Kim Kardashian says her grandmother understood something about her split from Kris Humphries that many people watching from the outside could not: she had once regretted her own wedding almost as soon as it was over.
Mary Jo “MJ” Shannon shared that experience after Kardashian filed for divorce from the NBA player. Her story offered reassurance from someone who knew how difficult it could be to admit a marriage was a mistake.
Kardashian, 46, revisits their conversation in Jonathan Van Meter’s biography, Citizen Kim: The Woman Who Created the Future, released October 27. The book includes interviews with relatives and colleagues who witnessed the relationship unfold.
Kardashian and Humphries married on August 20, 2011. She filed for divorce on October 31, just 72 days later, although their marriage did not legally end until June 2013.
MJ Had Also Worried About Ending a Marriage So Quickly
In an excerpt published by The Cut, Kardashian recalls Shannon explaining that her parents had saved their money to give her a big wedding. She had believed she was in love when she agreed to marry.
Within a month or two, Shannon realized she had made the wrong decision. The wedding had appeared in the local newspaper, and she felt mortified about the time and money her family had invested. She feared her parents might never speak to her again.
Shannon nevertheless went ahead with the divorce. When her granddaughter faced a similar situation, she drew on that experience rather than judging her for leaving.
“You have to be happy,” Kardashian recalled her grandmother telling her. “You have to be.”
Shannon, a familiar presence on the family’s reality shows, died on July 16 at age 91, according to Reuters.
Kris Jenner Offered to Help Her Cancel the Wedding
Kardashian’s mother had noticed her unhappiness before she walked down the aisle. In the biography, Kris Jenner recalls approaching her daughter during the rehearsal at the Montecito, California, property where the wedding took place.
Robin Thicke was rehearsing nearby, and Jenner could hear the music through the open windows. She told Kardashian she felt she was making the wrong decision and offered to handle the arrangements if she wanted to leave, according to Us Weekly.
Kardashian proceeded with the ceremony, which became the two-part E! special Kim’s Fairytale Wedding: A Kardashian Event.
Longtime Keeping Up With the Kardashians producer Farnaz Farjam told Van Meter that Kardashian lacked the confidence to back out. She remembered someone more vulnerable and uncertain than her public image suggested.
Kim Felt Pressure to Marry and Have Children
Kardashian’s hopes for marriage and children were already playing out on television, including in the archival Keeping Up With the Kardashians footage above.
Looking back with Van Meter in March 2022, she described the anxiety she had felt around turning 30. Friends were marrying and starting families, and she began measuring her own progress against theirs. Settling down started to feel like something she should already have done.
She later recognized that her reservations about Humphries had been present before the ceremony.
“I knew it before we were married in my soul,” Kardashian told the author.
At the time, she dismissed those doubts as cold feet. With filming underway, she also feared that canceling would make her a runaway bride in the public’s eyes and create an even bigger spectacle.
Humphries Later Defended Their Relationship as Real
Humphries has also described the personal cost of the breakup. In a March 2019 essay for The Players’ Tribune, he rejected the suggestion that their relationship had been invented for television.
“Our actual relationship was 100% real,” he wrote.
The former NBA player said he had underestimated how dramatically the attention would change his life. After the split, strangers recognized and filmed him, and basketball crowds booed him. He described developing anxiety around crowds and spending roughly a year reluctant to leave home.
Kardashian later acknowledged her own regrets about how she handled the separation. During the family’s 2021 reunion special, she said she owed Humphries an apology and had tried unsuccessfully to contact him.
Kim Gave Van Meter Access to Her Family
During her October 15 appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Kardashian described participating in the biography as intimidating because someone else was writing her story. She said she trusted Van Meter and had cried while reading his account of her life.
Van Meter told CULTURED that the project took approximately five years, including reporting and writing. Kardashian imposed no preconditions, he said, although he gave her the finished manuscript to check for factual accuracy.
His interviews extended beyond Kardashian’s recollections. He also spoke directly with Shannon before her death and singled her out as one of the people he most enjoyed meeting. She carefully traced her family’s history back to Arkansas, supplying details about the generations that came before her famous grandchildren.