MTVMending a broken relationship in the COVID era turned out to be one challenge that The Challenge's Tori Deal and Jordan Wiseley could not overcome.
The two shocked fans when they announced in November that they had called off their engagement. On the Chicks in the Office podcast Thursday, Jan. 7, Deal, 27, shed more light on the split and the events leading up to it. "Me and Jordan were on the rocks for a lot longer than people know," she said, "and we had broken up before The Challenge for a little bit."
She clarified details about the timeline of the split. "I was dealing with feelings of possibly breaking up since it first kind of came about back in June," she said. "I'm going through so much that nobody even knew, and so it was Jordan. It was both of us. Both of us were torn at the heart because we were like, 'Damn, we had this beautiful little love, where did it go?'"
The reality star competed on The Challenge's most recent season 36: Double Agents without Wiseley, 30. She said she begged Wiseley to stay with her before they called it quits for good.
"I would [say], 'Let's try to work it out,'" she confessed. "And we had this moment where were like, alright, I'm going to go on the show, you're going to stay home, let's see what happens, let's see if this distance will help us."
The two last appeared together on the show in season 35, which aired last spring, weeks after the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
"COVID really was hard on us," Deal said. "We were just like fighting all the time. When we lived with each other, we were just on top of each other. So it was like a big step back from that stress and obviously when I came home, we broke up really soon when I came home."
The reality said it's easier nowadays to talk about the breakup because she's "done months worth of healing around it."
"It still hurts," she said. "I thought I was going to marry him. Like, really."
Deal also reiterated that she did not cheat on Wiseley with The Challenge co-star Fessy Shafaat, who praised her in his on-air confessional. She had denied the rumors on Instagram on Tuesday, Jan. 5. "You think I could get away with doing something in the house?" she said. "F--k no. They would have a field day with whatever happened with me."