High-control religion is not only reshaping our families. They’re also changing our politics, laws, and elections. And what many don’t realize is that Christian fundamentalists want to govern our country the way they govern their homes. No one knows that as well as the wives and children of the patriarchs––but these citizens of fundamentalism aren’t allowed to speak.

Have you:

• watched your loved ones sink further into high-control religion and felt powerless to help them?
• had experiences at church that feel traumatic?
• struggled to overcome the grooming and training of a religious childhood that doesn’t serve you now?
• felt triggered by headlines and cultural news but can’t understand why?
• felt distressed at the changes happening in America and wondered how are we going backward?

I can help.

Hi, I’m Tia Levings

I shine a light on the abuses in Christian Fundamentalism and reveal how they impact our headlines & culture today.

My memoir, A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy, is coming out with St. Martin’s Press in 2024.

Welcome to my work.

I’m so glad you’re here.

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I believe knowledge is power. And I can tell you what the Christian Patriarchy doesn’t want you to know.

Because I was one of them, once––a woman who chose against herself to perpetuate their system. When I was excommunicated and shunned, and then escaped the violence with my life and my children, I made myself a promise:

I’d tell my story one day. I’d tell as many who would listen what it’s really like to live in fundamentalism.

Because stories like mine offer insight into where America is heading.

Fundies (a shortened nickname for “Fundamentalist”) keep women busy having and caring for babies. She’s a “keeper of the home.” If her world is small and simple, the rest of their governing goals will fall into place without her opposition. As a fundie wife, I wasn’t allowed to vote, drive, or spend without permission. I couldn’t say no, use birth control, or get a divorce. Sharing my story has proven what I never knew when I was locked inside: I was not alone.

Along with books like Uncultured, Educated, Cultish, and Jesus and John Wayne, cult-exposing content is popular. Dissent: The Radicalization of the Republican Party and The Making of Biblical Womanhood; cult documentaries like The Cult Next Door, The Way Down, Join Us, and Lula Rich; movies like Jesus Camp, and the startling near-future of The Handmaid’s Tale, are giving American audiences pause about what kind of Christians live next door. 

I open that door. My work reveals what it’s like inside a fundy home––reality without TLC’s cheerful narrator and gaslighting editor. But I made it out of that life. I’m committed to growth, empowerment, and connection. I don’t want to stop at just surviving trauma…I believe we are to thrive.

Your story matters to me.

It’s agonizing to watch a loved one descend into a cult. To see our country restrict hard-fought freedoms and move backward in time. But that’s by design.

The messages flood my inbox and social media: 

“I was raised this way too. I’m the oldest of 13 and I was their second mom from the time I was 9.”

“My parents spanked me until I was eighteen.”

“My mom died when I was 16. I’ve always thought it was from exhaustion. She had 12 kids in 12 years.”

“I was horrified when TLC put the Duggars on TV. That was my life! Set to cheerful music with a gaslighting narrator!”

“I always thought there was something off with that show. You’re helping me understand why.”

“I have a close family member caught up in a church like that. You’re helping me see why they’re under so much control.”

See @tialevingswriter on Instagram, Tiktok, and Facebook

Are you healing from religious trauma and Christian Fundamentalism? Here’s a list of Religious Trauma Resources that helped me.

See my other work here.

THE HAPPY DAYS: Healing on Purpose. Reclaiming Joy.

After a lifetime of “suffering for Jesus” and waiting for heaven in order to be happy, I now embrace my life for what it is and I live in the present. No bypassing, no wishful denial, no toxic positivity.

It turns out, dear fellow exevangelical, that life on the outside is full of ups and downs without any magic formula for happiness. Healing requires bulldog devotion and a multi-faceted strategy for trauma healing. This happy days project is just one light-hearted attempt to nurture joy within me.

There’s a highlight under my profile on Instagram of the first time I did this—a photo project to document a happy moment in each day for a hundred. My rules:

🌞use my big camera on a timer. Catch myself in the act of being happy
🌞no selfie poses or looking straight at the camera
🌞I must be in it

I blew the top off my definition of happiness and what it looks like, what conditions it requires to exist, and how I’m impacted by actively waiting for “the happy moment of the day.” I discovered a new depth of gratitude. And I created a stack of some of my favorite photographs that I put in a book and regularly return to with love.