Amish escapee reveals how she was banned from showering, cutting her hair or brushing her teeth – meaning she had to get dentures at age 17
A woman who grew up in one of America’s most conservative Amish communities has revealed the shocking rules she had to live by until she fled at the age of 19.
Lizzie Ens lived with her parents and 18 siblings on the ultra-strict 80-acre Swartzentruber Amish farm in Ohio.
Ens, now 38, has shared details of her early years with DailyMail.com, before she entered the ‘modern world’ after breaking away from the isolated and challenging traditionalist lifestyle.
Once Ens adjusted to her newfound freedom, she built a successful beauty business and helped others as a wellness coach.
During her strict upbringing, she was not allowed to shower, shaving was forbidden, haircuts were not allowed and brushing her teeth was not a daily activity. At the age of 17, she lost all her top teeth and had to get dentures in her mouth.
“There was no electricity, no indoor plumbing, no running water, and an outhouse that was the toilet where we urinatedThe kly baths were done in a shared stainless steel tub of water,” she revealed.
‘We weren’t allowed to shave, so we had hair under our arms and on our legs. We were not allowed to use armpit deodorant and newspaper was used as toilet paper.’
Lizzie Ens was 19 when she fled her ultra-strict Amish lifestyle in 2004. She said photos and videos were prohibited. The photo was taken by an Amish friend who had left the community. She said no one in her family had ever seen it
Ens, now 38, is a successful health and wellness coach and co-founder of a beauty company she launched in October
The dress code was strict: a head covering, long-sleeved dresses fastened with straight pins instead of buttons and zippers, and bras were not allowed to be worn, instead women wore undergarments.
Although there are numerous sects of the Amish, some are not so rigid, she explained, saying hers was the “strictest.”
‘There was no internet. No electronics. No pictures. No video. No television. Nothing from the outside world,” she told DailyMail.com.
Ens revealed that she and her twin brother had once tried to flee, but returned two days later because her sister felt too much guilt for leaving her Amish life behind.
But two years later, on June 30, 2004, the day Ens made a daring escape. She climbed to the roof of her three-story house, took off her hood, let down her long hair and jumped fifty feet to the ground.
“I jumped for my freedom,” she said. ‘I was scared, excited and relieved.
‘Afraid because I didn’t know if I would ever see my family again. Relieved because for the first time in my life I had the opportunity to follow my heart and my dreams.’
Leaving behind the only life she had ever known, Ens had just $20 in her pocket and wasted no time running away from her family, including her twin sister, who she said she didn’t want to leave.
Two days after she ran away, she told DailyMail.com that she had gotten a job as a dishwasher at a local restaurant.
She said the people who hired her had a “huge impact” on her life transition from Amish culture to the modern world.
Not Amish, they helped give her the support and resources she needed to get a Social Security card, a driver’s license and a car.
‘They taught me how to drive. I was terrified the first time behind the wheel, but within weeks of passing my road test I was driving alone. It was crazy,” said Ens, who used to drive a horse and cart.
But as she tried her best to adjust to the world she thought she belonged in, Ens said there was “a huge culture shock.”
“You have no idea how little you know about the world until you start to realize how little you know,” she said. ‘Then the shock begins to sink in’
Ens spoke at a function last year and shared her journey with others. At the beginning of the presentation she wore traditional Amish clothing (pictured), but underneath she had a stylish dress showing the transition
One of the first things she had to learn was how to get a job and get a regular job so she could pay bills.
“It was incredibly foreign,” she said. “I’ve never made my own money or had to pay rent or bills.”
She also had to apply for a Social Security number — a concept that was completely unfamiliar — but even the little things were mind-boggling, including a task as simple as turning on a light switch.
“Wow, this is amazing,” she remembered thinking. “I don’t need to light a kerosene lamp.”
She still remembers the feeling of experiencing a shower for the first time, which she described as “exhilarating” once she got outside.
But slowly Ens adapted to her new lifestyle, including beauty treatments and self-care that are now part of her daily routine.
“All my life I’ve been told it was a sin to cut my hair,” said Ens, who described her hair as hip-length.
“When I went to the salon and got my hair cut, I felt like I was losing the old version of myself.”
Shaving was another dramatic change, she explains. ‘Shaving was one of the first things I did when I left. “I didn’t know what I was doing when I first bought a razor, and it was painful and took me at least two hours.”
The Amish life made her extremely “self-sufficient,” something she says the modern world “crashes” for
Shopping for basic clothes – jeans and a T-shirt, even underwear – was life-changing.
“I bought my first outfit at Walmart. As an Amish woman, I wasn’t allowed to wear a bra, so that was super exciting for me.”
She added: “Putting on those first pairs of jeans was so surreal. I had never worn pants in my life. It felt like I was in a new body and a new world.”
Eating out took some getting used to, ordering from the menu and tasting a whole new range of food.
‘We grew our own fruit and vegetables, raised our own animals and milked our own cows. Most of our food was homemade and eating out was not an option and we didn’t do it,” she said.
She described her first visit to a Chinese restaurant as an interesting experience.
“I looked at all the food and thought nothing looked good,” she recalled, “so all I ate was the fruit.”
Based on her experience, she believes that women in Amish culture struggle to fulfill their potential.
“I came from a very oppressed background and really needed to be taught and guided by others on how to have a voice, which is one of the reasons I’m here today,” she said.
She added, “but I have the utmost respect for the way I grew up and what it taught me that made me the person I am today.”
Looking back, Ens is confident that she made the right decision.
‘I have no regrets. If I were still here, I wouldn’t be able to have the impact with my company that I have with my customers and on the world.’
Today, she said, she has a good relationship with her mother and keeps in touch with three other siblings who also left, but she does not speak to the others who remained.
She told DailyMail.com that her twin brother, who she hasn’t spoken to in years, finally got married and is expecting to give birth to her 11th child any day.
“If I had stayed, I probably would have gotten married and eventually had a lot of children, just like my twin sister – which was one of the main reasons I didn’t want to stay there,” she said.
She launched Miss Commando, a company for women by women, something she never would have been able to achieve if she had stayed in her Amish life.
Ens worked hard to become a health and wellness coach, channeling all the good things she learned during her Amish upbringing into launching a career — something she wouldn’t have been able to achieve if she had stayed put.
Last year she gave a speech in which she shared her personal journey. She wore traditional Amish clothing, but surprised the audience when she stripped off her modest clothing to reveal a stylish “modern” outfit underneath to show the transition.
Unlike her twin brother Ens, she is a single mother of a five-year-old son. Earlier this year, she and her husband divorced after ten years of marriage, something that was also not common in her previous life.
These days, she’s busy running a business and raising her son while living her best life in Phoenix, Arizona, far from the isolated and sheltered she once knew.
In October, she launched a female-run company called Miss Commando, which sells eco-friendly beauty soaps and lotions made from goat’s milk.
To continue her mission of sustainability, she teamed up with Michael Coleman, a distant relative of The Coleman Camping Family.
Their collaboration, she explained, aims to create a movement to use hemp fibers as a solution in the outdoor industry.
Its goat-based products and packaging are stored in biodegradable, non-toxic hemp plastic containers.