Speaker 1: Trust me. Do you trust me?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: Everly?
Speaker 4: And he was right? Trust This is the truth, the
Speaker 4: only truth.
Speaker 2: If anybody ever tells you to just trust them, don't
Speaker 2: welcome to trust me. The podcast about cults and extreme
Speaker 2: belief and manipulation from two not so plain people who
Speaker 2: actually experienced it. I am Lola Blanc and I'm Meg
Speaker 2: and Elizabeth. This week, we're back with Jasper Hoffman, writer, podcaster,
Speaker 2: and former Mennonite in part two. Today, she's going to
Speaker 2: talk to us about what the perfect woman looked like
Speaker 2: in Mennonite culture, how concerns were raised about Jasper for
Speaker 2: not being compliant enough, and how overtime she became depressed
Speaker 2: and developed an eating disorder in response to the pressures
Speaker 2: of the group.
Speaker 5: She'll share how her mom secretly found her a therapist
Speaker 5: on the outside, even though it was against the rules,
Speaker 5: and how that therapist helped to write a letter to
Speaker 5: withdraw her Mennonite membership, which led to the harassment of
Speaker 5: her family. We'll talk about how she tried to go
Speaker 5: back after she left but realized she really didn't belong,
Speaker 5: and why she started the Plain People's.
Speaker 2: Podcast Megan, before we get back into it with Jasper,
Speaker 2: learning all about plain people. Can you tell me what
Speaker 2: your cultius thing is this week? Yeah, my cultist thing
Speaker 2: this week is I'm looking into this guy. His name
Speaker 2: is Nikita Tukulo.
Speaker 5: I'm sure I'm saying that a bit off, but he
Speaker 5: is being held right now on a five million dollar bond,
Speaker 5: which stood out to me because that's quite high.
Speaker 1: And he had a hype house.
Speaker 5: I'm gonna call it a hype house, but a content
Speaker 5: house maybe that's more reasonable and only fans house, you know.
Speaker 5: And I've been so curious about how all of these
Speaker 5: houses are going to shake out when all is said
Speaker 5: and done, because you have a bunch of people living
Speaker 5: together creating content. I'm sure it can be done in
Speaker 5: a healthy way. But like a lot of times, I'm like,
Speaker 5: that sounds like a cult, would you.
Speaker 2: Agree, Well, that sounds like everywhere you've ever lived, So
Speaker 2: you mean me personally, Yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm not living at one right now, and I'm so sad.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I guess I do love living in
Speaker 5: houses with a bunch of people, but we're not creating content,
Speaker 5: but you are creating music and like well, videos are. Yeah,
Speaker 5: but this in particular was a little bit more intense
Speaker 5: because he was basically isolating women and having them create
Speaker 5: sex content and then stealing all of their money and
Speaker 5: threatening to kill them if they didn't comply to his
Speaker 5: very course of rules.
Speaker 1: Also, this man is twenty two years old. Oh my god.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so just a mini little cult leader and the
Speaker 5: making really high bail, which makes me think a lot
Speaker 5: of stuff is going to start coming to light. People
Speaker 5: have been drawing parallels to the Playboy mansion, but on steroids,
Speaker 5: like one woman made two hundred and thirty thousand dollars
Speaker 5: one year and it was all withheld from her.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it went under something like Nova Talent Management, so
Speaker 5: it sounded very real and you know, would get people
Speaker 5: in anyway. I love, as you said, living in houses
Speaker 5: with a bunch of people who love creating things. I
Speaker 5: don't make content per se, but you know it can
Speaker 5: go wrong, and often does.
Speaker 1: It just pisses me off. I mean whatever.
Speaker 2: Anytime anyone is a bad person to people, obviously that's
Speaker 2: that is angering. But what's cool about OnlyFans in theory
Speaker 2: and often in practice, is that it gives a lot
Speaker 2: of women the opportunity to take control of their lives
Speaker 2: if they want to gauge in like some version of
Speaker 2: adult content totally where no one's like telling them what
Speaker 2: to do. So when these guys come in and they
Speaker 2: take over and then they you know, essentially start trafficking
Speaker 2: women for OnlyFans, it's like, no, that's.
Speaker 6: The whole opposite of the point of only fans.
Speaker 5: And they're making like their own bots of women that
Speaker 5: are just AI created, and you know, it's we could
Speaker 5: do a whole podcast on the subject.
Speaker 1: I'm sure whenever a bunch.
Speaker 5: Of money is involved, you're going to find people being
Speaker 5: predatory and trying to control people.
Speaker 1: So curious to see how this shakes out.
Speaker 5: He's been speaking in Russian over the phone trying to
Speaker 5: get people to move all the money. And there was
Speaker 5: a kind of funny quote or one of the police
Speaker 5: agents was like, we have people here who speak Russian,
Speaker 5: and it's just like kind of funny. He was like,
Speaker 5: this is a secret language that I guess that they had,
Speaker 5: like a Russian guy on the police force.
Speaker 1: Hilarious.
Speaker 5: Anyway, I was reading a lot about it, and I
Speaker 5: wouldn't be surprised if some of it kind of involves
Speaker 5: spirituality in a weird way, or.
Speaker 2: Like, I mean, there is something wild and absolutely plausible
Speaker 2: at the same time about the idea of like an
Speaker 2: OnlyFans coercive trafficker who is also like it's under the
Speaker 2: guy's spirituality, Like I'm sure that's happening as we speak.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and by spirituality I just mean almost like prosperity gospel, yeah,
Speaker 5: and prying on people's wants and needs and taking it
Speaker 5: to the limit. So something to keep your eye on.
Speaker 5: And I'm curious to see how this will keep developing. Yeah, Lola,
Speaker 5: what's your cultiest thing of the week.
Speaker 6: It's it's very just silly.
Speaker 1: Oh good, it's.
Speaker 6: An article a little overblown.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: The article is called the most disturbing cult like towns
Speaker 2: in America you should avoid, Oh bye, Crystal Row. And
Speaker 2: this is on yahoo dot com, but I do up
Speaker 2: there sometimes you google cult and most of these I
Speaker 2: think this is like from a Reddit thread, Like oh yeah,
Speaker 2: this is just an article repeating people's posts on a
Speaker 2: Reddit thread.
Speaker 1: So it's not hard hitting journalism here.
Speaker 2: But it is a list of basically like everywhere anyone
Speaker 2: has ever felt weird. So there's like the actual cult
Speaker 2: connected town. So there's Clearwater, Florida, which is like the
Speaker 2: scientology hub there's Moscow, Idaho, where there's a controversial church
Speaker 2: whose leader has openly talked about wanting.
Speaker 1: To create a theocracy.
Speaker 2: Okay, they're called christ Church, and yeah, it's just like
Speaker 2: a super Christian nationalist thing with really crazy beliefs. Obviously,
Speaker 2: Colorado City is.
Speaker 1: On the list.
Speaker 2: My mom's town Island pon Vermont, where twelve tribes are
Speaker 2: and there's like the Yellow Deli restaurants there. And then
Speaker 2: there's a bunch that are like, oh yeah, there's a
Speaker 2: bunch of neo Nazis in this town and they were scary.
Speaker 2: And then there's a bunch that are like, for some reason,
Speaker 2: there are like eight different people sharing a really similar
Speaker 2: story in different places in rural America where they walk
Speaker 2: into a diner and then nobody speaks and everybody just
Speaker 2: stares at them silently the entire time, which is not
Speaker 2: a cult thing. I think that's just a country thing.
Speaker 2: Like why are they outsiders in my you know we
Speaker 2: when people never come through here.
Speaker 1: I think it's just that.
Speaker 2: But there's so many people who shared that like exact story,
Speaker 2: it's confuted. Ah, I guess. I guess small towns are
Speaker 2: kind of culty. Yeah, I mean totally. They're insulated communities.
Speaker 2: Often there's like weird hierarchies going on with you know,
Speaker 2: who's at the top of the ladder that week or whatever.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so one of them was in powers Organ.
Speaker 2: The person wrote stopped in the diner for coffee once
Speaker 2: on a drive through. I shit, you not like straight
Speaker 2: out of a movie. The other patrons just turned and
Speaker 2: quietly stared, not touching their plates until we left. I
Speaker 2: don't know why so many people are having this experience.
Speaker 2: But oh, same thing in northern Minnesota. Same thing in Dodgeville, Wisconsin,
Speaker 2: but it was at a bowling alley.
Speaker 1: I am from a rural town in Michigan.
Speaker 2: And also my mom lives in one of these towns
Speaker 2: that before she ever lived there, like, I went and
Speaker 2: visited because we'd heard all these weird things about these
Speaker 2: people who followed you. But then, of course, now that
Speaker 2: we know more about these people in this town, they're
Speaker 2: just like mostly lovely and anyway, it's interesting what we
Speaker 2: project onto the mystery of like a small town that
Speaker 2: we don't know about.
Speaker 5: Well, Jasper has a lot to say about communities that
Speaker 5: are up the grid.
Speaker 1: Shall I speak to her?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 5: What does the perfect Mennonite woman look like perfect, perfect,
Speaker 5: perfect hair.
Speaker 4: Everything is like beautifully jest, enough of a swoop, not
Speaker 4: a single hair out of place.
Speaker 1: It is the stepbird wife.
Speaker 4: Your your dress is immaculate for us, our print size
Speaker 4: had to be smaller than a quarter, so the flower
Speaker 4: had to be like fit inside the quarter. It was
Speaker 4: always like a pastel color, a little bit of ruffle,
Speaker 4: but not too much ruffle. She was very svelt and graceful,
Speaker 4: and her mannerisms were small, and she was very quiet
Speaker 4: but yet personable and warm. She had the perfect Guatemalin
Speaker 4: sweater and her her shoes were like hush puppies, not sass.
Speaker 4: And she had perfect Mennonite handwriting and she would write
Speaker 4: little notes.
Speaker 1: Did you have the bonnet?
Speaker 4: I had the white head covering. Yeah, And then I
Speaker 4: ended up buying like I had a custom made black bonnet,
Speaker 4: drove to Pennsylvania to have one made for me. I
Speaker 4: still have that too.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: But that was my way of trying to be even
Speaker 4: more in compliance with the t because it was like, Okay, well,
Speaker 4: if I have a bonnet, then they can't say that
Speaker 4: I'm trying to be too liberal. They had an issue
Speaker 4: with my I have two calics, and so my hair
Speaker 4: was a little bit too swoopy.
Speaker 7: These people are the swoop is the point in your
Speaker 7: guys's culture, Yes, but it's like in us, it's like
Speaker 7: it can't look like you're swooping.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. As in like the bump at the top,
Speaker 2: is that the swoop? Okay in question, that's okay, which
Speaker 2: is similar to the FLDS, but it's going to be
Speaker 2: smaller because the FLDS bump would be too high, way
Speaker 2: too high.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I call it the fundy swoop. But it's funny.
Speaker 4: I'm friends with a lot of like FLDS scals, and
Speaker 4: I found out the recipe that they used to like
Speaker 4: put their hair in place.
Speaker 1: What is it.
Speaker 4: It's like corn starch with honey and all of this,
Speaker 4: and they use it and like one of my girlfriends recently,
Speaker 4: she's like the flies would warm around the hair.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness.
Speaker 4: So we used Aquinette, Like, so we didn't do that.
Speaker 6: Okay, smaller smooth, no honey required.
Speaker 5: I noticed that a lot of these different groups have
Speaker 5: a different voice. Was the woman's voice supposed to be
Speaker 5: like kind of Michelle Duggery where it's kind of a baby.
Speaker 4: It is a very baby voice. Yes, like because there's
Speaker 4: also like this, you have a Pennsylvania Dutch accent. So
Speaker 4: they'll say things and they end things with a question.
Speaker 4: So if they say goodbye, it's goodbye like it's the
Speaker 4: sing song.
Speaker 2: I feel like you're doing ASMR right now. It's good
Speaker 2: making my brain it's a question goodbye. There's a little
Speaker 2: bit of a I say this all the time.
Speaker 4: Is it all? Is it all gone? They'll just drop
Speaker 4: a word, so is it all? Is very common?
Speaker 1: Is it all? How interesting?
Speaker 4: But everything sings song? Is it all? So they'll raise
Speaker 4: the note at the very end.
Speaker 2: Okay, it's interesting. What was it that led you to act?
Speaker 2: Actually start to consider that maybe this wasn't the lifestyle
Speaker 2: for you.
Speaker 4: Around this time, after I was not invited back to school,
Speaker 4: there were ongoing concerns about me. Right, and so I'm
Speaker 4: up for baptism, which they link membership with baptism. While
Speaker 4: they would consider you a Christian and you're wearing a
Speaker 4: head covering at the time, you can't greet each other
Speaker 4: with a holy kiss, you can't partake in communion of
Speaker 4: feet washing until you're baptized into the church. So they
Speaker 4: will have what's called council meeting a month beforehand, where
Speaker 4: the bishop will come into town and it's a regular
Speaker 4: church service. But then at the end of that, there's
Speaker 4: two rooms up front of the sanctuary. You could say,
Speaker 4: the ministry will be in there and the bishop, and
Speaker 4: there will be small sections of people. It's segregated seating,
Speaker 4: I should say this. So they'll start with men. They'll
Speaker 4: have the men go in and it's normally two or
Speaker 4: three rows at a time, and so you will go
Speaker 4: around and answer are the questions of the bishop. And
Speaker 4: then that's when you can raise any concern about anybody
Speaker 4: that is coming into the church or in the church
Speaker 4: in general. If there's a concern about an applicant aka
Speaker 4: me coming in, they'll note that and then at the
Speaker 4: very end of council meeting, the bishop will come up
Speaker 4: and then he will share what the concerns are. They
Speaker 4: won't say who it is.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's like av right, but you had to
Speaker 2: apply even though you'd been a member, Like can you
Speaker 2: explain what that is?
Speaker 4: So you can stand up during revival service to become
Speaker 4: a Christian. They'll take you down to the basement. Afterwards
Speaker 4: they will pray with you, and at that point you
Speaker 4: will then begin your instruction class with the intention of
Speaker 4: joining the church.
Speaker 1: So you will look Mennonite, but you won't be Mennonite.
Speaker 4: Until you go through instruction class and then are baptized
Speaker 4: into the church.
Speaker 2: Okay, So even though you'd been in since you were
Speaker 2: nine years old, you were not technically a member, right wow.
Speaker 4: Okay, Which that is a big part of the Anabaptist
Speaker 4: religion is that they don't believe in infant baptism. So
Speaker 4: that's where they separated from the Lutheran Church during the
Speaker 4: Great Reformation was because they believed. That's why they're called
Speaker 4: the anti Baptists the Anabaptist So, yeah, depending on the
Speaker 4: age and the type of church, it's more common in
Speaker 4: the Homish churches to join later on as a teen,
Speaker 4: but the Mennonites it's normally like.
Speaker 1: Traditionally kind of like early teen okay.
Speaker 4: But yeah, so you can be raised in the church,
Speaker 4: but then until you're a church member, you don't have
Speaker 4: as much expectation placed on you. So when you're an
Speaker 4: instruction class, that's when you're proving that you were worthy
Speaker 4: of church membership and baptism.
Speaker 1: Okay. So the two by two is very similar how
Speaker 1: I grew up.
Speaker 5: You had to stand up in a packed room to
Speaker 5: like profess your allegiance to this group in Christianity, in
Speaker 5: christ and then when you were older, you had to
Speaker 5: choose to be baptized because the most evil thing in
Speaker 5: the world was baptizing a baby. That's like such a
Speaker 5: horrible thing to do for them. And my sister I
Speaker 5: didn't get baptized because I don't know. I just was like, no, oh,
Speaker 5: I know, Lola's like, we got to get you baptized.
Speaker 5: Oh I got baptized at your party. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: I forgot.
Speaker 1: I forgot I'm baptized and baptized.
Speaker 5: Okay, so but but my sister, who's younger than me,
Speaker 5: did get baptized. We would do it on like farm
Speaker 5: lakes at convention. And my sister walked into the lake
Speaker 5: and tripped and fell into the water, came up and
Speaker 5: she goes, I baptized myself.
Speaker 1: I was like dead quiet. That was so bad.
Speaker 4: One of my really one of my really great friends.
Speaker 4: He grew up pretty conservative mana night, but he was
Speaker 4: never baptized. So recently he was baptized by one of
Speaker 4: his friends as she was dressed like Lady Gaga and
Speaker 4: so in Vegas.
Speaker 1: So amazing. Yeah, yeah, exactly, that's kind of what happened.
Speaker 2: A Yeah, Igon got baptized in the pool at my
Speaker 2: album releasehipah, it was great, amazing.
Speaker 1: I forgot about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, yeah, so you're an applicant and they're like
Speaker 2: an applicant who shall not be named, but we all
Speaker 2: know exactly who it is is not worthy of aggressive preaching.
Speaker 1: It's awful. What were the reasons that they were giving.
Speaker 4: I think it's the concern that I had a horse
Speaker 4: and that.
Speaker 1: I know how unrighteous of you.
Speaker 4: I was uncontrollable. They couldn't control me. I mean, I
Speaker 4: could give you a list of the reasons, but ultimately,
Speaker 4: probably because they knew that I would become who I
Speaker 4: am today of exposing them for the same things. I
Speaker 4: was ungovernable, even though I was trying so hard, they
Speaker 4: just couldn't nail me down. And I mean I ultimate
Speaker 4: was baptized the following months, so it was a great
Speaker 4: fu to them where I was like, see I did it.
Speaker 4: It was so performance striven, but I had to strip
Speaker 4: myself into just focusing on this goal, which was becoming
Speaker 4: a member of the church and it didn't matter what
Speaker 4: it costs.
Speaker 1: I just had to do it, and I did it.
Speaker 4: And then what it psychologically did was just I never
Speaker 4: had the space to recover from the pressure of that.
Speaker 4: And then then it was like more additional pressure because
Speaker 4: now I'm in Now I got to keep it. Yeah,
Speaker 4: and it's like, oh, that's so much on a teenager.
Speaker 4: I mean, so much on anybody, but like as a teenager,
Speaker 4: it was extremely brutal. I mean, obviously it was like depressed,
Speaker 4: but it just became worse because they started isolating me.
Speaker 4: So already I've been pulled out of school, so there's
Speaker 4: something wrong with me, and I've made it into the church.
Speaker 4: But at that point they started talking about trying to
Speaker 4: send me to a facility, one of their wellness mental
Speaker 4: health places to help me become more compliant and to
Speaker 4: help me out. And my dad was all for it
Speaker 4: because at this point, like my family is fighting constantly
Speaker 4: about me. There is a I'm a huge source of
Speaker 4: contention in the family, and my mom said, absolutely not,
Speaker 4: We're not sending our daughter away, and so that created
Speaker 4: even more controversy because now my dad can't get any
Speaker 4: of us in order, so then it makes him look
Speaker 4: like a bad leader in the church and they've just
Speaker 4: joined in. So it's like the pressure that the church
Speaker 4: puts on men to keep their women submissive. And the
Speaker 4: head shupporter. I look at that and I'm like, that
Speaker 4: would make anybody break, you know. Yeah, And his job
Speaker 4: is connected to his membership, right right. I get it
Speaker 4: now as an adult, where my dad was supporting all
Speaker 4: of us, and now I have two other siblings, so
Speaker 4: there's three of us plus my mom. Everybody needs to
Speaker 4: stay in order so dad can keep his job. And
Speaker 4: yet I was constantly messing up. So they sent everybody
Speaker 4: away that I was really close to, that I was
Speaker 4: writing letters to. They sent my best friend away in
Speaker 4: the middle of the night. They came and took her
Speaker 4: at three in the morning, and I was never allowed
Speaker 4: to talk to her again.
Speaker 1: Oh my god until.
Speaker 4: Probably like ten years.
Speaker 1: I didn't see her for twenty one years.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 6: And is it like a troubled teen type of thing?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: How does it relate to the kind of the troubled
Speaker 5: teen industry?
Speaker 4: What's the it's really on brand. It just looks prettier,
Speaker 4: you know. The facade, the marketing and the branding is there,
Speaker 4: but it's it's very similar, so whether they put you
Speaker 4: in a facility or they take you to somebody else's house,
Speaker 4: or like in her and since she was taken to
Speaker 4: the bishop's house and so she moved up a class
Speaker 4: or five in a way because there is such a
Speaker 4: cast system, so suddenly she's been yanked out of her
Speaker 4: family and put into its like President Snow's place, you know,
Speaker 4: it's like.
Speaker 1: The royal family.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was in some ways really
Speaker 4: good for her, but it was because of our friendship.
Speaker 4: So I'm losing people one by one, and so this
Speaker 4: isolation was really driving my mental health into plummeting. And
Speaker 4: you can see it in photos. You can watch me
Speaker 4: every year just lose more and more spark in my eye.
Speaker 4: So by the time I'm this age, like sixteen, like
Speaker 4: I was cutting and I was I was pulling my
Speaker 4: hair out, and I.
Speaker 1: Was so depressed.
Speaker 4: And then when you're depressed, you're trying to control your
Speaker 4: you know, for me, I was trying to control everything.
Speaker 4: So I become super ocd because there's so much it's
Speaker 4: performance driven, and I'm like, maybe if I can be
Speaker 4: the perfect Mennonite girl.
Speaker 1: Then they'll like me and I'll be accepted.
Speaker 4: So at that point, my mom, I think, realized that
Speaker 4: I was really not doing well, and so she made
Speaker 4: a choice to go outside of the church standard and
Speaker 4: seek counseling for me, which is not allowed any sort
Speaker 4: of mental health support outside.
Speaker 1: Of the community.
Speaker 4: But she knew that I was just she was going
Speaker 4: to lose me in one capacity or another. So we
Speaker 4: went to a county over so nobody would see that
Speaker 4: I was going to a therapist and we'd have to
Speaker 4: like drop me off, you know, a couple parking lots
Speaker 4: over and I'd walk in real quick. So I started
Speaker 4: going to a counselor and he saved my life completely
Speaker 4: because it was like the only person that saw me
Speaker 4: as me and not a performance or what I needed
Speaker 4: to be. And because he has nothing to do with
Speaker 4: the church, nothing, and he was so great at like
Speaker 4: how we phrased this, because you know, I'm so scared
Speaker 4: to be in there, and it's a man on top
Speaker 4: of it all, so here like these are two things
Speaker 4: that are not allowed to be happening. And he at
Speaker 4: the very end of our first intake session, I'll never
Speaker 4: forget where he made me like I laughed or something
Speaker 4: and he said, oh, he's like there it is like
Speaker 4: I can get you to smile. You know, it's in there,
Speaker 4: like you're we're going to be okay. And that tells you,
Speaker 4: like if you know, my personality and very giggly all
Speaker 4: the time, so like it was so bad that I
Speaker 4: just could not even connect with any sort of joy.
Speaker 4: So he recognized that, and then the next time when
Speaker 4: it was just the two of us, he told me,
Speaker 4: he said, I am not here to make you stay
Speaker 4: in the church, and I'm not here to make you leave.
Speaker 4: I'm here for you, and whatever that decision is, I
Speaker 4: will walk with you whatever you decide from a therapist standpoint.
Speaker 4: Good for him, because that's what exactly I needed to hear.
Speaker 4: I needed to hear that I was not going to
Speaker 4: be forced to leave the church because that was not
Speaker 4: my goal at all.
Speaker 1: He gave me that.
Speaker 4: Relief straight out the gate, which then immediately made me.
Speaker 1: Feel so trusting of him. And he was great. He
Speaker 1: was just phenomenal and taught me so much about learning.
Speaker 4: To love myself for me and things that were not
Speaker 4: ever taught for me since I was living in this
Speaker 4: performance based culture.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm curious, like how because it totally makes sense
Speaker 2: that would make your guard come down, so then you
Speaker 2: can actually just like be real with him. How did
Speaker 2: he encourage you to think for yourself and how did
Speaker 2: that kind of go against what you'd been taught about
Speaker 2: what you were supposed to think.
Speaker 4: A lot of a lot of my obsession was on
Speaker 4: body image at the time, because I was in a
Speaker 4: culture that's also uses not only the female bodies. The
Speaker 4: female body is responsible for everything, right, it's responsible for
Speaker 4: men's sin. And it's also like if the smaller you
Speaker 4: can make yourself, the quiet, the more you know elegant
Speaker 4: that you can become, you have a better chance of
Speaker 4: marrying somebody. And it was everything that I was not,
Speaker 4: So I was obsessed with being as skinny as possible.
Speaker 4: I've had a lot of eating disorders and I was
Speaker 4: just trying to control that, And so a lot of
Speaker 4: our focus was really on worthiness, that I was worthy
Speaker 4: without looking a certain way or performance, and that was
Speaker 4: so different than anybody else that was in my life.
Speaker 4: I think that that's where he started. He started at
Speaker 4: the point where I could identify with what it was.
Speaker 1: But truly like that life.
Speaker 4: Lesson doesn't it doesn't matter if it's like your body
Speaker 4: image or anything. It always the same thing, which is
Speaker 4: confidence and telling me that I was right, you know, whenever,
Speaker 4: and really just confirming and reaffirming what my intuition was
Speaker 4: when nobody else was like that. So a lot of
Speaker 4: our focus though, was just on the performance side of things.
Speaker 4: But he did tell me I'll never forget because he
Speaker 4: had asked me what my social Security number was and
Speaker 4: I didn't know it, and he said, oh, when you
Speaker 4: go to.
Speaker 1: College, you'll know it.
Speaker 4: So it was like these little little things that were
Speaker 4: like and I think about him every time I write
Speaker 4: my social security number out. I'm like, he's right.
Speaker 5: Number One, props to your mom for breaking rank on that, yeah,
Speaker 5: and taking you know, that's really cool. Number Two, you
Speaker 5: go to therapy, secret therapy, you come back, Do you
Speaker 5: have to.
Speaker 4: Pretend that you're not growing? Yes, I'll never forget. I
Speaker 4: was really struggling, but I was starting to like feel
Speaker 4: better because I was learning about positive thinking and so
Speaker 4: it was helping me like reframe things, and so all
Speaker 4: of a sudden, I like didn't feel so bad. I'll
Speaker 4: never forget. My school teacher. He was talking to me
Speaker 4: and he said something he was wanting to know how
Speaker 4: I was doing or whatever, and so I was like, oh,
Speaker 4: I'm I started saying that I was better, and he goes, well,
Speaker 4: you know, we don't believe in the.
Speaker 1: Power of positive thinking.
Speaker 4: Oh, but it was in a way that it was
Speaker 4: like I didn't say anything, but I was like, I
Speaker 4: think your phone should like because it's working. This is
Speaker 4: the best I have felt ever. And so I just
Speaker 4: had to pretend that he was right and just be like, okay,
Speaker 4: you know, and but I'll never forget that. So yeah,
Speaker 4: I totally.
Speaker 1: Masked like yourself growth a lot of my growth. Yeah wow,
Speaker 1: wow to respond like your old self. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so that was a gradual progression and probably, well
Speaker 4: not probably. That's totally why they don't allow you to
Speaker 4: have outside support mental health, because once you begin to
Speaker 4: have some sort of self worth and to be allowed
Speaker 4: to question things and work through things and make your
Speaker 4: own decision, you'll leave most likely.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And once you connect with somebody who's not in it
Speaker 5: and they're not pressuring you and you're just human to human, Yeah,
Speaker 5: that's also very powerful, very powerful, huge.
Speaker 4: So for me, there was no aha moment. It was
Speaker 4: just this gradual self awareness and self confidence where I
Speaker 4: finally was like, I can't keep doing this. And I
Speaker 4: also recognized that there was no way that they were
Speaker 4: going to let me marry who I wanted to marry,
Speaker 4: and I had no true future because for them, if
Speaker 4: you were over the age of twenty one and not
Speaker 4: in a relationship or married, you're an old maids. And
Speaker 4: how do you support yourself moving forward is that you
Speaker 4: would typically become a school teacher. But if they're not
Speaker 4: going to let you marry somebody that is a good
Speaker 4: Mennonite man, because you are a risk, they're definitely not
Speaker 4: going to let you teach their children. So I really
Speaker 4: actually looked at going to a less conservative Mennonite church.
Speaker 4: I was looking for a step down program, and there
Speaker 4: wasn't one where we lived unless I moved to Pennsylvania.
Speaker 4: And that was a huge risk too, because at this
Speaker 4: point I'm coming with this like tainted reputation, being this
Speaker 4: like you know, horror.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, they've already wrote letters about you.
Speaker 4: They have they do, like you know, And it was
Speaker 4: very well known that I was a problem. And because
Speaker 4: I wasn't allowed to interact with my peers like it
Speaker 4: was if we went to a visiting church, like everybody
Speaker 4: was told they couldn't interact with me.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So the friends that I still I still have them,
Speaker 4: like that went outside the box, like took a big
Speaker 4: risk socially and to be in trouble by.
Speaker 1: Associating with me.
Speaker 4: So for me, it was just this realization that it
Speaker 4: was like once you see something, you can't unsee it.
Speaker 4: And there was just I had developed such growth. I
Speaker 4: mean I've still like had a long waist to go,
Speaker 4: but I had enough to be like, I can't keep
Speaker 4: myself small like this. It's just unattainable without me wanting
Speaker 4: to die. And I don't want to feel like I
Speaker 4: want to die every day. Yeah, So that was it.
Speaker 4: There wasn't like I didn't have this one thing that
Speaker 4: made me leave that I can remember anyway. I mean
Speaker 4: that's the thing, like repressed memories are still there around
Speaker 4: this time period because I think it was just so difficult.
Speaker 4: But it's helpful to have my parents and you know,
Speaker 4: my mom especially remind me of things that were happening
Speaker 4: at that time, just to kind of put the puzzle
Speaker 4: pieces of trauma together.
Speaker 6: And so when you turn eighteen, what happens?
Speaker 1: Where do you go?
Speaker 4: I was able to stay at my parents' house. I left.
Speaker 4: I wrote a letter to withdrama membership with my therapist,
Speaker 4: because they do a lot of intimidation practices when you
Speaker 4: leave the church, they will come to your house, they
Speaker 4: will write letters, they will make phone calls.
Speaker 1: It's like this major harassment, very scientology.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I didn't want that. And so in the
Speaker 4: letter I wrote that I had my parents blessing and
Speaker 4: support to withraw my membership, and that I did not
Speaker 4: want anybody to come to my house to try to
Speaker 4: talk to me. And so Roger taught me this and
Speaker 4: we signed it this way that it was your anticipated
Speaker 4: cooperation is deeply appreciated. Roger.
Speaker 1: My therapist killed it with that, we love you, Roger.
Speaker 1: That's so good.
Speaker 4: And you know I ran into him two years ago.
Speaker 4: He walked in into my parents' restaurant and I got,
Speaker 4: this is my therapist and I got to thank him,
Speaker 4: oh foring all of the work that he did with
Speaker 4: me as a teenager. And because of him, I've been
Speaker 4: able to impact so many hundreds of lives because of
Speaker 4: his own work and invested in me, And it was amazing.
Speaker 4: It was his birthday. We've cried. His wife cried, and
Speaker 4: I know it was great. You know, to go back
Speaker 4: and thank the people that have been there for you
Speaker 4: is a unique experience and I was able to do that.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: So he taught me that phrase and I use it
Speaker 4: all the time.
Speaker 1: Your anticipated cooperation.
Speaker 5: The stocking and harassment is quite on christ Like, how
Speaker 5: do they reckon with that?
Speaker 4: Well, they would say that it's as Jesus would go
Speaker 4: out to find the lost sheep. It's essentially the same thing,
Speaker 4: like and bring it back to the fold. That's what
Speaker 4: they believe in, right, And that's where like a lot
Speaker 4: of people ask, what's the difference between Aumish and Mennonites.
Speaker 4: And the Menonites are a lot more mission driven. You'll
Speaker 4: see a lot more missionaries. And also they will proactively
Speaker 4: go to try to get somebody back into the fold.
Speaker 4: The Amish are not, and they do what's called the band,
Speaker 4: so they will freeze somebody out and that's their way
Speaker 4: of feeling like they can bring somebody back into the
Speaker 4: fold is by psychological torture. Pick whatich you're one?
Speaker 6: Yeah, God, both bad but anyways, both very bad.
Speaker 4: But the harassment's awful. And I see this a lot
Speaker 4: like actively working in the communities. And this is something
Speaker 4: that I've really tried to get the survivors to understand,
Speaker 4: even when they're still in the church, but maybe they've
Speaker 4: stood up and or they've reported their abuse, or they're
Speaker 4: seeking help. Is I tell them these are criminal actions
Speaker 4: that these men in the church and sometimes women are doing.
Speaker 4: And you can actually call the police and have charges
Speaker 4: pressed on them because this is stoking harassment. You can
Speaker 4: get a CPO and just to watch them, just like
Speaker 4: light bulb moments. Because nobody told me that either, but
Speaker 4: it's very common practice in the in the communities.
Speaker 5: What does it look like like they're outside your house?
Speaker 5: They're like, what do they do?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so they'll drive by.
Speaker 1: I mean they do this when you're in the church too.
Speaker 4: They'll drive by our bishops stopped in at They'll come
Speaker 4: late at night, stopped in it like nine thirty, I believe.
Speaker 4: And I think it's done on purpose because you're in
Speaker 4: your pajamas. You're not, you know, fully dressed for the day,
Speaker 4: and you're caught off guard. And he sat at our
Speaker 4: kitchen table and he was furious and told my mom
Speaker 4: that he would make an example out of my family,
Speaker 4: that it was not easy to leave the church. Wow,
Speaker 4: So the threats are there. I have letters. They really
Speaker 4: big on writing these like emotional guilt trip letters that
Speaker 4: you know there's choices and consequences and you need to
Speaker 4: think clearly and you know you're clearly not in your
Speaker 4: right mind and that everybody is praying for you, and
Speaker 4: it's it's the same thing. But when you get like
Speaker 4: these letters in they're from your family and these phone
Speaker 4: calls and people are driving by and stopping in, and
Speaker 4: it's hard. Yeah, it's hard when you've broken free.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was like gonna ask, were you tempted to return
Speaker 2: or were you more just like, God, these fucking people
Speaker 2: won't leave me alone.
Speaker 4: That's great question. Because I actually tried to go back.
Speaker 4: Probably I can't remember how long it was, but I
Speaker 4: know it was in like the first year that I left.
Speaker 1: I think it was like a couple months later.
Speaker 4: I decided, well, maybe I can go back, maybe because
Speaker 4: I couldn't do out here. This is like too much
Speaker 4: and I couldn't find anywhere else, and so I was like,
Speaker 4: maybe I'll just like go back. And I tried and
Speaker 4: I couldn't do that either. And that's the worst feeling.
Speaker 4: You don't know where to go because you don't fit
Speaker 4: in anywhere, and you don't belong and you don't nobody
Speaker 4: wants to and so but I was able to stay
Speaker 4: at my parents' house. My mom had left the church
Speaker 4: three months before and my dad was still a member,
Speaker 4: so I still had a home, so I wasn't kicked out,
Speaker 4: but there was. It was a lot of.
Speaker 1: Turmoil in the family. It was not easy by any means. No,
Speaker 1: that sounds horrible.
Speaker 4: I just focused on education.
Speaker 2: I was.
Speaker 4: I just found what I needed to, like the next step,
Speaker 4: and just really tried to be goal oriented. How met
Speaker 4: a night of me?
Speaker 1: And did you go to college?
Speaker 4: I did. I ended up having to go back to
Speaker 4: me forever to graduate. But I have my Bachelors of
Speaker 4: Science and Equine Science, which was yes, I still work
Speaker 4: in horses amazing and having a science degree is hilarious.
Speaker 1: Yes, so hard, that's perfect.
Speaker 4: Oh hard. Yeah. And in a five year span, I
Speaker 4: left a cult, I lost a very close grandparent. I
Speaker 4: went to college, I dropped out of college, got married,
Speaker 4: got pregnant, had a child, got divorced, and then went
Speaker 4: back to school.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: Not any support or therapy. So it was like this
Speaker 4: like flusterfuck of just shit. But I did it all
Speaker 4: like in my late teens and early twenties, I got
Speaker 4: all that like just out of the way, and now
Speaker 4: I feel like the rest of my life is just
Speaker 4: trying to untangle that and learn how to live in
Speaker 4: a state of peace.
Speaker 6: And you are untangling that on your podcast, which would
Speaker 6: love for you to tell people what that is.
Speaker 4: Yes, So in twenty eighteen, I decided that I feel
Speaker 4: like a podcast is the millennial white woman's version of
Speaker 4: a butterfly tattoo.
Speaker 1: Like all of us have one.
Speaker 4: I was like, I should trampstamp my own so hard
Speaker 4: a podcast in twenty eighteen called The Plane People's Podcast
Speaker 4: and if it's really just a creative endeavor to show
Speaker 4: what it was like to leave high control, high demand religion,
Speaker 4: and I was really focused on showing the need for
Speaker 4: a continuing education and slash education for women that were
Speaker 4: coming out of the communities because it's so hard to
Speaker 4: leave and there's no support or resources. And I've always
Speaker 4: been very, very firm the education is a gateway. It
Speaker 4: is a privilege. It is amazing. It is something that
Speaker 4: Americans don't realize is a lifeline for people that are
Speaker 4: leaving Poults because it gives you access to who you
Speaker 4: want to become, it gives you resources, it can give
Speaker 4: you housing if you stay on campus. It's like it
Speaker 4: is such a great landing spot. And so I really
Speaker 4: wanted to showcase why I felt like there needed to
Speaker 4: be more attention on grant writing and scholarships for women
Speaker 4: that would leave. They felt like they would leave more,
Speaker 4: and so I started the podcast kind of thinking that
Speaker 4: that was what it was going to be, is just
Speaker 4: show what it was like and why, and it segued
Speaker 4: into just a whole different direction than I ever thought
Speaker 4: that it would and grew. So my intention was always
Speaker 4: to just have roundtable discussions like this with people that
Speaker 4: had left the churches, whether they had good experiences or bad.
Speaker 4: I wanted to showcase just the spectrum and hear how
Speaker 4: their life was and all was curious, like how did
Speaker 4: they survive leaving the church? And so I just started
Speaker 4: with beginner energy, and there was not another podcast out
Speaker 4: there that was talking about amishr Mennonites at the time,
Speaker 4: so it took off like way more than I ever
Speaker 4: thought it would and quickly segued into immersing me in
Speaker 4: high levels of abuse that I had no idea was
Speaker 4: so prolific. So that was a really big learning curve
Speaker 4: for me, first.
Speaker 2: In terms of what was going on in the communities
Speaker 2: that you didn't know about that you were learning from
Speaker 2: these stories.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the thing was, it's like, as you can tell,
Speaker 4: the church was so focused on me and everything that
Speaker 4: I was doing wrong that while I heard murmurings of
Speaker 4: abuse that was happening, it was always very much made
Speaker 4: to feel like I was the problem. And what I
Speaker 4: found by sharing stories is that all my guests were
Speaker 4: made to feel that way too, and then recognizing there
Speaker 4: was a much bigger issue that was happening, which at
Speaker 4: the time most people were just talking about sexual abuse
Speaker 4: child sexual abuse. So I was thrust into all of
Speaker 4: a sudden people sharing all of these stories, not on
Speaker 4: the podcast, but writing in saying that they could identify
Speaker 4: with something or that they had had this happened to them,
Speaker 4: and did I know anybody else that had? So it
Speaker 4: became very overwhelming, very fast, and I just felt like
Speaker 4: I was just trying to get my feet underneath me.
Speaker 4: With the podcast, it started to feel overwhelming, like I'm
Speaker 4: not a therapist. I don't have the tools to be
Speaker 4: able to walk somebody through this, And these are people's
Speaker 4: lives in people's stories, and they're very vulnerable. And while
Speaker 4: I felt so grateful that they trusted me with that,
Speaker 4: I wanted to help them in the way that I could.
Speaker 4: So it's been been a journey of creating pathways and
Speaker 4: resources for people and to be able to connect them
Speaker 4: in and digging out the tunnels of resources. So podcasts
Speaker 4: started with intentions of just sharing stories. Then it became
Speaker 4: so much bigger in a way amazing.
Speaker 1: I mean, what were some of the things that you
Speaker 1: were learning?
Speaker 4: I was putting pieces together that there was trafficking going on.
Speaker 4: That was a big aha moment for me because like
Speaker 4: hearing what somebody was sharing, whether that's sex trafficking or
Speaker 4: labor trafficking, and seeing it from a different angle. Because
Speaker 4: when I'm talking to other Mennonites or Anabaptists wing people,
Speaker 4: I can use the terminology that we use, Like they
Speaker 4: won't ever say, oh, somebody raped their trial. They'll say
Speaker 4: they fell into sin ah. So there's all these common phrases.
Speaker 4: And so when I'm interviewing people and they say that
Speaker 4: it's like code switching, something will kick into me and
Speaker 4: I'll be like, wait a minute, that's actually called this,
Speaker 4: and being able to incorporate proper terminology into people's stories
Speaker 4: shifted the narrative of how people saw things. So when
Speaker 4: people were talking about the facilities and their experiences, I
Speaker 4: started recognizing, I'm like, I think this is labor trafficking.
Speaker 4: So then going and having to educate myself on that
Speaker 4: and being like, yes, this is labor trafficking, and then
Speaker 4: being willing enough to say it before it was common
Speaker 4: to say, and being ostracized for coming in with such
Speaker 4: an enforceful word, right or phrase. It makes people uncomfortable
Speaker 4: when you use terminology like that. It makes people uncomfortable
Speaker 4: when you say that's child labor.
Speaker 5: Yeah, when you call out the truth, they don't like
Speaker 5: to hear it. And these are communities that are holding
Speaker 5: quarters up to women's dresses to make sure the flower
Speaker 5: is smaller, minimizing these huge actual problems and language, and
Speaker 5: we're calling it this. And it's just like the more
Speaker 5: focused a community is on controlling the smallest things about women, the.
Speaker 2: Less they seem to care about sexual abuse and the
Speaker 2: commuse yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah it is.
Speaker 4: And so it was also really hard for me because
Speaker 4: I'm still like reprogramming my Menonite brain in order to
Speaker 4: be brave enough to say these things. And then I
Speaker 4: realized there was I think sex trafficking happening, which was
Speaker 4: called wife swapping, and being comfortable enough to even exploring
Speaker 4: that that was happening when people were like, there's no
Speaker 4: way that this is happening within the community. You're coming
Speaker 4: for them and you're just angry and bitter because you
Speaker 4: couldn't make it in the church, and I'm like, that's
Speaker 4: not it at all. So it's been a journey of
Speaker 4: like uncovering what is truly organized crime and being willing
Speaker 4: to see things that there's different layers. You know, a
Speaker 4: lot of members they don't recognize or see that that's happening,
Speaker 4: and their experience isn't organized crime, but that doesn't negate
Speaker 4: the fact that it is organized crime on a different level,
Speaker 4: and that there are very coercive, manipulative men that are
Speaker 4: doing things for money, but they're hiding behind the brand
Speaker 4: the Amish and Mennonite churches and the image that people
Speaker 4: in the outside world have also revered and romanticized so
Speaker 4: much so my battle is always not only just like
Speaker 4: talking frankly and exposing what is happening within to the
Speaker 4: people that are within. But also it's reframing and shifting
Speaker 4: the romantic lens that so many people hold on the
Speaker 4: amishon Mennonites totally. I always say this, I'm like kool
Speaker 4: Aid didn't do a collab with Jim Jones, And you
Speaker 4: know there's all these other cults. You're not buying Jehovah
Speaker 4: Witness furniture, right, but people still like I feel like
Speaker 4: when you look at cults, they honest, your Mennonites are
Speaker 4: like the most romanticized one at all. So when you
Speaker 4: start speaking out on that, they people in the outside
Speaker 4: world they don't like that. They get really really upset
Speaker 4: with you when you start calling it a cult or
Speaker 4: just naming the different crimes because they want to hold
Speaker 4: on to this romanticized version of the quilts and the
Speaker 4: reason that my family joined in.
Speaker 5: I was gonna say that they want their quilts period.
Speaker 5: I got the quilts and some fresh butter.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, Like they'll they'll accept the fact that there's
Speaker 4: puppy mells and that there's abuse happening within animals, but
Speaker 4: they still can't not always. But what I've seen it shift,
Speaker 4: but it's hard for people to still accept that, like
Speaker 4: organized crime is happening against children and women and men
Speaker 4: within the communities as well. So that's always been a
Speaker 4: little difficult where you know, people will almost like animals right,
Speaker 4: animal rights for children's rights. It's odd.
Speaker 2: I remember we interviewed the cult assassin Carol Murchison, I
Speaker 2: believe is how you say her last name who She's
Speaker 2: a lawyer who specifically like goes after abusive high control groups,
Speaker 2: and her journey began with someone saying that there was
Speaker 2: a Buddhist group that had become abusive, and she was like, Buddhists,
Speaker 2: no way, Buddhist wouldn't do that. That goes against the
Speaker 2: idea of Buddhism, and I feel like it's a similar thing.
Speaker 2: And of course she then learned that the abuse really
Speaker 2: was happening, and that sort of opened her whole world.
Speaker 2: It's like, wherever there's a sanitized image of like purity
Speaker 2: and wholesomeness, like, no matter what I promise you, there's
Speaker 2: a version of it somewhere where somebody's getting abused because
Speaker 2: unfortunately human beed doing that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's an inconvenient truth for quilts and the other
Speaker 5: things that people need to believe that is happening.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in the world. There's like pure living and it's
Speaker 1: just like.
Speaker 2: No which I'm sure there are communities where it's not
Speaker 2: happening and few.
Speaker 1: Families are having a great good time.
Speaker 4: It is, and that's the thing. Like So in twenty
Speaker 4: twenty one, I had a I don't know, maybe twenty
Speaker 4: twenty two, I had a group of current Amish women
Speaker 4: reach out to me from Ohio asking for my help.
Speaker 4: They'd found my podcast, They'd listened to everything they could
Speaker 4: relate to it, and they were trying to get eyes
Speaker 4: on what they were experiencing. And you know, I'd formed
Speaker 4: some relationship with some of them, and I told them,
Speaker 4: I said, I can do what I can do for you,
Speaker 4: which is I have a podcast, I have a platform.
Speaker 4: I would be happy to put out whatever you want
Speaker 4: the world to know because I can be that channel
Speaker 4: for you if you're comfortable enough. And they were so
Speaker 4: on board with it, because they felt like they'd been
Speaker 4: silenced everywhere else. So I started going up there and
Speaker 4: recording them and one of the things that's really helped,
Speaker 4: I think is being able to bring them into the
Speaker 4: rooms that I'm teaching in any sort of workshop, any
Speaker 4: sort of converse, and also on the podcast, because it
Speaker 4: shows that the problem is still existing and it's not
Speaker 4: people that have left the church that are out to
Speaker 4: get the church that are sharing these stories. Now we
Speaker 4: have people that are on the inside confirming that reaffirming,
Speaker 4: and it's very hard for people to silence those people
Speaker 4: versus those of us that have left, right, And so
Speaker 4: I feel like that's helped a little bit as far
Speaker 4: as shift that perception. And I've seen it, like in
Speaker 4: the last two years, like if a news article comes out,
Speaker 4: there's far less people trying to protect the brand, and
Speaker 4: there's a lot more people that are aware of what's
Speaker 4: actually really happening. And that's very much changed over the
Speaker 4: course of a few years.
Speaker 2: That's amazing, And well it sounds like you're instrumental and
Speaker 2: contributing to that change.
Speaker 1: So hell yeah, it's been.
Speaker 4: A journey, but it's been really rewarding. You know. I
Speaker 4: started doing these underground women's meetings a year and a
Speaker 4: half ago because I recognize these women they need to
Speaker 4: be supported, but they need answers. They need education from
Speaker 4: the people that can educate them, federal officers, people that
Speaker 4: they can trust within a state agencies and then local
Speaker 4: victim advocates, lawyers like everybody that can actually really help
Speaker 4: them answer their questions so that they have the autonomy
Speaker 4: so that they can stay safely in the church and
Speaker 4: if it doesn't feel safe, they have options and they
Speaker 4: know what to do. So it gives them the power
Speaker 4: versus them feeling like they're in the church and they
Speaker 4: have nobody that's out there listening to them.
Speaker 1: It's really helped, I believe amazing.
Speaker 6: Well, where can people find.
Speaker 4: Your podcast so they can find it on all the
Speaker 4: platforms I think except for SoundCloud, I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't figure that one out.
Speaker 4: But so look at the Plane People's Podcast, and I
Speaker 4: also have a website playing People's podcast dot Com. I
Speaker 4: started a substack that's called the Plane People's Project where
Speaker 4: I share more documents as crimes are coming out to
Speaker 4: kind of like show behind the scenes of the stories
Speaker 4: that are coming out. And on Instagram too. The Plane
Speaker 4: People's Podcast awesome. Thank you so much for coming on
Speaker 4: and telling us all of this important stuff. Sharing your story.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Speaker 6: And that's all we have with Jasper.
Speaker 2: Big things to Jasper for joining us Megan, do you
Speaker 2: have any thoughts on this episode.
Speaker 5: I think it's really cool that Josper's mom took her
Speaker 5: to therapy outside of the community that they were so
Speaker 5: involved in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty brave in the context of a community
Speaker 2: like that, I think so often that wouldn't happen just
Speaker 2: because of what the consequences could be for the parent
Speaker 2: or for the kid.
Speaker 5: Well, yeah, and so often, like her therapist, you know,
Speaker 5: she said, was incredible and wasn't going up against her
Speaker 5: beliefs started telling her what to do or anything like that.
Speaker 5: But I remember having been sent to therapy for my
Speaker 5: own eating disorder and them just kind of being like,
Speaker 5: what what.
Speaker 1: Is your family I believe that, you know? Oh right? Wow?
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5: So not to discourage anybody from going to therapy if
Speaker 5: they're afraid of getting their beliefs questioned.
Speaker 2: But well, you know, just a quick callback to the
Speaker 2: IXA conference again that I went to the other week,
Speaker 2: because there were a lot of survivors there and a
Speaker 2: lot of therapists and some people who were both who
Speaker 2: went into therapy because of their experiences, who were talking
Speaker 2: about how difficult it was to get appropriate therapy because
Speaker 2: there aren't enough people trained in the consequences of course
Speaker 2: of control and what that looks like psychologically and what
Speaker 2: you know how to treat it right, which is you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's just a specific thing, and religious trauma is a
Speaker 2: specific thing, but emerging from a closed system is like
Speaker 2: a very unique therapeutic thing to tackle. Yes, that's why
Speaker 2: it's like, so it is so important to try to
Speaker 2: find somebody who has some language for that stuff.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and perhaps won't attack the system when you're not
Speaker 5: ready for it to be absolutely absolutely yeah. And that
Speaker 5: was the big theme of the weekend too. I mean
Speaker 5: people just continue to say how important that was for them. Well,
Speaker 5: very interesting stuff. Thank you so much, Josper for coming on.
Speaker 5: Remember to go rate us five stars, leave us a
Speaker 5: comment if you like us, and as always, remember to
Speaker 5: follow your gut, watch out for red flax, and never
Speaker 5: ever trust me.
Speaker 3: Bye.
Speaker 2: This has been an exactly right production hosted by me
Speaker 2: Lola Blanc and Me Megan Elizabeth. Our senior producer is
Speaker 2: Gee Holley.
Speaker 6: This episode was mixed by John Bradley.
Speaker 5: Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain, and our guest booker
Speaker 5: is Patrick Kuttner.
Speaker 6: Our theme song was composed by Holly amber Church.
Speaker 5: Trust Me as executive produced by Karen Kilgareth, Georgia Hartstark
Speaker 5: and Danielle Kramer.
Speaker 2: You can find us on Instagram at trust Me podcast
Speaker 2: or on TikTok at trust.
Speaker 1: Me coult Podcast.
Speaker 5: Got your own story about cults, extreme belief, our manipulation,
Speaker 5: Shoot us an email at trustmepodat gmail dot com.
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