Christina Haack: All The Reasons Why Her Breakup With Josh Hall Was The Best Thing For Her As An Independant Woman – And Why Divorce Should Never Be Viewed As Failure

If you’re a fan of reality TV, then you probably know of reality stars that are Christina Haack (formerly Hall), Tarek El Moussa, and Heather Rae El Moussa (formerly Young). Christina and Tarek are former spouses. They were married between 2009 and 2018, and together they have two children, Taylor and Brayden. They’d also gone through Tarek’s both thyroid and testicular cancer diagnosis in 2013. Following their divorce, Tarek married Heather Rae Young, who previously starred in the Netflix hit reality show, ‘Selling Sunset’. Christina also moved on, though unlike Tarek, she’s been fairly unlucky in the love department. She was previously married to Ant Anstead between 2018 and 2021. The following year, she married Josh Hall. Earlier this year, they announced their plans to divorce.

Just recently, a clip has been released of the former couple’s newest reality show, ‘Flip Off’, which also stars Heather, where Christina breaks down in tears over her divorce. After seeing her being uneasy as soon as he came to her home, Tarek asks, ‘You good?’ She replies, ‘No… Josh and I officially split up. We had a blow up… middle fingers in my face. Things with Josh have been bad for a long time. The kids literally asked me to leave. They told me he’s not nice to me. Why would I stick around? I feel like I’m in a tornado all the time and I just can’t get out of it. Everything since like 2016 has been so hard and so horrible. It’s really taken a really bad toll on me.’ And while bringing up their own history, Christina apologized to Tarek for her wrongdoings. She said, ‘I’m really sorry for s— too. I really am. I just want you to know.’ As Tarek got emotional but her words, he said, ‘I understand that feeling of being a little bit lost. And I acknowledge that I’m a big part, if not the entire part, of all of this.’

The former couple has come a long way since they decided to end their marriage in 2016. They went from not being in the same room with Christina and Heather fighting to now the three of them starring in a reality show. Josh Hall was also supposed to star in the series and even filmed promo clips before the divorce was announced, but he’s since quit the show. Since then, Haack’s second ex-husband, Ant Anstead, who’s now dating ‘Bridget Jones’ star, Renee Zellweger, was previously seen filming the show and even embracing Christina in between takes. They’d also been through their own ups and downs following their divorce, and went through a bitter war over their son, Hudson.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Tonight, Haack opened up about her unpleasant experience working together with her third ex-husband on several projects throughout their short marriage. She said, ‘When someone [feels] insecure by you and doesn’t like to see you win, that really puts a damper on everything. I feel, like, I was not shining as bright to try and not make him feel emasculated, but who wants to live like that? It was not fun, to be honest. I did not enjoy filming with him. So, having split up made this so much easier and so much better in every way. The show would have been hard to film. He] doesn’t like our dynamic because Tarek and I have our own dynamic. Some could call it ‘flirty’. It’s more, like, a sibling-type thing. I’d been telling him that things were bad for at least a year. It wasn’t news to him.

Tarek and Heather opened up about filming the show as well. Tarek said in an interview with Us Weekly, ‘Man, I never, ever in my life thought this show would happen. Sometimes I’m sitting there and I’ll have a moment where I look over at Heather, my wife, and I look over to the other side, and there’s my ex-wife, Christina. And I wonder, ‘How did I get here?’’ And Heather said, ‘It’s a fun, creative thing that we’re doing, making fun of all the people that make fun of us.’

You can be most certain that I have opinions about this. I have to admit, when I first heard of Christina Haack and found out that she’s had 3 husbands, I immediately said to myself, ‘She must be the problem. There must be something wrong with her.’ Society is very quick to judge women for their mistakes, and in this case, I was part of the problem. I laughed, I giggled. When in fact, it wasn’t that. Men marry and divorce multiple times and they’re applauded for it, and yet if a woman does it, it’s automatically assumed that she has issues. But in fact, it’s women who get married and divorced multiple more than men do – according to statistics.

According to a study conducted by Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin in 2019, which questioned around 6,000 heterosexual American couples over a period of 15 years, many men experienced the perfects of psychological distress when their wives made more than 40% of their household income. Christina Haack’s third marriage was part of the statistic. Christina is a businesswoman, real estate investor, and of course, a reality star. She got her start in the world of reality TV on ‘Flip Or Flop’, which she hosted with her then-husband, Tarek. The duo continued their duties on the show even after their divorce and then moving on with other people. This is very telling in differences between Tarek and Josh as men in their masculinity, maturity level, and emotional intelligence.

Just like Christina, both Tarek and Josh are real estate agents. Anstead, on the other hand, is a television presenter, motor specialist, car builder, designer, and artist – absolutely nothing to do with real estate. The only thing he and Christina had in common was their work in the reality TV spectrum. It can be very challenging for couples to feel united when both work in the same industry. It can be even harder when they work together like Christina worked with both Tarek and Josh. There are cons, as well as pros in two people in a relationship working in the same industry. We’ll start with the cons. They include:

• Balancing work and life: Couples may find it difficult to balance work and life if they have similar schedules. 
• Income and job security: If both partners work in the same industry, their income and job security are more likely to be highly correlated. 
• Feeling like you can’t escape work: You may feel that your romantic life becomes less multi-dimensional. 
• Personal space: There may be no personal space between the two people in the relationship because you’re spending too much time together snd see each other too often. 

I actually met someone who told me that his first marriage ended BECAUSE they worked together in the same company. It wasn’t even that his ex-wife had epilepsy and would even speak an entirely different language that’s not English when she’d have a seizure. No; the ‘why’ in their divorce was strictly based on the fact that they worked together. Personally, the main reason why I refuse to work with my husband is the fact that if we do, we’d spend WAY too much time together. Space between two people makes the heart grow fonder. But that’s just me and my own personal beliefs on relationships. It works for us. Nevertheless, there are positive things that come from couples working together in the same industry. These include:

• Professional support: Spouses can provide advice and support for one another. 
• Financial predictability: Working for the same company can provide financial benefits for couples. 
• Increased intimacy: Couples can share details about their work lives in a more intimate way. 
• Less burnout: There is a lower chance of burnout when working with a spouse. 
• Planning vacations: It’s easier to plan vacations together as a family. 
• Career progression: Couples can support each other’s professional development and progress in their careers. 

When Christina and Tarek ended their ‘Flip Or Flop’ run in 2022. When they initially announced the end of the show, Christina posted on Instagram, ‘Surprise….! We started Flip or Flop in 2011 and the entire experience changed my life in many unexpected ways. Tv was never a part of my plan. Neither Tarek nor I had any background in television, entertainment or design. Self taught in all ways. I am grateful we had such an amazing team on this journey who always made filming fun and exciting. From rotten turkeys and wild chickens to rodent infestations and unexpected squatters, there was never a dull moment on set.’

Tarek shared the same testament in his own statement on Instagram. He wrote at the time, ‘If you’ve been a Flip or Flop watcher from day one, you’ve really seen it all when it comes to our flips: the good, bad, ugly, funny, gross, etc and you’ve also seen it all when it comes to our lives: our children growing up, our life experiences, our businesses growing, etc. I can’t tell you how much it has meant to get your guys’ love and support for 10 years and without you I truly wouldn’t be where I am today.’

A source close to the former couple said they even though the end of the show was a surprise to their fans, the decision to end the show wasn’t sudden. The source explained, ‘The writing has been on the wall for a while. It was not sudden. Tarek and Christina are generally cordial. They’re co-parenting and nothing gets in the way of that. The show was just too intimate of a setting at this point and it was time to close that chapter.’

I wasn’t surprised that Christina and Tarek ended the show. I was surprised that they lasted THAT long in working together following their divorce, especially considering their separation, divorce, and the aftermath was fairly bitter, including Christina’s bitter relationship with Heather’s new wife. The thing about divorce is that space from each other must be had in order to figure out your new relationship. Going from intimate partners to co-parents and friends is a real shift, and it’s almost impossible to get used to when the divorced couple spends so much time together following their separation. I think that was what caused so much friction between the three – Christina, Tarek and Heather.

Ending ‘Flip Or Flop’ was probably the healthiest thing that Christina and Tarek ever did for their family, because let’s face it, when you’re a divorcee and you have kids with your former spouse, you’re still a family. They were spending too much time together and they needed to create the space in their professional lives in order to figure their sh*t out in their personal lives and create a healthy environment for their children. That’s just what you do when you have a blended family if you want to make things work. And they did. Christina and Heather went from getting into public spats at their children’s sports games to now working together. It’s gotta count for something. If you look at Tarek’s instagram page, whenever he posts a promotion for their newest show, he always includes that he never thought that being able to work with his wife and ex-wife would be possible in his caption.

There’s a whole list of recommendations of what a woman can do to validate an insecure man. Signs of insecurity include:

• Trust issues 
• Jealousy 
• Needing constant reassurance 
• Apologizing excessively 
• Constantly attacking their appearance 
• Playing mind games 
• Being overly critical 
• Stalking on social media 
• Mood swings 
• Being overly dependent 

Insecurity can be caused by low self-esteem and confidence, or lack there of. Men who lack confidence may believe they aren’t worthy of their partner’s love and support. More particularly, men, and a lot of them I might add, feel more insecure than ever when their wives make more money than they do. They somehow feel less than if they know they’re getting less of a pay-check than a female. The 3 main reasons for it might include:

• Social norms: Traditional gender norms suggest that men should be the primary breadwinner in a relationship. 
• Unconscious beliefs: Many people believe that men must be able to provide financially for their family. 
• Fear of being seen as less of a man: Some men may feel uncomfortable, unworthy, or jealous when their partner earns more money. 

The best word I could use to describe this is intimidation. Men feel intimated by a woman who’s making more money than they do. They don’t feel like they could provide for a woman who’s making more money than they do, and therefore, they feel less worthy of themselves because society tells them that it’s a man’s duty to be the breadwinner of the family. What they fail to realize, however, is that that’s just not the case anymore in the 21st century, and that it’s totally okay that a man makes less. With that said, they feel intimidated by a woman’s success because they don’t feel like they’re needed. With that said, being married to an insecure man will put a lot of pressure and stress on the woman. It will make her doubt herself and her success. It will make her question herself and make her feel unworthy of everything that she achieved; not always, however. I can’t say it made Christina Haack feel all those things. She left him and her career didn’t stop thriving because of him. Being married to an insecure man can have the following effect on a relationship between two people:

• Baseless doubts and allegations: An insecure man may think you’re doing things for your own benefit. 
• Excessive arguing: An insecure man may use arguments as an opportunity to ridicule their wife. 
• Jealousy: An insecure man may be jealous of their spouse’s close friends and may start acting like their spouse is their ‘property’. 
• Damaged confidence: An insecure man may damage their wife’s confidence by negatively commenting on her appearance or choices or other factors in her life that don’t include him. 
• Excessive need for reassurance: An insecure man may demand excessive reassurance or validation. 
• Imbalance in the relationship: An insecure man can create an imbalance in the relationship, making his wife more preoccupied with what she’s ‘not’ not providing, according to her partner.

It’s safe to say that being in a relationship with an insecure man is absolutely exhausting. As a woman, you feel like you constantly have to explain yourself, belittle yourself, and degrade your accomplishments to make HIM feel better. The difference between Christina’s marriages to Tarek and Josh is that Christina and Tarek built their brand together and they became successful together, whereas Josh became known to the public only thanks to Christina and only as her husband. And notice that I never used the word ‘successful’ in my description of Josh.

Before his relationship with Christina became public, Josh was anonymous. He didn’t even have social media. Just as a fun fact, his sister, Stacie Hall appeared in reality TV. She made a cameo on ‘The Hills’ in the 2000’s and even has a history with Heather Rae El Moussa (Young), Christina’s ex-husband’s second wife. Before he became a real estate agent, he was a cop for 16 years before being forced to retire due to an injury. Ironically, Ant previously worked as a police officer as well in the U.K. In 2023, Josh gave his Instagram followers a glimpse into his previous life in the field. He wrote, ‘Typically I won’t share much about my personal life and my past, but with today being #NationalLawEnforcementAppreciationDay, me spending 16+ years in that field before medically retiring, I felt the need to remind those who are unaware and want to show some appreciation for those still grinding away for our safety. I won’t use this opportunity to share a resume of my accomplishments as an officer or talk about any impactful moments in my career. Granted all officers are not saints, some will have made poor choices and maybe even some of them didn’t respond to your needs the way you wanted, but be reminded there are roughly 700K police officers in the U.S. and the majority will spend the greater part of their life facing fears and people the general public would run the other way from.’

This can be hard on a man too; having to change his entire career due to reasons beyond his control. Josh had to recover from his injuries AND change his entire career. It would be hard for anyone. It was definitely hard on me. I was forced to change my entire plan for my career due to the 2015 car accident that caused my epilepsy diagnosis the following year. To add the notion of a man having to be the breadwinner in the family because society says so is something uncanny. I can’t say for sure that this exact thing caused Josh’s insecurity in his marriage to Christina, but let’s just assume that it was. My husband also had to make his own sacrifices in his career. But the thing about my husband is that he’s secure enough in himself to be okay if I end up making more money than he does. He’d be okay with me being the breadwinner and him being a stay-at-home dad. In fact, he’d encourage it and he’d be proud of me. And he’d teach our son to be proud of me too by setting an example that unconventional is OKAY, and it needs to be celebrated.

Women say all the time, ‘I don’t need no man.’ The fact of the matter is, however, we DO. We do need men. Needing a man doesn’t just entail a monetary gain. Monetary gain isn’t as valuable and important as the emotional connection, compassion and compatibility a partner brings to the table. It’s about the intimacy one brings; and I don’t just mean physical intimacy, but an emotional one too. In fact, emotional intimacy is more important than the physical intimacy. Physical comes natural when a couple has emotional intimacy. If a woman lacks emotional intimacy, she will most likely, feel overwhelmed by life’s pressures, worry, and feel uncertain in the relationship. And with that said, she will feel uncertain if the relationship is right for her. The ways a woman will feel emotionally connected by a man include:

• Understanding: A woman needs to feel that her partner understands her. This can be demonstrated by listening without judgment or offering advice, as well as by being present; fully present. 
• Authenticity: A woman needs to feel safe for her to be her authentic self. 
• Compassion: A woman needs to feel a mutual sense of compassion with her partner. 
• Support: A woman needs to feel equally supported and nurtured and cared for by her partner. 
• Enjoyment: A woman needs to enjoy her time with her partner

When a woman says she doesn’t need a man, it’s a whole lotta bullsh*t. A woman DOES need a man, but not for the reasons a man might think. A woman needs a man to provide her with all the things mentioned above. Kristin Cavallari once told her then-husband, Jay Cutler, ‘I’m with you because I love you, not because I need you.’ What she really meant was, ‘I’m with you because I love you. I don’t need you to take of me in monetary ways. I can take care of myself in monetary ways. I need you to show me that you care in other ways. I need you to provide me with emotional intimacy.’

As we saw on ‘Very Cavallari’, her own reality show, which chronicled her life as a businesswoman running Uncommon James, as well as a glimpse into her personal life with her friends, including Justin Anderson and her former best friend, Kelly Henderson, as well as her marriage to Jay and the role he played in her business, he wasn’t able to provide her with what she communicated to him she needed. He was helping her run the business as it was getting ready to be launched at the time, but there was always an agenda with him. He was helping her because according to him, in his mind, he owned half of it because he was married to her, and therefore, was getting half of the profits in the case of them getting a divorce. He wasn’t helping her simply because he was being a supportive husband. He was helping her solely based on the fact that he thought he had a monetary gain.

We saw Kristin communicate her issues in the marriage to Jay when they went on a date night. She told him that part of the reason they didn’t see each other as often and didn’t spend as much time together wasn’t because she was busy with her company, but rather that she didn’t want to. He didn’t make her feel good. She told him what she needed from him, and he told her he’d try to deliver. But he, of course, as we now know, didn’t. Jay had a hard time being in his new role as a stay-at-home dad following his retirement from the NFL, and he was having a hard time adjusting to the life where Kristin is the breadwinner and not him. He became jealous and was feeling less than. We even see him embarrass Kristin in front of her friends because of his ego.

There’s an entire blog entry here where we thoroughly discuss Kristin Cavallari and the narcissism she’d endured at the hands of her ex and her father, so I won’t go into detail about it here. What I will say here that she’s since found happiness in her relationship with Mark Estes, a 24 year old TikTok star. They’ve seen broken up due to their age difference, but he was a great, positive influence in her life following her messy, sad divorce. He was everything she was looking for in a man, and if he was, as she put it, a 45 year old man with kids, he would’ve been perfect for her. She previously said that Jay always had a vision for what kind of life he’d lead – he’d be the breadwinner and his wife would be at home taking care of the house and the kids. That’s not her. It’s never been her. She was clear about that, and they broke off their engagement because of that. Their relationship was doomed right from the very beginning.

And that’s something that Christina deserves to have in her life too – a man who’s secure and comfortable within himself to be a supportive and caring partner; someone who can provide her with the emotional intimacy that she needs from a partner and who won’t turn her into a villain for her success. Someone who won’t villainize her for her success, and instead will cheer her on and be proud of her. And she can still have all those things. It’s never too late to find ‘the one’. Let’s get one thing straight: divorce is NOT a failure. It can actually be looked as a success – making the realization that someone you thought was your person is, in fact, not the one for you. The fact that Christina did this 3 times makes her a success. And hey, Elizabeth Taylor was married 8(!) times. The best thing that cane out of Christina’s marriage to Josh was that they never had kids. She doesn’t have to ever see him again once the divorce is final, and she doesn’t have to worry about other people being affected by his narcissistic nature.

Not all is lost for Christina. She can still find a partner that’s right for her. Tarek even offered his services to screen her next partner. Yvette Nicole Brown, who previously starred in the hit series, ‘Community’, got married at 53 just in recent days. Of her new union her ‘happily ever after’, she she told People Magazine, ‘I’m not someone who really likes a lot of attention, and I realized there’s a way that I could have a wedding where I made it more about other people, in the sense that because I am of a certain age and I never thought it would happen for me, my wedding can be an inspirational moment.’ She also previously said on ‘Getting Grilled With Curtis Stone’ earlier this year, ‘To be my age, to have been single as long as I was single, and to have waited — I didn’t just grab a guy, I waited until I found the guy that my heart loves — that’s a testimony, and it’s also aspirational and inspiration to women that are in my position. I would love for a 40-something or 50-something woman to see this story and go, ‘OK, it’s right for me to wait for the right one, or to not just marry whoever asks me first if I don’t feel it, and it is still possible.’

And that’s what I hope Christina to find. As Megan Fox wrote on Instagram post in which she announced her pregnancy in November, ‘Nothing is ever really lost.’ She was referring to her pregnancy following a miscarriage. But this could be just about anything – finding the love of your life following a divorce, or 3 divorces, included.