The crowd was more excited and fevered then a crowd at a popular football game. I am not kidding! Practically every Diamond that was in the Dream Builders organization was there, as well as a major slue of celebrities and motivational speakers. Even good 'ol Florence Litower (sorry if I spelled her last name incorrectly) was there, and she was one of the speakers we listened to on tape and rather enjoyed. I found her to be humorous at the time. There were fire works, laser lights, special effects from dry ice and spot lights going in all directions inside the large coliseum, and the whole décor and theme was extremely patriotic.

It was all very compelling at first, and I sat there watching all of this unfold in an almost awestruck way. Before they let anyone inside the convention, they had us wait outside in the heat for what seemed like a very long time. Once we finally were inside, the excitement escalated beyond belief, and I was in the throws of a true cult and didn't even realize it at the time.

Although I can say that something Janet (our direct's wife) said to me did send some warning signals, and I was truly turned off by her statement. I made the comment on how amazing it was that the crowd was so immense, and she said that it was like a ministry to them, and that this was their church. She wasn't kidding! They certainly had no qualms about bringing "God" into the picture.

After we had made it into town, we all piled into two vans (up-line's vans) and went to the convention center together. Jim and I ended up sitting in that convention center all night long as a result. This was a terrible mistake, but we had no way of knowing that this would happen. Our up-line practically refused to take us to the motel, because they didn't want to miss out on anything. They said they had been to these before, and it was very important that we not miss out on any of it. We didn't argue. Bad mistake looking back.

We couldn't afford cab fare, and it was too far to walk back to our motel. We sat there all night long totally exhausted, and the speaking and parading went on and on. My breasts were killing me and my feet hurt terribly, and I was hungry, and so tired. We never even had the chance to sleep in that motel room we paid for! It was a total waste of money.

It wasn't only me who was being affected by lack of breaks from the program. There were many people who hadn't left at all, and it was plain to see that they were totally exhausted as well. Many people were asleep in their chairs and would fade in and out. I even nodded off from time to time, but wasn't in a deep sleep and could still hear the speakers and music and so on. It was all so loud and really was nightmarish in nature after a while. I swore that never again would I attend a "Dream Weekend" convention, and I didn't.

All I could think about was getting to my baby and feeding her, and making sure she was okay. I had tried reaching the babysitter on several occasions during the convention, but never could get an answer! I was almost crazed with worry. I wanted to start back home several times, but no one…not even Jim, seemed to be particularly concerned about the pain I was in, or my worried state of mind.

All this was racing through my mind as I drove, and each mile made me angry and very anxious. I was driving a Ford Probe (turbo charged) at the time. I kept going faster and faster have to get home to my baby my poor baby how could I leave her with a stranger must get to her! This is all crazy what are we doing? I have to get home I can't wait to get rid of this pain

I was practically frantic while Jim slept in the passenger seat. I had not slept in almost 24 hours and Jim was sleeping soundly. I resented him for that, and for not understanding the pain I was suffering, or the exhaustion. I resented him for talking me into leaving our daughter with our up-line's daughter. But worse of all, I resented myself and was angry with myself for being so feeble minded and allowing myself to be talked into such a ridiculous trip.

It was about a 17 or 18 hour drive from our house to that convention! What the hell were we thinking! We weren't thinking that's the problem. If we had been thinking we would have stayed at home! We didn't have the money to waste on all the gas to get there, our food, lodging, etc We certainly had no business attempting that long of a drive to hurry up and get to this convention, only to have to turn right back around after it was over and drive all that distance back home. And we were not aware that we would get virtually no sleep that whole weekend. More on the reason for this later I have a theory about yet another tactic to brainwash distributors.

You see, we really were under the influence of our up-line's constant hounding to do what it takes to make the business work, and under the influence of all those Diamond's speeches, and all the tapes we listened to, and "the system, the system, THE SYSTEM"! We were in so deep, that we couldn't even see the manipulation tactics at play. We really thought our up-line did have our best interest in mind I mean after all, they did come to the hospital after I gave birth! They sent me flowers and they all wanted us to succeed so badly! HA!

How could we have been so gullible and so stupid? Those people only wanted to succeed themselves, and they knew in order to do that, they had to try to force us to build a down line so they could reap the benefits. (by the way, we had no down line yet and I bet we would have been the same way if we had) And they were so far gone themselves, that they didn't even realize that they were just as controlled as we were.

They honestly believed in "the system". Never mind the actual hardship we had to suffer, or the financial danger. NEVER MIND the potential danger to our lives! "Just do what it takes to get there, because you HAVE to do this to understand how to build this business successfully"

I should have refused to drive, but Jim was also exhausted, and I was worried he would fall asleep at the wheel. I was afraid we would be killed and I wouldn't be there for my baby, so I took over and started driving. Stopping somewhere was out of the question for me, because of my obsession to get home as fast as possible.

I obviously wasn't thinking straight. My imagination getting the better of me, but that was how it was. The stage for disaster set, and we were reeling towards it at break neck speed. All open highway ahead, then suddenly without warning brake lights coming at me fast from out of the darkness. I wanted to scream, but couldn't!

No time to scream. I slammed on the breaks, but there was a problem. I didn't really slam on the breaks! Instead, my foot came back down on the accelerator! The turbo kicked in like a rocket and we shot forward so fast my head was pinned into the seat. All I could do to keep from slamming into the back end of that car, while traveling at over 100 miles an hour, was to veer the car just in the nick of time into the median!

We hit the grass and I lost complete control of the car, because by then, my foot had automatically without thought found the breaks. Incredibly the car didn't go airborne, or flip over and over! The low center of gravity (thank you Ford) and possibly the "g" forces as well, kept us pinned to the ground. We did however do many revolutions, and Jim of course was awake by this time, and freaking out completely!

I still couldn't scream, but remember thinking how sorry I was for going to that stupid convention sorry for driving too fast sorry for losing control of the car sorry for being at fault and probably killing us both (I really thought we were going to die because of me), and extremely sorry for my sweet baby daughter all while the car kept on spinning around and around

I was so panicked by the time I hit the median, that I just let go of the wheel completely, and took my foot off the breaks. I had no idea how to get the car back under control and really thought we were dead no matter what I tried. It was horrible in the worst way. Jim's face was sheer terror and I had never really seen terror like that on another human's face. I am even shaking now, as I relive those seconds that seemed like an eternity.

Our car was spinning all over the place, and we did one final revolution on the opposite side of the highway, between an eighteen wheeler, and what appeared to me to be a station wagon, then came crashing into the guardrail where we finally stopped moving. I can't tell you how many revolutions the car did before we finally stopped, but I believe it was about 10 or so.

The next thing that happened was a state trooper came along and he almost didn't let us get back on the road. I begged him to let us go, because I just had to get home to my daughter. Jim said he would be driving the rest of the way, and that he would stop at the slightest moment he felt tired. The trooper let us go.

It was amazing that the car could still be driven, as it didn't suffer much damage. We were terribly shaken up from the ordeal, and Jim didn't speak to me the rest of the way home. He was incredibly furious with me. Finally we made it home and I was never so happy to see my baby I can assure you, and was totally relieved that she was happy, okay and unchanged but I had been changed. I had been changed the minute we bought that damn kit and signed up! And my marriage had been changed as well.

Had I known that Gayla had plans to steal my husband, I would have done some things differently. We wouldn't have been in Amway for very long probably, or at least not under the up-line we were under. One day Jim went to pick up products, and Gayla was home alone. According to Jim (and this didn't come out until much later, so I don't know really any side of the story except his) Gayla came on to him very strongly. She had blatantly suggested that since no one was around (me or her husband), that she and Jim should get better acquainted in the bedroom. She had her nerve!

Imagine my disgust when on top of everything else, I found this out. For all I know she succeeded in getting him into the bedroom. Our marriage wasn't very strong at the time, and she could have easily persuaded him. He was just as vulnerable in some ways as I was. I was furious with her, and if I could have tracked her down, we would have had some words! So much for everyone in Amway having integrity as they wanted us to believe. I can't help but wonder if women's purses had been stolen, or money taken during some of those meetings, rallies, and conventions we attended. I bet they were!

By the time we had quit the business, major damage had been done to our financial situation and to our marriage. I was truly ashamed that I was ever involved in the Amway business, and I tried to forget about all of it. After being out of it for a while, I did manage to block out quite a bit, because I didn't want to be reminded of how stupid and vulnerable I was. Little did I know at the time that I would be telling you this story and needing some of those fine details.

However, I feel I was able to recall enough to help you get a pretty good feel for how Amway works, and what it is about. I feel that my story isn't really unique and there are dozens of letters from people on this web site who have experienced some very similar things. The overwhelming response from people of all walks of life, to this site, was my inspiration to bring these words to you. I hope it has helped you to read it, as much as it helped me to write it.

• Go back to Russell's Amway page.