Kristen Doute has no time for other people’s opinions on her pregnancy journey.
During the season 1 premiere of The Valley last month, Jax Taylor expressed his concerns over Kristen’s plans to get pregnant and have a baby with her long-distance boyfriend, Luke Broderick. While exclusively chatting with Us Weekly about her AirSculpt transformation, Kristen, 41, said she didn’t get a “protective brother feeling” from Jax’s comments.
“I felt like that was just Jax deflecting about his own life and not wanting to deal with all of the stuff that was going on with him,” she told Us on Tuesday, April 9. “And Jax loves to tell other people how to run their life. So, I don’t necessarily think it was about my fertility or actually about my choices about my body to get pregnant or for Luke and I to have a family. I think it was just Jax’s way of deflecting, not having to deal with his own stuff.”
Before the reality show’s March premiere, Brittany Cartwright revealed that she and Jax, 44, were “taking time apart” from their marriage and that she had moved into a different home. Season 1 of The Valley will document the lead-up to and aftermath of their split, as the show resumed filming after the pair’s breakup news broke.
In a season premiere conversation with Luke, Jax stated he wants to make sure Kristen is “OK having a kid out of wedlock.” Luke, for his part, clarified that he and Kristen “have the same mindset” about having kids and that being a good parent “is more important to me than a ring and a wedding.”
Kristen told Us that she and Luke will “definitely get married at some point” but are in “no rush” to walk down the aisle. “Neither of us are going anywhere, and we’re just happy,” she stated.
For now, their focus is on continuing to try to have a baby. “We were fortunate last year to get pregnant, and then we had a loss, but once we kind of got over that emotional hump, we’re just, we’re back on the train hoping for the best,” the Bravo star explained. (Kristen revealed in November 2023 that she had a miscarriage after discovering she had a “nonviable pregnancy.”)
Another thing she and Luke are “figuring out” is their long-distance romance. “He’s here [in California] mostly. He’s just going back to Colorado once in a while,” she told Us, adding that if The Valley is renewed for season 2, they plan to “spend some more time out in Colorado before we start again.”
Luke made his Bravo debut on The Valley earlier this year. Filming the reality series is something Kristen told Us hasn’t affected their relationship positively or negatively. “I wouldn’t say it necessarily brought us closer, but we have each other’s back, and I think our relationship, our foundation is just so much more than reality TV, and maybe that’s why,” she shared.
To prepare for The Valley premiere, Kristen transformed her body with the help of AirSculpt. “Truth be told, being back on TV and doing press again and being really thrown back into the public eye again, I just wanted to feel more confident about what I was wearing every day and getting dressed and trying on clothes and getting excited to do press and carpets and all of that. So, I just wanted to do something about it,” she told Us of the cosmetic procedure.
Kristen noted that she has walked out of the experience with “so much more confidence,” adding, “I just feel better about myself, for me, when I look in the mirror, and that’s really why I wanted to do it.”
The Valley airs on Bravo Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET, with new episodes streaming the next day on Peacock.
With reporting by Christina Garibaldi
