Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes break silence on scandal: 'There were days when I wanted to die'
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - MAY 17: Amy Robach amd TJ Holmes attend the 2022 ABC Disney Upfront at Basketball City - Pier 36 - South Street on May 17, 2022 in New York City. (Photo by Arturo Holmes/WireImage)
Former ABC News hosts Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes finally spoke out about their infamous scandal on Tuesday, insisting they "lost the jobs we love because we love each other" in their first public comments about the relationship that rocked the media industry.
"There were days when I wanted to die," Robach said on the premiere of their new weekly iHeartMedia podcast, titled "Amy & T.J.," about the aftermath of their relationship being exposed by the Daily Mail.
"I just didn’t want to get up, I didn’t want to see what new headlines was going to be out there," she continued. "And that has been such an eye-opening experience."
Robach struggled when she received text messages from Holmes in the "past tense" as their relationship became tabloid fodder, leading to a "welfare check" on Holmes.
"I was so afraid that he had done something… I started to cry," Robach said as she began to break down.
"I was pretty hysterical, and my dad was holding my hand, and we got to his buildling, and I knew the doorman, and I said ‘I need to get up,’ he said ‘I’m coming with you,’" she continued. "I was shaking, I remember going down the hall, opening the door… and I saw you and you were just splayed out on your bed, and I ran to you, I said, ‘T.J.,’ and you didn’t move, and I remember this is the most awful thing, having to touch your body to see if you were warm. I was so afraid. You were just incoherent."
Holmes, who eventually mumbled to Robach to prove he was alive, said that he was trying to cope with being at the center of the scandal.
"That was the night [the story broke]. The day was essentially me getting off work at 11 a.m. and I immediately started pounding vodka and I didn’t stop for several hours, and then I took who knows how many weed edibles," Holmes said. "That’s how I ended up in the state I was in."
Their relationship, which began while they were married to other people, came to light late last year and resulted in them being benched for two months from "GMA3," the dayside ABC show they co-hosted from 2020 to 2022. Insiders told Fox News Digital as the saga was ongoing at the end of 2022 and into 2023 that the affair was brutal for the family brand so important to Disney, ABC News' parent company.
Robach and Holmes eventually agreed to exit ABC but remained silent for nearly a year afterwards, which they quickly acknowledged on the podcast’s debut episode.
"We have not introduced ourselves in any broadcast form in a year, it’s weird," Holmes said at the top of the show.
Robach, who said she was nervous to speak out, and Holmes asked listeners to reserve judgment until they heard their version of the events.
"We have fought for love, and I can say I have never been happier," Robach said. "We have gone through, I think it’s fair to say, a year of hell… But, we have had each other through it all."
"I am in love with this woman, and she is in love with me," Holmes added as they joked about not getting too cheesy. "We are planning a life together."
When the scandal first broke, ABC News initially declared that Holmes and Robach would not be disciplined for their relationship, as both parties were considered consenting adults. They went on the air the same week their relationship hit the tabloids, and Holmes and Robach even joked on the air about having a "great week."
The following Monday, ABC News president Kim Godwin did an about-face and pulled Holmes and Robach off the air, claiming the "distraction" had become too significant. The podcast debuted on Dec. 5, the one-year anniversary from when they were told not to come to work.
"We never got a follow-up call to come back," Holmes said.
"We are the folks that lost the jobs we love because we love each other," Holmes continued. "A lot of you understand that life, love, marriage, relationships can be messy and usually are."
Holmes and his ex-wife Marilee Fiebig settled their divorce in October, while Robach finalized hers with actor Andrew Shue in March. Holmes and Fiebig had a daughter together; he also has two children from his first marriage. Robach has two children from her first marriage to Tim McIntosh.
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Robach and Holmes said they were "outed, not caught" by the Daily Mail last year. The shocking story included several intimate photos of the midday ABC News anchors taken without their knowledge.
"This is very important, we were outed," Holmes said. "We were outed by a publication that outed us. And so, to be clear, we were outed as being in a relationship, but everyone else thought we were being outed as adulterers. Being outed as cheating on our spouses. It wasn’t the case because, the odd thing is, that the day those pictures were taken and the day that article was released that outed us, we had both, at that point, were in divorce proceedings."
Robach said that Shue had already moved out of her home three months before the Daily Mail report was published.
"Everyone in my tight circle knew I was getting divorced," she said.
Holmes admitted they "failed at being good crisis managers" when the story broke but maintained they did nothing wrong. They said they have repeatedly apologized to their children.
"We're all in therapy," Robach said.
Holmes said that despite losing his "dream job," he’s in a better place now than he was during his tenure.
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Fox News’ David Rutz contributed to this report. Read more of this story from FOX News.