What ‘The Valley’ Didn’t Show About One of Kristen Doute’s Hardest Years

Kristen Doute has spent years sharing the messiest chapters of her life on reality TV. But this season of The Valley brought a different kind of vulnerability. Just months after welcoming daughter Kaia with her fiancé Luke Broderick, she let cameras capture the parts of early motherhood that don’t always make it to television.

Looking back now, Doute says she can finally see what she was going through in a way she couldn’t at the time. She also opens up about why she stood by Danny throughout the season, where things really stand with Janet today, how she’s working through postpartum intimacy struggles, and why she’s finally in a much better place. 

Here are the biggest moments from Doute’s conversation on Not Skinny But Not Fat, adapted from the episode.

Kristen Doute on Postpartum Depression, Luke, and ‘The Valley’

What has postpartum really been like for you?

“I had, and I think a lot of moms do, but I had this whole grand idea of what PPD looked like, was supposed to look like, where it’s like, do you want to hurt yourself? Do you want to hurt the baby? Like you hear about these very grandiose, next-level depression. So I figured it’s hormones, it’s normal. It doesn’t, I guess it doesn’t feel like that, so it must not be. But when I watch it back, I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s rage,’ for no reason, or like I can see obviously like the Mexico trip and traveling, and I was just so anxious the whole time. And again, so soon after having a baby…I don’t think I started feeling like whatever this new version is of myself, like kind of really stepping into motherhood and feeling more calm until she was like 10 months. And now it’s just getting a little bit easier every month because it’s just so the norm now.” 

How has motherhood changed your relationship with Luke?

“I think looking back now, it was like, I had this expectation and romanticized what we were going to be like during pregnancy, what we were going to be like after giving birth, like what he was going to do….I had this like this very like romantic expectation and idea of what things were gonna be…And so I think it was the expectation for sure because…now we’re obviously in a much better place now and he is the best dad I could ever ask for. I don’t need to ask him for anything. I don’t need to tell him what to do. I don’t need to request. It’s just like he just does. He lives and breathes for that little girl….

…[At first] it wasn’t the version I imagined, and he didn’t have the same connection, I guess, with Kaia as I did, and it didn’t bother him. And he was like, ‘I don’t know, she’s like a potato. She doesn’t really do anything right now. Like, I think she’s awesome, and you’re like, be obsessed with her.’ I’m like, stare at her, like, just can you just f*cking stare at her?….And he’s like, ‘You’re insane. Like, I have sh*t to do. She’s sleeping. Everything’s fine.’”

Where do things stand with Luke now after such a difficult season?

“We’re so good now. I mean, we still have our moments, don’t get me wrong. We have a 14-month-old. Like, we’re tired. We’re planning a wedding. We both work. We have dogs. We have a lot going on. But we’re just in such a different place now. Communication has gotten so much better because we had to learn how to communicate differently. We couldn’t keep doing the same thing we were doing before because it just wasn’t working anymore. I think becoming parents either really makes you or really breaks you. I feel really lucky that we made it through because there were definitely moments where it felt really hard.” 

Are you thinking about having another baby already?

“He wants another one, and his whole POV, I think he even said it this way, it was like, let’s just get it over with to be done. I’m like, ‘OK, will you carry the baby then?’ We both really want another one. I just don’t know if I’m ready yet, but I don’t know how much time I have either. So it’s, we’re kind of feeling that all out.”

Where do wedding plans stand now?

“We haven’t even, no…I think it’s, it’s all Kaia right now…Yeah, we have a wedding planner and we have a possible destination. We have an idea of where we want to be…nothing’s like set in stone.”

How are the intimacy struggles going?

“That is still tough for me. And after talking to one of my doctors, because I was on this SSRI that is a total libido killer, we’re switching medication. So right now I’m kind of in the middle of like weaning off of one and onto the other because I’m like, at least I can do that because I want, I want to have my libido. I’m not just doing this for him. I want us to have intimacy. I don’t want to, I don’t want him to feel rejected, and I don’t want to ever have to reject him…I also know, even though on the show it sounded like sex, sex, sex, it was like, we don’t have a relationship anymore. Like we’re just Kaia’s parents, and it feels very transactional and very like roommate type of a thing, and that’s what made him nervous.”

Why did you defend Danny this season?

“I think for me the biggest thing in defending Danny, it was that until probably until the season wrapped. I finally was able to articulate like, what two things need to stay separate. We have this stuff with Danny and Jasmine and Melissa that happened a few years ago that has blown up in our friend group because of the stuff that Janet has said, the words she chose to use. Then we have Danny, who is hiding drinking and being obnoxious when he’s drunk. And somehow, for me, it felt like those two things were blended. So it meant if Danny’s an obnoxious drinker, he must be inappropriate toward women. And because those things were meshed, I was always fighting tooth and nail to say, Jasmine and Melissa have asked for this to be done and over with, and I’m tired of people saying these really horrific things about Danny’s character. So it’s like that just because that’s over here, this has to just be separate. So it almost made it impossible for me to say, yeah, he is an annoying drunk because you didn’t want that to mean you thought that would mean that other stuff is true. So that was really tough because looking back now that I’ve seen everything that I’ve seen and I’ve watched all of the scenes is correct.”

How do you really feel about where things stand with Janet today?

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“I am in a place now where I can be around her…But I just don’t feel like she is going to add any value to my life right now, and my circle got so much smaller after I had Kaia. I’m very choosy about who I bring into my life and bring her around…She spoke badly about Zack, I mean, there were even things on the show that were about me, like saying with my ex. I remember, I forget if it was like season one or two, and she was with my ex before Luke, Janet was—we were very close at that time, we were, dare I, say like almost best friends at that time—and then to hear her go on our show and say that it was my fault and like not his fault, and she knew what a disgusting relationship and breakup that was and tried to convince me to break up with him for months. But I’m like, now you’re going on our show and spreading bullsh*t lies. I just, I don’t have the time for it.”

How are things between you and Lala now?

“I love Lala. We hadn’t spoken in like a year and a half, and then we started speaking maybe like four or five months before filming, and she came and apologized…And I will say like the scene where she comes over to my house to talk to me about the Janet stuff, there is no better person to do that than Lala. I could like feel her energy. She didn’t have to say a whole lot to really make me realize that I didn’t understand the weight of what she got.”

To hear the full conversation with Kristen Doute, listen to Not Skinny but Not Fat wherever you get your podcasts.

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