Kelly Clarkson Just Got Primary Custody in Her Divorce Due to ‘Trust’ Issues With Her Ex

A court ruling has granted Kelly Clarkson primary physical custody of her kids amid her divorce from Brandon Blackstock.

According to Los Angeles County court documents obtained on Monday, November 30, a judge found that “under the circumstances present in this case, the interest in providing stability and continuity for the minor children weighs in favor of Petitioner having primary custody,” referring to Clarkson, 38. The Grammy-winner shares two children—daughter River Rose, 6, and son Remington Alexander, 4—with her ex-husband (Blackstock, 43, also has two children from a previous marriage). While this ruling determines that Clarkson will have primary physical custody of their children in L.A., the pair will still maintain joint physical and legal custody.

Since her divorce, Clarkson has been vocal about putting her children first. “What I’m dealing with is hard because it involves more than just my heart, it involves a lot of little hearts. We have four kids,” she said about the split during a September 2020 episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show. “Divorce is never easy. We’re both from divorced families, so we know the best thing here is to protect our children and their little hearts.” However, it seems that coparenting has proven more “difficult” than expected, as per the late October court documents. “The level of conflict between the parents has increased,” the documents read. “The parties have a difficult time coparenting due to issues of trust between them.”

News of the “Stronger” singer’s custody arrangement comes months after she filed for divorce from Blackstock in June. Clarkson and her manager were married for nearly seven years, though the pair knew each other even longer. Clarkson and Blackstock were engaged in 2012, nearly six years after they first met at a rehearsal for the American Music Awards. The couple cited “irreconcilable differences” as the reason for their split. Multiple sources, however, noted that their separation was the result of many “problems” between the duo.

According to an ET source, the “Since U Been Gone” singer and her ex “had been having problems for several months and were making a conscious effort to work things out. They both hoped quarantining away from L.A. in Montana would help them work things out in their marriage, but instead, the change in environment was actually detrimental.”

Friends close to the couple were reportedly surprised by the news, but ET’s source suggested that “those closest to them know it’s been difficult.”