Michelle Duggar Used to Gift 'Spanking Rods' to New Moms at Baby Showers: Source

Michelle Duggar allegedly gave out "rods of correction" as gifts to new mothers at her church, according to a source who spoke with popular TLC blogger Katie Joy, also known as WithoutACrystalBall.

The source, who was only identified as "Alice", claimed that she would "never forget" the day that the mother-of-19 brought a flexible rod to her baby shower and gave it to her as a gift to eventually use on her soon-to-be born child.

"When Alice opened the gift, she found a long white rod, with a black handle and black tip. She said it was flexible and like rubber but not rubber," Katie Joy wrote, recalling her conversation with Alice. "She said the device would wrap around the body part you spanked and go back to straight when complete."

"Alice says Michelle gleefully told her that this is a gift she gives to all moms then told her she should [use] this on her children as 'correction'," the post continued, adding that the TLC star happily "instructed Alice on the importance of using the rod of correction as much as possible to train her children to be obedient."

Alice told the blogger that she was "terrified" of the rod and never used it on any of her kids. It was later discovered that type of device is generally sold to adults and is meant to be used by couples who practice BDSM.

Katie Joy noted that Michael Pearl — who wrote the controversial book To Train Up a Child, which detailed what are believed by many to be abusive techniques for parents to use to discipline their kids — took the design to make his own to market to parents.

"Alice remembers Michelle being the child discipline coordinator of sorts for all the new moms," she continued in her lengthy post. "She also remembers a time when the Duggars and the home church discussed the idea of husbands spanking their wives. She didn’t know if any of the husbands ever did this to their wives but it was a topic for quite some time."

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This comes months after the release of Prime Video docuseries Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets pulled back the curtain on the dark, inner workings of the family's cult-like religious beliefs.

Duggar cousin Amy King admitted that she had been "fearful" at times of visiting her aunt and uncle's home because of their way of disciplining their children.

"They literally said, 'You need to come into the room and we need to give you some encouragement,'" she said in the doc. "But it was in the sweetest tone ever of like, 'Do you need encouragement? I think you need encouragement.'"