Life After MLM

*In this episode we discuss evangelical deconstruction, church abuse, white supremacy and misogyny. Please use discretion when listening.* Did you happen to catch either of the Hillsong docs? Because I have questions, and I couldn't think of a better person to ask than Janice Lagata. As one of the founding members of Hillsong NYC, Janice remembers a time before Carl Lentz. Before NBA players, and...

After a heavy month of True Crime, we are starting off Cult Month with the lovely April Ajoy to discuss Purity Culture, Christian Nationalism and detoxing from Evangelicalism. From her days of wearing a purity ring and answering phone calls at Pat Robertson's 700 Club, to her personal experiences deconstructing her beliefs and having the hard conversations, April never loses her sense of humor. Sh...

*This episode includes details of sexual assault, and discusses the topics of consent, purity culture, identity and trauma. Please use discretion when listening.* 20 year ago, Emily Ragland was a freshman at Guilford College in North Carolina, playing on the softball team and studying to enter the field of civil rights. The Quaker based college appealed to her as a Christian, POC woman looking to...

*This episode talks about the details in a current murder case. As of publication, this case is still ongoing.* Today is full of bonuses! We've got 3 hometown hauntings, some details on an ongoing MLM-adjacent murder case, and a chat with the host of Murderish, Jami Rice! Jami and I talk about ethical true crime, what it's like to be a podcaster in this space, and her thoughts on Fyre Festival. Th...

*This episode contains depictions of violence including murder. Please use discretion when listening.* What's going on?? At the age of 12, Collier Landry helped solve his mother's murder, at the hands of his psychopathic, narcissist father. And if that wasn't incredible enough, he spent the next decade giving his mother a voice and finding the peace he needed to move on in his true crime documenta...

In a military career that spans her entire adult life, over the years Claire has witnessed a lot of strange behavior that caused her to pause and ask questions. Whether an obsessive classmate, a company draped in red flags, or a scummy dad at the park, her hackles were always up. In an anthology of true crime stories that Claire has been oddly close to, we learn how she navigated these encounters...

Terra Newell might be best known for taking down Dirty John, but she's definitely more than that! As a True Crime Survivor, Terra is an advocate for victims and survivors, as well as hosting a podcast called Survivor Squad. I've been a huge fan of Terra for a long time so I couldn't wait to chat to her about her story, her healing journey and her thoughts on "Ethical True Crime". Show Notes Connec...

From the moment I heard about Fyre Festival, I was hooked. And not because I wanted to go, I was leaving my own scam at the time but because of the scammer at the forefront, Billy McFarland. It may seem odd to have a "favorite fraudster" but Billy takes the cake, from his earliest scams in childhood to his Fyre Festival 2 vision for "making it right", he's the GRIFT that keeps on GRIFTING. After s...

After making lots of Billy McFarland content on TikTok, Gina reached out to me with a story I had never heard before. After the disaster, Gina who was there to help fun the event, and her team of 40 employees were stranded on Great Exuma for way too long, without any insight or solid plan for getting home. From the Lord of the Flies style pandemonium, flaming mattresses, sharp rocks, dusty cheese...

It's Halloween Season! Welcome back to PART 2 of both our Bodie Curse Ghost Story, and the ending of Amber's story with Bomb Party! After we got a bit into her rise throughout the company and the countless hours of labor exploitation in the name of building trainings in Part 1, in Part 2 we dive move into the passive aggressive bullying aspect of her experience and the downfall of her Bomb Party E...

Happy October! We've got holiday bonuses, starting with a story of a cursed ghost town in the high desert of California to accompany our MOST cursed episode to date! Audio issues are common in interviews, and most can be fixed in post... but it took 3 different recording sessions for this chat with Amber of Bomb Party to take. I've experienced Fair Gaming before but Kayla agreed, this felt otherwo...

Lianne is a French Canadian living in New Brunswick who's been in more MLMs than she can keep track of. From a couple of solid US-based standards, to some exclusive Canadian brands even I had never heard of, Lianne paints us a picture of a young woman trying to find her place in the world with the limited resources available to her. Past abusive relationships, the uncertainty of Military life, and...

*This episode discusses topics that may be triggering to some including, purity culture, sex and sexuality. Please use descretion when listening.* Sam reached out to me to add another level of understanding to the complicated topic of Purity Culture and how those teachings in our childhood affect us and our choices as adults. Our conversation leads us down a path filled with soapboxes, empowerment...

Steve joined Amway over 20 years ago, as a young naive man, looking for a steady income. Back then he was focus on building his products business, eventually making it to Emerald, but not seeing the same profits from others around him who had more of a "Tools" focus. It wasn't until Steve started asking questions nobody wanted to answer that he started taking a closer look at where the money was c...

Growing up in the Grand Rapids Michigan area, Amway is a part of every day normal life. Even if you're not a fan, it's almost literally impossible not to support the company in some way. From the medical research facilities, to the concert halls and arenas, the Devos/Van Andel family have made their mark on West Michigan in more ways than one. Emma shares some of her experiences growing up surroun...

*This episode includes conversations about Purity Culture, sex and the AIDS crisis and is considered 18+ in content. Please use discretion when listening.* I never thought in a million years that I would be making an episode on Life After MLM about sex, but when Pastor Rob reached out to me to agree with my takes on the dangers of Purity Culture and how he can use the bible to prove it, I jumped a...

If you know your LuLaHistory you know Courtney Harwood, the first "mentor" to leave featured in both LuLaRich and the Vice Documentary. A sit down with Courtney is probably one of my most requested interviews and it wasn't until recently that we could really find the time to make that happen. It's been almost 2 years since LuLaRich dropped and I wanted to catch up, put some rumors to rest, get the...

As a self proclaimed "MLM Addict in Recovery", Cindy Adams has jumped through a lot of hoops in the name of Boss Babery. From attending to many in-home parties to count, to traveling internationally across the country, she's made a lot of Hunbot level choices. So when she reached out with a story about almost getting roped into Amway as a teen, (and that's just the beginning!) I knew we had to cha...

*Content Warning : This episode talks about The No Name Fellowship and discusses the death of a child, among other cult abuses. Please use discretion when listening.* Shortly after Stacey's episode came out I got an email from another survivor of the "No Name Fellowship" who had even more to add to the story. With very little information about this group out there, any additional pieces to the puz...

Have you ever heard a Hun proclaim they owned their own business, with silently screaming inside that joining an MLM isn't the same thing as being a business owner? Have you ever been curious about some of the less obvious things a real small business owner would be concerned about that might never cross the mind of someone in an MLM? Well you're in luck! Olivia is an internal auditor by trade, wh...

A couple months ago, Russ came to me with an idea I fully supported; attending a motivational coaching seminar with a starry-eyed friend to keep him safe from being scammed. Spending a good chunk of change on the largest VIP ticket, he agreed to keep his eyes peeled, take notes and report back, but Russ's expectation verses his reality were two entirely different things. Show Notes Aspire Tour - h...

*Content Warning: This episode deals with Medical Child Abuse, including examples and descriptions of actual abuse in MbP cases. Please use caution when listening.*  In continuing our education into the exploitation of children, I invited my friend Andrea Dunlop on the show to open up the conversation about Medical Child Abuse. Andrea is the host of the podcast Nobody Should Believe Me which deal...

*Content Warning : This episode deals with heavy topics such as religious trauma, mentions of child abuse, trafficking and SA allegations, and domestic violence. Please use caution when listening.* Nikieta and Asha were both members of ICOC, or The International Churches of Christ - a dangerous religious cult with ties to child abuse and running a religious pyramid scheme. Both were young women en...

Sarah joined Scentsy because she wanted a family vacation, and somehow found herself in the owner's direct downline, without much help or guidance. As Sarah climbed the ranks to SuperStar Consultant she started to noticed something fishy, consultants breaking the rules, out spending each other on stock, buying ranks, and literally faking it until they make it. When she experiences some huge life c...

In the Amazon Prime Video DocuSeries Shiny Happy People we meet Tara and Floyd Oathout, two former homeschoolers whose love story started in the electronics section at Walmart. I was instantly charmed by their sarcastic wit and loving banter and knew they had a much bigger story than the show had room for. Through amazing adversity, and over coming some of the darkest times at true rock bottom, th...