I Do...Maybe

After publicly denying allegations of cheating and persistent rumors that their reality-TV romance was falling apart, Emily Maynard and Jef Holm of “The Bachelorette” have officially called it quits.

Maynard and Holm talked to People Magazine about the decision to end their engagement.

In a statement, Maynard confirmed the split to People, saying, “It was a very difficult and heartbreaking decision. … We tried our best because the love between us was so real. … Ultimately we are at different points in our lives.”

Holm, 28, said in a statement, “I’ve never loved someone so much in my whole life, Emily is the best person and mom I have ever met. … Everyone wants a salacious story to break, but the truth is we are just two people who fell in love and tried our hardest to make it work. I will always love her.”

Maynard, 26, who called herself a “hopeless romantic” in the statement, said she believes in the show and has “no regrets.”

When unlucky-in-love Maynard, a single mom to 7-year-old daughter Ricki, met Holm on this summer’s “The Bachelorette,” their engagement seemed like a fairy tale. The engaged couple appeared on “Good Morning America” in July after the proposal aired and said their relationship was different than all the other “Bachelor” and “Bachelorette” couples that came before, including her failed relationship with season 15 bachelor Brad Womack.

Since there has been approximately  one couple out of the whole Bachelor/Bachelorette franchise who have stayed together this was not a huge shock. At least not to me. 

When it comes to Hollywood marriages we hear stories like Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries, Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore, and Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes all the time.  It seems like nobody can make marriage work these days. So I would like to dedicate this post to Hollywood couples who have made their marriages work. 

After more than 30 years with Denzel Washington, Pauletta Pearson isn't fazed by all the female attention her husband gets; as she once explained to Oprah Winfrey, she knows that "he's coming home!" Washington met Pearson, who is five years his senior, on the set of a 1977 TV drama. The actors married in 1983 and have four children. The secret to their marriage? Knowing who's boss! "Do what she tells me," the Oscar winner joked to iVillage.

Michael J Fox and Tracy Pollan were married in 1988. In 1991, Fox was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, changing their lives forever -- but not their feelings for each other. "She sees who I am, and she likes me as much as she ever liked me," Fox told Oprah in 2009. "We have a sense of humor about life, and we enjoy life. We feel every day that we're so blessed." The couple is now raising four children together, three of whom were born after Fox was diagnosed. "If I hadn't faced (my disease), I don't know that I'd have the family that I have now," says Fox. 

Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick have now been married for more than 23 years and have two children. And they're in this for the long haul. "We always knew that we were each other's 'one,'" says the actress ("Both of us knew this was forever and we were going to work it out no matter what happens, so when we fight, it's not so scary." 

The 22-year marriage of Rita Wilson and Tom Hanks has been characterized by deep love and devotion. In his 1996 Oscar acceptance speech, Hanks said: "I'm standing here because the woman I share my life with has taught me and demonstrates to me every day just what love is." Wilson echoes that sentiment: "I didn't know what being in love was until I met Tom."

In 1991, John Travolta and Kelly Preston eloped in a midnight ceremony in Paris. In the past 21 years, they've weathered success and disappointment -- including the tragic death of their 16-year-old son Jett in 2009 and the "miracle" birth of their third child, Benjamin, 17 months, (big sister is Ella Bleu, 12). "You have to keep on creating a marriage," Preston has said. "We grow and change together, because nothing ever stays the same." 

Faith Hill and Tim McGraw are a couple in perfect harmony. The country singers (left, in 1996; right, in 2011) first saw sparks when playing together on the appropriately named Spontaneous Combustion Tour in 1996. By the end of the tour, they were engaged, and by the end of the year -- married! Since then, the first couple of country has produced three daughters -- Gracie, 15, Maggie, 13, and Audrey, 10 -- and some wonderful duets, like 1997's "It's Your Love." But Hill maintains that their marriage works because they make the extra effort. 

Will and Jada Smith credited their 14-year marriage to total honesty. "You don't know about all the walls you build up in your mind and heart until someone comes along and tears them down," Will said in 1996. "Outside of my mother, Jada's the first person with whom I can share what I think and what I feel so freely."