Mary J. Blige's music is raw and empowering, and she went through tough times to make it
that way. From her hard childhood with an absent father to a divorce that left her
feeling taken by a "con man," these are the tragic details about Mary J. Blige.
Mary J.Blige was born on January 11, 1971, in The Bronx borough of New York City. Her father,
Thomas Blige, was a jazz musician, and her mother, Cora Blige, was a nurse.
But her home growing up wasn't all domestic bliss. When she came into the picture, her
parents had problems of their own, which affected the makeup of her family growing up. Her dad was
dealing with the aftermath of having fought in the Vietnam War, which reportedly left him with severe
post-traumatic stress. Feeling unable to support his family, he eventually chose to leave them.
Recalling her childhood in a 2018 interview with New York Magazine, Mary J. Blige said,
"By the time I was born, he was out of Vietnam, but he wasn't all the way there.
I guess him leaving us at an early age was a part of him wanting to escape a lot of things."
Without Thomas, Cora Blige had to look after her kids on her own which meant that she would
spend long hours at work in an attempt to make sure that her kids were well-fed.
As a teenager, all Mary J.Blige wanted to do was become a singer.
She pursued this goal to the point of becoming rebellious, disregarding her mother,
and even deciding to leave high school early in pursuit of her dream.
She shared the story in a 2017 interview with The Big Issue, saying,
"When I was in 11th grade, I dropped out of high school.
I definitely regret it. I really wish that I had finished getting my education."
Twenty years later, the singer made the effort to successfully earn her GED.
Speaking to The Washington Post, she said,
"When I was a child I didn't care about getting an education, and I didn't finish high school. But I
got a second chance, and what I came to understand about education is that it is the key to life."
Blige even started the Mary J. Blige and Steve Stoute Foundation for the
Advancement of Women Now, or FFAWN, to help support women with college scholarships.
When Mary J. Blige worked on her second album, "My Life,"
she was struggling with her mental health. In a 2021 interview with Buzzfeed, she recalled,
"I was just in a vulnerable, horrible state of mind — depressed, ready to die. I just didn't
know what to do with this pain; it just all became too big for me and I needed to put it somewhere."
She dealt with her depression through music. More
than 25 years after the release of the album, Blige confessed,
"I was crying singing a lot of those songs, because I would have to leave the
studio and still deal with whatever I was dealing with in real life."
While she didn't know it at the time, pouring her pain into her music would prove to help her
fans deal with troubles of their own. But not even the success of her sophomore album could
help Blige with her own depression. To deal with that, she turned to the love of her fans.
In an interview with People, she spoke about how her fans gave her the strength to go on, saying,
"I think subconsciously, I was like, 'Oh I can't kill myself now.
All these people, somebody's going to come behind
me,' because people were too diehard and strong and emotional about this album."
For Mary J.Blige, drugs and alcohol seemed like a good way to forget about her pain.
She turned to drugs as a teen to cope with past trauma and found herself sliding into addiction.
In a 2019 interview with Self, she explained the appeal that drugs had to her at the time, saying,
"You're taking drugs so you can go out and feel courageous,
or go out and feel beautiful or whatever. You're doing it to cover up something."
However, for Blige, it became important to acknowledge that she had a problem
after she experienced a devastating personal loss. Blige told The Guardian in 2008,
"I saw my life going down a drain. One of my real close girlfriends died; I thought I was next.
And then Aaliyah died ... and I realized I didn't want to die like this, not tragic like this."
She came to identify and sympathize with fellow singer, Amy Winehouse, who died in July 2011 with
her death being attributed to alcohol poisoning. Blige later spoke about feeling the two came from
similar places, and expressed a wish that they could have connected during her life.
"I never got a chance to get to her and talk to her and tell her how similar our lives
was and tell her what a huge fan I was and how great she was and then she just died."
On January 23, 2014, Mary J. Blige's father Thomas Blige was attacked by his ex-girlfriend
in Battle Creek, Michigan in an incident that was labeled as a "domestic dispute."
"There is a developing story out of Battle Creek tonight. The father of
R&B superstar Mary J. Blige is in critical condition
after being stabbed in the neck earlier this morning by his ex-girlfriend."
According to West Michigan's WOOD TV8,
the attack started with all four tires of Thomas Blige's vehicle being cut
before he was attacked himself. He was slashed in the throat and the arm, and stabbed in his side.
The attack was witnessed by his roommate, who helped render first aid.
Thomas was taken to the hospital, while the police tracked down the attacker at
her apartment. She was initially charged with attempted murder.
In the criminal trial that was held months later, Thomas was quoted as saying,
"Me and Cheryl have serious domestic problems. The day before we were fighting and the police
were called. We have verbal fights multiple times. An enormous number of times."
According to Page Six, Thomas' attacker was later sentenced to 365 days in jail
and was ordered to pay over $17,000 to cover Thomas Blige's medical fees.
The family chose to stay silent about the matter, and did not issue a public statement.
Mary J. Blige was struggling to raise herself up when her marriage with her
former manager Martin "Kendu" Isaacs began to break down. After marrying in 2003,
they officially divorced 15 years later in 2018.
Speaking at a panel in 2017, around the release of her album "Strength of a Woman," the singer
admitted that she had been suffering for several years before the couple decided
to start the process of calling it quits. According to the Associated Press, she said,
"I don't know if people seen the last eight or five years of my life, but it's been hell.
And it's been ugly and it's been public and it's been nasty."
"This is not something that I wanted. I did not want this. I wanted us to last forever."
After the couple separated, the singer was told by a judge to cough up $30,000 as "temporary
spousal support." Speaking to Variety, she hinted at her feelings of betrayal, saying,
"I thought someone loved me, right? Turns out, he was a con artist and he didn't,
and now he's coming after me for all my money. When you come out of something like that,
you realize you were never the one. There was someone else that was his queen."
Blige later even revealed in a VH1 documentary on the making of her "Strength of a Woman" album
that her husband had cheated on her with someone she had mentored in the past: actress Starshell.
"All these years have come to this, to, you didn't even pick me, you picked somebody else.
That s— is humiliating. And it hurts real bad that I didn't get picked."
Before her divorce was finalized, Mary J. Blige was hard at work on her sixth album,
"Strength of a Woman."
According to Page Six, the collapsing marriage radically changed the direction of the album
as Blige decided to use the recording process to express what she was going through.
Before the divorce, when she was still hopeful,
she wrote songs about fighting for her relationship;
when the marriage fell apart, the project shifted to become more of a break-up album.
She said,
"There was no moment where I felt like I was going to keep this
in because it was way too much for me to handle on my own."
The singer said that she knew that it was important for her to release those emotions.
The result was a roller coaster of an album that included songs like "Glow Up,"
which focused on revenge, and a hopeful number titled "Smile,"
which was about moving on and finding love once again.
Growing up in a difficult environment, Mary J. Blige witnessed more than her fair share
of tragedy as a child. Reflecting in an interview with CNN in 2009,
she recalled seeing many women being beaten or even killed by men in their lives.
The experiences she had growing up led her to decide that she would use her success,
and her platform, to reach out and support women in need.
The singer explained to CNN,
"As a child, I [saw] women really, really suffer terrible, terrible situations,
and I vowed as a child to want to do something — anything — that can help them have better
self-esteem so that they don't have to be subjected to men that wanted to kill them."
Blige kept her promise and started The Mary J. Blige Center for Women in a bid to offer
support to women who needed help, basing it in her hometown of Yonkers, New York. She said that
the center would have doctors, psychologists, and daycare centers available; in other words,
"Anything that you need or they need to be able to better themselves is here for them."
Despite the confessional quality of some of her music, and how open she's been in interviews over
the years, it isn't easy for Mary J. Blige to open up about her deepest and darkest secrets.
According to an interview with SELF, she resisted therapy for many years,
not wanting to talk about her innermost feelings with a professional out of the
fear that the things she said would be leaked to the press. Her feelings had to do with, quote,
"how people would do anything for money, and how anybody at any moment can become paparazzi."
Blige also acknowledged that her music may make it seem like she's an open book – but
she's in face very intentional about keeping certain things to herself. As she put it,
"You only know what I tell you. And I don't tell everything."
Even though she's a well-known celebrity and a musician who has made a mark for herself in
the industry, Mary J. Blige has said she's found it hard to fully embrace herself,
and it's an issue she's had since she was young. She didn't like the way her hair looked as a
teen and felt like a bit of an outsider at school. She said in an interview with Elle,
"Because of the texture, growing up I always wished I had wavy hair.
Every little Black girl wanted wavy hair."
Later, as an adult, she experimented with her appearance through the use of wigs,
but was forced to confront her insecurities while shooting the film, "Mudbound."
During the production of that movie, she had to let go of her more elaborate wigs and heavy makeup
and opted for a simple look with a bun. What helped her develop more confidence in
her regular life, she said, was the compliments she received from the rest of the team on set.
She started using self-affirmations and telling herself, quote, "This chick is beautiful." She
told Elle that she told herself that every morning. Eventually, she said,
"I started to believe it and started to pay myself
high compliments to get past that feeling and that fear."
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