Strictly’s Karen Hauer finally opens up about the pain of losing Kevin Clifton — and insists she would have stayed if he had only asked.
Strictly Come Dancing star Karen Hauer has delivered a raw and emotional confession about her marriage to Kevin Clifton, revealing she believed they were meant to be together. The dancer, now 43, opened up during a deeply personal interview on Paul C. Brunson’s We Need to Talk podcast, shedding light on the painful silence and miscommunication that ultimately ended their relationship.
Karen and Kevin were married for three years before divorcing in 2018. While the world saw them dance in perfect harmony, behind the scenes, Karen said they were falling apart. “This one hurt because we belonged together,” she admitted tearfully. “We built a life. And then one day, we just stopped talking about the things that mattered.”
Kevin has since moved on with documentary presenter Stacey Dooley, with whom he shares two-year-old daughter Minnie. But Karen admitted the divorce never felt clear-cut. “It was like, ‘Are we together? Are we not? What do you want?’ Neither of us knew what to say.” She added she would’ve stayed and fought for the relationship if she believed Kevin still wanted her.
Adding to the heartbreak, Karen was wrongly labelled a cheater after she was photographed with another man — even though she and Kevin had already broken up privately. “I was literally just walking with someone and suddenly I’m being accused of cheating. I wasn’t. I was just waiting to be loved.”
Despite it all, Karen says she and Kevin kept things respectful while working together on Strictly, stating, “There will always be love there. We never spoke badly about each other. We respected each other too much.”
This emotional interview has reopened questions about what really happened between Strictly’s former golden couple — and whether Karen has truly found peace with how it all ended.
