NBA YoungBoy's Mom Fires Back at Rapper, Calls Him a Deadbeat Dad After Estrangement Comments

NBA YoungBoy's family tensions spilled into public view after his mother accused him of being absent from his children's lives following his comments about cutting off contact with her.

The drama began after NBA YoungBoy appeared on Funny Marco's Open Thoughts, where he reflected on his relationship with his mother, Sherhonda Gaulden.

The 26-year-old rapper said his mother had been one of the sources of anger in his life. He then suggested that he likely would not speak to her again, though he made clear that he still loved her from a distance. The comment quickly reached Gaulden, who responded sharply on Instagram.

Rather than focusing only on their strained relationship, she turned the criticism back on her son's own role as a father.

Sherhonda Gaulden Hits Back

Gaulden accused YoungBoy of failing to speak to some of his own children, presenting him as hypocritical for publicly discussing estrangement from his mother. Her posts appeared to frame the rapper as an absent father, though YoungBoy has not publicly responded to those specific claims.

Gaulden also initially claimed that she had been present for his Open Thoughts interview. She later walked that back, saying she had mixed it up with a different interview. The exchange turned what began as a rare personal admission from YoungBoy into a broader family dispute playing out in front of fans.

Relationship Was Not Always This Bad

YoungBoy and his mother have not always appeared this distant. Gaulden previously defended him during his public dispute with Kodak Black, after Kodak accused YoungBoy of 'snitching' in connection with Iyanna 'Yaya' Mayweather's 2020 arrest.

Mayweather, the daughter of Floyd Mayweather and YoungBoy's then-girlfriend, was arrested that year after allegedly stabbing one of the rapper's children's mothers. At the time, Gaulden publicly stood by her son. Her latest comments suggest their relationship has since deteriorated badly.

Health Revelation Adds to Interview Fallout

The family dispute was not the only major revelation from YoungBoy's Open Thoughts appearance. During the same interview, the Baton Rouge rapper said a doctor told him while he was on tour that the left side of his heart was swollen.

'On tour, a doctor told me the left side of my heart was swollen and I never told nobody,' YoungBoy said. 'I just kept doing every show.'

He added that the issue has not fully disappeared.

'My heart kind of still is enlarged on this little side,' he said, before connecting the condition to the pain in his music. 'That explains the music though, right? She's hurting.'

Rapper Hints at Slowing Down

YoungBoy also suggested that music is no longer his main focus.

'Music is not something I'm focused on,' he told Funny Marco.

When asked how many more albums he thinks he has left, he answered: 'One or two.' He was even more direct about touring, saying he plans to go on the road only once more in his life.

For an artist with nine studio albums, dozens of mixtapes and four Billboard 200 No. 1 albums, the comments were striking. But for now, the bigger story is personal: YoungBoy says he still loves his mother from afar, while his mother is publicly accusing him of repeating the same distance with his own children.