Patrick Kielty, the well-known presenter, has opened up about his 13-year romance with Strictly Come Dancing host Cat Deeley, making a heartbreaking admission: he didn’t feel like an equal partner in their marriage. This comes after the couple announced their split earlier this week after a decade of marriage.
In a joint statement, the pair confirmed their separation, stating: “We have taken the decision to end our marriage and are now separated. There is no other party involved. We will continue to be united as loving parents to our children and would therefore kindly ask for our family privacy to be respected. There will be no further comment.”
An interview from back in 2023 has now resurfaced, where Patrick candidly discussed his feelings of inequality within the marriage. Speaking on The Mid-Point podcast in July 2023, he was asked about how he and Cat made decisions in their relationship. He explained, “For a long time I genuinely thought I was in a 50/50 partnership.”
He continued, revealing his realization: “Then you realise you’re actually a junior shareholder in a 50/50 partnership. You go, ‘I thought we were 50/50? Why do you seem to have more shares?’ I think with big decisions you kind of have to float stuff and see how that’s going to go.” This revelation emerges after reports that Cat Deeley found one move ‘really hard’ before their split.
In the same resurfaced podcast admission, Patrick – who shares two sons, Milo, seven, and James, five, with Cat – also spoke about their move from the US to the UK. He noted, “What was weird about it was it was Cat who more wanted to do that. It was more so her decision.”
He elaborated on Cat’s perspective: “I think being a new mum and not having the family around and not having the network of cousins and brothers.”
For Patrick, the transition was different. He admitted, “I think, for me, London is not home. It will never really be home for me. In my head, I still live in a little village in County Down, even though I haven’t lived there full time for 30 years. These are the tricks you play on yourself.”
He also considered the practicalities of the move for himself: “Living in London, my family was always a flight away anyway, so that idea of being a longer flight away from LA wasn’t as much of a problem for me as someone who had to get a flight to go to see them anyway.”
Patrick acknowledged Cat’s professional sacrifices: “I also think because Cat was the one with a successful career out there, she was the one who chose to leave that at the right time, and that’s a decision that she made and only she can make.”
When asked in the podcast if they were at their happiest, Patrick stated that things were good, but emphasized that marriage was always something to be worked at. He added that “the idea of how you work together whenever the rough and the smooth and all those things” was the most important aspect.
