HOME IS WHERE EX IS FOR
Christine Mcguinness admits she and ex Paddy are luckier than most estranged couples as they still get on so well they can co-parent their three children from under the same roof, and even enjoy it.
And while that might sound like a nightmare for many former partners, she insists there are many positives to their living arrangements, including being able to support each other’s careers.
“We live as normal, although we have separate rooms. But we get on really well, we laugh a lot. So I haven’t had to deal with what most people deal with going through a divorce,” she says of life at their Cheshire home.
“When you are clearing out the other person’s boxes, that must be awful. But I haven’t had to do that yet. But I know if and when it comes to that, of course, it’s going to be difficult.
“I think the most daunting part will be the house situation if or when we do decide to go to separate houses.”
Christina, 36, who split with Paddy, 50, in the summer of 2022 after marrying in 2011, says she has no plans to start dating anyone new.
“I don’t think anyone would be OK with me living with my ex. And I’m just happy to put my love life on hold, whilst I do what I think is best for my kids,” she says.
“You know, I don’t want to ruin the dynamics, it’s working as it is, and I have to wait until [I have] my place otherwise it would not be fair to the children.
“It’s just not right now because I don’t think my life is ready for it, whether I’m ready for it or not, so until I am in my place and divorced, it wouldn’t be fair for me to even try and have a relationship with anybody.
“I’m not in any rush to go and meet anyone. I don’t know where I’d put it in my diary, to be honest. If I have got a day for myself, I want it for myself. So yeah, maybe it’s just me for now.”
I’m not in any rush to meet anyone, I don’t know where I’d put it in my diary CHRISTINE MCGUINNESS
KIDS A PRIORITY AHEAD OF LOVE LIFE
Former Take Me Out and Top Gear host Paddy got together with Christine when she was 19, and the pair are parents to twins Penelope and Leo, ten, and Felicity, seven, who all have autism.
Amid rumours Paddy may have started or be open to dating, Christine insists it would not bother her.
“We’re both single, and he’s entitled to go and date if he wants to, that’s completely his business. And it’s not my business at all, you know, and the same for me,” she says.
“It’s just I feel it’s not the right time. But I’m not totally against it. And if he wants to date, he’s completely single and he can, I don’t feel anything towards it.
“You know, it’s his life, it’s his private life, and he can do what he wants. I can’t complain about it. No, absolutely not.”
The former model is keen to move out of the shadows and be known as TV star Christine as opposed to the ex-wife of Paddy Mcguinness.
In recent years, she has made documentaries where she investigated her children’s condition and discovered her own autism. Other TV work includes
ITV’S The Games, The Real Housewives of Cheshire between 2018 and 2020, The Real Full Monty and next week she can be seen on BBC Two’s Pilgrimage: The Road Through North Wales.
“I think, of course, I’m always going to be linked to Patrick, because, you know, we’ve been together for such a long time, but not in a bad way at all,” she says. “I’m proud of us to say we are still a family, we’re mum and dad to our children, and I don’t mean that in a bad way at all.
“A lot of the stuff I’m doing now, I don’t think I would have gone for before, and it’s probably more post-diagnosis that’s made the change in me to go, ‘Actually, I understand myself more, and I can speak up a little bit more’.
“But I’m still working on it, I still am very quiet, and I don’t like to be too opinionated. I definitely don’t enjoy any debates or conflicts or heavy conversations.
I tend to sit back until I absolutely have to speak up about something.
“But I think it’s more of a confidence thing in myself, for example, I’ve always written, always, since I was a teenager.
“But it’s only the last couple of years I’ve had the confidence to say, ‘I’d like to be an author, and I’m going to see if I can get these books published, and I’m going to try to do something with myself ’.
“I wouldn’t have had the confidence to do that before, and then I’d hate for anybody to think, ‘Oh, she’s only doing well in that because she’s his ex-wife’.
“I’m an independent person myself, and I want to make that I’m able to look after my children myself, if needed to. I don’t want to have to rely on anyone.”
Part of that new-found independence includes heading to Wales for the new series of The Pilgrimage. She joined other famous faces including The
Traitors contestant Amanda Lovett, TV presenter Michaela Strachan and former Made in Chelsea’s Spencer Matthews.
They take a journey along a route that celebrates Celtic early Christian saints, with Bardsey Island, the fabled “Island of 20,000 saints”, off the western tip of the
Llyn Peninsula, as their destination.
For Christine, it was a bigger challenge than most faced as she overcame issues from her autism and ADHD such as eating in front of others.
She says: “The whole group really clicked and bonded, it was lovely.
“Amanda was instantly just lovely, we spoke about our children, she’s got lots of children, and she was just like the mother hen of the group, she was just really lovely, nurturing, and that was lovely for me, with it being, you know, a