James Brown‘s daughters explain the reasons behind their forgiveness after witnessing their mother being physically assaulted by him.
In the upcoming edition of PEOPLE magazine, Deanna Brown Thomas and Yamma Brown, candidly share their journey towards forgiving their father despite witnessing him mistreat their mother, Deidre Jenkins, during their childhood.
“When you see a family member being hurt, you’re not feeling the best about the person that’s hurting them,” Yamma said. “I was flat-out upset, mad with my dad at that moment. I still go back to that place every now and then, not to belittle my dad, but flashing back over my own life and the domestic violence situation in my life, thinking how much of that shaped me.”
Additionally, during a four-part docuseries chronicling Brown’s life and career, which debuted on Monday and Tuesday on A&E, Yamma addressed the final time she witnessed her father striking her mother—and how she intervened at just 6 years old to diffuse the altercation.
“I talk about it in the sense that it happened. It is an unfortunate time in anybody’s situation, anybody’s life. If they’ve ever had to go through domestic violence, they know what that’s like. And it shows that he was human because he was flawed, but it also is a time to show grace,” she said.
Despite his “intense” demeanor, Deanna reassured that her father never directed his anger towards his daughters.
“He never had any type of rage towards us because we were his children. That was a situation between a husband and a wife. There’s different type of love, different type of circumstances,” Deanna added.
James and Jenkins filed for divorce in 1981. However, in his third marriage to Adrienne Rodriguez, he faced multiple arrests for assaulting her.
