This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Episode 022 – Cheers to Leaving with Rachael & Molly (Crossover Part 2) – and bonus

September 6, 2023

BONUS: Sharon did WHAT?? No, Sharon did WAP!!!

T: Hey, hey, hey, this is Tracey from Feet of Clay, Confessions of the Cult Sisters. I am hoping that you’ve already listened to part 1 of our crossover episode on their great podcast, Cheers to Leaving. If you haven’t then what you’re about to hear might not make any sense to you, but also, I wanted to give you a little back story just in case. Did you know Sharon is a total sucker for a dare? Yep, it’s amazing the crazy stuff she can be nudged into doing with just a little taunt. A statement like I bet you would never … Well, a little while back Sharon was listening to the Cheers to Leaving episode where Rachael and Molly were talking about how annoying it is when Christians try to write new religious lyrics for popular secular songs. Then they laughingly mentioned the mega-hit WAP. That’s W A P, or wet ass pussy, and of course, that’s right up Sharon’s alley. They joked that it would be impossible for a Christian version of that song and yep, that’s all it took for Sharon to say, you wanna bet? So, due to popular demand, here’s Sharon’s Christian cover which first debuted on Cheers to Leaving last week, written by Sharon, of the chorus to wet ass pussy, WAP. The lyrics and the link are in the show notes. Enjoy.

 

…

T: Hi, I’m Tracey.

S: And I’m Sharon. And we are Feet of Clay…

T: Confessions of the Cult Sisters! Or, what I like to say, the gathering of the antichrist sisters, because that’s what’s happening today.

S: That’s what we are! Oh my gosh, wait a second, where are my devil horns? I need to put those things back on. So we are actually – this is part two everybody; we just finished up recording a wonderful conversation with two amazing young ladies, Rachael and Molly from an amazing podcast, Cheers to Leaving. If you’re tuning in right now, you’re going to want to go over to their podcast Cheers to Leaving, and hear part one of this conversation so that you can understand some of the references and silly things we say.

…

S: Hey, hey, hey folks. So after we finished recording with Rachael and Molly and listened back to it, we realized we should probably put in an extra word of caution for this episode.

T: I think that is very much indicative of who we are, Sharon.

S: I think so.

T: In addition to Sharon’s typical salty language, we are going to talk about sexuality and sex, and some pretty nitty gritty stuff.

S: Oh no, not again! We’re getting a reputation, Tracey.

T: Yes, so, as always, it’s probably not appropriate for kids and then we want to make a special call out – it might not even be appropriate for our own kids, but of course they get to make that decision.

S: Yeah they do. Alright, and we also want to reiterate – really important – when we talk about our exes, it’s not our intention to drag anyone through the mud. It’s just the fact is, our past experiences with them are such huge parts of our own stories, so it’s kind of impossible to talk about what happened in our lives without mentioning them from time to time as well. We’ve all been broken; we’ve all needed healing; we all need grace; we all need forgiveness. That’s all of us.

T: Yes, all of us. Okay everyone, you’ve been warned, so onto our conversation with the Cheers to Leaving gals.

…

T: Welcome! Introduce yourselves ladies – I do want to say that you guys have the best intro ever. I have a red glass of wine, for those who can’t see me. Cheers to leaving comes up so much out of my mouth, because it’s the best toast ever. Cheers to leaving, ladies!

S: Cheers!

R: And cheers! I’m Rachael, and I’m really glad to be here.

M: And I’m Molly. Sorry, I’m like, eating chicken nuggets right now. Very professional. I’m also very happy to be here.

R: Molly’s eating them nugs.

S: I just finished a square of Ghirardelli chocolate, so go for it.

R: Yum!

T: So if you guys haven’t popped over on their platform, we’ve been recording for a good bit. We got going, so I think we had some starving ladies here who are trying to eat and drink in between us taking up with the next part. So I just want to say that I am so excited to host the Cheers to Leaving gals; cult sisters, cult cousins, antichrist, fellow Quiverfull exvangelicals – all a mouthful, but very excited to have them on our podcast because you know Sharon, this is like the meeting of the generations.

S: Yes, it is.

T: So, you and I could be their mothers.

S: We could be. We could be. And maybe we’re kind of honorary at this point – hey, we can give you some motherly advice at some point.

R: Please, you guys can be my moms, both of you.

M: Yeah.

R: Stand in mom.

S: Molly has two mommies. Works for me.

[laughter]

M: Sharon, sometimes you say things and I’m like, that’s really queer.

[laughter]

M: And I can say that, cos I’m queer. Sometimes I wonder Sharon, about you.

R: Sometimes, as in the last hour and a half.

S: There’s a lot of fluidity in my life.

M: I love this.

T: And we would get – I wouldn’t say accused, that’s probably the wrong kind of thing, but people would definitely think our friendship has transpired over 40 years and we did the whole deconstructing together, and our kids have been friends and when we were out playing when we finally broke free of the purity culture…

S: That was our 40s, when we had our fun.

T: Yeah. Great decade. We had some good times together, so I do have some very compromising pictures that I have been searching for, and I found them and I think that people will definitely think we’ve been in a relationship when they see these pictures.

R: I love it.

S: They will, but you know, here’s the thing. We have joked from time to time Tracey, it would just be so easy if you were lesbian, if I was lesbian it would just be so easy because we’d be a great couple, but I’m just not into pussy.

M: That’s fair.

S: You know, so it couldn’t work. It just couldn’t work.

R: You could have a companionship and just live together.

M: Yeah, like Golden Girls.

T: Yeah.

S: Well we kind of already do have that.

M: What’s so funny though is I feel like there are certain friendships that feel like love relationships. Your friendship is deeply romantic. You have a deeply romantic friendship. You’re each other’s soulmates, in a way.

R: I feel like romance is not the right – I’d say intimate, but I wouldn’t say romantic.

M: But romance can be – let’s start a podcast together. Okay.

T: And we do have this weird connection over time.

R: I feel like you can have intimate women relationships but I don’t know if I’d use the word romantic, because that involves you’re in love with each other.

M: Okay, maybe I’m just too gay for you all.

R: Get out of here Molly.

[laughter]

R: You can be very close, and you can feel the type of love and bonding with another woman friend.

M: Yes, and also eat her out.

R: Oh my god. Mute your microphone, Molly!

S: Molly I’m sorry, I just like dick. It’s just the way it is. It’s not going to work for me.

M: I’m attracted to men, but I’m not attracted to men. I feel like you guys are soulmates though. There’s a soulmate path; your souls were destined to walk alongside each other. I think that’s so beautiful.

T: Ohh.

R: I think women’s relationships can be rich and intimate and just as fulfilling as romantic relationships, but they’re not romantic. We’ve just isolated relationships to be so romantic in this day and age.

T: Yes.

R: And I think sometimes when women have such intimate and beautiful relationships with each other, kindred spirits like Anne of Green Gables, then we we’re weirded out by it but it’s actually so normal and so beautiful, and I think it intimidates heterosexual men because they’re like, how do I even? And we’re like, you can’t. Anyway.

T: That’s so great. So I have a picture of us. I haven’t posted it yet because it hasn’t  come up in our podcast, but maybe it’s coming up now. So when we deconstructed, obviously for those listeners who can’t see us we do have our devil horns on, because as we deconstructed we’ve been called the antichrist, we’ve been called vessels of the devil, so we really walked into that mantle in the beginning of okay, you know what, you’re gonna call us that, we’re gonna do it. So we did go to a séance together.

S: We did!

T: In Richmond Virginia. It was one of the old, old – Ruth Crist had turned this old plantation house and they were doing – I think a ghost hunting.

S: Wait a second. I’m thinking of something different.

T: Oh yes, that’s a different thing, we went to a couple of seances. This one was really a séance.

S: It was a real séance!

T: This was at Ruth Crist in Richmond Virginia at Belgrade, I think it was?

S: Yeah, yeah.

T: So we were at the table and there’s a back story (there’s always a back story) – there’s a back story to this in that someone in Sharon’s sphere had seen a vision of my death.

S: {gasps} I remember that now. We can just call it out. You can call it out.

T: That’s up to you. That’s outing your people.

S: I’m gonna say it. We can decide if we’re going to bleep it out. It was my ex husband because he really believed that Tracey was the one leading me down the devil’s path and into divorce, so this was a convenient way that maybe if she died I would be shocked back into reality and come back to Jesus.

T: Yes. So he had this vision, and my name was on the gravestone and it was – I remember the date, obviously these things don’t fall lightly around you. It was April 13^th. What day was your marriage?

S: April 18^th. This way I was going to come back to him before our 25^th anniversary or something like that.

T: So, to honor that date we went to a séance, as you do.

R As you do.

M: This is now a very different kind of podcast!

[laughter]

R: The podcast of the paranormal.

T: I say séance, but they were really – it was like the ghost hunters shows, they were doing a live opportunity kind of thing.

S: It was just a silly thing.

R: Okay. So not a séance.

T: So we were at a table full of people and we decide to kiss each other; to open mouth kiss.

R: Love that.

S: I forgot about that!

R: Trace is like, how could you forget?

M: How did you forget that you made out with your best friend?

S: Because we were acting! We were drama.

T: No, no, she hut me forever. So we were at the table, we do this open mouth kiss and she pulls away from me and she says, you taste like coffee. I hate coffee.

R: She was not into it.

[laughter]

R: Tracey, you were downcast after this, right? You never tried ever again.

T: I was like, that’s why I go for men because they never complain about that sort of stuff.

R: Maybe you should go for lesbian women and not straight women.

T: Oh, that’s good policy.

[laughter]

S: Oh man, I totally forgot about that. And you’ve got a picture?

T: I do have a picture.

S: Excellent. We’re going to have to post it.

R: Of you guys kissing?

S: Yeah. I guess she’s got a picture of us kissing.

M: This needs to be the picture of this podcast episode.

T: It will be so great. And then we had taken our daughters to New York and they were not quite 21 but they were almost there and they were having a great time at the bar, and these men that they met were like, your moms are so gay. They are totally hiding it from you. If you don’t think that is happening with them right now, then you guys are really deceived. And they’re like, no we think they’re just really good friends.

R: Which is also something someone in denial of their mom being gay might say.

[laughter]

R: That’s what happens in TV shows. They’re always like no, they’re just best friends that live together, and everyone’s like, uh…

M: You know what a lot of historians this day and age say; when you look at people like Emily Dickinson who were considered hetero poets and things like that; she had a very intense relationship with a female friend who was just her lifelong friend who she spent all her days with, and she’d send letters to saying I crave the scent of you. They were just friends.

T: Sharon doesn’t crave the scent of me.

[laughter]

R: Sharon does not like Tracey’s breath.

T: She did not crave my scent.

S: No. And I’m telling you, I just like dick not pussy, so it’s not gonna work.

T: See, we haven’t shared this yet and who knows how this is going to go, but we have shared…

S: Okay, I’m afraid now. I don’t know what’s coming.

T: It’s the truth serum.

M: Rachael, we need to get freakier because they’re freakadeeks. They’re on a whole other level.

R: Molly, you are freaky enough for both of us.

M: You need to get on my level of freaky. Let me take you down the road. It is a beautiful life.

T: Oh god. And I think Troy and Brian mention it on their podcast about that, slinky swing – when you’ve lived under purity culture for so long and then you’re free, and it’s exploration and at that point we’re older, our kids aren’t real small anymore, so there’s a lot of opportunity to explore. So we did it. Sharon, you were with a man for a period of time,

R: A man!

T: And then she passed him to me.

S: Oh right!

R: You guys are Eskimo sisters!

T: Yes! I didn’t know if you could say that, but I’m like, we’re Eskimo sisters.

M: I don’t think it’s politically correct but it’s okay; we were raised in a cult, we don’t know any better.

[laughter]

R: It’s probably not politically correct. Did they rename it?

M: I don’t know. That’s the street term for it.

T: That is the street term. I’m going to take my cues from you because you guys are younger, so yes. So Sharon – I always say she gives me her hand-me-downs…

[laughter]

R: It’s not just clothes.

M: That’s what a good friend does. She said this is some good dick, my friend could use it.

S: That’s right. Friends with benefits.

R: I had a friend that did that to me once, too.

M: You know what Rachael, I’ll do that to you too.

T: How’d that go?

R: You want me to send you some dick? I’ll send you some dick in a box?

S: Oh that’s one of the best skits in the history of the universe.

R: So, good. Okay. So Sharon sent you her hand-me-downs and I think it’s more of a testimony to how much we both do like the male parts, because I think we got a review, didn’t we Sharon?

S: We did. We were told we were really good.

[laughter]

M: Rachael, were you told you were outstanding, because I was told I was outstanding.

[laughter]

R: That’s great.

T: So we think maybe that’s what people say, right.

M: I feel like these guys are just saying that to make you feel good. They’re trying to boost your self-esteem because they definitely want to get in there again, so they’re like, that was the best head I’ve ever had; please keep doing it.

S: Or maybe it’s the cult sister rebound. It’s the purity girl rebound, you know?

M: So did you magically know how to suck dick?

R: Maybe you just took out all that pent up sexual tension and you just were like, I’m down for whatever. I feel like that’s a thing.

M: It is actually. I’ve had people ask me are you this freaky because you were so like, restrained in purity culture? And I’m like oh for sure. Definitely.

R: Yeah, you’re like, I’m down to do whatever.

M: I’m making up for lost time.

T: Correct.

S: Yeah.

R: That’s the aspect of it, and it’s a little bit of a sad aspect I think, because don’t you just wish you were free to just explore your sexuality; have your sexual debut which is what I’m hearing people call it now, instead of losing your virginity, and just in a very positive light of being able to explore what you wanted as a young person – which I think is when you’re supposed to do it. I love that women are doing it older now too, because you guys were MILFS. That was great.

M: We call those, sexual renaissance.

R: Sexual r-r-r-renaissance.

S: I actually had a t-shirt that said Got MILF?

R: Oh yes, I love it.

S: You know what’s so funny, is my – who later became my husband I met him and his dad in that shirt; he saw me in the t-shirt because I didn’t know he was coming over, and I’m wearing my Got MILF – that was the got milk.

R: We were alive, yes.

[laughter]

S: Sorry. And he says to me, oh you like milk.

R: And you’re like, does that look like a K to you?

M: Missed a letter there, buddy.

[laughter]

S: I guess you had to be there. It was funnier when it happened.

M: It is pretty funny.

R: I feel like he knew and was trying to make it not …

S: Tracey, where are you going with all this?

T: I just wanted to – you know – intro. There’s things we haven’t – we’ve never shared those things, so we get to share them with you.

M: We love that.

R: I love it.

M: I feel so special right now. I genuinely – when I’ve listened to all your episodes I’m like, there are deeper questions I want to know the answers to and this was one of them – are Tracey and Sharon gay for each other? I wanted to know.

T: So I have stepped back and I have thought that as people listen that they would definitely have that question, and I think at the end of one of them I say that it was something I had to explore – not for Sharon. Because it is like a sisterly bond. It just is. But because I was so sexually dysfunctional I was like, do men not do this for me. This is before I had anyone outside my marital relationship because I was just shut down. I was willing to explore and consider that.

S: Did you actually try with anyone?

T: I didn’t try with anyone, but my imagination is very good.

M: Tracey, if you’re – I mean, I’m just saying. You cracked the door open, the door has been cracked.

T: The door has been cracked, and there is another sister – we all had to call them sisters – who was also at our commune who Sharon will know but I’m not going to say her name. we definitely talked about it, so I think there is – I think if – I can’t believe we’re going here. It must be the wine.

S: I didn’t see any notes. There were no notes about this conversation.

T: Nothing about this topic.

R: I don’t think Tracey needs notes.  I have no notes for Tracey.

M: I think Tracey knows what she needs to say.

[laughter]

T: So, I definitely in my exploration, I’ve thought about how people are introverts and extraverts, and I’m definitely an extravert as is Sharon, and I think the ability to share – I’m not opposed to a group setting or a menage a trois, but I would still say I default mainly to males.

S: I did that once.

M: Have you tried?

S: I did that once, but I was definitely into the dude, not the chick.

R: Oh, you did do a menage a trois.

M: So Tracey, I have questions.

[laughter]

M: I just have questions.

R: We all have questions.

T: We’re an open book if you haven’t gathered.

M: Tracey, I need a timeline. I think when I first started exploring women, I also just explored women in menage a trois situations and I have to say, it’s a lot different one on one than there is when there’s a man present. The way women explore sensuality and pleasure looks a lot different than you would see in porn, or maybe you would be in a more performative state while in a menage a trois with a male present, so I’m just saying because it’s a thought you’ve had. I’m going to send you some Instagram pages to look at.

T: Okay.

M: But it’s worth exploring outside of that scenario. I think it is. If it’s ever been a question for you I don’t think you can judge it based on a threesome, because threesomes are a very different kind of experience. Period.

T: I think that’s good advice.

M: That’s for any listeners too, who might be wondering about their sexuality and like, what their preferences are after coming out of something like this. Be safe out there, but try things. Try lots of things. And try them in different types of containers.

T: I think that’s super good advice, and I think that – so we have some dear gay brothers who were at the ministry that we’ve had conversations with and I’ve asked them – especially living in the commune – and I think when you’re so suppressed it is hard to even know. Their struggles were very similar because they had so pushed down their sexuality, they didn’t even have a chance in their young teens to even know. Any sexual thought, any sexual practice you had to put down so I think it is a really good message of being willing to explore; being willing to try different things. Why I think the gift for me was the artist in Philadelphia that was my first partner outside of my marriage, was a wild man.

S: Yeah. You need those

T: And it was a really great experience.

M: I loved that story when you told it. I was just like, smiling the entire time, hearing that story about your artist man.

R: I haven’t listened to it yet. What episode is that?

M: It was fantastic.

T: It was a bonus and that was…

S: No, your letter was the bonus, but your description of your time with him, was that Virgins and Volcanos 4?

T: Yep.

S: It was one of them. You just gotta listen to all of them.

R: Oh, four. I’m only on the first one. But I will say Tracey, my first one out of purity culture as well was a very wild, unavailable man. I don’t mean like he was married, I just mean relationally unavailable. I will say the only danger of that, it being your first experience outside of purity culture – for me – is I hold up that experience and that sexual experience to everything else since then, and that passion, that insane hot whatever, and I think you can’t do that. I’m not saying you’re doing that. I’m saying I’ve done that in the past. I don’t know if it was because it was the first time out of it or if this guy was really good and really passionate. I don’t know what it was but there was just something about that relationship that my mind will go back to sometimes even now that was just like – what was it about that relationship that was so – and it’s probably not sustainable over time, in a marriage or whatever. It just was what it was, and I need to take it and be fine with it.

S: I’m going to give a bit of motherly advice right now.

R: Give it to me momma.

S: Yeah. Who’s your mommy?

[laughter]

R: Okay, okay.

S: So we are – Tracey and I are both post menopausal and there’s this whole sort of thing – what happens to your sex life and your libido and there’s definitely changes. Anyway I could go into all kind of stuff, but I am reading a book right now that was recommended, called Come As You Are by Emily Nagoski – she’s a researcher. It’s about women’s sexuality and as I’m reading this and it’s talking about context and accelerators and brakes, and whether you are – she’s got examples, whether you’re in a heterosexual relationship, or whether you’re a lesbian – it doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter any of it, but it’s both looking at anatomy and brain parts and emotions, and it’s like, whoa. This is incredible. I’m looking at it going damn. I’m kind of thinking maybe the best sex of my entire life is yet to come. And it’s pretty cool. So I recommend that book, ladies.

R: Really?

S: All women out there, whoever you are, read it, and maybe even get your partner to read it.

M: I don’t have this problem, I have an amazing sex life, but Rachael, you should read it.

R: Yeah, but maybe your sex life isn’t as great as you think it is.

S: Maybe it could be even better.

R: Maybe you’re going to have great sex 20 years from now.

M: Yes I will! I will always, because I have amazing sex. I have amazing sex. I can count on one hand the number of times it wasn’t amazing. One hand.

R: Love that for you.

S: That’s great.

M: I think I’ve been really blessed with really amazing partners, but I also think that I’m really good at knowing what I want and need, and I know how to communicate it, and not everybody knows how to do that. But I also spent a lot of time listening to podcasts that were about the female orgasm and pleasure, and how to access that, and how to heal the parts of ourself that are keeping us from accessing that. So I think there is a lot of work that comes with great orgasm. With great orgasm comes great responsibility, okay? Like, you really do have to heal.

T: That’s your book coming out.

R: Do you want to interject though. You have not been with a partner for eight to ten years where you are dealing with the same partner and doing things that are like, almost – you know what I mean. It’s not the same thing every day. You’re not dealing with kids, you’re not dealing – she’s leaving. But I think that plays a lot into it.

T: Oh yeah.

R: When you start a relationship sex is incredible. It’s incredible for the first couple of years but when you have been with a partner for eight or more years, and you’re married, and you’re throwing in all kinds of other extra stress and job stuff and kids and all that stuff – it really puts a different spin on sex. So I feel like I love that for you Molly, but I also feel like unless you’ve been in that situation too, you can’t say that. Because there’s lots of things that…

M: But I can, because I have been in a long term relationship. I was with a partner for six years and we actually lived together for quite a bit of that. We ended up separating after like, six years. Our sex life was never bad, that was never an issue; it was more just like,…

R: I guess I’m thinking of throwing in like, marriage, house, kids, all kinds of other stuff.

M: I don’t know, I don’t think you can make that giant assumption that all women have like, bed death, where their sex life goes down.

R: No, I’m not making that assumption at all; I’m just saying there’s monotony in everything to some extent.

M: Sure.

R: Then you throw in – especially if you literally have children, sex is going to change in your body after children and it’s going to change.

M: I just think there’s ways to access this, as Sharon is saying. I’m agreeing with her.

[laughter]

M: I’m agreeing that everyone should read these books and work on the stuff they should work on to have a great sex life.

T: And get a safe space of women with a variety of backgrounds and experiences because these are the things we don’t really get to talk about – the things you’re saying, Rachael. I would hear that and people would say – the beginning of your relationship is the best sex ever, and I of course didn’t have that in my marriage. Then coming out and I think there’s a lot of variety out there, and your body changes, pregnancies.

R: And it depends what’s going on with your partner too. My sister and her husband have had physical difficulties, not because the desire wasn’t there, but because of hormones or whatever else. I feel like you can’t blanket statement stuff, because it also depends on a lot of physical things as well – is my only point in saying what I’m saying. There’s just so much that attributes to the sex life, besides what you want.

S: There’s such a wide – yeah, there’s such a wide range. I think the thing that’s most important for people to realize then is whatever you’re feeling, whatever you’re enjoying, whatever you’re struggling with – it’s normal. Once you stop thinking that you’re broken and you just begin to understand – it is context. Once you’ve got a bunch of kids screaming around, no you’re not going to feel particularly sexy. Does that mean you’re going to have no sex life? No, but when you’re feeling pressure; when you’re feeling…

R: When you’re stressed. Some people shut down – completely shut down when they’re stressed.

S: Right. And then you can reflect on yourself, is there something wrong with me or I wish it was, or this or that, and what I loved about this particular book – and I think it’s really cool Molly, it sounds like you have found a lot of resources in your life that have really helped you –

M: Well I also don’t have kids, so that is also helpful.

S: But what I really loved about this is talking so much about context, both about external situations and internal – your mind state, your physiology and all this sort of stuff, and it’s just very freeing. It’s kind of like – you know, this whole thing of what you should be as a fundamentalist Christian – this is what you should be, this is what you should believe, this is how you should behave – and you get this little homogenized – I don’t know if that’s the right word. It’s like a cookie cutter. This is what it should look like, and if you fall outside those lines there’s something wrong with you. You’re not devoted enough, you’re not holy enough, you’re not whatever enough. And that same mindset can get imposed upon our sexuality, and the feeling of failure – I don’t measure up, or I’m not this or I’m not that – and that does more to suppress being able to just engage and enjoy yourself and another person than anything else. So, yeah. That’s my mommy advice.

R: Thanks mom.

M: I think it is also very freeing when you realize what I’m going through is normal.

S: That’s right!

M: Whether it’s you feel shame around the fact that you have a kink, or you feel shame around the fact that you and your husband aren’t having sex as often as you would like to have it, or as often as you think you should be having it. But I also think there’s this weird expectation when you’re raised in purity culture to be completely and utterly pure, without an impure thought in your mind; very asexual as women – until we reach marriageable age and then when we’re married it’s expected we’ll be these sexual queens. Like, these people who know how to perform in bed and who know how to be these amazing sexual objects for our husbands, and to keep them sexually satisfied so they won’t go look at porn, that they won’t go cheat; it’s this very strange pendulum swing when you going from being in purity culture up until getting married, and all of a sudden you haven’t received any education and you are looking at sex from a lens of shame and fear. You don’t know what’s going on with your body; you don’t know what’s going on with theirs. There’s no education. So that is important to pay attention to as well – not only are people struggling in the area of wow I’m not having sex as much as I would like to, or the sex isn’t good, I wish it could be better. There’s people who are straight up, I think I’m supposed to like this? But I also don’t know because I’ve been told my whole life that it’s bad and it’s dirty, and there’s a lot of trauma that comes with that as well.

S: Yeah. There really is. I wanted to follow up – Molly, in what you were saying a few minutes ago you used the word blessed. I’m just wondering, is that like – I was actually thinking about this the other day. I’ll show you this. I have this thing right here that somebody gave me. It’s pretty and it was a gift. You probably can’t read it.

R: Does it say hashtag blessed?

S: It says thankful, grateful, blessed. I was looking at this a couple of days ago, and I was like, I don’t like that word anymore.

M: Hashtag blessed!

S: Hashtag blessed.

R: I only like it in that context. Hashtag blessed. But that’s sarcastic.

M: I think I used a lot of Christianese sometimes that comes out and it’s more like ironic and funny.

S: Okay.

M: Yeah, I don’t know if I take it on as like – I think the context I was using it in is I have been really fortunate to have partners who were all about communicating and consent, and being present with what is showing up in the moment and not shaming, and being able to communicate. It makes for a much easier time when having sexual experiences.

S: Yeah.

M: Especially coming out of this kind of environment.

T: Is that primarily with other females? Or were you able to have that level of communication with males?

M: With both.

T: Okay. I think communication is so important and that’s why I think a lot of times we’ll talk very openly now because that has been so taboo for so long, and being able to bring those things out of the closet of shame and be able to say if you’re really honest with a group of safe people, we’re all questioning and going through body changes and trying to understand if this is “normal”. Particularly child bearing years – I look at the coworkers I have now who have to take children, they’re rushing out the door in the morning, they’re working at these very high stress jobs and then they’re going home and they’ve got to do all this stuff. I don’t know how they do that. That’s so much.

M: Me neither. I don’t know if I want kids. It’s a lot.

T: It is a lot. And then when you’re having babies – you’re right, we didn’t get the sex education that we needed, so you’re expected – I think there’s a chapter in a book somewhere on how soon you can have sex after you have a baby, and I remember feeling immense pressure.

M: Isn’t it like, six weeks? That’s nothing.

T: I know. Especially if you’ve had any kind of episiotomy.

R: I didn’t stop bleeding for 13 weeks.

M: But you’re supposed to be back at work and already having sex by six weeks.

R: Oh, I went to court at six weeks. It was horrible.

S: You said you went to court?

R: Yeah, I went to court.

S: I heard that part of your story Rachael, and I kind of related to that. Mine was later in life, but my ex took me to court to try and get full custody of the minor children. Can you tell me a little bit more, if you can, about that experience for you?

R: I mean, sure. What do you want to know?

S: I guess, were you completely on your own? I know your parents looked down on you because you were a single mom and that relationship wasn’t that supportive, but did they support you in that? Did you have any friends and family helping you through that process?

R: My mom was definitely there for that. My mom also was a single mom with me. My mom, even though she didn’t speak to me for three or four days after I told her I was pregnant, she did eventually come around. What ended up leading to the court thing which I’ve been – there’s been shit going on this summer as well, which has me stressed out, that we might need to go back to court again.

T: Are you allowed to talk about it then? Is it okay?

R: Yeah, there’s nothing definitive I guess about it, it’s just stuff I’m dealing with and wrestling with because my ex is a huge narcissist and I’m dealing with borderline personality disorder, I’m dealing with a lot of stuff – there’s a lot of decisions he makes that don’t make sense, and in an effort to stop the cycle we’ve been in for so many years, which I’m frankly exhausted of, I’m trying to figure out how to be a better adult and take a better approach to this. So when I say go back to court I mean like, no nonsense. We’re not going to talk about it, I’m not going to deal with your shenanigans, we’re just gonna do it. So when I was reflecting on how this whole thing started – because most of the time he’s the one that takes me to court and I have to scramble, and a lot of times I’ve been screwed over, because our system, at least in Kansas, is so fucked up. Our court system is so fucked up, and that’s a whole other story we won’t get into – our civil, custody, family law court system is so fucked. So I’m sure Sharon, you have an experience with it I would love to hear as well once I’m finished, but what started this whole thing was my daughter was about three weeks old. I think it was the night before Thanksgiving. My ex was over; we’d been having some issues, we were just trying to figure out like, seeing the child/not seeing the child, what we were/what we weren’t. I again was 20 years old. He was the only boyfriend I had ever had so this was at my parents house, and I somehow pissed him off. I think I told him he needed to leave. He said something that scared me, he did something that frightened me – he’s a big six-foot man. Anyway. When he went to give my daughter back to me he took his elbow and just straight up elbowed me in like, my side, as he was holding my three week old baby. It freaked me out, as it would. He stormed out and left, and it freaked me out so bad I think I ended up calling my sister and crying and sobbing to her, because I didn’t know what to do. I was flabbergasted because he’d never hit me before or touched me in that way. So that ended up getting back to my parents, and my parents were like well, he can’t come over again, that is not okay, he can’t treat you like that. Then my mom did this kneejerk reaction of we’re going to hire a lawyer and we’re gonna tell him what’s what, and we’re going to tell him what’s up. So once we did that, he of course retaliated and hired a lawyer back. Three weeks later when I was barely six weeks postpartum, we were in court in the morning, arguing about child custody, all of this stuff – you know, times where as a woman you’re supposed to be resting; you’re supposed to be recovering. You’re not supposed to have stress. Things like that. It did prolong my postpartum I think, because I bled another seven weeks after that which is abnormal.

S: Right.

R: I also had placenta stuck in my uterus, it came out about nine days after I’d had her. I’d had a fever, all this stuff, then I went straight into hyper thyroidism. I dropped like, 30 pounds, had all these symptoms, couldn’t stand up straight, had zero energy. This whole time I’m in fight or flight mode, just trying to deal with my ex. I got mastitis at one point, which is insane to have. I got it when she was a year old and my ex insisted that I continue to drive her to him because it didn’t affect my cognitive abilities. I was like, sir, I am unwell. So my whole experience I guess, with court, was awful. I don’t think it did my body any favors; I don’t think it did my mental health any favors; I don’t think it allowed me to heal. I don’t think six weeks postpartum in any case – for jobs, for sex, for anything is enough time for a woman. It all depends on the woman, and I think men need to fuck off and just let their woman tell them when they’re ready to do whatever it is again. You’re on their timeline. The same goes for work. I think maybe three months would be more understandable to go back to work. You know what I mean? Six weeks is nothing. I think that absolutely needs to change.

S: Yeah.

T: I agree.

S: With the court evaluate, did they do a professional psychological examination?

R: No.

S: For either of you? That’s one thing I might suggest.

R: Do you have to request that?

S: I believe you do. When my ex in the divorce proceedings wanted to have me declared as an unfit mother, and for him to have sole custody – it was a little bit different because I was the one making the money. I was the one financially supporting the family. One of the things we did was my therapist suggested to get my lawyer (because they knew each other) to ask the court to do a court ordered psychological evaluation of both of us. So the court did that and they ordered that and in the findings, there actually was a diagnosis of my ex with ***, so it was in the clinical evaluation. Because of that, what happened in the custody thing was that we were granted joint physical custody, so equal time, but all decisions about health and education and all of these other things, critical decisions, were mine exclusively and that was a result of the psych evaluation. So why I keyed into that was you just mentioned, I didn’t know if what you’re saying you’re dealing with, with your daughter’s father, is true diagnosable disorders or just more how he behaves. But anyway, that may or may not help you in the struggles you have. And that is so hard Rachael. The complexities that get added to parenting when there is not a cooperative relationship – that’s just an awful burden to bear and I’m really sorry. I’m sorry you’re dealing with that.

R: Yeah, it’s hard because you want to protect your children; you want to make good decisions for your children, and when you have another parent constantly either conniving against you or trying to do things that are inconvenient for everyone – it causes me a lot of stress. I don’t think I would have as much grey hair as I do now, at 30 years old – or 31 now, I guess. It’s been a lot of stress for about 10 years, and even this summer has been really hard because I just sometimes don’t know if he’s going to bring her back when he says he’s going to bring her back. And the stress of that is so – I don’t even know how to describe it, as a mom. I try to be chill about it, but I’m so not chill and it’s so scary to me. The reason I do say with confidence that he’s borderline personality disorder is when we were trying to work it out I took him to my therapist for a couple of sessions and after that my therapist was like – – yeah I would absolutely diagnose him with borderline personality disorder. So maybe he could be a normal human if he took some medication. My friend told me about this therapy thing – EMR?

S: EMDR.

R: Is it EMDR? I thought it was only three letters. But it’s specific to people who do struggle with borderline personality disorders.

S: Oh yeah, that’s something different, sorry.

R: I can’t remember what it is, so they have resources out there but the thing with people with borderline personality disorder and narcissism will not go and do those things. They think there’s nothing wrong with them. I don’t know – I could explore getting an official diagnosis in that area, but it’s rough.

S: Find out from a lawyer first whether it makes any difference to you in terms of court rulings and your rights, because if it’s not going to help you in that, then it’s not worth.

T: And he’s still in the belief system, right?

R: Yah, and that’s what’s so fascinating about this, especially his now young wife is so hardcore Christian, and so engulfed in this thinking to where half the shit she says to me doesn’t make sense, and she will come down on me. She takes liberties to try to tell me how to parent as well, and it’s just so very interesting to be so fucked up and have this backwards sort of behavior, and then to call yourself a Christian. I think, like I said in my episode, part of this was my way out of Christianity because I was like, people who believe in God who are acting like this – and my mom would always try to be like, well, you can’t just like, say all Christians are like this, it’s just certain Christians, and I was like, these people are hardcore into Christianity and they’re fucking horrible people.

T: Yeah.

R: That’s my ticket out. That’s when I took my leave. I’m done.

T: You made reference, I think it was in that episode – do they hide in these places? That was one of my beginning phases to come out. We had created this post-Last Days community in Pennsylvania, and the types of issues the families were dealing with were off the spectrum from what the world was dealing with. I mean, police were showing up, knives were being pulled, and we’re trying to talk to my ex’s family, who’s normal family, and I’m embarrassed. I’m like, I don’t know why this group of people has so many issues and I began to see there’s some really undiagnosed mental health issues that do hide in this belief system.

R: I think mental illness hides in Christianity.

T: Yes.

M: I think Christianity attracts people who are struggling with this stuff. I think it’s very attractive to them because like, how many times have we heard like, my dad was a narcissist, my pastor was a narcissist – this is a common thread running through these Christian circles. Certain roles attract certain personality disorders and certain personality types.

T: Yes, and then it gets reinforced because they’re on the righteous side.

M: Oh yes.

T: That is what my family currently deals with somebody who is still in the belief system (their father) and it’s like, this is justified and it’s so batshit on so many levels, and yet I’m the devil.

[laughter]

T: I think toward the political spectrum as well, because one of the reasons we decided to start our podcast is we were very instrumental at the dawning of the religious right, which is also part of – this is our apology tour. For the Americans Against Abortion and just seeing how much the law is…

S: That was an actual organizational name, just so you guys know. It was “Americans Against Abortion”.

R: Oh. Americans Against Abortion? Oh fuck off.

T: And how all the law is focused on that and you’re right – not towards young children’s healthcare, not toward women being able to stay at home and support these children.

M: Not toward human rights in general.

T: Yeah!

R: Where are these babies being born into?

T: All of this political power has been invested in this very small portion of it, and it’s really – over time, because what year was that Sharon?

S: Oh my god, they were in the 83, 84, 85 realm.

T: Yes, so you look at the time it has taken and just the evolution of the rabid right, the rabid political landscape that even horrifies me, because I feel like we were at the beginning of this, but it’s horrifying.

R: It’s all political movement too. It’s not even really about the baby. The people who buy into it think it is, but really Republicans used to be for abortion at one point in time, and because it got turned around it was all political movement to move the masses against each other.

S: Did you guys hear the interview that Troy and Brian did on I was a Teenage Fundamentalist with Frankie Schaeffer? That was fascinating.

M: I don’t know if I heard that one.

R: I don’t think I did either.

S: Frankie Schaeffer is the son of Francis Schaeffer who was La Brie Fellowship in Switzerland, he was kind of this sort of mystic – he got coopted and then his son got coopted big time. Frankie Schaeffer has now totally disavowed all this right wing shit and also is seeing the role he played. I think that’s one thing that Tracey and I are just like – holy fuck. I mean, the things we did in our ignorant exuberance, just our misguidedness, to lay the foundation and really begin to do things that helped be the foundation stones for what this has become. Where the evangelicals have gone okay happy for Trump. Even Keith Green’s widow, Melody Green – we hear and see things like, she could be a fucking full-on Trumper from what I can tell.

M: Oh, I wouldn’t be surprized.

S: And I’m like, how did that happen?

M: Because Trump is a cult leader. And she’s attracted to narcissistic cult leaders.

[laughter]

R: She wants a cult leader.

M: She loves a cult leader. Trump attracts a very specific kind of person, and it’s the kind of person who wants something to get behind.

R: Well, and then he has the banner of Christianity – he’s like, I’m a Christian, and everyone’s like, okay, and I’m like can we just look at this guy and literally see he’s not?

M: I remember being a kid and it was always such a big deal when there was a celebrity who was a Christian. It was like, oh my god, the Jonas brothers are Christians and they have purity rings, so we’re all going to get purity rings because it’s cool to have purity rings and do these purity culture things. Christians are so obsessed with celebrities, and they’re so obsessed with celebrity Christians, and they’ll get behind anything that celebrity Christian does. Trump is a celebrity Christian. He’s backed by the Christian alt-right.

T: Which is such a mind-fuck. Because at the same time they preach against idols and celebrity, so even in the group we came from obviously Keith Green and Melody Green still have a very rabid fan base following. You said that exactly right. They would absolutely say they don’t follow a cult leader – that’s part of the devil horns, they think we’re pretty horrible for saying that, and then they have this crazy devotion to all of this extremism and it’s baffling to us now. We did preach against that – Keith Green was kind of known for preaching against that. And those are the very people that are in it.

S: But you know, it’s an immaturity. I’ve come to realize that this need for right and wrong; black and white; absolutes – that is a very immature state of emotion and intellect. It’s very immature. That’s what toddlers want. That’s what young kids want. They need to know – yes/no, right/wrong, black/white, because to try to look at things with shades of grey; to try and parse out the possibility of it depends, or nuance – that takes some maturity. I think if you examine these political mindsets and this almost unquestioned following – because hey, he’s going to appoint the justices and they’re going to outlaw abortion. It’s all this black and white thinking and it’s astounding to me how intellectually lazy it is.

T: Yes. You know Sharon, I don’t know if you want to give a quick background on Americans Against Abortion and your role in that?

S: Oh fuck.

T: And – this is why this is a difficult topic, even from my kids, because they know how much we were a part of that movement, and now looking at what it has become, to the point of our earlier conversation – to the neglect of every other logical family law taking care of our country, to the neglect of women, to the neglect of taking care of these women – every resource has gone into this just outlaw abortion. And it is upside down, dramatically. We do feel like we had a part to play in that.

S: We did.

T: So how do we make a voice now to help turn that tide?

S: Well, I’m just gonna apologize to Rachael and Molly and every other young woman listening. Young woman; middle aged – I don’t know. Yeah. We played an early role in helping to take away your rights, your autonomy over your body. It’s a sobering and horrible thing to look ourselves in the mirror and say yeah, we helped to make this real.

T: And how? Because I don’t think they know.

S: Well, there were a series of articles that we published with the Last Days magazine/Last Days newsletter. The first one that was anti-abortion was written by Melody Green called Children – Things We Throw Away. And just to give you context; our magazine at its zenith had almost 500,000 subscribers, and it was a clean list. It was an incredible achievement. We also published all these articles in pamphlet form, we called them tracts, that were sent out by the hundreds of thousands, if not millions. A couple of years – I’d have to go back and look at the timeline – but after Ketih died, one of the things Melody wanted to do was start really crusading on the whole anti-abortion thing, and we came up with this name. I don’t know if you even know about this Tracey. So the name we were going to work with was Americans Against Abortion, because let’s just say what it’s going to be and have it be its own umbrella and arm. Well, there was some other dude – think he was based out of Oklahoma, some other pastor that had registered the name Americans Against Abortion.

M: Everyone’s trying to capitalize off of this.

S: Oh man. But here’s the deal. He had it registered, so when we started using it he sent a letter saying you’re infringing on my copyright, and we were like oh but we’re already so invested in it maybe we can pay him money and buy it. I think -, maybe I’m wrong, but I’m pretty fucking sure we paid him $100,000 in the mid-80s for the right to use that name.

M: No way.

T: No, I think you’re right. I remember a scandal about this.

M: That’s ridiculous.

S: It is ridiculous! And that was God’s money from donations. Weren’t we good stewards.

M: This is before inflation. That’s a ridiculous amount of money now for something like that.

S: I know! Anyway, so now we have this series of articles – there are actually two that are still being promoted and maybe I gotta go do something about that now.

T: You do.

S: I don’t know what I can do. If you go look, Attitudes Against Abortion and Attitudes for Action…

T: Attitudes And Actions.

S: Yep. And they are written by Melody Green and Sharon Bennett. That was my married name. So here’s also another thing – at the time I was writing things for this magazine and I wrote one of them, and Melody was going to be the final editor, but then she said oh, this needs to run under my name, under Melody Green’s name because I’m the one with the name recognition. I’m in my early 20s and I remember struggling with the sense of is this just my pride that says if I wrote something and I’m the author, it should have my name on it?

M: Honey, you just saved yourself so good, from like, burning in all the fire and brimstone of social media reckoning, where people dig and say oh Sharon is all talking exvangelical – look at this article she wrote, anti-abortion, all of this, and you’re saying she can come out and lead the way in the deconstruction movement. Look, Melody saved you one.

S: There you go. She did me a solid.

M: They can’t dig this up now. You didn’t write that. What article? You didn’t write it.

S: Well, no they can. No, no, it’s in my name. You can go to the website right now.

M: She took her name off of it?

S: No, she allowed it to be by both of us with her leading.

M: Oh okay. I was gonna say.

S: No it’s there. It’s by Melody Green and Sharon Bennett.

R: Oh, but your name isn’t Bennett anymore.

S: It isn’t Bennett anymore, but I own it.

M: What article? You didn’t write this article.

S: Yes I did, I own it.

M: No, no.

S: Look, I bought into the bullshit.

R: Sharon’s okay with it.

M: I’m trying to help you here.

S: You know what though? Taking ownership –

M: There’s a lot of shame.

S: No, it’s not shame. What it is is taking ownership for the real shit that I did. Taking ownership for it; looking at it and going, holy fuck. There was this whole march across America, Americans Against Abortion, Walk for Life – we’re gonna have to do a whole thing on it at some point.

T: A whole deep dive, but it ended up being a very large petition presented by…

S: Three Million names. 3,000,000 names that we and churches around the country – and if you ask your parents I bet you they were involved at some point with this. It was incredibly huge.

M: Oh, I’m sure.

S: And we promised everybody that their names would not be used for anything other than presenting this to Ronald Reagan.

M: What else did you use the names for?

S: Well, what happened….

T: You’re gonna hate it.

S: We got kicked out…

T: You’re gonna end up disconnecting this call. Seriously.

M: Oh boy.

S: We got kicked out of the ministry.

T: That’s true. Our hands are clean on this.

S: Our hands are clean on this one. After we left, Melody wanted to hobnob with the whole religious right that was moving up so strong, and they turned those names over to the campaign of Pat Robertson when he wanted to run for President.

M: Oh stop. That’s wild.

R: Fuck.

S: Yeah. And those names – 3,000,000 names and addresses and contact information got fed into the right-wing political machine from what we did.

R: Was that legal?

M: No it’s not legal.

T: It’s unethical.

S: It’s unethical.

T: And we were complaining about that at the time; that this was against our principles because even at that time, I never signed up in Christianity to be a political arm, so I was pretty horrified that this political arm was starting to take off at that time – for all the wrong fundy reasons, but they were reasons.

S: But you were pure. You were more pure than me, that’s for sure.

T: My default back then was whoa, whoa, Jesus changes hearts, not your political allegiance. What’s the deal here? So that took off, but that is a real thing, because obviously my kids are your kids’ age (if we can say that enough) and this has been a real point of anger for them, and as I’m sure you guys have, and seeing how intensely it has grown and become this horrible landscape. And so that is one thing that Sharon and I – we talk about but haven’t gotten into it, but what now can we do to help? It’s very sad to see what has happened and been eroded in women’s rights because of the earlier Jesus People, who became the fundamentalists, who became political, who ended up having this very powerful platform in the United States. So, we’re sorry.

S: We’re sorry. We’re sorry.

M: Yeah, it’s overwhelming to think about what we can even do, like, to help change the tides. Some days I think it’s so far gone I don’t know if my vote is going to do much, but they say that if you keep calling your senators and petitioning, and writing letters and showing up to vote…

R: I think it’s been in the works for so long.

M: Yah.

R: …that it feels overwhelming – well, if it was happening back then, and that was the start of it, and it ultimately ended up reversing Roe-v-Wade – finally, for that amount of time…

S: Yeah, it took almost 40 years.

R: Right. You’re like, so will it take another 40 years – even thinking about getting Roe-v-Wade passed in the Supreme Court, that took so long and so much of women just fighting for their rights. So it’s just discouraging because okay, unless you have States doing their own thing – obviously it’s not protected on a Federal level, I mean, some States are so extreme, and some are still allowing it to happen. I don’t know. I don’t have a lot of hope in this area. As long as Christian Nationalism is on the rise, they’re all just fucking coming of age and doing their thing – we talked with Tia Levings about the political state of everything and she was saying that to some extent, they are breeding these people from a very young age, to do this.

M: To be politicians.

R: Yeah, to be politicians.

M: Training their boys to be politicians.

R: And they are, like I said, coming of age. They’re trying to get into Congress and Senate and all of this stuff now and I think it’s a snowball at this point. I don’t know. I want to be that person that’s hopeful, and let’s fucking get in there too and do some shit. There’s probably just as many of us as there is of them, but I don’t think this is going to be easily corrected, I guess.

S: It’s not an easy change. I’ve always been one who’s poo-poohed, gone oh my god and rolled my eyes at conspiracies, but Shiny Happy People and looking at the IBLP and the Joshua Generation and all this other stuff – there is a concerted effort, and there is a reason why all this extreme white nationalist Christian shit has risen and has gained so much power. Sometimes I’ll tell you Molly and Rachael, what I have thought is the hope is in your generation.

T: Yes.

S: That’s where the hope is. Your generation.

M: But we’re scared.

S: We gotta die off.

R: Millennials are tired.

M: We’re looking at Gen Z – I’m hoping you’re going to be the one. You’re the chosen one, you guys. It’s gonna be you; we’re passing the baton because we’re exhausted.

R: We are exhausted.

M: We’re working three jobs and still not able to afford rent.

R: We’ve lived through two recessions. We’re exhausted. So I watched this thing on Tik-Tok – and I know it’s Tik-Tok but there’s actually books written about it, where America goes in series of every 20 years is a new sort of era. So we’re in the crisis era; we’re at the turning of this – not the turning of the century, but at the turning of where we start over. So I guess this last one started at World War II, once that war ended. That was when we went into our new set of 80 years when there was the high years, the innovation years, all of these years, and now we’re in the crisis years, so Millennials were born into a shit era, but essentially we were dubbed as the heroes of this century, because we are the frontline workers; we are the people getting in there and getting shit down, so it actually might be us. Gen Z is going to produce the next round of artists, apparently, that were born during the last era, if that makes sense. I’m not explaining it very well…

T: No, you are.

R: I’ll send you the Tik-Tok video, but essentially – actually, it is us.

M: I don’t know how I feel about this.

R: I know but it actually makes a lot of sense. I’ll send you all the video.

T: We’ll put all the things in the show notes, but the Boomers are getting older. I know we’re at the tail end – I always have this conversation with some of my kids. We’re fading. The Boomers influence…

S: Die off is what we need to do.

T: …is fading, and it’s only a matter of time.

M: Sharon, that was the most therapeutic thing I’ve heard you say tonight. Boomers need to die off.

[laughter]

M: Thank you for saying that.

R: Well, you guys are the lower end, so you’re not going to die off as soon as –

M: We like you! Stay alive.

R: What is the oldest Boomer right now? Is the oldest Boomer like, 75 maybe?

S: I don’t know.

T: We looked it up at the beginning. We’ll put that in the show notes.

R: I think it was like 1949 or something.

T: Even us who are at the tail end; I’ve got retirement on my horizon, and I think if we could really get some people to advocate for putting some term limits and some age limits on our political representation, because it’s insane to me that 80 and 90 year olds are running stuff still, when they should be bowing out and letting the next generation come forward. So I think that’s my hope, that the Boomers are on their way out. It is a matter of short years for them to be out, and out of the power centers of influence. Communication has never been what communication is; your podcast, being able to get out there and encourage people to let their voices be heard, and I think women – honestly, it kind of comes back to what we were starting. The power of women – I think we’re just coming into it. We’re at what, 51% of the population now? I think we actually tick past the halfway mark, and really having women stand back up for our rights and our voice in this nation – I think there’s hope. So I’m hoping I’m not just like, yeah, rah, cheerleader; I do think there is hope and we need to start now continuing to talk, and encouraging people to get involved. Even in abortion – I’ve had some very honest conversations with my daughters on this, because I did have pregnancies – obviously five, so the narrative of killing babies, let’s just kill babies, is a really bad message. But when you can start bringing data in as far as what’s happening in these States, where people aren’t getting their live saving care; that all of these people going on welfare – all the other data points that are happening because of these laws, that’s the inspiring part of the message. I think they’ve coopted this, and we’re guilty of it because we had Baby Choice that was taken around in a casket as a saline abortion…

S: This was actually an aborted fetus that we held in our hands, this little baby of aborted fetus.

T: And took it around on a campaign, and of course that’s a very emotional message. Of course people are like, we don’t want that to be legal, so birth control, the birth control message of being able to get birth control and sex education into the hands of young women, being able to understand how these laws impact it…

R: Well, and the statistic too, that most abortions – I don’t know how old the fetus was that you were carrying around – but most abortions happen before nine weeks of pregnancy.

S: Yes. Clearly.

R: They do not look like whatever it is that you were carrying around.

S: That’s right.

R: That’s propaganda.

S: It was. We were involved in emotional propaganda, and I will say that my perspective, now in my 60s, is very different than it was back then, but I also do not see this as a black and white issue. I do not see this as all abortions should be allowed, or no abortions should be allowed. I don’t see it that way. I think it comes down to taking the time to be intellectually honest and vigorous and not lazy, and to look at ethics and morals, and to look at humanity and to look at evidence – all these things, they take effort. It’s much more than the bible says this and my pastor said that. I mean, that’s the lazy, immature bullshit.

R: Well, it’s such a personal choice, too. If it’s something you would never do and don’t want to do – you don’t have to do it. That is your personal right, and I think that’s when the smart people have ended up with it, to where they’re critically thinking if I don’t want to do it, I’m not going to do it, but I’m not going to make that decision for someone else. That’s why it’s about choice. It’s a very hard, personal decision.

S: It is.

R: And that’s where we need to leave it. We don’t make someone else take anti-depressants, right? That’s your own personal choice. We don’t make someone else get their gall bladder removed because maybe it’s medically necessary. Everything in healthcare is your own personal decision, so I don’t know why we’re making these decisions about something else that is also healthcare.

T: Yes.

S: It is nuanced. To be intellectually honest, the embryo, the fetus, is human and is life. And the question of what is the value, at what point does the law matter – those are valid and difficult questions. So that’s why I feel like there can be extremists on both sides, and I believe that rational, compassionate, informed – that’s what we need. Without a black and white but saying there is nuance, there is complexity. These are the conversations that need to be had, and again, Tracy and I are saying we are so sorry for the things that we did and said in our idealistic, ignorant, arrogant immaturity all those years ago, that set the stage for some pretty shitty shit to go down.

T: That put this in motion, and there’s enough women’s rights to be bringing to the forefront to get that flipped back again. I often liken it to divorce – all these fundys want to have this theocracy. They don’t want divorce to be outlawed, because that would wipe out a hell of a lot of them.

S: Not yet! But you know, it may be coming. What do you think Tracey, we need to start kind of …

T: Well, I have one question and then we’re going to end it. Have you guys seen the Barbie movie?

R: Yes.

M: I have not seen it yet.

R: I saw it on Friday. It’s fantastic.

S: I can’t wait!

M: I’m waiting with great anticipation.

R: It’s so good!

T: And were you allowed to play with Barbies?

M: No.

R: I was, yeah.

M: They were too sexual and too grown up and my mom did not want us to be inappropriate with them.

R: I was so inappropriate with them.

M: And she felt like because they had boobs, that we would be inappropriate with them, and she was right, because my friend had Barbies and I would play with Barbies over at her house, and our Barbies were definitely scissoring.

[laughter]

R: Of course they were.

M: And they were having threesomes with Ken, and taking showers together, and being very inappropriate, so my mother was very right that she didn’t want us playing with them because we would make them do inappropriate things, but I have to say I had Beanie Babies, and I also made my Beanie Babies do inappropriate things.

T: Oh, that’s hilarious.

R: You can make any of your animals do inappropriate things. It’s not just Barbies.

M: I found it interesting reading about what Barbie stood for with this moving coming out. I didn’t know any of this.

R: Women empowerment?

M: Yeah. About women empowerment, and women being able to own their own house, and own their own car, and have their own career, and be whatever they wanted to be when it came to a career, that Barbie wasn’t just isolated to being a  mother and a wife, and Ken was more of an accessory. She could have him around if she felt like it. And I was like, oh my gosh, what an amazing and empowering message that I didn’t get to participate in because they were too grown up and too sexual, and there was this big worry about us having inappropriate behavior with these dolls. But we and these American Girl dolls. American Girl doll is problematic in itself, with all sorts of weird colonial ideals being shoved down our throats…

T: Uh, yeah.

M: but they were celebrated! My sister had a slave doll!

S: Oh my god!

T: It’s Addy. I’m very familiar with them.

M: Addy was a runaway slave, and my sister had this doll and we would play running away from slavery.

R: Well the bible condones slavery so I don’t even know why we’re worried about that.

M: Little white kids.

R: That’s so much more appropriate.

M: Right. I just think it’s interesting – I was thinking about that and how Barbie is coming out in this film, and they’re showing the big positive influence had over a generation of girls, and I’m like, little Christian girls don’t understand the impact.

T: Don’t understand.

M: Nope.

S: Rachael, what was your experience?

R: With Barbie?

S: Yeah.

R: I don’t remember a ton. I know my mom had mixed feelings about me having them, but I think she got a shit ton at a garage sale once for a small amount of money so she was like, okay, well, here you go.

[laughter]

R: I also had a doll house with just like, regular dolls, so I don’t know. I think my mom was just hesitant with it. She didn’t do the empowerment thing. I guess I didn’t see how much different from other dolls I had that Barbie was, but like, I ‘m sure my experience was a lot different that the girls that were allowed to have all the Barbie accessories, and Ken. I don’t think I was allowed to have a Ken, actually. That might have been it. Maybe I just had Barbie.

T: That was exactly our rule! We compromised because my sister bought it, but the compromise was we will not have the Ken, because we were just not thinking that scissoring could happen, I guess.

[laughter]

M: Because gay people don’t exist. I have a funny antidote – we weren’t allowed to have Barbies, but…

S: Wait. Antidote, or anecdote?

M: That one.

R: Anecdote.

M: I have a funny anecdote, because we couldn’t have Barbies, but we could have bible character Barbies, so I had the virgin Mary and baby Jesus. And then I also had Moses from the Prince of Egypt. He was Ken-sized, so the virgin Mary, Moses – let me just say that Mary was not a virgin for very long.

[laughter]

S: What’s that line in Keith’s song where he goes, hey Moses, go on down.

[laughter]

S: Do you remember that?

M: Oh, Moses was going down.

S: Go down Moses! That’s what it is. Go down Moses!

M: He was going down, for sure. So I would do very inappropriate behavior with those dolls, and those were bible dolls so I feel like that was worse than Barbie.

T: Of course!

S: This is great.

T: I think I need to give you my head dress on that one.

M: Oh, do I get a point?

R: Oh my god.

T: You earn it on that, yeah.

S: Well I just gotta say I am the completely asexual one in all of this because I was just pissed off with Barbies. I had the Briar model horses and when you try to make Barbie ride the horse, one of her legs pops off.

M: Oh, I know!

S: So they’re worthless. Just worthless.

R: Completely pointless. I played with horses more than I did with Barbies.

M: You have to get the Barbie horse. Because the Barbie horse has a special saddle that her tiny little crotch can fit on.

[laughter]

S: Well, I’m going to go see the Barbie movie. I can’t wait.

M: I can’t wait for it. It’s gonna be great.

R: It’s so good.

T: Yeah, everyone has had – feminists hated her, and fundamentalists hated her, so I was interested in where we all lined up on that.

R: I love how many times they say The Patriarchy in the Barbie movie.

M: I’m ready

R: It’s so good. And they talk about the controversies with Barbie; there’s musical numbers; it’s fantastic. It’s so good.

T: Wonderful. Well, we’re going to end it here and wrap it up. I think at the beginning before you came on, Rachael, we had talked about meeting in (and I’m going to say it wrong) Louisville Kentucky, altogether culty sisters, cousins, and doing a recording session with some fun events.

S: We gotta do it.

M: It can be like, a special Patreon offering.

S: Which means you gotta get your Patreon going, Molly.

M: Well, it’s gonna be like it means you have to pay us money to see this shit.

[laughter]

R: This shit is wild.

M: Exclusive content.

R: [in a sexy voice] Four hours of unadulterated content.

S: Tracey, would we kiss again for that?

R: Yes.

T: I don’t know.

M: Oh my god. Stop. You’re so gay.

[laughter]

R: I think you have to. We’ll recreate it and take a picture.

[laughter]

T: Ohh. Yep. So you guys want to tell us for all the people who don’t know, how to find your show with the best toast ever? How can they find you?

R: Literally everything is @cheerstoleaving.

T: Oh, you’re so smart.

R: You can email us cheerstoleaving@gmail.com; Instagram; TikTok; Facebook group is in our show notes of every single episode that we have. You can search it, I think it’s Cheers to Leaving Exvangelical Support Group, but also you can go on our show notes if you don’t want to search for it. But yeah, everything is at Cheers to Leaving.

T: Cheers to Leaving. Which makes it so much easier than us, cos we are Feet of Clay Confessions of the Cult Sisters but you can find us on Instagram, feetofclay.cultsisters, and then that link tree will take you to everything else that we have, that’s some kind of combination of our names. Not as easy as yours.

R: We do have a link tree as well.

S: Very good. Well, Rachael and Molly, thank you both so much very much. You’re the beautiful daughters that we just want to adopt.

M: And you’re the mommies we always wanted.

R: Now. Not when you were younger. We didn’t want you to be our mothers then, because, no. That’s basically our mothers. We want the healed versions of you.

S: Aww. And still healing. We are all still on our healing journey. So thanks for being a part of it; thanks for all that you’re doing to help those of your generation and ours, and we will see you all next time.

M: Bye.

R: Cheers.

S: Cheers.

T: Bye.