Iyanla Vanzant, 70, recently appeared on Cam Newton’s podcast Funky Friday. During the episode, the spiritual guru shared her truth about motherhood.
“I was a horrible mother. Horrible. I was a great father,” she started, reflecting on her journey.
“I was a horrible mother, meaning when my kids were growing up, I didn’t know what mothering was. I didn’t understand it. And because the father wasn’t in the home in a positive way, I did the providing. I did the protecting, the guiding,” she added.
Vanzant gave birth to three children–two daughters and a son. Unfortunately, both of her daughters have passed away.
“I didn’t do the nourishing, the nurturing, the affirming. I didn’t do that,” the award-winning TV personality admitted. “I didn’t have time. I had three kids and a job and a crazy man. So I had to protect them. I had to provide for them, I had to get the rent paid, I had to make sure that they had structure and system. The things that the father would have done had he been there, I had to do. So I didn’t have time to wipe boo-boos and bake cookies and tell you how cute you are and how much I love you.”
The Fix My Life star has been married three times but had all of her children with her first husband, Charles Vanzant. That said, the relationship coach, who has had her fair share of heartbreak, publicly stated she has no desire to get married again.
The author’s youngest daughter, Nisa, died in July 2023, but the cause of her death is unknown. Additionally, the TV personality and coach’s eldest daughter, Gemmia, died 20 years prior. Gemmia died from colon cancer on Christmas day in 2003 at the age of 32.
Vanzant opened up about the grief of losing both of her kids during a visit to Tamron Hall in November 2023.
“The deceptive intelligence of the ego always wants you to think that you’re not enough, not good enough, not worthy,” Vanzant said. “And for me, who spends all of my life teaching other people, helping other people, fixing other people — when something happens in my life, the first thing that ego says to me is, ‘You’re a fake, you’re a fraud. You can save other people, but you can’t save your child.’”
Vanzant is still optimistic despite the repeated tragedy she’s experienced over the years.
“There’s a saying in the Caribbean: The bigger the monkey, the bigger the stick they beat him with. So I have a big life. I have a big place in the world. I have a big assignment.”
