Breakups are never easy, but that may be even more true for people who go through such romantic strife while in the public eye. Flip or Flop and Christina On the Coast star Christina Anstead announced last week that she and her second husband, Anthony “Ant” Anstead were divorcing after less than two years of marriage, and it didn’t take long for people to begin speculating publicly on why things didn’t work out for the couple. Now, a friend of Anstead’s is opening up about how she’s handling all of those “false stories” after announcing her divorce.
HGTV viewers who tuned in to watch Christina Anstead on Christina On the Coast were treated to many snippets of her new life with her second husband, their young son, Hudson, and her two kids with ex-husband and Flip or Flop co-host Tarek El Moussa, Taylor and Brayden. The blended family always seemed pretty happy and loving, so it surprised many to hear that they were divorcing so soon, which has led to a lot of speculation about why the Ansteads are separating. Anstead’s best friend and publicist, Cassie Zebisch, has spoken to People about how she’s doing, and noted:
Her children are happy and healthy and that’s all that matters. She’s really taking this time to focus on what’s important in her life and she knows that she has tremendous support from all her close friends and family. Despite the false stories that are continuing to circulate about her with unnamed sources, she is doing her best trying to ignore it.
It was just over the weekend that Anstead opened up about what she was going through and had been thinking about her life in the wake of her second divorce. She readily admitted that she was already trying to look into “breaking the pattern of” her tendency “to feel a void and hop into something that causes the feeling I’m used to.” For Anstead, she said that feeling was “a state of anxiousness” which sometimes led to wonderful new things, but could also leave her “crying in my closet.”
Christina Anstead also wrote about people who “may judge me and throw around rumors about me,” but noted that she was now simply working on herself and trying to make sure she focused on her children during this difficult time.
It’s likely that some of the rumors and “false stories” that she and Zebisch have spoken about have to do with the timeline of Anstead’s relationship with Ant. The couple began dating less than a year after her very public split from El Moussa, then married 11 months after that divorce was finalized, with their son being born roughly nine months later.
While Ant has also spoken out about the split recently, noting in an Instagram post that he “never gave up on us,” he also said that “I pray Christina’s decision brings her happiness,” and eventually turned comments off on the post because of people “trying to diagnose from afar.”
It’s pretty clear that people have a lot of opinions about what they feel may have happened in Christina and Ant Anstead’s relationship, but it’s also obvious that neither of them are going to let the negative talk get to them. All we can hope is that both parties can continue to heal and do what’s best for them and their children so that they can all come out of this as better, happier people.
Christina on the Coast is airing Season 3 right now, with Season 9 of Flip or Flop due on October 15. For more on what to watch in the coming weeks, be sure to check out our guide to fall TV.
