Kia Brooks is the mother to 17-year-old up-and-coming rapper and basketball star Flau’Jae Johnson.
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’s new series “Raising a F***ing Star.”
I didn’t want to push that, and it was scary for me because I was young.
But my brother was like, “Maybe God wrote this story out.
Give her a chance.
If that’s something she wants to do, at least let her try it.”
So I was like, “Okay, you’re right.”
Do she do this?"
I’m like, “Oh, I guess she does.
Yes, she does.”
What’s been your biggest challenge in helping her navigate the music industry and get started with all that?
The biggest challenge for her was trying to figure out who she was and who her audience was.
At that time, they’re going through a lot of different stages.
It sounds really kiddy.
We got on “The Rap Game” with Jermaine Dupri, and that was on Lifetime.
That’s when I knew this was for real.
That was the moment.
Because during the “Rap Game” season, she was really, really young.
She was 12 years old, and she was still learning.
Jermaine Dupri was hard on her.
She’s always been that way.
She is a very strong-willed person.
She gives me a lot of shout-outs, saying that “I watch my mom grind.
I watch my mom figure it out, and that’s why I go so hard.”
How do you balance that and make time for everything?
When I signed up to be a momager, I signed up.
Anything I sign up for, we don’t quit.
We don’t know how to quit.
We don’t start nothing we don’t finish.
But once you sign up, you’re going to finish it out."
you might’t go get a job and say you’re quitting without another job.
I explain that to them.
Life isn’t like that.
you’re free to’t quit.
We’re not quitters.
How do you balance your relationship as a momager [versus as] her parent?
I had to learn to separate that.
That was a task for me.
I was always like, “Flau’Jae, you oughta do this.
They’re hitting me up about this.
yo go and fill out these questions for this interview you’re on tomorrow.
c’mon, you have a show here.
They need to go ahead and have a drop.”
And sometimes, she would do it at the last minute.
And I was like, “People are paying you.
I separated those, and I learned that that works better for us.
Do you feel like it’s very separate modes you go into?
We can’t mix the two.
Her goal is to be the biggest rap basketball sensation ever.
She’s a unicorn.
Nobody has ever done this.
Nobody has ever been on these two stages like this and really dominating both of them.
I told her that always as a little girl because she wanted to be a basketball player.
I was like, “you gotta go Google what basketball players are making.
[Women are] not making what the guys are making.”
And we’re still fighting for all of that.
That ended up working out for us now with the new NIL rule for college.
People can actually book her, and she can get paid as a college student without any issues.
As far as me, I’m trying to be the next Kris Jenner.
I have a lot of talented kids in this house.
My son is writing music.
He’s an artist.
He’s into RnB.
I have Nixon; he’s on a football squad.
He’s doing really well.
Aiden, he’s the baby boss.
He’s really doing his thing.
I also have some extra kids from my husband.
Bonus babies are mine.
I didn’t give birth, but they’re still mine that I’m pushing.
I have a ballerina, my husband’s daughter, which is my daughter too.
And then I have MJ.
We’re trying to figure out what MJ wants to do right now.
He’s very comedic, but we’re going to figure that out.
I’m going to pull it out of him.
You have every industry covered in the house.
I got connections now; it’s been going good.
How are you feeling with the show coming out tonight?
Are you excited to see it,or are you nervous?
I’m very excited.
It’s been a while because we’ve been waiting.
You film ahead, and then you got to wait, wait, wait.
I’m really excited because I don’t know.
I haven’t seen how they put it together.
Even though we taped it, it was [in] pieces.
They might use it or not, so I’m very excited to see.
I know my family [and I] were real.
We want to give them the real.
We don’t want to be fake.”
If we have issues, put it all on the table.
This interview has been edited for clarity.
