Country singer Kelsea Ballerini is opening up about her "nasty" divorce from Australian singer Morgan Evans. The singers started dating in 2016 and tied the knot one year later in 2017, during a ceremony in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.
However, in August 2022, the singers announced that they were divorcing after nearly five years of marriage. Ballerini first addressed the breakup over the summer. “I wanted you to hear from me directly that I am going through a divorce,” she began her statement at the time before calling the divorce a “deeply difficult decision” that was the “result of a journey of love, growth, and effort that ultimately has come to an end.”
The 29-year-old singer candidly revealed how her four-year marriage failed in a bombshell-filled interview on the Call Her Daddy podcast. It included huge revelations about her marriage, the split and her new relationship with Outer Banks actor Chase Stokes.
“I feel extremely grateful for the many years of marriage to Morgan and hopeful for the next seasons," she said.
Morgan Evans added, “I am very sad to confirm that after almost 5 years of marriage, Kelsea and I are parting ways,” he wrote. “I wish it were otherwise, but sadly it is not.”
Here are some of the biggest revelations from Kelsea Ballerini's Call Her Daddy interview.
8 Kelsea Ballerini Never Wanted To Get Married
Kelsea Ballerini grew up with divorced parents, which meant she once "swore" she would never get married.
“Being an only child, watching that, walking through that at 12, 13, those impressionable ages, I was just like, ‘I’m not doing it,'” she recalled. She did admit that she took "full responsibility" for marrying Evans in December 2017 despite her initial reservations.
She is fairly sure she will not remarry. “I love the idea of partnership. I’m a relationship b****. But I don’t know that I believe in the legality of it all anymore,” she explained. “And I think if you want to be with someone, it should be a daily choice.”
7 Kelsea Ballerini And Morgan Evans Separated Multiple Times Before Divorcing
Kelsea Ballerini confessed she and Morgan Evans went through multiple “separations” during their marriage and had been in couples therapy for years.
“There was, like, many a night of sleeping on the couch,” she revealed, “I slept on the couch the night before the [2019] CMAs, and I remember I went to rehearsal at the arena and texting him, and him being like, ‘I’ll see you at the carpet.'”
Ballerini explained that her and her now ex-husband had “such a sense of disconnection,” which made her feel “resentful” and “tired.” Kelsea has said that while she asked him for a divorce in August 2022, the pair had already been quietly separated and living apart.
6 Did Kelsea Ballerini Want Kids?
Kelsea Ballerini also spoke about her and her then-husband arguing over starting a family.
“That’s a fundamental difference. And I still don’t know if I want kids at all or not,” she revealed on the new podcast. “But that was something that we had talked about early on, and that was something that I was changing on, you know? ‘Cause he was ready. He was like, ‘I don’t want to be an old dad’ … and I was like, ‘I’m not there yet, and I can’t do that to save this and give you something that I’m not ready for. I just can’t do that to myself.'”
Ballerini also revealed she wanted to freeze her eggs for her 30th birthday, but when she told Morgan Evans over dinner, he was upset. “It was not a good day,” she said, admitting that the former couple were “on different pages” about having a baby.
5 How Did Kelsea Ballerini End Her Marriage To Morgan Evans?
“I was just really honest [when I told him],” Kelsea Ballerini explained, admitting she brought up the divorce to him. “I just said, ‘I’ve loved what this has brought in my life, and I respect you, and I respect me, and because of that, I can no longer be in this marriage.'”
Ballerini described their last conversation as “really beautiful,” but she added that, “I haven’t talked to him since. … Everything kind of just shifted. I mean, I’m at peace with it now.”
4 How Did Kelsea Ballerini Meet Her New Man?
Kelsea Ballerini revealed her new romance on the podcast. Kelsea explained that she direct-messaged the 30-year-old actor Chase Stokes on Instagram in December 2022. She has since posted selfies with him and supported the third season of his Netflix show.
“He shoots [‘Outer Banks’] in Charleston, and my manager lives there, and he, like, put the bug in my ear. He’s like, ‘You know who’s really cute when you’re ready? Chase.’ I was like, ‘You’re so right,'” she revealed. “And I’ve never seen the show, but I just knew of him. And so I followed him, and he followed me, and I just swan-dove right on in.”
"I was ready to open back up," she told the host Alex Cooper. "I just felt, why not? I've never really dated; I don't know how it works. I'm like, 'Let's just put ourselves out there; let's just vibe.' And it's been fun."
3 What Kelsea Ballerini Thinks Of Morgan Evans' New Music
Although Kelsea Ballerini recently released an EP about her divorce, Morgan Evans released a song called, Over For You, in October 2022, one month before their divorce was finalized. She referred to this on Call Her Daddy as “opportunistic.”
“I felt really used in that moment,” she spoke about on the podcast, “His healing journey is his healing journey. I respect that, but publicly exploiting that feels a little nasty to me before it’s final.”
Lyrics in the track include "How long have you been waiting/To take our pictures down?/How long have you been breaking?/Why am I just finding out?" and "What do you tell your parents?/What do you tell yourself?/Was it something I was missing/Or is there someone else?".
2 Did Kelsea Ballerini Cheat On Morgan Evans?
An insider told Page Six that Kelsea Ballerini cheated on her now-ex-husband with The Chainsmokers' Drew Taggart in August 2019 at Lollapalooza.
The pair collaborated on the 2018 track, This Feeling.
While Kelsea didn't talk about it with Alex Cooper during the Call Her Daddy podcast, she did say, "I was not perfect, he was not perfect, it was not perfect. And so, there were definitely moments that I look back on where I'm like, 'Oh, I should of done that different, or, 'I could of showed up here. I could of taken the flight this time.' And in the unraveling, that thing I ended up sharing with him, just saying like, 'I need to own the last few years of like, I think, I checked out a long time ago and I need to let you know that.''
1 Morgan Evans Defends Himself On Instagram
Morgan Evans took to Instagram to call out Kelsea Ballerini for not sharing the “reality” of their divorce.
“It’s really sad for me to see this person, who I spent so much of my life with, and loved with all my heart, saying things that aren’t reality and that leave out what really happened,” he wrote.
“She knows I’m not the type of guy to speak on those things publicly. If this is what she needs to heal, I hope it helps. All I ask is that if you’re on my pages, please don’t be mean. Don’t be mean to Kelsea, don’t be mean to each other.”
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