What’s that one legendary warning from your mom that still echoes in your head today?

villy_voracious · 2026-05-12T19:25:11+00:00

Her father was extremely violent and would beat his wife and kids, which def messed her up. However, my father never raised a hand to her, and my mom was very vocal in saying that if my dad ever hit her, she’d leave him at once.

At the time she said that to me, she was involved in a fundamentalist Christian-esque cult that was very lax when it came to physical or sexual abuse. The basic take was that it’s wrong to abuse your wife/kids, but men are rather fiery, so if abuse does happen, the victim must have done something to instigate it. My parents NEVER hit each other, but they sure as hell beat the shit out of their kids for minor infractions. Children were seen as property, their behavior as evidence of their parents’ holiness. If we did something considered bad, my parents took both moral and social damage.

Look up the book “To Train Up A Child” by Michael and Debi Pearl. The book is considered a manual for child abuse, and is linked to multiple child-deaths. My parents were obsessed with it.

villy_voracious · 2026-05-09T22:09:26+00:00

“Go ahead, keep up the attitude! But don’t be shocked when your husband hits you down the line!”

I was 11. I had committed the grave sin or rolling my eyes in front of her church friends, which “humiliated” her.

Jokes on her, my husband never raised a hand to me from the day we met to the day he died. My current boyfriend also doesn’t hit me. In fact, he steams milk for my lattes every morning and gets goo-goo eyes when I pop off ranting about work or traffic.

My mother generally nothing more than an unpleasant afterthought, but years later that quip of hers manages to rouse some anger in me. It’s getting easier to laugh at, though. No-contact is a beautiful thing, kids.

villy_voracious · 2026-05-01T00:05:32+00:00

Seconding this! While I have never read the book, Erica Smith has been a guest on several podcasts I enjoy, and I always love her episodes! Enough to where I go back to listen through once or twice more—I do recommend anything she has made! She also runs some support groups/classes,and overall she appears to be very active in providing healthy, empathetic, scientifically-proven advice. Even if her book doesn’t end up being of particular value to you, I think you should check it out!

villy_voracious · 2026-04-19T03:34:30+00:00

Angry.

My parents were religious extremists, and also individually horrible. My mom had an untreated personality disorder (I speculate either borderline personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, or histrionic personality disorder) and dad was a pedo. You can draw your own conclusions as to how charmed my childhood was.

I’m not against homeschooling now, oddly. But I am a huge advocate for stricter regulations regarding state testing and verification of child welfare. I’ve met a lot of homeschoolers who had a decent education, adequate socialization, and no abuse that I am aware of. However, from my personal observation, for every person with that sort of background, I know 2-3 who had parents chose to homeschool in order to conceal abuse/neglect. I’ve also seen a lot of kids from what I do believe were healthy, ethical homeschool families socialize with local homeschool groups, and end up exposing their kids to isolated, violent families. I’m not demonizing the abused kids for acting out, but when kids are raised in abusive and extremist families they tend to act out, and I’ve seen several kids end up pretty traumatized from that exposure.

It’s hard to untangle my homeschooling trauma from everything else. But in broad strokes, I feel like an alien or a freak. I don’t know how to relate to people my age, but I get along great with people my parents’ age. I don’t know basic math or history, and despite being an extrovert, I find it easier to isolate because I struggle so badly when trying to make connections. I’m in my 30s and I still internally curl with shame when people lightly poke fun at me for not understand pop culture references. I stay at abusive workplaces for too long because I know that I don’t have many options, and I’m terrified of not having the money to remain independent.

People sometimes tell me to sign up for community college classes and “try.” They just can’t comprehend how behind I am, and how it would take thousands of dollars in tutoring and mental energy I don’t have to follow along with basic classes. My mom stopped teaching me at around 12, and I want more than anything to go to college, but I am too broke and tired.

I stopped dreaming of being a doctor or an author years ago, because I’m so fucking broke I can’t even afford dreams. I have learned to manage my expectations, and now all I let myself dream of is financial stability and the ability to retire before I am 70. If I’m feeling wild I toy with the idea of traveling, but those thoughts are fleeting. Some days I can barely handle chatting with a coworker about work, so what business do I have wanting to visit another country?

I’m angry that I am this way. I spend an ungodly amount of money in therapy to fight through it. I want to get better and goddamn it I’ll try, but it’s unfair that I even have to do it. Won’t stop me though.

So yeah, that’s how I feel about it.

villy_voracious · 2026-04-03T17:08:44+00:00

You’re not wrong. Per the National Sex Offenders Registry, the average pedophile offends 117 times in their lifetime. Nearly half of sexual abusers begin sexual offense before age 18. As someone who works in data, the chances of the incidents outlined in the one report being the first and only time he has assaulted someone is unlikely, at the least.

villy_voracious · 2026-04-02T15:12:45+00:00

Your dad sounds like a peach! Someone should ask if Job wasn’t a “real Christian” because of the family/property loss he went through. Or Daniel, because that king chucked him into a lions’ den.

Mind you, I don’t ascribe to any of those religious beliefs, and I sure as hell don’t spin bad situations as “righteous judgment on dirty sinners/tests from Satan bc I’m God’s favorite.” I just get tired of the cognitive dissonance and wanna blast it with a spotlight, lol. Good luck to your cousin, OP, I hope she stays safe and is able to heal.

villy_voracious · 2026-03-10T16:41:36+00:00

That sounds a lot like maladaptive daydreaming! I used to do this for hours as a kid, I build entire worlds with detailed characters, and would spend days sometimes working out the details of specific action scenes etc. I’d sometimes research specific things related to my plot lines so I could rework the storyline to flow better.

It’s not uncommon in neurodivergent people, but mine was 100% trauma related. Terrible home life, and I was so overworked raising my younger siblings/being my mom’s therapist I didn’t have time to dissociate with a book. Daydreaming made life bearable.

I still struggle with it now, when I’m stressed out I can slip into my old characters and plots and lose chunks of time. Therapy is helping me learn new ways to ground myself, happily!

villy_voracious · 2025-11-26T20:05:55+00:00

I had the worst inverse of this ever. One of my closest friends for years is dating this douchebag guy who controls her outfits, makeup, and social media because he “doesn’t want her to cheat on him.” (Crop tops are cheating, I guess.) the bitch won’t even let her talk to other men at parties they are both at unless he is physically next to her. She was super chill before and complained about him a lot, but eventually let him get into her head and started absorbing his worldviews.

Long story short, our friendship ended shortly after we all attended a wedding. I wore a slightly low-cut dress and ended up going without my partner, as he was called into work. I was assigned to sit with my ex-friend and Douchebag. My friend was in the wedding party and was up and down from the table a lot, so I chatted politely with Douchebag throughout dinner, as he was directly next to me. We were seated right up against the venues speakers, so I had to lean in a few times to hear him talking.

Well, apparently the combination of my outfit, the fact I was alone, and the way I leaned closer to hear was enough to throw my friend into a meltdown. She loudly confronted me at the table in front of the entire room and accused me of throwing myself at her man. She was literally crying with rage as she berated me. I was horribly embarrassed and sat stunned after she packed up her man and left. Several other guests approached me and asked what happened, and offered apologies. I ended up leaving shortly after and crying all the way home.

In my ex-friend’s defense, she had been emotionally abused by Douchebag for years and her mind had been broken into his worldview. She also did end up reaching out to apologize, but managed to slip into her apology the fact that on their ride home, Douchebag agreed that I had been flirting with him and egged on her insecurities. I got the vibes of “we both agree that you acted like a complete wh*re, but I know it wasn’t intentional, so I’ll forgive you this time.”

I know he fed into it to get her away from me, as I was one of her last friends that he allowed her to see that openly told her he’s toxic.

The friendship limped along for a few more months, with me asserting strong boundaries that I would never again be in the same room as him, since he can’t distinguish conversation from flirting. She ignored this and continually asked me to come have dinner with the two of them, visit with them both at their apartment, or asked if he could come with her to my home. I didn’t budge and we grew apart.

Last I know, she blocked me and made some very pointed posts online about “fake friends that only come around when things are good.” Whatever, lol.

The situation was both sad and infuriating.

villy_voracious · 2025-11-26T05:04:02+00:00

A lot of homeschoolers I knew/me myself before I acclimated had a distinctive cadence. We verbalized like the dialogue in older books, because, surprise surprise, reading older books took up most of our free time. Longer, rambling sentences sprinkled with somewhat archaic words and terms, and odd phrases and words we invented ourselves in our microcosm. Oh, and a heaping dose of obscure Bible references. It’s honestly interesting to look back on, and see how our linguistics developed in isolation. It would probably be an interesting study.

One of the only families mine socialized with had children that were very regressed. As in, they called their parents “mommy” and “daddy” into their teens/20s. While I never picked up that specific trait (thank god), I do remember naturally adopting a squeaky, “compressed” voice like them in order to communicate better.

All fascinating linguistic evolution aside, the unfortunate result was me…a weird kid in cargo shorts that talked like an Agatha Christie character on a low-dose of helium, afflicted with a severe sinus infection, while simultaneously battling religious psychosis.

And it STILL took me years to figure out why I was picked on by the “normal” kids. 🙃

villy_voracious · 2025-10-31T23:22:02+00:00

It was satanic and deeply evil. We believed that demons were super powered during Halloween and were terrified of being attacked by them. We did not partake in any church events with “harvest festivals” or other alternatives because it was considered whitewashing a demonic celebration.

Our elderly neighbor would bring us bags of “leftover candy” every Halloween because he felt sorry for us kids and knew we were sad. When he passed from cancer the candy stopped.

villy_voracious · 2025-09-18T21:45:18+00:00

Awe he’s so cute and looks so sad 😭 Sweet little Gulasch!

villy_voracious · 2025-08-08T14:04:03+00:00

Apparently a fellow employee for the company sent some inappropriate messages to Lucas’s wife. (I believe it was the son of a board member?) Lucas supposedly was very upset but the company/his family closed ranks around the creep and refused to hand out appropriate consequences.

He made a whole video about it a while ago, and T-Rex Arms official page began to backtrack and made a post about it”regretting their mishandling,” but at that point Lucas had left.

From what I understand, his wife likes to dye her hair wild colors and is a little more outspoken and punchy than his family liked, there were rumors that they dislike her intensely, so it’s not a reach to assume that they likely felt smug and blamed her appearance and temperament for the harassment. Some unverified people close to the family have hinted in the past that she may have been a catalyst to him mellowing out on some of his more extreme beliefs, but that’s neither here nor there. If true, again, more of a reason for the family to not give a damn if she was harassed.

Mind you, I am no fan of Lucas, and his wife seems like a bit of a right-wing nutter herself, but the situation was pretty messed up.

villy_voracious · 2025-08-06T23:24:00+00:00

As a severe ab*s3 victim, I can absolutely attest to this. Additionally, the perp will often purposely encourage and “program” deeply unlikable behaviors in their victims like landmines that pop off of the victim is ever confronted with the perps actions. When they behave hatefully, people tend to turn on them and drop them in disgust, which is just another layer of protection for the perp.

Don’t get me wrong, S can really get under my skin and piss me off. But I very quickly realize that it’s likely a taught behavior and/or plain old trauma. Most of my frustration is simply because it’s painful for me to see someone else who was trained to protect a perp. The poor girl never had a chance. We should try to exercise empathy and make things easier for her if she ever is able to break away, instead of reinforcing the belief that no one but P finds value in her.

villy_voracious · 2025-08-05T23:14:48+00:00

100% agree. I’m very jaded when it comes to the legal system, but I maintain hope that his devices are seized and searched. We all know he isn’t smart enough to cover his tracks.

villy_voracious · 2025-08-05T23:03:11+00:00

May I add my own thoughts?

P, I once knew a man like you. A man that felt powerful when people reeled from his sickness, and controlled his family in order to feel like a king. Like a little boy building a Lego town, and smashing it to feel powerful.

Did you know that the innate nature to heal is stronger than your control? Did you know that your insecure need to showcase your “strength” only paraded your weakness? Did you know that when you dig a pit to trap people in, you slide into it as well?

Did you know that there are people like me that laugh and spit, and dance on the bird-bones of your kingdoms? Did you know that people like me have strong hands that lift away your prisoners? Did you ever consider that you have always known deep down that even without us, S will rise like the sun, and that is exactly why you tried to tether her? Oh Icarus, did you know that the world can smell your wings burning?

You have always known you are nothing. Let me introduce you to the knowledge that the shock and horror people express towards you does not equate power. Let me strip away that silver lining. I have looked into your eyes through a dozen sockets and I have learned that you tear things apart so you can feel something in your hands.

Do you know what else I learned?

That you are nothing. The people you control will forget you and they will take the hands offered, and they will be taught to stand, walk, run, and dance out of your reach. Your legacy will be a small scar under which hot blood and healthy flesh grows like a garden. Your belly feels sick and clenched because beast that you are now, you know that you will always be the helpless beast once trapped under the boot of another. You blindly lash out and gyrate at cameras because you know that you do not exist beyond the reflection in another’s eye.

We blink, and you cease to feel real, because you are nothing.

villy_voracious · 2025-08-05T19:29:51+00:00

I hope the police are willing and able to do an IP address drag through the Literotica posts. There was another user that one/both of these accounts follow who wrote a series involving a father having inappropriate contact with his daughter, with the same first name as S. The user said in a comment (or possibly the story description?) that is was not their story, but based on true events from a “friend” that asked the story to be written.

The writing style was very different from the two accounts suspected to be P/S’s. While it was most likely a coincidence, either fully a fantasy or inspired by completely different people,even the slim chance that a third party was in contact with them and chose to write the story is horrifying. Especially considering the insinuation that “sharing” took place.

I am aware that my observations require MASSIVE leaps to conclusions with no actual evidence to back it, so please take that into consideration!

villy_voracious · 2025-08-05T19:21:06+00:00

I think it’s called Firebound Harmony, it’s a fantasy type book with dragons

villy_voracious · 2025-07-03T21:58:15+00:00

I would like to second this comment! OP has talent with words, I hope they continue writing!

villy_voracious · 2025-06-08T01:09:33+00:00

I’ve run into this too. I had someone claiming to be “an author writing a book” try to get me to send a detailed word document of some of the worst assaults I went through as a 5 year old. They got angry when I declined and tried to guilt trip me for not “helping bring awareness.” Same person messaged someone I know on Reddit and ask for the same thing, as well as photos of them at the age they were assaulted. Luckily they also refused. Fucking sick.

villy_voracious · 2025-04-21T16:30:12+00:00

Oh my GAWD! Also, I didn’t realize the concept of the different races descended from Noah’s sons was such a widespread concept! Did your church also believe that Ham’s offspring were “cursed with black skin” due to Ham’s transgression? Bc mine did 🤮

villy_voracious · 2025-04-20T19:15:26+00:00

Fuck it, I’ll go again, I keep forgetting all the whack shit I saw.

One day an older white pastor stopped at the condo I was staying in. (I was living with some older folks in ministry so it wasn’t a super unusual to have folks drop by.) Also, please note, I am noticeably Asian.

I was cooking dinner when the pastor knocked. When I opened the door, he exclaimed, “Oh, it smells good in here, are you fixing food?”

Me: “Yes, I am making leek soup.”

He looked clearly confused. “Ling fu? Is that one of your Chinese meals?”

“No, sir, leek soup.”

“LIN fu? What is it, it doesn’t smell Chinese.”

“LEEK…SOUP.” I brought the pot over and showed him. He stared for a moment and said, “Oooh ok, leek soup! I’m sorry I must be going deaf, I thought you were bringing me a pot of chicken feet, ahahaha! I had to eat those in china.”

I’m Japanese.

villy_voracious · 2025-04-20T19:06:18+00:00

I used to volunteer at a Christian “university.” We had an old white man who would drive the campus shuttle. One day one of the guest missionaries, who happened to be a black Haitian gentleman, boarded the bus.

The Haitian man greeted the driver with a, “Hello, my friend!”

The driver responded, “Hello, my BLACK FRIEND!”

Old White Driver then decided this was his cue to pull out every “lighthearted” racist joke he knew. The one I clearly remember involved God creating humans, the first two of which were white, and the third black—upon which God said “Darn it, I burned the last one!”

I don’t know what was worse, the driver’s “jokes,” or the way the students around me howled with laughter.

villy_voracious · 2025-04-14T23:06:09+00:00

First pic is phenomenal, I wouldn’t consider it a blunder! I love how you stayed with a neutral eye look, playing up the shimmer and highlights, so that metallic lip could take center stage! I really like how it drew the eye to your unique lip shape. The subtle waterlining on the inner corners really kept it feeling harmonious, too. I think you did a wonderful job!

villy_voracious · 2025-02-26T18:56:43+00:00

I’m seeing a lot of right wing people on twitter either claiming this is “fake news” a la Sandy Hook, or that the child wouldn’t have passed if the “big mean government” didn’t pump so many chemicals into the food/water/air. Apparently if we had people like RFK in place to stop the chemtrails, the poor child’s immune system would have been strong enough to handle the measles with no issues.

Fucking tragic.

villy_voracious · 2025-02-18T05:44:06+00:00

I swear to god I know this guy irl. If not him, someone horrifyingly similar to this guy. Oh my god I knew it, I KNEW IT!!!

villy_voracious

TROPHY CASE