Robyn Crawford confirms relationship with Whitney Houston in new memoir: ‘I loved her and I know she loved me’ – NJ.com

Rumors that Whitney Houston and her close friend Robyn Crawford were romantically involved have endured, years after Houston’s death.

Now, Crawford is speaking publicly about her relationship with Houston in a new memoir called “A Song For You: My Life with Whitney Houston.”

People reports that in the memoir, out on Nov. 12, Crawford confirms having had a romantic relationship with Houston, but that Houston put a stop to the physical part of that relationship when she signed a record deal with Arista’s Clive Davis.

“She said we shouldn’t be physical anymore because it would make our journey even more difficult,” Crawford writes in the book.

“She said if people find out about us, they would use this against us, and back in the ’80s that’s how it felt.”

Crawford, 58, says that Houston’s mother, gospel singer Cissy Houston, were among those in Houston’s family who opposed the relationship.

“Whitney told me her mother said it wasn’t natural for two women to be that close,” Crawford writes. “But we were that close.”

Houston, who was just nominated for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s 2020 class, was 48 when she died in 2012. She was found unresponsive in a bathtub at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles. The iconic singer’s cause of death was accidental drowning, with heart disease and cocaine listed as contributing factors. Houston’s struggles with drug addiction made headlines throughout the later part of her career.

Crawford met Houston, a Newark native, when she was 19 and Whitney was almost 17. They were counselors together at a summer camp in East Orange.

“I’m going to look out for you,” Crawford told Houston at the time. The two remained close as Houston’s career soared, with Crawford serving as Houston’s assistant and creative director. That closeness helped fuel rumors.

“Whitney knows I loved her and I know she loved me,” Crawford writes. “We really meant everything to each other. We vowed to stand by each other.”

Houston publicly denied being gay.

“We never talked about labels, like lesbian or gay,” Crawford says in her book. “We just lived our lives and I hoped it could go on that way forever.”

Houston’s ex-husband, Bobby Brown, said she was bisexual and blamed Houston’s family for squashing her relationship with Crawford.

“I really feel that if Robyn was accepted into Whitney’s life, Whitney would still be alive today,” Brown told Us Weekly in 2016. “She didn’t have close friends with her anymore.”

In the 2012 authorized biography “Bobby Brown: The Truth, The Whole Truth, and Nothing But,” Brown claimed that Houston married him to kill speculation about her relationship with Crawford.

In 2013, Cissy Houston told Oprah Winfrey that it would have bothered her if her daughter had been gay.

Crawford currently works as a fitness trainer and lives with her partner, Lisa Hintlemann, and their two children.

Her book follows two documentaries about Houston: “Whitney: Can I Be Me” in 2017 and the 2018 film “Whitney.”

While some of Houston’s family members and friends were interviewed in the films and Crawford was mentioned as being a part of Whitney’s life, Crawford did not appear in any interviews for the documentaries.

In “Whitney,” Gary Houston, Houston’s half-brother, told director Kevin Macdonald that his cousin, Dee Dee Warwick (sister of singer Dionne Warwick), sexually abused him, saying he believed that Dee Dee also abused Whitney. Whitney’s aunt and assistant, Mary Jones, also alleged that Whitney had been abused.

Have a tip? Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AmyKup or on Facebook.

Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.com’s newsletters.