We’ve heard Joy-Anna and Jinger Duggar discuss their childhoods, including eye-popping moments that they sometimes seem to gloss over.
Now, Jinger is admitting that, as an adult, she’s found herself seeking an “older mentor.”
Adult friendships can be hard to find. That is even truer when you grew up in an extreme and isolated environment.
But some think that Jinger bonding with older women might be a swipe, however unintended, at Michelle.
Jinger has a ‘not old, but older, mentor’
During a recent episode of the Jinger & Jeremy podcast, one of the eponymous hosts sat down with Joy-Anna.
“There’s a couple that I’m thinking of that are not in the season with kids and so they already they’ve had kids, or they are beyond,” Jinger described, “that and it’s really sweet because then I’m like it feels Like a godly older mentor.”
(As we have previously explained, some evangelical communities use “seasons” to refer to portions of one’s life, like chapters. This in-group terminology works to set people apart from members of the out-group.)
“Not old, but older, mentor and that’s also helpful for me,” Jinger continued, “especially living away from family and working through a lot of things like that.”
She commented: “It’s been helpful for me to have the wisdom and the care.”
Jinger went on to praise the “trustworthiness” of having an older mentor friend like the one that she has found.
Joy-Anna seems to agree.
The two say that they are both seeking adult friendships that are free of gossip and false pretenses.
(Maybe we’re just too far removed from the Duggar family’s subculture to understand, but it’s unclear what grown adults in their 20s and 30s would be gossiping about in a way that the sisters would find off-putting.)
It is very common for people to find it harder to make friends as adults. Someone whose fundamentalist background rules out common shortcuts (can’t really attend trivia nights if you’re unfamiliar with almost all arts and entertainment news from the past century) likely face additional challenges.
Is this intended to shade Michelle?
Additionally, both Jinger and Joy discussed the ways in which their limited social lives did not include discussion of their reality TV family lives when they were growing up.
They likened it to a “taboo” to speak of their TLC adventures. That … doesn’t sound super healthy.
Additionally, Joy spoke about how she was “glued to his hip” after marrying husband Austin Forsyth, as she didn’t really have adult bonds that weren’t familial in one sense or another.
All of this and more led a lot of folks on social media to take one message away from this:
Are both women deliberately shading Michelle Duggar?
Simply put, even if Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar were good people (they’re not), there is no possible way for them to have shown each and every child the love and positive attention that they deserve.
Commenters across social media have noted that this sort of “older mentor friend” dynamic is not uncommon for people who had bad childhoods or who have parents who are terrible people (or both).
If you feel like you’re walking on eggshells with your mom, then you might seek out a substitute mom — even if she isn’t old enough to be your actual mother unless she was a child bride — to give you a healthy dynamic.
Even if the Duggars likely struggle to recognize what a healthy dynamic is, they might still seek one instinctively. Everyone deserves love and emotional support without the whole abusive-nightmare-cult thing.
Jinger probably isn’t intentionally slamming her awful mom here. It’s just that people familiar with this family understand what sort of person Michelle is, and may understand some of Jinger’s emotional baggage a little better than she does.