Hilary Duff confirms she doesn't speak to her dad often: 'It's hard if a family breaks apart dramatically'
Hilary Duff confirms she doesn't speak to her dad often: 'It's hard if a family breaks apart dramatically'
Sharareh DruryMon, March 9, 2026 at 5:32 PM UTC
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Hilary Duff attends the InStyle Imagemaker Awards on Oct. 24, 2024 in Bel Air, CalifCredit: Frazer Harrison/Getty
Hilary Duff is reflecting on her parents' divorce and how it shaped her approach to her own split from NHL player Mike Comrie.
During a recent appearance on the podcast On Purpose with Jay Shetty, the Lizzie McGuire star opened up about the short and long-term effects of her parents' divorce. Robert and Susan Duff ended their marriage in 2008 after 20 years together.
"My parents divorced when I was around 18. And I feel like that was a really hard time," Duff said. "Because I was like kind of an adult, and then you're like, did they just stay together to get us to this point? And now you have guilt that they were unhappy."
The Disney Channel star and pop singer added that in watching how her parents were following their divorce — noting it was challenging for them "to be honest with each other" and "there was a lot of fighting" to the point they could not be in the same room — she tried for a more positive route in her own split from Comrie, whom she divorced in 2016.
Duff and Comrie share a son together, Luca. Duff has since remarried and has three more children with husband Matthew Koma, who is known for producing Grammy-winning EDM hits like Zedd's "Clarity" and "Spectrum."
Hilary Duff with her father Robert Duff in 2003Credit: Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic
"When it came for me getting divorced, I was like, 'I'm not going to have that,'" Duff shared. "We're going to do holidays together as much as we can. Not that it was always easy, but it felt way easier than the alternative."
Duff added that since her parents' divorce, she does not have a close relationship with her father, Robert Duff.
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"We don't speak very often," Duff admitted, noting that her estrangement from her father has left her without "a whole bunch of answers."
"You kind of hear one side and then take from it what you believe, and you know, the same on the other. It's really hard, I think, if a family breaks apart very dramatically. It's hard to find your way back sometimes. And some people want to, and some people don't," Duff continued.
Hilary Duff in 2026Credit: Emma McIntyre/Getty
In the same year as her parents' divorce, Robert was ordered to spend 10 days in jail for contempt of court during a trial to determine if he violated an injunction against selling family assets without the court's approval.
"I was unfaithful to our marriage. I feel very badly about that and the effect it had on the girls," Robert shared in an interview on Inside Edition later that year.
In a recent interview with Glamour, Duff addressed her complicated relationship with both her father and her sister, Haylie Duff, after fans speculated that the lyrics in several songs from her recently released sixth studio album, Luck... or Something, discuss both.
"That’s my family. Those are the people that affect you the most, take up the most space naturally as a human who’s born into something," Duff said. “Just because you’re born into a family doesn’t mean that it always stays together. You can only control your side and your street…. I’ve had a very complicated life, and my parents had a very complicated thing. I know it’s not rare, and I think it goes back to the theme of, Why share now? I guess I just felt ready."
on Entertainment Weekly
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
