Kieryn Darkwater is the eldest of 8, and was the firstborn daughter in what eventually became a quiverfull family. The Stay-at-Home-Daughter’s (SAHD) primary responsibility is often “training to be a helpmeet” by becoming the surrogate mother to the younger children. Kieryn started bearing significant responsibility for their family’s household by age 8. By the time they reached age 15, they were graduated from (homeschool) high school so they could better fulfill their role as a helpmeet-in-training, by focusing on childrearing instead of education.
When they weren’t caretaking, Kieryn was involved in right wing political activism. Working with Generation Joshua and TeenPact, they campaigned for Roy Moore, Randall Terry, Ralph Reed, and other Christian conservative leaders in the south. They also wrote prolifically and helped create a media network of blogs, podcasts, an online magazine by and for homeschooled Christian conservative teens. Embedding themselves in right-wing grassroots organizing, activism, and writing was the only approved escape they had from the daily grind of being a surrogate parent.
They left their family of origin on their 18th birthday and have spent the years since writing, deconstructing, healing, and raising awareness of this dark underbelly of christianity, homeschooling, and the quiverfull movement. All while trying to make up for a lifetime of educational and medical neglect, navigate through the “secular” world, get a college education, and transition while access to healthcare is systematically stripped away.
They’ve written on the topic of Christofascism and resistance for Autostraddle, Homeschooler’s Anonymous, and on their own site, Bridging the Gap.
You can follow them on mastodon and support their work on patreon!