In a rare interview, Mary J. Blige has left it all on the table and truly opened up about her failed marriage to former manager Kendu Isaacs.
Talking to Power 105.1’s Angie Martinez, the singer revealed that the man who she once considered to be her everything is now contributing to, by far, “the worst time” of her life.
Promoting her forthcoming 13th studio album “Strength of a Woman,” which is slated to drop April 28th, the ESSENCE Fest 2017 headliner was candid about how draining ending her nearly 13-year marriage was for her and how the healing is coming along.
“I’m still standing,” she told her longtime friend. “I’m good. I have to be good. I don’t have a choice because it’s always bad and it’s always dark. I got to stay in the light and I got to take care of myself and keeping loving myself regardless of who ain’t loving me no more.”
Here are some of the highlights from the tell-all interview that has the Internet buzzing.
Her Tour Helped With Her Healing
“I needed that. I needed to be somewhere other than home thinking about all of this foolishness. You know, these lawyers and this and that and, you know just all the stupidity. I needed to be somewhere where I can vent and express myself and use my music as my own therapy you know, and get some energy back from the fans.”
She Regrets Making Him Her Everything
“Unfortunately he was my everything and you can’t make a person your everything, because you’re giving them too much power, you’re giving them God’s power. And this is why thing like this happen. So, I just gave him way too much but I gave him all of that so he can feel comfortable, you know, in the company of my peers. When he comes around, he’s not just my Mary J. Blige’s husband. And that’s what I wanted him to get. That’s why I gave him everything I gave him. I made him my everything and I wanted people to know about it because he was somebody I liked and he was my friend and I enjoyed being around him. So I was like ‘I want the world to see this.’ ‘I want the world to know who you are and know about you.'”
Her Longing For Love Hurt Her
“I felt I was always desperate to be loved by a man that I felt like ‘oh wow this is him.’ And you know look, my desperation got me tricked. You know? So you have to be careful.”
She Feels More Empowered Than Ever Before
“I definitely feel empowered…because I have to handle my own business now I gotta do everything myself and I just feel like I escaped something really bad, something that could have been worse than what it is. I’ve survived, this is something else that I gotta survive. But it’s fine because I have the power and the strength to do it. You know, I’m surviving it and you know, it was just horrible to be in something that when someone doesn’t want you and you know that they don’t want you no more. But you still trying to fight for it and save it. I was trying to fight for my marriage. The whole, when I went into the studio to write my album the whole thing was based on fighting for my marriage and my marriage wasn’t fighting for me. So, God had to reveal this because He was like “I’m not gonna let you step out there and lie to yourself and to people.” This man is doing this. Boom.”
Even though she’s going through the storm, Auntie Mary knows that the light at the end of the tunnel will be brighter than it’s ever been. When all is said is done, she plans on penning a memoir and she says she’ll probably never marry again, but who knows what life will bring.
Oh, and by the way, she’s not all that cracked up about her fans and followers imitating her dance moves–“not everyone does it right. My sh-t is swagged!”
Way to have fun Mary, you deserve it now more than ever!