The harsh reality. Sister Wives’ Kody Brown’s battle to accept his split from Christine Brown has left him with a bad taste in his mouth — and resentment for his whole family.
“Christine and I have been on the fast track from separation to divorce now for a few months. The last time the family got together was when Christine told us she was leaving,” Kody, 53, said during the Sunday, October 9, episode of the TLC series. “I feel very separated from the family. I’ve struggled through this process.” (Christine, 50, announced via Instagram in November 2021 that she and Kody split after more than 25 years.)
The Wyoming native revealed that he was also dealing with Janelle Brown’s move from her house — which she could no longer rent — into an RV. Janelle, 53, planned to park the fifth-wheeler on the Coyote Pass property, which consists of five different lots.
“My life is in a form of limbo because Christine’s leaving and I don’t know what that looks like. I’ve been in the anger phase of divorce, so I’ve not been addressing it very well,” Kody explained. “I guess this construction project with Janelle and [contractor] Pete [is] kind of one of those things to get my mind off my divorce frustration. I am in the anger phase. I get tied up in knots over Christine leaving.”
Kody’s relationship with his first wife, Meri Brown, also hit another roadblock during the Sunday episode after the patriarch told Meri, 51, that it might be better if she moved to Utah to run her bed and breakfast. Meri’s mom, Bonnie, was running the place before her death, which fans learned about earlier this season.
“I was here are the very beginning. I helped start this family. It was me and him and we had plans. He loved me,” Meri said during a confessional while holding back tears. “For him to just be like, ‘Um, just go up there now.’ It didn’t make sense.”
Kody, however, managed to press pause on all the drama and join Christine in celebrating their daughter Ysabel’s high school graduation. While the party — which also included Meri, Janelle and Robyn Brown and their respective children — was a success, Kody left feeling “blue” about their future.
“We will never be there again. I’m living in a delusional world where I’m wishing Christine didn’t leave. I’m struggling with sort of a state of regret and frustration,” Kody told the cameras. “It’s a weird thing to be getting left. It’s made me question getting into plural marriage. Question my faith. The message we had to the world about functional polygamy seems so dysfunctional now.”
The head of the Brown family also confessed that his relationships with some of the other children — not just his kids with Christine — had recently hit a rough patch.
“I’ve got what feels like very strained relationships with a bunch of the kids. I don’t feel like I’ve got the respect that I should have,” he concluded. “No, I’m not OK. I’m here. I’m in a funk. It’s this loneliness combined with a bitterness with the entire family.”
Sister Wives airs on TLC Sundays at 10 p.m. ET.
Scroll down for all the highlights from season 17, episode 5 of Sister Wives: