At the Ranch, Hill states that in addition to rote learning of the works of L. Ron Hubbard[9] she was expected to do heavy manual labor for 25 hours a week.
"[14] After leaving the Ranch in 1997, she began training in the Commodore's Messenger Organization, where Hill claims she was given repeated "security checks", investigations looking for confessions of misdemeanors (known as withholds) from past and present lives.
Hill states that due to the Scientology-ordered practice of disconnection with relatives and friends who do not support Scientology or are hostile to it, letters from her parents were intercepted and she was not allowed to answer a telephone for a year.
The open letter was in response to Pouw's statement refuting allegations about disconnection made in the book Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography.
[15] In the letter Hill wrote: [Disconnection] is a widespread practice and if you dare deny it I have a list of all of [their] names together—these people's families are crying every day because they can't speak to their children who did nothing but leave the Church of their own free will.
[20] She has been interviewed about her experiences within Scientology by a number of media outlets, including ABC's Nightline in April 2008,[21][22] and Piers Morgan Tonight in February 2013 discussing details of the church.
On February 8, 2013, while appearing on radio's Opie & Anthony Show, she stated that she first learned about the story of Xenu from watching the South Park episode "Trapped in the Closet".
In 2013, Hill published her book Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape under the William Morrow imprint of HarperCollins.
Hill told James Naughtie, host of BBC Today programme, about her book and her life in Scientology's most secretive inner core, the Sea Org.