I Belong to Me: Tia Levings on Escaping Christian Patriarchy and Reclaiming the Self

What happens when the “perfect Christian wife” decides her life belongs to her after all? In this episode of The Rose Woman Podcast, Christine sits down with Tia Levings, New York Times bestselling author of A Well-Trained Wife and I Belong to Me: A Survivor’s Guide to Recovery and Hope after Religious Trauma. Tia writes and speaks about the realities of religious trauma, evangelical patriarchy, and the trad wife life, decoding the fundamentalist influences in our news and culture; her work and quotes have appeared in Teen Vogue, Salon, Newsweek, the Huffington Post, and the hit Amazon docu-series Shiny Happy People. Together, Christine and Tia explore how high-control religion shapes women’s bodies, marriages, motherhood, aging, and even our politics, why the trad wife aesthetic is so seductive right now, what happens when adult children step away from the faith of their families, and how to slowly rebuild a sense of self, boundaries, and spirituality on your own terms. Based in Raleigh, North Carolina, Tia is mom to four grown kids and, when she’s not writing or speaking, she loves to travel, hike, paint, and daydream. If you’ve ever felt confined by an ideology, a relationship, or a role you were told to play, this conversation offers language, validation, and a gentle map back to yourself.