Martha Stewart's Netflix documentary is causing some bombshells

Stewart grew up as one of six children in Nutley, New Jersey, and considered herself her father Edward's favorite child because, like him, she was a “perfectionist.” But according to Stewart and some of her siblings, Edward could be a volatile presence in the house – “an unsatisfied, unhappy person” who started his day with a cup of coffee and a glass of red wine.

Her father's alcoholism meant he had problems at work and “couldn't support six children,” Stewart says. She started gardening partly because the family was struggling to put food on the table. Edward could supposedly criticize his children's gardening. “We were whipped,” Stewart’s brother said Frank Kostrya says in the document. Her brother adds Eric Scott, “To this day I despise gardening.”

Stewart later enrolled at Barnard and began dating Andy Stewart, who studied law at Yale and would become her husband. “I had never slept with anyone before,” she says Martha. “He was very aggressive. And I liked it.” But when she broke the news of her engagement to her father, “my father slapped me,” Stewart says. “Slapped myself hard and said, 'No, you're not going to marry him.' He's Jewish.' I remember getting that slap,” she continued. “I wasn't surprised at all because he was a fanatic and impulsive. But I said, 'I'm going to get married no matter what you think.'” They married in 1961.

Martha didn't enjoy becoming a mother.

Stewart's daughter, Alexis, was born a few years later in 1965. “It turns out that being a mother isn’t natural at all,” she says in the film, attributing her discomfort with being a mother to her own upbringing. “There wasn't much affection in our house. How could I be a truly great mother if I didn't have the training to be a mother?” Stewart's friend Kathy Tatlock says Stewart was often relieved when Alexis took a nap and she could be alone. “She cared about Lexi, but wasn’t in love with her,” Tatlock said. “She was always a bit cold.” Alexis herself, who still maintains a close relationship with her mother, says: “I grew up in a very uncomfortable home and learned to suppress most of my feelings.”

Martha and her husband Andy were both unfaithful during their marriage.

During her five-month honeymoon in Europe, Stewart admits she suddenly came into contact with a stranger. While Andy stayed at her hotel, Martha decided to visit the Duomo in Florence. “It was a very romantic place full of tourists and I met this very handsome man,” she remembers. “He didn’t know I was married. I was that little girl hanging out at the cathedral on Easter Eve. He was emotional. I was emotional. It's just because it was an emotional place. It was like nothing I had ever done before. So why not kiss a stranger?”