Brainwash Be Gone is a podcast for women who have left a high control, high demand religion. In every episode, we deconstruct one specific rule you were taught so you can let go of harmful conditioning and live an amazing life on your own terms.

Today we are talking about the idea that you will only need your degree if your husband dies.

So many of us heard this growing up in high control religions, and on the surface it sounds almost practical, like someone is trying to give you helpful life advice. But those of us who have lived inside these systems know the deeper truth. Statements like this were not advice. They were limits. Limits on our lives and on who we were allowed to be.

Now that we have stepped out of that world, we can finally look at this with clear eyes, honest language, and our full intelligence. If you are committed to escaping the conditioning that taught you to stay small, this is for you.

Let us start with the surface explanation for why we were taught this. Often it was framed as being part of God's design. We were told that men are the providers and protectors. Women were meant to nurture, support, and raise a family. Full stop. That was the whole role. Everything else a woman might have wanted, like education or skills or any kind of ambition, was outside the pre-drawn box for our role.

This may have shown up in a few different ways depending on your particular culture and the particular high demand religion you were part of. Maybe you heard things like, "A degree is good to have. You will probably never need it." Or, "Education is just a safety net." Or, "Your husband will take care of the finances. Your job is to take care of the home and the children." Or, "You are just getting a degree because an educated man would appreciate having an educated wife, and it will help you raise your children."

It sounds loving. It sounds spiritual. It sounds pragmatic on some level, especially if you were raised in a culture where you simply did not see women doing things with their degrees, even when they had earned them. But underneath that apparent pragmatism is a clear message: growth is not for you as a woman. Education is not for you as a woman. Your life path is not for you.

How wild is it that you are given permission to be a person in your own right only if you are widowed. Maybe you could be an independent person one day, but only if disaster strikes and the love of your life dies. That is a terrible basis for a life.

As we go on in these environments, or sometimes after we leave, we start to uncover the deeper motives behind rules like this. Keeping women financially dependent keeps them tied to the system. If we do not have income, leaving is much harder than it would be if we were able to take care of ourselves and our children. If we do not have education, questioning doctrine that seems suspicious is harder. If we are not independent, do not have access to that independence, and do not have experience living in that independence as adults, then saying no is harder in all areas.

A lot of these institutions also function on free female labor. There are so many hours of volunteering, creating programming, lesson planning for kids' programs, caregiving, hospitality, and administrative work. We offer all of that generously because we are told that it is our spiritual calling.

And who could fail to notice that educated women are much harder to control. The inability to control women is completely at odds with membership in a high control, high demand group. When we are educated, we tend to ask better questions. We notice inconsistencies. We recognize power dynamics. Many of us eventually leave because of that.

I want to be clear that having an education is not what gives you intelligence or raw skill. Education can teach you how to direct your natural intelligence and abilities, but it does not make you smart. If you have not had formal education, especially if it was cut off to you as a woman in a high control group, that does not mean you are not smart or logical or capable of pushing back on the system. In many cases, education sharpens our ability to do that, or at least sharpens our confidence in doing that.

When I became a lawyer, it did not change my innate intelligence or analytical mind. Those were already there. What changed was my confidence in my own analysis of a situation. Previously I might have thought, "Maybe there is something I am missing. Who am I to know. Maybe this does not make sense to me because there are people who understand more than I do." Afterward, I was much more likely to insist on clarity and to keep pressing if answers were unsatisfactory, irrelevant, misleading, or meant to placate me. Before, I would have thought, "Maybe I am misunderstanding." Afterward, I would think, "I am going to keep asking until I get a good answer."

Discouraging women from education is not just theology. It is strategy. Strategy for how to control.

My boyfriend recently saw a magnet and brought it home because it reminded him of me. I love it so much. It has an image of Princess Leia from Star Wars and the words, "Well-behaved women rarely defeat empires." It feels like educated women are also more likely to be involved in defeating empires, not helping us be better behaved, which I love.

So press on, whether that is through formal education or educating yourself by listening to podcasts like this, reading books, or learning about new ideas and new ways of thinking. It is mind expanding and helps us escape the limitations of what we were taught.

Let us talk about what this teaching actually costs us. The idea that you will only need your degree if your husband dies has cost many of us more than we often admit, because it is painful to look at. Many of us did not pursue careers that we were perfect for. We shut down our intelligence so we would not be "intimidating." We were told, "Do not intimidate the boys. Boys do not like that." Some of us lived for years or decades believing that our ambitions made us less spiritual.

When an entire community is centered around beliefs like this, it affects more than just the women. Families are more fragile. The daughters shrink themselves. The sons learn to take authority they have not earned. Partners enter relationships with built-in power imbalances that continue throughout the relationship. The community loses out on the gifts, leadership, innovation, and brilliance of half of its members. This teaching limits women and damages the entire community.

There is also a huge flaw in the logic of this rule. It creates a false dilemma where your two alleged options in life are either to be totally dependent on another human to take care of learning, thinking, and providing, or to be alone and widowed and then do everything yourself. What a bizarre dichotomy. There is no concept of partnership, equality, shared growth, or collaboration.

It is also unrealistic. If you lost someone suddenly and had been entirely depending on them to do all the important adult activities, suddenly having to jump in and do everything yourself would be overwhelming. If you had spent decades being limited from handling adult responsibilities, how would you suddenly know how to manage money, run a household, build a career, and earn an income. Adulting is not something people learn overnight.

It is wild to imagine that a single piece of paper, your degree, would be enough. That you could simply jump into a career and feel fully comfortable after being kept away from those responsibilities for years. It is not realistic.

The teaching also ignores other very real possibilities that women face. What if he abandons the family. What if he turns out to be abusive. What if you need to get a divorce. These are realities that people face every day. What if your marriage is great, but he is in an accident and does not die, yet is incapacitated, and now you are the one taking care of the family. There are many other outcomes besides "We are happily married and he is taking care of everything" or "He is dead and now I am taking care of everything."

These teachings do not offer a realistic view of life and the many unknown things that can happen. We never expect certain outcomes. Many of us thought our marriages would last forever. I certainly did. Yet here I am, divorced and very happy. It was the best decision I ever made in my life. I should probably have more episodes about how awesome divorce can be in the right circumstances.

Let us talk about some new ways we could see things. The old rule is rooted in control. What could we replace it with. Here is what I believe, and maybe this will resonate with you too. Education matters because you matter as an individual human. Women are entirely equal with men. It is wild that this has to be said, but in some of these groups it is still shocking. We are people too.

We are also meant to grow up fully as adults and be fully functioning in all areas of life, including career, earning money, and understanding how the world works. If you have curiosity, ambition, or talent, playing that out is not selfish. It is actually a tragedy if you are not able to live that out. It is a waste of our lives when we do not grow and expand in the ways we are capable of and that bring us joy.

Your mind is sacred. Your gifts are sacred. Your independence is sacred. We need to be fully formed adults, and we do not need anyone's death to validate our dreams. We do not need to be widowed to start living our lives.

As we close, I want to offer a few reflections. When did you first learn that your ambition was dangerous or unacceptable. Who taught you that. How have your beliefs about this topic shaped your choices. Do you want to make different choices now. Are there choices you want to reclaim.

What would it look like to honor your growth as something sacred and not conditional. What if you could be whatever you want to be, no matter your age or circumstances, and simply start on that path now.

Who do you know who would appreciate having this podcast as part of her life. Send her a link to the show page at www.brainwashbegone.com.

Topics: Religious trauma, spiritual abuse, deconstruction, exmormon, exmo, exvangelical, recovering catholic, excatholic, former jehovah's witness, women's empowerment, feminism, leaving religion, self-worth, high demand religions, high control groups, high control religion, cult, cult recovery, brainwashed, high demand religion, spiritual trauma, church abuse