Toni Braxton - Unbreak My Heart: A Memoir

To Denim and Diezelthe two gifts who will forever make my heart whole

I m at a crossroads. More than four decades ago, I set out on a journey as a little girl with a huge dreamone that has carried me all the way from a dirt-filled plot in Severn, Maryland, to the stage of the Grammys and beyond. In one way, its a phenomenal gift to have your wildest dream actually come true. But in another way, when that happens, it can leave you with a profound sense of uncertainty about what to do next. Thats the juncture at which I standright in the middle of creating a road map of what my life could look like tomorrow. Next year. In a decade. Forever.

My dream is as much born of passion as it is of deep reflectionthat is the privilege of carving out a new path in adulthood, during lifes second act. This book is the sum total of that reflection. On every page, in every sentence, with every anecdote I recount, I am daring to examine both the steps and missteps that have led me to this moment. But Im not simply looking back as some kind of emotional exercisefor me, the point is to find my way to the next best place.

Someone wise once said that pain is informationits our bodies way of telling us, Pay attentionsomething isnt working here. So especially as I ponder the most distressing moments of my journeythose times when life has become burdensome enough to take me to the brinkIm looking ahead with that ultimate hope. And what is that hope? That peering back at my past heartbreaks will ultimately lead to healing. That is the only real point in reflecting on any experienceto find a purpose in it that leads you toward wholeness.

Nothing about my story and yours may seem to resemble each other at first glance. And yes, its truemy mountaintop moments and my lowest points really are unique to me. Only I can tell you what its like to live through the combination of experiences that has filled my years. But from another perspective, my path is also very much like the one youve traveled. You may not have grown up as the first-born of six in a town few people have even heard of. You may not have been diagnosed with lupus, cared for a son with autism, or cried your way through two humiliating bankruptcies and an agonizing divorce. But like every other person who has ever lived, you know what it means to ache. To love. To laugh. To regret. Our circumstances may be differentbut the emotions that come with being human are what connect us all.

The lessons of my journey are plentifuland here is one. Ive realized just how much of myself Ive suppressed. Ive sacrificed a lot of who I am to make the people around me happy. No longer. Ive entrusted people who didnt have my best interest at heart. That chapter is now permanently closed. I dont know exactly what the coming years will bring, but I do know this: I will never again hand over my power to another human being. To do so is to hand over life itselfand at long last, Im getting mine back.

You may know me best by the songs Ive shared with the world. Breathe Again. Seven Whole Days. Un-break My Heart. To know my creations is to indeed know one part of who I am. But behind every lyric, behind each of those melodies and countless others, there lies a story that Ive never been brave enough to tell. In this momentstanding at this crossroadsI have at last found the courage.

T he happiest day of my career arrived one February morning in 1991. Nothing could have prepared me for how that day would end.

Hey, what are you doing? I immediately recognized the voice on the phone as that of Greg, my then-manager.

Not much, I lied, since Id been pacing the carpeted floor of the town house I shared with a roommate in Laurel, Maryland. At the time, I was a student at Bowie State University, which is now the University of Maryland at Bowie. Whats up? I tightened my grip on the receiver and pressed it to my right ear. Even before he could answer, I somehow knew my life was about to shift. The only surprise would be how.

Since years before that phone call, Id always dreamed Id be a famous singer. My mother, Evelynwho once turned down a music scholarship so she could marry my father, Michaelfilled our Maryland home with music. Joshua fought the Battle of Jericho and the walls came tumblin down, Mommy would belt out in an operatic style when I was just a toddler. With so much music in the air, I and my five younger siblingsMikey, Traci, Towanda, Trina, and Tamarlearned to harmonize practically before we learned to speak. And since we spent nearly as much time in church as we did at home (my father eventually became a pastor), we were surrounded by the rich and soulful tunes my parents passed on to us. Mommy eventually recognized our potential and turned my sisters and me into the Braxtons, a quintet-style singing group. That was just the beginning.

On weekends and after school under Mommys strict guidance, the five of us rehearsed for hours in churches around town. Each time we performedusually right after my father had delivered a riveting sermon to a packed housewe heard a familiar refrain: Them Braxton girls sure can sing! All that practicing eventually paid off: In 1989, we signed a deal with Arista Records, and a year later, we put out our first single, Good Life. The song wasnt exactly a hit (it reached number 79 on the Billboard Hot Black Singles chart), but we were still over the moon. Not so for Arista.

Though Clive Davis and the other record execs recognized that we had talent, no one quite knew how to package a group of squeaky-clean sisters who ranged from a twenty-three-year-old with a contralto voice (me) all the way down to a thirteen-year-old who still wore braces (Tamar). So after our lukewarm debut, Clive handed us off to a songwriting and production duo that had just formed a label under Arista. Thats right: Kenneth Babyface Edmonds and Antonio L.A. Reid invited us to fly to Atlanta and put on a showcase audition. We were elated.

How exactly do you prepare for such a make-or-break moment? My sisters and I did it by practicing like crazy. Every day for a month, I drove from my place in Laurel to my parents home in Severn so we could rehearse. I put together a medley that included harmonies from the Carpenters song Close to You; our first single, Good Life; and Janet Jacksons hit Love Will Never Do (Without You). Throughout the performance, each one of us had a solomine was God Is, a gospel song. We sang a cappella for some of the pieces and I played the keyboard for others. My solo was to be the final one of the showcase.

In between our marathon rehearsals, I shopped for our stage outfitsas the eldest, I was in charge of that. So I drove over to Lerners (the store that carried plenty of extra-smalls!) and picked out black stirrup pants and leggings for the girls and a pair of keyhole earrings for each of us. Traci got the cutest outfit: a black one-piece catsuit along with a matching black jacket that had gold trim on itvery Salt-n-Pepa. As the shorty in the group (I was barely five foot one), I had to find some way to stand out. Thats why I chose a special outfit for myself: white biker shorts with lace trim, a belt with a silver buckle, a white jacket with long sleeves, and suede boots that I wore scrunched downvery 1980s Madonna. Mommy and Dad also bought each of us a black leather Kool Moe Deeish trench coat. A couple days later, we flew off from our home in Maryland and toward the kind of opportunity you only get once.

The night before the audition, my sisters and I; our parents; our manager, Greg; and Vernon Slaughter, then vice president of LaFace Records, spread out across six rooms at the Hilton Garden Inn on Peachtree Street. When the bellhop took our suitcases, I offered him a tip. Though the continental breakfast and coffee were free, I also proudly left a few crumpled dollar bills for the waiter. I felt so grown-uplike a star on an episode of