During the premiere episode of “Peace of Mind with Taraji,” Gabrielle Union explains how her PSTD from her brutal rape has resurfaced during quarantine and the impact it has on her relationship with her husband, Dwayne Wade.
Opening up to co-host Taraji P. Henson and Tracie Jade Jenkins, Union explains that she suffers from PTSD from being raped at 19 years old.
“I think it has been hard during the quarantine because we are in the same space,” says Union. “I have not been home in any kind of consistent way since I have been an adult, so just getting to know my husband, which sounds crazy, I was like, ‘Oh, every day, every day you’re going to be here, okay ahh yeah I guess this is healthy.’”
Although Union and Wade discussed her trauma while dating, their marriage has left her feeling “exposed.”
Union explains that therapy has helped but she feels like she is losing the “mystery” out of her marriage.
“I just feel a little bit more naked, exposed because I am just on Zoom with the therapist and I can hear the household,” Union tells Henson. “And then the doors open and… there is not enough space, you know what I mean, and that kind of worries me sometimes. You know when people are like, ‘You gotta keep the mystery about yourself. Don’t tell him everything.’ I’m like, ‘Well, s— then, the pandemic, you got the whole thing.'”
The actress explains sometimes she worries that she’s shares too much with Wade and fears it will scare him off.
“So you have to find out: ‘Do you love me for all of … the baggage?'” the award-winning actress adds. “You get worried that maybe you have revealed too much and you’re going to scare them away because damaged women aren’t supposed to be lovable.”
During her sophomore year of college, the then 19-year-old actress was working at a Payless shoe store. She was assaulted at gunpoint. The rapist is currently serving a 33-year prison sentence.
Watch the full episode here.
