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Lovingly Abused
In this highly relevant memoir, blending raw honesty and humor, Heather Heath's story begins with her mother's search for escape from childhood trauma, becoming perfect prey for a cult. It follows Heather's coming of age journey while enduring gaslighting, educational neglect, suicide attempts, purity culture, realizing she was in a cult once she was physically trapped, the painful choice to be shunned for becoming a paramedic, marriage, divorce, spiritual deconstruction, trusting again, reluctantly homeschooling through a pandemic, and finally discovering her own faith. Giving each reader insight into a hidden world using pop-culture comparisons, you'll feel as if you were having a real-life conversation with her.
This book's mission is to raise public awareness of hidden children all over America who are legally educationally neglected under the guise of religion. Seeing one such family on TV is a cult's convenient distraction from the thousands of women and children who are invisible.
This book's mission is to raise public awareness of hidden children all over America who are legally educationally neglected under the guise of religion. Seeing one such family on TV is a cult's convenient distraction from the thousands of women and children who are invisible.
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First published October 21, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 41 reviews
August 4, 2023
I've been reading a lot about conservative American religion of late, especially Evangelicals and the Quiverfull movement. It's not a new reading interest of mine (it's a very, very different world from the one I grew up in), but a few things have made this not-so-fringe group get more publicity of late, and consequently...more reading material.
So I picked up Lovingly Abused after watching the Amazon docu-series Shiny Happy People, for which Heath was interviewed. Heath was raised in the Institute in Basic Life Principles and its Advanced Training Institute, which is to say that she was homeschooled using the IBLP's so-called Wisdom Booklets—which in turn is to say that her education was, ah, lacking. Real school curriculums don't hand out actual tests asking "How do show love to a homosexual?" or show a video of a man limping and ask "What do you think is causing this man to limp?" (40), Heath writes. (The answers, if you're curious: you become a 'prayer warrior' for the homosexual—but not a prayer partner, because that could lead to temptation!—and the man is limping because of his extreme bitterness caused by Satan.)
These were the cult classics. I later learned this is an actual term for media geared towards a specific audience, but I mean it in the literal sense. This would have been convenient to know when I spent an embarrassing amount of time arguing with outsiders that films such as Monty Python and the Holy Grail or Clockwork Orange weren't even approved cult movies, let alone classics. (82)
IBLP is not in and of itself a religion: it's an organization that peddles its services to any number of conservative churchgoers. Heath describes attending conferences with Calvinists and Mennonites, Amish people and Baptists. But it has all the hallmarks of a cult: a leader taken as charismatic; a highly authoritarian structure with one leader at the top; an us-or-them mentality; a distrust of the outside world; suppression of questioning. Heath was taught that sexual abuse was the victim's fault, that dinosaurs and humans coexisted, that a seven-year-old girl sharing a hymnal with a seven-year-old boy was slutty and inappropriate, that touching a dead body would defile her, that her role as a woman was to be wife, mother, subservient.
You know that quote from Billy Graham's wife, "I don't believe in divorce, but I belive [sic] in murder?" I'm surprised none of my relatives have that cross-stitched on throw pillows. Throughout my whole family tree, we have rapists, incestual pedophiles, child molesters, spouse and child abusers, thieves, drug addicts, and a murderer. But I was the first one ever to get a divorce. My family simply didn't believe in divorce because, you know, it's important to have standards. (159)
Health is very clear about the disservice her homeschool 'education' did to her and the damage it wrought, but she's also clear-eyed about her parents' motivations—in particular, that her mother was trying to do right by her kids, and IBLP/ATI presented a path forward with what felt like security, a contrast to her mother's unstable childhood. It's a story that seems to be common: parents getting their families into IBLP because it sounds better than their stressed situations; kids bearing the brunt of the consequences. Heath tried, year after year, to fit into the mold—but eventually, the straws piled upon the camel's back became too much, and she started to choose her own future over the one her upbringing demanded of her.
As a book, it's somewhat hit or miss. Heath has a wry, dry humor, and it's very necessary in the face of the abuse, neglect, and control she describes. She also has the evidence to back it up: she's not talking just about 'here's my memory of this experience' (which would in itself be valid, to be clear), but she also has the materials from her homeschooling 'education' and an entire trove of IBLP references to pull on. It's entirely worth checking out her social media accounts after reading the book to get more visuals. That said, I would love it if Heath's role in Shiny Happy People led an established publisher (Lovingly Abused is self-published) to reach out and work with Heath on polishing an updated version of this. It's such a powerful story but sometimes feels all over the place—the structure is sometimes chronological and sometimes thematic, and at times repetition feels more like catharsis than like something that best suits the story. It makes a great deal of sense in the context of Heath not having had access to formal education until she was an adult, and to me it was worth it for the combination of context and personal story that the book offers, but I suspect that there's a potential version of this book that could reach, and resonate with, a much wider audience.
So I picked up Lovingly Abused after watching the Amazon docu-series Shiny Happy People, for which Heath was interviewed. Heath was raised in the Institute in Basic Life Principles and its Advanced Training Institute, which is to say that she was homeschooled using the IBLP's so-called Wisdom Booklets—which in turn is to say that her education was, ah, lacking. Real school curriculums don't hand out actual tests asking "How do show love to a homosexual?" or show a video of a man limping and ask "What do you think is causing this man to limp?" (40), Heath writes. (The answers, if you're curious: you become a 'prayer warrior' for the homosexual—but not a prayer partner, because that could lead to temptation!—and the man is limping because of his extreme bitterness caused by Satan.)
These were the cult classics. I later learned this is an actual term for media geared towards a specific audience, but I mean it in the literal sense. This would have been convenient to know when I spent an embarrassing amount of time arguing with outsiders that films such as Monty Python and the Holy Grail or Clockwork Orange weren't even approved cult movies, let alone classics. (82)
IBLP is not in and of itself a religion: it's an organization that peddles its services to any number of conservative churchgoers. Heath describes attending conferences with Calvinists and Mennonites, Amish people and Baptists. But it has all the hallmarks of a cult: a leader taken as charismatic; a highly authoritarian structure with one leader at the top; an us-or-them mentality; a distrust of the outside world; suppression of questioning. Heath was taught that sexual abuse was the victim's fault, that dinosaurs and humans coexisted, that a seven-year-old girl sharing a hymnal with a seven-year-old boy was slutty and inappropriate, that touching a dead body would defile her, that her role as a woman was to be wife, mother, subservient.
You know that quote from Billy Graham's wife, "I don't believe in divorce, but I belive [sic] in murder?" I'm surprised none of my relatives have that cross-stitched on throw pillows. Throughout my whole family tree, we have rapists, incestual pedophiles, child molesters, spouse and child abusers, thieves, drug addicts, and a murderer. But I was the first one ever to get a divorce. My family simply didn't believe in divorce because, you know, it's important to have standards. (159)
Health is very clear about the disservice her homeschool 'education' did to her and the damage it wrought, but she's also clear-eyed about her parents' motivations—in particular, that her mother was trying to do right by her kids, and IBLP/ATI presented a path forward with what felt like security, a contrast to her mother's unstable childhood. It's a story that seems to be common: parents getting their families into IBLP because it sounds better than their stressed situations; kids bearing the brunt of the consequences. Heath tried, year after year, to fit into the mold—but eventually, the straws piled upon the camel's back became too much, and she started to choose her own future over the one her upbringing demanded of her.
As a book, it's somewhat hit or miss. Heath has a wry, dry humor, and it's very necessary in the face of the abuse, neglect, and control she describes. She also has the evidence to back it up: she's not talking just about 'here's my memory of this experience' (which would in itself be valid, to be clear), but she also has the materials from her homeschooling 'education' and an entire trove of IBLP references to pull on. It's entirely worth checking out her social media accounts after reading the book to get more visuals. That said, I would love it if Heath's role in Shiny Happy People led an established publisher (Lovingly Abused is self-published) to reach out and work with Heath on polishing an updated version of this. It's such a powerful story but sometimes feels all over the place—the structure is sometimes chronological and sometimes thematic, and at times repetition feels more like catharsis than like something that best suits the story. It makes a great deal of sense in the context of Heath not having had access to formal education until she was an adult, and to me it was worth it for the combination of context and personal story that the book offers, but I suspect that there's a potential version of this book that could reach, and resonate with, a much wider audience.
November 3, 2021
For many fans of true crime and cult studies, dangerous religious fundamentalist cults run by the likes of Gwen Shamblin, Warren Jeffs, and even Jim Jones are things that happen to "other people". But to people like Heather Heath (and myself), one such cult defined our entire childhood and worldview.
This book is a fascinating, intensely personal, well written, and comprehensive book about growing up in the Advanced Training Institute homeschool cult run by Christian fundamentalist leader Bill Gothard. This cult achieved notable popularity in the 80s and 90s, but was largely ignored by mainstream Christianity and society as a whole. Even with the rise in popularity of their most popular adherents, the Duggar family, most people have not bothered to look into this particularly harmful cult nor the horrific worldview that it teaches to vulnerable families around the world.
Heather Heath has written a book that not only exposes the cult's teachings from her own unique perspective and vicious sense of humor, but also explores the long term effects of the cult's indoctrination and educational neglect on her adult life as she navigates a post-cult world in her career, relationships, motherhood, and mental well being. As someone who has also had to embark on a similar journey, albeit from the perspective of a cishet male, her journey was very relatable and true to my own experience in so many ways. If you are from this background, this book can be an extra heavy read. However, Heather's wit and unique ability to frame her experiences balance the heaviness with her relatability and inspiring outlook. By the end of the book, you will be rooting for her as she takes the trauma, neglect, and abuse she suffered under the cult, and builds a life for herself that reflects her resilience, empathy, and strength.
If I had to compare this book to any others I've read, the closest I could compare it to is Educated by Tara Westover. But what makes Heather's story stand out, our shared experiences aside, is the fact that everything she experienced in the cult could have been easily seen by anyone who was looking out for the safety of homeschooled children. She was not raised in a remote wilderness retreat, she was raised in an average American home and attended conferences held in arenas on public university property. As such, her book also contains a call to action to support organizations that prioritize the safety of homeschooled children. The book as a whole serves as a sobering reminder that cults thrive on secrecy and misinformation. Heather speaking her truth in this book is a strike at the very heart of the mindset that allowed her abuse to happen. To that end, this book is more than a memoir, it's a victory cry over years of systemic abuse.
I highly recommend this book.
This book is a fascinating, intensely personal, well written, and comprehensive book about growing up in the Advanced Training Institute homeschool cult run by Christian fundamentalist leader Bill Gothard. This cult achieved notable popularity in the 80s and 90s, but was largely ignored by mainstream Christianity and society as a whole. Even with the rise in popularity of their most popular adherents, the Duggar family, most people have not bothered to look into this particularly harmful cult nor the horrific worldview that it teaches to vulnerable families around the world.
Heather Heath has written a book that not only exposes the cult's teachings from her own unique perspective and vicious sense of humor, but also explores the long term effects of the cult's indoctrination and educational neglect on her adult life as she navigates a post-cult world in her career, relationships, motherhood, and mental well being. As someone who has also had to embark on a similar journey, albeit from the perspective of a cishet male, her journey was very relatable and true to my own experience in so many ways. If you are from this background, this book can be an extra heavy read. However, Heather's wit and unique ability to frame her experiences balance the heaviness with her relatability and inspiring outlook. By the end of the book, you will be rooting for her as she takes the trauma, neglect, and abuse she suffered under the cult, and builds a life for herself that reflects her resilience, empathy, and strength.
If I had to compare this book to any others I've read, the closest I could compare it to is Educated by Tara Westover. But what makes Heather's story stand out, our shared experiences aside, is the fact that everything she experienced in the cult could have been easily seen by anyone who was looking out for the safety of homeschooled children. She was not raised in a remote wilderness retreat, she was raised in an average American home and attended conferences held in arenas on public university property. As such, her book also contains a call to action to support organizations that prioritize the safety of homeschooled children. The book as a whole serves as a sobering reminder that cults thrive on secrecy and misinformation. Heather speaking her truth in this book is a strike at the very heart of the mindset that allowed her abuse to happen. To that end, this book is more than a memoir, it's a victory cry over years of systemic abuse.
I highly recommend this book.
December 28, 2021
Having also grown up in the cult Heather references, this was an incredibly cathartic read. Due to this shared history I've done a lot of reading on heavy topics like trauma and violence, and I'm really amazed at how Heather walks the perfect line of injecting humor without making light of really serious and heartbreaking situations. This is the book I'll be recommending to anyone who is curious about the homeschool cult, also my psychiatrist and any therapists or other medical providers I work with in the future. I'm so grateful to Heather for putting her story and soul into the world and her heart for effecting positive change in the lives of unseen kids and the world. She's a true proverbs 31 goddess.
July 19, 2022
This book was very personal for me and took me a step further in my own life journey. I can relate to it on many levels and am very thankful I came across it. I will be reading this a few times to completely process. An added bonus is that it is a local author and a portion of her proceeds go to great organizations making a change in our world.
February 23, 2022
I asked my therapist to read this to understand the world I grew up in better. My experiences of the cult and the author’s were not the same, and yet there was so much I could relate to, so much that it brought back, so much that exposed raw and still-tender areas of my psyche that I thought had fully healed. It was sometimes written in an almost stream-of-consciousness style, which was confusing at times, yet it captured in a unique way the chaos of a brain and a body recovering from a forced existence in an alternative reality.
June 20, 2023
There’s a lot of important information shared in this book. I would love to see it repackaged into a more cohesive, possibly chronological account to allow the reader to understand more clearly what is being communicated!
November 15, 2022
I have to give this 5 stars, because as memoirs go, I can hardly imagine enjoying something more. It touched on isolating and strange aspects of my own past (IBLP, ATI, homeschooling) and gave language to what it was: traumatic experiences in an cult that mixed love and abuse. At the same time it's a heart felt journey through Heather's long deconstruction, dramatic life as an EMT, and her incomplete story of healing. It was eye opening to read a woman's perspective growing up in these circles, which I already knew was misogynistic and disempowering, but in many ways worse and more complicated than I could have imagined. The writing style is entertaining and relatable, full of wit and amusing asides, like having a great conversation with someone who is open and honest in all the ways that I find inspiring. Must read if you come from ATI or "extremely conservative" homeschooling.
Selected highlights from each chapter:
(Intro)
The abuse I experienced was mostly invisible to those right in front of me. It was invisible to my abusers. They thought they were doing what God wanted and, in doing so, became trapped themselves. My goal in writing this book is to open society's eyes to the hidden world of homeschoolers who are frequently dismissed as kind of weird but great at spelling bees. I’ll show you how to recognize subtle warnings that a child needs a safe adult to intervene and how to help.
(1) Learning the Language
• Appearance of Evil... “Abstain from all appearance of evil.” ATI loves this verse because it doesn’t take much effort at all to make it mean whatever they’d like.
• Countenance... ATI never praises beauty but you could veil your compliment by stating how the joy of The Lord shone through her successful attempts of drawing attention to her face. Big hair and artistic french braids were all the rage.
• Blanket Training... Everyone knew that “the world” would see such parenting behavior as “extreme” and would likely provoke government suspicion.
• Rhema... “Being led” to homeschool or deciding whether to leave/join a church or start your own (if you were a man).
• Spiritual Gift... Moderately tempered people tended to be teachers, exhorters, or givers. Organizers and servers leaned more towards hyperactive tendencies, controlling the only things in their lives they could control. Mercies were mostly the submissive mothers who had given up all will to fight, and prophets gave zero fucks.
• Stronghold... Once a person becomes angry or bitter without asking God to quell these feelings, ground is given over to Satan and there is great Spiritual warfare in reclaiming the ground.
• The World: Anyone who thought differently from those leading ATI—even most churches—were referred to as “The World”-Defined by ATI as a noun: “The World would have us believe that women are equal to men. The World wants us to accept sodomy as a way of life. The World is convinced that education is the most important thing you can do for a child's future.”
(2) Were Your Parents Always in a Cult?
I’ve come to understand that the short answer is: “God led our family here.” However, even extremists know that God doesn’t act as our puppetmaster. There are always choices set before you and it is up to you how to act on them... I realized that the reason for my sheltered life was none other than separation anxiety and cycles of Stockholm-ish self-sabotage
[My mother] had fallen under Bill's hypnotic spell. She bought into his propaganda of having to “yield her rights” to God.
We were always taught that depression was created by lazy people as an excuse to reject the joy of The Lord.
(3) Gaslighting 101
ATI warns you will be ridiculed for being legalistic and “narrow-minded,” but that's exactly what you hope to have happen. Wisdom Booklet 49 explains, “Most people believe that by learning information, we will acquire knowledge. This idea is not true… If [presuppositions] are based on the opinions, conjecture, speculation, and theories of the broad way, we will have worldly knowledge.” If you’re often told you’re closed-minded and prejudiced, you’re winning at cult life.
ATI will often give examples of “liberty” in a negative context, highlighting sinful synonyms such as autonomy, right, and freedom. As individuals, we were expected to yield… and accept anything that happened to us from that point on as God's will.
Now, most quiverfull people will tell you they keep having kids because they want God to control the size of their family. But it goes beyond that. Bill's stated goal closely resembled that of a dictator, in that if ATI families kept their mass production of “perfect” offspring going, while the world leaned further into birth control and abortions, we would eventually be the majority and could essentially take over the world.
They lied about all of it. All. Of. It... Each time I read an uncited “fact,” followed by the warning, “Any other conclusion is willful rejection of this obvious truth,” it's another reminder that I was actively robbed of a legitimate education or any form of critical-thinking development.
I’d been groomed to believe that The World was never going to understand and the ultimate goal was to get people to stop asking questions, so they don’t call Child Protective Services on your parents... We were kids and we were trapped.
I can say with confidence that not one family was there because of genuine love that wasn’t outweighed by fear.
(4) But Look At How Well You Turned Out!
“But look at how well you turned out!” That is quite possibly the most infuriating and dismissive statement I hear... they don’t realize how many regrettable years I spent being a terrible person doing what I thought God wanted.
I was taught there are different languages because of God's anger over the tower of Babel and fully believed it was God's Will to keep us all separate… That person is a part of me I wish I could erase. I wish I could undo the racist, violently cruel things I said when I wanted to fit in and no one told me I was wrong.
An early Wisdom Booklet teaches that one of the world's greatest deceptions is trusting psychologists with mental health, instead of turning to the Bible, the only counsel one should ever need… Perhaps the most repetitive warning I was given was that psychologists will usually reject the fundamental teachings of ATI chosen by our parents, putting us into great danger in trying to get us out from under the umbrella of authority.
ATI instructed us to respond that a legalist is someone who believes salvation can be obtained through good works; therefore, since we choose to trust God for salvation, we cannot be a legalist. Yep. That “gotcha!”, also used to prove MLMs aren’t pyramid schemes because pyramid schemes are illegal, is right there in my curriculum.
Forming a harsh opinion about a stranger isn’t something I stumbled upon on my own. One of the very first assignments in the Wisdom Booklets is to people-watch and find who has hidden sin in their lives.
A popular point people like to bring up is how well-behaved homeschooled kids seem to be. That isn’t well-behaved; that is oppressed and abused, and it starts from birth. ATI has a way of exalting abuse while conveniently remaining non-committal enough that they can easily deny such accusations in a lawsuit.
ATI had several suggestions on how to break your child's spirit into submission (I’m not exaggerating, that was an actual parenting goal)
ATI exalts those who are grateful for their abuse. I have a 10-step guide from ATI on how to counsel someone who has been sexually assaulted. Steps one through five involve the victim identifying their behaviors and considering why God let this happen... The guide ends with asking the victim the following question: if they could do it all over again, would they choose being mighty in spirit or having never been physically abused?
Help homeschool's invisible children, we need responsible homeschool families to take on a small inconvenience in order to ensure that every child is receiving a full, valid education... I want to believe that every single one of you reading this, and every single homeschool parent would gladly accept the potential annoyance of oversight if it would save even one child.
(5) “Homeschool Heather”
Homeschooling, in and of itself, isn’t evil in my mind. The WAY I was homeschooled was... Many families, including mine, used the guise of “religious freedom,” but that was as much a scapegoat to endanger children as it is when used as a reason against life-saving medical care. I used to think public school was a punishment and, if parents actually loved their children, they would devote their lives to teaching them.
I want to make different mistakes as a parent, not the ones I know are likely to traumatize [my daughter].
I wasn’t sheltered from the devil; I was sheltered from the pure humanity of others. I had the advantage of breaking into a world in which feminists- the ones I feared in my diaries, had paved a smoother path for me to follow.
(6) Chasing Frisbees
ATI put a lot of effort into talking us out of going to college… because college “wastes the prime service years of a person's life.”
Even though [my mother] experienced ATI, she had no idea how truly evil they were. It was a completely different experience for a parent than it was for their child.
[Gothard] would say that if there were two rebels in a large crowd, they would find each other, no matter what. He was right; I found the other one.
Wisdom Booklet 18's homework assignment included listing “rights.” ATI places the quotation marks because they are professional gaslighters… our rights to listen to any music we like, choose our own clothes, eat good meals we enjoy, spend our own money, be helped with chores, be treated with proper manners, be free from injury, make our own decisions, choose our own friends, be heard without interruption (#MrVicePresidentImSpeaking), be appreciated, not be nagged, have our own space, and relax.
This was the first time I had been amongst real teachers and classes. I watched, feeling the weight of overwhelming betrayal that comes with discovering everything you were told had been a lie. School wasn’t evil. Teachers loved their students and actually cared about them. Those kids had parents who loved them. School wasn’t the punishment I had always believed.
(7) Craving Trauma
What people don’t realize—and I didn’t realize until my therapist, Paula, let me borrow her copy of “The Body Keeps The Score” by Dr. Bessel van der Kolk—is that although going from a cult to EMS may seem counterintuitive to many, it really was a natural progression. Dr. van der Kolk writes about a study done on mice who were raised in a nurturing environment and some who were raised in a chaotic environment, both placed in a stressful situation and given the option of retreat to either of the environments. Each group returned to the environment most similar to the one in which they were raised, even though one option was clearly more nurturing.
I watched the church bus grow smaller in our mirror as we left it further behind. That is what leaving a cult looks like. It's not some grand explosion of burning Bibles and raiding Hot Topic; it's constantly moving forward as your captor shrinks in the distance behind you.
(8) Satan's Doorbell
The entirety of ATI's sex education was “no.” All we ever learned was we weren’t allowed to touch someone of the opposite sex until marriage. Promiscuity caused cervical cancer. All blow jobs caused throat cancer. Our virginity and potential loss of such was often compared to perfect flowers with the petals viciously torn off, chewed and spit out candy bars, new cars with immediately lost value once driven off the lot, or white gowns with red dye thrown at them.
My father's plan was for me to enter a courtship with a man of his choosing... Not once had we ever engaged in a personal conversation, yet entering an engaged-to-be-egagedgaged relationship was the next fundamentalist step toward determining if we should spend our lives together.
Purity culture took away any of my choose-your-own-adventure autonomy and, yes, there are tons of people who regret not waiting, but there are also many who don’t.
I’d spent so much of my life hearing that all my value would be lost if I wasn’t completely naive to pleasure and I’d have to be grateful to have anyone want me; I’d just spoken it into existence.
No one ever taught them it's possible for something to be right in that moment but not forever.
I wasn’t a stationary stumbling block, as they’d always portrayed me. I was an active participant in the glorious, consensual ritual of making out. I decided my virginity wasn’t something I owed him or anyone. His willingness to date me wasn’t some heroically valiant act on his part… I didn’t become weak because the idea of pleasure was all I wanted in that moment… I felt powerful, like I was in control of something for the first time in my life… As soon as it was over, I looked in the mirror to check how dim my eyes had become. Shockingly, they looked exactly the same.
I’ve never taken a walk of shame; I prefer a strut of pride. There are people I would never choose to revisit, but there are none I regret.
I don’t believe there is one right way to go about one's sexuality. If a person wants to wait until their wedding night, I fully support them in that, as long as it's their choice, not an expectation. If they don’t want to wait, that's their choice; no one else should expect to make it for them.
(9) Scream Really Loud
Every lesson I’ve ever heard in a fundamentalist setting taught me that any sort of illness that could not be measured with lab results was not a real illness. ADD was for kids who needed more discipline. Depression was for people who let the devil speak louder than God.
She knew having another baby held a great risk of killing her, but ATI taught women they were acting in sheer disobedience by limiting their family size.
Seeing as I was homeschooled out of separation anxiety, it should come as no shock that I had a few attachment issues of my own.
Funerals weren’t sad; they were celebrations of someone's “home-going.” I’d learned to idolize death and martyrdom, reinforced by watching ATI corner my mother into a high-risk pregnancy, and it made no sense to me to hang around on earth, a place filled with suffering, when there was a much better option waiting for me after I took my last breath.
I felt as if I was being torn into pieces, each piece fully devoted to its victor. I wanted out of the world my parents had created for me, while simultaneously wanting to stay in and fully commit to the life of a pastor's wife. I knew the oppression was wrong but the simplicity of never having to be challenged academically seemed like an ideal road to take if I didn’t want anyone to find out just how much I didn’t know.
It was all too much and I had long forgotten how to scream really loud. I was used to secrets and having my concerns dismissed, so, instead, I internalized all of it.
I knew I needed to go to therapy but couldn’t, because therapy was where they fill your head with lies from the devil... Even though I was out of the cult, the belief that depression was a choice was still deeply rooted in my mind.
(10) The Adulterous Harlot
The year we were engaged was quite possibly the most mentally disturbing year of my life... I waited for the joy to come.
I poured all of my efforts into planning the perfect wedding, subconsciously making up for all the hell that surrounded us.
(11) Goddesses Aren’t Blasphemous
When you’re a girl in a cult, no one ever asks what you want to be when you grow up.
All my life, I’ve been told how great I am with kids and how I was meant to be a mom. It only occurred to me as I wrote this that it was all grooming. None of those statements were based on my behaviors; it was all them trying to shape me into who they wanted me to be.
That's the thing about deconstructing: you can physically walk away from everything, but you bring along all the thinking errors because there's no way to distinguish what's true anymore. You have to relearn all of it and, as far as I know, there's no crash course on how to be a well-adjusted, functioning human.
I’ve been reading that “using God's name in vain” actually means you should not take on the title of Christian nor Believer if you are going to be a shitty person who makes people want nothing to do with your God… claiming it's “God's will”… harming people, using them for your own agenda in the name of your “ministry”.
The Proverbs 31 woman would be considered a goddess, feminists can be feminine, and forming a cult was the blasphemous act all along!!! I discovered my inner goddess in this book. She is virtuous AF.
(12) When The Hero Becomes The Villain
All I wanted was to feel like I belonged or that someone cared about me. In looking for that, I lost myself. In every situation and relationship I’ve ever had, I became whoever they wanted me to be.
I didn’t have to decide how I felt about anything. Everything was black and white, sin or not sin. There was no in-between. It was a world where everything was perfectly clear. I didn’t have to fight for anything; God would handle it. I didn’t have to care about human rights because everyone deserved the suffering they endured.
Where I trusted the words a pastor had heard in a dream and denied the words of well-read scientists.
I get it. I took something you loved and I showed you how it's hurting someone else. I made your hero the villain.
Learning that someone you once turned to for all the answers, all the comfort and peace you knew, is, in fact, the bad guy is devastating. It hurts. It's so much easier to deny the abuse and keep blissfully making matching outfits out of drapes than to sneak out of a theatre full of Nazis.
ATI has become extremely skilled in teaching tactics that will cause pain to a child but won’t raise any flags in the systems.
In summary, it was all a fucking lie so they could convince us that abuse was love.
But the truth is, evil people are capable of doing good things, just as good people are capable of doing evil things.
This is about being gaslit into abusive behavior that fosters a generation of hatred towards people who look, believe, or love differently than I do. Changing is uncomfortable, even painful, but you can do it. I believe in you. We have to be willing to acknowledge that the ones we knew to be heroes may have been the villain to someone else. Only then can we move forward. We have to be willing to admit that, perhaps, we are the villain in someone's story.
Selected highlights from each chapter:
(Intro)
The abuse I experienced was mostly invisible to those right in front of me. It was invisible to my abusers. They thought they were doing what God wanted and, in doing so, became trapped themselves. My goal in writing this book is to open society's eyes to the hidden world of homeschoolers who are frequently dismissed as kind of weird but great at spelling bees. I’ll show you how to recognize subtle warnings that a child needs a safe adult to intervene and how to help.
(1) Learning the Language
• Appearance of Evil... “Abstain from all appearance of evil.” ATI loves this verse because it doesn’t take much effort at all to make it mean whatever they’d like.
• Countenance... ATI never praises beauty but you could veil your compliment by stating how the joy of The Lord shone through her successful attempts of drawing attention to her face. Big hair and artistic french braids were all the rage.
• Blanket Training... Everyone knew that “the world” would see such parenting behavior as “extreme” and would likely provoke government suspicion.
• Rhema... “Being led” to homeschool or deciding whether to leave/join a church or start your own (if you were a man).
• Spiritual Gift... Moderately tempered people tended to be teachers, exhorters, or givers. Organizers and servers leaned more towards hyperactive tendencies, controlling the only things in their lives they could control. Mercies were mostly the submissive mothers who had given up all will to fight, and prophets gave zero fucks.
• Stronghold... Once a person becomes angry or bitter without asking God to quell these feelings, ground is given over to Satan and there is great Spiritual warfare in reclaiming the ground.
• The World: Anyone who thought differently from those leading ATI—even most churches—were referred to as “The World”-Defined by ATI as a noun: “The World would have us believe that women are equal to men. The World wants us to accept sodomy as a way of life. The World is convinced that education is the most important thing you can do for a child's future.”
(2) Were Your Parents Always in a Cult?
I’ve come to understand that the short answer is: “God led our family here.” However, even extremists know that God doesn’t act as our puppetmaster. There are always choices set before you and it is up to you how to act on them... I realized that the reason for my sheltered life was none other than separation anxiety and cycles of Stockholm-ish self-sabotage
[My mother] had fallen under Bill's hypnotic spell. She bought into his propaganda of having to “yield her rights” to God.
We were always taught that depression was created by lazy people as an excuse to reject the joy of The Lord.
(3) Gaslighting 101
ATI warns you will be ridiculed for being legalistic and “narrow-minded,” but that's exactly what you hope to have happen. Wisdom Booklet 49 explains, “Most people believe that by learning information, we will acquire knowledge. This idea is not true… If [presuppositions] are based on the opinions, conjecture, speculation, and theories of the broad way, we will have worldly knowledge.” If you’re often told you’re closed-minded and prejudiced, you’re winning at cult life.
ATI will often give examples of “liberty” in a negative context, highlighting sinful synonyms such as autonomy, right, and freedom. As individuals, we were expected to yield… and accept anything that happened to us from that point on as God's will.
Now, most quiverfull people will tell you they keep having kids because they want God to control the size of their family. But it goes beyond that. Bill's stated goal closely resembled that of a dictator, in that if ATI families kept their mass production of “perfect” offspring going, while the world leaned further into birth control and abortions, we would eventually be the majority and could essentially take over the world.
They lied about all of it. All. Of. It... Each time I read an uncited “fact,” followed by the warning, “Any other conclusion is willful rejection of this obvious truth,” it's another reminder that I was actively robbed of a legitimate education or any form of critical-thinking development.
I’d been groomed to believe that The World was never going to understand and the ultimate goal was to get people to stop asking questions, so they don’t call Child Protective Services on your parents... We were kids and we were trapped.
I can say with confidence that not one family was there because of genuine love that wasn’t outweighed by fear.
(4) But Look At How Well You Turned Out!
“But look at how well you turned out!” That is quite possibly the most infuriating and dismissive statement I hear... they don’t realize how many regrettable years I spent being a terrible person doing what I thought God wanted.
I was taught there are different languages because of God's anger over the tower of Babel and fully believed it was God's Will to keep us all separate… That person is a part of me I wish I could erase. I wish I could undo the racist, violently cruel things I said when I wanted to fit in and no one told me I was wrong.
An early Wisdom Booklet teaches that one of the world's greatest deceptions is trusting psychologists with mental health, instead of turning to the Bible, the only counsel one should ever need… Perhaps the most repetitive warning I was given was that psychologists will usually reject the fundamental teachings of ATI chosen by our parents, putting us into great danger in trying to get us out from under the umbrella of authority.
ATI instructed us to respond that a legalist is someone who believes salvation can be obtained through good works; therefore, since we choose to trust God for salvation, we cannot be a legalist. Yep. That “gotcha!”, also used to prove MLMs aren’t pyramid schemes because pyramid schemes are illegal, is right there in my curriculum.
Forming a harsh opinion about a stranger isn’t something I stumbled upon on my own. One of the very first assignments in the Wisdom Booklets is to people-watch and find who has hidden sin in their lives.
A popular point people like to bring up is how well-behaved homeschooled kids seem to be. That isn’t well-behaved; that is oppressed and abused, and it starts from birth. ATI has a way of exalting abuse while conveniently remaining non-committal enough that they can easily deny such accusations in a lawsuit.
ATI had several suggestions on how to break your child's spirit into submission (I’m not exaggerating, that was an actual parenting goal)
ATI exalts those who are grateful for their abuse. I have a 10-step guide from ATI on how to counsel someone who has been sexually assaulted. Steps one through five involve the victim identifying their behaviors and considering why God let this happen... The guide ends with asking the victim the following question: if they could do it all over again, would they choose being mighty in spirit or having never been physically abused?
Help homeschool's invisible children, we need responsible homeschool families to take on a small inconvenience in order to ensure that every child is receiving a full, valid education... I want to believe that every single one of you reading this, and every single homeschool parent would gladly accept the potential annoyance of oversight if it would save even one child.
(5) “Homeschool Heather”
Homeschooling, in and of itself, isn’t evil in my mind. The WAY I was homeschooled was... Many families, including mine, used the guise of “religious freedom,” but that was as much a scapegoat to endanger children as it is when used as a reason against life-saving medical care. I used to think public school was a punishment and, if parents actually loved their children, they would devote their lives to teaching them.
I want to make different mistakes as a parent, not the ones I know are likely to traumatize [my daughter].
I wasn’t sheltered from the devil; I was sheltered from the pure humanity of others. I had the advantage of breaking into a world in which feminists- the ones I feared in my diaries, had paved a smoother path for me to follow.
(6) Chasing Frisbees
ATI put a lot of effort into talking us out of going to college… because college “wastes the prime service years of a person's life.”
Even though [my mother] experienced ATI, she had no idea how truly evil they were. It was a completely different experience for a parent than it was for their child.
[Gothard] would say that if there were two rebels in a large crowd, they would find each other, no matter what. He was right; I found the other one.
Wisdom Booklet 18's homework assignment included listing “rights.” ATI places the quotation marks because they are professional gaslighters… our rights to listen to any music we like, choose our own clothes, eat good meals we enjoy, spend our own money, be helped with chores, be treated with proper manners, be free from injury, make our own decisions, choose our own friends, be heard without interruption (#MrVicePresidentImSpeaking), be appreciated, not be nagged, have our own space, and relax.
This was the first time I had been amongst real teachers and classes. I watched, feeling the weight of overwhelming betrayal that comes with discovering everything you were told had been a lie. School wasn’t evil. Teachers loved their students and actually cared about them. Those kids had parents who loved them. School wasn’t the punishment I had always believed.
(7) Craving Trauma
What people don’t realize—and I didn’t realize until my therapist, Paula, let me borrow her copy of “The Body Keeps The Score” by Dr. Bessel van der Kolk—is that although going from a cult to EMS may seem counterintuitive to many, it really was a natural progression. Dr. van der Kolk writes about a study done on mice who were raised in a nurturing environment and some who were raised in a chaotic environment, both placed in a stressful situation and given the option of retreat to either of the environments. Each group returned to the environment most similar to the one in which they were raised, even though one option was clearly more nurturing.
I watched the church bus grow smaller in our mirror as we left it further behind. That is what leaving a cult looks like. It's not some grand explosion of burning Bibles and raiding Hot Topic; it's constantly moving forward as your captor shrinks in the distance behind you.
(8) Satan's Doorbell
The entirety of ATI's sex education was “no.” All we ever learned was we weren’t allowed to touch someone of the opposite sex until marriage. Promiscuity caused cervical cancer. All blow jobs caused throat cancer. Our virginity and potential loss of such was often compared to perfect flowers with the petals viciously torn off, chewed and spit out candy bars, new cars with immediately lost value once driven off the lot, or white gowns with red dye thrown at them.
My father's plan was for me to enter a courtship with a man of his choosing... Not once had we ever engaged in a personal conversation, yet entering an engaged-to-be-egagedgaged relationship was the next fundamentalist step toward determining if we should spend our lives together.
Purity culture took away any of my choose-your-own-adventure autonomy and, yes, there are tons of people who regret not waiting, but there are also many who don’t.
I’d spent so much of my life hearing that all my value would be lost if I wasn’t completely naive to pleasure and I’d have to be grateful to have anyone want me; I’d just spoken it into existence.
No one ever taught them it's possible for something to be right in that moment but not forever.
I wasn’t a stationary stumbling block, as they’d always portrayed me. I was an active participant in the glorious, consensual ritual of making out. I decided my virginity wasn’t something I owed him or anyone. His willingness to date me wasn’t some heroically valiant act on his part… I didn’t become weak because the idea of pleasure was all I wanted in that moment… I felt powerful, like I was in control of something for the first time in my life… As soon as it was over, I looked in the mirror to check how dim my eyes had become. Shockingly, they looked exactly the same.
I’ve never taken a walk of shame; I prefer a strut of pride. There are people I would never choose to revisit, but there are none I regret.
I don’t believe there is one right way to go about one's sexuality. If a person wants to wait until their wedding night, I fully support them in that, as long as it's their choice, not an expectation. If they don’t want to wait, that's their choice; no one else should expect to make it for them.
(9) Scream Really Loud
Every lesson I’ve ever heard in a fundamentalist setting taught me that any sort of illness that could not be measured with lab results was not a real illness. ADD was for kids who needed more discipline. Depression was for people who let the devil speak louder than God.
She knew having another baby held a great risk of killing her, but ATI taught women they were acting in sheer disobedience by limiting their family size.
Seeing as I was homeschooled out of separation anxiety, it should come as no shock that I had a few attachment issues of my own.
Funerals weren’t sad; they were celebrations of someone's “home-going.” I’d learned to idolize death and martyrdom, reinforced by watching ATI corner my mother into a high-risk pregnancy, and it made no sense to me to hang around on earth, a place filled with suffering, when there was a much better option waiting for me after I took my last breath.
I felt as if I was being torn into pieces, each piece fully devoted to its victor. I wanted out of the world my parents had created for me, while simultaneously wanting to stay in and fully commit to the life of a pastor's wife. I knew the oppression was wrong but the simplicity of never having to be challenged academically seemed like an ideal road to take if I didn’t want anyone to find out just how much I didn’t know.
It was all too much and I had long forgotten how to scream really loud. I was used to secrets and having my concerns dismissed, so, instead, I internalized all of it.
I knew I needed to go to therapy but couldn’t, because therapy was where they fill your head with lies from the devil... Even though I was out of the cult, the belief that depression was a choice was still deeply rooted in my mind.
(10) The Adulterous Harlot
The year we were engaged was quite possibly the most mentally disturbing year of my life... I waited for the joy to come.
I poured all of my efforts into planning the perfect wedding, subconsciously making up for all the hell that surrounded us.
(11) Goddesses Aren’t Blasphemous
When you’re a girl in a cult, no one ever asks what you want to be when you grow up.
All my life, I’ve been told how great I am with kids and how I was meant to be a mom. It only occurred to me as I wrote this that it was all grooming. None of those statements were based on my behaviors; it was all them trying to shape me into who they wanted me to be.
That's the thing about deconstructing: you can physically walk away from everything, but you bring along all the thinking errors because there's no way to distinguish what's true anymore. You have to relearn all of it and, as far as I know, there's no crash course on how to be a well-adjusted, functioning human.
I’ve been reading that “using God's name in vain” actually means you should not take on the title of Christian nor Believer if you are going to be a shitty person who makes people want nothing to do with your God… claiming it's “God's will”… harming people, using them for your own agenda in the name of your “ministry”.
The Proverbs 31 woman would be considered a goddess, feminists can be feminine, and forming a cult was the blasphemous act all along!!! I discovered my inner goddess in this book. She is virtuous AF.
(12) When The Hero Becomes The Villain
All I wanted was to feel like I belonged or that someone cared about me. In looking for that, I lost myself. In every situation and relationship I’ve ever had, I became whoever they wanted me to be.
I didn’t have to decide how I felt about anything. Everything was black and white, sin or not sin. There was no in-between. It was a world where everything was perfectly clear. I didn’t have to fight for anything; God would handle it. I didn’t have to care about human rights because everyone deserved the suffering they endured.
Where I trusted the words a pastor had heard in a dream and denied the words of well-read scientists.
I get it. I took something you loved and I showed you how it's hurting someone else. I made your hero the villain.
Learning that someone you once turned to for all the answers, all the comfort and peace you knew, is, in fact, the bad guy is devastating. It hurts. It's so much easier to deny the abuse and keep blissfully making matching outfits out of drapes than to sneak out of a theatre full of Nazis.
ATI has become extremely skilled in teaching tactics that will cause pain to a child but won’t raise any flags in the systems.
In summary, it was all a fucking lie so they could convince us that abuse was love.
But the truth is, evil people are capable of doing good things, just as good people are capable of doing evil things.
This is about being gaslit into abusive behavior that fosters a generation of hatred towards people who look, believe, or love differently than I do. Changing is uncomfortable, even painful, but you can do it. I believe in you. We have to be willing to acknowledge that the ones we knew to be heroes may have been the villain to someone else. Only then can we move forward. We have to be willing to admit that, perhaps, we are the villain in someone's story.
January 3, 2022
Between three and four stars…
I have mixed feelings in reviewing this book, as the subject matter was presented in a disorganized manner. It was interesting, and I know it was all true, but tinted with a tinge of something that left me feeling like it was written by a narcissistic person. But overall this brings to light more about the abuse of ATI and the lack the Wisdom booklets had. I remember, saying this as I was a teen watching my friends do them and saw the lack. The abuse in ATI is wide spread. But I see it the cult and homeschooling as a separate issue. I am one of the biggest supporter of going against educational neglect. But I am not sure this was quite the way to do it, but it was likely therapy for the author. But I enjoyed reading this expose…but like I said, a bit of mixed feelings.
I have mixed feelings in reviewing this book, as the subject matter was presented in a disorganized manner. It was interesting, and I know it was all true, but tinted with a tinge of something that left me feeling like it was written by a narcissistic person. But overall this brings to light more about the abuse of ATI and the lack the Wisdom booklets had. I remember, saying this as I was a teen watching my friends do them and saw the lack. The abuse in ATI is wide spread. But I see it the cult and homeschooling as a separate issue. I am one of the biggest supporter of going against educational neglect. But I am not sure this was quite the way to do it, but it was likely therapy for the author. But I enjoyed reading this expose…but like I said, a bit of mixed feelings.
October 29, 2023
Excellent information. I had so many flashbacks to things I had forgotten experiencing in that world. The book itself seems unsure what it wants to be—the author states in one place that she decided against memoir in favor or something more like an ATI expose, but to me it felt more like collected (extended) blog posts. The writing, while conversational, is often too casual. I hope the author reworks and expands it in the future as I’m sure she has a lot more to say and I would love to hear it.
June 18, 2023
Chaotic and not well-organized but really illustrative of what the IBLP/ATI cult was like.
March 26, 2022
An excellent book about growing up in and escaping from the cult Bill Gothard started (ATI/IBLP). Pay heed to the trigger warnings listed at the beginning in the Author’s Note. This is an intense book.
I saw a couple reviewers mention that the book wasn’t well organized, but honestly, that’s to be expected and is something I consider to be a feature of the writing rather than a bug. I grew up in fundamentalist Christianity (not ATI, thank goodness, but I could’ve easily ended up there) as an undiagnosed Autistic child and there’s a fair amount of disorganization when deconstructing that kind of gaslighting-filled experience.
This is an important book about an important issue.
I saw a couple reviewers mention that the book wasn’t well organized, but honestly, that’s to be expected and is something I consider to be a feature of the writing rather than a bug. I grew up in fundamentalist Christianity (not ATI, thank goodness, but I could’ve easily ended up there) as an undiagnosed Autistic child and there’s a fair amount of disorganization when deconstructing that kind of gaslighting-filled experience.
This is an important book about an important issue.
January 22, 2022
So dang validating!!
As someone who grew up in the same fundamentalist homeschool cult as Heather did, this book validated all the things I've felt for years.
Thank you for putting into words things I have only recently been able to admit in my mind. And thank you for providing a resource for my friends and therapist to finally understand my past.
As someone who grew up in the same fundamentalist homeschool cult as Heather did, this book validated all the things I've felt for years.
Thank you for putting into words things I have only recently been able to admit in my mind. And thank you for providing a resource for my friends and therapist to finally understand my past.
March 3, 2022
I grew up in the same cult as the author, and she does a fantastic job of painting the picture of growing up in an evangelical, patriarchal cult. Even after all of these years, it helps to know I’m not alone. Thank you for your vulnerability and sharing the story of your growth and healing with the world! ❤️
October 28, 2021
Disappointing
I was expecting more mature writing. This was scattered and hard to read to the end. I agree with her message and what she says, however it read much like a teen diary.
I was expecting more mature writing. This was scattered and hard to read to the end. I agree with her message and what she says, however it read much like a teen diary.
January 27, 2022
Those of you who came across this book (myself included) may have done so because it was written by a person who grew up in the same cult that among its members includes a certain notorious family who became famous via reality TV. This book is (thankfully) not about that family (although she does reference them a few times, though never by name).
What you will read about when you do pick up this book is the incredible story of a woman who endured religious abuse and gaslighting, conditioned by the cult to think she only had value as a wife and mother, who eventually was able to “overcome” (in her words) the cult and set her own course in life. Her story will make you angry at times, but as she takes you through her process of deconstruction, you will also find yourself rooting for her. Sprinkled throughout are occasional snarky comments that may give you a giggle.
Heather’s story is quite enthralling to read, and one that kept me engaged pretty much through the entire time I was reading it. She does a pretty thorough job of detailing the methods that some religious leaders (like the ones who ran the cult she was in) use to indoctrinate people into a cultic mindset, and how the beliefs instilled ultimately do more harm than good. Her writing is personable, almost as if she’s sitting in front of you telling you her story out loud.
As someone who wasn’t raised in any groups like this but who has always had a bit of a fascination with cults and the effects of religious extremism/fundamentalism on people, I would definitely recommend this book to those trying to understand why and how people fall into cults and cultic mindsets, how it’s possible for a person to overcome those circumstances, and how to understand the process of getting there.
What you will read about when you do pick up this book is the incredible story of a woman who endured religious abuse and gaslighting, conditioned by the cult to think she only had value as a wife and mother, who eventually was able to “overcome” (in her words) the cult and set her own course in life. Her story will make you angry at times, but as she takes you through her process of deconstruction, you will also find yourself rooting for her. Sprinkled throughout are occasional snarky comments that may give you a giggle.
Heather’s story is quite enthralling to read, and one that kept me engaged pretty much through the entire time I was reading it. She does a pretty thorough job of detailing the methods that some religious leaders (like the ones who ran the cult she was in) use to indoctrinate people into a cultic mindset, and how the beliefs instilled ultimately do more harm than good. Her writing is personable, almost as if she’s sitting in front of you telling you her story out loud.
As someone who wasn’t raised in any groups like this but who has always had a bit of a fascination with cults and the effects of religious extremism/fundamentalism on people, I would definitely recommend this book to those trying to understand why and how people fall into cults and cultic mindsets, how it’s possible for a person to overcome those circumstances, and how to understand the process of getting there.
Read
February 26, 2022So Glad Heather Broke Free!
It took my awhile to get through this book, partly because I have my own “issues” with memory and attention, but mostly because I wanted to stop and consider. Heather shares some deeply hard things in a manner that’s very matter of fact and conversational.
This is something I’ve found in my own Avis I’ve upbringing - I say things as if they are every day stories and friends and loved ones look at me in shock.
I felt this with some of Heather’s stories. Sick time my stomach sadness and anger at what she faced. And then having to realize that my experiences are just as sickening and anger inducing.
Heather did a really good job of keeping the spotlight on the cult that manipulated her and her parents. Of being honest “my dad did X” “my mom said Y”, but showing the motivations were not to cause damage to their children but because they were being deceived.
Anyways… really really well done Heather.
*hugs* Daisy
It took my awhile to get through this book, partly because I have my own “issues” with memory and attention, but mostly because I wanted to stop and consider. Heather shares some deeply hard things in a manner that’s very matter of fact and conversational.
This is something I’ve found in my own Avis I’ve upbringing - I say things as if they are every day stories and friends and loved ones look at me in shock.
I felt this with some of Heather’s stories. Sick time my stomach sadness and anger at what she faced. And then having to realize that my experiences are just as sickening and anger inducing.
Heather did a really good job of keeping the spotlight on the cult that manipulated her and her parents. Of being honest “my dad did X” “my mom said Y”, but showing the motivations were not to cause damage to their children but because they were being deceived.
Anyways… really really well done Heather.
*hugs* Daisy
February 1, 2022
Having been born into this cult, I very much appreciated the validation found in this book. Heather repeatedly says "This was BS!" or explains why something was a straight-up lie. Although my family was originally one of the ATI pilot families, thankfully I did not grow up as fully immersed as Heather did, so many of the lies told sound only vaguely familiar. I really appreciate Heather's bravery in telling her story and plan to recommend to many people. 4 stars instead of 5 because the writing style is disorganized and repeats information already explained, and drags on a bit at the end of the book.
Warning for conservative friends: this book has quite a bit of language in it, but definitely worth looking past this and reading it anyways if you have ever been involved in IBLP/ATI.
Warning for conservative friends: this book has quite a bit of language in it, but definitely worth looking past this and reading it anyways if you have ever been involved in IBLP/ATI.
June 12, 2023
The good: sheds more light on the ATI/IBLP cult. I've been following Quiverful and this particular movement since I was a secular homeschooler but because of where we lived, being surrounded by folks involved in various degrees of this culture. (I'm sure hard core members wouldn't have talked to me because I wore pants, among other things.) But I never before saw the level of dangerous lies the Wisdom books impart. (I now understand also how Michelle Dugger could say she was teaching all her children if they all had to learn from the same book at the same time.)
There is some odd repetition of paragraphs and ideas. So while the book is gripping in many ways, there were somethings I wanted to know more about that aren't ever fully addressed. S
There is some odd repetition of paragraphs and ideas. So while the book is gripping in many ways, there were somethings I wanted to know more about that aren't ever fully addressed. S
October 3, 2023
If you’re new to learning about the IBLP and ATII, this might not be the book to start with. Despite having a nice glossary, I don’t think this will be easy for new people to truly follow.
As someone who has read a fair bit, and watched several documentaries about super controlling regions, this was quite a ride. Could have used a better editing, but I’ve heard it was self published, so that can explain how raw and conversational it is.
I wish there had been more on her family during her leaving. Seems from her social media that she’s still quite close to her maternal extended family, so they all have to have processed better than many IBLP families, who scorn those who leave the umbrella.
As someone who has read a fair bit, and watched several documentaries about super controlling regions, this was quite a ride. Could have used a better editing, but I’ve heard it was self published, so that can explain how raw and conversational it is.
I wish there had been more on her family during her leaving. Seems from her social media that she’s still quite close to her maternal extended family, so they all have to have processed better than many IBLP families, who scorn those who leave the umbrella.
July 25, 2022
Each chapter was individually interesting. The topic and the author’s experiences were curiously compelling. I did find the lack of chronology confusing. This may have been a purposeful choice of writing style. I was left wanting to know more and trying to organize the narrative. Perhaps there was a rush to publish given the author’s purpose of exposing the possible dangers of home-schooling, and the timing of the pandemic having thrown people in to the experience. While there are some families who choose home-schooling who are providing a less than adequate education, I caution advocating for government oversight given the state of our current public education system.
July 7, 2022
Being an ATI exer as well, I highlighted so much in this book. She brought up sections of the curriculum I had forgotten. She talked about some I remembered and it helped me process another layer of it. I could relate to SO much of what she was writing about!
I, too, have serious concerns with homeschooling/homeschoolers. While some can do it well, it seems the minority. I appreciate that she brought up some of those concerns, and practical ways to help support organizations that are working towards children’s rights within homeschooling.
I, too, have serious concerns with homeschooling/homeschoolers. While some can do it well, it seems the minority. I appreciate that she brought up some of those concerns, and practical ways to help support organizations that are working towards children’s rights within homeschooling.
January 28, 2022
I will likely never have words for my gratitude in stumbling upon this book.
Thank you, Heather, for writing it.
And in turn, if you ever read your Goodreads reviews, I have a recommendation for you. I happened to be reading "Ethel Rosenberg: An American Tragedy" at the same time as your book. I think, somehow, you might find some of it strangely parallel to your own story. Yours ends better.
Thank you, again.
Thank you, Heather, for writing it.
And in turn, if you ever read your Goodreads reviews, I have a recommendation for you. I happened to be reading "Ethel Rosenberg: An American Tragedy" at the same time as your book. I think, somehow, you might find some of it strangely parallel to your own story. Yours ends better.
Thank you, again.
February 8, 2022
I devoured Lovingly Abused by Heather Heath in four days. The content is heavy, even in the definitions shared in the first chapter, but Heather somehow had me laughing, which didn't distract from the pain and grief. That all takes such skill. The full title is Lovingly Abused: A True Story of Overcoming Cults, Gaslighting, and Legal Educational Neglect, and I’m grateful that Heather is shining a light on these experiences.
May 30, 2024
I have been interested in IBLP for about a year since a random post on Instagram caught my interest. Having heard Leaving Eden and other podcasts this book personalised and bought depth to the issues the podcasts discuss. I read this book in a single evening and I've cried at least 3 times. Eell written with a conversational tone and a dry witty sense of humour. I would give it more than 5 stars if I could
December 14, 2021
She’s not pitching a fit. . .
I was not prepared for what I read. Heather did a more than fabulous job writing this and conveying the truth. If you knew Heather and her family, you would know how genuine her story is. Always truth, no BS. Thank you Heather for shining the light of truth to open our eyes! Yes, you have to read this book!
I was not prepared for what I read. Heather did a more than fabulous job writing this and conveying the truth. If you knew Heather and her family, you would know how genuine her story is. Always truth, no BS. Thank you Heather for shining the light of truth to open our eyes! Yes, you have to read this book!
January 1, 2022
Read this if you have ever been in a cult, attended a church or had a complicated family. Heather’s words are deep and poignant. Her voice and story are haunting. We all have things to unlearn from our childhoods ,some more than others, but we seldom articulate that transition with such grace, humor and insight.
February 13, 2022
If you've spent years watching the Duggars and seen hints of ATI/ IBLP, this book is a great way to understand the program and its teachings on a deeper level. The narrative was at times difficult to follow, but the tidbits about the beliefs and teachings of the group were bombshell-y enough to make it worth it!
May 5, 2022
Great story a bit preachy (irony , I know)
If you like unique memoirs and cult books this is a decent read. It gets a little preachy at the end when the author gets personal on homeschooling and politics. Overall a fascinating dive into the IBLP cult (same one the Duggars and Bates are in).
If you like unique memoirs and cult books this is a decent read. It gets a little preachy at the end when the author gets personal on homeschooling and politics. Overall a fascinating dive into the IBLP cult (same one the Duggars and Bates are in).
February 27, 2023
I don’t think I can find the words to describe how important this book is to me. I feel so deeply seen. There are so many parts of this book that felt like Heather was looking into my brain and into my past. I cried almost every chapter (and laughed too. With, not at. IYKYK). Thank you for writing this and for soothing my soul, while also triggering me like no other book has.
June 17, 2023
Compelling, eye opening account of a cults dominance and control of innocent vunerable children done through so called religious holy men using parents for their dirty work. The author did a fantastic job of conveying her story and her struggle. Glad to see her amazing progress. And as a fellow believer happy she amazingly still has faith in God.
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