Attempted Infant Sacrifice
My Jehovah’s Witness Parents Loved Less
(Chronicles of the Secret JW Family — Story Six)
I suppose most people don’t come across the experience of child sacrifice. I did. I had the unfortunate circumstance of being born into a doomsday cult. I had to hear speakers from the platform talk about sacrificing adults and children. That is what their Jehovah wants. That’s what they were trying to teach me anyway. By age twelve, I already lost a brother. (See Chronicles of the Secret JW Family — Story Five) I already knew at this time that my Jehovah’s Witness parents are biological brother and sister. I knew we were being “protected” from law enforcement. Two congregations and the leaders in New York had accepted my family.
The summer prior (1988) I was eleven. I grieved for my baby brother Chad who died in his sleep. The summer of 1989 I was expected to understand what a child sacrifice is. Soon after Chad passed away, my parents started trying for another baby. This time my mother had to go to my father’s (her brother) apartment to conceive. I knew my mother was going to my father’s apartment some evenings. She was (still is) a Jehovah’s Witness in good standing. They recognized her union with her brother. They saw them as any other married couple. My father disassociated from the Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1985. My mother was very vocal about her love for her brother. All the kids in the house knew she was leaving the house to get pregnant again. I think my father loved my mother more than she loved him. She was making it pretty clear that she just wanted more babies. I don’t know why. She was not a good mother to me or my siblings. My oldest brother at this time was nineteen and was very into the religion. The rest of us couldn’t stand it. My sister was fifteen. My closest in age sibling was eleven. I already wrote about his life. (See Chronicles of the Secret JW Family — Story One) My mother had been pregnant by her brother seven times so far. The first pregnancy was a miscarriage. My oldest brother was born in 1970. She then had a second miscarriage. My sister was born in 1973. I was born in 1977. My younger brother, in 1978. Baby Chad was gone so there were four of us left. My mother was trying to have a sixth child when she really wasn’t very loving to all of the children she already had. I was not mad. As a twelve year old, I was very maternal. I loved every moment with Chad, but he was gone so quickly. I would love another baby very deeply as well.
My mother announced her pregnancy in late winter of 1988. That is the same year that Chad passed away. I knew people at the Kingdom Hall hated seeing her pregnant. I really believe if it were up to the congregation or congregation elders that my parents would have never been allowed to join. In 1974 the leaders in New York had a meeting and agreed they could be baptized. They already had two kids together then. There is nothing others can do when the leaders make a decision that a member might not agree with. I never knew who these mystery men were when I was growing up. Now they are all over the internet trying to be relevant. I knew I was an atheist by the time I was twelve. I got tired of hearing “the one true religion” and “Armageddon any day now” and all that weird stuff. I especially thought it was odd that my family was being kept a secret. Like couldn’t their Jehovah see us? Were we really trying to keep my parents a secret from this Jehovah deity too? None of it made sense.
Seven months into the pregnancy my mother received a routine sonagram. Something was possibly wrong. There was some kind of unknown specs. I think they did another test to verify what was going on. We knew a baby boy was on the way. He was determined to have something wrong with his kidneys. He had to be scheduled to be taken two weeks early. The first week of June 1989 a team of doctors had already been chosen. My parents would only allow doctors who would promise to use no blood transfusions to treat the baby. The local elders helped to communicate with doctors to make sure they really would let this baby die if he needed any transfusions. Not again. . . It was two days shy of an exact year that Chad passed away. A new baby had arrived. I was facing losing two brothers in one year. Me and my siblings were old enough to be left at home. We were not at the hospital and had no idea if the elders and our parents were letting our baby brother die or not. We heard back that the baby had an improperly structured urinary system. He needed immediate surgery. Two of them. A kidney had completely failed. They would worry about removing that at a later time. My mother would get shunned if she allowed the doctors to use blood products. She was very mentally unwell, and this religion was all she had. It was more important than the children sitting at home. It was more important than this baby living. If they told her to leave her brother, I think she would have. I knew she would listen to them and allow the baby to die.
I will call this baby T.J. (This is a true story, for his privacy) T.J was born a healthy weight of eight pounds, one ounce. He was a big boy despite being induced two weeks early. He had two surgeries and survived them. He could come home until the next surgery. That one would be to remove the dead kidney. He would have to wait until he was six months old. T.J. would be put up for sacrifice again in a few months. Hopefully that would be the last time. I don't know why my father was following what the elders said. He was not a Jehovah’s Witness anymore. I guess he didn’t want my mother mad at him if he was to tell the doctors to save the baby by all means necessary. Did he not care about his son that he lost just the year before? It seemed that my mother loved her religion more than this baby. My father loved his sister more than this baby. He just stood back and watched her run the show with the elders. This was the first time that I saw my strong bricklayer father as weak. I know they would've permitted any one of their children to die for the Watchtower Society. They were willing to sacrifice T.J. for a publishing company in New York. My parents really couldn’t love us correctly. Afterall, they were loving each other incorrectly.
T.J. did survive the removal of his kidney. It looked like he wouldn’t need any other surgeries. If he did, then he would’ve been put back up for sacrifice. I knew they were feeling lucky and would do it again. By six months old, T.J. had survived three surgeries. Of course, the Jehovah’s Witnesses thanked their Jehovah. Highly skilled doctors did all the research and hard work under an extremely stressful demand of “let the baby die if need be.” I wonder if they felt sick seeing a baby go home to parents who would just let him die for their religion. T.J. was going to be raised in an abusive home. That was just a given. My mother had very uncontrollable rage. She used her children to get that rage out. I, as I did for Chad, had to care for T.J. a lot of the time. My big sister helped too. My mother had another baby that she didn’t really care for. T.J. eventually was noticed to have crossed eyes. He needed a fourth surgery. At least that one was not life threatening. My sister had to have that surgery when she was younger too. She also had abnormal bone structure in her feet. That was a surgery likely necessary from being the product of incest. I assume T.J. being deformed is for the same reason. Neither one of my parents nor the congregation elders ever let the medical staff in on the fact that they were working with a baby conceived from very close incest. Of course not. The police would be called. The religion would be embarrassed if it was ever on the news that a houseful of abused children from incest were removed from JW parents. This religion nicknamed itself “The Truth” but kept relevant information from an infant's doctors to protect their own reputation.
Nobody thinks about the children in this religion. I had a brother die in his sleep when I was eleven. A year later I am told to accept another brother dying because guys in New York say it's the rules. No. It's all a sick game. Men in power getting some kind of thrill off of seeing who will sacrifice who for them. It is rather “satanic” if one were to believe in devils and demons and that version of interpretation. Thousands have died from the disgusting sacrifice policy of this religion. Luckily, T,J. isn’t in a grave. He is now thirty-five years old. He left the Jehovah’s Witness cult as a teenager. He was never baptized. He never had any interest in the religion who thought he should die for them. Our mother likely did this to feel good about herself. She did this to virtue signal to the congregation. She was having sex with her brother as a baptized Jehovah’s Witness BUT follows the blood doctrine. I do not buy that at all.
I am the twelve year old girl in the photo captioned above. I am holding T.J. Left to right pictured is my oldest brother. Next to him is Brian (Chronicles of the Secret Jw Family — Story One speaks of his life and death), Me holding T.J and my big sister is on the end.
I am not advocating for or against blood transfusions. I am asserting that it should be the choice of an individual without the threat of punishment. I am discussing what the Watchtower rules were when T.J. was put up for sacrifice. My mother, an already mentally unwell woman, was told that if she allows her baby to have a blood transfusion then she will be disfellowshipped. It is a hard “sin” to be found repentant of by the elders. Being sorry might mean you prefer your child dead. Who is really going to admit to that? Religion has no business in its members medical decisions. No suggestions needed. No threats put upon people in life threatening situations. It is cruel. This cult seems to try to make parents feel less for their own children. They will let them die. They will shun them for decades if they decide to leave the sect. My parents certainly felt less, and it was encouraged by the congregation and its elders. They even got an ex-Jehovah’s Witness (my father) to cooperate in possibly ending the life of his own son.
(This is story six of Chronicles of the Secret JW Family. Stories 1–5 are also available to read at your convenience. Thank you for supporting me in my therapeutic writing journey.)
