Yeeeessss!!!! The late-diagnosed-neurodivergent-deconstructing-Christian to somatic witchcraft pipeline is real! Glad to find others feeling a similar call. I'm disproportionately excited to see the newsletter take this turn. ❤️
Omg I had no idea this was a pipeline but I have been newly obsessed with witches for the last two months and was listening to the BBC witch podcast when this popped up. Signs!
Hi DL! I have been following you for a long time as our journeys have somewhat paralleled (grew up evangelical, worked in a college ministry for 9 years and actually discovered you initially via IVPress, deconstructed, realized I'm not really a Christian anymore) but this post finally got me to upgrade to paid because it was such a lovely surprise to find out that you have also been exploring paganism and being a witch! In the last 6 months I have realized I am essentially a green witch as I have been pulled towards herbalism, communing with nature, & exploring my pagan indigenous roots. Suddenly all the novels I have read have something to do with witches :) (The Practical Magic series by Alice Hoffman, particularly the two more recent prequels, are so good! And Weyward, and The Once and Future Witches.) It has been such a freeing discovery to embrace all of this! I have been exploring the Wheel of the Year and printed a picture of it to hang on my wall to familiarize myself with the different. I really enjoyed "Seasons of a Magical Life" by H Byron Ballard and "Wild Witchcraft" by Rebecca Beyer. I'm obsessed with Phoebe Wahl's aesthetic in Little Witch Hazel and am so excited to discover she is coming out with a book about the wheel of the year in 2026 with Danica Boyce! And so most recently I have discovered Danica Boyce's podcast, Fair Folk, which I highly recommend and I just listened to her November almanac about the fox and the goose which was so lovely and fascinating. I am so intrigued by the tarot but haven't dove into it yet - you are inspiring me to do so! Anyway, I really appreciate you sharing your journey and I'm very intrigued that my discovery of these things are not isolated but shared by others. Looking forward to continuing to learn from you and others!
(Also while all this has been happening I have been semi permanently living with my evangelical trump loving in-laws so I have had to make all these discoveries in secret. So that really sucks!)
Oh my goodness thank you for all the recs! I would love to perhaps have you write a guest post about your experiences at some point in the future! If you want to explore the secret part especially . . . we can always put it behind a paywall.
I might be interested in that sometime!That would probably be a good exercise for me in processing my journey, but yes unfortunately it would have to be behind the paywall based on my current situation. The balance of being able to live my true self but also having the interdependence of family situations is a real doozy that I'm still right in the middle of!
I know, it's it exciting?! I want to live in Phoebe Wahl's drawings. I squealed when I saw the announcement! I seriously have debated ordering some prints from her store to frame. I will definitely be ordering her new one when it comes out!
Me too! I wish she could collage scenes from my kids childhood instead of me keeping haphazard photo albums. Her art is just so heartwarming. You should definitely get some prints someday! I have a couple and they make me so happy every time I see them. ❤️
i laughed aloud reading this because it feels so familiar. good on you, i'm feeling similarly. May I recommend the BBC limited podcast Witch and also Alix E Harrow's novel The Once and Future Witches. Both have helped me. many blessings in your witchy journey, cannot wait to follow along
As a long time follower, I love this for you! And welcome in to such a beautiful, vast space to just be. For me, it’s been one of the most healing parts of reconnecting to myself and the world after deconverting from Christianity. Can you possibly share the tarot deck from the cards you pulled? The illustrations are charming!
OMG, when I saw the title of this post it made my day! From one witch to another, thank you for sharing about this. "I am the kind of witch who screams at god and demands that he answer for all of his followers and all of the pain and suffering he has wrought." Hell yes!
Thank you for all the book recommendations! I am also in between interests, and this one sounds fun to, I realize today, re-explore.
You prompted me to remember that, when I was a child, alone on the farm, I spent a lot of time outside with animals. I learned to be still, so still, so that animals, especially feral cats, would become curious about me and inch closer and closer to me until I could gently touch them. I have always loved cats who were free to roam, who chose to come to me. I even had one cat curl up on my chest and comfort me while I cried after climbing a tree to escape my angry mom. They are amazing creatures.
These days, one of the most regulating things I do is dig in the earth of my garden and discover the life that’s all around me there. That’s my idea of being witchy today.
My kids are doing research papers for school, and I remember my first research paper was on the Celts. It was all so fascinating! My English Literature teacher had me read The Mists of Avalon and at some point later, The Robe. I can see how she tried to open my mind, and to this day, I remember those Ideas I had.
❤️❤️ Hi DL! Your journey and mine have paralleled so much in the years I have been following you. I am grateful to get to share in this too.
I have spent the past couple years quietly exploring green witch aspects of myself, though it scares me a little considering my background (so much like yours).
I’m still wary of any deity stuff (obviously) but connecting to cultivating growth in both the literal and personal senses has meant so much to me. Best wishes to you.
This has been me the last three years but I've kept it on the down low because after all my years in evangelicalism, I've just been so bone-deep tired of people telling me their opinions about how I've navigated my deconstruction, deconversion, and restructuring of my personal spiritual practices. I've gravitated toward natural practices and the irony is that once I read John Phillip Newell's Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul - a book about Celtic Christianity - I realized that spiritual practices rooted in nature feel right for me. That it's IN US because we ARE made of the earth. White Christianity has just eradicated it because of power, control, and racism. But it should be a natural thing we gravitate toward and our ancestors have done it for millennia. THEN, I had a life-changing past-life hypnotherapy session where I dropped into a past life that I lived as a witch (or what society considered a witch - just a woman rooted in nature and in her own self) and I was experienced my death in that session. It sounds really dark and woo woo but it was all meant for lessons I need to learn in my life right now. It was also so real for me and some things afterward really confirmed my experience. This is really literally the first time I think I've actually talked about it in a public space. Maybe it's time and I'll write about it soon.
I'm so glad to hear this and I'm along for the journey! I also have a large collection of crystals and rocks, if we were in close proximity to one another, I'd love to have you over and share them with you and everything I've learned and we could info dump together!!
I would love to see your rocks and crystals 😍😍😍 and thank you so much for writing this all out. It does feel strangely vulnerable to talk about this and I’m still untangling why!
I am fascinated by this and would be so interested to hear more about hypnotherapy. Thank you for sharing! Writing things out makes things feel more real and tangible, something I haven't done much of either.
I’m here for supporting you and being curious about you! I have resisted looking into anything meaning making because I know I need to grow stronger roots in autonomy first. I’ve always been deeply connected to nature. We’ve been the weird folks in the family homesteading, house full of found things, deeply grounded in the seasons, etc. I didn’t get there by way of ancestry but by affinity with my grandpa who is the same at his deepest level but alas so happy today with the turn our country is taking. Life is weird and complex and I’m glad to know other changing, deep thinking, fighting for healing humans!!
I will always ride hard for the folks who honor autonomy above everything. It has taken me so, so long to admit I may be weaving together a spirituality of sorts, because I didn't want to give up any of my newfound power. For me, my practices all keep me safe within myself and I do not look to others to predict the future or make me feel better, and that feels really good.
I sense that in you and am here to see what that journey has/is looking like for you!! My guess is so many of us will cling strongly to our autonomy. What I don’t know is healthy examples of how that also fits in with meaning making.
Brilliant….so glad to read this. I’m seeing this shift to more earth-centered spirituality/ancestral ways of worship & ceremony everywhere I look, and particularly among my younger friends and relatives. In my 30’s, my mentor was a 60-something former Rand mathematician-astronomer turned bookstore owner/macrobiotic chef, and her crone wisdom greatly helped to expand my worldview. Now, at 66, I’m proud to be In My Wise & Fierce Crone Era.
I screamed a little happy scream at “I think I’m a witch.”! The pipeline from autistic (or in my case, AuDHD) to witch is a real one. And I see all your points 100%, from the appropriating to the predictability (my 4 self scoffs). I’ve been listening to/reading about witchcraft & what it means to be a witch for over 2 years now, and only recently decided that yeah, I’m not just witchy. And I still have some lingering guilt about it. I haven’t told most people, but I’m learning that’s ok.
I haven’t had a good friend in the same town as me for over 6 years & the loneliness is so real, but I’ll keep trying. Let’s connect with each other & the earth. I think if anything can save us even in a small way, it’ll be this.
I’d love to see the venn diagram of witch/neurodivergent & enneagram type 😆 I think my 4ness makes me obsessed with the ritual/aesthetic but then also not want to be trendy. lol. The struggle!
I’m sorry you are feeling lonely too - sending out love across the ether and wishes for some community soon 🙏🏽
Yay! Love it. I was just thanking the trees last weekend for helping bear my pain and also celebrate my joy. I feel such peace when I can listen to the wind and touch the bark and leaves. Also been pulling cards from my deck which are ALWAYS on point. So am I’m a witch, too?? I hope so!! ❤️
I’m excited to follow along on your journey! I’m a self-diagnosed autistic exvangelical and have also been slowly exploring pagan rituals/celebrations over the past year. I also have been feeling a strong pull to researching the ways of old ancestors (Germanic/Irish/Scottish). I have found the breadth of paganism overwhelming, so I look forward to learning about others practices and how that fits into their lives.
The breadth is totally overwhelming. I have Irish and Scottish ancestors and I still don’t really know where to start . . . let me know if you have any good recs!
Yeeeessss!!!! The late-diagnosed-neurodivergent-deconstructing-Christian to somatic witchcraft pipeline is real! Glad to find others feeling a similar call. I'm disproportionately excited to see the newsletter take this turn. ❤️
Omg I had no idea this was a pipeline but I have been newly obsessed with witches for the last two months and was listening to the BBC witch podcast when this popped up. Signs!
I just started listening to the BBC podcast too!
The pipeline comment was tongue in cheek, haha, but yes! Signs! Love meeting other deconstructed witches and witch-adjacents. ❤️
No you’re just the right amount of excited! And me too!!🤩🤩🤩
Hi DL! I have been following you for a long time as our journeys have somewhat paralleled (grew up evangelical, worked in a college ministry for 9 years and actually discovered you initially via IVPress, deconstructed, realized I'm not really a Christian anymore) but this post finally got me to upgrade to paid because it was such a lovely surprise to find out that you have also been exploring paganism and being a witch! In the last 6 months I have realized I am essentially a green witch as I have been pulled towards herbalism, communing with nature, & exploring my pagan indigenous roots. Suddenly all the novels I have read have something to do with witches :) (The Practical Magic series by Alice Hoffman, particularly the two more recent prequels, are so good! And Weyward, and The Once and Future Witches.) It has been such a freeing discovery to embrace all of this! I have been exploring the Wheel of the Year and printed a picture of it to hang on my wall to familiarize myself with the different. I really enjoyed "Seasons of a Magical Life" by H Byron Ballard and "Wild Witchcraft" by Rebecca Beyer. I'm obsessed with Phoebe Wahl's aesthetic in Little Witch Hazel and am so excited to discover she is coming out with a book about the wheel of the year in 2026 with Danica Boyce! And so most recently I have discovered Danica Boyce's podcast, Fair Folk, which I highly recommend and I just listened to her November almanac about the fox and the goose which was so lovely and fascinating. I am so intrigued by the tarot but haven't dove into it yet - you are inspiring me to do so! Anyway, I really appreciate you sharing your journey and I'm very intrigued that my discovery of these things are not isolated but shared by others. Looking forward to continuing to learn from you and others!
(Also while all this has been happening I have been semi permanently living with my evangelical trump loving in-laws so I have had to make all these discoveries in secret. So that really sucks!)
Oh my goodness thank you for all the recs! I would love to perhaps have you write a guest post about your experiences at some point in the future! If you want to explore the secret part especially . . . we can always put it behind a paywall.
I might be interested in that sometime!That would probably be a good exercise for me in processing my journey, but yes unfortunately it would have to be behind the paywall based on my current situation. The balance of being able to live my true self but also having the interdependence of family situations is a real doozy that I'm still right in the middle of!
Sorry you’re in the “broom” closet 😉 I definitely still stow away some of my tarot decks when my mom comes over.
Just here to say, I’m obsessed with phoebe wahl too & im so delighted to hear she’s writing a book about the wheel!!
I know, it's it exciting?! I want to live in Phoebe Wahl's drawings. I squealed when I saw the announcement! I seriously have debated ordering some prints from her store to frame. I will definitely be ordering her new one when it comes out!
Me too! I wish she could collage scenes from my kids childhood instead of me keeping haphazard photo albums. Her art is just so heartwarming. You should definitely get some prints someday! I have a couple and they make me so happy every time I see them. ❤️
I’ve never heard the term green witch. I love it. That’s my spiritual connection too.
i laughed aloud reading this because it feels so familiar. good on you, i'm feeling similarly. May I recommend the BBC limited podcast Witch and also Alix E Harrow's novel The Once and Future Witches. Both have helped me. many blessings in your witchy journey, cannot wait to follow along
thank you for your recs!
Once and future witches!! I third!
yay! i wrote about it on my 'toil and trouble' post
https://therollingladder.substack.com/p/toil-and-trouble
Will definitely check that out! I also write about tarot if you’re interested 💞
oooh i am!
Just seconding the book! Loved it!
yay! i wrote about it on my 'toil and trouble' post
https://therollingladder.substack.com/p/toil-and-trouble
As a long time follower, I love this for you! And welcome in to such a beautiful, vast space to just be. For me, it’s been one of the most healing parts of reconnecting to myself and the world after deconverting from Christianity. Can you possibly share the tarot deck from the cards you pulled? The illustrations are charming!
It’s the affirmators! Tarot deck and I love it!
OMG, when I saw the title of this post it made my day! From one witch to another, thank you for sharing about this. "I am the kind of witch who screams at god and demands that he answer for all of his followers and all of the pain and suffering he has wrought." Hell yes!
hell yes! (and I owe you an email . . .)
Thank you for all the book recommendations! I am also in between interests, and this one sounds fun to, I realize today, re-explore.
You prompted me to remember that, when I was a child, alone on the farm, I spent a lot of time outside with animals. I learned to be still, so still, so that animals, especially feral cats, would become curious about me and inch closer and closer to me until I could gently touch them. I have always loved cats who were free to roam, who chose to come to me. I even had one cat curl up on my chest and comfort me while I cried after climbing a tree to escape my angry mom. They are amazing creatures.
These days, one of the most regulating things I do is dig in the earth of my garden and discover the life that’s all around me there. That’s my idea of being witchy today.
My kids are doing research papers for school, and I remember my first research paper was on the Celts. It was all so fascinating! My English Literature teacher had me read The Mists of Avalon and at some point later, The Robe. I can see how she tried to open my mind, and to this day, I remember those Ideas I had.
I love this comment so much. I really think there is a connection between witches and cats :)
Yes! I have also always been a cat person and it's nice to think of my current cat as my "familiar" :)
❤️❤️ Hi DL! Your journey and mine have paralleled so much in the years I have been following you. I am grateful to get to share in this too.
I have spent the past couple years quietly exploring green witch aspects of myself, though it scares me a little considering my background (so much like yours).
I’m still wary of any deity stuff (obviously) but connecting to cultivating growth in both the literal and personal senses has meant so much to me. Best wishes to you.
I am also incredibly wary of deity stuff! I am so excited to hear you are a green witch!!!!! I want to learn so much more about plants :)
This has been me the last three years but I've kept it on the down low because after all my years in evangelicalism, I've just been so bone-deep tired of people telling me their opinions about how I've navigated my deconstruction, deconversion, and restructuring of my personal spiritual practices. I've gravitated toward natural practices and the irony is that once I read John Phillip Newell's Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul - a book about Celtic Christianity - I realized that spiritual practices rooted in nature feel right for me. That it's IN US because we ARE made of the earth. White Christianity has just eradicated it because of power, control, and racism. But it should be a natural thing we gravitate toward and our ancestors have done it for millennia. THEN, I had a life-changing past-life hypnotherapy session where I dropped into a past life that I lived as a witch (or what society considered a witch - just a woman rooted in nature and in her own self) and I was experienced my death in that session. It sounds really dark and woo woo but it was all meant for lessons I need to learn in my life right now. It was also so real for me and some things afterward really confirmed my experience. This is really literally the first time I think I've actually talked about it in a public space. Maybe it's time and I'll write about it soon.
I'm so glad to hear this and I'm along for the journey! I also have a large collection of crystals and rocks, if we were in close proximity to one another, I'd love to have you over and share them with you and everything I've learned and we could info dump together!!
I would love to see your rocks and crystals 😍😍😍 and thank you so much for writing this all out. It does feel strangely vulnerable to talk about this and I’m still untangling why!
I am fascinated by this and would be so interested to hear more about hypnotherapy. Thank you for sharing! Writing things out makes things feel more real and tangible, something I haven't done much of either.
I’ve been obsessed with rocks and crystals since I was a little girl. Love all this for you and that hypnotherapy journey sounds so powerful!
I’m here for supporting you and being curious about you! I have resisted looking into anything meaning making because I know I need to grow stronger roots in autonomy first. I’ve always been deeply connected to nature. We’ve been the weird folks in the family homesteading, house full of found things, deeply grounded in the seasons, etc. I didn’t get there by way of ancestry but by affinity with my grandpa who is the same at his deepest level but alas so happy today with the turn our country is taking. Life is weird and complex and I’m glad to know other changing, deep thinking, fighting for healing humans!!
I will always ride hard for the folks who honor autonomy above everything. It has taken me so, so long to admit I may be weaving together a spirituality of sorts, because I didn't want to give up any of my newfound power. For me, my practices all keep me safe within myself and I do not look to others to predict the future or make me feel better, and that feels really good.
Also, I’m so happy for you!!
I sense that in you and am here to see what that journey has/is looking like for you!! My guess is so many of us will cling strongly to our autonomy. What I don’t know is healthy examples of how that also fits in with meaning making.
Brilliant….so glad to read this. I’m seeing this shift to more earth-centered spirituality/ancestral ways of worship & ceremony everywhere I look, and particularly among my younger friends and relatives. In my 30’s, my mentor was a 60-something former Rand mathematician-astronomer turned bookstore owner/macrobiotic chef, and her crone wisdom greatly helped to expand my worldview. Now, at 66, I’m proud to be In My Wise & Fierce Crone Era.
oh I cannot WAIT to enter the crone stage! Love this so much.
Um, if you need witchy video game recs, I know a girl... (love this for you, and us)!
ooooh possible future guest post????
I screamed a little happy scream at “I think I’m a witch.”! The pipeline from autistic (or in my case, AuDHD) to witch is a real one. And I see all your points 100%, from the appropriating to the predictability (my 4 self scoffs). I’ve been listening to/reading about witchcraft & what it means to be a witch for over 2 years now, and only recently decided that yeah, I’m not just witchy. And I still have some lingering guilt about it. I haven’t told most people, but I’m learning that’s ok.
I haven’t had a good friend in the same town as me for over 6 years & the loneliness is so real, but I’ll keep trying. Let’s connect with each other & the earth. I think if anything can save us even in a small way, it’ll be this.
Oh I so hope you meet some likeminded witches in your area. For now we connect where we can (like here!)
Absolutely! So grateful for online safe people & spaces like you & yours (and that you have local peeps).
I’d love to see the venn diagram of witch/neurodivergent & enneagram type 😆 I think my 4ness makes me obsessed with the ritual/aesthetic but then also not want to be trendy. lol. The struggle!
I’m sorry you are feeling lonely too - sending out love across the ether and wishes for some community soon 🙏🏽
I would love to see that Venn diagram too!!
Yay! Love it. I was just thanking the trees last weekend for helping bear my pain and also celebrate my joy. I feel such peace when I can listen to the wind and touch the bark and leaves. Also been pulling cards from my deck which are ALWAYS on point. So am I’m a witch, too?? I hope so!! ❤️
Sounds like you are a witch to me!!! What’s been fun is realizing that so much of what I intuitively do are practices so many have done for centuries
HOW ARE WE THE SAME BUT ALSO DIFFERENT PEOPLE. Same. Same, same, same.
I knew there were a bunch of us out here
I’m excited to follow along on your journey! I’m a self-diagnosed autistic exvangelical and have also been slowly exploring pagan rituals/celebrations over the past year. I also have been feeling a strong pull to researching the ways of old ancestors (Germanic/Irish/Scottish). I have found the breadth of paganism overwhelming, so I look forward to learning about others practices and how that fits into their lives.
The breadth is totally overwhelming. I have Irish and Scottish ancestors and I still don’t really know where to start . . . let me know if you have any good recs!
I LOVE this for you, D.L.! And for all of us who feel the call.