champion Julianne Hough made a heartbreaking confession in a recent interview on IT Cosmetics founder Jamie Kern Lima's podcast on Thursday. opened up on the about the healing journey she started at 25, and shared that she suffered as a child. The professional dancer explained that her neighbor began assaulting her at 4.
"I've actually never said that out loud to anybody in an interview before," she said on Jamie’s podcast. "It was a very confusing time because growing up in the Mormon culture, everyone needs to be perfect, everyone needs to put on the shiny 'we've got our stuff together,’” she continued. The ex-Dancing With The Stars judge explained that her victimizer didn’t have any consequences because she didn’t reveal who was hurting her until later.
Julianne also admitted that others in her family had gone through similar situations. Julianne revealed that though she told her parents about the abuse it was "later on” because she didn’t remember it at first. "I forgot about it and other things happened later in my childhood," she expressed.
"At 15, I came home and started sharing about other things, but had forgotten about the neighbor thing." The actress told Jamie that her parents felt guilty about what happened to her. "They felt helpless," she confessed.
"’I'm not blaming you now, but I needed more at the time'," Julianne said, reciting what she told her parents. As for her neighbor in Utah, she no longer speaks to them. Julianne noted that when she was young she had gone to her mom and told her that her clothes were inside out.
"She asked me why and I said, 'I don't want to talk about it'," Julianne detailed. She disclosed that her mom told her to reveal to her what happened. Julianne confessed to her mom that it "felt like she had a Sprite bottle behind my legs.
" During her childhood, she wasn’t permitted to have carbonated drinks; however, when she tried it, it burned. "She freaked out and panicked. Her reaction was 'let's get out of this neighborhood," Julianne noted.
"My mom did what she could and wanted to get us out." Julianne emotionally expressed that she was scared of the repercussions after she revealed her truth. "I feel like I've done something wrong," Julianne said.
Julianne then admitted that two of her sisters were also violated, in addition to her brother, who was hung upside down and had a gun put to his head..
