Raised to Obey: Losing My Family to Jehovah’s Witnesses

My mother converted from Methodist to JW when I was less then a year old. I'm the third of four kids, so my older siblings remember the change. We went from celebrating Christmas and birthdays to being forced to going to boring meetings three times a week and out in service every Saturday. I had no idea how unusual it all was. I thought it was normal.

As I got into my teen years, my siblings began to rebel; asking questions about the religion (cult), and getting into trouble. My oldest sibling was disfollowshipped, and my second oldest just stopped going to the meetings. After my little sister stopped going, it was just me and my mother. My father wanted nothing to do with it.

My mother groomed me to be like her; the perfect JW daughter. She would baby me and make it seem like I never did anything wrong. The true was I was too scared to say anything. I was too scared to start asking questions or have doubts. This lead to severe depression and anxiety, which to this day I struggle with.

My mother only got worst as she got older. She lost the ability to even think for herself. She believes everything the Watchtower says. One day, she even said, "I don't trust my own family anymore. Only Jehovah." The haunts me to this day. I quietly left over 15 years ago, but I never told my mother. I think she's just waiting for me to come back, but I would rather die then go back. I'm middle aged and just trying to get by. My family has been torn apart by Jehovah’s Witness doctrine and the way it reshaped my mother’s priorities and identity. She cannot see the damage it has caused. Her loyalty to the organization now overrides her ability to recognize the harm done to her own family.