YouTube Chip and Joanna Gaines admit to going to marriage counseling.
Chip and Joanna Gaines may be experts at renovation and design, but the pair know all too well, as is the case with home-remodeling projects, relationships don’t always go as planned.
The HGTV mega-stars appeared on Discovery Plus’ Super Soul in an interview with Oprah Winfrey. In an outside flower-filled setting, the trio discussed several topics, including the couples’ marriage and journey.
During the interview, the Fixer Upper stars opened up about attending marriage counseling and were challenged to keep away distractions like television while engaged, but per the Gaines in the interview, they’ve taken that concept to another level.
“They left it to us to say how long we would do it. Everybody said a couple of weeks, a couple of months; we just came back instinctively and said we wanna be without television for one year,” Chip explained to Oprah. “We thought it would be romantic. And at the end of that one year, we said, what about another year? After that second year, we’ve never looked back.”
You can listen to the whole interview here:
Over time there have been rumors of the Gaines’ union being on the rocks. Here we discover that the counseling they received was pre-martial. This counseling was an effort to ensure that they set themselves up for a healthy marriage.
Joanna Gaines Shares the Secret to Her Marriage
Another point of discussion during the almost 40-minute interview was Chip and Joanna’s pursuit of happiness in the marriage, and their commitment to balancing career with family.
Oprah asked why their marriage and family work:
“Jo, I read that the reason the whole family works,” Oprah confirmed, “is because you all put the marriage first, and everything else comes after that.”
Joanna responded with passion and depth about the topic:
Yeah and I even think, but even before that, one thing I’m thankful for is that we met each other a little later in life. Chip was probably one of his oldest friends to get married and in that time period it’s like we both… I know for me as a women I figured out, I wanted to be as whole with all the stuff, like how can I be whole? We didn’t want to come to marriage saying how will someone complete me, but I think as much as we can not rely on each other to fill us up. That’s not our job, it’s to come together and partner together, then we’re the best for our children, so it’s got to be in that priority in our minds, in our hearts and in our home, that we’re healthy and whole so that our children, what trickles down to them is health and wholeness as well.
Chip and Joanna have been a part of one another’s lives for 20 years, which has given them plenty of time to build their relationship, family, and multiple businesses.
Chip and Joanna Have Built an Empire
The Gaines had no idea HGTV’s Fixer Upper would open so many doors on multiple levels. The pair have owned their own real estate company since 2009, which is where it all started.
You can also find their home and décor products in Target. The big-box store started carrying Hearth & Hand with Magnolia products in 2017.
Chip and Joanna are also best-selling authors, each releasing a title earlier this year to make for a total of eight books on the market. Since 2016, the power couple has opened three restaurants, all in Waco, TX.
And if all of that wasn’t enough, the design duo will launch their network, Magnolia Network, in January 2022. Partners in life and business, the Gaines have figured out how to make it all work.
READ NEXT: Black Women Respond to Christina Haack’s ‘New’ Extension Method