From Cult Survivor
to Global Activist
helping people trust themselves more
“Do you really believe God would want women to have to submit to men?”
- a guy asked me, at 21 years old.
Growing up in the South I was homeschooled and raised in an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Church. Both of my grandfathers were pastors in this denomination. I was socially isolated from much of the outside world and exposed to authoritarian, patriarchal ideals.
Patriarchy - the belief that men should be in power and control over women in the home, church, and in some cases, society too - is something that my family and church practiced since I was a young child.
I was raised to be a “submissive” girl…to obsess over my clothing (to make sure I wasn’t causing men to lust), and to prepare to become a wife and mother of as many babies as possible.
I was raised to
be a “submissive” girl…
The idea was that MANY children would be shot out into the world like arrows from a quiver sinking into different sectors of society like the home, church, government, media, and schools to dominate the world with our oppressive religious perspective.
My dad even sold homemade arrows with children’s names engraved on them illustrating this point! I even had to sit through a DVD lecture, with other homeschool families, during my teen years about “the 200-year plan” to control women.
This video lecture mapped out a plan from how to dominate the world with our patriarchal message through overpopulation. My role as a young woman was to set aside my leadership dreams and instead to get married, have babies, and populate the planet.
What I didn’t know then that I know now… I was raised in a cult.
I had an “exorcism” done on me as an infant because I cried as a baby.
In this highly-controlled community, I faced many types of abuse by multiple abusers, including being engaged to an abusive man and having an “exorcism” done on me as an infant because I cried as a baby. And, without knowing anything else, I submitted to this way of life and even created a blog called “Stay-At-Home Daughter,” teaching thousands of other teenage girls and women about how to adhere to the patriarchy.
Since I was a young child, I had dealt with anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts but after I broke off my engagement, I spiraled down even further.
I didn’t miss the relationship, but the PTSD from what I had experienced was setting in, and I was having regular panic attacks, nightmares, and flashbacks to the abuse. I didn’t know how I could keep on living. Anxiety medications and therapy helped some, but I was still living in that toxic community, and I was being pressured to keep quiet about what had really happened.
Then something happened, and EVERYTHING changed!
My intuition said, “It’s gonna be ok, something big, something good is about to happen.”
One night, I was up late. I turned on music in my headphones as loud as I could just to drown out the sound of my own mind. And in that moment, everything changed.
Suddenly, I felt a feeling in my body and my intuition (which has long been squelched) spoke up loud and clear for the first time in YEARS. My intuition said, “It’s gonna be ok, something big, something good is about to happen.” I was in shock. I had never received such a clear intuitive message before in my life. I didn’t know what was happening but it gave me hope.
Soon after, a girl who briefly visited my church invited me to come to the coffee shop where she worked. When I arrived, she introduced me to a man who loved talking about religion as much as I did, at the time. Our conversation started out easy, but after quickly learning about my beliefs on women and submission to the patriarchy, he disagreed with me. He believed women should have equal opportunity and should be self-controlled, not controlled by men. My 21-year-old brain started spinning.
What was this feminist nonsense?! Hadn’t he read the bible?!
Despite my initial resistance, to my surprise - he actually had some good points, but I was frustrated with myself. The questions he was asking me - how come I hadn’t thought of these things before and how did I not have answers to the questions he was asking me - further proving his point that women should have equal opportunities.
I went home to find the answers - the “right” answers - so I could come back to our next debate and completely blow him out of the water! I felt I was right, that he was wrong, and that I should be the one to set him straight.
But, to my surprise as I dug into deep study the equality arguments WERE logically answering my questions better than what I had been taught by my community. This scared the hell out of me! I didn’t want to consider that I could have been wrong about what I had always believed. But I couldn’t turn my eyes away from the truth.
I knew this could change my life forever!
I didn’t want to consider that I could have been wrong about what I had always believed. But I couldn’t turn my eyes away from the truth.
And it did. When I realized women were created equal and as an adult, I should be able to make my own choices, I started looking into the other things I had been taught and finding that so much of what I believed was a lie! I started studying and was finally able to identify many of the bad things that had been done to me as abuse, not just the engagement. My whole belief system, taught to me by the cult, fell apart.
Then things got REAL wild…I bought my own car, I started learning to swing dance, going to the movie theater, and listening to Taylor Swift! LOL That was my “rebellion” stage because all of those things had previously been banned.
But it wasn’t until I was 22 years old when I married my now husband Will Easter and that physically removed me from the cult. He’s the man of my dreams, he is pro-equality for women and he gave me a safe place to start my life over.
With the cult life over, I began diving deep into my own healing with therapy, coaching, and doctor appointments. I closed down my old blog, apologized for what I used to teach and began writing about my experiences of freedom and healing from abuse.
To my surprise, hundreds of people started reaching out to me, telling me that they had also experienced abuse and that church leaders or family had responded badly and in some cases even tried to cover it up! They felt so alone and isolated but I knew they were NOT alone because so many were reaching out to me telling such similar stories.
This is when I knew I needed to reclaim the power that had been stolen from me. I needed to become the leader I always knew I was deep in my soul.
I started working towards ending abuse AND empowering survivors!
Not everyone was pleased with my desire to tell the truth about what happened to me nor my advocacy for other abuse survivors.
We were sued for 10 million dollars!!
In 2016, The Courage Conference was born! It was an event meant to equip victim advocates and empower survivors of abuse. The conference provided tools from trained professionals, and survivors freely shared their journeys of triumph.
Not everyone was pleased with my desire to tell the truth about what happened to me, nor my advocacy for other abuse survivors.
In 2017, my husband and I were sued for 10 million dollars for defamation because I had written publicly about a homeschool leader who I believe groomed me and crossed sexual boundaries. That lawsuit lasted for 8 long years!!! At first, it was excruciatingly painful. It felt like I was being punished for speaking up. In one deposition, as I talked about how painful this was, he said aloud: “Good!”
In the beginning, I was frozen with fear, and when I was deposed, I experienced one of my worst panic attacks. Still, the longer the lawsuit continued, the more I realized this would be a deeply empowering experience.
After 8 years, he asked to settle. His lawyer fired him and placed a lien on the lawsuit winnings, if any. My husband and I refused to settle, but our insurance company signed settlement papers equaling about 1% of what he was suing us for. However, this amount was far less than the lien his attorney placed on the lawsuit winnings. Will and I paid him NOTHING. We did not settle. I did not recant. And today, I can freely tell my story. Also, the lawsuit was able to document, under oath, so many terrible things that have happened to me and others I knew.
Few survivors get that level of validation from their story!
Today, I’ve turned my life experience into something meaningful - I help other abuse victims and survivors.
I’m a trained abuse victim advocate, an author, a founder of an internationally attended abuse survivor conference The Courage Conference, CEO of the non-profit Courage 365, a television producer, an ordained reverend, an international speaker, an intuition coach, spokesperson for an internationally reported-on protest, the For Such A Time As This Rally, and I also served as Vice President for the largest and oldest advocacy organizations, Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests.
What I’m most grateful for is that I’m living my life with confidence and courage. I’m living my dream of empowering others to follow their intuitions and speak their truths (whatever that may look like for them). I’m embracing my fulfilling, loving relationship with my husband and constantly up-leveling every area of my life!
