That was the message her family hammered home so relentlessly that she came to accept it as fact.
Today, no one calls her that – instead, she has been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world and one of the most powerful people in entertainment.
Involved in a horrific car accident
Some childhoods are tough — and then there are truly harrowing ones. The star we’re focusing on today once thought she wouldn’t make it past 21. At times, the story of her early life is almost unimaginable in its tragedy.
Born and raised in South Central Los Angeles, California, her childhood was filled with turmoil and heartbreak. Her father left the family when she was only three.
Her mother, Leola, was an African-American small business owner from a Jehovah’s Witness family. Unfortunately, the mother’s life — and everything that happened to her — would have an enormous impact on our future celebrity.
”When I was a kid and I was moving around, all my stuff had to be in trash bags, and moving like that is not good for the self-esteem because it [makes] you feel like garbage that can easily be transported to here or there,” the star told Variety.
”You start thinking of yourself as such, as garbage. That was the worst feeling in the world personally.”
By the time our star was nine, her mother had been in a serious car accident that left her with brain damage. Struggling to regain basic skills, her mother sometimes directed her frustration and anger toward her eldest child.
The mother became quick-tempered, abusive and violent.
Diagnosed with schizophrenia
By the time she reached high school, the future award-winning actress still hadn’t learned to read. Not because she lacked the ability, but because no one had ever properly taught her.
“Everybody’s telling me you’re stupid – my stepdad, my mom, grandma,(…) So, I believed I was stupid and I can’t read and I can’t do these things because I’m stupid,” she shared.
Then a teacher stepped in, seeing past the label and starting private lessons. Slowly, she began to catch up, a small but crucial victory in a childhood that was anything but easy.
“That was kinda cool to be nominated for a Grammy for reading out loud when I couldn’t read at one point in time in my life when I was in my teens,” she once said.
“I was told every day I’d never be nothing,” she recalled. “Now I look in the mirror and say, ‘[Her name], I love and approve of you.’ It was all worth it.”
Eventually, her mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia and institutionalized, leaving her children in foster care, separated from siblings, and forced to navigate a world they were unprepared for.
“I was basically a 10-year-old mom,” she said bluntly, describing how she cared for her siblings and herself. Group homes weren’t much better.
“It was more like prison. My comedy skills came in real handy. I thought that if I made these girls laugh they wouldn’t beat me up. But bully girl said, ‘Ahh b***h, we still going to beat your ass … but you funny.’”
Laughter became her shield
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