A Well-Trained Wife

My Escape from Christian Patriarchy

By: Tia Levings

Narrated by: Tia Levings

Length: 10 hrs and 30 mins

Publisher's summary

“Today it hit me when he hit me, blood shaking in my brain. Maybe there wasn’t a savior coming. Maybe it was up to me to save me.”

Recruited into the fundamentalist Quiverfull movement as a young wife, Tia Levings learned that being a good Christian meant following a list of additional life principles—a series of secret, special rules to obey. Being a godly and submissive wife in Christian Patriarchy included strict discipline, isolation, and an alternative lifestyle that appeared wholesome to outsiders. Women were to be silent, “keepers of the home.”

Tia knew that to their neighbors her family was strange, but she also couldn't risk exposing their secret lifestyle to police, doctors, teachers, or anyone outside of their church. Christians were called in scripture to be “in the world, not of it.” So, she hid in plain sight as years of abuse and pain followed. When Tia realized she was the only one who could protect her children from becoming the next generation of patriarchal men and submissive women, she began to resist and question how they lived. But in the patriarchy, a woman with opinions is in danger, and eventually, Tia faced an urgent and extreme choice: stay and face dire consequences, or flee with her children.

Told in a beautiful, honest, and sometimes harrowing voice, A Well-Trained Wife is an unforgettable and timely memoir about a woman's race to save herself and her family and details the ways that extreme views can manifest in a marriage.

©2024 Tia Levings (P)2024 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

"Rebellious and riveting—A Well-Trained Wife is a rare gem of a journey from horrific abuse to victorious healing. Not many survivors are willing to lift the veil of shame that shrouds most stories of domestic and cultic abuse. Private and painful, this important memoir will shine light on the darkest crimes within the religious patriarchy with hope for the future—a triumph for all survivors.”
- Sarah Edmondson, author of Scarred: The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, the Cult That Bound My Life and host of “A Little Bit Culty” podcast

"With unflinching honesty and relentless self-reflection, Levings’ debut memoir is a portrait in courage." - Julie Bogart, author of The Brave Learner and Raising Critical Thinkers

"It's hard to imagine the stores of courage Tia Levings drew on to write this gripping account of living in and then escaping the shackles of an abusive marriage fueled by high-control religion and dogmatic theology. With clear-eyed precision and riveting narrative voice, Levings pulls back the veil to expose the often clandestine, radical patriarchy found in many fundamentalist congregations—a doctrine that inflicts irreparable harm on girls and women by insisting their roles are to sustain and satisfy the men around them through submission and strict adherence to purity culture. For any of us whose religious upbringings were anywhere adjacent to these damaging mindsets, Levings revelations about her experiences reverberate to the core. A Well-Trained Wife is an unforgettable and incisive testament to one woman's daring to break free, speak truth to power, and finally find her authentic self along the path toward healing." - Melanie Brooks, author of A Hard Silence and Writing Hard Stories