Transcript
Speaker: The following podcast is a Jill Devine Media production. Christianity has become known for judgy people, strange words, ancient stories, confusing rules, and a members -only mindset. This is why I stayed away from the church for so long, but it's not supposed to be that way. I'm Jill Devine, a former radio personality with three tattoos, a love for a good tequila, and who's never read the entire Bible.
Speaker: Yet here I am hosting a podcast about faith. The Normal Goes Along Way podcast is your home for real conversations with real people using real language about how faith and real life intersect. Welcome to the conversation. Welcome to season four of Normal Goes Along Way and to a brand new year, 2023, you're gonna be a good one.
Speaker: feeling in my bones. I'm your host Jill Devine. And before we get into this week's conversation, I wanted to talk to you a little bit about season four and the direction that we are heading. Now we are still going to be exploring my faith journey and my faith questions, but I want to hear some more stories. I want to hear stories of redemption. I want to hear stories of struggle. I want to see how God has shown up
Speaker: in your life. And so we're going to focus on that we're going to focus on stories. I mean, we might have some experts on that will provide their perspective on a topic that they're trained in. And then we'll have what I like to call just friends on that can talk about their experience and where it's led them. Now listen, it will be good. And it can be ugly. And that's
Speaker: what we need. We need to have those honest conversations. Sometimes it doesn't always end up the way that we would like for it to end up. And what I mean by that is maybe I encounter someone who is just done with their faith.
Speaker: Well, I wanna know why. I want to hear what they have to say because I believe that that conversation is just as important as the conversation of someone who has been strong in their faith for their whole life or for a short time. We have to talk about all these things. So that's kind of the direction season four is gonna head and we're gonna start it off.
Speaker: with this week's episode focusing on a woman's redemption story. So I intentionally chose this week's guest to kick off season four because January, if you did not know, is Human Trafficking Awareness Month. I most certainly didn't know this before booking
Speaker: Today's guest, I'd like to introduce Laura Fleetwood to you. She is going to be conducting the interview with this week's guest and to kick off season four of normal goes a long way. Hi, everyone. This is Laura Fleetwood. Today on this episode, I have the pleasure of interviewing Kia Vower. She is a survivor expert, a student of life, a wife, a mother and missionary. She is a powerful voice of hope.
Speaker: in a growing ecosystem of despair. Her motivation and passion for youth and women of all ages is inextricably linked to her own story of hardship and survival against insurmountable odds. As an author, speaker, and advocate, she connects viscerally with audiences and is known for her uncanny ability to help others make real emotional connections with otherwise obscure realities.
Speaker: Kia's current work is centered on advocacy in collaboration with organizations that rescue women and children from the sex trafficking industry. Welcome to the podcast, Kia. Thanks for having me. I'm glad to be here, Laura. Absolutely. You know, we learned about you from some common friends and they said you have to interview this woman. She has
Speaker: an amazing story. And I had the honor of reading your book last night. And I have to say, I could not put it down. Your story is one of survival, of resilience, and redemption. And I can't wait for you to share it with our listeners. So I'm just going to give you the microphone and ask you to take us back to your childhood
Speaker: And tell us the story of what has made you such a powerful advocate now for human trafficking. Absolutely. So in order to go into my story, I'd like to just kind of give you a foundation for how these things seem to happen, right? How does life happen to us? How do we get into situations that we did not anticipate?
Speaker: My story, yes, is one of redemption, but it's also a very common story that I would say, you know, for many years of my life, I thought it was unique to me. And then I began to realize that this is more broad in scope. And so I grew up in, well, kind of checkerboarded the US. My father was in the military.
Speaker: the United States Air Force as a Staff Sergeant, and he was based in Torahorn Air Force Base. I'm probably saying that wrong in Madrid, Spain. And my mother, she and my father at that point had been married about five years. I have a brother who is five years my senior that was there in Madrid, Spain. My father came from at the south side of Chicago, grew up in a number of foster homes in low -income neighborhoods.
Speaker: He had a very large family. And then my mother, an only child, grew up in Columbus, Ohio on the opposite side of the tracks with a socialite affluent family. And so the two paths meet. They marry in 69. My father is, he's at this point served a tour in Vietnam.
Speaker: And the landscape was very rocky, okay. My father had a lot of childhood trauma. My mother had childhood trauma as well. So my father pretty much being, I believe, the 11th child of his mother, and I believe the third or fourth child of his father.
Speaker: Then my mother, being an only child, experienced a lot of abuse as a child. And so my father, their socioeconomic status, which was kind of low on the totem pole, there were a lot of foster homes that he was passed around in. And it's a very complex story.
Speaker: So, by the time I arrived on the scene in 1975, their marriage is somewhat on the rocks. He is experiencing, of course, looking back. It was post -traumatic stress in the making from the war and then also from the very rough neighborhoods that he drew up in.
Speaker: Basically, he was on drugs and alcohol and anything he could to cope and survive with his story and his set of circumstances. And the home was filled with domestic violence. He would be going to beat my mother throughout all my childhood. That's all I can remember are these moments and ebbs and flows of instability due to a very privatized, abusive life that we experienced.
Speaker: of this was going on and we were still attending church just about every time the doors opened. And so by the time I was the age of 15, I had reached just my end. I had a very traumatic experience with my father who was actually going through withdrawal from the drug usage. And it was a very trying time
Speaker: And so ultimately he would have, there would be an altercation. He would threaten my life and continue abusing my mom. I decided the only way I could live and exist was to leave home. And so prematurely as a homeschool student, that's exactly what I did. I left home with
Speaker: just a lot of bravery, you know, and a lot of boldness, right? And so from having lived multiple states, I was accustomed to moving, so that wasn't an issue. So I actually, I'd met a gentleman who won a flight from Dallas, Texas to Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Speaker: The reason why I was going back to Tulsa is because there was a prom that I would attend. I was a very friendly young lady and so I actually exchanged numbers with this man. He had no business exchanging numbers with me. He was about 27 years of age, but he did. I went on to become friends with him. We would have frequent conversations.
Speaker: This was prior to the incident with my father. And so I got to know him. And he basically said, if there's anything that you need at all, even if it's a place to stay, then please feel free. And he lived in Atlanta, Georgia at the time.
Speaker: And so by the time we have this interaction with my father, you know, and it was an altercation, very intense situation, I called Michael after my father had threatened my life. Basically, I called the cops, won him, and he was taken away to jail. That would give me a window of opportunity to leave, and that's exactly what I did. So I called this gentleman, and I told him the situation. He was like, okay, well, if you can get to me, then you have a place to live.
Speaker: So at the time, I was a homeschool student. I worked three part time jobs, Eckerd drugstore, Wendy's, and I was a contributing writer at a local newspaper called the Dallas Weekly.
Speaker: And so I scraped up my funds at about $119 ticket from Greyhound that I purchased and I moved to Atlanta, Georgia. And that's when my life took a very dramatic change. This guy was not my trafficker, but he would, the situation would, would cause me to meet my trafficker or traffickers. And ultimately, you know, I became
Speaker: live in, if you will, I would say it was more along the lines of sex slave. I was in exchange for a roof over my head and in exchange for clothing and things of that nature, the basic necessities and the icing on the cake in this was, you know, I met a very well -to -do famous music producer in Atlanta and
Speaker: He allowed me to live with two of his groups and told me he would put me in music videos and he did all of those things as long as I took care of their, you know, their needs physically. And so that's exactly what happened. And that's what I did. I have lots of questions to ask you about that particular time in your life. But before we do that, can we go back to your upbringing and
Speaker: the abuse that you were experiencing in your family of origin. And talk about the fact that during all of that chaos and trauma, you were an active churchgoer. So tell me about how did those two worlds collide in your life, this faith that you saw and that you lived and then yet
Speaker: what you were experiencing at home and how did you hide it or did you hide it from your family at church? Well, it was really simple. First of all, simple in that here was the rule, what goes on in this house stays in this house at all costs. And because of witnessing my father physically abused my mother and my brother for so many years, it was ingrained in me that you would not do anything different.
Speaker: you know, if you didn't want to, you being me, if you didn't want to experience my father's wrath, then you would not discuss what it is that was going on in the house. And so that was just a code that we lived by. And so my mother, she did not say anything about what she was going through. My brother did not say anything and I did not say anything.
Speaker: And so church was a place of joy and it was easy to go there and escape the horrors that I experienced and lived through at home. The other thing is because we moved around so much, we didn't grow roots, okay? My mother had estranged my mom from her family and his own extended family. So we did not grow up with cousins and aunts and uncles that would check up on our welfare.
Speaker: So we were very much isolated. And so maintaining silence was easy because being a young child growing up in that environment, you know, it's fear based. So, you know, your lips are just sealed. So what was your personal faith like during that time? My personal faith was very childlike. It was, I really did believe that God loved me
Speaker: I believed everything that I learned in Sunday school and in church, but I was conflicted. And so by the time I was 15, I had made up in my mind that, well, I'm not sure if he loves me as much as maybe he loves someone else who's not going through what we're going through, because if he loves me so much, why would I be going through this? Why would my dad beat my mom and my brother?
Speaker: and eventually me, why are we going through this if God loves us so much? Yeah, gosh, that's a hard question for anyone, but especially for a young girl. Right, right. So you gathered up all your courage and you made this move to get on a bus and to travel to Atlanta to live with a man that you had met on an airplane.
Speaker: In that 15 -year -old's mind, what were you imagining your life was going to be like when you got to Atlanta? I really didn't know. I was terrified. But I imagined it would be better than what I had left behind. And so I was willing to take the risk
Speaker: to see how better it could be, right? I was pretty desperate and so very short -sighted, desperate. I just wanted relief immediately. I also had in mind if I left, my mother would leave because I was the youngest. It was just me and my brother who was five years my senior. He had already left the house and went on to school.
Speaker: And so I felt like this would definitely help her. So I did it for me, but I did it for her as well. And time would reveal that it was what she needed to get the courage to change her life as well. So that's, that was at the forefront of my mind. Gotcha. Okay.
Speaker: Well, before we dive into what happened next, I'd like to ask you this question. What would you say right now to a young girl who is in a similar situation that where there's abuse at home and she's feeling she has recognized that it's not healthy and that it's not the way life is supposed to be and she
Speaker: is in that same situation as you. Knowing what you know now, what advice would you give her as she's trying to figure out where to go or what to do next? The advice that I would give her is to speak up.
Speaker: to tell the authorities what is happening in her home, no matter what has been threatened. Tell the authorities. Tell someone. It might have to start in school. Tell your intervention counselor that something is happening in your home. You can start with your teacher, and they will guide you to your counselor to let them know that something is going on in your home. It is not acceptable. You don't deserve it.
Speaker: And take the risk. You're worth the risk of sharing what's happening. And it has nothing to do with the love of God for you. God loves you no matter what is happening to you. And so the decision that people make to hurt people is not God's decision. That's the depravity of fallen mankind.
Speaker: That is sin. That is someone's desire to exert power, control, and fulfill their own twisted desires. And they're looking for someone that they feel they can do that with where there would be least resistance. That's so important. I hope that any of the listeners who are tuning in today will also take that advice to heart because
Speaker: If you even suspect that abuse is happening in the home, I think it's our responsibility, not just as Christian brothers and sisters, but as human beings on this planet, to tell an authoritative figure. I mean, it's so much better to be over cautious and have it turn out that nothing's going on.
Speaker: Um, rather than, you know, try to push aside something because you think, Oh, they're in church every Sunday. Of course there couldn't be any abuse happening. We know that that in fact is not the case. Exactly. Okay. Well, unfortunately you, um, you didn't have that happen in your life and didn't have that intervention. Um, and so you intervened on your own and here you go off to Atlanta and end up
Speaker: in a situation where to survive, basically, you are just at the mercy of this group of men who you're living with. What did a day in your life look like at that point?
Speaker: Well, a day in my life at that point, of course I got hooked on drugs fairly quickly because that was their lifestyle. And so I pretty much emulated that. And so I was hooked on drugs very quickly. A day would look like most days we were drinking and smoking.
Speaker: substances that was on most days and there were oftentimes events that we would go to and you know I was almost like a roadie if you will so I would go around to these different events with them and usually I would hang out at the hotel
Speaker: And there would be an after party. And I was just literally, I would just be in the room of a hotel waiting to see who would walk in next. And sometimes it would be individuals and sometimes it would be groups. And I was there to perform a service. And that was an average weekend, weekday, whatever, whenever there was an event.
Speaker: I was definitely there for that. It would also look like going out to restaurants and eating with them. It would look very communal and a warm tomato. It was like we laughed about things and watched movies together and lived together. But when it was time for me to perform,
Speaker: you know, there wasn't an option to say no, maybe there was, but I just agreed to this, right? I agreed to this. And so I would definitely say, and I'm not a psychiatrist, psychologist, or mental health professional, but from what I've read about, it's
Speaker: it pretty much looks like the Stockholm Syndrome. And so this became my family that I became protective over because they were the hand that fed me. You see this play out and I remember there was a movie that Brad Pitt was in called Troy. And you see this play out where a woman who was held captive fell in love with him. And so they became
Speaker: like family to me, even to the point that the producer sent me home to visit my mom, who was living in a shelter at the time, but during Christmas time on a round trip ticket and I came back. Why did I come back? Why would I come back to that? Well, she was in a shelter. She could not help me. Her mental state was horrible. And at least I got a chance to ride around in Mercedes and Range Rovers and
Speaker: Um, felt a little bit, uh, exposed to the celebrity life because there were celebrities that were sometimes, uh, my people I would serve. Right. Um, for that's the best way that I can put it. And so, you know, there was, you know, I was in a music video and, you know, so I felt like, well, this is just a lifestyle. I did hope that somebody would see me. Um, there were many moments where I felt, especially when I want to interact with other women.
Speaker: I would wonder why they didn't ask more questions as to why I was there. I look, I'm 47 years of age and I have been told I don't necessarily look that old. Well, when I was 15, I looked like a baby. I was a small.
Speaker: Framed Young lady who looked young and so, you know, I always wondered why would they not see me and I would hope for it But I would never open up my mouth because I was terrified again that had been instilled in me when I was younger Don't you tell about what's happening at home? Because you're going to be harmed and so they did Have the bodyguard one of the bodyguards tell me that he would kill me
Speaker: And so I had that fear reinforced. And so I did not know how to get out of that situation mentally. I felt very trapped, but eventually desperation led to me making other choices throughout a, you know, a six year period where I just went from one handler to the next and then eventually
Speaker: I ran, quote unquote, my own enterprise, but it was just more of the same. It became a very sickening lifestyle. So I'm curious, what do you wish a woman who saw you in the midst of all that and thought to herself, she is way too young to be involved the way she is. What could they have said to you or what could they have asked you that you think might have
Speaker: given you the courage to say or share what was really going on. Because I think I'm guessing that if people were to have that experience, that they wouldn't know what to say. And so I'm curious from your perspective, what might be a good word of wisdom to tell us that we could somehow get through to a young lady who's
Speaker: stuck in a situation like that. Yes. And I did ultimately have a couple of women who did realize something was off and did extend their friendship to me and tried to help me. But the only thing that they did not do was alert the authorities.
Speaker: And I would say that if you get a disclosure, I don't care how old the individual is. If you get a disclosure of this magnitude of abuse or any type of abuse, it would be in the person's best interest that you got someone else involved. Because consider that their mental state may not be all the way together. And to be able to disclose that to you took a lot of courage.
Speaker: They had overcome a lot. That was their bravest move was to tell you. And even when they say don't tell anyone else, because that's fear. That's the first thing. It's like, I don't, you don't know what has been said to me. If you say anything, I can, that could be my life. That can be a life of love. Who knows? Alert the authorities. I believe that that is the right thing to do. That is the right thing to do because that person at this point is a victim and their mindset may not be fully
Speaker: are able and capable to do all the right necessary steps for them. And you can do that anonymously. Such great advice. And I think, too, it's important to point out that when I think in general of human trafficking, I think of like somebody who is being held against their will. But more and more, we're learning that is not the case. Like in your circumstance, you are free to come and go.
Speaker: but you didn't feel like you had the resources to exit the situation. So just because someone looks like they're having a good time and having fun in this environment does not mean that it's not abuse. Because if they're underage, it is abuse. Right, exactly. In the state of Texas, you have to be 18 to be considered
Speaker: non -minor. And so if you are under the age of 18, you are not able to consent to sex, first of all. You're under the age of consent. And so it is automatically illegal, right? And so
Speaker: My story and my situation is one way that this happens, but you do not have to be without money and resources and means in order to be mentally trapped into this lifestyle, right? And so we have to look at the process. We have to look at the means and we have to look at the end.
Speaker: This is the goal and the game of the trafficker. So first of all, in the process of recruiting, they're going to groom you in some way. There's going to be something that they do, some need that they provide. They're looking for low -hanging fruits. They're looking for vulnerabilities. And vulnerabilities do not have a socioeconomic status attached to them. So they're going to recruit or harbor or move or obtain
Speaker: Your person, your image, okay, so this was in 1997 with me. Now, one of the ways and means of trafficking is through images, all right, pornographic images that are uploaded to the dark web, et cetera. But, so you're going to look at the recruiting process. You're going to look at, they're looking for and searching for vulnerabilities, okay.
Speaker: they're going to become everything that you need. You have a bad relationship, they're going to be good for you. No one listens to you, they're going to listen, right?
Speaker: than the means force, fraud, or coercion. So it's very possible that you get caught up into sex trafficking by force. That's like you would see in the movie Taken. They knock you out. They drug you. They drag you. You're gone. You're missing. But that's not always the case. There are many parties that you might attend from someone who is setting up and looking for someone
Speaker: who would be the next victim, because this is a multi -billion dollar industry, let's not forget that. And so, you know, I think of college campuses, I think of high school parties where they're drugging individuals and performing acts, videotaping it, uploading it, that's also sex trafficking, okay? Or they're using text messages where the so -called boyfriend or girlfriend
Speaker: is requesting images, right? And then, you know, they use those images also as a way of revenge to say, hey, if you don't do these other things, I'm going to send this to your parents or to your this person or that person, or I'm going to spread this all over the web or whatever the case may be.
Speaker: And so I can go into so many different nuances of how this works, but they're going to either force you somehow, they're going to be fraudulent in their luring of you, or they're going to find a way to coerce you into doing these things.
Speaker: But it just depends on the situation and the environment. And their end goal is basically either involuntary servitude, okay? There's debt bondage, because let's understand that this happens not just in the US, but it happens globally. Or flat out slavery, right?
Speaker: I would say that I was in the category of slavery. That was sex slavery. I was living in this particular place, even though I could, quote unquote, come and go as I please because of all the psychological
Speaker: and physical abuse and threats of death, it was slavery, right? And so they're gonna force you into some form of commercial sex act. Okay, that's another way. So there's all these different ways that this happens. My story, I was vulnerable as being a teenage runaway, but this is not the only way that it happens. So you've seen some of in the news, you've seen the Epstein case,
Speaker: OK, this is not a situation where you're dealing with people who are uneducated and they are at the bottom of the rung of society as far as socioeconomics. You're actually looking at people who need a better quality product. And so they're going after the college students and they're going after the women and men.
Speaker: because this is not just an issue with women and girls, this is also an issue with boys and men, but they're going after, quote unquote, prime stock. So it's a very difficult, complex situation, but the end goal is money.
Speaker: And with humans, you know, with drugs, once you use the drugs, they're gone. All right? So they're always looking to find more drugs or create more drugs to sell, right? But when you talk about a human, you're talking about an individual who, you know, in some cases you think about, you know, some of the sex slavery in Southeast Asia where these women are literally in cages and hundreds of times a day until they die. Their life expectancy when they enter is about eight years.
Speaker: and then they die.
Speaker: And they start off sometimes even as little kids where this is happening and it's not uncommon to find them on the side of the road discarded after their bodies gave out because they could no longer be used again. So this is a very complex issue and that a lot of research has been put into but there's a lot more that needs to be done. You know, I could give you statistics but you can research the statistics. I'm just one of them, right? I'm one of those
Speaker: who has had this experience. But by the grace of God, I'm a survivor of it. This all happened to me in 1997 is when I made my escape.
Speaker: In our next episode, we are going to hear Kia's redemption story, her healing story. I hope that you will join us for the conversation as it continues between Kia and Laura. You can follow along on our social media accounts, normalgoestalongway and also at normalgoestalongway .com. But in the meantime, here's a little sneak preview of what's to come.
Speaker: And I remember at that moment being so terrified and crying out to God. And this is not just being in the church setting, but in that moment, it was about me and Jesus. And I'm like, right, you're really real? Then I need you to show up right now because I don't know what's going to happen. I'm terrified. I don't know what to do. And so I literally felt a warm sensation from the crown of my head, literally go all the way down my body to my feet. And I felt the peace of God. And I knew it was the presence of God.
