A recent report claimed the couple was separating.
Monique and Chris Samuels are setting the record straight about separation rumors. After People reported that the former Real Housewives of Potomac star and ex-NFLer were going separating following a decade of marriage, the couple sat down for a live YouTube video where they denied that divorce was on the horizon.
Monique admitted that she was "so upset" by the article, which Chris called "very disappointing," before adding that they were "kind of ambushed by" it.
"It's no secret that Chris and I have been struggling in some areas of our marriage. Anyone who watched Love & Marriage: DC last year, y'all saw the arguing," Monique admitted. "... It was crazy building up to that 10-year mark of our marriage. When you've been married that long and you have things that you're like, 'Listen, I feel like this has been unmet' or 'I've been unheard,' and it's been the same thing, you start to get frustrated. It's just like, 'Oh my God. Is this how life is going to be? I can't take it anymore.'"
Monique continued by saying that the disagreements on the show were her "cry for help."
"It was like, 'I've been saying the same things and he's not hearing me and I've just had it up to here,'" she said. "... We've never been afraid to be vulnerable with you all about our marriage."
Monique went on to blast how "people are praising a rumor of divorce or a possible dissolution of a marriage," which she called "sad." Then, she denied the entirety of the report.
"When you say the word 'separation,' that insinuates the road to divorce," she said. "Are Chris and I getting a divorce? No, we're not getting a divorce. Are Chris and I going our separate ways?... Absolutely not. Nobody ever said that. OK?"
"Have we filed a legal separation? No! Have we filed for divorce? No!" Monique continued. "Is there any document that proves of any divorce filings? No! Have we separated to the extent of breaking up? No."
While Monique and Chris said the report was untrue, they explained that they were busy working on their marriage.
"What we were planning to showcase this season on the show was Chris and I were going through a process... in order to fix our marriage while working on our personal issues," Monique said of the upcoming season of Love & Marriage: DC. "We wanted to take a step back and focus on ourselves... If we don't deal with [past trauma] how is that going to allow our marriage to survive?"
"We have multiple homes. We decided that we would spend some nights apart, so we could give each other space while we're on our counseling journeys," she continued. "We've been communicating a lot better than we have in a long time. We wanted to focus on our children, being great parents for them."
Monique added that she and Chris are "most definitely still together" and "haven't given up" on their marriage.
"We didn't break up. We're not looking to divorce. We're simply trying to be better," she said. "We basically said... let's go back to the beginning, fix on ourselves on an individual level... and then focus on our friendship... and then focus on what we both want for our marriage... We needed a change that would work for us... We were not connecting like we should be, like we used to."
"We were like, 'We don't want our children to look at this and think this is how love and marriage is supposed to be,'" Monique added of Christopher, 9, Milani, 7, and Chase, 3. "This gave us a chance to rediscover who we were and give each other space while doing that."
As for People's mention of RHOP's Ashley Darby claiming that Monique was "going through some personal things" at BravoCon, Monique instructed fans, "Ashley is innocent, leave her alone."
Monique explained that the article being published before the season kicks off filming hindered them from showing viewers their true selves.
"We were going back and forth in our minds like, 'Is this going to work?' But I honestly feel like that's not just us, that's every married couple," she said. "There's just not a lot of couples who will talk about it, and that's what we were hoping to show... It's not always easy, but we're still in this marriage."
When the season does eventually air, Monique said she hopes it "inspires other couples out there."
"My ring is still on my finger because we have not gotten to a point where we're done with each other," she said. "... We love each other."
"I ain't going nowhere," Chris added. "We're going to work through this. We're in a great place... It really was a headache, but we've been through so much and it's made us tougher."
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