‘Sister Wives’: All of the Red Flags in Janelle and Kody Brown’s Marriage Revealed in ‘Becoming Sister Wives’ Memoir

In the Sister Wives memoir, Becoming Sister Wives: The Story of an Unconventional Marriage, Kody Brown and his second wife, Janelle Brown, document their perspectives from their first meeting to their life until the book was published in 2013.

At the end of Sister Wives Season 16, Janelle and Kody’s marriage has been on the rocks. It appears that their marriage has never been perfect. Here are all the red flags in Janelle and Kody’s relationship revealed in the Sister Wives memoir.

Kody had no intention of marrying Janelle at the beginning

In the memoir, Janelle described the exact moment she met Kody and Meri. She recalled the fireside get-together she attended with her church while she was in the middle of a divorce with her first husband, Meri Brown’s brother, Adam.

She penned, “That evening, when Kody walked into the house to join the party, the strangest feeling washed over me. I felt as if I had forgotten something and suddenly remembered it. It was a feeling of relief and recognition.”

However, Kody’s first time meeting Janelle falls flat in comparison. It seems as though he pitied her. It was not love at first sight. He said that he had no intention of marrying Janelle. He wrote:

“After Meri and I were married, Janelle was often on the periphery of our lives. We both knew that Janelle had endured a rough period during her short-lived marriage, and we wanted to make sure that she remained close with Meri’s family despite the divorce. We, as well as Meri’s parents, were looking out for Janelle purely because we cared about her. There was never any thought in my mind, or in Meri’s of Janelle becoming a wife.”

Kody Brown

In Kody’s chapter, he claims to have first met Janelle when she was still married to Meri’s brother, Adam. However, the spark eventually came from the platonic relationship. He wrote, “Through Meri, I got to know Janelle. Our friendship was entirely platonic, but I recognized Janelle’s intelligence, and conversation always flowed easily between us.”

Kody felt like marrying Janelle would solve all of her problems

When Janelle was finally single after her divorce, Kody swooped in. He recounted a time right after Janelle’s divorce when he frequented the employment agency where she was working. He wrote:

“One afternoon I had to stop by Janelle’s office to pick up a check. I passed by her desk to say hello. A quick hello turned into a long conversation. Janelle was very forthcoming about her life. She complained about the guys she was dating, about how immature and unsatisfactory they were.

Immediately a thought popped into my head: Janelle should marry a guy like me. I thought I was the perfect solution to Janelle’s problem. Back then, I was young and arrogant. I was also naive. I thought that I was everything Janelle was looking for.”

Kody Brown

Janelle and Kody were step-siblings before they became husband and wife

In the memoir, Janelle recounts a difficult childhood: her father died when she was just two years old. Her mother remarried a man named Merlin Fryer. Janelle says her first stepdad was not “a hands-on father,” describing him as “distant” and “emotionally unavailable.” Her mother eventually divorced him.

Later, Janelle’s mother, Sheryl Usher, ended up marrying into a plural marriage with Kody’s father, William Winn Brown. So technically speaking, Janelle and Kody were step-siblings when they met. And since Janelle was married to Meri’s brother, that means Kody was Janelle’s brother-in-law for a bit as well.

Janelle confirms this in the memoir, recounting the time she was living off the land on her stepdad’s ranch in Wyoming. She wrote, “I decided it would be a good idea to spend some time living closer to nature, as Native Americans once had. I bought a teepee and quit my job, intending to camp in my teepee for as long as I could bear it.

She recalled:

“Kody’s father had lots of open space on his ranch, and offered to let me camp on his land. By this time, he had married my mother. I knew that if I got too cold in the teepee, I could retreat to a warm house where my mother would be waiting.”

Janelle Brown

In the memoir, she talked about her stepdad, AKA Kody’s dad. She wrote:

“Kody’s father is a patriarchal man, in the sense that he feels it is his duty and responsibility to look after the people in his family orbit. I was one of those people. He took me under his wing and made it clear that it was his intention to find me a guy. Winn’s plan was to convince me to settle on Kody’s brother. But I had other ideas.”

Janelle Brown

Kody and Janelle’s only ‘date’ was when he proposed to her

After Janelle approached Kody about joining his family, he accepted, and they officially began courting. Kody admitted that it was a speedy courtship because they had already known each other for years. He wrote:

“Even in comparison to most plural courtships, Janelle’s and mine was particularly short. We managed to go on only one date. And it wasn’t much of a date. It took place sometime after New Year’s and it was freezing cold. I had been working a fifteen-hour shift, so when I finally got off work, it was late. The town where Meri and I were living in Wyoming was really small.

By the time I picked Janelle up, all the restaurants were closed. So we drove around in the dark. Janelle’s mother had given me a ring that had been hers. I put the ring on Janelle’s finger and asked her to marry me. It was more of a formality than an actual proposal. It was dark, it was late, and it was cold.

Kody Brown

Two weeks later we got married. We had a spiritual ceremony on another bitterly cold January night. Then we went on our honeymoon. We had no plan. We just drove and drove, staying wherever we felt like stopping.”

Janelle admits that since her courtship with Kody was void of romance, intimacy, or PDA, it was difficult for her to feel in love. She wrote:

“During the first few days of our honeymoon, it was difficult for me to consider our relationship as a married couple. Even though we’d had the spiritual ceremony, which committed us to each other in a newer, deeper way, I felt no closer to Kody than I had a week earlier. We had been friends, but now we had to learn to be husband and wife.

I know now that Kody and I weren’t in love then. But there wasn’t a moment that I didn’t believe I’d made the right decision, not just about Kody, but about my new faith.”

Janelle Brown

Kody has always treated Janelle like a friend or associate, especially in comparison with his other wives. This is highlighted in all of the chapters in the Becoming Sister Wives memoir. Sister Wives fans hope TLC will shed more light on Janelle and Kody’s marriage in season 17.