On the heels of the revelation last week that Missy Elliott has been suffering from Graves’ disease since 2008, the raptress sat down for an in-depth interview with VH1′s Behind the Music series to talk about those health issues, as well as a variety of other hot-button topics in her life, including the poverty and abuse she endured as a child. The episode will air tonight, June 29, at 10 p.m. on VH1.
In the episode, Missy—and those close to her, like her mother and fellow artists Timbaland, Mary J. Blige, and Ciara—discuss the challenges and triumphs she’s faced. Specifically, Elliott talks about the abuse she and her mother dealt with when she was a child. “He pulled the gun out in front of me,” Elliott recounts of her father. “I was screamin’, ‘Daddy, please don’t kill my mother! Please don’t kill my mother!”Later, she adds: “I never forget it. Like, it was the most scariest time in my life.”
In the special, Elliott will also talk at length about her near-fatal battle with Graves’ disease, including the day she first realized something was wrong. “One day I was riding in the car and I realized that my foot couldn’t hold the break down,” Elliott says in the special. “And my leg started shaking real bad, then I started having dizzy spells, bad dizzy spells and I realized I had a knot in my throat and it was huge. I knew something was wrong, I was very scared.”
Additionally, Missy will address rumors about her weight and open up about being sexually molested as a young child, a subject she rarely discusses, as well as the reasons behind why she had to walk away from DeVante Swing of Jodeci and her first group Da Bassment after she got signed for a record deal at the age of 19.
Source: music-mix.ew.com
