It seems everyone is talking about Hannah Neeleman aka Ballerina Farm, but why are they?

She’s been described as the ultimate ‘trad wife’ and married her husband just two months after first meeting him

4 months ago

If you’ve been on TikTok or Twitter recently you might have seen a lot of conversation around a social media account called Ballerina Farm, run by Hannah Neeleman. There’s been a lot of controversy around her lifestyle and content, but who even is she and why are people getting so heated over the topic?

Who is Hannah Neeleman?

@ballerinafarm

I’ve been on a sheep’s milk ice cream kick. The milk is so creamy that I don’t have to add additional cream and I love that. However, we did add in some homemade apple pie and homemade maraschino cherries on top! It was what summer dreams are made of. 🍒 🐑 🥚

♬ If I Had You – The Benny Goodman Sextet

Ballerina Farm is the name of the social media account run by Hannah Neeleman, and boats a whopping nine million followers on Instagram and another 9.3 million on TikTok. She’s a former ballerina who trained at the highly prestigious Juilliard and was raised to be devoutly Mormon. After she met her husband they moved to a farm in Utah, that they named, surprise surprise, Ballerina Farm.

Whilst she was pegged to become a hugely successful ballerina, after moving to Utah with her husband she’s stopped dancing, and now seems to spend most of her days cooking and cleaning for her children and husband.

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A post shared by Daniel (@hogfathering)

Following her online success, an article was published about her which described her life as a “trad wife.” Trad wife is an abbreviation for the traditional wife, a role where women are expected to give birth, and typically stay home cooking and cleaning for their family.

The article claims that she had plans to turn a small barn on their farm into a dance studio for herself, but instead, it became a classroom for their children. Another part of the article discusses how “sometimes [Hannah] gets so ill from exhaustion that she can’t get out of bed for a week.”

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A post shared by Hannah @Ballerina Farm (@ballerinafarm)

However, Hannah has hit back at claims she’s a “trad wife”, telling The Times in an interview earlier this month: “I don’t necessarily identify with it because we are traditional in the sense that it’s a man and a woman, we have children, but I do feel like we’re paving a lot of paths that haven’t been paved before. So for me to have the label of a traditional woman, I’m kinda like, ‘I don’t know if I identify with that.”

However, the interviewer also admitted: “I can’t, it seems, get an answer out of Neeleman without her being corrected, interrupted or answered for by either her husband or a child.” There have also been concerns raised around the access she was allowed to pain relief whilst giving birth. She explained that with one of her children, she was “two weeks overdue, and she was 10lb and Daniel wasn’t with me…so I got an epidural.”

Concerned fans have pointed out the short time spans in which Hannah seems to have children, as she’s currently had eight children. The pair have previously said they leave pregnancy up to the will of God and do not use birth control.

Why is her relationship with her husband Daniel so controversial?

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A post shared by Official Mrs. American Pageant Page (@mrsamericanofficial)

There’s also been a lot of controversy over her husband Daniel Neeleman, who was previously the full time director of his father’s security company but is now the owner of Ballerina Farm. Daniel was also raised to be Mormon and his billionaire father is the founder of JetBlue airline. The two initially met at a basketball where Daniel asked Hannah out but she politely declined.

However, soon after Daniel found out Hannah would be flying from Salt Lake City to New York using none other than JetBlue Airlines. He then asked if he could sit next to her, leaving fans wondering if this was wildly romantic or bordering on creepy.

@ballerinafarm

We try and go on a date once a week. Usually dinner at a nice resturant, and its the happiest. Love you @Daniel

♬ original sound – Ballerina Farm

The two soon started dating whilst Hannah was still at Juilliard and she firmly told Daniel she wanted to date for a year before they got married so she could finish her time at Juilliard. According to the article, Daniel told her that wouldn’t work and they had “to get married now.” A mere two months after their JetBlue flight together they were married and three months later she was pregnant with their first child. Yikes.

One particularly controversial moment in their relationship happened recently when Hannah celebrated her birthday and shared a TikTok of herself opening the present from her husband. She explained she’d wanted tickets for a holiday to Greece, but he ended up giving her an apron so she could “finally collect eggs.”

@hannal.ballerinafarm

❤️❤️❤️ #foryou #ballerinafarm

♬ original sound – hannal.ballerinafarm

Because as everyone knows if your very hard working wife has expressed to her extremely wealthy husband she would love a holiday, an apron is basically the same thing, right?

What’s her response been to being called a ‘trad wife’?

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A post shared by Hannah @Ballerina Farm (@ballerinafarm)

One week after the initial article calling her a “trad wife” was published she shared a video with her thoughts on it. She explained: “A couple of weeks ago we had a reporter come into our home to learn more about our family and business. We thought the interview went really well, very similar to the dozens of interviews we had done in recent memory.”

Hannah continued, “We were taken back, however, when we saw the printed article, which shocked us and which shocked the world by being an attack on our family and my marriage, portraying me as oppressed with my husband being the culprit. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Nothing we said in the interview [implied this] which leads me to believe the angle taken was predetermined.”

She went on to explain how she and her husband are equal partners in everything and that the “greatest day” of her life was their wedding. She carried on: “Together we have built a business from scratch, brought eight children into this world and have prioritised our marriage all along the way. We are co-parents, co-CEOs, co-diaper changers, kitchen cleaners and decision makers. We are one.”