Former member of polygamist Mormon sect FLDS reveals how she was left to raise more than 20 children on her own after her husband and his four other “plural wives” were torn from their home as part of a “purge” of “sinners”

A former FLDS member has revealed how she was abandoned by her husband and his four other “plural wives” after they were forced out of the sect, leaving more than 20 children within the polygamous sect.

Ceci Hendrickson appeared on a recent episode of the Cults for consciousness podcast to discuss her experiences living within the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints Church (FLDS) in Utah.

FLDS was a breakaway group that split from the original Mormon Church when the mainstream religion stopped practicing polygamy.

Ceci candidly exposed the “traumatic” experience of her family being torn apart by former self-proclaimed leader Warren Jeffs.

Ceci started by explaining to host Shelise Ann Sola how she grew up as part of FLDS under the rule of Rulon Jeffs before son Warren — now in prison for child sex abuse — took over when she was just 12.

“When Rulon Jeffs was the prophet, there were rules about how you dressed, how you would conduct yourself as an FLDS member, and the beliefs were very similar to those of the Mormon Church.

“But the things that changed was that Warren Jeffs became the prophet and then instead of just wearing a dress, it was a dress with very specific collars, cuffs, it had to be a certain length, the women had to put their hair in wear a certain style. In a certain way you had to go to bed at a certain time and get up at a certain time.

“The rules they had went from almost reasonable… to extreme. Every moment of your day was planned for you.”

Ceci had been prepared for marriage since she was 13 and admitted that even though it was “normal,” she had “always been kind of a wild spirit.”

But she fought her rebellion for the sake of her family and said she had seen other people break away from the church without success.

“I saw a lot of people leaving and then becoming drug addicts or ending up on the street with the wrong people, and I didn't want that,” Ceci explained.

“That was a big fear if I leave, my life could be like this: leaving from a comfortable home even though I don't love it here that much with the dynamics I had to deal with, but I would take that over if I go away. living outside and on the street.

“And if that meant getting married and being given to someone who already had a wife… then I took what seemed logical to me as the safest option.”

Ceci said she “poured her whole heart and soul into becoming a woman” before marrying an “assigned partner” at the age of 16.

She became the second wife of a man who was nineteen years older than her and who already had five children with his first partner.

“I loved him, but I was never in love with him and a lot of that reason had to do with the fact that many men in the FLDS can't form an emotional connection,” she explained.

Ceci became pregnant five months after tying the knot and welcomed three more children with her husband, while also juggling the jealousy of being just one of five women he married.

“The only way to really survive – because that's really all you do is survive – is to just be friends with the people you live with, even if you don't quite get along.

“At some point you just have to say: OK, we live here together in this house, we have children that we are raising together.”

She continued, “Every woman who came had her own children… the family just got bigger and bigger by the time our family was as big as it was when I left, we had twenty – I don't even remember exactly. number – children under one roof…

“There's just nothing easy about taking care of and nurturing so many children.”

During Warren's time at the helm, he began expelling people from the group for “various reasons” that tore families apart.

“It happened very quickly…” our family was one of the first to have this happen to him.

'IIt was just a random weekday and suddenly all the women and my ex piled into a car and just left.

“I just sit there – they never did that without saying, 'we're running to the store' or this or that.

“I was actually terrified at the time because I thought maybe they would get some kind of church blessing and I would be left behind…

“I was super stressed going through everything that had happened over the last few months and wondering what I had done to create this situation where I wasn't involved in what they were doing.”

She continued, “But when they got back later that day, my ex took me aside and said we needed to talk…

'HHe just broke down and sobbed, and he could barely get the words out.

“He said, 'I'm losing my family, I'm losing everything, I have to come over tonight and the only thing I can take with me is what I need to survive.'

“Then he told me the exact words that had been said to him and one of the phrases was, 'You must go away and go far away to repent and never come back.'

'He said, 'And all the other women must come with me – you are the only one who can stay.”

Ceci labeled it a “traumatic and emotional day for everyone,” adding, “Everyone was just in tears because they had to leave their children behind.”

She said the children of the other four women were divided among relatives before Ceci returned to live with her father's family with her own four children.

“It was just a huge purge of people leaving hundreds and thousands of children without parents,” the mother said.

Ceci eventually moved to an apartment an hour away from the community and became pregnant again by a man she had been in a relationship with, who then turned his back on her.

'I thought I would have support with my four children and being pregnant, but that fell away from me.

“Church at that point was obviously like you were on your own and they came to pick up my kids and at that point I became homeless.”

Ceci was separated from her children for over a year before she finally saved up the resources to return and get them back.

Since then, she has remarried, welcomed even more children with her new husband and started her own clothing line.

In 2011, Warren Jeffs was sent away for life after being convicted of two offenses of child sex abuse for having sex with two girls aged 12 and 14.

He is currently serving a life sentence plus 20 years for the charges, but it was previously reported that he has continued to preach to the remaining members of the FLDS from his prison cell.

As of 2018, the Guardian reported that there were still about 10,000 active members of the Church.