Natasha Hamilton and Ritchie Neville will stop living together this week as the Atomic Kitten star is moving into a new home.
The 34-year-old singer and the 5ive hunk called off their engagement in March but stayed living in the same house for the sake of their 23-month-old daughter Ella.
Although they got on fine as friends and housemates, Natasha is happy that they can finally end their unconventional living arrangement and she can start afresh in the house with Ella and her other three children – son Josh, 14, with Fran Cosgrave, son Harry, 11, with Gavin Hatcher and six-year-old boy Alfie from her marriage to Riad Erraji.
Natasha announced she is moving on during an appearance on ITV show ‘Loose Women’ on Wednesday (31.08.16), saying: "When you split up, for me personally, the most important thing was the children. I can deal with my emotions, it’s not idea but I live in the middle of the countryside, houses don’t become available all the time. There was nowhere for us to live … Ella’s coming up to two so I’ve been explaining that mummy has got a new house, I move out on Friday. It’s my fresh beginning and it’s my home, I’ve got a home again."
Natasha recently embarked on a new relationship with Charles Gay, a Creative Director at Independent Leaders fashion brand, and she is looking forward to him coming to visit her at her new home, something he could never do when she was cohabiting with Ritchie, 37.
She added: "I’ve got a new boyfriend. It just happened we met in a pub through friends; I was at a friend’s birthday party and he’s a friend of a friend. I didn’t know him but I was told he was a nice guy. We’ve actually courted, we both live at the opposite sides of the country – he lives in London – so we meet each other once a week and go out for dinner. We commute and done some proper courting. He doesn’t come to the house because that would be a little bit awkward."
Although she is moving on with her life, Natasha is adamant she will always be close to Ritchie, but she has long accepted they are better off as friends.
Speaking about their relationship, she said: "We’d known each other since we were kids, it was a whirlwind romance and we’ve got a beautiful daughter from that. We got engaged and we were due to get married and we were going down that route but there were lots of little cracks and they became a massive thing. There’s just lots of different underlying issues, we’re just better off as friends than we are as a couple. Getting engaged made us think whether we were 100 per cent committed or going to be 100 per cent happy … For me I’d never walk away unless it was definite. It was definite … We did rush a little bit but we didn’t get married."
Meanwhile, Natasha is about to head Down Under with Atomic Kitten to tour Australia and New Zealand with B*witched, S Club 3 and East 17.
Although she will miss her kids while she is away, the ‘Whole Again’ hitmaker is looking forward to having some fun with bandmates Kerry Katona and Michelle Heaton – who is stepping in for Liz McClarnon who has a phobia of flying and can’t make the tour.
She said: "I am a single parent, so I have to go where the work is. As great as it is to tour Australia and New Zealand with Atomic Kitten it’s a question of how I fit it in around the kids … We’re literally mums on tour. We were in Australia about four weeks ago for five days just to do one gig. The three of us were so jet-lagged but we were like, ‘We have no kids!’ "
Natasha Hamilton moving on from Ritchie Neville and into new house
