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A Q&A WITH TIA LEVINGS
Tia Levings’ memoir, A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape From Christian Patriarchy (St. Martin’s Press, August 2024), recounts her escape from the fundamentalist Quiverfull movement, a group that encourages large families and strict adherence to patriarchal roles, viewing children as “arrows” in a “quiver” for God’s purposes. This interview traces Levings’ writing journey from early online forums to viral social media content, exploring how digital platforms shaped her voice and supported her development as a writer. Dr. Tamara MC spoke with Tia about the roles of blogging, social media, and online communities in her personal healing, professional development, and eventual memoir publication.
Dr. Tamara MC: You were part of an online community called the Trapdoor Society in the late ’90s. How did this early digital experience shape your writing?
Tia Levings: In 1999, when I was about 26 and involved in the Quiverfull movement, I lacked access to alternative perspectives or a supportive community. The internet was still new, and women like me were pioneering this vast, unexplored universe of online connections. That’s when I discovered The Trapdoor Society, a web-based forum for women to discuss books, music, ideas, and beliefs. This space became a lifeline, allowing us to connect with other homeschool mothers and explore different ways of being Christian, different ways of being women.
In these early days, men hadn’t yet figured out how to control this new medium, so the internet provided us with a literal and metaphorical trapdoor—a way to escape our confined realities and explore broader horizons. We, the homemakers, were the ones doing the homework, finding the resources, and essentially running the show in homeschooling. The Trapdoor Society gave us a safe space to engage in heated discussions, challenge our narrow Christian worldviews, and explore the humanities.
Over time, this community helped many of us, myself included, break free from rigid thinking. Most of us are no longer professing Christians, having liberated ourselves through our shared curiosity and intellectual pursuits. Julie Bogart, who founded The Trapdoor Society and later launched Brave Writer, was instrumental in shaping my writing voice. On Trapdoor, I engaged in my first free writing exercises, which were critiqued by other women trying to articulate what they thought and believed. Julie’s mantra, “write bravely,” became my guiding principle, influencing not only my writing but also my journey toward personal liberation.
TMC: Your journey as a writer began with blogging. How did your blog “Living Deliberately” contribute to your development as an author?
TL: I wouldn’t be here without the internet. When blogging came on the scene around 2004, I was an immediate adopter. At the time, I was about 30 or 31 years old, and it coincided with my move out of state. I had a very organic need—I remember sitting at the table and thinking, I need to update my family. I didn’t want to send everybody a separate email, so I thought, maybe I can do it in one place. That place became a blog.
I started writing about my lifestyle as a homeschooling mom, documenting field trips with my children. It quickly became something other homeschooling moms read for inspiration, and it grew fast—really fast. The irony is, the tagline for my blog was “What if you want to change your life?”—a question that resonated deeply because, at the time, I was trapped in a life I desperately wanted to change but felt powerless to do so. My subconscious was working things out as I practiced writing and sharing my life, even though I was still constrained by the very circumstances I longed to escape.
TMC: You’ve embraced various forms of social media throughout your career. How has your approach to these platforms evolved, and how have they contributed to your writing journey?
TL: After establishing my blog, I wrote about homeschooling and my life as a young mother. As the years passed and I continued to write and engage with the online community, I began to question more aspects of my faith and lifestyle. I started connecting with trauma survivors and ex-evangelicals who were also questioning their beliefs. This transition happened gradually as I became more aware of the deep issues within the fundamentalist community that I was part of.
During this period, I started working on my book, initially framing it as a novel under a pseudonym because I wasn’t ready to fully own my story. Writing under a pseudonym allowed me to explore my experiences without the fear of exposure. But as I continued to heal and gain confidence, I realized I no longer needed that shield. My book shifted from fiction to memoir as I became more comfortable stepping into my truth.
The turning point came in 2021, when I was 48, and Josh Duggar’s trial brought national attention to the abuses within the Quiverfull movement—the same group I had been a part of. The Duggar family, often seen as a model Quiverfull family, mirrored much of what I had experienced. As the story gained traction in the media, I felt compelled to share my own experiences more publicly. I began creating reels on social media, sharing my insights and exposing the reality of life within that community.
Reels were a new platform, and the timing was perfect. My reels resonated with a wide audience, and within just a few months, my following grew from 2,000 to 50,000. This surge in visibility caught the attention of my agent and eventually led to my involvement in Shiny Happy People, the Amazon documentary about the Duggar family, which was released in June 2023, when I was 49. And now we’re here. That’s how it all unfolded.
TMC: How can your experience in the digital world help other writers?
My journey demonstrates how digital platforms can be powerful tools for writers. By being an early adopter of technology and starting with authentic storytelling, I connected deeply with and quickly grew my audience. Since then I’ve also embraced Substack, where I write a column called The Anti-Fundamentalist.
Link to original article
Tia Levings grew up in a Southern Baptist megachurch, was recruited into fundamentalism, and eventually landed in the fundamentalist Quiverfull movement. She was excommunicated and formally shunned in 2007 and narrowly escaped that violent marriage with her four children later that year. Today, she is an author and advocate supporting survivors of religious trauma and exposing the abuses within Christian Fundamentalism. More of her work can be found here.
Dr. Tamara MC is a Muslim-Jewish writer and multidisciplinary artist who explores her complex hybrid identities through her work. She holds a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics, focusing on how language can manipulate vulnerable populations. As a lived experience expert in cults, child marriage, and human trafficking, Dr. MC passionately advocates for girls and women to live free from gender-based violence and coercive control globally. Her writing has been published in over 60 prestigious outlets, including The New York Times and Huffington Post. Honored with fellowships and residencies at places like Bread Loaf, she is also a polyglot and avid traveler, having visited nearly 80 countries. Discover more about Tamara here.