I grew up in an incestuous family, kids were riddled with deformities & aunts marrying nephews was ‘normal’ – I escaped

A YOUNG woman who grew up in an incestuous family and cult has revealed how she managed to escape her arranged marriage with her cousin.

Priscilla Tucker, from Utah, grew up in the Kingston Group, a splinter group of the Mormon church that encourages polygamy and marrying within the family.

While the Mormon church banned polygamy over a century ago, many splinter groups, like the Kingston Group still encourage it and Priscilla was in the middle of it all.

Now, Priscilla, 27, has opened up about her experience on social media providing an insight into the ‘cult’ which is internally known as The Order and promotes incest to keep bloodlines ‘pure.’

Family Affairs

She revealed that when she was 17, she was told she was going to marry her first cousin.

Priscilla said: “My whole entire family wanted me to marry my first cousin.

“But I didn’t want to marry my first cousin. so I told him not to propose to me, and he said he wouldn’t.”

Speaking on the Cults to Consciousness podcast, Priscilla said: “It was such a weird feeling for me because his mom is my mom’s sister and then my dad is his dad’s uncle so I was related on both sides.

“Normally in The Order, when you marry your cousin, you don’t grow up playing with them and doing everything with them but I did because it was our moms that were sisters. 

“It was just so weird because his mom would be like, “Oh my gosh I’m so happy because I know that you’re going to be so amazing and I already know you.”

“And then our grandma said, “Oh my gosh I’m so happy that my two grandkids are getting married.””

Her mum woke her up one morning with a surprise, the surprise being her cousin proposing to her.

He took her up on a hot air balloon with a bunch of strangers and got down on one knee, not wanting to ruin everyone else’s experience, Priscilla said yes.

But when they reached the ground again, she took off the ring and told him she wouldn’t go through with it.

He had already told their family she had said yes, and not wanting to cause more drama, she put the ring back on.

People were stunned by the story, but Priscilla said marrying her first cousin wasn’t shocking when you saw her family tree.

Family Tree

Her great-grandfather Charles Kingston who founded The Order married two women, Vesta and Lavenda, each woman gave birth to one son and one daughter, Kathleen, who then married each other, Priscilla explained.

Kathleen who married her half-sibling was Prisiclla’s grandmother, and she had two kids sons, Paula and Joe as well as a few daughters.

Paul married his half-sister while Joe’s son went on to marry Joe’s sister.

“So she married her nephew,” exclaimed Priscilla.

When Kathleen’s husband and half-brother Ortell died, she went on to remarry Joe who was technically her stepson and nephew.

“Then Joe had a different son. and that is the cousin that they wanted me to marry,” she explained.

“My dad happened to not marry someone that was related to him, thank goodness.”

Priscilla went on to say that the family were all related to each other in multiple ways and even got confused herself trying to explain the blood relations.

Not wanting to marry into her own family meant Priscilla was kicked out of her home after refusing her cousin’s proposal.

Shortly after, she moved in with her grandmother before another cousin confessed his love.

Escape Plan

At this point, Priscilla was sick of the attention and decided to file for emancipation at the age of 17 to get away from her family.

She moved to a safe house but her family wasn’t going to give up on her being in the cult that easily.

But her escape was interrupted when her mom orchestrated her ‘kidnapping’ to take her to a facility in which they taught women the teachings of The Order. 

Priscilla was determined and began once again thinking of her freedom.   

‘I ended up running away in the middle of the night and I took a bus to Las Vegas,’ she explained with the help of some cousins who had already left.

Riddled with Problems

Now that the young woman has left the polygamous cult, she also details the effects incest has had on her family.

“There are definitely a tonne of issues procreating within the same family,” Priscilla says.

Not only does cancer run in the family, but so do blood clots and many children have suffered from physical deformities like having no fingernails and being born with one ear.

She added: “There’s so many issues and honestly I feel like the main issues are mental.

“Like, you can obviously tell from the physical issues, but the mental issues are so much worse.”

Priscilla said many people within the cult were diagnosed with schizophrenic and antisocial personality disorders.

Both can be inherited genetically but often are triggered by things like trauma, abuse and drug addiction.

Better Days

Priscilla made her way out of Utah to Las Vegas, where she met her current partner.

The two now have a daughter and are still happily together.

As for her family, Priscilla speaks to her mum on special events like birthdays, but doesn’t talk to them throughout the year.

People were quick to take to the comments of Priscilla’s story, and they were horrified by what she went through and the results of inbreeding.

One person wrote: “I’m so happy you made it out.”

Another commented: “I wasn’t expecting much and you just kept going with all the issues you’ve directly seen from it holy mother that’s messed up of them to do.”

“Was confused until you said Kingston family… makes sense now,” penned a third.

Someone else added: “You lost me at cousin.”

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