Karl Stefanovic’s eldest daughter Willow has revealed that her parents “haven’t been in the same room together for years” following their highly-publicised marriage breakdown.
In an interview with Woman’s Day magazine, the 18-year-old model said that
the Today show host and her mother Cassandra Thorburn remain on bad terms in the wake of their bitter split.
Karl, 48, and Cassandra 52, were married for 21 years until they separated in mid-2016.
The former spouses also share sons Jackson, 23, and River, 16.
Willow, whose real name is Ava but prefers to go by her middle name, said she is hopeful that her family dynamic will improve in the future.
“That’s something I’ve always wanted – to bring them together for special occasions, but I’ve had to distance myself from it because it’s not my issue,” she said.
“It’s their business if they choose not to be friendly – of course I wish it wasn’t like this, but I won’t be forcing them. I hope one day we can all be together again.”
According to Willow, her mum Cassandra, a former television producer and journalist, has “never been happier” in her current job as a dental nurse and receptionist.
The recent high school graduate went on to describe her dad’s new wife, Jasmine, as a “second mum”.
“(Jasmine) has become more like a friend to me …(although is) much stricter than dad,” Willow said of her 39-year-old stepmother who shares daughter Harper, two, with the TV star.
Karl met his second wife Jasmine Yarbrough in 2017, after splitting from Thorburn the year before.
Thorburn opened up about her spit from the Today show host in a 2017 interview with Woman’s Day magazine, talking about the “dark days” she experienced in the wake of their divorce.
She told the publication that she had grieved the end of her relationship and that Stefanovic was now “dead” to her.
“I realised I was going through stages of grief, and to me it was like someone had died,” she told the magazine.
“The children still have a father but I don’t have a husband. He really is dead to me and no, we won’t ever be friends again.”
She revealed adjusting to life as a single mother to the couple’s three children Jackson, Ava and River wasn’t easy.
“There were days in the beginning I would get up, put on a brave face and drop the kids at school, then I’d get to the back door and I would lie in a heap for the rest of the day unable to move — there were very dark days,” she said.
“I was completely gazumped when I realised Karl had gone.”
She knew for months before things officially ended that her relationship wasn’t working anymore.
“I questioned and doubted myself about everything,” she said.
“I slept on the couch in front of the fire for months because I didn’t want to go near the marital bed. I was in a very dark place.”
While Thorburn struggled in for some time following the split, in another interview the following year she told Woman’s Weekly that she had become more strong, healthy and confident than she had been in a long time.
“The flip-side of that is I feel like we’re dead to his family and almost anyone from our old life,” she told the publication.
“There has been practically no contact. I feel like we’ve been discarded and disposed of, replaced by a whole new line-up of starters. It has been a real adjustment period for me.”
But a spokesman for Stefanovic’s hit back on Thorburn’s comments to the magazine, telling Nine’s TheFIX at the time that they were “disappointed” by her comments.
“We are disappointed Cass would claim such inflammatory suggestions that we have alienated Karl’s children from our family,” the spokesman said.
“Nothing could be further from the truth. Karl regularly co-parents his children and has his loving family around them.”