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Beat: My Journey Through Abuse and the Holdeman Mennonites

I was born to an abusive doctor named Ahaz in Kentucky, homeschooled and not even allowed to have friends. When I was nine, Ahaz discovered The Church of God in Christ, Mennonite (Holdeman) in Tennessee, and he forced us to move there.The Holdeman's were religious exempt from education beyond the eighth grade, and I was beat for begging to go to a high school.As a minor, I had to kiss approximately 200 different people on the lips, some of whom were complete strangers, for the sake of something called The Holy Kiss; only it didn't feel holy.Ahaz determined to break my independent, inquisitive nature through severe beatings and worse, including deadbolting me within my bedroom and nailing my windows shut.Multiple Holdeman Mennonites were aware of what was being done to me, yet no one reported it. Instead, I was made out to be mentally ill; a liar.After years of suffering through emotional, physical, physiological and sexual abuse, how could I even survive?No one could hear me then... will YOU hear me now?Read more

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