‘Sister Wives’: Are Meri, Robyn, Christine and Janelle Still With Kody Brown?

The Brown family is reevaluating their family’s dedication to plural marriage. In Sunday’s Season 15 premiere of Sister Wives, Kody Brown and his four wives — Janelle, Robyn, Christine and Meri — sat down to discuss where their relationships stand with one another as they attempt to establish a life together in Flagstaff, Arizona.

With such a concentration on building their family compound, Janelle feared her family wasn’t looking toward the “right goal,” which put a strain on their interpersonal relationships. “I think the situation really is that we’ve sort of become lackluster about our relationships. We need to fix things now,” Janelle said, as per InTouch Weekly. “I just get really frustrated because I feel like we signed up for something when we decided to be a plural family and it just seems we’re all sort of like, ‘Whatever, let’s just let it happen. We’re gonna just roll with it,’ and I don’t like that.”

Sitting everyone down together, Janelle invited her husband and fellow wives to share why they initially joined a plural marriage. “I did it because I loved the whole idea of the family and this whole group synergy,” Janelle said, explaining she always thought they would be able to move beyond initial tensions. Meri answered that for her, it was “just like being raised in” plural marriage, as she was Kody’s first wife.

“I liked the example that my grandmas were, for sure,” Christine added of her own upbringing. “They were just really close and after my grandpa died, they just stayed together. So, I like the sisterhood.” Robyn, who was the final wife to marry Kody, added that she always wanted to have a big family: “I loved when I first met you guys, how you guys functioned. I loved it.”

Kody shared that he had been thinking about his reasons for wanting a plural marriage lately amid all the difficulties in his family because he didn’t want to advocate for the family arrangement since becoming aware of “the apparent and obvious unfairness in the relationships.” He added, “I know I have all the love I want, and you guys sometimes feel like you are pining constantly for me to give you some.”

Kody added to the camera that while he initially came into plural marriage “by way of commandment,” he has come to realize the “stark reality of the struggle” it is. “In that vein, I want to go to my wives and say, ‘Did you marry me because you thought you would have a good life and a loving husband and a good relationship with me, or did you marry me because your religion commanded it?” he noted. Sister Wives airs Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on TLC.