Bobby Brown is getting candid about habit throughout his marriage to Whitney Houston.
Within the second half of A&E’s Biography: Bobby Brown, which aired Tuesday evening, the singer talked about being hooked on crack, heroin, cocaine and alcohol earlier than lastly getting sober. He additionally shared the “huge false impression” about his marriage to Houston.
Brown, 53, was depicted within the press because the “dangerous boy” throughout his relationship with Houston and blamed for her drug spiral. Nevertheless, he mentioned the “Best Love of All” singer with the angelic voice was the extra skilled drug person once they acquired collectively, which he got here to seek out out on their 1992 marriage ceremony day.
On the day of their marriage ceremony, the New Version alum was “scared to demise” and locked himself in a toilet, the place he was “ingesting, smoking, sniffing” cocaine, he recalled candidly. It was his now-wife and then-friend, Alicia Etheredge, who truly helped him overcome his jitters — speaking him out of the lavatory.
When he did come out and felt able to wed, he noticed his bride-to-be for the primary time and she or he was “doing a line of coke.” Whereas he referred to as it a “shocker” to see her “sniff for the primary time,” amid his marriage ceremony day nerves — and worrying about whether or not he was doing the proper factor — it made him really feel like he “had extra in frequent” with Houston than he thought.
Nevertheless, “I used to be new to [using cocaine] and she or he, I assume, had been doing it for some time,” he mentioned.
Brown mentioned when he and Houston weren’t getting excessive, issues have been nice. “She was simply the kindest, sweetest person who I knew. They weren’t “within the throes of the illness” at first. They have been centered on elevating their new child, Bobbi Kristina, who was born in 1993, and “would get together” on the weekends. Cocaine quickly “grew to become an issue in our marriage…. After some time, we simply misplaced our thoughts.”
Brown admitted that along with cocaine, he was smoking heroin and crack, the latter of which he would combine with marijuana.
“Being an addict is de facto arduous,” mentioned Brown, who has been sober from medication for 20 years and alcohol for 2 years. “You do not know you might be an addict till it will get worse and worse and worse.”
One of many worst moments was touring with reunited New Version in 1997 and Houston becoming a member of them on the highway. Brown recalled being so excessive that he thought Houston was attempting to kill him. He mentioned he kicked everybody off the tour bus, pulled over and ran via a area with a .357 magnum in hand and cocaine, crack and weed in several pockets.
“They’re attempting to kill me!” he recalled yelling when the proprietor of the property got here exterior with a shotgun pointed at him. Brown left the tour after that because of the drama in addition to a respiratory drawback, describing it because the “lowest of low” factors.
However that wasn’t his “all-time low.” That got here after he was incarcerated in Florida for 65 days in 2000 after violating parole in a drunken driving incident 4 years earlier. His habit was peak when he went into jail however when he left, he mentioned he was fully clear and sober of narcotics. Nevertheless, Houston did not get sober whereas he was incarcerated.
“When Whitney picked me up [from jail], in fact there was medication within the automobile,” he recalled. “And I did not need any. I used to be grateful that I did not. It was out of my system. That is once I knew that I had moved into a special realm. I used to be in a special house at the moment. That is when the issues began with me and her. I wished her to change into sober like I used to be. It was actually arduous for each of us to remain collectively and be collectively after that.”
He mentioned Houston was “nonetheless utilizing arduous medication” and whereas clear from that himself, he began overindulging in alcohol growing an habit there. Brown insisted that they “would nonetheless be collectively if it wasn’t for medication. Medicine simply acquired one of the best of us.”
Brown additionally wished to clear up a “huge false impression” and it was that he was bodily abusive towards Houston throughout their admittedly “tumultuous” marriage. Brown was charged in 2003 with battery after an altercation with Houston which left her with a bruise on her cheek and a minimize higher lip. He was sentenced to 60 days in jail for violating his probation.
“A giant false impression on me [was that I was] bodily abusing Whitney,” he mentioned. “I by no means, ever bodily hit her — deliberately.”
Of the harm, Brown claimed Houston “acquired in the best way of a battle that I used to be having with one of many drug sellers we have been coping with.” He claimed he was sober and “whooped” the seller to ensure he did not come again to their house.
“Whitney acquired in the best way,” he claimed. “My hand went again, smacked her. That was the worst time in my life. It was one thing that I felt actually dangerous about. I by no means anticipated to place my palms on her and to today I want it did not occur.”
In 2006, Houston filed for separation from Brown and their divorce was finalized the subsequent 12 months. Whereas he got here into the wedding with $55 million — Houston’s father made him present him his financial institution statements earlier than the couple was allowed to marry “The Voice” — he walked away with nothing, together with custody of Bobbi Kristina.
“I left the whole lot on the desk,” he mentioned, together with his vehicles, home and cash. He moved to Los Angeles and lived in his automobile in future spouse Etheredge’s driveway till he was legally divorced. Brown then dated Etheredge, a music supervisor, who he had a long-time friendship with, they usually married in 2012.
That was additionally the 12 months that Houston died after drowning in a lodge bathtub as a result of coronary artery illness and cocaine intoxication. Brown realized the information whereas touring with New Version. His long-time bandmates advised him when he got here off stage.
Brown began crying as he recalled being in “shock” from the information. “It was simply unbelievable, man… That was the worst time in my life to know that she was gone… I wasn’t there… I want I may have been there for her. However we had made our beds and we needed to lie in them.”
In hindsight, Brown mentioned “figuring out what has occurred … I believe we may have helped one another out. I believe she’d nonetheless be right here if we hadn’t divorced.”
On the heels of the documentary, Brown has a brand new docuseries, Bobby Brown: Each Little Step, which facilities on his life now with Etheredge and shifting previous the deaths of daughter Bobbi Kristina and his son Bobby Jr. that airs Tuesday evening at 10 p.m. after the doc. Its common timeslot might be Tuesdays at 9 p.m. beginning June 7.
