Julia McNeil
Julia McNeil was born and raised in The Family as the eldest of eleven children. She grew up in the UK, India, the Philippines, Italy and Belgium, before leaving the group in 1995 at age twenty. The challenges both she and her siblings faced when leaving The Family demonstrated to her firsthand the need for support and resources for those leaving high demand organizations.
In 2001, McNeil created the community website MovingOn.org for other young former Family members. This website provided a place for these second generation adults to interact with people who understood the challenges of integration into society and to participate in peer-to-peer support.
McNeil is a founding Director of Safe Passage Foundation, an organization whose goals include providing support and advocacy for people raised in restrictive and isolated communities. She currently lives in Canada and works as a Senior Systems Analyst for a pediatric health care and research facility.
