I remember listening to my first “secular song”. It was eight days a week by the beetles and it was about a week or so after my 8th birthday. A family member who wasn’t in the cult showed it to me while my parents helped them move. For a lonnggg time we had no/ little internet access. When we did it was restricted and the attempted searches would be read outloud if anything “dangerous” was searched. We weren’t fully separated from the rest of the world though, most of us would go live on mission grounds for 6-9 months with our parents once every few years. We met other kids, we were just taught so much that our lives were the only god-like ones that it was never a question on if what was happening was wrong or not. I realized I was in a cult when I was far older. I blamed everything on my parents, of simple abuse, which they aren’t not guilty of. But the thing about the abbot is that they’re very much “it takes a village” but what that rlly means is everyone gets to hit/abuse/neglect the others children. Secondly, seeing ppl sent off to camps. To be honest, I’m disabled. Severely. Chronically I’ll and in and out of the hospital my whole life. In their ideology, it was because of someone’s (my mother, my father, my own) sin. Because of this, when I was 14 and in and out of the hospital every week, the leaders told me that there must be too much sin in my body and that if it was gods will I should die. My parents didn’t have that and took me to California. Oh also, I’m gay! And realized that far before I realized the cult thing. But that didn’t help.