This was published 1 year ago
‘We’d been unhappy for a while’: Moana Hope on her marriage split, single parenting and her football future
Being one of the country’s most loved-up, high-profile, same-sex couples, Hope’s split with model Isabella Carlstrom took fans by surprise. Now, she’s ready to talk.
Moana Hope is late. It’s the kind of unexplained delay – 40 minutes, and counting – that prompts me, a fellow “toddler mum”, to assume something must be wrong with Hope’s one-year-old son, Ahi. A sudden call from daycare; a lights-and-sirens dash to hospital; an all-nighter with gastro. Any one of these things could reasonably cause a mother, never mind one as busy as Hope, to forget a meeting.
When Hope finally arrives at the cafe, thankfully it’s none of those things: Ahi is fine. Dressed in a fluffy, shell-pink shacket, the 35-year-old apologises and flashes a warm smile while tussling her trademark bleached shaggy bob. It was just work, she explains, a few teething issues with her latest project. Called Entrepreneur Her, it’s a daily radio show on a new digital channel, Disrupt Radio, featuring in-depth interviews with enterprising women.
“I want women to bring women up,” she says. “There’s nothing more important than women supporting women because we already get the short stick of everything.”
To say that Hope, best known as one of the foundational players in the women’s AFL (AFLW) competition, has had a hectic few months is an understatement. As well as the new radio gig, Hope runs her own traffic-management business, which employs 160 people, and is the primary carer for her 30-year-old sister Livinia (“Vinny”), who has Moebius syndrome, a rare neurological condition.
But her greatest challenge by far has been navigating life as a single parent since separating from her wife, model Isabella Carlstrom, in May. (They also share a daughter, Svea, 2, whom Carlstrom carried.)
Throughout their six-year relationship, the pair, who made their first public appearance on the 2017 Brownlow Medal red carpet, shared many aspects of their lives on social media, from the highs and lows of trying to conceive through IVF to buying their home in Melbourne’s inner north in 2021.
Being one of the country’s most loved-up, high-profile, same-sex couples – complete with the 2019 wedding featured in Vogue magazine and the outfits to match (Carlstrom wore Toni Maticevski, Hope wore an Effie Kats suit) – the split, which they confirmed on Instagram last month (the posts have since been deleted), took fans by surprise.
“We’d been unhappy for quite a while,” says Hope, speaking for the first time about the circumstances leading up to the break-up. “We knew that separating was the worst-case scenario, because we’d be separating the kids. We do love each other; we just fell out of love.”
Sandro “Mode” jacket, $1290, and pants, $605. Senso “Jorja” boots, $330.Credit: Jesse-Leigh Elford
For Hope, the cracks started forming in the relationship about 18 months ago, when being pregnant with Ahi brought back traumatic childhood memories. “I went through a lot as a kid, which I have never spoken about,” she says. “When I became a mum, a birthing mum, I was triggered by that.”
Hope attempted to cope by “getting lost” in work and says she and Carlstrom, 31, tried everything to get their relationship back on track, including couples counselling.
“I love Bella, she is an unbelievably kind human. She inspires me as a mum … but we just grew apart.
“And I didn’t feel the same way as I used to feel … it didn’t just happen like that,” she says, clicking her fingers.
Born on Valentine’s Day in 1988, the 10th of 14 children, Hope grew up in public housing in Melbourne’s north, where her mother, Rosemary, still lives. At the age of 11, she dropped out of school to care for her father, who was diagnosed with leukaemia.
“I went through a lot as a kid, which I have never spoken about. When I became a mum, a birthing mum, I was triggered by that.”
Following his death in 2002, when she was 14, Hope briefly returned to school, but her passion for sport and the drive to become financially independent proved too strong.
At 18, she got a job with a traffic-management company, working her way up before starting her own business eight years ago. Despite not being able to read or write proficiently, Hope studied industry texts and manuals at night. She was driven, she says, by a determination to “break cycles that I watched all my brothers and sisters go through” – being unable to afford rent, or struggling with substance abuse.
As a teenager, Hope was a talented cricketer who played for Victoria, but ultimately it was Australian rules football that captured her attention. In 2016, after a hugely successful stint as a leading goalkicker in the amateur leagues, she joined Collingwood.
She was one of the club’s two marquee players when the country’s first semi-professional women’s league launched in 2017.
Bassike jacket, $995, and shirt, $360. Weekend Max Mara jeans, $630. Senso “Jorja” boots, $330.Credit: Jesse-Leigh Elford
“It was weird, going from being … that kid with tattoos, who people judge for having short hair and not wearing a dress, to what they would call a ‘cult hero’,” she says. “It was kind of cool in a way, because … now they liked me for who I am. But [playing football] was a really quick reality check. You’re being judged by everyone, always.”
Hope’s first AFLW season was plagued by a tear to her posterior cruciate ligament before the start of the season. The club made her play on, which in turn led to a lot of negative headlines about her form, and the start of her struggle with mental health issues. “I was sitting in the car park after training every night crying, after every match, sitting in the toilet cubicle crying,” she says.
“[I would think] ‘Where’s the support here?’ That was the double-edged sword of overnight celebrity.”
It was in the aftermath of that difficult first season that Hope met Carlstrom at a Melbourne nightclub. After an intense – and intensely public – two-year dating period, they married in August 2019, a few months after Hope was delisted by her second club, North Melbourne, effectively ending her AFLW playing career.
“I was sitting in the car park after training every night crying, after every match, sitting in the toilet cubicle crying.”
About six months after their wedding, Carlstrom became pregnant using donor sperm at Monash IVF, although the pair have said previously it took two failed rounds of treatment before Svea was conceived.
Asked which was the bigger adjustment, going from no children to one, or from one to two, Hope says: “No kids to one was all about excitement. Everything was new, scary. Every time Svea had a rash or something, we would rush to the hospital. With the second, you are more relaxed.”
She says her and Carlstrom’s decision to carry one baby each led to totally different experiences. “For Svea, it was all about me being Bella’s support and finding that connection with Svea because I wasn’t breastfeeding,” she says. “With Ahi, it was a whole lot more emotional, because I birthed him. I had bad postnatal depression and I went through a lot, postpartum. It was very different.”
Golden Bear satin bomber jacket, $1,344 from The Outnet Maggie Marilyn Bobby boyfriend pants, $695 Senso Jorga boot, $330Credit: Jesse-Leigh Elford
Hope also suffered a serious pelvic prolapse after going running when Ahi was 10 weeks old. She says she didn’t know she was meant to see a physiotherapist after giving birth, a lapse that set back her physical recovery six months. Only now is she starting to regain fitness. “Pregnancy took a piece of me and I’ll never get it back,” she says. “It’s underestimated and spoken about in such a casual way, when it’s the most difficult physical experience.”
So, is there football in her future? Maybe, but she thinks a role in sports media is her true calling. By keeping some involvement in the game, she can also continue to fight for women players to achieve equal pay to men within 10 years.
“Some of the darkest moments of my life have been some of the best moments of my life. That’s what makes you grow.”
“Some of the darkest moments of my life have been some of the best moments of my life,” Hope says. “And every time something happens that’s negative or bad or hard, I learn from it. That’s what makes you grow. I am the resilient, independent woman I am because I have been through a lot. I am proud of myself for getting through those things.”
For now, “getting through” means adjusting to life without Carlstrom, which has included enrolling Ahi in daycare and continuing her sessions with a psychologist. She’s also made other changes, including Ahi’s transition to his own room, the highs and lows of which have featured on her Instagram. The goal? More “me moments”, she says.
Another heartbreaking but healing change has been moving to a new house. It’s near where Carlstrom is staying so the children can spend as much time together as possible. “He’s such a social, cute, loving boy,” Hope says of Ahi. “Whenever he sees his sister he tries to hug her all the time. He just watches her, everything she does, then he tries it.”
No matter their own problems, Hope says she and Carlstrom are united in their approach to parenting; neither makes a significant decision regarding the children without the other’s consent. Eventually, that will extend to any future partners. “I don’t regret any of it,” Hope says. “I know I made mistakes. I was not the perfect wife. But the thing is, I don’t walk away from it beating myself up. I will be better, and if I meet someone to be better for, that’s great. But most importantly, I’ll be better for me.”
Hope already has plans to have another baby, just as soon as Ahi turns two. “I’ve always wanted three kids, so as a single woman, I will have a third,” she says.
As for love, Hope is definitely open to meeting someone, but only after she has done more work on her mental health. She says she was last truly happy 18 months ago, but thanks to her work and everything else happening in her life, she’s on the road back. “I need to use this time to learn how to love me again, before I can love someone else,” she says. “And that’s what I’m going to do.”
Fashion editor Penny McCarthy; Hair Keiren Street using Wella Professional; Make-up Aimie Fiebig using Sisley Paris; Styling assistant Emmerson Conrad
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