How Theophila reclaimed her life after Gloriavale
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Theophila Pratt is reclaiming her life – fighting back against the legacy of her brutally confining and abusive childhood in the West Coast fundamentalist cult of Gloriavale. The ability to appreciate the smallest of life’s freedoms and not to take them for granted is a victory.
The power to choose when she wakes each day, what she wears, what she eats and who she befriends means everything to Theo these days. Her primrose-yellow toenail polish is in full joyous view when we meet – a subtle statement from a young woman in charge of herself and a world away from the life she once knew.
All female members of Gloriavale are forced to dress in the same neck-to-toe blue full-skirted cotton frocks day in and day out. To show an elbow or an ankle, let alone a painted toenail, is considered by the all-powerful male “shepherds” an outrageous sexual provocation to the men of the sect.
Even their hair is to be covered by a head scarf and never, ever cut short. Theo’s is shoulder-length these days and a rich chestnut – another snub to the Gloriavale regime she escaped.
There’s a moment of hesitation as she greets me at her front door. She considers my offered hand. A wariness perhaps? She later explains that it comes from years of self-doubt and denial of any sense of self. “I never introduced myself to people. I never shook a hand.”
She and her partner Kevin have bought their first home at Ōrere Point, a tiny settlement on the west coast of the Firth of Thames, about an hour’s drive from central Auckland.
“It’s what we could afford,” she says, but it’s perfect for the pair. It’s peaceful, with a big garden, and just a short walk to the beach. There’s only one shop in the village, a small general store.
Theo delights in being with Kevin, who shares her love of nature.
“He was interested in me for myself, interested in what I was studying, what I thought about, not necessarily where I had come from, but where I was going,” she says.
The two have been together for six years. Kevin is not religious and neither is Theo any more.
Content retrieved from: https://www.nowtolove.co.nz/news/real-life/theophila-pratt/.
