Melinda French Gates opened up Thursday about her recent divorce from her billionaire ex-husband, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.
French Gates addressed Gates’s affair with a Microsoft employee but said there was not a single event or moment when she realized the marriage was over.
“I certainly believe in forgiveness,” French Gates told CBS News’s Gayle King. “So I thought we had worked through some of that. It wasn’t one moment or one specific thing that happened. There just came a point in time where there was enough there that I realized it just wasn’t healthy and I couldn’t trust what we had.”
MELINDA FRENCH GATES WILL NO LONGER PLEDGE MAJORITY OF WEALTH TO GATES FOUNDATION
French Gates said she cried over the end of her 27-year marriage, which resulted in three children, all of whom are now adults.
“You’re grieving a loss of something you thought you had and thought you had for your lifetime,” French Gates said. “This is painful stuff.”
The couple remain friendly but not friends, French Gates said. They were spotted in October at a wedding for their daughter Jennifer, and both remain on the board of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. French Gates also has her own company called Pivotal Ventures, which funds projects that empower women.
French Gates added that she is still committed to the Giving Pledge, in which billionaires promise to give most of their money to charities.
“If you are lucky enough to be a billionaire, believe me, you can give away half of it and not change your life,” French Gates said.
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The couple’s divorce was announced last May but became official last August.
