Ex-CNN Anchor Brooke Baldwin Reveals She Was Beaten With a Belt by Her Father as a Child in Emotional Confession: 'I Woke Up Black and Blue'

Former CNN anchor Brooke Baldwin revealed a childhood experience she said she has never publicly shared before.

The 47-year-old journalist said her father once beat her with a belt so many times that she woke up "black and blue" on her backside.

Baldwin shared the story in her Substack newsletter, Unraveling, after spending more than two weeks traveling and interviewing women for her independent journalism project, "America, Tell Me Everything."

A conversation with a Southern woman about being spanked as a child brought Baldwin back to her own experience.

"I have one very specific memory. Elementary school. My father... The belt," Baldwin wrote. "I've never shared this story before."

The former anchor added: "The full-body panic. The anxiety of knowing the pain was coming. And also the semi-defiance: do itttttt."

Baldwin believes she may have been fighting with her younger brother and ended up taking the blame because she was the older, larger sibling who was expected to "know better."

Baldwin said this one incident stood out from the others because of how severe the punishment became.

"One time, I got belted so many times I woke up black and blue on my backside," Baldwin wrote.

"Let the record reflect... this ended up being my last spanking," she added.

The incident happened as Baldwin was preparing to leave for sleepaway camp.

She said she was "mortified" by the thought of other children seeing the bruises while they were showering, wearing swimsuits, or changing clothes.

Baldwin eventually showed the marks to her mother.

"This was my little-girl-way of speaking up. Do you see me? This hurt. This is not okay," she recalled.

"I remember being furious. I remember trying to make her feel terrible," Baldwin admitted.

As an adult, Baldwin said she has also thought about her mother's position at the time.

She wondered whether her mother was dealing with her own shame surrounding the punishment and a marriage where Baldwin felt her father held more authority.

"I watched my mother defer, over and over, to choices my father made about me — decisions some part of me knew weren't really his to make alone," she wrote.

However, Baldwin stopped short of placing all the blame on her mother.

The ex-CNN anchor said the experience has also shaped the way she thinks about family patterns.

"But I also know that sometimes, someone has to be the one to break the cycle," Baldwin wrote. "And it’s rarely the generation that started it."