Sister Wives

Previously on Sister Wives...

You and I have intimacy.

I'm sorry it's conditional based upon being part of a plural family.

I feel like, to Kody, Robyn is more important.

I think he has a favorite wife.

And that's why all of this is like it is.

You want to be with me, but you're not courting me to that relationship.

I didn't know I was supposed to court you.

I'm not suggesting that Meri chase me.

In fact, that could be off-putting.

She's not making any effort.

I have somebody in my life who is fundamentally loyal to me,

who sees me as the head of the family.

I'm saying to you that you and I get that if you're loyal to me.

I just can't believe what he's saying.

You and I have been acting like we weren't a married couple

for most of our marriage, Janelle.

Okay, I'm spitting mad now.

You guys, thank you for coming.

Hey, it means a lot to me that you came.

It's just devastating.

I'm sorry I'm angry.

-I just... I just survived a really, really, dark place. -I understand that.

You don't give a though.

-Look at you, dismissing it. -Okay.

- Would you ever have any empathy for me? - Please don't leave.

- When you're in pain, I try to understand you. -Can we just keep talking?

Kody. Can we please keep talking, Janelle? Please?

Janelle, this is a really bad idea for you to walk off on this one.

Well, all you're doing is yelling at me.

Well, the state of the family is... strained.

I mean, like, it almost feels like a civil war.

I- I don't even know how to describe it.

Christine moved me out of her house a year ago.

And she said we were divorced.

And basically, that's been months now.

Meri and I have infrequent interactions.

We talk about what's going on,

having functioned in a marriage-like relationship for about seven or eight years.

It's been a long time.

Things with Janelle and I are pretty strained.

It's like, I can't figure this out

because I'm so upset.

The holidays are coming up. I don't know what we're going to do for the holidays.

The family is not talking.

Today I am getting the trailer ready to haul off to winter storage.

Clean it out, roll in the slides, hook it up

to the truck and take it down south to store for the winter.

You know, when we first all moved to Flagstaff three and a half years ago,

we bought this piece of property with the intention

that we would all build houses here.

And since then, Robyn has bought a house,

and I've been holding out, waiting for this dream on this property, this house.

So, now I've decided to rent an apartment in town for the winter.

But I am kind of sad. I feel like I've somehow failed a little bit.

When our family first moved to Flagstaff,

our full intention was to build on our property that we had bought.

Robyn got a rental, Janelle got a rental, Meri found a rental.

A year later, Robyn's rental sold out from under her.

We couldn't find a rental, so we ended up having to buy a house.

Two years later, Janelle should've bought a house.

I did not want to buy a house.

All I wanted was to get out on that property.

Okay, let's see... what we need to here.

Hang on. Hey, there's some stuff I got to trade out,

so it goes to storage with the RV.

Oh, so that it goes to the storage?

-In the back of the storage trailer, -Mmm-hmm.

there's the septic hose.

-Okay, yeah, we got to throw some stuff in, right? -And... Yeah.

Kody and I, since COVID, have really been struggling in our relationship.

Everything really started to fall apart

with the beginning of COVID and the quarantine.

Kody didn't feel like my boys were being very safe. He didn't trust them.

He thought they were going to contaminate us all.

So, I mean, at one point, Garrison, who was very frustrated

with how he felt like I was being neglected called Robyn

and said, "Hey, can we have our dad back? Because he hasn't been around."

Kody feels like Robyn's been severely wronged,

and that my children need to apologize.

I never asked for an apology. I don't want an apology.

I want to be able to be okay with these boys,

and that was never my intention.

And now with some prompting from Robyn,

he's come around to where there has to be a conversation.

But, yeah, I still see no movement on his part towards reconciliation.

-Where are you going for Christmas? -Here, here.

-Okay. -But my kids, they're renting an Airbnb.

Because I don't think they're welcome. Right?

-Well-- -I never said my kids weren't welcome.

-If they apologize, and they're kind of like-- -No, no, no.

All I want to do is talk to 'em.

Well, Janelle's going to back east.

See Madi and Caleb for Thanksgiving.

Okay, all right. I get it a little bit.

But I am still sore. I am tender, emotionally, from a divorce.

This would be the time that I would wish that my wife would

look me in the eyes and say, "I support you."

Sure, I've been an ogre.

But I love you and I support you.

I understand what you're going through.

She's not doing any of that.

She's literally telling me she doesn't like me,

she'd prefer other things, she even prefers my ex-wife.

After Christmas, Christine said that

Ysabel and everybody are coming home,

and they want to come see the family here.

Oh, man. This is exactly what I was afraid of

with Christine leaving.

Kody, it just was working out that we had a vacation rental,

so we extended it so Julie and Ysabel can see you,

But you're talking about everybody going to some neutral zone.

This is my house.

Welcome to my house in Utah.

I'm really so excited.

So excited.

Like, I left Flagstaff two months ago.

Yeah, it feels like I'm ripping things apart.

I thought that it would just be a little bit easier.

But it's an end of a book. It's an end of a saga. I don't know.

And so, everything just feels a little unsettling.

Christine's gone. And Janelle doing stuff with Christine...

She's not doing stuff with the rest of us. Or even me.

So, I don't know what to make of this.

It's tense in the family across the board.

It's tense for a couple of different reasons.

There's Christine leaving. and her divorcing Kody,

it's... there's a lot of tension going on.

Now they're talking about doing Christmas separate.

It's just this whole new like, worrying, heartbreaking stress

about whether or not we'll not be together for Christmas.

But it's still like, horrible to sit and think about.

It's like... It's scaring me and stressing me out a lot.

-I'm letting it out. -I need someone to do my...

From the minute I met the family, we've been doing holidays together.

Every single holiday together.

And this is just such a weird experience to go,

"Who's going to be together for the holidays?"

It just seems so, ugh, screwed up, and I hate it.

What's up?

Okay, I just need to move all this stuff out here.

-Like, all at once? - No. Well, I don't know.

Just put it in the backseat.

You know, everybody made choices.

Christine chose to leave.

Janelle's choosing her as somebody that she wants to be close to

rather than Meri and Robyn. Or even me.

People make choices. We made choices all the way along.

So, it frustrates me if anybody in this family

starts acting like they're a victim.

Uh, Jenelle. Uh, go ahead and start pulling it in.

I'm going to watch it.

Yeah, it's going great. Just keep going.

-Oh, sorry. Keep going. - You scared me.

You scared me. Sorry, I heard your voice.

It'll be more of a yell than that if it's not going good.

You know, I think that this trailer thing has been

even more strain on Kody and I's relationship, to be fair.

I didn't anticipate it. I thought we'd have this grand adventure,

didn't anticipate it would be so hard.

- -Good.

And when it wasn't all easy and it wasn't comfortable,

and it was hard, I think Kody really got disillusioned very fast.

And it was very easy for him to blame me for this.

Okay, I'm going to close this trailer.

And then, uh, we can hook up and leave.

As soon as the dang land is paid off,

I can break ground.

So, I'll come back out next spring 'cause we have one year

until the property has to be paid off.

You know, when we brought this property, the seller carried the note.

He carried the loan.

And as any other bank, he has the right to foreclose if we default on the loan.

So, the clock is really ticking.

We could lose it all if we default.

I really, really would like to have an amiable divorce.

-How's it going? -How are you?

-Oh, here's... I didn't... -Oh.

-Nice to see you. - Hi.

I'm not feeling like I'm in a great place.

It was late up with covid. I was out of my mind.

-But when I talk about getting anxiety, Christine, -Sorry, I'm sorry.

-the depression-- -I know, and I'm sorry to even laugh a little bit.

But Gwendolyn was like--

-You didn't mean it that way. It's okay. -Yeah. I...

I'm back in Flagstaff again, just visiting with family, Janelle, her kids.

Come in.

-Hey, Janelle. - Oh, hey.

I know. So, I got the bookshelf that we walked about.

For right here?

-Oh, my gosh. - Yes, 'cause I'm struggling, like with

-all the... where to put everything. - That's beautiful.

-That's perfect. -So, okay.

- Cool. -Yeah, let's do it.

Let's put it. If you want to help me, 'cause I'm

-sort of intimidated about putting it together. -Please.

This is my favorite thing to do.

I'm visiting Janelle in her apartment today.

This is the first time that I get to see it.

And she asked if I would come over and help her build the shelf.