“The divorce from Tommy [Lee] was the hardest, lowest, most difficult point of my life,” Pamela Anderson writes in the excerpt of her new memoir, Love Pamela, that PEOPLE published ahead of the book’s Jan. 31 release date. In the section, Pamela, 55, writes about the destructive end of her marriage to Tommy, 60. She and the Mötley Crüe drummer tied the knot in 1995, and their love resulted in their sons, Brandon and Dylan. “We just wanted to have babies and be together forever,” writes Pamela, who notes that her “relationship with Tommy may have been the only time I was ever truly in love.”
Pamela and Tommy’s relationship lasted until 1998. One night, he twisted her arm while she held then-seven-month-old Dylan while Brandon played nearby. “Tommy ripped Brandon off me and threw me and Dylan into a wall,” writes Pamela. Tommy was arrested and sentenced to six months in jail. From there, Pamela notes, “our hell began.” She entered that “most difficult point” of her life by filing for divorce. “I was crushed,” writes the Baywatch star. “I still couldn’t believe that the person I loved the most was capable of what had happened that night. We were both devastated, but I had to protect my babies.”
Tommy was arrested for spousal abuse, child abuse, and unlawful possession of a firearm in February 1998, per Entertainment Weekly. He ultimately pleaded no contest to the spousal abuse charge and was sentenced to six months in jail. Pamela, through her lawyers, pleaded for leniency, according to the Associated Press. She urged counseling and probation over incarceration. Ultimately, Lee got six months in jail, was ordered to pay $5,000 to a battered woman’s shelter, avoid drugs and alcohol, attend anger management classes, undergo random drug tests, perform 200 hours of community service, and stay at least 100 yards away from Pamela. If he violated these terms, he could have faced three more years in jail.
Pamela has been married a handful of times following her split from Tommy Lee. She married singer Kid Rock in 2006, but they divorced just one year later. In 2007, Pamela married poker player Rick Salomon, who she divorced the following year. Pamela and Rick would re-marry in 2014, but their second marriage didn’t last longer than the first. In January 2020, Pamela wed producer Jon Peters secretly, though she later announced they were never legally married. In December 2020, she married her bodyguard Dan Hayhurst, but they called it quits in January 2022.
“I live a more romantic life now that I’m alone than I did in relationships,” writes Pamela in her new memoir. “I’m sure it would be lovely if someone else was in my life and wanted the same thing, but I’ve just never met them. It’s usually about catering to them, and there has to be a balance.”