Daniella Mestyanek Young knows a little something about the psychology of groups. She grew up in a cult, escaped when she was 15, graduated from high school, went to college, and then joined the Army. She has read just about everything she can find about group psychology, like memoirs of former cult members. And now she’s offering up her own thoughts, hard won through years of difficult personal experience, trauma, and healing.
As a child, she was born into The Children of God, a strict religious cult where the women (and girls) were treated as second-class citizens. Daniella grew up mostly on a commune in Brazil, where she and the other girls were beaten and abused. They were taught to do anything that the Uncles told them to do (the Uncles being all the men at the commune), and the Aunties could do nothing to protect them. Her mother had been born into the cult also, and she had been married to the leader of the cult when she was a young teenager. She started having babies when she was really still a kid herself, at 14, and continued to have babies as the years went on, so she couldn’t do much for Daniella, to protect her from the abuse.
Daniella seemed particularly prone to getting herself, and often the others with her, into trouble in the cult. She would try to speak up, she wanted to say that what was happening was wrong, and that meant more smacks for her and for all the other children. As she got older, she got more and more disillusioned with her treatment in The Family, so when she is 15 she leaves.
There is a former Family member living in Texas, and she lets Daniella move in with her. They get Daniella registered at the local high school, the most formal schooling she’d had up to that point, and she finds a job. While her fellow high schoolers are worrying about makeup and dates, she is basically raising herself in an environment that is radically different than anything she has ever known. While she is no longer living with the Family, she can’t shake the feeling that she is about to be in trouble, she s about to be punished, she is about to be exposed as the fraud she is.
When she writes an essay for a class about growing up in a cult, she is called to her counselor’s office. Daniella figures that this is it, this is the moment that she will have to answer to the police for her behavior, or she will get kicked out of school, or something else horrible will happen. Instead, her counselor explains that colleges will be interested in her, that there are probably many that will offer her scholarships. For the first time, Daniella realizes that no one is waiting to punish her any more, that she is free to do what she wants, and that her experiences may have value.
After college, Daniella decides to join the Army. It was an idea she’d been thinking about, and she thinks she will do well with the structure. She pushes herself hard, to prove that she can keep up with all the boys, and she does. But it also turns out to be an environment where the men are encouraged to succeed while the women are treated as second-class citizens. In some ways, it feels to her like home.
She makes it through basic training and goes into intelligence. She serves in Afghanistan, where there are fewer women and not much support for the women who are in the sand box. Daniella fights to stay strong, despite the names she’s called, despite the pamphlets that encourage women not to get sexually abused by their fellow soldiers, despite the double standards. And when she gets the chance to be one of the first women in combat, she signs up.
Her years of service and dedication to the job gets her a promotion to Captain and a better job in the Army, but the toxic masculinity is still the norm. The Army starts to understand that the environment is not conducive to healthy relationships between the men and the women, and when Daniella tries to speak up about her experiences, she finds that her good intentions backfire and she is accused of making things worse for another female soldier. The fallout from that affects her health so thoroughly that she ends up in the hospital with a potential brain tumor.
Eventually, she is able to figure out how to be emotionally and physically healthy, but it takes many years for her to sort it all out and find her way to a happy marriage and to being able to put all of her trauma and healing into this book. Uncultured is a difficult book to read, for all the abuse, particularly when she was a child. But Daniella never stopped fighting. She fought for her freedom, she fought for her life, she fought for her safety, and she fought for her healing. She is an inspiration to anyone who has felt trapped in a toxic group or relationship, and the strength of her spirit is a thing of beauty.
Uncultured is an important book. It will be motivational for those looking for a way out of a difficult situation, and it can be instructional to those who are working with former cult members and veterans. Her insights into the way a group can affect behavior are backed by personal experience as well as research, and they are offered here with compassion and empathy.
I listened to Uncultured, read by Daniella herself, which made some parts particularly difficult to hear. I hope it was healing for her to finally get to tell her own story in a way that she has control of. It was both traumatic and healing to listen to her tell it. But despite all the pain that she openly shares with us, I am glad I listened to this book. Her story is important, and I got to bear witness to her downs and her ups, to her extended punishment at The Children of God commune to getting to meet President Barack Obama after being invited to the White House. I don’t believe this book is for just anyone. I think you need to know what you’re getting into with this book and go into it knowing it will be painful and horrific and traumatic. But it’s also important and empowering and healing, and readers who are well prepared will find Daniella’s story an inspiration.
A copy of the audio book for Uncultured was provided by Macmillan Audio through NetGalley, with many thanks.
