Cold Ep 3: Faith and Finances

Susan married her husband Josh Powell in 2001 they were both active members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they were even married in one of the churches temples, making vows “for time and all eternity.” But it wasn’t long after that that Josh stopped almost all of his interactions with the church and within only few years of their marriage, he quit attending Sunday services and pressured Susan to do the same. Nonetheless, Susan remained committed, both to her faith and to her marriage. Susan believed that Josh was her eternal companion, and Josh took advantage of her devotion. He became completely in control of their families finances and would become furious any time Susan spent more than he thought she should on necessities, including the food she would buy for herself and their two young sons. As the discontent Susan felt in their marriage continued, she sought out a counselor and encouraged Josh to join her, an offer that he most often refused. Susan’s Father Chuck Cox attended one of the sessions though, a session where her counselor observed that Susan was indeed in an abusive relationship, a conclusion that Chuck agreed with. Shortly thereafter Susan’s parents bought her a cell phone that she would keep secret in case she ever needed to make a quick escape that they paid the bill on to make sure that Josh wouldn’t ever know about it. But Susan wanted to make their marriage work. It had started off so wonderfully but things had changed. Josh started becoming more strict and harder to live with a friend observed. After a particularly brutal fight that she and Josh had one evening, Susan drafted a handwritten will the next day at work where she was obviously concerned about her own safety and well-being writing, “If I die, it may not be an accident, even if it looks like one,” she wrote. “Take care of my boys.” One of the contributing factors that may have played into this fear was that Josh had taken out a million-dollar life insurance policy for her, a purchase that made little sense to Susan unless he expected something horrible to happen. “I’m worth a million dollars dead and biking to work.” She wrote in an email to a friend, “You tell me how easy it would be to have an “accident.” Shortly after that, Susan disappeared. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe below on your platform of choice or wherever you listen to podcasts and be sure and leave us a rating or a review and share it with your friends, it really helps us out a lot: Apple: http://bit.ly/ColdonApple Google: http://bit.ly/ColdonGoogle Spotify: http://bit.ly/ColdonSpotify Follow for the latest on our website: http://bit.ly/TheColdPodcast Keep up to date on the latest with our Social accounts: Twitter: http://bit.ly/TwitterCold Facebook: http://bit.ly/FBCold Instagram: http://bit.ly/IGCold Reddit: http://bit.ly/RedditCold Episodes: Episode 1: http://bit.ly/ColdEp1 Episode 2: http://bit.ly/ColdEp2 Episode 3:http://bit.ly/ColdEp3 Episode 4: http://bit.ly/ColdEp4 Episode 5: http://bit.ly/ColdEp5 Episode 6: http://bit.ly/ColdEp6 Episode 7: http://bit.ly/ColdEp7 Episode 8: http://bit.ly/ColdEp8 Episode 9: http://bit.ly/ColdEp9 Episode 10: http://bit.ly/ColdEp10 Episode 11: http://bit.ly/ColdEp11 Episode 12: http://bit.ly/ColdEp12 Episode 13: http://bit.ly/ColdEp13 Episode 14: http://bit.ly/ColdEp14 Episode 15: http://bit.ly/ColdEp15 Episode 16: http://bit.ly/ColdEp16 Episode 17: http://bit.ly/ColdEp17 Episode 18: http://bit.ly/ColdEp18 If Susan’s story sounds familiar in your own life, in other words, if you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse in any form, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Support in the US is only a phone call away at the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233 or online at https://www.thehotline.org/