She added: “He’s in a relationship of his own. I’m single but we have maintained a very close friendship ever since the restraining order has been dropped. We’ve just worked on it, little by little, and it has not been easy. It’s not easy.”
The “Diamonds” singer told Winfrey, 66, that it was the repairing of her damaged relationship with her father Ronald Fenty that led to her fully forgiving Brown for his actions.
She shared: “I repaired my relationship with my dad. I was so angry with him, and I was just angry about a lot of things from my childhood and I couldn’t separate him as a husband from him as a father.
“I thought I hated Chris, and I realized it was love was tarnished. It looked like hate because it was ugly, angry, it was inflamed, it was tainted. And I realized that what it was is I had to forgive him because I cared about him still. And the minute I let go of that, I started living again.”
Rihanna also told Winfrey that in the aftermath of Brown’s attack on her and his subsequent arrest, she was more worried about the effect the incident was going to have on him and his career than her own well-being.
She added: “I was hurt most, nobody felt what I felt. It happened to me … I felt protective. I felt the only person they hate right now is him. It was a weird confusing space to be in because as angry as I was, and hurt and betrayed, I felt like he made that mistake because he needed help, and who’s going to help him?
“I was more concerned about him.”
