How Jill Duggar's Husband Derick Finally Hit Back At Jim Bob After Years Of Tension

Jill Duggar Dillard, along with her 18 siblings, were raised with strict rules by their parents, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. The world got to see a lot of that in the Duggars' hit TLC shows and specials, including "19 Kids and Counting" and its spinoff, "Counting On." In Jill's memoir, "Counting the Cost," she revealed several crushing things about her parents and her life growing up as a part of a reality TV family. For instance, Jill acknowledged the pressure she felt from her father harmed her marriage to her husband, Derick Dillard, whom she married in 2014. 

That seems to be a major contributing factor for Jill and Derick leaving "Counting On" in 2017, and Jill confirmed that as of her book's publication, they still have a strained relationship with both of her parents. The former reality star spoke with Christy Carlson Romano on her podcast, "Vulnerable," about the relationship between her husband and father and how it broke down. 

"It used to be really great," she admitted, but over time everything fell apart, with Derick standing up for his wife and telling Jim Bob that how he was treating her wasn't acceptable. It got so bad that it reached the point where Jill said Derick had to tell her dad, "If you keep contacting her directly, then I will have to file a protective order." That's a serious breakdown in the relationship.

Derick Dillard's breaking point, which led to him threatening to issue a legal protective order against Jim Bob Duggar, didn't come out of nowhere. Rather, it was after years of escalating tension that began, as Jill Duggar Dillard told Christy Carlson Romano, "Once we started having some differences and saying things that weren't — we weren't falling in line with everything."

That difference of opinion and not following the strict patriarch's orders directly went against how Jill was raised within her fundamentalist Christian family. Secrets about the religion she was raised in — the Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP) — were shockingly revealed in the Amazon Prime docuseries, "Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets." Following your father's rules is a must.

Just one of the things Jill and Derick did that Jim Bob Duggar wasn't happy about was drinking alcohol. Jill detailed in her memoir, "Counting the Cost," how her father found out that Derick was drinking a beer, and in what seems like a massive overreaction for a single drink, though perhaps not for someone within the IBLP faith, he tried to then force Derick to go to rehab for alcoholism.

Derick and Jill Duggar Dillard also accused her father of not paying them for their filming work for TLC, including for their wedding special. After attorneys were brought into it, a settlement was reached. Jill noted in her memoir that the ongoing harsh treatment she received from Jim Bob Duggar led to her telling him, "You treat me like I'm a prodigal who's turned her back on you. You treat me worse than you treat my pedophile brother." Josh Duggar was found guilty of possessing child pornography and of molesting four of his sisters when he was a young teenager.

Derick has also made his feelings about Jim Bob's actions clear. In comments on a TLC Instagram post in 2020, he wrote disparagingly about the patriarch, asserting that he and Jill had been "humiliated and threatened when we first tried not to film," (via the Daily Mail). Derick also compared his father-in-law to Jeffrey Epstein when it came to power and control. 

Then, in 2021, Dillard called Jim Bob a manipulative, money-hungry liar in a lengthy Facebook comment on a since-removed post. It doesn't seem like a restraining order against him was ever put in place, though. But even without one, it's clearly going to take quite some time before there's a healthy relationship between Jill, Derick, and Jim Bob again, if ever.