Kris Jenner is in no need of more spotlight. But as a wife and mother post-divorce, what about her as a person? Alison Chrun considers the celebrity in a real light.
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Imagine being married to a man for over 20 years. Imagine being madly in love with him and having babies with him. You envision growing old together, and work hard at keeping your blended family together. But things change; people change. And one day, you make the heart wrenching decision to walk away from that man, not because you don’t love him, or because he’s done anything wrong, but because you both decide you’re happier apart. And you do this in front of the whole world, having no idea what the repercussions will be.
As you begin walking your separate ways, you become a target by the rest of the world, being called a bully in your own marriage. What is typically a private matter for most, is a spectacle to the rest.
The amount of scrutiny Kris Jenner took from the media, the public, and her husband during the end of her marriage and divorce was enough to put anyone into an emotional rage. In my opinion, whatever went on between Kris and Bruce Jenner during the time of their marriage and their breakup should have remained their business. But it’s reality T.V. and nothing seems to be off limits with this family.
Let’s be honest, there is A LOT of hate towards the Kardashian family. Many think Kris has exploited her family and young children all in the name of money and fame. But take that away and you have a woman who loves her family and works hard for them. Whether we, as the outsiders think she deserved everything that went her way is irrelevant, because every woman has the ability to place herself in the shoes of Kris Jenner. Not as the multimillionaire to her Kardashian dynasty, but as a woman, and a human being.
She lost her husband of over 20 years to divorce, only to find out months later that he in fact had been suffering and keeping a painful secret his whole life. Then he came out to her that he is transgendered and would be taking the first steps toward the physical transformation to a woman in a matter of weeks.
I can’t imagine the pain, confusion, and process that needed to take place. That process would take time, but time was the last thing she had. She couldn’t worry about time, or herself. She had six children she was concerned about.
How would they handle this? How would they process it? Any decent mother out there would put herself last and focus on her kids during a time like this as Kris did. And then BAM, a Vanity Fair cover is released featuring her ex-husband; debuting him to the world for the first time as “Her,” Caitlyn Jenner.
When I saw the cover, I felt so proud of her. As Caitlyn was quoted, she’s “free.” What an amazing feeling that must have been for her. I’m sure she will be riding that high for quite some time. Not to mention the amount of support she has received in the minutes, hours and days following. It’s a moment in time that she has waited 65 years for, and she deserves it. She deserves to live her truth and life as the person she always felt she was meant to be.
But what about Kris?
As of this moment she has not made any public statements or comments regarding Caitlyn’s reveal to the world. Some would say she’s giving Caitlyn her moment, but I’m envisioning her grieving behind her bedroom door. Not because she believes that Caitlyn shouldn’t be celebrated, but because Caitlyn is not the person she has known for the last 25 years. She intimately and deeply loved someone who is no longer there.
I’m imagining her questions to be something like, “Did he ever love me? Why wasn’t I enough? Why does this hurt so bad?”
This article is NOT to take away from Caitlyn’s joy and journey, this is to show compassion and consideration for the other side, to put ourselves in Kris’ shoes for this fragile moment in her life as well as Caitlyn’s. Because if all we do is hate on her and mock her wealth, that insinuates that we don’t see her as a human being. And she is.
I’m putting myself in her shoes in this moment, and my gut kind of hurts for her. My heart aches a bit for the amount of scrutiny she’s received regarding her role as Bruce’s wife. I don’t think Kris deserved so much criticism regarding the ending of their marriage the way she did. I believe there was so much more going on that we obviously didn’t know about.
And what I hope she understands is, that man loved and adored her enough to create a full life with her for two decades. The love isn’t lost; it will always be there. But while we celebrate Caitlyn, she mourns the loss of Bruce, and prepares herself to make a whole new life of memories with Caitlyn.
It’s a process that I don’t think Kris was prepared for, or had time to explore before everything changed. I hope people can be compassionate and sensitive to the experience she is having, because in the end, only few people have any idea what that experience is like. And even fewer understand what it’s like to experience it in front of the whole world.
I’m not asking you to like her–I’m just asking you to consider the other side.
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This essay originally ran on Alison’s Blog Appetite for Honesty.
Photo: Christina Saint Marche/Flickr
This reminds of those situations where a celebrity woman who is married to a man comes out as gay after the marriage ends or even during the marriage. In most of those cases absolutely zero fucks are given to the guy that just found out his wife has changed in a way that renders their marriage undoable.
Trying to see how the other person feeling and dealing with such news would help everyone out a lot (I just wish it didn’t take for someone to realize that a woman is on the receiving end to recognize this).
That’s the thing. They were divorced. You figure once people are divorced they should be able to live their own lives. They were married for 20+ years and had 2 children. I’m pretty sure he was taking care of business at least from her perspective or they would have split long ago. People become unhappy in marriages for smaller things than living life as the wrong gender. What should have been different? Should Caitlyn have remained Bruce for the sake of Kris? I don’t think we would be asking this if it happened to a man.
Even though the author seems to be projecting her own relationship issues on this situation, it has absolutely nothing to do with her or Kris Jenner, even though it feels like it should.
It’s difficult to learn that you can’t love someone hard enough to keep them from being who they truly are.
Sorry, this is the Matriarch of the biggest family of attention -whores in the world. The women who, if I’m correct, negotiated a 100 million dollar deal for her reality show. Even Bruce/Catlyn, called brave by so many has TA DA!!! a reality show based on his ‘coming out’. Now I’m not wishing the women or any of her brood ill will. I’m just saying they flushed shame or hurt feelings down the toilet long ago for ‘Da Cash’!
Don’t worry, Kris Jenner will turn this into a money maker. She will write a book about her life with Bruch Jenner , she will parlay this into a huge round of the talk show circuit.
You have no need to word, this will work out just fine.