What Happened to Iyanla Vanzant’s Daughter? Family Asks For Privacy Amid Tragedy
She was only 49, so fans of the Oprah Network were left wondering what happened to Iyanla Vanzant’s daughter Nisa after she was honored on her mother’s Instagram on Sunday, July 30, 2023.
Iyanla is an inspirational speaker, spiritual leader and life coach who made a name for herself on the Oprah Winfrey Show and is widely regarded as one of the most influential Black Americans in the country. From 2012 to 2021, she also served as the host of OWN’s Iyanla: Fix My Life. The series tackled some of the more controversial topics on TV at the time, including abandonment and abuse, taking a deep look at the lives of both celebrities and everyday people as they sought peace from trauma and torment. In an interview with Ebony in 2017, she said, “I didn’t make it my life’s work, it is my purpose. I’m a teacher, that’s it. I’m not some special somebody endowed with magical powers or anything [laughs]. I don’t have my own star shining left of heaven; I’m a teacher and a spiritual technician.” She continued: “I didn’t choose this, I’m a criminal defense attorney by trade. That’s what I went to school for and I paid $87,000 to get that education, but I thought I was learning man’s law when, in fact, I was learning God’s law.” But on Sunday July 30, 2023, she made a said announcement on Instagram that had people wondering what happened Iyanla Vanzant’s daughter. Here’s what we know.
What happened to Iyanla Vanzant’s daughter?
What happened to Iyanla Vanzant’s daughter? Nisa Vanzant, Iyanla’s youngest daughter, died at age 49, according to her mother’s Instagram post.
“It is with great sorrow that we announce the transition of Nisa Vanzant the youngest daughter of our Beloved Iyanla Vanzant we are asking for your prayers. Please respect the privacy of her and her family at this time. Thank you,” she wrote with an image of a candle marking the years 1973 – 2023.
How did Nisa Vanzant die?
Neither Nisa Vanzant’s cause of death nor other information was provided at the time. It’s the second tragedy to hit Iyanla’s family as she’d previously lost her daughter Gemmia in 2003 from colon cancer at age 30.
Iyanla was born Rhonda Eva Harris on September 13, 1953, in Brooklyn, New York City. She holds a Juris Doctor degree from the City University of New York School of Law as well as a Master’s Degree from the University of Santa Monica, Center for the Study and Practice of Spiritual Psychology.
In 2022, the spiritual leader spoke with MSNBC about grief and loss, while being included as one of the Forbes 50 over 50 list. “Give yourself permission to have the initial shock and horrification of whatever the change is,” she said. “And sometimes you’ll fall over, and sometimes you’ll stumble ahead, and sometimes you can barely get up. It’s one step at a time. That’s the only way you can do it, because you cannot rush through it.”
She continued: “Most of us don’t breathe. We can walk around like that for months, really not breathing, not being present in the body. So, the moment something happens, whatever it is, breathe. Breathing will get you in your body and out of your head.”
Finally, she added, “You’ve got to get into your heart, and then to whomever or whatever, you have to ask for help. We’ve got to ask for help sooner, and I don’t care who you ask it from: divine, internal, grandma, somebody. Ask for help.”
On being named one of Forbes’ 50 over 50, Iyanla said she never “hoped” even making it to 50 herself. “I was coming from total poverty, total dysfunction, no support, in survival mode. Fifty was too far ahead … It was moment, by moment, by moment, so I never thought to look ahead to 50, surely not 60 and definitely not almost 70,” she said. “My father died at 59, and my mother at 33, my brother at 49, my sister at 52, so I didn’t have a model for what it looked like beyond 50.”
Yesterday, I Cried: Celebrating the Lessons of Living and Loving
Bestselling author Iyanla Vanzant has had an amazing and difficult life—one of the great challenges that unmasked her wonderful gifts and led to wisdom gained. In this simple book, Yesterday I Cried , she uses her own personal experiences to show how life’s hardships can be re-languaged and revisioned to become lessons that teach us as we grow, heal, and learn to love. The pain of the past does not have to be today’s reality. Iyanla Vanzant is an example of how yesterday’s tears become the seeds of today’s hope, renewal, and strength.
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