A 17 Year Old’s Journey To Freedom

Our childhood plays a huge part in our development as humans. What we see, hear and experience moulds us into the person that we currently are, or will be.

In regards to religion, we follow in the footsteps of our parents. This may change as we grow older, but we lack skepticism as child. In fact, we believe most things that we are told at that age. Things such as The Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus are all things we once believed to be true. Maybe I’m speaking for myself there.

It isn’t difficult to make your child believe in something. This can be a good thing. However, the dangers of this can not be overlooked.

What comes to your mind when I mention the word “Cult” ? Men in long dresses praying to aliens? Scientology? Many things may come to your mind. You’re probably right, too.

Did Jehovah’s Witnesses come into your mind at all? Maybe they did. The chances are that you view the Witnesses as some annoying individuals who knock on your door, rather than a cult.

I was one of the annoying individuals who knocked on your door. In fact, I was doing this up to a few months ago. Then, I stopped. Not long after, I removed myself from the religion.

In this article, I will explain why I came to this decision, and why I’m not the only one who has done so.

I was only baptised just over year ago. I didn’t last very long at all. The reasons are fairly straight forward, but I’ll get to that later. Let me take it back as far as I can.

I remember attending my first few meetings. I had always been in the religion but had never regularly attended meetings. I visited the congregation that I sporadically attended. At this point, I was determined to make my attendance regular. After a while however, I feel that I didn’t connect with that Kingdom Hall. Also, a friend of mine was in another hall.

This hall was in the same building, but the congregation was different. My first meeting at that hall was nice. I sat next to my friend and I felt pretty good. Mainly because I felt that I had a friend. The reasons weren’t exactly related to religion.

As time went on, this friend introduced me to other people. These people all appeared friendly. I felt pretty amazing, as having friends wasn’t something I was used to. I eventually met my Bible Study conductor. He was a typical British fella. Very cockney and confident.

I have had bible study’s before, but I was determined to take this one seriously. After a few study’s, I had already created quite a social circle. I met a ton of people when my best friend at the time was baptised.

The friends I gained made me staying within the religion compulsory. Well, it at least felt compulsory. I noticed that my friends were going on service and were all fairly spiritually active. In order for me to fit in, I requested to became an unbaptised publisher.

I was very determined to fit in. In order for this to happen, I needed to start going on service. The meeting that was needed in order to accept my request took forever. I was extremely upset when the meeting was cancelled. All because it looked as if my friends were having a great time, and I wanted to join in.

Eventually, we had the meeting. I was eligible to engage in field service and immediately started putting in around 50 hours per month. After this, my social life sky rocketed. I met more and more people. Not only was I making more friends within the hall, but I was meeting their friends from other halls. It was all surreal to me.

Me and my best friend at the time’s friendship got closer and closer. Eventually, a girl who was a friend of his began to hang out with us. We did everything together. We did ‘Long days’ on service on some Thursday’s and every Friday.

We all regularly attended each others houses and confided in eachother. I have never had a friendship as close as this.

I thought getting baptised would put the icing on the cake. I told myself that Jehovah gave me those friends. However, deep down I knew it was to fit in with my friends.

After some nerve wrecking sets of questions, I was eligible for baptism. I was over the moon. After my baptism, life continued to get better.

However, it didn’t take long before things went downhill. I had my doubts, which wouldn’t budge. Everything just seemed too good to be true. However, I tried to push these thoughts to the side. Questioning the organisation is EXTREMELY looked down upon. You must trust in Jehovah and the governing body which he appointed.

I was happy with the friends I made. started to realise that I was only doing this for them. I was aware of this before, but I finally started to accept it. I carried on attending meetings and field service but it was extremely uncomfortable due to the doubts. I started to examine the reasons for why I was doing all of these things. I used to get up extremely early and engage in the Preaching Work. Why? Because I wanted to walk long distances for fitness purposes. I loved going to the Morning Preaching. groups, why? Because I would see my friends. Did I enjoy spreading the word of God? No. Did I believe in what the religion taught 100%? No.

I started to become more distant from these friends of mine. It was noticeable as I was always so desperate to be around them. I tried to give them hints, but I don’t think they took them. I realised what I had to do. I had to stop attending meetings. So I stopped attending, and this was even more noticeable. I never missed meetings beforehand!

The texts came flowing in. I think it was shock more than anything. I wasn’t even baptised a year, and I was already becoming ‘spiritually weak’. Many were worried about me, but to be frank, I didn’t care. I only cared about the two close friends of mine.

I knew that I wouldn’t be returning to the hall, so I began to research. I was disgusted and was even more certain that I wouldn’t return. My mother was not happy at first. She was quite upset about my research, but I showed her some things that really hit home to her personally. She was shocked. From here, she admitted that had many doubts herself, but couldn’t express them beforehand.

We both began to research together and woke up my sister in the process.

They constantly texted me and I always replied, but made things too obvious. Eventually, one of them asked if I was viewing apostate websites. I made a huge mistake and admitted that I was. From here, he told about 3 elders in the hall. From there, I was screwed.

Me and my friends had many arguments and disagreements during this time. It was very stressful and I ended up moving out temporarily. I blocked most of the Witnesses numbers. I was ready to move on.

My mother has pretty much decided that she was leaving. You wouldn’t believe how happy this made me. Having my youngest sister with me was amazing too.

We sent a text to most people within the congregation. We told them that we would be leaving the religion. This is where everybody cut us off. Yes, they cut us off completley. If they see us on the street, they will not even give us eye contact. This was the hardest part for me. I got extremely close to some people within that congregation. In fact, I made some of the closest friends I have ever had. Losing them was going to be extremely difficult, but I didn’t want to live a lie in order to keep them. The thought of walking past some of my closest friends whilst they don’t even give me eye contact is horrible. Even to this day, I think about the people that I met in that religion everyday. Most places that I go within my area bring back memories. Looking back at pictures absolutely kills me, but there isn’t much I can do.

I kept asking myself why I even lasted as long as I did. I had to stop doing everything that I loved for this religion. I started to look at things even deeper. I asked myself why I gained so much confidence. Well, it wasn’t rocket science. I was knocking strangers doors and giving religious leaflets on the street. Of course I’d gain confidence from doing such things. Why was I happy? Well, I gained a social life and a social circle. This was something I craved for a while. I asked myself if it was worth it to keep doing something I did not fully believe in, just to keep these friends? Especially when I had to cut out everything I loved and live an extremely restricted and regimented life.

When you associate with Jehovah’s Witneses, you realise that they are not on the same planet as us. They can not think for themselves, they let the Governing Body Of Jehovah’s Witnesses do that for them. They are given Watchtower’s weekly, with doctrines being repeated week after week. They are completely and utterly brainwashed. They can not question the religion, and must be in full compliance at all times. Their extremely regimented lives makes them feel extremely depressed, and left out. They can not read any information that is critical of their religion. If they do so, they can be removed from the congregation. Anyone who leaves or questions the religion are viewed as mentally diseased. They are to be disfellowshipped, and cut off from all JW family members and friends. Some lose their entire family, and are left completely alone.

These are some of the many reasons which led to me and mother leaving the religion. We came to the conclusion that a loving religion wouldn’t do what the Jehovah’s Witnesses do. I researched more and more. The deeper I got, the more convinced I became the I was victim of a cult. I discovered the many child sexual abuse cases that the religion covered up. I found letters available online, that are only distributed to Elders which direct the Elders to hide such cases. They are told that it is a spiritual situation, and the police are not needed. The Elders have NO professional training whatsoever, and have no right to determine who is a sexual predator and who isn’t. News has recently came out that there have been 1006 unreported child sexual abuse cases within the org.

That, in a nutshell, is how and why I left. In future posts, I will focus on debunking their doctrine and my next post will talk about life since exiting. I will also try to talk about my mothers exit in more detail.