Tanya Brown Finds Forgiveness
Marlise: What your book does is give people insight to what it’s like when things suddenly happen that are completely out of your control.
Tanya Brown: You know, we were a private family. And, everything changed overnight, life definitely turned upside down on June 12, 1994.
Marlise: You speak about having to pick up Nicole’s kids from OJ’s house and how the thought of seeing him was sickening to you – and then your mother said, “You are there for those kids – leave your opinions at the door.” This was clearly the right thing to do, to focus on what was best for the kids, but do you think the fact that you had to continually stuff your feelings is one of the elements that created the explosion that led to your mental breakdown?
Tanya Brown: Oh absolutely. You know you can’t possibly be in the home of a murderer and pretend everything is okay. I did, but that eventually caught up with me. It was very surreal… the neglect, denying my feelings and stuffing my opinions, and not having a voice in the case, primarily because I was young.
My family was telling me, “Tanya, we were trying to protect you, you were way too young, mentally young, to even take this on, to even understand” And that I understand and I respect. But, that’s why I tell people they have to face their grief no matter how big, no matter how small, because it all catches up with you. It puts you into state of depression, it can make you a very bitter person, where you resort to drugs and alcohol. When you suppress your feelings it all catches up with you eventually.
