Mykelti Brown recently opened up about her feelings toward her dad’s first wife, Meri, revealing why she will never have a relationship with the Sister Wives star now that she’s an adult.
During an interview with the Pop Psych YouTube show, Mykelti— who is the daughter of Kody Brown and his ex-wife Christine— was asked to go into more detail about why so many of the Brown Family’s 18 children have no relationship with Meri, who helped raise her own child, Leon, as well as the 12 kids Kody shares with Christine and his second wife Janelle. Mykelti previously opened up a little about her siblings’ past public claims that Meri often singled her out with her allegedly abusive behavior, but during her new interview, Mykelti did not hold back.
“She just was not a very good parent,” Mykelti said of Meri. “She wasn’t a very good mom. She was not fun to be [around].”
Mykelti is not the only grown child from the Brown Family who has publicly discussed Meri’s harsh and allegedly abusive behavior toward the family’s kids. Christine’s son Paedon and daughter Gwendlyn each claimed that Meri once got physical with Mykelti, while Janelle’s daughter Madison opened up last month about Meri’s “extremely harsh” behavior.
Mykelti brought up the fact that her mom Christine‘s new book mentioned a few incidents from the past that made her no longer want a friendship with Meri; however, Mykelti confirmed that there is more to the story than Christine wrote about in her book.
“She says it without saying it,” Mykelti said of what her mother wrote. “It’s because obviously we need to be careful of what we say specifically…we don’t want to throw around words that could have a really long-lasting effect [on Meri].”
Although Mykelti initially seemed a bit reluctant to discuss why she does not like Meri, she eventually let it rip and blasted Meri for being so mean to her and her siblings.
“Meri’s personality is very hard. She has a very aggressive personality,” Mykelti said. “Not physically but, like, ‘go in, get it done.’ It doesn’t matter your age; it doesn’t matter your capabilities. It doesn’t matter when she asks, you go in and you get it done. If you complain, you get in big trouble. If you don’t do it exactly to her specifications, you get in big trouble. If you have questions about how to do it better, you get in trouble. If you didn’t do it in a timely manner, you get in trouble.
“She was very, very hard and she was very strict,” Mykelti continued. “She tended to pick on me a lot, more so than the other kids. I couldn’t tell you why.”
Madison and Paedon each recently stated on social media that they have no relationship with Meri currently and have no plans to change that. Mykelti said that this is because she and her siblings have not forgotten how harsh Meri allegedly was to them when they were kids.
“Most of us don’t get along with her [now] because of how she treated us when we were younger,” Mykelti said, adding that Meri has tried to apologize for her past behavior.
“As we got older, she would do that classic, ‘I’m so sorry. I love you. I’ll treat you better, let’s just go have a nice girls’ day or something.’ And then, right in the middle, she’d get mad at you for something and then somehow it would become your fault,” Mykelti said. “And then it would back-pedal to where you were apologizing for something she did….suddenly you felt like it was an honor to be in her presence and amongst her, but you were still in the wrong.”
Mykelti claimed that Meri exhibited these patterns of behavior the whole time she and the other kids were growing up.
“She would have these big emotional swings where she would just get angry and intense,” Mykelti stated.
When Mykelti’s husband Tony Padron hinted that Mykelti was being rather harsh, Mykelti doubled down on her comments about Meri.
“I think that’s the reason why most of my siblings choose not to have a very big relationship with her,” Mykelti said. “I won’t say all of them. A lot of them will still try and talk to her, have a relationship with her and work on things…. at the end of the day, she’s human and she’s trying to figure it out. But because of how she treated me when I was younger, I will never have a relationship with her.
“However, I don’t think she’s a bad person. I just think she’s made mistakes. She still deserves happiness at the end of it. I’m just never going to have a relationship with her.”
In 2023, Paedon claimed during a Live session with John Yates that Meri was mean to all of the Brown kids, but singled out specific ones for harsher treatment.
“No, Meri was not nice…Abrasive is not enough of a word to explain what Meri was to a few of us children specifically,” Paedon said at the time, confirming that the alleged abuse was not just verbal. “Oh, it moves so past verbal.”
When John Yates asked Paedon to confirm the rumors (that were started based on what other wives and kids have said in the past), that Meri was ‘abrasive’ and ‘kind of mean’ to some of the kids during their childhoods, Paedon had a surprising answer.
“Abrasive and ‘kind of mean’ are not strong enough words,” Paedon said. “They are not aggressive enough words…there’s definitely things I can’t say. But when I’ve gone into thorough detail with people [about what Meri did], it blew their mind…we were never safe around her.”
During the interview, Paedon brought up an incident in which Meri was allegedly physically abusive to Mykelti, something Gwendlyn later seconded.
“Meri had moments where she was rude and scary but I don’t remember her getting physical with anyone except for Mykelti and that was only once,” Gwendlyn (who remains close to Meri) wrote on her Patreon in 2023.
In a video posted around the same time, Mykelti confirmed that Meri was allegedly abusive to some of the kids in the Brown family. However, she denied that Meri ever got physically violent with her, as Gwen and Paedon have claimed.
“I’m speaking on my own personal experiences and opinion of Meri Brown. I don’t want to discount my siblings’ experience with her, though,” she said. “I don’t remember Meri ever being physically abusive to me, but she was very emotionally and verbally abusive to all of us when we were younger, until I think we got old enough and she stopped because, I don’t know, we were able to fight back or something I guess. “We were just too old for her to continue.”
As Mykelti stated during the new interview with Pop Psych, some of her siblings continue to have a relationship with Meri. Her sister Gwendlyn is on good terms with Meri, as is Janelle’s son Logan. Meri also has a good relationship with her own child, Leon, whom Meri was very supportive to when Leon came out as transgender in 2022. It is unknown if any of the other Brown kids stay in touch with Meri.
Meri has never publicly addressed the Brown kids’ claims about her behavior toward them growing up.
You can watch Mykelti and Tony’s full interview with Pop Psych below!
RELATED STORY: Maddie Brown Reveals How She Feels About Meri Brown Now, Years After Calling the ‘Sister Wives’ Star an “Abusive Human” & “Monster”
19 Responses
Janelle’s boys beat the crap out of each other including black eyes and split lips. Christine’s kids were also very violent. Remember when Aspyn and Mykelti got in a fight and one broke the other’s laptop so the other purposely destroyed the other’s cell phone? And Christine complained because she had to go buy a new laptop and cell phone. The kids were out of control.
Meri appears to be the only one that actually disciplined the kids. Of course they are going to hate her. Kids who have no consequences for their actions will resent anyone who gives them consequences. Also please note the discrepancies in the stories. One of the kids (I don’t remember which one) claimed that Meri physically abused Mykelti yet Mykelti says Meri was never physical.
Logan raised his siblings. Aspyn raised her siblings. Please refer to when Aspyn was moving out to go to college and Christine begged her to stay because “who is going to run the household?”. When Aspyn moved back home she chose to live with Robyn because she said Robyn didn’t expect her to take care of her kids. Meri was probably at her wit’s end with a bunch of kids who were physically violent with each other and were allowed to do whatever they wanted. I’d snap too.
She was deeply unhappy
I’m calling BS on this. I think Mary was probably the only parent that gave him any discipline at all, and for all we know, that was her defined role in the family.
If Mykelti was abused by Meri, why did she go and work for her when she was an adult? Meri brought her into her Lula Ro business. Would you go to work for somebody who abused you as a child?
Oh boo hoo, you had a parent that was strict and didn’t pander to you, get the f**k over it, there are children that go through far worse and also they should be more respectful if not about meri’s feelings definitely Leon’s feelings, still there sibling
I don’t care for Mykelti but I love that her and Christine set boundaries, especially when it comes to abusive family members. Just because you are “related” in any way shape or form doesn’t mean you have to have a relationship with that person. Meri to me shows no growth besides her own personal confidence growing- She clearly doesn’t think she was abusive and has no regret for how she raised those kids. No self-reflection. She still thinks she was in the right when she was cheating on her spouse and sending out suggestive pics with fruit to strangers on the internet. Full blown affair with someone she didn’t eve know on the internet while still being in love with Kody and married to him (legally or spiritually at this point, I can’t remember which). That goes to show her character right there. I am not surprised she had no takers at speed dating – I would not want to marry a divorced cheater either. Gross little girl. I would not call her a woman with her behaviour.
With fruits?
Face it. Mykelti is just like her mother Christine and can’t let the past go. Since when is polygamy a really successful way to live? One man choosing 4 women to be his wives when only one marriage is legal. And the women are expected to be happy and not jealous of each other? And raise the children together ? I am not saying Meri was right to seek attention on the internet but my god watching Kody run from one woman to the next and then settle all his attention on Robyn and forget the rest of his so called family was disgusting. I really wonder how Mykelti would accept it if Tony decided he wanted sister wives and children with them. (by the way, what kind of a name is Mykelti?) Christine and Mykelti can dish it out but they can’t take it. Kody, Meri, Janelle, Christine and Robyn made the choice to put themselves out to the public and drag their children along for the sick ride. Kody and Robyn bullied Meri into a divorce she never wanted so Kody could marry Robyn and adopt her 3 kids. Hmm. What about the 6 kids he had with Janelle and the 6 kids he had with Christine? The real victims are the 13 kids Kody left behind for Robyn. Tell me Alex, could you support polygamy? Grow up and look at it for what it is. As for Mykelti’s claims, it may be so but look what she married…Tony a guy who does not want to work and needs a damn good haircut and regular showers.
By the way, how would you deal with 13 kids running around in one house knowing your husband was sleeping with the mothers of those kids, waiting for your turn with him? Not in my life time!
Sounds to me like meri was a strict parent.
I don’t think she was jealous of the other sister wives cause they have more kids, tbh the others used it to their advantage that meri only had one child.
Like when paying for their kids education the others took it out of the family fund that all the sister wives put money in, then the others would say meri should pay for Leon’s education herself cause she only has one child.
After watching the show imo it was meri that was being disrespected and bullied by Christine and kody and most of the kids would’nt listen to meri anyway.
Christine brought hers and janelles kids up and imo manipulates alot of them in her way of thinking.
I like meri and janelles ok but Christine imo is a manipulating b***h and mykelti is exactly like her mum
I always thought she’d be a mean mam to the children because there was a lot of jealousy over the other wives having more children than her and I can believe she’d turn that anger towards the children out of spite, I believe them when they say she was awful to them as we had many glimpses of her passive aggressive behaviour.
Mykelti bugs but this is one time I am on her side. Adults who are intentionally mean to children have issues. The power dynamics are not equal and Meri took her frustrations out on her husband’s other children. It’s one thing to correct it’s another thing to punish and it’s the lowest form of punching down.
Meri was always miserable- she was only able to have the one child and for whatever reason, she made that her self worth. Honestly, that shouldn’t be something that defines you and her being able to have one is a blessing some never get. She also always came in last with Kody (IMO) and she allowed that to also affect her worth. I always knew she was evil… I truly think she will be alone for the rest of her life because she’s so miserable and honestly she’s weird- and not in a good way.
Only able to have one kid? Maybe because he was sleeping with other women instead of her?? Fucked up family.
Any woman that would sleep with him after he just slept with three other women prior deserves what she gets
I mean I mostly agree with you but the word “able” is being properly used. They’ve discussed on the show Meri has issues conceiving. Robin even half assed offered to be a surrogate for her.
She was probably miserable for that entire marriage and the kids suffered as a result.
Tell me- Why is John Yates always popping up on every reality person’s drama? THT guy needs a life!
Why is John Yates always popping up on every reality person’s drama? THT guy needs a life!