Andrea “Drea” Kelly explained why she took so long to come out about R. Kelly’s chronic abuse and alleged criminal behavior with young girls.
Kelly rationalized to “Fox Soul” that she needed to wait until she was sure her children were better equipped to handle such horrible news. Also, she said she watched the blueprint of respected men behaving viciously toward their wives. So she felt that’s what women were supposed to do.
“My grandfather was a Baptist preacher but he was also the first man I ever saw beat a woman. And it wasn’t so much what my grandfather did that changed me because I accepted that he was a monster. It’s what my grandmother didn’t do that changed me because the very next day, she got up and made that man breakfast like nothing ever happened. My grandmother was so elegant and what she taught me about abuse is you deal with it like a lady of grace,” Kelly said somberly.
“My grandmother was also the first lady. She’s sitting in a pulpit covering her bruises while my grandfather is up in the pulpit. The same hands that you were taken to christen babies and cast out demons are the same ones you use[d] to whoop a–. Monday [through] Saturday you’re hell on wheels but on Sunday you’re an archangel. So I was taught at a very young age that God, love and pain were one. Fast-forward, I’m in an abusive relationship. It’s not foreign to me,” she said.
Kelly said she doesn’t care about the haters who criticize her for staying so long in an abusive marriage.
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