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Ed Hartwell Opens Up About His Split From Keshia Knight Pulliam: ‘We Probably Messed Up’

Telling his side of the story. Ed Hartwell revealed the reason he abruptly filed for divorce from his wife of nearly seven months, Keshia Knight Pulliam, on Monday, July 25, in a new interview.

The former NFL player, 38, told Page Six TV on Thursday, July 28, that suspicions of infidelity on both sides played a large part in the pair’s split, but that ultimately he decided to pull the plug on their marriage after Knight Pulliam, 37, announced her pregnancy publicly earlier in the month.

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“She wanted a baby really fast, and what I was trying to explain to her was that — from my beliefs, from seeing other successful people — that when you first get married, especially since we didn’t have a long courtship, that we should actually focus on each other and not just have a baby,” he explained of how the two were on different pages from the get-go. “That’s something she really did want to do.”

Ed Hartwell and Keshia Knight Pulliam
Ed Hartwell with Keshia Knight Pulliam

Hartwell added that Knight Pulliam’s desire for a baby got to the point where he had to have a sit-down chat with the former Cosby Show star.

“I said, ‘I think we probably messed up. I think we moved too fast,’” he said. “‘Our lives and wants are headed two different directions.’” The couple tied the knot in a New Year’s Eve ceremony after just four months of dating.

The athlete also came clean with his wife about his feelings for his ex-wife, Real Housewives of Atlanta star Lisa Wu, who he’d been married to for six years (and who he shares 9-year-old Ed Jr. with), telling Knight Pulliam that he realized he still “cared about” Wu after the reality star told him she had “lost a baby.”

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“[Knight Pulliam] wasn’t mad that I still cared about [Wu],” Hartwell clarified. “All she was mad about was, ‘You don’t want to have a baby, but you’re mad about her baby. You can’t talk to her.’ And there was a big fallout.”

After that, Hartwell said, the former child star acted out, disappearing for days at a time and “sometimes not coming home at all.” This, he said, is why he requested a paternity test when he filed for divorce.

The pair had stopped having sex once the conflict escalated, so the former Baltimore Ravens player grew suspicious that Knight Pulliam may have found other means to have a child.

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“What I learned about her is that if she wants something, she wants it now and she’s going to get it,” he told Page Six. “That’s one of the reasons we actually stopped having sex.”

In an interview with Entertainment Tonight that aired on Wednesday, July 27, Knight Pulliam alleged that it was Hartwell who was unfaithful.

“Early on in my marriage when I was faced with this, I was ready to leave,” she said tearfully. “It’s not OK. In the process, I found out I was pregnant. And I had to take another hard look and decide if I wanted to try to work through this and forgive him for the sake of the child. Like, I had divorce papers ready. I presented it to him. … Once I was pregnant, I did decide to give him that one last chance.”

A rep for Knight Pulliam declined to comment when contacted by Us Weekly.

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