The studio didn't take kindly to her impulsive 1941 marriage to army husband Owen Ward and supposedly punished her by relegating her to "B" films. Three children were the result of this first marriage -- Pam, Timothy and Beth. Brenda eventually lost interest in her career, but was coaxed back to the film set when brunette Maureen O'Sullivan left the Tarzan series and Johnny Weissmuller approved the athletic beauty as his new blonde swinging mate. Beginning a four-year excursion with the film Tarzan and the Amazons (1945), Brenda continued on as Jane after Weissmuller left (actor Lex Barker took over), but finally decided enough was enough. Brenda left after her fifth movie, Tarzan's Magic Fountain (1949), and just walked away -- never to return.

Following her movie career, Brenda moved to the Washington D.C. area and worked with the Refugee Services for nearly 10 years in which she helped displaced persons find employment and places to live. This line of work eventually had her relocate to the Carmel, California area and she worked with Catholic Resettlement in Seaside, California (near Monterey). Besieged by personal and health problems in later years, she endured a painful divorce from Ward in 1960 after 19 years of marriage. She was then married and divorced twice more. Suffering from dementia in her twilight years, she stayed with her children at various stages until she was forced to be institutionalized in a nursing home in Santa Monica, California. Brenda died there of complications from pneumonia in 2007.