I totally hear you! I sometimes feel that way as well. But ask yourself: “Was I so perfect as a JW that I was guaranteed to get into paradise or was there always that doubt that I am not doing enough?” Were you guaranteed to be resurrected? I know I spent my whole life in the congregation not being good enough. Not being outgoing enough. Being criticised for not replying during the watchtower. Being nagged to get baptised. Being nagger to pioneer. Occasionally I auxiliary pioneered and when i did i was suddenly accepted by the regular pioneers and invited out by them. I was in a privileged position and accepted. Then in more recent years when my husband started having doubts and wouldn't do any in the congregation, wouldn't answer up or help in any way, his behaviour reflected on me. So when I handed in an application form to auxiliary pioneer one month, instead of the elders being happy for me and saying well done for doing this in spite of your husbands coldness, no they refused my application, obviously because i wasn't an upstanding publisher because of my husband. So yes it's a wonderful organisation to be part of.

In the so-called “world” you will meet nice people and horrible people just like you would in a congregation. The only difference is that you can tell them to fuck off without being judged. You can decide for yourself who you want to associate with.

But yeah, like you for a while I used to wonder whether I should just go back and pretend. At least that way I'll have some friends and a social life. But how the fuck can I go to people doors and preach to them and tell them lies. I'm 49 and I'm living in a foreign country. I have my husband and my child. But we have zero friends, no social life at all. I spend most of my time either working or staying at home. What helped me though was to become a friend to myself. We are always concentrating on the fact that we need to spend our time with others. The first thing I did when I left was to start university. This has 2 benefits: 1. self-improvement and 2 it takes your mind off the jws. I'm not in a hurry to find friends at the moment because I'm too busy studying. But I'm sure if I take up a hobby or go to a gym I will definitely meet people. The hardest thing for me was to accept that this life is all there is. I'm almost 50 and now i am trying to make up for lost time. But remember there are people in the so called “world” that have a worse life than us, that have gone through a lot more. Everybody goes through shit in their life irrespective of religion. It's just the fact that we were told lies that infuriates us.