At the top of Live With Kelly and Mark‘s Friday, November 14, episode, the cohosts got candid about their own relationship while discussing a report claiming that married couples who dated for three years or more are less likely to get a divorce.
“‘Dating longer can give you more data on a partner.’ I got my data pretty quickly,” Consuelos quipped, to which Ripa replied, “We didn’t have that much data. We were so young when we got married.”
While the two only met one year before they tied the knot in 1996, Consuelos credits playing love interests on the soap opera All My Children with helping him and Ripa form a strong connection in a short amount of time.
“It was double the time, long hours. I got to see how you dealt with pressure and long hours,” Consuelos explained. Ripa, for her part, added, “I feel that you get a pretty good glimmer into a person when you are one-on-one with them for any prolonged period of time.”
Contrary to how the report suggested that couples date for several years before marriage, Ripa said she’s happy with the way her and Consuelos’ relationship played out. Reflecting on their history together, Ripa revealed that she and Consuelos technically didn’t live together during their early days as husband and wife.
“We eloped. And so, we still had two separate apartments,” Ripa told viewers. “We still had separate apartments because we didn’t plan the wedding, obviously, and then, we had two leases, and they didn’t expire anytime soon,” she told viewers. “So, during the work week, we would stay at my apartment. And then, we would go to Mark’s ‘country estate’ on the Lower East Side for the weekends. We were like, ‘Let’s head down to the country,’ and then we would go to the Lower East Side.”
Consuelos agreed with Ripa’s assessment of their relationship, stating that he has “no regrets” about their past decisions.
Ripa and Consuelos briefly split before rekindling their romance and saying “I do.” One year after their Las Vegas wedding, the pair welcomed their eldest son, Michael. Their family continued to grow with the births of their daughter, Lola, and youngest son, Joaquin, in 2001 and 2003, respectively.