There’s a very niche crowd of fans who follow people like Kristin Cavallari, mostly made up of big “Laguna Beach”/”The Hills” watchers from back in the day. Which I totally get -- those shows were some of the first good examples of “reality” TV to hit it big, and the cast were college kids and moving into their early 20s when their shows were airing. Whoever watched LC and Kristin kind of grew up with them while they discovered their career paths and started their families.
Nowadays, Cavallari has the kind of influencer-ish “brand” that’s attractive to a lot of fans. The same people who were her age when “Laguna Beach” and “The Hills” were on are now also career moms with kids, so the appeal for her fan base is there: She’s 33 with three kids, her own business, her own TV show and a soon-to-be ex-husband. See? Relatable!
Post-MTV, Cavallari bopped around Los Angeles to do some random guest appearances and bottom-of-the-barrel (sorry, but it’s true) film roles. From there, she started doing some red carpet stints with E! News, who offered her her own reality show, “Very Cavallari,” in 2018. The show launched around the same time that Cavallari was opening a brick-and-mortar boutique for her fashion and lifestyle brand, Uncommon James, in Nashville.
Having just wrapped its third season, the show follows Cavallari and her family’s lives. When it started, workplace drama at Uncommon James fueled the storylines, but fans agree that now that the store is settled and the focus has shifted to "farm" life at the Cavallari home, it’s getting a little stale. There are also whisperings that Cavallari will appear in season 2 of “The Hills: New Beginnings,” so her attention may drifting from E!.
But they gave this woman a lot -- it was E! News royalty Giuliana Rancic who reportedly set Cavallari up with then-Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler in 2010 while Cavallari was still filming “The Hills.” After two engagements (red flag, anyone?) and a ring that was literally put in the mail the following year, they were married in June 2013 in Nashville after their son Camden was born the year prior.
Another son, Jaxon, was born in 2014, followed by little girl Saylor in 2015. The family was living in Chicago while Cutler was playing for the Bears, but moved to Nashville when he was cut in 2017 and “Very Cavallari” was put on the table.
Cutler’s been a fan favorite on the show, but cheating rumors swirled while season 2 was airing. Still, their relationship seemed normal, albeit challenging, during its third-season run, but as soon as the episodes drew to a close, so did the marriage.
All seemed relatively normal when they announced the break-up. The two both posted Instagram photos together with the same caption touting their “loving conclusion to get a divorce.”
“We have nothing but love and respect for one another and are deeply grateful for the years shared, memories made, and the children we are so proud of. This is just the situation of two people growing apart,” they wrote.
Sounds pretty amicable, no?
Yeah, no.
In the five days since the announcement was made, more and more drama, allegations and thrown stones have emerged that leads us to think that Cavallari’s acting skills from her “Hills” days have been front and center on her show. She’s been vocal about struggles and has even shared that she and Cutler frequented marriage counseling, but this was a little more than what we expected.
You’d think it’d be about the affair rumors, as when Us Weekly obtained the divorce papers, they reported that Cavallari was citing “inappropriate marital conduct,” but reports say no; a possible affair is actually becoming the least of these two’s worries.
Custody of their three children is becoming a problem, with Cavallari asking for primary physical custody, claiming Cutler has never been the primary caretaker. Cutler, meanwhile, wants joint custody. Though, she’s also asking him to pay for health insurance and any medical expenses for the kids. Can you have your cake and eat it, too?
Meanwhile, Cutler is reportedly barring Cavallari from buying a home. While he claims that it just comes down to the fact that they already own other property in Tennessee, Cavallari claims Cutler is withholding funds. This, apparently, has been a recurring issue.
“Kristin always knew that Jay was trying to keep some of his money from her. She suspected this for a while and found some type of proof,” a source told Us Weekly.
Sources say that both parties plan to stay local for the sake of their kids, but somehow I don’t think the idea was to stay in the same house.
The divorce also comes after the couple, their kids and two family friends were “quarantined” in the Bahamas for three weeks, returning to Nashville on April 7 -- the date that Cavallari claims as their official separation date. I put the word in quotes because I find it hard to believe that having an island resort all to yourselves is much of an isolation struggle. There wasn’t a ton of evidence that Cutler and Cavallari were spending a lot of time together while they were there, anyway, but the jump from paradise vacation to divorce is a big one.
We wish both of them happiness, but it seems like “growing apart” means something different these days. 🤷