‘Selling Sunset’: Amanza Smith Reveals Where Things Stand between Her and Her Ex
Amanza Smith joined Selling Sunset in the second season and since then she has become a key member of the cast. When she first joined, she revealed that her ex-husband NFL star Ralph Brown had gone missing. Throughout last season, she was constantly running around, trying to take care of her kids without the help of Brown. Now, she’s opening up about where things stand between them.
Has Ralph been found?
Though Smith and Brown were not together when Smith started filming for the show, they were sharing custody of their two children. But just two weeks into filming, Brown disappeared.
“We filmed for seven and a half months when he was still nowhere to be found,” she told Entertainment Tonight. “This is a huge part of my life and I have cameras following me 24/7. You can’t hide.”
Since her ex went missing, Smith has done everything she can think of to find him. She has filed a missing person report and hired a private investigator. But his family hasn’t exactly been helpful in the search.
“If I reach out to his sister and brother-in-law, the next thing, I would be blocked,” she said. “I text, email, voice message his brother and his father to no avail. I’ve had at least 20 of his ex-NFL teammates reach out to me saying, ‘Hey, have you heard from him? Do you know what’s going on?'”
Brown’s phone has been shut off so she has no way of contacting him.
“His best friend of 20 years has no idea,” she told the outlet. “He’s alive somewhere, because otherwise we would know. There’s so many people actively trying and there’s just no answer. It’s the most bizarre — heartbreaking for my kids, because it’s not just their dad. That whole side of the family has just disappeared.”
Does Amanza have full custody of her kids?
When she and Brown first got divorced, they decided to share custody of their daughter Noah and son Baker.
“He was such an amazing father,” she said. “When we got divorced, I was adamant that we have 50/50 [custody], because I’m not that kind of person that would ever want my kids to never see their father as much as they see me. ‘You have two good parents. I want you to experience both of them. What I’m learning is once you go into it with it 50/50, it’s really hard to then switch to full custody.”
Since his dissapearance, Smith has been trying to get full costody of her children but the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has caused several delays and made the process even harder than it normally is.
How are Amanza’s kids handling things?
The disappearance of their father was not easy on Smith’s kids. In the beginning, they would cry themselves to sleep. Smith has been telling them that their father’s brain is sick and he is just taking time to himself to get better. She even bought them a book about mental health called When the Brain Breaks, so that they could better understand what’s going on.
“Everybody says kids are so resilient,” the real estate agent said. “They really are. I wish they didn’t have to be so much, but I’m really grateful that they are. They could be really messed up right now and they’re not. They’re happy and thriving and they’re smart and they get great grades. They have tons of friends and they’re athletic and funny and kind of cute.”
