After being separated for more than a year, Brittany Cartwright can’t believe how much Jax Taylor still cares about her personal life.
“He very much is still focused on what I’m doing a lot of the time,” Cartwright, 36, exclusively told Us Weekly on Friday, April 11, while promoting season 2 of The Valley. “The constant, like, ‘Who are you with? Are you talking to anybody? Are you this? Are you that?’”
While the Bravo star acknowledges they are filming a reality show together and coparenting their 3-year-old son Cruz, Cartwright is still surprised by where things stand between the exes today.
“It’s weird that I still feel like he’s controlling things in my life,” she claimed of their current interactions. “He’s super, super controlling in different ways. I feel like I haven’t spoken on how negative things really have been between us.”
According to Cartwright, some critics believe she’s talking about her situation with Taylor, 45, “all the time.” But from her perspective, she’s simply responding to what others are saying about the dynamic.
“I’m defending myself for things that were said and podcasts and different things,” she explained. “The show’s coming out, and there’s trailers, and there’s this and that.”
When Bravo released the trailer for season 2 of The Valley on March 11, viewers watched as Cartwright alleged that Taylor had “people watching me” as she tried to block cameras. She also claimed that her estranged husband had been seeing other people after she spotted a thong on her bathroom sink.
In a separate interview with Us, Taylor said of allegations he was seeing other people, “It was not like that at all. It was just, again, her creating her own narrative. I would own it. I would say it.”
While fans may think they know the dynamics between Taylor and Cartwright, they may be in for quite the show when The Valley premieres Tuesday, April 15.
“Things are a lot worse than people think,” Cartwright claimed to Us. “Just the controlling aspect of everything — wanting to know where I’m at, what I’m doing 24/7. You’ll see throughout the season. … They’re gonna be like, ‘Wow. She went through all of this?’ And just because he is trying to be a better person doesn’t mean that it’s actually better.”
By the time cameras picked back up for season 2 in summer 2024, Cartwright and Taylor were going through divorce proceedings. He subsequently entered a 30-day treatment program to address his mental health struggles.
More recently, Taylor revealed that he has been battling substance abuse issues, including abusing cocaine, for more than two decades. In early March, the former Vanderpump Rules star revealed he was 83 days sober.
While Cartwright wants to be Taylor’s “biggest supporter,” she explained to Us that “all the trust is gone.”
“It’s gonna take a long time,” she said. “It’s just complicated. Whenever you don’t trust somebody anymore and to get that back, it’s gonna be very hard. I don’t think that he realized how much damage he did to me.” Taylor’s rep could not be reached for comment.
Season 2 of The Valley premieres Tuesday, April 15, at 9 p.m. ET. Stream old episodes anytime on Peacock.
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