Markis and Melvin clash.
It’s day two and Iyanla is making the brothers breakfast. She is looking forward to the brothers getting to know each other. As she is fixing breakfast, the brothers are in another room, talking about controlling themselves.
Mikuel leads the conversation, and Markis says he can’t control himself when he gets angry. He tells his brothers he doesn’t think clearly when angry. Melvin, feels completely differently from Markis, and explains what happened during their first day.
Iyanla mentioned that the brothers need to work on listening to each other express their pain. This is exemplified as Markis and Melvin fail to listen to each other properly. The two brothers begin to argue and things escalate as Markis calls his brother a b****.
It escalates to a point where Marvin and Mikuel have to separate their brothers, and Markis calls Melvin a fa****.
Hearing the commotion, Iyanla runs up stairs and lays down the law.
She yells to Marvin to, “Shut your mouth!” Iyanla then pulls Melvin and Markis aside to talk things out. She tells Markis that he is keeping up a violent pattern going after Melvin.
Iyanla takes Melvin one on one.
Next, Iyanla goes to Melvin to calm him down. She tells him that he doesn’t have to “fight to be right.”
Melvin cries as he recalls his trauma in the group home. He recalls having to fight being called a fa**** by others in the group home for looking suggestively at others. However, this confused him, driving his anger.
“I [was] 10, I don’t know what this means.” – Melvin
He then cries out his emotions on Iyanla’s shoulder. Melvin chose to accept being called names by his brothers because he loves them.
Iyanla says this isn’t right, and doesn’t have to accept that treatment.
Mikuel, Marvin and Michael Jr talk things out.
Meanwhile, Mikuel, Marvin and Michael talk out Markis’ anger. They all want Markis to control himself and be a better parent to his kids. Mikuel tells his brother’s how he wanted to go out and retaliate for Miguel’s murder, but his daughter and girlfriend depended on him.
Markis and Melvin make peace.
Iyanla eventually got the two brothers, Melvin and Markis, to apologize to one another.
During their apology, Markis tells Melvin that he doesn’t understand him currently but will work on learning how to.
This breakthrough makes Iyanla happy and she goes back to finish breakfast.
Iyanla sits down for breakfast with the brothers.
The Mitchell brothers meet Iyanla for breakfast and she praises them for their breakthroughs. However, she tells Markis that his anger outburst can result in him getting really hurt.
“I feel like all of y’all could do better if I just wasn’t here,” Markis insists.
“Y’all are intelligent men.” – Markis
“And you’re not?” Iyanla immediately interrupts.
She then tells the brothers that they are coming up on a critical time in their lives in their early 30’s.
“This is a critical time for men. This is the time of the awakening, 33 to 35. You get to choose your life for moving forward. It’s called the dark night of the soul.” – Iyanla
She then explains that they’ve all been prepared for this due their experiences. Next, Iyanla asks Melvin repeatedly what he wants.
He breaks down when he says he wants acceptance.
“All you have to do is ask for it…” – Iyanla
Lastly, Iyanla feels one more person should join them, and she asks the Mitchell brothers if its okay.
They agree.
Michael Sr. Joins the brothers’ group.
After the brothers agree to have Michael Sr. join the group, they all sit down for a game called “Breakthrough Bingo.”
Iyanla uses this exercise to show everyone that they have shared similar experiences with their father. Michael Sr. really hopes this can begin a process of getting to know his sons.
First, Iyanla asks for everyone who feels like they are abandoned. Everyone raises their hand, and Iyanla has Michael Jr. speak out on his experience.
“I feel like I am the black sheep.” – Michael Jr
He explains that he feels overlooked by his brothers, despite being the oldest brother. Iyanla discovers that his brothers didn’t know he felt that way.
She tells them they use his disabilities, which they don’t know what they exactly are, to push him aside.
“His developmental challenges don’t give us the right to treat him like he is invisible.” – Iyanla
She also tells him that he is still at the head of the line. Melvin says that they overlook him as a way to protect him. Iyanla dismisses this, says they assume what his difficulties are, and ignore him.
It’s pointed out that Michael Jr. isn’t the only one that feels ignored.
Next, Iyanla gets Mikuel to talk about the verbal abuse he experienced with a foster parent. He speaks about being called stupid for not ironing his clothes.
Michael Sr. then speaks how this woman used them for the state money that came with housing them. The woman took much better care of her kids and grandchildren than she ever did for the brothers.
Afterwards, they all reveal to Michael Sr. that they’ve been homeless. This occurred as they ran away from a foster parent. They ended up sleeping in an abandoned car on a highway.
Michael Sr. says he is livid with himself for not being there.
Markis expresses feelings of guilt.
Lastly, Iyanla asks who feels guilty. Markis raises his hand. Markis runs down of list of what he feels guilty about, and breaks down.
Iyanla comes over and has him lean on her back. He eventually reveals guilt over Miguel’s death.
“I’m guilty of my brother being dead.” – Markis
He also reveals he is treating his sons like Michael Sr. treated them. Iyanla says he must change the way he looks at the past so he can break the cycle.
Iyanla brings over Mikuel and Marvin to lean on.
“I’m guilty of having anger and rage toward [my father],” Markis says through tears.
“I’m guilty of not understanding him… guilty of not trying… guilty of not caring.” – Markis
Michael tries to walk out but Iyanla keeps him in place. Eventually, Michael Sr walks over and hugs them all. He tells Markis he loves him and walks him outside.
Marvin then brings up that he’s never witnessed a breakthrough like this.
Afterwards, Iyanla tries to get Michael to tell everything surrounding why he and their mom Leronda abandoned them.
Michael only told them Leronda left them for rehab. However, Iyanla doesn’t believe it. She tells him he can’t or won’t give them the truth about Leronda.
“No way I am sleeping with her if she keeps abandoning my children.” – Iyanla
As a result, she wants to get to the bottom of everything.
Iyanla meets with Leronda, the mother of the Mitchell Brothers.
Leronda says she had her first child with Michael Sr. at age 22. She ended up having a baby every year of her marriage to Michael. Iyanla asked her why.
“I don’t know why” – Leronda
However, she then explained that Michael came from a big family and he wanted that dynamic.
Iyanla then asks, “How can you leave these kids?”
“Smoking Crack.” – Leronda
“These boys are devastated.” – Iyanla
She then tells Leronda none of the boys are beyond the age of 15 mentally.
At this point, as Iyanla goes in on her abandonment of the boys, Leronda asks, “So what do I do?”
“What we’re gonna have to do is ask them. Their father failed them. Their mother failed them. The system failed them. And then the village failed them.” – Iyanla
Overall, Iyanla is livid with Leronda for her past behavior.
Kizzy meets with Iyanla, Markis and her mother.
Iyanla reveals that Leronda also abounded her oldest child, daughter Kizzy, age 38. Kizzy lived with Leronda’s mother.
Kizzy feels that her mother didn’t like her. She feels this way because her grandmother took her in. Apparently, Leronda constantly came and left due to her crack addiction.
Kizzy also said her aunts felt Leronda was jealous of her because of her relationship with her grandmother, Leronda’s mother.
When it comes to Leronda, she feels like a random person on the street to Kizzy. Leronda wants to build a relationship but Iyanla says that is too late.
When Kizzy reveals she felt Leronda loved her half-brothers more than her, spending more time with them, Iyanla questioned this
“Are you sure about that?” – Iyanla
In a twist, Iyanla then brings in Markis and he tells them that she wasn’t with them either. Kizzy didn’t know her brothers were in foster homes.
“Did you know they lived in a car?” – Iyanla
Despite this, Kizzy still feels abandoned. Markis reveals they were jealous of Kizzy because they felt Leronda was there for her.
However, Iyanla tells them both that Leronda is responsible for all of this, and she has no clue about who she is as a woman.
“I need you to know I am so mad at your mother.” – Iyanla
Markis then repeats that they were jealous of Kizzy, and Kizzy cries. She says the material things don’t matter.
At the end of the episode, Kizzy and Leronda argue.
During the argument, Leronda reveals she had a terrible relationship with her mother who took Kizzy in.
“Let me tell you how my mother did me!” – Leronda
What did you think of the episode?
Their sister has no clue. You can tell she’s been lied to her whole life. She thought her mom was mother of the year with her sons but she was somewhere on crack while they were in foster homes. Whew.
Exactly. She had no clue. She thought she was the one who had it the worst but she actually had the better life. That’s crazy.
This just shows how destructive generational curses are to families. They really do travel from one generation to the next.
My heart hurts for this entire family..
Drugs have been destroying black families for a long time. And everyone is affected too.
Beautiful kids. It’s awful that all of them are hurting so much. I don’t know if it’s possible but I do hope this one session with Iyanla helps all of them. The only way to move forward in life is to deal with the past once and for all. I’m rooting for everyone.
It’s so sad that Markis feels like his brothers would be better off if he was dead. That was so hard to hear. He’s in so much pain.
Maybe it’s jus me but their mother looks like Frankie..dam