How did this picture-perfect pairing come to an end?
After weeks of speculation, it’s official: Tom Brady and Gisele Bündchen are calling it quits.
The couple announced their separation on their Instagram accounts this week.
“With much gratitude for our time together, Tom and I have amicably finalized our divorce,” Bündchen wrote in both English and her native Portuguese. “My priority has always been and will continue to be our children whom I love with all my heart. We will continue co-parenting to give them the love, care and attention they greatly deserve.”
The couple had been married since 2009 and Bündchen says they “have grown apart,” but that she still feels “blessed for the time we had together.”
In a separate post, Brady called the divorce “painful and difficult,” and said they both “wish only the best for each other as we pursue whatever new chapters in our lives that are yet to be written.”
Rumors had been swirling for a while that things had been tense inside the A-list marriage: In September, CNN reported that the pair was “living separately” as they sort through “marital issues.”
While it’s impossible for outsiders to pinpoint the exact source of the tension, reports said the biggest issue was Brady’s commitment to continue playing, since it keeps him away from Bündchen and their children, 12-year-old Benjamin and 9-year-old Vivian. (Brady also shares a 15-year-old son, Jack, with his ex Bridget Moynahan.)
In February of this year, Brady announced that he would retire from the NFL after 22 seasons. But by March, he’d already changed his mind, declaring he would, in fact, return to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for the 2022 season.
“These past two months I’ve realized my place is still on the field and not in the stands,” Brady said at the time. “That time will come. But it’s not now. I love my teammates and I love my supportive family. They make it all possible. I’m coming back for my 23rd season in Tampa. Unfinished business.”
According to a report in People, Brady’s choice to return to the game didn’t sit well with Bündchen, who would prefer a more consistent family schedule than a demanding football career can allow.
“From a family standpoint, these are critical years,” a source close to the supermodel told the magazine. “The kids are getting older, Ben is 12 now, and Gisele feels like Tom needs to be home.”
Yet another People report published last month quoted a person connected with Brady, who said the quarterback “knows that this is his last season” playing the sport “if he wants to stay married,” adding that he hopes to make his remaining time count and will most likely retire — for good — once this season comes to a close.
Brady had said he was “close to the end” of his NFL run during a September episode of his podcast, Let’s Go!, explaining that he’d been feeling emotional knowing that the clock was running out on his career.
“I think when you get close to the end — and I don’t know exactly where I’m at with that, but there’s no decision to be made, it’s not like I have 10 years left, I definitely don’t have that,” he said.
Bündchen entered the conversation via an interview for an Elle cover story, during which she admitted that Brady’s career did cause her stress, but said that she wanted him to feel fulfilled.
“Obviously, I have my concerns — this is a very violent sport, and I have my children and I would like him to be more present,” she said. “I have definitely had those conversations with him over and over again. But ultimately, I feel that everybody has to make a decision that works for [them]. He needs to follow his joy, too.”
Though that Elle interview was published in September, the writer noted that her conversations with Bündchen had taken place earlier this summer, before Brady took an unexpected 11-day break from the Buccaneers’ training camp in August, citing “personal reasons” for the absence. At the time, the team’s head coach Todd Bowles said Brady was “going to deal with some personal things. This is something we talked about before training camp started.”
When Elle followed up with Bündchen in September to get her reaction on the rumors of strife within her marriage, she declined to comment. But in her previous remarks, she did elaborate on what she brought to the marriage to allow Brady the time and energy for his career.
“I’ve done my part, which is [to] be there for [Tom]. I moved to Boston, and I focused on creating a cocoon and a loving environment for my children to grow up in and to be there supporting him and his dreams,” she said. “Seeing my children succeed and become the beautiful little humans that they are, seeing him succeed, and being fulfilled in his career — it makes me happy. At this point in my life, I feel like I’ve done a good job on that.”
