Da’Naia Jackson is opening up about her troubled relationship with her estranged husband Derrick Jaxn for the first time.
Social media users sunk their teeth into the salacious allegations of infidelity against Derrick two years ago. In a new interview, Da’Naia revealed that she had been dealing with her partner’s wandering eye for nearly a decade. The two met when they were 19 and attending Tuskegee University. They dated for nine years before getting married in 2018.
“When we talk about commitment, we gotta tone it all the way down. We gotta go back to the elementary level of the word,” she told “Dear Future Wifey” podcast host Laterras R. Whitfield in part one of their discussion. She went on to explain their “situationship” had been strained by its on-and-off nature and other people.
“There was commitment at times, but there was a lot of on-and-off again through college and even after college … Leading up to our marriage, we were actually off, right, we were actually off,” circa 2015 to late 2016, she said. “We went our separate ways because there was other people involved, and there had already been other people involved even in college, right. Other women.”
Da’Naia specifically admitted to using a co-worker named Fabian while in college to make Derrick jealous. “I used him to set Derrick up because I was tired of him being with all these girls, and catching him, and going through his phone, and watching him do all this stuff with these girls,” she continued.
Per her plan, they made it look as though they were happily involved and linking up at rendezvous spots. “I knew Derrick would find out about it and I wanted him to because I wanted him to pay,” said the self-identified devout Christian.
The former couple share three children together. They announced their divorce in December 2022. The prior year, the popular social media personality was blasted for allegedly cheating on his wife with a woman he had known for nearly a decade.
He later addressed the accusations, admitting to spending time with the woman, identified as Candice De Medeiros, but claimed they never had sex. He also said he and Da’Naia were separated at the time.
“I’ve sat there and watched, I mean literally went through his phone and watched him have sex with other girls. On the phone, like, I literally watched it. That was soul crushing. You know, at that time this is well before we’re married, I’ve seen it multiple times, multiple girls,” she continued.
Da’Naia admitted she never confronted him about the alleged videos, out of fear of rejection. The 32-year-old described herself as an individual who is reserved and, at times, loyal, to her own detriment. Looking back on her life, she attributes the latter trait to her childhood, where she dealt with rejection and abandonment as the child of teen parents.
“They never really had a relationship per se,” said Da’Naia of her mother, who was 16, and her father, who was 17, when she was born.
“There was some questions actually about whether or not I was my father’s or not… Just the relationship that I had with my father growing up, I felt like he just wasn’t as present as he could be or he would always not come through or follow through with his promises.”
Her dad, she said, passed away when she was 12 years old. “I wanted the affection of my father,” she noted. Elsewhere in the discussion, Da’Naia disclosed that she was sexually assaulted by another person three weeks before she met Derrick.
She said she did not tell anyone about the incident for years. Her tendency to not outwardly deal with issues was a recurring theme she identified in her relationship with the best-selling author. By the time she sought therapy, at the age of 30, she said the trauma had impacted intimacy in her marriage, as well as her mental and emotional state.
Around the 40-minute mark, Da’Naia disclosed that she became pregnant with their first child while they were broken up, but still sexually involved. She claimed that she was one of many women on his “roster.” She said the pregnancy was a wake-up call to get her life in order after already having had three abortions.
Despite approaching Derrick about the status of their relationship, she admitted to continuing intimacy with him while he was involved with other women. Da’Naia explained that it took a toll on her, leading her to obsess over his other lovers.
“I became a shell of myself. I didn’t know who I was,” she said. In previous Instagram posts, she alluded to knowing the bodies of other women. While speaking with Whitfield, she elaborated on what she meant.
“I knew several other women’s bodies better than I knew my own. I went in such a deep hole where I was like studying these women. I would go to their profiles and I would study their pages, what they wear. I knew when they had met up, so I watched their videos of them having sex so I would try to imitate that.”
Her efforts never managed to satisfy the relationship guru, who allegedly continued to cheat. Through tears, Da’Naia said she wanted to embody everything the other women were so that Derrick would choose her.
“That is a low point to be … I hate that I even got to a point where that was a thing,” she added. “I completely lost myself, I became a shell of myself. I tried to imitate their hair, their actions, even sexual things that I had seen him doing with them, I tried to recreate that in our life when we were engaged, and none of it amounted to anything.”
Reactions to the revealing conversation have garnered Da’Naia newfound support from people who once clowned her for wearing her “helmet of salvation” and sticking beside her estranged husband.
Part two of the conversation will be released on May 25.
