Book Review: Becoming Sister Wives Part Four: Celebrity and Epilogue: Kody

Part Four: Celebrity

Meri's Chapter

Some interesting tidbits:

• Found it difficult to lie about being a polygamist and that Janelle and Christine were not Kody's sisters but actually Kody's wives. Meri said "Lying is not part of our faith, nor part of my own moral compass so to feel as if I had to lie, or at least not tell the full truth, was quite difficult for me."
• Believes Kody is a dreamer: Kody was on board for doing the reality show long before Meri was. She "...assumed this was another one of those plans that he would eventually drop." She was wrong.
• She claims Kody's purpose for doing the show was to show a different side of polygamy, different from Warren Jeffs and the FLDS.
• Meri was very uncomfortable the first days of filming. She said that Christine was the actor of the family and Meri found it difficult to act naturally around the cameras.
• Meri feels she is a black and white type person. She doesn't sugar coat and can only be honest. The couch sessions were a wake-up call because they had to learn to think before they spoke. Occasionally, someone would "..inadvertently throw a sister wife or Kody under the bus."
• Meri's relationship with Robyn suffered at the beginning because she felt unwanted and unloved. They were able to work through those feelings, and Meri now claims this shows the audience the beauty of the sister wife relationship - the constantly evolving of relationships towards being people.
• Meri said she was terminated from her job at a rehabilitation center for troubled youth because the management was afraid that the investigation by Lehi police would "...bring unwanted attention to the facility and the children housed there."
• She still is surprised when people across the USA recognize her as a Sister Wife. She believes she is just a wife and mom who happens to be on TV.
• She says she ignores "...the polls and commentary on the Internet about our show or family members. I have more important things to do with my time!"

Janelle's Chapter



The Moment Kody announced he picked out Robyn's wedding gown - just before Christine left the set for 3 days!

Some tidbits:

• Although originally apathetic about doing the reality show, as the premiere got closer Janelle found herself worrying and stressing out to the point she sought counseling. She says this annoyed Kody, who said she should think more positive.
• She was particularly worried about her job. The HR department advised her that as long as she never mentioned who she worked for, what she did in private was her own business even if it would be showcased on TV.
• Janelle said once TLC began advertising the show, her church community became very upset, "...worried that we were going to be sensational and improper. Once they discovered that we intended to film Robyn's wedding reception, some members became even more concerned."
• Janelle felt that at the beginning, the couch sessions were "...unearthing emotional hurts that we had skimmed over to keep the peace. There are times when we don't watch our words and put our feet in our mouths."
• Case in point, when Kody announced that he had selected Robyn's wedding gown, Christine walked off the set. What wasn't shown was that Christine walked out of the couch interview AND DID NOT RETURN FOR THREE DAYS!
• Janelle feels "...many intelligent Americans cannot differentiate between a healthy, polygamous family and a man cheating on his wife -- or even a harem!"
• When they decided to leave Utah, they told no one - including friends coworkers. She said even the show's producers had no clue they were leaving.
• Janelle credits moving to Las Vegas for exposing her children to a more diverse culture.

Christine's Chapter

• Christine states "My dad was drafted into the Vietnam War when he was nineteen. He was frustrated that he had to serve a country whose laws denied his family fundamental civil rights and caused them to live in fear."
• She was asked to represent her faith in Principle Voices, the public face of polygamy.
• It was Principle Voices that thought the Browns would represent polygamous families in a positive light. They were introduced to a journalist who wanted to use the Browns' story as a promo for a possible documentary. They eventually turned down this offer.
• Eventually, through Principle Voices they were contacted by Tim Gibbons, and that's how Sister Wives got started.
• During the early publicity interviews, some journalist asked extremely brutal questions to Christine, which caused her to nearly break down.

Robyn's Chapter

 Some tidbits:

•  Robyn attended public school and her father would walk away from her mother, brothers and sisters if he saw someone he knew outside of his faith. She was terrified someone would discover her beliefs.
• When she was dating Kody, she couldn't be truthful to her non plyg friends about the relationship.
• She initially dismissed Kody and family being on a reality show as a pipe dream.
• Eventually, she soon realized the show was happening, and that if she did marry Kody, she would be signing on for the reality show.
• Some of her family members believe being on a reality show about polygamy is sacrilegious. Her mother has struggled the most, and has even blocked Robyn's posts from her facebook page.
• She says "Sadly, during the first season, many of our fans cast me as a home wrecker out to destroy Meri, Janelle, and Christine's happy family. I try not to dwell on the Internet commentary, but since I think it's important to interact with our fans, I can't entirely avoid it. There have been so many negative comments about me that it's been difficult to shrug them off. People believe I have an ulterior motive -- that I want Kody for myself and not because I love the family or my sister wives. People believe I'm manipulative and conniving. I usually place last in the 'Favorite Sister Wife' poll."
• Robyn believes being on Sister Wives has taught her about herself and that the one constant in her life is her family.

Epilogue: Kody

• Kody claims the reason he left Lehi was because the situation had become unstable and unsafe.
• He coined the move as "the Vegas Vacation."
• Operation Detox partnership was due in part to his wives association with their fitness coach.
• Kody says "I'm sure that there are millions of people in the world who misinterpret what I do as hedonistic and selfish. My response is: Every day I work my tail off for this family. Every day I manage four separate marriages, four entirely different relationships, four distinct personalities. I'm not doing this for fun and games. I'm doing it because it is my calling..."

What ever, dude...


I am so glad I've finished this book, I'm just hoping I will probably never have a need to read it ever again!

Oh yeah...and a lot of trees gave up their lives for this book.

reprinted 7/25/14

Book Review: Becoming Sister Wives: Part Three: Family

Ysabel packing for a stay at Meri's



Part Three: Family

Meri's Big A-- Chapter

Well, over half way through, and finally, I get to Part Three: Family. Then I take a look at the chapters. Whoa Nellie! What's this? Why is Meri's chapter almost twice as many pages as Janelle's and Christine's combined?

What the heck is happening?

Then I start reading Meri's chapter. I don't know, maybe I'm getting tired of reading this stuff, but for goodness sakes, I can't believe how she could talk so much about so little.

For example, at the beginning of her chapter, she says when she married Kody, they shared a checking account. When Kody married Janelle, Meri added Janelle to the account. Meri paid all the bills, and set up the monthly budget, Janelle felt Meri was trying to control the finances and got mad at Meri. Eventually they got their own bank accounts and started paying their own bills for their households.

Four sentences. Meri conveyed the same information in four PARAGRAPHS. And I'm still left wondering, did Janelle think Meri was perhaps not allocating enough funds in Janelle's budget? Why would Janelle get so upset? Guess I have to wait until Janelle's scant 5 1/2 pages to get an answer, maybe.

As I continued to forge ahead, I notice a major faux pas - well in my book at least. After a lengthy discourse on why she doesn't allow her bonus children to jump on her furniture, how she expects her bonus children to not only respect her, but her space and inanimate objects too etc etc, she starts talking about how she had to discipline the boys who were picking on Robyn's girls on a camping trip. Wait a minute, wasn't that incident on the show (yes it was). And then 3 pages later she talks about her "close bond" with Ysabel and that "Christine will joke from time to time that Ysabel should come live with me...Half the time I'm not sure that she's joking!"

Hey, that was covered in the first 15 minutes of the same camping show, when Mariah was cleaning up the extra bedroom so Ysabel could move in. Are you telling me THAT WAS ALL FOR SHOW AND NOT REAL?????Ysabel wasn't really moving in??????

And why the hell is Meri writing about stuff that already was shown on the TV show anyway? What happened? Did the book writing get in the way of traveling back and forth to Utah?

Here's some tidbits - summarized to preserve your mental well-being:

• The Browns divide the responsibility for bill payment (mortgage, cell phone etc) based on each person's income level. In other words, the person who makes the most money, pays the most in bills.
• Emergency expenses are brought to Kody's attention who then will go to another wife (or wives if it's a lot) to collect enough money to cover the expense.
• If Kody had a good sale month, they would either use the extra cash to pay past due bills or use the money for a trip with a wife and her kids.
• Once when Christine disciplined Mariah, Meri disagreed with the punishment claiming it was inappropriate and extreme. Christine stood her ground and they agreed to disagree.
• When Robyn disciplined Christine's boys about picking on Robyn's girls (camping trip incident) Christine later told Meri she was completely out of line for yelling at the boys. Christine would have preferred to talk to her boys in private and individually.
• Mariah is a goody two shoes (my words) and plans on going to college and becoming a doctor and plural wife.
• Mariah shares Meri's eating habits - they prefer fruits, vegetables, chicken and fish instead of "kid-friendly" foods.
• Robyn and her kids join Meri for dinner at Meri's house often. This happens with and without Kody being present.
• Though Meri and Janelle both have pools, the teens tend to congregate at Janelle's house more often. Meri claims this is because Janelle's house is more centrally located and she has a bigger pool.
• Meri's house is the quietest of all the houses.
• Meri has bonded with Dayton, and they share the same birthday.
• Mariah is often at Robyn's house babysitting or helping out with her kids and she "...is happy to do it."
• When Mariah leaves for college, Meri sees her life going down three possible paths: continuing school, pursuing the family business by doing humanitarian work or travel, or Robyn being a surrogate and Meri becoming a mother again.

Janelle's Chapter

Some tidbits:

• Compared to Kody and the other wives, Janelle believes she is a softy, and if it wasn't for them, her children would have run wild.
• Certain kids form attachments with different mothers, in Janelle's case Hunter "gravitates towards Christine."
• She believes that because they are out in the open about being polygamists, they can be available for each other's children at school or sports events. "We can finally be the family we always dreamed of being."

Christine's Chapter

Some tidbits:

• Christine says "While all four of our households have more or less the same rules, the enforcement can be quite different! For example, none of us permit jumping on the furniture - but Meri's couches will last her entire lifetime, while Janelle's were broken after a month,. Mine get really , really dirty, really, really fast, while Robyn's will remain pristine for a long time."
• Christine finds plates and forks under her couches occasionally, and wrappers shoved in between the couch cushions.
• Christine acknowledges she has a problem with Aspyn and Mykelti showing too much skin, and hides their low neckline shirts.
• Mykelti is best buds with Robyn who helps her with hair and makeup.
• Christine has asked her kids not to go on blogs because "...some people have no conscience online and say  whatever they feel--and sometimes it really hurts our kids."
• Christine has been thinking about moving into a house with Janelle and her kids, but they would need at least 9 bedrooms.

Robyn's Chapter

Some tidbits:

• Robyn says "...Now that we have a television show, we are essentially working together as a family on a daily basis and we are a team financially."
• Breanna and Robyn are hypoglycemic.
• She stands up for the underdog: She stands up for Mykelti and sees  the best in her.
• Robyn does not tolerate bullying and minor teasing is off-limits.
• Admits the older kids did not accept her as a mom, and although their relationship is getting better, it's "still a work in progress."

Next but not least: Part Four: Celebrity and Epilogue: Kody.

reprinted 7/25/14

Book Review: Becoming Sister Wives Part Two: Sorority

After reading this section of the book, Sorority is definitely NOT the word I would use to describe these women's lives.

Armageddon...maybe. Purgatory...most definitely. But Sorority? WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE TRYING TO KID??

Like I said, this part should have been named PURGATORY, for surely these women were living, and continue to live, in a place or state of continual punishment !!

 

Part Two: Sorority

 

 

Meri's Chapter

I've never liked Meri Brown. To me, her mouth seemed to say one thing, but her facial expressions said something totally different.  Remember Meri's scowl?

  

 Some tidbits:

• Meri describes herself as a paradox: She's reserved but can be opinionated.
• Acording to Meri, if it weren't for the fact Janelle was married to Kody, she says "I'm sure..our friendship wouldn't have gone past basic cordiality."
• She claims Kody never discussed his feelings about marrying Janelle to her, so she was surprised when Kody told her Janelle wanted to join their family.
• After Janelle and Kody married, Meri was relieved the newlyweds were not a "conventionally romantic couple."
• Janelle was pregnant with Logan when Kody started courting Christine.
• Meri felt threatened by Christine  because she was "...cute and energetic...young and girly...and quite flirtatious...[Christine's] relationship was grounded in an undeniable emotional attraction."
• Meri got pregnant when Christine was 4 months pregnant.
• Meri felt her sister wives flaunted their fertility "...to validate their marriages to Kody in a way [she] couldn't."
• When Kody got a job requiring a lot of travel, Janelle seized the opportunity to move out into a home of her own. It wasn't until they found the big house in Lehi did Janelle move back in with Kody, Meri  and Christine.
• According to Meri, Kody started dating Robyn during a low point in their marriage. She claims she had no idea she would be so involved in selecting Robyn as a possible 4th wife. Since Christine and Janelle did not know of Kody's attraction to Robyn, Meri saw this as her little secret between Kody, Robyn and herself.
• Kody and Meri sought help from a marriage counselor to mend their marriage while he was courting Robyn.
• While Meri's relationship with Christine was good, she felt it had no depth.
• After Kody married Robyn, when it was Kody's night at Meri's house, Robyn and her kids would sometimes drop by and spend the evening with them. Meri claims she never had to ask Robyn to give her space.
• However, Meri states "...when it's time for Kody and a wife to have their own time, I make it a habit to not call him unless it's something extremely important."
• Meri feels after 22 years of marriage "...Kody and I are better than ever. We share a deep and passionate love, and finally understand each other's love language."

My conclusions?  Meri has a lot of issues, and polygamy has not helped her to "smooth out the rough edges." She can be mean, bullies those she doesn't like, can hold a grudge forever and a day, and if you're her favorite, you can get away with murder. She is the Queen of passive-aggressive behavior.

You couldn't pay me enough money to live with this woman, let alone be a sister wife with her.

Janelle's Chapter

Janelle, Janelle, Janelle. Who would've thought she was a polygamy groupie? Or that she camped out on Winn Brown's Wyoming ranch in a teepee. But the most amazing thing about Janelle was that she lived with Meri and Kody in a cramped, 3 bedroom mobile home after marrying Kody.

This lady deserves a medal.

Some tidbits:

• She loves to work and have a career.
• When she moved in with Kody and Meri, Janelle says her relationship with Meri went ".. from cordial to frosty overnight." And that Meri had an overbearing personality when she was younger.
• According to Janelle, "Often Kody would take Meri with him when he worked out of state, which made me very resentful of her. I couldn't just take off from work, as she seemed to be able to. But when Meri didn't work, she didn't get paid - I thought it was extremely flaky to blow off work for fun like that, especially when we were so broke."
• During the first years of her marriage in Wyoming, Janelle was comforted that her mother (now married to Kody's father) lived only 20 minutes away.
• When Janelle visited family in Utah, they tried to forcibly bring her back into the LDS faith. She was 8 months pregnant with Logan.
• When Janelle found out she was pregnant, she knew that Meri would upset, but she said she "didn't care how [Meri] felt about my news. If it upset her, so be it. Things were incredibly tough in our relationship, so her feelings were of little importance at that moment."
• Janelle felt Christine acted like a little princess and was clueless.
• Janelle said Meri and Christine were close friends, and often would go off and not invite her.
• Janelle felt that it wasn't until 5 years into their marriage, that Kody begin to mature emotionally.
• After a particularly brutal fight with Meri, and Kody's subsequent lack of empathy, Janelle packed up her children and moved in with her mother for several months until she could find her own place. She went back to school and obtained a degree in accounting. Kody still visited her and the kids. She lived in her own house for 2 years, until Kody moved to the big house in Lehi.
• Janelle was surprised that after 16 years of marriage, Kody said he was interested in courting Robyn, which coincided with their agreeing to appear on TV in a reality show.
• Robyn taught the sister wives how to argue effectively.
• Robyn takes the lead in family discussions because she can keep a cool head.
• Janelle is working on further developing her relationship with Robyn.

Christine's Chapter

To tell you the truth, at this point, I am totally confused when any certain event takes place. So your guess is as good as mine in reference to a timeline in Christine's chapter.






Some tidbits:

• When Christine married Kody, she chose to ignore any potential problems in their marriage. She says "If I was naive, it was because I chose to be."
• She lived with her sister wives for three months. She then got her own cottage so she and Kody could work on their marriage.
• She got pregnant 3 months into her marriage.
• Christine claims Kody did not know how to listen to her and would cover his face and put his head in his hands when they argued.
• She considered Meri to be her best friend, but had a more practical relationship with Janelle.
• For financial reasons, the wives, kids and Kody had to move back into one house (3000 sq ft) in Utah. It had a kitchen and a kitchenette.
• Christine said she loved Kody way before they got married.
• She enjoyed being the housewife of the family.
• A year before she got pregnant with Truely, Christine had a fight with Meri accusing her of being too tough when disciplining her children. Christine felt Meri was taking her frustrations out on her children.
• Christine's mother broke her heart when she divorced her father.
• Christine loved being the last wife. She claims she was never jealous. But when Kody brought in Robyn, her world changed.
• She suffered from extreme post-partum depression after the birth of Truely. She panicked at the thought of being neglected.
• Although she feels Kody has become a stronger, more reliable man, Christine still feels a lack of stability in her relationship with him.
• She feels once she strengthens her relationship with God, her confidence will return and her jealousy will disappear, and everything will fall into place.

Robyn's Chapter

What a despicable, opportunistic, manipulative, gold-digging, passive-aggressive wrench this woman is! Don't forget she married into a "well-regarded" family the first time around. She knew what she was doing, too bad she didn't pick the right polygamist to climb up the social ladder. But wait, along comes this Lexis convertible with a goofy long haired dude inside it just aching to add a hot skinny mama to his unhappy harem to do the wild thing with. No matter what this woman says, read between the lines, folks, its plain to see exactly what her agenda was.

She didn't want a huge wedding, that was all Kody's idea. She just wanted a "quiet, yet romantic wedding." She didn't want to be the center of attention and she wanted to get married as soon as possible. But alas, Kody was broke. So, even though Janelle offered to let her move in with her, Robyn had to say no. She needed to explore her relation with Kody. And obviously, she needed alone time, in her own place, to get to know her man, if you know what I mean.

So, like that saying about what happens when people wait, a big old gift fell out of the sky into her skinny lap. The pilot sold to TLC, and TLC was willing to pay for a HUGE wedding! But, shy Robyn didn't want to be the center of attention. Oh no, as she puts it "It would be a grave disservice to Kody's first three wives to feature his wedding to me in the opening episode of the show...it would shortchange [the Browns'] rich family history."

But she continued on with her wedding plans, making sure her future sister wives were involved so their feelings wouldn't be hurt by all the lavish attention she had to endure. Robyn wanted her wedding to be a celebration all right, she "...wanted to do everything within my power to avoid offending my sister wives..." Then she adds, off-handedly, "...some of whom didn't have the opportunity to have a large wedding". Oh yeah, Robyn, great way to just rub those bitches' noses in it. You are one class act.

When Kody revealed that he had helped Robyn to choose her wedding dress, she just didn't think Kody meant to cause any hurt feelings. But now her sister wives think she only pretended to want their help. Well, we all know why Robyn thinks that way -- she didn't expect Kody to OPEN HIS MOUTH AND ANNOUNCE THAT HE HELPED HER CHOOSE HER WEDDING DRESS! As she puts it "I was frustrated with Kody for blurting out the story in a way that hurt my sister wives. I hadn't meant any harm..."

Of course you didn't.

Some other tidbits:

• Robyn said she would have been happy with the smallest of receptions BUT...since TLC was paying...
• She worried that it would appear she was getting preferential treatment. After all, she did get a big wedding and honeymoon and the first three didn't. But the honeymoon was necessary for her to get to know Kody better. And it was all Kody's idea.
• Even though she made sure Kody called each wife each day of their honeymoon, she was surprised to learn the wives were hurt by the length of her honeymoon and in some cases refused to take his calls.
• She can understand why her sister wives were jealous of her relationship with Kody, for her marriage was "fresh and young."
• She showed her sister wives, through example, how to argue effectively in family discussions.
• She says "My sister wives already do so much for me that sometimes I feel lazy."
• She also said she sees the perks of  "having three wonderful women help me raise not just [Sol] but my three other children."

Next will be Part Three: Family, Part Four: Celebrity and Epilogue:Kody.

reprinted 7/25/14