Rylan Clark has opened up about the reasons for his marriage split for the first time. The BBC Radio 2 host split from husband Dan Neal last year after six years in 2021, with the news coming out amid a four-month break from the spotlight.
The pair met on Big Brother's Bit on the Side - which Rylan was hosting - in 2015 and they became engaged the following year. Rylan and Dan, an ex-Met Police detective, walked down the aisle in 2016 and kept their relationship away from the public eye. But fans became concerned after Rylan missed several weeks of his radio show.
Speculation then began as to why he had pulled out of his show before his split was rumoured. Rylan, 33, later confirmed the separation in a statement which said: "Following reports about Dan and I spending time apart, I feel I have to speak out - as the way it is being reported is unfair. I have made a number of mistakes which I deeply regret and have inevitably led to the breakdown of our marriage."
Rylan returned to work after a four-month break and it wasn't until January that he opened up to The Observer about his struggles during that period. He explained: "I’d got to the point where I didn’t know if I wanted to come back."
The TV star has now put pen to paper in a new book, Ten: The Decade That Changed My Future, which chronicles his life from finding fame on The X Factor in 2012 up until now. And for the first time he details the reasons for the end of his marriage, admitting he had cheated "years ago" but only told Dan last year.
He writes: "I woke up one morning and decided to tell my now ex that I had cheated on him, years ago. I’m not sure why it was that time, or that day I had to do it. But I did." On the reaction, Rylan continues: "He left. Told me it was over and that was that. You’re not surprised? I get that. But I couldn’t believe it."
Rylan said he then went into "self blame" mode and felt his life was over and spent time hiding at his mum's house. He writes: "And for the first time in thirty two years I felt I couldn't carry on no more. What's the point I thought. I'd lost what I thought was everything, the one thing I always wanted. A man I loved. A family of my own. And now it was gone. And so I tried to end it."
He then sought help and spent time in a mental health hospital. Speaking at an event in London on Wednesday night, Rylan reflected on that time and the Mirror reports him saying: "It is no secret that my marriage broke down last year. And I disappeared for five or six months and people knew when I didn't turn up for work that something was wrong because I am always on f****g telly, you know what I mean?
"But the truth is what I went through last year was so revisited with writing about it. A lot of people said to me, especially my publishers 'It will be cathartic. It will be a good thing for you.' And it was to a certain extent, but actually it was awful because you will find out in the book just how bad I got from my own self and it was."
He then added: "The book opens with a disclaimer put it that way. That is how bad it got." Last week, Rylan hared how his mum Linda, who is a hit among his fans having appeared alongside him on Celebrity Gogglebox and his BBC Radio 2 show, was concerned.
The Strictly It Takes Two host said on the Happy Place podcast: "My body did completely shut down. I wouldn't eat. I went through a stage where I couldn't even talk, which for some people might be quite handy. My speech was just slurred. My mum thought I was having a stroke. My body just went. I went down to 9st and I am six-foot-four."
As his marriage came to an abrupt end, Rylan pulled out of work events. He said: "Two days before I was due to do Eurovision, everyone knew when I wasn't at Eurovision something was wrong."
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