CW: This episode contains discussion around diets and diet culture, as well as child abuse and infant death. Listener discretion is advised. 

What happens when faith, control, and diet culture collide? In our first episode, Heather dives into the rise of Gwen Shamblin Lara, founder of the Weigh Down Diet and Remnant Fellowship Church. From her early teachings on weight loss as a path to holiness, to the cult-like control she wielded over her followers, we trace how spiritual hunger was manipulated into obsession and how it all unraveled.

Sources:

• HBO Documentary. The Way Down: God, Greed, and the Cult of Gwen Shamblin.

• Sinisterhood Podcast. Episodes 147 & 148 – Gwen Shamblin Lara and the Weigh Down Diet (Parts 1 & 2).

• Wikipedia. Gwen Shamblin Lara.⁠ Read here⁠
• YouTube. The Rise and Fall of Gwen Shamblin.⁠ Watch here

Meet the hosts of Altar Ego. Two close friends, one a therapist raised Southern Baptist, now agnostic; the other a spiritually curious ex-Catholic who believes in ghosts and is terrified of demons... we dive into dark tales and crimes committed in the name of God (or the devil). Through ethical retellings of possessions, prophecies, cults, and beliefs, we investigate spirituality, belief systems, and the ambiguous psychological spaces in between.