Some news is too big to keep to yourself. TJ Jackson kept his for seven whole months, and when he finally told someone, he picked his uncle Michael.
TJ is the youngest son of Tito Jackson, Michael’s older brother. If you remember the 1990s, you might know him from 3T, the singing trio he formed with his brothers Taj and Taryll. TJ was the youngest of the three. And their uncle, of course, was Michael Jackson.
TJ told this story in an interview with Yahoo Parenting, and it’s one of the sweetest things he’s shared about Michael.
It starts with Frances, the woman who became TJ’s wife. TJ met her when he was around 20, and the two of them were going to have a baby boy. They’d name him Royal.
But TJ didn’t tell anyone. Not for a long time.
“I didn’t tell anyone until Frances was about seven months pregnant with Royal,” he said.
Why so quiet? Timing. “My brothers and I were at the peak of 3T,” TJ explained. The group was riding high, and he didn’t want anyone trying to talk him out of his plans. So he held on to the news.
Well, almost.
There was one person TJ trusted with it. “The only person I confided in was Michael,” he said.
It made sense. By then Michael was a dad himself. His son Prince was born in 1997, and his daughter Paris came along in 1998.
And he was thrilled for his nephew.
“Michael was so excited for me, telling me to read this book and that book and saying he only wished he had done it sooner,” TJ remembered.
Think about that for a second. The King of Pop, one of the most famous men on Earth, was handing his nephew a reading list for new dads. And the only thing he wished he could change about his own life as a father was that he hadn’t started earlier.
TJ says his uncle was in a happy place in those days. “Prince and Paris were young then, and Michael was on cloud nine.”
Around the same years, Uncle Michael produced and sang on a 3T single called “Why,” and he joined TJ and his brothers in the black-and-white video, so you can see the uncle and his nephews side by side.
3T and Uncle Michael in the official video for “Why”
TJ also remembers that when Michael took the nephews to Toys R Us after closing he told them to fill a cart, but with his own children “he made them limit their toys to three each.”
So when TJ came to him with his secret, Michael kept it and cheered him on, with a stack of book tips to go with it.
For a young man about to become a dad, that’s a pretty good person to call first.