Hip-hop's reigning queen is exposing her emotional cracks, and a preview of Nicki Minaj's forthcoming Queen documentary finds the rapper in an unusually vulnerable state.

Minaj, whose fourth studio album dropped in August, described in a new collection of Instagram videos — which serve as a collective preview into her latest project — domestic violence that pervaded both her childhood and adulthood.

“I remember when my mother would let my father be violent with her, and she always brings up this story… as a little girl, I would stand in front of my mother, and go like this (with my arms out),” she said as her voice cracked. “That’s why I’m like, maybe some people would describe me as abrasive, or bitchy or whatever, because I vowed from that age, no man would ever be with me and call me out my name, treat me like that… And then all of the sudden, that was my life.”

Minaj added that being subjugated took a toll on her creativity, and that she felt unable to preach the value of strength to other women when she, herself, felt so beaten down.

“Who was I going to inspire when I had nothing in me to give? I let one human being make me so low, that I didn’t even remember who I was. I was scared to get in the studio. I didn’t believe in myself.”

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