Their relationship may have been tumultuous and their struggles with substance abuse well-documented, Bobby Brown insists that he is not the reason ex-wife Whitney Houston started doing drugs, a habit that she battled right up until her death in February.
"I'm not the one that got Whitney on drugs, at all," Brown told "Today" host Matt Lauer in an interview set to air on Wednesday and Thursday. "I'm not the reason she's gone."
Brown admitted that when he learned of his ex's death, he was saddened to hear she had started using cocaine again.
"I was hurt ... because, you know, me being off of narcotics for the last seven years — I felt that she was, you know, I didn't know she was struggling with it still. But at the same time, you know — listen, it's a hard fight," he said.
Regarding his involvement in Houston's drug use, Brown said that drugs were a part of Houston's life before they met in 1991. "I smoked weed, I drank the beer, but no, I wasn't the one that got Whitney on drugs at all," he insisted. "It's just, it's just unexplainable, how one could [say that I] got her addicted to drugs. I'm not the reason she's gone."
The New Edition member said that Houston seemed to have "a glow about her" the last time he saw her over dinner at a restaurant with their daughter, Bobbi Kristina, which was about a week before she died.
"She just looked like she was in a good place," he said.