MAGA ex-wife says she believed God would provide if she listened to her husband before leaving

Stefania Messina once believed she could stop worrying about money, work and politics if she simply did what she was taught: submit to her husband and trust in God.

The Michigan woman says she took that belief quite seriously. She became an evangelical market wife, took up housekeeping and homeschooling, and came to realize that her husband’s leadership extended to decisions regarding money, politics, and even voting.

Over time, this worldview began to crumble.

Messina’s account, featured in The Guardian’s series on former MAGA supporters, offers a striking look at how faith, marriage, motherhood and political identity intertwined in her life.

From postpartum depression to “tradewife life”

Messina said she took a deep dive into her faith after the birth of her third son, when she was experiencing severe postpartum depression without fully realizing it.

While working, she was overwhelmed with caring for three children. Looking back, she said she believed she also struggled with an unequal division of labor, and at the time she didn’t have the words to describe it. Instead, she turned to the church.

This eventually led her to the tradwife movement, where she embraced the belief that she did not need to pursue financial independence because God would take care of her family.

“I don’t have to work. I don’t have to worry about how I’m going to afford these kids because God will figure it out,” she recalls thinking.

She said she believes that if she listens to her husband and submits to his leadership, “God will bless me.” She added: “I took it 100% seriously. I was a trade wife.

“It wasn’t my job to vote.”

Her understanding of submission went far beyond household duties.

Messina said she was taught that politics was not her responsibility and that she should not worry about voting or deciding who to support.

“It wasn’t my job to vote or know who to vote for,” she said. “I just had to obey my husband and do what he thought was necessary.”

This revelation is central to her story because her experience as an evangelical sales wife was not just about cooking, caring for children, or staying at home. She said this has affected the way she understands her own political agency.

Her MAGA was “Make America Godly Again.”

Messina also says her support for MAGA was based primarily on religion, rather than personal devotion to Donald Trump.

“I have never worn a red hat. I’ve never been to a Trump rally. My MAGA was “Make America Godly Again,” she said.

“My loyalty was not to Trump. I was devoted to God and the church.”

She also recalled how she was advised not to use left-wing media because it was considered “demonic”. Recalling that period, Messina said: “I was so deep in what I can only call a religious psychosis.”

This is Messina’s own description, not a formal medical diagnosis, and should not be presented as such.

COVID has challenged everything

The Covid-19 pandemic was a turning point for Messina.

She trained and worked as a respiratory therapist and said her professional experience increasingly contradicted the messages she heard from political and religious leaders. She recalled her pastor calling the COVID lockdown a “demonic attempt by the deep state” to keep people out of church.

Then came a devastating personal loss. In March 2021, Messina’s former partner and father of her eldest son died in a motorcycle accident. At the funeral, she recalls, the pastor’s wife told her son that the death was a “blessing in disguise” because he would grow up without non-Christian influences.

For Messina this was a turning point. “After that I was done,” she said.

Recovery after MAGA

The departure was not immediate. Messina said she was afraid to speak out because she thought people would hate her.

But as her views became more progressive, she said she felt her compassion return. Her departure ultimately forced her to reconsider her views on marriage, work, motherhood, money, politics, and religious authority.

She now describes leaving as an ongoing process rather than a single political conversion.

“I don’t care how long it takes,” Messina said. “I will deconstruct the rest of my life.”

For a former MAGA worker wife who once believed that obedience would bring God’s blessing, leaving a relationship meant questioning the very structure that once promised to make her life safe.