Note: This article contains subject matter relating to suicide. Please read and share cautiously. If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Hotline online or via phone at 1-800-273-8255 or 1-888-628-9454 for Spanish speakers (for the deaf and hard of hearing, contact 1-800-799-4889).
Tamar Braxton has more to say about her time on Braxton Family Values.
According to Atlanta Black Star, Braxton wrote some heavy claims about the show on Instagram, stating, “Ya wanna know a fun fact? We have been the only and #1 Black all-female family show for the past 10 years and have NEVER been nominated or been fairly compensated for ANYTHING!!”
"Sometimes you have to be your own flower," she continued. "We love each other and get along better than ever now."
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Braxton famously left the series after it severely impacted her mental health. In 2020, she told Tamron Hall how the series nearly cost her her relationship with her family.
“I love my family. And I don’t want to fight with my family. And I don’t want to be an example of a family who fights and argues and always has turmoil. And now we’re at a point where it’s assaults and threats. This is not the show that I created,” she said. “I created the Braxton Family Values because I wanted to be an example of the Black community with five Black amazing sisters, with all different walks of life, who can inspire and help and people can learn from our experiences along the way. We wasn’t teaching anything but being devilish and I didn’t want to do that.”
Braxton began talking about her issues with the series after being hospitalized for a suicide attempt in 2020. She later wrote that the show, plus We TV’s alleged treatment of her, led her to feeling worthless.
“Over the past 11 years there were promises made to protect and portray my story, with the authenticity and honesty I gave,” she wrote. “I was betrayed, taken advantage of, overworked, and underpaid. I wrote a letter over 2 months ago asking to be freed from what I believed was excessive and unfair. I explained in personal detail the demise I was experiencing. My cry for help went totally ignored. However the demands persisted. It was my spirit, and my soul that was tainted the most….Who I was [began] to mean little to nothing, becuase it would only be how I was portrayed on television that would matter. I twas witnessing the slow death of the woman I became, that discouraged my will to fight. I felt like I was no longer living, I was existing for the purpose of a corporation[‘s] gain and ratings, and that killed me.”
She also wrote how she will fight for those who have experienced several mental illness.
“I will do everything in my power to aid those who [suffer] from mental illness including those of us [whose] mental [health] was only a result from the toxic, systemic bondage that dwells in television. It was only God’s gace and His mercy on my attempt to end my pain and my life that I am here to utilize my voice.”
If you or someone you know is suffering from suicidal ideation, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8225 or visit the lifeline’s website.
