Hallmark’s Victor Webster and Shantel VanSanten’s Divorce Takes Dramatic Turn Over Spousal Support Negotiations
If you watched them fall in love on the Hallmark Channel, you may be wondering why Shantel VanSanten and Victor Webster divorced and what went wrong with their relationship.
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VanSanten and Webster met in 2017 on the set of the Hallmark movie Love Blossoms, in which they played love interests, Violet Chappel and Dec Granger. (VanSanten also stars as Nina Chase in FBI, while Webster has also starred in Hallmark movies like Homegrown Christmas, Hearts of Winter, Five Star Christmas and the Matchmaker Mysteries series.) The couple dated for four years before their engagement in February 2020. “It was the most perfect, wonderful day of my entire life,” VanSanten told People at the time of Webster’s proposal. “And I can’t wait to marry my best friend.” She continued, “Relationships aren’t easy — you have to fight for it, you have to work at it. We’ve done that and we’ve put in the work and now feel settled. I’m excited that we get to begin forever together.”
VanSanten also People at the time that the secret to her and Webster’s relationship was that they “balance each other out.” “He has this childlike wonder when it comes to adventuring and exploring and pushing the limits and getting me to sit on the top of a 500 foot waterfall in Bali, to jump out of helicopters,” she said. “There’s just such a zest for life, and I would say I’m a little bit more of a homebody. I’m not as social as he is.”
She continued, “He’s the head and I’m the heart. And when it comes to making decisions, we can be fire and fire, but in the end, the way that we both come to the table with different things has allowed me to grow and to see a different perspective in life.”
VanSanten and Webster married in 2021. However, less than two years after their wedding, news broke that Webster had filed for divorce. So why did Shantel VanSanten and Victor Webster divorce? Read on for what we know about their split.
Why did Shantel VanSanten and Victor Webster divorce?
Why did Shantel VanSanten and Victor Webster divorce? Webster filed for divorce from VanSanten after two years of marriage in January 2023 and listed the date of their separation as January 10, according to court documents obtained by People.
Per court documents obtained by Us Weekly in June 2023, VanSanten and Webster “are in mediation and any issues regarding spousal support will be determined” through that process. VanSanten also requested that the court acknowledge that she and Webster had yet to decide on how to allocate their shared assets. “The determination and distribution of community and quasi-community property to be determined in mediation,” the filing stated.
According to the Office of Civil Rights, “Mediation involves the intervention of a third person, or mediator, into a dispute to assist the parties in negotiating jointly acceptable resolution of issues in conflict. The mediator meets with the parties at a neutral location where the parties can discuss the dispute and explore a variety of solutions.”
Though Webster didn’t include a reason for the divorce in the filing, he posted a cryptic Instagram Story the day after People broke the news of his divorce on April 11, 2023.
The Instagram Story was a repost of a quote by author R.M. Drake, which read: “There’s nothing with being alone but at some point you’re going to need someone to love. Regardless of your past or how many times you’ve been hurt. Sooner or later. Someone is going to find you. And they will be honest with you. And you will be honest with them. And they will appreciate your scars. They will read them and touch them. And feel them in ways you never through another human could. And they will love them just as much as they love you. and it will all be okay. IT will all be enough. Please believe this.”
Webster’s followers started speculating that he and VanSanten had split in March 2023 after he posted a photo of him alone at Arches National Park in Utah. “I love following your post but what happened to your happily ever after wife?” a user commented. “Are you still married, what is going on.” Another user added, “I’ve been wondering that too!!”
Others noted how Webster had posted less about VanSanten on his Instagram before news broke of their divorce. “They both saturated their Instagrams with pictures and videos of the two of them and then all of a sudden she’s not there so it’s an expected question. I’m sure there are tons of followers that want to ask but also don’t want to get their heads bit off,” a user commented. The user continued, “I kind of feel like this is a catch 22 because I agree that they are entitled to their privacy but when there was so much of the two of them everywhere it’s natural curiosity to wonder what happened to her. It could be that they are totally fine and she decided she was tired of being in the public eye. So he quit posting pictures of them. These aren’t selfies so someone’s taking them”
Webster and VanSanten’s divorce came less than two years after they married in three wedding celebrations, which started with a civil ceremony at Pasadena City Hall in California on August 9, 2021 — VanSanten’s grandparents’ wedding date. “When my grandfather unexpectedly passed away on Father’s Day, the heartbreak was unbearable; I had been planning on him walking me down the aisle in Minnesota,” VanSanten told Brides at the time. “In the midst of my grief, I looked at Victor and said I wanted to do a spontaneous civil ceremony on my grandparents’ wedding date, August 9.”
She continued, “The idea of my grandparents being reunited and watching over our ceremony from above gave me some peace. They were married for 63 years, had such a special, deep love. They were the example to me of how love is a choice and takes work. It wasn’t perfect, but their love was always pure.”
The second wedding celebration was in October 2021 in Napa Valley, California, while the third was in Luverne, Minnesota, so VanSanten’s elderly family could attend. Before their wedding, VanSanten told People that she wanted to have a wedding that incorporated their families in Texas and Minnesota, and friends in California. “We have lots of ideas we’re tossing about,” she said of their plan at the time to do smaller weddings in each location. “Who knows where we’ll land, but we’re such adventurers and just love traveling together,” she adds. “So I feel like that’ll have to be some sort of part of it.”
VanSanten also told People that she wanted her wedding to be inspired by the road trip she and Webster took across the country to visit her family the summer prior. “If you can go on a 42-day road trip with your partner and not kill one another, I think we’re good,” VanSanten said, adding that her relationship with Webster was still a “total surprise” to her. She continued, “I would never have known it was going to be him. That’s the biggest surprise to me — I never had a picture for what I wanted in my life, and my heart has always been very open. But I remember meeting him and now looking back on our journey to where we are now, and it’s a total surprise. I love him more and more with every breath.”
Love Blossoms is available to stream on Hallmark Movies Now.
For more on Hallmark’s stars, check out our gallery on the hottest Hallmark men who made us swoon.
