Escaping a Cult with Michelle Dowd

Breaking Away From a Cult with Michelle Dowd. As a child, Michelle Dowd grew up on a mountain in the Angeles National Forest. She was born into an ultra-religious cult—or the Field. Michelle lives a life of abuse, poverty, and isolation, as she obeys her family’s rigorous religious and patriarchal rules—which are so extreme that Michelle is convinced her mother would sacrifice her, like Abraham and Isaac, if instructed by God. She often wears the same clothes for months at a time; she is often ill and always hungry for both love and food. She is taught not to trust Outsiders, and especially not Quitters, nor her own body and its warnings.

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Michelle Dowd:

I mean, even if you wanna throw out, is Hitler a cult leader? I mean, that these kind of questions, it honestly depends on how you define cults. It really does. It’s very difficult. They control the people who are around them for certain, but can you know, how how who’s in the container? Right?

And, anytime you believe something against reason, I think there’s a cult ish aspect to that. But, you know, cults also this is something that I’ve heard from a lot of people. They have rings kind of. Like, there’s something at the center.So anything might be a cult at the center, but those of us who are influenced, we’re I mean, we could go to a Scientology church or museum. There’s a mentality in our country that is very consistent. It supports cults, I think.

Bert Martinez:

I’ll just keep asking because I think that I think that your experience and your willingness to talk about it is, first of all, incredible experience. Amazing that you were able to break off and do the stuff that you’ve done. But being able to talk about it, I think, helps a lot of people understand what’s out there and and how some of and and how some of these cults work.

Michelle Dowd:

Yeah. There’s a lot of them out there. I I didn’t even know until after the book came out.

Bert Martinez:

Yeah. I the, there was a researcher who said that there’s, like, approximately 10,000 active cults in the US Wow. Which surprised me. That’s a lot.

Michelle Dowd:

Yeah. There’s a lot of them out there. I I didn’t even know until after the book came out.

Bert Martinez:

Yeah. I the, there was a researcher who said that there’s, like, approximately 10,000 active cults in the US Wow. Which surprised me. That’s a lot.

Michelle Dowd:

Yes. I believe I’ve heard that number. I think I first heard it, on the Frank Buckley well, not on the podcast, but behind the scenes because she had looked, up the cult I came from in a cult directory. And I said, cult directory? I’m like, what? And she was letting Frank know. She’s like, oh, his producer. She she said, no. No. I already researched this.

Of course. You know? Like, of course, I did my due diligence. And I but, anyway, that’s crazy to me that there’s 10,000. But, also, there’s a mentality in our country that is very consistent. It supports cults, I think.

Bert Martinez:

Absolutely. I think humans in general are are kinda hardwired to support cults. One of the things that I noticed, like, 10 years ago, And for whatever reason, I remember having this moment that this is why cults work, and this is why certain, what do you call it, groups come together. And this is completely disconnected. But I was working out at a health club called 24 Hour Fitness. And they had a bunch of fitness trainers there, which totally makes sense. What was so weird to me is that none of these fitness trainers looked like they worked out. They were all fat.

So I nicknamed it 24 hour fatness because they were all out of shape. I mean, you can tell there was one guy that looked like he had worked out before, but had totally given it up. I mean, he had a big old pot belly. And then the rest of the people looked like they just never worked out at all. And what happened to me, the epiphany was that people are so starved for leadership. They’re so starved for for being told what to do or how to do it, that they’ll listen to anybody who raises their hand and says, I can help you.

I’m a leader. Because I just would not hire I just would not hire somebody who’s fatter than I am to help me work out. So I just I think that humans are we’re starving for leadership. I don’t know what it is, but I think humans in general to one level or the other are susceptible to cults. Matter of fact, I wanna get your take on this. So we have former president Trump, and a lot of people have said, this is has a lot of similarities to Colt. What’s your take on this?

Michelle Dowd:

I’m not really making political statements in my interviews right now, but I, this reminds me what you’re talking about of a book by Carlyle called of hero and hero worship, which I read back in graduate school, but it’s been around for, I wanna say, over a 150 years. And how, yes, people do want heroes to worship, and anyone could be made into a hero if they claim that for themselves and then they find people who also uphold them. And if you think of a cult as an example of someone who controls your behavior, your information, your thoughts, and your emotions, and there’s a question to which somebody can control that on a national scale. I mean, even if you wanna throw out, is Hitler a cult leader? I mean, that these kind of questions, it honestly depends on how you define cult. It really does. It’s very difficult. They control the people who are around them for certain, but can you know, how how who’s in the container? Right?

Anytime you believe something against reason, I think there’s a cultish aspect to that. But, you know, cults also this is something that I’ve heard from a lot of people. They have rings kind of. Like, there’s something at the center. So anything might be a cult at the center, but those of us who are influenced, we’re I mean, we could go to a Scientology church or museum or Mormons, and we’re not going to be drawn in unless we are particularly vulnerable in that particular moment. Right?

Bert Martinez:

Michelle Dowd:

Oh, yeah. Well, honestly, that that’s very interesting because what that is about is a lot more about the control for the people in the group. It’s a threat. It’s like they need the people who lack, A, not to talk about it, but B, to be failures. And so they’re not trying to get those people back. What they’re trying I mean, they might be getting them back in terms of revenge, but not they’re not trying to bring them back into the cult. What they do is the people, once they’re in, you’re sworn to secrecy on some level, and and there’s this loyalty thing. So if you it’s like you deflected or something, you know, and, like, you abandoned the ship.

And so they want the people to know inside that people who do that are not only sinners, but they’re like betrayers. Like they should be hung as, you know, I mean,  it’s like, well, we have a different word, right, for a trader. It though, you know, it it’s a different, like, punishment in the army if you’re a trader versus just if you deflect. And so there’s a certain degree once you’re in the inside that you’re a traitor if you, leave, if you decide not to stay in the circle, and I’ve certainly been called a traitor. And, I mean, that’s kind of what cults do. I just think that not all of them do it in a huge public arena, but my guess is pretty much all cults punish their forerunner members, not just with excommunication, but by, telling everybody in the cult what a bad person they be.

Bert Martinez:

Yes. And and and that makes sense because if you wanna keep your your group, your cult secret, you you wanna make sure that those the person who just left is a bad person. You can’t believe them. They can’t be trusted. They’re not loyal. And it makes sense. I never thought about the fact that you want them to fail because that way you can point and see, hey. Look.

They left our cult, and now they’re being punished for their for their for their whatever, for their defection. Right? Your your situation is, I think, to me anyway, amazing because you were born in this cult, and the name of the cult is, fields?

Michelle Dowd:

Yeah. We called it the field on the inside. That was the interior name, but yes.

Bert Martinez:

Okay. And and you were born in this cult, and there’s a certain amount of brainwashing that  is parents that we all do. But what what was fascinating is to me, is that you were born in this cult, so you don’t know any better. I mean, this is this normal life to you. At what point did you start thinking this is not right? Because you have nothing to compare it to. So so I’m trying to just wrap my head around the fact that here you are. You’re starting to make these thoughts or these decisions that are completely contrary to what you were brought up in.

Michelle Dowd:

Well, I think that this is very common, not just in cults, but in families that are dysfunctional.

Children blame themselves for what they see as, quote, what’s wrong. Like if their needs aren’t getting met, they blame themselves for that. So if their parents are alcoholics or drug addicts or in prison or whatever, in any way that their needs as a child, you can’t count on your parent, you blame yourself. So I think that there was the majority of the time that I was there, I blamed myself. And I would say even up until the very end, I was blaming myself at least 80%. And so there was a certain degree to which I was excommunicated, yes, but this leaving was also because I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t get it right because it didn’t it stopped making sense to me. But I don’t know that I thought that they were bad like, wrong.

I just think that I felt like there’s something wrong with me that doesn’t fit into this. Now only in retrospect can I say that I think my mother probably pushed me out, and maybe as an act of compassion, maybe as an act self defense? I think that she well, I know she had 3 daughters before she had a son. And 3 daughters is a lot, especially in a cult that doesn’t really support women. All her daughters are very bright. My mom was, I think, the brightest of her siblings. That’s an opinion. But she certainly was the most communicative, and she was the one that my father relied on most to speak for him. And my mom had some power in the cult.

It was not much because women didn’t have much, but she was, like, the only woman who was allowed to speak in public. The only. Her sister wasn’t allowed to. She was the only one. Could she really afford to have 3 daughters coming right after her nipping at her heels? Like, I think to some degree, my mom alienated each of us. I mean, all of us left except for my older sister. She made it so uncomfortable, you know, that I think that I just don’t think I could have stayed, You know? Like, there was just everything in me felt so, angry, I think, even though I was taught not to express anger, so I didn’t know that that’s what I was feeling. Right.

My parents never argued publicly, like, even inside the home. Wow. I’d never heard my parents argue ever. And they stayed married till my mom died and never heard them argue. They were very much into you So that So that would that was very deeply ingrained in me. The most I would do is just put my head down and walk away, you know, to whatever degree I could get away with that. But even now, I feel like if I have something to say to my dad and I start to bring it up, he shuts it down so quickly. He’ll hang up the phone.

He’ll walk away. He’ll like, he just he’ll change the subject. He’ll do whatever he can to not allow for confrontation. He’ll only see him in public when there’s a lot of people around, and then he’ll you know? And I think that that’s probably, why it it was difficult to really name for myself what I thought was wrong.

Bert Martinez:

Yeah. And, again, it makes total sense. But that that’s weird. So it sounds like there was a little bit of competition in in in this cult. You’re  because you’re saying that you that your mom might have been concerned that you guys..

Michelle Dowd:

There is always a competition in cults. You cannot have somebody at the top. It’s just like the all the old stories of Shakespeare and the king. Everybody’s always trying to kill the king. Everybody’s always trying to be in the right hand position that, you know, the whole story of Lucifer being like he thought he was jealous of Jesus being at the right hand of God, and he took 1 third of the angels to fight against God. I mean, this whole legend of that. If you have a tight control, there’s always somebody trying to get rid of the person maybe at the top or maybe right next to the top. Everyone went in my mom’s position.

My mom had a lot more freedom than everybody else did, of course, but she would never say it was competition. And I can’t say that I competed directly with her because I she she was in a power position. She won. Had I stayed there and she had indoctrinated me, stayed there at all costs, I think there’s a chance that at some point, I would have risen above her and but that did not happen because I was still so young. Right. But but I wanna throw out culture extremely competitive. It’s all politics inside of a cult. Like, is in terms of the position as a power.

I mean, how else and the leader can always say, and this is true even if you wanna use somebody who may or may not be a cult leader like Trump. I mean, you could just get rid of somebody who disagrees with you. Right? I mean, that’s what cult leaders do is they get rid of the people who challenge them.

Bert Martinez:

Interesting. The other thing that you said that I found very interesting is this thing that, that the women were really subdued. They they weren’t allowed to have any power. As you said, your mom was the only one allowed to speak publicly and the only one allowed to speak for your grandfather. Why is that? Because, I guess, again, I I it’s obviously a a form of control, but why take that power away from women? Is that maybe like a a misinterpretation of of, like, stuff from the bible or the old testament or because it almost sounds like the Taliban. Right? That’s what the Taliban do. Women have no rights to do anything.

Michelle Dowd:

I’m gonna make a bold claim here.

All powerful institutions restrict the rights of women.

It’s very, very important once women start getting power that you control the means of production means of reproduction. You can have women making the choices for themselves if you’re going to maintain total control. And I you can look throughout history. I was listening to an interview with Gloria Steinem, and she was saying how it didn’t surprise her, the Dobbs ruling.

She said that the thing is that you Hitler shut down shut down these all the women’s health clinics the day he got elected, and he was elected. So, like, he got rid of all that. You get rid of your artists, but you have to cramp clamp down on women because if women start controlling their own bodies, they could potentially be a threat. Right? And so Right. I don’t think it’s uncommon that cults control their women. I mean, if you look at again, whether you call the Latter day Saints a cult or not, do they control their women?

She said that the thing is that you Hitler shut down shut down these all the women’s health clinics the day he got elected, and he was elected. So, like, he got rid of all that. You get rid of your artists, but you have to cramp clamp down on women because if women start controlling their own bodies, they could potentially be a threat. Right? And so Right. I don’t think it’s uncommon that cults control their women. I mean, if you look at again, whether you call the Latter day Saints a cult or not, do they control their women?

Of course. And this is true, you know, the Taliban, but the question of whether or not there’s separation of church and state, I think, is a lot of of whether or not religion is used as control. But as a political tool, there’s all sorts of ways that we in this country restrict women, and we have great freedoms as as country’s women. But up until 50 years ago, women didn’t even have the right type of credit card.

Bert Martinez:

That’s right. It and first of all first of all, I’m still reeling. I am still reeling from the fact that what you said, I can’t dispute. I can’t think of an organization that does not, on some level, try to control the women or subdue their power. I’m just like, why is this a revelation to me now? But it’s just blowing me away. I’m like, my mind is thinking, okay. Well, she’s gotta be wrong, but I can’t figure it out because first of all, as far as I know, all religions do that. Right? And to your point, for women for a while couldn’t vote, couldn’t have a credit card.

I think it was Ronald Reagan that gave women the right to initiate divorce. And when you think about that, Ronald Reagan isn’t a guy who’s a 100 years old, you know, whatever. That’s kind of recent. When you think about it, it’s just like, when I heard that, I’m thinking you got a beginning. It’s just so weird. But, again, when you look at our go ahead.

Michelle Dowd:

I heard an older actress speaking in an interview, and she was saying how, I believe it was the early seventies. I wanna make sure that I don’t misquote this, but she definitely told the story, although it could have been during the sixties, but that she was separated from her husband. She couldn’t get a divorce, and her husband ex husband, whatever you wanna call him, they weren’t legally divorced. And this also happened with my own paternal grandfa grandmother, excuse me, where the man could follow you around. He could climb through your window. He could rape you, and it was entirely legal. It didn’t matter that you were separated, that you’ve been separated 10 years. He also had access to her money.

And she was a woman earning a lot of money in Hollywood who could not get a divorce and could not keep her husband from sexually assaulting her, and she had no recourse. That wasn’t very long ago. And when she tells the story publicly, she told her on documentary, I was just so struck by how recent that is. And then also the degree to which, you know, it it’s questionable the degree to which sexual assault is kind of evicted compared to how I mean, there’s how often it happens and then how often it’s reported and then how often it is taken seriously or considered as an actual offense and then how often it is prosecuted, and there’s many steps to there.

So probably and there’s different statistics on this, but there’s probably 1 out of a 1000 sexual assaults that are are actually convicted. I mean, we don’t know for sure, but most of us don’t report because it’s not worth going through the public humiliation. And so there’s all sorts of ways. But also there’s a book called Sapiens, that has been was pretty popular about 5 years ago, I think, when it first came out.

Bert Martinez:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. The the there is, there are so many extremes. And real quick for you guys who are joining us, I am here with Michelle Dowd. The book is Forager, deal notes on surviving a family cult. It’s an amazing read. And I just started reading it, when  my producer told me that  you were coming on, and so I just start kinda started getting into it. But it is so fascinating, because again, this is a family cult you’re that you were raised up in.

And as we’ve already discussed, your your you have your grandfather and then you have your mom, kinda puts you in in that inner circle, which is a privilege or or kind of an envy or enviable spot for a cult or for any organization.

Michelle Dowd:

Yes. And I think that even people who are in family businesses have expressed to me that it reminds them. And that’s, I think, why we use family cults in the title because there are other examples of families that are very controlling, and they have a lot of rules. Some of them unwritten, but they are some of them even unspoken, but a lot of expectations. Right? So, yes, my mom didn’t have experience on the outside. So she was very you could call it brainwashed. I’ll call it indoctrinated. She was very indoctrinated by her father.

She had 3 older brothers who all had power. They certainly had a lot of physical power in the cult. She just, was married off. She was the first marriage that the cult ever had. So it used to be an all male organization. And so that is relevant, I think, to why men had so much power. It was all men. And then my grandfather’s 4th child was a woman and a girl at the time.

And then when she became of age, like, he didn’t know what was he gonna do, quote, have her be a spinster, an old maid, whatever. Her mother wanted her to get married, his wife. Right? What were they gonna do with her? She had a younger sister, 7 years younger, but the question, because she was the first one, is, like, what are we gonna do?

And so they kept her virginal, secluded, everything they could do, but eventually, my, grandfather married her off to his lead top dog guy who happened to be my father, 6 years older than my mom, but was also part of this organization since he was 12 years old. So he’s very well vetted. And so my parents were the very first wedding. All the marriages at this particular cult that have taken place since 1966 when my parents got married, a 100% are still married. Not even separated. Not just legally married, but still together.

There’s never been a wedding there that has ever resulted in a divorce because, they have that kind of control.

Bert Martinez:

Sure. And it and it also makes it easier when you have limited choices. And and for those who are okay, if it any relationship, you have to have a, you know, commonality. So if you believe the same thing and and you have more or less the same choices, you’re surrounded more or less by the same environment. It’s easier to stay together. I find it interesting that your grandfather started a cult. First of all, that’s interesting. But second of all, to say, we’re only gonna it’s going to be just a a boys club.

That is just weird. Did you ever find out why he only wanted boys?

Michelle Dowd:

Well, it’s 1931. You couldn’t really get away with, if you had here’s the thing. He only worked with children, basically. You couldn’t have girls were not just, like, available to be playing sports or doing things like that in the 19 thirties. There was also the depression, everything else. He ran an after school boys program. He was a he was a boy scout leader, so that’s really where he came from. I mean, he was an orphan who came here.

He started as a boy scout leader. He couldn’t have enough control as a boy scout leader. He took some of the boys from his boy scout troop, so that might be largely it. I speculate my grandfather might have been gay. There’s there’s a lot of he certainly didn’t womanize. He he didn’t like women. Like, I don’t think he actually liked women. So I don’t I don’t know for sure.

There’s stories that I’ve heard that I  mean, how was one verify these things? But, of course, this was a different era. In the forties with the wars and everything, like, there wasn’t there wasn’t mixed gender kinda groups around. And if you had allowed for that, you would have to deal with things like sex. You’d have to deal with things like marriage. You’d have to deal with things that they did have to deal with once in the 19 sixties. People like me. You know, my family, my I’m not the oldest there. I’m the 4th that was born there, but it you’re just courting disaster if you start, like people have families.Right? Like, if you can keep he believed he could keep all those boys or those men celibate. And if they chose to leave, that was on them. But he did presumably keep I mean, he had a couple guys who were old men when they died and by all accounts, like, there’s nobody who’s come out of the woodwork who says that they weren’t celibate. You know? They were men who stayed with him since the 19 thirties, who died there in their nineties or some of them in their seventies that were, followed him their whole lives.

Bert Martinez:

That’s amazing.

Michelle Dowd:

You can have a lot more control if you don’t let people fall in love.

Bert Martinez:

I suppose so. And you’re right in the sense that it’s it’s less chaotic because, first of all, you know, when you have opposite sex, it’s it’s drama. Even in the same sex, you’re gonna have drama, but it’s going to be minimized. But to your point, if all of a sudden you have a bunch of women in there, there’s gonna be jealousy, heart heartbreak, all those different you know, all that different emotions that we have to deal with. So in one sense, yeah, it makes it makes total sense to say, hey. If we’re if we have just guys being a guy, I know more or less what they’re thinking. I know how to deal with it. It’s it’s gonna be much easier to control.

I I that makes sense, but it’s still weird, but it makes sense.

Michelle Dowd:

Well, and in a heteronormative society, there was no discussion of, you know, men who are attracted to men. Of course, that had to have existed, but it was not socially sanctioned. And so he could get away with not, like, just vilifying it and sort of keeping it on the outskirts. But if you think about it, it’s very much like the military up until recently. The military has been all men. I made sure they brought women in as, health care support and things like that, but the fighting has in this country, and there are countries who do it differently, but it has been a male dominated world, and there’s been men who have risen in their, like, profession. Yes. They’re allowed to get married.

I understand that. But their working conditions are all male or have been until, you know, the last couple decades. It’s very interesting.

Bert Martinez:

It’s very interesting. And I tell you, I  work with several veterans groups, and one of the things that we do is make sure that our veterans get their their benefits, things of that nature. Sometimes it’s it’s very complicated. They get denied quite a bit. Here’s what I found that was disappointing, frightening, shocking. You hear about these women that get raped in the military. Men get raped in the military almost as much as the women.

I I not found that to just how can how can our guys do this? It’s it’s amazing. So I’m thinking back to this cult of all guys, something not everybody can be celibate on some they they have to do something on some level.

Michelle Dowd:

And, also, I worked in a men’s prison, and I was trained specifically to think about hierarchies. And one of the things in men’s prisons is almost all the sex is very hierarchical, so we’re talking about power dynamics. Where in women’s prisons, the sex is mostly consensual and it’s mostly relational. And most women, regardless of their sexual persuasion, will be affectionate, if not sexual, with another woman by choice in order to, you know, they call it tend and befriend. And so women will, partner off.

And in men’s prisons, they will create units. Right? Like, they’ll just have a lot more hierarchy. So I think that the thing about sex is it can be used as a power mechanism, and I’m sure that goes on in the military all the time. I’m sure it still does even though I think that I think that they are a little more responsible in the way that they handle it. There still has to be so much shame around it that there’s gotta be a lot of people who don’t report.

Bert Martinez:

Absolutely. Absolutely. And again, we were talking about this earlier. When you look at the whole history of of the abuse that women have gone through, and what what I mean by that is you had pointed out that here’s this actress who’s making a lot of money, who can’t divorce her husband, who is being who’s being raped by by him, who’s being financially abused by him, and she has no rights.

That’s, you know, the and like you said, it isn’t that long ago. I mean, we’re still seeing that even to date, it’s it’s been, greatly reduced because now men in society in general are starting to realize, hey. Some of these women are being abused. There is no, you know, there is no system for them or there wasn’t a system for them for the longest time.

Like, anyway, so, yeah, it’s incredible. One of the things I tell people, I’m an immigrant. And and one of the things I tell people about America, America is great. I’m sure that there are other countries that are just as great, but this is where I’m from, or at least where I grew up. And so the great thing about America is that it is an op, equal opportunity abuser. Also, all of our societies from the Native Americans to the women to to any other immigrant, group that’s come here has had their experience of abuse, whether you know, and it’s been physical. It’s been it’s been financial. It’s been you name it.

It’s for some reason, it’s it’s part of the, what do you call it? The process of coming to America. You come here, you’ll find you’ll experience some level of prejudice or, pushback. But if you persevere, if you stay at it, you’ll you’ll eventually come out okay.

Michelle Dowd:

What country is your family from, Bert?

Bert Martinez:

Cuba.

And and, yeah. So, again, I’m I’m as an immigrant, I was born there, and I’m so grateful for the United States because, again, this is one of those weird things. And and, not to go down the political rabbit hole, but if you’re Cuban, you know, for almost any reason, you can come to United States. If you and I get on a raft and we make it to, close to the Florida Keys, we’re gonna we’re gonna be brought in. Oh, they’re Cuban. You know, take care of them. But if we’re Haitian and we make it, we get sent back. And that’s all political.

But, anyway so I wanna talk about this. So here you are. You leave this cult, and you go where?

Michelle Dowd:

So I do want to I’ve been told that I I don’t talk about the book often enough in my interviews. I do wanna mention that the book does look at these kinds of hierarchies, which I think are very similar to what’s going on in the United States in general, but from a child’s perspective who doesn’t make judgments on these things, but just observes them. And so that child’s me, but I’m speaking about her in 3rd person because she’s a character in the sense that, you know, she is her own voice, and the voice of that child is not the voice of me now.

It is the voice of a former version of myself. And so when I was going through the process of becoming aware, I think it’s very similar to many people in this country who have no idea, and we’re always told it’s a great country, but they’re not necessarily aware of the abuses. And I I’m not excusing, you know, anyone for not understanding racism or or I mean, there’s so much ethnocentrism and, obviously, there’s sexism and there’s there’s things, but I think that you don’t see it if it is the water you swim in. Right. And so that is was my experience growing up is I didn’t of course, there was the hierarchy because that’s the only world that I knew, and so men had the power.

And if I wanted, you know, to be protected in any way, it was you know, there’s the kind of the slogan, the alcohol, the, cause and the solution of all life’s problems. It was like that’s what men were. They caused a lot of the problems about, you know, maybe all my problems, but they were also the only solution for my problems. Like, you had to befriend somebody in power. And so as I was, you know, getting older and starting to be a teenager and starting to get male attention, there’s this constant dance of, like, can this male attention serve me or is this male attention going to destroy me?

And, I would say that’s probably a common dance for young women, but in this particular world, they the men had all the power. And so there was this, dance that I was constantly engaging in. So and this is in the book, but the the ultimate sort of, like, pinnacle of, like, what caused me to leave, of course, had to do with boys. And then, like, you know, the the kinds of things that were happened around me, and the, quote, temptations or whatever.

But when I left, I really didn’t have anywhere to go except for, so I had a little period of time where I was alone in the world. But where I ended up is in college, and I did move into dorms when I was 17. And the reason I got into college was because I was working as a housekeeper. I worked as a house cleaner for lots and lots of families, kind of secretly at the beginning, and then I think my family knew, you know, that I was bringing in money this way. But I I’ve worked as a house cleaner for a long time and continued to do that in college. But one of the families that I worked for was educated, and they had resources, and they thought that I was bright. And they, you know, the woman, the matric of the home gave me a college application, which I filled out in pencil. It was very poorly done.

But, you know, I did manage to get into a school in Claremont, Pitzer College, where, they really value, and I think to some degree still do. I just went to a memorial service of one of my former professors. Long term partner was also a professor there, but he was a professor when he very first started. So he passed away. I went to this beautiful sort of celebration of his life, and I heard all these things about how Pitts started in the late 19 sixties and how it really, really wanted to shift education and take out the idea of someone telling you what to think, but instead, you know, be, like, the students are teaching themselves from their own curiosity.

And when I got there and and one of the guys who was a friend, so very, very old man, he said that he thinks until the early nineties it was still like this. And I thought that sounds about right because it I still felt that. So this school accepted me because I was unconventional and because I could ask questions.

I was curious, and I had a weird sensibility, and I turned it poem as a, you know, statement of purpose. And but I think that compelled them. Now I also did, to be fair, take some exams, and they let me for example, I was able to forego taking any writing classes or math classes. I actually was really adept at those things.

I think that learning by doing so even though I didn’t have formal education, I had read the Bible cover to cover from a very young child, but also continued to cross reference the Bible for many, many years until, I really understood the language of of King James, and that’s a real critical thinking sort of tool. I certainly, you know, could read Shakespeare and understand because it’s the same era as those that particular translation of the Bible. And so, when I got to college, I actually was so excited. Not I didn’t understand the culture of the socialization.

Like, I was very scared about other people my age. That freaked me out. But I was really interested in the learning aspect, and so I became very close to professors and, went straight to grad school, but also started teaching college at 21. And I taught at university. Like, a writer in residence job kinda thing at the university writing program in Boulder, Colorado. So that was my trajectory.

I, like, came into this another little bubble, right, of education, and it stayed in that bubble because it served me. I also had children very young, and so I got married while I was still in college, before I went to Boulder, and I, married somebody from the fields because that was really I couldn’t understand outside people.

So, you know, that’s only tangentially covered a little on the epilogue, but, like, how does a how does anyone leave what they’ve known? I think it is very I sometimes you know, people say you’re like an immigrant. I said, I kinda feel like I am an immigrant. Because when you come to a new place, you have to learn all the new customs and the, you know, the values of the particular community that you’re in, and it can take some time to really you can call it deprogram yourself, but reprogram, you know, to figure out what what anybody wants and what, like, what brings in money. So, you know, all those kinds of things.

But house cleaning, for example, you learn a lot because you learn what every different family wants something a little bit different. Like, there’s not one cleaning. There’s, like, some people want you to talk to them and some people don’t. And, like, you know, some people wanna you they want you to be invisible so they don’t have to think about how somebody else is cleaning their house. You know? That kind of thing. Right?

Bert Martinez:

Right. Yeah. So how old were you when you left? 17.

Michelle Dowd:

17.

Bert Martinez:

17. And  again, this is the part that I find fascinating because it’s one thing if all of a sudden your mom grabbed you and and the rest of your kids or siblings and said, hey. We’re leaving. That to me makes total sense and that’s usually what you hear. It’s not a 17 year old kid leaving a cold.

It’s usually an adult who is now heading up, and they’re moving on, and they’re much older. They’re so for you at 17 to make this decision, I find that to be exceptional. That had to be super scary. So alright. So at at this age of 17, you’re a house cleaner. And do you have a place to go? Or are you?

Michelle Dowd:

No. But I’m I was very good at I mean, I had been trained. That part of being trained to be in the army of God was to sleep on the earth. And, like, I knew how to I’d also done a lot of proselytizing slash pandering, like, panhandling, which is also pandering, but, like, panhandling on the streets. Like, I had done a lot of that, so I knew how to ingratiate myself to people. I also knew how to live without anything. When your house is clean, sometimes they give you leftovers. Sometimes they let you take things home.

Sometimes they actually feed you while you’re there. And there’s just a lot that you can get from, knowing how to survive. And I felt like my life was always so unstable. And in our particular biological family, we really didn’t have much of a unit. I was raised pretty collectively to begin with. So I was used to staying in lots of different people’s houses if I was in a house, and I was used to sleeping on the ground. I was listen used to sleeping in a tent. I I’ve been asked in interviews, like, what was a normal day? And I’m like, there was no normal day.

But, but, you know, there was a certain malleability that I have, since come to see had built resilience in me. I went to a therapist one time not too long ago, maybe, 8 years ago. I had been beat up by a guy, and I ended up in therapy and which I didn’t really wanna go to. But she kept saying, I want you to look at me. You’re you think you’re messed up, but you’re not that messed up because whatever happens to you, you’re resilient. And, like, you know what your own resources are and your own tools, and you will figure out a way to use them.

So let’s just start there and say, what tools do you have to deal with this? You know? Like, how can you and I just think I’m sure there’s lots of different forms of, you know, various counseling that people get, but I think that that’s very true. Right? The things that happen to us early on in life do build a toolkit.

And that’s how we navigate the world. So whether we’re immigrants, whether we’re, you know, anyone who is in any sort of well, even if you’re in the mainstream, you’re like, you’re in a dominant culture, you still are developing tools. But there are there’s some advantages to being riffraff. You know?

I have girlfriends who call me white trash all the time. Like, I mean, they do it affectionately, you know, and I’m like, yeah. And I can, I’m a chameleon that way. I can be in any sort of, situation and feel like I  know how to be at home.

Bert Martinez:

Absolutely. One of the things I’m taking away from this is you look at today’s kids that a lot of them have become so soft. They’re they don’t go outside the way we’re used to going outside, that they have limited skills in their toolbox because they’re not they’re not being allowed to really explore the world.

And, of course, everybody’s on their phone. So as opposed to what you experienced, you you know, your therapist is right. You have an abundance of of tools where no matter your situation, you’re gonna figure it out. It might take you a minute or 2, but you’ll figure it out. Because if you’re used to sleeping on on the floor or in a tent, anything above that has gotta be a step up.

And on top of that, you figured out like, when you’re panhandling, that’s a skill. And to sit there and get rejected over and over again and and being able to deal with people and and size people up, that’s another set of skills. That’s right there. Dealing with rejection and being able to size up people, those are important skills that it takes most people a very long time to acquire. So you’re ahead of the game.

Michelle Dowd:

Yeah. So to answer your question more succinctly, I was a child, but I was also the the guy I married, Scott, he used to say to me all the time, you were never a child. Like, I was quite a bit younger than he was, but he was I I was, like, taking care of him from the beginning. I’m like, we’re okay. We can do this. We can do that. Let me do I I got this. You know? But I don’t think you know? I don’t know.

As I get older, there’s a lot of people who go back to the things they loved as a child and people say, what did you love as a child? I was like, what? Like, I mean, I can tell you what I did as a child, but, like, there was no childhood. There’s no point at which I was free, you know, where I felt like I was doing the things that I love to do. That just wasn’t part of my experience.

Right. And so now I I very deeply value. It’s like the value of hot water is still never lost on me. I mean, a hot shower is, like, one of the most miraculous things in the world. Like, it really is. And fresh Like, ample fresh water. Like, it that’s crazy that we have safe drinking water everywhere around here in this country.

That’s amazing. And when you’re so excited about safe drinking water and, like, a hot shower, like, those things and a and a soft mattress, like, you you’re I just feel so grateful all the time. You know? And it helps, I think, now to think too that I value freedom.

Freedom not in I don’t wanna put a capital f on that and make it a political statement, but I value that I do have choice in my life and that I have some agency to make the decisions about work. For example, like, what I do to make money and how I was raising my children. I had choices what schools to send them to, and I had choices to live in a geographic reason region. If I bought something, I could sell it, and then I could buy something else. Like, there was a lot of mobility that I didn’t I wasn’t raised with. So that to me is something that is just so joyous all the time for me. Like, it’s just so wonderful to think that if you make a mistake, you can make another decision. Like, you can, like, say, woah.

That was kinda dumb. Whatever. But you can, like, you you can start over. You know?

Bert Martinez:

Without shame or feeling fear.

Michelle Dowd:

There may be shame, but sometimes I can’t say that I’m above shame. But that that resiliency of saying, like, it doesn’t have to be the end of the story that you can rewrite it even if you have shame.

Bert Martinez:

Yeah. Yeah. And and that, by the way, is a great lesson for all of us to remember that no matter the mistake, no matter how we’re feeling, get up, try again. Alright. The the book is Forager. Why Forager? What is the significance of that?

Michelle Dowd:

Well, it has a literal and a metaphorical meaning. Literally, my mother, part of what she did to help us train for surviving the apocalypse. So the idea that, you know, the second coming was gonna come, there was gonna be, potentially depending on how you read revelations. But in their interpretation, a 1000 years of terror rained out upon the Earth, and so we had to learn to survive when the system collapsed. You know? So whether that ended up the apocalypse ended up being nuclear war or, you know, however God chose to, like, sound the trumpet and have things shift, They believed that was gonna happen in 1977.

And then after that, they thought that the dates were just kinda off or whatever. And so we were trained, and my mother became an expert at, plants that just grow in the region that we were living on the mountain. And so for 10 years, I lived on a mountain where I could eat. I learned to eat off of what happened to be growing, whether that’s acorns or whether it’s learning to work with the bark of a tree or whether it’s elderberries or chokecherries or, you know, those kinds of things. You learn what season.

And so I forged around for literal food. And then, of course, forged, in my case, forged for words to understand the context of the bible and then to ask for what I wanted. But then also, when I left, which was a really big it’s a big thing in the book and it’s a big thing in my life is that then you have to forage for what you need on the outside. And that is a different kind of foraging, but it’s still foraging. And I think that the difference between, preppers, for example, and survivalist. So preppers hoard things so that they’ll be prepared.

And I was trained to survive when you don’t have anything. And so I do think that that’s a really interesting life skill. It’s like, if you have nothing, what’s the first thing you reach for? What is the first thing, you know, that you go find? And there’s games like that. I think there’s training games like that where you are looking for, like, if you’re in a, what do they call them? Like, there’s those escape rooms or things like that. Like, there’s just situations where you have to think critically of, like, what’s the next thing. And I think foraging is very much a skill like that, that you’re always looking for what it is you need from what’s around you. And that is why I look at Forger.

Bert Martinez:

Yeah. And I think that’s great. And everything you said is is absolutely true. Even today, we’re all kind of forcing trying to figure it out and make the best of what we have. You know, people sometimes get in that victim mindset where they can’t do this because I don’t have this. I don’t have that. And the reality is

None of us all have everything that we need, but it’s not about what you don’t have. It’s about being resourceful with what you do have.

And and so, being able to know what bark to eat. Did you have a favorite bark?

Michelle Dowd:

No. It tastes good. None of it tastes good. But, you know, to to go on what you were saying too, I I have often found that, I have some very, you know, close friends I’ve had for decades now from the outside. And I have tended to become closer to people who had very troubled childhoods of some way, especially those who are raised without resources. So raised in poverty, of one form or another, because I tend to find, we have a really good sense of humor, like a a dark sense of humor.

But, also, like, I just think that there’s something, like, so wonderful about people who you could have called them victims at the time, and they never would have chosen this life for themselves, but they figured out how to get out of their family of origin to whatever extent, they might still have a complicated relationship and maintain, you know, communication.

But the people who I love and and, like, and just really cherish and I feel like who really get me are people who just like, they just have one reason after another to, like, laugh at, the drama or the pain or the chaos or whatever of where they come from. And it really helps, I think us forgive each other easier to, like, you know, I just feel like there’s so much less that’s unspoken because we’re just used to telling the truth and it’s easier to tell the truth to somebody who’s been through it than it is.

So I’ve I’ve certainly met wealthier people who were raised with a lot, you know, more of codified privilege, a lot of, you know, wealthy white men or whatever, and you’re just like, oh God. Like, they don’t even they they think that that’s the only thing in the world because they haven’t necessarily experienced anything else. And if something goes wrong, they think they have no agency at all. It’s like, well or they have to call home and ask daddy to pay for it. Right?

Bert Martinez:

Right. Right. Yeah. I I interesting. It absolutely is. There’s that, there’s that entitlement. Hey. This isn’t right.

You don’t know who I am. I’m not used to being treated like this. Whatever. Get out.

Michelle Dowd:

Right. Yes. I’ve offended. I’ve offended a lot of people in my life. But also going back to the shame thing. I think that there is something about dealing with the shame because poverty is a source of shame in this country, and I don’t think you can easily get out of that. And I think if we carry it with us. And I was at this memorial service that I’m mentioning just a couple days ago on the weekend, and, there was a woman who is was related to the man who had died, by marriage and, a daughter-in-law, basically, stepdaughter-in-law.

But she, had given or her, mother-in-law had given the, forager copy of forger to her daughters, and she apologized to me. And she said, I’m sorry. I can’t read this. And her daughters were there talking. They’re 18, 16. You know? It was super interesting conversation. And I said, oh, you know, you know, that, of course, or whatever. And she said, no.

I I wanna tell you if you have something in common. And she went on to tell me that she’d been raised Krishna in a very restrictive and very painful way that a lot of people don’t understand. And I said, of course, I don’t understand. We have certainly heard of the group. But she said there’s so many different ways that they were abusive to women. And she said, I just can’t bear to read stories about people who were, you know, controlled and restricted like that. Right? And abused. And I said, oh, plea like, I I’m not here to tell you to read this, but what I did say to her, she said, I I 5 years ago, she said I could not have told you that.

I was so ashamed of where I come from. And all I could say to her is I have heard from so many women who have come out of super restrictive backgrounds, and every single one of them expresses shame to and and and I want you to know you’re not alone. You don’t need to read a book. If you I mean, can you read the book or not read the book? That’s not my point, but my point is we have all felt that. We feel shame, like, somehow she was born there.

Like you know? But there’s so much shame attached to where we come from sometimes that is so unwarranted, but it is indoctrinated into us. And I and I wanted to address that since you brought it up earlier because I think that sometimes that people think, like, if I’m if if I feel ashamed, I must have done something wrong, and that’s not true. A lot of times I mean, guilt maybe because you did something wrong, but shame often comes because it was programmed into us, and it’s a control mechanism.

And so for me, I have to encounter shame all the time. Like, I feel it, and I’m like, oh, that’s shame. You know? And then what do I think about that? I’m like, I don’t I wouldn’t judge somebody else for that. Like, why am I judging myself? You know?

Bert Martinez:

Right.

Michelle Dowd:

It can take a long, long time, and I would like to say that it gets better. I think it does, but I don’t know if it ever goes away. We’ll see. Maybe in a few decades. I’m Yeah. Who knows? Right?

Bert Martinez:

So you’re saying you’re writing a book about shame? What was that?

Michelle Dowd:

It’s not specifically about shame, but it’s called prodigal daughter, and it’s the book I’m working on right now. And it’s a follow-up to Forager, a so a form of a sequel, that looks at, what happens when because the prodigal son story, the biblical prodigal son goes out and spends his dad’s fortune and everything, but he gets brought back into the fold and his father forgives him, etcetera, etcetera.

And I don’t know that there’s really stories like that about women. I don’t know that as a woman, you could go out and sin and do all the things and go to the house of prostitution, all that, and be taken back and forgiven. So it’s called that for a reason. But it is also looking at what happens with when you go out as a as a woman and experience life in ways that you’ve always been told will kill you and all the shaming that goes on in our culture around that. And there’s all these cautionary tales, especially for mothers. Oh my goodness.

Like, if you do, you know, if you do this, your, you know, your family blah blah blah blah blah. And so what I’m exploring right now, I mean, through telling a true story of my own, a a period of my life, but really exploring how much new experiences that other people might judge me for were so useful in finding my way outside of a cult and how many of us keep ourselves chained even when we’re no longer chained because we’ve been trained to see ourselves that way and how much risk it takes to deal with the shame and break 3 free of the, you know, programming and the indoctrination and the tenets that you were taught, as as as somebody growing up. So that’s what I’ve been exploring lately, and it has been very eye opening to me to think about how how I came to that. Absolutely. Yeah. So whether that’s tattoos, smoking cigars, or those you know, there’s more, a lot more. But Right.

Bert Martinez:

Well and I think one of the benefits of getting older is that you’re able to shed those different levels of shame because what was embarrassing or shamed you when you’re 17, probably by the time you’re 20 or at least 30, no longer is a thing. It’s you’ve been able to shed that, and that is an unfortunate thing, about humans that it takes us so long, number 1. Number 2, that it’s unfortunately different timing for everybody.

It would be great if either in a high school or maybe junior high, if that if there was a, what do you call it? A class that helped you deal with shame early on because it it does hold us back. Those those doubts, those fears probably are more destructive than anything else and and causes all sorts of problems.

Michelle Dowd:

Thank you for sharing that. I I really wish we did teach young people that. So, maybe we can help the young people that we know.

Bert Martinez:

Absolutely.

Michelle Dowd:

Up soon, but I do I would love for, anyone who reads Forager if they want to reach out. I have, I’m writing weekly on Substack, and I do respond to emails there that, if you go on Substack and you follow me under Forager Fridays, then you can just reply to the emails I send once a week, and it goes directly to me. And if you come from a cult or you have shame, in your upbringing or whatever, I am happy to engage, and we can also engage publicly in a conversation as well.

And people write in about their experiences, and doing this has helped me stay in a conversation and realize, yes, my situation was specific, but it’s not that different in some ways than what a lot of people experience in this country. And I think that we it helps one of the things that helps with shame is being able to talk about these things. I try to listen with an open ear and mind and to respond to people and let them know, that I honor their journey as well. So I don’t know if you can post that link, but..

Bert Martinez:

Absolutely. We’ll put the link in the show notes. So it’s so they go to Substack and it’s Forager Friday.

Michelle Dowd:

Yes. It’s also under my name. It’s mdowd@substack.com. So but if you put in Michelle Dowd, you’ll find me.

Bert Martinez:

Great. Great. Michelle, thank you so much, for stopping by. It’s been a thrill getting to know you.

Michelle Dowd:

Thank you so much, Bert. It’s a pleasure.