Flavie Flament has made some particularly difficult revelations about her relationship with her mother. In a lengthy interview with the media outlet La Déferlante , the television presenter reflects on her childhood and explains why she decided to sever all ties with the woman who raised her. This break, which dates back to 2011, is directly linked to her feeling of not having been protected as a young girl. "She could have raised me differently, but she didn't protect me. She exposed me to men, unfortunately ," Flavie Flament states.
"She didn't protect me."
In this interview, Flavie Flament reflects at length on the upbringing she received from her mother, who had her very young. "I question the upbringing I received from my mother. She had me at 20, in 1974. So she experienced May '68. She was on the threshold of a door that led to freedom, and she didn't cross it ," she recounts. The television presenter continues with much harsher words: "She could have raised me differently, but she didn't protect me. She delivered me into the hands of men, unfortunately." A particularly serious accusation given Flavie Flament's background. The presenter has publicly recounted suffering sexual violence as a teenager and notably accused photographer David Hamilton of raping her at the age of 13. He denied these accusations before his death in 2016.
Flavie Flament hasn't seen her mother since 2011
When asked if she still has a relationship with her mother, Flavie Flament's answer is categorical: "No. I haven't seen her since I wrote my first book in 2011, *Les Chardons*." It has therefore been 15 years since the two women cut ties. Flavie Flament explains that she tried for a long time to understand her mother's behavior before finally deciding to sever this relationship completely. "I think it doesn't bother my mother that I'm no longer in her life. In a way, I freed her from something, because it tormented her not to be able to control me anymore. For a long time, I hoped, I tried to understand, I made excuses for her..." she confides. The television presenter explains that she ultimately felt she had to "cut off this rotten branch on which I couldn't lean . "
A letter to break off definitively with his mother
The break didn't happen through a confrontation between the two women. Flavie Flament reveals that she chose to write a letter to her mother. It's a decision she admits she struggled to accept herself, as the idea of breaking with a parent seemed so transgressive. "You just don't break with your mother, it's not moral ," she says. She remembers the precise moment she mailed the letter: "When I saw the envelope disappear down the slot of the yellow mailbox, my life began."
A mother-daughter relationship that is definitively broken.
These statements reveal the depth of the family rift. Flavie Flament doesn't describe a simple, gradual estrangement; she recounts how she herself made the decision to definitively end her relationship with her mother after years spent, in her view, searching for explanations and making excuses. Fifteen years after this letter, the television presenter maintains this distance. And when she reflects on her childhood today, her main grievance remains the same: not having been protected by her mother when she feels she needed it most. "She could have raised me differently ," Flavie Flament asserts, before this particularly powerful statement: "She handed me over to men, unfortunately."
