Baby joy for ‘Jilted John’
NEW ARRIVAL OLIVER CROWNS A RELATIONSHIP MARKED BY EPIC TWISTS AND TURNS
A COUNTY couple whose rocky relationship has generated national TV coverage in the past have welcomed a baby boy into their lives.
“Jilted” John Whitbread made headlines in 2015 when, with the wedding arranged and the honeymoon booked, he was ditched by fiancee Amy Jackson.
Having splashed out on a nonrefundable romantic stay in the Dominican Republic, John held an eBay auction for someone to join him in Amy’s place.
The auction was abandoned due to bids that were not genuine, so John set up on online raffle which raised £1,420 for prostate cancer research.
The raffle was won by a woman who accompanied him on the trip, whose first meeting with John, two hours before the flight, was broadcast live on TV.
However, no romance blossomed and John went back to normal dating.
But in April last year, John was back on television - and Amy was back in his life.
His marriage proposal in a restaurant was broadcast live on ITV’s Good Morning Britain.
The couple, who live in Measham, plan to start on arranging their wedding next year.
But in the meantime, they have welcomed baby son Oliver, who joins Amy’s daughter, Daisy 11, from a previous relationship.
Photographer Amy, 29, said she had instantly regretted jilting John at Christmas 2015.
She said: “It all happened so quickly when we first got together.
“Within a month we’d moved in together and got engaged quickly.
“There were lots of pressures. It all happened too soon and I got cold feet.
“I thought I wasn’t ready for it – I’d not lived my life enough.
“How I handled it was wrong. It was when I was getting Daisy ready for school I saw my face on TV and the story was on the radio. It just reinforced I’d made a mistake, but when the media got involved, there was no going back. I was asking to meet up and he was saying no.”
For two years, the couple did not speak and tried to move on with other relationships, but it never worked out. Then they started to make contact with the odd message, although John made it clear they were not getting back together.
But as time passed, they realised they were “meant to be together”.
Amy said: “When it’s meant to be it’ll always find a way.
“I never thought four years ago we’d be back together with a family.
“It wasn’t easy as he was really hurt. We had to be really honest and build it up from scratch.”
John, 37, said of being a father ro Oliver, who is now 12 weeks old: “It’s not easy, but you just do whatever you think’s right. You have to work together as a team.
“We’re both tired and he was a very ‘sicky’ baby. It pushes you to your limits, but when he smiles it all just melts away.”