Former This Morning regular Dr Ranj Singh has hit back at claims he “lied” to his ex-wife about his sexuality before coming out. In a new podcast, the 47-year-old recalled the “difficult” conversation he had with Sulvinder Samra four years into their marriage, after realising he was gay during therapy, and reflected on the pain it caused.
Rejecting accusations of deception
Ranj says that despite moving on and finding happiness with partner James Colebrook years later, he still receives abuse online from people accusing him of lying, deceiving and misleading his then wife. He rejects these claims, arguing that he was trying to find happiness in the same way straight people are allowed to.
“Every other, let's say heterosexual person, gets to trial and error and you work out what is and isn't your happiness and relationships fail for lots of reasons, we need to stop treating any kind of relationship that involves a queer person as some sort of scandal because it's not, it's life,” he shared on The Full Disclosure podcast with James O'Brien.
Understanding identity through therapy
He has said he only began to properly understand his identity in therapy, after accepting the relationship was no longer working. Ranj went on to explain that he is queer, which he said is “anything that's basically not heterosexual”. He added: “It includes any kind of bi, pansexuality, fluidity, sexuality, identity, all of those things are fluid and they change as we grow. Therapy helped me with that.”
The television medic admitted he “is not proud” of how upsetting the situation was for everyone involved. The subject resurfaced publicly during his time on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing in 2018, prompting his former in-laws to comment.
Ex-wife's account of the split
Sulvinder has also spoken openly in recent months about the heartbreak of their split, including in posts online and in podcast conversations. On what would've been their 20th wedding anniversary earlier this year, she shared an emotional Instagram caption, telling her followers that the public divorce left her feeling “extremely unattractive and ashamed”.
“When it ended, both parties were hurting, and a divorce was the only option. I mourned. It was heavy because the future I thought I had was gone and the person that I thought I had married was gone as well,” she added. She went on to urge followers: “Don’t let the past dictate your future. You get to choose what your story is going to be… no one else.”
Speaking on the Suddenly Single podcast back in July, Sulvinder also said she had no choice but to cut her ex-husband out of her life following the ordeal. “I don't know who James is, I don't know anything about Ranj's life. That's the truth,” she revealed.
The nervous system coach added that, following their separation, she decided to block him on social media. “You decide how can I take control of this? And I chose not to know whatever Ranj was doing because I didn't see it to benefit myself,” she explained. “You do the usual things, you block on Instagram and what have you, so I don't know anything about him.”
