Tyra Banks is opening up about a troubled time in her past when she was in an emotionally abusive relationship.
The supermodel admits on a new episode of TV One’s Uncensored that she side-eyed other women who stayed in abusive relationships until she found herself trapped in a relationship for years.
“I remember being kind of judgmental for women that were in bad relationships. And I’m just like, ‘Get out. Come on, like what are you doing? Leave him! I don’t get it.’ Until I experienced it myself,” she says during the episode, airing Sunday.
The mother of one continues, “I was in a relationship for many years, and we probably broke up 14-15times. There were things that he said and made me feel like, I couldn’t leave, or if I left I had to go back.”
The worst part about the relationship, Banks says, was that her ex knew his power over her.
“He told me that that is what he does. That he knows how to break a woman down. And it took so many different friends and family for me to finally say goodbye to him,” she reveals.
It’s not the first time Banks has opened up about this abusive relationship. In 2009, the supermodel and Emmy Award winner sat down with Oprah Winfrey and shed light on the failed relationship.
“He never hit me, but I would say there were blows to my spirit, blows to my emotional well-being every day,” she recalled 10 years ago. “He was a master at being able to be happy and nice to everybody else but whispering these negative things to me.”
Watch Banks talk about her relationship, her modeling career and her hit TV series Top Model when Uncensored: Tyra Banks airs on Sunday at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. Central on TV One.