Saturday, December 31, 2011

A little more background on us...

So I've already told you a bit about us in my first post. Time for some more details.

Our former religion is Jehovah's Witnesses. Now, many might say they aren't a cult, but if you look at it objectively, it most certainly IS. If it looks like a duck, and it sounds like a duck, and it walks like a duck, it's probably a duck.

I'll post at the end a GREAT link about cults. For now, I'll tell you more about us and our celebrations this year.

The Husband & The Roomie are both what is considered "born-in" because their parents were already JWs when they were born. I am not a born-in, but my siblings were. As it stands currently, none of my siblings have remained JWs, 1 left on his own and the other 2 were disfellowshipped, and subsequently, shunned. Our mother is the only one still a JW and she's quite devout. She does vacillate with her shunning of us, though. Sometimes she talks to us, sometimes not.

We all recently celebrated our birthdays and Christmas. I was about age 3 when I had my last Christmas and I remember it well. Thing 3 is 4 and just had his first Christmas, so it feels a little like he is picking up where I left off.

I insisted on a REAL tree and we spent probably $150 in decorations, a tree skirt, stockings, and the like. We easily spent over that on gifts. And this was supposed to be a cheap Christmas. Next year, we will already have our decorations and we'll have worked on collecting gifts throughout the year instead of having to buy them all in one fell swoop. That put a major crimp in our budget, but it was a great experience for the kids and a learning experience for The Husband & me. The Roomie seemed to enjoy himself, too, and picked gifts for the kids that were perfect for each of them.

For his first birthday, at age 29, I baked and decorated a cake for The Roomie, since he has special dietary needs. This one was gluten free. It was Super Mario Bros. themed and I think I did a bang up job, if I do say so myself! At some point, I'll figure out how to upload pictures and you all can see it. He loved it. :)

For Thing 2's first birthday this year, she had a cake with polka dots and a giant green bow. It was beautiful and tasted delicious! (Sam's Club FTW!) Thing 3 had a Batman cake! He was more interested in the toy on top of it than he was in the actual cake. LOL! Thing 1 had cupcakes earlier this year, since we were still living with my parents and unable to comfortably celebrate it for him.

We had our first Halloween this year, too! JWs are taught that this is the devil's holiday and it would HORRIFY most to know we turned our backs on our former beliefs and celebrated such an awful day! Frankly, I kinda like that. :) The only issue I found w/ taking Thing 3 out trick or treating is that I kept thinking I had to come up with some stupid presentation and offer a magazine to the householder! LOL!


As I promised, I'll share a link about cults. This link is my favorite because of the way it's organized.

http://freedomofmind.com/Info/BITE/bitemodel.php

Behavior Control
1. Regulation of individual’s physical reality
a. Where, how and with whom the member lives and associates with
b. What clothes, colors, hairstyles the person wears
c. What food the person eats, drinks, adopts, and rejects
d. How much sleep the person is able to have
e. Financial dependence
f. Little or no time spent on leisure, entertainment, vacations
2. Major time commitment required for indoctrination sessions and
group rituals
3. Need to ask permission for major decisions
4. Need to report thoughts, feelings and activities to superiors
5. Rewards and punishments (behavior modification techniques- positive
and negative).
6. Individualism discouraged; group think prevails
7. Rigid rules and regulations
8. Need for obedience and dependency

Information Control

1. Use of deception
a. Deliberately holding back information
b. Distorting information to make it acceptable
c. Outright lying
2. Access to non-cult sources of information minimized or discouraged
a. Books, articles, newspapers, magazines, TV, radio
b. Critical information
c. Former members
d. Keep members so busy they don’t have time to think
3. Compartmentalization of information; Outsider vs. Insider doctrines
a. Information is not freely accessible
b. Information varies at different levels and missions within
pyramid
c. Leadership decides who “needs to know” what
4. Spying on other members is encouraged
a. Pairing up with “buddy” system to monitor and control
b. Reporting deviant thoughts, feelings, and actions to leadership
5. Extensive use of cult generated information and propaganda
a. Newsletters, magazines, journals, audio tapes, videotapes,
etc.
b. Misquotations, statements taken out of context from non-cult
sources
6. Unethical use of confession
a. Information about “sins” used to abolish identity
boundaries
b. Past “sins” used to manipulate and control; no forgiveness
or absolution

Thought Control

1. Need to internalize the group’s doctrine as “Truth”
a. Map = Reality
b. Black and White thinking
c. Good vs. evil
d. Us vs. them (inside vs. outside)
2. Adopt “loaded” language (characterized by “thought-terminating
clichés”). Words are the tools we use to think with.
These “special” words constrict rather than expand understanding.
They function to reduce complexities of experience into trite, platitudinous
“buzz words”.
3. Only “good” and “proper” thoughts are encouraged.
4. Thought-stopping techniques (to shut down “reality testing”
by stopping “negative” thoughts and allowing only “good”
thoughts); rejection of rational analysis, critical thinking, constructive
criticism.
a. Denial, rationalization, justification, wishful thinking
b. Chanting
c. Meditating
d. Praying
e. Speaking in “tongues”
f. Singing or humming
5. No critical questions about leader, doctrine, or policy seen
as legitimate
6. No alternative belief systems viewed as legitimate, good, or
useful

Emotional Control

1. Manipulate and narrow the range of a person’s feelings.
2. Make the person feel like if there are ever any problems it
is always their fault, never the leader’s or the group’s.
3. Feeling-stopping (with number 4, Excessive use of guilt). Like thought-stopping, this is the automatic suppression or blocking of feelings that are not acceptable by the cult identity- such as feeling \”homesick\” or feeling \”depressed\” or feeling \”resentful\”.
4. Excessive use of guilt
a. Identity guilt
1. Who you are (not living up to your potential)
2. Your family
3. Your past
4. Your affiliations
5. Your thoughts, feelings, actions
b. Social guilt
c. Historical guilt
5. Excessive use of fear
a. Fear of thinking independently
b. Fear of the “outside” world
c. Fear of enemies
d. Fear of losing one’s “salvation”
e. Fear of leaving the group or being shunned by group
f. Fear of disapproval
6. Extremes of emotional highs and lows.
7. Ritual and often public confession of “sins”.
8. Phobia indoctrination : programming of irrational fears of ever
leaving the group or even questioning the leader’s authority. The
person under mind control cannot visualize a positive, fulfilled
future without being in the group.
a. No happiness or fulfillment “outside”of the group
b. Terrible consequences will take place if you leave: “hell”;
“demon possession”; “incurable diseases”;
“accidents”; “suicide”; “insanity”;
“10,000 reincarnations”; etc.
c. Shunning of leave takers. Fear of being rejected by friends,
peers, and family.
d. Never a legitimate reason to leave. From the group’s perspective,
people who leave are: “weak;” “undisciplined;”
“unspiritual;” “worldly;” “brainwashed
by family, counselors;” seduced by money, sex, rock and roll.

Things I want to do...

I'd like to learn about writing code. Programming. The Roomie codes all the time and he talks to me about it constantly, so I'd like a better understanding of what he's talking about. Thankfully, one of my siblings knows where to direct me in that regard and has been quite helpful already. 

I'd like to learn a little more about servers, too, like how they work, what they're used for, etc. I grew up with a parent in the computer industry, so I'm familiar with a lot of it already, but I choose not to think about it. I don't really know why, I just know it kind of bores me. But now I want to know, so I guess I'll learn. Besides, it will help The Husband feel like I care about what he does. I do care, it's just stuff I grew up hearing.

We'll be moving into a huge house in Feb/March! I'm so excited! I'm already working out where I'll put furniture and how I'll delegate house keeping chores. Things 1 & 3 will share a room, Thing 2 will get her own room, and The Roomie will have his own room, but it'll be bigger than the one he's currently in.

The house has an intercom system! How freaking awesome is that??? Another positive to this house is that it's in a good school district and Thing 2 will go back to her old school! Thing 1 has moved on to middle school, so while he won't be in the same school that he was, he will be with familiar faces, which is paramount for a child with Asperger's Syndrome. They need to know what's next, who will be there, etc. 

I'm the same way, actually. I need to know step-by-step what's next, who will be there, where we are going, how long we'll be there, even what route we take to get to/from our destination. And every night I ask The Husband & The Roomie, "What are you doing tomorrow?" I need to know what happens every day. I feel very stressed out and uncertain if I don't know what's going on.

A bit about me...

I'm November. You can call me Ember, if you'd like. I'm using a pseudonym for now. Maybe one day I'll feel able to open up a little more. My kids are Thing 1, Thing 2, and Thing 3. I also have The Husband and The Roomie.

I'm tinkering with the blog a bit, so you may see changes from time to time.

I have chosen to live a life with no regrets. For the most part, that has served me well; I view my  experiences, positive or negative, as something to learn from. Not all have been pleasant, but I move forward.

In Autumn 2009 we moved our family from Texas to the Appalachian region of the US to live with my parents and help them out around the house, as well as to be mutually encouraging toward one another on a religious level. We were all practicing Jehovah's Witnesses. I was raised as one from the age of 3, The Husband was born in. (His parents were JWs before he was born.)

As it turned out, the situation became unstable, in part because of our changing religious beliefs, and we moved out in Summer of 2011.

In October 2010, due to an INSANE amount of stress related to maintaining 2 households (mine & my parents), and taking an anti-depressant that has since been linked to making people homicidal (Prozac), I spent a week in a mental health facility and then another 4-5 months in an intense therapy program. This is when I was diagnosed with ADHD and bi-polar disorder.

During that time, and for a bit before, The Husband had been questioning our religious upbringing and beliefs. Unbeknownst to him, I had questioned it, as well, for a very long time. We were taught that to question those beliefs, we were bad people and not to be trusted. We were also taught never to speak of doubts about the religion to others, so The Husband & I didn't discuss it with each other until early this year.

We struggled for a few months, attending the meetings sporadically, and hating every minute of it. I would regularly have anxiety attacks just figuring out what to wear that day, let alone actually showing up and being present. I've also had anxiety attacks while in attendance.

In the Spring, there is a worldwide event for this religion that everyone attends. This is known as The Memorial of Christ's Death and it is the ONLY observational/celebratory event for the Jehovah's Witnesses. It is scandalous if you don't attend! We managed to attend, but that was the last time we went to any meetings at all, as a family. Looking at our picture of The Husband and I that night, you can see we didn't want to be there. I did go one other time for an announcement involving my dad. He was disfellowshipped, no longer considered part of the congregation. I didn't really care, but I still cried, knowing it was a life altering decision affecting him & my mother, who is still a devout believer.

In mid summer of 2011, The Husband and I moved from my parents house, in Appalachia, back to Texas. It seemed nothing was working for us in this plan to move and when we finally DID manage to move, it was literally with the clothing on our backs & whatever we could fit in the car & the overhead storage bin. For a family of 5 and 2 cats, let me assure you that it wasn't nearly enough. We stored everything in a storage unit near my parents' house and my brother has one of 2 keys. I trust him with our belongings more than I trust my mother.

My mother left my father after we moved away because she feels that she is spiritually endangered by staying with him, despite the fact that he does not stop her from or harass her about studying or going to meetings. She has repeatedly asked to buy my daughter's beautiful white bed (in storage) for use in her new apartment and I have repeatedly told her NO, it is NOT for sale. It's brand new & Thing 2 only used it a few months before storing it. Why would I give up my daughters brand new bed??? It's her first piece of GOOD furniture that can last her for years. Ugh. Anyway....

In addition to moving with only what fit in the car, we also moved with nowhere to live. We stayed with friends in North Texas for 2 or 3 nights, then with family in Central Texas for a week, then with family in South Texas for 2 weeks (they were out of town for one of those weeks), then in a motel for 2 or 3 nights. FINALLY, we found a place available and moved in. It's a bit ghetto, but it's big enough for our family (a little tight since the addition of The Roomie) and it's not forever.

When we moved in, the in-laws gave us a queen size bed, a couple of air mattresses, a couch, & some household items which was ENORMOUSLY helpful! A client of The Husband was also helpful in the furniture department. His children have all grown and moved on, so he & his wife were cleaning house and gave us beds as well as a set of living room furniture and 2 desks. We've furnished the kitchen almost exclusively from the local thrift stores, which has been just fine with us. We now have everything but a kitchen table, but a heavy duty folding table is doing the job just fine for now.

Living with such minimal belongings for a time was freeing, somehow. I still have much in storage that I'm missing and need/want, but we'll get it eventually. We have plans to move into a house in February and I'm looking forward to that. Once we're settled, The Husband will fly up to Appalachia and bring our belongings back. Including my daughter's beautiful white bed.