A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy

An incredible, wrenching story that is 100% true to life and very normal, not shocking or unheard of to those of us who’ve grown up like Tia. I can’t recommend this enough.

"The fundamentalists and evangelicals, now one and the same since the Trump administration, wanted to cast the fallen son of TLC’s 19 Kids and Counting as a single bad apple. But he wasn’t a single bad apple—he was a product of their making. Duggar was the fruit of a high-control system that taught children from infancy to suppress their needs and conform or be beaten. It taught firstborn sons would become eventual patriarchs. It gave young children a premature and inappropriate amount of authority over their younger siblings. It taught males are entitled to gratification and servitude from females who can’t say no either to men or to God. Josh Duggar registered no guilt for his crimes because since childhood, he’d grown up with an external moral compass, and a feeling of entitlement to women’s bodies. Remembering that IBLP homeschool groups want to run our country the way they run their homes, I suddenly realized why it mattered so much that I talk about what it’s like in those households. I could tell the public what it’s really like. No female vote. No consent. No contraception. No choice. No careers. Courtship marriages. Stay-at-home daughters and parentified older siblings. Closets. Suppression. Book bans. Harsh discipline. Rigid roles. High control. Shame. As bad as it would be for women, it would be worse for anyone gay. Worse for anyone of color. Bad for anyone except a straight white patriarch … and I knew from experience it wasn’t really good or healthy for them either. We all deserve better." (Tia Levings, A Well-Trained Wife)

An incredible, wrenching story that is 100% true to life and not at all surprising to those of us who’ve grown up like Tia. I can’t recommend this book enough. If you’re confused by the fundamentalist Christian ideology that’s being politically pushed on Americans, and how those women choose to be complicit in their own oppression, this book will give you a look behind the curtain and how damaging it is (and hard to get out), when you’ve been raised with this ideology.

I also want to highlight the dates - the Republican rhetoric and fearmongering was very much present decades before Trump. This is not new, it’s just reached its final form.

"The fundamentalists and evangelicals, now one and the same since the Trump administration, wanted to cast the fallen son of TLC’s 19 Kids and Counting as a single bad apple. But he wasn’t a single bad apple—he was a product of their making. Duggar was the fruit of a high-control system that taught children from infancy to suppress their needs and conform or be beaten. It taught firstborn sons would become eventual patriarchs. It gave young children a premature and inappropriate amount of authority over their younger siblings. It taught males are entitled to gratification and servitude from females who can’t say no either to men or to God. Josh Duggar registered no guilt for his crimes because since childhood, he’d grown up with an external moral compass, and a feeling of entitlement to women’s bodies. Remembering that IBLP homeschool groups want to run our country the way they run their homes, I suddenly realized why it mattered so much that I talk about what it’s like in those households. I could tell the public what it’s really like. No female vote. No consent. No contraception. No choice. No careers. Courtship marriages. Stay-at-home daughters and parentified older siblings. Closets. Suppression. Book bans. Harsh discipline. Rigid roles. High control. Shame. As bad as it would be for women, it would be worse for anyone gay. Worse for anyone of color. Bad for anyone except a straight white patriarch … and I knew from experience it wasn’t really good or healthy for them either. We all deserve better." (Tia Levings, A Well-Trained Wife)