Michael and Kyly Clarke’s picture-perfect life comes crumbling down

On paper and all over Instagram, Michael and Kyly Clarke led a picture-perfect life, but in the trauma of a marriage break-up, they are just like everybody else, writes Louise Roberts.

• Kyly to keep Vaucluse mansion in Clarke divorce
• Pip Edwards denies Michael Clarke romance in wake of split

Whether you are a celebrity or a civilian, nothing can really insulate you from the trauma of marriage break up.

Loss, regret, panic and somewhere in that swirl of emotions a hope that the looming divorce cloud has a silver lining.

It’s a trajectory we ought to respect, especially amid the tang of schadenfreude now wafting over the very public break up of former cricketer Michael Clarke and his wife of seven years, Kyly.

Michael and Kyly Clarke on their wedding day in 2012. Picture: Supplied

No one says “I do” and plans somewhere along the line to admit, “Actually, now I don’t”. It hurts.

Do the Clarkes remember the magic of what brought them together? Only they know the strength of that.

Their shock “amicable separation” announcement on Wednesday was the “best course for their daughter”, we were told in a statement.

A picture-perfect wedding, enviable jet set lifestyle with a $12 million Vaucluse home and A-list, influential mates.

And that’s before you factor in the jewel in their crown — a seriously adorable little girl Kelsey Lee, their beautiful daughter and naturally their priority as lawyers, advisers and estate agents have elbowed their way into the intimacy that was once the exclusive domain of Mr and Mrs Clarke.

The couple’s Instagram accounts were full of loved-up shots.

The Clarkes were picture-perfect.

On paper and all over Instagram, the Clarkes had everything but in the end they had nothing to keep them together.

Inevitably there will be those who get out their swords and slash at these tall poppies with some kind of misguided delight that they deserved to be taken down a peg or two.

Their breezy glamour and Kyly’s lithe gym posts would no doubt irk some envious types.

But dissolving a marriage is a cataclysmic life event, many would argue as big as the emotional envelopment of grieving the death of a loved one. It is not a step taken lightly. So sympathy please, not acid.

Driven and by all accounts a bit of a perfectionist, Clarke has always been a polarising sports personality which has been fascinating to observe in Sydney and adds to the interest in this split.

A common topic at backyard barbecues has been that while technically very skilled, people were keen to know what Pup was really like as a person.

The pair are devoted parents to Kelsey-Lee. Picture: Instagram

He met Kyly while they were both at Westfields Sports High School in Fairfield West which proudly lists him as one of their alumni on their website.

So there’s having it all and then there’s having it all crumble around you, brutal to digest when you come as a shiny package adding star wattage to any event while also serving as proof of boy and girls from the ’burbs who have done well for themselves.

If you apply the maxim that no one really knows what goes on in someone else’s marriage, then it follows that what is curated in public bares little resemblance to the real person putting out the wheelie bins.

Who knows, they too might have quarrelled about damp towels left on the bed, snoring, bad TV or having enough personal space amid the hurly burly of family life and careers.

Marriage is an institution and a serious legal commitment at the beginning as, as I fear the Clarkes will discover, just as legal at the end.

Smitten with their newborn daughter in 2016.

Two adults who once loved each other, mixed in the same circles before they fell in love with each other but now that adoration channelled directly to a four-year-old who needs more support than mum and dad combined.

That they managed to keep the split quiet for five months within the city’s gossipy circles is a feat in itself but the pressure to keep up the image in order to preserve their privacy must have been tough.

For all three of them, their life security has fallen apart.

As recently as January, Kyly was talking up their domestic situation saying: “We’re not, never were and never will be splitting.”

“Have those date nights so you’re always keeping everything nice and fresh,” she added.

But then this on Wednesday: “After living apart for some time, we have made the difficult decision to ­separate as a couple amicably.

“With the greatest of respect for each other, we’ve come to the ­mutual conclusion that this is the best course for us to take while committed to the co-parenting of our daughter.”

As parents, the Clarkes face the same challenges as the rest of us in that they will try to keep the emotional bumps off Kelsey Lee’s road as she shuttles between Mum’s Vaucluse mansion and Dad’s Bondi pad.

Yesterday Kyly said she was “doing fine”. Meanwhile it hasn’t escaped Sydney’s attention that Clarke is “living out his worst fears” because of the emotional damage he suffered when his parents Les and Debbie divorced after 25 years together.

“Their break-up affected me to the core,” he wrote in his autobiography.

“When I split up with my then fiancee Lara Bingle in 2010, part of the undercurrent in my thinking is that if a couple like Mum and Dad can’t make it, what hope have I got?

“I don’t even want to start a serious relationship if it’s going to end in a separation.”

But separation it now is.