Source: OWN / OWN
OWN’s new series, “Behind Every Man” seeks to explore the dynamics of the extraordinary women who support the men we may recognize from their respective endeavors in entertainment. While we know the men for their accomplishes, “Behind Every Man,” explores the women, who are less often seen, but play a significant role in their success.
The couple appearing on this weekend’s episode is Kirk and Tammy Franklin. In their interview, the couple discuss Kirk’s childhood trauma and how therapy helped to make them better people, a better couple and better Christians.
See what they had to say below.
Kirk: I was wired, as a young man, to seek help. I’ve always tried to find a mentor. I was always desperately looking for help. I could not be a good husband without therapy. I could not be a good man without therapy. Then to find out, I could not be a productive Christian without dealing with the deeper issues that have to deal with who I am as a broken soul. That I’ve struggled with since I was a kid. When I was a four-year-old kid, I was adopted by a 64-year-old lady. Gertrude was a widow and she didn’t have any children.
Although I’m extremely grateful for what she did and who she was, of course, she came from a different generation where there was not a lot of nurturing, there were not a lot of positive statements. I’ll never forget being about 12-13 and getting into a lot of trouble because of these abandonment issues. I remember coming home, saying to Gertrude, ‘When I get in trouble, everybody in the neighborhood knows when I do something wrong. But nobody ever talks about when I do anything right.’ And I’ll never forget her saying, ‘Oh boy, you just want somebody to praise you.’
…Yeah…yeah.
So that lack of getting affirmation as a young man, really, really crippled me.
Tammy: The way that he was hurt would come out a lot. There was this fear that I was going to someday leave because everybody that loved him, left him. There were times where I think he was like, ‘Let me give you a head start. You’re going to leave anyway so let me just push and push and push.’ And I came from a background of sticking it out and fighting.
Kirk: Off and on we were in therapy for about four years. And it ended up being the most painfully beautiful journey of our lives. So we are better people.
Tammy: Absolutely. That’s a good way to even describe it. Painfully beautiful.
