A friend of Craig Monk, the estranged husband of singer Cher Lloyd, has urged the former X Factor contestant to address their marital issues privately rather than publicly. The comments come a day after Lloyd, 32, revealed on Instagram that she had split from Monk, with whom she had been married for 13 years.
Lloyd announced the separation by posting a photograph of her ring-free hand to her 2.6 million Instagram followers on Monday. When a fan inquired about her wedding ring, she replied, "It's in the bin." This public disclosure has reportedly been met with disapproval by Monk's circle.
A source close to Monk, 35, told the Daily Mail that Lloyd should "stop airing her dirty laundry in public" and have "an adult conversation with her husband." The source described Lloyd's comment about throwing her wedding ring away as "extremely disrespectful" and suggested her actions were "for attention." They added that once such a statement is online, "it's always online," implying a lack of mature handling of the situation.
Lloyd and Monk married in November 2013 and share two daughters: Delilah-Rae, born in May 2018, and Eliza Violet, born in September 2023. According to the source close to Monk, he is "getting on with life and prioritising his two girls," stating they are the only ones who matter.
Following her announcement, Lloyd shared several posts on social media that alluded to moving on. She 'liked' posts referencing gut feelings, intuition, crying, and lost love. One reshared video featured a caption about the loss of "old-school love," questioning what happened to loyalty and genuine care in relationships. Another reshared post showed a bird and a caption about having conversations, with a hope that her father could hear her from heaven. Lloyd's father passed away on April 11, 2026, a loss she described as creating a pain she had never felt before.
Lloyd's marriage to Monk began less than a year after they met, following her rise to fame on The X Factor. In a 2018 appearance on ITV's Loose Women, Lloyd described her relationship with Monk as "like a fairy tale," acknowledging they had experienced ups and downs. The news of their split surfaces three months after the death of her father, who had battled COVID-19 and required hospitalization multiple times in 2020.