Ellie Goulding is 30 weeks pregnant - but says during pandemic it has been ‘lonely’

‘It happens really quickly, and then you almost don’t believe it at first,’ said the singer

(Getty Images)

Ellie Goulding is pregnant with her first child with her husband, art dealer Caspar Jopling.

The singer said she discovered the pregnancy on her first wedding anniversary in August last year, while she and Jopling were away together.

She told British Vogue: “It was crazy because it was our one-year anniversary. That was not the plan.”

Goulding, 34, said the pregnancy was unplanned but that she is “enjoying” being pregnant, and admitted that she was in “denial” at first.

“It happens really quickly, and then you almost don’t believe it at first,” she said.

“You’re still eating the same, looking the same, for a while I was probably in denial.”

The singer admitted pregnancy had been an isolating experience due to coronavirus.

“You have your partner, and you have your friends, but in a pandemic, it can feel particularly lonely,” she said.

“Because it wasn’t something I had planned for right now, [and] I knew it was a more solitary journey because of what’s going on. I think that made me keep it very secretive and made me very protective over it.”

The star said she feels it’s “taboo” to talk about pregnancy as being “challenging”, adding that “you’re not always glowing”.

She revealed that the sickness and tiredness she has suffered has been like nothing she has ever experienced before, and that she has a “newfound respect” for women with children.  

Goulding met her husband in 2016 and last year revealed “it wasn’t love at first sight” for the couple.

Speaking on Jessie Ware’s Table Manners podcast, Goulding said she met Jopling at a dinner a friend threw for her.

“It’s not a particularly exciting story, sadly. It wasn’t a love at first sight thing at all,” she said.

“We didn’t fancy each other at all. We were just sat next to each other at dinner.”

Goulding said she wasn’t feeling well on the night, and she and Caspar appeared to have “nothing in common”. 

She recalled: “I was feeling really rough. I had terrible bronchitis at the time and I was really ill - the most ill I’d been in ages. All I wanted to do was go to bed after the show and I went to this dinner that my friend had kindly put on for me.

“And I was sat next to Caspar and he was from a big farming family and I talked about how I was vegan. And he talked about how much he loved meat: beef and chicken and lamb and whatever else. So we literally had nothing in common.”

She revealed they eventually got together after Jopling “wooed” her and they went out on dates together. The couple got engaged the following year in 2017.