Jemele Hill Witnessed Her Mother's Drug Addiction and PTSD: 'I Just Saw Her Falling Apart'
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
Jemele Hill is speaking out about how she's been able to overcome the trauma and adversity she faced throughout her childhood.
The former co-anchor of ESPN's SportsCenter appears on Wednesday's episode of Facebook Watch's Red Table Talk, opening up to co-hosts Jada Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith and Adrienne Banfield Norris about the pain passed down in her family after her mother Denise was sexually abused and turned to drugs to cope.
"Seeing my mother battle with this addiction, it was obviously something I was absorbing," Hill said on the show. "One of the harsher incidents was the night my mother showed me what a piece of crack cocaine looked like."
"She's dealing with trying to understand the pain that she is in but at the same time mother enough to tell me, 'Do not do this ever. I'm suffering from something I don't even understand but I know one thing, I don't ever want you to trade places with me,'" she continued.
Jordan Fisher
Banfield Norris then asked Hill when she recognized that something was wrong within her family, noting that throughout her own 20-year battle with heroin addiction, daughter Pinkett Smith knew something wasn't right at a young age.
The sports journalist admitted that she first witnessed her mother's downward spiral when she was just 6 years old, revealing that her mother was raped that year.
"I just saw my mother falling apart," Hill said. "As a kid, you know something is wrong but you don't know how to put a finger on it. And as she continued to work through what we know now is PTSD, all I could see is her slipping away."
Jordan Fisher
Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.
Sitting alongside her mother, Hill said on the show that she's not angry at her despite her rough childhood — something she learned through therapy.
Hill explained, "It's funny about how I started going to therapy because my mother said, 'I think you're angry and you just don't know you're angry. And maybe you need to see somebody.' And I was like, 'I ain't angry!' So I thought well maybe I shall start seeing somebody just to see if this is true. And, you know, what I found out is I wasn't angry."
The Facebook Watch original series Red Table Talk airs new episodes every Wednesday at 12 p.m. ET/9 a.m. PT.
If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual abuse, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor. If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, please contact the SAMHSA helpline at 1-800-662-HELP.
