Chantelle Houghton and PrestonCelebrity Big Brother couple Chantelle Houghton and Preston have announced they’ve decided to separate after less than a year of marriage.

The couple met on the reality show at the start of 2006 and married in August last year but have now issued a statement confirmed they’re through: “After much soul-searching and tearful discussions we have sadly decided to end our marriage.”

“We hope we can always remain friends and still love each other, but we both think we put so much pressure on one another to make our marriage work that it has ended up destroying our relationship.”

“We’ve spent hours and hours discussing whether we can salvage our marriage, give it another go, try harder, anything rather than give up. But we now both agree that we should go our separate ways.”

“We know people will think we married too quickly on the back of Big Brother, but the truth is that, despite what anyone thinks, we did have a whirlwind romance but we were genuinely in love with each other at the time and we will never regret our time together.”