ABC/Craig Sjodin Zac Clark is one of the men vying for Tayshia Adams' heart on 'The Bachelorette.'
Zac Clark’s ex-wife, Jennifer Stanley-George, kept her name out of the headlines and away from the Internet sleuths, but on the night of The Bachelorette finale she finally broke her silence.
In an interview with Us Weekly, Stanley-George talked about her marriage with Clark — which was undone by his struggles with addiction — as well as his on-screen relationship with Tayshia Adams.
“He’s a different person,” Stanley-George said of Clark. “Obviously it’s weird for me … we were together for so long, you know? It’s weird to watch him on TV. But yeah he’s a completely different person now, and he seems happy and healthy and that’s great.”
Clark, 36, spoke about his former marriage during a one-on-one date with Adams, but revealed few details about the woman he married in his 20’s. He said that his drug and alcohol addictions meant the marriage was doomed from the start.
“I decided, like, ‘Oh, I’ll get married,’” Clark told Adams. “And she did nothing wrong. It’s important to say. But at that point, I’m, like, drinking and doing drugs and just partying and just totally being selfish. I was hanging out with some sketchy people — it just wasn’t pretty. I got arrested. I got a DUI. And my wife left me. She’s like ‘This is over.’”
Stanley-George agreed with what Clark said led to the divorce, but she took issue with one part of his explanation about why their marriage fell apart.
“He said [on the show], ‘I left after a DUI’ — I don’t even remember him getting a DUI honestly,” Stanley-George told Us Weekly. “He needed to do [get clean] for himself, not for me. And I think at that point, if we had stayed together, he would have been doing it for me.”
What Does Clark’s Ex-Wife Think of Tayshia Adams?
No contestant on this season of The Bachelorette was quicker to say they were in love with Adams than Clark. Adams was also quick to reciprocate those feelings in a way she still hasn’t with any other contestant.
Stanley-George says it’s been a “little shocking” and a “little hard to watch” her ex-husband develop such a strong romantic relationship on television. But that doesn’t mean she’s not a fan of the show’s lead.
“I love Tayshia,” Stanley-George said. “I watched her on the other shows too and she seems so sweet … I want the best for him. I hope that he is the final one tonight and that they are still together. I wish that for him. I just don’t know if he’s being completely honest and genuine on TV … But I don’t know if that’s just because I’m scarred from our past.”
Stanley-George Says No Cheating Led to their Divorce
In one episode of The Bachelorette, previews showed Clark admitting he cheated in the past, a shocking revelation, but not an entirely surprising one considering his previous life of addiction that included deceiving many of his loved ones.
But in a conversation with Adams, Clark revealed that his cheating story happened in sixth grade and the couple laughed it off. While many fans called Adams gullible for believing Clark’s story, Stanley-George says that infidelity wasn’t a problem during their marriage.
She also says there’s no hard feelings all these years later.
“I’ve long since moved on with my life and I’m happily married now and I just had a baby so, I’ve been obviously distracted, but I have watched this season,” Stanley-George said.
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