Janelle Brown is spilling the tea on fellow Sister Wives star Meri Brown’s disconnect from the family. The reality TV star dished on how Meri Brown had drifted further apart from the family after she became an empty nester after her son’s departure from home.
On the November 5, 2024, episode of the Reality Life with Kate Casey podcast, Janelle Brown was asked about Meri Brown’s disconnect from the larger family. Janelle Brown revealed how Meri Brown was always pretty distant from the get-go.
However, she noted that Meri Brown and Robyn Brown — Kody Brown’s only remaining wife — have always shared a close relationship. Janelle Brown also shared how Meri Brown was an empty nester before the rest of them, referring to how the latter’s son Leon Brown had moved out, leaving her with time to develop interests outside the family.
Janelle Brown further spilled her two cents on Meri Brown’s relationship with ex-husband Kody Brown in the following words:
“I mean, she and Kody had been estranged for many, many years.”
The Sister Wives family has been falling apart like a pile of Jenga, with Christine Brown being the first to leave her plural marriage to Kody Brown in 2021.
A mere year later, the patriarch called it quits with Janelle Brown in December 2022. And just about a month later, he and Meri Brown parted ways in January 2023. Robyn Brown remains the last wife standing in the Sister Wives family.
Janelle Brown Termed Her Marriage to Meri Brown’s Brother a Starter Union
In the same episode of the podcast, Janelle Brown revealed how she doesn’t count her brief marriage to Meri Brown’s brother, Adam Barber, as the real thing. The Sister Wives star tied the knot with Barber back in 1988, but their marriage was short-lived.
Host Kate Casey cracked a joke stating that they’ve all had “starter marriages,” to which Janelle Brown agreed incredulously, noting that her marriage to Barber would qualify as just that. Janelle Brown reflected on how her marriage to Barber “didn’t take,” considering the fact that they divorced in 1990 after merely two years of marriage. Janelle Brown provided further insight on her brief marriage to Barber in the following words:
“I think we might have lived together physically, actually lived together for, like, six months.”
Interestingly, the same year that Janelle Brown and Adam Barber divorced was the year Meri married Kody Brown as she became his first wife.
Janelle Brown revealed how, at the time, she had maintained her relationship with her former sister-in-law and her husband, which eventually led her to be intrigued by the “faith” and concept of polygamy. Janelle Brown confessed that her relationship with Kody Brown hadn’t blossomed overnight.
She’d initially known the duo as her cool and “unique friends,” and the faith eventually pulled her toward Kody Brown.
Sister Wives Season 19 airs Sundays at 10 PM EDT on TLC. The episodes, along with all previous seasons, are available to stream on Hulu.
