Rapper Roxanne Shante Shares Emotional Story of Trauma and Abuse DMX Endured

As fans and celebrities alike continue to honor rapper DMX’s after he died on April 9, one old school rapper spoke candidly about her deceased friend in a touching video.

Queens native and rap legend Roxanne Shante shared an almost eight-and-a-half-minute video discussing the emotional and physical abuse that DMX suffered at the hands of his mother. The Shante expressed just how much the abuse and subsequent abandonment affected her comrade.

“This is one of the most serious things that I’ve ever said, maybe even one of the most emotional and personal things that I’ve ever said,” she began.

Shante also elaborated that it was a first-hand account from the emcee’s own mouth.

“It has to do with DMX and what he had went through,” she continued. “This is not what somebody told me, this is what he said to me. When he was younger, his mom had took him to a children’s home and said that they was just going to visit, and she left him there. She took him there, and she left him there.”

The emotional tribute to her fallen homie continued with Shante expressing that DMX was “too little to defend himself” and “too little to take care of himself,” yet he managed.

 “I know what it’s like to run the streets, sleep on the train, sleep in the hallways, tried to sleep at friend’s houses. Have people say you can come stay at they house, and they brothers would come try and mess with you or even they fathers and uncles and s**t.”

“As soon as me and DMX came in contact with each other, as soon as me and Earl came in contact with each other, we already knew what was done to that spirit,” Roxane Shante said through tears. “It makes you overly aggressive. It makes you seem angry to people. It makes you seem mad at people. So, people try to find whatever they can in order to overcome that.”

Shante’s reminder of how situations can have a profound effect on someone’s life was poignant and food for thought.