Bethenny Frankel gave a withering update on her co-parenting dynamic with ex-husband Jason Hoppy during a podcast appearance this week.
The “Real Housewives of New York City” alum, 55, sat down with Benny Blanco on Tuesday’s episode of the “Friends Keep Secrets” podcast and made clear that civility remains elusive. When Blanco asked whether she and Hoppy, also 55, “co-exist,” Frankel fired back, “We do both exist on this earth, so that’s positive.”
She continued, “It’s been a strained year. It’s been a challenging year.”
Frankel’s divorce from Hoppy was finalized in 2021, nearly a decade after the couple separated in 2012 following what she described as a “two-year marriage.” The Skinnygirl founder did not mince words about the legal aftermath, calling the protracted proceedings “a 10-year, horrible, horrendous, worst-of-my-life divorce” and likening the entire experience to “torture.”
“There were a lot of circumstances that have been too much,” she divulged during the appearance, noting the absurdity of “10 years [in legal proceedings] on a two-year marriage.”
The swimwear designer was ultimately granted primary residential custody of their daughter Bryn, now 16. Despite the admitted trauma of the split, Frankel gushed over her relationship with the teenager. “I love her so much,” she said, explaining that they occupy a space “in between” being mother and daughter and friends.
“When we vibe and we are watching something and we’re laughing, we connect,” she added.
But Frankel also acknowledged friction, sharing that they can find themselves “on different paths” and quipping that they’re “very much like Thelma and Louise.”
This is not the first time Frankel has spoken publicly about the toll the divorce took on her. During a December 2025 episode of Alex Cooper’s “Call Her Daddy” podcast, she openly cried while discussing the ordeal. “Nothing compares to what my divorce was for 10 years. Nothing,” Frankel said at the time, noting that even her difficult childhood with her mother was “child’s play” compared to the “trauma of someone wanting to torture you and telling you that they’re going to do it.”
Frankel claimed she “lost hair” and thought she “would never survive” the split, going so far as to say she “didn’t want to,” She added, “I had to because of my daughter,” recalling that she “literally thought, ‘I’ll never be happy again.'”
Before her marriage to Hoppy, the Bravo personality was briefly married to Peter Sussman from 1996 to 1997 — a union she dismissed by saying “was like it didn’t even happen.”
Frankel and Hoppy’s relationship played out publicly on “RHONY” and their spinoff, “Bethenny Ever After,” which documented their courtship, marriage, and eventual unraveling. The couple’s split became one of reality television’s most contentious, with years of legal battles over custody and financial matters dragging out long after their on-screen romance ended.
On the personal front, Frankel appears to have turned a corner. In April, the outlet exclusively revealed that the TV star was dating investment banker Shane L. Campbell, with a source saying she’s “the happiest she’s ever been and is fully in her intentional dating era.”
