Jen Shah‘s 26-year marriage to husband Sharrieff Shah nearly came to an end after the debut season of The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.
In a recently-released preview of the upcoming second season, Jen is seen sitting down at her $3.2 million Park City rental with friend Lisa Barlow to discuss what she’d been up to in the months since they’d last seen one another. And, after admitting to going through a “rough” patch, she opened up about her and Sharrieff’s marital turmoil.
“The last six months have been really rough for me. COVID happened. Everything shut down. We were all quarantined. And so I’m doing OK now. I didn’t know I would be OK. I thought my entire world was ending,” Jen begins in the Bravo Insider sneak peek on September 7.
Jen then reveals that just months prior, Sharrieff began to feel that he wasn’t a good influence on her and informed her he was ready to end their marriage.
“Six months ago, Sharrieff and I almost got a divorce. Lisa, I thought my life was, like, over,” Jen shares. “Sharrieff felt like he wasn’t being a positive influence in my life, like he couldn’t help me. What I didn’t realize was how I was acting, and because I hadn’t fully told him how I was feeling, it made him feel like he was the problem. And so, he was like, ‘OK, I have to leave.’ And at first I thought, ‘OK, this is just an argument.’ And then the next day, a divorce attorney contacted me. He had already reached out to a divorce attorney. And Lisa, I was devastated.”
While Jen and Sharrieff have had their fair share of arguments in the past, the football coach had never confirmed plans to leave as he did during the discussion in question.
“This is the first time he ever said, ‘I am leaving you,'” Jen states.
As for what led Sharrieff to consult a divorce lawyer, Jen suggests it was her ongoing anger issues.
“His final breaking point was, it’s the same stuff I had been doing, honestly. You know, getting angry, getting upset and lashing out to get attention from the people closest to me and this time it was like, ‘We’re hurting too, Jen, and I don’t know how to help you. So maybe somebody else can,'” she recalls.
The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City season two premieres on Sunday, September 12, at 9/8c on Bravo.