A MAN who grew up in a religious cult with 44 siblings has revealed what restarting his life was like after leaving - saying he had to "deprogram and unwind himself" from the culture.
Calvin Wayman grew up in a polygamist community with 44 siblings, four mums and one dad all living under the same roof.
The 34-year-old was born into a fundamentalist Mormon cult which believed men with multiple wives would receive a higher rank in heaven.
Calvin said pursuing his dream of being an entrepreneur “blew this thing wide open” because he was able to look at his life from an outside perspective.
However, he first had to “derprogram, unwind and unravel” himself from the cult mindset.
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Speaking in Truly series My Extraordinary Family, he said: “Hands down, the best part of my life and upbringing is having 44 siblings.
“But there were certain key points in my life where the religion became very detrimental to my development.”
Calvin grew up thinking having five parents and endless siblings was totally normal, before he began conjuring up dreams of his own.
He is the sixth of his biological mother Christine's 12 children, but he was raised with three other mums in the house.
After questioning his lifestyle throughout his twenties, at 30-years-old Calvin travelled 500 miles from the family farm in Utah to southern California, US to start a new life.
Upon leaving the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), he discovered not all of the religion resonated with him.
He studied the origins of the FLDS, which was founded in 1929.
It was formed after The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rejected polygamy in 1890 and cast off members who refused to give up having multiple spouses.
One of the cult’s previous leaders Warren Jeffs was sentenced to life in prison in 2011.
Jeffs was convicted of aggravated sexual assault of two children, aged 12 and 15, whom he took as wives.
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He is believed to have 78 wives and at least 60 children.
Unfortunately, not all of Calvin's family were supportive of him chasing his dream to become an entrepreneur and thought he should stay working his 9-5 in Utah.
He explained: “When you have 50 people in your family, there's a lot of different reactions.
“The person that was the most sad for me I felt was my dad, and I think he took it personally when I decided to leave.
“He was really wanting to understand why, and then he tried to talk me out of it.
“He gave me a couple of different books and said, ‘Please, read these before you make the full decision’.
“I said, ‘I will read them, but I've already decided’.”
Calvin added: “The judgement that I felt when I left was challenging.
“A lot of people in the community were quick to say something sharp.
“Because as far as their view goes, I was someone that got sucked into the allure of fame and money in the world, and it got incredibly toxic in some places.”
Since Calvin left the cult four years ago, his biological mother Christine has followed suit.
She revealed in the Truly documentary: “Once you are away from the religion and the location, a lot of those things in your mind that are going on drops off too.
“I have about six children that have left [the cult] and as they grew up they gave me bits and pieces of things to think about.
“I was a very open-minded type of mother.”
Calvin is currently living in New York - on the other side of America to his family farm in Utah - and said it's the first place he has ever been able to fully relax.
