“My whole life history was there, with them,” Twain remarked on a new Creating Space with Hoda Kotb podcast episode.
Shania Twain is speaking up about losing her parents in a car accident in 1987.
In a recent podcast interview with Hoda Kotb, the country diva discussed the deaths of her mother, Sharon Twain, and stepfather, Jerry Twain, and how the loss affected their family.
Twain, 57, recalls being 22 years old and attending a “computer programming” school in Toronto, where she was working on a “backup plan” in case her singing career didn’t take off when she learned of her parent’s deaths.
“My sister called to tell me they had been killed in a vehicle accident. I came apart ultimately, went into shock for days, and couldn’t let go of them, “said the Grammy winner, who has spoken honestly about growing up in poverty and dealing with Jerry’s mental and physical abuse.
“I had to abandon a crucial basis. Even if it was shaky, it served as a basis, “Twain continued. “My entire existence was there, with them, and many associations faded along the road after my parents died. It was true that their presence in my life was responsible for so much of my good and bad life.”
After the catastrophe, Twain took up the responsibility of rearing her three younger siblings. “My children, as I frequently refer to them. I know they’re not mine,” she explained, noting that her eldest sister was “very busy.” She has a marriage and two children.
“My younger sister was still living at home, and my two younger brothers were still, you know, 13 and 14,” Twain explained. “We were all in agreement that they should not be separated. Nevertheless, none of them had any family who could take them in. So staying together was the only option to keep them together.”
Twain, on the other hand, was not unfamiliar with the responsibilities of a caregiver. “In our house, I was already a mother figure. My mother was depressed for much of our childhood, not getting out of bed for days at a time, “She remembered.
“That’s why I was up, ironing my father’s shirt and pants, getting everyone ready for school in the mornings, and getting home after the whole morning mess,” the singer-songwriter continued.
“I had to hurry up and scurry around cleaning everything up before he got home, so he didn’t drag her out of bed by her hair. This was the cycle, after all.”
Twain released her debut self-titled album in 1993, around five years after her parents’ deaths — two years before she would rise to popularity with The Woman in Me and its singles, including “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?” and “Any Man of Mine.”
