Ayesha Curry has been absent from the public gaze as she’s decided a career as a media personality isn’t where she’s happiest.
Source: Variety / Getty
The 33-year-old mom shared with Insider that she retreated from being a main character to lower the stressors in her life and found balance after years of insomnia.
Curry also spoke about healing after making an appearance on Jada Pinkett-Smith’s Red Table Talk in 2019. During the episode, Ayesha spoke candidly about postpartum feelings of insecurity and sometimes wanting attention. But instead of empathy, Curry felt the overwhelming backlash when her words were misconstrued and used against her, causing the entrepreneur to reevaluate her desire to be at the forefront as a media personality.
Ayesha asserts the show “was edited in a way that made me sound crazy,” and claims, “It’s not what I said, and the context was weird. Yeah. I took that one personally.”
Those who were trying to understand Ayesha did, and those looking for an opportunity to drag the postpartum mom found one.
“Media is a very ruthless space,” Curry’s sister-in-law, Sydel Curry-Lee told Insider. “Celebrities are real people. All press is good press, but that’s not true when it comes to our emotions and our mental health.” In the Curry family, “we’re all about protecting our peace.”
The restaurateur left the spotlight and focused her energies on philanthropy and entrepreneurship, launching her inspirational lifestyle brand, Sweet July. Instead of Ayesha’s fame using her, she used her notoriety to create a brand, including an eponymous magazine that uplifts a myriad of eclectic creatives.
“Sweet July is a feeling of happiness for me, a time when all the things that are good in my life happened,” Ayesha said explaining the name of the brand. “My hope is to encourage everyone to find their own version of Sweet July. It’s a feeling, a thought, a phrase, and I hope it will become a movement,” Ayesha penned on the company’s site.
She says her goal was to build a company with substance that contributed to the progression of Black and women-owned businesses. “It’s cliché at this point, but representation does matter,” she noted. “If I have the opportunity to uplift another person’s business that looks like me or comes from the same background as me, I’m all for it.”
Morning cold plunges and sauna-sitting have also contributed to this fun-loving mama’s new balanced lifestyle as the entrepreneur has mastered how to wind her nervous system down through the numbing and reawakening process. “It’s freaking cold,” she admits. “But it works.”
The founder had her own cold-plunge-and-sauna units constructed in her Northern California mansion that she shares with her husband. The wellness setup was installed during the pandemic as Ayesha was determined to improve how she felt mentally and physically during quarantine.
Like many moms, Ayesha was spreading herself thin as she ran around like a chicken with its head cut off to manage the responsibilities of business and her household. Still, the chef says she has become intentional about living a pleasant life. “I feel like you see a lot less of me, and you hear a lot less of me, but it’s because I’m actually living my life,” she says. “And it feels really good.”
Source: Miikka Skaffari / Getty
The mommy of three has also been able to squeeze in more time with her husband since she and NBA champ, Stephen, have been recovering from workouts together using the cold plunge and sauna and red-light therapy.
Another key to Curry’s contentment is applying therapeutic tools she acquired while talking to a professional — something she initially turned her back on. “I had some bad experiences, and they scared me away. But now I’ve found one that I love, and I actually look forward to it,” she says.
Ayesha previously caught heat for telling ABC’s Nightline she’s not an “NBA wife” but she’s happy with her decision to make a name for herself.
“At the end of the day, when you’re in the position that Ayesha is in, people will always attribute your success to your husband. It’s even harder to make a name for yourself,” Curry-Lee commented on her sister-in-law’s career. “But really it’s her determination, her creativity. She can be talking to someone and come up with a really creative idea that no one else has thought of. She has this mind that not a lot of people have.”
A woman finding her voice in the midst of their husband’s deafening success is a feat that often goes unpraised.
What do you think about Ayesha’s take on her experience?
