As a general rule, breakups are hard and heartbreaking to live through. And while mutual breakups may still sting, there’s something even more challenging when one person is totally blindsided by the other. And, unfortunately for many of our favorite celebrities, they’ve also been blindsided with splits over the years.
Selling Sunset‘s Chrishell Stause, for example, had to live out her breakup in front of the cameras when her ex-husband, This Is UsJustin Hartley, texted her that he filed for divorce just hours after a fight. Back in 2001, Tom Cruise pulled a similar move on his ex-wife and fellow A-lister Nicole Kidman when he suddenly filed for divorce. “Nicole is in a state of shock,” a source told The Mirror at the time.
Find out other stars who were totally blindsided by their partner filing for a divorce below!
Chrishell Stause
As fans of Selling Sunset know all too well, Chrishell Stause was blindsided when her ex-husband, This Is Us star Justin Hartley, filed for divorce in 2019.
In the show, a distraught Stause was seen crying in a hotel room shortly after their split. “I’m just kind of in shock with it all,” Stause told her friend and co-star Mary Fitzgerald, per Women’s Health. “It’s just a lot all at once because everybody in the whole world knows. I love him so much. This was my best friend. Who do I talk to now?”
According to Stause, the two had a fight in the morning and only a few hours later she received a dreaded text. “I found out because he texted me that we were filed,” Stause said. “Forty-five minutes later, the world knew.”
Sophie Turner
Joe Jonas and Sophie Turner, who split in the fall of 2023, also had an abrupt ending. According to court documents obtained by Page Six, the “breakdown [of her four-year marriage] … happened very suddenly.”
Per the documents, Turner and Jonas had a reported argument on Aug. 15, the date of Jonas’ 34th birthday, and by Sept. 5, he had filed for divorce, which she learned of in a very horrifying way. It wasn’t the musician nor a family member who told her that her marriage was over, Turner was informed “through the media.”
Nicole Kidman
Back in 2001, Hollywood power couple Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise shocked the world when they announced they were going their separate ways after over 10 years of marriage. At the time, sources told the Daily Mail that the Moulin Rouge star was totally taken by surprise.
“This divorce was not her decision,” the source said, per The Mirror. “Tom made the move. Nicole is in a state of shock.”
Per the sources, Kidman reportedly begged Cruise to reconsider but to no avail. “[Kidman] protested [Cruise’s] intention to dissolve their marriage and urged him not to leave but to enter marriage counseling with her, or take other steps to address whatever problems may have existed in their marriage,” the source detailed, revealing that Cruise was determined to end things. “Tom said his decision was final and he departed the parties’ home,” the source revealed.
Tom Cruise
The roles reversed for Cruise in 2012 when his third wife Katie Holmes took a similar approach when ending their relationship. In 2012, Holmes filed for divorce and asked for sole custody of their daughter, Suri.
“I didn’t expect it,” the Mission Impossible actor told ProSieben, per The Mirror. “Life is a tragicomedy. You need to have a sense of humor.”
Kevin Federline
Following his split with Britney Spears, Kevin Federline shared his side of the story in their split and it was quite heartbreaking to hear.
“It’s hard enough to be in a marriage, and then have a kid, then kids, it changes everything,” Federline told People in 2008. “For me, I’d become more concerned with my children. Not that I ignored Britney, but my kids are always most important … I mean, we were having complications. I didn’t give her an ultimatum, but I was trying to work stuff out with her, and she didn’t even talk to me or anything and went behind my back and filed [for divorce].”
“[I was] completely blindsided,” he concluded. The two were together for three years before their unfortunate split in 2007.
Pete Wentz
From 2008 to 2011, Pete Wentz and Ashlee Simpson were married until Simpson’s sudden filing for divorce. According to sources for RadarOnline, Wentz was not only shocked but distraught too.
“Pete has been crying a lot to her about this,” a source told the outlet. “He is crushed, and does not want it to be over.”
Simpson, for her part, was certain in her decision. “Ashlee is done, she loves him, but she’s ready to move on,” the source added. “They married really young and have grown apart, she just wants to focus on her child and her career.”
Kris Humphries
While their marriage didn’t last long, 72 days to be precise, Kris Humphries was reportedly blindsided when Kim Kardashian filed for divorce.
“There was never a discussion about it,” his father told Life & Style, per Daily Mail. “It just came out of nowhere and blindsided Kris.” Soon after, Humphries went on to sue Kardashian for fraud.
Johnny Depp
Although their defamation trial in 2023 put their heaps of dirty laundry out to the world, Johnny Depp was reportedly surprised when his ex-wife Amber Heard filed for divorce in 2016.
“Johnny was blindsided by this but the timing could not be worse for him,” a source told RadarOnline. According to the outlet, Depp’s mother had passed away two days prior to Heard’s filing. “He sees her true colors now and he is not going to back down to her,” the source added.
Jeannie Mai
After over two years of marriage, Rapper Jeezy filed for divorce from his now ex-wife Jeannie Mai. “I was going through things and [my] marriage ended in divorce and it was kinda hard,” Mai said in an appearance at the Jennifer Hudson Show. “At the time, when I found out at the same time as the rest of the world that my marriage was ending in divorce, I was gutted.”
“Today it’s about picking up the pieces and discovering me being a mom to the best blessing in my life, my little girl,” she said. Mai and the rapper share an 11-month-old daughter Monaco.
Jennie Garth
In her memoir, Deep Thoughts From a Hollywood Blonde, Jennie Garth opened up about her reaction when her ex Peter Facinelli asked for a divorce. “My husband was away a lot then, working across the country on location on a film that he’d written, was producing, and was starring in,” Garth wrote, per Yahoo. “I was thrilled for him that he was taking his career to the next level, but I was also, I can see now, feeling a bit resentful and itchy in ways that I couldn’t quite identify. … All I know is that I felt like I was waiting: for him to come home, waiting for him to be free to join me in the day-to-day of our family life, waiting for the next job to be lined up that would take him far away from us again.”
But, despite their ongoing issues, Garth was still shocked when Facinelli pulled the trigger. “The ground that had been cracking and shifting finally split open and pretty much swallowed me whole: Peter came home, and told me that he didn’t think he wanted to be married to me any longer, and he thought it best that we separate so that we could get a better sense of where we stood with each other, she remembered. “I was devastated by the news that he was no longer in love with me.”
Brad Pitt
While Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s divorce has gotten quite messy over the years, Pitt was reportedly taken aback when Jolie first filed for divorce in 2016.
“[Pitt] only knew that she was filing for divorce a day before she did it,” a source told Page Six at the time. “They’d just got back from Europe. Brad didn’t want it to happen. He still loves Angelina and wanted to work it out.” As we now know, reconciliation was not in the cards for these two.
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