Cheryl Burke believes her view of love was warped by past traumas, including her father’s infidelity and a “caregiving experience” she went through as a child.
The Dancing With the Stars pro, whose parents divorced when she was 2, shared Wednesday’s Red Table Talk that her “first memory as a child was seeing [her] father with another woman.”
After they split, Burke said her mother started dating and later married her stepfather, whom she described as “an amazing guy.”
However, he has put his trust in the wrong hands.
Burke’s stepfather hired a family friend, a retired postman in his late 60s, to babysit. She was 5 when the babysitter started bothering her.
Cheryl Burke says her father’s infidelity and a “nurturing experience” she went through as a child distorted her view of love.Red Table Talk/Facebook
“It was more of a nurturing experience,” she told hosts Jada Pinkett Smith and Adrienne Banfield-Norris and a veteran psychologist, explaining that while there was “sexual activity,” “it wasn’t intercourse.”
“I’ve never felt physically hurt,” she admitted, seemingly reluctantly. “Like, there were moments – and I’ll say it now – like, it didn’t feel bad? It was really intimate.”
“He nursed me,” she repeated. “And he was my definition of love. That equals love, right? Seeing my father’s infidelity, being abused by this old retired postman – I didn’t really know what a healthy relationship was or was. There was no stable father figure in my life.”
Burke said on RTT that her “first memory as a child was seeing [her] father with another woman.”Cherylburke/Instagram
The 38-year-old dancer described the years of sexual abuse she endured as “brainwashing” that didn’t end until her older sister’s friend “did the right thing, ran home to her parents and told them.”
Burke said the girlfriend’s parents immediately contacted her family and they “actually testified against it [the babysitter] at 9 [years old].”
The man was sentenced to 24 years in prison.
Her parents divorced when she was 2 years old and her mother remarried her stepfather.Sherribburke/Instagram
Shortly thereafter, Burke discovered ballroom dancing, which she feels “saved”. [her] Life.”
Still, she said the activity forced her to “grow up fast” as she pointed out all the “tiny, skimpy dance costumes and eyelashes.” [and] Fake Tan[s].”
“It’s a man’s world,” she said of the industry. “The man leads; The woman follows – from the dance floor to the dance floor. And with that come abusive partners and abusive trainers. Was there sexual abuse and psychological abuse? 100 percent.”
Burke was 5 when the family friend her stepfather hired to babysit her started molesting her.Instagram/cherylburke
When she was in high school, Burke claimed she “dated two men who were very physically and emotionally abusive” — one of whom allegedly belt whipped her while his parents sat around and watched.
“I would see those welts and be like, ‘That’s not really there,'” she recalled, adding that she didn’t end the relationship with this supposedly “controlling” man because she harbored hope that “everything would work out will be okay.”
She admitted she was “addicted” to the makeup breakup cycle.
“For me, love was synonymous with abuse. Love equaled infidelity. Love was synonymous with manipulative, narcissistic behavior,” she said, explaining, “That’s why I used to drink. I was in survival mode. I used alcohol to numb myself.”
For Burke, “love equaled abuse… infidelity… manipulative, narcissistic behavior.”
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For Burke, “love equaled abuse… infidelity… manipulative, narcissistic behavior.”
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“He was in the NICU for a little over one time…
Burke celebrated four years of sobriety in August, six months after filing for divorce from Matthew Lawrence after less than three years of marriage.
“My father has died [in March 2018], and my dad was an alcoholic,” the choreographer shared on a September 2020 episode of the LadyGang podcast. “So I would either crash and burn and check myself into rehab, or I would just quit cold turkey.”
She recalled coming to the realization that she wanted to quit drinking at her and Lawrence’s engagement party in May 2018.
She said she “craved” vulnerability in her marriage to Matthew Lawrence.moviemagic
Her sobriety has remained, but her marriage has not.
“I didn’t want that,” the ABC star told RTT about their divorce. “That was definitely not the plan. I’m not proud of it, that’s for sure. But then there’s also a point where I have to put myself and my sobriety first.”
Burke said the ability to be “vulnerable” in a relationship is what she “craved.” [her] marriage.”
“It’s two people saying, ‘I’m not perfect, but we both want the same thing,’ which means, ‘Let’s work this out together, and we’re going to do what we have to do to hold ourselves accountable and stop finger pointing.’ ”
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