The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Sex Trafficker’s Wife: A Story of Truth, Faith, and Trust in Self by A. Quick

Episode Date: January 14, 2023

The Sex Trafficker's Wife: A Story of Truth, Faith, and Trust in Self by A. Quick She was a loving housewife. He was a hard-working husband. Together they shared three precious boys. Their marriage wasn’t perfect, but there was love between them, and it worked…right until that fateful day when it all fell apart. This is the true story of Amanda who, through no fault of her own, found herself caught up by the darkest most insidious corners of the criminal world of sex trafficking minors. Her husband, the man she loved and the father of her children, was a criminal. And when it all came down, she was left holding the pieces. This book is written for the women left in the shadows and the aftermath. For the spouses and partners who lose everything in an instant, but still have to keep going, navigating through complex legal systems, coming to terms with the betrayal, and somehow “holding it all together for the kids.” The ones nobody talks about, except in hushed whispers. With a remarkably candid tone, and a clear explanation of events and facts, Quick pulls back the curtain on what happens to those left behind once the perpetrator is caught. Much more than a memoir, this book is also a beacon of light and hope for others in the same situation. As Amanda states, “My message to the world is really quite simple. The only person who can change your life is you. Every single person has the power to choose differently.” Are you ready? It is time to shake off the shackles of the past that were put on you by another. It is time to step into your own power. It is time to trust yourself. It is time to begin to heal.

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready. Get ready. Strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education rollercoaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Well, I'm Oaks Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com, thechrisvossshow.com. Hey, welcome to the big show, folks. We certainly appreciate you guys coming by today.

Looks like I'm still kind of in the drabs of the CES show hangover for 2023. Be sure to go see all the shows we did on that, about 20 or 30 shows. I'm still feeling just beat up from the road and all the stuff we did. But go enjoy all that material we put out from CES show. And all the great interviews with CEOs, people at the show with their great booths, their innovative products and all that good stuff. Today we have an amazing author on the show. We're going to be talking to her about her newest book that just came out January 7th.

It's called The Sex Trafficker's Wife by A. Quick. She's referred to as Amanda. We'll be calling her during the show, of course. But A. Quick is the author, which is her. Am I starting to create a circle where I'm just going to go around? Maybe I am. Maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm just taking you on a ride and we're just going to call it that for what it was. So we're going to be talking about her and her amazing book that just came out. We're going to learn a whole lot of good stuff that will make your life better. Amanda Quick is an author, mother, wife, quantum energy healer, and empowerment coach. Her newly

released memoir, The Sex Trafficker's Wife, A Story of Truth, Faith, and Trust in Self, recounts the events following her ex-husband's arrest for attempted human trafficking in 2016. Welcome to the show, Amanda. How are you? Thank you. I'm great. It's wonderful to have you as well. Congratulations on the new book. Give us your.com wherever you want people to find you on the interwebs, please. Yeah. So you can go to thesextraffickerswife.com to get any info about the book. I also have amandaclickhealing.com if you want to work with me in any other capacity. There you go. So we'll talk about your book and then talk about some of the other stuff you do.

So what motivated you to write this book? It seems kind of obvious, but people like to hear it from the words of the author. Of course. So in 2020, after my divorce was finalized, which was two weeks before the pandemic hit, it was really loud. It was a very loud message that I kept hearing over and over and over again that people need to hear this story. And that so many

people who go through trauma and they go through really difficult divorce situations, they go through very difficult abuse situations, don't feel safe to share their stories, don't feel heard or seen. And the majority of people who go through things like this actually end up sharing custody with their abusers or their children's abusers. And that I succeeded at something that many, very many, very many people do. And that I needed to share my story. I need to share what changed for me. I needed to share the thought process that I went through, the trauma that I went through, the things that I felt shame about needed to be shared because all that needed to come out of the closet essentially and help

people feel seen in their own stories. There you go. There you go. So what happens? You end up getting married. You probably, you know, everyone's happy. It's a whole married, start having kids and things. Is that the way that it went for you? I started having kids before we got married, but we got married when I was six months pregnant with my oldest. And we had a normal life. We had three kids at that point. We'd been married six years. He worked really long hours. I was a stay-at-home mom. We were a very normal American household. We were upper middle class. We had investments and all kinds of things everywhere. And we weren't middle class, we had investments and, you know, all kinds of things everywhere. And, you know, we weren't the closest as we used to be, but we had three young

kids. You know, it's like, well, that's not the season that we spend all of this one-on-one time together. And, you know, he was absent in work and he definitely had some depression issues, but none of that seemed like this huge thing. And one day he just doesn't come home from work and I can't find him. And eventually I found him in jail and to my shock, he had been arrested for attempted human trafficking with a $250,000 bond. Wow. 250. So what,

what is, what is sex trafficking or human, human trafficking? So we established that definition. Yeah. So there's a lot of, you know, I didn't know what it meant at first. And the, you know, the first charge was human trafficking. And that basically people are like, well, what does that mean?

But he, anybody who was a party to buying and selling people is a party to trafficking. So he wasn't, he wasn't being charged for somebody who was selling or moving people. He was being charged because it was a sting operation to meet an 11 and 14-year-old for sex. And so he was caught in that sting operation. And the first charge was trafficking. They later changed it to solicitation of a minor because he never took possession of the children.

Wow. So this was, who was that guy who used to do that, Chris Hansen? He used to do that show I used to love to watch where they would sting them. But for an underage minor, that's quite extraordinary. Yes. Yeah. So they offered both 11 and 14, and they had like a normal ad and people responded and then they offered children and those who continued the conversation and eventually showed up to meet.

Some people exchanged money. Some people got cold feet. Some, you know, there was a bunch of, and they, they caught a handful of defendants and one of them was my husband. Wow. So what, how, what's your, what's your reaction to them at that point? Well, at first I don't believe any of it because it makes no sense. I think I know this person. I think I've been married. I knew him 10 years at that point. And I believe there has to be some other explanation.

First, I thought maybe his wallet was stolen and he was dead in a ditch somewhere and somebody was using his ID. That's how far-fetched it felt. And then I actually found it was him in jail. And I's how far fetched it felt. And then I actually found it was him in jail and I still don't believe it's possible. Like something else has to be, has to be true here. Like he doesn't belong here. I have to help him because, you know, I have this, this huge protective instinct to my family. And if I don't, if I don't think they're dangerous, I think it's my job to help them. And so I bailed him out of jail and his side of the story was very different than what the police said, of course.

And he had, he basically admitted to me that he had been soliciting adult prostitutes our entire marriage, but that when they offered children, he didn't think it was real. He was trying to help them. He kept, he had this whole story about what was going on that nobody, you know, nobody would listen to me. They wouldn't let me call you. And he was very scared. And while I wasn't very happy to learn that he had been cheating on me, I also didn't understand why he was then being accused of trafficking minors and felt like that they didn't equal each other. And so I chose to stay and support him through the criminal trial because I believed my children deserved to have their father in their lives. And I didn't believe he was dangerous. I didn't believe that he was what they were saying and that he had his

best chance was if I stayed and supported him and that we would figure out later how to deal with his sex addiction and the infidelity and that people do recover from those things. And so I, I sort of shoved it all down and said, let's get through this part first. And so then what happens? So then, um, you know, criminal trials, I didn't know anything about how that works either. And they're very slow and they're very drawn out. And, um, you know, and the defendants get evaluated for various things. And there were new disclosures that were made, but nothing that was particularly alarming when it came to attraction to children.

And he ended up being offered a plea deal. And most of these cases get pled out, which people don't realize, is even though they get charged with a really big felony charge that looks like they're going to go to jail forever most of the time they get offered plea deals with very low sentences and he actually has offered a plea deal with only four years of probation no jail time whatsoever so we can have we can have the conversation about how a privileged white man in in america doesn't go to jail for trying to have sex with children but that's what happens and um at the time we were grateful like okay we're gonna have a time to recover he can get

the help he needs you know all of these things my family can get back together and at the same time in the state of colorado where we were there was also a new supreme court precedent set that said though the people who are convicted of a sex offense don't lose their right to parent. And so even though as a sex offender on probation, he wasn't allowed around other children, he was allowed to move back home with his children, because their right to parent basically supersedes that. Which at the time, it was like, okay, we can put our family back together. We can, you know, get help. My kids were, had their dad back, which they were ecstatic about and, you know, try to figure out how do we recover our marriage. And, um, his mental health was

struggling. And I realized I had to go back to work, even though I hadn't worked in a long time, but I didn't want that to, I didn't want to be financially dependent on somebody who was no longer disabled and I started to go back to work and I started to start to realize that I couldn't really stay married to him and as much as I wanted to repair the marriage and I wanted to keep my family together there was too much there was just there was too much going on it felt like there was ghosts in the bedroom with us like there was just so much that too much going on. It felt like there was ghosts in the bedroom with us. Like it was just so much that I didn't know. And I could feel it, even though I didn't understand it. And so I started to pull away. And I started to, you know, didn't want to date other

people even because I was looking for comfort other than other places and people who could hear me and understand me. But I was also terrified that people were going to find out my connection to his offense because it was, it was public record. It was in the paper, it was in the newspapers, like, you know, and then after a year had gone by, unless you knew him directly, you probably didn't remember, but I didn't want anybody to put the pieces together. And so I was really,

I was really pulling myself apart because on one hand I wanted to keep my family together. And on the other hand, I wanted to keep my family together. And on the other hand, I didn't know how to be okay anymore in that marriage. Yeah, yeah. And once I started to separate from the marriage, I also started to see his mental health started to deteriorate. And he basically started alienating the children and say that I was the one who left the marriage and I was the one who left them. And mommy won't forgive daddy. And that's why we can't live together and things like that.

And so my children started to pull away from me also. And eventually he also filed for divorce and tried to kick me out of the house, claiming he was the primary parents. And so the manipulation started at that point and didn't know how bad it was. I still thought my kids needed their father. You know, people are upset when people file for divorce, like all of that. And just trying to figure out how to get through my days.

And, um, and at the same time, part of me knew there was more going on. I just didn't know how to prove it or what it was. You know, you get... You just have that suspicion. You have the suspicions, but you don't have any evidence.

You don't have proof. And because I had stayed and supported him through the criminal trial, from a legal perspective, it looked as though I supported him and him being a father. And so, you know, when going through a custody case, I basically had to prove differently now. And I had to have evidence of why I would believe differently. And it couldn't just be because I feel it. That's not adequate for family courts. And so I started, we started gathering information.

We hired parental rights evaluators, lawyers, all of that. And we had full psych evaluations done, the whole thing. And some personality disorders started to show up. And I'm psychologically normal, but it's good confirmation for me. That's good. And the stuff between my children and I started to get worse and worse and worse. And they had come to the point where they were being physically violent with me to not come to my house because of what they were, they were hearing from their father. And, and so as that started to escalate,

I also started to see my middle child's behavior start to change. It started to, he actually started to get sexually inappropriate with me and started to like, come on to me. He was seven at the time. And I'm like, what is going on with my kid? This is like, this is not okay. What is he being exposed to? What is happening? And I started to get this really fearful feeling that there was more going on in that house.

And, you know, the thing about grooming is it's very hard to prove because it's not, the specific things they're doing aren't wrong. They're not against the law, but they push boundaries and they start to normalize inappropriate behavior just enough. And I started to realize that there was more going on and I needed,

I needed to actually fight to get full custody. I needed to fight to protect my kids. And, you know, the bottom drops out again. I don't know. I don't know what the rating on this show is. If I, if I should say these things specifically out loud here um i mean you'll

be fine it's usually swear words to get caught up okay i can say okay so my my son says one day out of the blue sometimes i suck on daddy's fingers and just shocked me and went, what the hell is going on in that house? Yeah, that does, that would, that would trigger me too. I'd be like, what the hell is going on?

And of course it's, you know, blowing back in my face. This is the same man who was arrested for trying to have sex with 11 and 14 year old. And my middle child was very empathetic and sensitive and sometimes effeminate. And so it was very like,

Oh, he's the perfect predator, you know, target because of how sensitive he was and how much he was terrified to get his daddy in more trouble too. Wow. As he knew that he was in trouble, he knew there was restrictions.

He knew, you know, that he wasn't allowed around different things. He didn't understand why, but he didn't want to get him in more trouble. And so he was also very protective of him. Wow. And so speaking to therapists and all of those people, um, his, my child's therapist actually asked, told me that I should ask him to show me what that meant, you know, show me what the game is about kind of a thing and um it's as bad as you can expect

when i asked him and oh my god she said if he had shown me that i would have to call i would have to report it i'm a mandatory reporter i would have to report it and so i was able to report it because when you're in the middle of a custody dispute anybody making new accusations is really watched closely because it's your potentially trying to alienate or make things up for your case. They, they take that very seriously. And so with the therapist saying I would have to report it, I was able to report it. Child protective services did nothing because he was like, Oh, it was just a, you know, it was a silly game. He started it. I told him to stop. You know, that was, that was it. He just explained it away and it was just a silly game. He started it. I told him to stop. You know, that was it.

He just explained it away, and it was no big deal. Because, you know, fingers are not considered sexual, exactly. Again, grooming is about moving that line, moving that barrier. Right? And even with his offense history, people were not taking this seriously. And I was at my wit's end. I was like, I don't know how I'm going to be okay if I have to share custody with a man who is going to abuse my children.

And the volatility between us at that point was considered high conflict. There was like hostage situation type things going on between us when it came to transferring the kids. We must agree to this or I'm not letting them in the car kind of stuff. So I was diagnosed with PTSD. I was having panic attacks all the time. I was really, really struggling because I was watching this play out and felt like the system was failing me. There was nothing I could do. And at that point, it was actually my mental health therapist who had been trying to help me and was just as confused as I was, said, have you ever thought about seeing a psychic? And I was like, what? No, like, I'm totally agnostic, totally just none of that's real, you know, but I'm at my wit's end. So she's like, I know of somebody who's good. And I was like, well,

fine. I'll go see your lady because I don of somebody who's good. And I'm like, well, fine. I'll go see your lady because I don't know who else to call. Child Protective Services isn't doing anything. My lawyers can't seem to help. Like, fine. I'll go see your lady. And you know, I don't, I don't believe in it, but I'm willing to try. And I go see this lady and she starts telling me about how there's this past life that she's seeing where he beat me to death in front of my children and my body starts to have this fear response as she's telling me the story and I'm like what is happening and I start to realize that I'm terrified of the man because he'd never lay a hand on me but I was terrified of him I would have real fear responses

and there was stalking like behavior happening and the mental and emotional manipulations that I had been experiencing triggered this huge fear response in me. And, you know, I was scared to stand up to him. I was scared of what he was capable of. I didn't know what he was capable of. And I really felt like on some level I had been hiding because I was so scared. And she says, you have to get a grip on that fear. You have to stop, you have to realize that fear isn't now and that you need to not operate from fear. You need to stand up to him. You have the right to own property in this life. You have the right to do different things.

And she says, and then she tells me that there are more people who are willing to help me and that I need to stop. I need to basically keep going and that it looks like I'm doing everything, but on some level, I hadn't really made the decision that I was done, done with him completely because that part of me wanted him to get better. I wanted my kids to have a relationship with their father. I wanted to want to believe I was in the situation I was in. It was

still so unbelievable to me. And she said, you have to decide that you're done with this pattern, that you're done trying to help somebody who doesn't want to be helped. And you have to basically put yourself and your kids first. And so I stood up and I said, okay, I'm done. I'm done. I can't do that anymore she, I left her office with a new round, a new bit of motivation and like, okay, somebody can help me. And I had this realization, everybody knows somebody, everybody knows somebody and somebody ever though somebody's know somebody. And, you know, if the regular channels aren't working, there were different ones I can find. And, you know, I went back to work and a coworker told me that she

had an uncle who worked for ICE and wanted to contact him. She's like, I don't, I don't like what's happening. I don't like that nobody's helping you. And they put me in touch with Homeland Security who put me in touch with the arresting officer back in 2016 and vowed to help me. And then the district attorney unsealed the case file because I had never seen the truth of what happened in the criminal case. Oh, really? It was sealed? They don't ever show the family because they think if they're going to go to trial, they need to keep their evidence protected.

And they seal it because it has identifiable information. But as soon as they redact that identifiable information, they can unseal it and it becomes public record. And so he said, I can do that for you i can redact what needs to be removed and then i can i can release it to you i said please and so i was able to read the text transcript between my my ex and the undercover agent and all of the what ifs and maybe that wasn't what happened all of that went away once i read that wow yeah because you're seeing the whole conversation. I'm seeing the truth.

And I've been married to him. I had three children with him. I knew some of his preferences in a sense. And I was able to read that and understand. And I started doing more things to listen to my kids. I started to stop being so frustrated with their behavior and realize that they were just as traumatized as I was. And they needed to be heard. And they were confused when their dad was telling them one

thing that was, and when they were asking me about it, it was them trying to understand their world. And I started recording conversations with them. I started reading the books about keeping bodies safe and private parts private. And I was able, they, I received more disclosures from them by doing that because there's, there was a place in a book that says, you know, if anybody shows you pictures or videos of naked people, that's a red flag. And my son goes, well, it's okay if it's animated, right? What? Yeah. And he disclosed to me that his dad was climbing into his bed in the middle of the night and I was able to get that recorded. And so we went to court six weeks

after my meeting with that psychic with a three inch binder full of evidence of everything that was going on between and all of the reasons that I was in a state of mind I was in and why the reasons that I no longer supported him. And, you know, that was the first time I really got to stand up in court and fight. And, you know, after that court case, the day before my 33rd birthday, two weeks before the pandemic hit the world, my divorce was finalized and the judge completely removed all of his overnight visits, reduced all of his time to just a couple of afternoons and gave him six weeks to comply with a large set of requirements, more evaluations, more therapy, all of these things. And if he did those things,

he would be able to have some time. And if he didn't do those things, he was only going to ever get supervised visitation. We did not a single one on the list. And six weeks after that, his time was reduced to only supervised visitation, which he never has exercised. It has now been zero contact between us since April of 2020. So he doesn't, he's not around the kids at all? I haven't heard from him in almost three years now. Basically my understanding, I, once I received full decision-making and because no matter what he chose, I would have full decision-making either way. And once he no longer had control of me through the children, he stepped out. He didn't choose to participate in their lives in any capacity. He hasn't paid a dime

of child support. He hasn't done anything. And honestly, it's as hard as it is for my children to have lost a parent. They are safe. They are happy. They are healthy. And I am so, so grateful at this point that we were able to move past that because i don't believe things ever got to the point of no return you know they were they were going down that very very scary path but nothing else actually happened to my knowledge and i'm very very grateful that we got out and after all of that you know and the pandemic hit the world and everybody was quarantined at home. I was like, oh, my God, if it had been any later, they would have been quarantined with him.

Yeah. That's terrifying. Yeah. Or, you know, the case wouldn't close. Exactly. I think most of the courts. They shut down. Yeah, shut down.

And the custody fights over pandemic issues, you know, that was a whole other thing that people had to go through. And I didn't have any of that. And I was so grateful and so just in awe in a lot of ways of how fast it shifted and how much, you know, how much once I changed and once I started to realize that I couldn't hide anymore and that I needed to stop giving my power away to the system to be the one to help me. I needed to say, this is what needs to happen. How can the system make this happen for me rather than I don't know what to do and the system help me. I flipped it. And I started realizing that I needed to put myself first and that, you know, rather than my kids need their father to be okay so that I'll be okay, I need to be okay and that that will help them be okay. Definitely, definitely.

And parents being stable during a divorce or after a divorce is really important. I've dated all my life, and so I'm usually always dating someone's ex-wife. And sometimes you see the way that either of them behave that are so awful for the children. You know, I've had to take fathers aside and go, look, man, I'm not replacing you. You're their father, their birth father. It's very important that you're in their life. I'm not here to demonize you. We're not playing games.

So, you know, just cool out a little bit. Calm down. Maybe stop the drinking. You know, and then you see parental alienation on both sides, and they just weaponize the children, which is the most awful thing you can do. I was lucky enough that my parents, when they divorced, they divorced about four or five years after we had all left the house, and they called us up one day and they said,

hey, we're going gonna get that divorce there and we're all just like shoo we're glad you guys finally came to the conclusion we came to 10 years ago they're like what anyway jokes aside um there's uh you know there's a lot of lessons of what you're talking about here i mean the first thing that people do in this situation is denial yes Yes. And, of course, protect their family unit. You're a mom. Moms protect the nest. The father's part of the nest. So, you know, you try to stand by your man, as they say. But some good lessons.

Find out what's really going on or what really happened, especially in cases like this. And it's great that you finally were able to read the transcripts, you know, see the proof, uh, clearly the, the, the guy had a pattern to whatever he's doing, but, uh, you know, I mean, it, it's a crazy life and how things work out, but it's a great story of how you got through it. What, one of the other things that you, uh, good lessons that you have there is advocating for yourself in court, or you have to advocate for yourself in anything in life,

even medical, but advocating for yourself, because I've seen friends that have gotten dragged through the court system for divorce, or even for, you know, just they weren't married, trying to figure out the family court, you know, who gets the children when. Just be a nightmare.

I mean, I've seen, I saw one couple spend a hundred grand each on both sides and I was 75. So I feel like, yeah. And the lawyers seem to be the only thing that win this game and the racket. I mean, they make a, they make a cut off of child support, but, uh, you know, you advocate for yourself and, uh, you know, you being healthy in a state of mind both parents being healthy in a state of mind in a divorce and not creating more animosity because those children they they just don't understand what's going on they want their parents with them and stuff um

i don't know it might be more the kids need counseling later in life but it's good that you share the story so that anybody else who's in a situation like this where they find that they're you know things that haven't worked out quite the way they have or someone that's been around that was you know maybe changed um you know how to deal with it and how to survive well and the thing i think a lot of people don't understand is the system is meant is not meant to be protective its goal is not to protect. Its goal is to only be punitive if something bad enough happens. And so it's not waiting until it's bad enough, because how bad does it have to get for them to take it seriously? Unfortunately, it's usually pretty bad. And we have to be the

ones to protect ourselves and our children. And we have to exactly advocate for what's right and what's wrong and what's okay and what's not. And it was a huge lesson I had to learn and understand when navigating the complex. Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's insane. I mean, I just, I would see so much that my friends would be like, yeah, we're going to get the kids today and resolve this. And then it would, you know, $25,000 later and 5,000 more appointments. So appointments so uh let's talk about uh the book sounds inspiring and motivational where it can help people um it can give people a story of hope where they can come out the other side uh you know we go through these cathartic times in life and these are lessons that can really help us uh let's talk about some of the things that you do for coaching. There's the Golden Haven Foundation as well.

Yes. So after all that happened, I realized there was much more to the universe and there was much more that I had a bit of a spiritual awakening in a sense, and I really went searching. And I went searching because traditional therapy also wasn't really working. I kept graduating from therapists. They would say, you know enough. We can't help you anymore. You're fine. And I'd be like, that's great and all, but and I knew that my kids were going to need help as they got older. And I wanted to understand

how I could help them heal in a different way. And so I jumped into other energy healing modalities and they jumped into learning how our physical bodies are connected to our mental and emotional bodies and how all of those things are related and how we can work with people on a bigger holistic scale. And so the work that I do from a healing and coaching standpoint is to help see people on all levels and layers and so that we can look at the mental and emotional things that have caused some of the physical ailments they've gone through and, and vice versa. And a lot of the pain we store in our bodies is related to the traumas that

we've experienced and the things in our minds. And people know this on some level, but it's not, you know, it's not talked about in mainstream very much. And, and so I jumped into all of that and work in that capacity. I also teach

people, um, I've really opened up my own channels and my own understandings and how the universe operates from a, I have an IT background. So I went very much into the physics standpoint of it. And how do I explain this in a way that makes sense to my IT brain? And which is, you know, it's fascinating stuff, But then, you know, the other big piece that really resonated with me is it cost me over $75,000 to fight this case. And it was a really, really hard case to fight. And it wasn't the money that succeeded. It wasn't that I had more money or threw more of that at it. It was the mental shift that I made. But had I not had the money, I would have not even been able to have the fight.

I would have not ever been able to hire the lawyer or hire the evaluators or anything that most of that had to get funneled through. Wow. And the reality is that people don't have access to that. And especially women of color and underprivileged communities, they don't even have the ability to think about having a fight like that. The amount of people who ended up sharing custody with their abusers and their children's abusers is astronomical. And that I just, there was a huge part of me that went,

that's not okay. People deserve to be safe in all aspects of their lives. And that just because, you know, somebody is biologically their father, if they are abusing their children or abusing their ex-wife, that those things need to be taken seriously. And so I want, I'm in the process of starting a foundation. I've filed the initial paperwork, but very, very early stages of creating a foundation in which I want to do something about that. I want to make a place where people could apply for cash grants, where people can go through some education and understand the mental and emotional shifts that need to happen in order for you to take back your

power and start to advocate for yourself and start to get a grip on some of the emotional stuff that you go through so that you can actually make those actions. And I want to put together a community of people who've been through hard things because we don't talk about this stuff enough. People hide in the shadows and they hold so much shame and guilt and it makes everybody feel so alone. I felt so alone and so judged that I couldn't share what was happening. I couldn't ask for help. And if you, by sharing my story, it isn't to dump all of my trauma on people. It's really to help people see themselves

through what I went through and see parts of their own stories and realize they're not alone. And then somebody else has been there too. And somebody else has been there and potentially succeeded at something that they haven't yet been able to succeed at and give them some ideas

of how they could better advocate for themselves and how much power they have to change their own lives. And that's my big overarching goal, no matter which capacity I'm in, whether I'm doing coaching work or whether I'm working on the foundation, it's really to empower everybody else to trust themselves, to take action from their intuition, from their knowings, not what the system is telling them or what everybody else is saying, but to listen to the signals their body is saying,

to listen to their inner voices, because, you know, if we don't trust ourselves, what's the point? What's the point of what we're doing? That's true. You know, and there's the signs are usually there too. We're just ignoring them. Absolutely. I mean, looking back, once I started

to open my eyes, there were red flags long before that I had, you know, and I was, I was 18 when I met him and 19, I thought I was a grownup that knew everything. You know, and I didn't. And, you know, I had to face my own demons as well, believing that I that I was right and believing that I, you know, knew the things and I, you know, believing that I knew who he was, I had to face a lot of stuff from of my own. And had I had I not done that, obviously, I would be in a very different position. But, you know, my goal is to spread that empowering message, to really show people that no matter how bad it gets, no matter how deep and horrible life seems, that there's always a way through and there's always something better on the other side. Most definitely. It's a good, inspiring story to help people.

So what do you normally cover when you coach people and help them heal? So I get a wide variety of people. I get people who have been through hard times and are looking to change their lives. They're looking to, you know, they either want to start working in some other capacity or they really just want to stop feeling horrible. And so we address on all levels and layers, and we start to look at the things that they've gone through and we start to look at their childhood and why they have the beliefs that they have. And we can go through and start to understand where a lot of that has come from. And we can

actually work to release those things from the body. Because as we bring awareness to why we have the beliefs we have, we can start to go, well, that's a ridiculous belief. Like, I see why I think that. But I can decide that that doesn't serve me anymore. And let's start to find ways that, you know, that can show me that that's not how I need to operate anymore. And we can start to shift those things. And so I work with people in that capacity. I also get some people who are on a spiritual journey who want some help there because I've gone through that as well.

And so depending on where people are in their own journeys is really kind of the direction we go. Wow. I mean, it's a compelling story. And I imagine there's a lot of people who've gone through these issues and stuff. But even the cathartic times of where you lose everything, you can't trust the person you went into a marriage with, and suddenly you find you're alone. And, you know, it's healthy for people.

Because the worst thing with trauma is people don't realize that people think they're alone. They alienate themselves. They go off on corners. Sometimes they do horrible things like take their lives. But, you know, they find themselves isolated. And when they finally start talking about some of their problems, they find that there's plenty of love in the world and there's other people who struggle with that, you know.

Exactly. And then we feel less alone in the world. And to me, that's the beginning of healing. If we can feel less alone and we can feel heard and understood and realize that we're not all by ourselves, we can actually start to recognize how much more we could access and how much more this experience could be about. And we searched when I was doing research for the book, and not a single person has ever told the wife's story in this way.

It has never been written. There's a lot of perpetrator stories. There's a lot of victim stories, but there has never been from the perspective of the spouse. And it was like, oh my God. Well, I clearly, I have to. And, um, you know, the, the family goes through its own version of trauma. We are a victim in a different light. We've been manipulated and gaslit and lied to and have our own discoveries that come through in all of these different ways. And it was, you know, really, really loud that this story needed to be told. Definitely. I mean, it can help people from all different walks of life, especially the divorce stories.

I wish people would be better in divorces, but I don't get to make the rules. I just see the worst of it. And of course, I used to watch, what was it? The Chris Hansen Show and stuff, and it was crazy,, all the stuff that they would bust on that show. But appropriately so. The no one should be going near children. That's should be off. To me, that's almost worse than murdering other people.

It should be. They get off. Right. Yeah. Even most of the time they get probation or, you know, his lawyer said he might go to jail for a couple of months, but he didn't even get that. It's crazy to me that people are in jail for, you know, smaller things. And, you know, that for whatever reason, the system believes that it's rehabilitative, that the treatment programs that they've created, they work. And so their goal is to get people into treatment not to put them in jail and when they offer things like probation it comes with

they have to complete a sex offender treatment program but uh you know on there's no real consequences in the same way right there they still have access to all kinds of things and in my experience at least the treatment programs do not keep a very close watch. Yeah, yeah. Hugo from LinkedIn says, Loneliness is the biggest killer. It leads to addictions. Get connected to some groups.

Build on relationships is some of the advice he's offering there. Well, it's been wonderful to have you on the show, Amanda. Very insightful, and hopefully it will inspire, motivate, and move some people to get through their cathartic times as well. Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you. Uh, and, uh, give us the plug for your.com as you're consulting, you do and all that stuff. So the sex traffickers wife.com has all the links to buy the book. It's all on Amazon ebook and paper book copies are out now. Uh, Amanda quick healing.com is my coaching and healing business with a spin on

all of the spirituality and quantum physics. And TheGoldenHaven.org is the very beginning stages of my non-profit foundation. There you go. And this will be great to see making the world a better place. So thanks Amanda for being on the show. Thanks to Honest for tuning

in. Thanks for your comments. Go to goodreads.com, Forrest S. Chris Voss. Go to youtube.com, Forrest S. Chris Voss, and all the other places you see us on the interwebs. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe. And we'll see you guys next time.

Thanks. And that should have us out.