Rachael and New Zealand-Canadian actor Daniel Gillies (The Vampire Diaries) first crossed paths in an LA bar in 2003. "I was checking him out, for sure," she told Hallmark of their first encounter.
Things moved fast for the two Hollywood hotties, as they tied the knot in August 2004 after less than a year of dating.
“We got married incredibly fast,” she said during a 2013 interview with People. “We got engaged after dating for maybe five months and we got married a couple of months after that."
During that same interview, Rachael discussed why the couple waited almost 10 years into their relationship to have kids.
“There was just so much more both of us wanted to do. We wanted to travel and accomplish a lot more in our professional lives," she admitted.
“We’re both people who like kids, but we weren’t jumping up and down, like, ‘Oh my God, let’s start that chapter of our lives,’” she detailed. “We weren’t those kind of people. Now that we know what our lives are going to look like — sort of — for the next couple of months, we just felt like it was the right time finally. We’re not getting any younger.”
Though many were surprised it took the couple so long to build a family, Rachael clarified that there were no regrets about the timing. Over the course of their marriage, Rachael and Daniel brought two children into the world: a daughter named Charlotte Easton, and a son named Theodore Vigo Sullivan.
After nearly 15 years of marriage, Rachael and Daniel separated in 2019.
“With deep gratitude for every year we have spent together and the thousands of beautiful memories shared, we have mutually decided to separate as a couple,” the spouses said in a public statement posted to their Instagram accounts.
“This decision isn’t one we have come to easily or lightly. We love and respect each other as parents, people and artists and look forward to maintaining the best parts of our relationship for many years to come,” the statement reads.
Per court documents obtained by People, Rachael and Daniel's divorce was finalized on March 10, 2021. The documents state that they "will share legal and physical custody" of their kids, and neither party will receive spousal support.
Luckily, Rachael and Daniel have found a silver lining over the course of their divorce: True friendship.
"We're friends now. We talk about things that we never talked about before because we have this new relationship," Rachael told Entertainment Tonight in 2020.
"He'll tell me about dates that he goes on and funny things that might have happened and we genuinely laugh about it," she continued. "I don't know. Divorce needs a new publicist. It's not that bad."
