Was I In A Cult? - Solid Rock Church: “My Dad, the Cult Leader”

Episode Date: October 28, 2024

What happens when your father becomes your pastor and eventually your cult leader? In this episode, Emily Maldonado shares the raw truth about growing up in a cult led by her own dad. From staged exorcisms to discovering that love and freedom could only come by breaking every rule, Emily’s story is heartbreaking and inspiring. With gripping honesty, she unpacks the jaw-dropping moment she knew she had no choice but to leave… and for Emily, leaving meant losing her entire family. With humor and profound resilience, Emily shares how she escaped a life dictated by manipulation—and found the strength to rebuild a life of joy and authenticity.   ___ Control Body Odor ANYWHERE with @lumedeodorant and get 15% off with promo code “inacult” LumeDeodorant.com! #lumepod __ Follow Emily on Insta/Tiktok: @styledmicasa __ Follow us on Instagram/TikTok/FB: @wasiinacult  Have your own story? Email us: [e-mail]  Please support Was I In A Cult? Through Patreon (we appreciate the hell out of you guys): https://www.patreon.com/wasiinacult   Merch is here! www.wasiinacult.com 

The views, information, or opinions expressed by the guest appearing in this episode solely belong to the guest and do not represent or reflect the views or positions of the hosts, the show, Podcast One, this network, or any of their respective affiliates. And I'm really at a phase where if my story can help anybody see that there's a life after trauma, after a cult, after extreme brainwashing, and you can unravel some of that and you can cherish the life that you're given after. I want to share that story, but never publicly. Never shared the full story, but I'm just ready to accept it as being part of my past

and talk about it. Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome to Was I in a Cult? I'm Tyler Meesom. I'm, and I'm sorry, I was just blown away by your welcome. It was, it was just too good. It's a nice day. It is. It's a good day. Nice good. It's a nice day. It is. It's a good day.

Nice to welcome people on a nice day. I'm Liz Iacuzzi, guys, and I am very excited about today's guests. You know you're excited about every guest. I am excited about every guest. You say this all the time. And why shouldn't you? Right.

Our guests are fabulous. They're fantastical. Yeah. We all have that thing in life that is hard to get over, right? Yeah, like a bad relationship that forever haunts you or not walking away from the black deck table when you should have four hands ago. I was in Vegas last week and I was up.

Yeah, I was up. I was up. Yeah, I know. You got to know when to hold them. And you got to know when to not go to Vegas. But what if, what if that one thing that was bothering us that we had to get over was your entire childhood? And what if your entire childhood was lived in a cult?

With your father, yeah I said that right, your father as the leader. Today's guest is Emily Maldonado and she came to us because her sister-in-law's hairdresser told her sister-in-law about her show and said, Emily needs to share her story on Was I in a Cult? And guess what guys, her hairdresser was in fact correct. You know what's funny is we are oddly popular with hairdressers. Honestly, there's no better way to spread word of mouth. Hairdressers have dozens of individuals captive for 30 minutes or more every day.

So it's your job to tell your hairdresser about our show so they can be our little recruiters. If I owned a bakery, I'd bring muffins to the local salon every Tuesday, and they'd promote my blueberry muffins to each split-ended person sitting in their spinny chair. There you go, it's a free idea for all you muffin-making bakeries out there.

Shout out, by the way, to Melissa LaPlante Miller, or LaPlante. I like it better, LaPlante. The hairdresser who listens to our show and sent us Emily. Keep up that grassroots word of mouth, my friend. Emily's cult is still active today and without giving anything away. It's just in the process of still- Don't say it. There's something else.

There is something. Don't say it. It's just- I know. Fine. Let's get to it, shall we? Let's just get right into it. Yeah, stop. Take out your knife, purify me.

Don't spare my life, crucify me. So my name is Emily. My dad's family is from Buffalo, Minnesota. My mom's family was too. And I'm the baby of six. So, when we grew up, we were assembly of God, which is a very strict spare the rod, spare the child. You discipline. The women are to be seen and not heard. There's no movies, no secular music, no influences outside of our church, homeschooling. We didn't get vaccines, we didn't get checkups. We didn't really do dentists or doctors or anything like that. Assembly of God is a Pentecostal Christian denomination known for its charismatic worship,

including speaking in tongues, prophecy, and divine healing. And maybe you guys just heard her say the term, spare the rod, spoil the child, which we have covered in previous episodes on this show. Yeah, not enough time to get into it. Suffice to say the term never appears in the Bible, but comes from asexual poem written in the 1600s. It's more like, spare that rod, spoil that child.

So look it up, right? Rob, will you find the episode that we talk about? Thank you. Hey, just got finished listening to every single episode of this podcast and I finally found it. It's from the March 10th episode, Gloria Vale, Gloria Fail.

The guest on that one was Jason Christian. It's another episode about a creepy cult leader family member, so go back and check it out if you like that kind of thing. And my family was traveling evangelists. So we would go from church to church and we'd get on the stage. My dad plays a lot of instruments. My mom played the mandolin and we all sang.

And six little kids walking in a perfect line, perfectly behaved, always doing what they're told. Churches found that quite adorable. As a kid, each one of these churches we'd go to, I would go into like their nurseries or their kids church. And my parents would come pick me up and I'd have a name tag on that was a different name. It was never my own. Sometimes I was Stephanie, sometimes I was Crystal, whatever name I wanted to be at that particular church. And when I look back on like that coping mechanism of how I

really dealt with growing up the way I grew up in, it was this kind of particular church. And when I look back on like that coping mechanism of how I really dealt with growing up the way I grew up in, it was this kind of fantasy world, right? The sky was pink and I just lived in my own imagination. Imagining is a common psychological defense mechanism, especially in children growing up in controlling environments. Disassociation through fantasy helps them cope with a reality they can't escape. In fact, Sigmund Freud believed that escapism is a natural part of the human condition and that people need a certain amount of escapist fantasy in their lives. He believed that humans cannot survive on the limited satisfaction that reality provides. You're telling me reality provides satisfaction?

Limited. Limited. Which is also another reason why people end up in cults, right? To increase their satisfaction of their reality. Mm-hmm. My mom was a really smart individual, artistic, well-spoken, but also incredibly determined and blunt. No tact whatsoever. She thought that her children were her mission from God.

And her mission in life was to raise them to all be ministers or missionaries. My dad was somebody that came from the automotive industry, your typical used car salesman person. He was an alcoholic before he found Jesus. Around that 70s, Jesus People movement, everybody was turning from drugs and orgies to Jesus people. From drugs and orgies to Jesus. Surprisingly a common refrain on this show. My mom was a single mom.

She'd had a pregnancy in high school. She was 17 years old with a baby. She was enough to think that she was a sinner with her situation with her daughter. She wasn't highly religious, and she was just vulnerable. I would say my dad converted her, and he and his pastor started bringing her into his office and just telling her like, this is the man God has for you, and you need to marry this man. Ah, yes, the classic God told me we should be together line.

Somehow it only works for co-leaders. And horny BYU students. Bring him young. That's what Joseph Smith said. They weren't compatible at all. They fought horribly. My dad was a very difficult person to be around, road trips with all of us in a 15 passenger van with six kids.

If we were laughing or we were having fun, he needed quiet. Don't laugh, don't scream. He needed silence. He was a pretty difficult person. That was me growing up. We had a van and there were seven kids piled into that thing, rocking down the freeway, picking fights with each other and holding our bladders for just a few more miles.

Just a few more miles. Seven. Seven kids in a van. My dad was a nice guy though. He didn't yell at us more than we needed to be yelled at. Was it an Astro van? No, it was a, it was pre Astro van. It was those big, huge vans and, you know, with the captain's chairs and the back that

folded out. It was, it probably still smells somewhere with seven kids in it. I gotta say, the vans nowadays, they're actually pretty cool. They're comfy, they're stylish. I can't believe I'm saying this. I can't believe that just came out of my mouth. I mean, I'm getting a Mustang pretty soon. A red one. To build my testosterone. To compensate for his very small pinkies.

I'm not getting a Mustang. I may get a minivan at some point but not now. I'll get a minivan too. Why not? Let's all be soccer moms. Sure. But Emily's family traveling evangelist Von Trapp's gig couldn't last forever. So whenever my dad could no longer pay the bills of the house we were renting, we'd pick up and move to the next house and then pick up and move to the next house. He finally got an offer. His sister was actually at Elk Grove Assembly of God. The church had just gone through a big sex scandal. So you can imagine how victimized

everybody was in the church. They're looking for the next savior, the next pastor to come. Enter Emily's father, Bill, the solution to their problems. And the creator of many more to come. I was about nine years old when we moved to Elk River, Minnesota, where my dad took over that church. You know, at the beginning, it felt very surreal. We would get our own house we would maybe never have to move out of again. A big eight-bedroom and six bathrooms,

a big swing set, my own room. There were so many acres of land. There was a huge church building. And he would get to pastor this place. When he took it, it was a few hundred people, potentially over a thousand. I think that's really when he realized like, hey, I have this big congregation that's counting on me. You've got single moms, you've got moms that were sexually abused by their previous pastor,

you have immigrants that come to the country and don't know anybody, and a lot of people that are in a vulnerable position. And they really looked up to him and I think he was able to share his message and kind of be whoever he wanted to be. And he could create whatever story he wanted. The holidays just around the corner. Which means it's time to figure out which relative you are gonna get in a fight with. And it also means eating and eating and eating. Stuffing, rolls, bread pudding.

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My dad started to get away from Assembly of God and create his own doctrine or his own religion. He dismantled the Assemblies of God board, he forged their signatures, he took all of it into his name. We became like a one-man show. He did know how to benefit himself in situations. The church, originally the Elk River Assembly of God,

he called it Solid Rock Church once he took it into just non-denominational. Solid. Solid as a rock. I will give you $100 right now. If you can name who sings that. Any of a listener that can not Google who sings that song, we got to have one listener, but shout it out right now.

Do they have long hair? Long, smelling long. No, it's Ashford and Simpson. You're never going to get it. I wasn't. I wasn't. So. He literally forged signatures to make it happen. I mean, the confidence or should I say the narcissism it takes to pull that off is insane.

Yeah. And once it's all under his control, no one can question him. He's built this entire structure where he's on top and no one else gets a say. Never question the leader. Initially, a lot of the people at the church stayed, they wanted to give him a chance. You can see that evolution as he started getting a little more power, people started listening to him, they started giving offerings. He just took on different tactics and he seemed to get smarter with the way that he would manipulate those kind of patterns that he saw and whatever would help him control people and make money. This doctrine revolved a

lot around money. And so all of a sudden, the messages were taking multiple offerings. The services were starting to last three hours, six hours, eight hours. They were Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night and Thursday night and Saturdays. You needed to make sure to attend each of the services, be on time, stay, be involved, be serving, be helping in the church. You're just constantly trying to fit the standards. You're trying to please everybody. But there was just the disappointment, the constant, we have really high hopes for you. You have this

great gift and God has given you these gifts and if you don't use them, you're not fulfilling your destiny and your calling. And it was just the pressure of trying to live up to the standards. So a lot of people wonder just how do cults start? Well, it's a little bit like this. A shift to financial abuse, abuse of time, and a need to control your people. And for Emily, a learned behavior of silence. For my brother and sister, they were very physically abused because they were more outspoken.

Me being the baby of six and seeing all of that, I just kept my mouth shut. I was a chameleon in every situation and just figured out what they wanted to see and hear. And so I didn't get as many physical consequences as them, especially as I got older. I was a daddy's girl. I worked to gain his favor in all facets. Everything was about how do I make sure dad's not mad today. I was constantly catering to keep him happy because that kept our house at peace and it kept my mom happy. Yeah. I thought I wanted to marry someone like my dad. Thank goodness I didn't. I followed

him everywhere. He would work on cars in the garage. I would Thank goodness I didn't. I followed him everywhere. He would work on cars in the garage. I would wet sand cars with him. I would say, how does an engine work? And then he'd talk for hours. You put the motor in and then it feeds the pistons and then the accelerator, the alternator will turn over the engine

and I would just let him talk for a few hours. Oh yes, we forgot to mention that the holy message receiving prophet Bill also owned a car dealership with his two sons. Weirdly another common refrain on this show. What is it with cult leaders and car dealerships? I guess they're all selling lemons, right? I don't know.

And this one is Matthew's auto sale in Elk River, Minnesota. Go pick yourself up a Chrysler LeBaron. A prophet for profit, his kids used to joke. Yeah, another nickname they used was Dollar Bill because so much of his preaching was about money. We are going to continue that nickname for the rest of this episode. FYI. He was always in automotive, focusing on body work and car restorations.

He put some used cars for sale on the front that my oldest brother would run and then fixed cars in the back. He was always working and then pastoring on the weekends and evenings. I don't know if he needed the money or if it just became an additional source to meet more people and try to win them to the Lord. Oh, looks like you need a new carburetor and a new path to God. You've come to the right place then, eh? Yeah, and then next thing you know, he's selling you a shoddy Christ the Lord of Barren with bad breaks. But also salvation. Salvation can come in a Christ the Lord of Barren.

He wanted an elite group of people, the group of people that were going to heaven. We're not trying to get people in our church that aren't serious about God like we are. So he didn't do a lot of recruiting. But I mean, I recruited every guy that asked me to date. Like I got a job at an outlet mall. And if a guy came in and started talking to me, I was clueless, first of all, that he was trying to date me. And I would just be like, oh, you should come to my church. And then he would just come to church for a little while, and then pretty soon he'd stop coming to church. And like all cults, well, they tend to get cultier as time goes on. And with that we mean more control, less critical thought, and less trusting of yourself. Well, there was so much control around information.

I don't want to be saying the wrong thing to the wrong person, getting caught sharing information or talking with anybody that doesn't go to our church so that you were only learning whatever he was indoctrinating you with. So one good example, he would have a sermon where he talked about how we were all sheep and he would say, repeat after me, you're my sheep. Bah bah bah. And everybody would repeat bah bah bah. Or he would say the Holy Ghost has given us laughter. And he would say, ha, ha, ha. And everybody would repeat, ha, ha, ha. And then you'd just sometimes do ha, ha, ha's for three hours.

You know, my two-year-old son would love to be part of this cult. What does the sheep say? Ah, ah. He'd rise to the ranks of priest very quickly. And no, the subliminal messaging of having his congregation Baja like sheep is not lost on us. Nor is it lost on our very astute listeners, I assure you.

Obviously, they picked up on it way before we did. He would teach how you would need to ignore your inner self because those are emotions and God doesn't deal in emotions. And the brain was a dangerous thing because it would give you thoughts that were of the devil. So I think his messaging fed into just this world of isolation. So for me, I just lived in my head, my imagination. I did fake podcasts actually. I would take out a radio with a tape player, with a cassette. I'd put it in there and I would interview the imaginary person. So a day in the week would be going to the school in the basement of the cult.

And it was basically just group homeschooling. And then in the evening, you'd have things like you'd have Bible quizzes where you would memorize the books of the Bible from Genesis all the way to, I don't even remember anymore to be honest. You must not have been a good student. But Tyler was. Name the books, Tyler. I can't name the books. I was going to see how many you could name because I can't name them.

I can name probably more than you, but I was going to say. I can't name any of these books. No, I'm going to try. Okay, so do that. Here's where I'm going to start this. Okay, Liz, how many of them can you name? Me? The books, the books of the Bible. How many can you name? Not one.

Come on, you got to name one. Matthew. There's one. Paul. There. Peter. Three. Javier.

There's no Paul, actually, and there's no... That's because the Bible is racist. Okay, Peter, Paul, Mary. There's no. That's because the Bible is racist. OK, Peter, Paul, Mary, Mary. There's there is no Peter, Paul and Mary. That's the trio. Right. OK, but I got Matthew. Oh, Mark. There you go. Mark.

Luke. Bing. If it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if it if Bing. Epidermis Lair. Ephesians. Ephesians is one, yes. Euphemisms. We already covered the book of euphemisms. Euphemisms, Mark, Luke, Paul, Matt. Matthew. Matthew. I call him Matt. He's Matt to me, guys. I got them all. Yep, you got all 66 in there.

You got every single one of them. What did I miss? There's 33 books in the Old Testament, 27 in the New. I can't name them all either. Probably I can name more than you, but I don't want to bore our audience with them. Can you give me a few more? I mean, there's always the Deuteronomy's. There's Jeremiah, Ecclesiastes, Proverbs is always one of my favorites.

Enthusiastic is my favorite. And then there's weird ones like Habakkuk. Ah, Habakkuk. That's my favorite book in the Bible. It doesn't take long for you to go take the Bible and make it dirty. There's like this children's song that you would have to learn when you were a kid. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Samuel, something like that.

Rob, find it and put it in. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth. First day of the year, I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy.

I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I'm going to be a good boy. I can't make you listen to that anymore. And then you'd have prayer meetings. So you'd get together in the evenings to pray for a few hours. When you're little, they start teaching you to speak in tongues and it's really just free up your tongue and just blow up. I probably couldn't even do it now, but it's like holo-shumbarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabarabar which is supposed to help you relax. Put you in a kind of a hypnotic state. Hypnotic state. It's a way to silence the critical thought even more. So you'd show up seven o'clock.

Prayer meeting would start on a Saturday night. There'd maybe be 20 or 40 people. The lights would be a little bit low. The soft, like elevator music would be playing. And you'd just hear murmurs. Everybody's... By nine or ten at night, you'd all get in a circle and hold hands. Sometimes he would have a word for everybody. A lot of times he'd open with the scripture, but then it would trail into just nothing

that had anything to do with the scripture by the end. Coming up with reasons why social media is bad. Coming up with reasons why you need to be tuned in to God. And a lot of encouragement to people about their finances. So at one point, God was going to make 10 people in our church millionaires. You just had to keep showing up and giving your offerings and do enough, be good enough to be the millionaire. Or they'd be stories, just stories of people that had left God. And you'd hear the same stories over and over. Somebody would leave and that person got in a car accident.

Their child got sick. They died of cancer. Something horrible happened to every person that left. Another one was one of those board members that left the church and he got cancer. What's that smell, Tyler? What's that smell? Oh? What's that smell? Oh, that's fear tactics. Fear tactics.

It's very strong. And of course, this group also did healings, known as blessings. And they were pretty dramatic, to put it lightly. And if nobody goes up for the blessings at the end, you're definitely going to be guilted into it. Like he'll just keep fishing around for prophecies until he gets, oh, the one with, you're feeling some pain in your knee right now. And nobody goes up for that. Then it's, oh, it's, you need healing in your elbow until finally gets a taker. And they go up and look behind, like make sure the ushers have made their way to you before you fall. Just double check. Always glance over your shoulder. You don't want to actually hit the

ground. So the men ushers will catch you and then the women ushers will throw the little towels over your skirts when you lay there. Oddly enough, yet another thing we covered on a previous episode. These are called lapkins. Lapkins. Napkins for your lap. Lapkin. Lapkins. So the filthy, dirty men of God aren't attempted to sneak a peek of your, Lapkins. Napkins for your lap. Lapkin. Lapkins. So the filthy, dirty men of God aren't attempted to sneak a peek of your Midwestern bloomers. Because man, are those sexy. We should also do some wazana called bloomers. I am into this weird merch today.

Lapkins. You know what that is? That's called a portmanteau. Ooh. A portmanteau is when you take two words and put them together. A portmanteau is... Is it two words put together? A portmanteau is actually a big travel case, and within the travel case are smaller cases.

And so you're putting words into different words. You make a portmanteau. A lapkin is a portmanteau. Is portmanteau a portmanteau? Meaning, is it a combination of a toe and a portmanteau? It is not. But sometimes if I was really tired, I just use that as an opportunity to sleep for a while

because they don't really care when you get up. So if that happened two or three hours into the service, I'd just sleep and then it would be like 11 or 12 o'clock and you'd wake up and it's like, I was just anointed. I was passed out in the Holy Ghost that whole time. It's a good little nap. Great use of time, Emily. I was passed out in the Holy Ghost that whole time. It's a good little nap. Great use of time, Emily. I applaud you.

Get a nap in wherever you can in church, right? If she was taking a nap, did they have to give her a napkin for her nap? That was like a bad Liz joke. Get enough. I'm trying to think of any examples of portmanteaus. Like a motel. Motel is a good one. A motor and hotel.

Motel. And brunch. Brunch is a good one, right? Lunch and breakfast. Oh yeah. Smog. Smoking fog. Did you know that?

Internet is a good one as well that most people don't know. Interconnected and network. Inter-net. Chillax. There is, that's actually a modern phrase. Modern portmanteau. Modern portmanteau. Yes, there you go. Chillin' and relaxin'.

A podcast is a portmanteau. We are literally. We are literally living. In the confines of a portmanteau. This is, you are listening to a portmanteau, people. Saturday night prayer meetings would usually consist of casting the devils out of people. Somebody that he decided had a devil in them would be in a cot and a bunch of us would be around praying in tongues and trying to exorcise the demons out of this person.

It was terrifying just speaking in tongues for hours until the person had the devil cast out of them. Sometimes they'll jump up on the chairs and run back and forth. They'll take laps, shaking, vomiting. Sometimes he says that Holy Ghost laughter hits, so he just asks everybody to laugh together for a while. Sometimes they see gold dust on their skin, but the exorcisms are pretty traumatic. I mean, as a child, I would have so many nightmares of devils flying around in my bedroom because my dad would say like, oh, I just saw the demon fly up over there. And so I just was always a shadow.

Kind of looks like the demon must have flown up to my room. They're up in my ceiling now. It was just a state of constant fear, the constant fear of just praying every night to forgive all of my sins so I didn't die and go to hell. And meanwhile, Daddy Dollar Bill's ego continued to grow. And grow and grow and grow. He started to go on these missions trips, Nigeria, Russia, Dominican Republic. And then when he'd come back, he would sensationalize the missions trips.

He cast out a lot of devils. He healed people. And there were just stories, one when God showed up to him and entered his stomach in a ball of fire. That's when he got his gift to heal cancer. And I think on these types of trips, nobody can validate this information. So if you're a congregation member, you're thinking, man, my pastor hears from God, he heals cancer, he saves people from being witches. There's just all sorts of accolades that are coming out of these works of God's or money's. It's going to

a good place. We'll keep giving. Money was big in his religion. That's a big part of his message, is giving to your church and giving to the man of God 10% of your gross income before taxes. And actually one of my sisters started a coffee shop and she tithed off the gross. And if you know anything about restaurant businesses, you cannot tithe 10% off the gross when you have expenses of rent and buying food and you don't even have 10 percent profit in your first year of a restaurant business. So it went bankrupt a few years later. But Dollar Bill wouldn't think twice about it. And from his own daughter, for Christ's sake.

And that's just the tip of this financially shady iceberg. Some services he would just say, everyone repeat after me, money cometh. Ha ha ha. Money cometh. Ha ha ha. Money cometh. Ha ha ha. And it would just be hours of confessing that money was going to come. I mean, I don't know how it was going to come, but somehow it was going to come. It just never, it never actually came though. I think it just, none of us were rich. He would say, God told me there's 10 people in the service right now that are going to give

$1,000. You know who you are. God's already, He's talking to you about it right now. He's weighing heavy on your heart. Come up to the front. And so not only is it like, wait, am I not hearing God's voice? Is that supposed to be me? But also, if I go up to the front, everybody will see it's me. And so there's kind of two benefits to this. You're number one, I heard God's voice.

And number two, you all saw me give the $1,000. He's had so many hundreds of thousands of dollars passed through his hands. He's had congregation members take out second mortgages on homes and give him thousands and thousands of dollars, and yet he'll be back due on his taxes, or he'll be taking money robbing from Peter to pay Paul, or taking money from my 94-year-old grandma's social security check. And then other things were just that commingling of if I need money from the church or the body shop and I just share funds back and forth and then don't pay taxes. So lots of shady things with money my whole life,

definitely my whole life. Okay, Tyler, can we talk about how good it feels to finally swap out summer clothes for fall sweaters. I just got my hands on a Mongolian cashmere sweater from Quince and I may never take it off. Shower might prove difficult, but yeah, I get it. Quince is the best. Their cashmere sweaters start at just 50 bucks.

I also just got my husband their cashmere sweatpants, which that's something he never thought he would ever own in his life and he loves them. And guys, Quince is cheaper but it's not lower quality, which is why we love them so much. Yeah, Quince partners directly with Top Factories and skips the middleman. That way we get the same high quality stuff for 50 to 80% less than other brands. I also just got a set of linen napkins from them. Obsessed. They're super soft sweatpants and sweatshirts.

I can't remember the name of them, but just look them up. I find myself reaching for them more than the other sweats in my closet. If you haven't tried Quince yet, you're in for a treat. They have great customer service and a great return policy. So get cozy in Quince's high quality wardrobe essentials. Go to quince.com slash cult for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's q u i n c e dot com slash cult to get free shipping and 365 day returns.

Quince.com slash cult, get it y'all. Woo woo. You got any fun trips coming up, Tyler? I mean, if Massachusetts for Christmas is fun, then yeah. Well, you know who's not invited on my next trip? Your ex cult leader? Body odor. And thanks to Lume deodorant, that won't be a problem. I love this product, you guys. No parabens, no baking soda. but it actually lasts. I use this stuff and

hours later I smell myself and I'm like, what? How do I still smell good? I was actually very pleasantly surprised by this product. It's clinically proven to last 72 hours in fact. So I can fly with two layovers and not smell like I woke up in a dumpster fire. And my favorite scent is their Lavender Sage. I use their Body Deodorant Cream. It comes in a little toothpaste-like tube, and you just put a little cream on your finger,

and it's safe just to use about anywhere. Your pits, under boob, your feet. And it's pH balanced, so it's safe to use below the belt, if you know what I'm talking about. I don't. Below the belt if you know what I'm talking about. I don't. Yeah, below the belt. You know what I mean?

Like on your shins? Sure, Liz, on your shins. Like on your inner thigh sweat. On your inner thigh sweat. That's what I meant with that, yes. Lume's Starter Pack is perfect for new customers. It comes with a solid stick deodorant, cream tube deodorant, two free products of your choice,

and free shipping. As a special stick deodorant, cream tube deodorant, two free products of your choice and free shipping. As a special offer for our listeners, new customers get a solid 15% off all Lumi products with our exclusive code. And if you combine the 15% off with the already discounted starter pack, that equals over 40, 40, 40% off their starter pack. Tyler is so excited his voice is breaking. Geeky geeky geeky. Use our code guys, inacult for 15% off your first purchase at lumedeodorant.com. That's code inacult at L-U-M-E D-E-O-D-O-R-A-N-T.com.

And Liz knows how to spell deodorant everybody. Woo! Applause! I don't, it's just on the page I just read it. So. Hey guys, we're back. Just wanted to take a second to thank you all for listening to the show, but we are asking something simple.

If you haven't yet written a review on Apple Podcasts, we would love it if you could take a simple two minutes out of your already busy day to quickly write a kind review. As silly as it is, reviews really help our show. So it helps us to keep making the show and it's... That's it. And it helps my ego to read them. Yeah, it does help. Occasionally we have people who don't like the show and that's fine. That's okay. But if you like the show, tell us. Say something about it. Yeah, when we have a format now where we are producing episodes every week and reviews really do help. So we thank you in advance. We thank you, thank you, thank you.

And just a little something, we do offer ad-free listening for Patreon members in case you didn't know. Now back to Emily's life and her father's cult. Standard rules is you're never going to have a girl alone with a guy. You stay away from temptation, dress modestly, the women submit to the authority, the man of God in their life, so the man is the head of the home. We were not supposed to date. You're only supposed to get married to the one that God has for you. Women didn't go to college. And so if you weren't married by 18, what are you doing?

A lot of the girls you'll find in that church, by 14, they had these kind of, I don't know what to call them. Were they grooming these little girls? Adult men, many times six to ten years older than these 14-year-old girls. They would become promised to these adult men. I remember just being so frustrated that God hadn't really showed me the one yet. And I was asking my dad, who am I supposed to marry and who's gonna be the one?

And I'm like 16 years old, and he gives me two options and I'm thinking, both of these are awful. And one of them, maybe he was 25, 26, something like that. And I go to his house and his mom sets us down at dinner and his mom says, so when are you gonna get married and how many kids are you gonna have? And I had a literal panic attack. Okay, here are your options, Emily.

You can marry Mr. Terrible or Mr. Worse. Don't worry, they're both disgusting pervs, so you'll be equally miserable with either choice. Grooming teenage girls to be with adult men. That's very, very nice. Yet another common refrain on this show. And unfortunately in life. As of late, yes. Come on, male populace.

Get your shit together and stop ruining it for the good ones. Where are the good ones? Right here. My hand's up. Just checking. But fortunately, you guys, Emily didn't swipe right on either terrible choice. I'm the greeter at the church, so of course I'm saying hi to everybody at the front door and welcoming them because I'm the pastor's daughter. And then one fine day, a handsome young man strolls into the church.

Bow chicka wow wow. Hey, Stud, who are you? What are you doing over there? She actually stood up for that. She kind of danced. Did the acid just kick in? Is that what happened? I just wanted Emily's guy to get the entrance he deserves.

He's from Guatemala, and he'd been in the United States like three months. I was just like instantly stricken. He didn't go to the church. He showed up because his mom sent him to pick up his cousin. And so little by little, we start talking. He asks me out. I'm like, I can't date, but you can come to church. And so he'd show up at the end of service.

He'd wait till service was over and then he'd go to Applebee's with us in a group. And so he chased me for three months. By this time, I'm 18 and a half years old. I finally said, fine, let's date. When given the choice between hours long church services and Applebee's. Oh, you always go for the crispy cheese bites and whiskey bacon burgers. Obviously. Oh yeah, and it's a good bargain

if you go at four o'clock on a Friday. Give me time to talk to the waitress. So after many Applebee's encounters, Emily and her Guatemalan beau were? 19 and 22 and super in love. By this time he was coming to church, but you can tell he's not buying into the doctrine. And so pretty soon my parents are trying to break us up. He's not the one for you.

He doesn't share our beliefs. And we say, you know what? Let's just get pregnant. Because if you're pregnant, you have to get married in church, right? Nobody can know the pastor's daughter got pregnant without being married. We came up with our plan July 4th, parents are out of town. We're like, all right, this is the day I'm going to get pregnant. July 10th, I take a test and I'm pregnant. Just stupid kids and somehow it works out. I have no idea. And I tell my mom that night at prayer meeting, we were married in like less than two weeks.

And that was 22 years later. So at least one thing in life was a smart choice, even though it seemed ridiculous and stupid at the time. We're 19 with a new baby. And I was like waitressing a little bit. My husband was a machinist, so we buy a townhome. I went to work in mortgages, but my mom was mortified that I took a job. But it worked out well.

It got me into the real world a little bit, although who knows, they all probably thought I was super crazy and I thought they were all going to hell. So my husband and I had a lot of conflict our first couple of years because he was not the sheep that my dad and mom wanted. And he was really hard and I love that about him today. He does not give a fuck what anyone thinks ever, which is his best quality. But it was a really difficult quality when your parents are cult leaders. And so if he would miss a service or he didn't follow

their instruction, we would get talked to about our marriage and it would be he wasn't following God. But he just was trying so hard to please me. He knew how much it meant to me to be in my parents' good graces. So he tried as hard as he could to like go to all the services and to adhere to it. This church was much more than simply a church run by Bill. It was a family business. The sweet little children that used to travel around in a van and sing for congregations were now being put to work for the ministry. So all family members kind of played a role. I had one that was the teacher of the school,

one that was the song leader, one was the youth pastor, and another, my younger brother, was the children's pastor. His name is Drew. And one of the prophets that came to church prophesied that he should marry Lorena. And Lorena just happens to be my husband's cousin, who was my best friend at the time. So my brother, of course, they get married rather quickly. aside that he should marry Lorena. And Lorena just happens to be my husband's cousin,

she was my best friend at the time. So my brother, of course, they get married rather quickly. They got married about six months after my husband and I got married. And the four of us were like best friends, always hanging out, watching movies together at each other's houses, just normal siblings and cult friends.

And my brother decided to join the army. I think he really was looking for a way to escape but not be disowned by the family. My family wasn't happy with military or politics or any of that. They definitely viewed that as like backsliding. So he went into boot camp. And while Drew was away, we all got news that my mom was sick. In 09 in January, it was actually New Year's Eve, and she passed out. Who knows how long she'd been ignoring the signs. Got taken to the hospital and she had tumors everywhere, her brain, her lungs, absolutely everywhere.

And interestingly, she was sick once with cancer, but they hid it. So she had a sore in her breast for two years. She just covered it with a band-aid because doctors were really frowned upon in general because you should have faith to get healed. And so she ignored it for a couple of years until finally it was pussing so bad, she went to the doctor. She ended up getting a mastectomy, but nobody was able to know about the cancer, especially because my dad's gift that God gave him was healing cancer. So imagine his own wife getting it. He said she clearly must have been disobeying God and she would have to deal with that and

figure out what she had done wrong to get cancer. But he left it at that. So thanks to the wonders and miracles of modern medicine, yes, modern medicine and science, Emily's mom was cured of her cancer. She was almost five years cancer free. But now... It's very aggressive at this point. Tumors through her entire body,

needs full around the clock care. My dad made sure we hid that from my brother. He didn't want him finding out. Me and my sisters, we volunteered to my dad. We'd like to take care of our mom. We'll take turns and we'll help. And he said, no, God told me that Lorena should take care of your mom. And Lorena was my brother's wife. So she's a single mom for now while he's at boot camp in the army. So she moves in with my mom and dad and really didn't have any

talent to be a caregiver, hadn't even finished high school, no background whatsoever to be taking care of somebody with cancer. My mom would put sticky notes all over her bedroom for herself to remind Lorena to fill her prescriptions. Tell Lorena to order this, tell Lorena to order that. But it was what God wanted, a completely incompetent caretaker who wasn't her actual daughter to forget to refill her cancer prescriptions. And you can't question what the Lord wants. Or what Bill wants. As the months went on, we would go over to the house and my sister-in-law would answer

the door like it was her house. She would welcome us in, do you want anything? She would thank us for cleaning. And we were like, we're not doing? She would thank us for like cleaning. And we were like, we're not doing this for you. This is our mom. Like you definitely felt the ownership of the home kind of switch.

It also got to the point where my dad would tell my mom, don't call Lorena in the middle of the night for anything. She needs her sleep. And he ended up moving out of the bedroom because it was too hot for him to sleep in the room. Uh-huh. Yep. And then one day Lorena had forgotten to fill the oxygen tank. So her oxygen levels are just tanking and dropping and nobody can figure out why.

So she ends up going into the hospital. It was Easter Sunday. And actually, my dad told us all, don't go to the hospital. You need to be in church. And my sister and I were like, screw you. We're going to the hospital with our mom. We're not staying at church. And she was gone a couple days later. The day my mom died, he called us into a room and he said, hey, God spoke into me and God has told me that he has a new wife for me.

He said, the devil stole something from me and God's gonna return it sevenfold. And I don't know, maybe I already sensed who it was because I said, as long as it's nobody that I know, is what I told him. We'll be right back. Spark something uncommon this holiday season with incredible handpicked gifts from Uncommon Goods. You know, when I was a kid, my mother would have all the Christmas shopping done by October.

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it. And I myself, I got the magnesium body butter which haha I'm obsessed. There's so many cool things on there toys clothes kitchenware bar stuff jewelry just everything. So whether you're shopping for your Secret Santa or your entire family Uncommon Goods knows exactly what they want. To get 15% off your next gift go to uncommongoods.com slash cult. That's uncommongoods.com slash cult for 15% off. 15% off! Do not miss out on this limited time offer. Uncommon Goods, we're all out of the ordinary. For years, Tim Ballard has been championed as a modern-day superhero.

The first time I saw one of the kids from the video, and it like changed my life. He was the face of Operation Underground Railroad, a movement that inspired hope around the world by rescuing children from human traffickers. However, Ballard's crusade to save innocent lives has always hidden a darker secret. Well, I think he's a pathological liar. Beneath the accolades and the applause, a dark storm has been brewing. I mean, I can't find a time that he's told the truth about anything.

Shocking allegations of sexual misconduct have surfaced, casting a shadow over his once unquestioned reputation. I am host Sarah James McLaughlin, and in this new season of The Opportunist, we explore the rise and the fall of Tim Ballard. Join us this October for Tim Ballard Unmasking a Hero. Subscribe to a new season of The Opportunist now, wherever you get your podcasts.

The next day after she died, he wanted all of her things out of his bedroom. He repainted his bedroom. He cleared out her closet, wanted her out of his room. First of all, she just passed. We haven't even had her funeral. And I remember as we were picking out her things, Lorena, my sister-in-law, is there like taking her things. We're like, this isn't your mom. Like it was it was very confusing. And so my other sister-in-law were chatting and we're like, all of this is really weird, right? Like you think it's weird, I think it's weird. She's like, yeah, it's

weird. Her and I go and we talked to Lorena and we're like, you need to move out. You have an empty house right down the street. Go back to your house. And she wouldn't move out. And so we took all of her things out of her bedroom. We packed them into a car. We drove them over to her house and we put her back in her house. And then for the next few weeks, we followed them everywhere. We would find them sitting outside on the step of her house. We're just like, what is happening? It goes against everything he's ever said. Don't be alone with the girl. Avoid the appearance of evil. We're just like, we don't know where this is coming from. And so it turns out that those two are together and God has told him that she's the one that he's

supposed to marry. She's 31 years younger than him. She's the one that he's supposed to marry. She's 31 years younger than him. She's a little younger than me, his youngest daughter. She's still married to my brother at this point. They have a daughter together. My dad was preaching that my brother would die in the war and that there was a scripture verse that he had planned for taking on your son's wife. The Old Testament is pretty screwed up. You don't say.

Yeah, that is for sure. So, I wanted to find this scripture, this particular scripture. So, I reread the entire Bible just last night, and I actually couldn't find anything about taking on your son's wife. Really? Yeah. However, I did find, to Bill's credit, I did find Deuteronomy 25 5, which basically says that if a man dies without leaving a child... But he did leave a child.

Well, that's what it says, brother. So, not... Oh, so I can see how that could be misconstrued. Exactly. Brother to son. Right. However, there is one scripture that Bill might have had a hard time adapting to his own thoughts and this is Leviticus 18.15 which states quote, thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy daughter-in-law, colon, she is thy son's wife, semicolon, thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. I like that it says it twice just so everyone's clear. Like the first time it's like don't have sex with your daughter-in-law. Oh and by the way in case you didn't know what that was, don't fuck your son's wife. Yeah it's great because it says don't uncover the nakedness of my daughter-in-law and just in case you don't know what a daughter-in-law is it's like she's my

son's wife. Yeah right. Just in case you don't know what daughter-in-law means. Also just in case you missed it the first time, don't uncover her nakedness. It's pretty clear. However, to be fair, in Bill's defense, it doesn't really say that she can't uncover her own nakedness, Waltz thou watches. Right, right. Solid loophole. Un-fucking-real. I mean, the Bible is a manual, isn't it? It really is a manual in life. I was in such a state of confusion of just, will this blow over?

Why is this happening? I couldn't mourn the loss of my mom because this drama is the day after she passes. And my son at the time, he's in the school in the church basement. And he goes there with his cousins, the same school I went to. He's six years old. And he comes home from school, innocent little six-year-old with questions.

And he says, My cousin Olivia said that grandpa is marrying Auntie Lorena. And the moment those words came out of my child's mouth, the first thought that popped in my head is, okay, I've been having suspicions that this isn't right. I've been asking pastors. I've been reading the Word. I've been showing my dad scriptures. I've been trying so hard to understand if this is right or wrong. And then the six-year-old innocent child that doesn't know the difference of right or wrong. The fact that a grandpa can marry an auntie, I was instantly awakened. How unsafe that environment was for my family. It was just an awful awakening moment. For that to be the way that you figure out what's going on isn't okay.

And my husband, thankfully, had probably been waiting eight years for me to say I was ready to go. So he's like, I'm out. It was really disruptive. Like we pulled my son out of school that day. He didn't go back. Put him in public school, which was the devil. And my grandparents, my aunts, my uncles, they immediately disowned us. Okay, we have heard a lot of escape stories

and some are more heartbreaking than others, but this one is devastating. To lose everyone, your entire family overnight, not because you committed some unforgivable act, but because you dare to reject the fact that your cult leader father was likely fucking your brother's wife while your mom was dying of cancer, and then on the day your mother dies your sick father has the audacity to announce that God has blessed him with a brand new wife, and that wife just so happens to be your brother's wife, whom he just had a new baby with. And then with all the gaslighting, manipulation and abuse you've endured from this twisted man for all these years, you're supposed to just sit back and accept this flaming pile of sanctified horseshit like it's God's plan. Are you fucking kidding me? Liz, are you OK?

I'm sorry. I had to let that out. What I meant to say was I really feel for Emily here. Thankfully, I had the support of my husband and I had his parents. My husband's parents left with us. They were also mortified at the situation. But my mother-in-law made that same choice. She lost communication with her brother, her nieces and nephews. Both families immediately split for one guy's selfish decision. My oldest siblings, who all worked for him, they get their paychecks from the church. They live in church personage.

They just said, okay, let's make a story around it. Let's say that it's God, and let's support him. And you would get some members of the church just saying, you know what, that's his personal life. He's my man of God, and I'm committed to my man of God. And they just would try to separate the two things. Okay, so there was one sibling who was not present for all of these occurrences. Drew. Yeah, so my brother, nobody could really tell him what was going on. He comes home from basic training to find his mom and died.

Dad's stealing his wife. He no longer has a job as a children's pastor. He no longer has a house. His entire family thinks he's backslidden. Your ex communicated. Your grandparents don't talk to you, your aunts and uncles don't talk to you, your siblings don't talk to you. So he literally comes home to absolutely nothing. Not able to see his daughter just came home to nothing.

Liz, you OK? Sorry, I just can't. I'll be back soon. I just fucking can't. I'll be back soon. I just fucking can't. So my brother, his divorce was official in September and they were married by January. She would call him grandpa dad at first and and then it morphed to dad, and she would call her dad Andy. They didn't expect my brother to fight for 16 years and hire lawyer after lawyer and take them to court over and over.

Obviously, there's so much more to Drew's story. Fortunately, we have that side of the saga because next week's episode features Drew, who will share what he went through. But we are not quite through with Emily. Meanwhile, I'm still living on the street with the cult. It's 2009. The market is crap. We can't sell our house. We live two houses down from my dad.

We lived right in front of the church. We'd see the cars in the parking lot on Sunday morning, Sunday night. I remember feeling so hurt every time we would see them. Like they could see in our windows if we had curtains open. And so it was a constant reminder, just over and over seeing them all gather and be together and be uninvited, right? Excluded.

Even though it was by choice, we made that choice, but you somehow think they care. As my kids, now that they went to a public school, they'd take the bus. We'd be standing outside our street and their grandpa would pass by. They didn't even know who he was. He wouldn't say hi. He didn't talk to us. They're all passing in front of us.

My brother lived next to me, didn't talk to us. And that was probably most hurtful is just seeing him completely ignore my kids. Don't talk to me, but that's fine. But your grandkids? You think that maybe he misses his grandkids? Liz is still not okay. So we were there for five years after we left, which in those five years, it felt like I healed zero. And finally, in 2014, the market went up, we could sell our house and we moved like a mile and a half away.

When I'm looking back, I felt a pretty big jump when I was no longer in the same home, in the same street, in the same neighborhood. I felt quite a bit of freedom and relief. Started like making friends with other parents from my kids' soccer teams and things like that. My husband's super social and everybody loves him anyways, so that helped. He made lots of friends for us.

Started to kind of like figure out what normal would be. Also, my sister left and of course, my brother. Oh, thank God. Thank God other people left. Okay, I'm back. All right, we missed you. I'm back. And so, my sister was very ready to say it was a cult. She was very ready to say that was spiritual abuse. I wasn't, I didn't think it was a cult

and I had to do like a lot of Googling and reading definitions. And I found these kind of common themes of information control, mind control, and money control. And I decided, you know what? It fits all the boxes. I'm willing to admit it's a cult. That's a really hard thing to say.

And it's a shocking thing when you tell somebody, I grew up in a cult. It takes a while to be comfortable saying that. It took some time for us as siblings to understand our relationship with each other. We're really close now. And throughout the years, I think we just all dealt with it so differently, like we all had very different journeys. Yeah, and just sorting through what I did wrong, what they did wrong, you know, the judgment of saying

something against your own family, that's a hard choice to make. It was really hard at the beginning. Nobody believed that I should talk poorly about my dad or that I should admit that he had done anything wrong because I should still respect elders and I should still honor my father because he's my father. And that's so hard, especially when you start off as daddy's little girl.

So Daddy Dollar Bill was out of her life, but she did bump into him. My youngest must have been like five or six. And I saw my dad in the grocery store. He came over and he had this habit, like even if I was at church, he'd come and shake my hand. Hey, Emily, nice to see you here on the Sunday morning. Because he was my pastor on Sundays, it wasn't my dad. So he comes up to me and cubs foods.

Haven't talked to him in years. Shakes my hand. Nice to see you. Acts super friendly. And I do remember I was no longer intimidated by him. I felt smarter than him. I didn't look at him as somebody that had the authority to affect my decisions anymore. And it was really shocking.

And I thought, was he always this way or has my perception changed? And my son goes, who was that? I said, oh, that's my dad. Never asked another question. Didn't know that meant that was his grandpa. This may be my coping mechanism, but I see narcissism as a mental disorder. And so I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry that he believes himself. That's his real truth. That he genuinely thinks that he's doing the right thing and that he's following God's voice. And I feel bad that he's still hurting people. And I'm just better without him. Three years ago, we moved to Texas, which was again, like a giant leap forward of just

not even seeing the same city. So I'm the head of growth at a data science firm, but I'm an influencer on the side. So I have a home decor account and I'm on Instagram and TikTok and YouTube and it's really fun. I style people's homes. So I'll do anything from a full design to styling and staging. And there are these moments where I feel so incredibly grateful to live the life I live, what other people would take for granted, like going on a trip or my daughter got the best dressed award in her high school, a public high school. I was always taught was the devil and she gets voted best dressed.

Like I'm living a normal life. To me, it's just if I can fit in with society, if I can be a beacon of hope for somebody else that's gone through horrific things, and I know there's a lot of horrific things out there, and you have a choice what you do with your future, and you can either be sad about the 27 years that were wasted, And of course I'm sad about that. Or you can be grateful that your kids aren't living that life and that you are breaking some of these generational curses.

27 years, my life was a lot to give, but I can make up for all of that lost time. The best I can, I still have plenty of years left. Like I just, I don't have a lot of time. I need to do everything. Try to live life the best I can. How fantastic is Emily? Yeah, she really is great.

I love these guests and their stories. Honestly, sometimes I hear them and I'm just amazed at what they've gone through and what they continue to progress towards. And their outlook on life after getting out of this is fantastic. And today, sadly, Dollar Bill's church continues. Even now, there's probably over a hundred people there, but a lot of them are just having six of their own kids. And then, you know, a lot of my cousins that are there,

and they're all having kids, and it's growing in that way. So, obviously, there is much more to this story, and they're all having kids and it's growing in that way. So obviously there is much more to this story and there are other characters who were involved. One of course is Emily's brother, Drew, whose father stole his wife. You know, that phrase still doesn't, it still bounces off the ears in the wrong way. It doesn't really come out right.

Those words are never meant to go together. No, the sound waves coming from that, your mouth don't seem to make sense. Bouncing off. Right, right. Well, next week, guys, we're going to hear from Drew, and we're going to get his entire side of the story. He's a really sweet guy that wears his heart on his sleeve. And to see him fighting day after day, year after year,

to live life, to try to see his daughter, he's definitely a survivor. Thank you, Emily, for sharing your story. It was a joy getting to know you in this editing process. I really love these siblings. You guys, they were so easy to talk to. They're so funny, warm. They just have really kind eyes, incredible souls. So Emily, stay in touch, please, and thank you again.

It was great to meet you. And again, guys, go get great design tips and ideas from Emily on her social media at Styled Mi Casa. Styled as in past tense, but she's going to do it for you in the present tense. Very nice, very nice. That is our show today, folks. Thank you so much for listening.

Thank you for supporting and thank you for helping keep our world just a little bit more cult-free. Ooh, what's in a cult is hosted, written, and produced by me, Liz the Witch, Ayacuzzi. Nice, very nice. And me, Tyler, transmission and salvation me some for $5.99. Oh yeah. It'll get you a car and it'll get you your soul revived.

Audio editing and sound design by the professional sheep impersonator Rob Pera. Give us your best sheep voice, Rob. Okay, as a professional sheep impersonator, usually I get paid a lot more to do this, but here it goes. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem.

Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ahem.

Ahem. Ahem. Ahem. Ooh. That's not bad, Rob. He brings all those sheep to the yard. And they're like, it's better than yours. They're like, it's not bad Rob. He brings all those sheep to the yard. And they're like, it's better than yours, man, like, it's better than yours, he can teach you, but he'd have to charge Rob, sheep brings all the- okay, continue.

Yeah, okay. Yeah, uh-huh. Also, additional audio editing by Greta Glossalelia extraordinaire Stromquist. Our social media crusher is Shani Portmanteau-Payton. I think her title should be So Mead. Like social media, So Mead. Oh, So Mead, the Portmanteau, the So Mead. And our last but never least,

our fine executive producer, not at all creepy pastor, Stephen Labrum. Is Labrum a Portmanteau, I think? For Labrador and drinking rum, a dog who drinks rum, perhaps. Also what I call my area between- Don't, don't, just stop. And of course, a heartfelt thank you

to our stellar guest, Emily, for bravely sharing her story. And as always, thank you to you, our dear listener, for listening to Was I in a Cult? See you guys next week and until then, always trust your gut. And stay away from anyone with a creepy handshake that claims he can cure cancer. And a Selenia Gadd and a Ford Mustang at the same time. A Pontiac LaSaber. That's what I think he's probably pawning on.

And anyone selling you a Pontiac LaSaber, I'm in God at the same time. Don't spare my life Crucify me And for Emily, a la la la la. And for Emily, a learned behavior of silence. You can keep in all the making fun of me parts, Rob. Because our audiences love it. They're not here to do it. They're not here to do it. Tyler's gotta do it.