Julianne Hough’s Dogs Were Killed 10 Days After Brooks Laich Separation

Julianne Hough opened up about the period of time when she ended her marriage to Brooks Laich — and lost both of her dogs.

“I had asked for a separation, and then 10 days later my dogs were killed by coyotes,” Hough, 36, recalled on the Tuesday, August 27, episode of “The Jamie Kern Lima Show” on YouTube. “My dogs that represented unconditional love and safety — gone. I’m like, ‘Whoa, what am I doing? I’m blowing up my life.’”

Hough decided to separate from Laich, 41, because she felt something was “not working,” but she didn’t expect to be grieving her pets at the same time.

“[I] woke up before my phone even rang, and I knew. And I picked up the phone and my assistant at the time was just screaming,” she continued. “I’ve never had coyotes in my yard, I have gates and everything.”

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The actress has now found peace by being “grateful they went together.”

“Usually how it happens is very quick, and that we got their bodies,” Hough said about the tragic incident. “Going through any kind of loss is painful, even if it is the right thing. And so as that was happening, I was just experiencing pain out of a decision that I felt like was the right thing for me. And also they were experiencing pain, so that was just really painful.”

Hough and Laich tied the knot in 2017 after four years of dating. They sparked split speculation in early 2020 when they spent time apart during the COVID pandemic and subsequently announced their separation later that year.

“We have lovingly and carefully taken the time we have needed to arrive at our decision to separate,” the pair said in a joint statement in May 2020. “We share an abundance of love and respect for one another and will continue to lead with our hearts from that place. We kindly request your compassion and respect for our privacy moving forward.”

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A source exclusively told Us Weekly at the time that the former couple “argued a lot” before calling it quits, adding, “[They] just had different viewpoints on important issues. [They were] trying to find themselves separate from one another and deal with any issues they’ve faced that were exacerbated while married.”

Us confirmed that the duo’s divorce was finalized in June 2022. Hough has since discussed how difficult the experience was for her.

“It wasn’t right. That can be a hard thing to fully accept,” she said on an episode of the “Armchair Expert” podcast earlier this month. “I feel like our relationship and our marriage was exactly right, and the end of it is right too. We both have regrets that it didn’t work out, because I don’t think we had the maturity to come together. He was contracting while I was expanding. We just couldn’t find each other in that.”