Reba McEntire told her son: Dont be a little jerk. Dont be a spoiled brat

Reba McEntire is starring in Big Sky: Deadly Trails. I guess it’s some kind of mystery series. Clearly I haven’t seen it but it looks good, I’m just surprised to see Reba not in a comedy. She has an interview in the latest People to promote it and she spoke about her son, racecar driver Shelby Blackstock. Shelby is Brandon Blackstock’s half-brother. Brandon is Kelly Clarkson’s ex, and he made Kelly’s life a living hell. Shelby’s dad is Narvel Blackstone, to whom Reba was married from 1989-2015. Narvel left Reba and moved on with one of her best friends. Despite all of this, Reba said that Shelby was raised not to be a jerk. She made a point to teach him that if he wanted to be liked, he couldn’t be a spoiled brat.

She’s an enduring legend of country music, but Reba McEntire doesn’t see her exalted status as a free pass for tardiness.

After calling in to her PEOPLE interview earlier this month a mere three minutes late, she apologizes not once, but twice, for running behind.

“Mama and Daddy always said to me, ‘If you tell somebody you’re going to be somewhere at a certain time, you show up,” she says in this week’s issue, on newsstands Friday. “That’s the way I was raised.”

When McEntire, 67, became a mom to her son Shelby (with ex-husband Narvel Blackstock) in 1990, she made sure to pass down those same values she learned growing up in Chockie, Oklahoma.

“When we would play games or cards, I’d never let Shelby win,” she says. “He wouldn’t have learned anything that way. I always told Shelby, ‘I’ll always love you, but I want other people to like you. So don’t be a little jerk. Don’t be a spoiled brat.'”

Those words seem to have resonated with Shelby, 32, as “a lot of people have told me you would never know [he] had been blessed with the life he was given,” McEntire says.

“I’m very proud of him,” she says. “He was a kid who had ADHD and could barely read in school, and now he’s read 10 books this year. He’s always trying to improve and do better. His daddy did a great job too.”

[From People]

I did a quick Google search and have not found any stories to suggest Shelby is a gigantic, spoiled brat, so maybe the lessons sunk in. He just got married to social influencer Marissa Branch in a huge Disney wedding last February. But his parents are rich and famous and he’s a racecar driver and it was a wedding, people go all out for those. It’s nice that Reba has made such a concerted effort to stay friendly with Narvel in the press, especially since the divorce was so hard on her. Even in this interview she’s giving him credit for Shelby being a good guy. But since we know how Brandon turned out, I think Reba can take the credit for Shelby. Although she also gave a shout out to her nannies who helped raise Shelby while she was working on her career. I love when successful people admit they have help doing “it all.”

As for the Don’t Be a Jerk lesson, I wish they taught that in schools. I chuckled when Reba brought up not letting Shelby win at cards when he was a kid. Parents feel very strongly about whether you should let your kid win at games or not. Ask you parent friends if you have any. But be ready, there’s no gray area on that subject for most.

Embed from Getty Images

Embed from Getty Images

Embed from Getty Images

Photo credit: Instagram and Getty Images

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7pLHLnpmirJOdxm%2BvzqZmcHBpaYNze9GemZqXnZiyr8DIq5yYrJ%2BhsaC0xKuWrKeelLGwutOYmZ6XkZS5qsDTpZyYopWnuKCwzqermJqVlK6gv8%2BooKWdlJSvs63TaA%3D%3D