Known for following strict rules when dating, one of the Duggars recently revealed she may have disobeyed her family's guidelines when courting her present partner.
Jessa Duggar-Seewald opened up about the time when she was courting her now-husband, Ben Seewald. In the revised edition of ‘Growing Up Duggar,’ the reality TV star admits she used to talk with Ben without the presence of a third party.
“The day Ben and I started courting, we began our tradition of calling each other on the phone every night. These were such special times,” Jessa states in the book, as pointed out in the Duggar Family Blog. “These calls were not ‘chaperoned.’ They were private just between the two of us.”
While the couple was previously not chaperoned on the phone, the ‘Jill & Jessa: Counting On’ star assured her fans that their conversations were simple and decent.
“We would talk about everything from how our day went, to what we had been learning from our Bible reading, and then just anything else that we want to talk about,” she wrote.
This is not the first instance of Jessa moving away from the Duggar family’s dating rules. The night before accepting Ben’s marriage proposal in 2014, the couple ate dinner with their parents, which was featured in an episode of TLC’s ‘19 Kids and Counting.’
After the family members gathered hands and said their prayers, Jessa and Ben held each other’s hands for the first time, known in their clan as a move usually saved for engaged pairs.
Although Jim Bob recognized his daughter’s mistake, he showed self-control as he was aware of the engagement that was on the way.
On the same episode, after Jessa spent the whole day finding him as part of the scavenger hunt for their engagement, the couple may have broken the rules once again by hugging each other. This time, the Duggar patriarch was not present to see the act.
Meanwhile, a news report has surfaced, pointing out that Jim Bob and wife Michelle are currently experiencing tension in their marriage and that the couple was “destroyed” by their son Josh’s involvement in an infidelity scandal.
After their eldest son admitted to molesting five underage girls, including four of his own sisters, it was also revealed that he was subscribed to Ashley Madison, the infidelity dating site, to cheat on his wife Anna with whom he has four children.
Consequently, Jim Bob and Michelle faced criticisms for attempting to hide cover up their son’s acts and saying no to the necessary psychological treatment for Josh.
When Josh returned home in March after spending six months in a faith-based rehabilitation center, the report indicates that the Duggar parents’ relationship has not been the same.
"She has actually raised her voice to Jim Bob," a "family friend" told Life & Style. "The Jim Bob Michelle fell in love with 32 years ago is very different from the man she knows now. He bears little resemblance to the young man who was filled with hope and happiness."
However, due to their strict beliefs, Michelle is unlikely to resort to divorce, despite the report stating that “they are not the happy couple they once were.”
‘Jill & Jessa: Counting On’ season two is set to premiere on TLC this summer.
