Hey everyone. I’m 25, from Quebec, Canada, and I was raised as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses.
I was baptized at 17, became a regular pioneer, attended Pioneer Service School, and genuinely believed I was serving Jehovah. I wasn’t someone who secretly hated the organization or spent years looking for a way out. For a long time, I believed it was the truth.
But behind the spiritual routine, I was struggling with severe depression, loneliness, and eventually burnout. And when I finally began questioning what I’d been taught, everything started to unravel.
This is my waking-up story.
Growing up as a Witness
I was diagnosed with severe depression at 13, something that followed me throughout my teenage years and into adulthood.
In July 2018, at 17, I got baptized. Looking back, I felt pressured by my parents, and there was also the expectation that baptism was simply what a young Witness was supposed to work toward.
I wanted to make my parents proud. I wanted to be accepted, and I genuinely wanted to do the right thing. But I was still a teenager figuring out who I was, making what the organization considered a lifelong commitment.
Becoming a regular pioneer
In 2020, during the pandemic, I became a regular pioneer.
And here’s something I want to emphasize: I actually loved pioneering at first.
I believed I was helping people and doing something meaningful. It gave me a sense of purpose during a period when I was trying to find direction in my life.
I also attended Pioneer Service School, which I genuinely enjoyed. I loved the discussions, the learning, and the people I met.
I had good experiences as a Witness, and I’m not going to pretend otherwise just because I no longer believe.
For a while, I also had a pretty active social life. I was invited to gatherings, included in plans, and felt like I belonged.
Unfortunately, that didn’t last.
When pioneering became exhausting
After the pandemic restrictions eased, I started working full-time while continuing to pioneer.
I’m a chef, so my job involves long hours on my feet, physically demanding shifts, and plenty of stress.
At the same time, I was trying to reach 50 hours of ministry every month, roughly 12 hours a week.
Sometimes I’d finish a long shift and go straight into metropolitan witnessing, standing beside a literature cart for another two and a half hours.
Then there were meetings, assignments, personal study, and everything else.
At first, I thought I could manage it. But eventually, I was running on fumes.
Something I’d once genuinely enjoyed had become another obligation I was struggling to fulfill.
I was seriously depressed
This is probably the most important part of my story.
I wasn’t just tired of being a Jehovah’s Witness. I was genuinely depressed.
I’d already been diagnosed with severe depression years earlier, but trying to maintain my religious responsibilities while working full-time made an existing struggle much harder.
I was constantly exhausted, unhappy, and lonely. No matter how much I accomplished, I felt like I wasn’t doing enough.
And because I still believed the organization had the truth, I kept looking for the problem in myself.
Was I not praying enough? Was I neglecting personal study? Was I not doing enough in service? Was my relationship with Jehovah weak?
Those questions followed me constantly.
I’d spend my day working in a kitchen, go out in service, attend meetings, and then feel guilty whenever I finally had time to myself.
Resting didn’t always feel like resting. Sometimes it just felt like time I should’ve spent doing something spiritual.
I also felt pressure to maintain the image of a spiritually strong young man.
People saw a regular pioneer who attended Pioneer Service School and participated in congregation activities. They didn’t necessarily see how difficult everyday life had become for me.
There were days when simply getting through my responsibilities felt overwhelming.
And what made it worse was that I genuinely wanted to believe I was doing the right thing.
I wasn’t secretly planning to leave. I wasn’t questioning the organization’s teachings yet.
I thought that if I prayed more, studied harder, and trusted Jehovah, things might eventually get better.
But I was already giving everything I had.
I wasn’t losing my faith at that point. I was losing my ability to keep going.
Feeling excluded
My social life also changed over time.
I used to be invited to gatherings and included in plans. But gradually, invitations became less frequent, and eventually I got used to being left out.
It hurt, especially when the congregation was supposed to be my spiritual family.
I knew plenty of people. I could talk to them at meetings or in service, but I didn’t always feel that I had close friendships I could rely on.
I was surrounded by people and still felt incredibly lonely.
And when you’re already struggling with depression, that kind of isolation makes everything heavier.
Brother Humble
There was also an elder I’ll call Brother Humble (name has been changed), who was anything but humble. 😂
He once removed me from microphone duty because I had a goatee. When I asked him for a scriptural reason, he laughed and walked away.
Then the organization changed its direction on beards, and suddenly facial hair was acceptable. Go figure.
His attitude toward appearances and authority was one of the things that eventually got me questioning.
He didn’t make me lose my faith, but he certainly helped me start asking questions.
October 22, 2025: stepping down
On October 22, 2025, I submitted my letter stepping down as a regular pioneer.
I explained that I needed to prioritize my mental and emotional health.
At that point, I still believed. I wasn’t leaving the organization or rejecting its teachings. I was simply exhausted after years of trying to balance everything.
After stepping down, I barely participated in field service. I started sleeping in, resting more, and having time for myself without constantly worrying about reaching a monthly service-hour goal.
It felt strange at first, but also incredibly relieving.
And having that space gave me time to think.
November 2025: the beginning of my waking up
Around November, a friend opened up to me about no longer believing.
We talked about our experiences in the congregation, including Brother Humble and some of the things we’d witnessed.
For years, I’d been taught that questioning the organization was dangerous. But here was someone I trusted expressing serious doubts.
So I started researching for myself.
I learned about the Watch Tower Society’s historical correspondence with Nazi Germany, including the 1933 letter addressed to Hitler, and its former NGO association with the United Nations.
I began questioning the blood transfusion policy, the treatment of disfellowshipped people, and the organization’s handling of child sexual abuse cases.
I also examined the historical evidence surrounding Jerusalem’s destruction in 607 BCE and the organization’s calculation of 1914.
That last subject particularly interested me because of how central 1914 is to the organization’s teachings.
The more I read, the harder it became to reconcile what I’d been taught with what I was finding.
And I wasn’t simply accepting everything I encountered online. I was comparing sources, examining arguments, and trying to understand the evidence.
My faith didn’t disappear overnight.
It gradually faded as I kept researching.
Eventually, I reached a point where I couldn’t honestly say I believed the organization had the truth anymore.
That realization hurt. I’d spent years preaching something I genuinely believed, only to find myself questioning its foundations.
My friends were waking up too
Something unexpected happened during this period: several of my friends were also waking up.
We hadn’t all experienced exactly the same things, but we were beginning to reach similar conclusions.
We compared experiences, discussed the organization’s teachings, and shared what we’d found through research.
For the first time, we could ask difficult questions without worrying that someone would report us to the elders.
We could disagree, laugh about our experiences, and talk openly.
It was comforting knowing I wasn’t going through everything alone.
May 2026: a talk about prayer
Here’s one of the more ironic moments of my waking up.
In May 2026, I gave a midweek meeting student talk titled “We Should Pray Often.”
The funny part?
I’d already stopped praying.
I even used an illustration comparing prayer to keeping in touch with someone over the phone.
Everyone heard a normal student talk about maintaining communication with Jehovah.
Meanwhile, the person giving it was privately losing his faith.
Looking back, it’s both funny and sad how easily I could continue playing the role of a believing Witness when the conviction was already disappearing.
The 2026 convention: Zach’s videos
By the time the 2026 Eternal Happiness convention came around, I was already questioning the organization.
Watching the videos from that perspective was completely different.
One dramatization showed a father who worked incredibly hard to provide for his family and bought cruise tickets, only for his daughter to reject the gesture because he’d been absent from family worship.
As someone who’d spent years working full-time while pioneering, I found that frustrating. I understood the importance of family time, but I also knew what it felt like to work yourself to exhaustion and still be made to feel spiritually inadequate.
But the videos that affected me the most were Zach’s.
Watching him genuinely made me sad.
Here was a young man with his own interests, feelings, and problems. Yet it seemed like there was always someone ready to correct him or remind him how a good Witness should behave.
His entertainment choices were questioned. His doubts were discouraged. When information critical of the organization came up, the message seemed to be that he should dismiss it rather than examine it.
And as the videos progressed, he seemed increasingly unhappy.
What bothered me was how familiar that felt.
I’d spent years trying to be the spiritually strong young man everyone expected me to be, even while struggling with severe depression.
I recognized that pressure to keep going, to question your own feelings, and to assume that if you’re unhappy, maybe you just aren’t doing enough for Jehovah.
The saddest part was that these videos were being shown at a convention about eternal happiness.
Maybe other people found them encouraging.
I didn’t.
I saw someone struggling under expectations that reminded me of my own life.
And I couldn’t help thinking about how many young Witnesses might be watching those videos while quietly going through something similar.
For a long time, I felt like Zach.
June 2026: I stopped attending
Around June, I stopped attending meetings and participating in field service.
There wasn’t a dramatic announcement. I simply stopped going.
In September, I deleted the NW Publisher app.
It might sound insignificant, but after years of checking congregation schedules and assignments, deleting that app felt surprisingly satisfying.
As the months passed, I noticed that my mental health was improving.
Leaving didn’t cure my depression or make every problem disappear. I still have difficult days.
But without the constant pressure of meetings, service hours, and congregation expectations, I finally had more room to breathe.
Telling my parents
This has probably been the hardest part.
My parents are still devout Jehovah’s Witnesses, and eventually I told them I no longer believed.
Their reaction was painful.
I’ve been called masuwail, a Tagalog word meaning rebellious or disobedient. I’ve been accused of not loving my family and ruining it, and I’ve been threatened with being kicked out of the house.
What hurt most wasn’t simply the threat of losing my home.
It was the feeling that my relationship with my parents could be damaged because I no longer shared their religious beliefs.
I’m still their son. I still love them.
I just don’t believe the same things anymore.
I remember opening up to my friends about what was happening and crying.
They listened, supported me, and reminded me that I wasn’t alone.
I don’t think I’ll ever forget that.
Apparently, my “worldly friends” are a problem
Recently, a JW friend reached out because he was concerned about me spiritually.
He’d seen that I was spending time with friends and asked whether I felt like I was spending more time with my “worldly friends.”
That wording stuck with me.
Not simply my friends. My worldly friends.
The irony was that I’d spent years feeling increasingly excluded while I was still active in the congregation.
Now I was finally being included in things again.
Birthdays, dinners, parties, and ordinary hangouts.
And apparently that was something to worry about.
But there’s one friend I especially want to mention. I’ll call him Alex (name has been changed).
He’s been there for me through some of my darkest moments, never judging me for what I believed or didn’t believe. Even when things got difficult, our friendship never changed.
I may have lost my faith, but I never lost a brother in him.
And for that, I’ll always be grateful.
I appreciated the concern from my JW friend, but I couldn’t help noticing the difference between how he viewed my life and how I actually felt.
I wasn’t miserable because I was spending time with non-Witnesses.
I was happy because I had people who genuinely wanted me around.
Where I am today
I’m 25, and I’m no longer a practicing Jehovah’s Witness.
I don’t attend meetings, participate in field service, or believe the organization has the truth.
My relationship with my parents is complicated, and I’m still dealing with the emotional consequences of leaving.
But I’m happier than I was during those final years as a Witness.
I work as a chef, spend time with friends, enjoy my hobbies, and make decisions without constantly worrying about whether someone in the congregation will disapprove.
I don’t regret every moment I spent as a Witness. I genuinely enjoyed pioneering at first, loved Pioneer Service School, and met people I cared about.
Those good memories are real.
But so are the years I spent depressed, exhausted, lonely, and feeling like I could never do enough.
I spent so much time trying to be a good Witness, a good pioneer, and a son my parents could be proud of that I sometimes forgot to take care of myself.
Looking back, I wish I’d understood sooner that needing rest didn’t make me spiritually weak.
And that questioning what I believed didn’t make me a bad person.
I didn’t leave because I wanted to do bad things. I left because I could no longer believe what I was being taught.
After years of trying to meet everyone’s expectations, I’m finally beginning to feel comfortable being myself.
That’s my waking-up story.
Thanks for reading.
