Former ‘trad wife’ reveals the ‘ugliness’ behind picture-perfect lifestyle: ‘I wish anybody could help me out of this’

Enitza Templeton seemed like she was living a picture-perfect life as a “trad wife,” baking bread from scratch as a stay-at-home mom and giving birth to her children without an epidural.

But — despite the glittering, family-first exterior — the former traditionalist was unhappy with her lifestyle and couldn’t help but think of her daughters.

“I remember watching TV, folding the towels, thinking, ‘I wish anybody could help me out of this. If I had the money, if I had the means, if I had some way, I would not be married. I hate this. I don’t want my daughters to be in a marriage like this,'” the 41-year-old Denver resident told People .

“If I want my daughters to do any different, I’m going to have to show them different,” she added, recalling her commitment to making “changes” in her life until she could leave her husband, whom she married in 2009.

Now, she is alarmed by the glorification of the “trad wife” lifestyle she’s seen on social media, noticing the glaring similarities between her past life and that of Hannah Neeleman, known for Ballerina Farm , who recently made headlines for sharing her the details of her traditional life in Utah as a homemaker and mom of eight.

“Trad wives” have drawn criticism from skeptics who argue it “romanticizes” a regressive lifestyle, while others champion the so-called family values and minimalism that the traditionalists represent.

“I see women moving away from their roots to compete with men,” one Virginia-based tradwife, Estee Williams, told The Post in 2023. “That’s not the way it should be. We are women and we need to embrace that.”

Williams explained the impetus behind her lifestyle.

“The Bible speaks of wives submitting and serving their husbands and being their husband’s helping mate,” she said. “The Bible talks specifically about gender roles, and I completely support traditional gender roles.”

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However, despite creators’ claims that they are happy with their chosen paths, Templeton insists she can “hear the sadness.”

“I see their deep, deep, deep desire to validate the lifestyle and to be, like, ‘Look at me. I’m so perfect and beautiful, and I do all these things amazingly,'” Templeton said of “trad wife” influencers. “It’s super sad. It’s also a little bit disingenuous. I know what it’s like. You’re not showing the full picture. There is a lot of ugliness behind the scenes.”

That pursuit of being a “perfect trophy wife” is nearly impossible, she added.

“She’s beautiful, she has the children, she does it unmedicated,” Templeton explained. “It’s this stupid, stupid, stupid goalpost that’s always moving. You can never reach it because if you bake the bread, well, did you use fresh yeast? Oh. Well, did you mill the flour? Oh. Well, did you grow the wheat that you milled the flour? They can keep pushing it back.”

The “trad wife” lifestyle, which is typically rooted in religion, is often adopted by couples who do not have that much money, she added.

When Templeton and her ex-husband were married, she was 26 and had graduated college with a graphic design degree, the pair attempting to make ends meet with his student loans and a “mishmash” of odd jobs.

The couple decided they wanted to “have as many kids” as they could, “just trusting that the Lord would provide” for their growing family despite financial hardships.

“We would say — and this is super common in the little Christian circles — we’re living on loans and love right now until we can make it,” she said.

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They shared a bank account — which prevented Templeton from saving up for her own splurges and expenses — but he controlled the cash, even her earnings.

Her days would begin around 3 a.m. by feeding her youngest, getting a few more hours of shut-eye before preparing fresh bread and making breakfast for her other children before homeschool commenced. At the “apex” of her traditional life, she said, she was making her curly hair pin straight, putting on makeup and wearing dresses every single day — regardless of being tired, sick or pregnant.

It wasn’t until her fourth pregnancy that she was finally able to use disposable diapers instead of cloth.

After lunch — when the freshly baked bread was enjoyed — Templeton would take her kids on some sort of outing for the afternoon before going grocery shopping.

“I was really just trying to get out of the house,” recalled Templeton, who would cook dinner while the kids played.

“That’s it. Just cooking meals, taking care of kids and tending to everybody else’s needs. That was the whole day,” said Templeton, who wasn’t allowed to use fast-acting yeast when baking.

The monotonous, rigid routine became more difficult when her second child was born with Down syndrome and a heart defect, which required multiple surgeries. But the health complications of her young child did not deter the couple from having more children.

While her daughter was “teetering between life and death,” Templeton was juggling more pregnancies, homeschooling, caretaking and cooking from scratch.

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That balancing act, she said, was “not sustainable” nor “appropriate,” and, looking back, she admits she should have paused on growing her family.

“I was having a baby that was having open heart surgery, but I was still pregnant with another one. And then pregnant with another one, and another open heart surgery,” she said. “And then trying to homeschool one of them and trying to keep this one alive with her oxygen and then pregnant with the next one.”

Her decision to leave her perfectly curated life — which she began to post about on social media at the time — came after a wake-up call from fellow moms.

She took on nursing jobs under the guise of her mental health, getting her “ducks in a row” so she could leave.

“I was not raised to believe that women had a right to think and a right to ask questions,” Templeton explained, referring to her decision to be transparent about her experiences online . “I thought if a woman didn’t have a child, she was going to be miserable for her whole life. I did not understand there were women that were just happy to just live and be themselves.”

Eventually, after a fight between herself and her husband, Templeton said she wanted a divorce.

That was five years ago, and now, the single mom has a boyfriend, hosts a podcast called “Emerging Motherhood” and feels “younger” and “more regenerated,” she declared.

“When you see a problem and you feel like you have a solution, it’s your responsibility to do something,” she said. “I felt like as a mom, it’s my job to clear the path for my daughters. And I have to make as much of an impact as I can for them.

“I don’t want them to grow up in a world like this.”

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