A no-holds-barred podcast conversation got quite revealing.
It’s not uncommon for two people to go from coworkers to spouses, but what about the reverse? Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos aren’t just husband and wife, they’re now co-hosts of Live With Kelly and Mark.
As those who watch her every morning already know, Kelly Ripa isn’t one to hold back. (Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, considering this is coming from the woman whose own mother wouldn’t read her memoir because she called it a “sex book.”) On a recent episode of her podcast, Let’s Talk Off Camera, listeners got a preview of what may be to come on Live With Kelly and Mark, when Ripa joined by her longtime husband, Mark Consuelos. Together, the couple shared the naked truth about how they maintain the heat in their marriage and the conflicts that have bubbled up between them in the past.
How do Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos keep their sex life steamy?
On the topic of keeping things hot, the couple revealed how they maintained an intimate connection while filming in separate locations at the height of the pandemic: “We had sexual rituals that were so ludicrous over FaceTime,” Ripa said.
What did that entail, exactly? Well, for Ripa, it involved going to great lengths to be seen at the most flattering angle possible during video calls.
“I became so alarmed at my appearance over FaceTime that I started rigging the computer to hang from a ladder. I’m not kidding,” she confessed. “I hung the computer over a ladder so that I could look up to Mark and he did not have to see what gravity was actually doing. You get really close to yourself in situations where you’re separated from your husband for long periods of time.”
For his part, Consuelos added that sex has always been a crucial part of the spark between them, and he considers that physical connection to be an essential element of their relationship.
“There have never been months [between us having sex] unless I was in another country,” he said to his wife. “But if you just decided, ‘Yeah, we’re not having sex anymore,‘ I would probably have a problem with that.”
What have they learned about better communication in a marriage?
During the conversation, Ripa also shared her “biggest complaint” about Consuelos, which she said caused significant emotional hardship between them at the beginning of their relationship.
“This is not recent, because it definitely changed, and I don’t know if I changed or if you changed or if it was some combination of change — but you used to be insanely jealous,” she told her husband. “And that was a hard pill to swallow. It’s very hard being married to somebody who is jealous.”
To illustrate, she recounted a story in which a waiter (who was in his 70s or 80s) gently flirted with her during a dinner in Boston. “I thought it was so cute that this old man called me a princess, and I looked at him and I gave him my order in a very smiley way,” Ripa recalled. “And he walked away and you picked a horrible fight with me.”
Consuelos remembered the story and agreed that it had upset him. But he added that he’s grown a lot since then, and he can now recognize how his behavior created conflicts, admitting that he was “pretty insane” and jealous when he was in his 20s.
“That jealousy thing definitely followed me for a while,” he said. “It’s a character flaw. It’s ugly. And as ugly as it feels to the person who is on the receiving end of it, it’s such an ugly feeling inside. If this is any consolation, you know you’re being crazy. The jealous person knows that this is wrong and it’s ugly but they can’t help it.”
But, just like any person in any marriage, Ripa hasn’t been totally innocent, either — and one of her worst habits was also revealed on the podcast.
“You haven’t done this in such a long time, but when you’re pissed off on the phone, you hang up,” Consuelos said.
“That’s so bad. It’s so bad,” Ripa replied. “That’s a byproduct of how I grew up. I come from a family of famous hanger-uppers.”
The spouses were joined in their conversation by Linda Carter, Ph.D., their marriage counselor, and they spoke at length about how bringing in a professional to mediate these kinds of disagreements can make such a substantial difference in a couple’s overall happiness.
“One of the great benefits of going to marriage counseling — especially when things are good and you want them to get better — is that the old habits and the old behaviors you kind of hung on to, I thought twice about doing them because I knew that within a week or five days, I would be accountable to somebody and that person would look at me like, ‘You want to explain that?'” Consuelos explained.
In a fitting twist of fate for a couple who met while working on a TV show (on the set of All My Children), the pair will be reunited onscreen starting April 17, when Consuelos joins Ripa as the co-host of Live following the departure of Ryan Seacrest, who will spend more time focusing on American Idol, his radio show, and the Ryan Seacrest Foundation.
