How AFL WAG Sophie Cachia found true love with a woman

WAG Sophie Cachia reveals how her life changed when she unexpectedly fell in love with a woman. Now engaged, Cachia says there’s no such thing as a traditional family.

She was the footy WAG, mum and influencer who flipped the script on her seemingly perfect life by leaving her AFL-player partner for a new romance with a woman. So why did she blow it up? Blogger-turned-businesswoman and author Sophie Cachia opens up during an exclusive “modern family” style photo shoot with Stellar about finding herself, defying convention and why her new blended family is anything but broken.

For Sophie Cachia, Mother’s Day typically looks like that of any other mum. Breakfast in bed, cuddles with the kids, maybe an autumn afternoon spent rugged up at the footy. But this year, the day will be celebrated with an unconventional twist on a “typical” family. That’s because, she tells Stellar, “My children have three mums.”

The 31-year-old, who first shot to fame with her parenting blog The Young Mummy, is emerging from a transformative chapter of life that has seen her family shift and expand. She arrived on the set of our photo shoot with her whole crew in tow.

There’s her fiancée, Maddie Garrick; her ex-husband Jaryd Cachia; her children, Bobby, 8, and Florence, 5, whom she shares with Jaryd; his new partner, Jacinta; and Jacinta’s eight-year-old son, Max.

Sophie Cachia: “My children have three mums.” Picture: Sam Bisso.

“This is the definition of family,” says Sophie of the big, blended bunch, noting that it’s worlds apart from the traditional nuclear unit in which she was raised.

The daughter of former AFL player and coach Robert Shaw, Sophie enjoyed a comfortable, “sheltered” upbringing in Melbourne. She attended private school and studied journalism at university while dating Jaryd, a Carlton Football Club player.

At 22, she fell pregnant with their first child, Bobby, and the couple married two years later.

Meanwhile, Sophie was busy building a name for herself as one of the original “mummy influencers” (today she has 266,000 Instagram followers), and launching a host of businesses, including her premium sleepwear label Cachia.

But in 2017, just eight weeks after their daughter, Florence, was born, the young mum’s life was thrown into chaos.

“I met [a woman] and my whole world changed,” she recalls. It started with a fleeting encounter at an AFL event, and electric sparks flew.

Sophie, who’d never been attracted to women, remembers going home that night and giggling to her husband about her new crush.

The couple’s relationship was intensely honest and they’d previously enjoyed periods of open experimentation, so Jaryd encouraged her to explore her feelings while the pair remained together.

“[He] knows how much credit and respect I give him for allowing me to process what I needed to process,” says Sophie. “He chose soul over ego when it came to helping me.”

Adds Jaryd, 30, “Being a prick and storming out… wasn’t going to help the situation and, at the end of the day, I was never in the dark about anything, and I respect Soph for that.”

Over the next two years, Sophie dated several women (including, briefly, the original one who had rocked her world).

In 2019, she and Jaryd split, concluding together that their love for one another was no longer romantic.

Sophie Cachia has found love with WNBL basketballer Maddie Garrick. Picture: Sam Bisso.

“Society tells us that if you separate and your wife moves on with a woman, you have to be bitter and angry and jealous. People find it very hard to believe [we’re amicable],” says Sophie.

“Why can’t two adults make a conscious decision together for the best interests of their children and still be friends? Jaryd [is] my best mate. We literally talk like two blokes.

“We talk to each other about our girlfriends’ boobs… I’m of the belief that you have more than one soulmate for different reasons, and that’s why he is a soulmate of mine.”

Today, Sophie has found another soulmate in WNBL basketballer Garrick, 30. “She’s my number one. She’s a six-foot glamazon, she’s funny, she’s gorgeous, she’s so smart,” enthuses Sophie.

In March this year, she proposed to Maddie, who’s already utterly enmeshed within the family. “My kids think she’s the coolest person in the world, they idolise her. Maddie and Jaryd’s relationship is also special – and I only see glimpses of it because they have their own friendship.”

Jaryd, too, has sought out his own happiness. “What I never told Sophie is that her journey and everything she went through inspired me to go and find my own direction,” he says, adding that he’s recently welcomed his new partner, Jacinta, 30, and her son into the clan.

“To be honest, it’s been hard at times,” admits Jacinta, a registered nurse. “I’ve got

a son who lost his father when he was four, and I’ve been his whole world. But Jaryd’s family comes with so much love, support and acceptance.”

Adds Maddie, “A happy family doesn’t have to be traditional. We just live life together [without] pressure to be ‘normal’. Our conversations, between all the adults and kids, are honest and inclusive.”

Jaryd Cachia has welcomed his new partner, Jacinta, and her son into the family. Picture: Sam Bisso.

The group even discusses the prospect of family holidays (the epitome of co-parenting) but the set-up is not without its challenges.

“I don’t want anyone to read Jaryd’s and my story and go, ‘Oh my God, [they] have the most amazing relationship. It’s all roses,’” says Sophie. “It’s not. We’re humans, we have disagreements, but there’s always communication and respect.”

Sophie shares that she’s undergoing fertility testing and is hoping to become pregnant within the next year – and that Maddie plans to carry a baby down the track, too.

“I’d have 10 kids if I could, they provide so much love,” says Sophie. “Everyone goes, ‘Of course Jaryd is going to donate his sperm.’ And that’s something we’ve discussed in the past, but [we] don’t think that fits anymore.

“We both have separate partners. And that’s not to say we wouldn’t... it’s another hurdle we now face.”

Sophie admits that, even a year ago, the thought of bringing another baby into the world filled her with fear, given she still carries guilt about the breakdown of her marriage and the impact on her children.

“I think there would be a lot of people who relate to that fear of commitment or marriage or children again after a separation because – I can acknowledge – I had a beautifully amicable separation and I have a great situation now, but it’s still f*cking hard.

“It was still horrible and I don’t want to go through that again,” she says.

“But then I [think], do I stop myself from happiness out of fear? No, because that goes against everything I believe in.”

Lisa Curry stars on the cover of this Sunday’s Stellar. Picture: Steven Chee.

Happily ever after, Sophie surmises, probably doesn’t exist and instead she’s found her “now”.

“Nothing is static or fixed; you can’t guarantee forever,” she explains, a theme explored in her candid new memoir Then There Was Her. “It’s about accepting that, at some point, life will take a turn.”

The key lesson she wants to instil in her kids is that they don’t have to fit into society’s restrictive moulds, and that living outside the box may lead to the greatest joy.

“We have a beautiful family. If anything, we have a bonus family with our [new] partners,” says Sophie.

“I now see my children with two incredible female role models around them. My kids have three mums and one devoted, hands-on dad. Where is the failure in that?”

Then There Was Her by Sophie Cachia (Simon & Schuster, $34.99) is out Wednesday.