Jesy Nelson has explained her relationship broke down after facing a ‘traumatic experience’.
The former Little Mix singer, 34, welcomed twin daughters Ocean Jade and Story Monroe Nelson-Foster with partner Zion Foster prematurely in May last year.
However last month she then shared publicly that they’d ‘never walk’ after being diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), with news of her split from her fiancé also coming soon after.
In a tearful video posted on social media, Jesy revealed that she’d been told that without urgent treatment, her daughters would have died.
Jesy and fellow musician Zion, 26, began dating in January 2022 and announced their engagement last September.
However last month it was confirmed they’d split, with a source saying that Jesy had been left ‘devastated’.
Now the singer has spoken about the end of her four-year relationship.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, Jesy said that her relationship struggled to cope after the dynamic shifted, but the pair are now focused on co-parenting their daughters.
‘We have been through such a traumatic experience and for us, our girls are our main priority and our main focus,’ she said.
‘We want to give them the most positive, happy and uplifting time and energy and because we have both been through such a traumatic experience, the energy wasn’t right between us, which is understandable.
‘We are still friends and we are still united in co-parenting our daughters, they are our main focus, that’s all we can do, be the best possible parents we can right now.’
During her pregnancy, Jesy was told her babies were monochorionic diamniotic (MCDA) identical twins and had twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome (TTTS), a rare condition where both babies share a placenta.
Although they seemed healthy when born, that changed with their SMA diagnosis six months later – which she says saw her ‘whole world fall apart’.
Jesy is also now campaigning for the UK to include SMA screening in the routine newborn heel prick test.
However, she admitted she felt ‘sad’ and ‘angry’ that her daughters weren’t identified within the vital early window, with doctors also telling her not to compare their growth with other babies due to the fact they were born prematurely.
Speaking about how she’s dealing with the aftermath of their diagnosis, she shared: ‘I am taking each day as it comes because I feel like right now, especially with the girls’ diagnosis, it’s all I can really do. If I try to look too far into the future, I will drive myself crazy.
‘The girls are doing really well and they’re happy, that’s all I can really ask for.’
Jesy’s interview also comes in the lead-up to the premiere of her Amazon Prime series, Jesy Nelson: Life After Little Mix, which charts her rise to fame after auditioning for The X Factor and her career with Little Mix, as well as following her throughout her pregnancy.
Although she was initially hoping the project could be something she could one day show her daughters as a way to detail her career and their birth, the focus quickly shifted as her pregnancy took a turn.
As she puts it: ‘No one could ever prepare me for what was about to come.’
Jesy went on to explain that it was ‘crazy how the universe works out’, as the first time she allowed cameras follow her, she then faced one of the biggest challenges of her life.
But she said that ‘as horrendous and traumatic’ as it all was, she was ‘so incredibly grateful that the cameras were there’.
‘You see my birth; you see everything. But I’m just so proud of it. I am so grateful that my girls are going to see how incredible and strong they are, and I just love that it will hopefully raise as much awareness as possible about the things I have been through,’ she said.
When news of Jesy and Zion’s split first broke, a source told The Sun that the pair ‘remain friends and are fully focused on their daughters’.
While Jesy rose to stardom on reality TV, Zion grew a sizeable fanbase on SoundCloud as an artist and producer.
In 2015, he earned 250,000 streams with his song Get This Girl, which helped to launch his career. He now has 429,000 listeners on Spotify on tracks such as Letter to a Broken Heart, Full Effect, Diamonds, and Dangerous.
In 2024, Jesy and Zion released the R&B track Mine, following the Little Mix icon’s exit from Polydor Records.
Despite briefly splitting after initially getting together in 2022, the couple announced their engagement in September last year, sharing a romantic sunset snap on a beach which was captioned: ‘Just got engaged to my best friend.’
After their daughters arrived prematurely in May, Jesy shared an update on social media in which she detailed having to watch them spend time in the NICU.
‘It’s the most scary overwhelming feeling of emotions not being able to feel like you can protect your babies,’ she said.
‘Naturally as a mother you just want to hold them and comfort them when they cry but you can’t because there are what feels like a million wires coming out of them and tubes and masks in the way with people poking and prodding them it breaks your heart into a million pieces.’
Last month Jesy broke down in tears during an appearance on This Morning, discussing her daughters’ condition and how she’d ‘never be able to get over it or accept it’.
‘When you know that there is something that could be done about it and it’s life changing, that’s something I cannot accept,’ she shared.
‘I’m still struggling. I just want to be their mum; I don’t want to be a nurse.’
Jesy Nelson: Life After Little Mix is streaming from February 13 on Amazon Prime Video.
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