Former House Rules star Jessica Dover tells of her painful split from ex-Crow Jared Petrenko and her new love Daniel MacPherson

House Rules star Jessica Dover talks about the shock of her sudden split with a former Crow and how she’s bounced back into the arms of a hunky Aussie actor.

Adelaide model mum Jessica Dover has opened up about the aftermath of her painful split with ex-Crow Jared Petrenko – and shared her joy with new love, actor Daniel MacPherson.

Dover, 31, and her House Rules TV co-star Petrenko broke up suddenly in early 2021, about six months after the birth of their child Sebastian.

The former reality TV star, model and social media influencer talked about her heartache over the devastating separation – and how she bounced back – on her new podcast, Mothering on My Own.

Describing the “abrupt” split as out of her control, Dover said she “mourned” the life she once knew in the months after the relationship ended.

“It was not something I saw coming. I’m not going into the details of it but it was something that was a little bit out of my control and it did happen quite quickly,” she said on the Spotify podcast she co-hosts with Rachel Maksimovic.

“So I didn’t have time to foresee what that life may look like, being a single mum and doing it on my own. It was something that was a big shock.

“You’re trying to be the best person you can possibly be for your child at that time when your whole world has shattered around you, and you’re not only thinking who am I as a person, I’m trying to navigate being a parent still.”

SA House Rules contestants Jessica Dover and Jared Petrenko Source: Channel 7

Jessica Dover and Jared Petrenko. Pic: Instagram

Dover, who starred with Petrenko on Seven’s renovation show in 2018, said she changed her mindset about eight months after the break-up.

“I was so tired of being angry. I did get to a point where I was like, I don’t want to talk about this anymore, I don’t want to talk about things that have happened in our past anymore,” she said.

“No one can control what’s going to happen to us, but we can control the way that we look at it, the way we approach it, the way we let it live in our brains.”

A qualified schoolteacher, Dover said she had just returned from an overseas holiday last year and wasn’t looking for love when she met her new partner, Australian actor MacPherson.

“We were both in very similar spots, of being happy on our own. It was very slow, he’s got a child too, so we were both just doing our own thing,” she said of MacPherson, who has a three-year-old son with ex-wife, actor Zoe Ventoura.

“He lives interstate so it was actually nice both having our time to just very slowly get to know each other. It was really slow and easy.

“It’s just something I would have never imagined. It’s the most healthy, happy, safest thing I’ve ever been in and I’m a better person for it.”

Best known for roles in TV shows Neighbours and City Homicide, MacPherson described Dover as a “wonderful human” in June.

Dan MacPherson with partner Jessica Dover

Dan MacPherson with partner Jessica Dover

“Jess has got her world and her son and as long as your kids are happy and smiling the rest you kind of work out. We’re all doing something right,” he said.

“Once you become a parent you couldn’t date anyone that wasn’t a parent, it changes everything. We’re going very nicely, even through some challenging times and ultimately she’s just a wonderful human.”

Having navigated some tough times, Dover said she wanted to help other mothers going through a similar experience.

“There’s so much guilt that comes with separating when they’re so little because you think … you just feel like you failed them. I don’t feel that way any more,” she said.

“The life and the mindset that I’m in now is something that I’d never have dreamt of and it’s because I went through what I went through. So if you’re in your darkness and your hard times, know that although you may not know how you’ll get there, you will get there.”