For two seasons, viewers have watched as desperate men and women have attempted to leave polygamous religious cults on A&E’s reality show Escaping Polygamy, and now the network is going to show us what’s happened to those men and women since they were on the show.
The network has announced that the first of the ‘Escaping Polygamy: After the Escape’ specials will premiere Tuesday, January 31, following up on the people who escaped with the help of the show’s cast.
In a preview clip of the new specials, we see several of the people attempting to adjust to life outside the FLDS and The Order cults.
“I’ve tried to make ends meet,” one women says in the clip. “It’s a struggle.”
The clip also features Rachel Jeffs, a daughter of FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. After escaping the FLDS herself, Rachel sought help from the ‘Escaping Polygamy’ team to try to get her friend out of the cult. She was unsuccessful, but in the clip, we see her speaking to other members of the FLDS and trying to help them escape.
“I really want to help my family,” she says.
According to the previews from A&E, the specials will focus on five of the people who escaped the cults on past episodes of ‘Escaping Polygamy.’ They will include Vanna and Ariel, sisters who escaped the FLDS during Season 2. They will apparently “reveal a big secret” on their special.
There will also be a special featuring Leah, a woman featured on the show’s very first episode; and Eskel, the brother of show star Amanda, who escaped The Order with the help of Amanda and her friends.
Watch a preview for ‘Escaping Polygamy: After the Escape’ below:
(Photo: A&E)
I love this show and wish the series was on netflix!!!!!!!
Cattfink,
You shouldn’t feel any shame. I don’t know Katie, but I will go out on a limb as say that she probably didn’t mean that the survivors made her uncomfortable, but rather watching a show about men/women whom have been suppressed their whole lives coming to terms with “the big, wide world” is overwhelming to see. In these kind of shows there is no captured “happy ending”, they always end with people frightened about their choice to leave, struggling with limited experience and trying to stand on their own. The awareness is soo important, but providing support groups and a lending hand up; job training, assistance transforming daily tasks into a marketable resume, etc would be much more helpful than ratings hungry networks airing their anxiety attacks. I hope you have found a wonderful network and are doing well for yourself.
I just don’t know about a reality show about escaping a cult. It doesn’t feel right.
It might do well for many to get people to talk about cults and toxic invironments.
Being in…being out… watching a show about people helping other people escape… none of it feels right. Spending time in such a destructive environment leaves a film of general ickiness on the whole of your existence. For a long time. Exit counseling helps. Time helps. I hate to know that other people understand, but it also helps to know that I’m not alone. There are more of us around than you may know. I wasn’t in a religious group, but there are a lot of universal similarities in all cults and in the mental and emotional wreckage left in those of us that bust out.
I can’t watch. It stirs up a lot for me. I also feel a connection to these strangers. These survivors that found their ways out of their own bizarre existence and into a new one. There are a lot of us. We exist. Most of us wont ever talk about it unless we know you’ll understand. That’s partly because we want it behind us. It’s also because being a cult survivor is some sort of taboo. We know we make you uncomfortable. Maybe a reality show might get folks a little more used to hearing our stories. Maybe we wont have to feel so ashamed at some point.
I almost never say anything about this. Sorry for the rambling whatever blah…
Sorry something made you feel not right.