Christine Brown may no longer have all her sister wives with her, but she and former spouse Kody Brown are still family.
“I’m related to Kody,” the Sister Wives star revealed to current husband David Woolley on the long-running TLC series’ Dec. 28 episode. Raised in a prominent polygamist family, “I knew growing up that I would have to marry a convert because I was literally related to everybody in the church,” explained the 53-year-old. “I did marry a convert, but I was still related to him too.”
When David—Christine’s husband of two-plus years—told her, “That’s not cool,” she clarified, “Third cousins, once removed is fully legal. Fully.”
And though she acknowledged that, actually, plural marriage isn’t technically legal, she and Kody— who share kids Aspyn Thomas, Mykelti Padron, Paedon Brown, Gwendlyn Queiroz, Ysabel Brown and Truely Brown—are “third cousins once removed.”
While still within the bounds of the law, the situation became something of a family gag.
“I think in the polygamist families, this kind of stuff happens all the time,” continued Janelle in her confessional. “It wasn’t the kind of relationship where, like, you saw each other at a family reunion, like, it was a very distant relationship. But they would always joke about being cousins. It just is a small community.”
Photo by Gabe Ginsberg/FilmMagicBut while Christine and Kody are still (distantly) kin, the link they share through their six children has begun to unravel in recent years.
And Kody’s viewpoint is that the friction stems from his splits with Meri, Janelle and Christine.
“Those deteriorations happened as a party, not as an individual,” stressed the dad of 18. “My bad experience with my children and their pain comes from an experience that we were in together, not that they or I did something wrong and offensive.”
And now, he continued, “I’m willing to have the conversation. I’m willing to hold space. ‘Dad, you did this, you did this, you did this.’ I’m willing to hold that space.”
Though he and his kids aren’t yet on good terms, many of them have still shared their side of the story. Keep reading to see everything Kody’s children have shared about their rift.
