Was I In A Cult? - Swartzentruber Amish — PT1: "Promoted to Housework"

Episode Date: May 11, 2026

Many people picture a peaceful, technology-free life of butter churning, candle making, and horse-drawn buggies. But for today's guest, the reality behind the plain dresses and pastoral image was far more restrictive, and far more dangerous. Lizzie grew up in one of the strictest Amish sects in the country: the Swartzentruber Amish. No electricity. No indoor plumbing. No music. No photographs. No Rumspringa. And absolutely no preparation for life outside the community. In this first part of a two-part conversation, Lizzie shares what it was like growing up under intense control, the rigid rules imposed on women, and how isolation and fear kept members obedient. She also opens up about the early cracks in her belief system—and the impossible choices that eventually led her to attempt an escape. __________________________________ FIND LIZZIE: Instagram: @lizzieens_wellness / TikTok: @lizzieh_wellness Book: Amish Renegade: The Anthropology of an Amish Girl Turned Global CEO Website: undietyou.com _____________________________________ FOLLOW US  → For more culty content — follow us on Instagram & TikTok → @wasiinacult SUPPORT THE SHOW Join our Patreon! Get ad-free episodes, bonus content, and behind-the-scenes conversations. (And our forever gratitude)   HAVE A CULTY STORY? Email us → [e-mail]

The views and opinions expressed on this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of Libson or its affiliates. Guest accounts are personal recollections shared from their own perspectives. References to specific individuals, organizations, or groups are presented as commentary, opinion, and personal experience and should not be interpreted as definitive statement of fact. This podcast is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. Welcome all to was I an occult. This is the show that features badass people telling badass stories about, well, you know, just being badass, I guess. Sounds like a good show. I over here, I'm Wazai Kuzi, I'm kind of a badass.

Yeah, and I'm Tyler Mism and I'm just kind of bad. And I'm an ass. You're just a badass. Put together. Today we have a cult that we have long wanted to cover on this show. I think since, I don't know, forever. Yes, since the Amish. Yes.

We're in season five now of the show and we wanted to cover it in our first season. We've been trying to track down someone who is Amish because I personally find the world and their beliefs and how they live quite fascinating. Yeah, because many people know the Amish just as, you know, a group who live in the woods. wear suspenders and silly hats and have those beards without mustaches, right? Yeah. They don't have the mustaches.

You know, no electricity. You drive a horse and buggy. And they make their own candles and butter. And that is exactly what I believed growing up because I'm from Chicago. And if you go south in our fine state of Illinois, you'll eventually find Amish country. And we went on a field trip there in middle school.

And I just, we were like making our own candles with these ladies and I remember being like, this is so cool. I thought it was really cool. Making candles is cool. Buying candles is also cool. Making light bulbs is actually better than candles. Look, they do present as peaceful folk.

They aren't bogged down by the plagues of modern technology. Like everyone listening to this bloody show. But there is always a but. You will learn today that there is a lot more high. in that cellar next to the homemade beet wine and sweetberry jam. Today we talked to Lizzie and her story. Well, it is classic. Was I in a cult?

It's got intrigue. It's got pathos. It's got comedy. It's got drama. It's got Liz dropping a laundry list knowledge of cults. It's also got an ad for Bowling Branch and Quince. It's classic. Was I in a cult?

And let me tell you, her escape is cinema worthy. Give them just a clue. Give them just a tease. One clue? I don't know. How do you give a clue to that? Give a tease. Meow.

A cat. Yes. They don't know what that is and that's okay. They don't. We're sticking around for. That's the point. Now, the way I found Lizzie was quite amazing. So like Tyler said, we've been wanting to tell an ex-Ommish story for some time.

But finding the right person for this show had proved challenging. And then one day, I think this is in January of this year, On my Apple news feed, there was just a random People magazine article titled, Woman attempted to leave Amish community at 17 with twin. What happened next was devastating. Exclusive. And I was like, huh. They put devastating in quotations, right?

For whatever reason, devastating was in quotes. Because that's journalistically, it can't be devastating. That's an opinion to be devastating. She said it was devastating, but I can't say it. Then they liked Lizzie so much the next day. Another People magazine article came out titled, Ex-Amish Woman recalls developing an eating disorder amid strenuous, quote again, manual labor on farm. Exclusive.

Exclusive. Clickbait, clickbait, clickbait, but it worked on you, Liz. Well, it only worked because I was like, Amish, who is this woman? And so I was intrigued because once I, opened the article. The woman I was looking at was a strong, self-possessed powerhouse of a woman who happened to be Tyler, a CEO, an author, a speaker, a wellness entrepreneur with massive following online and hosted her own podcast. And I was like, yep, her. That is exactly who we would like to have on the show. So I just randomly DM'd her and not thinking she would have a way back.

and she wrote immediately back. And she was exactly the badass, I surmised. So thank you, People Magazine, and your sensational eyes clickbates. Never thought we would ever say those words, but yes. Thank you. So now this is a two-parter because by God it is golden and it deserves the extra time. Liz did a four and a half hour interview with her and I thoroughly enjoyed editing it down. But don't worry, the best stuff is in.

In the show, it always is. So let's welcome our guest. Welcome to the show. Thank you. You're the second Liz Lizzie incarnation of our mutual name. I'm assuming your full name is Elizabeth. No, just Lizzie. You're kidding.

Yeah, it's a very common name in the Amish community. Fascinating. Welcome to the show. Would you just please introduce yourself? Yes, my name is Lizzie ends. I reside in Phoenix, Arizona. I grew up Amish in the strictest order of Amish community. There's new order which is more modern.

And then I'm from the Swartz and Trooper Amish, which is the most conservative. They don't have any kind of tractors. They're not allowed to have any kind of the rubber tires on anything. Like it all has to be steel or wood. And horses was what we used for farming. We didn't have any indoor plumbing. So no showers. no toilets, nothing like that inside. We used outhouses. And our clothing was just far more strict.

Like, we dressed with straight pins and safety pins as women. No zippers allowed, you know, buttons and holes and hook and eyes. We weren't allowed music. We weren't allowed cameras. All your hair had to be covered. We also couldn't show our sleeves. Like, we could not roll them up farther than just right above our elbow. How big is the Swartzen-Truber sect? I don't know. I do know that someone said recently that there are over 300,000 Amish people. So we all stem from the same break off from the Anabaptists.

Okay, so a little religious history lesson for you. The Amish traced their roots back to the Anabaptist movement in 16th century Europe. This is during the Protestant Reformation, when basically everyone was, kind of arguing about how to Christian correctly. So these dudes step in and basically said, hey, what if we just started over? The Anabaptists, well, they believe that baptism should be a conscious adult choice, not something done to you as a baby, which that's crazy.

I mean, I can't believe they dare to think. How dare to think this. But at the time, this idea, this thought was enough to get you arrested, exiled, or possibly killed. They also believed in nonviolence, separation from government, and living apart from the world. And because of that, they were heavily persecuted across Switzerland, Germany, and parts of France. So naturally, they just pack up and they were like, peace, Anabaptists out. And by the early 1700s, many of them had immigrated to North America, especially in Pennsylvania,

looking for their religious freedom. In Pennsylvania basically said, yeah, we got room. Build some barns here. Raise some barns. But the Amish specifically formed when a Swiss leader named Jacob Ammon broke away from the other Anabaptists. Because, of course, like all the white dudes before and after him who have broken off some sect of something, he thought they were not strict enough. So Ammon believed in things like shunning, completely cutting off members who broke the rules. and a deeper level of separation from the outside world.

And over time, those ideas evolved into what we all now recognize as Amish life, simple living, rejection of modern technology, and a tight-knit, highly regulated community structure. It was in the 1800s, and this was around the time that the steam engines came out, because everybody back then had horse and carriage. But the steam engines were like one of the first things, I guess, that came out that was an electronically driven or gas fuel-driven vehicle. And the steam engines, hey, that's getting way too advanced.

And it runs on its own except for someone driving it. At the end of the day, convenience of the technology to them is the more you are with that, the farther away you are from God. We don't do anything that the world outside of us is doing that's modern. So I'm incredibly grateful that I got to grow up the way that I did because it's taught me so much. And it's made me who I am today. Integrity and ethics are two big things. Being a good human being and your word is your word.

How to make a living and show up and you get stuff done. Like you just get shit done. And there's actually a whole process and that is order, structure, and discipline. You get up and you get your chores done. You all get together for your meal three times a day. And those are things that I see lacking so much in this chaotic modern world with access to so many quick things, Amazon priming everything, food delivery, everything, quick, fast stuff and people wonder why they have anxiety. And the truth of the matter is, is, The Amish don't need the world.

The world needs a little bit more Amish without their religion. Without the religion and some other things, which we will eventually get to, but yes, she isn't wrong. And also, she's pointed out how and why so many cults get started in the first place. The pitch, the world is insane and chaotic and has a plethora of issues. And thus, why my farming community or my orgasm housing community, or my pole dancing community is the reprieve from all of that insanity that you need, right? It is the draw of many occultic communities that is for sure.

And yet, I mean, I still marvel at the ideal of the Amish. I mean, I think we all do. I'm certainly not ready to give up my bean-grinding coffee maker or my MacBook Pro. But yeah, I do sometimes think we all need a simpler life. And a beard, one of those great beers. The Breville? I have the Breville coffee grinder.

It's so great. Just one button. It's so nice. I was born in Ohio, and my parents have 19 kids. So my mom came from a family of 18. What? I know.

So my twin and I were the first twins, so she had three sets. But we were the oldest ones. So my mom had the same doctor for all kids. and she would give birth at the birthing center. And so because they don't do ultrasounds, they don't necessarily know that it's twins. She told me that she suspected that we were twins,

but she didn't tell the doctor because legally the doctor has to make you go give birth at the hospital if it's twins. And she's like, I don't want to go to a hospital. I want to give birth at the birthing center. So anyway, I'm born. And she told me this story last year. And she said, I was born first.

And then the doctor, like, looks up and with these big eyes and goes, there's another one. And my mom goes, I know. Your mom's kind of a badass. So she is a badass. When did she start having children and when did she stop? She had her first one when she was 20. She was 44 when the youngest one was born. Yeah.

So the first five or six kids were like 11 months apart, all of them. And then eventually they started to be spaced out a little bit more. But most of them are like a year to a year and a half apart. Speaking of a lot of children, this is a total side note. But from last week's episode when we discussed all the tradwives, Tyler had me look up all this trad wife content to give him for clips. And now, Tyler, my algorithm is forever. Fuck.

It's like watching a train wreck. I'm like, what? They're who and you and how? I have no words for what I'm seeing now, and I don't understand what these people do with their time. What? I guess you've got to balance out your algorithm, Liz. Get some monster trucks or something to just...

I know. I have to, like, go on a deep dive on some other end, and then my algorithm isn't like going to just like spurt out. Do not compute. Who are you? I know. I feel like my algorithm, because I search calls. stuff all the time. My Google page is just like, are you in one? Are you joining? Are you starting one?

What are you weird? My earliest memory of work is when I was five. And I know I was doing stuff before them, but that's just the earliest I can remember. And the simplest thing is carrying in wood for the wood-burning stove. That's number one. And then number two is washing the dishes after you feed 20 people. But a typical day would be, you get up around 5 or 6 a.m. My dad would wake up first, and then he would stand at the bottom of the stairs where most of the kids slept upstairs, and he would call each one by name to wake everybody up. Like, they would call your name until you answered. The boys would all be in one room and the girls in another room, but we would share a bet. So typically two bets in one room,

and two in each bed, except some of the smaller kids, they would literally sleep three in a bed. So that's how you wake up, and you were just expected to get up. You brushed your teeth once a week, and that was on a Saturday night. And we didn't have showers, so we took a bath once a week, Saturday nights. We would hop out of bed, and then the boys, they could just get up and go downstairs and go start chores. They just slept in their clothes. Whereas us girls, we had to get up and take 15, 20, maybe 30 minutes, to get dressed and put our hair up,

put our coverings on, our dress on. But in the winter, we wore two dresses, which was an underdress and then an outer dress, and that was just part of keeping us warm. So you have your winter coats, you have a shawl if you're going somewhere, you have knee-high stockings, your shoes. You had to wear a cave and an apron in the winter.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, did she just say a cape and an apron? You had to wear a cape and an apron in the winter? No. Yeah. There's no way. There's no way. Yeah.

No, there's no way. She said it. I heard it. Well, golly, why would you need both a cape and an apron when you could use a capron? A capron. A capron. Now, for you loyal listeners, you might recall a previous episode, The Vampire Cult, where we discussed inventing a cape. that flips around to be an apron or an apron that's called a cape.

It's a capron. It's called a caperan. It's a caperan. It's a capron. It's both. It's both. It's a capron. We actually got way too many responses.

It's like, can you guys write about the content? You're like, a capron. No, I forgot the calls. Let's talk about caperins. I don't care about it. Where's your capron? And they're like, where is it? And they reached out.

They wanted a capron. And so we did it, guys. we made it. We didn't make it. We didn't make it capron. It's still a great idea. I don't care who you are. We need caprons.

You had to wear a cave and an apron in the winter. And then you had your original covering for the hair. And then you had a scarf that went over that. But if you left on a horse and buggy, you then had to put an additional bonneton. Everything had to be dark, brown, dark, dark. purple or plum, like those were like the main colors. We weren't allowed to have anything bright. We made all of our own clothes. Like every single piece of clothing is made to grow into. They put

pleads in there to then lengthen the dress when it needs to get longer and then you can shorten it again if you need to for the next size. A sort of genius actually. I mean, think about it. Us women, we don't ever get just one dress. In fact, we can't even wear the same dress to an event if we already wore it to another event where the same people might be there. And men, you guys, you get one suit. One suit, and that's it.

Uncle Mario's wearing the same suit to his mom's funeral, his son's wedding, and his promotional party at work. No big deal. But Rosie, she's having a stage four meltdown in her closet because the only dress that fits her right now It was the same one she wore last week for Margaret's baby shower. It's hard being a woman.

It is. Let's not forget we do have to change the tie, though. We have to wear a different tie. But do you? Does anybody notice the tie? And you get your chores done. You milk the cows all by hand. Feed the animals, take care of all of that.

We had about three to 400 laying hens. And then once that's done, everybody comes in. and we all sit down at the table at the same time to eat. And every single person has their dedicated spot at the table. Like, that's the place that you sit every time. Breakfast was that, well, my mom would cook like three to four dozen eggs every morning. We would have bread with jam on it, best bread you'll ever have, and homemade jam. And then when meals done, the women take care of the dishes.

and everything else. So we as women were primarily in charge of taking care of the house, the sewing, the canning, the cleaning, cooking, baking, all of that stuff. And the guys go outside and they do the farming and whatever needs to be done outside. And then around noon, everybody comes together again. So the women cook the meal and everybody comes together and everybody sits at the table, has their lunch. An example would be fried chicken and mashed potatoes and,

green beans. And then the second course of that meal was some kind of canned fruit or if it was summer we have fresh fruit like fresh strawberries, fresh peaches. And we always had cookies and we always had pie. Like it's like a full three course meal. And then it was pretty common for people to take a short nap after lunch. Then it's just back to work to whatever you were doing. And then And dinner, everybody comes together again. Dinner is usually whatever was left over from lunch will get pushed over into dinner. In the summer, when it was like hot and humid, they would make what was called cold soup. And it was, it's so disgusting. It's bread in little chunks. Then they put milk and sugar over it. And it just gets socky. And then the worst part is, is when they put bananas in

because then the bananas would get brown and make it even more mushy. Then after dinner in the evening, it was back to milking cows and doing the chores and all of that. If it was summer, we would go finish doing gardening stuff or the guys would be in the fields. And so we would get hungry after doing all of that work. So one of our favorite things to do was to make stove pop popcorn and we would eat that at night. with a homegrown popcorn and some lard best popcorn you'll ever have. You're obviously not using any electricity for anything. Right.

So it's a pioneer wood-burning stove and you have an oven in it. And that's where you do the baking. And then the top is where you do the cooking. You put the wood in and it heats up the whole thing. And then obviously have like stainless steel kettles as well to heat up water. Because you didn't have a water heater. You had to heat up all of your water. The women do the laundry every Monday.

We had an actual ringer washing machine, and it was hooked onto a belt that went to a little kerosene engine. And the belt was hooked onto the washing machine and the little motor. And you start that little engine up, it will spin the spinner in the washing machine. So once it's done washing, you ring your clothes through the ringer, and then it goes through rinsing, and then you go through the ringer again, and then you hang it out on the clothes line. Usually it's like a two to three hour process for everything. Because you're talking men's clothes, women's clothes, divers, towels, all the bed sheets. Like, we had 12 or so beds. So all the bet sheets every week are Sunday dresses.

They always got iron, and there were very specific rules on how to iron the pleats of those dresses. Okay, this dress idea just lost a major appeal. If I can't steam it, I don't wear it. Don't give me an iron. Do not hand me an iron. I still iron. I still iron shirts. Okay, well, you're Mormon.

Oh, that's why. I iron shirts. I did have to iron shirts on my Mormon mission as a 19-year-old ironing white. I knew it was tied to being a nice, good Mormon boy. Yeah. Ex-Morman guys. If you don't listen to the show, he's an ex-Mormon. Well, obviously, I'm not a Mormon.

I'm doing a cult show. And I think I said fuck earlier. I mean, Mormons don't say fuck. And he just drank wine and Diet Coke and coffee. He just talked about his. Breville coffee maker. He's definitely not a moment. Sinner.

And one thing that we were really big on ironing was our bedsheets. We would iron our bedsheets. You would fold it a very specific way to have very specific pleats in the bedsheets. It's very Germanic, actually. The way that we made money is we would milk cows, and then we would have a milkman that would come pick up the milk, and then we would get a monthly paycheck for milk, and we would sell hundreds of dozens of eggs to customers.

And if we got an overload of eggs that didn't sell, we would then take those eggs and make homemade noodles and sell the noodles. And here's the other cool thing to know about that is you only use the egg yolk to make the noodles. What do you do with the egg white? You make angel food cake, and now you sell the angel food cake. So very creative and efficient with their stuff. Like, we did not throw away leftovers.

Okay, so I'm kind of obsessed with sleep, and I've read a number of books about sleep. Sleep experts agree that around 65 degrees is the ideal bedroom temperature. 65? Yes, 65. I do 68. Maybe I should go colder. I think you should go colder. I moved from Chicago to L.A. for a reason. 65 is ideal.

I'd love it. I would love 65, but I can't. It's a problem in my house because I want cold. My wife, apparently, she likes it hot. She likes to grow tomatoes in the room. It's so hot. And guess who wins? Your wife.

Yes, of course she does because I'm a good man and a good husband. So I suffer through it. Go sleep outside under the stars. That's what I'll do. I think the problem is not your thermostat, Tyler. I think it's your bedding. Because bad sheets trap heat and you wake up sweaty and nasty. and that's your problem.

And here's where the ad part comes in, which is why I love our Bowlin Branch setup. And I know this is an ad. But it's true. We have the sheets and we have the waffle blanket. And we just got the comforter. We just got the comforter. The holy trifecta, all three are on our bed.

Which one did you get? Signature? Yeah, that's the one. I got the dream one. Very nice. The dream one is so dreamy. Everything on our bed is Bowling Branch. The sheets are 100%.

organic cotton woven specifically for airflow. And unlike those like weird cooling synthetic fabrics, have you tried those before that like kind of give you like the ick? It's not like that. It's literally like how the cotton is woven. So. Yep. Chris. It's cool. It's comfortable. Still cozy. I would not go back to regular bedding. I'm never going back ever. Don't ever leave us, Boland Branch. And you too. You listener can sleep cooler this summer with Bowling. Boland Branch. Get 15% off your first order, plus free shipping at bolandbranch.com slash cult and use our code cult.

That's Boland Branch, B-O-L-L-L-A-N-D, branch.com slash cult, code cult to unlock 15% off. That's actually a lot when you start to add it up. 15% off Bolinbranch.com slash cult. Code cult. Exclusions apply. Okay. So just a bit more about. the Amish. There are, as Lizzie said, an estimated 370,000 Amish members in the United States,

and they are one of the fastest growing populations in the U.S., basically doubling in size every 20 years. Now, this isn't because of conversions. This is basically due to them having so many children. Like 19. I'm sorry, I don't think we spent enough time talking about Lizzie's mother having 19 kids. That is a lot. That is a lot. My mother, she had eight children, which is so many, so many children, but she would have to double that and still pop out three more of my stupid sisters to get to 19. It's so many. It's a giving birth to an entire kindergarten class. Yeah, or the pitching staff, the entire pitching staff of the Phillies, but with a better bullpen. They're not very good?

No, not right now. No, they're not very good. So these big Amish families typically live close to one another, but in Lizzie's case, not necessarily so. So where I grew up is peculiar to most people that grow up Amish because my parents bought a farm, like a few years after they were married, and our closest to Amish neighbors were three miles away. So all of our neighbors were not Amish.

How long is three miles on a horse? Morse and Buggy. How many minutes? Maybe 20, but it was the same distance every single day that we went to school. Walk three miles in the morning, three miles back. When did you start going to school? We went from first through eighth grade, and we just learned the basic stuff. Math, reading, English, spelling. We learned German in school because our Bibles and Hempbooks were in German. It's the oldest form of German. So a lot of people that are German, they don't know how to read it. They don't understand it. But Pennsylvania Dutch is our first language, which is a dialect of Swiss-Deuts.

Like we didn't learn English until we got second grade, I don't think. We were not allowed to do science or history. That's basic education. But anything beyond that, if you're going to be in the Amish community, you don't need anything else. My eighth grade education card It says promoted to housework Is that the funniest shit ever? That's all that's expected, my dear.

Yeah, it is the funniest shit. But the less funny shit is that it's also protected by U.S. law. You see, in the early 70s, the 1970s that is, the state of Wisconsin required kids to stay in school until they were 16, but a group of Amish parents refused to send their children to high school after eighth grade, saying it violated their religious beliefs and the state, well, they find them, but the parents pushed back, arguing that high school would expose their kids to ideas and

values that would pull them away from the community, which was kind of the entire reason I actually went to high school. You mean when you actually attended class? Yeah, I did miss a few classes. But when the case reached the Supreme Court, it was known as Wisconsin v. Yoder, the justices cited with the Amish in an eight to one decision. They ruled that forcing Amish children to attend high school would violate the parents' First Amendment right to freely practice their religion. The court basically said that because the Amish have a longstanding, self-sufficient way of life where kids are trained in farming trades and community roles, that formal high school education wasn't necessary.

And there it is, another legal loophole to keep cults from outside influence. And education, which of course would encourage terrible things like critical thought and original ideas and self-grinding coffee makers. God forbid. So what were you taught about? outside world? The main thing that comes to mind for me, it wasn't that everybody was a bad person or anything like that because we communicated and had lots of customers that were from the outside and there were really nice people. It was just that if you're born into the Amish,

that's where God wants you and where you belong. So it's okay for them to not be Amish. They're not the chosen people. My biggest thing was, I don't understand how you're coming up with these rules. Why do only Amish people go to heaven? That doesn't make any sense to me. I would ask that question. And my mom would just be like, well, that's just how it is. There was this lady that would come visit us. And she had really short hair, so they believed, like, you can't cut your hair. She would talk about Jesus.

She would talk about God. She was just such an amazing human being. And one day she left, and I asked my mom, I said, so just because she cuts her hair, she's not going to go to heaven, even though she loves God. And my mom's like, well, that's just the way it is. And that was the moment that I was like, no, I cannot believe in that kind of God. I refuse to. And so that's like my earliest memory that I remember of me going, I refuse to believe that.

Her first crack in the dogma. There's so much suppression of the voice. As a young kid, you don't have a voice. You just do. You put your head down. You don't question. And you just do. And so if you are someone that starts questioning those things, it's like, shut down.

And because I had a rebellious spirit, like a lot of my siblings and even my mom, like, they didn't understand me because I asked questions. And then when I, like, didn't understand something, I got angry. And then here's the other thing is we were taught that anger is a sin. So I remember being like so freaking angry about something because this was something I didn't understand. I don't know what I did, except I probably screamed, but mom clearly knew I was very angry, and, like, she took me into the bedroom, and she punished me for being so angry. So if you're disobeying the church rules and how you're dressing, you might get a talking to,

a pretty, pretty rough one, a pretty harsh one. Or you might get your rights taken away to go visit. Like, every other Sunday was not church. So we only at church every other Sunday. and then in between Sunday was you could go visit somebody or somebody come visits you. So that's called the visiting Sunday. And if you had planned to go visit someone, that might get taken away. If you are a teenager and someone that's in the dating, every Sunday night that there's church,

all the kids that are in the dating, they have what they call a singing and they all come together and they sing and then they might go on a date or whatever. and that might get taken away from you. But a big thing for us to get in trouble was like if you talked back, like you were not to talk back to your parents, saying a bad word or potentially lying. As a teenager, what we lied about

was when we were going to get in trouble for potentially listening to music or drinking beer or something like that. We call it crazy, is not crazy. Hiding in the attic listening to music is not crazy. No, that's not crazy. Hiding in the attic listening to music is not crazy.

It sounds great. Just an attic that I can escape to. It has a record player playing Pink Floyd and an old cot. Maybe some pretzels and a dartboard. That's living. That's not crazy. That's what I want. I can tell you two stories of things that my twin and I got caught with

then I just think it's so funny. First one is it had to do with red beet wine. So my mom, she read somewhere that you can make beet wine because we can't beets every summer. And the leftover liquid of it, you could ferment it and make beech wine. Yeast, sugar, cover it, let it sit for X amount of time, turns into wine, alcohol.

And so she read that you can use that in the winter to prevent getting sick or when you do get sick. That's the funny part. So we would only take like a tablespoon or two at a time and then go to bed and they would help with viruses. So we make all this beet wine. My twin and I discover that you can get drunk on it. Yeah. So we were invited to a wedding and everybody goes there to 300 people and they feed everybody lunch.

And so my twin and I, when we left for the wedding, we had snuck a whole quart of beet wine onto the buggy. And we go to our cousin's house, and our uncle was the bishop of the church. Now, mind you, we're not drinking the wine. We're just hanging out with our cousins. But while we're hanging out there, he decides to search to Bucky. And he finds the wine, but he doesn't say anything. He just leaves it there. So we don't know that he saw it.

We go back to the wedding, horse and Bucky, and on our way there, we drink the wine. And we got so trashed. We couldn't even participate in anything. Like, we had to hide out in, like the wood ship. or wherever. And all of a sudden, our brothers come and they're like, hey, it's time to go home. So I don't remember any of the ride home.

No idea. I probably slept. And a few days later, here comes our uncle down the road. And we're just like, oh, my gosh. So he tells our mom that he found it. And we couldn't lie about it. So we just said, yeah, we took it to the wedding and we drank it. And she goes, all right, you guys are going to go dump the rest of it down the drain.

never make it again. Can I just say for the record? Don't ever drink bead wine. It's disgusting. It's so gross, but it did the job. I feel like that's like you can take any 16 year old, give it that story, just replace the buggy with a car and it's the same story. It's just a horse and buggy's safer than the car. Let's be honest. But the other, the other story of her and I getting in trouble and I just love this so much. We stole our Amish neighbor kids boombox. One of our brothers told us that he was hiding it in the schoolhouse. So one Sunday, we planned to go see friends of ours, and they were troublemakers. And we found out about the boom box, and so on our way there, we stopped at the schoolhouse. We had to open a window and

climb up into the window. And then from there, we had to stand on the desks in the schoolhouse to pop open the lid that goes into the attic. And there it was, a beautiful big boombox. We take it. And we take all his cassettes and CDs as well. Like literally all of it. And I think our intention was to put it back, but we didn't. And I don't think he ever found out what happened to it. But we put it on the back of our bucky. And here we have like over an hour drive to go to our friends. And we just jam out on country music. the hallway. But mom found out that we had a boombox that wasn't even ours, and she made us take it out to the burn pile and burn it. Here's the thing, though, it's not like we didn't know that there was music, because we had tons of people that came to our place to buy eggs and groceries and all that stuff.

And so we heard people driving by with loud music on all the time. So we knew there was music. We just knew we weren't allowed to have it. Same thing with TV. We knew there was. TV, we just weren't allowed to happen. Neighbors across the street were Catholic and they had 10 kids and they were all our age. We would sneak out sometimes at night and go watch TV over at their place. The first movie that I ever watched

was Eraser by Arnold Horsenegger. I just remember having this thought, like, why would you want to be a a bad guy on a movie because you just die? Like the concept of this is just acting. wasn't there. Like, you just didn't know. That's a pretty, like, intense movie for first movie. I personally can't remember my first movie. Suffice to say, it certainly wasn't the very violent

1996 film Eraser, in which Arnold plays a U.S. Marshal who works in witness protection, and he, quote, unquote, erases people. So, here's just a little scene. It's from the first two minutes of the movie, and while you listen, imagine yourself as a young Amish Lizzie, thinking that the bad guy is sacrificing his life for the good of the movie. To actually die. I mean, talk about trauma. Talk about PTSD. Ah! Nobody hides from us. Fennie, get me some ice, I think I broke my goddamn hand.

Show, boy. Just do me quick. Shit, Jennifer. But first, Mr. Canelli wants a little souvenir. Close your eyes. Who are you? Shut up. Will it be back?

All right. So if you're Amish and you're listening and you make your own clothes, you can... You are going to hell because you... First off. How did you get an iPhone? Right. But also, you can skip this ad because you can go. You can go iron your own clothes that you made.

But if you're not Amish and you want clothes that feel quality and like you made them from luxury fabric. Well, we have something for you. And you all know what it is, but we'll say it anyway. It's quince. Quince. And guess what? You can get multiple dresses at quince, not just one for Sunday and one for the week, but multiple without paying the multiple dollar sign price tag. Boom. If you've listened to this show, you've heard us say the name quince before. We do like it. I'm not just saying that. I like it. I go there when I need clothes. I go there when I need adult stuff. Like, what kind of adult stuff do you need? I don't know. Candles. Dude, their candles are so good. Yeah, they have great things. Suitcases? I got my son

a suitcase from Quince. He still loves it. It's multi-colored. I feel like I just walk around and I'm a walking Quinn sat. I was at the doctor the other day. I had my zip up that I'm currently wearing, actually. And the nurse was like, where did you get your sweatshirt? And she's like, is it insert name here that I'm not allowed to say because we can't. But it's an elevated workout where I'll just say that. And I was like, no, this is Quince. And she was like, really? And I was like, yeah.

And I've washed it multiple times already. She was like, no way. I was like, way. And she literally said these words, it is such nice fabric. I mean, first off, it's nice to be let in on what women talk about when men aren't around, other than talking about us, naturally. Yeah. The girls' locker room is really, really, really gross and dangerous.

Did you tell her that they cut out the middleman and work directly with ethical factories to keep prices? About 80 to 50% less than similar brands, Liz? I did not go into all that, no. Did you say refresh your every day with luxury you can actually use? Did you tell her to head to quince.com slash cult for free shipping on her order, Liz, and 365-day returns? I didn't even tell her it was available in Canada. It is available in Canada. You failed to let her know that.

I did actually tell her that. Oh, that's good. For some reason. Did you let her know that it's spelled Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash cult for free shipping and 365-day returns? Repeat after me, quince.com slash cult, everyone. All right, we'll go back to the doctor, let her know. I will. She's like, what's available in Canada?

My mind definitely did wander. I was curious. I said to myself, I don't want to be here, and I could never see myself as a married Amish woman with a bunch of kids. We were not allowed to hug and kiss. We were never told, I love you. Like, even just normal things like, excuse me, thank you. That wasn't really verbiage that was used.

And I just remember our neighbors were not Amish. And sometimes I would see them give each other a hug and a kiss. And I remember one day going, like, if I can't do that to my future husband, if I want to, like, I don't want to be Amish. And so there was that. And then we would get these Chazy Penny magazines. And I would look through the women's section and be like, oh, I want to wear that. Our neighbor later, she would wear this long red petticoat.

in the winter. And I was like, man, I want to wear a piti code. That's what I wanted to wear. So what were you told what happened if you left? You know, you've turned you back on God and you're going to go to hell. So that's why to them it's death. Like they mourn you. That's the worst thing that you can do other than like committing murder, leaving the homage is like second. But yet because of the religion and the rules of the church and if you do something wrong, that's where the guilt and the shame comes in. And so if you're an angry person, if you put your clothes on wrong, if you disobey the orders of the church, if you talk back, like any of those things could get you cast out of heaven. But if you are someone like me who always questioned things and was like, no, I'm not okay with this. there's more to this life and I know I don't belong here,

but I don't understand what I'm supposed to do because you can't tell anybody what you're thinking. Because if you tell somebody, they're going to go tell your parents, and then your parents are going to have a sit down with you and make you feel even more guilty. So this is something that you don't really think that would be a thing in the community, body shaming, dieting, or eating, per se, but because I was a twin and I was bigger than she was when we were born from that

moment on, we got compared to each other. And when I was a teenager, I would get bullied for my weight because I was heavier than she was. And so what that ended up doing is leading me into what I now know as a massive eating disorder and body dysmorphia like none other. And what I did, because I was determined to get myself smaller than my twin to prove myself. And it's funny to think about being obsessed with your body as an Amish woman. All you're doing is covering everything up with a dress and pins. That's crazy, but it happens. So what I did is I was starve myself and just eat very little, but I also physically made myself smaller. Like I would curl myself up in a little ball sitting on a chair to any table I was sitting at really, I would hunch over to make myself as small as I possibly

could. And then I just told myself that I will work harder than anybody else. So I'll put my head down and I'll work. And I don't know where I got this idea that working harder is going to make me smaller. I didn't know anything about calories and burning calories and exercise. But I just at that in my head. And so along with that came a lot of health issues. I became anemic. I had like incredibly bad periods. So it was horrible. But you know, a lot of times they say eating disorders are about control. And if you're in an environment where everything is out of your control, meaning every decision is made for you. Do you think part of that expression was like a way that you had control over something in your life?

That's a good question. I never thought of it in that way. Yeah, you have little control of everything else in your life. You're told what to do, what to wear, how to be, who to be. But nobody can tell me if I eat too much or eat to not to eat. If anything, they're going to tell you to eat, that's a great point. So Lizzie is going along with her great big family, still young and innocent, when something completely tragic rocks.

her world. So when I was 13, at this point in time, my dad is a preacher in the Amish church. And normally when you're a preacher in the Amish church, you people kind of don't like you. But he was different. He was a beautiful soul. And people liked him. I love my dad. He was funny. He had a sense of humor. He could say the funniest joke ever and not even crack a smile. So October 28th, 1998, he had planned to go make apple cider. And so what he would do is he would take the open bucket and take a whole bunch of milk cans along. And then he would go to somebody's apple orchard and pick all the apples that day and then go to the cider place and make apple cider and put them in the stainless steel milk cans and then bring it home. so then we would can the cider or we would use it to make vinegar.

And I just remember, so it was a school day, and I remember that morning, he was in a really good mood. It was a beautiful day. And my twin and I are in the wash house and we're choking around, oh, hey, we get all a lot of chores done before dad leaves. Maybe he'll let us write to school. And he was outside the door and he hurt us. So he busts through the door and he like starts teaching. us about this whole thing. And he didn't say whether or not he would, but he continued to get

ready. We did our thing. And then we go upstairs to change into our school clothes to leave, and we get to the hall window, which was towards the road. And we're like, oh, no, he already left because we saw him going up the road. And so we opened the window and we yell his name. And he looks back. We wave at him and he waves back and he has like this huge smile on his face and I think got so much for that moment I really really do so that night when he was on the way home it was getting dark they don't have the best lighting on their buggies and there was a drunk driver ran into the back of his bucky he was doing like 80 miles an hour and um my dad flew up so high into the air that the driver of the truck ran through the ditch before he hit the ground.

So then the horse was killed, the buggy was demolished, and it happened right in front of an Amish farm. And the lady, like, runs out to find him, like, face down in the ditch, and he made this, like, moaning sound. And so she pulled the grass away from his face so that he could move. breathe better. Ambulance came, so they took him to the nearest hospital. He had no broken bones in his body. The only thing that he had was one of the cans on the back of his buggy. We believe it hit the back of his head. And it created this massive blood clot on his brain. So they had to decide whether or not they do surgery to take this blood clot off. the brain because chances were he might have a stroke, he might never wake up from that.

So they ended up making a decision to do the surgery and they did the surgery. For a while there, they just couldn't stop the bleeding. Like they thought he was going to bleed out. But then eventually, like, they got it to stop and he was stabilized. And that was early morning hours. And then all day, Friday, all of us kids went to the hospital, saw him. still very vivid memory of that. No responsive, like nothing.

And then we went home. I just remember being in these days of like, surely he just has a broken arm and he'll be fine. That's what you tell yourself. And then Saturday morning, seven in the morning and this big hospital van, just pulls into the driveway and my grandparents and my mom and all my aunts and uncles, it's like you just know.

He passed away early Saturday morning. What's really beautiful about the Amish community is within hours of them coming back from the hospital and saying he's gone, is the entire community comes together. And they do a three-day viewing. So they cook the food, they prepare the place, they do all of that. And so that is a very beautiful part about the community. And then they have the funeral. But I just remember being in this place of, like, I can never be happy again.

First of all, it took me a very long time to accept the fact that my mom's a widow. I'm like, no. And then second, to be happy, if someone saw me laughing or smiling, I was afraid that they would think I forgot about my dad. We were allowed to cry. We were allowed to talk about it and all of that, but there's no therapy to understand all of this. The driver left the scene and he didn't have insurance. He had just gotten out of prison for something else. And he ended up turning himself in because it made national news.

And there was a manhunt for him. So, dad's dead, the horse is dead, the bug is demolished. And here we have a massive hospital bill. Moms left with 18 kids at home. What people from the English world, as they call it, what they did is they ended up putting buckets out in the community all over. And because it made national news and people knew, about this donation book at banks, at grocery stores, at literally anywhere. And to this day,

my mom has never told me how much money came in from that. But I remember when that money came in, it was enough money to pay off the hospital bill and to pay off the farm. And for months, I don't even know how long. We get letters and cards in the mail every single day with money and carts, condolences, all that stuff. And then what else ended up happening is the old order and the new order Amish. Like, they would just bring in, like, truckloads of groceries and food. And our whole basement and attic were full of all this stuff. We couldn't even use it all.

That's the story of my dad. I've told that story about my dad before and didn't cry. But you know what crying means? It means your heart's open. You can feel it. things because for a long time I couldn't feel things. That's what makes you human. Were you able to mourn? We were able to mourn. Like we, we would cry, we would talk about it. But my mom, she just put her head down and she tried to manage things the best that she could. And I can't imagine the amount of times

she just had moments to resolve of weeping. My mom never remarried. And, I can't imagine the amount of time. I can't imagine the amount of time. She just had moments to resolve of weeping. my mom never remarried. And the reason that I believe that they really did have true love is because she just, she's like, I could never marry anybody else. So that was when I was 13. And I don't think I really thought about actually leaving until I was 15, somewhere between 15 and 16. So at 13, Lizzie loses her father.

By 15, she's thinking about how to get out. and by 19, she's acting on it. And I grabbed a few things. A flashlight, I had $20. That was it. And then I wrote a note to my mom. And I said, this has nothing to do with anybody here, but I have to go. And like I walk over to the window and I climb out onto the roof because I'm going to

jump off this roof and it's like a 15 foot roof. As I'm climbing out onto this window, There's a dock underneath on the porch and he just starts barking. I'm like, fuck. I'm like caught. All of this. Plus, you get to hear about the Amish term bundling. Oh, yes.

Bundling. It's so good, which I will explain why it is similar to Mormon floating, if you know that term. Cults need to stop coming up with their own language. if they don't want to be called Colts. You got to name it something. I'm going to go soak after this. I don't know if you know what soaking means. With all my clothes on.

I don't think you're using the term soaking. I'm going to go tea bag myself. Again, I don't think you're talking about tea. I know you want tea, but. I'm going to go stick a tea bag in my large cup. Happy 12th birthday, Todd. Sip the

while I s'-h-h-in-the-tub with all my clothes on. Lizzie's book, everyone, is called Amish Renegade, the anthropology of an Amish girl turned global CEO. You can get the book in our show notes, and if you buy it before next week, why, I mean, you can read it. Find out how it ends before anyone else does. Does she get out of the cult?

Or doesn't she listeners? You tell us. Lizzie, I got to just shout out. I loved our time together. So thank you. And thank you to you, our listeners. We love you. And please continue to like and subscribe

and all that dumb stuff that you have to do that helps us. Help you, help us, help you, help us. Help Lizzie and cults. Help Lizzie. And tell your friends about us. We really appreciate that. It means everything.

It really does. And now Tyler has a line that he wrote that I didn't know where to put in the script, but I didn't want to cut it because I knew he really wanted to say it. I didn't know where to put it, but I didn't. The process goes that, you know, Liz does an interview most of the time, and she dump trucks this long interview on me. Just go and read the line. And then I write the script and I'll, like, do the first part of the script.

and I just had a funny line that it was. You had a line and I knew if I cut it, you'd be sad. And I said, I would have forgotten. I totally forgot. I don't know where to put the line. It was nothing is a miss about this former Amish. It's not that good. It's worth it.

Say it again. Nothing is a miss about this former Amish. Was Anna Colt is written, produced and hosted by Tyler, once a week Saturday bath mesem. Except we know you don't take a bath. Once a week Saturday shower.

Remember Lizzie only takes a bath every once a week. I know. Once a week. Yeah, which is more than I ever take a bath. Can say. And Liz, beat wine hangover, Ayakuzi. Oh, that beat wine hangover is nasty.

And Rob, Peach Pie for Lunch, Pair.