Shona says she and Brad were together for six weeks after MAFS but split as he didn’t change

Following them being removed from MAFS UK 2023, many people have been questioning if Shona and Brad tried to make it work outside of the experiment, and what happened to make them split.

We saw Brad and Shona advised by the dating experts on Married at First Sight to leave the show, and Paul C Brunson came under fire when viewers said he appeared to encourage the couple to try again, despite Brad’s controlling behaviour. Paul clapped back saying they told the couple to get help, but Shona has now confirmed they did give things a second try.

Whilst Brad and Shona had previously not said anything about their split following MAFS, it was clear they had, as Brad has been posting with a new girlfriend since the show. Now, speaking on the It’s Not You, It’s Them…But It Might Be You podcast, Shona has clarified what happened when they left the show and eventually broke up.

She said he promised: “I love you, I love you. I love you. I’ll be different on the outside. So I gave him the benefit of the doubt.” But she explained they broke up after five to six weeks, when Brad didn’t change his behaviour.

“We stayed together on the outside for, I think, about five to six weeks and the same behaviour continued,” she said. “He was exactly the same person. It was the listing, it was the harsh criticism, it was belittling me, like making me feel so small and questioning myself.

“And it got to the point where I just doubted, like my every word, like constantly, like gaslighting me and asking me questions and then being like ‘mm-hmm, okay’, and then later on bringing it up and being like, ‘oh yeah, you know, earlier I just didn’t agree with anything that you said and this is why’.

“I just I felt like he was constantly going in on me and then one day I was thinking, ‘Shona, everything in your body is saying that this is wrong, like why, why are you still with this person?’ And then he called me one day and he just said, like ‘the way I feel about you is so mental, it’s so crazy, but like I don’t love you, I just lust you and I think you’re really sexy and I think it’s physical for me, but like I still want to be with you’ and I was like what? I just woke the hell up.”

Shona then said she booked a flight to Sri Lanka and went to do yoga teacher training. “I really took the time to process and heal, like everything I’d been through, and just getting myself back to the person that I was when I went into the experiment, because I have done so, so much work on my self-esteem and I felt like I genuinely was in such a good place but in such a short amount of time,” she said.

“The harsh criticism, the constant not feeling like I was good enough, really affected me and it got it really like I was just doubting myself constantly, I didn’t feel good enough at all and it’s scary how quickly that happened.”

 She said in Sri Lanka she “fixed her heart” and realised she had been “so focused and so desperate to make that relationship work” before realising she needed “to love me so much more.”

“It sent me on the biggest self-love journey which I’m on right now and I feel empowered, and I feel strong that I will never, ever, ever put up with that kind of behaviour ever again,” she said. “And, Bradley, if you’re listening, enjoy the fucking universe babes.”

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