Perfect Prey: Dr. Christine Cocchiola on Coercive Control

[00:00:00] The views and opinions expressed by a little bit culty are those of the hosts, and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast. No they don't. Any of the ridiculously thought-provoking content provided by our guests, bloggers, sponsors,

[00:00:14] or authors are of their opinion and are not intended to malign any religion group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone or anything. Also, we're not Dr. Psychologists or her supreme holiness, Gwyneth Peltrow. Goop! Just two mortals trying to make a gluten-free, holistically helpful podcast that helps inform

[00:00:30] and entertains and maybe moisturizes silky silky smooth. Hey everybody, Sarah Edmondson here, and I'm Anthony Ames, aka Nippy, Sarah's husband, and you're listening to A Little Bit Culty, aka ALBC, a podcast about what happens when devotion goes to the dark side.

[00:00:58] And back again, a little about us, true story, we met and fell in love in a cult. And then we woke up and got the hell out of dodge. And the whole thing was captured in HBO docu-series The Vow, now in its second season.

[00:01:11] I also wrote about our experience in my memoir, Scarred, the true story of how I escaped next to him, a cult that bound my life. Look at us, couple of married podcasters who just happened to have a weekly date

[00:01:22] night where we interview experts and advocates in things like cult awareness and mind control. Wait, wait, this does not count toward date night bait. We got to schedule that that's separate. So it's two days? We got to hang on?

[00:01:33] We do this podcast thing because we learned a lot on our exit ramp out of Nexium, still on that journey, and we want to pay the lessons forward with the help of other cult survivors and whistleblowers. We know all too well that culty things happen.

[00:01:45] It happens to people every day across every walk of life. So join us each week to tackle these culty dynamics everywhere from online dating to mega churches and multi-level market. This stuff really is everywhere. The cultiverse just keeps on expanding and so are we.

[00:02:00] Welcome to season five of A Little Bit Cultie, serving cult content and word salads weekly on your favorite podcast platforms. Learn more at alittlebitculti.com. Welcome back everybody. Welcome back guys. I'm so excited because I have to stop using the word excited.

[00:02:34] I'm so jazzed, super jazzed, super pumped. I really nailed that one. Jazz reminds me of jazz hands. He's doing jazz hands too. It's just hard to get in there. It's hard to segue. It's hard to segue in the domestic abuse, isn't it?

[00:02:56] Coercive control, which is a word that we've been using a lot since we started this podcast. But we realized we actually hadn't talked about what it actually means. This podcast should have been on our first season. It really should have been on the first season.

[00:03:09] So our apologies has taken us this long. But our guest today is talking about coercive control and that is her expertise. Also domestic abuse. Domestic abuse has become a pretty commonplace topic, which is both good and bad because domestic abuse, any form of abuse is terrible.

[00:03:26] We talk about it because it's prevalent. But conversations around domestic abuse is positive. And perhaps a more recent occurrence than one might think are historically the topic has been somewhat hush-hush because of gaslighting. Have you heard about gaslighting lately? Yes.

[00:03:39] The number one looked up word in Miriam Webster's dictionary. I blame you, sir. Thanks. Classic Darbo. That's gaslighting. We'll get into that later. And actually like what 13,000 people messaged us that meme. So thank you. I think that's a good thing that gaslighting has become more commonplace.

[00:03:56] I hope the word doesn't get weaponized, though. Yeah. Like narcissists. It's kind of like a lot of, yeah, like all this stuff. Nick, did you know that it wasn't explicitly illegal in the US for husbands to beat their wives until the 1920s? That's nuts.

[00:04:11] Moreover, it wasn't into the 70s that states began actually criminalizing acts of violence by men against women. And now that Roe versus Wade is gone. Who knows what's next? More on that later. The conversation around domestic abuse has also highlighted the different forms

[00:04:25] of which you can take place. That's part of what our guest today, Dr. Christine Coachiola is here to talk about. Dr. Coachiola is a coercive control advocate, researcher, educator and survivor. She's currently a college professor teaching social work at the Connecticut

[00:04:39] College System, as well as an adjunct instructor at NYU. She is the creator of the protective parenting program, which specializes in helping mothers in healing their children when the kids are victims of coercive control. So what exactly is coercive control? And how does it play out?

[00:04:52] Luckily, Dr. Coachiola is here to enlighten us. Without further ado, enjoy. All right, welcome, Dr. C. We've been talking about doing this for a long time and appreciate your patience with us as we've been moving and rescheduling and kids sick and God knows what.

[00:05:17] But you're here and that's what counts. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. Sarah and I were discussing, we know you're an expert and you're also a survivor. So we'd like to hear how you got in, how you got out

[00:05:27] and how did you get here? What brought you to this point? When did you actually begin to realize you were a victim of a narcissistic course of controller and had that lead to your work today? So I met my ex-husband when I was 16 years old

[00:05:42] and fell madly in love with him. And I was reading Scarred, Sarah's book and just thinking about how I had just this really loving family system and we were taught to be kind and forgiving. And I think that a lot of people who end up

[00:05:58] in these relationships actually are, I call it perfect prey. I'm actually hoping to publish a research study on the idea that there are just some people who are set up in this way to be the perfect person for a narcissistic abuser.

[00:06:11] So I was with my ex-husband for 27 years. I hadn't really dated anyone else and was in love with him. He was in love with me. Oh my gosh. Like when I look back now, there was just so much immediate love. I was put on a pedestal.

[00:06:28] I was everything to him and we dated for seven years and had an idealic wedding and about eight years later had children. And in the meantime, I was always working one full-time job and one part-time job, always trying to ensure that we had, you know,

[00:06:45] the thing is what we know about course of control is 99% of victims suffer financial abuse and financial abuse can look a lot of different ways. But in my case it was about, you know, you work extra hours and then we can have all these things that we want

[00:06:59] because I'm busy doing these other important things. And the relationship I would say relatively seemed happy and seemed good until I began to notice that I was being diminished in front of my children. There was some counter-parenting going on

[00:07:14] at a very young age when they were very young and I just didn't understand it. And I know that a lot of people talk about one parent being the fun parent and one parent being the disciplinarian. And I kind of chalked a lot of that up

[00:07:26] to that normal conversation that people have, but it kept getting worse. And I should mention that at the age of 19, I began becoming a social justice advocate. I became a certified domestic violence sexual assault crisis counselor. I was very interested in child welfare and domestic violence.

[00:07:45] And I still continue that work today. And I guess what I would say is that even though there were all of these little tiny nuanced behaviors as someone working in the field, teaching on the power and control wheel every single semester in my social work classes,

[00:08:02] I teach college classes full-time and never really recognizing that this could be going on in my own home. And I think that when we think about these abusers, of course there's a spectrum. And I believe in my particular case, he was very good at keeping it so covert

[00:08:20] that I couldn't put my finger on it, even though I was helping victims all of the time. Even though there was no physical violence, right? I had caught him cheating once and thought that that was it. And I wanted to believe by the way

[00:08:35] that he was a good human being. I didn't want to believe the cognitive dissonance was so extreme. I just wanted to believe that he was and he was a great dad, I thought. I thought he was a wonderful dad with our children. I just couldn't understand why,

[00:08:50] when maybe mom would dance in the kitchen, instead of him saying, look how adorable your mom is. He would say, look at how funny your mom dances. And if I became defensive, then I was accused of being defensive, being too sensitive, being too emotional.

[00:09:06] And I learned very quickly to not dance. I learned very quickly, cannot be argumentative if I disagreed with something he said. So what I talk about in the research study I did is that victims learn very quickly that they either leave,

[00:09:23] if they think they actually know something is wrong or that their boundaries have to keep getting closed in on them. But they cannot retain the boundaries that would be healthy. And so to cliff note this a little bit, I think I had a couple of aha moments.

[00:09:38] One day I was teaching in class, the power and control wheel have been doing it for like 15 years at that point. And just had this moment of, wow, it's not physical, but is there psychological abuse going on? Is there manipulation and gaslighting going on that I'm not noticing?

[00:09:55] There was that. And then what I recognized at the end of the relationship is that if I didn't leave the counter parenting was so significant. I had a beautiful baby girl and my son, but my daughter was really very much, could not display love and affection for me.

[00:10:15] She really couldn't. And I realized that if I stayed, I wanted to stay for her, but if I stayed that I might lose her entirely. And so really he was the reason why I left not him. And then when I left,

[00:10:30] that's when the post separation abuse was so horrifying. If he had not been so bad post separation because he was begging me to come back, but if he had not been so bad post separation I might still be with him. I tell people that because he started sending

[00:10:45] about 300 emails a day, 10 were, I love you, you're my soulmate. How could you do this to our family? Please come back. Let's get therapy. And the other 290 were, you're unlovable. No one will ever love you. Your children will see you for who you are.

[00:11:01] And it took me 13 months to go to the police with that. And when I went to the police, I walked into the police to make my complaint. And I had 3 officers come into the room, the interviewing room.

[00:11:13] And I was with my best friend who is a police officer from another town. She came with me, we left my car at a commuter lot because we knew, I know he had my car tracked. He would know where I was all the time.

[00:11:23] Come to find out he had my computer hacked. He had my phone totally accessed for at least 5 years. But when we walked into the police, I had 3 officers standing over me. And I started to describe and had my flash drive of the 3000 harassing emails.

[00:11:39] And I never replied to him. I knew then to disengage. I had figured out to disengage. And one officer accused me of cheating on him. The other officer said, oh, you're the woman who's using all of your family's money on the divorce. I had just filed.

[00:11:54] No money had been used yet. And the other officer said, we're not here to take complaints that are trivial. He had been friends with all 3 of them. She knew the police. He was going out regularly to a local cigar bar.

[00:12:07] And he had told me that if you ever call the police, I'm friends with all of them. Because a couple of times I had threatened that. And I did call the police a couple of times. One time, like 5 years before he had thrown

[00:12:18] all of my clothes out of the closet because he accused me of cheating on him, which I never did. He accused me of cheating on him because he saw an interaction between a friend of mine from high school and we were gonna go out for a drink.

[00:12:31] And he was away and had left our family when my son had been not feeling well and my son had Lyme disease. And he had seen this interaction. And in the interaction, I clearly state, I would never cheat on my husband if this is totally platonic.

[00:12:44] I'm happy to go out and get a drink with you. And that was how it was left in the cat. But then my ex accused me of that, threatened my life, said he was going to slit my throat,

[00:12:55] left a voicemail at my work, and I still forgave him. I still went back to him after that incident. So the divorce was relatively quick because I walked away from everything. I actually, he started locking me out of my own home and the police would not get involved.

[00:13:09] I couldn't go into my home. I left with the items in the trunk of my car and had an adorable apartment that I now call home. And I think the worst part of it, and I'll promise to finish up, but the worst part is that he had attempted

[00:13:25] to alienate me. He used my children as proxies against me. They were now 19 and 17. And they, you know, to come to my house or go to the beautiful home we had built, right? To stay like, they were in college or getting ready for college.

[00:13:39] This was all like during that process. My son was in college. And then when COVID hit, a lot of people I know have tragic experiences with COVID, but I would say that COVID saved my life because they came home. And when they were going between both homes,

[00:13:55] they would come and see me. He started, when he did this to me by the way, he turned off the electricity in the garage so they couldn't leave with the car to see their mother three miles down the road. He would hide the car keys.

[00:14:06] He of course had such a false narrative about me that they were so confused. And I quickly put on my clinical hat as a therapist and recognized that the most important thing I could do for them was provide a safe haven, a calm environment,

[00:14:22] a place where I didn't talk badly about him even though, oh my gosh, I was so betrayed and felt so horrifying. The trauma was significant, but they were suffering cognitive dissonance. They were suffering it. So the good news is,

[00:14:35] is that they unfortunately see him clearly for who he is. They understand narcissism. They are proud of me. I had just received my doctorate. They came to my presentation. My son said, mom, you took a personal injustice and made it a societal justice. My daughter sees it clearly

[00:14:54] and it's heartbreaking and such a betrayal. So that's my story. I mean, I always made this my life's work. I was always working for victims, but now it's like, now, oh man. I always say the guy who he's had an affair with

[00:15:09] for over 10 years now, they were having an affair and I'm sure she's heard such a false narrative about me, the husband reached out to me. This was another affair. Like I of course found out he had multiple affairs. And the guy said, yeah,

[00:15:21] he told me not to reach out to you three years ago because he said you don't wanna poke that dragon. And I kinda like that, because he poked a dragon now. He has no idea. He does have an idea actually. He knows exactly what I'm doing.

[00:15:34] I didn't realize this was also recent. Yeah, neither. Divorce was final in 2019. Sorry that happened and thank you for sharing. Oh, sure. Yeah. I will say Sarah, I think Sarah can agree with being someone who is working with people in the very thing that you didn't recognize

[00:15:49] was going on to you. Sarah and I had a moment when we left just to relate to your story. It's we could tell when everyone was in a cult or in something coercive ourselves and we would actually arrogantly roll our eyes without what they were doing.

[00:16:05] Like if it was another program or something like that. Meanwhile, we were probably in one of the more abusive ones which I think is a testament to a cognitive distance that you speak to and just how hidden it can be. And you feel foolish at the same time

[00:16:19] but also like, wow, it's really, it's a real thing. Right, right. And that's why I feel like I do tell my story because I feel like if it happened to me, I'm not suggesting I'm better than other people. No, no.

[00:16:34] God, I was teaching on it every freaking semester. I was working with victims and survivors in my volunteer work for a local agency. I mean, in other words, I think it can happen to anyone. Yes, yes. It can. That's why talking about this is so vital.

[00:16:48] We literally had a class about cults and how to know what a cult is. Oh my God. Using fear, using fear and dependency and just the word, you know, anyway. I'm glad we're laughing at it. You know, we actually recorded an episode with Diane Dirks about parental alienation.

[00:17:08] Is she on your radar? She's not. She's not. Yeah, there's a lot of divisiveness in the field about the term parental alienation. So yeah. And that doesn't mean she's not doing fantastic work. I just, we try to use, some of us in the field

[00:17:22] try to use domestic abuse by proxy. And yeah, that's a whole nother podcast, by the way, to talk about unpacking that concept. Sure. Can you define coercive control and what it means? What we know now in the field is that coercive control is the foundation

[00:17:41] of literally any kind of abuse. So it's certainly the foundation of most domestic abuse, for sure, because situational violence is something that occurs very rarely and it occurs when perhaps two people have a maladaptive coping that is anger.

[00:18:00] And so they might hit or push when they're angry, right? But coercive control is everything else and it's based on this power and control and what I think you guys are trying to highlight and so many people are now

[00:18:13] is that coercive control happens in systems all of the time. And it is how people have power over others, power over. And so what I always tell my clients is that our goal is to have personal power in relationships, that's not a bad thing.

[00:18:30] That's a really good thing. But when there's inequality in a relationship and we see this, of course, I mean things like racism, like this is an example of coercive control. And so what we know is that it's often non-physical and that it is a psychological harm.

[00:18:48] And actually in the field, there's a lot of research that talks about it as psychological maltreatment, not even just psychological abuse because psychological abuse, abuse actually means something that is overt, something that we can see. And neglect, like when we think about child abuse, right?

[00:19:05] Neglect is usually something that we can't see and we call it an act of omission because someone didn't actually supposedly, supposedly by the way, intend to harm someone where abuse is usually intentional. And so maltreatment covers both abuse and neglect and it is something that impacts

[00:19:25] and I also try to vary away from emotional abuse. And I'll tell you why, because emotional abuse is something that harms me emotionally. It makes me afraid, it makes me anxious at all of those things that are going on. But psychological, when we use that term,

[00:19:40] it actually encompasses trauma on the brain. So it not only impacts my anxiety level, my fears, my sadness, those things, but it also we know is actually changing the brain. Like literally the organ of the brain is changing. That's fascinating. And so yeah, I mean,

[00:20:01] it truly is remarkable when we, and I'll just segue for a moment into this whole idea, which is really my area of focus is the impact on children, right? So when children are coercively controlled, how the developing, like you guys went into this horrible experience,

[00:20:21] but you were both adults when you went into it, imagine a child and the developing brain actually being put into that kind of circumstance and how much trauma and longstanding impact that has. So the psychological maltreatment or abuse, as a lot of people call it is the gaslighting,

[00:20:41] is manipulation, intimidation, isolation, threatening behavior, diminishing you as a person, taking away your autonomy. Dr. Evan Stark calls it unknowing what we know. Isn't that so true? I got chills when you say that and everything you just said in case our audience hasn't connected the dots yet,

[00:21:01] but all those things are the same thing that a cult leader does. Exactly. Cult of one. Trauma in the brain. Yes, and unknowing what we know. Unknowing what we know, it's like that's exactly, we've always called it dismantling our intuition that we felt our intuition got dismantled.

[00:21:17] That's a lot of valuable language to things that a lot of people don't have language for. Yeah, it truly is about like linguistically connecting people to their experiences. So he has another great quote that I'll share with you. It's like carpenter ants in a house slowly devouring.

[00:21:36] Like you don't even know it's going on. You don't even see it. You don't hear it, you don't see it, you don't know what's going on, but then the foundation falls. So it's a stripping away of your autonomy and that happens of course in domestic violence

[00:21:53] where one person has a position of power over you. That is exactly what happened in my situation. Just slowly eroding away. And I don't even like to say self-esteem because frankly, I had great self-esteem in my career. It's a great distinction, yeah.

[00:22:10] So some people may have some self-worth issues. That's certainly true. And I always say self-worth is a continuum. Listen, I may have low self-esteem in a crowd maybe, but not in my like work in a classroom or something which I don't have no self-esteem in a crowd

[00:22:24] by the way, pretty social. But anyway, the point is that it's a continuum and it's not a blanket effect. But these abusers are actually just taking away our ability to know who we really are. Who am I? I no longer know, I think I'm a bad mother

[00:22:45] or I think that I need to really enhance my maybe in your case acting skills or creative skills or whatever it is instead of actually knowing who we are anymore. And that's exactly their goal. This is the golden age of cult recovery.

[00:23:04] The more we speak up and share our stories, the more we realize we are not alone. Your voice and your story can empower others. This is Sarah and I'm proud to be a founding collaborator of the hashtag I Got Out movement. Learn more at IGotOut.org.

[00:23:28] This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? Maybe you never skip leg day or never miss yoga. Maybe it's getting eight hours of sleep. I mean, that's my personal and everyone's dream, isn't it? Well, I definitely have some non-negotiables. Like I'm in Vancouver right now

[00:23:45] and I'm spending literally as much time as I can outside of nature. Hashtag cold pools, hashtag crushing it. Nature is a non-negotiable. Not enough time in the fresh air and the trees around me and I start to feel not great not myself, not grounded.

[00:23:57] Therapy day is a bit like my nature walks. I try to not miss it. And I know I'm just gonna feel so much better all around if I make it a priority. I get so much out of it. It helps me put my worries and anxieties

[00:24:08] in their rightful place and helps me clear my mind so I can focus on what I really need and sometimes what I don't need. Like, I don't need to be overbooking myself just because I hate to say no to people. You know what I mean? Thanks, Therapy.

[00:24:18] Thanks for helping me see that. And if you're thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire and get matched with a licensed therapist

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[00:24:44] Visit betterhelp.com slash culti today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash culti. The Frankies were a picture perfect influencer family, but everything wasn't as it seemed. I just had a 12-year-old boy show up here asking for help.

[00:25:03] He's emaciated, he's got tape around his legs. Ruby Frankie is his mom's name. Infamous is covering Ruby Frankie, the world of Mormonism, and a secret therapy group that ruined lives. Listen to Infamous wherever you get your podcasts. Would you argue that knowing who you are

[00:25:26] is sometimes hinging on being connected to them or through their filter? If they are the person who is diminishing you all of the time, even if it's covertly, you don't even know what's going on, right? The carpenter ants kind of thing, right?

[00:25:42] If they are diminishing you all the time, then aren't they the people that perhaps you're looking for for affirmation? The crumb. A crumb. The crumb of affirmation, yeah. We've talked about that a few times in the podcast how Keith would doll out these little crumbs, little crumbs.

[00:26:01] Do you remember in season one of the vow where they had, Keith had me like up on, it wasn't stages, but it was in front of all my peers practicing the new sales pitch. You don't see the full thing, but it was going on for hours, like drills.

[00:26:12] And I was determined to not give up and not cry and not be humiliated. And I was humiliated. And then at the end he was like, good job. It was like the only time I ever got a compliment from him and it meant something to me.

[00:26:23] And I can only imagine what it was like for the women who were with him and wanting that from in some of their cases, like their lover, but also the source of fixing everything. But there was a level, I think you were susceptible to it though, Sarah.

[00:26:36] So I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, that was the level to which you were susceptible. The people who ended up being as in her circle were maybe even targeted more or more susceptible because for various case by case reasons.

[00:26:50] And I was susceptible to a different degree. Yeah, I mean, I think I was susceptible to even just being like getting on the straight path and like, and tell it to please share your analysis, Dr. C. But what I resonated with, you know,

[00:27:02] hearing some of your other interviews is that I am accommodating and I am a fixer. And so, yeah, I saw you say, I heard you say that a couple of times. Talk to us about that. Yeah, so actually the research study that I completed, it's called Perfect Pray.

[00:27:16] And the idea behind it is that, so Jeffrey Young and Janet Glasgow do this 11 Life Traps book and it talks about maladaptive coping schemas. And because we all have them, right? And so we may grow up, it may be because of our development

[00:27:32] and maybe how we're born, it might be culture, but certainly in particular for women, there is a people pleasing like just how do we make everything right? How do we fix things? And so that maladaptive coping is called subjugation, which you guys are familiar with, right?

[00:27:48] And so our people who have that as one of their traits. And by the way, Dr. Sander Brown calls it a super trait because it means that we kind of just want everyone to be happy. You know, we're not like, we're not making the neighbor cookies

[00:28:04] cause we're trying to kiss their ass. We're making the neighbor cookies cause we think it might make their day, you know? Like that's just like how it is. And so do those traits set us up to be Perfect Pray? And the answer is a resounding yes.

[00:28:19] And then would a narcissistic coercive controller ever be attracted to anyone who doesn't have those traits? First of all, if I'm a narcissist, then I don't like myself. I know that I'm not decent human being. I don't like who I am.

[00:28:34] So I'm gonna surround myself with people who I do like so I can mirror that, right? So there's that. But then am I gonna be around someone who's gonna maybe dictate to me what to do? Or am I gonna be around someone

[00:28:47] who's constantly trying to make me happy and fix things? And so, you know, young in class go talk about these like identity characteristics. It's like it's totally is people pleasing to some degree. It's giving more than taking. Think of all the people, you know,

[00:29:05] who are givers in relationships. How readily have they been harmed by other people? Be trade over betrayal trauma, right? Be trade over and over again in relationships. It's over and over. It really is. I've seen it, like it's the same thing over and over.

[00:29:20] They pick the same type partner. Probably why also people call top, right? Oh yes, yes, right. Needing to find someone else. So walk me through the perpetrator psychology. I see people that want to please, please and you just address some of it. But walk me through the impulse

[00:29:40] of abusing them in the way. Like what would someone get out of that that's so abusive? So I say this, right? Not all narcissists are coercive controllers, but all coercive controllers are narcissists. When I think of coercive control, I think of it as people in positions of power.

[00:29:59] Obviously cult leaders, people in government. I think of child perpetrators. They use the same tactics and grooming children. I used to be the educator here in the state of Connecticut on The Stranger You Know and grooming children for child perpetration, sex trafficking, all of that

[00:30:16] is literally the playbook of a coercive controller. And so why do I need to have power over others? If I'm a coercive controller, I have a character logical issues. I have a pathology that is filled with Jane. And the only way that I can feel good

[00:30:36] is if I have control over other things in life, control over people in life. And so what do I do? I find people, perfect pray, that I can actually exert this control over. And if I can't exert it over you, oh, then I'm outta here.

[00:30:52] I'm not sticking in this relationship. I'm only doing it. I mean, I think like people who left cult who were kind of considered evil by those of you in the cult, right? Like the people who decided to leave, right? Because those people had harmed his ego so significantly

[00:31:10] that he had to get revenge. And that's what I think is important for people to understand. The number one tool of all of these abusers is, and that's how we can tell the difference by the way between an abuser and a victim.

[00:31:24] I mean, we say family court can't tell the difference between abusers and victims. I'm like, the writing's on the wall. Who wants revenge? Who will do anything to harm the other person because the other person has left or disengaged or said something bad, something true about the abuser?

[00:31:43] Because that shame is something that I, as an abuser that I cannot live with. I cannot live with that shame. So I have to retaliate. That makes sense. Well, in our scenario, the legal system was abused to scratch that itch

[00:31:57] and Keith, and in fact, there's a very powerful moment in season two of The Vow where Keith says shame on you. And that's to Sarah for revealing this. Shame on the women who left. Shame on the women who broke their secret, broke their vows.

[00:32:11] You saying shame, we can get into shame and what that means if we want, but even just the term shame, if shame is the prime motivator for these perpetrators, then they must think it would be the prime deterrent for us to keep doing what we're doing.

[00:32:24] Not the case. We're not governed by shame. Oh, we felt it. Trust me. Sarah and I went down some shame spirals, but we knew it was temporary and we knew it was something that we were gonna be able to bounce back from.

[00:32:34] Well, our shame was more about joining in the first place and missing the red flags and being such zealous recruiters. Not shame for leaving. And not shame for breaking my vow of secrecy. Not shame for blowing the whistle. No, no.

[00:32:49] Well, I think he thought that would keep you in control, but it didn't, right? No, just like he thought that branding me would lock me down. Which was an attempt to shame you though, wouldn't you say? Yeah. Dr. C, you go.

[00:32:58] Well, I guess I was just gonna say that the reality is that he wanted, of course, for you to feel shame and that's we call entrapment. So if I can trap you in a relationship by making you feel that you're relying on me,

[00:33:12] like in other words, that I'm going to, if I say that you're bad, then you're gonna stay. This is what abusers do all the time in intimate partner relationships, right? And so the idea is to make you believe that you are bad. And that's what he did.

[00:33:26] Is he made you believe that other people were bad for going against him and that you would be bad if you went against him. But I guess going back to you, having shame about not seeing any of the red flags until later, they're so good at this game.

[00:33:40] It's a game of chess. They are so good at it that I think that the more that we expose that so many people miss the red flags that this is not yours to carry. I mean, that's why I think it's so important

[00:33:52] that we are open about this conversation. Absolutely. Because people leave these things and they're so ashamed and then they just pretend it never happened. I can't even tell you how many people have left with us, you know, trusted us and left with us but never addressed these things.

[00:34:06] Never. It's like, okay, that was bad and then just ignored it. And I feel like it's coming back to haunt them but that's a separate story. When you first reached out, what was it that you saw in our story that you thought we should have a conversation?

[00:34:19] I think the idea that we can be so indoctrinated in a false narrative and believe it 110%, like just believe that this is a good thing. This is a good thing. And then the dismantling of that and realizing that in that again goes back to that betrayal trauma, right?

[00:34:38] Like literally you guys were so betrayed by the system, by him, by loyalists, there's just such a betrayal. And I think, you know, going back to your shame conversation, you know, some people say to me, why are you so open about it?

[00:34:51] And so there's still people trying to shame me is the point. And so I think when you guys have the courage to have a podcast and actually talk about the insidious nature of this abuse, that resonated with me. Great, that's awesome.

[00:35:05] What would you say to the loyalists who say that I'm not the victim? Sarah is the abuser. Gosh, I mean, I think that first of all, the question is what makes you say that, right? Like from a clinical perspective,

[00:35:17] we always ask people why, like why they think that, like what makes you say that? And I guess their response would be that you turned, that you guys turned against their great leader. So for me, they need intensive therapy to discuss what their maladaptive coping is.

[00:35:33] Going back to those negative schemas that we have that we get as a result of childhood development and how we're born and culture, what are theirs that they're not willing to face? They have all of this evidence. What is it about when you have all of this factual

[00:35:48] evidence that you're still being in some ways destabilized by the abuser? You didn't think of it that way. I would want to give them intensive therapy. Hopefully we'll be sending some people your way. I mean, we haven't done our vow season two debrief on our main feed.

[00:36:06] We just did it on Patreon so far and we will, but that's one of the things that we will share is that every episode we thought, oh finally this is gonna wake them up. This, at this moment, seeing Keith leave his lifetime

[00:36:20] partner in her own feces while he eats eggs will wake them up. All these points, no, I don't see a crime. He's just a bad boyfriend. Wow, this is a very false narrative. Why did they show this part? I think at this point they've dismissed

[00:36:34] the process of accountability, not the content points. They don't address the content points of anything. They just address the messenger and the process of they go, no, no, no, they're all and they have to discredit that because if they actually listen,

[00:36:47] they have to take responsibility for their own trauma. And at this point it's kind of a revenge movement more than it is about anything on that. What's your take? Yeah, I guess I would say that at some point it becomes too painful.

[00:36:57] The pain to acknowledge that they are wrong or that he is bad is so painful that they can't. Like we see that all the time in domestic abuse too, right? People stay simply because they can't actually rationalize in their head and that A,

[00:37:12] the person is that bad and that certainly goes the case for the loyalists. I mean really, I mean some of the things that they've said and the way they've diminished his behaviors, but it's too painful for them to acknowledge that they actually fell for it.

[00:37:26] Like their egos, that's the point, right? So how healthy are their egos in order for people to engage in these kinds of relationships? To some degree, people aren't able to see their resiliency. And in the case of these loyalists, how resilient are they that they can't even acknowledge

[00:37:44] that they may have done something wrong, that that's too painful? That's a lot like a narcissist. Think about it, narcissists can never admit they do anything wrong. They can never acknowledge that they've made a mistake. And so is it that some of these people who are so loyal

[00:38:02] actually have some of these tendencies where they can't admit because that's too painful? Is that related to them being ego compromised in some way? In Nexium we called it pride issues. I remember in our conversation used the term ego resilient. What does that mean?

[00:38:19] Yeah, so Dr. Bruce Perry does some wonderful work and there's a Harvard study. And what it talks about is that we're all, think about a seesaw in the fulcrum in the middle of the seesaw, the little triangle and it goes on either side.

[00:38:30] That we're all born a little more ego compromised or a little more ego resilient. And based on our development, based on our surroundings, our environment, that's gonna be enhanced or that's gonna be marginalized. So for someone like Keith, maybe born ego compromised, maybe,

[00:38:48] and then grew up in a home, there was no ego resiliency fostered. There was none of that was fostered. So it created the monster, frankly, someone who can't deal with shame, someone who has to project all of the time, someone who certainly needs to have power

[00:39:03] and control over others to feel halfway decent as a human being. But it's the only way he feels good is to have power and control over others. And we were also told by someone who knew him at a young age that he had multiple girlfriends

[00:39:15] at the age of like 12 or 13 already. Like he started young and also was it, was like an obvious chubby or like just a nerd or like either way he didn't fit in, but found ways to like start messing with people at a very young age.

[00:39:28] Number of people around him that knew him when he was young have confirmed that. So that makes sense. Why is it that some people, when they're made fun of, when they're younger or maybe have a bad experience, don't become perpetrators? Why, right?

[00:39:42] They don't become narcissistic course of controllers because they probably were either born more ego resilient or ego resiliency was fostered in their development. And so someone like again was that like there's no excuse for abuse, right? It sounds, but there really isn't.

[00:39:59] But what is it about some people that they can have horrifying circumstances and they still are decent human beings? Right, like the way that they're loved and supported outside of those experiences. Human connection. Unconditional, what we know from the research is that having unconditional positive regard

[00:40:18] from a primary caretaker is the one saving grace for every single child that is abused or neglected in some way. Unconditional positive regard. Unconditional. So think about a course of controller as a parent, narcissistic course of controller. Their love is not unconditional.

[00:40:38] You're only loved if you give certain things. You were only a part of that cult if you guys gave what you needed. Like you followed the rules, right? And so the question always becomes for people who are wondering, am I in this kind of toxic relationship?

[00:40:55] Is does the person you're with love you unconditionally or are they using your vulnerabilities against you? Do they take your vulnerabilities and use them to harm you? Because that's all that abusers do. And that is the biggest, in my opinion, red flag.

[00:41:14] And so in the case of Keith, he probably didn't have anyone who loved him unconditionally with positive regard and or was ego compromised. Again, you can be born ego compromised and never get that love, but you get it from someplace else. Human connection with unconditional positive regard

[00:41:34] is the most important thing for healthy brain development. The most important thing. It starts with skin to skin and eye contact while breastfeeding. We learned from Dr. Ramani. I did the skin to skin part. Hey there listener. Hope you're enjoying this episode

[00:41:51] and that you're remembering to hydrate, stretch and unclench your jaws. Sometimes listening to conversations about heavy topics can really make you tighten up, you know? And remember, a little bit culty loves you. Also come hang out with us on Patreon after you finish this episode.

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[00:42:41] in our local communities at Macy's. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? Maybe you never skip leg day or never miss yoga. Maybe it's getting eight hours of sleep. I mean, that's my personal and everyone's dream, isn't it? Well, I definitely have some non-negotiables.

[00:42:59] Like I'm in Vancouver right now and I'm spending literally as much time as I can outside of nature. Hashtag cold pools, hashtag crushing it. Nature is a non-negotiable. Not enough time in the fresh air and the trees around me and I start to feel not great,

[00:43:11] not myself, not grounded. Therapy day is a bit like my nature walks. I try to not miss it and I know I'm just gonna feel so much better all around if I make it a priority. I get so much out of it.

[00:43:21] It helps me put my worries and anxieties in their rightful place and helps me clear my mind so I can focus on what I really need and sometimes what I don't need. Like I don't need to be overbooking myself just because I hate to say no to people.

[00:43:31] You know what I mean? Thanks therapy. Thanks for helping me see that. And if you're thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online designed to be convenient, flexible and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire and get matched with a licensed therapist

[00:43:45] and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge. Look, even when we know what makes us happy, it's hard to make time for it. But when you feel like you have no time for yourself, non-negotiables like therapy are more important than ever. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp.

[00:43:59] Visit betterhelp.com slash culty today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P dot com slash culty. Tell us about Darvoh. So the idea is that when she, in particular was researching children and when they are abused, what happens when the abuser,

[00:44:20] the course of controller basically denies the abuse, right? That's a betrayal. That's a trauma betrayal, right? And that what ends up happening is that oftentimes, and I think it probably is very relatable to cognitive dissonance oftentimes, there is this belief that it didn't really happen anymore.

[00:44:41] How many people do you know? Do we all know that have been horribly abused as children or maybe are still talking to the narcissistic course of controller in their life? Again, loyalists, right? Because they become blind to the betrayal because that's an easier way again to cope,

[00:44:58] to not deal with the pain, to not deal with the shame. It's all of those things. And then if you take, of course, the power over that an adult can have over a child, and that's where Jennifer Frade's original terminology came from

[00:45:11] is in these systems, how many children we can't when they've been abused, right? And so we become betrayed by the trauma of the course of controller. And they're experts at it. They are experts at it. So I imagine, and just trying to put my mind

[00:45:26] in the mind of one of these people, they probably know by looking at certain people because I'm thinking of like the profiles of some of the people that were in Key Center Circle and they have a lot of consistencies to them. And I'm just- Perfect pray.

[00:45:38] And he must know, like when he's losing them, when he's keeping them, he must know how to play it like a chess board, right? Exactly. Those again, giving characteristics, accommodating. It's just scary to know there's people out there like that and then are playing that game

[00:45:52] while you're interfacing in a kind of regular relationship and they're scheming to do that. And it's that covert, I'm pissed. Too good, right? Well, I think you bring up an important point. I think that there are more people like this than we know.

[00:46:09] They are the most, I think dangerous people on the planet. They are who is harming our children. They are in charge of sex trafficking and they are the people on control. They are doing all of these harms on humanity and we're not talking about it enough.

[00:46:26] On that line, but the question was where do you see course of control most in the world and where is it most concerning? Gosh, where do I see it most in the world? I think it's everywhere. I think that's the problem.

[00:46:36] I think that when Evan Stark originally came up with the, well he didn't, biterman did, of course. In the 1950s came up with the term course of control and when it was determined that prisoners of war would actually align with their abusers and he did the biterman report.

[00:46:54] I mean, the reality is that this is happening everywhere. It's happening in systems. In social work we call on the macro level. It's happening like in policy and governments. It's happening everywhere. It's happening in the mezzo level in between. It's happening in family court. It's happening in communities.

[00:47:12] It's happening in churches. It's happening in cults and it's happening in intimate partner relationships. It's happening everywhere. And like when you think about people in positions of power it's a lot of people in positions of power. I know. Which is scary.

[00:47:29] Okay, so if we can agree that that's the optics, right? And I think we can. The solution looks like what? Because I don't think you can enforce, you can't use laws. It's starting to. A course of control is starting to get into the legal system, right?

[00:47:44] Five out of the 50 states? It still doesn't get to the root cause of it. Like so it's gotta be something and if the solution is the human interaction part that you talk about, how could you get something in legislation or something like that?

[00:47:57] I mean enforcing compassion doesn't really kind of non sequiturs. What is the solution? I guess short question. First let's talk about the legal. It's not the solution but it will I think sway people if it is illegal because up until I think I read one of your things

[00:48:12] that five out of 50 states have nothing in course of control in the legal system but five states do. That would be part of the solution, right? So to be clear in the United States, we have five states that codified coercive controls a form of domestic violence. Got it.

[00:48:28] So that means that if I don't have a Bruce and I have 3,000 harassing threatening emails that I could actually get him charged for domestic violence prior to 2021 in the state of Connecticut, you couldn't do that. So there's now five states that actually look at non physical violence

[00:48:45] which is a start but the UK, South Wales, France right now they're all trying to criminalize coercive control which means that not only is it considered a form of domestic violence but it's also considered a criminal act and that I believe would give us leverage.

[00:49:01] How are they proving that though? Yeah, so like if you had 3,000 harassing threatening emails right, you know that would be proof if you have a history we call it vexatious litigation like in the family court system like someone who continually brings you back for pleadings

[00:49:18] or contempt charges that are false. So there's that aspect of it but how do we do this? Well, I'm gonna return back to so I actually created a program at the college where I teach words called intimate partner violence sexual assault prevention

[00:49:33] but I have one of my workshops is called Where is Your Line? Because the reality is is that if we don't start talking with young children about boundaries and what's healthy and unhealthy in relationships whether it's related to sexual coercion, physical coercion, psychological coercion

[00:49:52] these are all coercive tactics. So really for me it feels like and of course I'm an educator so I have an affinity to that but it feels like we need to begin educating more and more so that people don't get caught in cults in these kinds of relationships.

[00:50:08] I mean, you know your book Sarah details like you had these feelings right? That's an interesting conversation and I always say to like clients like we're always taught especially as women by the way to diminish the butterflies we're feeling the feelings we're having of our intuition

[00:50:24] telling us something doesn't feel right. We might be in a like a ramp garage and walking down and we might hear footsteps behind us but we don't run because we don't wanna offend the person behind us. This is how women behave like all the time

[00:50:35] we're not willing to follow our intuition because we don't wanna offend someone. I mean, right Sarah does that sound like familiar to you? Yeah. And so really what we need to do especially with our young children is say you know that feeling you have

[00:50:49] that you don't like to sit on Uncle John's lap that's a good feeling. That's an okay feeling and mommy and daddy are listening to you. We're hearing you allowing young people children to feel their intuition and not diminish it. I think it's the beginning of them

[00:51:03] seeing what a red flag is. And just to be clear, not it's an okay feeling but it's okay to express that feeling. Exactly. Yeah, the feeling itself is not okay, which is the point. Right? Exactly. Somebody told me recently they taught their kids

[00:51:15] that it was called the uh-oh feeling. And if you feel a feeling to make sure you express it and tell your parents or not necessarily the person who's giving you the uh-oh feeling. Right. And the other side to that is that the parent

[00:51:27] cannot have told the child over and over again. If you tell me that anyone ever touches you I'm going to kill them or never talk to them. Like in other words, we have to set our children up that we're safe space to tell that story too. Right.

[00:51:40] Yeah, but I mean young people, adolescents, this education about what is a red flag? What are the toxic features of relationships? Is I think the beginning, of course having it illegal would be helpful. I think the other issue is that people are not talking about,

[00:51:58] a lot of people don't talk about coercive control and they don't see it as a systemic issue and it truly is. They don't seem to understand what the real reason is they don't seem to understand what they're looking at as well. So I read your assessment,

[00:52:12] it was called the reframing of the depth herd log that you did and I'd love for you to expand on that because Sarah and I didn't really follow it. I saw a couple memes, tweets about it. I just didn't like watching a marital spute

[00:52:25] and I didn't know much about it but the superficial impression I had of it was that she was a lot of the perpetrator and then I think Johnny Depp won money, is that right? And reading your reframing of it really has some parallels between our experience

[00:52:38] and I'll let you explain it, particularly in the non-existing annihilation aspect of it. You care to explain the optics of that and how at least when I read it I felt educated and informed. Thank you, I appreciate that. Quick thing before you do

[00:52:52] because like every time we do a podcast that has like a heated topic like this, everyone's like, oh, like because there's sides, right? Everyone's so binary and I just hadn't even covered it because I didn't have deep dive. I haven't researched it myself and I still haven't.

[00:53:06] So that's sort of what I wanna preface is that this is your perspective, I wanna hear it, I'm not taking sides. I haven't done my own research yet but I wanna hear how this relates from what you learned in that case.

[00:53:19] Sure, so I would say first of all, we can agree like people who disagree with me it's absolutely fine, we can agree to disagree but the foundation of the relationship, the initiation of the relationship is based on one person having more power, having inequality in the relationship.

[00:53:37] And so Depp was much older, he had more money, fame, fortune, et cetera. And people will say, well, she took advantage of his money and she wanted all of that. And okay, maybe she did, like of course she did. Like that's irrelevant to the coercive control.

[00:53:57] It's attempt to slander her character to justify abusing her. Absolutely, and that doesn't highlight- It's not relevant. It's not relevant. It's irrelevant to the issue, it's irrelevant. Exactly, exactly. She did a lot of things, she's not the perfect victim

[00:54:10] but frankly, let me just ask, who is by the way? When people are trapped over and over and over again and if you listen to some of her audio clips, if you listen to experiences she had, she was trapped. Okay, now maybe he was trapped sometimes.

[00:54:28] Okay, fine, people wanna say he was trapped sometimes too. I would say that there was always an attempt by her to calm him down, to get him not to be upset. She actually said after she disclosed her own domestic violence, she said,

[00:54:45] let's just put this aside, let's just move on. And he did not want that. He wanted to make an example of her. And so if we think about the fact that he certainly hired with lots of money a negative social media campaign

[00:55:03] that highlighted all of the mistakes she made, then that's all that people heard were all of the mistakes she made. What people did not hear is that he threatened her constantly, constantly. He told her over and over again that she was nothing, that she was zero,

[00:55:20] that he was going to annihilate her, that he made the trial public in Virginia. He didn't have to do that. He had lost in the UK, 12 of I believe 14 counts he had lost. So this is about power and control. That's all this is about.

[00:55:37] This is about one person exerting power and control and when that person lost, they decided they were gonna exert more. And what we know about coercive control is that it intensifies post separation. It intensifies when you have gone against the coercive controller.

[00:55:56] He has every single sign of intensifying his abuse over and over again. And so he did, he's not the perfect victim. He did some pretty gross things. And I would say that interview in my world to domestic abuse, interview 100 domestic abuse victims.

[00:56:17] I'm gonna tell you that probably at least 50 of them pushed their offender back, physically pushed because when you're trapped over and over again we don't call that mutual abuse or reactive abuse. Those are misnomers, I refuse to use them. We call it defensive.

[00:56:32] You reach a point where you literally can not control yourself any longer. And that goes back to the conversation about subjugation I had earlier. What we know about people is when they're constantly over and over again attempting to try to please someone in never meeting with success

[00:56:50] that eventually they may explode. They may actually lose their ability to control themselves. And in the case of Amber, she did that. She did that. Of course she did. I did too. And it was called my temper tantrum. Well, there we go.

[00:57:07] I just wanna read this excerpt from it because I think it's great. The annihilation is exactly what a coercive controller wants. Coercive controllers want to have control of their victims. And if their victim pushes back they will do whatever they can to demoralize the victim

[00:57:20] and attempt to have them lose who they are to diminish them as a person. That describes our situation to this day in a lot of ways. I mean, they're still attempting to do that. So when I read that and read that about the depth hurt,

[00:57:33] of course you can say whatever you want about Amber Hurd but you're also seeing the second punch. You know, there's a joke in sports, you know, never hit back because the ref always sees the second punch and never sees the first one.

[00:57:44] What you're seeing is the second punch. The great sports metaphor again for the games. I always weave them in. I'm always weaving them in. That's a good one. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. That one I understand. There you go.

[00:57:54] So anyway, I just thought when I read that, you know because I hadn't gotten a strong sense of the case and by the time it's on a Twitter feed or something like that it's been politicized and polarized.

[00:58:03] So but to hear that description of it was personal to me. So thank you for that. Yeah. And I think that that's what people need to realize is that is literally what every coercive controller does. It's a playbook. Listen, everybody's story is slightly different.

[00:58:19] We all have different nuances of our story but the playbook is the same. I'm using a sports metaphor right there by the way. Thank you. Thank you. They're contagious. Yes. Yeah. So if someone is trying to get revenge if someone is trying to annihilate you

[00:58:37] if ask yourself the people you love who you know are kind of giving people is that what they do when they're upset? Is that what they try to do? Is they try to annihilate someone else? They try to harm someone else? No.

[00:58:51] They try to bring to the forefront the truth but that's not the same. Yeah. Some of the dynamics we've talked about recently with our boundaries being so crossed and how both like I'll just speak for myself like I have a sort of a PTSD startle reaction

[00:59:07] that like if even when my kids jump on me I'm like, I think I'm being attacked and I feel like sometimes Nippy has had interaction like I don't know if you wanna talk about what happened recently in it but it feels like your response

[00:59:20] you go to 100 really quick. Oh, when I feel like my boundaries are crossed like I can be totally fine when I feel like there's an infraction of my boundaries I go to zero to 10 and I'm just like I need me.

[00:59:31] It's like I gotta have whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm like back, back. My back goes up. Yeah. That's entirely what a young and class go detail in their book about subjugation right? Is that then we're percolating a little bit

[00:59:45] and then like literally the top of the percolation of the coffee pot like explodes because you're just so tired of being trapped from other experiences, whatever, right? But you're so tired of that feeling that your brain goes into reptilian mode, right?

[00:59:59] So the brain you can't cognitively process that issue and say, okay, wait a minute this person's not trying to do that to me. It's just reminding me of that other thing you're in reptilian mode so you're responding in the same way

[01:00:12] that you would if you were in a cave with a bear. Yeah, amygdala, right? Right. Amygdala hijack. Amygdala hijack. So many overlaps with little nuggets from past episodes right now that I'm linking together. I mean this is such a treat

[01:00:25] because Nipi and I get like this sort of bonus pseudo therapy. Honestly it's so informative because you've been able to turn it into really poignant wisdom to put words to like, oh my kid's not ego resilient yet or that's an area I'm not ego resilient.

[01:00:38] Like the language is valuable. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anything that you feel that we missed that you wanna share about terms of what you're doing now or what you want our audience to know? I just wanna say to all the protective parents out there

[01:00:52] who are dealing with a course of controller that I hear you and I see you. It's so painful what happens to our children by a narcissistic course of controller makes me tear up, you know that you are not alone and that I would say that your children

[01:01:10] that attachment that children have to their protective parent, it never goes away. The course of controller's goal is to fracture it and he or she is working double time to do that but it's always there and I'm asking I say to protective parents just

[01:01:27] I want you to just hold tight to that. Like I actually use the analogy that protective parents are in this lifeboat in the stormy seas of the course of controller and that just keep that lifeboat there and be ready. So my heart just goes out to those parents

[01:01:41] so heartbreaking when your children have been turned against you. I'd offer that same lifeboat analogy to anyone of our listeners because many people are listening because they have friends or loved ones in cults or course of relationships of any kind. So same lifeboat metaphor is offered. Thank you.

[01:01:58] And we're gonna put a link to your resource page on our show notes. So appreciate you taking the time to explain these things to us and have such a frank conversation and also to share your story which is so heartbreaking but also so inspiring

[01:02:11] that you've turned it into this path of hope and wisdom for other people. Well, thank you. Thank you so much. You guys are doing amazing work. Appreciate it. Let's keep elevating the conversation. Absolutely, absolutely. So what'd you think, babe?

[01:02:39] I just had a lot of knowledge dropped on me. I love it when people have thought about, evolved their own trauma where they can then inform other people and I felt informed and I felt educated by her story, her experience and with the work that she's doing now.

[01:02:54] Definitely a through line in this series. Yeah, I love that she saw our story and saw that we had some congruencies and I love that those are the conversations we're having as a result. Think of us doing the same. Yeah. And anyone interested in learning more

[01:03:07] about Dr. Coachella, you can check out our website in our show notes and we'll be listing out some of the resources discussed on today's episode. And stay tuned for next week's, which is looking more into a subset of course of control specifically around what happens

[01:03:23] when parents are using course of control with a term that is a bit controversial. We'll talk about it next week, parental alienation and how that is used and how that relates to cult of one douchebaggery. Till then. See you over on the Patreon.

[01:03:39] Don't forget guys Christmas is coming up and Hanukkah, whatever you celebrate might wanna get a mug or a fanny pack or a tank top for that little bit culty fan in your life. I know I'm sure hoping to get some hint hint. What do you want?

[01:03:53] Some ALBC merch or a trip to the spot or some absence songs. Okay, don't forget to like us on Instagram, write, rate, review, subscribe, all those things. We love you guys. Bye. Singing down to the depths of the ocean Hanging on to the way to my lovely

[01:04:16] But I know I won't Hope you liked this episode. Let's keep the conversation going and come hang out with us on Patreon where we keep the tape rolling each week with special episodes just for Patreon subscribers and where we get deep into the weeds

[01:04:33] of unpacking every episode of The Val. And if you're looking for our show notes or some sweet, sweet swag or official ALBC podcast merch or a list of our most recommended cult recovery resources visit our website at a little bit culty

[01:04:46] And for more background on what brought us here check out Sarah's page-turning memoir. It's called Scarred, the true story of how I escaped Nexium, the cult that bound my life. It's available on Amazon, Audible, narrated by my wife and at most bookstores.

[01:04:59] A Little Bit Culty is a talkhouse podcast and a Trace 120 production. We're executive produced by Sarah Edmondson and Anthony Nipy Ames with writing, research and additional production support by senior producer Jess Tardy. We're edited, mixed and mastered by our rocking producer Will Rutherford of Citizens of Sound

[01:05:16] and our amazing theme song, Cultivated is by John Bryant and co-written by Nigel Asselin. Thank you for listening.