outintexas

My Story spans over 30 years.

I'm Outandabout's "little" brother. It was a Saturday night in December 1973 when it all began. I remember that because I really just wanted to watch "All in the Family" that night. I was 17 and a high school senior. My sister was home from college. She sat me down and showed me a bible, which I had never seen before. My dad was and is an athiest. My mom was a Christian, but we never went to church. Our parent's policy on spirituality was to let us kids figure it out on our own. Btw, I also have an older and younger brother that never got involved in twi, thankfully. As far as I know they are either athiest or agnostic.

What an odd book with numbers in front of every sentence. And she had WRITTEN in it! That seemed so sacreligious. I started going to a "twig" at her apartment. Of course I was told about "The Class" and eventually I came up with the $85 and I took it the following Fall. On reel to reel audio tape, by the way!

There are a lot of details of course, but the overall story is that I was a very shy and insecure adolescent with few friends and these people seemed to be interested in me. In the course of the next 25 years I went WOW twice and I was in the Way "College Division" (as it was known then) for one year (1978-79).

I ended up marrying my "WOW sister" a week after my second WOW year (1982-83). Still insecure and shy, I fell for the first female who showed an interest in me. We had three children together born in 1984, 1989 and 1991. On May 25, 1999 we were "put on spiritual probation" largely because our marriage was dysfunctional, we were in debt, and our house was not physically clean enough. Our "Area Coordinator" told me I was guilty of "treachery" on that phone conversation where we were kicked out, er, put on "probation". Many of you know the drill, we supposedly were to get our "act together" on our own and were expected to come groveling back in six months hoping to be let back in. My then-wife and I decided in a matter of days that we would never go back. At least we had that much sense.

Eighteen months later my then-wife announced she wanted to leave me and the kids, which she did 5 months later in April, 2001. We divorced four months later. All she wanted was one of the cars and half the cookware. She remarried in less than a year. She lives in town, but sees the kids only sporadically at her convenience.

The time since has been very difficult, needless to say. But I have grown and developed emotionally many times more than I ever did in that cult. I feel like the whole time I was in twi, I was in an artificial environment where my emotional growth was put on hold for 25 years. With the help of a therapist and a lot of new friends (and Greasespot!) I am truly becoming a late bloomer. I found to my surprise there are honest genuine caring people outside of twi. Imagine that. I still have a lot of learning and living to do, but I feel God has blessed me more these last few years than He was ever able to do in the 25 I was in twi.

I think I'll stop here for now. This is just kind of a skeleton to get started. I've skipped a lot of details which I can fill in later. You guys are great! I've been coming in here almost every day for a long time. God bless you all. Or "y'all" as they say here!

The poll only goes to 20 years. I was in for 25. 1974 to May 25, 1999 (age 17 to 42) when I got M&A'd - the best thing that ever happened.

Thanks for the warm welcome :)-->

I'll be posting "My Story" before too long.

I'm suddenly reminded of a classic Twilight Zone episode. The one where this five-year-old kid played by Billy Mumy ran the world had this power to whisk people into the cornfield if they ever disagreed or complained about the way he ran things.

So everybody put on their happy faces even though the situation was very bizarre. They had no freedom to speak their minds.

Btw, this is my first post! There will be many more :)-->