Tina Knowles Reveals What Brought Beyoncé and Solange Closer as Kids
Speaking at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, Tina Knowles reflects on the parenting decision she made long before it was widely accepted, and how it helped shape her daughters’ relationship.
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Therapy, for many families, used to be either kept secret or avoided. For Tina Knowles, it was the opposite. She made it part of both Beyoncé and Solange’s lives from an early age, sitting them down with a child therapist and standing firm even as relatives pushed back.
Knowles shared the story at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, where she appeared in conversation around her memoir ‘Matriarch’.
“Beyoncé was this little superstar at 7 or 8 years old,” Knowles told the crowd. “She was winning all these talent competitions. And she had this little sister to come along.” As Beyoncé’s local stardom grew, Knowles explained that the dynamic between the sisters began to shift.
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“I just noticed she started being irritated with her and not wanting her around. And the more she didn’t want her around, the more sad Solange became.”
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Knowles knew she needed to intervene, and she knew she needed professional help to do it. “One of my clients at my hair salon was a therapist, and I asked her to find me a child therapist. I found someone, and I took my kids to therapy.”
The response from her family was immediate and sharp. “My family did not like it. Especially in Black households, they were like, ‘You know, that’ll make those kids crazy.’” Even her then-husband pushed back. “He was like, ‘They’re eleven and six, what do they need to go to therapy for?’”
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But they went anyway and Knowles says it changed the trajectory of her daughters’ relationship. “It opened Beyoncé’s eyes. She was like, ‘This is my little sister. We’re always going to be close. I’m going to take care of her, and I’m not going to let the age difference get between us.’ She was much kinder.
And they’ve been close ever since.” Knowles paused before adding, “They could have gone in different directions. I was so afraid of that.”
The decision, she says, was about more than sibling rivalry. It planted a seed that shaped how both women navigate their inner lives today. “My kids grew up knowing that it was okay to have someone to talk to and to share things with, and not to try to keep it bottled up inside.”
Knowles has been just as open about her own relationship with therapy, especially when it comes to unlearning patterns she grew up with.
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“I’m codependent,” she said. “I’ve been going to therapy forever for that. When you grow up with a codependent mother, she gave me the message that everybody was more important than me. And that happens in a lot of families.” She grew emotional as she continued: “I still struggle with putting myself, not even putting myself first, but making myself as important as everybody else.”
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Looking back, she says that pattern affected nearly every part of her life, from her relationships to her self-worth. Her breast cancer diagnosis, detailed more fully in the new paperback edition, became a turning point, she said. “When I got cancer, I had to slow down. I had to stop being so codependent and just really take care of myself and take time to enjoy my life and not be so stressed all the time. That was the biggest lesson.”
And she is candid that the work continues, “I still fall short sometimes at taking the best care of myself,” she admitted. “But at least I’m conscious of it now. Because you can give and give and give, but you’re not going to be there to give to those people one day if you don’t take care of yourself.”
The new paperback edition of Matriarch is available April 28.
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