Whenever you’ve been within the highlight so long as Ashanti and Nelly have, you be taught fairly shortly: everybody has an opinion. Whether or not it’s about your music, your strikes, or your relationships, the general public at all times feels entitled to a say.
However now, as newlyweds navigating marriage, parenthood, and life in full view of the world, Ashanti and Nelly have mastered the artwork of tuning all of it out.
“Me personally, I don’t care,” Ashanti informed theGrio when requested about how outdoors opinions have an effect on her. Her reply left Nelly, who responded “I don’t give a s–t” to the query, visibly stunned, sparking one in every of many lighthearted exchanges that present simply how comfy they’ve change into of their dynamic.
“I’d by no means name you a liar,” he mentioned with a chuckle. “I’d simply say, at this second, every thing just isn’t being mentioned.”
Nonetheless, Ashanti specified that on the subject of public criticism, whether or not or not it’s of her, her husband, or her relationship, she says: “I really feel like I don’t care to a sure extent, so long as we’re good. I don’t let it get to some extent the place it’s disrupting issues between us. I really feel prefer it’s actually necessary for us to know what it’s between us and make it possible for we’re good, as a result of you’ll be able to’t management what the general public goes to suppose and do.”
It’s the sort of peace that may solely come from progress. And if there’s one factor Ashanti and Nelly have had, it’s time and house to develop.
The couple, who famously dated within the early 2000s earlier than calling it quits in 2013, rekindled their romance a decade later, a lot to the delight (and shock) of followers. However for Ashanti, it wasn’t some cosmic blueprint or grand manifestation like “Ciara’s prayers” that led them again to one another. It was merely destiny doing its factor.
“When issues are supposed to be, they are going to be,” Ashanti shared. “I don’t suppose we have been essentially searching for one another. I feel issues occurred organically. I imply, everybody talks about Verzuz, the hug, and all of that. So, I assume a possibility offered itself, after which issues sort of simply organically occurred after that.”
Nelly echoed that sentiment. 10 years in the past, he by no means imagined he’d discover himself married with a new child alongside the very girl he as soon as liked and misplaced. Nonetheless, marriage had at all times been a part of his greater image—he simply wasn’t going to be pressured into it.
“Folks used to get on me on a regular basis, ‘You’re not married. You’re not married.’ And I’d by no means let no person rush me into getting married, as a result of for me, it’s not about having been married. It’s about dying married,” he defined. “I feel we’re in a society the place we’ll give credit score to any individual who was married and has been divorced, reasonably than to any individual who’s by no means been married.”
That endurance paid off. Quick-forward to as we speak, and the 2 are usually not solely husband and spouse but additionally new mother and father to 11-month-old Kenkaide “KK” Haynes—Ashanti’s first youngster and Nelly’s third. Nelly can be father to son Cornell III (Tre), 25, and daughter Chanelle (Nana), 30. After shedding his sister Jackie Donahue to leukemia in 2005, he stepped as much as increase her kids, Sydney and Shawn.
“Whenever you make that vow, you gotta maintain that—” Nelly started, just for Ashanti to lovingly end his sentence: “Without end.”
Since reuniting, their love story has prompted a wave of thinkpieces. Do you have to spin the block? May your ex truly be the one? However Nelly shrugs off the theorizing.
“All of us are completely different. All people goes via completely different wavelengths and completely different challenges,” he mentioned. Reflecting on the time aside and the way they’ve developed, he added, “I feel for us, I feel a number of the issues that we thought could be deal breakers, um, weren’t deal breakers in any respect. Our total view of each other and life as a complete was manner greater than what we thought was sort of petty.”
That deepened understanding is on full show of their new actuality collection, “We Belong Collectively.” The present presents followers a uncommon peek behind the scenes because the couple navigates marriage, parenthood, profession calls for, and mixing households.
And whereas a lot has been made about their choice to not reveal child KK’s face onscreen, the center of the present is about one thing deeper: two grown, totally established people studying the right way to construct a life collectively.
Stream “Ashanti & Nelly: We Belong Collectively” now on Peacock.
