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Johnny Depp Says His Abusive Mom 'Taught Me How Not to Raise Kids': 'I Thank Her for That'

Johnny Depp, a father of two, said his late abusive mom Betty Sue Palmer "taught me how not to raise kids—just do the exact opposite of what she did."

Despite the harrowing parts of his upbringing, the actor — who's dad to daughter Lily-Rose, 26, and son Jack, 23, with ex Vanessa Paradis — was later close with his mother, who died in 2016 at age 81. Some of the violence she inflicted included throwing an ashtray, a high-heeled shoe or a telephone, Depp alleged, adding that she'd hit her children in their heads and "had the ability to be as cruel as anyone can be." The actor continued, "And when Betty Sue, my mother, would go off on a tangent toward my father — and of course, in front of the kids, it [didn't] matter to her — he, amazingly, remained very stoic and never, as she was rationing him with horrible things, he stood there and just looked at her while she delivered the pain, and he swallowed it.

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