I realize now, even though I did not quite understand then, that I was trying to please the elders instead of trying to please God. I know my mother had a hard time with the same thing. I heard her say many times, “Jehovah God understands my limitations. I think He is more merciful than the elders are.”
Another thing that bothered me was the lack of love. So many of the sisters and brothers were so rude to me. I kept telling myself that they were just imperfect humans and I expected too much. I also spoke out many times about the motivation everyone had for going door-to-door. They counted hours. I saw many times pioneers waste time on purpose. They would go to people who obviously just wanted company and did not care about our religion. They could give them literature and count it on their time cards. They did not care about baptizing people. They just wanted to make their time card look good. I remember 2 people getting baptized who were converts instead of being “raised in the truth.” In 24 years there were only two.
Please do not get me wrong. I was not a perfect angel myself. I had my faults. I kept trying and trying. I kept making new commitments to Jehovah, only to find myself sinning yet again. I would try and fail. I never really felt like I was growing though. I felt more like I was just running and then I would get exhausted. I would run some more, and then get exhausted.
At this point I was 18 years old. I saw many things that I thought needed to improve in the congregation. Never did I imagine or fathom that all of it was a lie.
I graduated from high school May 2000. I was very tired of being told every single move to make. My parents would not let me date even though I was legally an adult. They told me I was going to have to pioneer until I started college in the fall. They let me go to college interestingly enough. I was the second to go to college in my congregation in its history. I am glad I was not the first. I remember how much she was criticized. My parents refused to pay for college. They told me that I would have to work to pay for it myself.
During college I began to learn so much about history and how to logically think. I was bothered that the arguments and logic of the society commonly made little sense. Their reasoning was so empty to me. Their arguments were just not sufficient to me. I remember in the summer of 2005 reading the scriptures and coming to a conclusion about a point in the scriptures. I tried to show my family and they dismissed me quickly. They would not believe me. Then two weeks later the Watchtower had “new light” and said exactly what I had just said. I showed my family yet again and they said, “You should have just waited on Jehovah to reveal it.” That made me realize that no matter how true something is, they will not believe it unless the Watchtower said it. I was stunned.
That time in life was when things really started to change for me. June 1st, 2000, I decided that I could not take being told every single step to make. I wanted to remain a faithful Jehovah’s Witness, but I wanted to have the freedom to let my own conscience guide me. I left home and eloped with a boy from the kingdom hall. We married without having been on a single date.
I did not do anything wrong by getting married. I had some of my close friends disown me at that point. They did not agree with the decision I made so they refused to speak to me. They would say hello but that was about it.
The boy was one that had been interested in me for a long time. He went to school with me and started coming to the kingdom hall when we were about sixteen. He got baptized in about 1999. I had suspicions then that he only converted because he wanted a relationship with me. I did not realize that he knew the whole time how much of a lie it all was. He pretended for years to be a Jehovah’s Witness until he gave up about a year after we were married. He just faded away. He never told me or any of the other Jehovah’s Witnesses that he did not believe them. He also never told me until after my disassociation that he had decided he was going to hell for leaving Christ to be a Jehovah’s Witness. Because he had decided he was going to hell anyway, he treated me in any way he selfishly felt like it.
While we were married, he slyly put doubts into my mind. He would ask me questions like: “Why do they not welcome people in whatever clothes they have? Why do they insist that they dress differently even if they cannot afford it?” He would never agree that Jesus was Michael the archangel no matter what. He actually got me to think and defend my doctrine. I realized how little proof I had for a few of the things. He asked me why a lot but never attacked me. I do not know how he held back from telling me the truth all of that time. I guess he knew that I would shut off talking to him about it if he admitted that he did not agree with their doctrine.
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