Shania Twain is opening up about the violence she says shaped her childhood, describing a home where fights between her mother and stepfather often became physically terrifying, as reported [1] by Page Six.
The “Man! I Feel Like a Woman!” singer, 60, said she and her sisters, Jill and Carrie Ann, grew up around repeated conflict between their mom, Sharon, and stepdad, Jerry Twain, in Ontario, Canada.
Speaking on Thursday’s episode of NPR’s “Wild Card with Rachel Martin,” Twain said the violence was not limited to the adults in the house.
“They loved each other. They went through so many ups and downs together, but they fought a lot, and they got violent often,” Twain said.
When Rachel Martin asked whether that violence also reached Twain and her sisters, Twain answered directly.
“Yeah, with me too,” she said.
“If I was standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, definitely,” she continued.
“I mean, both my parents were pretty harsh physically. We definitely got smacked around a lot, and kicked around sometimes, literally kicked around.”
Twain, who was born Eilleen Edwards, said her parents caused the most harm to each other, while recalling how extreme the fights inside the home could become.
“It was very violent. So my mom, you know, she would lose clumps of hair. She was bruised often in the face and … it was pretty bad sometimes. I mean, our house would shake. Those walls would shake,” she recalled.
“It’s very traumatic. It gets loud and scary, like a really bad thunderstorm.”
The country icon said Sharon repeatedly tried to leave Jerry, but according to Twain, the family was never able to stay away permanently.
“My mother did often try to leave. She did leave; we did leave, but he’d always find us, or she’d always give in and go back,” Twain said.
“It was a cycle.”
Sharon divorced Twain’s biological father, Clarence Edwards, when the future singer was 2. She later married Jerry Twain, who adopted Shania and her sisters.
Twain was 22 when Sharon and Jerry died in a car crash near Wawa, Ontario, on Nov. 1, 1987. At the time, her music career was beginning.
The “You’re Still the One” singer has previously spoken about her childhood, including in her 2011 memoir “From This Moment On.”
In that book, Twain alleged that Jerry physically and emotionally abused her for years. She also said she watched him repeatedly beat her mom.
Twain recalled one incident in which she struck Jerry with a chair while he attacked Sharon. She said he then punched her in the jaw.
Twain also alleged that Jerry sexually abused her beginning when she was 10 years old.
In 2018, she told the Guardian, “I feel the sexual abuse goes hand in hand with the physical and psychological abuse when it’s somebody you know. I learned to block it out.”
On Thursday, Twain also shared a more positive update about her personal life. She told People that open communication has been important in her 15-year marriage to Frédéric Thiébaud.