Kelly's Secret Pain - Family Feud Explodes

Old wounds are reopened as the singer’s brother makes some startling claims about their fractured family...

Kelly Clarkson’s rise to fame is a Cinderella story if ever we’ve seen one. After years of struggling to break into the music biz, the singer became an overnight sensation when she won the OG season of American Idol back in 2002 at just 20 years old.

However, behind her success was the heartbreak that she’d been cast aside by her dad Stephen when she was just six after he divorced her mum Jeanne. Having spent years trying to maintain a relationship with her dad, Kelly, eventually stopped making an effort to contact Stephen – who sadly passed away earlier this year aged 67 – after it became “humiliating” when he never responded.

“You’re like, ‘I shouldn’t have to work this hard for someone’s love.’ Like, that’s a little ridiculous,” Kelly, 36, says. “And at that point too, you grow up so much to where you go ‘OK, I don’t even think you’re capable [of love].’”

But now Kelly’s half brother Erik, 28, has brought up the painful memories of her past.