Allison Holker says Twitch was ‘touched’ by a male during his childhood & struggled with it

Allison Holker is sharing a dark part of Stephen “tWitch” Boss’ history.

More than two years after the death of husband, the So You Think You Can Dance alum is opening up about the demons Stephen had been privately fighting, the depth of some she only discovered while going through his belongings and journal entries.

And it was in the latter that Stephen included allusions to having been sexually abused by a male figure during his childhood, something Allison had not known prior to his December 2022 suicide.

“He was wrestling with a lot inside himself, and he was trying to self-medicate and cope with all those feelings because he didn’t want to put it on anyone because he loved everyone so much,” she told People in an interview published Jan. 7. “He didn’t want other people to take on his pain.”

She added, “It was really hard to put all the pieces together. Through certain discussions, even with friends and things that have been said, reading through his journals … you realize he went through a lot as a child and never faced it.”

While the 36-year-old admitted to experiencing feelings of betrayal after some of the discoveries—which included finding shoeboxes in Stephen’s closet containing a “cornucopia” of drugs—she also spoke to how her mindset changed over time.

“Reading Stephen’s journals, and even going back into the books he had read and the things that he was highlighting and lining, really gave me a better perspective of where he was in life and the type of things he was struggling with,” she explained. “It did have me feel a lot of empathy towards him and sadness for all the pain that he was holding.”

It also put into perspective how much her husband of 9 years—with whom Allison shared kids Weslie, 16, Maddox, 8, and Zaia, 5—had been trying to battle on his own.

“It’s hard to think that he never opened up to someone and wanted to face it, to get through on the other side,” she added. “I really hope people dealing with the same thing will help themselves out of the shadows and [know] you’re going to be okay.”

In looking back, Allison has also come to realize how much Stephen struggled with navigating his public persona—which included a major role on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and time as a judge for So You Think You Can Dance—amid his personal struggles.

“When I would think about my husband at the time, I would think, ‘Oh, I love that tWitch is such a great performer, but then when he comes home he feels safe enough to be Stephen,'” she said. “I was with him for so long, and that’s how he’s been the entire relationship. I was like, ‘It’s a beautiful thing that he can be both.'”

But now, Allison feels his “two very different personalities” were ultimately locked in some sort of battle. “What if he felt safe being this one individual that has different kind of energies,” she reflected. “You don’t have to be a completely different person and put them aside from each other.”

And Allison isn’t the only celebrity to stress the importance of mental health. For more, keep reading.

Visit the original source for more information: eonline

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