Four years ago, Tiwa Savage welcomed Jamil aka JamJam with her ex-husband and manager, Tunji ‘Teebillz’ Balogun, and life has not been the same.
Savage didn’t set out to be a single parent when she tied the nuptial knot with Teebillz in 2014; but in April 2016, she got separated and moved on with her life while caring for the only product of the estranged relationship, JamJam.
In a recent chat with Tamar Braxton on her YouTube show, Savage opened up on the challenges of being a single mom and a music star.
“I had my son four years ago and he’s such an amazing personality,” Savage says, “when my son was one or one and a half, I took him everywhere I went but now that he’s in school, I think it’s important to have him stable, so he’s in school and he’s at home.”
After her marriage crashed, Tiwa threw herself so much into her work and career under Mavin records. The result is more demand in shows, music, and charitable collaborations, music deals, and brand endorsements. In 2019 after her contract with Mavin records expired, her hard work got the attention of one of the world’s leading music groups, Universal Music Group, UMG, and she was offered an exclusive recording agreement to make music with UMG and have access to their infrastructure and distribution tools. She took it and remained on the road, flying around the globe and performing at world music festivals.
“I don’t take him (Jamil) on tour. I can’t take him out of school too much, so he’s been at home and this is why I’ve been loving being at home during this stay at home because I’ve just grown to know him more on a different level like his personality,” Tiwa says of his son and touring the world.
Savage, meanwhile, agrees to always have mum guilt while on tour or away from 4-year-old JamJam. It breaks her heart to find out new things or great habits her son had picked up while she was away. And she wanted to always try to compensate for that by buying him gifts and whatever he requests for.
“I have to be very honest with you. First, I used to buy him gifts when I travel so when I’m coming back I will buy him everything. One time, he said he likes dinosaurs and I bought him 56 dinosaurs. I mean like a whole suitcase full of dinosaurs,” Savage says.
But Savage’s mum, Cecilia Savage, won’t have any of it. She knew Tiwa was just having mum’s guilt for not being around and decided it was time they had a talk about it.
Savage agrees to not wanting to spoil JamJam saying, “So, my mum sat me down and said you don’t have to compensate him, this is your son and he knows. What we are doing is actually for our children so I had to pull back because I also don’t want to spoil him but I definitely feel guilty a lot especially when I go for a long period of time and I come back and they say Jamil likes to do this now and I wonder when did that happen but it’s what it is.”
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