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Both Jinger Duggar and Joy-Anna Duggar have been opening up about the lingering effects of their childhood.
The thoughtless way that their parents raised them has led them to face unique struggles as adults.
One grosser consequence is that they only developed good hygiene habits after they married.
When both Jinger and Joy married as very young adults, their respective husbands had to teach them about basic hygiene, like regular showering.
Jinger and Joy-Anna Duggar shared similar learning experiences when they married
On this week’s episode of The Jinger & Jeremy Podcast, Joy-Anna once again appeared as a guest.
Jinger was only 22 when she married Jeremy Vuolo. Joy was only 19 when she married Austin Forsyth.
(There are many who believe that these ages are simply too young for marriage, but the fundamentalist community has a vested interest in marrying off their members within the cult at a young age to keep them locked into the extreme lifestyle.)
Jinger and Joy can both attest that living on their family’s compound until they married at these young ages left them with habits that neither of their husbands liked.
Simply put, their hygiene was lacking. And both Jeremy and Austin let them know.
Before she married Austin, Joy did not wash her hair frequently or take daily showers.
“Some days you don’t feel dirty,” she claimed. “I did not care that much. [I was like], ‘Hygiene? Ehh.’”
This meant that, for Joy, the biggest adjustment after marrying Austin was showering every night to please her husband.
“That sounds crazy, doesn’t it?” she asked.
Daily showers are common, if not universal, in the US — especially in the hot-and-humid southeast, where the Duggar cult is situated.
Did they both marry ‘germophobe’ husbands?
“Jokingly, he was like, ‘You know when we get married, we’re gonna shower every night! We’re gonna be clean!’” Joy recalled.
“He let me know his expectations,” she continued, “and I was like, ‘Ok, fine.’”
Because Austin washes his hands frequently and sometimes showers twice a day in the summer, she labeled him a “germophobe.”
Austin’s showering habits sound like they’re within the normal range. That’s not something that we normally get to say about Austin Forsyth.
And washing your hands frequently is normally a healthy habit. But since the Duggars clearly did not learn good habits at home, they had to learn them once they married.
Unlike Austin, Jeremy was not aware of how unhygienic the Duggar daughters could be before he married Jinger.
“The hygiene thing has improved with Jeremy [in my life],” Jinger reported.
She shared that “he has improved my hygiene majorly. We won’t even get into all the hygiene things because it’s too much to talk about.”
Repeatedly, Jinger made it clear that there are aspects of hygiene that she was unwilling to discuss on the podcast. Joy seemed to feel the same. So it’s possible that the girls were a little grosser than they let on.
“I still don’t wash my hair [often], Joy,” Jinger Duggar admitted. Well, look at their mom. Sometimes people inherit their parents’ worst habits.
They both seem uncomfortable with certain hygiene topics
“The hygiene thing, it’s massive in [Jeremy’s] eyes,” Jinger added. Did both Jinger and Joy Duggar marry germophobes, or did they marry guys with normal hygiene expectations?
What we should remember about the Duggars is that they are, famously, a very large family.
Showering — and especially taking hot showers — was not always possible or practical. Hot water runs out, and then showers become uncomfortable or even painful.
Due to the restrictions of their cult, the Duggars were taught to hide and even ignore their bodies. They could not experience healthy sexual development and milestones and did not receive any real education — on their bodies or on numerous other topics.
The somewhat feral habits and Jinger and Joy describe having to unlearn to please their husbands aren’t really a surprise at that point. They’re just further sad consequences of the terrible choices of Jim Bob and Michelle.