‘Sister Wives’ Recap: Kody Says He Won’t Reconcile With His Older Kids If They Don’t Accept Robyn

If Robyn ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy. Kody Brown is making his loyalties clear on this week’s episode of Sister Wives. The father of 18 has many estranged relationships with his older children, and despite the fact that they all FaceTimed in for Mykelti Padron’s gender reveal, it doesn’t look like those relationships are going to improve anytime soon. 

“Some day our family civil war might end and then that contempt, you know, we can deal with it,” Kody says of the tension within the family. 

But Kody made it clear that he and his only remaining wife, Robyn Brown, are going to be inseparable. 

“You’re not going to separate us. They want their dad, but they don’t want Robyn,” Kody says. “That’s not going to work. Robyn and I are going to be like this. We’re going to work this out. And that’s just the relationship we’re going to be in.”

Several of Kody’s older children, specifically the children he shares with his exes, Christine Brown and Janelle Brown, have expressed that their father shows favoritism toward Robyn, especially during the pandemic. Arguments over Kody’s rules and protocol during COVID led to estrangement between the polygamist and his sons, Gabriel and Garrison Brown. 

“Our older kids choose who they want to have relationships with,” Christine later says, specifically referencing her daughter, Mykelti’s, estrangement from Meri Brown. 

Not only is Robyn’s opinion the one that Kody seems to value the most, it’s also the only one he’s considering these days. 

“My life has changed a lot, and it’s been interesting because I don’t really feel like a polygamist anymore,” Kody admits. “It’s been 10 months since I’ve been to Janelle’s house. I don’t even know what’s going on hardly half the time with Meri’s life. Now I’ve got all this time that Robyn and I, we’ve got, sort of, this special life together.”

Janelle also admits to Christine, “I don’t think I really even am married anymore.”

Christine, who announced she was divorced from Kody in 2021, says that discussing Janelle and Kody’s marriage is a “delicate balance,” noting, “I’ve never wanted to sway her to leave Kody, even though it’s the best decision that I made.”

Kody adds that Janelle has made it “difficult” for him to feel like he’s still married to her. 

“It’s just she’s just constantly gone,” he says. “I don’t think we can reconcile, and I don’t disagree with her, but I sometimes feel like, are we just giving up too easy?”

And while Janelle might consider herself to be single, she adds that she’s “not interested in dating at all.”

Janelle and Christine also talk about how Robyn joining the family in 2010 changed the dynamic. 

“When Robyn came, a lot of those traditions changed,” Janelle says. 

“We stopped doing our Friday night dinners. Every single Saturday we were doing things and Robyn came in the family and it stopped,” Christine adds. 

“She was a separate entity from us, and Kody ended up being over there quite a bit,” Janelle explains. 

But Kody disagrees in his own confessional interview, adding, “Robyn always supported our family traditions because that was part of the negotiation that we made when we got married. In fact, she enhanced our traditions.” 

New episodes of Sister Wives air Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on TLC. 

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