Robbed Of Her Childhood: Bek Condello On Escaping A Cult
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This is an R Media podcast.
Marie Claire presents You're Gonna Want to Hear This.
Especially being a young girl growing up in the cult, my rights were even more limited, I guess, and my opportunities. No one once ever asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up or what I liked or didn't like. No one cared because my role was to be an obedient daughter and then become an obedient wife.
Hello, and welcome back to You're Going to Want to Hear This, the Marie Claire podcast where ordinary people share extraordinary stories. I'm Georgie McCourt, the editor of Marie Claire. Now, before I introduce today's guest, just a quick note. This conversation contains themes of childhood abuse, physical punishment, sexual trauma, and coercive control. So please take care of yourself while listening. Okay, now most of us learn the rules of the world gradually through our friendships, our many mistakes, our bad and good dates, and also those really memorable teachers. We don't notice we're learning them because no one told us we couldn't. My guest today is Bec Condello. Bec grew up inside the Geelong Revival Centre, a high-control religious group where the pastor's authority reached into every single corner of life, who you married or even who you went on a date with, where you worked, and even whether you were allowed to ask a question.
Her new memoir, Can You Handle a Girl Like Me, is all about what it cost her to grow up inside that strange world and about the disorientating, sometimes exhilarating, work of rebuilding a life when you're effectively starting from scratch as an adult.
What was it like growing up inside the Geelong Revival Centre?
It's the most incredible, intriguing and interesting conversation. So let's meet Bec Candelo. Bec, your memoir begins with a childhood that is shaped by fear, obedience and control. Looking back now, when do you think you first realised that what you were experiencing was not a normal family life but something a lot more damaging?
I don't think there was one moment in my entire 30 years of my life that I really fully realized it like I think it was when I was writing my book like I had all these like moments where I was like oh my god like that's what that was I don't think how only when you were writing yeah I don't think like I think I maybe realized things were a bit weird or like it wasn't normal but I don't think I really realized you know when I write in my book about the physical abuse that my parents you know I was like oh that was actually child abuse like there were so many moments that I just I don't think I realized till I actually had to pull it out of my brain and like write it into words.
Isn't that incredible? I guess your conditioning, you were brought up to believe what was happening was very normal and never to question it.
Yeah. And you only know what you know. And I think that's why I think language is so important because I didn't have like the language for a lot of the things I experienced. So I don't think I could have even articulated what I was experiencing. Yeah.
or anyone to talk to. You write that in Geelong Revival Centre, which we're going to talk about in more detail, curiosity itself was dangerous and that questions were often met with punishment, silence or shame. So tell me, how does growing up in an environment like that affect your ability to trust your own thoughts as an adult?
I really didn't for a really long time, I think. And even now, I think I still have, you know, moments where I think like the years of like gaslighting, because really that's essentially what it is. Like you're not really learning to trust yourself. You're believing an alternate reality that you don't really have any evidence or proof of. Any questions around it, we'll just pray about it. And then later on in my marriage, in my early 20s, like any sort of thoughts or feelings that I had were always sort of second-guessed and questioned and pushed back onto me and and so it took me a really long time and even now with my book coming out I'm having these moments where I'm like did I make all this up like is this real like and I know I haven't but I still think some of that conditioning maybe might always be there.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:04–1:46
2
What was it like growing up inside the Geelong Revival Centre?
1:46–7:12
3
How did religious trauma manifest in Bek's childhood experiences?
7:12–16:04
4
What impact did fear-based faith have on Bek's identity?
16:04–19:37
5
How did purity culture affect Bek's understanding of consent?
19:37–24:59
6
What challenges did Bek face when escaping a controlling church?
24:59–30:27
7
How did Bek rebuild her life after leaving the cult?
30:27–36:37
8
What journey did Bek undergo to learn self-trust?
36:37–1:00:14
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from You’re Gonna Want To Hear This
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