There were tears in the public gallery on Friday as a former resident of Gloriavale recalled the exhaustion and brutal work hours she suffered within the community.
Virginia Courage is one of six women arguing she was an employee while working at the isolated Christian commune rather than a volunteer, in an Employment Court case in Christchurch.
Courage gave birth to nine children inside Gloriavale. On Friday she held her 11th child which she'll raise outside of the isolated West Coast commune.
"They might tell you that you're taking all your children to hell which for a mother was unbearable to even think about or consider," Courage said in court.
The 43-year-old left Gloriavale in 2019 because she felt the community was straying from its Christian faith.
"To say that Gloriavale is a Christian community is wrong. It is a cheap labour camp," Courage said.
Current Gloriavale members who have attended each day this week deny work is forced.
Courage said when she was a young single woman life was tough.
"By the time they actually get to bearing their children, their bodies are physically damaged."
Courage said she was expected to go to work, rather than care for her babies.
"I was getting my primary school-aged sisters to go to my room in the morning as I worked and a couple of times they forgot and I could hear her screaming where I was working in the kitchen."
Work even underpinned relationships in the community.
"I know of girls in Gloriavale that couldn't work fast enough or hard enough or put out the same standard of work as other people and they were picked on, bullied, ostracized," Courage said in court.
One of Courage's daughters fell into that category, it drove her from the community.
During her pregnancy with her tenth child Courage was at breaking point.
"I was over 20 weeks pregnant with my tenth kid. I was still throwing up with morning sickness. I just thought 'I want to die, I want to die'."
Channelling that emotion on the fifth day of an employment court hearing examining the role of women at Gloriavale.
"A volunteer doesn't exist in Gloriavale, you are not volunteering, it's always called work at Gloriavale."
But on the outside, as Courage's family now is, it'll take a court to decide.
