Anyone who has been living long-term with an abusive or controlling situation could take these steps to help themselves too, you don’t have to be Amish to learn from hearing this experience.
Somebody should have suggested a thrift store. So cheap and there is some quality stuff. I guess if you ever have to help some newly escaped Amish people that’s a good idea. Also please consider writing a book! You are awesome.
I can only imagine the desperation that led to jumping from a 15 foot roof. I have so much respect and admiration for your perseverance in accomplishing so much so quickly after you left.❤
2 months!? Wow, that’s impressive. You must have worked really hard at that. I think when you tell the story it sounds easier than it really must have been.
I would love to see a video where you go over some of the biggest culture shocks and things that surprised you in the first year or so outside the Amish.
Yr One Strong Woman The Jehovah Witnesses Have the Same Problems When they Leave or get Expelled Totally Having to Start a New Life Lucky u Had Some Good People to Help U
Your story hits close to home, it's been a year since I left, I was raised in a Mennonite home tho.. I was so tired of living in a box, and now I have freedom and a wonderful husband 😊
Wow that is some serious work ethic to be able to accomplish all you did in just the first couple months! You are so brave and inspiring. Thanks for continuing to share with us all ❤
I do hope she feels brave & inspiring! Most Amish have an amazing work ethic anyways. I love learning about all of this. I find it extremely interesting.
Please keep telling about your path to freedom! Im enjoying these clips so much. What happened after your brother went back? Did you continue living on your own in his trailer?
I left a high-demand religious group in 2007, and I remember it being SO exciting and happy and freeing until a few years later when the PTSD hit. I've struggled with mental health ever since, especially because escaping from that kind of background is not common. So it was the longest time before I got diagnosed with PTSD and started receiving treatment that helped at all. But it took like about a decade of being passed around in the mental health system which was itself just as traumatizing as growing up. I look at your story and I don't understand why you achieved a normal life and I didn't. I must be doing something wrong but idk what it is?
Hey, don't worry, don't compare yourself to others, because you have achieved a great thing leaving that community that abused you! People are just different, some have a higher resilience naturally than others - there are also war refugees or SA survivors and some are more traumatized than others, although they've had the same experiences. You are not weaker or less worthy for having PTSD and I'm glad you got help and I hope so so much that now you have tools to help you manage daily life. You are wonderful, don't ever doubt that! And you are not alone, there are so many others struggling with PTSD. Praying for your full recovery 🙏🏻♥️
You're not alone. I grew up in a violent household with a mother who hated my guts; she did cruel things to me and had others do uh... stuff, as well. I have physical scars to prove some of those incidents. I predictably got with a sadistic wife beater and had a child. Less than a year later, I got out and took my son. That meant saying goodbye to the fam, as my mother and brother were good friends with my ex and my father believed it was better for my son to have a father that beat him than none at all. My whole life I've had CPTSD but I didn't know until an incident in my 30s - while this was a narrow miss of getting gang something'd and murdered, I couldn't figure out why I spent 3 or 4 hours every morning balling my eyes out. After all, it wasn't like all the violence that actually happened when I was a kid. Turns out it was simply the last straw that lead to a nervous breakdown. As @raspberryjam9258 noted, we're all different. The way us PTSDers are similar is that we all need to share our experiences and receive validation. We can't do anything about the lost potential or time, all we can do is accept where we are and work with what we've got left.
As others have already said different people process trauma in different ways. I don’t know the specifics of your situation but she has spoken before about how she loves her family and has respect for her upbringing and how it shaped her. I’m not trying to lessen her experience, it’s still awful and traumatizing but its possible you experienced more extreme events that were harder to move on from. But even if not, I think not having a normal life after something like that is a normal response and something you shouldn’t feel shame for. I grew up in a very religious environment, although it wasn’t a cult or extremist organization and I have struggled so much for having experienced less than both of you. Getting out is an incredible accomplishment on it’s own and you don’t deserve to feel bad because you’re affected by the awful shit you’ve been through. Anyway, sorry this is long, I hope you’re doing alright 💕
Each one of you who have escaped a highly limited religious-based culture have been mentally indoctrinated in different ways and constantly influenced and intimidated and pressured into believing different things... Lizzie Ens's background experiences may have been similar to your, but, Dear and Precious and Beloved Child, they were NOT the same. What is similar in Lizzie's life to yours can help you in some ways; what is not easy to understand about the success in her ability to move forward and seemingly without deep emotional obstacles can actually be a source of courage for you, just like she tried to describe the person who is "stuck on the roof" still (VERY many of us in the world have been on that "roof," but the length of time we're "there" and the reasons we stayed any length of time are ALL different, but represent the struggle within ourselves to accept that what we were forced to believe may NOT be true after all and that there IS goodness and hope waiting for us once we "jump off that roof." You very likely suffered such mental, and maybe emotional &/or physical intimidation that is deeply rooted in how you can receive the change in life you find now. You will be alright. If no one has ever told you, there IS a God, a GOOD GOD who really did create each one of us all to BE His Beloved Children... not like some humans display parenthood, but like you would want if you could imagine the very best scenario that is full of abundant love, nourishing life and full provision, power and victory over what ever comes against you in this world. This God loves and wants you, He wants each one of ALL of us just exactly as He loves and wants His only Son, whom He gave up to gain us. This Son, Jesus, became one of us just so He could take our place and finish out the sure end of mankind that was separated from our God & Father, to make us His again forever. He's more real than we can know with these earthly brains, but with the faith He gave us we can choose to believe Him safely and live all the loving Father-Child life of safety, trust and joy ... the Bible tells of our history as humans, shows our Loving Father God's character and mind about keeping His promises He made for our benefit and tells not only how He accomplished all of that, but showed He did. No one can make you believe any of this if you don't want to. Being curious to know if what I'm writing is even half true isn't going to condemn you to anything. Everything you do to try to find Truth will reach the Loving hand of our Father God who WILL definitely reach to yours. He is more than a gentleman and will NEVER force His ways, ideas or will upon you, but created you to find out for yourself, experience for yourself and to decide for yourself whether you will accept His Salvation. He holds nothing against you or against any of us; He wants all of us to accept the Salvation He gave for us so we can enjoy being His Children. You are Beloved.
You are such an inspiration, with your incredible drive to live your life as you wanted. Your success in the achievement of goals is awe-inspiring. Thank you for telling your story!
I'd be very curious to know, how much exposure to the non-Amish world did you have before you left? I'm not sure how things are in the various communities in Ohio, but there certainly is the gradient of experiences here in central Pennsylvania, with many Amish people having significant exposure to the non-Amish world (especially if they're part of a business) and many people being totally isolated.
You are amazing. I would love to help young women get out of such a life. I am an older woman and live near a few Amish communities, admire them very much as I farm, but value freedom of choice of lifestyle.
You’re a very strong woman. What you did was an extremely difficult, and scary. You’re very courageous. No one can fully understand what you’ve been through and how you felt. I’m sorry that you went through this. ♥️
Thanks so much for a part 2! It definitely gives me tips for what's necessary to help me move forward on my own journey! Also, I agree with what others are saying: you most definitely should write a book! I would snatch it up in half a heartbeat!
Thank you for sharing your story. 7:03 I'm not Amish, I didn't grow up in a religious household, I wasn't sheltered from the world, but I honestly feel like I'm not smart enough to get my GED. So hearing you say you never studied those things, science, history, etc, before (while I was taught some of those things in school) and you got your GED gives me hope that maybe I can do it too. I'm not at all saying you're stupid (you're amazing) or that it was easy for you, I just mean that we grew up completely differently and you had the strength and courage to learn those things and get your GED and maybe I'm doubting myself too much. ❤️
Thanks for sharing you story with us. I love your content and appreciate that you’ve been adding it to RU-vid as well. What a blessing that the couple took you in and helped you get started.
Sounds like since she only bought one outfit from Walmart she probably had enough left over for the hair cut. Her $20 + the $40 she borrowed probably went a long way back then, given how cheap Walmart is present day.
Can you tell us a bit about ur life now/how life turned out for you e.g did you find someone to settle down with, do you have kids, what type of work you do, hobbies etc
I got emotional when you said you got your GED after not knowing math or science. You’re so strong I’m really happy you get to live life on your terms now. Do you still believe in God? I hope this hasn’t pushed you away from him.
Thanks for the great videos! I’m watching and seeing in only one week how your subscriptions are growing - in no time you’ll be hitting that 100K mark I’m sure!!! 🎉
Had to pause for a question here... what do Amish girls wear if not bra's and panties 😳🤨. Also as for long hair, I have had pretty long hair the majority of my life and it was used as a punishment for me to have it cut.
How common is it for people to leave the Amish community thinking they’re leaving forever, and then later decide to go back? How difficult is it to be accepted back into the Amish community after years away?
Very familiar with the old scool amish , We dare to call them friends . Are you from Ohio ? We live in a high population of amish and know there are many different churches with different views . Wayne and Holmes county .
Eli Yoder, who's also on social media and left an old order Amish community, shared that he went to an Amish school growing up. I think it was like a one room school and taught by an Amish teacher who didn't have a lot of education.
that cutting your hair part i understand a bit i had long hair sinds i was 11 years old and cut it like when i was 32 at one point it was just over my ass i did cut small pieces of now and then but never fully so when i did i was scary to do and felt really strange not like you but can sort of relate
You got your driving licence within two months? That's quite time consuming and expensive a thing with all the required driving lessons and the theoretical and practical tests you have to take. At least it was for me in Germany (where I was living at the time, I was 19 then). Then again, needing your own car to live a self-supporting life is something so American ... I'm 53 and still living car-free, having always chosen my homes to be near regularly served intercity rail stations. Anyway your live is stuff for a movie!
If you can pass the test and pay about $25, you can get a license in the US. Professional lessons are not required. If she had a friend teach her to drive and learned the rules for her state, she could take a test and be licensed in the same day.
Do you think the government should do more to protect Amish kids? Like programs to help them get out, if that's what they want? Or make it mandatory to get an ID or Social Security Number for their kids? Or mandatory doctors appointments to check on the children's well being where they could teach them to bruch their teeth etc.?
Why not, as it could have benefits for the children like better health if they knew how to brush their teeth? I don't want to come of as rude, I'm really interested in why you think the government shouldn't get involved :-) @@angelh3771
I'm still working my way through your library of content, so I may not have gotten to it yet, but do you share what happened to the boyfriend and the other people that helped you in the beginning? Are you still in contact with any of them?
how did you not break a leg jumping that high may i got conversion wrong i use metric but if correct 15feet is 4.5 meters thats high to jump of even on gras and with rolling when you land i have done 3.5 meters but 1 meter extra wtf
@squidsbizarreadventure yes it is and it was a little uncomfortable to watch and I'm sure she didn't mean for it to happen because she's not like other woman that intentionally show parts of her body which are meant to be private. If this happened to me accidentally, I'd want someone to tell me so that I could rectify or delete it before the masses saw it, so as to prevent further embarrassment or an image I did not want. I don't have a means of contacting her privately.
@@shanimarais9695 "meant to be private"? Are you serious? Can you stop sexualizing a stranger's body, please? First of all, breasts are normal and not even inherently sexual, that's literally YOU choosing to sexualize other people's body parts. Breasts aren't shameful or "meant to be private" and it's weird & inappropriate that you actually made a comment on this video about her cleavage. As for the whole "she's not like other women who intentionally show parts of her body", that's just a load of judgmental, slut-shaming BS. People who choose to wear clothes that reveal cleavage aren't immoral or in any way lesser than people who choose to wear clothes that cover their cleavage. Good for you for wanting to let her know that you can see her boob and it made you uncomfortable-- if that's true, you COULD have reached out and messaged her on any of her contact links that she has *readily available in her RU-vid bio* to PRIVATELY tell her, if you REALLY did think that she would care and want to know. In the future, you can use the dimming function on your screen to turn off the screen while still listening to the audio of her video, OR you could literally just choose to LOOK AWAY from her cleavage if it truly makes you so uncomfortable! Having breasts is nothing to be embarrassed about, if anything I think it's far more embarrassing to publicly admit in the comment section that you're sexualizing someone else's body parts and incapable of averting your gaze from their cleavage.
@ElleLillian lol, I'm not even going to read your essay! Aaaa, amazing how angry you getting when decency comes into question. OK buttercup 😉, run along now...
I was kind of wondering, the same thing, and wondered if maybe she had a skin tone tank top under it. I just wasn’t sure. Not trying to be unkind, just wondering.
