Melinda French Gates recently opened up about her divorce and said that it is unbelievably painful.

Melinda French Gates recently spoke out about her experience, saying that it was incredibly difficult more than a year after the divorce.

Melinda, 58, stated in an interview with Fortune Magazine that she ‘simply couldn’t stay in that marriage anymore’ due to a number of factors.

‘The strange thing about Covid, though, is that it afforded me the privacy I needed to get the job done. In countless respects, it’s excruciatingly terrible, but I had the privacy to get through it’ she went on.

Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe are three of the former couple’s children, who were born after their 1994 wedding.

After nearly 30 years of marriage, Melinda French Gates and Bill Gates announced their divorce in May 2021.  It was finalised in August 2021, but the couple announced that they would continue to run their foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, together.

She went on to say in the interview that she ‘continued working with the person I was drifting away from’ and that she ‘needed to show up and be my best self every single day.’ She continued, ‘I have to show up and be at my best, even though I might be crying at 9 am and then have to be on a video conference at 10 am with the person I’m leaving.’

She told Fortune that following her divorce she would cry for some mornings before the virtual meetings she had with her former husband and their colleagues but also pointed out that the foundation inspires her to be her best.