Terrence Howard Opens Up About Childhood Sex Abuse

Terrence Howard sat down with Patrick Bet-David on his PBD podcast for the second time, and the conversation was more expansive and even more personal than the first appearance.

The most traumatic moment comes about an hour into the conversation as Howard reveals he was only 4 years old when he had his first sexual experience, when discussing whether men and women can truly have platonic relationships.

“I was 4. It was the older girls who were watching me. They were like 6 or 7,” he says, revealing that the sexual relationship continued for years.

“And we did that every day until I was like 13. I had more sex than I’ve ever had in my adult life.”

He says he was “effectively molested,” but it was accepted because all the kids in his neighborhood were doing the same. Still, to him, it “always felt wrong.”

He wishes his mother had guided him away from that, saying, “I would probably have been a completely different person. It gave me an askew view of interaction. I kept thinking everyone was promiscuous like that.”

Experiencing that for years affected how he acted as a teenager when other kids were having that puberty-driven awakening.

“By the time I get to 16, 17, I’ve had enough,” he explains. “To where the spiritual side of me is starting to show up.”

It’s only now that he’s understanding how that affected his mental health as an adult, and it’s manifested in him being super protective of his kids and others. 

“If we have family, a friend comes over, I’m just overly protective because I wanted somebody… I’m trying to protect me,” he said. “My kids are never alone without at least two people watching them.”

He estimates that between the ages of 4 and 13, he had sex with at least 100 girls.

See social media’s reaction to Howard’s brave admission below.