Shari Franke’s Memoir The House of My Mother (with Kate Casey)

Summary

Glamorous Trash: A Celebrity Memoir Podcast Episode: Shari Franke’s Memoir The House of My Mother (with Kate Casey) Release Date: January 31, 2025

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Introduction

In this emotionally charged episode of Glamorous Trash: A Celebrity Memoir Podcast, host Chelsea DeVontes delves deep into Shari Franke’s gripping memoir, "The House of My Mother: A Daughter's Quest for Freedom". Joined by special guest Kate Casey, the duo explores the dark underbelly of family vlogging, child exploitation in the digital age, and the profound personal struggles faced by Shari Franke as she seeks to reclaim her life from an abusive upbringing.

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Overview of Shari Franke’s Memoir

"The House of My Mother" stands out as the first memoir authored by a child who grew up in the pervasive world of family vlogging. Published in January 2025, the memoir reveals Shari's harrowing experiences as the daughter of Ruby Franke, the creator of the popular YouTube channel 8Passengers. The channel amassed millions of views by monetizing Shari and her siblings, turning their everyday lives into public spectacle.

Chelsea emphasizes the importance of this memoir, drawing parallels to other narratives like Jeanette McCurdy’s experience as a child actor exploited by the entertainment industry. She notes, “I think it is really important to platform and hear these stories from the children who grew up in this” ([00:59]).

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In-depth Discussion with Kate Casey

Family Vlogging and Exploitation

Kate Casey, host of Reality Life with Kate Casey, brings her expertise on unscripted television to the conversation. She shares her familiarity with the family vlogging phenomenon, noting her past interactions with successful family vloggers: “I ended up being invited to events... I was privy to what an absolutely vicious world it was” ([06:38]).

The Introduction of Jody Hildebrandt

A pivotal moment in the memoir is the introduction of Jody Hildebrandt, a life coach who manipulates Ruby Franke, further exacerbating the family’s dysfunction. Shari describes Jody as “a monster masquerading as a mental health professional” ([30:05]). Kate elaborates on Jody’s manipulative tactics, highlighting her role in convincing Ruby to isolate the family and control their finances and behaviors: “Jody’s a cult leader... she has almost, like, no more escape” ([30:16]).

The Impact of Mormons' Cultural Practices

Shari’s upbringing in Utah’s Mormon community plays a significant role in her story. The memoir details how cultural practices of meticulous documentation and promoting family unity on social media set the stage for exploitation. Chelsea reflects, “in my church, we're encouraged to document our lives meticulously” ([17:40]), connecting it to how Ruby leveraged these values to sustain the family's online presence.

Kate adds, “Mormons are such good influencers because you are raised to document and share” ([18:11]), underscoring the intersection of faith and online persona in Shari’s narrative.

Abuse and Its Psychological Effects

The memoir does not shy away from the heavy topics of sexual predators, suicidal ideation, and physical abuse. Shari recounts moments of profound distress, such as when she reaches out for help during a depression episode, only to have her plea dismissed by Ruby: “I can't believe I don't have to do this” ([25:10]). Kate compares Shari’s experiences to other tragic stories within the Mormon community, emphasizing the complexity and confusion faced by those trapped in abusive environments.

Legal Blind Spots in Utah

A significant barrier in Shari’s journey is Utah’s legal framework, specifically the “free range parenting law” and the “Romeo and Juliet law,” which inadvertently protect abusive practices by categorizing them under the guise of promoting independence and true love. Shari writes, “thanks to the free range parenting law... there's just not enough evidence to bring against them” ([54:50]). Kate expresses her horror, stating, “It’s dark, just really dark” ([55:58]), highlighting the systemic issues that allow abuse to persist unchecked.

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Booktal Test Insights

Chelsea and Kate conduct a "booktal test" to evaluate Shari Franke’s memoir across three dimensions:

1. Vulnerability: Both agree that Shari exhibits remarkable vulnerability in sharing her truth. Chelsea remarks, “Without question. Yes” ([66:27]), acknowledging the bravery required to disclose such personal trauma.

2. Entertainment Value: While the memoir is deeply disturbing, it provides insightful perspectives into the mechanics of family vlogging and child exploitation. Kate finds it “entertaining in the way that it gave me more insight into the business of family blogging” ([66:27]).

3. Life Elevation: The memoir serves as a crucial tool for raising awareness and fostering empathy. Chelsea notes, “This book did elevate my life... it gave me so much empathy” ([71:02]), highlighting its impact beyond mere storytelling.

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Personal Reflections and Closing Thoughts

Throughout the episode, Chelsea and Kate reflect on the broader implications of Shari Franke’s story. They discuss the psychological toll on children exploited in the online arena, the challenges of breaking free from abusive family dynamics, and the ongoing struggle to reconcile faith and personal identity amidst trauma.

Chelsea concludes with profound respect for Shari’s resilience: “She has done an incredible job... and she is still a very strong believer of the LDS Church” ([62:50]). Kate echoes this sentiment, praising Shari’s courage and her commitment to protecting other children through her narrative.

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Conclusion

This episode of Glamorous Trash offers a heart-wrenching yet essential exploration of Shari Franke’s journey to freedom from a life of exploitation and abuse. Through candid discussions and insightful analysis, Chelsea DeVontes and Kate Casey shed light on the dark consequences of family vlogging and the urgent need for systemic changes to protect vulnerable children in the digital age.

Notable Quotes:

• Shari Franke: “If I could go back and do it all again, I'd rather have an empty bank account now and not have my childhood plastered all over the Internet.” ([04:32])

• Kate Casey: “I am proud to be one of the first child influencers in the state of Utah to speak against this issue.” ([04:32])

• Shari Franke: “Finally, upload to Instagram. Share this nightmare was born on social media. It should die here too.” ([12:40])

• Shari Franke: “Have you ever heard of the fawn response?” ([50:03])

• Chelsea DeVontes: “This child had to learn to do everything... and even in the end of the book, when the cops come, Ruby goes to prison, Jodie goes to prison, but only for two years each.” ([57:56])

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Where to Find More

• Kate Casey's Podcast: Reality Life with Kate Casey – Available on all major podcast platforms.
• Shari Franke's Book: "The House of My Mother: A Daughter's Quest for Freedom" – Available in bookstores and online retailers.
• Glamorous Trash Podcast: Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or join the Patreon for exclusive episodes and community access.

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This detailed summary captures the essence of the conversation between Chelsea DeVontes and Kate Casey, highlighting the critical issues within Shari Franke’s memoir and the broader implications of child exploitation in online family vlogging.

Transcript

[Chelsea DeVontes]

This episode is brought to you by Companion. Iris and Josh seem like the perfect match, but when a weekend getaway turns into a nightmare, Iris realizes that things aren't as perfect as they appear. From the creators of Barbarian and the studio that brought you the Notebook comes a twisted tale of modern romance and the sweet satisfaction of revenge. Companion, now playing only in theaters. Rated R under 17. Not admitted without parenting. This episode is brought to you by Amazon. Sometimes the most painful part of getting sick is the getting better part. Waiting on hold for an appointment, Sitting in crowded waiting rooms, Standing in line at the pharmacy. That's painful. Amazon One Medical and Amazon Pharmacy remove those painful parts of getting better with things like 24. 7 virtual visits and prescriptions delivered to your door. Thanks to Amazon Pharmacy and Amazon One Medical Healthcare just got less painful. Welcome to Glamorous Trash. This is a celebrity memoir podcast where we dive into all of the glamour and all of the trash. If you have ever referenced Mariah Carey casually in therapy, then this might be the podcast for you. I'm your Host, Chelsea DeVontes, TV writer, comedian, filmmaker, author. And sometimes I'm in stuff too. And before I get into today's episode, I just want to tell you that if you are a subscriber on our Apple podcast or you are a member of the Patreon, where you get bonus exclusive episodes, we just dropped a phenomenal one last week on the memoir of Griffin Dunn. He is the nephew of Joan Didion, the son of Dominic Dunn, the Vanity Fair writer. He was Carrie Fisher's best friend. This memoir has the most celebrity stories of any memoir I've ever read. It also gets super, super deep into this trial about his sister. And so if you want to hear that episode and many, many, many other bonus exclusive episod, you sign up on Apple Podcasts or on our Patreon, which also gives you exclusive access to chat with fellow cookies. Links to sign up to all of that are in the show Notes. Now today we are book clubbing the memoir of Sherry Frankie, the first memoir to come out from a child who grew up in family vlogging, who has now grown up to speak out about the vlogging industry and exploiting child influencers. It's called the House of My Mother. It was published in January 2025 and the tagline is A Daughter's Quest for Freedom. Now, it has taken the world a long time to hear the stories of child actors like Jeanette McCurdy, who was exploited as a child actor. All these horrible things that happened to the children of Nickelodeon and now we have a child influencer. She grew up on YouTube. Her life was monetized by her mom, Ruby Frankie, who created the account 8Passengers on YouTube. And now Sheri is talking about it. I think it is really important to platform and hear these stories from the children who grew up in this. And so that is why I really wanted to cover this memoir. And I'm excited to talk about it today. Now, to give you a little bit of setup before we just dive into the book. Sherry Frankie is the daughter of Ruby Frankie. The YouTube account Eight passengers had millions and millions and millions of views until it came out in one of the videos that the son was being abused and sleeping on a sleeping bag. One of the children was. And they get canceled. They lose tons of followers. And then a woman named Jody Hildebrandt comes into Ruby's life. And Ruby, already cast out of the YouTube universe, becomes a disciple of this cult guru, life coach abuser. And the abuse within her family gets worse and worse and worse. Now there will be discussion of sexual predators, suicidal ideation and child abuse and some physical abuse. So please take care when listening. This is a very intense story. Now, Sherry's memoir does a really good job, I think, of telling her story without it becoming a true crime story and exploiting the details and getting too much into that. And so I am also going to do my best to zoom out from those details so that this is a story we can all hear and take in because it is still happening with families everywhere. Exploiting children online, family vlogging, monetizing this content that children who are still growing up is now being put out for everyone to see. So I think we really need to hear this story. So let's dive into this book.

[Kate Casey]

If I could go back and do it all again, I'd rather have an empty bank account now and not have my childhood plastered all over the Internet. No amount of money I received has made what I've experienced worth it. While I don't have all the answers nor many feasible solutions for this problem, I am proud to be one of the first child influencers in the state of Utah to speak against this issue. I don't want people to look at me and blame my unique circumstances with a mother in prison to the Frankie criminal case. Family vlogging ruined my innocence long before Ruby committed a crime. I promise you that my experiences are not unique and are happening to child influencers all over Utah and the country. So let's tackle this issue before it becomes a bigger crisis than it already is.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Our guest today is Kate Casey. She hosts Reality Life with Kate Casey. It's an amazing podcast. I love it. She is devoted to unscripted television. The daily podcast features interviews with cast members and producers of reality shows and the subjects, directors, and producers of documentaries and docu series. She's the go to expert on what to watch. She was also our guest on the JOC on Stamos episode, which is something I continue to laugh about to this day. Hi, Kate. Thank you so much for being here.

[Kate Casey]

Pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me. And every time I see John Stamos on tv, I think about our episode.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, I think about the Beach Boys, maybe. Every time I see him, I think about him drumming for the Beach Boys.

[Kate Casey]

I think something must have happened in his life that makes him stuck in a Disneyland life. Like, he hasn't moved forward because of it.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I think of him dressed as Eric from the Little Mermaid when he proposed. Like, I think of him wearing that red belt and blue pants at Disneyland. Well, today's book, even much darker than John Samos's memoir, as wild as that Mensmore was. So, Kate, what was your Knowledge of the Eight Passengers YouTube account before reading this memoir? Like, did you follow this story as it was unfolding? Were you a fan of the YouTube account? Did you just come to it now? What's your relationship to this?

[Kate Casey]

Very familiar with the story. I'm somebody who consumes all pop culture news. This obviously became a huge story in the news. I'm also very familiar with family vloggers because I actually started a blog before I had a podcast, but mine was about kind of like pop culture. And I did TV recaps, which was kind of how the whole reality TV thing started for me. But because of that, I ended up being invited to events all the time with the women that would become some of the most successful family or, you know, mom bloggers of that time. So I knew them. I was not considered under their umbrella, so they would be somewhat nice to me. But I was privy to what a absolutely vicious world it was. And I still know people who are considered under that umbrella of family, not family vlogging, where it's like, they'll say things like, today we're all gonna go to, like, Disneyland, but parents who run accounts with minors. So I feel like I have kind of like, an interesting window on the side because I have absolutely no interest in ever making any of my children television stars. My experience with all of them were that they were probably people that had wanted to be a Reality star, but maybe didn't have the lifestyle, the personality, or the looks to be considered for a casting agent, but. And therefore are living vicariously through their children.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, absolutely. I think this is the first child influencer to grow up and, you know, tell their story. And I wrote down a sketch idea that I never even wrote, but I, like, I don't know why I think about it so often, but it's tied to this, which is. Do you remember when the TV show the Swan was on where, like, you would go on and get tons of plastic surgery and, like, do your big reveal? I had this sketch I tried to write for a long time where the child of one of the swans grows up, and it was like, why? Why don't I fucking look like you?

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

You know what I mean? And, like, sort of like the beauty or whatever. And so I think that was, I don't know, 20 years ago. And now those children are adults and can tell their own story, like, if they want to. So this is like a very. It's a very important book to hopefully stop people from doing it and supporting it, because there's just so. So many accounts like this alive and well.

[Kate Casey]

Well, right now, at the same time that we're recording this, HBO has a documentary called An Update on Our Family about the Stauffer family.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

So I. I cannot stop watching that documentary.

[Kate Casey]

It's. It is the perfect time for us to discuss the aftermath of putting your children onto a social media channel. I think that Sherry makes a lot of great points, sort of as a cautionary tale for anybody who even considers putting their child on social media channel at all, is that you're. You're welcoming them to a barrage of insults that I don't think you can ever undo that damage.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Not to mention so much more. And the Stauffer documentary, for anyone who doesn't know, is called An Update on Our Family. And maybe you'll remember the story from the news where basically the mom, Micah, made this big. When I say big to do, I guess I mean hundreds of videos about adopting a child with special needs from China. And then they rehomed that child, which is a word that I know some people are trying to get rid of. But my adoption expert find, Angela Tucker, still uses it because she's like, we should think of it as brutal as the word sounds. And they rehomed their child, and then everyone on YouTube found out, and, you know, everything that ensued after that. Is that. Would you say that's the roundup of that documentary?

[Kate Casey]

Yeah, I would because what I was doing was reading this book in tandem with watching all the screener episodes for the HBO doc. And so many of the things that Sherry says started to make me understand the Stauffer family better and how they operated behind the scenes. For example, there's one part in the book where Sheri talks about how if she had wanted anything from her mother, she would have to do so on camera while they were filming. And that's because her mother wants to project this Mary Poppins sort of like, I'm a great mom kind of Persona. And so, in other words, if you're on camera and you say, mom, I'd love to go to Lucy's house. Is it okay if I can go to Lucy. Lucy's house today? She would have never let her go to Lucy's house if they were not filming, because on film, she wants to look like she's this great mother. So it was almost like a necessary tactic to communicate with her mother, but also to have any sort of opportunity to do something for her own social life. And I feel like a lot of the things that the Stauffers did revolved around accommodating the people that were filming the show.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

Wow.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. It is fascinating to have that documentary coming out as this book is coming out. And if you wanna know more about that, but you don't want to put yourself through the documentary, go listen to Kate Casey's podcast where she is covering it. No, I'm serious. So let's read just a few sentences from throughout the introduction to give an overall perspective on what's in this book. So it starts with the introduction titled, Finally, August 30, 2023. That is the date when the police officers raid the home and. And rescue the two youngest children from Ruby, Frankie, and her cult leader guru. We're gonna find out lover twist from that house. And that is not that long ago. Kate, you. You and I are both in the book world. To publish a memoir a year and five months after the day it ended is so extremely fast. And I'm really happy, really, really happy that Sheri is like, I'm telling this story. And, like, Ruby made us public. So now in the public sphere, I'm gonna tell the true narrative. But also, she is very, very young herself. She is still a child. This just happened. There's a lot of processing that still needs to happen that couldn't in this time frame while writing this book. Is that how you felt?

[Kate Casey]

Yes. And I also wondered. I think there are two different documentaries that I'VE heard about or read about about this family. And a part of me wondered, I'm trying everything I can to take my own power back, and if that means rushing this project, I'll do it. She's trying to get ahead of the story, so she keeps her story her own.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, which, which, that's where it's like, okay, yes, you need to do this. And it's a 2020 did a documentary on them and she said it was like horribly done and like exploitative of her family. And also as she's writing this book, she's like, we have allowed a documentary crew in. And I hate the camera still being here. I hate this world my mom put us in. But it is now up to us to reveal what went on so that family vlogging stops. And so, but in the book, it's beautifully done. But also, you know, there's just so much more for Sheri to unpack that I'm sure it's gonna come through for years and years and years. But the introduction starts with a neighbor has called her and said, there are police all around Jody's home, where her mom, Ruby, lives with their two youngest kids. And she writes, it's happened. Came my thought, they're dead. I hadn't been back to that house since Ruby had disowned me a year prior. Ruby, the self anointed saint of motherhood. Ruby, who had turned my life into a surreal version of the Truman show for her social media disciples. Ruby, who had subjected me and my siblings to her twisted interpretation of crime and punishment. All of our lives. Until Jody came along, adding a terrifying new flavor of sadism to the regime. Jody, our family's very own cult leader, a false prophet who swept our lives like a hurricane. She said countless warnings had been sent to the Division of Child and Family Services by me and concerned neighbors. And yet they'd fallen on deaf ears. And then finally, finally they're taken from the house and Sherry says, she pulls up her phone, captures it and says, frame shot. Snap. The caption crystallized in my mind, a single word that carried the weight of years. Finally upload to Instagram. Share this nightmare was born on social media. It should die here too. Yeah. So that is a larger overview of what's to come in this memoir. But let's start with she tells the story of how Ruby and her dad, Kevin met. And there is just one detail that is so wildly ridiculous and hilarious, which is that Ruby goes to college to find a good Mormon husband and she wants to get married young. She wants to have lots of kids fast. And she's like, here to meet her husband. And she meets Kevin. And she said Kevin is holding her hand under a blanket at a friend's house in their courtship. And then it says, then Kevin glanced over and noticed another guy, one of Ruby's admirers, sitting way too close to her on the other side. His stomach dropped as he realized Ruby was holding the guy's hand under the blanket, too. So Ruby was holding one suitor's hand on one side, one suitor's hand on another side under a blanket. And then Kevin gets mad and she's like, okay, fine, marry me. And two weeks later, they are engaged and the marriage begins. And she's like, I have fulfilled my purpose and drops out of college. What did you think of Ruby's character early on in the book?

[Kate Casey]

I'm still trying to figure out what her personality disorder is, or maybe there are several things, but she can be very infantile. Like, that is an example of it, like, to be disrespectful to these two guys. That's something you do when you're like, younger, right? Of course. She's like an infantile version of marriage. You're going to see him across the room and God's rainbow will come down and you'll know that you will be the anointed one. And then you must have children right away. It's just like, okay. But she also starts to exhibit behaviors that are very, like, excessively controlling. So she's kind of hard to pinpoint.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, I agree, and I'm not a true crime person, but I was trying to, you know, do more research for this episode. I was watching footage of her being arrested and taken in, and she is fully limp, like facially, physically. Won't speak, won't talk, but not in a defiant way, in a very infantile way, like you said, where it's just like a quiet, like doe eyes. So she talks about documentation in Mormon homes. And as you know, because they've been on your podcast talking about growing up in Utah and the secret lives of Mormon wives on Hulu, which we recapped on this podcast and your podcast. I grew up in Utah for eight years, so she wrote this in the book. In my church, we're encouraged to document our lives meticulously, creating a roadmap for future generations to understand their roots. And it seemed as though the Internet was just an extension of that. Another way to do the Lord's work. Her little recipe filled blog gave Ruby her first taste of online Excellence. And so when she wrote that in the book, I was like, oh, my God, like, the amount of scrapbooking parties I went to when I lived in Utah as a child, like, we were just always scrapbooking and documenting and how this is, like, culturally part of the LDS Church. And then I thought of, oh, this is why. And she talks about it in the book, like, this is part of why Mormons are such good influencers, because you are raised to document and share. It's also why Mormons started and are a huge part of ancestry.com and, like, Mormons own that. And then the actual LDS Church owns a totally different family DNA site that, like, works together with them, but it's like, because they were raised to document, document, document, document family history, genealogy, all of that. And I was reading this being, like, so horrified. And then I had this thought of, like, I think growing up in Utah is why I have so many meticulous journals from my childhood, which is, like, one of the greatest gifts in my life, which is, like, how I was able to write a memoir.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. But there is. There is an aspect of it, as an outsider, that it sounds almost like they're setting you up to make yourself believe that you're the star of your own show.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

Who would think that every moment of their life is that exceptional, that it needs to be documented?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And yet, like. Because I think there's obviously massive darkness around this. But, like, yeah, it was like our girl youth group, and you'd go to houses and just buckets of stickers and beautiful scrapbook paper and scissors that cut things in a squiggly line for you to be like, here's what we did in class yesterday, and I have emblazoned five pages about it.

[Kate Casey]

Oh, my God. Sounds so boring.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I know. And yet, like. And yet. I obviously had, like, so much positive experiences around that. And yet it goes into why we see so many tradwives who are from the LDS Church, like Ballerina Farm or Nara Smith, who are influencing trad wifing. And Sheri, in this book, talks about how LDS families are particularly good at family vlogging because there's large families, so.

[Kate Casey]

There'S lots of characters, so it's more interesting, right?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Lots of storylines. And then she said, you know, we're taught to document culturally in the church, and then also sharing your testimony and spreading the word of the church. And your family is also culturally part of the church. Of, like, go tell others.

[Kate Casey]

Mm. Like, being a great example. Like, look, we're such a happy family. We're beautiful. I know, but, like, for outsiders, we're like, so who's the weird one in the family? You know?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And yet everyone's watching because she gets millions of followers, and so many of them do.

[Kate Casey]

But I think those. I can tell you as a mother, the people who are mostly watching are children, and they quickly get bored by it. Because my kids, I mean, they don't watch TV. They watch YouTube. Right. And they got sucked into a couple of those families, and then they just lose interest quickly because your kids grow up and they're into one family if they like to play a game that they like. The problem, I think, is that the parents, they get sucked into the business model, and how do we sustain this and how do we keep them interested? And Sherry even tells a story about her mom bribing her with $100 to wax off half of her eyebrows. Totally fake.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Her mom tells her, I'm gonna clean up your eyebrows. And then she waxes it straight off for the film, for the YouTube.

[Kate Casey]

It's like the stakes keep getting higher because they've set themselves up to have an audience that's extremely fickle.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

Women are gonna watch Real Housewives because the stories sort of resonate, and that behavior is kind of crazy, but it sucks us in, and we stay. Children are the most fickle audience in the world.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I did not realize that it was children watching family vloggers. I really thought it was like, other families or moms wanting to learn or people watching their own reality show.

[Kate Casey]

No, no, That's.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

No haunting.

[Kate Casey]

No. Parents are watching family vloggers.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

You really?

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. So what was weird about the HBO documentary about the Stauffers is the first episode. You have two women that were vloggers themselves, and they said, we were captivated by this family, but I'm like, I don't know who you are representing, because parents don't watch them. Parents, like, they're like, oh, that's a nice, you know, YouTube channel. It's safe for them to watch. They're opening gifts or going to a park, because it's a lot. It's pretty saccharine. I mean, Mormon families, God bless. They're pretty saccharine. It's not really, like.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Well, except for.

[Kate Casey]

Well, behind the scenes, but, like, on when you're watching it, I think a lot of parents like, oh, that's safe for them to watch. And, you know, interesting. But it's not parents watching little kids.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Interesting. Well, one other thing I found Wild is that Ruby had sisters, and they got into Family vlogging first. And it's like theirs didn't go the way of Ruby's. And Ruby decides after her sisters get successful in our monetizing, I'll start my own channel. And she chooses the name eight Passengers. And I just think that is such haunting branding. And also before you know where this story goes, you're like, whoa, what a name. What an eye for a name that will stand out, but is like creepily religious, but is also seemingly positive. And eight Passengers is the name of this channel for her, her husband, and their six children. What do you think of just the name eight Passengers?

[Kate Casey]

Sort of transient. It doesn't give them any identity. You know, the kids have zero identity.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, you're on Ruby's journey.

[Kate Casey]

It's all about her. But by the way, so are most of these parents. I could share with you, like two, three of them where it's parental driven. The kids are sort of like little accessories.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yes.

[Kate Casey]

They're so over the top. This really is a breeding ground for narcissism.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Is it a breeding ground or is it like bait for narcissism?

[Kate Casey]

Both, probably. Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Completely agree. So we kind of go through a lot of childhood of just like Ruby starting her family. She gets to six at this point. Sheri, who's writing the memoir, is 14, and she asks her mom if she can start her own YouTube channel. The reason why in her head is like, I want money. I want to get out of this family. I want independence. Not realizing as a child that, like, her mom's gonna have that money or, like, to have a bank account, it's gonna go to her mom or later Ruby is like, okay, but I take 10% of it as your manager and like, here, put your life online. And the other thing that, like, happens as she's doing this, even before she starts her own account. I want to read some of this, she says. My mind drifted to the comments I'd read online about myself. Words of strangers on YouTube who thought they knew me based on carefully edited snippets of my life.

[Kate Casey]

Ugh.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Sherry is such a kiss ass. She's always riding out her siblings and trying to be Ruby's favorite. So smug. Imagine reading comments about yourself.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

At that age. I mean, like, reading comments now on. On my own stuff. Awful. I can't imagine how these children's psyches are surviving.

[Kate Casey]

I'm not sure either.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And then she writes in school, which I was like, wow, shocking. This is amazing. In school, she learned about the symptoms of depression. And immediately after the Class, she wrote, I texted Kevin, dad, I'm depressed. I don't know if I want to live anymore. And he said, thank you for telling me. We're going to talk. We're going to get through this together. He even shared a link to an inspiring talk that he my help. And they come home, and Ruby's like, she doesn't need therapy. Don't be ridiculous. You just need to sleep better, exercise more, and eat right. And she said, but Kevin surprised me. No, he said firmly, we should let her see a therapist. This is serious. Ruby. And Sherry gets to see a therapist about depression. Blake is protecting her mom and won't really tell her the truth. And finally, when she tells her just a little bit of the truth, which is like, these abusive piano lessons Ruby was giving her where she would, like, hit her if she hit the notes wrong or hit the piano or just be really aggressive, and it was giving her a lot of stress, she tells the therapist, like, I don't want to do this anymore. The therapist brings Ruby in, and together they tell Ruby, I don't want to play piano anymore. And Ruby's like, that's fine. Not a problem. And she's like, oh, my God, I can't believe, like, my mom changed. I can't believe I don't have to do this. And then she gets home, and her mom's like, hey, great news. You're healed. You never have to see a therapist again.

[Kate Casey]

Right?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

That's just so dark.

[Kate Casey]

So dark. And too. And I think most of us, when we read that part, think about our own childhoods. I mean, it's so hard for you at that age to go against your mother because you're reliant on them for everything, and so you feel disloyal. It's confusing. So for her to have the strength to ask for a therapist at that age is pretty incredible.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

Kevin needs a real throat punch by yours truly. I mean, this guy is such a loser. An absolute loser.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And also how. How this was really similar to the Jeanette McCurdy book, where there is a main character mom doing massive amounts of verbal, physical, excessive abuse, and there's just a very quiet bystander who is the husband enabling it all to happen, which makes them just as abusive and just as complicit. But he seemingly agreed with Ruby for almost the entire marriage of, like, this is good. Like, she was leading. But he was like, yes, we should. I don't know. But then at moments he would be like, no, she gets a therapist. Like, what is. What do you think was going on with that guy?

[Kate Casey]

I know, but he's such a dodo brain. Because the moment this woman Jody moves in and you know, you can't come upstairs, you have to knock. You have to wonder if, you know. Do you remember that story about Jan Broberg and how there was the family friend and he kidnapped her?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Another Mormon story of kidnapping.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. A Utah family, too. And I asked her, and I never forgot this, I said, do you think that your faith is part of the problem? Like that, that it created a situation where an abuser could sleep in, but it sustains them at the same time? So it's conflicting. Like, what'd she say? She said, yeah, absolutely without question. In other words, like, she was naive to a lot of things, as was her family. Because of their faith. They're conditioned to be so trusting of people. And then, of course, in the aftermath, she survived because she went back to her faith. So it's very conflicting. But for Kevin, I think they're very young and impressionable when they get married and they're so tied to their faith. He's almost, like, naive to so many things where it's almost like he's still naive to things now, like, well, after the rest, where he's like, well, I know, but I thought it was better for me to be isolated for the family and not to speak to anybody, because that's what I was told.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And you're sort of like, that's what God wanted.

[Kate Casey]

That's what they're conditioning to believe so much of.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Well, let's get. Yeah, let's explain some of this story so we can talk about Jody. So what happens is Ruby starts this channel. It gets millions of followers. It becomes their number one source of income, even though Kevin is a professor at byu and they take a trip to Universal Studios that is a whole plug for Universal Studios. And they have all these brand ad placements coming in to the point where Ruby's like, okay, we're gonna make a big mess. Everyone, like, make a big mess in the van, and we're gonna clean it up with wet ones. And the kids are like, okay. Like, everything is fake. And the only other kid who is named in the book, who is Sherry's younger brother Chad, because he's of age, and she doesn't name the other kids out of their privacy, which I think was a fantastic decision. Chad is mischievous, bad, also known as a kid growing up in this psychotic family.

[Kate Casey]

Also, he probably has adhd.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Like, it's just like, oh, he has energy and, like, doesn't want to listen to you. And then they would. You know, Ruby would discipline with extremism.

[Kate Casey]

Which is like 70% of boys.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And then he would find ways around it. Then they discipline him for being manipulative. Well, in this case, he does something, and they say, we're all going to Universal Studios as a family. You have to stay in the hotel room alone all day as discipline. Which also highly unsafe. Right, Kate?

[Kate Casey]

Like, why are you living in. If they. If there was, like, a maid or something that came in to clean the room, they probably would report that.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Like, that's not okay. Well, Chad takes a cab to Universal Studios, shows up, has the best day by himself while the family's at the other end of the park. And because of that, Ruby comes back and she's like, chad is a nightmare and a delinquent. We need real help. And this is how they get introduced to Jody Hildebrandt, who is the other massive player in this story. And I want to read on page 92 how Sherry talks about her. She said they needed someone aggressive enough to break through Chad's defenses. They were on a mission to find the perfect person to crack his code and rewire him to their liking. Which is how the monster came into our lives. A monster masquerading as a mental health professional armed with a tight smile and a mind full of psychological warfare tactics. A monster who would see my mother's inner darkness and cultivate it, nurture it until it eclipsed all light. A monster named Jody Hildebrandt. So tell me, what are all your thoughts on Jody Hildebrandt?

[Kate Casey]

Jody Hildebrandt, Really? Her modus operandi was to work with women and to convince their women to leave their husbands.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, or convince the husbands to leave the women in the name of God.

[Kate Casey]

Well, like, for example, with the way of Kevin, she convinced him that he was doing a disservice to his family by being around and that the best thing he could do for the family's growth, spiritual growth, would be to remove himself. And so a lot of people think she's clearly got ulterior motives with all of these clients, that she had women so she could maneuver herself into their family and maybe obviously have a sexual relationship with them, but also kind of take over their finances, too. So diabolical in so many different ways.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. So I knew about this story lightly from the headlines, but I'm not a true crime person, so I never looked closer. I was shocked that this turned into a lesbian relationship. Really? I never saw it coming? I don't know. Yeah, I never saw it coming because, again, it is via the church. The church's platform is mainly gay. People are bad with some slight nuances of like, well, maybe they can attend church, but, like, still bad. And there's so much homophobia in a lot of churches. Definitely in the LDS church and Jody specifically, Ruby specifically, were like, homosexuals are bad. Being gay is bad. They would speak out against it. Obviously, this fits the pattern of being gay themselves. But, yeah, I. Yeah, I didn't see it coming because it was through this LDS life coach warming clientele. I want to make your family stronger. And then this pattern of, like, all the husbands are disappearing. Jody seems to hate all men, but also Jody's a Mormon. And then the way she finds out is they're in this kind of guru cult for a while. We're like, to the kids is mean with Jody. Ruby's meeting with Jody, then Kevin's meeting with Jody, and she just does these hour long, manipulative life coach sessions, never letting anyone know that she lost her therapist license for incorrectly reporting a man for abuse with no evidence and, like, ruining this family. And so she's just life coaching now. And at one point, Ruby's like, sheri, you need to move out of your room. Jody is moving in because Satan is after her and demons are after her through some of her other clients who are mad at her and she needs to, like, hide away in our house. And they begin sharing a bedroom in the house, Sherry's. And then Kevin is no longer allowed upstairs, and he's living down below. But these are moments where you're like, dodo brain.

[Kate Casey]

What, bro? Yeah, what? I mean, you had mentioned kind of like they were on the same page. But, like, as time goes on, she's becoming more and more aggressive in her tactics, like, the things that she's doing. There's a difference between disciplining in terms of taking things away in order for them to show you that they can show responsibility and duct tape and hitting and all of it. At some point, it tipped the scale and he remained supportive of her. So again, is your point, like, are you just as diabolical or are you so under this woman's spell? Like, is Jody the cult leader? Is Ruby the cult leader? I don't know. Maybe it's just.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Is Kevin, like, the person who enables the abuse and stands by silently as it happens? I think just. Just is bad. And basically one night, Sherry, like, sees her mom coming out of the room. She would be like, hold up. There for hours. You couldn't go visit them. And she came out of the room and it was clear that, like, something sexual had been happening in the room upstairs as they are preaching this, their version of this faith and doing this, like, abusive discipline. But also it's really complex because she said Ruby, her mom, had this massive rage problem. Screaming, yelling, hitting. And when her mom began working with Jody, all of that. And so there was this feeling of like, oh, Jodie's incredible. Jodie's really helping. But then this insidious psychological warfare started. As a child, I imagine that must have been so confusing.

[Kate Casey]

And for Kevin too, probably, it's so confusing. I mean, a lot of these cases that we've even earlier mentioned, even my own mom who was assaulted by a family priest, it's conflicting because you feel like you're powerless to your abuser. But then they do something nice or they exhibit a certain behavior. Behavior that, like, seemingly is nice and so you're second guessing yourself all the time. And I think that's what those kids were doing, which you can understand. Like, I don't know, maybe. Is she that bad? Because my mom doesn't scream at me as much. We do get a little inch of more freedom. It's an act of surviving, is trying to make sense of the chaos.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And like taking in those nice pieces as a way for your brain to help survive it. Of like, oh, well, it's not that bad. Okay, we're gonna take a quick break right now and we'll be right back. What's the best time of day to get a deal? All day with Jack in the Box's all day big deal meal. You get to choose from four entrees like the supreme croissant and five tasty sides, plus a drink starting at $5. So hurry in or take your time. You've got all day at Jack. Every bite's a big deal. This episode is brought to you by Intuit. TurboTax didn't file with TurboTax last year. That's in the past. Now taxes is getting the TurboTax app and filing your own taxes for free if you didn't file with them last year, file by February 18th. All tax forms all 100% free. Now this is taxes intuit TurboTax. New filers and filers who didn't use TurboTax last year only must start and file your own taxes in app by February 18th. Excludes TurboTax Live full [e-mail] Build a routine with Ollie that supports your wellness needs. Like getting your daily vitamins and minerals with Ollie's multigummies or keeping your mood upbeat with all the vitamin D and hello happy. Give your gut health some support with probiotics and wake up feeling refreshed after taking Ollie Sleep. Do wellness on your terms. Find Ollie at a Walmart or Target near you [e-mail]. these statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Okay, let's dive back into the episode. So as catchy as eight Passengers was, Jody's company is called Connections. But there's an X.

[Kate Casey]

Can't stand it where the T should be.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Connexions Connections. It's such loser branding.

[Kate Casey]

I know.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I was like, this is loser branding. How dare anyone go to a workshop with Connections? And she wrote this. Sherry wrote this on page 107. I thought, oh, this is the it of the book. Connections wasn't introducing Ruby to a new way of thinking. It was giving her the vocabulary and pseudo scientific backing to justify what she'd.

[Kate Casey]

Been doing all along, which is like a cult leader.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, absolutely. And the way this starts to come crashing down is that Ruby posts a video where Chad in the background nonchalantly mentions on camera he's been sleeping on a bean bag for seven months because Ruby took his privilege to a bed in a bedroom away. And finally, the Internet has, like, a clear enough piece of seven months and they are wildly canceled and they lose 90% of their income from this one video. And even Kevin is like, hey, maybe we should take this down. We're losing all our money. And Ruby's like, no, we must stand strong. Everyone loves our family. If they can't understand the truth of why our family is so good and it's because of disciplinary measures like this, then, like, they're kidding themselves about their mothering. And Sheri rightly calls out like, I think Chad was really smart. Like, he threw it in on camera.

[Kate Casey]

Yep.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And Ruby was so delusional to think she was such a good parent. She didn't even edit it out.

[Kate Casey]

I know, but that goes back to what I said in the beginning. Remember? She said, I knew if I wanted to get something done, I had to do it on camera. That's the only small way. The kids are the source of entertainment and the source of income. They're also the source of canceling because they are the truth tellers. The parents are not the truth tellers.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yes. And she even notes, like, our editor at the time made that the Focus of the video. And Ruby was like, tight, cool video upload. And Sheri has been seeing Jody, and she knew Jody was horrible, but then she starts seeing Jody. And Jody is trained to make you hate yourself. And who's better at that than a teenage girl? I mean, a lot of this book is, like, stories of her crushes and kissing and being a kissing bandit and kissing five guys. But then she shaming her friend for kissing, and her parents finding out, like, she's just growing up normally. But then she has these sessions with Jody that's like, hey, you're actually a pig who should hate yourself. Have you thought about that? And she, like, becomes a Jody follower for a while, until. This is that journaling thing Sherry taught to journal journals, these things that Jody said to her. Jody said, I'm, you know, a disgusting monster who. Blah, blah. And later on the call, she brings it up. She's like, hey, remember how you said all these things about how horrible I was? And Jody says to her, I never said that. You're a liar. I would never say that to you. You need to, like, free your brain of these lies. And because Sheri had written it down in her own journal, she could go back and be like, no, even though I'm a child and you're an adult, I can trust my own brain. I can trust my own experience. You are the abuser. And she gets free of Jody again. What did you think of that, of Sheri's relationship with her?

[Kate Casey]

Well, you know what? It's interesting. Basically, her vibe is she wants women to be freed of men, you know, But Ruby, as a mother, is always telling Sherry, want a man like this. Like, no one's gonna marry you if you don't do that. So it's. It's like conflicting the two people that have been positioned to have most power over her. And at a very seminal time, her mom really is the one pounding, like, you have to be this kind of person in order for a man to love you.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yes. And that leads into what happens next, which is Sheri is 18 at this point, and she's going to be going off to college, to BYU and for the summer because she's had her own YouTube channel. She helps this other adult man with a family and kids with social media content, and he starts grooming her for a sexual relationship. And when it started in the book, she's like. And then sometimes he would compliment me in this way. I'm just writing like, no, please, no. Like, please don't be where this is going. And this was so horrifying. She wrote this. He started doing little things. Kind gestures that made me feel seen, Cared for a doordash delivery when I was having a tough day. A little shopping trip if I needed something, even if I didn't. One day he told me, his voice low and intense. I'm the only one who really cares about you, Sherry. You know that, right? Each time he sent me gifts, I felt a little guilty, Pressured, somehow. The man who was showing me so much kindness. But for some reason, I wasn't sure I liked it. One day I accidentally called him dad. That was the first time I saw Derek angry. I think we're more than that, aren't we? He said, his face a storm cloud. This teenage girl in such a deficit for care and love.

[Kate Casey]

Oh, he knew that. That's why I accidentally calls.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Which is why he, like, is like this. You know, I can do it to this one. And then she accidentally calls him dad. And it makes him mad because he's like, no, I am your lover. I am your. I don't know, sexual ruler.

[Kate Casey]

And by the way, he's married. He's.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yes, married, with a family. He's part of the church, and he's.

[Kate Casey]

Hired her to do social media. So he's in a position of professional power. It has all the makings of disaster. But she's brought up in a family where you have to be of service to a man, which is devastating. And she doesn't feel safe to communicate anything with anybody because she's afraid to spill a cup of tea on the table. She can't express anything about this to anybody because it will result in exponential chores and abuse. So she's trapped. And she's only.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

She's trapped.

[Kate Casey]

She's relying emotionally on someone who has purposely chosen her because she's in a vulnerable state.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And she needs anyone on her side. So even if it comes at this really high cost, it's something her psyche is willing to accept to try and get a. A avenue out of this. Abusive family.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. That's like with my mom. That was the family priest. And her parents were like. Her mom was an alcoholic and her dad was a philanderer. And there was a lot of abuse. But the priest would come to the house and he would teach her how to read. She was really little. So when it comes back to the conflicting. Because you're like, well, they're so nice to me. They're the only nice person to me that I trust in that. And then the feelings of, like, love are confusing too. So I think for Sherry, she's like, I really don't have anybody I can trust. I want out of this space so bad. This is probably my only opportunity. And even though it goes against everything that I think is moral, he's the only person that cares about me.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And she's been raised in this church that he holds a really high status position in. So, like, this place that you believe in, that you've been told is good all your life has said, this man is one of the best men. So even when your body is telling you as a teenager danger, like, this guy is bad, you think you have evidence. Like, no, actually, he's really good. You must be wrong. And meanwhile, at home, Jody is telling Ruby she's having visions of Ruby up in heaven riding a lion named Charles. And then Sherry is like, so Charles was this guy on Reddit who realized that this family was up and was writing, like, hey, watch out. Like, Ruby's up. This family is in trouble. And then Jody was like, you ride Charles from Reddit as a lion in heaven. And Ruby would be like, yes, Jody, you're a saints. Like, that was.

[Kate Casey]

Well, also, if you're somebody like Ruby and you are so just perpetually rattled and like, anxiety, panic driven, want to control things. And then you meet Jody, who has these, like, end of days theories. That's why the story of Ruby's confusing, because surely before Jodie, she had behaviors that were controlling a maniacal. But there's also a part of it where you're like, was she being groomed by Jodie too? They're so. Both so terrible. You can't quite figure out.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And yet Jody is the leader. Jody runs the program, Jody runs the show. It's Jody's disciplinary practices that Ruby takes on, however, kind of as she wrote earlier, it's like Ruby was always looking for the reason to do what she was doing. So exactly like you said, who's in control here? Who's using who? And when Sheri goes to college, Ruby kind of cuts her off. They're having less and less contact. She's relying on this guy Derek, who continues to groom her until one day she's having a panic attack about what's happening with her family. And he says, I know, I know what will calm you down. Skin to skin contact. I take off your shirt for anxiety, and it morphs into him being like, I should have your iPhone location. You're not talking to other boys, are you? And he becomes extremely, extremely controlling, which Sherry is already prepped for because she Grew up with Ruby, and she's realizing her family is bad and her mom is bad, and, like, that abuse is going on as she is fully in a newly abusive relationship. And she wrote this. What irony. While all this was happening, I was studying abuse of power in my college classes, learning about the dynamics of coercion, about the ways in which abusers groom and manipulate their victims. But even as I intellectualize these concepts, even as I wrote papers and participated in discussions about the insidious nature of abuse, I was unable to apply. Apply that knowledge to my own life. My brain wouldn't let me go there. I found that so deeply relatable and so important where, like, she's literally studying the thing happening to her and yet cannot recognize it in herself, because that's how insidious trauma is.

[Kate Casey]

That's how deep it is. Yep.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. And so Sheri's the eldest, so all the younger kids are getting it worse, especially the youngest. Youngest. And she's sort of finding her way out, but she's struggling, and she finally asks her mom to talk. She's like, hey, I think you're being abusive and bad and horrible. And her mom is like, I would invite you to talk to me about this in person. And she meets her and her mom for dinner, who are like, you're a horrible person, Sherry. This is all your fault. How dare you say this to your beautiful mother. And at the end, Ruby says, I would also like to invite you to pay for dinner.

[Kate Casey]

Of course.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And then they get up and leave. I would like to invite you to pay for dinner. That's. I have to tell you, I had an improv or, like, a. Yeah, improv sketch teacher director who would give notes. Like, I would invite you to make a better choice here. I'd like to invite you to be funnier. And it's just so.

[Kate Casey]

It's like, passive.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Such fucked up language.

[Kate Casey]

It is.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I'd like to invite you to pay for this dinner where we have cut you off from the family.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. And even though I've given you no emotional or financial support, you should pay for it. I mean, remember when she was starting her channel and Ruby made a big deal? Like, you know, I'm gonna get a cut, Right. Who talks to their kids like that?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Oh, and Ruby was like, you can start a channel, but I'm not gonna shout you out. You have to earn it. You have to make it to a hundred thousand followers. Then I'll shout you out. No nepotism here, just sadism.

[Kate Casey]

I was brought back to, like, the Beginning of the blogging days for me and how so many of them are like that. I don't think she's the only one who had that mindset and probably still have that mindset. But definitely back in those days it was like, like, why would you work with somebody who also doesn't have a following? They're of no use to you. The other thing too is the benefit if you are a Mormon social media star, is that from what I understood was like, you get everybody in your ward to follow you too and comment. So it's not even just like you have your own channel, but it's like you've got a built in liking comment.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Group, an engagement algorithm generator, an engagement.

[Kate Casey]

Algorithm to help you promote your business too. So if you're listening, if you're Mary Jane and you live in Poughkeepsie and maybe, you know, you're Catholic or whatever, it's a steeper hill to climb. Whereas I think that like, they're really like, truly what you said in the beginning was like, that community is so there's this machine that really. It's a well oiled machine in all ways.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Wow. And at this point in time, Jody has finally done it. And she invites Kevin to leave for an entire year. And he's not allowed to contact any single member of the family, including Sheri. And supposedly Chad is going with him because they're both bad and evil men. Even though she finds out later that Chad just goes to a different random house, he's not with his dad. And they're like, cher, you're not allowed to contact your father anymore. And Kevin is like, don't contact me. I have to go work on myself. Because Jody says the twist. Sherry is in college at BYU where her dad is a professor. So when Kevin would see her on campus, he would like, look down and look away because he's not allowed to talk to her at, like, this hugely heralded religious institution of higher learning.

[Kate Casey]

It's just such hypocrisy, Such hypocrisy.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And then, oh, I screamed. Now, if you're a longtime listener of this podcast, you're going to scream too. And if you're new to it, but you'll scream for a different way. She wrote this in the book. She said, sherry, she's talking to a new therapist. Have you ever heard of the fawn response? Okay, had you heard of this before?

[Kate Casey]

This one broke me. This, this was. I. This resonated so deeply.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

So my therapist taught me about this years ago. The first time I Heard it. It broke me as well. Which is why I talk about on this podcast often where we know.

[Kate Casey]

No, I think I first heard it in your book.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Oh, yeah, I did talk about it.

[Kate Casey]

You did talk about it. And then when she talked about it, it broke me because I'm like, this happens so much more than people are willing to acknowledge.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, it's huge. It's basically when you are in survival mode when something horrible is happening. You have fight as a response, you have flight as a response, you have freeze as a response, like, how are you going to survive something horrible? And the fourth one that often comes up with women, but you know is genderless is Fawn, which is a new one being talked about, which is, I know I can people please my way out of this. I can make you so happy. I can be so likable. I can do everything so right. I can just appease, appease, appease, appease. And then harm won't come to me. And as soon as she learns about this, she realizes, oh, that's what I'm doing with Derek. I keep allowing this and being nice to him because I think it's the way to keep me safe from his abuse. But it's not keeping me safe anymore and I need a different response. And she goes to end it with him because she's gotten this therapist. I'm like, yes, the therapist. Like, yes, byu for this class on coercion. Like all these ways that she gets free. And what is so nuts is that of course Derek goes psycho and he's stalking her and he's following her and he's crying again. Married, full family bishop in the church. And at this point in time, Sherry gets back in touch with her mom, Ruby's sisters, her aunts who had been cut off and isolated through Jody, of course. And her aunts are with her as she's like, hey, there is a 45 year old man who has been doing everything sexual with me except going all the way because that would be against God and I'm trying to get him out of my life. And she is at their house, they're driving her from St George, which is where I used to live. And she's at their house when he follows her iPhone location and like stalks her at the house. And her aunts, her grown, grown women aunts are like, oh no, should we do something about this? And Sherry says, no, I'll handle it. He needs to hear it from me. And I'm just like, no woman was raised in this environment to know how to stand up to danger. None of them know how to do it. So how. How do you learn? It's like, the answer. Like, okay, you do it, Sherry.

[Kate Casey]

You tell them, like, and she's a child. I mean, comparatively. Yeah, yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And then she gets on a zoom with her bishop after getting help from her roommates to confess to her bishop. You know what she thinks she's done. And her bishop is shockingly wonderful, where he's like, this is not your fault. This shouldn't have happened to you. However, I need to report you to the guy higher than me, and he decides what happens to you. And Sheri is still a really devout Mormon till this day. And she didn't want her temple recommends taken away from her.

[Kate Casey]

Right.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Which is. I don't know. It's like the green card to, like, go to the temple.

[Kate Casey]

You. You are worthy of participating in church.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Practices in the highest. Like, you can get married in the temple. You are, like, the highest indoctrinated Mormon versus, like, just going to church. She eventually gets it back.

[Kate Casey]

But wait, he doesn't. He. Nothing happens to him. No.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. He says, she's lying. I'm a bishop. And they said, okay, good job.

[Kate Casey]

I mean, are we ever going to know who this guy is?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Sure. I listen. These people just love to document themselves.

[Kate Casey]

I know. I kept thinking, I. I hope it comes out who this person is.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, me too. And he was like, later, later, later. He receives, like, a little bit of punishment and loses his temple recommends, but it takes a long time. She changes bishops. Good for her. And she realizes things with her family are getting really bad. Ruby's getting really abusive with Jody's help. Her dad is fully living outside of the house and won't respond to any. She calls DCFS because neighbors are reporting what's going on at her house, and she lives 10 minutes away. Like, she's in the same city, but she's in college, like, in the dorms. And she makes an entire case. She tells them everything. And the social worker calls her up and says, I'm so sorry. There's nothing we can do. There's just not enough evidence. We sent a police check. They said they're fine. And then they cited the free range parenting law of Utah law. Had you ever heard of this law?

[Kate Casey]

No. Tell me.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I think Sherry writes about the law incorrectly in her own memoir, to be honest, where she's like, thanks to the free range parenting law. It allows children to have extreme independence under Utah law because parents in Utah want to raise their children to be like, independent individuals who Work on their own, take care of themselves. So it's like, it's a positive law. But it was being misused because now these teenagers, these minors, there wasn't enough evidence to bring against them because they could use the free range parenting law of like, these kids are just taking care of themselves. However, there's also something in Utah called the Romeo and Juliet law, which we read about in another episode, which is a law that allows 14 year olds to get married to each other or an adult as long as they are not seven years older than them. That is also a Utah law supposedly about true love. Both of these laws are about marrying off minors because polygamy was like a huge part of the state. That's my read on this law. They made these laws to make minors adults so that they could be married off, married to you, married to adults. And then these laws are what stops anyone from intervening in this abuse.

[Kate Casey]

It's dark, just really dark.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And finally she gets the call one day where Ruby had moved into Jody's house. She was packing up all her belongings to flee Utah and go to Arizona where they would have even less supervision. A neighbor reports it to Sherry. So Sherry knows, like, they're packing up, they're trying to move. All this stuff is going on where she's like transferring the money she made as a kid to her own account. So smart. Going to get the deed to her car. Like, she's going through so much drama as her mom has taken the two youngest children to Jody's house. And like, extreme abuse has started. And finally one of the children breaks free, the little boy, and goes to a neighbor's house. And finally the cops come. And finally the physical abuse evidence get these children free of a situation that had been reported for years and years and seen on YouTube for years and years. And when they pull Kevin in, do you remember what he said in the book when the police, like, pull him in?

[Kate Casey]

What did he say?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

He says, what will happen to my wife? I love my wife.

[Kate Casey]

Oh, that's right. I love my wife. I felt so enraged by the end of it. It's crazy because when you start the book, you're like, I can't stand this woman, Ruby. And this Jody person is terrible. And I had hope that I would at some point, like the father. Cause he's painted in the beginning as like somewhat loving in the very, very beginning. And then you're like, oh my God, even you let her down. Everybody let her down. The church let her down. Her mother let her down. Jody let her down. And her father, too. It's almost like the only people she could ever trust would be maybe her own siblings. Cause even the sisters, you know, in that one moment, they didn't come to. No one stood up for her at all. So it makes sense to me now where she says, a, I will only refer to my parents by their first name because they're not worthy of being called mom or dad, which I totally salute. But she also has said she doesn't want to do any more interviews after this. She wants to go back into her own life. And I get it.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. This child had to learn to do everything, as every single adult, including Derek, abused her and everyone around them. And even in the end of the book, when the cops come, Ruby goes to prison, Jodie goes to prison, but only for two years each. Maybe, like, basically their sentence might be, like, cut down enough to two years. She skips the healing with Kevin. She's basically like, kevin went to rehab, and now Kevin's at home, and we are a family again. And she said, I talked to Jesus about it, and Jesus said, I should forgive Kevin. And so I have. Have. And I'm of two minds. Which is like, she did not hold back writing details of what Kevin did.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And what he was like. So now if Kevin's back and being the only helpful adult in her life, I see why she is like, again, she's still a child. She's like, I'm just gonna accept this, but reading the book, you're like, we have skipped a lot.

[Kate Casey]

I just. So I kept thinking, where do you go from here?

[Chelsea DeVontes]

You.

[Kate Casey]

I could not communicate with anybody except the siblings. That's it. But even the problem with that is the siblings are an extension of them. I think what ultimately, especially with families with a lot of kids, like, I can speak to this, too, is the more you grow up and the more distance you have from your family of origin, there are relationships that will have to be cut off because they are a witness to the experience that you had as a child. And you don't want to have a relationship with someone that reminds you of what you've been through. I mean, this is a very poor example, but it makes me think of, like, hostage situations throughout history. Like, how many of those hostages that were held together still keep in touch, because even though they were bonded by that experience, as they get older, they don't want to be reminded of what they experienced.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. On the flip side of that, and it's too nuanced for this to apply to everything, but, like, exactly what you're saying was one of the biggest pain points of me and my mom rebuilding our relationship simply because, like, we were witness to the worst things that happened in each other's lives. And it's just so hard to have to work through that. And sometimes people shouldn't. Sometimes you should cut off, you know, but other times, like, you know, with my siblings, it's like getting confirmation that the horrible thing happened, did happen, via your sibling who also experienced it, but has their own perception, is also one of the most healing things that can happen. So I really wonder what's gonna happen.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

With her and the siblings, because for a while, Chad was like, jody is amazing. Sheri, you're the problem. Get away from me. Don't talk to me. Don't try and help me. They all have, like, a path to come back to.

[Kate Casey]

Also. They've been raised to believe a certain set of values. So they're.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yes.

[Kate Casey]

So they're competing against that also in big families like that. I mean, I have five kids. My oldest is 15. My youngest is six. And she does do a lot of mothering stuff because we're like a train that's moving. And so it is hard to let go of a relationship as you get older, because I think for some of the older siblings, they feel like they were part of. Of the raising of their siblings, too. So there's so many conflicting feelings and.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Survivor'S guilt that she wrote about. Like, I got away from them, but my siblings were still trapped with her as she got into her worst behaviors.

[Kate Casey]

You know, I had a friend who she was one of three siblings and terrible parents, but she was the oldest, so she, you know, went to college, and then she kind of moved on and got married. And the younger sisters resented her because they felt like, well, you didn't protect me. And that's a difficult conversation where the oldest is like, but I deserved to be free and to set my own course for life. And I shouldn't have been responsible for you because I was not your parent. But that.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And I was also a child.

[Kate Casey]

Right. But then sometimes the younger siblings are like, but you were my mother figure, which is unfair, too. So it's just all awful.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

It's all awful. And this book has a lot of. I don't know. Yeah, I. What you're saying goes to, like, Sherry is incredible. She just traveled miles and miles and miles on her own, growth wise, emotionally. Therapy, like the law, knowing how to talk about her parents and abuse in this book, protecting her family. And yet I just kept feeling like, this is so soon, and you are so young. And simultaneously being like, she has done an incredible job, and it was really important that she write this. And she is still a very strong believer of the LDS Church. It's a big part of her life. So she has to navigate the LDS Church teachings that she grew up with with her mom and separate that from, like, what is her own and what does she believe in. And from her Instagram, I know that she's engaged, you know, which also follows culturally, like, very young engagements. She wants to start her own family. And she said, like, I will never share my family, my husband, my wedding, anything on this platform, but I will continue to speak out against family vlogging.

[Kate Casey]

That I do think is such a bright. Like, I'm so grateful for her voice because, like you said, this is kind of like the first child that is giving voice to all of those kids that were on social media platforms. Basically, they're like family businesses and they're unemployed minors. And I'm glad that she's giving voice to it. I do think that it will continue to be painful for her in different ways. Like, there'll be ebbs and flows. I know that I speak for a lot of moms who feel like if you've come from a dysfunctional family is that you think you're kind of healed, and then you have a child, and then it's like, there are a lot of holes that get filled because of that unconditional love and that feeling of incredible, deep, deep love. But it also rips new ones open because you're confronted with what you lacked while you're giving what your child deserves.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

That has to be so intense of, like, oh, I am doing what my mom didn't do for me. But, like, you can still feel the child in you that missed all of the things. Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

You're, like, mourning what you should have had. And you're also sort of separating yourself because then you suddenly see your parent as a contemporary, and you think, oh, my God, if I were in mom's club with my own parent or dad's club or whatever, would I respect them? And the answer is often no. And then you can feel angry about it. So it's a very intense feeling. So I feel like she's so young and she's got her power back in some ways. But we're gonna have to check back with her in a little while if she starts to have kids. And I would love to know how it shifts. By the way, I should say a lot of people, too. They have a different experience. Like, for me, it was really painful. And then I sort of made peace with things and have moved on in my own personal way. For a lot of people when they have a child, they suddenly feel a tremendous amount of empathy for their own parent and what they went through. Because our parents are raised in different generations with a set of different circumstances. So some people are really good about forgiving them and moving forward. But there are a population of people, parents, who feel like, I can't get past what I didn't have now that I have my own child.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Sherry writes in the book. She's like, I adopted a cat. He is my son. And even just having this cat, I cannot believe what my mother did to me.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Given the way, like, I love this cat, and. And she's about to go and have her own family. And I, too, know people who, you know, had empathy for their parents, then had a child and was like, actually, you're cut off. Like, now that I have a child. Like, I just can't fathom how you did this. And I think that goes to Ruby, where something is so, so deeply wrong in her to the point that whatever discipline she was doling out and giving, she then found extreme amounts of love from Jody. And she got to be Jody's disciple and follow Jody's rules and get affection from Jodi. And she writes in her journal, like, I have to work for your affection, Jodi. Like, why do you do this to me? And so she was clearly craving and enacting abuse in just so, so many ways. And one thing I loved in the book is that she talks about the beautiful speech her mom g when she was being sentenced of, like, my little babies and blah, blah. And it's like, that's like, don't come near me. I don't believe you. Yeah, you think because you can describe, like, the day you gave birth to me, I forgive you. Like, I do not. No one should forgive her. This sentence should be longer. Don't fall for her tricks anymore. She's just like, she's wise beyond.

[Kate Casey]

She really is.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

She's just wise.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, she's just so wise. Okay, let's do the booktal test. First question. Was the author vulnerable in the sharing of their truth?

[Kate Casey]

Without question. Yes.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, absolutely. Especially the Derek stuff, because she was raised to believe that, like, kissing a boy was a sin and made, you know, made you a horrible person. And so she was put through all of these sexual escapades thinking that she was now a bad person and she was a Part of it. And she was able to like write that in the book to show how bad it was. Even though I know she must have been feeling guilt that was not hers to feel. So I was just really impressed by that. Okay, second question. Was it entertaining to read?

[Kate Casey]

It was entertaining in the way that it gave me more insight into the business of family blogging or vlogging. So that I found really interesting and all the nuances, like, I can only get what I want from my parent by asking on camera. Like, those things I thought were very eye opening. So yes, that was very entertaining.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, I feel really conflicted because it was written through the point of view of someone who still has processing to do. It was like, not the way I wanted to take in this story, but also am thrilled that a child influencer was able to tell their own story. But, like, it wasn't the way I would want to take in this story.

[Kate Casey]

You know what's interesting too? When I talk to people that I know who are like, I still think they're a little bit too obsessed with the likes and the comments and the participation of their kids and whatever project it may be. And by the way, I want to caveat this. I'm not talking about people posting pictures of their vacation pictures with their kids. What I mean are like, is the business when there are brands that are paying for you, that is a whole other thing. I bring up the, like these cases, the Stauffers and the Frankies, and the immediate reaction is like, oh, but that's not like what we do. There's still a huge population of people who are in this business who just feel like that's them. That's not me. Those of us on the outside can see clearly what this is, but there are children that are not being paid for work that they're doing is part of a family business. And the family business is this. It's totally immoral.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Even when they're like, oh, no, but my kid loves it. They love doing it. They ask me to do it. It's like, yeah, because that's the thing their parent loves. Their parent is making money and likes it. And listen, I, when I was three years old, I've heard this story. I don't remember it, but also I'm like, exactly right. I pointed to a television. I said, how do I get in there? And my mom said, oh, well, you would need an agent. And I was like, let's get one. One. Let's get an agent. I'd like to be doing like the grape juice Commercial with, you know, the kid. And my mom was like, no. Like, no, it'll ruin you. I still, to this day, I'm like, you missed out on millions. I would have loved it. I, you know, and yet, like, she made that call of, like, even though it's my choice, it's like, I'm a child. Of course I want to be on television. Right. And now we read about Janette McC and Nickelodeon, like, everything that was happening to those kids where it's like, yeah, it is your choice, but also you're a child, so your brain isn't fully formed enough to be making healthy choices.

[Kate Casey]

Yeah. And some moms and dads will say, but I'm with them on the set all the time. You can't be with them all the time, especially if you have other children.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah. Also, they shouldn't be on set all the time.

[Kate Casey]

No, they need children. Go play kickball and go to the YMCA and have fun.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

And like you said, it's like television is barely regulated for children and poorly regulated. YouTube, family vlogging, no regulations, nothing. It's just in your own home.

[Kate Casey]

Well, there are some states that are making some efforts, and California has new legislation too, about kids that are part of social media businesses like this in the state of California that they have to have a certain percentage of their money put away that's only put into practice January of 2025. So let's think about all those years that have preceded this and how much money some of these families have made. A house, little. The children have gotten access to. And in the aftermath of it, people can go back and watch these videos and still write hellacious comments on videos of children. And those kids, even that have turned into adults, can go see what strangers think of them.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

I mean, the way we perceive ourselves, develop our personalities, get reflections back to us, and become humans that way. And even I can go back, you know, and think about some grade year and have the shivers like, yeah. Through the lens of adults watching my family blog, talking about me, like, I just, It. It feels unsurvivable from my vantage point. From me, who did not. I was not a child with an iPhone. And yet it's happening everywhere.

[Kate Casey]

Everywhere. Yep.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Okay, last question. Did reading this book elevate your life in any way?

[Kate Casey]

I do think so. I think it really helped me have a better understanding of not just of her singular experience, but the shared experiences of children who are subjected to families that want. Want their entire family to be part of the entertainment business. I felt like I'm armed with new Information that I can, you know, kind of question somebody who wants to do the same. And I think that's the great job that we have as. As podcasters is to storytell and share these. These stories, because we may be enlightening someone to something that may actually protect somebody from a decision that they will likely regret.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

That's really beautifully said. I agree. This book did elevate my life. I think that one specific way that really elevated my life is that when Derek entered the picture, I had this feeling of, like, too much. You're already gonna be a part of one of the most famous mommy bloggers who is abusive and Mormon. Like, this. This is too much, like, how could this also be happening? Which is also how I felt when I would be editing my own book where, like, as a writer, I'd be like, this is too much like, how, how, how. And through Sherry's point of view, it's just so clear. It's happening because of how you grew up, right? Not despite all these things you went through. You have something else to go through. It's happening because you went through all these things. You have lived a life that someone else sees as, like, oh, they'll be susceptible to abuse and manipulation, and I'll be able to do these things to them because I've seen it being done to them in other parts of their life. And it just. It gave me so much empathy, honestly, for myself, which is how it elevated my own life. You know, where it's like, yeah, this.

[Kate Casey]

Weekend, I was talking to a man who has, like, a marriage therapy business. We were at this, like, business conference thing that our whole family got to go to, and I was sharing with him that when my oldest two were little and there was a bully, I made them do this exercise. And I know it sounds silly, but my kids were just like. Especially my oldest. She was very shy. So I made us have our chairs across from each other, like, the $25,000 pyramid. And I said, this is what you need to do. You need to look at them straight in the eye, and you need to say something like, I will not allow you to talk to me that way or, do not speak to me that way. I said, but the whole trick is you cannot be the first person to look away. They have to be. So we would practice them saying that to my face and then looking in my eye, and they looked away. I go, no, no, gotta do it again. Because it's so important when you're a child and you feel like you're getting, like, pummeled socially, that you have to stand up for yourself because once you do, the bully kind of lets go. So I was saying, like, I did that exercise and I said, cause it's so important to me that my kids always feel like they have a sense of their own power.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah.

[Kate Casey]

And what really moved me about this book is, is how young she is, how hard she fought for her own life, but also for the life of not just her siblings, but for every child that is right now filming with their family will never be compensated and will not feel like they have any sense of their own self. And she has done that. She's standing at the top of the hill for all those kids. And what a marvelous way to walk out of a life situation like that. That feeling like you're going to forever change the lives of kids that come after you.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

That was incredibly sad. And I think we must end on that 100%. Her sharing her story has just saved so, so many kids. Kate, tell everyone where they can listen to your podcast, where they can find you.

[Kate Casey]

You can listen to my podcast, Reality Life with Kate Casey. Wherever you listen to podcasts, I've got a what to watch list. Every Monday, I tell people what to watch in unscripted TV and then on social media. Instagram, KCCA, TikTok, it's Kasey, Twitter threads, blueskykasey.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

She's on Blue Sky. Should I go over there? What's the deal?

[Kate Casey]

I don't know how long it'll last. I don't know how long any. That's the thing about social media. Like there all of these people that have invested so much time into one platform. Like, I think everything's gonna go away at some point.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Yeah, yeah. And listen. Hell yeah.

[Kate Casey]

Exactly.

[Chelsea DeVontes]

Thank you for coming on. A huge thank you to our podcast producer, Christina Lopez, our executive producer Jordan Moncada, our sound engineer, Marcus Hamm, and our amazing associate producer, Jaron Padre. I also want to let you know that if you love audiobooks but you want to support independent bookstores, go to Libro fm, where it is easy to download audiobooks and support local bookshops. And right now, you. You get two Libro FM audiobooks for the price of one with your first month of membership using code Trash. That's right, Trash. T R A S H. Two audiobooks for the price of one at Libro fm. And if you have questions, go to the Patreon Chat Lounge and I will see you there.