Ahead of the release of Jill's memoir, the former reality star and her husband opened up to ET.
Jill Duggar Dillard is getting candid in her new memoir, Counting the Cost, about everything from her rocky relationship with her parents to the emotional toll of having her childhood trauma thrust into the spotlight when police reports were leaked by the press.
Jill and her husband, attorney Derick Dillard, recently sat down with ET's Deidre Behar and reflected on the painful experience of tabloids publishing the leaked police reports regarding how she and some of her siblings were victims of abuse by her eldest brother, Josh Duggar, when they were children.
"That was one subject in the book that I was very. very careful about bringing up, and not wanting to go delve deeper into it," Jill shared. "Because it is a very traumatic time in my life and one that I talk about as just feeling humiliated in front of everybody."
In May 2015, In Touch published redacted police records from 2006 revealing that Jill and several of her sisters were victims of molestation by Josh when they were children, and included police interviews with family patriarch Jim Bob Duggar. Josh was later convicted of receiving and possessing child pornography and is currently serving a more than 12-year sentence.
In Derick's mind, the police reports should never have seen the light of day.
"I think the world did not have to find out about it," Derick said of the leak. "I think what is important is that, once that happened, the judge [should have] had that destroyed. Like, that should never have happened."
When it comes to who they feel is responsible for the leak, Jill claimed that "the city of Springdale and Washington County and the police chief and In Touch magazine... these people are the people that just used us as victims."
"There were bad actors in the family, bad actors in the media, bad actors in city government, county government," Derick claimed. "It all created the perfect storm... [and] even to this day they have not -- the actors responsible -- have not been held accountable."
While she's reluctant to dredge up the details of the reports, Jill explained, "I do want to advocate for victims and just again say how victims should never have to be put in the position that I was put in and what happened in my life... with these records being exposed."
After the records came to light, Jill and the other members of her family who were involved in the Duggar Family controversy became the center of much-unwanted attention. As the years progressed, Jill took back more and more of her autonomy, and began to address the situation with candor -- privately and publicly.
According to Jill and Derick, that led to some real tension between her and Jim Bob.
Jill recalled how she last saw her father when she was hanging out with her sister, Jinger Duggar, and Jim Bob "showed up" while they were having a "girls' brunch." And while outwardly things were pleasant, Jill said it was clear he was distancing her, emotionally.
"He won't bring anything up when we're all together," Jill said, adding that the mood "might be awkward" but not confrontational.
"It's not like it used to be... It used to you would get pulled to the side into a room and [told off], you know, behind closed doors," Jill said. "But now... there's this respect of our boundary, where it would not fly. Like, we would pick up and leave [if] something that came up."
"I think what's sad is that the pattern we've seen is kinda happening to us, where if you're somebody that he can't control then you're cut off," Derick added. "It's like, 'I can't control you, so you're cut off.'"
"You can hang out sometimes, and have surface-level conversations," Jill explained. "Which is what I am actually wanting right now."
Jill's emotional and candid memoir, Counting the Cost, is on bookshelves now. See the video below for more on ET's exclusive sit-down with Jill and Derick.
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