Ballerina farm - just fell down a rabbit hole

[Mamabear04]

Just fell down a rabbit hole looking at this Instagram account. Of course it can't be true or surely even close to it? I feel so sorry for her, she seems too tired to even smile most of the time. She prides herself on being a servant to her family but it doesn't look like she enjoys it. Also 8 kids by 34? Anyone from or have a ginormous family - what's your experience of living with so many kids/siblings? Does it look like this? Surely the woman has cleaners and although she "helps out" on the farm, they will have a huge amount of staff no? I don't know why I'm obsessed with this this morning...maybe I'm bored of the Kardashians now!

It's frightening to think that some people are blind to the red flags being raised re this woman's situation and that of her children. The "trad wife" lifestyle is a huge red flag for abuse and control in the guise of religious adherence. I'm worried that some women seem to have a bit of a blind spot if they can't see the harm being done to another woman. This woman was asking for help and the video showing this was deleted...she can't go anywhere by herself as she hasn't got a car presumably because the controlling husband doesn't want her to have one. She seemingly has no agency over her own body in terms of having children or even being able to go through childbirth with appropriate pain relief. He's using her as an incubator....she's given up her career and her life to live in an isolated farmstead where she seemingly only has purpose to get pregnant and bear huge numbers of children and spend her entire life as nothing more than a servant and a baby producing machine....abuse is more than physical sometimes...I think she's being coerced and controlled...

I don't believe she gave a hand signal that was deleted - deleted or not what has anyone actually done as a result? Could she not have slipped a note to the journalist? Whatsapped someone? Told her family? I'm not convinced.

If it was that easy to leave an abusive marriage, abusive marriages wouldn't exist.

In the days when I lived in bedsits, one of my landladies was furious about the church her daughter had married into - not LDS. The daughter had a horrendous labour, resulting in extensive surgery being required. The surgeon said that she should not ever become pregnant again, as she would almost certainly die. And the elders of the church, all male of course, gathered round her bed ane prayed very loudly that she should go on to bear her designated quiverful of babies. Apparently, quiverful refers to something in the Bible and has been defined as seven. Her mother wanted her to come out of that church, but she wouldn't, and I lost touch so I don't know how that ended.

I see that the father was around during labour, so he saw how it is painful, and he didn't have the reaction that he wanted to spare his wife. May he be reborn as a small woman with a narrow pelvis. My sister had full term twins, 48 hours, breech birth, and no more. My other sister had to have a section, massive blood loss for her first, section for the second, he had the snip. Real men both.

The number of women who think all this is acceptable is quite sobering and scary.

Yes agree. Women are meant to support other women.

@Treaclewell , ‘Quiverfull’ is a fundie sect (similar to the Duggars) that basically says how many children a woman has should be left up to God. They don’t use birth control of any sort (including natural family planning) and women aren’t allowed to refuse their husbands sex. Add in Quiverfull daughters tend to be married in their teens and you can see why they end up with 20+ children.

She's won several business awards. She hired a business coach and learned about social media marketing in the early days of she and her husband deciding to set up their farm after spending some time in Brazil? Argentina? - I forget now - observing amd learning how to run a farm.

I really like her account. She has full agency and it's obvious she wears the trousers in the family. I don't agree with all her decisions - the yearly beauty pageants - especially competing in one immediately after having a baby. But overall I think it's nice to see full time motherhood have such a high profile. She has a massive following so she clearly taps into something. She's a consummate business woman and very talented in handling social media

No comparison with the Duggars. Just because people are religious and believe in having a big family does not make them all the same.

I struggled with pain when my husband was not present at birth as he was helpfull and relaxing so I had better control over breathing and he was very afirmative.
Also, once partner is out of picture it is sometimes harder to advocate for what you want when you are in pain, afraid how things will go and hounded down by a bunch of medical staff.
At least that was my nhs experience.

She has a massive following so she clearly taps into something

I'm not sure follower numbers are a good indication of anything. The Duggars have over 1m followers and Ruby Franke had a significant number as well.

I'm genuinely glad that was the case for you. But in the article, she wanted pain relief and said it was an amazing experience to have it.

I really wish people would stop saying what's happening to her is okay just because it happened to be okay for them in their particular set of circumstances.

No comparison with the Duggars. Just because people are religious and believe in having a big family does not make them all the same.

Of course not.

But there is absolutely some comparison to be made with the Duggars. They may be from different branches of Christianity but it's clear from the articles that not all Hannah's choices are her own.

It's not true choice when your options are a pile of shit or a different pile of shit.

@Doingtheboxerbeat this Sunday Times article backs up some of those things - Meet the queen of the ‘trad wives’ (and her eight children)

https://www.thetimes.com/article/34a971ae-4e4c-422c-8566-58b5f14dc81e?shareToken=9de46560b581e65b3b6128836ff41029.

I think this article is a precursor to the one that @EmpressaurusDeiGatti linked to above.

I find it very sad and unfair that Hannah Neeleman is not really free to make her own choices anymore. She used to be a ballet dancer - and was expected to be one of the best, given she trained at the Juilliard School. Now though, it seems like most (if not all) of her needs and wants come second to those of her husband and children, which is shown in the article I’ve linked to. I’m sure she loves her husband and children, and aspects of her life now. I just feel really sad that her life could have been freer, with more options and choices. I think that’s the thing I feel saddest about.

She has full agency

What makes you think that? Because she's made money off social media and appears (on the surface) to be a good business woman?

What about the fact that she was pressured into marriage and babies so she couldn't continue at Juillard? What about the fact that "God" decides when she gets pregnant and that it's conveniently always 9 months after she's last given birth? What about the fact that she couldn't give birth with pain relief until her husband wasn't present to step in?

What gets me about this is that most of this noise isn't about concern for her. It is tiktokers and journalists profiting off this possibly abused lady. Monetised tiktok after monetised tiktok talking about her and her family, once the money in talking about her dries up they won't give a shit.

I don't know if this woman is being abused or what but I think that none of this is actually helping her.

Wow you’re right! That is a rabbit hole.

Some fantastic articles.

My ended up completely elsewhere: that the boys better not start WW3, because if they did it’s going to be unlikely the women step aside and give them all their jobs back this time.

She has over 8 million followers on Instagram alone. Majority of them women I assume

I don't think that number is made up of only religious people by any means.

I'll have to look up Ruby Franke, don't know who she is.

It's interesting as I perceive BF lifestyle as very privileged. In the sense of its a great privilege to be in a position where you can own land and spend time focused mostly on yourself and kids. It's a privilege mostly consigned to white women due in part to inheritance and generational privilege.

Now when a person of colour like Naza Aziza Smith for e.g. does something similar the reaction is different. Then it's all about being able to have a soft life and something to aspire to. There's criticism, but equally a sort of joy to see a POC able to live such a life when historically POC didn't have such choices as such due to social inequality.

So I just find it interesting how the narrative changes depending on the original perspective. Both women are Mormon, both get criticised. Both receive a different level of it.

Right. And the hand signal did what exactly? As opposed to something less open to misinterpretation. Enough opportunities each pregnancy. I'm not an idiot but I don't believe that hand signal is anything other than a social media invention.

I'll have to look up Ruby Franke, don't know who she is.

Ruby Franke is a fundamentalist Christian who severely abused all her children - tied them up with restraints (like the Turpins), denied them meals, forced them to do hours of housework, beat them and locked them in the house. It's horrendous.

She was also "TikTok famous" and had a lot of supporters until one child escaped and the whole thing collapsed like a house of cards. She's now in prison for child abuse, amongst other things.

The number of women projecting based on tailored content and assumptions is scary.

What opportunities? Her husband accompanies her to all her births. She wasn't even allowed to give birth without pain relief until he happened to absent one time.

The "help" thing could well be a made-up internet thing, but I really wish people wouldn't intentionally ignore what's really going on here.

I'm not basing it off her content, I don't follow her.

I'm basing it off the article where she says herself she was pressured into having babies and a marriage way earlier than she wanted, and where her husband admits to telling her when she's allowed to become pregnant because he "speaks to God" about it.

@sunsetsandboardwalks That's the thing that really tugged at me, when she said that her "dream" had been New York City. She's ended up isolated on a bloody farm in the middle of nowhere.

It's heartbreaking.

You have to be so fucking talented to get into Juillard and she made it - then got pressured into having a baby and had to give up her dreams forever.

I can't get worked up about white women on Tik Tok saying that the ballerina farm article is the worst thing they've seen this week, in the same week that footage was released of Sonya Massey being shot in the head by the police she called to help her.

Before anyone says you can care about both things at once, the point is that most of the white women on Tik Tok posting videos about ballerina farm (a millionaire influencer who makes her own life choices), said nothing about Sonya Massey although the news broke at the same time.

White feminism is selective, racist and toxic, and cares more about a rich trad wife with choices and agency making money off her trad wife choices, than it does about a dead black women whose only choice was making the mistake of calling the police when in need. The fact that this thread in a few hours has already got more posts on Mumsnet than the thread about Sonya Massey is proof of the toxicity of white feminism.

I read the interview too.

The whole thing makes me uneasy. Feels a bit coercive. Although we can't know, obviously, but it feels like he's pimping her, somewhat. The interviewer's reports of him answering for her made uncomfortable reading.

I would not like to think of one of my daughters being seduced away from exciting opportunities to follow her passion by a controlling man - and landed up milking cows with eight children swinging off her hair.

Not at all against full-time housewifery as a positive choice for those for whom it is an option. This is a whole different thing, isn't it.