Married at First Sight has once again ended with all of the season's couples divorcing.
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During Tuesday night's Married at First Sight reunion special, Dr. Pepper Schwartz met with the six individuals who participated in this extreme experiment to discuss how the six months after Decision Day -- when each couple determined whether they'd like to stay married or split up -- played out.
The big shocker of the night was Tres Russell and Vanessa Nelson, who chose to continue working on their marriage once filming concluded. They were basically America's sweethearts all season long, but Vanessa dropped a bombshell on Dr. Pepper during their session.
She and Tres broke up after the show and are no longer together.
"Things just fell apart," Vanessa said before bursting into tears. "We stopped being physically intimate."
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The end of their relationship was prompted by a blowout fight they had when Tres came home at five in the morning after a night out. Vanessa admitted they had said "really mean things" to each other and she was badly hurt.
"It was terrible. Tres tells me that he doesn't have romantic feelings for me. Things weren't perfect at all, but I thought it was at least [assured] that we liked each other," Vanessa explained.
Tres confessed he stopped having sex with Vanessa, which he regrets because it probably planted a lot of insecurities in her.
"I just felt like at times we would take all these steps forward and [then] we would have to start all over," Tres said, adding that the pressure of being married and trying to be the perfect husband all the time didn't help. "I felt like it didn't matter what I said... After a while I got burned out on trying to prove myself."
Vanessa did struggle with trust issues throughout Married at First Sight and tended to push Tres away at times in fear of getting her heartbroken. She had high expectations of Tres as a husband, which he often admitted he probably couldn't live up to.
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However, the couple had no hard feelings toward each other, and Vanessa said she had no regrets. The pair decided they wanted to work on a friendship and went out to dinner to discuss what went wrong with their marriage in depth. Tres and Vanessa also apologized to each other for the hurtful things that were said.
Meanwhile, Neil Bowlus and Sam Role had become great friends since the show stopped taping. Sam still wears her wedding ring out of respect for Neil, and they do fun activities all the time together.
Dr. Pepper saw real potential for this strong friendship to develop into a romantic relationship down the road. After all, Sam insisted she was falling in love with Neil during the show -- a revelation which shocked him. Sam took responsibility for treating Neil badly, saying she would've asked for a divorce as well had she been in his shoes.
As for the third couple, Ashley Doherty refused to even sit and talk with David Norton. Ashley said they didn't connect on any level and she lost all trust in him when he asked another girl out behind her back. Ashley explained David was pushy to get her to open up, and if anything, that made things worse.
Dr. Pepper kind of accused Ashley of writing David off the minute she saw him and discovered she wasn't physically attracted to him. The expert also said Ashley was cold and probably made David act out because he felt so rejected.
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Ashley didn't admit to any of this, insisting she and David were just two totally different people who never would have clicked. She also refused to make excuses for David's mistakes. David assured Dr. Pepper he never had any intention to cheat on his wife. If anything, he just maybe wanted a little validation from her friend that he was doing things right and truly was a good guy.
David told the expert he was probably overbearing in his marriage but it's because he wanted that life so badly. He tried to start a dialogue with Ashley after the show but she never responded. David is still very hopeful about finding Mrs. David Norton in the future.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski