It was a good childhood

One of the things that I have really learned to do in the last couple of years, is to appreciate the life I did have with my adopted family. There are so many things and experiences that I would never have experienced if I had been anywhere else. When I first found my birth family I was so angry with my adoptive family. I just couldn't understand how they could love and raise me as if I was their own and then when I am 30 and come out as gay they decide this is one sin they can't look beyond. And really when I say "my parents" I think it's important to know that my Dad was never a Jehovah's Witness. My Mom met my Dad when she was taking a "break" from being a JW and it wasn't until they adopted my brother that my Mom decided to go back to church. My Mom shared with me when I was a teenager that when my Mom went back to the church they (my parents) decided that my Mom would be in charge of the spiritual upbringing of my brother and I. Throughout my whole life I was able to see small glimpses of the world outside of my local congregation because of my Dad. Now that I am an adult and see how stubborn my Mom can be, I am even more appreciative of all the battles he went to with my Mom so I could experience somewhat of a  normal childhood. When I was disfellowshipped from the church it put my Dad in the middle and I of course wanted him to take my side, but as the years went by and my Mom still refused to talk to me, my relationship with my Dad slowly faded.  Happily my relationship with my Dad seems to be going better and my whole surgery ordeal has opened up the doors for us to talk several times a week.

One of the things that I had growing up was a cabin at a local lake. Anytime I think about my childhood, Lake Lotawana always comes to mind. I spent every weekend there in the summer and we even spent time there in the winter even though our little cabin had no heat. I have so many good memories from my time at Lake Lotawana. I think the big one was we were always there together as a family. One thing I can say about my childhood is, my parents were very involved. I don't remember a soccer game or any other activity that I didn't have one or both of my parents there. As a child (and much into my adult life) I felt very safe being near my parents. I think that is why I had trouble distancing myself from my adoptive Mom once I moved out and didn't see her everyday. For so much of my life, my adoptive Mom was the most important person in my life. Sometimes when I really think about it, I wonder how I don't cry every day that I no longer have the woman that raised me in my life.

But back to happy things....I had a very good childhood. For so long I think I only focused on the bad and what had happened to me, but I soon learned that everyone has something they have had to overcome and compared to what some people go through growing up, I didn't have it that bad. Even when I was being abused by my brother, I still was a happy child and filled with so much hope.

I often wonder why things never worked out that I would have children of my own. For the last two years that my ex husband and I were married we did not use birth control. Sometimes I struggle with my faith, but then I remember that I never got pregnant when I easily could have and how not having a child probably saved my life. Things would have been so different if my ex husband and I had had a baby. I could see myself being just like my adoptive Mom and being scared and staying in the church and never trying to venture out on my own.

Boy, it feels good writing again. And thank you so much for your feedback. Keep it coming. I love hearing from you!

So many untold stories

When you leave a cult it takes many years to de-activate your brain and to move away from all of the things I had been brain washed about.  Before I left the church I slowly started doing things my way and I quickly found that I wasn't struck by lightning and god didn't suddenly want to do away with me. I remember Christmas of 2000 and I bought myself a little Christmas tree. I put it up in my living room but had it close enough to the closet in case one of my witness friends/family members showed up. I loved that little tree and it was the first time that I did something that was totally against my religion and what I had been taught. 

When I was a witness I prayed and prayed that god would make me what he wanted me to be. How could I believe something that was making me so miserable. When I think back to the Caroline between the years of 2000-2004 I wonder what made me hang on and not just give up. There were many times when I did want to give up because I could not see living my life as a Jehovah's Witness and to be sane at the same time. The last few years that I was a Jehovah's Witness I felt like I was going crazy. My heart was telling me one thing, but everything I had been taught my entire life was telling me I god was very disappointed in me and my life was going to be a miserable one. 

When I was married to my ex-husband I had what I had always thought I had wanted. I had a husband that was nice to me and we had what seemed like a good life together. But something wasn't right and it wasn't right from day one. Four years into our marriage I finally came to terms with who I was and it suddenly made sense why my entire life with my ex-husband did not feel right to me. When I shared with my ex-husband that I had feelings for a woman he was in shock. He went right to the elders and told them that not only was I now smoking (this woman I had feelings for smoked and I picked up the habit to impress her) but I was also claiming to be a lesbian. James' outcry to the elders called for an immediate meeting with 2 elders to discuss the claims James was making. During the meeting I denied being a lesbian (feelings for a woman did not equate to me being a lesbian yet) but I did tell them I had started to smoke. This whole smoking thing was a way for me to get out of the church. I held onto that and within 8 months I was disfellowshipped for smoking cigarettes and my ex husband had moved out and suddenly I was on my own for the first time in my life. 

It amazes me how quickly Jehovah's Witnesses can turn their love and affection on and off. A few years ago I confronted the elders at my local congregation in Kansas City and they still denied that they shun people that are disfellowshipped. Not sure how they can continue to deny they shun members when there are millions of examples right in front of their eyes. 

I sure do love all this writing that I have been doing. I keep telling myself that I would love to write a memoir or maybe even a fictional book based off my life. I am working on my motivation to write more and to share more because this heart of mine has so many untold stories! 

Consequences of being baptized

I got a lot of private feedback regarding my last post and it has really inspired me to keep writing and to keep sharing. Thanks to those of you that encouraged me to keep writing it out.

For two days now I have been looking for a picture of my cousin Jill and I on the day we got baptized. I feel that pictures with some writing speaks volume that wouldn't be there if the picture wasn't there. But I am going to try to not let me not finding this photo turn into I will wait to write.

I think I want to address another thing that was said to me today. Someone mentioned that I had a lot of bitterness towards religion and as much as I feel like I do, I don't let what has happened to me in the past to stop me from being who I am today. Writing me for me is something that I really enjoy doing and I love that there are people that love reading what I have to say. I'll try to keep any bitterness out of my posts. :-)

People are always fascinated with the fact that I was raised a Jehovah's Witness. The religion as a whole is very private and they hate when outsiders find out about how things really work on the inside. The main goal in converting people is to get them to where they dedicate their life to the church. They don't say the church but rather, you are dedicating your life to Jehovah and his earthly organization. Once someone is baptized you are pretty much stuck and the only way to get out is  leave all of your friends and/or family. When someone converts to Jehovah's Witness I feel they have an easier way to escape than someone like me who was raised in the religion and whose entire extended family are witnesses. My adoptive Dad was an only child, so I never had a lot of extended family outside of great uncles and great aunts. Because my adoptive Mom's family lived just a few miles from us and were also Jehovah's Witnesses, we did everything with them. My best friend growing up was my cousin Jill who is 3 years younger than me. We were raised more like sisters and it was not uncommon for me to see Jill and rest of my extended family 3-4 times a week.

As soon as you are a teenager you start getting pressure to become a baptized member of Jehovah's Witnesses. Any sins you commit before you are baptized are not disciplined as harshly as someone that is baptized. So baptism is a very serious commitment and it is not taken lightly. When I was 16 my cousin Joel (he was one year younger than me) got baptized. Then the pressure was really on me since my cousin who was younger than me already made this lifelong commitment.

When my cousin Jill decided she was going to get baptized at the next convention (baptisms are only done at the large conventions that are held 2-3 times a year) I decided that it was probably time for me get baptized as well. I knew that any mistake I made after getting baptized could be held against me and a group of elders could decide if I should be part of the congregation or not. I just hoped that I wouldn't be one of the ones that did end up getting disfelloshipped because that would bring so much shame to my family.

When you decide you want to get baptized you are required to meet with 2 elders and to go over a certain set of questions. The elders ask you several questions and depending on how you answer them they decide if you are mature enough to make this commitment. I was scared to death they would tell me I was not ready, but I ended up passing the test just fine and a few weeks later I was baptized in a cow trough at Kemper Arena in Kansas City and the date was June 16, 1990. There is a special talk before the baptism that is directed only at the people getting baptized and I remember the elder telling our group that our baptism date was the most important date in our life. He was wrong, I think the most important date in my life was July 29, 2004 when I was finally able to get out of what I had started 14 years prior.

I know that when I first left/got kicked out of the church I was angry and there are times when that anger comes up. I know there are some that are reading this saying to themselves...Why can't she just get over this? I wish it was that easy. It's really hard re-programming your brain after 30 years of brainwashing. My blog and my writing is a great way for me to work through things and I guess if you don't want to read about this you can chose not to.

Two days in a row of blogging...maybe tomorrow I can make it 3 days.

Me vs Religion

 Slowly but surely I have been backing away from religion and all that comes with religion for the last 11 years. For the first 30 years of my life, the religion my adoptive mom chose for herself was what I was forced to eat, swallow and digest every single day of my life. Now when someone starts waving anything religious in front of me, I immediately back away and most times will back away and there are times when my response makes people back away from me. Anyone that really knows and loves me, knows that religion is a very touchy subject for me and it really is best to leave me out of anything related to religion.

For the first 30 years of my life I was forced to go to church 3 times a week and then on Saturdays (or any other day you didn't have to go to work/school) I was forced to go out in the "field ministry" to preach about the religion my adoptive mom was trying to force down my throat. When I was younger I was extremely shy so going to strangers doors for hours on Saturday mornings were torture for me. I was so jealous of my friends that were home watching cartoons while I was out knocking on strangers doors. I hated having to speak to strangers about something that I didn't believe in and something that I really didn't understand. It's weird because as much time as I spent in church learning about the bible and what god expects out of me, the whole idea of Jehovah's Witnesses was confusing to me and it never made sense what they were saying.

There were several times in my life where I really put forth an effort to be a good Jehovah's Witnesses. In June 1990 I was baptized as a Jehovah's Witnesses (I was 17); which really is a blood oath that you will forever be faithful to the church and do everything possible to spread the "truth". That summer I was baptized I auxiliary pioneered for one month. Being an auxiliary pioneer means I have committed to putting in 60 hours of knocking on doors for a one month period. I teamed up with my cousin Jill and we did out best that August to reach 60 hours and hopefully changes some people's hearts and convert them. I did neither. I think I made it to 56 hours and I ended up having to explain to the elders why I was 4 hours short. I hated that whenever there was a moral question my adoptive mom would always tell me to call the elders.

It was all controlled and when you did not meet their expectations, you were forced to explain to the elders why you did not meet your commitments. Once I was out of my parents house and able to have a little bit more say in what I did, I learned to lie about going out in the field ministry. Every baptized member of the church is expected to get at least 1 hour a month of preaching the good news. Once I was on my own I learned that it was very easy to lie about being out in field service and finally one day I decided I didn't want to do it anymore...and I didn't. But I continued to turn in my field service report every month with all made up numbers.

It took me twice to remove myself totally from the church; which also meant total detachment to my family. I knew that once I was kicked out of the church (disfellowshipped) my family would only talk to me if I came back the church. It's hard removing yourself from a cult, especially when your whole family and everything you have known is attached to that church. But here I am 11 years later and I feel I am stronger than ever.

But one area that I is still such a personal struggle for me is the idea of organized religion and an organization telling me what to do. I think this is why I could never be part of another church again..I don't want to be controlled.

Yes, it's been 11 years since I left the church and even though I spent my first 30 years inside a church  for hours each week, I think my relationship with God is just now getting started.

And I don't need religion to have God in my life.