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Tom Brady reportedly ‘didn’t want’ to divorce Gisele Bündchen and was willing to do ‘whatever’

The couple went to marriage counceling a few years ago


Jovita Trujillo
Jovita Trujillo - Los Angeles
Senior WriterLos Angeles
NOVEMBER 1, 2022 6:31 PM EDT

Gisele Bündchen filed for divorce from Tom Brady Friday, and within hours, it was finalized. They both called their decision to divorce amicable, but an “insider” is trying to make it very clear that it was not the athlete’s idea.

It’s been all eyes on the former couple since he infamously retired and unretired 40 days later. There were reports of an “epic fight” which many believed was about his decision to continue to play football. While only the couple knows the whole story, an insider told PEOPLE, Brady was ready to do “whatever” it took to make things work. “This was not Tom’s idea,” they said, emphasizing, “This was not Tom’s idea.”

The Buccaneers quarterback, “didn’t want the divorce and he didn’t want the marriage to end,” and was “willing” to do whatever, including therapy and marriage counseling,” said the insider. They said Brady “was trying to make things work, and to make things right,” near the end of their marriage, but it was “a little bit too little, too late,” for Bündchen, who had already given him, “a lot of opportunities to fix things.”

While Brady was busy “following his passion” during their marriage, it left his ex-wife feeling that “he wasn’t hearing what she was saying.”

It wouldn’t have been the first time the ex-couple went to marriage counseling. Brady told Howard Stern in 2020 they attended counseling a couple of years prior because “she didn’t feel like I was doing my part for the family.”

His interview also sheds light on how Bündchen has been feeling  for several years. “She felt like I would play football all season and she would take care of the house, and then all of a sudden when the season ended, I’d be like, ‘Great, let me get into all of my other business activities. Let me get into my football training,” he said, per PEOPLE. “And she’s sitting there going, ’Well when are you going to do things for the house? When are you going to take the kids to school and do that?‘”

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The insider’s claims come after Monday’s episode of Let’s Go! where the athlete shared his Halloween plans, and talked about the personal challenges in his life. Without saying the word “divorce,” Brady called it an “amicable” situation. “Obviously, the good news is it’s a very amicable situation and I’m really focused on two things: taking care of my family and certainly my children, and secondly, doing the best job I can to win football games,” he said.

The couple officially ended their 13-year-long marriage on Friday, October 28th. They each shared their own statements, “We arrived at this decision to end our marriage after much consideration. Doing so is, of course, painful and difficult, like it is for many people who go through the same thing every day around the world. However, we wish only the best for each other as we pursue whatever new chapters in our lives that are yet to be written,” read a portion of Brady’s.

The model wrote in a portion of her statement, “The decision to end a marriage is never easy but we have grown apart and while it is, of course, difficult to go through something like this, I feel blessed for the time we had together and only wish the best for Tom always.”

The pair, who wed in 2009, share two children, son Benjamin, 12, and daughter Vivian, nine. Tom is also a father to son Jack, 15, whom he shares with his ex Bridget Moynahan.