VIDEO: BBC TV Producer, Christine Njeri Opens Up On Dark Family Secrets That Sent Her Mom To An Early Grave
Former Tahidi High actress, Christine Njeri better known as Makena has laid bare some dark family secrets and her battle with depression after her mum was sent to her an early grave. Makena, a former TV producer of NTV’s youth show Teen Republik who now works for BBC also revealed the struggles she went through growing up in a household with an abusive father.
In a candid interview on NTV’s weekly talk show Unscripted, the actress who doubles as a journalist tearfully revealed some other dark family secrets including her father’s alcoholism and infidelity.
According to Makena, her father struggled with alcoholism and often became physically abusive towards her mother to a point that she had to share a bed with her mother to protect her from her father’s blows.
In addition, she said her dad cheated on her mother and infected her with HIV. She says,
“My dad started cheating a lot. I would bump into him in town with different women”.
After getting infected and finding out, her mother went into severe depression causing a nervous breakdown as she tried coming into terms with her health condition.
However, she did not tell her children that she had been infected with HIV/AIDS by their father.
”She went into severe depression and she got a nervous breakdown. So those are the things up to date I still think about, she didn’t have to go through that. After she healed and was back home, she would take medicine and say it was for the nervous breakdown. That’s what we knew.” She further revealed.
On how she found out the medicine was not for her nervous breakdown, an emotional Makena said;
“One day she told me to please clean her room and as I was cleaning I bumped into the medicine she used to take and I decided to pick the leaflet so that at night I can read about this medication and what it’s doing to her.
After dinner, I went into my room and opened the leaflet and started reading and the first line crushed me. These are antiretroviral drugs. At that moment my whole life came to a standstill because at that point I thought she is dying.”
Makena who lost her mum in 2013 said she never told her mother she was aware about her status until just a few months before she passed away. She said she took up the responsibility to care for her mom at a young age, making sure her diet was in check and that she took her medication in perfect time. Makena admitted:
“At that moment my whole life came to a standstill because at that point I thought she is dying. I still struggle with what my dad took us through.”
And after the death of her mom, the TV star who rose to the limelight with her role as Makena on Tahidi High, said she broke down and felt that it was unfair since the dad was the one who infected her mother. As it turns out the father was a carrier.
When they laid their mum to rest, she revealed that she refused to talk to her father until two years later when he was at his death bed.
She finally went to see her dad at his death bed after being convinced by her brother to see her dad before he passed on.
“I went back to see my dad, he couldn’t talk he was very sick and I told him ‘Daddy I forgive you’. I forgive you for everything you took us through. I set you free,” says Makena.
Watch below…
Photo credit: Instagram/Makena