235 episodes

True stories and conversations with survivors, advocates and experts on the insidiousness of cults, frauds, scams and pyramid schemes. Through compassionate and educational informal chats, we work to end the stigma of "failure", in an machine systematically designed for you to fail. Hosted by Roberta Blevins, star of LuLaRich.


Life After MLM is a part of True Native Media. Visit https://truenativemedia.com for more.

Life After MLM Roberta Blevins

    • Society & Culture
    • 4.3 • 946 Ratings

Listen on Apple Podcasts
Requires macOS 11.4 or higher

True stories and conversations with survivors, advocates and experts on the insidiousness of cults, frauds, scams and pyramid schemes. Through compassionate and educational informal chats, we work to end the stigma of "failure", in an machine systematically designed for you to fail. Hosted by Roberta Blevins, star of LuLaRich.


Life After MLM is a part of True Native Media. Visit https://truenativemedia.com for more.

Listen on Apple Podcasts
Requires macOS 11.4 or higher

    Episode 234 : Shanny Payton

    Episode 234 : Shanny Payton

    *Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about infertility, adoption and foster care. Please use discretion when listening.*
    Shanny grew up in a strict Evangelical cult where her entire life as a woman was planned out for her. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the baby in the baby carriage, right? But what happens when no one prepares you for the very real possibility that things might not work out the way you want? For Shanny it looked like supporting every newly pregnant friend at their baby showers, fielding constant questions about her future as a mother, and silently navigating a long battle with infertility she never expected. Going down both adoption and foster care routes to expand her family, Shanny offers a valuable perspective with a hilarious wit.
    Show Notes
    2024 MLM Conference
    Connect with Shanny : Instagram | TikTok | YouTube | Podcast
    ShannyPantsShow.com
    Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 1 hr 28 min
    Episode 233 : Andrea, Terra & Roberta! Podcast Crossover!

    Episode 233 : Andrea, Terra & Roberta! Podcast Crossover!

    Last month I got to go to Podcast Movement Evolutions in Downtown Los Angeles and record a fun crossover episode with some of my favorite podcasting ladies at Spotify Studios! HUGE THANK YOU to Spotify for the use of the space and your hospitality! And it was so great to hang out with and collaborate on content with Andrea Dunlop and Terra Newell! Our chat got cut short due to LA traffic and bad GPS directions, but we managed to get in some time to chat about the intersectional topics of our shows, and how we can support those who want to tell their stories.
    Show Notes
    Connect with Andrea : Instagram | TikTok | Podcast
    Connect with Terra : Instagram | TikTok | Podcast
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 46 min
    Episode 232 : Meg Appelgate

    Episode 232 : Meg Appelgate

    Trigger Warnings : This episode talks about child abuse, kidnapping and CSA. Please use discretion when listening.
    When she was just 15, Meg Appelgate was abducted by two strangers in the middle of the night from her home in California. Over the course of the next 6 months Meg would enter a behavioral modification program called Chrysalis in northern Montana where she would spend the next 3 years. These programs go by the names "youth residential treatment centers", "wilderness programs", "boot camps", or "therapeutic boarding schools" among others, but they are what we now know as the Troubled Teen Industry, a vile abusive system of control that Meg is fighting to end.
    Show Notes
    Connect with Meg : Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Website | LinkedIn | TikTok
    Unsilenced
    Unsilenced TikTok
    Troubled Teen Industry
    Synanon
    Meg's Book! - Becoming Unsilenced
    This Is Paris
    WWASP Survivors
    Former Campers Speak Out on Trails Carolina
    Project SPEAK
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 1 hr 26 min
    Episode 231 : Ann

    Episode 231 : Ann

    It was just past year that Anne took pause and started digging into her admittedly "weird childhood". After listening to the podcast Nobody Should Believe Me, she started to suspect that she may have been the victim of medical child abuse, what is more commonly known as Munchausen by Proxy. With an unhealed and unwilling mother to answer her questions, Anne dove into everything she could consume to process the trauma she experienced as a young girl. In our chat we get into the triggers and possible reasons for her mother's actions, as well as the generational trauma we both are breaking free from.
    Show Notes
    Nobody Should Believe Me Podcast
    The Curious Case of Natalia Grace
    The Prison Confessions of Gypsy Rose Blanchard
    Medical Child Abuse : A Review by Subspeciality
    Factors related to medical neglect recurrence and foster care and adoption services
    We Came Here To Forget by Andrea Dunlop
    Dying to be Ill : True Stories of Medical Deception
    Take Care of Maya (Netflix)
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 59 min
    Episode 230 : Sandy Rusk

    Episode 230 : Sandy Rusk

    Last year I received a heartbreaking email from a mother who had felt she was running out of options; her daughter was stuck in a controlling cult, isolated from friends and family, and she hadn't seen her in years. Over several months I met with Sandy to discuss her story and the history behind how she got here. The more I heard the more I wondered; Was Sandy's daughter a strong, independent spirit? Or was there something more calculated and nefarious at play?
    Show Notes
    Connect with Sandy : Facebook | Instagram
    The Truth About ITOWN Church - Facebook Support Group
    An Open Letter to ITOWN (from a former member)
    Alopecia
    About ITown
    The Roy's Report re: ARC
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 1 hr 34 min
    Episode 229 : The Life and Times of Glenn W. Turner

    Episode 229 : The Life and Times of Glenn W. Turner

    Sean Munger is back to share the story of Glenn W. Turner! Arguably one of the earliest HunBros of all time, with such hits as "Fake it til you Make it!", Koscot Interplanetary and the Dare to Be Great! course scam. In our chat, Sean recounts the life, times and legal troubles of the early MLM Kingpin Glenn W. Turner, a man so obsessed with fame, success, wealth and greed that it lead to his ultimate downfall and felony conviction.
    Show Notes
    Connect with Sean : YouTube
    Sean's Koscot Video
    Glenn W. Turner
    FTC v. Koscot
    Life Magazine May 28, 1971
    Glenn W. Turner Obituary
    Salesman Documentary (Amazon Prime)
    Conman or Saint?
    Think and Grow Rich
    Dare To Be Great NYT 1977
    Hurst v. Dare to be Great
    Challenge Inc Case
    Glenn Turner in Prison
    Out of MLM
    The BITE Model
    LAMLM Book Club
    MLM Dupes
    How can you help?
    MLM Change
    Report Fraud
    Truth in Advertising
    Report to your state Attorney General's office!
    Not in the U.S.? No Problem!
    Support the Podcast!
    Website | Patreon | Buy Me a Taco | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Discord | Merch!
    Life After MLM is produced by Roberta Blevins. Audio editing is done by the lovely Kayla Craven, video editing by the indescribable RK Gold, and Michelle Carpenter is our Triple Emerald Princess of Robots. Life After MLM is owned by Roberta Blevins 2024.
    Music : Abstract World by Alexi Action
    *Some links may be affiliate links. When you purchase things from these links, I get a small commission that I use to buy us tacos.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 1 hr 31 min

Customer Reviews

4.3 out of 5
946 Ratings

946 Ratings

atlgal404 ,

Give guests a little more grace

Been listening since close to the beginning and love Roberta. She has grown a lot. Lately though seems like she’s back to dominating the conversations and not letting us hear the guest stories and perspectives. She’s doing most of the talking. I don’t care for that at all.

Jay DeeNola ,

Please go back to MLM content!!

Overall interesting content but it could use some editing and the last stories seem very off base. There are too many random interviews that aren’t connected to the MLM topic that made earlier interviews interesting. If you view MLM as exploitation then you could have hundreds of topics that are vaguely connected but then you miss out on the content that made it interesting. What is this podcast about? Unsubscribed it’s too chaotic and all over the place. This was such a good niche please go back!!!

Podcastfan1979 ,

Obnoxious

Stop repeating words like “DINK” over and over!!! The concept just wasn’t that important. Get someone else to write your interview questions and stick with the script more. Fascinating concepts and guests. I would also like to argue that “DINKS” that are working for an MLM DO NOT have extra disposable income!!! They do have the luxury of nearly unlimited TIME to recruit and sell to others. That is why MLMs like “DINKS.” DINKS, DINKS, DINKS……!!!!!!!! The host just does not get it!!!

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