Home > Stories
Our Stories
Real-life case studies put a human face to the problem
We are collecting stories to make mandated shunning more relatable and tangible in front of lawmakers. Some authors have chosen not to include a photo due to safety or personal reasons. Their voice still matters.
Yanil Barbosa: Dead to Them—How Mandated Shunning Robs Families of Life and Love
On May 28, 2019, my husband and I left the Organization of Jehova's Witnesses when sudden changes happened. We made research on topics and found out the incompatibilities between dogma and practices accomodating this as "New Light". We found out t...
Daniel Balderas: Escaping the Small Box—My Life with Jehovah's Witnesses
My name is Daniel B. Finally, there's a forum to tell my history. I'm six decades old now. This JW cult has brought death, destruction, and ostracism to my family and me. It all started when my mom and father came to the USA looking for a better ...
Micki: Real Life is Better—My Journey Out of the Jehovah's Witnesses
2020 was the year I realized I had spent most of my life in a doomsday cult. A perfect storm of events propelled me into researching my religion: a breakup, the pandemic, conspiracy theories, and job loss. One day, while on Reddit debunking QAnon ...
John Meulenberg: Science Saved Me
During my formative years, my parents aligned themselves with the Jehovah's Witnesses. Their affiliation led to my initiation into the faith through baptism at the age of twelve. My spiritual journey progressed steadily, culminating in my appointm...
Jordan: I Couldn't "Pray the Gay Away"
I was born and raised a Jehovah’s Witness in a loving family, the youngest of six children. My family was extremely involved in the organization. My father was a presiding overseer in the congregation, my three brothers were ministerial serv...
Don't Look in Their Eyes—It's Easier That Way
Our very young daughter was sexually assaulted by the Presiding Overseer. I reported the incident to the Elders and my father and was categorically informed that without 2 witnesses our daughter was not believed. Our family was a perfect target fo...
Kairo Kirk: Scared to Openly Question
I grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness. I got baptized at 11, and became a pioneer as soon as I could. My father was an elder. My parents were both extremely controlling and strict; I had no privacy whatsoever, and they monitored everything I did ...
Eric: Jehovah's Witnesses Use Pain, Loss, and Sadness as Power
I was raised in "the truth" by my mother. When I was 9, she married my stepfather who was very strict in religion. I had to study technology at school while I actually wanted to work in healthcare. But he wanted us to study engineering because tha...
Quin Moon-Reed: Shunning is Traumatic
When I was 18, I was kicked out of my parents’ house, largely because I began questioning the Jehovah’s Witness religion that I had been born and raised in. Despite still attending meetings for a while, my disconnection from the faith ...
April Fraedrich: From Despair to Healing–My Journey Out of the Jehovah’s Witnesses
My mother started studying with Jehovah’s Witnesses when I was just seven years old. From that moment, my entire world changed. I was taught that I had to be separate from “worldly” people—no friends outside the faith, no b...
Eydie: Shunned for Thinking Differently
I was born and raised in South Africa, speaking Afrikaans. My journey with Jehovah’s Witnesses began when I was six years old, as my mother started studying with them, followed later by my stepfather. My childhood was controlled by ...
Gretchen Guzman: Leaving Jehovah’s Witnesses—My Journey to Truth and Freedom
I must have been five or six years old when I first grasped the terrifying implications of my religious upbringing. I was at my little friend’s house across the street when, in innocent cruelty, I blurted out, “You’re going to di...
Alice: Waking Up Together
I was born and raised as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the UK. Like many others raised in the faith, I never questioned it. I was baptized at 17, began pioneering at 18, and devoted the next ten years of my life to it. At 19, I met my husband, and...
Dorene Del Real: Breaking Free from Fear and Shunning
I was born and raised as a Jehovah’s Witness in the 1970s and 80s, a second-generation member of the faith. When I was just an infant, a Witness came to my mother’s door, and she soon began studying and attending meetings—despite...
Rae Bruvold: Leaving Jehovah’s Witnesses
I am 30 years old, and this is the story of my journey in and out of the Jehovah’s Witnesses —not once, but twice. My life has been shaped by the doctrines, the fear, and the manipulation of this high-control group. Now, I am finally free, and I w...
