Manipulative Husband Once Forced Danica Patrick To Push Her Parents Out of Her Life – “They Were Taking Advantage of Me”

Some may argue that Danica Patrick is the most discussed NASCAR driver of all time. Even after her retirement from the sport, the IndyCar driver makes it to the headlines for one reason or another. However, with this sort of popularity, sometimes some ugly facets of life leave a jarring scar.

In an episode of ‘In Depth with Graham Bensinger’, Danica Patrick revealed a tumultuous time in her life while she was married to Paul Edward Hospenthal. She shared her struggle with having her parents work for her.  

She said “I think that it’s best to not have your parents working for you especially when the boss is the child. I think that’s a really really tough dynamic. How do you hold your parents accountable for the little things when they’re your parents?”

Furthermore, she revealed that she was manipulated into certain family dynamics based on a relationship that was not okay. She shared that her husband forced her to choose between him and her parents. She said; “I was in a relationship where I was kind of forced to choose and push my parents out and it was really sad. But it was my reality then.”

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Danica Patrick shared that those were some of the most devastating days of her life. She revealed that she didn’t see her parents for five straight years because she was manipulated into believing that they were bad.

Danica Patrick on her relationship with her parents

During the conversation, the interviewer asked what exactly was Danica told about her parents. To this, she answered that there was a list of reasons that she was forced to believe. She began listing; “Because I was forced to choose because they were taking advantage of me because they weren’t doing a good job because they didn’t have my best interests at heart.”

However, soon she began realizing how important her family was to her. Moreover, she said that since she was being manipulated, it was easier for her to believe all the bad things. But she did admit that certain things that she was told about her parents were actually true.

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Yet, she now believes that nobody is perfect and parents especially would never want anything bad for their children. She said; “But I know parents don’t always do the right thing but I think they always want the best. I don’t think they always know how. Because they’ve got parents too that screwed it up, and their parents screwed up and their parents screwed up. Nobody’s perfect.”