1 Million Followers
⚠️DISCLAIMER⚠️
This piece may include sensitive topics such as domestic violence, loss, or trauma. Reader discretion is advised.
I believe that women should be able to live the life they love with no pressure or persuasion! None of these stories are meant to reflect women in a negative light or victim blame in anyway. We deserve protection, peace, and understanding.
Support & Resources
If you or someone you know is experiencing situations similar to those portrayed in this story, you are not alone. Support is available:
National Domestic Violence Hotline (U.S.)
Call: 1-800-799-7233
Text: START to 88788
Chat: https://www.thehotline.org988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline
Call or text: 988
Chat: https://988lifeline.orgRAINN (Sexual Assault Support)
Call: 1-800-656-HOPE
Chat: https://www.rainn.orgPostpartum Support International
Call or text: 1-800-944-4773
https://www.postpartum.net
I always knew her as kind and loving, she was someone that would give you the shirt off her back before you asked for it. The sun bouncing off her curls reminded me of waves in the ocean. She grew up southern baptist with good parents who loved her and made sure she had everything she needed or wanted. When she was fifteen they bought her, her first horse she named Ember. When she didn’t have school or church she was on that horse. Ember was a tall black and white horse with a thick white tail and mane. She started social media at eighteen and had over twenty thousand followers, videos with Ember were always her most watched videos.
I’m not sure how she ended up with him. Maybe it was his dimples or the way he would tilt his head when he smiled. He was always working in the church, singing, youth mentoring, and teaching Sunday school. On her nineteenth birthday he asked to take her to lunch. The verses from that day's service repeated in her mind.
Ephesians 5:22-24 “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.
For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church…Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.”
Colossians 3:18 “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.”
1 Peter 3:1–2 “Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives;
While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear.”
These verses would haunt her for years leading up to her death. She did everything a good wife was supposed to do. She homeschooled the kids and worked as a Sunday school teacher. Her kids were her whole world, she was so excited everyday to wake up and fix them pancakes and sausage or eggs and hashbrowns. Mornings smelled like maple syrup and evenings smelled like baked chicken and cornbread. Content creation was a fun job that helped her stay herself, it was so important for her to teach her followers about Jesus’ love and always talked about the benefits of her union.
An elder in the church pulled her to the side one day. She noticed a bruise on her leg that she forgot to cover. The elder watched her grow up and become the woman standing in front of her that day. She made excuses, she said she fell off Ember, the next time she said she slipped feeding the chickens, after that she ran into a door. The bruises were getting bigger and so was her following. She stopped talking to her friends and didn’t make pancakes as often. She hadn’t been to her parents house and hardly recognized who she saw in the mirror. The weight loss was the most noticeable.
He would belittle her, he would scream in her face, and pinch her when the kids were around. She prayed every night with tears in her eyes that god would heal her husband. He took everything out on her. If work was hard, so was her day. The day he killed her was like any other, he kissed her on the forehead before heading out and told the kids he loved them. She made pancakes and taught that day's lesson. Her last video was about peace and healing highlighting healing and forgiveness
Psalm 147:3 “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”
1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
Matthew 6:14 “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.”
She was trying her best to keep the kids happy and keep them from seeing their mother so broken and tired. Her following had been growing the past few weeks and she was thirty followers away from 1 million. He came home late throwing off what seemed like the perfect day. The Jack on his breath nauseated her, he was calling her all kinds of names and accusing her of sleeping around. The first shove knocked her to the ground, she zoned out as he screamed spit flying on her face. As she came back to reality she noticed her face stung, her blood was warm running down her mouth soaking her shirt. She looked past him as he gripped her shoulders, shaking her and accusing. All she could think of was getting back to the house and cleaning herself up before the kids woke. She was on the ground again this time he got on top of her. She saw the shell of the person she married looking down at her. That soft man had turned into the demon she prayed so hard to avoid. She came to again realizing she couldn’t breathe. His hands were around her neck, she tried pulling them off but he was 6’3 and enraged. Her last moments in the barn were spent crying and praying. She could feel herself losing the fight and he didn’t notice how hard he was choking her until it was too late.
She hit a million the next day.
I tried so hard to be the best wife and god fearing woman I could be. I couldn’t believe he killed me. Someone I shared children with, a man of god and a respected member of the community. He killed me and left me in the barn until the next morning. He called the cops frantically “HEELP HEEELLP MY WIFE IS DEAD”, he told them he found me in the barn and that someone must have broken in. Him being so involved in the church and police force helped police ignore the obvious. Their respect for him mattered more than justice for me. He remarried and faced no jail time, Ember is always happy to see me passing through the pasture. She gallops and rolls around in the grass every time. The kids are ok. They don’t see me but feel my presence from time to time.
I tried to be the perfect trad-wife then I realized the only perfect trad-wife is a dead one.
A note from me 🤍
This story was written to give voice to spread awareness and shine light on things that aren’t talked about enough.
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