Tradwives and Other Dangerous Fantasies:
One Man's Legacy of Destruction.
The brutal truth behind the Instagram-perfect
"traditional values" flooding your feeds
"traditional values" flooding your feeds
While social media celebrates tradwife content (500M+ TikTok views) and politicians promise a return to "traditional family values," this is what those values actually created when women had no rights, no bank accounts, and no way out.
This isn't ancient history. As reproductive rights collapse worldwide and women are told to return to "traditional" roles, we're forgetting what we fought to escape—and what happens when we go backward.
About The Book
Beginning with a husband's devastating suicide—his calculated final assertion of control—this unflinching narrative examines the mechanics of generational trauma and patriarchal power. The manuscript confronts themes of domestic violence, sexual abuse, coercive control, incest, and reproductive coercion while revealing how these abuses flourish when women lack economic independence and legal protection.
At its core, this memoir is about bodily autonomy—who controls women's bodies, choices, and lives—and the devastating consequences when this fundamental right is compromised. It examines how financial dependence creates conditions for abuse to continue unchecked, how legal systems historically protected abusers rather than victims, and how victims' economic independence remains their primary protection against exploitation.
Through meticulous documentation of one family's experience across three generations, the narrative provides a counter to today's romanticized "traditional family" structures by exposing their role in enabling extreme abuse. As women's rights face renewed attacks worldwide, this examination offers essential context for understanding what truly lies beneath nostalgic portrayals of the past.
This isn't just one woman's story—it's the fulfillment of a promise to break the cycle by refusing to be silent. Before his decline and family breakdown, Laurie had begun writing his family story to expose how dangerous men could be and the generational trauma that followed. His early words about breaking cycles are included in this book, alongside the brutal reality of how trauma ultimately claimed his life.
The narrative dismantles victim-blaming myths by showing the impossible calculations abuse survivors make daily. It challenges the simplistic "just leave" advice by documenting how separation often triggers the most dangerous escalation, forcing victims to choose between physical safety and economic survival. They must navigate systems designed to protect perpetrators rather than those they harm.