she was awesome. I felt really bonded you know at that at that time like I was over all the depression and all that and I just I just could not see living without her anymore.

[00:59:14] You know I was just I was just so like see like it’s almost like waking up and finding Oh I just did all this and here I am you know and I had a boyfriend at the time that was like you know not the best choice because when you’re in that kind of position you’re not you’re not really able to make good choices.

[00:59:37] But you know a decent person you know just a typical boyfriend and I had her for a couple weeks and she went back and then six months later I went to see her in Ohio and I actually called my ex and I said OK I’m willing to come back. I don’t believe it. I don’t believe but I’m going to. I would come back be a drover’s witness and just you know Mario again. So I can have my daughter. And he said I wish you’d told me this before because now I’m engaged. And it’s like it was a year and a half later he was already engaged. And I said to who and he said this girl she was 17. I was like Are you kidding me. You haven’t learned. And there are things that he had told me like. Finally at the end trying to like open up finally that that I was just like it was just too late for me at that time and I said Does she know that. Yes she knows everything about me. Like I just felt just like I don’t I don’t I can’t even explain exactly how I felt like a relief on the one hand because at least I was willing to go back you know like it was in his hands now. But also that. OK. Now there’s no hope in that part. Just Don an so and so he did Mary that girl and she became my daughter step mom right then. Right. You know. So. So as time went on I I got her whenever I could.

[01:01:18] And I still felt bad I was starting to like realize like this life is real and trying to like live life like you need to live to be successful and stuff but it’s very hard when you have no education and no way to get like decent jobs or anything. And.

[01:01:35] I ended up living in Texas with another ex Jehovah’s Witness friend of mine.

[01:01:40] She let me move in with her and her family. And she had been and she had a really rough time of it too. So we were both like this mess thought these messed up extro was one this is it still felt guilty though it wasn’t. We really couldn’t help each other through it at that time. But you know she she did help me out a lot at that time to to move to Texas and then. I ended up meeting my husband now. And I was like I would tell on like my story and stuff. And he could tell from the way I talk like I was still a Jehovah’s Witness you’d be like you’re still Jehovah’s Witness. I’m like No I’m not like I am just Fallah so I’m certain. Yeah I was like I am anything but Jehovah’s Witness. Like trust me. Like that’s why nobody will talk to me.

[01:02:28] And he thought like my anxiety like if a fighter jets would go over I would be like oh my gosh it’s Armageddon.

[01:02:38] It’s starting like I would really feel like that at any time. I still felt like the end was coming any day now. And I ended up we got married and I got pregnant with my second daughter and I was really happy.

[01:02:54] But of course that makes you think about you know what if they’re right. And now I’m bringing another life into this. And my mother ended up coming to visit when she was like four weeks old and I was so excited like like I told my husband like you know she won’t come. She’ll never talk to me. She won’t see her. But she did. And I was like oh my gosh my mom’s coming.

[01:03:18] I couldn’t wait to see here and I cooked for her and painted her toenails like I really catered to her. That’s what I always did and she said to me was holding my baby trying to feed her. She said you know you better come back to Jehovah or you and your baby and your husband are gonna die. And I’m going to be in the paradise with your other daughter. And I just started bawling. I was hysterical you know as it was so it was such an awful thing to say to somebody you know like the whole both sides of it like rubbing it in that she’s going to live forever with my other kid and we’re all going to be dead.

[01:04:00] And like that’s so heartless that is have no boundaries.

[01:04:04] No. And she or she had also told me she would have stoned me to death if we were in Bible times. So those kinds of things coming from your mom are very damaging.

[01:04:14] So did you know that there was actually a watchtower article I think and I don’t remember what decade it was from but they were lamenting in there that they couldn’t kill people more.

[01:04:29] Oh my God you know. Well you know we can show them. But if if this was barbel times we could have stoned to death man. The good old days. If only we could go back and be barbaric. You know what.

[01:04:43] I cannot believe your mom said that about stoning. That is. Wow.

[01:04:48] It’s hurtful. You know I still believe it. It really cuts Joe the core even more because you are still you’re physically out mentally in.

[01:04:58] Yes. I didn’t know that term but that’s exactly what I was. So so my husband came home from work about me crying in the bathroom and he he luckily had enough like he was raised I think like lucerne or Methodist Methodist I believe like not too extreme but his first wife was an extreme Baptist. And so for a while in his life he was like going to church all the time teaching Bible studies until he saw the hypocrisy in that particular church you know and he backed away. But he knew enough about the Bible that he told my mom you know you can’t say that to her like what the bible says love love is the greatest thing and you need to guard your hearts and doesn’t. And my mom screamed at him no way. And I mean it was just it was insane. And he made her leave. And that was the last time that I really was around my mother. That was the last time. So she left a few magazine stuff and I told my husband. I said well we’re going to have to be Jehovah’s Witnesses. And he said OK let’s study then let’s do some research. Which was the best thing he could have done. You know he knew there was no way you were ever being Jehovah’s Witnesses but he knew that I had to see it. So I started Ahmadabad. Yes. Smart man. So I start off with the magazines or the publications she laughed like the weirdest thing happened. Like when I read it it was like like a tune in my head. You know the way they talk and the way they write it’s different than anything else even Vitus even typing the type of the type of print is different.

[01:06:45] So you might write that nobody talks like that.

[01:06:50] You know here’s my mom as a kid I was like How are kids supposed to identify with this like nobody talks like this. No one would speak to another human being like this. They have their own style yes. And that tune in your head. Wow. So it makes must’ve made you feel at home to kind of get to it.

[01:07:08] Exactly it was like almost like a snake tamer you know playing the flute like I just I mean it really made me feel almost like in a weird way like it was very strange like I recognize that and myself immediately. And he’s like my husband was like why don’t we just use the bible because the Bible is what you need to you know show me and not these publications. Why do you need that. And I thought well how are we going to understand without the you know like the whole thing. Javas want us to say you’re not someone to show me like I’m too dumb to understand. So he said let’s just do the bible on us. OK. I was like Well one thing clearly that the Bible talks about is the dead are conscious of nothing at all and everybody else believes you know that everybody goes to heaven or hell and he is OK where does it say that. And I. Found it and then he’s like okay read around it and it was amazing that. That whole scripture the whole thing is talking about everything under the sun is vanity and it’s really about what it would be like if there was no God and the person who wrote it was like in a depression. It also said money is everything and wine makes the heart Mary and it was really like Oh so that’s not really what it’s talking about and that was eye opening you know that that little part was interesting to me and then I remember there were a few other things I said well the Bible says this and he says where and I.

[01:08:38] Locked

[01:08:39] and locked and locked and locked.

[01:08:42] And

[01:08:43] it didn’t say it anywhere. Yet it was something that we were taught as fact. You

[01:08:48] know what I mean. Oh I know what you mean. Yes.

[01:08:51] The whole technique being you know they would always Jehovah’s Witnesses would always make fun of other religions and say well you know if they just read the context around these verses then they’d see that their teachings are false and they say yes you know it’s them who you know they have their own narrative and they are skewing verses and skewing contacts to fit the story that they wanted so you knowM. trickers I mean.

[01:09:19] Yes. So though that kind of got me started. So then I thought oh my gosh I don’t even know what Jehovah’s Witnesses believe which was really bizarre to me because I felt like I knew everything you know. So so I actually got on the evil Internet again and I looked up what do Jehovah’s Witnesses believe which was kind of we I thought this is weird I should know what they believe but then I started reading like the whole thing about believing that Jesus is the mediator only for the 144 thousand and where the Bible clearly says Jesus is the mediator for all mankind. And like I said this I was on my own and I was reading stuff and then reading why it was wrong and there were different websites that I think other like Christian religions put out at that time.

[01:10:07] There wasn’t a big extra hole was when this community at that time so it was really with people trying to help Jehovah’s Witnesses which was really nice and I was able to just find things out and like the whole thing about.

[01:10:20] I thought if Jesus was God I should just say it plainly in the Bible and then finding out that is what the Bible says. They just change it to a god like so many things and that like I remember one day it was like a light bulb went off on my head and I would say I literally felt the brainwashing leave that I don’t believe it. Oh my gosh. I don’t believe it anymore. I don’t believe it. And it was from then on that I was able to start healing you know. Then I. Was able to. It was an obsession for probably six months of research and research and research and research and research. And then I found like JTB fact Starcom which was awesome because I still didn’t want to read anything from bad people that had you know. Dead against Jehovah’s Witnesses apostates hippo like that kind of thing. So that was a great tool to have just stuff that they said from their own mouths.

[01:11:20] Because you benefactor’s all their own publications.

[01:11:24] Yes. So awesome resource. So actually my total naivete called my mom and I said Mom you’re not going to believe this like you’re not going to believe what I found you know I said Who is your mediator who is your mediator.

[01:11:38] And she said Jesus is my name. I said don’t. You see God. She said. You don’t come up with this on your own which you know she didn’t come up with the Jehovah’s Witness stuff on her own but you know what does that mean.

[01:11:52] That is but I’m fulfilling. Well you just got that from an apostate.

[01:11:57] So it doesn’t count if you go at it on your own then it would count right if you were a child. It’s not exactly.

[01:12:04] And she she ended up hanging up on me and I was like wow and then that’s when I tried to get my stepdad dad you know come in and help and he saw he was really tricked too. So that was out. But from that point on I was able to help my daughter by carefully planting seeds. Like I told her one time. And she was definitely taught you know like one time she said Mom you’re like Phaethon. And I said No I’m not like Satan. Like it’s a little too you know you’re a little too young to understand but somebody explain play I’m not like think me as you are. You know those things were put in her head she was taught to still respect me because I was her mother but definitely to write off anything I said because I’m like feet. You know it’s a really sad way to see your child view you and everything you say doesn’t have any real merit because you’re not saying what everybody around her is saying. But I was able to.

[01:13:06] Like I said you know what the Bible says like take life’s water free. Like what does that mean. Like what if I told you you can have a free popsicle. But then I told you you have to run around the house 20 times to get it. Would that still be free. No. You know I all those real basic things but I was hoping it would plant seeds in her head. And we had a very close great relationship like she always felt like she’s just like me and all the little crazy that a little wild and you know funny and just just really we are bonded and we had text almost every day and I feel like it was probably on my mind almost every hour of the day of how to help her to wake up you know like I couldn’t say anything outwardly against them because I would worry that she wouldn’t see me again. But I try to instill critical thinking like I had her Holper little sister with a school assignment of like let’s say you look at this Web site for a product on the market that you see all these ads for. And everybody says we love it it’s great it’s the best thing ever. You know it’s so worth the money but then if you look at another Web site with balanced views and people who use them bought it then you can see while it broke. After three days or the batteries run out or you know just like you can see all the coffee.

[01:14:35] Exactly. I try to do it in a subtle way.

[01:14:39] When I ask her like What if when you grow up you find out like everybody around you kept saying the sky is red. That’s what it’s called is called Red. But then you find out everybody else thinks it’s blue. You want to know or would you just want to keep thinking it’s red. And she said I’d want to know. So I was like You know I had like hopeful moments that you know hopefully she’s getting this in her brain. But as she got closer to 18 I used to tell everybody like she’s going to have to stop talking to me and they said no no no she wasn’t like you guys are so close. I can’t see that happening. Everybody everybody said that and it would really frustrate me because I know you know. You know I know that you know she was baptized at 11:00.

[01:15:23] So like I I knew she was you know she’s raised and I’m very very good Jehovah’s Witness family where so my ex ended up moving in with his wife’s family and a very very small house with just one bathroom. They are like an addition in the garage. And he worked. And pioneered so they don’t have much at all. And my daughter was like a office off the kitchen that didn’t even have real drywall. So they grew up in she grew up with a lot of sacrifices in this life for the next life. You know that’s their view. That’s the new systems coming in. And it was worth it. And I know they like her that mom talked about my grandparents had a trailer with the fake rock around the bottom you know and she said Oh I love that look like someday I’m going to have a house with all that rock around and I thought I know what she’s talking about she’s talking about her mansion in the new system. You know what I mean. Like that’s how they think of things. They’re they’re planning their future like we planned it by trying to save money and you know plan on what we can do as we retire and get older. They plan on their whole life being perfect in the future because Armageddon is coming.

[01:16:39] So I definitely knew how she was being raised and how it looked and she seeing her dad treat her like they do on assembly parts like she doesn’t like any kind of conflict or yelling she likes things to be very calm. But you know that’s how she grew up. OK. Honey let’s sit down and read this Bible verse so you know who is going to soon take care of all the bad people including your mother on the road. Joe have a good job. That’s what she grew up with and felt comfortable you know. And she has a lot of anxiety problems and stuff just like typical witnesses do. So yes we we all did with that. So and her first step mom has a lot of that too. So like I could see her like following along like you know everybody second it because everybody stressed out because having that weight on your shoulder any day now it’s Armageddon is coming in if you slip up at all. You’re going to be destroyed too. You can see the weight. It really takes some people you know sitting back and just wishing you could tell them you know you just want to help them.

[01:17:48] It’s hard to live life with the guillotine hanging over your head you know knowing that at any moment it might fall and chop your head off. You know there’s a horrible way to kind of unpleasant.

[01:17:59] Yeah yeah yeah. So.

[01:18:01] So the last time I had her like I was getting desperate. I was just like I can’t lose heart like I can imagine.

[01:18:10] Yeah I I I did not ever want to live my life without her. And I knew her sister too would suffer. And we have I have two step daughters that they wouldn’t get to see her. You know I knew how this would be so like I had my sister saying just go back just go back. And you know it’s easy like just go back and you know it’s not easy but you know I thought I will do anything for her. If I can just get it changed a name like I’m not doing anything bad my life is very immoral just a simple happy family life. So. I thought you know what the heck.

[01:18:47] And I’ll just get that label changed and then all I can fade out of it you know so. So I called the elders in this town and had them come over and met my husband and my daughter and my husband. You know it was definitely a. It wasn’t legitimate which I felt bad about. But then again this is for my daughter. I’m willing to do anything. So yeah why feel bad.

[01:19:14] They’re the ones holding your daughter hostage.

[01:19:17] Right. But in their view like I do worry about putting this out there because oh you tried to trick me.

[01:19:23] You know what I mean that they record eight million people around the world.

[01:19:28] Yeah that’s why I know if if this is heard by my daughter or her family right they will be you know free to listen to it. So I hope that means that they will understand what I’m saying.

[01:19:41] So they came over and they were very pleasant and my husband said like he didn’t want me bringing my daughter to the meetings. He said she said you guys would Shawn her. Nobody would talk to her. Is that true. Yes. Yes. Well we have to take our time and see if your wife is clean. I just thought oh my gosh I wish he could just punch them now because. Of saying that to a man that. They’re going to judge your wife if she’s Kaleem like oh my gosh. So they said though probably a couple of months and I heard differently but I thought well that’s not too bad. So I started going to meetings and it was so hard like like I mean even knowing what I was doing it was just listening to it and the way that they talk about other people and how everybody is clueless but that is just like oh my gosh it was so difficult but. But I did it. And I found out later like I was really too confident to myself like I should have been crying to them and you know begging them to forget.

[01:20:50] I should have acted we. But it was almost like I couldn’t be that and authentic. So I was like a confident woman I would sit in the front because the back seats were all taken so I would go in and sit in the front. Like I have nothing to hide. I should have done that shit is that in the back.

[01:21:06] But people came up to me and introduce themselves and say I’m disfellowshipped and they turn around and walk away like it was just like a very awkward situation like like it is for anybody trying to go back and I’m glad I knew that. You know this. This wasn’t really me because being treated like that is so hurtful by a bunch of strangers.

[01:21:30] So I did that for a couple months and then they were going to have a meeting with me on a Sunday. And I was like Okay this is it. And I hadn’t gone to every meeting because on some Thursday as my husband at school and I couldn’t bring my daughter she was too little will be alone.

[01:21:46] So I’d call in. One brother gave me the number to call in. And so I sat with three brothers and two were the ones that had visited me and then there was the bad cop you know the one brother that was like the bad cop. And they were questioning me and I mean trying to see how sincere I was like I was I didn’t really know the point of the questions. But the one brother said like you haven’t been to every meeting Thursday and I said Well you know some of the meetings I listen to at home and he’s like that number is not for you and he was pointing in my face.

[01:22:21] That is for Prue publishers only not for you. And I was like OK. He’s like not for you. I mean it’s just like you gave me a number. No. But like OK. Please. Yes. And they locked the door which is really uncomfortable. Three Men and Me and a locked room like is just like.

[01:22:41] And what they were okay so let me go out and that and the other room and then when I came back and they told me you know Jehovah may forgive you but sometimes it takes the brothers longer so we’re going to give you a few more months and then we’ll meet back. And at that time I was like. I mean I took everything I had to walk out calmly my lesson as I saw my husband as I. Lay dying. I tried I tried and I could not do it anymore so he did like leave a message with one of the guys and said you know you guys said it would be like two months like that. That’s a lie. And to treat somebody like that is is not correct. Like I will not she will not be coming back. I’m not going to allow her to you know.

[01:23:27] So I’d just like to say that you know let’s say that your daughter were to hear this and let’s say that your daughter is still one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and go and let’s say she stumbled upon this what love would it take.

[01:23:44] For her to go to a Baptist meeting for four months and pretend to be a Baptist or a Lutheran or a Catholic or a whatever you know that she would view as as not being correct. Well Sue to get a person back. I mean what you did. Is extraordinary to be able to suck it up and go into that environment when it’s not what you believe. And face the bullying abuse of those brothers all out of love for your daughter. I mean I tip my cap to you that that is. I just I don’t think I don’t know that I could step back into a kingdom hall for any thing man and let it take me.

[01:24:47] It took you back like I hadn’t been in like 20 years and it felt like yesterday. Like the same talks the same information the same repeat stuff except there was a lot of new lies. So all the truth had changed. Right. But it was still taught like the same boring self-righteous misinformation beamed out and you know what.

[01:25:13] That’s what it’s going to be. And yet you put yourself in that position because you love your daughter and you wanted to have the freedom to see and speak to her. And I mean just thinking about that just just how an organization can can keep that from you can force a young girl to to go against what might even be her own and I imagine is her own individual feelings deep down if she were to actually think about it underneath the indoctrination underneath the rules. And I was a good rule follower myself. But underneath the rules were my brother was disfellowshipped I still knew this. Not talking to him thing is not right. This hurts. It feels wrong. Emotionally it feels wrong. I’m only doing it to follow a rule and if it feels wrong you know that’s oftentimes your conscience your body’s way of telling you this isn’t the right thing to do and that’s why so many people in the organization are so full of anxiety and depression because emotionally underneath the indoctrination they know this isn’t right. This hurts. And if it hurts why is this the right thing to do. We all knew better. On some level our humanity are basic instinct was that this wasn’t right but we did it because we were following rules established by an organization that had their best interest at heart not necessarily ours. And so I just I I feel for you I mean to be able to go into that situation. I mean that’s kind of how the year you know those that have to be able to to sacrifice that much to be able to go into that you are willing to sacrifice who you were.

[01:27:22] Just to get back and you know I found you cannot do that. Like. Like you have to be yourself. So like all extro was witnesses who think of doing the same like you know maybe somewhat more success and I’ve heard of the moms going back to save their kids you know to get them out and some have been successful. But but even if I had gone back now like I think about how it would be like when she came to visit. I would have to pretend all the time like the way that they talk all the time like when she knew I wasn’t a witness. I didn’t have to pretend to be a witness so. So now would be like talking to my other daughter like oh look how beautiful this tree that your home made was like. It would just be so and authentic and like trying to push my other daughter to go to meetings and I would still have to go to keep up appearances like that. The bottom line is it would not work but I did still feel like I just had to try it because because if I didn’t I felt like I would regret it. I was just really grasping for straws. I was like this is becoming desperate.

[01:28:28] Yeah. Again it speaks to your sincerity. I mean you were doing something insincerely you know ingoing trying to go back as far as you know being a witness but you were so sincere in your feelings for your daughter that you were willing to try something that goes against the very grain of who you are. You know just for her.

[01:28:53] And then you think to heck they let child molesters back. Of course they’re not doing it for the right reasons they’re doing it to get their claws into more children. But that doesn’t prevent them.

[01:29:05] So it was like you know like for you know like me you know for all you know one of those elders who was like Jehovah may forgive but but we humans sometimes have a hard time it’s unforgiving. For all you know one of those elders who is sitting there in that room with you had molested a child. Yes point or had done any number of awful things and come back.

[01:29:30] But now he can lord that over you. Yes. You know and an interesting thing because.

[01:29:38] I was talking to her about this stuff when when I was going through it and I told her I did tell her what happened like this brother was very unkind like he was saying this and you know I was doing what I could do listening to me means she said well he probably just had a bad day like the brothers are imperfect.

[01:29:56] And then my ex husband said something about I wouldn’t worry too much about the brothers like they do what Jehovah wants them to do because I’ll tell you what I’ve been in a position where I really felt like I knew the right decision and then by golly Jehovah directed me another way and I thought well why is that what I think but Jehovah directed me and I thought that sure takes a lot I don’t even know the word for.

[01:30:27] But to think that Jehovah is really in your head directing you. Yeah I mean that is just so surreal to me.

[01:30:35] Well how can you tell me. Yes exactly. God speaks Dante. Yeah. Yeah yeah that’s that’s where he’s out right now.

[01:30:45] Yeah. That level of believing that he is a Jehovah’s hand is right on him.

[01:30:50] And it’s funny how it is yeah funny whatever. But yeah it’s ironic how Jehovah’s Witnesses love to point out the imperfections of other religions as the reasons that they’re not the truth. But yet when anything goes wrong in Jehovah’s Witnesses organization there oh well we’re just imperfect. Right. Wait a minute I thought imperfection was an excuse. Now all of a sudden it’s an excuse for the organization. It’s not an excuse for Lindy and why she slept with this person but or whatever you know. Right. Well it’s an excuse for them to cover up and do all kinds of horrific things that hurt so many more people than you as an individual ever hurt or you know anyone as an individual has Jehovah’s Witnesses have no problem using that label of imperfection to cover over so many sins that exist within the organization as just a cover up and different rules it really hurts them and everybody everybody who is not a Jehovah’s Witness.

[01:32:03] Absolutely yeah.

[01:32:06] So one good thing during this time she did come to visit me like we went to a meeting together which you know she saw me Sean first hand which you know is just she’s got a good thing for your kid to see I’m like you know. But. But that was the time where the Australian Royal Commission was going on.

[01:32:23] So my husband came home from work and he said hey I saw your you guys as religion in the news something about a royal commission. So I was like Oh really. So I looked it up and I said oh oh this is interesting. And I handed her the I’ve had like checked out and she like read over and you could tell was like uncomfortable immediately for her because it said you know over a thousand abusers and not one reported the police and she’s like oh and then handed it back and that was it. And then I also said you know you know dad her step dad has a membership to the Y and I wasn’t sure if I should go or not but I was doing some research and I found out Jehovah’s Witnesses were actually part of the United Nations so they could use the library for a while so it seems like they could do that I could go to the Y for the pool and she’s like No no no no no.

[01:33:22] They would never do that and it would never do that I said Well let me call your dad and ask. So I called him and I was like.

[01:33:29] Hi you know I was just looking up something I thought oh they were part of the United Nations for like 10 years and he’s like oh ho ho oh they’re.

[01:33:38] Yes well yeah. They thought well they need a membership to the research library and then they kind of thought oh well maybe this is such a good idea oh so they stopped being like Aha yeah.

[01:33:52] That they start being it like a week after they are formality expose them and then the last ten years.

[01:34:00] Yes so. So I told Sheila I’d like my daughter I told her. Well.

[01:34:06] Yeah your dad said that did happen and she you could tell it just like she was. What. So the thing is during that time I was able to show her things that normally I would not have been able to show her. So the like pretending to go back yeah. As far as that goes because once you start seeing cracks it’s impossible to not see them like how long it takes for those cracks to grow. I have no idea. But yeah at least she thought that so. So she went home after that trip. And I had a feeling this is the last time I’ll see her like I was in the summer and her birthday turning 18 was the following May but I had planned one more big trip that I was really going to just show her more because I was like now I have nothing to lose but she actually called me like a month before she turned 18 and just said she is crying like. Hey.

[01:35:01] Babe what’s up and she said Oh that’s like what’s wrong what’s wrong. I thought our cat died or something and I could talk to you anymore and I was like wait a minute wait a minute you know you’re not 18 yet you can still talk to me like we’re going on this one trip and you’re still going to do that.

[01:35:20] Like I was kind of like no no no no no no no like this can’t happen.

[01:35:25] And she was like No Bob you talk bad about the governing body and you can’t do that. And I said you know I I understand this and I knew this would happen because I know you don’t have a choice. Yes I do. It’s my choice.

[01:35:40] This is my choice not to talk to you anymore and I said well I’m going to call your dad because you’re still under 18. So he stopped to respect me and I’ll call you right back. And I called him and he like this. I felt like he really showed his true colors because before that I had called me I I’d talked him before and apologized for what I put him through. And for the way I went about things like explained about like I really had postpartum depression I just really Sari’s and I’m sorry to like I wasn’t perfect and I’m sorry too and you know it seemed like pretty good.

[01:36:12] And I thought well maybe he has a heart and he knows like this would be devastating to our child to lose her mother. Like devastating to a kid with Auriti anxiety problems and already issues they’re going through. That needs a mom you know and he said you had this coming. Lindi this is all on you. And I was like. And I said you know Jesus would never shine on anybody. And he said you need to dig a little deeper.

[01:36:42] And it was just it was just nasty. So says Lake it. And I lost it like hysterically crying. Shaking. I mean it was the worst day of my life. I put a post on Facebook like this day the day I dreaded it finally happened. Like she’ll never talk to me and her step grandma wrote me on Facebook messaged me and said.

[01:37:12] How awful I was. I don’t deserve Jehovah I deserved to be destroyed. How I’m trying to make this all about me and it’s about Chailly. I mean it was just out to a private message of course and I ended up writing her back calmly. Three days later when I calmed down and just said you know I understand she had no choice.

[01:37:35] This is the way she was taught to believe and she thinks she’s doing the right thing and she thinks it’s out of love for me. And I understand that and I hate that she’s going to. I kind of like a show like basically kindness and then she wrote back like you should really come back like it was a first.

[01:37:51] You’re not deserving. You should be killed. That’s like all you should come back. Like it was just so they’re so crazy what they’re thinking.

[01:37:59] Yes phrasing Absolutely.

[01:38:01] So it’s all about them and how they feel in the moment.

[01:38:05] Yes yes so much. I mean and how proud she was of her daughter and my ex and like. And it’s like in the real world like a man living with his in-laws and a little garage you know it’s not exactly something to be proud of. But in that world it is because they’ve given everything up for this cult. You know so I went through a lot of mental anguish.

[01:38:35] I actually talked to a few tears I think he’s an expert witness therapists like I talk to him a few weeks up to this call that trying to prepare and then the day it happened I call them and think there’s nothing you can say. That’s the hard part like there’s nobody that can really help you deal with this. It’s just awful and. I went through like weeks of just shaking like I didn’t even know how to process.

[01:39:05] It was just like this is the worst thing ever and I can’t believe I can’t just call her and say look this is wrong. Because this way here’s the fact. Like it’s so mind blowing that we can’t help people we love that day. I mean it’s hard to even comprehend. Really. It really is.

[01:39:23] It’s a little job of manipulating the entire situation by the colds. I mean they’ve they’ve got it set out to where doing it. They’ve got you coming and going. There’s no way to really be able to have these honest conversations because they just shut down.

[01:39:40] Yes shut down really and so many time. Yeah exactly. Get furious or shut down. So so I kept thinking all these things I wish I could tell her like the things that I was going to tell her. And I ended up doing YouTube videos for her and that was so therapeutic because without that like to think oh I should tell her this why were she knew this. I wish she knew that and knowing that I will never know the right time for her to know these things. But if I put it on YouTube then at. Her like maybe some night she’ll be alone in bed and thinking of me and she’ll know these videos are out there and she’ll look at them. Who knows. But. I figure I can help other people because I’ve been silent for so long. Keeping my mouth shut about everything because I didn’t want it to get back you know I didn’t want to be viewed as an apostate term which I already knew wasB.S. Anyway I already knew it wasn’t anything bad but. But I didn’t want her to hear that word for me because I knew how she viewed it. But I I did a lot of research for each video and organize them and I hate being on camera about I did it. Hopefully someday she’ll see them I managed to be very calm very you know fact factum you know we’ll see what happens down the road with that. But like now I I felt this other level freedom opened up where I wasn’t Oh I wasn’t faking part of my life you know like for her like not saying certain things that felt really freeing and good I was able to reconnect with my real dad because I think up to that point I was so consumed with my daughter and wanting to help her. I didn’t have time to put in things that I needed. So my step dad had passed away and my mom was out of the picture so I have a real dad and I allowed myself to have that again. And that’s been very healing and good to have an. Eye. I just hold out hope for my daughter to some day. Call me you know but I hear a little things like she doesn’t talk much to your sister anymore which is devastating.

[01:41:52] You know my my youngest daughter Megan she’s she is so just amazing like she’s heard all this stuff for so long that when we we went to Ohio to visit my grandparents and that’s where my daughter is and she met Megan for launch and she made sure I was not going to be there I was not going to come in.

[01:42:15] And that was like yes I know I’m not coming in but my grandparents went to a different restaurant with me and I dropped off Megan for her sister. When Maggie came out is like so what did you guys talk about. And she was like well I brought up like the blonde like the Bible says I want mercy not sacrifice. And and she said well blood transfusions kill people too. And. I brought up the child abuse and she said well that’s only in one country and the media is just lying about it all. And she brought up you she brought up like fagging subject. Right. I didn’t even know she real. She had a handle on all of us but she did. And her sister kept saying well dying and you’re too young to understand and she said like what’s wrong with mom like you were fine to talk to her before. Now you can’t like she just loves you. I mean she just went to bat.

[01:43:10] For me and her sister like she knows she’s tricked. She doesn’t take it personal. Like I’ve explained to her from the times she’s very little. Because this is a part of our family.

[01:43:22] You know it’s part of our life. So she she has she she doesn’t internalize it or think it’s her fault but she wants to help her sister so much so that was amazing. And then I’ve had my my sister now has opened her eyes and off to like talk to her about it and say like you know I’m not living that a lifestyle and you talk to me. You talk to your cousins who are like you know quote unquote bad but you don’t talk to your mom who is like living like the cleaners moral lifestyle of us all like that does it make sense you hang out with other relatives that are witnesses and aren’t aren’t even good association like known to do drugs and get drunk all the time. Like it’s just amazing how disfellowshipping or shunning it’s just to keep information from them period.

[01:44:13] It is not about your association or like. Can you imagine a mom being bad association like hey you should go do some drugs honey. You know that’s ridiculous. Right. It’s really all about the control.

[01:44:26] And you know like you said it’s about information you know withholding information from these people it’s not about it’s not about anything more than that they’re really now and now and actually getting married I found out that like she’s not even one witness.

[01:44:46] Right. We all know there’s price to me.

[01:44:48] It’s funny. No surprise me about like my family I said well she’s probably married right. Right. But now. Now and then huh.

[01:44:56] Wow that’s Yeah. You know I it’s funny how. Every.

[01:45:00] Sunday they all believe me that I know what I’m talking about you know abiding by it. Yes. So every time I hear stuff like that as though the knife just twists like like I heard Brenda talk about you’re never free from it because as long as you are people you love. I feel like they’re chained inside the prison and I won’t leave the prison walls because I will always be there in case she ever needs to come out. You know as soon as she’s ready I am there. So you can’t ever go far.

[01:45:30] Yeah. No you’re absolutely correct.

[01:45:33] I mean I think any of us that still have family and we’ll always be connected to Jehovah’s Witnesses or LDS or Mennonites or whatever Cullity religion you know there is because we have to be. They’ve they’ve got people in there and if we love them then you know we want to still be around to help them if they need or whatever. Which you know is such a it’s such a contrast. You know Jehovah’s Witnesses proclaim to you they profess that they they have no true love they know what love is but yet their love is so short short handed. You know they they’re quick to dismiss a person to throw them away like trash. You know whatever happened to the scripture in Corinthians about love believing all things hoping all things never failing. You know their love is so easy to fail. If you if you just say you know one of the questions the elders often want to ask anyone who’s leaving is do you still believe in the faithful and discreet slave and the governing body. You know are those people like if you answer no to that their love is gone. It was just that that conditional. And yet you know here we are people who are being shunned who are being treated like crap by those that we cared for but yet we would all welcome them back. You know with open arms they don’t have to even change who they are. You know right. They just have to be open. That’s it.

[01:47:23] Yeah. My my niece once said like I think she would talk to you if you just don’t talk about their religion. I said I absolutely would not talk about religion if that was the case. Yeah but it’s not and that’s the point. That’s why I’m talking about the religion. There is no way for me to have her in my life as long as she’s in it. There’s no way.

[01:47:44] No it does not matter right. No. Toward the end I know with my own family toward the end of when we would we would hang out.

[01:47:56] You know they knew not to discuss their religion any more. Around me I hadn’t at that point. I still believed in it all. I just had a lot of bones to pick her and I usually I would try not to even say anything but they knew that if they brought up something like let’s just say hating on the gays as my like to say you know you would say something about the gays and I would say well like you know you know I would just say that they’re not choosing that anymore than you’re choosing to be heterosexual. You know I wish I had started to gain perspective on things. So they knew to shut that conversation down. So they just wouldn’t talk about anything anymore and we could still hang out you know but the sad thing is my wife and I noticed and we would talk about it after we left that the conversations were one sided it was just us. Because aside from being one of Jehovah’s witnesses they have nothing else to talk about. And that’s so true. And we also said we would go over there and my wife and we we would leave and we like it’s just not the same anymore. There’s there’s nothing to talk about because that’s all they have. You know we would talk about other things we were getting NS2 or things that are interesting in life and they just really didn’t have anything except for either talking about their beliefs or talking about the brothers and sisters in the Keenum Hall. Yes the gossip. Yeah yeah. Other than that they don’t have anything else. Their life is completely one dimensional. And it’s so sad that you know that’s all they have. So you know like with you and your daughter if you were around her it’s going to end up being about the religion because your daughter would have to bring that up at some point because that’s just sadly what they have.

[01:49:59] And yet it’s that’s their whole world their whole self-esteem. Like everything that it was for us when we were in it it is for them. And they they’re not allowed any other aspect. So it’s it is very sad and very limiting. And then one day like I’ve noticed a lot of people really miss the fellowship you know that feeling of having a community and it’s hard when you leave to not have that but it’s so important to realize that. Like like my husband brought up to me because I said I miss that like I miss that and he’s like that’s not normal. Like what you experience there that’s not normal. And you can see it’s not because it can be gone in the drop of a hat like having a couple friends a couple good friends. That’s what’s normal.

[01:50:46] So having a million worldwide brotherhood of friends that can drop you in a hot second or having two good friends like what would you rather like the normal thing is just a couple good friends that will stick by you and you know really care about you won’t leave your faith your family. You know just having your spouse that loves you unconditionally better than a million people loving you conditionally. So that’s something like I feel like it’s important for us all this extra help as witnesses to remember. Like yeah.

[01:51:18] Yeah. D Is it me I’ll be honest. Because you know I’ve even told my wife I I’m the kind of person I’ve always been the kind of person.

[01:51:30] When I was a witness I knew everybody and a lot of people knew who I was.

[01:51:36] I had a few close friends too. It’s kind of a kind of strange at least when I was young I had some close friends and then as I got older I had no close friends but I knew everybody all Yeah yeah I knew everybody and everybody knew me. But you know as an ex Jehovah’s Witness like I’m finding myself like I have a lot of friends. I don’t have a lot of super close friends and honestly I’m not 100 percent sure that I know how to how to have super close friendships because in the organization you just don’t. You don’t have that many super close friends. Everything is conditional and having any real intimacy I don’t know if that’s the right word for a friendship but any real closeness that’s that’s not something you have that often in the organization because everything is very shallow it’s shallow. You could get moved congregations at any time.

[01:52:40] And you always knew like you if they moved you to a certain other congregation to help out or something like you’d never see those people you were friends with before again. So true. So it really does have an impact on even the way you see the world and life socially. That is very hard to shake because those are the foundations that you were you were built upon her. So that’s an excellent point.

[01:53:06] I love it when someone like yourselfer have had other guests on the show who maybe were married to someone who wasn’t a witness or in a relationship and that person can see things in the witnesses like this. You know with relationships with friendships and you and I being from have a hard time seeing because it’s just the only lens we’ve ever had.

[01:53:35] Yeah and it’s normal to have a few buddies that maybe you met through work to go golfing with but you don’t know everything. Like they used to say at the meetings I used to know the wallpaper and the brothers and sisters kitchens you remember that like you know everybody that well that you know what wallpaper they have in their kitchen. I like it when I hear things. Yeah but you were work Colo. No. And when you look at somebody you knew Valy BAM gone. Yeah.

[01:54:04] Like so and you were always bishes to them too because bad association wasn’t just outside in the world at large right that associates could be right found right in the in the Keenum Hall with you so you had to be so cautious around everybody and always kind of looking with that side of drugged out what they were really out to.

[01:54:26] Yeah so so just. But but it is normal in life just to have friends that you enjoy hanging out with. You don’t have to be like no everything they read because it’s exactly what you believe. Like there wasn’t much mystery there with being a Jehovah’s Witness with exactly what they believe. They know exactly what you do or they wouldn’t be there.

[01:54:46] It was automatic but it was very shallow. Yeah relationships are very yes.

[01:54:51] Very much so. So yeah. The stuff that we’re experiencing today if you have like one person that loves you unconditionally. You are. You know you are on top of your game and if you have a few friends to hang out with like that’s pretty much normal and we just have to realize that yes it’s fulfilling though it really is like you know it doesn’t leave you longing for things like with my second daughter Meghan. I always felt so bad. She doesn’t have a grandma but she has a mom and a dad that loves her unconditionally and she’s happy as can be and she missed that she doesn’t miss having a grandma that would love her conditionally. So it’s really eye opening to see that somebody who hasn’t been and that doesn’t even miss it because it’s not normal.

[01:55:35] Very true very true yeah. Well are there any ways you know that you’re speaking about you specifically. You know we’re talking about the friendship and relationship aspect but are there any other ways that you find it you know your past life as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses kind of still impacts you.

[01:55:56] Oh there are all kinds of weird things that come up like I like my stepdaughter was watching a TV show a very popular TV show about the dead that are walking. And she was like 15 and I was like I don’t think she should be watching that because like what will that lead to. You know she watches that when she’s 15. What’s she going to be. Is she going to be eating people by the time she’s 17. And I thought wait a minute like I don’t really believe this like it.

[01:56:27] It’s funny the things that your mind kind of reverts back to. But it’s fun to discover. Me. I’m. Not. That judgmental. You know that. That doesn’t lead to that. That’s you know it’s just like taking things a lot lighter is so important. And I love not judging people. I love that. I think that’s that’s who I am on the inside. And like I’ve I’ve always hated like we’re not supposed to judge in the religion but you do Yeah judge everybody. Yes. Yes. So not having that is just just incredibly freeing and not having the guilt for every little thing that you do that is so nice. So and I think by now I’ve pretty much been able to. A lot most of it go. But like the whole thing with Trump saying peace and security I. Had.

[01:57:19] To refresh my memory on why that doesn’t mean it’s been declared peace and security now then coming home like some still got me and it shocks me when it happens like you know like goodness we have all the extra witnesses to turn to that. Oh have been that a million times haha. Oh yeah.

[01:57:37] Oh yeah. Those who are listening who aren’t affiliated with the witnesses. There’s a scripture that says something about there would be a cry of peace and security and then sudden destruction has to be instantly upon you.

[01:57:50] And so Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that that verse to mean that there’s gonna be some sort of a cry now this cry can either be We want peace and security because things are so awful or that was originally what they said. But then to hedge their bets. They all said that it could be well it could just be a cry that hey we’ve achieved peace and security and then Armageddon will start. So so whether things look good or whether they’ve got it covered as long as the word peace and security is in there then that is when sudden destruction has to be instantly upon us as humankind. Now of course 1986 was the International Year of Peace and Security. And somehow we’re still here in 2018.

[01:58:41] I’m ahead much more of a crime than a than the International Year of Peace and Security where commemorative coins were made for it. But now any time any world leader says the words peace or security suddenly witnesses get freaked out thinking that Armageddon is about to come. And so I mean I I’ve seen on some of the forums and sites sometimes ex witnesses you know like yourself others you know even just hearing that because we were taught that that was a trigger for Armageddon. Yes. You know it’s just so embedded in our psyche that we hear something like that and it’s like oh crap what if they were right.

[01:59:20] Yes.

[01:59:21] They did that because they do want it on your brain. All that’s right. Anything could be the start again. There is right one funny thing that happened when I was a kid. I think I was like 13 and I was babysitting. A bunch a little kid and how House Los Vegas and I heard this big boom like this huge boom and I thought this is Armageddon. And I try to stay very calm with the children. But my mind was like oh my gosh it’s starting and it was it was blow up at the marshmallow factory so it’s not Armageddon but it just out.

[01:59:54] It’s on your mind all the time.

[01:59:56] Yes. And you second. Well I would say that a world without marshmallows might be as good as Armageddon. Yeah it’s even worse than I thought. Yeah.

[02:00:09] So you know it is funny though how those little things you know and I still find them too little things that creep up or just even know from me.

[02:00:20] I have a hard time even watching things that are like very violence or you know because I just I wasn’t around it so. So I’m very sensitive to that stuff.

[02:00:34] But you know that again I know a lot of my friends who watch all kinds of things that you know that go you know very violence or whatever. And I’m happy for them because I wish I could get get beyond some of that stuff. You know that’s what I think we’ve all got are our things.

[02:00:55] And you know it’s OK to be like that’s another thing like war and all the same stuff. Yeah. You know Alinsky handle it for some don’t enjoy that for stress and anxiety of that so. So it’s OK it’s OK if you enjoy it it’s OK if you don’t like it.

[02:01:08] That’s the lovely thing about being free and being yourself and you can figure that out you know. Yeah. That’s right.

[02:01:20] If you could say anything to your family and friends that shown you. Is there anything that you would say. I mean maybe. Is there anything you would say specifically to your daughter or to anyone else.

[02:01:32] What I would say to my daughter is I love you so much and I’m here for you no matter what. Like there will never be a time that I am done with you that I feel like it’s crossed the line. Like if you ever come to me I am here with open arms no matter what your situation is.

[02:01:52] And that is what unconditional love is and that’s the kind of love I’ve always had for you and always well and I hope that someday you understand like all the things that happened and why because they had nothing to do with my love for you even though it hurts to have your mom leave. And it hurts to feel like you weren’t good enough to come back to a religion for what it had nothing to do with that. And I will always love you and I always think if I pass away or something happens and she gets out and regrets it. I want her to know that I always know she loves me even if she can’t show it. So that’s what I would tell her.

[02:02:35] Oh that’s beautiful.

[02:02:39] I just miss her so much. Like I don’t cry motto try not to cry much but there are times that I just cry all day because there is not a day that goes by that I don’t miss her. You know.

[02:02:52] Yeah I mean I think one of the worst things about shining is that that person isn’t dead. They’re just treated that way. They’re like oh so hard and so I mean I guess I’m one sided. You can still hold out some hope but you know hope well.

[02:03:14] Oh wow I guess I’m going to quote scripture that they hope deferred makes the heart sick. You know it’s true. Oh I hate that I said that there are some good guys. But it’s untrue. You know when a hope is deferred it hurts.

[02:03:34] And you know obviously you know you’re going to miss her until that day comes. And you know I think what you said was beautiful you know that deep down she loves you. She says she’s currently a victim of circumstance. And you know hopefully someday hopefully something that will change. That’s the hope that we used to always hold out for. You know when we were witnesses I used to hold out that hope for my brother who was this fellowship that yeah maybe someday he would come back.

[02:04:02] Now look at now it’s me that’s all I know is that you know we’re so weird that think that they were like yeah we hope you come back to our little bubble com bubble instead of us going to where the real world.

[02:04:16] That’s just so funny to have both perspective. Yeah we really are. We were the ones using to shun them. They never changed but we’re hoping something different. So great docilely. Yeah really is.

[02:04:31] Is there anything you’ve learned since leaving the cult that has impacted your life for the better.

[02:04:40] I mean just everything you know you know off. Yes. The Freedom feeling authentic and real being a law without restrictions are not guilt for nothing. That one day I enjoy it.

[02:04:57] It’s weird like when you’re a witness you always want paradise paradise paradise like that’s what you’re hoping for. And now I look out the window like.

[02:05:05] Paradise like going to the beach and spending the day on the ocean and finding shells. I mean just little simple things that you don’t have much time for as a Jehovah’s Witness that I enjoy it so much you know just those those kinds of things and just learning to be to really think critically about everything is me me just a better person like I really honed in on those skills and.

[02:05:33] And able to think things through and trust my own gut like that is something so important because like when I first left and anybody who first leaves will have issues with that. Because you’re taught a higher life you can not lean upon your own understanding or you have you know your heart is treacherous and and you know you have to have somebody telling you what to do but we are born with these natural instincts that will help us along the way and learning to trust that has been really really just a great feeling and confidence in yourself like that’s okay. Just just so much.

[02:06:08] I mean is there anything that you know appreciate it how you brought out that you know even like the little things like going to the beach and collecting shells like your life now is more precious because this the life you have not that this promised paradise in the future or whatever but this is what you have. And so you know it’s Carpe Adium situation. Or is there anything else that you that you really enjoy anything you’ve been able to do or are there any dreams even that you have for your new life you know since like I felt like I was held down for a long time until my daughter actually left and you know going through that process.

[02:06:55] I think right now my focus is a lot on being the mom to my 12 year old like it’s so nice. Oh I do love raising her knowing there’s no Kalt.

[02:07:05] You know there’s no she. She can be herself and seeing her blossom in that and seeing what a wonderful human she is. It’s made me feel like OK I am a good mom because that was something that I was scared to even have another child like I might leave that child to you know that I might do the same thing but it’s been a totally different experience.

[02:07:25] And having woke up right when she was born it was wonderful you know to be able to come out of that and her be able to see me confident and she admires you know what I do and supports me you know getting the story out there.

[02:07:40] She’s she’s really an incredible little person. So that’s a that’s that’s my thing right now is just raising her and being a good good family person like that song Three Doors Down. If I could be like that I would hear it. And it said just so warm house on a quiet little street like that’s all I wanted.

[02:08:03] I wanted to find that because it was so hard being a witness thinking Armageddon is going to come kill some of your relatives that you love. You know you’re going to be in paradise but aren’t you going to miss them. No. Who is going to make you forget them. All that was a constant stress and then leaving was a very stressful time and I just would listen to that song over and over and then last year on my birthday it came on the radio. As we left the restaurant and I just started bawling. I have that you know. Yeah that’s that’s my life.

[02:08:32] So so my focus has kind of been like you know getting late being free to talk and using that outlet and trying to help people. And suddenly they think maybe I would like to be some kind of counselor or therapist for other people exiting cults because I think there needs to be more help for that cause it’s like it takes an average of seven years I’ve read to really figure things out and that was about the link for me.

[02:09:01] So I would love to just explore more of that.

[02:09:05] Once my daughter’s older you know that’s a beautiful goal to have thought about that myself.

[02:09:13] Yes. And you’re doing a wonderful job what you’re doing is that so. I mean yeah you are. It’s awesome.

[02:09:20] Well I I’m in all of your story. I think that it’s just so impactful you know what you went through and I think one of the things that shines through in all of it is your sincerity and I just think that’s that’s a beautiful quality. You know that as long as you can be a sincere person and stay away from the wrong influences then you know you can turn that into anything. So you know I think that I know myself that’s that’s something that I’m working on too. You know once you leave a call you have to take all of that energy and all that sincerity and channel somewhere you know figure out where to put that. And I think it’s beautiful that you’re you know you’ve got that cozy little home now and you know you’ve got family and you’ve got your friends and I just think that’s so great. And I hope that you know who knows maybe someday your daughter can even come in and join in the fun.

[02:10:26] I really hope so that would be a day. I mean people ask me on my YouTube channel like have you heard anything like it.

[02:10:33] No but her asked me the day it happens it will be an hour like I will shout it out. You know if I if it ever happens and I have that reality that it may not like. Sure. That is the fact. And that is like that’s a hard thing to face. And every single parent or every single person who’s lost their parent I mean all of us all of us who’ve left these controlling religions know that is a big possibility and to say like oh just don’t give up or that’s not really fair to us because there’s a big possibility that it won’t happen and that happens to a lot of people. So what I think is important is we have to go it go ahead and give yourself permission to take care of yourself and to live the happiest best life you can because if they ever do come we want to be like not devastated not torn down not ruined like you in my life I’ve lived 20 years without you do you know what this has done to me. I haven’t been able to be a mom to the other kid. I’ve been you know neglecting my husband like no we have to be strong and be there for them. So that’s one thing that kept me going is like OK I’m going to do the best I can to be happy and healthy myself so that when she comes to me it can be helping her. You know that’s yeah that’s something we all. And it takes permission to do that because we always want to put others like theirs. There is a thing of like self martyrdom that we all grew up with too that we don’t want to let that influence us today. We’re worth it. It’s OK. It’s ok to be happy in and do the best thing for ourselves. That’s that’s what we’re here for. You know this everyday life this is each day you have is the one you’re guaranteed so make the most of that.

[02:12:19] You know as always I want to thank Lyndi for being so open about her life the ups and downs the good the bad and I’m so glad that she’s been able to carve out a good life for herself and her family. And I hope that maybe someday her daughter that still in can open her eyes and maybe see what she’s missing out on. You know I know it won’t be easy for her either if that time comes. You know once a life has touched rather cold there’s not really a lot of easy choices but there’s always hope and freedom is a beautiful thing. So we hope that she finds that to if you’d like to leave a nice message for Lindi you can do so in a couple of ways. You can go to shun podcasts dot com and you can find our episode on the episodes page and leave a comment of support there. You can also join in. Over a hundred of us our own little congregation of sorts at the new Facebook group called shun podcast. It’s a private group and we do some fun things in there. We share quotes that we like to talk about self care share music try to make it a positive place for those of us to land after leaving these controlling groups. Lindy’s actually in there too and you can leave a comment on the post that all make for the episode so you’ll know that she sees it. You can also find the podcast on YouTube under the channel called shunnedpodcast. One word you can also find us on Instagram at shunnedpodcast. Also one word and on Twitter shunnedpodcast. Yes. It’s one word. If you’d like to hear my story and a great insight into how the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses works you can do so at the podcast called This JW Life. Also found at thisjwlife.com we don’t have any new supporters for the show this month but you can always go to patreon.com/shunned and support the show there for as little as a dollar a month. I’ve been getting all the transcripts done enough for the episodes so those are all on the Web site now speaking of episodes I’m back at the regular schedule now. Over the past few months I’ve done some extra episodes released. I think it was five episodes instead of my normal one a month. So it’s been kind of crazy. It’s been fun at the same time I’ve done a lot of interviews as well and I’m kind of looking forward to getting back to the regular schedule for now I know the great way that you can support both the show on podcast and this Jadavpur life is to head over to iTunes and leave a five star review for them. It helps them to get found in the searches over there so that more people can find it you know I actually just got an e-mail this week from a guy that is currently on Episode four of thisJ.W. life and he’s dealing with complex PTSD after leaving the cult. And you know the shining and everything that comes along with it. And he said he’s being helped by the podcast so you know as he makes his way through I’m sure at some point I’ll get an e-mail from him. Hopefully he’ll join us on shunned as he eventually gets around to this maybe even this episode. And I’m sure I’ll probably get an e-mail saying hey that’s me. So yes we’re talking about you and we hope that you know you feel better over time and we’re glad that the podcast can help. So you know any little thing you can do whether it’s supporting financially or with a review or just telling a friend you never know whose life it might help. I’ve been bad about remembering to include the songs that people chose to represent their journeys at the end here. So Linda chose the song If I could be like that by three doors down. It’s a great choice if I do say so myself. Go to the Web site you’ll see things that impacted her listed on her episode post. You also see a link to the song. And actually if you’re on a podcast you can probably see all of the relevant information in the description on your app as well. The song that opens and closes every episode of shown now is no hell yet by fair voyeur and I’ve been getting some good comments about the song must be kind of an earworm seems it kind of sticks in your head a bit. The artist is actually an ex witness herself and we relate some of the comments to her and she was absolutely thrilled to hear them so feel free if you like the song. Feel free to. You can say so in the Facebook group you can shoot me a private message on Facebook if you’re a friend send me an email. Podcast theG.M. dot com whatever whatever floats your boat. But you know she likes hearing that people are enjoying her music as well. And so for those on to her. So until next month. Love others do no harm and go be happy.

Torah Bontrager – Growing Up Amish.mp3

[00:00:42] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose religions that you shunning as a tool to control people. I know that the show typically focuses on the lives of Jehovah’s Witnesses because that’s my community. But you know the reality is that as we’ve already seen through a few episodes with other groups other religions other cults you know shunning isn’t something that’s only used by Jehovah’s Witnesses. My goal from day one has been to expose groups that you shunning as a tool to control people. And I didn’t want people to feel alone not only in their own group. You know us as Jehovah’s Witnesses but I’ve always wanted to show that there are other groups out there that you know participate in some of the same things. There are a lot of similarities between all of these groups. So you know the group of shun Jehovah’s Witnesses we’re not alone. There are other groups out there that are doing the same thing.

[00:01:40] And I hope that the show is available to kind of highlight the similarities that we all have.

[00:01:48] I was fortunate enough recently I had someone by the name of Toora Bontrager reach out to me she’s a speaker the founder of the Amish Heritage Foundation. She’s been on MTV True Life that Tim Ferriss blog Forbes.com the Huffington Post and she contacted me and now you know I’m going to share her story on the Shunned podcast which is pretty cool. So you know I learned a lot through this interview. Torah has a Amish conference that is going to be coming up pretty soon. And you know part of the goal of that conference is for the Amish to take back their own stories so that they can sell it themselves. Not everything that you hear is necessarily accurate from a secular perspective. They have things like I didn’t know the Amish have their own language their language isn’t Swiss It’s not German it’s not necessarily Dutch or whatever it’s Amish. They have their own language that they’ve developed over time. There are things that are misconceptions that we have in a secular world that they want to correct. And so in this interview you’re going to learn about the Amish pray learn some new things. I know I did. You’re also going to learn about Torah. Because you know my podcast is about people telling their own stories their own personal stories. So I wasn’t just interested to learn more about the Amish. I wanted to learn about Torah. I wanted to meet Torah and to see what she’s been through in life and what her journey has been. So without further ado let’s go ahead to meet Sara My name’s Tor Bontrager.

[00:03:37] I was raised in the Amish church. I literally escaped in the middle of the night and I’m shunned by my family community people I grew up with.

[00:03:48] All right. So I normally ask people you know how did you come into the religion. Were you born into this. From what I understand that’s typical how it usually works.

[00:04:02] Yes. So I was I was born to be Amish all my my grandparents were Amish still were. I think they’re all they’ve all passed away now. So they were all inside the Amish church remain practicing members. All of my mother’s side of the family the immediate family my aunts uncles cousins all of them are still inside the church. Most of my aunts and uncles on my father’s side are all my aunts but three of my uncles on my father’s side.

[00:04:38] Oh I take that back.

[00:04:40] The the answer all practicing Irish in the church.

[00:04:44] Three of the uncles have left and the rest of the uncles are inside Luchador to get them on that side. And most of my cousins on my father’s side of the family as well. And here’s an interesting twist. Five years after I escaped my parents decided that it’s okay for them to resign from the Amish church but I’m still going to help and that I have had no contact with them for five years I believe and that took place. The last time that they contacted me I had to call the police to get them to stay away because they just wanted to proselytize and convert me to their religion. They’re not fundamentalist evangelical right wing fanatics. Which is a trend very alarming trend that’s going on within the Amish. For those of the four those who escape leave resign whichever one of those three is lots of them are coopted by the religious right and get funneled into the Born-Again system. Wow.

[00:05:51] BUSH Yeah. That is a unique twist. I mean you know that your parents would would be ok with leaving themselves but still Sean you would have expected that whatsoever.

[00:06:04] Yeah yeah. Usually you know everybody everybody’s parents are different. How accepting or tolerant they are if you were not like what your interaction is with your parents if you’re your child that leaves. That varies from from family to family and community to community. It’s sort of you know first of all depends on whether or not the community is on the more strict or liberal and within the range of Amish rule rules or if you are parents personally are a little bit more tolerant and whichever the case may be. Usually after 10 20 years the parents mellow out a little and you know they become a little warmer or more receptive.

[00:06:56] If they didn’t before my parents the exact opposite my father is just there. There’s no Oh no were even remotely positive to describe him.

[00:07:08] OK so then let’s let’s talk about policy talk about you know your parents your family growing up Amish you’ve mentioned that there are different types of communities or you know some are more strict some are a little more liberal for you being raised that way. How did it make you see the world. What was it like being raised.

[00:07:31] Where was your family or your community. More liberal more strict. And how did that make you see the world around you.

[00:07:39] I was born to a strict end of the range within the church and just for a little bit of context there is no central governing authority among the Amish to that says the rules that are universal for every Amish church. So it’s not like the Catholics the pope and the Vatican for example within the Amish they’re the only universal rules are no electricity no cars are motorized vehicles to for transportation.

[00:08:16] You have to drive with some buggy for personal transportation you can hire someone to drive you’re on in their car but you can’t drive yourself around in a car. And and no cameras.

[00:08:29] That seems to those three rules seem to be the only universal rules that apply to every single church. If if someone has electricity or someone has a car and drives themselves around in a car buyers wanting to get slummed and so forth.

[00:08:46] And if someone has a camera now you’re no longer Amish András.

[00:08:52] So I was born on the strip to an audience of of the hierarchy of rules. And that meant for example that I grew up in a community or was born into a community that did not allow bathrooms indoor bathrooms so I would write out to an outhouse to go to the bathroom and that rains son.

[00:09:18] It’s all snow. You went out to the outhouse. Of course you know during the winter you used the chamber pot. You know they think back in the Victorian days. I guess so.

[00:09:28] Well so you are actually use them.

[00:09:31] Yes I I that’s how I was. That was the community I was born into the church type of church I was born into. And then when I was around age.

[00:09:43] Oh and we also didn’t we we didn’t have running hot water. We did have running cold water and we didn’t have gas stoves for example everything was cooked on a wood burning stove or kerosene or something a little Burner’s that were left with kerosene.

[00:10:04] So then when I was around 10 years old my parents moved to a more modern community and in terms of the range once again of the different rules it was towards the very modern liberal end of the Amish church and that meant we now had indoor bathrooms we had running hot water.

[00:10:25] We had propane powered stoves propane gas stoves and refrigerators.

[00:10:33] A big huge deal is I oh my god we have a refrigerator. I don’t know how how to imagine or think about this but that’s a big deal to jump from no fridges to fridges because especially for a big family when you have a family of minimum six kids on average to eat up to 14 which is not unusual you’re having to cook food grow food preserve food all. I mean everything revolves around putting food on the table or somehow preserving it. And once you have a fridge now you can you can prepare more because you can freeze it. Certain things can be frozen that you would not be able to preserve. SNOW Absolutely.

[00:11:27] So so your diet changes and along with that also more I’ve noticed looking back. We start eating more toxic food and growing less getting a little lazier for some reason. So that’s one of the negatives.

[00:11:45] I would say of everything gets easier and then you know it’s easy to pick out processed things and stuff like that.

[00:11:52] Yeah yeah. Lots of processed stuff which is not good.

[00:11:56] And then the other thing that was unusual about that immunity was that we were also allowed to have bikes which which meant that I would be using a bite to go everywhere instead of having to get checked the horse and buggy and we kids could bike to school and we could bike to go up to the Amish neighbors thing get some milk because I did grow up on a farm. And so we got all or not from our Amish neighbors and we also had phones in the barn. So God was fine with phones in the barn and can have him in the house if they were in a house we go to hell.

[00:12:37] So you’re walking the line there laughter. So let me ask you so so as as a child growing up in the more strict environment how what was your feeling. I mean were you happy in that environment. Because it’s all that you knew or did you feel deprived you know what was what was family life like when you were in the strict environment and then compare and contrast that with how it became once you got more modern. How did you feel personally.

[00:13:13] Well personally I was very happy for the more modern conveniences. Of course what you wouldn’t want running hot water and indoor bathrooms and fridges and stoves that didn’t reek of kerosene views.

[00:13:29] Is that something though that you even knew existed when you were in the stricter environment.

[00:13:35] I knew about acid that’s a very good question.

[00:13:39] You know why and if you felt deprived you know because if you don’t know that it exists then it’s hard to feel deprived because it’s just normal you know of course Natalie.

[00:13:47] Yes. No I didn’t. I did feel deprived because when I was around three years old between 3 and 4 around that age for a brief period of time my parents lived on an English farmers in an English farmer’s house and English by the way is anybody who is not Amish doesn’t matter be Chinese. You’re Afrikan your Asian you’re you know European whatever your English.

[00:14:19] You’re not my accents. I can understand how that would be so.

[00:14:26] So my father for a brief period of time was working for an English farmer and we rented their little house on the farm that was attached to the main farm and that was a temporary rental until my father bought our own house because we we’ve moved from one community to a neighboring state. So it was like a temporary fix until my parents got their own house. So during that period of time between 3 and 4 years old around the age I was living in a house with electricity and hot water running hot water bathroom and fridge and stove and all that kind of stuff. Of course I was too young to appreciate a gas or electric stove versus not budget. I understand what was going on that this is different from from our Amish House or the arm shows this hour.

[00:15:30] And the thing that I remember the most. Now that you’re making me go back into your memory land is the carpet the rug the slaughterhouse carpet it that is what I remember that sticks out to me the most that happened that and being in the tub in the bath bathtub with the running hot water. But really the carpet sticks out to me the most. And I know why. Because when we moved to our own house we were not allowed to have have carpets we can have black kitchen area little tiny rugs or whatever. But most of our floors were exposed. And it would get cold in the winter since 40 below zero Wisconsin cold back in the days before climate change to cover those floors were freezing any kids grew up running around barefoot during the summer.

[00:16:26] And you know during the winter as you’re on these cold floors and you don’t have central heating and the wood burning heat is not very efficient. It doesn’t circulate very well. So I was always cool.

[00:16:40] Yes. Sounds like you got a taste of the modernity and then went back words to a more austere environments where you got your Amish home.

[00:16:53] Exactly yes. And also the other thing in terms of wondering if if I knew I was deprived or felt deprived was yes because once again we did not live in physical Commines completely physically isolated from the rest of the world. We would see things in the grocery stores in town.

[00:17:17] We’d go to a hardware store you’d see appliances things like that. And we also then went on long trips or shirts that were too far away for a horse and buggy to travel. Know we would go in a nice heated car or add. And the difference was very clear in my mind. There was that contrast of what we were allowed weren’t allowed and how much nicer the outside was.

[00:17:49] So I know you try to think about things in terms of what I’ve experienced and I know you know as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses growing up we weren’t allowed to celebrate birthdays or Christmas or anything. And you know for us we would see other kids getting gifts for their birthday or having a party or whatever for Christmas. You know all of the celebration. And so you know that was something that we would look at and kind of feel left out of.

[00:18:19] And you know so I can I think I can understand on a level what you’re talking about it has to be hard. Do you think that are most kids in that environment aware of you know the world and feeling kind of left out. Or do you feel like sometimes you would feel left out of course but we would justify it. Like well you know but we’re doing it right. And that’s and they’re doing it wrong. So it kind of a similar thing in your situation.

[00:18:52] So in my eyes you know I can’t speak for for all the other kids her I don’t know if you know these are stories that circulated. Yeah right.

[00:19:03] Well I know for for all the kids to escape or leaper resigned yesterday at some point felt that and I do know that there are a lot of kids especially once you you hit adolescence teens that kind of age where we’re not happy. And you see that more among the boys than the girls because the boys are more exposed to the outside especially if they don’t grow up on farms. So over the course of my lifetime the Amish have become far less agrarian.

[00:19:41] They had to give up their farms because they can’t compete with big agriculture and they had to move to more construction work for example or in the more the most modern communities that they’ll work in factories. The borders will for example modern factories furniture Arby’s whatever the case may be. And so they get exposed to that as the case for the boys to be in that environment it’s not okay it’s wrong if the girls aren’t in the environment. So you will see that I saw that where there was a lot more signs of no signs of of dissatisfaction among the boys mom the girls. There is a significant number as well but it’s harder to detect because there’s this element of you don’t know who you can trust especially if you’re a girl because women are second class citizens. We are by virtue of being born female. We have no rights. We are literally required to obey our husband as part of the marriage vows and to actually follow through on that. It’s not just lip service. So we have no rights. We’re not allowed to even consider going against the rules whereas the boys it tends to it’s a little bit more like well they have to do this in order to make a living. Oh well you know they have to be in this environment to make a living. So you know yeah I mean they’ll be using electric power tools on the worksite even though it’s not allowed it in the home. And women are just don’t have that exposure.

[00:21:27] And then you also don’t know who you can trust to talk to if you’re unhappy about something. That was my message in my situation particularly was that I didn’t know where I could trust. I had to just keep everything inside of pretend to be the perfect good girl and toe the party line. And that was really my best shot at making a successful escape. When I did make the attack.

[00:21:57] Okay so.

[00:21:58] So you mention the not knowing who you can trust is what’s is what would be the repercussions if you told the wrong person how you felt. Is this what is the situation.

[00:22:14] So you know I interviewed someone who is a former Mennonite.

[00:22:21] And he said that or a nonpracticing Mennonite. And he said he said that he and their their culture they were.

[00:22:35] You know if somebody found out something about you it was literally brought up before the congregation at times and everyone kind of decided your fate. Is this a similar situation with the Amish if you are a baptized member of the church.

[00:22:52] Yes. And you break the rules or do something say something or do something that is frowned upon.

[00:23:01] Yes. Then if someone finds out about it and hasn’t had a problem with it and they report it to the bishop or wherever they bring it up in their church members only meetings. And you have to confess and ask forgiveness.

[00:23:16] And in the worst case you know the Senate and the Sinner error or whatever it is considered to be really great then you’re excommunicated for six weeks.

[00:23:28] And and that’s actually the the the highest sentence you can get punishment or punishment being excommunicated for six weeks and then you know theoretically you know you’re no longer breaking the rules and you’re back in good standing after six weeks. But in the case of someone like me was never baptized in the church. I can’t be commanded to go and confess before the congregation.

[00:24:00] You’ve got to you’ve got a little extra layer of protection there a little buffer.

[00:24:04] Not really. Oh really depends on the family. So I’ll give I’ll tell you what happens when when when you tell the wrong person that you want to leave and that person turns out not to be trusted. That happened with with the girl I thought was my friend. So I two friends in when I was a teen and that modern more liberal community. And I told her name’s Rosanna and I think she’s still I mean if she if you were to find her track down she by the way got married and she and her husband after marriage resigned from the church. So she was very unhappy as a teenager. We both were. I thought that I could trust her as she she. She was unhappy about it to me and she was talking about wanting to leave. And I would talk to her about my unhappiness. She was the only one I talked to and thought of course that I could trust. Well she I don’t know what happened exactly except that something happened.

[00:25:16] Maybe she got caught her.

[00:25:20] Her parents kind of she got outed by somebody for expressing something about wanting to leave.

[00:25:26] And she ratted me out like Asher of herself. Yes.

[00:25:33] And I was working at her parent’s bakery that summer. So I think I was maybe 13 or 14 I can’t remember how old I was but I was working at her parents bakery that summer.

[00:25:45] I come home one night bike home from work in the bakery and I walk in to my room and it is ransacked. It’s like somebody from the Gestapo was rifling through everything the drawers were rifled through the bedspread was messed up and the bed was you know sort of you know the mattress was shaken up or whatever like moved everything. I looked and all that my secret places and all my contraband had been confiscated. And I go back downstairs is like my mother didn’t say anything to me when I had first walked in. This was sort of high. I knew something was wrong but I didn’t know this was what had happened. And my father comes in and that night like I just it was hell.

[00:26:43] It was interrogation like I don’t know how how to describe what happened except that it was as if I had been living in Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia and some some you know police or authority officers somebody not invade you know broke into my room and stole all my contraband and and took me in to this room and interrogated me and psychologically tortured me.

[00:27:24] Using you know tell me I’m going to hell. Why did you do this. Tell me all of this and what else have you here. I was sitting at the table and and all the rest of the kids have been dismissed and sent in to their rooms. And it was just me and my parents my father my mother sitting there and my ex parents there. I can’t call them my parents anymore at all ever really. And so they’re sitting there and it was just here was a pile of things on my father like dumps all all the stuff that he confiscated everything he thought was breaking the rules or wanted to see anyway like my diary. There was a dress that to this day I don’t know why he grabbed the dress that I had made but. Because it followed all the rules of it. But that’s another story.

[00:28:18] It was like basic. I refuse to wear it because as an actor like protest against the hypocrisy of the rules.

[00:28:28] They got everything and dumped on the table. And so your contraband consisted of basically a diary manageress diary drafts a radio that I had bought on the down low snitch like body on the slide. Yeah. And and yeah like any letters from from one of my friends in a different state that she she and I wrote these letters and you know she wasn’t happy either.

[00:29:00] But just how is it so sad. Yeah. That’s all it takes to be considered you know quote contraband he felt like something you know how this is so so tough to hear that it takes so little to create such a massive wave of essentially feels like persecution towards you is persecution.

[00:29:23] That’s why you like these words like Nazi Germany and the Gestapo and an interrogation and torture because that is what it was. I’m a teenager 13 14 years old and.

[00:29:36] And I’m not allowed like I’m in an oppressive a situation you know in an oppressive institution that does not allow me to have any rights simply because I was born a female and that does not allow me to express myself creatively and that does not allow me to learn does not allow me to to question or think like all those things are considered sin and such sins so bad that you’re going to go to hell and you die. You’re lucky if you go to heaven. Let’s just hope that we get to heaven.

[00:30:12] So you use.

[00:30:15] You mentioned there something about not being able to express yourself creatively. Is that so. From what I understand the the ban on cameras is because all glory goes to God you shouldn’t be taking any for yourself. So does that. I don’t know if that’s accurate or not but does that also apply then to other creative endeavors as far as I don’t know.

[00:30:38] Can you can paint or draw portraits or something.

[00:30:43] Yes. So the reason that we’re not allowed to have cameras is because of the tent. One of the Ten Commandments thou shalt not have any graven images before me. That’s why in the in the army because pictures photos of ourselves are considered idols you know graven image.

[00:31:01] So it is about giving yeah taking away detracting from the glory of God because some of that might go to you.

[00:31:08] Well no no that’s not them. That’s a different mindset. OK. Yeah. So this is considered worshipping idols like it would be like creating a statue and worshipping a statue and calling that God is that it is having photos of oneself. Is that OK.

[00:31:32] And then apply also to I mean just because you mention the creative endeavors it makes me think you know obviously you mention like making a dress and how it had to be to certain standards.

[00:31:48] Yes. So yes. So let’s talk about the dress for example that we’re not allowed to have bright colors depending on. Once again this specific church sure in the stricter the church the darker the clothes and the more modern and they will have light greens and blues and sometimes red.

[00:32:14] You don’t see that quite as often.

[00:32:16] But some Amish churches do a lot of that color and some may be tan you know version of brown like.

[00:32:24] So you can tell by the style of dress and the color of the clothes exactly what kind of community that an Amish person comes from. How strict how how modern and in terms of the dresses so we so all our own clothes you know we don’t go. There’s no such concept is going to a store and buying our clothes. And every community has its rules. As in terms of how long the dress has to be how many inches off the floor of girls or a woman’s dress has to be literally hominy and just like six inches or inches whatever and it can’t be even a quarter inch off.

[00:33:10] That’s very very strict.

[00:33:12] So the Southern I’m assuming is there any creative expression. Are you allowed to be a painter or sing songs that aren’t.

[00:33:22] Maybe skirt you know biblical songs or whatever like.

[00:33:27] So it depends again from community to community the church and the family itself. Right. And in general your. Well first of all you’re not allowed any musical instruments. I grew up without any musical instruments except the harmonica and that was only in the INS in the more strict community. Some of the stricter communities allow harmonicas but the more modern you get it’s almost as if well to make up for allowing other nice things we have to ban something else to make a backup. So from age 10 onward we were not so close that harmonicas any more respect get rid of them. That said my parents harmonicas stayed in their little drawer in their Berro in their bedroom. They never got rid of it.

[00:34:22] They

[00:34:22] kept it they weren’t allowed they didn’t play it but they didn’t throw it away which was one of the hypocritical things that I was protested against I was unhappy but it’s like okay so you’re stealing my dress but you have a harmonica. My dress is per code. It’s up to date for code but you’re but if you burn it in yes that’s what happens after the long hours and hours of torture and screaming and you’re going to go to hell. My father takes all of the stuff throws it scoops everything up off the table throws it into a plastic garbage bag and takes it outside grabs a gasoline not kerosene gasoline and dumps it in a big bong bonfire and lights it up and makes me watch it watch it. You know everything got burned. All the letters my journal which I was going to print once I escaped like I knew I would want to someday go back in and read those things and all get burned versus I’m sorry that’s that’s so remote is such an emotionally abusive situation there.

[00:35:38] So you know I basically say you know here’s your shame. Watch it burn. You know this is a.

[00:35:44] Yeah. And in terms of oh so I want to answer that. The thing about painting like for example painting was allowed and that’s an interesting question because when I was around 14 I actually learned how to oil paint paint with oils and that community in the more strict ones. That was not allowed but in the more modern Gwatney I’ll throw the harmonicas.

[00:36:11] But but now you’re allowed oil royalty and arbitrary.

[00:36:18] So I didn’t learn how to do that. When I was 14 and that was the one thing that helped me make it through until I escaped. It was the only creative outlet I had. I would sit down and I would I would express myself like I could just get lost in a painting it was like the sort of zen moment it was the only time that I could just exit you know exit from remove myself from all my problems and unhappiness and all of that.

[00:36:52] So you had mentioned earlier you know the difference between someone who was baptized and someone who had never gotten baptized.

[00:37:01] It sounds like from early on you kind of knew that this wasn’t for you and that you didn’t want to get baptized. Is that accurate.

[00:37:13] Yes absolutely yes. So I was I believe. Okay let me start over I’m trying to think of my age as here.

[00:37:24] I was 11 when I made the conscious decision to escape. That was when I realized that my dreams were not compatible with the Amish church. I could not ever fulfill my dreams and hopes if I stayed inside the church. And I also realized at that point that I had always been thinking these things when I was a little kid. I had this very vivid imagination.

[00:37:54] I would read all the books I could get a hold of. So I didn’t learn English until I was six years old and went to school as it and I couldn’t wait to read. I couldn’t wait to go to school so I could read. So I wouldn’t have to depend on my mother for bedtime stories. And as soon as I got into school I learned my ABC is as brutal as possible and I was reading several grades ahead.

[00:38:20] And that was how I learned more. It was the only access I had to the outside world other than observing as is it any sort of an when we go to school or go to town or whatever you know like we we observed it as an outsider and we’re in the world but we’re still not part of the world. But the real exposure the real sort of like what is life like inside those English houses.

[00:38:54] You know I didn’t have that much access other than you know between age 3 and 4. So I got that glimpse through reading books. And those were the characters and places that I read about the things that I learned through the books. That was what I dreamed of becoming and doing. And I was 8 years old for example when I watched the planes go by overhead and wonder what were the people doing inside the planes are they going to China or to one of those places I’ve read about in the books. Things like that. And then at age 11 realized that I would never be able to fulfill my dreams and that also as a woman I had no voice. There’s never ever have a voice.

[00:39:47] So that brings us to questions and I guess the first movie is there pressure to get baptized by a certain age. Yes.

[00:39:58] So there it is again it depends on the community the family the church or whatever generally from society some kids get baptize at age 17 18 others don’t get baptized until later when they want to get marriage. Inside the church they have to get baptized first if they aren’t already. So if you’re from a war in a bigger community with lots of teenagers and and you have peer support to break the rules a lot of them wait until they’re older to get baptized. But in my case specifically because I had tried to escape once I had a failed first attempt after that my mother was on my case night and day to get baptized I was only 15 at that time. And in that community they were trying to push the kids into getting baptized earlier because there’s this concept here. Well if a kid is unhappy or dissatisfied let’s pressure him less you know pressured him into getting baptized because then that will you know now your fate is sealed.

[00:41:12] Now you have vowed to remain a practicing Amish person for the rest of your life until your death. So now we can relax and not have to worry that you’re going to leave. And my mother tried to push me into getting baptized earlier and I knew there no way that I could get baptized or it would cut off certain assets. I would have later on life for the work that I’m doing now for example I would not be able to do business with other practicing members of the church if I were baptized.

[00:41:52] Ok that makes sense. Get get a man get them roped in early. Yeah so there’s that pressure you know behind that person.

[00:42:02] Why do you think they allow the access to books. It’s that it’s really strikes me as a as a chink in the armor. It seems like a weak spot to allow.

[00:42:15] If you if you learn English and then you can start reading other things it seems like it kind of fosters a desire for something else. And I’m surprised they allow that. Is there. You know. Has that ever been an issue.

[00:42:34] Yes. So that once again is something that kind of access you have depends on the community once you get an armed of specific family as well.

[00:42:45] And for contex the Amish didn’t used to send their kids to school until the 1972 Supreme Court ruling Wisconsinvs. Yoder allowed Amish parents to remove their children from public schools and for the Amish who create their own schools and their own curriculum with zero oversight.

[00:43:08] And my mother for example grew up going to public school. She has a public school education. And what I learned many years later was that my mother’s side of the family are actually very pro education and they love learning. If they were not members of the Amish church they would be your typical sort of like professors and academic types and which is a great loss to the world that we’re deprived of. Yes. Oh absolutely. And so my mother because she grew up with that education and she would talk to me especially when I was younger about her teacherMrs. Norman designed the oldies of of of the kids. So I so my mother was very very much for all her other faults and terrible things about her. One thing she did write was educate me and she introduced me to all the books that she had read as a child and in public school. So there I don’t think that she made the connection because she had exposure to all those books she was exposed. All those books you expose a public school education she had an English teacher. And she still remain you know a good girl inside the Amish church so I don’t it never occurred to her that her daughter will depart from that.

[00:44:44] Well that’s fascinating. Yes. You mention departing from that year. That takes me back to you said so you made an attempt around 15 to escape. Yes. Can you.

[00:45:00] Can you take us through what that is like. What does it take for someone like me. I don’t know what does it take to escape. And then what is it like when that escape. What’s it feel like it sounds seems like it would be as such a a heavy burden for it not to work out for you.

[00:45:24] Yeah it was it was just. I don’t have the words like the worst kind of feeling.

[00:45:33] You know it’s imagine being growing up where your own by somebody like a slave for example or maybe even in modern day there. There’s the human trafficking that goes on like trade. You know this isn’t just something from other areas. So imagine that sort of situation. And when you try to escape and you get stopped. I mean what what is your what is going to happen to you. Of course Leahy is the worst feeling. And that’s not. I don’t even have words for it. Just like if I painted it it would be black and dark clouds and heavy stuff on just a blank look on a square like sort of Kalat like where it’s just there’s no color on there except black and variations of black you know I can I can totally understand I mean it just sounds so depressing.

[00:46:37] So what was the attempt. Can you describe what happened.

[00:46:41] Yes so I was in a when when I had you think here that shortly after I turned 15 I made a phone call to late at night. It was run well in the evening around 7:00p.m. or so in the evening. I made a phone call to one of the non Amish taxi drivers. So every Amish community has not Amish drivers to drive them around. If they can’t do that to me with horse and buggy so I called one of the substitute taxi drivers and ask her if she could take me to Holland the next morning early the next morning to catch a Greyhound bus. And this person was. I didn’t know if I could trust her or not which is why I didn’t make a phone call until just the night before and she said Oh my God I wish you would have called a little bit earlier. I could have totally taken you down if. But I have to take my kids to school in the morning and I can’t make other arrangements it’s too late to make any other arrangements so I was like okay don’t worry about it I’ll find someone else. You know no big deal. And of course there’s no one else to call.

[00:48:07] I go to bed that night. Everybody’s in bed that night. It’s 10:00 around 10:00 or a little bit late or something like that. All of a sudden I hear a vehicle pull up in the drive and you are not. You always turn on light. Knock on the door downstairs and I drop my window open because my room was right there above the drive.

[00:48:29] And I heard my father’s voice I didn’t hear what was being said but I was like oh my god this is that lady and I of course thought she had come wrap me out because that’s the mind that you have is as a kid you think everybody else knows your rules too and that that may have been breaking the rules or like you’re 15 years old. Are you going to Holland on your own and. And I just went back crawl back into bed and try to like train. No please God don’t let this be you.

[00:49:07] You know what I think it is. Blah blah blah blah blah. You know like you it was like trying to just blurt out everything and make the world stop and try to go back in time and make it never have happened that I made that call.

[00:49:22] And like several you know ten minutes later something I hear the slow stumps stone stones start of the steps of stairs.

[00:49:33] And I my room with the down the corner around it’s sort of an L shaped hallway and I’m praying that okay the steps are gonna stop. You know this is just my father wanting something with one of my brothers or sisters. No. It keeps on coming down. Stop stop stop. And that night I got no sleep. My father made me stay up all night. Talk about sleep deprivation and all sorts of other kinds of interrogation techniques to try to break you.

[00:50:11] Where were you going. Like a yo. Why did and why are you going to leave. Or where we gonna go.

[00:50:17] You tell me everything. And in that moment it was I knew that I could either confess everything and pretend to be the perfect good girl.

[00:50:31] From then on to try to make my second attempt successful so they would think that I had reformed and I was now no longer have any thoughts of leaving or I could just be outright you know F you and win it. When you’re that in in in their face where you’re just play f you like. You’re not going to tell me what to do anymore. I mean if you go to that extreme. What are they going to do. You can’t be in the middle it had to be one extreme or the other. The perfect good girl who’s completely totally fully reformed or the perfect like f you all to hell. And I chose the good girl route because I wanted my parents to know that I left because something was very very wrong. I laugh because there is some serious shit that’s going on inside the church. There are major issues in the church and in our home that is not right.

[00:51:41] The abuses I suffered endured the physical violence and verbal violence and in the name of the discipline and the psychological and brainwashing religious brainwashing those things. Not to mention a sexual assault that runs rampant in the church. Those are wrong things and you cannot cannot claim to be the perfect people and the godly people when you’re aligned that shit can happen.

[00:52:07] And that’s true. Yeah. And then there was a reason for me to leave. A valid reason that I could not be part of the hypocrisy. And it wasn’t just a rebellious teenage act. I have thought these things through and I had already read the Bible from cover to cover each guy and you know figured out that this is not the way to live if you actually believe Jesus basic teachings of being kind and compassionate if you choose to believe that’s what he actually said. You know but that’s how I interpreted it at that age and so yeah. So I thought okay well this is going to having this long term view. This being the good girl will be the only way to try to get the point across. AKRIGHT escape. So this is going to come as a complete and utter surprise once they do make my second attempt. And you know surely at that point they can think about well this wasn’t just some rebellious teenager or like what happened. It would make them change and wake up which it didn’t. So in retrospect I wish I just said fuck you all to hell.

[00:53:22] What would have happened then.

[00:53:24] What is so I was trying to play that went out of my head when you said it. You know you give them the big fuck you. What do they do they kick you out do that. What would they do to you or with you at that point if you’re seen as just unruly an unmanageable uncontrollable. What do they do.

[00:53:44] Well I would have wanted to it would have loved it if they kicked me out. I would watch it. You know like or they would have said you no you can’t be here any more. In fact I actually would have it when have happened that I really have been there over just said fuck you I’m leaving right tonight anyway. Like I just packed up and left that night.

[00:54:05] And that’s an option. So you could have done that.

[00:54:08] Well it’s not an option that they would have given me. It’s an option I would have taken I would have said fuck you and your like you’re you’re not standing in the way I’m packing up my shit right now and I will call the police on you if you try to stop me. Do they you man. I take that back a little bit. I didn’t even know i could call the police. Now this is what I want kids to know that you can’t call the police about these things. Not that they would have helped. That’s another whole story.

[00:54:38] There’s there’s a moment in another episode I did with a lady who escaped the Felda escort and I just this just really reminds me of something she said.

[00:54:48] There was a moment where she realized that you know the power they had was the power she gave them. To an extent. And that there are laws in the United States. And you know maybe she couldn’t call the local police because they were pretty much owned by the LDS but she could call the state troopers or whatever. And and there were people out there that legally could do something.

[00:55:15] Well yeah but I would just like to add my you know commentary to that is I don’t want listeners to to buy into it that the power they had as the power we give them we children don’t have that awareness at least we only saw it doesn’t mean she was an adult.

[00:55:36] OK. OK. Right right. No I understand technically you know of course they took the power from us. They never gave us anything to begin with.

[00:55:45] Yeah right. And they keep us repressing oppressed and ignorant and all of that and they says that everything on the outside is evil and bad and they do own the police as well they’re in cahoots with the police. If any Amish kid gets into trouble with the law like this agreement is that the police report it to the bishop and the bishop. We handle our own crimes which they don’t.

[00:56:07] I mean really so they have the police in their pocket as well. Wow.

[00:56:13] Child care services will not show up if they get a call from an Amish child and that’s completely against the law that’s against federal and state laws.

[00:56:24] I mean that’s that’s the orchestra that we’re addressing through the Amish Heritage Foundation and the conference in September. And we’ll be talking about you know here the issues.

[00:56:37] This is just a little bit of an aside but you mentioned you know how kind. Let’s say in the Bible Jesus was you know kind of the opposite of the culture and environment. You felt that you were in do and again this may of course vary over groups or whatever but. Do Amish consider themselves Christians yes.

[00:57:03] So the Amish are a form of Protestant Christianity. It’s their own interpretation. So we grew up with with you know the old and new testament and we were told to read it but not analyze it.

[00:57:24] Don’t think too hard right.

[00:57:26] Exactly. And to make it at another interesting level to that.

[00:57:32] And a strict very strict communities they don’t allow you to read English. And in the super super strict some offshoots of the Army source and trigger Amish for example is one of them where you’re not even allowed to have read the Bible in English and the Bible that you are supposed to read is in German which is not Amish. I mean I can read German. I don’t understand German or very little of it on it so it’s very similar to the situation with the Catholic Church. Way back when when they had mass in Latin and and the peasants or the illiterate couldn’t understand what was going on and they were told this is what the Bible says when it didn’t stay that way.

[00:58:21] So you have now made an attempt to escape. You made an Onix unsuccessful attempt and you have gotten through. No you’re sitting at the table or sitting there with your dad all night talking about this. How do you transition from I’m leaving to being that good girl and how do you how did you work that out so where you essentially got their trust so that if you didn’t make a second it sounds you could not only kind of make a points and that you know hear the good girl left but also be more successful in that attempt so that all night sleep deprivation take place in my room and not at the table the table scene.

[00:59:22] Right right here.

[00:59:23] You know when I got ransacked and almost confiscated my diary a horrible sin of sense.

[00:59:34] So yes.

[00:59:35] So what happens in the early morning hours. I’m up all night. I’m being forced to stay awake all night. I’m not allowed to fall asleep all night long.

[00:59:46] And in the morning one of the taxi drivers comes along to pick up my my mother my father. Me and a couple elders of the community and we go off to a neighboring church as bishop.

[01:00:04] So not the Bishop of our community but some other neighboring communities Bishop who runs there who is a therapist to troubled teens Amish teens. And that’s another bullshit joke beyond jokes. There’s no such thing as mental health services in the Amish.

[01:00:23] There’s a little bit more now than there used to be over 20 years ago when I had to go see this bishop. And also I just have to qualify and say that the mental health services that are provided is only invited in in the context of you must remain. This is why you should stay inside the church.

[01:00:49] It’s of course administered by anyone who without a training or not so.

[01:00:56] So this bishop self-proclaimed therapist to troubled teens sits me down and will tell me what happened and why did you want to leave Ben. Blah blah blah you know he like all pompous and thinks he’s like really you know something. And.

[01:01:17] That’s like right through.

[01:01:21] I knew exactly what I needed to do. How exactly how I needed to behave. What answers I needed to give him in order to be pronounced reformed and cured. And and I had to make it into a game in order to not go insane and lose it. So I just had this running commentary in my head while he’s asking these questions and you and I created this little competition for myself.

[01:01:54] I wonder how quickly I can get him to say that okay. She’s she’s completely you know she’s cured she’s reformed no more therapy sessions and I believe I did it in two sessions.

[01:02:11] Wow. Not a very good therapist. He’s not very discerning.

[01:02:19] Or damn good. That’s right. You played him.

[01:02:29] And of course having that secret victory soothe you know the pain a little bit. You know it’s just this failed attack. And I was put under Amish house arrest which means I was never allowed to do anything by myself be alone without adult supervision and baptized adults are numbers in the home. I could not be alone with my friends. I had to quit my job at the bakery and was never allowed to even go back up the road to the Amish farmers to pick up milk.

[01:03:10] Nothing I had to always be either with my mother my father or some other church mother.

[01:03:17] Wow is there a time limit on that.

[01:03:21] The time limit was nine months later when I made my second and then successful escape.

[01:03:28] So that would have been what. And so maybe you got so you know assuming you didn’t know Mangham other terms. Would that have just been until maybe you got baptized.

[01:03:40] Yes. All this time there was a serious heavy lobbying. My mother used the whole well you know you’re saying she manipulated that like it. Well you’re now late this reformed or whatever like you agree to abide by the rules and and see the error of your ways and blah blah blah. Now you know you need to get baptized. And it was all like yeah like it is she would not let it go let up on it. And and it was got to the point where as I could not maintain my good girl image if I did not get baptized like I had to escape before the next class for 4 4 kids started to get baptized and that was all. So so from September through me that was a period in which my mother was just lobbying and pressuring me to get baptized join the baptism class in the spring or in the summer like the next one that would start a that must have been some intense pressure.

[01:04:52] I can only imagine because you have a desperate mother who is really trying to corral her child and you on the other hand are so intent on not being in a you know not living that life. So how did that progressed as you went on. So I mean I guess you knew you had x amount of time if you wanted to make another attempt. How do you plan that out.

[01:05:20] And how did you end up executing that so my plan was so so the the plan was to leave via the Luddington Park ferries. So in Michigan that was the community we lived in at the time was located near Lake Michigan Luddington which had a car ferry service that took you across to Wisconsin. And I had one of my uncles who had left the church. One of my paternal uncles enoughs Bontrager is his name. Remember that name because we’re going gonna get back to it. He had a breach. I knew that he was on that side and that I could call him to pick me up. Once I got to that side and I could bite to Whitington it was like 9 miles or something not very far. So that was my plan. But the car free service only was seasonal only and would not start up again until May and the baptism classes weren’t to start right around that time I wasn’t sure exactly when it was going to start. I believe it was late summer or something like that and it ends two weeks before the carvery season starts. My parents moved to a completely different location in Michigan. And that was another reason why I wanted to. Play sort of play the good girl. If what if I was going to play the good girl I wanted to keep playing the good girl so we wouldn’t move because that was that was the only way I could I could get away with once this perforin season started up and if we moved in with somewhere else then I wouldn’t be familiar with the geography. There wouldn’t be something like that available you know access to public transportation is basically nonexistent in the Amish are these kids going to get to a greyhound or Amtrak or something like that. It’s pretty difficult to do that. So throughout the nine months my parents were like they started eventually despite me pretending that you know I was a hundred percent committed to staying inside the church. They decided that they were going to look for a different community and the community that we lived in at the time that local community had lots of problems. There were horrible things going on. There’s this whole other backstory that we didn’t even get into about as like oh there’s lots of of disputes among the members and all of that and a lot of people were thinking about moving anyway. But then when I tried to have that failed attempt then that just escalated the mood. The timetable for many parents for example and that the typical solution for parents of children who have attempted to escape over let’s move that fixes all our problems any problem life just move that’s going to automatically fix everything.

[01:08:28] And so we moved to a community just outside of Lansing which is way down south of the state towards further down south. And I didn’t know anybody I mean in terms of like where the taxi drivers in and where the nearest train station or bus station. How to even get there you know all that kind of stuff. And their baptism class was going to start up that month.

[01:08:58] How

[01:08:58] assured of no pressure.

[01:09:00] Yeah.

[01:09:01] And I believe that was another part of the reason it’s because of all the disputes going on the Luddington church amongst the members they know a part of it was I’m not sure they were even offering a baptism class that you’re not or whatever either. So that had something to do with it. And yes so I’m like What am I going to do. Well luckily my good girl act paid off because once we moved to the Michigan that lower Michigan community outside of Lansing I was allowed to go work in the Irish paper again. That one down there and out of sight of adults revision I was allowed to be on my bike again. Oh you know like well you’re like well we trust you now like you like we’re all going to start trying to make a new new start and blah blah blah. And part of it too was that looking back it was it was my mind my father trying to project this over a perfect family image and blah blah blah. So if if they didn’t let me go to the bakery because the Amish people had needed someone to help them then you know they would have to explain you know the issue.

[01:10:16] Oh well you know blah blah I don’t know you know like how I know her totally makes sense because that would have been a black eye on the family if they admitted from the get go you know from day one that you weren’t the perfect child.

[01:10:27] Right. That I was reformed you know because everybody already knew it. Try this escape. I mean word travels through the great mind faster than the internet really wow.

[01:10:37] So they already knew that down there.

[01:10:40] Yeah yeah. They already Holling because it was the same. You know everybody you know I mean the gossip galore.

[01:10:47] I mean you think like Tamzin is gossip about her.

[01:10:51] When I get there because I mean I know gossip is really bad among Jehovah’s Witnesses there’s not a lot a lot going on in life.

[01:11:00] Got half of us up there.

[01:11:02] Yeah. It was like this. Well will this bishop per Nazre cured or whatever reformed and like we parents like were were like the perfect parents to you know kids you know like we’ve we’ve made it like that we have this perfect relationship with our child.

[01:11:17] Now you know Korth.

[01:11:21] And so if they and the baker people needed me you know they had they were dependent on finding someone to help them and it would not be Amish Christian. You know a Szolnok over here. And those in need.

[01:11:39] Just being a good group.

[01:11:42] And so the one clincher was that the house we moved to wasn’t Amish a five hour early. With the Amish don’t always build their own house. It’s like they’ll buy existing houses and then like just turn off electricity and and remove whatever appliances aren’t allowed to be in there and replace them for example. Interesting. Yeah. It doesn’t happen to like the very very super strict ones. I’m not sure if they allow that properly nowadays because of just economic reasons. You know it’s tough to build a house from the ground up. But yes. So until we got our new phone line in the barn we kept the phone lines active inside the house for business purposes because we need to take people take dozens calls for the call. So I was scared like I can’t make phone calls during the night to my uncle Herbie Bell in Montana and all this time I’ve been calling him cleped at night. I’ve been sneaking out of the house and I knew that I could be in Montana with him. Once I did figure out how to skate on this and so I was just like okay I have no car ferry service.

[01:13:04] I don’t know how to go how to get to anywhere around here. And I can’t even make phone calls. And this baptism class is starting up and I just can’t take it anymore. I was just getting to that edge for me where I was like I’m going to I can’t make it inside anymore. So luckily for me because of the bakery I got that little bit of freedom.

[01:13:32] And I would bike past the Amish schoolhouse which had a phone in in the schoolhouse for all the Amish to use it. And so I stopped in at the schoolhouse and made my calls to both uncles and I called my Wisconsin Uncle Enos and told him you know like if I could leave tonight I would. I just I just can’t take it anymore. And he said if I came over picked you up tonight would you. Would you willingly even. I’m like you know I had this moment of like oh shit just got real with me like I can’t not say no. But it was like so unexpected. So the whole escape did not go at all as how I had planned. So I go home that night and you know I leave the schoolhouse a blight on home. And I had packed all my things that I wanted to take with me into a little box when we made the move for Luddington to just outside Lansing because they and I didn’t unpack. I knew that this was what I would take with me. So I kept it in the box. And so it was just a matter of getting my birth certificate and Social Security card and fax vaccination card out of the safe. And you know try to find movement when I could sneak into the safe downstairs. Well my mother wasn’t around and none of the kids were looking and take that stuff out those documents. And so I did that and the whole night was just surreal. It’s actually a little bit hard to remember that night because it happened so fast and until you know I went to bed. I remember not being able to fall asleep I set the alarm and finally did fall asleep and all of a sudden woke up and freaked out because I thought I had slept through the alarm that while that would be so much panic. And in fact I had somehow gotten the little hand and the big hand turned around. Now. Nervous and and my my uncle had told me that he’d meet me at a certain time and he had mentioned on the phone and all he said you know I’ll wait I’ll wait all night if for some reason you don’t show up at the allotted time at all. And it was like around 1:00 o’clock I believe it was something like that. He said you know I’ll wait until morning. And I had told them that oh no I’m going to be there I’ll be there. So the way they’re not going to happen. And and I was you know so happy that he had mentioned that and thought of that. And so I woke up and this panic you know when I got together my stuff and I had to sneak down these creaky stairs that KERTH Yeah.

[01:16:52] When the old story you can read it read this story like in my basic escape from the Amish interview that Tim parasitized quite a few years ago.

[01:17:03] But you can find that on his blog but it was go down this creaky little stairs and I’d memorized all the spots. That’s sweet. No matter how much WD 40 I put on. Went down in the living area and then head across the dining room into the kitchen to go out the back door and circle around the house to try to like are on the edge of the yard and maintain cover because the moon was shining that night was on a full moon or an actual full moon so it’s pretty bright outside and Jaso. I ran ran down half a mile. I couldn’t take my box of all my prized possessions. The only thing they cared about I couldn’t carry with me because I could not. What if I. Once I’m down stairs and crossing over through the dining room and one of my parents wakes up and sees me Hamah how am I gonna explain. I could explain. I’m going to the kitchen to get a drink of water. But my heart stops. How is it I was not not going to be successful that night. So I just had the clothes on my back 170 bucks that I had. I took out of my father’s wallet that night and my little sort of laptop size duffel bag. It’s not a duffel bag it was kind of like a briefcase size thing that I took with me with my documents and a couple personal items. That was it. And to end the story I know where it’s like 339 said have no words. I actually have to wrap it up too because I have another meeting. Yeah. So so otherwise they’d be talking longer but. So I just want to add that there’s plenty of information out there about my story you can just Google my name. Toora Bontrager and you can also go to my Web site and you can find the links to all the interviews I’ve done before as well. The Huffington Post won and the Huffington Post one I want to point that out because that’s where I talk about how my uncle inas Bontrager started raping me.

[01:19:26] And I also talk about my oh you that your uncle who you escaped with.

[01:19:32] Yes you are. Come on. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:19:36] So I also hear this all this stuff you know that goes on goes into trying to escape and then you think you’re going to a place that you have somebody understands you gets you in. You’re going to be safe with in less than a month Harvey youth raping me in Montana. And that to this day I don’t know how often because it was just an offer from me through December until I figured out how to escape him because the first night after the first night he told me if you ever challenge one I’m going to kill you. And that bought my silence. He was a violent end and I had no doubt that he would kill me or send someone after to kill me if he ever suspected I’d ever go to the police or tell anyone.

[01:20:30] So how did you get away from him.

[01:20:33] Well so I during a winter break from high school I came up finally figured out a plan which was to use the excuse that there are no jobs for high school students during the winter in Montana which is true.

[01:20:50] There were no jobs. It was this very very tiny town and just thrived on tourism during the summers. And my argument was you know that I want to be self-sufficient independent and make some money. And I called inas in Wisconsin the uncle who helped me escape that that night. I called him and asked him Hey would you be able give me some work after school in your furniture shop. He says yes. So I got that confirmation from him and then told Herbie his older brother Blake already talked to us. He said yes come that they’ll pay for the ticket for me to to go to Wisconsin. And that I presented it in a way that did not threaten him clearly because I was still alive. And I got to Wisconsin. My heartbeat was divorced. Didn’t have kids in the house. It’s just me in the house. I mean I was in another. Once again talk about being in prison and feeling like a hostage and innocent on the other hand was married and had kids. So I thought I’d never once occurred to me that that the same thing would happen weekend the first time his wife Barb both on overnight business trip he does the same thing. And it was just like you know once again like no no no words to describe how it feels. It’s like one of the thoughts that crossed my mind this was I guess this is just what uncles do. And. And I couldn’t go to the police because hard would kill me if I reported illness then you know that would Wooler him.

[01:22:41] So Harvey was doing it too.

[01:22:43] Harvey did it all from from May through December when I was in Montana. What happened was they picked me up in Michigan it took me to Wisconsin and put me on a train out to party. So that happened in the span of four four days during my escape. Andrew Yeah. Yeah.

[01:23:04] So I just like wait it out the semester.

[01:23:10] I couldn’t not be in school because my emancipation was dependent upon me staying in school so when I was 16 years old I became emancipated as a minor which is why I say in my parents. Even if it were a legal status my parents are not my parents or my ex parents it’s like divorcing your parents right. So I got all the rights as an 18 year old as long as they didn’t break the law as long as they abided by the rules that they you know that an 18 year old have to abide by including I had to be in school until I was at least 18 so if I dropped out of school in an effort to get away from illness I would lose that. And besides like where was I. I didn’t even know who to go to. I mean I had I didn’t have my driver’s license. I didn’t have a job. I didn’t. Yeah.

[01:24:08] So you end up I mean I know you’re on a time time crunch here. So how is it that you eventually end up away from all of these people.

[01:24:18] Yeah. Yeah. Was soon as school was over then I by that time had establish contact with some people in the Wisconsin community that I lived as well as an Amish kid. Before my parents moved to Michigan so it was another part of Wisconsin. So some of those the Amish there had left the church and one of them they went to school with actually he had he married by the church. They needed a babysitter. So that was my you know way to look at a place to stay. They they let me live there in exchange for babysitting and so I would babysit part time you know like whenever they were at work and and then I look for a job at the same time you know some other job.

[01:25:15] Had like three jobs were it myself not sure when you don’t have a lot of secondary education. It makes it more difficult to earn enough of a living.

[01:25:27] Well yes and also I couldn’t get any jobs that pay anything beyond minimum wage. Azzam yeah yeah yeah.

[01:25:34] I mean that that’s a big problem with Jehovah’s Witnesses too so I totally understand that it’s hard to find find your place financially in this situation. Yeah. So. So you get free from everybody. How long have you been out now.

[01:25:51] Twenty two years.

[01:25:53] So May 24 This was my 22nd anniversary 22nd year anniversary.

[01:26:01] That’s awesome. Now how many years were you in.

[01:26:06] Fifteen. It was late in the year I turned 16 so I wrote about it several months before my 16th birthday. I was like almost 16 years. So now officially I mean I’ve officially been out of the church longer than I’ve been in bed and I was getting and I really like that. Yeah yeah yeah. And I remember thinking about that for a year. Right. Right as it within the first year of my escape thinking wow I wonder what it would be like once I hit the 15 year mark you know where I’d be like cool and. And it seems like such a long time ago and at the same time it seems like not much time has passed by. It is very easy for me to go back in time. I sort of like time travel in that sense you know where I’m not I still speak English or Amish fluently. So that’s one of one of the things I still speak Amish fluently. I’ve not you know removed myself in that sense whereas that is so it’s easy for me to go back into that those memories or remember the good things about the stuff or think about the kids how I can help them or what needs they have. So it’s kind of interesting. Yeah I don’t quite know how to how to explain. I mean definitely I’m very culturally Amish. I’ve always maintained that and been it’s been important for me to maintain that.

[01:27:36] So what do you like about your life on the outside. What do you what do you like about the freedom that you have now.

[01:27:48] What do you like about the freedom obviously freedom is something like But what are you doing. You know what can light your fire what gets you excited about this life.

[01:28:01] The that’s such a good question that and trying to think of how to answer.

[01:28:11] I just love learning that’s always been who I am is to learn and just let life experience everything that there is to experience and do everything there is to do I mean like I I have so many dreams and end things on my wish list. And so many talents that.

[01:28:34] Innate talents I have that I haven’t yet had time or resources to develop know music for example is is high on my list.

[01:28:44] That’s my childhood dream to become a musician which still happens and I don’t feel that that might. My life is not going to be I have done what I was meant to do and until I’ve I’ve you know I’ve become a musician.

[01:29:08] I feel you know so everything else that I’ve done is amazing and huge accomplishment. You’re going to an Ivy League school. I mean just the fact that even like managing your high school is incredible for an army. Yeah yeah. You know like learning how to fly a plane at age 18 traveling to about 30 countries living in New York City and loving it. And now you know Jane writing a memoir which is hard work I mean harder than I ever thought it would be things. I mean I’ve experienced a lot. I’ve lived a very good life in terms of all the things that I wanted to do when I was a little kid. I mean I’ve I’ve done it except becoming a musician which is my very original during I could say that that’s really impressive you know to be able to do all these things at such a young age and to have so much time to pursue.

[01:30:03] Now you know what you want to pursue. I know that you know you’re doing this interview ahead of this this Amish conference that’s coming up. Can you can you tell us a little bit about the conference about what you’re hoping to discuss about maybe some of the issues that you want to tackle or just you know what is what is it that people should be looking forward to.

[01:30:26] Yes. So the name of the conference’s disrupting history cool and reclaiming our Amish story so that’s exactly what we’re doing. Like that we’re we’re taking back our story which has been coopted by academia a so-called expert authorities on the Amish just google them and their names will pop up. They’re not experts on US omission and they have no right to call themselves that. Our story is like our are the narrative of of us Amish has been determined by them and also the entertainment industry. Reality TV for example and comedy were were just a laugh line. And those issues need to be rectified. I mean these are serious serious issues where there’s this collusion of what we call church and state. You know the outside coopting our story and colluding with the state to allow it to allow the Amish as it as a people to remain frozen in time. So Wisconsinvs. Yoder really sealed that fate by. It was basically just the outside the state the federal Supreme Court level saying well we embrace ignorance and and that’s great for for the Amish and never mind that we’re actuallyU.S. citizens. I mean what about the rights of the children. So it’s really about addressing those forces that are happening so it’s not just the Amish clergy elders or whatever violating the rights of children it’s also the state and the federal government.

[01:32:22] And how do they pander to that religious pressure.

[01:32:26] Well yeah both both pander to both. Also just for their own purposes because of whatever other political agendas other groups had. It was easy to latch onto as Amish because that was what we were not engaged with the world. There was no representation in the court for us children during coffin versus Yoder no representation. And even though theU.S. is the only country in the world that hasn’t ratified theU.N. Convention on the Rights of the child. I mean even Somalia has ratified that. I mean for God’s sake not the old it but at least they signed on like the US hasn’t. And despite that there was still a law at that time and still is. I believe that children need to be represented like somebody needs to be speaking on behalf advocating for the child in a situation like that and no one did. So this is serious like real heavy serious issues that we’re addressing so it’s going to be you know this educational issue and then talking about how about sexual abuse for example special with me too. Now people finally understand the general public understand sexual abuse issues in a way it never did before. So much easier talk about that now thanks to meet two movement.

[01:33:55] And then just about women’s rights and the fact that women do not have any rights at all inside the Amish church.

[01:34:04] This is 2013 we’re in one of the Westernized countries supposedly them freest country in the world.

[01:34:14] And there is a population and entire people that do not have any rights as women. Right.

[01:34:24] So songs. So can you give us the winds and where’s the commission that’s coming up. Is it something.

[01:34:34] You know it seems like it would be a good idea to go ahead and you know kind of plug that for those universally in your audience who might listen.

[01:34:41] Yes if you’re listening please please go buy your ticket. There’s an early bird ticket sale going on through August 30 and we’d love for you to you can go to the Web site W W dot Amish heritage that word or you can google my name and you will find us everywhere. Your chickies you can get those on Eventbrite or on Facebook or on our Web site. And it’s a two day conference September 28 29 in Lancaster Pennsylvania. Easy access fromD.C. New York and Baltimore anywhere in the Northeast region via Amtrak or car. And it’s going to be awesome. Our keynote speakers on Friday the keynote speaker is a Pulitzer nominated attorney author and attorney Marci Hamilton and Saturday’s Keano is Gaelen Gingrich is a member of the Council of Foreign Relations and a Unitarian Universalist minister and in New York City. So it’s going to be very interesting. And he wrote a book by the way called God ribeyes. For anyone wondering if it’s going to be a very interesting conversation.

[01:35:56] No that’s really cool. Now I’m going to give you one chance here. You talked about taking back you know your own story as Amish people after you had a moment here to to correct some misconception or something that was out there that you would like to to speak to.

[01:36:17] Feel free to go ahead and do that now.

[01:36:22] Rumspringa it’s not what you think it is a ritual that is really not at all. So come to the conference if you want to find out what rumspringa Ashley is or means otherwise shoot me an email or you know go to my go go on social media ask. I would love the conversation to be public.

[01:36:46] OK. You say go on social media. Where where would where would someone ask you on social media where would be the best place look for Twitter.

[01:36:59] The Irish heritage foundation I think that the handle is Amish heritage. No I take that back on Twitter the handle is Amish Foundation.

[01:37:09] And you can also find the facebook page the handle on Facebook is Amish heritage foundation.

[01:37:19] Which heritage foundation.

[01:37:21] It’s all right well I will make sure that all of this gets gets posted up so that people have an opportunity you know to have that conversation.

[01:37:31] I think Ramesh ring as a I said it anywhere near close enough. I hope you know that I know that that’s something that that is a fascinating concept as far as what most people know about it but I think it would be really interesting to hear from you exactly what that is.

[01:37:50] So if somebody else doesn’t ask the question I will.

[01:37:53] So yeah yeah yeah. In short it perpetuates the problem is it adds to the issues and you know we’re not given a choice but let’s have the conversation online.

[01:38:06] All right. That sounds great. Well I appreciate your time appreciate you reaching out to do this and for sharing as much of your story as you could and in a time that you know was provided. And yeah I just wish you the best and I hope that your conference is a huge success.

[01:38:21] Thank you. Thank you so much. It’s been really awesome to have this conversation and I appreciate it.

[01:38:30] As always I want to thank her for being so open about her story. You know I know it’s not always easy to relive the past.

[01:38:38] A lot of us have some some really painful sometimes ugly things in our past. But you know the past kind of informs our present. And when we discuss these things openly we let other people know that they’re not alone. So it was beautiful to hear her be able to share some of her story. I hope that it helps others. You know I just recently started a Facebook group called shun podcast where we can actually all get together and share our stories support each other even across these different groups. So please join in. Just look it up on Facebook. It’s entitled Shunned podcast. It’s two words. It is a private group. I will have to approve you but no worries there. We’re already doing some things like discussing career challenges encouraging self care on the weekends sharing what we’re doing there. Some of the previous guests are there. You can say hi to them. You can also tell us some of your own story if you like. It’s not just that typical JW a group not necessarily focused on following the ins and outs of what the cult does. It’s about us it’s about our stories. It’s a place focused on personal story. That’s kind of reflective of the podcast itself. So come join in no matter what group you come from. Again the facebook group is called Shunda podcast if you’d like to support the podcast. You can do so in various ways. One way is to leave a positive review on iTunes. When you put a review up on iTunes it helps us raise in the rankings and by doing so then maybe other people who are looking for help can also find us. So it’s really a pretty important thing to do. The other thing that you can do is go to patreon.com/shunned and there you can support the show financially for as little as a dollar a month. The money that I get I put right back into the show. Believe me I’m not getting wealthy off this but you know I use this money to go for things like the Web site for hosting and you know we’ve got this big push where we’re doing transcriptions so that we can have more content on the site for SEO which means more people can possibly find us the next episode that I’m going to release we’ll be out around the beginning of October. It’s going to feature Lyndi a former Jehovah’s Witness. She’s had an interesting life.

[01:41:00] And you know now we’ve all been shunned by various people. But one thing I haven’t covered yet I don’t think is a person who is shunned by their own daughter.

[01:41:15] And you know it’s one thing to be shunned by your former witness friends. It’s one thing to be shunned maybe by your own family who raised you. But when you raise someone and then you know they’re around a cult they become one of those people and then they shine you when you leave. You know that’s that’s another dimension. And you know Lindsay has a really interesting project that she had put together to try to reach her daughter someday. So we also feature that the music today for the show is by fair voyeur. It’s entitled No hell yet. And if you’d like to hear my personal story you can do so by listening to the podcast called This JW Life. It’s also found at thisjwlife.com both the Shunned podcast and This JW Life can be found on YouTube now. You can find them at Sean podcast oneword or thisJ.W. life and I even do some in person videos. Now do some videocast on the Sean channel so Sean podcast on YouTube. So let’s go ahead and send this out like I do all of them love others do no harm and go be happy.

Sydney is shunned by Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:41] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose the religions that you shunning as a tool to control people. Today I have an interview that I did with Sydney at the end of the interview I left in a part where I invite her to a local upon the first. And I actually got to meet Sydney for the first time at the Midwest upon the first near Indianapolis at the beginning of August so it was really cool to get to meet somebody before I even got to release their episode. And she got to meet a number of other ex Jehovah’s witnesses at this event. So I’ve been able to meet her in person and through this interview. And now you have a chance to meet her as well. Be sure to stick around after the interview. I have something new and I think it’s pretty cool that I’m going to announce that I think alike.

[00:01:27] So let’s go ahead and meet Sydney I am Sydney. Twenty eight. I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I am shunned all right.

[00:01:39] So then how was it that you came to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the first place.

[00:01:46] Well I would say technically I was born into it because my father’s parents were Jehovah’s Witnesses and he was a was witness but my mother her my dad dated when they were real young and they got married really young and even though she grew up in a strong Christian background she ended up converting to being a Jehovah’s Witness when they were married. And the funny thing about it is my mom was baptized and my dad wasn’t baptized but my dad’s dad was an elder and he married them. I don’t know if he was an elder. Yeah. I don’t know if he was an elder at the time that he married them but they got married pretty young I think my mom was like 17 maybe. And then they had me when she was 20. So she was a witness for a few years before they had me and he still wasn’t baptized. But yeah I would say that I was I was pretty much born into it even though my dad wasn’t excuse me he wasn’t super regular obviously but my mom was and then when she got disfellowshipped I was like 3 or 4 when they got divorced.

[00:03:08] So from that point on it was a split between a Jehovah’s Witness household and a Christian household.

[00:03:16] Gotcha. So your mom was disfellowshipped. Do you know you said you had a split between a Christian and a Jehovah’s Witness household. So I’m assuming that your mom stayed with the Jehovah’s Witness religion.

[00:03:33] No it was actually my dad that stayed because like I said his whole family was he has eight brothers and sisters and they’re all I mean they’re not all like baptized but they were all raised that way. So my dad’s side of the family they’re all still Jehovah’s Witnesses. My mom actually she when she got disfellowshipped. She never really whipped back or never really tried. I’m sure she got remarried Oakhurst each year. Then my step dad was not a Dover’s witness at all. And I think she had a really hard time with how she was disfellowshipped it really put a bad taste in their mouth because this is just like hearsay within my family. You know people will admit to things or won’t admit to things but apparently my dad had cheated on my mom with my aunt her sister and then because he wasn’t baptized he didn’t necessarily get in trouble for it.

[00:04:37] And the elders kept encouraging my mom to work it out with him and she was obviously not wanting to do that you know or I mean she tried for a little bit but then she ended up wanting to be just free of it. And I think that’s why her first relationship outside of my dad was really rushed. You know rationally have anywhere to go.

[00:05:05] Sure she can have a stranger cell from the family you know and this guy that she ended up marrying after my dad was like her biggest support I guess because he was he was friends with both my mom and my dad and it’s the whole it’s the whole thing.

[00:05:23] But anyway she she didn’t like the fact that he didn’t get in trouble and then she got disfellowshipped because of you know I’m divorcing my dad and they didn’t even like have a formal meeting for her. They just disfellowshipped her over the phone. Well they didn’t even give her the time of day.

[00:05:45] I thought really supposed to be given a chance to prove your repentance.

[00:05:50] Yeah I know. But I think because she moved in with another man they were just like oh well she’s just not even worth you know investigating what happened and she’s the one who’s baptized suffusing to be the one who was going to be punished for it.

[00:06:04] Anything without that magical baptism if you can avoid that you can skate on a lot of things. But if you are and you get baptized you’ll get in trouble for all kinds of things that the person who doesn’t get baptized can seem to skate on. Even though I mean like you said your dad was around the organization much longer than she was.

[00:06:25] Oh for sure for sure. And you know to what’s super sad you know that you say that as far as you get baptized in then it’s like you know the whole world is split on your shoulders and all this responsibility in my step mom.

[00:06:40] In time we get baptized together.

[00:06:43] And to this day I mean now we’re we’re we’re definitely not talking we’re not we don’t have really a relationship anymore but for a long time after I had left and was disfellowshipped she would just say to me and me and I just wish you hadn’t got baptized things would be so much easier I could see you would not feel this way.

[00:07:03] And I’m thinking from a Christian standpoint I think well this is one of the most horrible things you could say to a person like I wish you hadn’t dedicated your life to Jesus and made it possible to be with him after death because I want to talk to you right. So selfishly even if you’re whatever like I’m not anything anymore I’m not Christian I’m not I’m not anything I don’t go to a church and you know I don’t even know what I believe anymore just because I was so like messed up that way. But I was so sad that she would always say that because it’s like that is such a cop out for you because you have a relationship with my sister and with my brother because they are not baptized. They don’t go but yet they smoke weed and they do all these things that I don’t even do. And yet I’m being punished because I don’t want to be a witness anymore and whatever. I just think the whole thing’s messed up.

[00:08:01] Oh no it absolutely is messed up in every way. Just like what you said there about you know the way she she treated your baptism and said that she almost wish you had been baptized. That’s an interesting way of looking at have had looked at it from that angle before.

[00:08:19] So you know when you were a Kurd obviously now like you said you were you were kind of living between this Jehovah’s Witness household in this you know kind of more just christian household. How did that impact you as a kid.

[00:08:42] As far as you know the world view that you had because you were kind of torn between the two.

[00:08:50] Yeah. It was not easy. I mean I know there’s a lot of people who you know they’re forced to do it and they don’t really have another choice. So I felt that I was blessed to have an outlet through my mom in her family. When it came to that as a child. But my mom suffered from a lot of issues obviously after leaving now and going through the trauma that she did. And as a kid being with her was hard too because she suffered from a lot of mental issues. I mean she wasn’t like crazy or anything but she just was a very impulsive person. And she worked a lot of jobs because she was like a single mom. And because of like her strong Christian background she felt the need to marry a man instead of just dating them you know. She felt like she was sleeping with another person. That it was you know she wasn’t going to hell for it. So she would marry these men she would date instead of dating them. And also there were a lot of turmoil with my mom and saw the world go be babysat by like mom to have my answer my grandmother. And so I guess that I I was really close to all of them and they were kind of a reprieve for me but at the same time there were a lot of good qualities about my dad my step mom when I would go there because they weren’t really regular when I was a kid we would go on a Sunday is that I would be with them cause they had every other weekend custody type of arrangement even like I would go on Sunday is with me. And it was fine other than like I would get spanked a lot. I’m taken back to the bathroom a lot because I didn’t really know how to sit still in Oleg differentness Sunday school or just not going to church at all you know.

[00:10:57] Yeah you’re expecting a small crowd to sit for two hours in a boring environment and not move.

[00:11:05] But before long to expect from a kid.

[00:11:07] Well I think too I did. There were other children around my age at the Keenum hall that we went to but I didn’t I didn’t really click with one because I came from. Also on my mother’s side of the family who are very Christian they’re very mean they go to church. And my one aunt was like really big in her church on the other and she doesn’t necessarily go to church but she’s a very strong believer in so there would always be teaching me about God and how you should be and how you should treat other people. And you know and I thought while this is cawkers I see that they are doing that and they’re saying that and I will go to my dads and they will go to a Kingdom Hall and they will be like well we need to do this this this and that. And then like you know a week later when we didn’t go to the meeting they does do whatever they want and whenever they wanted list you know like excuses that the witnesses you know they would use teaching tools at times that they wanted to teach you. But then they never did it themselves kind of thing.

[00:12:13] No I mean that continued on into my teenage years so that’s interesting because that’s that’s the opposite of what as a young witness were taught. I remember being taught you know that essentially we as witnesses we talk the talk AND walk the walk.

[00:12:32] All right.

[00:12:33] But you know these other Christian religions they were just these things that you know these people put on on Sunday and then they took off as soon as they left church and they just went and did whatever they wanted and then they came back Sunday and put that personality back on and were certainly you know their church personality.

[00:12:51] But you know as this podcast is shown through a lot of the stories when you start getting into who what’s behind the scenes a lot of what was taught at the Keenum Hall in a lot of what the brothers and sisters professed to believe is not what they acted out in their home life and so it is very different. So what was your childhood like at home. I guess from the witness perspective what was it like when you were at that side of the family.

[00:13:28] Well you know it’s funny it’s my step mom. You know as she would I guess say this to me a lot as a kid but as an adult she has mentioned it more than a handful of times she would say you know I always felt bad for you because you just seem like a very depressed and sad kid. And I would say like I would think top editors say anything really because I don’t really know what to say to that. Because in my mind I was thinking I was a happy kid like you know I think the most depressing part of my childhood.

[00:14:04] You know I do want to hurt their feelings and saying theirs but I felt like maybe I was sad because I was with them you know I fell more myself in happy when I was with my mom’s family than I was with them and then I think that you know because this is a young kid like I said we only went once in a while.

[00:14:30] My step mom was not baptized. Even though she was like an avid Jehovah’s Witness and all her family were Jehovah’s Witness like her mom and her sisters and stuff like that so. Things didn’t really pick up in to being role serious until I was about 13. And before that I was able to go to school and have school friends and have school friends come over and play in sports and do all sorts of stuff because like I said it was legal once in a while thing. And then when I was 13 18. Well go back a couple of years and when I was 10 I hit my parents my step mom and my dad had my little brother and then they can use that as a manipulative tool to try and get me to want to live with them.

[00:15:23] So when I was 12.

[00:15:25] The custody arrangement changed between my parents and my mom signed papers before she really read excuse me read them.

[00:15:35] And mind you my dad does. There’s a lot of good qualities about my dad but my dad is a bully. And I think just the trauma that my mom has had in the past with him and his intense severe hatred for my mother. He bullied her in to signing all custody to him and my mom I don’t think really realized what she was signing. And so I only visited her like every other weekend and now I’m living with my dad. And they had full control over.

[00:16:12] Everything I did.

[00:16:14] And. You know I think that they really start there. I mean that Mester up to you and she really know what to do after that cause you know she only had me and she was in at the time. Abusive relationship with a man that I don’t remember if he ever laid a hand on her but he was extremely verbally mentally abusive been like controlled all the money and everything. So my mom was like in a in a really bad place.

[00:16:47] So we both got to be hard for you to you know being so young you suddenly not only has the chain of custody changed and that now you’re with your dad wore but also you’re in this totally different environment more your life had to change a lot.

[00:17:13] Well

[00:17:14] yeah for sure. Because to you know my dad he’s a contractor so he works all the time. My step mom was a nurse she wasn’tR.N. so she worked all the time and we ran a horse farm. For me it was like for my sister to especially because she’s seven years older than me. She’s my stepsister but you know we had a lot of horse chores. We had a lot of house chores we had a lot of things we had to do because both our parents worked full time. My dad was like 80 hours a week maybe and I said mom you know she would have a lot of overtime and on call and also my sister and I it was like clean the house make the food do the barn chores you know you need to get good grades in school in harm’s way to a lot of pressure on us as kids to do it. We had a lot of work we had to do. And I didn’t have to do that at my mom’s. Yeah I had to do homework and stuff. But you know we lived in a small house and there really wasn’t much to clean then. She liked to sit down and play games with me and he and all board games and dice games and we just we just spent time together so.

[00:18:30] Like you got a job.

[00:18:32] It was actually when I was a teenager I got upset because I don’t like horses I don’t like riding horses that really it’s had me years and I’m like I’m doing all these chores like yoga. Give me some sort of compensation for doing these tours like I know I’m your kid but I want nothing to do with this. And so I convince them to pay me eight dollars an hour to do it so.

[00:18:58] But sounds like home home was was pretty you know busy. So yeah. So I mean it’s it’s kind of no wonder you didn’t go to meetings super regularly and such because. How would you find time.

[00:19:16] Yeah it’s definitely the biggest part of it. And I think Penny scares me.

[00:19:20] My step mom she I think she used that as an excuse like I’m tired I’m not gonna let somebody bully me into going to a meeting when I’ve worked this many hours in a week like you know I think she felt like that’s my religion don’t make me feel bad for not going it’s not like I’m a non-believer. I just worked really hard this week. So mind your own business kind of thing you know. And then when I was 13 it was only obviously a year after lume with my dad my mom kind of had a total mental breakdown. At one point in Hurn I got to a really big fight.

[00:19:58] And I stopped going over and seeing her on my own. Because I couldn’t deal with that with her.

[00:20:07] And then that was the pushing point where my step mom was like you need to study with somebody I think you need something in your life you can’t just you know not have is.

[00:20:19] I think you will. You know it’ll make you happy. It’ll get you all you know out of this depression and it all gets you whatever. Besides the study here’s here.

[00:20:30] You know what you need. You need an escape. You need to escape into this thing here and forget your problems.

[00:20:37] Exactly which is what it ends up being for a lot of people.

[00:20:41] What I think too because my mom was disfellowshipped and really didn’t have a whole lot of interest at the time of being a Jehovah’s Witness anymore. It was a lot easier for them really.

[00:20:53] But look it now you’re a Jehovah’s Witness and your mom is disfellowshipped you can’t talk to her because she’s disfellowshipped.

[00:21:00] So now you know it was I think that was a word I didn’t even think about that. Pretty manipulative.

[00:21:07] And then my mom being who she is she is she wants to be Christian. She struggles a lot with some religion because she desperately wants to be in a relationship with God and have all of that but because of how messed up she became after being a Jehovah’s Witness. It’s been I mean she’s in her late forties and it’s still really hard for her. She says she still doesn’t really have a place she feels like she can call home when it comes to a religion. So for her she was. She was I think glad that I was studying to be a witness because she’s like oh what if it is the truth. Right. There’s still that in the back of your mind if you haven’t gotten to that point where you know it’s not you know. So she’s like what if it is I’m I’m glad my daughter studying and maybe I should try to go back to the Kingdom Hall and get reinstated and we can do it together. You know she immediately was like well we can do this together we can you can be baptized and I can be reinstated and then really really close. You know my martyrs.

[00:22:15] Yeah. Oh yeah yeah.

[00:22:19] So I mean it was kind of come in from both sides but in the end my mom was just like she just tried to be like OK well that’s how you feel that’s how you feel. I’m just gonna let you do your own thing and hopefully one day we can reconcile something you know.

[00:22:39] So the reality show IMO emotion in school. Did you have to change a lot. You know a lot of witness kids have trouble in school. You know it’s hard to not stand for the flag salute not Duni the holidays and such. You came originally from I guess you know the more dominant Christian family because you’re staying with your mom or wants that changed over. Did you have to go back to school with a new outlook on Thoon and really start changing.

[00:23:16] Oh my goodness yes. Because that was so hard for me too because you know I had one really good friend because I’d switch schools when I moved in with my dad.

[00:23:26] So I switched schools to the school that I went to until I graduated. And I met a girl and and I became really good friends. And to this day she’s my best friend still. And so when I moved in with my dad and I couldn’t celebrate birthdays anymore. I couldn’t really do anything like that stuff that they do at school. I didn’t necessarily. I guess protest in the not saluting the flag and stuff until I was studying at the age of 14. But before that like I would lie to my parents and be like oh yeah you know Rachel’s just having a party we’re just getting together for the volleyball team you know secretly it was her birthday party when they found out about that and I was so grounded. So it was a birthday party and it wasn’t a volleyball party rise. So yeah I I couldn’t you know I couldn’t do any of that stuff anymore. And then when I started studying it was just like well you know I’m not even gonna stand let alone salute an arm. It really didn’t feel super awkward until we had a veterans assembly where war veterans came in and you know they were doing a flag ceremony and I was sitting there and everybody was like really looking at me like how can you disrespect these men up on stage like that. I definitely feel really awkward in that situation. But I still sat there because this was what to do.

[00:25:03] So yeah that off really puts you in a bad situation and then you know having to make that change as a kid. It’s just really tough to be pulled in so many directions. What about at the at the Keenum Hall. How were you. How were you received when you you know we’re back with your with your dad. They kind of see that maybe as an opportunity to seize upon you a little bit.

[00:25:38] See that’s weird cause it totally didn’t happen like that. My dad doesn’t go to the Kingdom Hall. I mean now I think he goes more so because of a because of current circumstances. But even then he would only go to the memorial.

[00:25:56] Oh he he never went to the Kingdom Hall. But my step mom would go you know occasionally to the meetings and she’s like I think you need to study. So what happened was there’s two kingdom halls there’s one that was only 20 minutes away 15 20 minutes away from where we lived. And then there was another one that was 45 minutes away from where we live and we live in a really rural area. So it’s like you kind of. There’s not a lot of kingdom halls to choose from.

[00:26:24] And at that time they weren’t necessarily really picky about which one you go to just because there wasn’t a lot of people excuse me at the halls.

[00:26:32] So what happened was the one where we went to when I was a kid that was only a couple minute you know 15 minutes away is that moment like going there because the women always looked at her and judge Durran you know she felt like if her shirt was a little bit too low she got like rude glances at my step mom is very much like you don’t like me then keep it to yourself or like don’t look at me that way.

[00:26:54] She’s very much like I don’t know she didn’t like that kind of judgment.

[00:26:59] And so we started going to this other kingdom hall and that’s the one that my dad’s sister went to. So here’s my aunt found a girl who at the time I think with like maybe three or four years older than me and so I was like 14 to like 18 or 19 and very sweet girl I really clicked with her. But she went to this kind of hall that was far away so that became her new hall. We didn’t know anybody there and we really liked it because there was a lot of people my age there was a lot of you know pre-teen teen age young 20 year olds and it was a very active. Kingdom Hall as far as there was tons of parties. There were tons of cookouts and tons of get togethers. Because I loved volleyball and they couldn’t play volleyball in high school anymore. I actually found a whole group of people at 10 or 12 people that loved to play volleyball.

[00:28:03] So all of us at Keenum Hall like after a meeting like a night meeting we would go drive 10 minutes up to a volleyball court and outdoor volleyball court and play volleyball for hours after the King holiday.

[00:28:17] After the meeting. Oh yeah. So it was really super fun Hall to be a part of.

[00:28:23] Yeah that’s that’s rare. A lot of us were not bluff. Ruth you have so many opportunities for her association on housing meltdown and a lot of lessons though.

[00:28:38] You know I think that that was a definite draw for me too because I didn’t have a lot of friends in school. I just had like a handful maybe two or three really good friends in school but not like you know kind of felt like I was in a popular career old league.

[00:28:55] Everybody liked me and wanted me to go to these things because I’m the new girl and I’m doing so God and I’m so like faithful and all the things that I’m doing. And so I guess I felt the love bombing in that way where they’re like yes another new young person that we can hang out with and influence.

[00:29:13] So yeah it’s a big deal when a new person comes in and you feel like you have a new opportunity for friends because you know everyone in the congregation is especially among the young people is is pretty starved for friends.

[00:29:27] Yes. So it’s always you know an exciting time when there’s a new face.

[00:29:34] How did things you know how did how did it progressed to the point about TISM with you. You know from the time that you start living with your dad again you know up to that point a baptism. Well you know it happens so fast and in such a short amount of time and I think the biggest push.

[00:30:00] For me with it was the influence of all the young people. And the cool thing at the time because I had to distance myself from my friends at school. I could play volleyball anymore with them.

[00:30:17] And you know as a witness you were constantly talking about the Bible or talking about something that just happens to relate to what you were talking about and not really self or like distancing themselves from me. And then I got to where I felt uncomfortable talking about it with other people at school because everybody started looking at me like the weird girl who’s the witness so I actually ended up just becoming. Like a hermit crab other than the girl that I’d studied with at this new kingdom hall had a cousin who went to my high school and she was one grade up from me and she wanted to study with this with her cousin.

[00:31:05] So she would go pick Michelle up and she would pick me up and we would go hang out at her house.

[00:31:13] The girl I studied with we go hang out at her house and the girls she studied had a brother who was my age and went to because our school our high school was like the regular high school but then there was an arts school. And he went to the art school. So technically we would have been in the same school but he went to the Concord Academy. And anyway I became super fast friends with him and with Michelle incel because I had Michelle in high school with me. Then it was like I felt better about not having my worldly friends anymore because it was me and Michelle against everyone too. And actually Michelle and I and my step mom all got baptized together and I think it was just I was always studying. I went through the what does the Bible teach book with the girl I studied with. And then we progressed in to where we would just study like the Watchtower and Awake together and then we were or we read the way the awake together and then we would do studies from the theocratic ministry school book together and then we would do Tuesday night bible study we would study that book which at the time I think was the Daniel book you know so I was just really progressing really fast and I did all of my extra time that I had outside of all of my home chores that I had. I was hanging out with them I was going up a field service with them. I was really getting close to the entire family.

[00:32:55] Because the girl I studied with she had two other sisters and I really liked them too and I would hang out with them and I really liked her mom and we just had a lot of stuff together and yeah I got my step mom to go with me to do a lot of stuff and she was studying with some with an older lady at the hall to her and the lady she studied with became really close fast friends and the lady she studied with her husband was an elder.

[00:33:25] So we hung out with them a lot too and even though my step mom she was still in that mindset of like you’re not gonna bully me into doing things that I can’t physically do because I don’t have the time or the strength because I still work a full time job and I run a horse business because we boarded horses all also it wasn’t just our horses at one time we had 18 horses in our barn alone so it was a lot. And so like on a day to day basis if we weren’t going to the Kingdom Hall or I couldn’t convince my step mom to go out in service with me or take me out and surveyors or whatever.

[00:34:07] It was Dalys during the school year.

[00:34:10] Wake up go to school come home clean the house get something out prepared for dinner go down clean the poor stalls feed the horses bring the horses in and then come back out to the house cook dinner or at least check on it to make sure that like everything’s cooking just fine and then I would have time to study for the Kingdom Hall for whatever the next meeting was. And then after that we would eat dinner and then if I had like two seconds to myself I would sit down and watch tv with my step mom. We were sitting American Idol our bachelor or something and then I had to go to bed and then it was like if I had to do any homework I had to fit it within that time frame or I could do it on the bus on the way to school. So it wasn’t a student. I mean I graduated I do a3.0 GPA but it was mostly because it took like art.

[00:35:07] Office assistant or library assistant it wasn’t because I was like in all advanced English or something so I have to ask you so just what you’re talking about there is something that like that is something that that kind of resonates with me I’ve just been thinking about lately and that is that so I know myself as an adult I’m a little bit of a workaholic and I’ve just been kind of looking back at my past.

[00:35:40] You know growing up in an organisation where there is so much to do you had so much to do not only with all the study and then you know the meetings the service and then all these horse and just home chores and everything.

[00:35:58] I’m just curious do you think that that has impacted you as an adult. Do you think that it has had any impact on how busy you need to be or do you think or was it just something you did back then and you were kind of done with.

[00:36:13] No I really I. Because my dad he’s kind of a perfectionist when it would come to the house like a teaching home and he saw you sitting on a couch watching TV. He would literally point out seven things that you could be doing instead. You know. And so for me owning my own home. Now of course I’m not that anal retentive but I do when I’m stressed. And you can ask anybody that’s been in my home more than one time. I compulsively clean when I have stress in my. Also it’s not just it’s not just like oh I want to dust this it’s no I’m going to rearrange my entire house furniture you know underneath the couch in the bed. My husband he’s just like he does not get his late wears whatever he’s looking for. It was over here last week and it was over there that week. You know this is like a walk in the house and it’s like I live in a house every time he comes home now. Oh I think that’s definitely because of how much I had to clean and how well almost OCD my dad was about stuff because he’s he’s actually I think he has HIV and a lot of perfection blood type issues with that kind of like what you talked about in your own story to say that’s me you know Hamman have things a certain way in if other people don’t think that way well you should just think that way and this is how you should do you know. And I think I kind of in that way too now because he was that way not because I’m naturally that way. Right.

[00:37:53] Yeah. Oh just wondered if it made you have kind of a need to stay compulsively busy.

[00:37:59] I mean just an idea but I have changed all that in to a sedentary lifestyle. I am always busy but I’m knitting crochet a lot got this shy constantly using my hands like I’ve never just sit down and watch TV. If there is TV on. It’s not something I want to watch it’s something I can listen to. That’s why I love podcasts like listening to self-help and stuff like that. Or you know whatever because I just I’m constantly crocheting and knitting.

[00:38:31] So yeah I feel you there. I mean not crochet or knit but I’m always online and watching TV and then I’m online either responding to e-mails or learning about some business thing or just whatever.

[00:38:45] But I’m always busy and at least mentally if not physically. Yes. So I’m usually busy physically too.

[00:38:57] So how do things you know kind of play out as you were a teenager you know you’re baptized you know you obviously kind of were all there for a while with your friend here and everything. How did things kind of progressed. You know as you went on into young adulthood.

[00:39:17] Well the boy that I had mentioned the brother of the girl that I was studying with I fell madly in love with him and he was I guess that with me too for a while.

[00:39:34] And we even went to because we weren’t you know obviously allowed to go to prom or anything.

[00:39:40] Well Jehovah’s Witnesses and both of our schools had prom at the same time I went to his junior prom with him. And I mean we’re best friends. We never officially I guess dated because we were like 15 16 17 years old when we were going through this.

[00:39:59] But I mean he was like all eyes on him for three years.

[00:40:02] You know and my stepmom didn’t really like it. And my dad certainly didn’t really like it.

[00:40:16] So I got irritated because I’m like I’m truly innocent person like this isn’t like I’m not trying to do bad things with him like I just I just want to be in his company I just want to be friends with him I just want to whatever.

[00:40:32] Well then at one point I think I was like 17. He decided he doesn’t feel that way for me anymore. And that was devastating. And then it was kind of like oh now I can focus on other things because I’m not worried about him anymore. And I’m I was really active with a lot of my other friends of the kingdom heart and life really brief period. Like literally three weeks I dated like I officially dated an older boy in the Kingdom Hall and my dad did not like that and he made me end it with him. So I was like they just they had a way of making me feel dirty or making me feel like I was not being innocent with boys when I realized seriously was like I had never really kissed a boy or done really anything until I had kissed the first boy you know and it was super innocent and aside we were like making out all the time.

[00:41:34] So anyway that is it is always funny to me how how six crazy they are in the religion how. How every time two people of the opposite sex are seen together in pretty much any capacity. They assume something is going on. It’s it’s really funny that they claim that you know the world outside is sex mad but that’s all that is all there Malha. Yeah.

[00:42:10] And for me that wasn’t even something I wanted to necessarily do. I mean obviously your teenager your home. Know you think about it but it’s not something that I was like Oh I’d better be careful because I might lose my virginity to this person. It wasn’t about her. You know so I just I don’t know I became a really extroverted butterfly. Being a Jehovah’s Witness whereas before I was kind of very introverted and I liked myself a lot when I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I think that’s what I did and I think that’s what made me flourish as one for the short period of time that I really was dedicated to it.

[00:42:52] And things started to change when my dad made me break up with that with the boy that I dated that was in the kitchen Moha mostly my step mom Camilla convinced him you know he’s from an uneducated family. He was home.

[00:43:12] He doesn’t have asG.D. he is missing mom’s very pro college which I know Jehovah’s Witnesses aren’t but because she went to nursing school and she was a nurse. She’s definitely pro. You need to go do something with yourself and you’re not going to settle for somebody who didn’t do that for themselves. Like which. I think that’s a good thing. Look I’m not saying that it was bad that they made me break up with him.

[00:43:36] But as a young teenager do the things that the excuses that they made I thought were really harsh you know but they’re like Oh he comes from an uneducated family and he had like we’re something wrong with his eyes and he had really thick glasses you know but he was like literally the coolest person I’ve ever met in my entire life. He was so fun. Super nice really funny. I don’t care that he had that glasses. I’m more of a beauty on the inside. Like seriously I don’t care what anybody looks like. I just love people for who they are. And I think that they didn’t they didn’t believe me in that or they just whatever they didn’t want me to be with him because they didn’t like him.

[00:44:18] And so anyone who is keeping up appearances that they wanted to keep.

[00:44:23] Yeah yeah for sure. And so that’s when I started to be like Well listen I go to school I get good grades.

[00:44:33] I go to the Kingdom Hall every meeting and I the ready for every meeting even though I’m only getting four hours of sleep at night because I’m one down with anxiety and I have insomnia. And I have to keep up those good grades in for my own standards. I have to study for every meeting and even though my step mom didn’t send it for every meeting or I would be like hey mom let’s study for the meeting that’s coming up. And she was like want to be there she’s like I’m just too tired I’ll do it later. You go ahead and do it you know. So I was always study and then when I was in high school during the time that I was baptized I actually used that as always an opportunity to write an English paper about something they had to do with being a Jehovah’s Witness or I sat out of English class because they were learning about Greek mythology and I would write a paper about being a dobs witness or you know it just whatever the situation was I tried to use it as an opportunity to study more and I had I remember what it was called but you’re not because you were in it longer than I was I left in 2008. But they had that disk where it had like every publication on it and a our library. Yes yes. OK so I had that. Yeah. That would put it in the computer and I would just research so much stuff. And like I always had questions about things but didn’t necessarily want to go to the Ellers for answers. I felt like I could find the answers on my own. And so I just was you know every spare moment that I had was on the computer researching stuff through that particular city round. So anyway.

[00:46:22] I didn’t really have questions about the religion itself.

[00:46:26] I didn’t really have I guess a problem with the religion itself. It was. It was the problem that I had with my parents was really the reason they eventually laughed and then growing into an adult and I see the you know hypocrisies in the things and how I’m treated and how things should be. And that’s what’s I guess turning me so like so sour against it now. But when I was leaving I was so depressed I get so depressed because nothing I did was good and like I said you’re in good grades in school. I was studying for the meetings I was going to meetings and I was going out and service. I was doing all the horse chores I was cleaning the house. I was making dinner. I was washing my brother. If I had a spare second a time where they would let me leave the house I would go hang out with my Jehovah’s Witness friends you know. And nothing was ever good enough. And it got to a point where for instance sorry I’m going on an aside tangent but this is like really important to my story. Because around Christmas time and my dad picked me up from high school and my brother we were sitting in a parking lot waiting for my brother and there was a Christmas song came on. Now mind you I know that it didn’t say anything about Christmas. You didn’t say anything about Jesus but it was a song that they played causes crime. I can’t even tell you which one it was I don’t remember a lot of snow man jingling bells or somebody doing something very neutral wrong you know. But to me and this is what I think my dad didn’t realize or didn’t care to realize. Was for me. I celebrated Christmas with my mom when I was little. And that’s a really sore spot for me. And it wasn’t that I necessarily missed Christmas but that time of year for me or with my mom and my grandma was extremely special for me.

[00:48:29] So anyway I said Dad will you please SHUT THAT SONG OFF we please change the station.

[00:48:35] He was so belligerent about the fact that I asked him to change that song because I was ridiculous you know like I was taking being a Jehovah’s Witness too far that I wouldn’t listen to that song and he wasn’t going to change it and he was like yelling at me in the car about how I was late being disrespectful to him because I want him to change song or something my dad was always like threatening to tell the elders on me about something and I’m thinking go ahead and I’ll tell them how much we knew smoke and all this other crap that you do that is now in obscurity can’t and don’t want to go confess my sins. So you know you did get baptized them.

[00:49:23] Oh he did.

[00:49:24] He did get baptized to my mom and him got a divorce like right before he married my step mom. He ended up getting back. Got you.

[00:49:31] And I think it was mostly because he was feeling the pressure from his family. Maybe I don’t know why he got baptized. He never really dissolved any information about his own story to me ever.

[00:49:44] Mean I don’t really talk. He doesn’t like me though. He says he was very abusive. So later that night got home he was drinking. Mind you I consider him an alcoholic.

[00:50:00] I know that’s a self diagnosed thing but hey if you have to drink every single day I’m sorry you’re an alcoholic and I just mean like have a glass of wine every night. No I mean like you’re drinking six plus beers every single night. You’re an alcoholic to me. So he was extremely verbally and mentally abusive. He would always take yes like you no matter what the situation was. You were the one at fault. It doesn’t matter what was said. The way that he acted towards him was what was wrong or what you know is. The problem and nothing was ever his fault. So anyway as he was drinking that night in of course that the fact that I like told him to do something really ticked him off. And so my son had already gone to bed and I just like take a shower and was like he was laying on me and I was sitting on the couch she was getting ready for bed and. I must have said something about a TV show that we were watching and he switched off on me and was screaming in my face and telling me that he’s going to tell the others how disrespectful I am and he’s the ME and the House and who do I think dying. And I don’t mean he’s like sitting in that chair in the living room with me. I mean he’s sitting on the coffee table in front of me three inches from my face with his big breaths bidding at me yelling at me telling me how much of a disrespectful little girl I am. And like I said he’s the head of the house. So anyway this went on for like 20 minutes of him just screaming at me. And at this point I get when I’m confronted like that I have learned not to talk back because it does not bode well for me in that house. And so we just air and kind of he would want me to look at him. You know look at me when I’m talking to you kind of thing. So I would look at him but because I was so dead inside about the whole thing. I have that deadpan look at my face and he would hate that so much like you just like your mother get that look after your face you know. And I’m like there’s a whole other story. And so finally after he pounded his fist on the table like three or four times a glass table. Broke it. My step mom comes downstairs and she says Phil what are you doing.

[00:52:44] Daughter.

[00:52:46] And that was the end of that.

[00:52:48] Then I just had to go to bed and I was like Oh OK. So it’s over. And nobody else was here to see any of that other than my stepmom was woken up by him screaming and told them to go to bed.

[00:53:01] And then also I mean that wasn’t the first time it happened but that we know that just shows it’s not because your step mom knew she could just come down and just be like it just snap out of it you know and it would be over it’s kind of sad that nobody that your step mom didn’t you know she obviously knew he was in the wrong and.

[00:53:29] But why didn’t you know if she truly cared she should have sat you down and you know had a real caring discussion with you about what just happened and try to help you.

[00:53:39] But know he would do that in my room when nobody else was there. And I would just really just have to wait for it to be over. Or it’s awful. Oh yeah. Or he would be drunk and the only time he could ever show me any affection was asked was one o’clock in the morning.

[00:54:01] He’d been drinking all night long. Come downstairs. And it’s so funny because my my bedroom was in the basement and we had a three floor and three story house and their bedroom was on the top floor. So I would be in the basement sleeping. He would come into my room he would sit on my bed with his leg drown. Beer Brad.

[00:54:22] Oh we love you.

[00:54:24] You know I love you and I’m proud of you and you don’t want to be kids and it’s all a. Nasty and oh I’m sorry. Alcohol is such a tough because my mom’s.

[00:54:39] My mom has issues with drinking too and something is very triggering for you.

[00:54:43] Oh it definitely is. Even when other people that are like I don’t know your story I don’t know what you about. But if you’re drunk just get on my face like a.

[00:54:53] I mean this sounds like that that was a defining part of your growing up. And honestly I don’t know. I’m not trying to I guess I am trying to play armchair psychologist here or something but I mean your dad has some has some problems besides the alcohol.

[00:55:18] Oh yeah. The narcissism. He it’s so bad.

[00:55:22] I don’t know if it’s you know like a narcissistic personality disorder or something but that’s that’s just so abusive and that’s the kind of stuff you know like you said you had gotten to the point where you were so dead inside you know that that’s the kind of stuff that breaks your spirit and that can break your spirit.

[00:55:42] And that is just so hard to to live around because you know like you’re walking on eggshells you never know when he’s going to snap and you don’t know when that next time is going to come where his three inches from your face you know spitting on you because he’s so angry.

[00:56:05] That’s just it’s all the you know the funny thing to with that is he would you know he was very much like you need to go to bed. Your bed time is your bed time. Call it fine though if he would catch me in the basement because the basement was very big it had his office my bedroom a bathroom the laundry room in a rock room and it was kind of like the cat show because it was a walkout basement to the barn. So we had. It was always very dirty because we had all the barn clothes. That’s where the dog kennels were. That’s like where you know I lived but anyway if he caught me in the middle of the night cleaning down there cause I got to a point where I was compulsively cleaning because I couldn’t sleep. He wouldn’t tell me what a bed he’d be like.

[00:56:59] You know after he’d been drinking you come down you know maybe want to have one of those conversations with me and he’d be like oh well you probably should go to bed but thanks for clean that or it only he really wouldn’t know what to say because he was like I mean Nana how had something of the mind you want to talk about well because I was cleaning.

[00:57:18] He was like okay with that. It was it was weird. And um so but that the that instance I had with him I think was definitely the turning point of me not wanting to live there with them anymore.

[00:57:36] I was 17 when it happened or 16 eternal almost 17.

[00:57:40] And so because the boy that I had you know was crazy about didn’t feel that way about me anymore. And I couldn’t date anybody else at the Kingdom Hall. It wasn’t like I was boy crazy but I felt like. If I hung out with a boy that would mean that he was my boyfriend because he would have to be a chaperone. And it’s like no I just get along with boys better. I have a more I guess tomboy thing about me am I was into sports and doing like playing games and video games and I was really nerdy and all.

[00:58:17] So I started to get super depressed because I felt like I didn’t fit in anywhere anymore.

[00:58:25] And a lot of the girls stopped. I think liking me at the Kingdom Hall because the boys liked me. I don’t want to sound super conceited because I don’t really know how many of them actually liked me.

[00:58:36] But you can definitely see their ones like me kind of thing. I can see that yeah.

[00:58:42] And so then it was like I was distancing myself from the girls the kingdom.

[00:58:47] And then Michelle my really good friend went to high school together she graduated a year before me.

[00:58:53] So I was in high school for a whole year myself and she started going to the Kingdom Hall that was closer to her and not my kingdom home. So she started making friends with the other kingdom how she was going to hang out with them. So we were seeing you know each other and I just felt really alone. I got to a point where I would just call the guy that I had dated for that short period of time and call him in the middle of the night and I would just talk to him for hours and hours on end. And he wasn’t weird he wasn’t like turning like be my boyfriend he was just a really good friend and he would just talk to me and he would confess because he wasn’t baptized he was an unbaptized publisher so he confessed to me that he was drinking and he was glad I called Kaz’s that he could like I’ll lay some of his stuff on me and that I lay some of my stuff on hand. We were like kind of hate on everybody with each other.

[00:59:47] And so I had gotten Solal with it at home that I see.

[00:59:59] Now mind you at this point I’m trying to actually be friendlier towards the people that I was friends with prior in school because I’m there by myself without Michelle. So if I had to survive one way or another at home you to my friend Rachael again and she was very accepting. And then there was a boy at school that was showing interest in me and I didn’t let anybody in. I would sit next to my two girlfriends that I had there. Ian Lee boys Widlake would never talk to me and try and flirt with me and stuff and I was like NUPE like there was a wall there. You were not breaking through. I don’t care how charming you are. Carol silly you are. Anakin Olaf you I’m not going say things I’m not supposed to. So but I’m getting close to my friends in school and I start like breaking down my my barriers towards other people at school and my home life was so terrible. I would sneak my stepmom’s painkillers in me being super naïve about how this man works.

[01:01:03] I thought I’d overdosed only for Motrin itself. And this is over like I take it for extra strict prescriptions strict Molterer and I mean TMI put my stomach pumped I hope that I just died before the ambulance gets here like I was ready to just like it all.

[01:01:21] I I really seriously wanted to just die because I was so lonely at home. Yeah yeah. There you go. Alex Yeah and I would like I would sneak through alcohol at night my parents alcohol just a little bit you know just to try and like help me go to sleep and nothing really worked and then I called my friend Ratel and I told her I did. And she’s like no you’re going to be fine. You didn’t overdose like you’re gonna be fine. She’s like but I really hate that you are in that situation. Like how did you get to that point.

[01:01:59] You know so I was really confiding in her. And then one boy that was friends with all of us walked her like group.

[01:02:08] He was really showing an interest in me and so like I would hang out with him at school and we talked and then I you know I liked him and he like asking me out so late. Okey Asher towards us boyfriend girlfriend at school kind of thing because obviously I can’t hang out with you outside of school. But then I got really ballsy and because my bedroom was in the basement it was a walkout basement. He convinced you to sneak out in the middle of the night walk down my driveway and go through the words to where this truck was and he was at his house and we would hang out at his house for a couple of hours and he’d make sure that I got back home before 4:00 o’clock in the mornings that nobody would know that I was gone. So I would do this for like a month a couple times a week. I would sneak out and go to his house and because things obviously progressively were getting worse at home and I was trying to keep up facade with them but knowing that no I don’t want to be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore. I don’t want this split like I want to be able to do what I want to do and not be judged for or at least begin to judge me for doing something and I am going to do something bad you know because I was such a goody two shoe that like I’m gonna give you a reason to move you’re gonna accuse me of it I’m going to leave do it. Exactly. So that’s when he was a big he was really into smoking weed and so I tried that with him and I’m thinking what does it matter. My parents do it so they can get mad at me for doing it you know because they do it so I was motivated with them in there and um it was it was right after my 18th birthday I decided I’d done I need to have a reason to not be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore because my parents aren’t going to let me not be one. It’s certainly my stepmom mum and so I had sex with this boy and I went home and said it was because things happened so fast like it’s hard for me to remember exactly the timeline of it but I know that I told my dad.

[01:04:23] And sat on that I snuck out and was with Chris and I had sex with him and then I didn’t want to be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore and that they would have to disfellowshipped me because I had premarital sex. And you can’t say I can’t be a Jehovah’s Witness anymore because I did this bad thing.

[01:04:39] And I said I’m not going to the kingdom anymore I’m not studying and that I’m doing nothing. And I think my dad at that point because he was so good at bullying me he didn’t know what to do. He was dong Ratho on a day when you stand up you know and he didn’t know what to say. I mean he was speechless other than he said that he was. He threatened to sue Chris with statutory rape and I was like yeah yeah can’t because I’m 18. He’s like oh was it a birthday present. I’m like what. That was the dumbest thing to say. Is it a birthday present. So anyway he doesn’t really know I guess what to say. And my step mom was like I’m gonna take you to that kingdom hall and dragged by her hair. If you know whether you want to go or not I will drag you. And I was like okay whatever. So I waited in the car.

[01:05:37] At the kingdom home I had a couple of people which was super weird a couple of people that like I barely knew.

[01:05:45] I mean they were nice people but they came up to the car and the one girl I had hung out with her a couple times as she was like begging me not to do whatever it is that I was about to do. She just knew something was going to happen and she just felt the need to come out and talk to me because she just didn’t want me to do what I was going to do an arm like she would like. Confess the story about how she had a blood transfusion when she was a kid and she just remember how bad it was and how she feels like there’s the soul of an old man living in her because of the blood transfusion she had in mind. She felt free hand. And I’m like What does that have to do with anything like you don’t even know what’s going on and you’re out here begging me to do not do something. So I’m shooting back inside. And then an added meaning was over. I’m with Eric inside and my step mom obviously had talked to the elders and told them what happened in Salt Lake. That was my official meeting was that night and I went in and I talked to them and they you know they asked me what happened. I told them exactly what had happened. And I said in I don’t want to be a jobs witness anymore. And then one elder which is the older of the wife that Ron had studied with. You know I was really close with him and his wife and I felt bad because I did really like them and he just looked like he was heartbroken. I think that I was leaving because he didn’t like me so much and but at that point like I said I was pretty dead inside. Everything that had to do with anything with all that and so that night I was disfellowshipped and later that week because it had gotten so bad at my house there I skipped school in the middle class. I convinced Rachel to skip class with me. Not that I really had to convince her. She was like yeah let’s hit you shitless go. We drove to my house and I packed up all my stuff in her bedroom in her car and I left and I never went home. I like is that emancipated myself at 18 and just high school.

[01:07:59] So let me ask you how how was that home after you were disfellowshipped.

[01:08:06] It just was they were you know home. Has that had on. It wasn’t really that. I don’t think I waited very long to really see.

[01:08:18] What would happen. After I left I was just ready. I just I didn’t want to see them anymore. And it went to be a part of anything anymore. I literally think it was maybe two days after I this fellowship that I just left.

[01:08:29] You

[01:08:30] were just done with all of it. I was so done with everything. I don’t blame you. Yeah.

[01:08:36] And that is a ballsy move at 18 you know to like you said you know pretty much emancipate yourself. Where did you go.

[01:08:45] Well

[01:08:46] I wanted to stay with Rachel but her parents did not like my parents. And you can’t blame them but they didn’t really want that kind of drama in their house. What I definitely didn’t blame them for. So Rachel’s like as much as you are my friend and I want to help you. You can’t stay here. I’m like look at us. It’s fine. But Chris the boy that I was dating he just lived at home with his dad and his dad worked nightshift and then like he went to schools that were sleeping. And as it was really all about. Me coming and staying like Chris kind of told the situation and his dad was like oh yeah that’s fine. So I dealt with Chris and I think that’s why my dad’s family thinks like I’m boy crazy. But it’s like there’s really the only Blaziken day.

[01:09:38] So get in where you fit in at that point.

[01:09:40] Exactly.

[01:09:42] So after that. Because obviously Tom is going to be on to this day. The thing I regret the most about that. Part about it was my little brother was 8 years old and had never gone home on the bus by himself.

[01:09:58] And like you know he’s eight years old but I guess at the time I thought he was so much more naive than he probably was. And you know like I said we grew up in a very rural area.

[01:10:10] So for him to like take the 35 minute bus ride home and not know where I’m at and I’m always there and then he has to like be home and then he’s home after school by himself at eight years old. Nobody’s there because everybody’s at work for hours on end you know like I felt really bad about that. That’s literally the only thing I felt bad about.

[01:10:33] Yeah. And that’s that’s that’s really sweet. But the reality is that he was your responsibility.

[01:10:42] Oh that means that he kind of was.

[01:10:45] Yeah yeah yeah I totally understand feeling like you abandoned him in that situation. Whether or not it was your responsibility or not. I’m sure you didn’t. Oh sure you it’s a shame you couldn’t have taken them with you.

[01:11:02] Yeah I know huge. Yeah. He and I do love my brother but him and I have never really meshed well. He he’s like a totally different person. He’s like an alien to me you like. We just don’t have anything in common.

[01:11:21] Oh yes.

[01:11:23] As you grow up and grow up differently.

[01:11:26] That’s where so you’re disfellowshipped you’re on your own now you you’re living with Chris and his family.

[01:11:39] Do you go ahead and complete high school and you do go to college or how’s life play out after that.

[01:11:47] So I had always wanted to be a beautician. And I think that that definitely like fell within the oh you could totally do that as a joke was witness because you have to go to school but it’s not for very long. So everybody was pretty supportive about me being a beautician and that’s what I thought I wanted to do. So I graduate high school. Nobody came. I was like Whatever that’s fine. My mom’s side of the family. I was like talking to more. And after I left I witan visited my grandmother and I called my mother and talked to her and told her what happened and she was so ecstatic that I wasn’t living there with my dad anymore and I had like broken free. From everything. So she came into town to visit me.

[01:12:37] She was living in Indianapolis at the time and so I graduated high school fine.

[01:12:46] And I wanted to go to be this school and this is where it gets like super weird because I’m really messed up. I’m doing a lot of drugs with Chris. I’m kind of like just living out this extremely rebellious and very irresponsible part of my life where I don’t know how to get a job I don’t know how you know the only job outside of doing chores for my parents or painting would in the summertime for my dad’s business was I. I was a when I was 14 15 14 or 15. My friend Michelle had gotten me a job at one of the resorts around there as a housekeeper for the summer cleaning. It was a you know as somebody who knows somebody can a job you know. So I had never gotten a job on my own I didn’t even know how to do anything like what I put on a resonating I’d never done anything. So it was really hard for me to get a job and really do anything to support myself. So Chris what kind of do my dad and step mom they can. I don’t know what it was that gave them kind of a change of heart. Maybe they were going through. I don’t know their own issues with things. After I had left. So we kind of started talking again. There was an instance I don’t really want to share and here because it’s extremely personal but it kind of threw my step back in my life. And so she would call me and see how I was doing. And so I told her you know I guess I want to be this school but I want to go to beauty school at this college. That’s an hour and a half away. And I can’t really afford the gas to go down there like I can’t get student loans to get me through the college. But like actually having the extra money because beauty school a 40 hour a week school is like a real job without getting paid. It’s like an internship. You know what you’re paying them. So to have a job outside of that is really hard when you don’t have reliable transportation or extra money to to drive all the way there. So she says well I want to help you with college. I still think you need to go to college. I still think you need to do something and I will help you with that. I’ll give you money. You know armed aside money to look happy with your Gasson you know through travels only be like 500 dollars a month to go toward that will be our contribution to you getting an education skills. Well that’s very sweet of you thank you. As leg but you do realize I’m not going to come back to the Kingdom Hall and she’s like Well you know that’s our only a stipulation. But as much as I want you to come back like I’ll still help you but you just need to think about it. Just pray about it. You know look whatever. And then my dad he’s like well what is Chris doing. Does he need a job. Because I need somebody. Who do you know who. Who needs to do this or that around the job. And you know like I could I could probably throw him some work if he needs some money to do whatever and sells yeah like I’ll ask him. And Chris was like yeah he wants to give me work I’ll do it. So he started working for my dad and then my dad had a conversation with me about well do you love him. You know you’ll never be accepted back or be able to come back to the Kingdom Hall or be a part of this family unless you’re married. You can’t just be living in sin so he’s like you really love him. I was like Well yeah I loved him. I didn’t really know whatever well think I love him and so I convincedF.K. convinced him to marry me and we got married.

[01:16:42] I was 19 and let it go well.

[01:16:49] Our marriage obviously fell apart within like six months. I was I divorced him when I was 20 but mostly because I had so many my own issues. But he did a lot of drugs at the time and I was like Yeah that was fine for a minute like I did that and my rebellious phase. But let’s let’s grow up here like I’m actually pretty responsible person. I can have my head on my shoulders and I want to kind of thing. And I was over it and he was not ready to be over that. And for me it was just kind of like I don’t really don’t want this these series of mistakes to be who I am in my real life kind of thing. So I left him and he was devastated because at that point I think that’s when he realized that he didn’t want to be with me even though we weren’t really the greatest couple. And I had gone to the Kingdom Hall a couple of times that we get married and just the looks that I got at that kingdom hall he had all houses like all this is not and no I can not do this. Especially the boy that I was in love with he was there and he was looking at me like Who are you.

[01:18:02] And I’m thinking to myself I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m doing. Is trying to please everyone you know.

[01:18:12] And I had made an offhand comment about my dad being an angel to one of his employees. It was supposed to be a joke. I said it in a joking way and I didn’t say it in a malicious way.

[01:18:29] Well they got back to him that I had said that and there must have been misconstrued the way I said it because after that Kristen how anymore work. Oh I’m not helping with college. You’re so disrespectful. You’re not even going to the Kingdom Hall you couldn’t even finish going to the meetings.

[01:18:44] You all in. So now stuck in of marriage. My parents have cut me off and the. You know Chris isn’t working anymore and I’m already in college. I’m making it to you know beauty school every day. And I found a girl that lived by me that I carpooled with and it just got so to the point where I didn’t have any money I couldn’t keep going to that school or had a drop out. And then you know I was like 4000 plus dollars in debt from taking out of school loans to get into a college that I didn’t even finish.

[01:19:21] And you know Christianize relationship was really rocky and falling apart. And so you know when I left him I just moved to Indianapolis my mom.

[01:19:34] And I stayed with her. But because all of her arised relationship was nonexistent for five years. And then all of a sudden we were thrown back together and she didn’t know how to. It was weird because like as a kid she wanted to be my friend not necessarily my mom. And then now that I’m an adult she want to be my mom and not my friend. You know so then she’s like trying to tell me how to live my life and I’m like girl I just left a place that was like this. You cannot tell me how to live my life now that I am 20 years old and yet I’m living with you. But Kaline like.

[01:20:14] So her nice relationship was very rocky for a really long time and I ended up.

[01:20:19] She helped me though get a job like she is really going to get me a job. She’s really good at making your résumé look good and she definitely helped me get in to that.

[01:20:30] I worked atJ.C. Penney here in Indianapolis and that’s actually where I met my current husband. He had him and I sold shoes together.

[01:20:38] So her.

[01:20:42] But yeah.

[01:20:46] That’s how that’s how that ended up.

[01:20:48] Well yeah that’s so. Have you ever have you ever talked to that.

[01:21:06] I think I know the answer to this is why I’m stumbling but have you ever talked to your witness out of your family anymore.

[01:21:14] My dad’s parents died and I was with my current husband. We were only together for maybe six months or so when I when my grandfather died and my gramma had already passed. And I was invited to the funeral at the Kingdom Hall. And I told Eric kind of my ethics my husband. I told him kind of like you know like about my past and everything and I said I want to go. I think this will be a good opportunity to try and you know mend things considering they reached out to me to tell me that grandpa died and I said but I’m going to warn you like this is going to be super awkward. I’m not going to stay with them we’re going to get a hotel room because I can’t stay with them. I can’t anything in it. We went we went up there got our hotel room and then we got a phone call like hey we’re having like all the families don’t get together here at the house. Please come. We would like for you guys to be here. And they said Okay so we go. And my dad. I mean he he loved his parents so much. He would do anything for them. He did a lot of things for them. And I think that’s why he felt like his kids should be that way towards him. I get it matter what our relationship was like you lived and breathed and died for your parents. That’s how he was with his parents.

[01:22:42] And you know so I went to their house he and my dad gave me a really big hug.

[01:22:50] He’s crying and everything like I’m really sad like I start crying you know. And then he takes his hand on the back of my head and yanks my head back by my hair and was like. I don’t even remember what it what he’s saying because I was so shocked that he did that. But basically he was like you need to straighten your life out and be a part of this family. Kind of thing. And I I I hit him on the chest and pushed him away and I was like See this is why or we don’t have a relationship. You are not allowed to touch me this way. You were not allowed to talk to me this way. This is why our relationship is so volatile and if you want a relationship with me we have to stop right here. Pretend not pretend that things didn’t happen but you did stuff. I did stuff. Let’s call it a day. Let’s start over. If you want a relationship with me you’re going to have to do that. And I think because of his parents death he was willing to accept that I guess. And so from then on we were we were pretty much okay. I mean once in a while we would have a text message between each other where we were like disagree on things and he would try and bully me into thinking a certain way or you know Hill me would make comments about how I was a dumb kid and I did this and that I made these mistakes. Don’t you wish you didn’t do that. And you know you realize when you’re older that your parents were right and.

[01:24:23] You know he would say things like that it’s like a very insecure person who constantly needs validation that he’s the big man on campus.

[01:24:34] Yes. Yes.

[01:24:35] And he I think because I wasn’t there he kind of transferred that aggression towards my brother. And so when I would visit them. And he would get upset about something my brother did something that made him mad like I had told you in our conversation before that I would like stand in the doorway you know like you’re I to be that somebody that sticks up for my little brother.

[01:25:00] We may not get along. We may not be close but I’m not gonna let you bully somebody on my watch like I’m not scared of you anymore. I proved that I could leave and I could not rely on you and I could stand up to you and he wouldn’t do it. Thing about it. So you know I tried to I would try and be there for him.

[01:25:20] Well then Eric and a few years later fastforward I got pregnant.

[01:25:28] We weren’t married. I was scared to get married again because of the stigma that not only my mom had for being married a few times. No religion to be like your mom. Well no I got married because I was pressured into it. My first marriage and it was a joke. So this next time I’m get married unless I know that this is for real and I want to be with this person and share life with them. So we get pregnant and we had our first kid in 2014 and late 2014. So in the summer of 2014 they were having the international convention.

[01:26:09] And I was like you know the smurf lives right.

[01:26:14] Yeah I think it was in Indianapolis lesbian never went through. And I was visiting my parents from Michigan so I was up in northern Michigan visiting them. And. At that point from the years that I had left to that point my parents lost their house was their business the farm the barn business and everybody else had to find somewhere to take their horses. My step mom had to get rid of a lot of her horses and board somewhere else. So my dad had bought a piece of property in a different part of town and he was going to build his own. You know the next house that they had they were going to build their own house with cash no mortgage so that if he was out of work like he had then that nobody could take your house away from them. So in the meantime key they stripped that property that they lived at before because my dad literally built everything on their property. So he’s like the bank owns the house but they don’t own this barn and they don’t know my shop and they don’t own the fence and they also he likes strip that place and took all the materials to this new place and built himself a pool barn. So they’re living out of this poll barn and I’m visiting them. I’m really pregnant. An elder from the congregation that my family originally went to when I was a little kid. So he’s a family friend. I’ve known him my entire life. I’m pregnant and I answer the door and he says Oh hi Sydney and I was like hi Gary. And he said well how are you doing. You know I was he’s an older so you can technically talk to me and I’m like I’m a girl and I’m pregnant with my first kid. We’re ever we’re just kind of being friendly. And I think mostly because we were fairly friends like I’ve known him my whole life. It wasn’t as like oh you’re a disfellowshipped person. I need to keep the strictly business right. So he’s like well I was here to talk to your dad but since you’re here how about I just let you know all about this little you know I’m just going to give him this pamphlet about the international convention you know and I’m just sitting there like Aha.

[01:28:35] Aha.

[01:28:37] And he said something to me that really started me down the path of this religion isB.S.

[01:28:48] Not only do I not want to be a part of it because my own personal reasons but this is obscene. He decided to make a comment about how we really go did this. I think you like it. I think it would help you come back to Jehovah because you’re having a little one now.

[01:29:05] You don’t want them to not make it was like Are you or effing kidding me.

[01:29:13] You will move in a room.

[01:29:16] And you’re going to tell me that because of my spirituality that God’s just going to destroy my kid and does not even give him a chance because of my spirituality. Well you know that this is my step mom. She she was like in the shower shoe throwing something where she couldn’t come to the door. Gary laughed. I was nice to him but I relayed the message to Penny. No sir. Mom and I said that’s not okay with me. Is that okay with you that you believe that that this religion believes that can you believe that she goes. Well.

[01:29:55] Oh I get Yeah. I mean I know that that’s like what they believe but they shouldn’t really know what to say. And I was like You’re seriously going to stand there and look at me and tell me that God is going to destroy my child and he’s not going to live because of a mistake I made.

[01:30:15] And she’s like Well it does say that the children pay for the sins of the father. I said yeah in the old testament but the new testament says that Jesus died for all of us. So that’s Nolan Boyd. She’s like well you. I’m going to get that she’s like I don’t really know. You know is really know what to say when you when you make a logical when you say something that is so logical and she knows that they don’t believe that or that they believe another way. She’s just like whatever.

[01:30:46] Like maybe I don’t really agree with that but she knows it looks really bad. What they actually believe looks pretty horrific but they know how it looks to the outside world so they have no problem mincing words to try to give off the optics that they want to give Ray.

[01:31:05] Well in my dad he was when he found out that I was pregnant he was real mad. I think mostly I mean I wasn’t married Eden he really really likes my husband or like my husband now. So I don’t think he was mad that I was pregnant with her when I was pregnant with. I think he was just mad that I was having a kid and I wasn’t married and my dad at the time I’m just he just never feels like I am a sufficient human being or something. So even though he loves his grandkids he hasn’t met the new one. And I mean he’s like crazy though about my older son and my daughter. So but every time I’ve gotten pregnant he just has it in mind you he doesn’t go to the Kingdom Hall and he’ll say I can’t believe you’re bringing another soul into this treacherous world. Ahmed is right around the corner and how could you be so cruel as to getting pregnant again and bring another beautiful soul into this.

[01:32:11] Also does. Oh I just it’s just such a cheerful outlook. No kidding.

[01:32:18] I mean it’s the way they see the world though.

[01:32:20] You know they think that it’s almost irresponsible to bring children into this world because it’s just going to be destroyed. And Usher kids watch your kids reach that age of accountability then even even if you were a witness that you can’t help them there and you have to stand on their own so you’re pretty pretty tough way of things. Everything from the daily life to you know any future prospects including your kids. And I’m sorry that you that guilt trip on you there at the door about your unborn child.

[01:33:00] Oh I was so mad that my step mom she knew better than the like trying to find. I mean she was just like yeah I know I don’t really know what to say about that because you’re not going to tell a pregnant woman that you agree with that man that 12 hour drive.

[01:33:19] So.

[01:33:20] So you have you clearly left those personal reasons and left the religion and like you said when that Elder is standing at the door and who’s trying to use this opportunity to shame you into going to coming back for the cult. What is it though like you know from there how did you start waking up you know mentally. Did you start looking into the religion more or what did you start doing that has kind of helped you from there.

[01:33:59] Well it makes me my parents you know like has shown in my story.

[01:34:07] They kind of did it. They were foot floppy as far as the shunning thing. You know they would shoot me if they felt like it was justified. But then their conscience would be getting in the way and wanting to reach out.

[01:34:21] Because like I said they really like my husband now they have grandkids and it’s kind of like oh well I can overlook certain things or I can not shun her as long as she is good enough. You know just so I can see my grandkids and things like that. And in it we went back and forth because if I posted a picture of us like dressed up for Halloween old then I’m not you know they’re not going attack me for a year and then you know then they’re going to talk to me or talk to me again because when I voice my opinions or my IM logical thinking you know they don’t really know what to say. I mean my step mom will agree with me on a lot of things that I have issues with. But at the end of the day she still thinks it’s the truth. She still thinks that I need to come back and you know now I have put a Kabah issue to the back and forth and I am I’m making them shun me because they want to for their religion. They don’t want to because of their humanity. But I’m not allowing them to go back and forth on it anymore. I walked them from contacting me and as hard as it is as sad as it is I think it’s better for me to not have that turmoil and I’m not going to put my kids in. That’s when I really wanted to get in too. Now why is this so bad. I know why it’s bad because of what I think but why is this so bad. And that’s when I started to really listen to shows like your show or Lady see and her husband that does their show the critical thinking show and you know just a lot of stuff I didn’t even know was going on like the two witness rule. And I mean there’s so much that I was like wow my story is like nothing in comparison to some of these people and what they’ve gone through in like I knew it wasn’t the truth. I knew it wasn’t a good religion. I felt as though it was a cult. I just never knew. I just never had the proof. You know and it really constituted as a cult until I researched it and I’m like oh yeah that’s exactly what it is. That’s this all of this is. Yeah.

[01:36:48] So when you grow up with that you know you don’t really have clear vision as to what it is. It’s interesting for me actually on a few of these interviews and then just on forums and things.

[01:37:02] It’s always fascinating for me to hear what the loved one of someone who is a witness says when they go to the meetings for the first time and so many times though apparently come out of a Keenum Hall and be like that’s messed up you know and you know for us that was just normal because it’s all we knew but apparently you know for people who have any amount of perspective on the outside who who go they can pretty quickly see what’s going on and so yeah it’s very tough and it takes somebody to kind of to kind of open your eyes or show you that when you’re finally starting to wake up because it’s really hard to get enough distance from it to see it for what it is anymore.

[01:37:57] Mary is there anything that you’d like people to know about the religion that you know is there anything you’ve learned about it in particular that you think people should know on the who have never been a witness before.

[01:38:16] Yeah they’re nice when they come to the door and I was nice to but I was naive you know and a lot of these people are just sheep and you know people say how bad this religion is and then they say Oh yeah but these people are so nice we yes they are nice and they’re probably very decent people but they don’t know what they’re doing.

[01:38:39] I mean they think they do but in their well-meaning people and so like don’t be super rude to them but at the same time just don’t even bother with hurt just just don’t.

[01:38:51] Yeah. It’s not though it’s the people that are horrible necessarily it’s the culture that they’re involved in this thing that’s bigger than them is.

[01:39:01] What about also know your group. Well to I just I get so.

[01:39:08] Frustrated with people who are not Jehovah’s Witnesses but they love people who are in so you say Okay but what about this and this and they get so brainwashed into thinking that if anybody says anything bad about that religion who then it’s that’s their problem. It’s not true. People are just making up lies. People who aren’t even Joves witnesses will say that and it bothers me because it’s like there’s always two sides to a story and the fact that you’re dismissing this other person’s story just because it shows a bad light on something that you don’t think is that bad is wrong and you need to listen to other people’s story because just because somebody on Yelp says that a restaurant is terrible doesn’t mean it is just as delicious doesn’t mean it is wrong and you are right.

[01:40:04] There’s no valid your religion is so personal. That’s it. It is a person’s individual faith their individual hope for salvation there. It helps them overcome their individual fears of death mortality the world around them it gives them some sense of control. When you start threatening that people tend to lash out personally because because it hurts. It’s something that emotionally fills something in them that they need to and you know to each his own whatever anyone wants to believe. That’s fine. The only problem is when you start hurting other people and you know unfortunately Jehovah’s Witnesses don’t have the greatest track record. As far as not hurting people or allowing some of the most vulnerable among them to be hurt. And it’s very sad. Does your. Do you think that your past still impacts you. You know just as a person.

[01:41:16] Oh for sure. I still have a really cause I’m lucky now. My husband works two jobs and he allows me to be a stay at home mom to our three children. I have a hard time being out in the real world and working. Like when I was selling shoes where I met him you know I came from being a total extrovert super butterfly in the Kingdom Hall to clamming back up and then when I had to get a real job here in Indianapolis it was like I didn’t know what to do and how to talk to people anymore. I didn’t know how to relate to the culture down here compared to the really sheltered really small predominantly white culture of northern Michigan like I had one black friend and he was half Irish and he was also is also gay and was the only black kid in our school. So I mean he was an anomaly in itself. It wasn’t like he was like other you know African-American people I’ve met.

[01:42:23] So which is funny to this day of him and I are actually still pretty good friends and we would have a lot of like religious discussions because before he came out as gay he his dad he was this you you went to a regular Christian church. But we would have a lot of meaningful conversations about church and things like that. And now he’s like I’m gay and I’m atheist.

[01:42:45] And if you don’t like it whatever and I’m like I’m not anything and if you don’t like it whatever. So I’m over that now to help him.

[01:42:57] Yeah yeah but it is it is it is hard to to come out of the religion and then try to try to live life from the normal world to some degree and you know find out where you fit in.

[01:43:13] Well in that feeling like you really have that.

[01:43:17] I think that’s the biggest thing is like you know we are Jehovah’s Witness you have this destination that you’re going to get to eventually and so you dislike live day by day as it. Whereas when you’re free of that you’re like you don’t even know where to begin. The possibilities of what you can do with your life or where you could go and you see a lot of times I feel like I have the want to do things but I don’t have the courage to take that leap to get out of my comfort zone that I have established now as a stay at home. You know or I don’t think was going to go back to college should do something. What on earth would that be like. I ended up going back to school and I actually have a beauty license I graduated from beauty school here in Indianapolis.

[01:44:04] But that was super hard for me also.

[01:44:08] So I’m like artist don’t even want to go down that road. My kids are in school my in get a job I’m just going to be one of those moms are just told all the kids everywhere they want to go and be at all of sports and do all the things I don’t even know what I want for myself. Right now I’m kind of living vicariously through my children even mothered you know 3 2 and 6 months so sofa role you know that.

[01:44:30] That is a great point though you know freedom while a great quality. It’s not. It always comes with certain prices and one of those is responsibility you know you’re responsible for your own life. Now you know you can’t just handed over to a Colts and say here you know you tell me what to do and you tell me when to do it and I’ll do it and then life will be OK. It’s it’s it’s scarier because now you know we have to make our own decisions we have to decide you know does this fit for me or does this not end. Because you and I and a lot of people listening have never had that opportunity really especially from our formative years it’s very difficult to suddenly be kind out there and be like well what do I want to do.

[01:45:25] I don’t know. I’ve never I’ve never been able to do what I wanted to do. So it’s really it’s not easy to quite figure out you know because we’ve done what other people wanted us to do for so long.

[01:45:37] Well and for me too as far as life skills went I think clean a house like nobody’s business.

[01:45:43] And I can say I want to move down toward a job.

[01:45:50] You’re not very far away from where I live. So I told her let me just go down there and do the interview he’s like leave me with three kids for that long.

[01:46:03] Yeah.

[01:46:03] We thought we’d end up hiring you anyway.

[01:46:06] Put it away too because I told I told my husband I’m so like quirky sometimes I have this obsession with watching on YouTube professional cleaning videos. Oh really.

[01:46:20] Oh yes. To watch professional carpet cleaning people go into these places like restaurants and the carpets nasty you like bring it back to life and I tell him I’m like I want to that’s so bad. Like something about that is so satisfying and he’s just like you are so weird.

[01:46:41] Well then I guess I’m weird so I don’t sit around watching the videos but I do yeah.

[01:46:49] You know there’s something satisfying taking something and making it shine again or you know restoring it in some way through the cleaning process.

[01:47:00] That’s funny. Maybe who knows maybe maybe in the future. That is something that you could pursue if you enjoy it. You know I mean there’s certainly nothing wrong with doing that.

[01:47:13] I told them I was like huggy never any women in these videos. I want to be the first woman in these videos professionally cleaning these carpets with these guys.

[01:47:23] So there really are.

[01:47:24] That’s interesting to me. I guess if I think about it yeah any time I’ve ever been around a carpet cleaner in apartments or houses or anything it’s always a man.

[01:47:36] Yeah that’s what you’re claiming.

[01:47:40] You know being a maid is predominantly like a woman’s.

[01:47:43] Oh yeah.

[01:47:44] Because I’m the first fashion show I’ve ever had and I clean houses and you know there’s I’ve run into issues in the past where women didn’t want me to clean in their house because they didn’t think I could clean because I was a man. So you know it’s funny. There’s all kinds of prejudgments about those types of things. Yeah. Yeah. There you go start your carpet cleaning business that would be awesome.

[01:48:14] Let’s find ideas that I can work for. So yeah well what are some things.

[01:48:25] Well let me ask you this I mean I guess you do have right now some distance between you and your family.

[01:48:35] And I don’t know if this has been an issue for you or not. Can’t matter if we’ve talked about it before.

[01:48:40] But sometimes it’s difficult when when X witnesses have kids sometimes they’re witness relatives will want to have something to do with them. But it’s really just to kind of get at the kids to try to teach because they want to save the kids they want to teach them you know the truth. And so at least with this distance you don’t have to worry about that right now but you know is there anything. If you had something you could say to your family if if they hear this and they were to to you know want to shut you off again. It sounds like they kind of do anyway. Is there anything you would want to say to them.

[01:49:33] Mostly that it breaks my heart that it’s my kids won’t see the good side of them that I know that they have that I’ve been able to experience occasionally with them. They’re better at sharing their. With everybody else but me.

[01:49:55] But I know it’s there and I know they’re genuine. I know that they love my kids and I’m very sad that they.

[01:50:06] They’re not going to have that with my kids because a lot of who I am. I think the the good qualities that I have come from my dad. I think that the good qualities he has. I I definitely got some of those and for them to not know who they are as a part of me makes me really sad but at the same time I’m firm on my children not being a part of that.

[01:50:41] I don’t want them to hurt the way I did. I don’t want them to not know what real love is. I don’t want their love for my children to be an additional home. I don’t think that that’s fair on a child especially a child. As an adult it’s whatever. You know people come and go in your life even your family. But as a child I don’t want them to know what that feels like. Maybe that’s sheltering and maybe that’s because of my own upbringing. I’m going to you know go maybe to extreme on that or people might think that that’s a little bit extreme but I I I very much feel that I don’t want my children to go through that. You know my husband didn’t go through that. And he’s a perfectly fine person. You know everything. He knows what we know what it’s like to have love and you know a lot of times they don’t think he understands or he he just really doesn’t know how to relate to me and a lot of things or how I feel but his family’s never done that to him so he is just okay with us not not being close with them because he doesn’t want our children to have to deal with that. So if anything I just want to tell them you know they may look at it like this is my fault but it’s not because I gave them the opportunity to be in their life.

[01:52:08] I just asked them to not pressure me in to anything and to not talk to me about that. No religion anymore.

[01:52:19] And me it doesn’t matter what I have said to other people what they have seen or heard me say to other people or on Facebook or whatever. You know if you wanted to be part of your grand kids life you could of. And you can’t put that we can’t put all of that on me.

[01:52:37] So that’s that’s one of the it’s always one of the saddest things to me is when not only do they shun the ex witness but they shun their kids or they’ll jerk their kids in and out you know that they’ll be there for the kids for a while and then suddenly they’re shining again or whatever. It’s just you would think that if you had a religion and you claimed Jesus to be your Christ to be your exemplar a man who never shunned anyone a man who ate with the tax collectors and the centres a man that drew little kids to hell because he was so sincere. You would think that if you wanted to create something attractive to other people to try to draw them to a religion that you would do so with love and that you would do so with positivity and not fear and shame and guilt and shunning and all this stuff. And it’s it’s so sad that kids get caught in the crossfire of something. You know what did they do they didn’t do anything. And ultimately in the end it’s your parents that are deciding to treat you a certain way. It’s their fault. Jehovah’s Witnesses like to they are so masterful victim shaming or victim blaming they’re so masterful at saying Well you didn’t follow this prescribed course that I set up for you unfairly so therefore because you decided to be you and not be a copy of me and you decided to go your own way. Well therefore you’re a bad person and you have destroyed the family. No because it was an unfair and unrealistic expectation from day one that you conform to something that was their choice and their decision. They got to make that choice. Why don’t you. And it’s it’s just such an unfair thing to put upon people.

[01:55:00] And they like it they like to put that on me though that it was my choice because I got baptized.

[01:55:05] And it’s you know what’s funny is I’m going to speak to your parents or step mom and dad right now. They didn’t get baptized as kids.

[01:55:19] Yeah I don’t really know. No it’s like yeah they don’t know they they were able for whatever reason to skirt that.

[01:55:27] But as kids there’s tremendous pressure to get baptized. And if nothing else I don’t care. What it is. How many things do you hold. So how old were you when you got baptized. Let me ask you.

[01:55:46] I was 16.

[01:55:47] Sixty. How many things do you hold a 16 year old to for the rest of their life.

[01:55:53] How many of the decisions that a person that is 16 years old they make are therefore reflective of an honest decision not undue influence where a person is only ever had really one choice but an honest and true decision to make for the rest of their lives you’re 16 you’re just learning how to drive you can’t get married you can’t drink alcohol.

[01:56:21] Jesus didn’t get baptized till he was 30 and he was the perfect son of God if you believe in the Bible so you know I’ve never understood how they can hold kids to decisions for the rest of their life.

[01:56:35] And do so so callously you know with just this cavalier attitude of well you made the decision you were you were 16. Come on. Like it’s it’s so it’s so unfair it was one thing that I remember in my own story with my brother who is shunned I remember asking my mom one time like how or why are we supposed to shun him for something he did when he was like 13 14 years old whatever it was like it never made sense to me that you could.

[01:57:13] That this kid who grew up with kind of only knowing one way or in a family where there was a lot of pressure or in every kingdom hall there’s pressure put on the children to conform to to their peer pressure to keep up with their friends. If you’re not baptized by a certain age people look down on you and talk about you and the Keenum all holidays they keep their kids away from you.

[01:57:39] How that was the main reason why I felt the pressure was the other younger kids in the hall.

[01:57:45] Yeah yeah. You see them doing it and you gotta keep up and if you don’t you know there’s gonna be consequences. So they’ll even tell you from the platform that you know they’ll talk about the age of accountability and how you know once basically you can think and reason for yourself if you don’t get baptized then God Jehovah is going to hold you responsible anyway so you might as well where I saw him like oh well so-and-so is only an unbaptized publisher just after his publisher you know to be a part of a higher class or something like he’s almost humor like you have yeah.

[01:58:31] Like once you get baptized now you’re a real person and you know I just don’t I don’t understand. I mean I do understand I can intellectualize it but emotionally it’s very hard for me to understand how you can have a baby. You’re it’s one of the most exciting moments in a person’s life I can look back at pictures of my own mom and dad you know holding me as a baby and they were so excited that they got a little baby book and they you know stamp your feet and they put it in the baby book or your fingerprint or whatever.

[01:59:08] All these things and then and then you know you’re excited for that baby’s first steps and you’re excited for all the moments that you’re going to have with that child and then because that child does not take one path that you tried to set them mine you throw them away like garbage.

[01:59:33] It’s me as a parent now I cannot fathom that really I don’t think there’s anything any of my children could do. Later on that would justify in my mind me treating them the way I’ve been treated.

[01:59:52] There’s there’s no there’s nothing.

[01:59:55] It’s just unfathomable. It really is. I really is. I think I mentioned it on on my I’ve mentioned it before somewhere in a podcast but I remember there was this. So hopefully I’m not boring people but there’s a scripture in proverbs. I think it is that that in Jehovah’s Witnesses the New World Translation The Scriptures essentially says to train up a boy in the way in which he should walk and he will not turn aside from it. Yes. And it sounds like here is the way in which you should walk. I’m going to train you to go down this prescribed path and you know you’re going to do that. But in other versions another translation’s it says to train up a boy in the way in which he is bent and he will travel that path. But the difference is it’s in the way in which he is a bit find out who that child is when you have a child you know you’re curious as to who that child is going to be what will they become what will their personality be like. It’s not oh look here’s a little mini me a little robot a little automaton let me program him and he will do this one thing and then if he doesn’t well then you know forget him. You know it’s just it’s just does.

[02:01:13] It’s so inhuman and it really wish that we’re true then everybody in everybody’s family would all be the exact same right. But they’re not. So they’re obviously born with their own personality as much as you try and makes. A person be who you want them to be.

[02:01:33] Or treating a child in to doing one specific thing while it’s up to them whether they’re going to do it or not and yeah whatever happened to the free will that Jehovah’s witnesses talk about Jehovah giving us it gave us free will and he lets us exercise it then who are you to come between me and Jehovah and my free will to decide whether or not good enough to to even say hi to in a store you know.

[02:02:07] Oh yeah.

[02:02:08] Oh my gosh to this I was I wasn’t there mentioned this earlier but I had one of the lessons I had gone to visit my parents.

[02:02:17] There was a man in his daughter whom I shared a hotel room with because my step mom couldn’t go with me to an assembly in southern Michigan so I went with them like just their family and share a room with them. And I’ve known them since birth.

[02:02:37] Like my real mother was friends with this man’s wife and he saw me walking up the path to my parents house and he was walking out of my parents house in him and his daughter who was like 12 literally look the other way the whole time I walked past them and then looked back like he put his hand up to make shade his face thinking I know you know me my whole life.

[02:03:07] You and I shared a hotel room together with your family and you’re going to play pretend like you’re looking at me is going to burn your face.

[02:03:17] How is this all a me. And I told my stepmom when I walked into the house. Can you believe that he did that to me and she’s like Well I think that these things are not supposed to end. You know she’s like What. Why that also is why I’m going to tell your dad and he’s going to say something to him.

[02:03:35] No. What is he conceded that guy Edwards couldn’t change anything. I don’t care. I’m just irritated that he had to go so far.

[02:03:43] As to block his face literally throwing a shoe that he literally threw shirt at you. Yes.

[02:03:53] So childish. You know it’s just it’s sad what the religion seems to devolve humans in to these petulant children who throw fits. Is this really sad.

[02:04:08] Well when I when I was thinking the whole time to is what did I do to you. No I did nothing to you. I am still that same person that you knew.

[02:04:20] For either what I did to leave what I did to be this fellowship had nothing to do with anybody else other than I made that decision.

[02:04:33] And yeah maybe I was disfellowshipped but how does that really affect you personally for you to think you can treat it that way.

[02:04:41] Well I mean that’s one of the things that that makes it Koltai you know. Yes you know.

[02:04:48] Well so let’s let’s in this on a more positive note.

[02:04:54] Yes. You’ve got this new life you’re free you’ve got three kids right. Yes yes. And they are adorable. I’ve seen them on Facebook. So you know what do you enjoy about this new life that you’ve got so far in India what are your dreams for the future what are you what are your hopes.

[02:05:20] My favorite thing I think about being in this new life not have I mean of course I say I’m affected by it otherwise I would be on your show you know. But in I just feel like I’m so happy that my kids don’t have to deal with that own. I will take on anything to prevent them from going through something and then to see them be as happy as they are like with my husband’s family or my mother or people in my mother’s family. And I’m creating bonds with those people and just in the back of my mind I feel like even if I’m not super close to that person or I’m not best friends with you know my husband’s sister or something.

[02:06:14] My kids get to build relations excuse me relationship with these people and their relationships not mine.

[02:06:23] I have no say over it. I have no idea. You can’t see that person anymore because you worry. You know we don’t like them anymore because you know they get to choose whom they love who they have a relationship with and build off of that. And just more people who love my kids and want to be in their lives. That really brings a lot of joy to me. Even just having relationships with my own kids because I don’t see them as little mini me or little mini Eric Seasonale they. Either my 6 month old has his own personality and just seeing them grow. It’s weird because I never wanted kids. I love me like that was like the first thing on my To Do list her was to have kids and then when I had I was just like oh my gosh in the womb my husband didn’t want to have more than two. I was a little upset. We ended up having three and I was like OK we can like that’s enough. We can’t necessarily afford to just keep having kids. You help sell an out. I love him. You know he Kim and I are so different now. We have a lot of things in common. We live very kind of separate lives like I said because I’m a stay at home mom and he is in the army. And then he’s also has a civilian job.

[02:07:56] He works a lot. And I’m so grateful for that. But I think that because we live very separate. When we come together it’s really good. We have a really good time. We share a lot of family time.

[02:08:11] And he actually might go on a nine month deployment next year to Kuwait. And.

[02:08:19] You know he came home and he’s like oh I didn’t want to make a decision without talking to you first. I mean I think a lot of times he doesn’t realize how like in-sync we are because he’s like well I just want to be sure like that if I did that you wouldn’t be mad at me. And I told him I said you signed up for the Army if they ask you to do that. You go do it because that’s what you signed up for. Like I’m supposed to support you 100 percent in whatever you do. And he’s like okay good cause like eyes like what an offer to do for sure. But I just want to make sure that we were okay. You know I never really had a relationship like that with another person so. I guess I just am loving our marriage and having our kids and we live very simple. You know we have a small house and I’m okay with that. You know I think being a Jehovah’s Witness they teach you to live very simple. And I kind of I I did like that about them you know to not be very materialistic. And we do live very simply. But I think we find a lot more joy in things not having to. I don’t know. We just we do.

[02:09:34] Don’t worry about a lot of other things that I feel like people with a lot of money can end up worrying about I guess it never leaves us trade. There are so many tradeoffs and low yes.

[02:09:50] And that’s as Atholl you know what. What you enjoy. It sounds like sounds like you’ve got really you’ve kind of got everything you want. You know you’re happy and I think that.

[02:10:03] You know in talking to my sister mom and dad they always say I hope you’re happy and I’m like Well I think you you know like I know you thought that it wouldn’t be possible or something or maybe I didn’t deserve to be happy but. So.

[02:10:21] Thanks. Now I think a lot of times a lot of times some of those comments honestly are reflective of their own unhappiness. Because it’s not it’s not. I don’t know. I can’t speak for all of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I can just say that I in enough congregations and pretty much everybody was depressed and unhappy. Though they claim to be differently. When you really get down to talking to them or you know someone many of them had to be medicated for depression and different things not you know there’s nothing wrong with that. But when you claim to be the happiest people on earth. And everyone is kind of deeply unhappy at their core and searching for this using this religion as an escape. It’s just it’s not happy or healthy and you know here you are you leave you actually find happiness and you know what you thought you should have always had inside the organization is what you know by and large most of all the people that I’ve been talking to they find on the outside of whatever that organization was. It’s it’s sad to say that you know bad things.

[02:11:43] Don’t happen to people on the outside. There’s been a lot of things that have been like Roadmaster that I have gone through with. You know worldly people on the outside it in scary situations but. You know it can happen to anybody and it goes both ways.

[02:12:06] Right. That’s right.

[02:12:09] Yeah there’s good and bad on both sides. You know people are just people ultimately. But it’s a lot. I think it’s a lot easier to find happiness in freedom though there is more responsibility with it than there is in captivity.

[02:12:28] Yes for sure.

[02:12:30] Portière Well is there anything that you wanted to say that I didn’t get a chance to ask you you know or we skipped over.

[02:12:44] Well not really I would like to put a shout out there to a couple of people.

[02:12:52] You know the girl Michel that I talked about she was disfellowshipped a couple years after me and her and I reconnected and are friends again were real you know. Oh yeah she is really cool person she is. I keep telling her she needs to listen to your show.

[02:13:09] I think it’s really triggering for her though because like I said like all a lot of her family is still and even her brother in law had become an elder and at a public event told her she needed to leave because she was making everyone uncomfortable in a public event. It was like a festival like out outdoor that’s the vote for the town and he told her she needed to leave because he she was making everyone uncomfortable.

[02:13:40] I’m like girl you’ve got to find an outlet.

[02:13:44] They think she struggles with stuff sometimes two things in front of a big thing for a lot of us is taking your power back.

[02:13:53] Yes. You know what.

[02:13:56] But look you know shout out to Michelle for getting out here being free.

[02:14:03] There’s that there’s a couple of young people that were in the Kingdom Hall that have had later found out have left them not necessarily good friends with them after the fact because we didn’t really have a lot in common in it other than we were in it in the same age type thing but it kind of gives me hope for them. You know because when you’re in it for a long time when you’re an adult and you leave it sucks cause you feel like oh I wasted a lot of my life. But at the same time what could I have done differently for you know my kids or my grandkids or whatever. And these young people that are leaving I feel like it. It warms my heart a little bit because I feel like they have a chance to make their generation and the next generation different.

[02:14:52] You know that’s beautiful. I am always encouraged when I see young people come out. I have a member of a forum and I see people come out come onto the forum who are like 12 13 years old who can already see that it’s it’s bullshit.

[02:15:18] You know and I’m like oh man I wish it was over 13 I could have seen that and wasted decades of my life in it.

[02:15:26] And it’s funny how I just feel like you know those witnesses all when there’s world peace then you know the end is coming. And if they only know that technology was going to make it so that people would join their cult in the end.

[02:15:45] They have not protected that after the true religion that the Internet is going to follow.

[02:15:50] Now there are some people right now who are who are trippin because North Korea and South Korea are are having peaceful relations or whatever and so you know Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that when there’s going to be this cry of peace and security that the end is going to come and you know the funny thing is about that cry of peace and security is that originally at one point they thought that it was going to be that basically the world was going to be in such a bad state of affairs that people would be crying out for peace and security because they were hoping to have it and then Armageddon would come and Jehovah would usher in this new system of peace and security.

[02:16:35] And

[02:16:35] then they they kind of backpedaled and said Well you know we don’t know maybe it’ll be a time where it appears that mankind is on the brink of peace and security. And you can’t play it both ways. Like in other words. So when North and South Korea looked like they were going to be at war just a year ago you know Jehovah’s Witnesses said oh look you know things are getting tense over there the INS going to come. Now things are going better over there and it’s like oh peace and security here.

[02:17:10] I’m like no crying wolf either way. Right right.

[02:17:14] It’s

[02:17:14] always coming tomorrow. It’s been coming to morrow for over a century. Yes. Even before that you know 1914 if we’re going to start the beginning of that century they thought that’s when the end was coming.

[02:17:28] So

[02:17:28] let me think so too with all the world wars at that time.

[02:17:33] Right. They’ve just they’ve constantly changed. Yeah. Yeah. It’s this doesn’t it doesn’t fit. But anyway.

[02:17:43] Was

[02:17:43] there anyone else that you wanted to shout out.

[02:17:48] Now it is said that Michelle and I you know were we’re friends again. Like I said I’m not super close to anybody else on there and I’ve made some really really good friends.

[02:17:58] Now

[02:17:59] here in Indianapolis there they’ll say so they’ll sit there and they’ll like suffering through listening to my story isn’t. I appreciate that. I really feel like I found a couple of really really good friends here now in Indianapolis so I don’t feel as well feels lonely. You know it’s one thing to have a significant other but they can’t always fill every role for you. You know you kind of have to have other friends too and for a long time I did it. But now I feel like I do.

[02:18:30] So coming up through a past the first demographer make some more friends.

[02:18:34] Heck

[02:18:34] yeah I’m going to her it.

[02:18:36] It’ll

[02:18:37] be fun.

[02:18:37] Oh

[02:18:38] there’s quite a few people there last year. So

[02:18:42] what does I mean by WhatsApp.

[02:18:46] I

[02:18:46] say you’ll have to send me the invite saying go oh oh you’re not I don’t know if you knew the people or whatever. Ok yeah I’ll definitely some that to you. Yeah yeah.

[02:18:56] Offer

[02:18:57] that to make a note to do that.

[02:19:04] Yeah I’ll do that. I mean they invite hundreds and hundreds of people. I mean not everyone can come and they’re inviting people from a large geographical area. I think last year there was like maybe 30 people or something like that. But yeah I’ll send you the invitation.

[02:19:28] As

[02:19:29] always I want to thank Sydnee for being so open about her life and I’m really glad that she’s free and her kids never have to grow up in a cult. My wife and I look forward hopefully to going up where she lives and hanging out again sometime. Now I mentioned at the end there and in the intro there was an apostate fest. So the weekend of September the 8th and 9th I’m going to release an episode comprised of a bunch of many interviews that I did while I was at that Apostafest. They were originally going to be a bonus at the end of this episode but there’s enough good stuff there that I’m just going to go ahead and make it an episode of its own through it. You’re going to get to meet a bunch of people get to know their lives a little bit get some idea of who might be in an apostrophe fest if you ever have the opportunity to attend one sometime. All right now for the big announcement I started a Facebook group. I know there’s a ton of Jehovah’s Witness Facebook groups but this one is for fans and guests of the podcast. I don’t want it just to be that typical J-dub group where people keep up with the latest happenings in the cult. I want this to be for anyone that listens to the show and left any cults or religion. I guess you don’t even technically have to be a listener but I don’t know how you’re going to find out about it otherwise. But my goal is to make this a fun and supportive group. It’s about things that these stories are about people’s lives their feelings their what they want out of life. Trying to find that after leaving a call things like that. So I’ve already started one thread where people who were guests of the show can raise their hand and you can meet them. There’s another tribe where you can introduce yourself and write some of your own story to meet and to share with others. And then on the weekend my plan is to do what I’m calling an SCS thread or self care Saturday or Sunday where people can share something that they’re doing over the weekend for themselves.

[02:21:38] It’s not easy when you leave a cult to learn self care our whole lives typically revolved around the whims really of whatever call or group we were in. So you know maybe if you still struggle with self care maybe I’ll see what some other people are doing for themselves and get some ideas for yourself. So my point is that the goal is to make this a support group for all of us. The goal of this podcast isn’t just to focus on former Jehovah’s Witnesses. My goal is to help us all see that across these different cults or groups. We aren’t alone not only within our group but even outside our group we’re not alone. There are other people in this world that are going through or have gone through the same types of things.

[02:22:25] So we can all learn from one another whether we left the witnesses the FLDS the Mennonites or any other group the name of the group is Shunned Podcast. Two words and it’s a closed group so you’ll have to sign up and get approved to join by making it closed. Only members can see who’s in it. Now with that said I can’t control who gets in and verify who every person is. I can however kick out troublemakers with the quickness and if you’re super worried about being discovered. My suggestion would be to maybe create an account with a pseudonym and join that way. So come find us on Facebook at the group called shunned podcast and let’s do something good. I’ve already got several of the guests that have been on the show in there. Some listeners that saw my post on Facebook about it and it’s already fun to be honest so the more the merrier. Speaking of doing good between this podcast and This JW Life where I told my story we now have over 40000 total individual downloads. I never would have believed when I started thisJ.W. life that it would have grown like this. There are still people to this day that find an instar episode one of thisJ.W. a life lesson through that go through the whole this Jadaliyya life episode list and then come join us on shunned. You know I get really cool e-mails from people that have been helped to wake up by the podcasts people that are out but now know that they aren’t alone that they aren’t bad in some way and people that now understand that you know jata relative or friend and honestly you know some of these other groups. The Mennonites LDS whatever you know it’s people understanding you know what somebody else in another group went through. And by doing so they understand better what they went through themselves. I want to go ahead and take a moment and personally thank Sarah Kristen David and Lindy for signing up at Patreon.com/shunned to help support the show financially. They signed up just in the month of August. You can do so for as little as a dollar. And it really helps. You know right now I’m in the middle of doing extra episodes and with extra episodes comes extra costs. If I get these new these other ones transcribed that costs money as well as well as it takes more time. So again that’s Patry on dot com slash shunned if you’re interested in helping to support the show. I’m actually kicking around some ideas. I’ll probably start a thread in the group the Facebook group once we get a good sampling of people in there. I have so many people that are reaching out to me that want to sell their stories. At the present rate of one episode per month. I really can’t keep up with demand so I’m considering going to maybe two a month and I’m kind of trying it right now. As you can see here in August and September but you know there’s a there’s a limit to what I can do and work like I need to to make ends meet or at least like I do in our cleaning business. If I could do something like this and help people and take some pressure off cleaning financially I could spend more time doing this. We’re looking at options ourselves as far as cutting down some cleaning because frankly we’re running ourselves into the ground anyway just in that part of our life. So there you go. There’s part of self care right. Don’t run yourself into the ground in whatever business you have. I know that you know this podcast helps people I know that not only listeners are Hultz but people who get to tell their stories it helps to process your own stuff to kind of sit it down and maybe be able to walk away from it a little bit to get some perspective on it if nothing else. And I want to help as many other stories as possible but the reality is that there is only so many hours in a day and so much energy I can give mentally and emotionally to the interviews and production.

[02:26:41] This past month I did try to do an interview every weekend and I enjoyed doing it but it does take something from you mentally and emotionally to just frankly just to interview anyone but you know some of our stories are are pretty harsh. And you know I’m not immune to the impacts of listening to these stories and digging them out and bringing them out. So you know I’d like to be able to do more and I’m working on that as a potential option. Again I’ll post in the Facebook group Shawn podcast and and we’ll kind of have a discussion about what people want. You know I don’t know if my listeners are are interested in more content or if what I’m doing right now is enough more than enough for people to try to keep up with. You know I want to know what you want and try to I. I want to do all these myself. So don’t don’t think you’re saving me from myself by saying you know 1 a month is good enough for me and I can barely keep up as it is. If that’s true that’s fine. But if you would like more of these let me know and it is my desire to help everybody but at the same time obviously I realize that I can’t.

[02:28:12] So anyway trying to strike that balance there is what I’m looking for. And so I’m open to input their if you’d like to leave a comment for Sydney. You can do so at show podcasts dot com on the episodes page. And in a new Facebook group I think I’m going to put a post up every time I release an episode and you can also leave comments there of support or questions or whatever. For the people who who did the podcast and then if they’re a member of the group they can actually respond to their you can also support the by leaving a five star review on iTunes. There’s a link right in the description that is probably available on your app where you can do so. You can get all the information you need in the description on my site or from your podcast app. Follow us on Twitter Instagram or YouTube. As Sean podcast one word I even just put out on in person a video a vodcast on YouTube that you might like. The song that Sydney chose to represent her journey is playing God by Perry more and there’s a link in the description to the song if you’d like to listen or watch the video. It’s my bad. I’ve been neglecting to mention people’s songs. Trying to remember what all the put in the intro was an outgrowth of these episodes so you can go to shun podcasts dot com and see the songs chosen by each participant. The music for the podcast is about Fair Voyeur and titled No hell yet and until next week love others do no harm and go be happy.

Jason is shunned by Jehovah’s Witnesses.mp3

[00:00:41] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose religions that use shunning as a tool to control people. I told you that I had some bonus episodes coming out. And this is the first I was able to interview JASON TOWNSEND And when I set up the interview I didn’t even know that he had a book coming out at the same time. So it was kind of a surprise to me and I wanted to get this one out to go ahead and consult coincide with the book release. So let’s go ahead learn a little bit about Jason and then I’ll tell you more about his book After the interview. My name’s Jason Townsend I’m 34 years old. I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I’m shunned. All right Jason so then how did you come to be a witness in the first place. I was born into it. My dad is an elder in Lancaster Pennsylvania. It’s kind of where near where jackass is filmed. We lived in Amish country. So religion marries as thick as molasses. Yes I thought we were normal compared to the Amish. Not really. Yeah that’s interesting. I assume you ran into a lot of Amish people when you were out in your door to door ministry work. Yeah yeah. We would actually try to you know speak to the Amish. They were they were never very responsive. I don’t think it was back. I don’t think there was ever an person that had even come to a meeting. But we tried anyway.

[00:02:11] Yeah that’s interesting I was you know we never had anything quite like that in our territory. I always wonder you know how people fare when they’re trying to talk to people that you know have such staunch religious beliefs in their own community and all that that’s so insular. I always wondered how how witnesses would fare trying to get anybody out of that charge to offer them electricity. Yeah. Yeah yeah. They’re so certain in their ways it’s but then you know I think the Jehovah’s Witnesses are exactly the same as the Amish. So it’s both very stubborn. And basically when you approach the Amish they make a lot of time just pretend they don’t speak English. Oh really. Yeah that’s that’s actually a trick that maybe a lot of people out there listening might want to come to their door. You understand the little German that you can yell YEAH YOU. All right so then so you know that’s an interesting place to be raised as a witness so you know how did your how did your parents come to be witnesses you mentioned your dad was an elder. You know how far does this go back in your family. OK. Ellen my great grandfather Max he was actually a Swiss inventor in Zurich Switzerland and he had a son who went in to World War Two. He got he came back with PTSD really bad. So when he answered the door he was ready. He needed something. He was suffering from everything he had seen in World War 2. So he was an easy convert to the Jehovah’s Witnesses. So consequently my mom was born into it. My dad’s mom.

[00:04:10] She answered the door and she had an abusive husband. Yeah. My grandpa was was nuts. He joined up so like my grandmother she needed something really bad his her home life wasn’t. So she joined up and then consequently my dad who is the oldest of eight. He was he was Jehovah’s Witness since he was about like 13 I think and he really took a liking to that. So my time trickled down to me. That’s all I knew from birth to very staunch parents and where your grandparents still in their religion and around at that time or if you had that extra influence. What’s kind of weird is yeah I know my grandfather on my dad’s side the one who was an alcoholic cause he died young. I mean I think I was like 10 so pretty much all of my influences were heavy Jehovah’s Witnesses my mom my mom’s dad he ended up being an elder and they were all pretty hardcore that include like do you have like cousins and uncles and aunts that were in the in the quote truth you know back then as well. Yeah yeah. The only ones I was allowed to know were Jehovah’s Witnesses. I like it said my dad my dad’s. He’s one of the eight. So there is actually he has several brothers I hardly know. Even though I see them I’ve seen them around when I go to my grandmother’s house. They have like a giant mechanic’s garage in Pennsylvania and it’s a pretty popular place. And they all work there except for my dad.

[00:06:11] So it was just weird when I visit my grandma I’d see them walking around and you know my parents be like you know don’t talk to them. The most friendly uncle they would walk around look like a friendly guy wanted to talk to. He had gotten a divorce. So he was like the devil and I was allowed to talk to him which can suck. So I wrote about half of my aunts uncles and cousins that I don’t know because they weren’t Jehovah’s Witnesses. Yeah. It’s amazing how that works and how isolated you end up even in your own family. So then you know you you do have quite a few people surrounding you still you know even though there are others who you’re not allowed to talk to who are witnesses what what did it mean to you back then you know as a young person being raised in the religion. Was it something you love there or did you kind of feel strange about it all. Yeah. I was I was a really curious kid like a curiosity. It’s got me into trouble and it’s also the thing that has led me to learn everything I know. And I was a little kid I was a eager little kid who just loved people and I love being part of something. And I was I was into it. You know I wanted to be the best witness when I was a kid. Yeah. Did you. Did you have siblings or were you the oldest known the middle child. I have. Yeah I have an older brother who’s like 14 years older me who I actually didn’t know he had gotten kicked out when I was like.

[00:07:55] As soon as he turned 18 he went to senior week and that was the last straw for my parents and I just remember a fistfight in the doorway. I didn’t see my brother again for me. I basically still don’t know him. And I have. And I have a little sister who’s 2 years younger than me. And slowly but surely my parents are pretty much kicked out or pretty much everyone their kids. So yeah they there they have a way of driving people away. So then you’re you’re wanting to be this uber Dubb you know here you’re wanting to do this you can be. What was the way you know how did you see the world then you know growing up. I was terrified of it. They basically had me trained to hear the word world as a curse word. You know the world is a scary place. You know they kind of define the word worldly as like a slave to corruption an unbeliever outside of Jehovah’s one true religion the truth. So I came home from public school with news that I’d made a friend I’d immediately be corrected. You know my dad would say no you didn’t make a friend. You made an acquaintance. Yeah. So I had to keep conversations at school about school or use it as a preaching opportunity. Yeah. Your own private little territory as you. That’s like us sending us to school was infiltrating. Yeah yeah. We had a captive audience and they had to listen to us. Yeah man this is so miserable. It sucks. Yeah. So then how did you how did you fare.

[00:09:57] You know let’s let’s talk about school. How do you fare in school as a young witness. I was an outcast. I mean I loved actually being at school in elementary school. You know the holidays were still celebrated in public school and I guess it was early 90s late 80s and in elementary school. I’d go in at the beginning of the year and my mom would make this big Ziploc bag full of little snacks and she’d give it to the teacher. So during holiday parties pretty much any party they had. I wasn’t allowed to participate. And for one reason or another. So I was sent out to the hallway to eat my little snack alone during these parties. I didn’t salute the flag. I wasn’t really supposed to be too friendly or body up you know like we talked about any schoolmates. So it wasn’t hard enough I stuck out like a sore thumb and then sometimes the beginning of the year my mom would come into the class and explain why I was so weird to everyone which just made it even worse. Yeah. Then you go out ministry and sometimes you bump into one. So that was also fun. Wow I’m trying to think like the whole SMAC thing like I’m trying to think is that a kind thing she did and that you know she at least wanted you to be able to have something special. What are you sitting out in the hall or. Yeah. Is it kind of sad because you were deprived like maybe you could have sat in the hall but had some of the snacks that the other kids had. No.

[00:11:41] Yeah. Maybe maybe she looked at it like a cat and they want to touch that act out of you. You felt this way too. But yeah you know like I can’t actually even thought of the food as being evil like I would even take a bite of a birthday cake because it’s got Satan in it. Oh yeah. Yeah. You might go off and behead someone if you if you like of the birthday cake. Right. My mom was a really loving person. We had a as long as everyone felt like we had a very tight family. And yet I think she was really it was a gesture of love. Yeah yeah. It sounds like she was trying to to acknowledge your feelings and that you know at least if you’re gonna stay out in the hallway you know you should have something that makes you feel special. Yeah. That’s pretty cool. I was her special boy but like a lot of Jehovah’s Witnesses she was just clueless as to how that actually made me look in reality. Sure my back. Yeah yeah for sure. So then what about at home. You know how is your life at home. You know speaking of your mom and your dad your how is your life growing up as a child at home. Back at home we studied for church almost a year. The meetings almost constantly. And just a little bit for school. Secular Education was very secondary. We had material we had to study for meetings. There were three meetings per week.

[00:13:15] At that time at least one at least one day and field service as a bare minimum. So I was a really busy kid you know my dad was an elder. Even when we were studying for the meetings at home we had a really think about our answers to the material. It wasn’t just you know like yes or no we had to go in depth know because there’s this kind of competition you know at the meetings. There’s this whole like framework that exists in the Jehovah’s Witness system that other people don’t think about too much and that it goes into like how good your answers are at meetings you how people decide how good of a Jehovah’s Witness you are based on how deep you go into your answer. So so we we always try to be the best you know get the best answers. So it took a lot of study and I wanted to study for school. But we spent like 90 percent of our time studying religious materials so I was just constantly busy when I was at home. Yeah you know. Two things that you said that struck me and one is you said you had three meetings back then. But what I always found interesting and it just popped into my head. You know we would always say well the organization would always promote how awesome it was that they had five meetings a week because you know Thursday was technically even though it was one meeting you were going to it was broken up into two parts and they called those meetings Theocratic Ministry School. And the service made. Right.

[00:15:02] And then on Sunday you had the public meeting the public talk and the Watchtower study. And I thought Oh yeah it just struck me how you know I would always say we have three meetings a week. You just said we had three meetings a week. But the society the Watchtower Society would always say we have five meetings a week. And you can see how we can make it sound more psycho. Yeah yeah. You can see how even even the way that they count the number of meetings they have is to try to make it sound more than it does. It’s just it just struck me as you said that it was something I always wondered about when I was a kid. I was like why do we why do we say we have five meetings. I mean we go to the Keenum Hall three times a week. You know each time is a meeting. We are meeting each time we go. But somehow I guess they acted like we left and came back for the second part. It’s really weird like they don’t say we have. I just think for their regional conventions they call them now they don’t say like they’ll say we have three days of conventions but they don’t say we have like you know I don’t know how many parts individual parts there are at a convention. They don’t think we. We have four to eight conventions every week you know.

[00:16:20] You know I think one of the lawyers in Bethel came up with that kind of struck me as strange and then also just the fact that you were talking about how how at the meetings it wasn’t just because we were all we were all being judged on you know not just where are we paying attention but why are we commenting and raising our hands and participating. But then it even went a step farther like you said and it’s how good are your comments. Do you right. Do they show that you are fully like accepting the brainwashing and taking it within yourself so that you can say it in your own words and you have an even maybe go beyond what they’re saying. It’s just amazing how we were basically lauded for self brainwashing. Yeah. You know even though down to the way we dressed. Yes. You know the kids that that didn’t dress quite right. They were kind of assumed not to be very zealous wherever. So as an elder’s kid. Any any clue David anyone in the congregation that might be a bad influence I couldn’t even talk to. So I stuck out an extra Sawka so I’m guessing you had somewhere. So you know there were the brothers who wore the full suits you know with Mat pants and jacket. And then there were the brothers who wore the you know they would come in with khakis and a sport coat or whatever. And they were looked at differently than the brothers who wore the full suit that was matchy matchy. So you know. Yeah. You had to one up each other there too. I know I got involved in the. I can’t peacocks you know that’s the way you can express yourself as a young person.

[00:18:11] You’re you’re meeting cause you know you might dress like a golfer and ordinary life but they got you know the nicest suit and tie to wear a meeting. I wanted to be like one of the khaki kids. I kind of like get mired down. Yeah me too. But I had it. Yes. Oh yeah. If you’re going to give a part on a convention you have to wear a full suit you can’t wear the khakis and jacket. Oh you get booed off the stage. Yeah yeah. They won’t even let you up there if you if you’re not matchy like that. Yeah yeah. Definitely been there done that. Yeah I had a buy. I remember I was one time I was going to be on a convention and I didn’t own a suit. We were pretty poor. And I remember I had to go out and buy a suit so that I could give my PA on the convention because they wouldn’t let me up if yeah yeah didn’t look the best and it just shows so much of it is about appearance as we’ve been discussing already. So how did you feel you know in these in these different settings you know at home school and church or the Keenum Hall you know how I know you mentioned at school you know you felt somewhat like an outcast. But what about at home and in the Keenum Hall. What were your feelings as a kid. In the Kingdom Hall I was a really enthusiastic kid. I was eager to take on responsibility. I like to please so I wanted to be the most righteous kid in the whole congregation.

[00:19:48] So as an elders kid I was like a superpower and I actually alienated myself without knowing it to the kids in my own congregation. They were scared of my zeal or they were just jealous and they wanted outranked me. I was like a dumb little puppy. Add too much energy. I loved everyone but I got smacked on the nose most of the time from my dad. The other elders loved me. My dad always pushed me to do more. And frankly I think my energy just annoy the hell out of him. But my parents loved me in the years when I lapped up all the spiritual crap shoveled out me and I played by the rules at school. I did at his fellow Guardian belong there. But it was it was also the thing I was most curious about. Being at school and and just learning about the world it was like a giant elephant in our family room. I know a lot of energy and curiosity. And I was encouraged to farm the curiosity for the Jehovah’s Witnesses. But anything regarding world the world or school and I really love science and computers computers were just starting to become a thing. That was all that was stifled pretty heavily. Yes I can I can only imagine. I mean it sounds like your dad was pretty hardcore Yeah. He does. Borderline abusive sometimes so yeah. Preach they kind of raised us in the truth with an iron fist you know. So I mean you already mentioned something about your brother. Oh yeah. You know so you know it sounds like things were pretty heavy handed. Yeah yeah absolutely. I mean I still even I forgot.

[00:21:55] I forgot about just a few minutes. I actually know more about the guy down gas station than I do my brother. Well then how did how did things go. You know presumably you know I assume you got baptized at some point. How did things go as you started to get older and and you know go into your teenager years and young adulthood. Yeah. OK so at 12 I got baptized and I was working on being a ministerial servant auxiliary pioneer whenever I could. As I got into my teenage years and had puberty started here that’s when things got really difficult for me. So you know as a teen you feel more pressure to find your pack find your place to fit in. And I did. I didn’t have any good friends in the Jehovah’s Witnesses. You know because what I said before I said I was so hard core most kids were scared of me or I was allowed to have friends at school. And the older I got the more I wanted to be social. And I like to kids at school. I was curious about because I didn’t know much about them even though it’s shoulder to shoulder with them every day. So I would sneak friendships and of course I like girls. I like them a lot. It was almost weird how much I like girls that there is girls were like called a house and my mom would scream because you know we had recorded phone that was leashed to the wall.

[00:23:38] There was a few of them around the house and I were like brought home a cordless phone one time and hung it on the wall. Within like an hour my dad had taken it down thrown in the trash bin and put the cord one back up so we’d be left to the. Let’s hit it. Yeah. So anyway as soon as girls would call my mom we’d pick up and tell them you know this is not what we want for our son. Don’t call your. Which made it. I go back to school blowdown my neighbor my closest neighbour we lived out in the woods kind of in the middle of nowhere. But my closest neighbor was a Jehovah’s Witness. My parents had bought our acre of land from another job as a witness so that the path of least resistance would lead right to another job as witness front door. It was like a year old maybe we are gone through puberty together and we ordered a playboy and we got caught. He actually told on himself that ended up being this huge thing and the shame that everybody carry is where they fall on themselves. Oh yeah I mean and it turns out you know from me from just going through puberty you get to just some of things I put together later I it turns out he’s totally repressed homosexual. He’s still on the religion so he’s probably still not out the closet but I just feel bad for him he’s pretending to be somebody else and in my teenage years my parents were starting to catch me and punish me right left like every day for trying to sneak a look at girls or doing something you know going through the Sears catalog.

[00:25:15] Get the brass section and stuff it trying to talk to worldly kids and so they were tightening the leash. I mean I couldn’t do anything. Yeah I mean that the tighter they they they pull in that leash. I mean then the more any little thing that you do is going to be stimulating whether it’s you know seeing the bra section of the serious catalog and just trying to even look at a girl or whatever like yeah you know the more you you forbid something the more enticing it becomes oftentimes in life. And it sounds like wow they were they were just so tough on you. Yeah I have to ask you were you were baptized that’s 12. Why did you get baptized or what. If you think back you know did you feel pressure or did you. Were you just into it that much. Or you know kind of a do you know what was behind it I was find that interesting. Seemed like I got the pressure but I know I do remember just this little thing like when I went to get baptized my dad kind of gave the prerequisite of like you know we’re not pushing you to do this. But I mean everything my whole life I’m still this way anything I want to do I’m going to do balls into a wall and I just wanted to be you know one of the first kids in my peer group to get baptized in. At the time I really really believed it. And I got baptized for the right reasons. But like you said that the tighter they yanked the harder I pulled away. Yes.

[00:27:11] It goes back to that I think I talked about it in and podcast the state of your life but it goes back to that illustration. They would always use of the spring and how a child was like a spring in and you compressed this spring. And if you let go of the spring too fast then you know the child will just bounce everywhere and go wild. But if you slowly release the pressure on that spring you can control the direction that it goes. And my question which I’ve mentioned on the podcast was Why do you have to crush the spring in the first place right. Right. And that’s what they were doing to you they were absolutely crushing you from every angle it seems like. Yeah. That’s funny you said that. I wrote my book about it and I described it as as a rubber band. So like a scene you know I kind of snapped and I just fell right to the ground. And all this kinetic just wasted. Yeah yeah that that makes a lot of sense. I mean you know both illustrations are so accurate. You know I mean I can I can totally see you know that rubber band that holds so much energy. But you know you can only pull on it for so long before it’s going to break. Yeah and once it does it’s useless. I mean it’s just the first nothing much you can do at that you’ve you know broken broken it pretty badly. So so how did that go for you then.

[00:28:43] You know as far as you know being this rubber band let’s say and you know being having them pulling on you so tightly as you you know progressed in your young adulthood. How did things transpire. Yeah it was a pretty dramatic snap so I know like I said I was baptized when I was 12 and by the time I’ve been working since I was 15 just to get out the house I was starting to feel the byproduct of them encouraging me to study all the time was when I started to read about how about the other religions I forget which book it is now been out for almost 20 years but mankind’s search for God brother. There you go. Yeah. Well I didn’t understand was why I had to read their description of this religion. Yes. And yeah I started to kind of look outside I sneak to the library at school and I I start to fight to find loopholes in it. A lot of loopholes that I thought were there when I’m talking like 14 15 years old. They were just like a feeling it was just a bad feeling I had and I really loved everybody. And I just wanted to learn more about those things. So I guess I was working since I was 15 and I had a little bit of money saved up and I bought a car as soon as I turned 16. My parents didn’t know about it. I hid it in our woods. And I started kind of covertly dating this this Catholic girl at school. So yeah like at 16 shoot she was white. The first love of my life. And I’d sneak over there. They know it.

[00:30:41] They knew I had a job at a hardware store and they kind of they didn’t like it. They did not like that I had a job. I just kind of insisted on it. So my dad would follow me around town. I didn’t know it but he was he was talented and I got caught having dinner at the Catholic girls house. My dad he said he was following me around and he basically ripped me out of their house. I think he just walked right in and it was a huge thing like grab me by the back of a shirt. And they were all freaked out. And he’s like this is not work. This isn’t what I want for our son. You know you have no idea. He’s like you know he kind of tried to apologize a little bit like I know you guys on dad but he does. I mean this family is this Catholic family. I was at I mean to this day. They’re pretty much the model example of what a good family should look like an yeah. It didn’t make any sense to me that my dad was yanking me out of there. And pretty that’s pretty traumatic. Yeah awful. Well when somebody a worldly family had had saw that my my girlfriend’s family day they were like okay sometimes you’re right sometimes actually a little weird at your house and they kind of they kinda encouraged me a little bit to to leave. I guess around there they were very worried about me but they I think I took the reassurance that they thought it was weird.

[00:32:24] Pretty heavily and I took that car and hid in the woods and I left at 10 o’clock at night. I packed everything I had gathered my whole life since birth into a trash bag. I was pretty fit and I had this big try to sneak out of the house I had this big blow up with my dad. We were out. First time ever curst out him was in the front yard. He got in the car tried to chase me down and it was a huge thing aired but I got away. I had a sleep in my car for a while. I’m like 16 and I was bouncing around different kids houses who just thought he was crazy. What I was going through you know I stated some pretty shady bad places but I made sure I always went to school everyday. The school was the structure it needed. As a teenager were now without a family. Eventually that Catholic girl’s family they felt bad for my situation. And they took me in. So like at 16 17 I was living with my girlfriend and her Catholic family. And it was great man. If I felt so happy and relieved and excited to have Peligros finally normal and this weight had lifted off me and I was free and just run around still like a dumb puppy. But Dejour did your family like that they reach out to you. Did they try to either kindly reach out to you and encourage you to come back and show love. Or did they even like an authoritarian you know come at you with the you know you’re coming home type thing you know they did.

[00:34:11] Was there some way that they did they attempt to go after you at all. Yeah a little bit but. So when it first happened I think yeah there they were. We didn’t have cellphones back then. So they were trying to track me down and I actually I think I went back and it only lasted a day or two. Just having a little taste of freedom was like. I mean I went back for maybe like a day or two just out of being torn away from my family. And like what that felt like to go to sleep at night and I said No you’re your family. Is away from you. You know it was a very emotional thing. So I try to go back in and they treated my see they already already had my brother who went through this. So they can’t I had practice. They decided that it was best to treat this with like a jailer you know. And they were even more rigid and so when I went back it only lasted a day or two and I was like Screw this I’m out of here. And then they decided to be real assholes. When I left home and I’m sure you understand there’s this dynamic that when somebody leaves there they’re dangerous. MARTIN You know I was becoming worldly and my at that time I had just got my driver’s license and if you’re under 18 your parent can revoke the license so the only way I was getting school and work and stuff with my car. They my dad voluntarily revoked my driver’s license so even though I wasn’t living at home I never saw them.

[00:36:04] He just kind of like stock 1 2 million and revoke that license to make it harder for me to get around. Probably hoping that I crawl back home but I didn’t. I just drove anyway. Yeah that’s that’s pretty controlling. And I think that’s that’s kind of the theme here that you can see is so much here it really is just about control. Yeah I think that’s a point of religion in the first place but oh yeah yeah I agree. And then you know also you just see the the authoritarian nature of not only Jehovah’s Witnesses but you know even down to the micro level inside your own family. Your dad was just being an authoritarian instead of being a good loving father who you know because he could they could have taken you back in and said OK you know like you don’t want to live this life. I get it you know but how can we find a compromise or anything. But no it’s you know his way or you know their way or the highway. And they even revoke your license you can’t drive on the highway. Yeah just a little jab in the ribs Yeah yeah let’s make it harder for you to have any success in this in this life. So then how did it continue. I mean you know you’re living with this family and and clearly estranged from your own family. How did that play out as you know did you go on to college you know. How did it how did things end up there.

[00:37:48] Well I mean all of a sudden I was in the midst of puberty and I went from being the most reserved kid in high school to the most free overnight. I was like the only kid in high school who moved out of their parents house so you know I had a I had an opportunity to really try to make up for lost time. And I did. I went to parties work where kids thought it was crazy to feed the Jehovah’s Witness kid who mom whose mom used to come in and preached her from fear and drugs and might put my girlfriend’s mom over there were really good parents they stepped in where my Jehovah’s Witness parents let go. And they tried their best to finish raising me. But like you was a rubber band and I was I had a taste and I just wanted to see everything I was kept away from. And she did help me get a full scholarship to college. She just wrote a story about how I survived that story essay she wrote an essay about how I survived high school and I actually got a full ride to a college over it. But they were they were from New York City and we ended up having a rough situation when I was living with them and I ended up staying my senior summer after graduation. I left Amish country and I went up to New York. And I loved it there. You know life is like Johnny 5 and short circuits just needed input. You know add up your lot input.

[00:39:33] I got a job that summer I made friends at Friendly’s Ice Cream and these really genuine friends who didn’t know how I grew up they just I was just a kid from Pennsylvania who showed up and that summer was great and I had to go back to college for that fall right. And that whole ride lasted about three weeks before I screwed it up and I got caught by a security guard drinking beer and I had a girl in my room and they actually called the cops on me. So I fled Pennsylvania went back to New York kind of like how I left my parents in the middle of the night running away. And I never went back to Pennsylvania again. So then how did things shake out with that family. Were they. I’m sure they had some input. You know they had they had helped you get this scholarship and oh yeah they came up to New York and tracked me down in a chair to try to get me to come back to Pennsylvania. They were actually pretty upset but I just made friends and I loved it. New York I wanted so bad. Keep learning about this world that I haven’t done anything else. And by some terrible stroke of luck. When I moved to New York just completely by accident I met this group of Jehovah’s Witness runaways. I mean they were like the lost boys in New York. And is this a new york city or you New York State. This is Long Island. I’m like Queens Nassau County town full Levittown. They were up here and they all left and they were really really into drugs and yeah I start. And I kind of just fresh off the boat here. And I tried everything out.

[00:41:36] It wasn’t just we but like hard stuff like Coke ecstasy mushrooms. I mean they were growing mushrooms. Oh beards everything. So one of my first drug experiences was I had a really bad trip where I decide to sniff ecstasy in each room. This is the first time I did it. I just yeah I said everything I did I did bottles of water. I’d go all out there right. Yeah yeah. It turns out they weren’t just doing that stuff they were selling it. And I mean not just little dime back there were weight. And there was pretty much the worst situation I could get into. And I tried everything. I got my input like I had girlfriends. I partied all the time. Actually I ended up in jail. I crashed my car went through the windshield took a swing and a car ended up overdosing on ecstasy. Really bad. She almost always drew my face. But I did have a little survival instinct just from that short time of being on the streets during high school and I had a taste of homelessness and I just want to make sure that was it me. So I kept a good job no matter how hard I partied. I always made sure I went to my job. I worked for a major insurance company that I purposely took midships so that I could party all night long and I have to wake up early to go to work. But it was a. It’s been raised an obvious country. Give me a little bit of a work ethic. Or is just being terrified of being a fish out of water.

[00:43:09] I just made it was the only thing I had. It was a priority but I ended up in rehab that my job it had paid for. There was a good company and I met this guy in rehab who had put it in my head. I got to move out to California. So I just packed up and moved to California and then ended up being a really bad situation. He was like a he was a really scary person. And as soon as we got here to California I ran out of a motel in the morning and I left everything behind in that high school diploma and worked for all my clothes everything and I moved in with this girl I met at a bar just the night before. There’s a first person I met in California call them up like this crazy thing just happened as a cop asleep on the couch. And I’ve been friends with them for four years. So did you move to California with that guy from New York. Yeah I got out of rehab in and rented a convertible from enterpriser leave the state with it and we drove that thing all 3000 miles to San Diego. Matt When I screw up I screw up big time. You know again this is how you do whenever you do something you do it whole hog. You know the whole Yeah it does. Just wanted to learn everything I could do it. Yeah I mean it was it was satisfying my curiosity I was learning a lot of things.

[00:44:42] But when you’re you know like in your young 20s you’re kind of oblivious to how what damage you’re dealing in and how off the rails you really are. You think you’re invincible. Yeah. So I looked down at him with this girl. Yeah yeah. Her roommate ended up being my best friend. We dated for a while. It didn’t work out. I dated a lot of different girls and then they were a really good influence so they came from affluent families. They were intelligent they graduated college and they said they were a good influence on me. I slowly got on my feet. I got away from the Jehovah’s Witness kids I’ve met in New York and kind of built a new group of friends here and and built them a little smarter this time around and had good influences around. I slowly got on my feet. So then as you’re you’re getting on your feet. What does that look like. Did you know you find gainful employment did you go back to school. No I didn’t go back to school. I had I always I was on the court. To build community committee where we built kingdom halls. I really love construction. I like to work with my hands so for 15 years now I’ve been doing construction I was good at so I had a pretty good job doing construction electrical work. And I eventually met my wife when I was about 26 I met a flight attendant from Puerto Rico. We got married. Which was great. I got more input. I got to travel the world. She spoke six languages.

[00:46:51] She’s from Puerto Rico and got to travel the world get free drinks on the way in first class as a nonrevenue airline spouse. We’ve got to see Japan. Dublin went back to New York pretty much every weekend. But about a year or two into marriage we started thinking about kids and my 10 year high school reunion was coming up and I hadn’t seen my parents really in 12 13 years. And my dad was he was scary. He was an intimidating big guy when I left home and he said he enforced our pretty aggressively. But my parents actually now that I was married they figured I guess I was a little less scary so they invited my wife and I to stay with them from my high school reunion where I saw my dad at the airport is probably one of the most impactful things that I’ve ever seen today. He was completely unrecognizable to me. He was scary to my left and when I saw him again he was old and gray and walking with a limp I mean we didn’t we didn’t even really recognize each other. And like I hid there was like crying the whole way out of the car. My wife was curious about the story. That’s why I went back and it can be pretty horrible if she came from a Spanish culture where they had tight families and she just didn’t understand. So when she met my parents she understood. We woke up one morning I had the stroke of luck one at one of the fellow elders I think died the morning after the reunion.

[00:48:44] So we will go to my mother’s standing over top of us like scream and you know you carry you know you’re going to die you’re gonna miss out in paradise. And my wife left me pretty much only got home she realized this isn’t a good guy to have a family with. She realized I was serious. We got divorced that kind of sucks. I guess I didn’t see that coming. It’s alright yeah I have them all right. I mean and I understand the culture that she came from you know being totally different and and what a shock that must have been to wake up to your mom screaming like that. And that’s. Yeah. God is so wild to an outsider. Yeah just seeing it. I guess you figured I was being dramatic or something the whole time just didn’t register to think she knew only Jehovah’s Witnesses or anything like doesn’t matter at all. But what she actually saw that I think that hit home for the wasn’t a good situation to be in. Well she got out of it. So how do you first. I’m sorry. And second how to pick up the pieces of that. I mean how do you you know when you when you’re leaving get home and that happens. How do you. Clearly you just have to go on. But what what did you do next. What were your next steps.

[00:50:32] Well you see I also I also drank a lot because a erm I’d been torn away from my very young age and I always felt this like this kind of emptiness and I’m just pretty much always been scared so I would mask it with drugs and alcohol and I did that I don’t know when my wife left and I jumped in to a rebound situation pretty much even before I was divorced made his horrible decision. I moved out to Dallas for a while and what as a religious girl hit like a divorce situation like that again get into. And that ended up horribly because by then I was pretty much atheist and I developed this bad drinking problem. I was with her for a couple of years and I just realized I’m unhappy. And I was jumping from relationship to relationship. And I was expecting these girls to replace my entire family. And it’s not fair to them now. I put a lot of them on their shoulders and when I moved back out to San Diego I moved back with absolutely nothing. The relationship in Texas went horrible she took my truck. I came back with a backpack. I was thirty one I think by that time and I had absolutely nothing. I stayed on friends couches. I bought a boat and I lived in the Pacific. I’m on this boat. It’s pretty cool in San Diego. You could live for like MS a very expensive place but you can live on a boat for about five dollars a month. It includes your electricity hookup and your water. Add up I revisited something I used to do as a kid. I like to write. I love I’d write these little stories and pretend like I was somewhere else. Growing up in a different family and I’d make my old little books you know. And I’d read them and pretend I wasn’t this kid. So I just knew that I was I had a drinking problem.

[00:52:51] And for somebody who has curiosity and likes to try different things from me to do something repeatedly every day it makes no sense. So I pretty much realize this and almost overnight I stopped drinking. I was with everything bad that had gone wrong. I still ended up in a situation where I woke up every morning on the Pacific and looked out my front windshield and saw sailboats go on by and the military ships coming in and out past Cordaro island. I felt like I was still I didn’t have anything materially but I had gotten everything I wanted when I was when I was a a Jehovah’s Witness that I dreamed about you know I’ve been through all these circumstances I learned firsthand why not to do them. I mean when I heard all the people who had been through this and been through like hard situations where things just happened bam bam one after another is to right cause I floated on that bow and I wrote I just wrote down everything and happened and chronologically just went through it. And then when you have that as like one piece that you can look back on I was able to kind of put together the pieces and figure out you know the patterns I was making mistakes in. And yeah I was able to make some changes. Yeah Sunny. Yeah. It’s funny that you mention the patterns because I’ve just been sitting here as you’ve been talking listening. Last night my wife and I went to see Citizen Kane the old movie. Really. Yeah. We went to see it with some friends at a local theater.

[00:54:45] They were playing some old movies and Jimmy Wales Yeah yeah. Orson Welles yeah. Orson Welles Yeah yeah. And it was it was you know when when I left that movie I was like you know you could see this pattern of this kid that you know his his mom pretty much doesn’t seem to care about him a lot his mom and his dad and they just kind of send them off and he spends his entire life chasing love. His entire life trying to to force everyone else to love him the way he feels he needs to be loved to you know make up for the injury he had as a kid. And we as human beings tend to repeat certain patterns. There are things that happen to us when we were young and then we tend to go through life trying to fix those injuries from when we were kids. I mean I know that I’ve noticed that in myself and I did you know thisJ.W. life I told my whole story and I’ve noticed things in there about myself and I’m still noticing things and I was just sitting here you know after watching that movie last night I’m just sitting here listening to your story and saying how you know you had to run you know just pack up and run to leave a bad situation with your parents and just how you know over and over again you know you you get put in situations where you have to pack up and run. You know it’s it’s it’s it’s amazing how we play out these things in our lives. Yeah I actually ended up doing it. I mean I kind of paraphrased this but I counted up.

[00:56:27] I actually ended up packing up and running thirty eight times in five states. Wow. Yeah isn’t it. You know and it’s not it’s not something to look at a person and be like that’s not something to point out where a person is wrong or something. It’s just it’s it’s fascinating how we as humans internalize this stuff and we get hurt in some way and then it just manifests itself and we don’t even know we’re doing it. We are given these roles when we’re young sometimes and we will play them out. And that’s for everybody. And I think that what you said was so so good about you know sitting down and you know kind of writing out your life and I mean it helps from a processing perspective just to get it out of your head and then you get to see this whole picture and be like oh yeah you know this is that thing. Yeah oh yeah yeah. It’s we humans are amazing creatures. Yeah yeah it really is. I’m glad that you got to do that for yourself because I’m sure that it has helped to you can’t heal what you don’t see. All right. Right. Going through some of that now though. We all have you know yeah. I mean you know I’m saying that I don’t. I struggle to as a witness. I knew everybody and a lot of people knew me and I had like all these. I’ve always struggled with the concept of what is a friend. And so like I knew all these people but I never had any. There was no intimacy there.

[00:58:14] There was no real relationship. We just we knew each other and it was around common thing. You know being the religion and right now that I’m out I’m finding you know like I know all these people now you know and I have friends that do different things with or whatever and that’s great. But I find that you know a lot of them are honestly couple friends it’s things that my wife and I go do things with people but I’m kind of terrified of putting myself out there and being vulnerable and trying to have like a one on one friendship with somebody because I’ve just never never been taught how to do that or how to get close to people and things like that it’s not. You didn’t get close to anybody as a witness. They were probably going to be disfellowshipped or leave. You know in the distant future and then you would never be able to see them again. So why have a relationship with them. Right. And so you know we all have these patterns that we play out and you know these places where we have to we have this damage from the religion or from our families of origin in the religion because it all plays hand in hand and we all have to try to try to look at ourselves and think OK well you know this is a it’s not like if we weren’t born into Jehovah’s Witnesses we would somehow have these magical laws where everything was healthy but we do have special things that maybe we have to deal with. Right.

[00:59:48] Well we always would have been exposed to the to the real world that you have to live and work in. Altium Yeah. So many times you know people have a hard time making friendships once they leave. Yeah yeah it is. It is. It’s just hard to get close to people or you know like as a as a young witness. I’m here I’m spill my guts. Yeah. As a young witness you can’t get close to anybody like in school or anything like that because you’re not allowed to be friends with them. And then at the Kingdom Hall you’re not allowed to really be yourself because you’re having to put on this appearance that you’re the perfect witness and that you know you don’t like this song or that movie or whatever you say you can’t be yourself anymore. Right. And so you know then when you leave first you kind of have to find yourself and figure out who you even are. And then it’s terrifying to show that to other people like Will you accept me if I show you that I disagree with died or you know I like this other thing or whatever because you spend so long trying to be who everybody else wants you to be so that you can fit in in any you know somewhere whether that be inside the witnesses or are like you said outside the witnesses sometimes people leave and they think they have to be you know like that pack of ex witnesses that you you ran into who were so heavily involved in all these bad things that are kind of this self-fulfilling prophecy that the organization gave us which was that if you leave you’re going to be this drug dealing murdering raping horrible person.

[01:01:33] Ed so you leave and you’re like well I guess I got a lot of deals from drugs and rape somebody at my yesterday so that I can fit in and out here. Yeah yeah yeah. You know this taught you that you would just be the worst of the worst. So yeah you know we all have these we all have so much damage we carry with us from from that time in our lives and we have to try to figure out either do we like that part of us you know for you you know maybe you love being kind of more transient and being able to move around or maybe you really want to be stable more stable in a certain place you know. And so that’s what you find. You know we all have to kind of find you know do we want to be that adventurer or do we want to settle down somewhere or you know what do we want our lives to look like. And it’s a battle that we all have to fight. Unfortunately at a much older age than other people because you know we grew up the way we did. Right. Well if you left you know the Jehovah’s Witnesses when you were single. The first thing you find is your penis which is going to lead you directly into trouble. Pretty much let on the Lost Boys Anjos witness. And you Arctus that’s what led us in trouble. All of us and we did not have practical practical information to approach the world with. And they expect us to fail. Yeah they don’t give you the tools to survive.

[01:03:07] And then they call it prophecy. You know when you win you fail is complete hypocrisy. So let’s take that let’s let’s take that for instance that you just gave. How you leave and find your penis. You know I was just thinking you know the other day I was reading a thread on this forum and they were talking about you know like did the organization screw you up sexually and they were talking about how even in even in marriages even even inside the organization you’re taught that you know your genitalia whichever variety you have is evil and off limits and bad. And you know while you’re dating this brother or sister in the congregation like you can date them. But of course only with chaperones and don’t even think sexual thoughts. And then as soon as you get married boom like you were expected to be the sexual creature. You know you can’t just stick with it right you can’t just turn things a lot and often people know that’s just systematically destroying relationships. I feel bad for a lot of Jehovah’s Witness couples that that put on a smile pretend everything’s great and you know it’s not. I’ve been through this. I mean I’ve had like 30 some relationships I’ve tried to make work like I’m not just talking one night stands I’ve tried. And I realize I have so much to learn practical information that I have to figure out. I have a failed marriage. Yeah they really screwed up. I actually have a daughter right.

[01:04:59] I was in the middle of this you know trying to I don’t even know my daughter over this whole mess I was as soon as I left. By penis led me directly into trouble. Yeah. Now 34 I’m where I should be when I was 24. I’m trying to clean it up. Yeah yeah. You know let’s let’s let’s take people and let’s let’s repress all of their natural not just you know sexuality but just their abilities their thoughts their feelings let’s repress everything in them and then expect them somehow to be healthy. You can’t do that. Right. And so you know I think oh good lord if I found myself single some day married since I was 21 years old I’d have no I have no clue. I don’t know what the rules are in the wide world around us. I don’t know. You know just dealing with people with different histories and everything. You know it would be so hard. And I can I feel for you know people who leave and you know have to figure all that out on their own because it’s it’s it’s a very hard thing to do to navigate you know the world is hard enough to navigate as is. Throw in a culture that makes you know decades behind other people and a lot of ways and try to figure this stuff out. It’s just so unfair. But I’m glad that you know I’m sorry.

[01:06:34] You know you two have had to go through you know pain in these different areas but I’m glad that you know you’re you’re mature enough to look at this stuff and to be able to see it now you know for what it was and to try to you know kind of you know grow and work toward a better life for yourself. As a Korean have it you know hard enough just leaving the Jehovah’s Witness religion we also grew up on the cusp of one of the biggest things if not the biggest thing to ever hit the human race. The invention of the Internet. Now dating is turned upside down. We’re learning to navigate this new timeline of the human race. Is a star it’s a hard time. Yeah you on a call. Yes absolutely. Absolutely. So then you know we kind of know why you left. You know the Kalt. But I’ll let you know. Do you want to do you want to say why you left or you know was there more to it than just you know that period when you were that age. You know why would you say that you left now. What helped you to wake up to what it really was. I was following an instinct and I’m glad I did. I still think I have pretty good instincts. I mean I got a lot of trouble but I learned my lessons. The hard way and I’m I’m still glad I did. I mean I learned a hell of a lot. But back then it was science and girls. That’s why I pretty much left. Were my favorite subjects of study. The more I studied the truth the more I took issue with it. And I really find it hilarious that they name their religion. The truth is like if you start a call we should name it. The ultimate truth no Baxley’s. Yeah.

[01:08:42] It’s so insidious just naming it that it shows you know that there is an agenda just in the name is juvenile. Yeah yeah. Well I love other people and I began to look for ways as I was studying as now baptized Jehovah’s Witness. I was starting to look for ways to prove the child was witness witnesses wrong instead of always bending every bit of information that comes in to prove it right. And I was surprised at how easy it was to punch holes in an almost 20 years since then I’ve I’ve educated myself very heavily in science cosmology physics biology geology. I love everything that I can learn. And the more I learn about that the more it just takes me away from that religion and the rationale that religion. They are. I think there’s a definite reason why they they keep you from secular education. Yeah I I just it seems so clear to me. You personally that that the Bible and the religion Bible and religion are totally manmade fabrications. I don’t see any evidence to support it more. And I’m glad that I left. I’d like to say that no one don’t narc. There wasn’t a global flood 4000 years ago are eight point seven million species didn’t come from two of every animal that survived on a wooden boat. The population didn’t come from one incestuous family and Sanders is a real and a man’s a grammatically incorrect way to say a man. It just sounds like a story to me. You know it just sounds like a manmade story.

[01:10:33] I can’t believe that I was starting to figure it out it at like 15 and my parents are still in their 70s now. And do they still believe in Noah’s Ark. Oh yeah yeah. They still take all that literally. How can a grown adult believe that and come to live. Well I live in southern Indiana Kentucky just across the river and go to Kentucky and I think that’s where the that’s where the Ark Encounter is. Oh Ken Ham yeah yeah yeah that’s all that’s just yeah in the state across the river. Yeah. You know I mean it’s you know I think if you’re if you’re taught that from birth and you’re you know a bible literalists then you know you you have the faith to allow those things to be you know faith isn’t something that I can just have anymore. I live more of an evidence based life. But yeah I think that’s that’s how how people get around it. And I think that there are people who clearly you know need it on some level emotionally and maybe they don’t need you know the ark specifically but you know like you said about your dad. He I think it was your dad. I don’t I don’t want somebody in your family you know had that PTSD. And my grandfather your grandfather. There you go. And I think you know things get introduced because you know in doing this podcast so far I’ve talked to a lot of people who you know when you start getting into their stories it seems like you know the nexus of somebody joining the witnesses in the first place is some sort of trauma right. And then they are looking for certainty and they find something that will provide them that certainty.

[01:12:40] It may not be necessarily evidence but evidence based certainty sometimes doesn’t give people what they need or what they want and they just don’t know how to work through their stuff and then they give birth to people who are born into this and man when you’re taught it from the time you’re a kid it’s it’s really tough to work your way through. Yeah yeah. I mean now to me. Well it’s pretty much the fact that word faith means to believe something without any evidence of it. You know now I’m 34 and I’ve had a hell of a lot of education because I went out and saw it. I have a lot of street education and I I did make a lot of friends a I know a lot of people have a hard time with that and I know why. I still am not very confident myself but I have to do it. So basically I’m 34 and I’m more educated than my parents will ever be. And I just have a hard time. Like everywhere else go. Well you know I would say that you know you are the type of person that has this curiosity. And when I’m listening to you it makes me think of the people who you’re more like an adventurer. You’re a person who has that spirit in them where you have this thirst for knowledge you have this thirst to it. You’re an explorer. There you go you’re an explorer. And I don’t. Not everybody is an explorer. You know naturally not everybody is kind of naturally wired that way.

[01:14:31] And for some people it’s you know find a place and live there your whole life and never change much for other people it’s you know you got to go. There had to be somebody who went and explored things and were those you know pioneers back in the day and and not witness pioneers. I mean real pioneers. Yeah I actually did something. Yeah I guess that was my point. My foundation I feel it is built on on concrete now. It was made much when I left the Joves witnesses. But I’m always since a little kid. That’s why I went into construction for a while. I’d like to know how things work and I want to know actually how it works not how you think it works. I want to see it work and that’s how applied life and how we look at the universe. And I think jobs what is there and pretty much like every other religion they’re just trying to answer questions that probably don’t have an answer and they feel it gives them a false sense of pride that they know everything that’s happening in the universe. They have all the answers and it just I figured out at 15 that this is bullshit. Yeah if it’s difficult to take the perspective of others that try to figure out you know why they why they are where they are sometimes. Now let’s not think why my parents are in it. So do Evers. So I was going to ask you you know so it sounds like are you officially out. Are you like this you know like or you. Are you still technically a witness. Are you disfellowshipped.

[01:16:30] They’re just kind of wondering you know. From the perspective of like you know is there a narrative out there as to where why you left. You know is there a file on me. Yeah yeah yeah. Do people. Why would people think that you left. Do you ever go back and see any of those people. Are they still friendly to you. Or do they kind of see you a certain way. I mean I was baptized at 12. And as far as I know I still am. We had an elders meeting when they realized that for a period of time that this all happened very quickly. But I had stopped wanting to get out of the car or go knock on doors and cause that stirred up hours as they forced me to go in service work. I wouldn’t get out the car so I had an elders meeting and I basically decided you know how things were going to go. And they sat me down they tried to talk me out of it and trying to reason with the Bible. And even then the Bible was when I had the issue with the entire book so and the others me and they were trying to read scriptures to me and like what that book is when I have a problem with that and I don’t recognize your authority. And I did pretty much just walked out and they had this like hilarious stunned look on their face and I didn’t resign. I don’t think I was disfellowshipped I never sent a formal letter like Michael Jackson did to disassociate myself from the neighborhood book club.

[01:18:02] I just kind of thought this was all made up and like a book club and just walked away. Yeah. A I don’t know if they’d just fellowship me or an office. I don’t really have any communication with anybody. I grew up with law. Does that include you or your family. Do you have any communication with them anymore or is that just kind of after that last incident. Is that kind of just the end of it. Okay that happened probably well for now there have been about six years ago. I probably talked to them. I talked my down on the phone once and my mom said probably in six years for text messages. So yeah I don’t think they even know what I do for a living. No. Yeah sorry. I just I don’t know. I don’t really care. It’s to me it is like the Boy Scouts or something. Now doesn’t doesn’t apply anymore. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. You’ve grown beyond that. Yeah. Is there anything that you would like people that have never been witnesses to know about it that you think they might not know about my departure or just about Jehovah’s Witnesses in general I mean they they tell you not to make worldly friends they came up with this word worldly and they steering away from science for a reason. And that is because it pokes holes in what they want you to believe. They want to keep this pact together. And anybody who started I would say feed that you know learn things for yourself go through experiences. And it’s good to have a support group.

[01:20:12] I was kind of unfortunate when I left and immediately found other Jehovah’s Witnesses to be friends with. You know I kind of thought I didn’t become atheist. It took a long time. A lot of research to come to that conclusion. So I thought maybe Jehovah led me into a group of other jobs as well as kids. And it was one of the worst things that happened to me because we’re all deficient in the same areas. We all suffer the same thing. So what you need to do is if you’re looking to live is to meet people who have no idea what the Jehovah’s Witnesses are because they’re going to be strong in the areas that you need to learn about. And you know it’s hard to make friends. What you have to be if you don’t have a family anymore you need to make one. I have a huge family now. I don’t have any blood family but I have a family that spans the United States that someone has always been there and it helped me when I fell down the aisle. I live in a house now and I’m okay. But it was other people that helped me get there. You know when you when you’re thinking about leaving the Jehovah’s Witnesses people are scared to leave the support group that they have there. But you have the potential to make a much bigger one. What a much more rounded group of people. Is that the end of the world. You just have to go out n generally people are good. Of course there’s bad people out there who are going to learn that too to avoid that.

[01:21:52] But usually the red flags come up pretty quick and you want to avoid those people that make friends that are that are strong good people and you know don’t be a mooch but they’re just tell them your story has pretty much to this day if I is they’ll tell people how I grew up. They’re shocked by it and they’re interested in and they want to talk to you and figure out why this is a thing that happens. I 100 percent agree. And I think that that is a very important point about telling your story and not just because I had to pay Castro I help people. But yeah I mean first of all that’s being vulnerable and allowing yourself to be vulnerable to others which people respect. Second of all you know I think we all are taught we’re all told as witnesses not to share our story we’re told to keep quiet about it all. That if you’re going to walk away at least keep your mouth shut. And that’s another thing that they tell us that’s a self-fulfilling prophecy because they know if we go out into this world and we don’t tell anybody our stories then it’s going to be easier for the witnesses to keep the reputation that they want instead of what is actually true. And then it’s also going to be more difficult for you to actually connect to anybody because I mean I tell people my story I mean you don’t want to just say you know there’s a time and place for it.

[01:23:25] You don’t want to overwhelm people or Oh or or take over things but if you bring up the subject and people are interested then tell them because they want to know and you know it’s a way for people to get to know each other. Stories have been an important part of human history since day you know for a long time. So right. I mean anyone raised Jehovah’s Witness does have good quality. I think that’s the whole point of religion in the first place. It’s a vessel to understand morality which are generally good people so there’s no reason why you can’t go out and make friends. But yeah I think it’s funny that you said you know they tell people to keep their mouth shut when they leave. Isn’t that something a rapist would say. Oh yeah absolutely. Or someone who is molesting kids or whatever. Yes. Yeah. They tell you keep your mouth shut don’t tell anybody. I mean it’s so abusive. So what was that as human pack animals as human beings you know we need to go out and make friendships and yeah we all need to find our tribe somewhere right. So where are you now in your journey. Well I you know it took me 20 years to recover from from this upbringing. And then the breaking of the rubber band. I mean I really I really made a mess of my entire 20s and I’m finally say I’m 34 I feel like I’m 24. Now back to being single but I know I finally have it I’m okay. I have a place to live a job.

[01:25:12] It is really hard to sit down and write out everything that happened that that’s really when everything came together for me and I know I was where and I don’t really notice I was that bad of an alcoholic and drug abuser until I wrote it down it and then oh man I really got to stop that. When he had the right motivation. I was able to do it pretty much overnight. Yeah. And especially the motivation that they expect me to fail. So now I have this motivation it’s like a fire on my ass that then till now I’ve basically accepted that they want me to fail. And it almost killed me like I pretty much tried to kill myself in my 20s slowly. You have this like guilt that lives in the back you that you feel bad for even exploring your own life. They kind of build this prison in your own mind that you live in and because it follows you around in Nowheresville educated by I’m trying to approach life with this information and I really feel like I’m just starting now. I look forward to the rest of it. That’s awesome. Me Now you have the chance to make it what you want instead of what you know they wanted it to be for you like your dad said you know when he was yanking you out of that girl’s house you know this isn’t the life I want for my son. Well you know what Dad. It’s not your life right. You don’t get to decide how other people live and who they are. So I’m glad that you’re getting the chance now to decide that for yourself. Is there anything that you’ve learned that you know specifically has really impacted your life for the better.

[01:27:14] I mean you know beyond maybe science or whatever but is there anything that you’ve learned about yourself or just about people or whatever that that has really made your life better. Yeah just from the social aspect of of human beings n being able to do is see my 20s as as a whole what I’m really concerned with. Now when I left the Jehovah’s Witnesses I was terrified of even talking about it. It was like almost seeing a spider for a while. I don’t want to even think about it. And I think that’s why I did so many drugs and things in my 20s and I think it’s important. I’ve actually bumped into some Jehovah’s witnesses that are in their 20s now and have decided to leave like months ago. So I feel like I’ll get this opportunity to kind of help them to not make the mistakes I did. I know a lot of people who have just like yourself sprang just just went crazy as soon as they left and I think they’re what you’re doing is a good thing. You know we’re a support group because basically our parents had stopped raising us. And we need somebody there to help steer us through this world. You know I’m just on that journey now trying to help other people and not do the things I did because it ended up really bad for me. So I went to jail like I overdosed and it took me about ten years after that overdose to really be able to remember to retain any memories. Do to form any new memories and I don’t want that to happen to other people.

[01:29:20] And it’s funny you know witnesses would say Well yeah cause she went to jail and jail and ended up on drugs. I mean look at you you’re in the world now. You’re right. It’s not because of the world it’s because of them. Exactly it is not. That is not the world or my experience in the world that put me in jail or made me overdose. It’s my experience with Vemma that did it. They set me up this way. They set me up to fail as soon as I left. I had no tools. Yeah. So well you know I know that you know you’ve talked a lot about you know some of the mistakes you’ve made and things like that which I think is awesome because you know it helps others to maybe avoid some of the other similar mistakes. But what do you what do you enjoy. You know paint a picture for me what do you enjoy about your new life. You know as you see it now. What are you what are you looking for in your new life. What are your plans. What are you up to now. What’s good man. Well like I said I’ve kind of become this pillar of strength that these young people have just come out. It was totally inadvertent. But like I said I like to help people like to work on boats. I still like to see how things work. And I like to write. I just love how much there is to know me. Variety is the spice of life. It can’t be overstated. But you also have to approach variety with moderation.

[01:30:53] You can’t go crazy on any one thing or it’s going to hurt you. Variety is everywhere in the universe. It’s a keener balance. You have to take a variety of classes in college for a reason you know to get a degree in one field. You have to eat a balanced diet. Finding and experiencing that variety is the fun in life. You know like Mark Twain’s travels fail all bigotry. So it’s failed ignorance. Learn everything you can. I’m a jack of so many trades and the pursuit of knowledge. It’s the whole point of life and the key to doing that safely is moderation which I didn’t know in my 20s. What I learned the hard way. Well that’s cool. Do you have any anything that you’re anything specifically that you’re wanting to do. Coming up having gone for like 17 years or something but I’m in a new place in life. Or you know I’m planning on trying to approach people and not be so scared of talking about it like seeing a spider. So I plan on kind of going down a path or more in helping where I can help kids like me who didn’t have anything to look forward to when they left. You know I was raised preaching to other people. I just the subject has changed. That’s all. I like that.

[01:32:32] I mean there are there are real serious issues that we do need to work out and I think serious things that that could use a little preaching that people need to take seriously like tangible things like our our planet where we’re destroying and that there’s just a lot of issues that need to be dealt with instead of dealing with fanatical religion that affects everyone’s home. We share this. So I agree and it’s the difference between you know Jehovah’s Witnesses would tell you that that essentially there is no hope for this planet other than you know what God is going to bring. And you know through they have absolved themselves essentially of much responsibility today because they can just say well you know God’s got it I don’t have to worry about any of this stuff. I don’t have to help anywhere participate in anything or you know do anything that actually you know a lot of them unfortunately then even can even get to the point where they just don’t they just to do things that harm the earth because they just don’t care. But yeah I mean Jehovah’s Witnesses they’re just pretty much one and I think there’s like 33000 plus different variations of Christianity alone. I mean there just one. And we’ve spent all this time shedding on our home planet while we look to the next life you know like our time here is temporary. That’s a horrible way to look at it because generation after generation is coming along you know and meanwhile we have this thing religion that helped us understand our morality. But it I don’t think it’s doing us any good anymore. We know why we need morality and we’ve we’ve banned contraceptives in different religions and now we’re overpopulated. We’ve crossed the tutelary threshold. And we’re looking at serious problems if we don’t do something fast for our planet. I think that’s the things we need to worry about.

[01:35:02] I agree I agree wholeheartedly and I think it’s great that you know now that you’re out you can you can focus on those things you can focus on you know living your own life helping other people and doing things that actually matter today instead of pushing it all off into the future and I think that’s great. Thanks. Just first proof that it rips families apart and life is too short. Enough already not to have a fair start at it. I just just want that to end. I agree. Well is there anything that. Is there anything that I didn’t ask you that you wanted to say or anything. Well as far as as far as my parents and everything you know I’m pretty critical of them. But at this rate they’re in there in their 70s and even though I am critical of the way they they they raise me. It was what they were taught to do. And I don’t really harbor any ill will against them I do against their religion. You know I’ve actually you know wrote this book about growing up and why it’s so important to leave and it’s going to be for sale on Amazon like next week and I don’t even want them to know about it. I don’t want to hear this podcast haha. At this point they’re in their 70s and if they if they did realize they would look back on an entire life of missed opportunities and I think that they don’t have much time left and I see that you know as I don’t want to be like that. No I understand.

[01:36:46] It’s like if you wake up somebody that is in you know that is in advanced age. Then you wake them up to the realities of what their life has been and they look back on a wasted life will destroy them. Yeah it easily could. Especially because it is their whole social circle. It’s somebody who has their identity it’s a lot of times they’ve you know I think about my mom you know my dad died you know at this point you know the resurrection hope. I’m sure she’s holding on to that. And you know I don’t I don’t want to take that away from somebody. You know a lot of times you know witnesses this is like to vilify us you know quote apostates or whatever they want to call us as people who are just out to ruin their fun or whatever. But the reality is that if you talk to most of us you know I don’t want to take somebodies faith away from them. I don’t want you to put your faith on me. You know I’m not here to take your faith away. If you ask me questions then I should be able to answer them without you freaking out because you ask the question or otherwise don’t ask and that’s fine. We don’t have to discuss the subject of spirituality the Bible any of that we can. There are so many other things in life to discuss. But you know most of us we don’t want to destroy other people’s lives and their faiths and things like that. You know we’re not trying to hurt anybody they are doing the same thing that we do.

[01:38:34] We thought we were doing when we were Jehovah’s Witnesses and we want to help people yeah want to help them see. Yeah. And only now we actually are helping people. Right. You know like I think about you know how many people have reached out since I started my podcast last year and have said you know that I was able to help them in some way. When I was a witness I knocked on doors I mean I pioneered at that point I knocked on doors for 90 hours a month. Yeah and I never helped a person with anything. No company yeah yeah yeah I guess a bought old ladies in houses who you know would invite you in. That was that was it. We never really truly made anybody’s life better and now I hear from people who have been able to help in some way. I thank Jason for reaching out and for being willing to tell his story if you’d like to hear more. Like I said he’s written a book entitled “worldly – how not to escape a cult”. So again that’s “Worldly – How not to escape a cult”. The book was just released on Amazon as a paperback or even as a Kindle version. Jason has a heart to help and he wants to help others know kind of keep them from making some of the same mistakes that he made. You know we’re given so few tools to deal with reality when we grow up in the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

[01:40:09] And hopefully his book can help some not to learn some of the lessons the hard way like he did feel free to go to shunnedpodcast.com and leave a comment for Jason on the episode’s page for his episode. You can follow the show on YouTube my channel called shunnedpodcast. Again that’s one word and you can get my personal videos there is vidcast as well. You can also find us on Instagram and Twitter as shunnedpodcast. And my wife handles those channels for the show. You can also help the show by leaving a review on iTunes. It really means a lot to me. You can also support the show financially at Patreon.com/shunned for as little as a dollar a month. I count on the support there to help me pay for things like the transcripts that I put up on the site to help attract more traffic and listeners those listeners are people that are needing and hopefully finding help as well. And you know this is the way we’re all in this. We can all help in some way. You can hear my story at the high caste called This JW Life if you haven’t already. Our theme music is by fair voyeur who is also a former witness in the song is entitled No hell yet. The next episode’s going to be out at the beginning of September it will feature Sydney and other former J-dub. And she has an interesting story. I actually got to meet her for the first time at an apostafest just over a week ago and while we were there I went ahead and did some many interviews that I was going to add to her episode.

[01:41:41] Well it just so happened that I got so much good concept from those many interviews that I’m going to release them separately as yet another bonus episode. So you can look forward to that. She come out after Sydney’s episode. And I’ve got lots of good things coming up. But for now let’s end this the right way love others do no harm and go be happy.

Kacey Is Shunned By Jehovah’s Witnesses

[00:00:41] Welcome to the shunned podcast where we expose the high control religions that you shunning as a tool to control people. Today’s episode is personal to me. It features somebody that I know that I knew in my own congregation when I was growing up and it shows the damage that can be done through the cult of Jehovah’s Witnesses you’re going to see how the cults and the culture around an in it can really steal a person’s life. Of course you’re also going to get to see how a person can come back from the depths of despair and find happiness in life. Kacey is telling this story even though it could have some ramifications for her personally as she’s taking a stand today. So many people have been hurt by this cold. And lives are ruined or even destroyed at times. And it may be that we all have that point in time where we are we know we have to take a stand for truth. You know I remember being a kid and there was a relative of cases that was out knocking on doors with my mom in field service. I remember my mom coming back to the car and telling us how bold her relative was because something she said at the door she told the woman well ma’am sometimes the truth hurts. And you know we all thought that was so great. Oh you know how witty that she told this lady in response to some objection the lady had to something she had said that you know that sometimes the truth hurts.

[00:02:14] Well you know who would have thought that so many years down the road we would have all found that out to be true. The truth hurts Jehovah’s Witnesses that would listen to this would be agitated by it. And why. Because the truth hurts this podcast and others like it hurt them. Why. Because it’s the truth. And they’d rather hide behind convenient lies having their ears tickled as they used to say and they aren’t concerned with actual truth but rather with the truth. Their religion so let’s hearK.S. story learn about her life and how it was impacted by growing up as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. My name is Kacey. I am 34 years old. I was a Jehovah’s Witness and I am shunned. All right. So then how did you come to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the first place. How are you. When I was about 2 or 3 years old my mom started studying with the witnesses. So I don’t really remember anything but going to the Kingdom Hall when being a Jehovah’s Witness have like some spotty memories. I remember riding a tricycle when I was about three years old and my mom and dad telling me that my my dad had bought that for me for my third birthday. But I don’t remember like ever celebrating any holidays or anything. I don’t remember that being a birthday party. I just remember having a go Red Tricycle. I am my man and my and my uncle and their mom my grandmother they had all studied with the witnesses at random times in their lives. I know my mom studied English.

[00:04:00] She was about 14 or 15 she studied and went to meetings for a while but she didn’t really take. You know there was no commitment made there when they were younger. That didn’t come until until my mom started studying when I was about two or three years old. How old do you think she was then when she started studying again for the second time. Probably around my age and in her 30s and so there is a pretty big gap there. Yeah yeah like 15 20 year gap. Yeah it’s kind of amazing how you know once you’re exposed to the religion it kind of seems to stick with you even if you get away from it like that you know she was just the kid she studied but yet you know here you know decades later it is coming back into her life. Yeah and one thing about my mom is she went through some trauma with my brothers and a guy that she had dated. And at the point in her life when the sister knocked on our daughter when I was 2 I really think my mom was just looking for something to cling to and see this was familiar because she had already started it for a while when she was younger. So in her mind I think that like Gyges came full circle because no Jehovah was trying to lead her back or something. I mean I never really ask her a lot about is she. She won’t talk about any of the trauma that she’d variant so that she saw my own personal life per statute perspective I guess. Oh no no no that makes total sense. I think a lot of people are attracted to the religion because it’s a sense of surety.

[00:05:51] It’s a prescribed path that you can take in. And you know you can hand over traumas and things like that to something that you perceive is bigger than you. So I can definitely understand why that would happen. So then you were pretty young and it doesn’t go back many generations. You know just to your grandmother who studied later in life as well as for you what did it mean to you back then. You were a kid growing up in it. Well it was confusing. My life was really confusing. My dad was raised Catholic and very very strictly opposed to my mother’s studying with the witnesses. My dad’s family is the type of family that while they love each other they put most of the focus on their family time around holidays. So you’re talking Christmas Thanksgiving Easter. Those will be like big times for my dad’s family to get together and then they probably quinsy each other for the months in between the holidays. So it was really hard for my dad to accept that my mom was converting to this religion where there were no holidays there were no birthdays. She spent so much time away from home. And he was really oppose like I remember as a child my family dynamic especially around Christmas for the week before Christmas the week of in the week after my parents barely spoke. My dad would just kind of walk past us like we weren’t even there. Jelic he was really really upset about it it caused a lot of arguments in fighting between Hilsey. My mom stood firm because that’s what she was told to do.

[00:07:52] And my dad stood firm because he he was a momma’s boy Matt my dad and his brothers were just raised father mom. They never had their dad so he would have done anything to to keep his mom happy. You know he didn’t want his mom to think badly of him so. So you know and that’s the way he was raised he went to Catholic high schools. So it’s just something that that was I guess probably their one of their biggest arguments and something that tore them apart for many many years when I was a child and other than that. Growing up as a Jehovah’s Witness in school was horrible. Look I hated it. I wanted to be like the other kids. I’ve always been like a little bit of an awkward childhood. I have older brothers. I’ve always been more like I’ve always been to rock music in metal like me my brothers my two older brothers are eight and 12 years older than I am. And so when my mom and dad were at work they would babysit me and it would just be like a party BAM you know we were like a lot the Pantera and Slayer and you know they’re smoking cigarettes out the back door and I see this and I just like my brothers you’re so cool. Her hair oh is like the awkward you know I wasn’t the cheerleader or the ANC. You know I was I was the captain of the safety patrol at my alma mater. I’d rather get a total book worm like I. People didn’t like me so I decided I didn’t like people.

[00:09:38] They all made fun of me because I was a Jehovah’s Witness because of course on those first days of school when I have to go to my teacher and say hey here’s you know here’s this chapter pamphlet on why I can’t salute the flag. And my mom sends letters saying make sure that she goes to the library if there any holiday celebrations or birthday celebrations you have to you know single her out and take her to the library. So that was my life books. Yes. So that’s what I did which is bury myself in books. Makes sense you got to escape. You know. However you can try to find your place. Yeah. So then that’s what it was like at school. What about at home what was your life like at home growing up. You said a little bit about you know being babysat by your your brothers. Now your brothers. Were they witnesses at that time. My older brothers never got baptized into the religion. My they are not my dad’s biological children but you would never know because my dad adopted them like he loves those boys. You know they call him dad. He says those are his sons are but they weren’t. They were older I guess my mom just didn’t enforce it on them the same way she did us because they rebelled a little bit. And while they would go to the meetings they they were never in it. You know what I mean. They were like physically and mentally out from the beginning they just weren’t buying it. They were too old. They were already into their own things.

[00:11:17] And so I just think that my man put more emphasis on me because I was young enough that she could raise me up right in it. You know as my she couldn’t so and then my brothers asked so both of them fell in love and got a girl pregnant at a very young age. My oldest brother I think he had his first daughter when he was 16 hour seven. I think I was four when she was born. And then my second oldest brother when he was 15 and had been seeing a girl who was 21 and got her pregnant. Oh yeah and that was like a huge scandal and you know he wanted to do the right thing. So at age 16 when their child was born a baby even got married right before. My nephew was born but he moved out. You know when he was like 15 and started going to term I can’t remember what the name of the high school is. You work half a day and you go to school half a day. So it’s like a co-op type thing. Yeah. No. He could he could. And they lived together and raised their child. For me my I have a younger brother who he has some mental and physical limitations. He has autism and cerebral palsy and so most of the focus in my house was really put on him. So I was just kind of a I was expected to just do the right thing like I wasn’t allowed to mess up as a kid like it wasn’t acceptable for me to just do things that kids do.

[00:13:10] I kind of had to learn to always be mature and always realize that my little brother comes first. Now as an adult. Of course he comes first because he has. Of course he comes first you know he has a scar here and he uses a lot of a lot of need. Yeah. And it’s now I understand. But as a child I was just starved for like I wanted attention. So I would get really hyper and go out and run around and no I wasn’t always that way. I remember a time where I would just like sit on the floor coloring book all day color for hours. Other than that my my dad was an alcoholic and so he was very abusive. He was very verbally and emotionally abusive. And as I got older I don’t want to say he was physically abusive like he beat me every day. But if he came home and it had enough to drink and that I didn’t do it. There was like a couple dishes left in the sink. I was I was catching one to my backside for sure and my dad is a very big man and I honestly don’t think that in his sober mind he would have ever done anything like that. But it made for a very like tumultuous childhood and kind of walking on eggshells. I never knew if my dad was going to be drunk when he came home or not or what was going to happen. It caused a lot of anxiety and I just remember having a really confusing child as far as know not where I belong.

[00:14:58] Sounds very confusing I mean it on the one hand you have you have the religious divide between Jehovah’s Witnesses and Catholicism and you know the obvious rift that that caused you know around holidays and just different factions of the family and then you’ve got you know you’re your own person and you’re trying to make it. But you know at school you’re you’re ostracized because you’re one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and then you’re your dad. This he’s got his own issues. And I’m sure that made you feel very isolated there even at home. So yeah it would be hard to to feel like you fit in. Did you did you feel like so then what about at the Keenum Hall. Did you feel like you fit in there. How was life. And you know as a child there in the church you know I never had never felt like I. Well most of the girls there were actually growing up in that hall a decent amount of kids that were around my age guys and girls. And so there were plenty of girls for me to go to their house or whatever or spend time late or play with their call my friend. However my dad was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and most of their guards were there guards were elders. And like I said I was always kind of like a weird cheerleader and aquatinted I didn’t really follow the dress code you know how old it was. It was rough. There were times where I’m the I’m OK.

[00:16:50] So one instance I can remember is that when I was about 12 I had been invited to a summer party for the girls in my congregation and I was so excited because I thought there you know the tide is turning white things are going to change I’m going to have friends I’ll actually have somebody that I can talk to and not not thought they wanted me there. We give them get there. It’s really I’m super nervous because I don’t know how to act in front of other girls. I was raised with boys. And you know as as a Jehovah’s Witness you don’t get to play with other kids so you go to school with you don’t get to play with kids in your neighborhood or I didn’t see them some day but I never got to do those things. The only girls that I had in my wife were my cousins and they were both very tomboyish just like I was. So I didn’t know how to mix with girls who were girly and did their hair and painted their nails. So we go to this summer party and were in the basement of one of the girls grandmothers and so the girl that was hosting this sleepover look set me at some point during the night and says you know the only reason you’re here is because my grandma was going to cancel my summer party if I didn’t invite you. That’s welcoming. Yes. I just wanted like I just pretty much sat in the corner by myself for the rest of the night. Fighting back tears because I didn’t want to let them know that it got to me and I so wanted their acceptance. You know I just wanted to be a part of and am and that hurt you both in their work.

[00:18:49] There were a few other times where they would have sleepovers invite me but then it’s always in the back of my head that the only reason I’m here is because somebody whose mom forced them to invite me. So then they would try it. They should preempt this by saying s I was drawing we had some issues in our house as well. Jehovah’s Witnesses would not say your house is haunted they would just say like you have demons or you brought an item into your house that had a demon has attached you or whatever. We had a really really crazy things that were happening in our house. My dad he got punched like in in the face one night and there was nobody there. He he had a fist. He had physical marks on his body from being attacked. Mike my toys would move all around. I had a teddy ruxpin doll and he would open and close his eyes and move his head in his arms. You know it was really scary. Elder Kivy dolphin Yeah yeah it was a creep. My parents actually took one back to the store and exchange shit for another one because they thought it was just a some sort of malfunction of the toy. Right. And it still happened with the excellence the elders of the congregation even came to our house. Unlike a shepherding girl and we had to throw out everything that we had and start over and paint the walls in like do all this crazy stuff that I didn’t understand why I had a hearing on my voice. I think has made you do that that was their suggestion. Yes.

[00:20:38] And yet that was their suggestion was that you know we get rid of everything because you know my mom went to their stores Nazo a lot. We weren’t rich just you know grown up. So they the only explanation that they had was that someone had either been practicing like witchcraft or demonic spiritualistic ritual isn’t something that that we had bought from this yard sale or thrift store had had been attached by a demon or something. I was I was young when it happened. But I do remember we have had talks about this family night. And you know there’s no there’s no like haunting or evil energy. You either got angels demons away to help us when this really did. Pretty much everything’s on the mend. So if you’re not emitting them the following year you know it’s Sunday best of the Bible you’re here. So I’m Bega. That was their suggestion was that we get rid of all these games that we painted the walls. I mean a lot of things. My dad got rid of every art read he had just a lot of things that they said could be a channel for these demonic whatever. So the girls at the hall they would.

[00:22:06] Two of them their dads were elders and I remember them asking me about this one time when I was at one of their houses they were asking me about the demons in my house and I was just kind of like glad they wanted to talk to me so I’m telling them this crazy stuff that’s happened and then they turn on me they’re like oh well I don’t want to be around you you scare me that those stories are scary and then they went back to their elder father’s who is probably who they got the information from in the virtual to say because they shouldn’t have even known that that information that’s all supposed to be confidential. Exactly. And they tell one little girl told her dad that I was telling them about stories of demons and that I wouldn’t stop talking about it and that I was scaring her. So they made me go home. And like I didn’t bring it up and come here to see what they did. But that’s just like that’s just how the dynamic between me and the other ladies at the Kingdom Hall when I was younger it was not a good you know it wasn’t right Father Yeah I would have much rather hang out with the guys in our congregation because I did get along with them but that is inappropriate. You know you’re not allowed to have male friends unless you’re trying to marry one of them and then you don’t even really get to know each other until after you’ve married this person there’s no courting it’s almost arranged in a way. So I was homeschooled starting in middle school as well. Was that to get you so that made my wife. You there to get you away from like worldly influences at school or something. Yeah just tighter grip on you. Yes. And my parents had also. They had also taken custody of my cousin which is a whole other story but it’s a different chapter and they’re taking custody of my my male cousin and and he was like a brother to me.

[00:24:21] You know we had grown up together and had at her grandmother’s house we were very close to me and my cousins my parents are taking Kersee of him. So he had a really really bad ETG like he was very hyper he couldn’t pay attention to anything. He had really bad learning disabilities and school so my mom maybe she could take a leave from work and home school the both of us. And so that’s what she did. So it worked for me. I can’t on really quickly it did not work so well for my kids. So they let you know they were better off as a person who is a little bit HD myself. Self-learning in that kind of environment without structure could be very difficult. Yes. Yeah. And you know I’m almost a working part time so sometimes she would just give us our assignments and say finish season more go over the answers when you’re down. And so I ended up helping him and teaching him more than my mom did an extent because we were there together all the time. So and I caught on I’m a pretty bright person I’m I’m fairly intelligent and I got good grades anyway so. So it was fine. But you know it it was hard to keep up with my schoolwork and math when my mom had to go back to where her my dad were both working full time. And I’m trying to you know take care of my little brother who has his disabilities.

[00:26:13] And from about the age of 12 until I moved out that was you know my responsibility was to get my brother his medicine because he had to have special medicines certain times of the day or he would have seizures and put him on the bus make sure he got off the bus make sure he had snacks make sure you know he was clean and then in the summertime when he was on summer break he was my responsibility full time at the law to put on a kid. Yeah it is. I don’t remember ever being on time though honestly that I regretted that because I left my brother. And you know I would do anything for him. He is he’s like my kid in a lot of ways. He’s here you know because we were so close growing up and then you know to take care of him the way that I did. I never regretted any of that. I never had any resentments towards him because of that. It just made me grow up so fast that I feel like I missed out on a huge portion of my life. We’re just caught up with me in later years. So it wasn’t. It was not resuming towards him so much as it was towards my parents because they put me in this situation where they said oh you’re mature enough and you’re you’re strong enough and you’re smart enough to handle this. You know we wouldn’t give you the responsibility. We think you could handle it. But as a child at 12 years old it was like I was in the same house every day I felt trapped. You know what do I do. I can’t go anywhere I’m not allowed to sit on my front porch and even talk to the neighbors.

[00:28:12] You know I hear a kid go to the girls at the Keenum hall and have fun with them. I have nowhere to go. They’re very isolated you know they’re isolated. Yes. So then you know I’m just thinking you’re trying to you’re living this life which sounds pretty busy for a 12 year old. And at that same time you know being one of Jehovah’s Witnesses that means that you probably had other things you had to do too. So how did the burden of being one of Jehovah’s Witnesses or privileges they would see it. How did that impact you. You know growing up going to meetings and field service and knocking on doors studying all those things that you had to do. How did that fit into your life. What was your experience with that. Yeah. As a child I was a I was excited at first as as a young child to go out in the field service ministry. And it was fine. I thought you know when I was like them ages four five six I could read at the age of three so that was always a good selling point. My mom was taking me to the doors. I could read really well so have me reading scripture. These people would just be like oh she’s the most adorable little thing you know. I guess these little girls aren’t do great but if literature. So you know we would rehearse those things and I liked it. As I got older know obviously I think a lot of people feel this way even those who are still in the religion.

[00:30:07] They think they kind of you start looking for it to go out and vote 030. You know I became an unbaptized publisher and I started to you know give the little presentations that the sisters are allowed to give on the stage or that they used to be allowed to care. Not sure how that works anymore. I wanted to get baptized. I thought that that would fix everything. And at the age of twelve I was already being shy and to an extent in my congregation because the girls in my heart had said you know that I was too worldly and that now it’s not not like them. So I don’t really have a lot of friends. Anyway I was already isolated and I thought if I get baptized maybe it’ll it’ll make some these expectations easier and people will like me more. You know it’s a way of proving yourself exactly. So I started to study the questions and go over that. And in October of 1996 oddly I was baptized at a special assembly. How were you then. I had just turned 13. Go to 13 in September and I was baptized not so and now of course like I said before I was really good at reading and comprehending so of course some made it sound like I really knew what I was answering those questions. And you know when that’s when the elders talk to you about your commitment I really sounded like I was serious about it. Oh yeah we all did because we all we all knew what we needed to do what we needed to say. You know in order to make that happen. Exactly.

[00:32:15] And you know even if you didn’t know exactly what you needed to say there was somebody that was more than willing to coach you in to it as long as it meant you were assigned in your name on the dotted line. Mike you are by your name because you were baptized witness outright. Yeah. That they weren’t going to let you slide. It is kind of funny. Did they ever turn anyone away because they kind of do sometimes but eventually they always get everybody in. Yeah yeah they do. They do. So I got baptized in here and I started to pray here because I was homeschooled so at one my brother was in school and the bus would come to get him and then a sister from the Keenum Hall would come to pick me up and take me out and service them. So I would go out and service three to four days a week and so it gave me something to do. I wasn’t stuck in the house all day. And so that was it gave me something to do. However I feel like I probably in hindsight in retrospect used that more as like a social hour because I was just so desperate to have somebody to talk to. And so I didn’t really take it serious enough. And there was a brother in the hall at one point at we were at we always would break at McDonald’s and we were at McDonald’s and early in the day it was him his wife another sister and me in the car.

[00:33:53] And I had I was hungry really hungry and I was like What time is it you know could we go to McDonald’s yet. And I had said something a couple times about Hungary. And when we got to McDonnel as this father pulls me aside and says to me if you’re just going out until service of somebody or buy you a meal at McDonald’s you can’t go out with me anymore so don’t ask me or my wife to pick you up for service anymore like it was. It was pretty innocuous just like I mean I’m just I told him just to take me home at that point. And you know mom actually my mom was really upset that he would say that to me and she went to the brothers I don’t know whatever came of it honestly. I had to really put some thought into remembering this much of my childhood because I know some some PTSD. Jack it’s really cool. My memory is just I know I don’t have long memories. They’re very spotty. I remember circumstances like the atmosphere that I was in bed. It’s really hard for me to remember specific things so all the things we talk about then talk about that atmosphere what what was it like what was your feeling. You know just what were you feeling as a as a kid and all this. What was it like for you. I mean I was miserable like like I said my whole life was just one situation after another of me trying to find where I fit in. You’re trying to find my place. So that was a really miserable place to be. And at the time when I was when I had got baptized.

[00:35:43] I was not aware that I was suffering from a disorder that causes me to repressed memories from your childhood trauma. And so all of this is starting to come online at the same time and I’m sorry to have flashbacks of these things that happened to me when I was a child that I didn’t remember before that. So I’m just I’m I’m miserable but I don’t know how to cope I don’t know anything to do except to just keep going out until there is you. A study in my Bible and keep you know I’m at this point I really was legit. I really did want to be a spiritual person. Have you had a reason to want to be you know just like you open this talking about your mom and how she had these traumas and then there’s this religion comes full circle that comes back to her and she sees that as a way to maybe fix her problems. Well here you are as a kid with no tools. I mean what what 12 13 year old kid has the tools to over overcome and cope with all this stuff and then you think you’re going to get baptized and you know Jehovah’s Holy Spirit is going to rain down like a dove upon you and you could fix all your problems. I’m about do you know. Right. Right. Of course. And those are the things that they they tell you you know they tell you this stuff that’s part of the sales pitch to get you to take that step. So you know here you are.

[00:37:18] Now you know the lonely depressed little girl and you’ve got trauma coming back you know in these flashbacks and you had every reason to think that you know just doubling down on whatever you were doing quote spiritually in the organization was going to fix everything and you desperately probably needed that at that time. Yeah. And you know not to mention the Elderts any time that I would go to them or seek counseling. That’s what they told me to do. Surround yourself into that you know you need yet more hours talk to more people tried so Bible study read your Bible mosque and be more embodied in the appropriate ministry support. You know you do things like clean the keyboard to launch an offer to help older sisters at the whole year. You’re selfish and you’re not doing enough. You know so that was my issue. They made me feel like everything that happened to me was my fault you know and that I’m not good enough. So so why not heap that burden on a child that you know you have somebody who is clearly hurting already and then tell them you’re not good enough because you’re not regular in cleaning the Keenum hall or something stupid like that. You know it’s the last thing you needed at that point in your life I’m sure was a culture of an organisation that just beats people down yeah works. And you know some people I think that people well and people like you and I we have we have a resilience about this but also we work Farlane for their business like they wanted us to do. Yes. They can only beat you down for so long.

[00:39:12] And some of us just have to stand up and say I’m not going to take this anymore. And honestly I think my mom got gone. I know you got hurt. People like my mom who life had already beaten her down so far that it’s like that’s what she was used to. So when she came into this cult she was almost like a relief for her like she could breathe again because she had somebody telling her what to do she didn’t have to think for herself anymore. She didn’t have wonder what what was going to happen. She was told that if she were out on Jova and she prayed and she became spiritually fit that everything in her life would just come together and that you know she would that she doesn’t have to worry about those things anymore. Anything that happens in this lifetime doesn’t matter because as long as you’re faithful to Jehovah under every circumstance you’re going to go to paradise. So it doesn’t matter who does it doesn’t matter who abused you it doesn’t matter what happened in your past. Just paraded hopeful about it. Just stay faithful kids in paradise. It’s all going to be race. You know so I mean for her for her. That was enough she didn’t ask questions for me. It wasn’t. It was you know I had questions that couldn’t be answered from a very young age. And I tried to suppress those because of course after I got baptized that I had the obligation of doing what I was supposed to do as a baptized member of Jehovah’s Witnesses and then I had guilt because what the only people actually have in my life or my parents. I don’t have friends.

[00:40:49] I don’t have social activities I don’t have anyone else that I can turn to. My parents are the people that are even. No matter how abusive or how how horrible of an experience I may have had growing up they the only consistency I had. So you know I don’t want to disappoint them. I don’t want that guilt as being the black sheep of the family. But it is what it is now. But at the time you know and then one when I was when I was 13 almost 14 I started having these flashbacks. And I was in my body went into like shock that I was having seizures from from the trauma like I don’t I don’t know what exactly happened my mom took me to a neurologist. He says that you know I was filtering into puberty at the time and sometimes that puberty can cause you your your brain to remember things that you didn’t remember for a child. So it can cause you to lie it unleashes these things like all these warnings. So I started having seizures and I try to slip my mom and dad down one night. Tell them and. No I haven’t told you this before and now but I’m starting to remember things ma’am about your brother about my uncle. You know he he touched me when I was little and I was explaining to her specific instances of times when I was at my grandmother’s house or when I was at my uncle’s house spending the night with my cousins around the age of 4 or five. Where he would one by one come in to the bedroom and take us out.

[00:42:41] And then when one came back he would sometimes it would just be one that night sometimes it would be all of us but one by one. So I’m not gonna get into it like a lot of detail that I did with Obama did tell her specific things that happened and she sends me to my room. Taksin my dad calls me back down and says mind you wrote me when me say this my uncle or was in prison at the time that I’m telling my mom this I’m formalizing his own daughters and his stepdaughter. For a long time I didn’t know why he had gone to prison. Nobody would tell me because I was a kid and I didn’t need to know. They just said he did a bad thing and he had to go pay the consequences for his actions. Right. And these were the same two little girls that he molested were the same two little girls that you were spending the night with. Correct. Yes. Yeah. Got you. And so my mom tells me that she thinks I’m just lying that I just want it in June and that she’s going to take me to the elders. We’re going to talk about this and get some spiritual counseling. Littlefeather before you get to that I don’t mean to interrupt. Do you think you said that your mom had trauma in her past.

[00:44:09] Do you think that her brother could have been part of that trauma and that maybe she was just you know this was a way to she couldn’t accept it herself and she had to distance herself from it by any means possible even if that’s invalidating you. You know that’s a really really good question. I can’t give you a straight yes or no on that because I really don’t know that it’s very proper. I do know that my mother’s a child endured abuse. I’m not sure who it was. Family members I know but I’m always under the impression that it was older members of the family that they had been left with as children. And you know and that’s how the cycle gets past them. Exactly. And I just wondered if you are being spent that most of what my mom endured was like my older brothers were abused by a woman that my mom was a man that my mom was dating. And I don’t know the extent of that abuse either. However I do know that it really hurt my mom because she was just trying to do what was right. She was working two jobs and she had left my brothers with this man who she trusted who she loved she thought would not hurt her older children and come to find out he did hurt my brothers badly. And so my mom I don’t think she’s ever forgiven herself for that. So for me to come to her and say hey this happened I think she was just so it probably brought back trauma from her as well as how helpless she felt as a mother to my brothers when that happened. So for her to have to feel that helplessness again I feel like she failed her child. Stop think she could accept it. Like yeah I know that makes sense. Yeah.

[00:46:05] It didn’t make sense when I was a kid. Oh god no. But I was lying or just be told that I just wanted attention. Oh and you know we ask your uncle and he said he never did that. So right. Right. I mean he wouldn’t lie about oh this is what I was told. Right. Pretty much Kirby. You know I was so angry because he said it didn’t happen. And the elders you know the elders make me go through every curse detail of what happened. Like my mom couldn’t tell him I had to for them to just tell me that OK my cousins were there when it happened. But since they weren’t in the room with us he took us away. So since they weren’t in the room with us they didn’t see it with their own eyes. Happened to me. You know that’s not good enough. Really. Yeah. They weren’t witnesses. They were living in Pekin at dinner with their mother. So at this point John they were living with their mom and they weren’t baptized witnesses so they weren’t credible anyway you know. Right. They were Webley and so the brothers took me on reproofs they place you on reproof. Yes they did were lying for fun I guess because I was making this big story up you know. And it was private reproofs at the time which later turned it into public reports because I had been writing letters back and forth to a boy from the Georgetown congregation and our letters were a little more racy than they should happen. So then it was public proof shortly thereafter.

[00:47:48] So there’s a snowball just builds and rolls downhill and they just gets bigger and bigger. You know it’s from one right when am I led to the deaths no matter where I turn. I’m being rejected I’m being told that I’m not a good kid I’m being told that I’m not a good Jehovah’s Witness. I’m being told that I’m a liar that I want attention that I’m yes. That there’s something wrong with me. You know that there’s something wrong with me that what is happening to me is my fault. It has I. I’ve done something wrong. You either deserve the way I’ve been treated or or because I’m lying you know about it. That’s why that’s why I have all of this emotional pain and this and this is why I can’t get over this hump and be more spiritual because I’m not being truthful and then I’m not you know those kind Zoet everything is my OK and it be that you’re very hurt person it can’t be that there can’t be any modicum of compassion it has to be. You’re a piece of shit and you know you did it to yourself you know. Yeah. It’s so awful. It is. It is awful. And it throws me into a like a victim stance. You know what I mean from that point on from my only point. But even today still I have issues with like playing the victim. Does that make sense. Oh ha. Like I I I don’t even mean to.

[00:49:30] I don’t even realize I’m doing it sometimes if it hadn’t been for therapy and for that other progress that it has been it helped me heal from this. And so I don’t even know I’m doing it. It’s something you mean you mean you mean to tell me the programs outside of Jehovah’s Witnesses have helped you but Jehovah’s Witnesses didn’t you know if that is that dynamic Jehovah’s Witnesses act like their their religion or the Bible or whatever will cure all your ills. But in that funny how you know for most of us that managed to get out it’s the fact that we went to quote worldly you know through programs or to therapists or whatever. It’s those people that actually helped us. It’s not the truth the religion or you know the Bible itself even necessarily it’s these outside people that show basic human compassion and humanity that help us to get through these traumas and to get better. It’s not usually a byproduct of escaping into a religion. This whole our whole life this religion this these these principles of the Bible and their religion are supposed to be what saves us from whatever ails us and how it’s funny that they are so against us turning any worldly therapy or any any other sort of medium to help with our issues. Yes. Those are the people who helped us most borders. And I think a lot. I never felt well I’m not one iota of compassion from the elders that pretty much raised me. Never. Never once did I feel like they were truly on my side. You know horrible you know there’s supposed to be loving shepherds looking for lost sheep and caring.

[00:51:39] You know they always had these pictures in the magazines of a shepherd holding a little lamb or whatever. But you know in a caring way. But you know so often when people go to the elders in the congregation for for help for truly devastating problems I think it just gets back to what you said a minute ago and that is they pretty much just point a back at you and say it’s your fault. Yeah yeah. There is bad and might be separating the flock books deflect. Yeah it’s not it’s not just to make you feel like it’s a man. I don’t know. But I’ll tell you I think that I do think that on some level it takes a certain personality to climb the ladder of Jehovah’s Witnesses to even become an elder sometimes. I’m not I’m not indicting all elders as stone faced compassionate less monsters now but there are certainly a lot of that Jordy of them. There are a lot. You know I got into you as I got older. And then I could drive my life was a little bit easier I guess. And when I switched halls I ended up meeting a guy and I married him to be honest with you just to get out of my parents house to and can’t blame the congregation that he went to. There were some really nice people there you know. I mean it’s the organization that’s cricket it’s the it’s the organization. The rules and the policies that they set down an end. And I don’t think that all of these elders are. I don’t I don’t think they even know how really like screwed up they are.

[00:53:42] I mean I think you know just like what they’ve been brainwashed to do just like read it. They’re doing what they’ve been indoctrinated to do and they make and they’re being passed up like cause it’s a big responsibility to shepherd the flock and so you know you’re doing God’s will. You’re doing what God told you to do. You know and I guess there’s not much room for compassionate love when on the business end of that. And that’s what most of them look at it as just regulations. Yeah yeah and that’s like that. I know I listen to your podcast and you know that rank and file you know at. OK so first of all I’m I’m a kid and sick enough female. And third I’ve already been a reproof so there is like no room for compassion for somebody like me because I’m not any of those things that you need to be. You weren’t even an ounce of respect from an elder. So it is. I don’t know. As a kid it really made me feel so important. Yeah it’s got to be hard to have self respect. Well I know it was for me in such an environment where you’re so invalidated all the time. I respect for myself either I get it. Yeah. So then is the next step in your life then pretty much you know getting married to this person. And yeah a few years and in between there I still struggled with my identity with an making meetings and I was depressed. There was a point in time I developed an eating disorder. And I got really really skinny and we were on vacation.

[00:55:49] One year my family and I and my dad busted in on me in the bathroom when I was throwing up what we had eaten and so on. They put me in the hospital. So I was in a mental hospital here for her for a little while. And when I came out of there is when I decided OK I’m going to turn over a new leaf I’m really going to give it my all this time with that with that organization. And I’m not I’m not going to go dressed in black and shave my head and you know because these are things I’ve done. Like I would go to the Keenum Hall in black head to toe. I had cut my hair off my hair was really long I cut it all off I had color orange I had colored it black you know any sort of expression that I could get away with. I was doing it. So it sounds like you’re kind of trying to trying to find yourself or just have a little control over you her life you know. Yeah in that life where you’ve had so little control and been trapped by so many things just coloring your hair different. Hey it’s something you can control just like honestly the eating disorder those are usually about control. Yeah exactly. And you know also a part of that was when you know a lot of people are going to treat me like shit anyway I’m going to do what I wanted.

[00:57:12] I don’t have friends here know how anybody to impress you so I’m gonna come dressed in all black and wear black makeup and comb my hair in my head or do what I want because it’s not like anybody cares you know. You know if they care they would take time out to talk to me. So since since you’re gonna treat me like an outcast I’m gonna go ahead and be with you. And yeah I did have a lot to do with control. And the lack of control I had in my life and making any decisions for myself. So you know I try to get over that they put me on like all these psych meds and I’m worth 30 days. I was in this hospital in a glass room so that every time that are eight they would make me sit in them you know the floor for an hour after 8:00 to make sure that I wasn’t going to go out there I out. And I did that for like 30 days every single day. And I was on so much medicine that I could not. Like I literally could not see straight. I was seeing double because I was on so much mess and all I wanted to do was sleep. So I come home with these medications and I just feel like a zombie like I don’t remember a whole lot of that my life. So I start slowly weaning off of the medications and then going back to meetings and trying to find branch out and find a group of young individuals that I can get along with that I can’t fit in with. Which is where I met my first husband. And they were they were close they were. They were skaters. They listened to rock music.

[00:58:44] They got together on the weekends and had chaperoned parties where we all had fun and you know I mean it was like I actually started to feel like I applaud them because they didn’t judge me. But they were like those walk the line witnesses Hitler there’s a lot of absolutely everything that they could do without getting. Yeah. Right up to the line. Yeah exactly like toes dangling off the edge. Oh I was like these are my kind of people I could be a witness if I could do it like this. So you know that was nice to finally have a place right. Happy in the sky. You know you take an interest in me. We have talked a lot. And to be honest with you I really wasn’t in love with him. I was in love with the boy from my congregation that I had tried to date for a long time and it just didn’t work out because we were so like mentally screwed up from this indoctrination. We were both so crazy like you know we had no clue who we were relation at the time but am he you know he he ended up calling me three days before my wedding to this guy and my parents had already paid for everything you know for me you get married. They paid for the trip. I was marrying and he had proved himself that he cared about me unconditionally. No decisions on our relationship. And I just I’m used to it. How so. The guy called me in it was like the hardest thing I’ve ever had in the mood is saying. I’m kind of a scheduled myriads other guy. Sorry.

[01:00:42] And as a witness you know they view an engagement almost as though you are married. So you act like an engagement is a promise. And if you bring up an engagement you can get in trouble for that. So yeah. And especially if I were to break it off to go with this other kid. Yeah. There’s no perfect the whole and not me. And I’m really this point this is my last ditch effort. You know I’m going to I’m gonna do this. You know I’m not I’m not going to give up on this religion and I’m not going to give up because my mom and dad like I had been threatened with being disfellowshipped so many times excommunicated and so many times as a teenager because of my actions that they didn’t like so I’m scared to death that I’m going to get this fellowship and the only family that I have the only people that have ever been consistent in my life will have shown me. And so I’m just I’m doing anything I can at this point to stay on the good side because I don’t want to lose my mom and dad and my brother. Right. So I get married and I moved to Cincinnati and I’m married like pretty much falls apart before it ever starts. Regarding to some very immoral sayings we were drinking all of the time smoking weed and as he went he would drink he would be drunk all the time and he wasn’t like an abusive drunk or anything. Happy drunk.

[01:02:05] It was just he was sloppy and we argued a lot and we had no clue how to be a daughter how to be married or you know it was typical with this kids getting married. Yeah exactly. That’s one thing I did like every other witness. But we were also clueless at that point. Yeah. Well we had no we didn’t know how to be anything like I did not know how to be an adult. Okay I did. What what politics were. I don’t know. I never had to pay attention to how many taxes they were taken out of my paycheck or balancing a checkbook or paying bills or you know like I was never taught life skills. I was hopscotched off of that so I didn’t have any idea how to socially interact with people who weren’t jobs. Yeah cause you know the. As you mentioned before the marriages as Jehovah’s Witnesses almost on some level feel arranged and there’s such a lack of the ability to really get to know another person in there. You know chaperone courtship arrangement. Then you end up marrying somebody and finding out oh look you know he he is he can’t start drinking and he’s doing other things and and exact things you could have known other than for the arrangement. The Jehovah’s Witnesses Jews as far as dating goes exactly. Yes. So I still feel guilty about that because honestly he was not a bad person. He’s not a bad guy. We just weren’t right for each other. I did try very hard to make it work though once we moved. I really honestly.

[01:03:52] I can be honest in saying this now and I’m not saying it in like I’m not trying to say it in like a bragging way but I really just marry him to get out of my parents house and I and I thought that’s what you were supposed to do get you into a certain age. Three days after I turned 18. Yeah. Yeah but it hurt a lot. Yeah. And so I just we tried to make it work for a little while. But we both started seeing someone else and the only reason I didn’t get disfellowshipped because of our divorce is because we were both inactive at the time and because she had he had committed adultery. He had been with someone else and had admitted to it. And so I didn’t get disfellowshipped for that. And I’m already considered I’m hiding I’m ducking and dodging the others after this. Like I’m not even in mobile anymore so I don’t have to worry about facing the same people that were in my congregation. So I could go to new car she started new and they don’t even have to know about all this stuff right. Right. And I’m not thinking they’re gonna stay in my publisher’s God with all the private notice about you. So then they got the dirt on these others. They realized you know what we’re going to do. And since you been an active for a little while and you’re coming to us and we think you’re truly repentant for everything that’s happened we’re a lot let you start over like we’re not going to put on her proof. Now we want you to study with the sister here and we’re just going to treat you like a study and movie backup so you can’t answer any questions right away.

[01:05:34] But you know if you come to meetings consistently you can start answering questions again. And you know we’ll worry about all that as it comes. We’ll let you progress backup. So I thought this is it. This is my chance right. That was actually somewhat kind of them. Yeah it was but these were Aldred these were in Cincinnati Ohio got up and I had started smoking cigarettes at this point. And so I was not willing to give up smoking. I mean I tried but I just it’s a very very hard addiction to ultimate. And they thought I should just be over a period away you know oh my goodness. You just stopped smoking. So then I had called in to in a meeting with those owners a couple turns and they’re like if you can’t quit smoking get healthy. So I just stopped going again. Right. Like I run from the problem because that’s the best way for me in that time. Right. Those were the tools you had. Exactly. I don’t know how to work this out or anything so I just I stopped going again and I’m still making the memorial. You know my mom’s like oh no you’re not making other means but you have to make the memorial. So I I do it to make her happy here. And I met another guy and had my first son with this man. And you know me my picker was broken because this man was very emotionally abusive to me and controlling.

[01:07:09] And so it was very fitting for me to be with someone who was going to control every aspect of my life. And I went through our a string of bad decisions with him and I started drinking and using drugs after my son was born. I was using cocaine and ecstasy and pretty much anything else that was offered to me at the time. I would do it I mean that makes sense. Yeah. Well I didn’t want to have that. I was always looking for an escape. You know of course of course I was nothing nothing to this point has ever been dealt with. You know exactly and not only has it not been dealt with but up until this point in my life I’ve never felt my gobble armed anywhere. And that’s a deep emotional pain because as humans it’s in our nature that you want to be have that herd mentality and you want to fit somewhere I want to go somewhere where you feel safe. And I never have. So I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t delve into my addiction at that point but later on in my life I did develop a very honest debris addiction to drugs. I tried to fill that void with sperm men with getting that attention. You know that from a man to validate me I’m it would work for a little while. But then once reality set in and hit the newness where were off and he wasn’t in love with me anymore I would just drop him and go on somebody else. He was going to worship me for a little while. Yeah it’s really sad. A lot of people are immense Herpa that comes with all that too. Well there is. Yeah.

[01:09:05] Because for the first time I felt like I adored and respected him. You know what to an extent anyway even if it was just like a physical validation it was validation and I craved that. So you know things things progressed. My mom and dad didn’t really shun me. They knew I wasn’t doing the right thing but they were always you know trying to tell me my dad was not a bad times we necessarily think that he wrote something or met you which Mersch is it your mother’s right and you need to go back to the whore you know kind of. He he would like. Eventually he got to the point where he agreed with my man. And I guess he finally decided or they decided together that they did love each other and it was worth fighting through for their marriage and they got to a place where my dad wouldn’t go to the hall. But he didn’t oppose my mother got anymore. He would help my mom get my little brother ready or help her cook dinner or make sure that we were being quiet. My mom was doing her Bible study or whatever so he got to a point where he was more supportive. But by that point I was already far too far gone I guess. You know ordinary affect me that much that he and then I just thought it was hypocritical of him like how are you going to tell me to do this. You don’t do it. And you can tell and I don’t want to think you’re going make me go anyway. You know yeah yeah.

[01:10:24] Suddenly you think about those with your dad because they don’t know what her so then you know how did this. So you’re not you’re not disfellowshipped or anything you’re you’re just you know you’re living this life your sounds like your own addiction at this point. How did that you know how did that play out. As far as you know from there on because you know that you know honestly with all the trauma and not just you know that you know most people will see trauma as obviously you know what happened to you when you were a little kid from Europe your uncle but you know trauma has just been the name of the game throughout your life as you’re going through. You know this whole life as a witness and then you know now you’ve got I’m sure there are negative consequences and traumas as a result of the drugs and everything else. Honestly you’re probably very fortunate that you didn’t destroy yourself. That probably it speaks to you know your spirit. So how did how did that you know transform over time. Well like I said I went from just dabbling in different drugs and then I did quit for a little while I went to school to get my cosmetology license. I got my cosmetology license and was happy by a very short period of time. I’m getting married to my sons Dad would fix everything it just made it worse. So when I mean our society last year and one day I just packed my stuff while he was at work and I ran and felt really guilty because I lost my son for a period of time.

[01:12:15] But I had to do what I had to do it away from him. I’m desperate at that point to just get away from him. I could not under the abuse any longer I was really sick. I had developed a stomach disease a rare stomach condition called gastroparesis and I had had seven surgeries and the two year period was on pain medicine. Just one prescription after the other after the other. And so I’ll get a prescription every month from my doctor thinking that I meet it because I’m in pain not realizing that when I run out I’m not so sick because of my disease I’m sick because I’m going through withdraw because I’m now addicted to these opiates. I didn’t know what addiction was. My family never really had that dare talk with me. You know we never really talked about that kind of stuff because they never expected that of me being raised as a witness. That was more it was more women never expected me to dive into that. You know so we never had that talk about drugs and how they can ruin your life even if they had. I’m not sure what made a difference because I was just taking the medicine that the doctor prescribed me not not realizing that I’ve got this physical addiction that has grown inside of you. So I get cut off from the doctor because you know I’m trying to refill my medication too early like three months in a row and I start. And so I mean I’m as if all the trauma that happened when I was younger wasn’t enough I’m traumatizing myself over and over again every day with this day in and day with.

[01:13:49] You know I was I was homeless for a little while just on people’s couches and and then my addiction really took off when I was about twenty seven. And I had met another guy and had another son. And the crazy thing about this is one thing I’m really grateful for. Through all of this is that I never had any hard core addictions when I was pregnant with my kids. So I didn’t have to worry about my children being born addicted to drugs. I can imagine what what a woman goes through when she has that problem and I used to be really judgmental I think and how could you do drugs when you’re pregnant with your baby you don’t care about your baby. That’s not true. Addiction is a monster addiction will take everything from you and make you feel like it’s everybody else’s fault that your life is in shambles. You know it’s hard to take that power back but just miraculously somehow I ended up not being on any hard drugs or anything when I was pregnant with my kids so they were born healthy. They’re very smart sweet intelligent children. Unfortunately the cycle continued with them because you know through my addiction and through the trauma that I had never dealt with my children ended up going through a trauma. They ended up leaving a sick life because I was sick. And so it was a ripple effect. I wasn’t there for my children. Emotionally I would leave my kids for days at a time with my parents and go off to use drugs and be just laid up in abandoned house somewhere high for days.

[01:15:23] I have no clue what actually happened to me some of those days. I don’t know the people that I was around. I’m. You’re right. I’m really really really fortunate to have come through that as unscathed as I did. And it’s not it’s not a place when I was that 13 year old girl get that test that I ever imagined my wife would be at because I thought that their religion was going to fix all of these issues I was having. And I thought that these people would help me get over what I had experienced and make me a better person. And that’s just not the case. You know what. It’s not what happened. You heard that Jehovah has limitations. Yeah yeah exactly yeah. And you know a hen so throughout all of this progressing my addiction went from prescription pills and alcohol to heroin. And I had started you know just wasn’t using intravenous at first for the first couple of years but it developed did you anI.V. drug use situation an arm I’ll leave a lot of those details just because it’s it’s too much to get into. Really wish I had. OK sir. By this time I had left my midriffs CERN’s dad and I had a string of men who when I actually did commit myself to a man he would always cheat on me. He would always either read me for someone else or he would say was me. Because you know I I worked I cook I clean to Jahid kids. A lot of the guys in my life didn’t really have any responsibility that took on that responsibility because I wanted to fix someone.

[01:17:14] And I was so desperate for somebody to love me and to care about me that I was willing to go to any lengths to make that happen. So I would say no no no no you don’t have to go to work. I worked two jobs. No let me cook for you. Let me take care. Maybe let me do the housework thinking oh they’re going to have so much admiration and for me that they will be able to leave me because they never going to finally get a tree that is not so bad. Do you think that in any way. I guess I’m a little bit of a workaholic myself and I kind of attribute a lot of that to growing up a witness as a witness you are a people pleaser or you’re out of taught to be. And we always had so much to do as witnesses that there wasn’t really time to just sit down and just be you are always doing something you know the difference between a human being and a human doing. You know we were human doings we were always busy going here and going out in service or going to this meeting or studying this and then you from what you said also had this family element where you were taking care of your younger brother and you were helping your cousin in the homeschooling while trying to kind of do the homeschooling yourself and in addition to all these other witness activities so do you feel that just.

[01:18:47] Just struck me do you feel that you know some of these relationships not only was it just you know desperation for attention for love for validation but also kind of a bond and a need or something that has been developed in you to just keep doing something always. Well yeah I still have that issue. I’m verya.g so I’m always fidgeting. Like we’re talking right OK. My hands are man and I’m crossing and crossing my legs. Oh understand. It’s busy work. You get so reigned in during that busy work when you’re a part of the organization because they keep you doing that so that your mind is focused on what they want to be focused on. So we’re not missing on any doubt you may have or you’re not really able to look at the big picture because you’re so busy. Yeah. Some guests that definitely think that probably it has something to do with it. I’m not sure that I ever really respect the kinds. I’ve always been Saccharomyces you know I had always been stuck on trying to get attention from someone or validation or that loves or be you know that that you make a really good point there that I’m always it’s something that I just don’t know how to not do. I don’t know how to say it so I don’t you know I don’t know how to not do that busy work. I guess I have I have two speeds and that’s on and off. And either you know sometimes I can sit there and just kind of go in front of the TV. I like the TV honestly and personally I like to watch reruns of shows because I don’t have to pay attention to them.

[01:20:35] And I can just turn my brain off it’s pretty much the only way I can get otherwise I’m just constantly going. But you know even every human being needs to shut down at some point. So that’s how I do it. But I just it’s something that I’ve been realizing myself and you know just hearing your experience here just made me wonder if you thought that might play into it as well. Obviously there’s lots of things at play you know in our humanity. But it seems to have quite an impact on us. You know the whole experience of being a witness not to mention all of the other stuff that you had to deal with and face Oh yeah Devon definitely makes an impact. The whole my whole life was just kind of a recipe for disaster. To an extent as far as my drug use goes and how far down that I went where I hit bottom with that. Yes. So even though I found healthy ways now to keep myself busy and I find healthy ways to I guess decompress. It’s still something that I’ll know that I’ll ever be able to get rid of that you know that feeling. Because when you’re a witness when you’re in the truth quote of course you feel guilty if you’re not. If you have downtime because that means you could be spending either in battle field service. You know at the Keenum studying more in depth next week’s Watchtower Bible study or whatever you like so you’ll see if you take time to yourself. There is not. There is no allowance for you to know who you are. For you to enjoy you there’s no allowance for that.

[01:22:22] So I still feel that way now. As a mother as a wife and in a lot of times I’ll give this to you and say I don’t ever have time for me I don’t ever get slowed down. I don’t make time for me I don’t make time to sort out. So really I can’t you out right now. I have to make that time and I just don’t because I end up like something in the back of my mind says that I’m not allowed. Something tells me I’m not allowed. I recently listened to a podcast. There’s a book by a lady named Gretchen Rubin and the book is entitled The four tendencies and the book has to do. From what I could gather with with how humans respond to outside expectations and there were four different tendencies for categories it was like Upholder questioner rebel or a bludger. And when she was going through them the first thing I thought is oh I’m a questioner you know I’ve questioned a lot of things in my life that helped me to leave this organization behind to help me leave this cult that had me helps me to to challenge my my own perceptions on a lot of things and to find a healthier freer life. But as she was talking about them and I believe there was a test that you could take on her Web site. It was very apparent to me that actually at my core everyone has some of all these qualities but I am Anna Bligh Jr.

[01:23:59] I am very much a person that if I feel that there is an outside expectation of me to do something I will absolutely do it and go above and beyond the Indian thing going above and beyond and doing it obliges tends to make excellent people in service industries like I work in. Because your customers are going to love you you’re going to do anything for them. But obliges tend to end leaving themselves out of the equation and that can make a very bitter resentful. Yeah. Conversations with yourself can. It can. And I really think I think that on some level I was naturally wired that way. You know again we all have parts of these qualities but I wonder how much are our upbringing as witnesses. I almost wish I wish I could take some sort of a survey of it. I don’t know maybe I’ll put up a survey on the on the Web site or something I’m think about that but I just wonder how many other people who might be listening to this who are ex witnesses would would also kind of tick the box of being in a bludger and I think that that has to do with growing up in an organisation that was so authoritarian and that absolutely made us that way not in an organization that if you like you don’t you’re not allowed to have free thought or an it’s all so it’s not about you. It’s all about them. It’s all about them and it’s all about their name. You know they know they want that gold star by their name. Yep and you have to get it for Zakhilwal. Yeah and if you don’t then your hey you’re out buddy. You voted yes. Now. Yeah.

[01:26:05] We were never allows for it to be about us right. We didn’t birthdays we didn’t have celebrations where we were special. No we weren’t. We weren’t told that we were special again like we were good for nothing slaves of Jehovah just as it was. So why would we ever think that it was about anything other than them or quote unquote Jehovah. You know is it’s just waking up to this has been has been life changing and heart breaking and freeing all at the same time. It almost makes you or me personally. It almost makes me feel like how could I be so stupid. How could I be so good. You know what I mean to think that that even though even though I had questions about it my whole life I’ve had questions about the people. But my mom always told me you don’t serve the man you serve God you serve Jehovah. You do these things because of Jehovah and the organization of religion has good bones and that there’s people in the organization that are going to be good people because we’re all imperfect but it’s not up to us to serve man. We serve Jehovah. So my whole life I’ve gone through this every phase of my life where I’ve done really effed up things.

[01:27:28] And when I come back around when I come down I’ve got that guilt still in the back of my head about the truth that this is the truth and how how can I turn my back on it and I know what I need to do and I’ve been told my whole life that you know all this bad shit that’s happened to you has happening to you because you aren’t serving Jehovah and if you just serve Jehovah and get back into the congregation your life will be fine. Jahar would bless you if you were doing what you were supposed to do. But we’re not going to help you because you’re not doing the same. And it’s all your fault it’s your fault it’s your fault. That’s all there is to it. So my whole life I think about all these times that I finally thought I was going to break away from the religion. I did it in the wrong way. I did it through you know through promiscuity and through drug abuse and through running. You know I was scared you didn’t know who I was so I didn’t know how to break away and just beat me. So I think about all these times like how could I really have thought I never I never thought to look deeper. It was it wasn’t until I started listening when I connected with you on Facebook and started listening to your podcast and then I started listening to JT and Lady C. And this is a man who was in Bethel. Okay. This is a man who would have been like royalty to us in our congregation. And he’s not he’s not gashing he’s not bashing he’s not he’s not speaking out at all. Some sort of resentment. He’s not being vile about it. He’s speaking from his heart about this organization and why he just could not go on. You know I mean because it is crooked like he but he wasn’t. He’s not trying to convert anybody else. He just has a simple discussion just like you.

[01:29:24] You told your story if you didn’t want anybody into a category of everybody in this way this is bad and you need to leave right now. You told your story and you changed my perspective you knew open my eyes saw that I could question. So I know I’m the only one who was questioning his dignity. That it’s such an instantaneous thing that the way they make us feel alone because we can’t talk about it. Yes exactly. Yes. And so once I realized I wasn’t alone and actually did do some research for myself and that I could I could ask questions because I wasn’t the first one to ask those questions. And like apostates were a real thing. Many were certain death if you ever talk to an apostate or loaded up past they say oh yeah. So yeah it was really the turning point in my life just hanging in like the last year. Because when I got clean and sober in 2014 where do you think I went back to the Chelimo. Exactly. I went back to I started attending meetings. What did the brothers and I confessed all my sins. Our show. And I thought you know that brother was your brother. Now I have to say this brother he will always love him and I’ll always have respect for him because not once did he ever look at me as anything other than a person. He didn’t look at me as a bad stepsister. He looked at me as a drug addict he didn’t look at me as somebody who had children out of wedlock.

[01:31:01] He looked at me as somebody who’s been hombres you look at me as a person. And to this day this brother has still sent me text messages or if he sees me in public he won’t judge me. He refuses to work and that means so much to me because it gave me hope like a glimmer of hope. And I really want to go to him some time. And like text him the link to your podcast stands the link to like JT inlays just see what would happen because you could tell that he is an elder. He has a reputation. You are recording. However he is not going to let them take his humanity. Yeah. And so I have. I have mad respect for their elders to be honest. It’s that the people who don’t allow their humanity to be taken are often the people who leave. So yeah you know there’s still hope there is hope that I don’t want to be the one. I just really thought about hey here’s the information it’s right in front of you take your Revitt do what you want. I don’t want you. I don’t know. That’s right. It’s like I have a ambivalent about it. No I understand because it’s it’s it’s a you don’t want to destroy somebodies life that they have if they’re happy. Exactly yeah. I totally get that. You know and look you know my podcasts Ray Franz’s book Crisis of Conscience JT and Lady C John Cedar’s like all these. There is so much information out there. I mean I’m leaving out so many people who are out there that are you know producing different content.

[01:32:48] The Army just as the that army of apostate chick the other all these people who are putting things out there that you know in their own voice and you know some times you know one person’s voice. I remember when I when I first came out I didn’t like Lloyd Evans’s stuff. I found it be a survey it was it was too strong for me. I just wasn’t I wasn’t ready to handle the directness of some of that information I just couldn’t I couldn’t look at that on at the time and I only did something else. And there were other things. Yeah. Yeah. So you don’t want to leave you in a little more gently. Yeah yeah definitely it a little more. It was very hard to look at all this stuff it was terrifying and very difficult. And you know so many people who are listening I’m sure have been through that process. So this this elder this guy that you have this you know respect for. You know if if he’s looking he’ll find it and if he’s really open and if he’s not then he won’t. And you know it’s his life. Exactly. It’s his life. You know I just I’m just that’s why I figured out I have this issue like I really want to do that and at the same time I doubt it’s because that at one point in time if someone had tried to show me those things I wear them like most of the witnesses are and dismiss it and being really upset was something I had become too on my own.

[01:34:27] So I would have dug in further I would have said not only am I not going to listen to whatever this is. I’m going to double down on being a witness because now I’m scared. Yeah exactly. Yeah but seeing your podcast was the first thing I ever listened to that was Antine Jadavpur you know I had heard things before and had conversations all about you know even as an inact it’s non-member Jehovah’s Witnesses about’s you know oh well I’m not in the religion but I would never bring reproach upon Jehovah’s name. And this is what they really believe and you know it’s so interesting to witness to people even though in my heart I know I don’t believe it. But I feel like I’m afraid if that comes out of my mouth that that disbelief if those questions come out of my mouth. I’m on Mattingley like I’m going to be zapped off the earth. Then you know to this day to this day and you know I’ll say it I’m an atheist at this point. But to this day if I say something and you listen to my part here on the show and podcast you I do occasionally say things I’ll joke about something or whatever. Yeah it’s still pings in the back of my head. Oh you’re bringing reproach on Jehovah’s name. He’s going to kill you. And it’s like you know a lot of talk. We can’t rewire our selves now. Well it doesn’t go well you know I don’t know I’ve I’ve only been out two and a half years or less you know maybe eventually it will go away. That sounds nice as well.

[01:36:05] But it also kind of just points to how much like let let’s break this down. What were what was it that we were really being ruled by. It wasn’t this loving God it wasn’t out of love for neighbor any of that. It was fear it was fear that if there is this authority figure in the sky that if we don’t do everything just right is going to kill us. Yeah like we used to exist in there’s no after life. You’re just going and you’re going to be gone. You’re going to have no happiness. You’re going out. You have nothing right. You know what this is what I always talk about you know in the Bible it talks about the fear of God being a motivation. And they would always say that it’s not a fear. Help me see here. Oh yes yes. So you feel. Yeah. A healthy fear of displeasing him just like when you want to displease your parents right. Well I mean that nobody wants to displease their parents. You know everyone wants to respect and love their parents. But if just being you displeases them and they are going to kill you for it then that’s not healthy. Yeah well that’s that’s like being in an abusive relationship and being abused as a child. You. It’s not a healthy fear of displeasing because it’s a loving and forgiving God. If you just please weddings again in God in you’re imperfect and we know you’re imperfect then why would you have to be so out of step that he’s going to smite you once you cease to exist because you made a mistake. Right.

[01:37:42] You make human error. So yeah it never made sense to me. And I don’t think I’ve ever read that. And I’ll tell you in the last year I’ve had one times where I have had these deep like irrational thoughts in my head when this really is the truth. I am an apostate now and I’m speaking out against it and it turns out to be true. That’s right. I can’t get it out of my head. The sandstorm has wrought Judy and I just hope it’s a thing. I don’t think ever Rogel away. Maybe maybe it will years down the road. I hope that maybe actually help some people just kind of see the light so to speak and to help them if they want out. They know how to reach out like it maybe that will be therapeutic in a way. I hope this I hope that you might know it is therapeutic. I can 100 percent say that it’s very therapeutic and I think that it that honestly doing this podcast does help me too because we all need it. You know every one of us that left this still has those those things in the back of our head that ping us at times leftover indoctrination and it helps to be able to talk about it and to help others and things like that. So yeah in every Chanderpaul have said listen to them they’re telling a piece of my story. There’s always that common pebble. You know that we have. And so that in itself is therapeutic in healing for me. Every single time that I hear.

[01:39:25] That’s that’s why I kind of approached you had said like hey I want to be a part of this because every time that I hear those those things that we have in common it is just reaffirms that I’m not alone in that I’m not crazy and that I’m not a bad person and that I don’t have to be a victim anymore I can stand up for myself. Yeah that’s pretty cool and in fact you know what you’re doing right now is kind of standing up for yourself. You know it’s you know the consequence is that this the scariest for me. We’ve talked about that you know. So yeah. But you’re not officially shown at this point. No not officially. I’m sure and I’m not. It’s not on paper yet but I promise you it’ll get back around and I will be I’m sure. And if it does and I’ve come to terms with that I’ve come to peace with that and I respect my parents for who they are and what they choose to believe. It’s sad that they can not even respect me for who I am and what I choose to believe. But that’s just because they’re just as brainwashed as I was at one point. So my dad is now baptized and goes to meetings and is just as indoctrinated as my mother. And it’s like I think you were talking about this in more of your earlier podcasts about secondhand smoke effect. And in a continuing secondhand smoke effect where you know when you smoke around someone they may not be directly putting it in their lungs that secondhand smoke affects their actions like those people could get sick from being in that atmosphere.

[01:41:07] So it’s kind of an anathema to NATO is that that that atmosphere that was around my dad my dad you know his fame was not really close to him and my mom. And you know my mom’s family they were the ones that were around so he was around us atmosphere. Jehovah’s Witness religion he was around this culture he saw. So my mom goes through all of these things and you know Hando you know her life through the policies of the cult and how women rock. The one thing that really was the turning point for my dad was my mom. You know the whole world issue. Jehovah’s Witnesses refuse blood transfusions. So my mom has always been very ill. Pretty much my entire life. She’s had her problems she’s cancer she’s had some serious diseases she’s had surgery after surgery. And so my mom’s surgery a few years back and the doctors Kagin when they told him you know call your Priester or whoever to do last Friday because she’s bleeding out and she’s not going to make it down there. So my word for the first time ever in my life that means he hit his knees and he was like you know Jehovah we’re not on good terms but you saved my life. I will do. I would do whatever you want I promise you I would do whatever she wants me to do if you just let her live. I’ll be a Jehovah’s Witness. I’ll be a good person I’ll quit drinking completely out of watching horror movies.

[01:42:46] My dad is begging on his hands and knees his eyes out because I’ll tell you what my parents they’ve been put that together and they’ve come out the other side stronger. My parents are just as alert today as they were when they first met and my parents are a special breed. I don’t know how to explain man. One hand are very cold towards me. They weren’t like I’m gonna ask them for help you know because I know where I am sure I’m going to get which is. Well you were right. What a relief it shall even. Yes it’s a conditional love to an extent. And then there’s other times where they’re so confusing because they will call me to tell me Oh you’re that sick and he’s gonna have surgery or whatever. So I don’t really know how to take that again. Gynt fusion of mixed signals like Maharastra nothing but my dad was just and his heart you know. So she came through somehow she pulled through that surgery without any blood or blood products or anything and she was in the hospital for a few weeks and she was really weak. She made it and my dad kept his promise. No that’s what he said he’s going to do so that’s what he did. And he studied and he started going to meetings and he got baptized this last year. And you know maybe he should have became a doctor since that was the doctors that saved him saved her. Yeah right. Give us about that other. Yeah. The doctors performed the surgery that saved your mom. That’s who he is he really owes something to but.

[01:44:36] Now I understand and I understand the emotions of that and and you know death is something that’s bigger than us and that’s scary and you know you’re looking at losing somebody you love. And yeah you know I completely see how you know emotions get heightened and you would do anything you know to save that person. So he has followed you know. And it was I guess it was one of those points where my dad can he didn’t really have much known for him in the way of his Catholicism anyway. He hadn’t gone to the church and he didn’t do any of that stuff. So why not. You know I mean his character was one of those Weinert situations where one just bugged me my I closer together. We’ll have every that we can share sir. Hey it sounds like it got him to quit drinking too. So I mean that’s click click heavily drinky. Yeah. I doubt put in that mental hospital. That was a turning point as well. He quit heavily drinking then I guess maybe it was a little bit of a wakeup call for him that we and our dynamic changed that went to my dad. We don’t have a strained relationship as my mother. I do. But I still not I still feel like I’m unapproachable to me. Now even evenF.R. even if I wanted to approach them with something they’re just the way they would be possible. So it often ends up being pretty one sided because Jehovah’s Witnesses have this policy of shunning and then the only like a loophole in their shunning policy is that a person can be spoken to for quote necessary family business.

[01:46:29] Who determines what necessary family businesses. Is the witness so weak as the non witness you don’t get to determine that they do. And so it so it becomes this one sided thing where when they need you when they want something from you they will let you know but otherwise they’re probably not going to be there for you. And the sad thing is like my go know I can’t say that there will be a point in time where I’m not there for them if they do call me. Because as Emily and I refuse to be that way out west this cult or a reason because it might be that kind of person. So I refuse to be that person so whenever my family ever calls me and eat something I’m going to be there for farm because that’s what SAMEWAY supposedly thinks. Yeah that’s beautiful. Are there any questions that haven’t gotten fixed. Well. Well I know we talked about my addiction. We really talk about my recovery as much so when I did go back yeah I mean it’s in rehab. You know I needed some help. I needed a program that would help me learn how to live again. Being sober and drug free and that would help me learn how to some sort of therapeutic process. I could go through to leave all this crap behind so that I could be the person that I was meant to be. I guess you could say that you and I went brothers. Yet when I went to the brothers in the congregation they had no symptoms. You know they just had nothing for me. They treated me like scum of the earth.

[01:48:01] Most of them when I went back to the congregation. I was raised in. They would not even look at me. There were two people there even were remotely happy to see me. Then one of those people you may know. It’s like you could say it’s mama. I didn’t know I didn’t want to. Yeah your mom. Remember that. Nice to me. She really was she. She told me Don’t worry about what anybody else said she was just happy to see me. And then another sister the sister that actually studied with my mom brought her in. She was very nice to me. I went back several several times and was it was the same way every time. Nobody even looked at me. They would just walk past me like I wasn’t standing there so I’m trying to talk you not talk to my mom and said you know my mom I’m dry in here. I just feel so out of place. I feel like they’re never going to let go of my past. The money Nevine. So she says well you know they’re hurt you hurt them. You have to look at it like this. They put their trust in you that you wouldn’t bring reproach upon Jehovah’s name and you did and they were hurt so that you have to prove yourself to them before they’re gonna give you their attention. Because they gave you their attention in a way when you were younger and you traded. So now you have to prove yourself. That was her justification her reasoning behind why they treated me like that.

[01:49:32] The film’s loving you. I turned to you know Hafsat program on the bike an Alcoholics Anonymous program. And you know I was sponsored by a woman to help me get down to the root of my problems who helped me be armed with the facts about who I really am and helped me blossom into this. This journey of of who who do I want to be. Who am I. Who are you. Like I really don’t know. So let me know. I was in the middle of this identity crisis trying to stay clean and sober trying to regain everything I had lost my addiction and the first place. Like I said that I thought to go was back to the organization. And it was the first place I went and the first place that turned around and kicked me right out the door. Basically you know saying I’ve found no solace there I found no shelters here. There was no refuge for me in the organization. So all but you know I’m my one of the biggest problems I have especially with that congregation is the man who molested me as a child is a member of that creation still. No. Yeah he he is a member. He goes to that congregation. He may have moved from that congregation. Now I don’t know. I haven’t spoke to him at all. You know my family when he got out of prison they just pretend like everything should be fine like I should be run to be in a room with this man. We had a graduation party my brother. It was like a huge day.

[01:51:17] He graduated high school for someone with cerebral palsy and autism and his business more like a mental deficiency like a communication issue than it is a physical issue. He’s not in a wheelchair or anything. He just he has problems with comprehension. And he’s like he’s 31 now but he’s got the mentality of like a 15 year old. So for him to graduate high school was an amazing thing. So I’m with my mom. We are planning his Tony. I’ve got decorations. I’ve learned a place to have as part of the cake. I’ve made all these arrangements and I’m so excited to give Mother Brennan’s graduation party because we’re so proud of him. The night before the party my mom and dad very casually very like I guess I don’t know what the word is. Cavalier maybe they were kind of like oh by the way your uncle’s going to be their and US flipped. I lost my shirt. I was like I’ve thrown all my energy and time into this from our brother. And you know how I feel about him you know. Why would he do this and then why would you make it like this surprise. And it’s not the first or last time. Right. Well I guess that was kind of the first time that happened but it wasn’t the last time that it happened. They will have cookouts in the past few years. My parents want cookouts a family gatherings are my mom probably in some cases and you can’t cut my hair and I’ll cry and then it’s like I’m in the middle of cutting her hair.

[01:52:41] Oh your uncle’s on his way over a holiday weekend for a house dad here. We’re going to spend the night Gordon meeting with us. Right. How can best this man who robbed not only me but other girls in our family of our innocence who may have remorse that doesn’t show it as far as I can see he was still never admitted to this day that he hurt me. How is he not shy. And I know it’s completely it’s completely backwards. He’s supposed to be. He’s supposed to be accepted. Now come on Casey look. You. You should just forgive and forget. Okay. Now what you did that’s unforgivable and unforgettable. Well he did. I mean come on. You know when I look at Ben Mike he was just starting and he wasn’t baptized until later when he got out of prison. It was okay it was OK. It got a race all out in the books. I was baptized. So what I did was George havan on the organization I tarnished their name. He didn’t tarnish their name. They didn’t tarnish their name by protecting pedophiles and by punishing the victims. Yeah he tarnished you are you know me and that in turn tarnished their organization. I’m the one who needs to be shot. Right. You haven’t done anything in this whole and everything that you’ve explained so far. You have the only person that you have heard so far as you say you didn’t do anything to hurt anybody else. You took it out on yourself. Yes. And he actively hurt other people. And yet he.

[01:54:30] Oh he’s cool because of some stupid organizational technicality. It’s like nowhere. Will show me in the Bible where it says that once you’re baptized everything you do thereafter counts. But before you’re baptized none of that counts. Like where is that. That’s not there. Yeah. And the fact that they would protect him and that he’s in this congregation with what he did. Okay. And then Emily allows him to come around and I lost custody of my son came on little side. And he live with my brother and I am now you know I’ve been clean and sober a little over three and a half years. So I’m really proud of that. And I’m working so working towards regaining our thanks that I gained weight loss when I was on my addiction my kids be one of those things. Now my 8 year old he lived with my brother and my brother. Knowing how I felt about this and nobody ever protected me nobody ever stood up for me not out of my older brothers. My own father my mother nobody ever stood up for me and said What about how I feel you know and I’m not trying to be poor poor pitiful me now because it’s over with and I have to get a break and run for my own sanity I consider that you know I’ve had enough years of resentment over it. However when I tell my brother how I feel about that and other he has custody of what he’s allowing this person to be around my children. It drove me insane.

[01:56:03] It it’s it’s something that I know I will never be able to accept I’ll never accept that you were allowed this known around my children. You know no it’s not his job. I do in the bedroom. Momma Well let me ask you so I know there was. I just I you can choose to talk about this or not but there was one witness who tried to help you out with your kid right. Oh yes. So you know that brother that I was telling you about that. Never quite lost his humanity and was a really good guy. Right. Right. Okay so I mean I was incarcerated for a while. I was actually clean and sober at the time that I was incarcerated. But because of another technicality of a program I was and I was put in jail. And I had my son was only six weeks old my youngest had a 2 year old. He was only six weeks old pharyngeal and. And I go now and then. Was that right back in. Because I disagreed to go to this long rehab. They wanted me to go to one that was already clean and sober but I’m a felon so I’m kind of like I say I’m not sober to the Commonwealth. In a committed or an easy to hold. Then you have a choice I have to do what they say or go back to jail. Well for the first time in my life I held my integrity and said No I’m not doing this. I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m going to stand up for myself and I’m not going to go get shipped off four hours away from home.

[01:57:42] I want to go home. My kids well they put me back in jail. And this sister wrote me in jail. And she told me that since I had chosen a life of immorality and drugs and crime and couldn’t be a mother to manage children that I she just let her adopt my son out to someone in a congregation because there were people out there who were actually care about my son and give him a chance at a good life serving Jehovah. But he wasn’t even that nice about it. He was not. She was very dry about it. Like basically just he was the only sensible thing for me to do what I would be doing my son a disservice if I didn’t sign him I wrote to her about her adoption and that this lady she’s just she’s never been a nice person in general. Maybe somewhere down deep inside of her she is. But from you know she’s like a third generation or more. so she never had a chance to have a hip a humanity side to her. She’s just she’s a mind was drawn. She wasn’t even born with humanity as far as Asir most of the elders in people in the congregation don’t see you as anything more than the number on your publisher’s card. And that’s how she saw me but she saw a chance at redemption through masseurs. So she wanted to take Marsan from me in an that’s one time my mom did kind of stand up for me though. She was like absolutely not. If anybody’s going to have your son is going to be me.

[01:59:28] So I’ve no problem properly telling this woman to screw off. Any mindless stoners get to rest my to love Jehova. It’s got to be smart. Well obviously. So how much of that letter was about hoping you none of it absolutely none of it really. They don’t I’m just shocked that they would only want what they wanted. She came to visit me one time in the jail and that’s all she talked about was what were my plans because I lived in a trailer park that they owned at the time I lived in a house where my plane with my trailer because they really needed to move my stuff out get somebody else in there. I wasn’t going to be living there. And what did I decide to do about my son. And I just Hungar found up and turned my back and waited to be let out of the. So you were behind the glass. Yes I was ready to go back into the plaza and that the charge had been that there was no concern for me or is there anything they could do to help me or not even money redistributed. Yeah you know it was like all business now they were done with you they just wanted your kid out. Yeah they wanted my offspring. It is sad. It is there anything that you would like people that have never been witnesses to know don’t do it it’s a trap. No not look it’s not that all the people in the organization OK.

[02:01:14] There are some good people in that organization but as you said earlier the majority of the time those people are the ones who end up leaving because they wake up I I don’t think it’s just an organization of these evil vile wicked people. However I do believe that at the top of that pyramid are some evil and vile and selfish people who dole down these principles and these policies and the organization itself is just it’s a very crooked place. And I would not I would not raise my children to be raised like I was. Oh I could. I wouldn’t do you know just do your research. If there’s ever anything if you’ve ever thought about setting with a member of Jehovah’s Witnesses or being a Jehovah’s Witness. Just do your research what they have him tell you is everything that doesn’t. Is it proJ.W. is a lie that’s been handed down by apostates because they are a part of Satan in the world. But that’s that’s not the case. Do your research and you know it is it’s something you know you really want and you think you could be happy then by all means. But from my experience I’m really lucky to be alive today. Very much and I will never go back to that. I will never go back to making myself feel worthless or making myself feel like I’m not good enough. Because you know the religion tell people that I left because I’m a sinner and I’m immoral and I let the world insane take place of Jehovah an organization that’s out there I never had the love for Jehovah my heart. That’s not true. I have a very big heart. I’m a very loving person.

[02:03:22] I mean my husband gets mad at me sometimes because I go out of my way to help other people. And I would take away from myself still to help someone else. A part of that is probably my people pleasing the pirates because I have a lot of compassion and because I’ve been in a lot of dark places in my life. So to see someone else in a dark place where they need help. It just it hits me in the feels I can’t help it. You know I just I want to help in any way I can. And that’s a beautiful quality that you would think that witnesses would have. But they only help people conditionally. So exactly yeah yeah. You know my my husband was interested in going into this nondenominational Christian church. And my sons grandparents are a part of this church. And you know we we went there Father’s Day last year I went for him as a part of his apology I guess you know. And I have never felt more love from any religious organizations but this is not. It’s not like your normal church you know. It’s like your normal church policies where there’s there’s no white rank and file there. These people are just treated like a person. I was hit my vape my cigarette they drink here that I have tattoos. They don’t care that my hair was purple. They didn’t hear that you know they they just they were just like hey you were just happy you’re here. Tell us about yourself tell us about your rights. Is there anything you need. How can we help you.

[02:04:53] And yes Jimmy spoke very Yongs about how these worldly organizations are supposed to be so horrible and evil and how we are supposed to avoid them at all costs. But hell these people didn’t know me from anybody and they reach out a hand and a railing embraced me and more just from day one just nice down to earth people there is nothing fake about them. But this organization who raised me who saw me from the age of two grow up into a young lady into a grow to a young woman who who should have had some sort of emotional investment in me because they’ve known me since I was a baby you know how they have absolutely nothing to offer me. They have no they have no assistance they have no help. They have no not even a nice pair not even a house. They just pretend like at any minute just to get off of them you know it just it just shows like the parallel. It’s everything I needed to know for me to finally leave and just say I’m done. You know and there’s consequences and so be it. But I feel like if my story can help one person who is on that fence about whether or not they should meet who is having doubts who’s experienced anything like what an experience has had their sexual abuse or domestic abuse covered up that is an organization whose parents were told not to go to the police. It was made to feel like everything in her life was their fault. If I can help one person to overcome until less alone it’s worth the consequences because I’m going to walk in my truth today and I’m gonna be free and my true.

[02:06:39] And I don’t have to be afraid of them anymore. Her Yeah you know it’s it’s very wrong. Yeah. You think that riding your allegiance to this organization to this cult is going to give you some deep and personal spiritual connection that you’re going to rise up and feel like you have this conscious contact with Jehovah like he’s truly reaching his holy spirits out you know out there. You’re you’re being showered in it. In fact it’s quite the opposite it’s not until I left completely and finally said enough is enough that I felt any sort of spiritual freedom. And I just I would hate to think that there’s someone out who is scared and you know didn’t get that help because I didn’t speak out. You know what I mean not only understand. So then let me give you the chance to speak out again if you could say anything to your family and friends that shown you or I mean let’s face it you know there could be consequences even of this conversation. You know so let’s say you have a last chance to say something to these people what would you say. I would say I love you and I forgive you and no matter what you ever do I’m going to love you. And you know I’m really sorry that you can’t feel the same way about me my love. I refused to put conditions on my last. And I hope our hope is that if I really prayed like that that I would pray and petition that maybe they wake up and do their own research beautiful.

[02:08:21] Yeah cause I’ve had a beautiful opportunity to actually be my own person and you know I’m not sorry. I love them but I’m not sorry. I’m just not. I’m not going to apologize for being who I am. And that even if they don’t love me unconditionally I will always love them unconditionally. Well that is that is certainly a larger love than a love that only exists as long as you toe a certain line. So you know it’s beautiful when you get free and you can learn what love really is instead of what you and I we’re taught as kids. Is there anything you know other than Well there you go. Other than that love you know is there anything that you’ve learned since you left that that’s really made your life better. Just that I don’t I don’t have to be ashamed of who I am. I don’t have to hide I don’t have to live by that fear obligation and guilt anymore. And you know I mean I enjoy my life today. I enjoy celebrating my children’s birthdays and not having guilt because I had imperfections I can embrace those imperfections today and not criticize myself constantly and I’m just I’m a happy person. I’m very happily married. You know choose what the rest of my life. He supports me unconditionally. He loves me unconditionally. He loves my children unconditionally. I’ve never had that type of love before. Had I stuck in that organization and been put into another arrangement of marriage I probably would have never felt that. And so I’m grateful for the life I have today.

[02:10:15] I don’t I don’t regret one bit of it and honestly being the person that I am today and being grateful for that person everything that I went through in my life led up to me being here at this moment right now. So there’s no point in me saying I would have changed a thing. You know and you know if I’m accept no that makes total sense. Do you have any dreams anything that you’re wanting to do here in your free life. Well yes I do. Well my husband and I are on our own business and we are on a carpentry business. He does remodeling restoration. He likes to build furniture and use reclaimed the word. So we’re working on that and working on building Nadda so that it’s something he can be independent with. And also I am actually working with that non-denominational church right now on some outreach programs for we do a lot of work with people in our community. Some of the ladies they they actually take like all recycled plastic grocery bags and they make sleeping mats for homeless people. We cook we take food out and feed the homeless population as much as we can downtown. We collect blankets socks hats coats shoes get together things that are kind of necessities like hygiene packs for people. And you know I feel like that’s important for me to give back. It was something that I never would have done had our state a Jehovah’s Witness because they doubt you know they do not care about their community they don’t truly care about humanity. If your inner circle is here their babble great but even then you’re not going to have any type of outreach.

[02:12:06] If you’re if you’re working that minimum wage job because you never went to college or struggle to make ends meet because Jehovah’s Witnesses tell you that you don’t need to put your faith in anything of this world could you. Now the end is near for like 100 years now. And so you know you’re not going to go to them and say oh yeah can I go to the food pantry this month because we’re running a little short on fuel or is there any way that the organization can help us pay rent because otherwise we’re going to get evicted with our kids. You know those kind of things. So my my guess at this point is to open and run a halfway house for four families that are struggling with addiction and who are trying to rebuild their life to give them a halfway point. So once they get clean and sober and so gives them a place where they can come with their kids and they can get back on their feet in making and have resources with help finding a job and learn how to budget and manage their money so that they can save and eventually move out on their own and live with their own life. Clean and sober. If I hadn’t had people tell me how to do those things and show me and help me I wouldn’t be here today. So I want to get back in that aspect. And also I am proud of my five year plan as my husband’s business grows is to open a rescue for animals. Probably more for dogs than anything however any animal farm.

[02:13:38] I’m not to make a rehabilitation center for animals you have either been tossed to the side or put in a kill shelter. Those are my two passions right. So helping the West fortunate I suppose because I was that less fortunate. And someone stopped to help me and I feel like it’s the least I can do to give back. And and candid I guess put my own good karma out there in the world for those who reached out to me and helped me in and I found a real passion in a real naks were really like helping people. And I’m really that I it. So I’m not beautiful. Yeah it helps me heal. It helped. It helped me heal a lot to her to get out of myself. Like I said get out of that victim’s stance and stand up and say I don’t have to be a victim anymore I can help other people. And I can and look at me I’m leading a better life. You know I’m not going to let that warming anyone’s. This is pretty cool too. To see that you know out of all of this you know all the trauma of all the drama all the everything you know that you’ve come out of it and you know as this strong woman who can live her own life you have your own family. You’re wanting that you are not only wanting to help others but you’re able to help others now and that you’ve taken your life back. I mean that’s that’s what’s leaving any of these cults.

[02:15:17] You know unfortunately there’s they’re shunning that comes along with it but it’s not just about the shunning there’s so much there’s so much more that that that we get on the outside and away from all that toxicity. And know now you have a chance to to make your life what you want it to. You know instead of looking forward to some promised paradise in the future that she’s delaying you know you get to have those things now and that’s awesome. I mean it’s like well here’s you know it’s yeah. You know since I’ve reached out like a whole family. People have been shown who they treat me like family. They treat me like better than any person in their religion everyday. And it’s so nice to have that network of support. And you know like I know we touched on this already but it’s not as scary to be Sharon when you find out that you can take your life back and maybe you can reach out and have that individuality. It’s not a state anymore. It is when you realize you don’t have to be alone to them to exist. In fact you’re not doing anything about existing in that position. When you come to the realization that you can have ontogeny and that you can kind of when you take your power that it’s not a scary anymore to be shown. It’s really not because there is a whole other life out there. People who are a hundred times more compassionate loving and caring them than the people in your organization ever were turned out as a blessing in disguise as being shown in mine. I agree I agree. There’s a few things in life are all good or all bad. You know being shunned by your family missing those people that is bad and that does hurt.

[02:17:19] But there’s I wouldn’t trade the benefits on the other side for that ever. So yeah exactly. I totally agree. As always I want to thank Kacey for being brave enough to speak her truth. It’s not easy to do so especially when that truth could cause problems for yourself. But in the end that’s what Jehovah’s Witnesses taught us to do right. Don’t be mad because we’re taking a stand for what we see is true. You taught us to do that. So good for Kacey for doing so if you’d like to leave a note of encouragement for Kacey. You can go to shunnedpodcast.com and you’ll see her episode at the top of the episodes page. Please do so for all the brave people that face their fears and tell their stories. We were all taught that if we were to go away we should at least do so quietly by the cult. So you know it is kind of reminiscent of what any abuser would tell their victims. You know you can go away but shut up. Well one way to speak up is to show support for the guests here. Another way you can show support is to leave us a good review on iTunes. It helps give legitimacy to the show and helps us rise up in the rankings so that other people can find us to of course. This show does cost money to produce and you’ll notice that the transcriptions are out now for each new episode due to the mazing donors that give as little as a dollar a month to the show through Patreon.

[02:18:50] Our numbers of listeners continue to grow and having those transcripts helps us to get traffic to the site and then traffic in turn turns to new listeners. So if you’d like to help financially you can do so at patreon.com/shunned. In fact this month I have two new patrons to thank. I’d like to give a thank to someone called Covert Fade and also to Zachary and their families for signing up again. Every dollar helps. Putting the money back into the podcast and the more that there is the more I can do speaking of Covert fade. Some of you may know him on Twitter. That’s where I found him as well. He’s been kind to the shunned podcast himself and he started his own podcast calledJ.W. forward cast again that’s JW forwardcast. One word you might want to check that out. Pretty cool. Speaking of Twitter some of you that follow this podcast actually follow it on Twitter and Instagram well for all this time. My wife Jenny has been making most of the initial post and then I’ve joined in at times when needed or private messages with friends and things like that. Well now she is taking over all that. So if you go on to Instagram or Twitter that’s my wife Jenny and I’m really happy to have you know somebody that supports me in all this. It means a lot. And you can support her as well by stopping by and saying Hatsu you on those platforms. You can find us on Twitter and Instagram as shunnedpodcast one word.

[02:20:33] You can also find my new VIDcasts on YouTube under the same name shunnedpodcast. Again one word just put out two new episodes of that in July 1 about comparison and one about how the cult stole our problems. In fact that the latter one had an article in it from the great joho. So shout out to Joho who is an online friend of mine and who wrote that article. So subscribe there and you’ll get new videos as I produce them. If you want to hear my personal story you can find it by listening to the podcast called This JW Life. Also found thisjwlife.com if you want links to anything mentioned here you can find all of that on the show notes you can find the show notes either by going to shunnedpodcast.com and going to the post for each episode or you can probably just on whatever podcast your app you’re using. You can just look at the description and that should have the notes. You probably noticed that we have a new theme song. Day one of our Instagram friends gave us a song to use called no hell yet so no hell yet is the song and her name on soundcloud is fair voyeur. She has other songs as well that you can listen to so I’ll be sure to link it the show notes. Is this the song that she gave us. And you can listen to more of her music there as well. So thank you so much to her for sharing that all right.

[02:22:01] So this is where I usually tell you something about the next episode instead I’m going to tell you that you’re about to get a lot of new episodes. For the next couple months I’m going to be doing some extras. I have an episode coming out in mid August at some point from a former witness that has a book coming out and I have a regular episode coming out then afterword at the beginning of September as per usual with another former witness. I then have a special interview that I’m doing with someone that was formerly of the Amish faith that will come out in mid September ahead of a big Amish conference. And right after that at the beginning of October we’ll have another regularly scheduled episode coming out by another ex witness so that a one a month you’re about to get five podcast episodes in short order for some special circumstances and then we’re going to get back into the regular swing of things. So watch out for the new episodes. If you’re not subscribed go ahead and do so so that you get them automatically. And as we end them all go into the world and love others do no harm and go be happy.

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.