Paige DeSorbo and Craig Conover have called it quits.

The Summer House and Southern Charm stars, who met on the first season of Bravo’s Winter House, dated for three years before breaking up.

Their split appears to be a mutual decision, with DeSorbo saying on the newest episode of her Giggly Squad podcast published on Monday, Dec. 30 that she and Conover “have decided to no longer be together.”

“It’s weird, it’s very weird. I wasn’t expecting this,” she told podcast co-host Hannah Berner. “Obviously, when we first started dating, you don’t think, ‘Oh, what will happen? Will we get married, will we not?’ You’re just kind of like, in this relationship.”

DeSorbo didn’t reveal what caused the breakup, but hinted that there wasn’t strife. “Not to sound traditional and old fashioned, this is not a situation where I have, like, a 50-part series of ‘Who the f— was I dating?’” the reality personality joked. “Could not be more opposite of that.”

Said DeSorbo: “I have so much love and respect for Craig. I think he is one of the best people I have ever met in my entire life. I will remain the biggest fan of him and want the best for him and he truly will get the best because he is the best. But with that said, I think it was just the right decision for both of us moving forward in our lives and the direction in our lives that we didn’t force.”

“I love him, I think he loves me,” she added. “I think we will remain friends. No one did anything. It wasn’t a bad thing. I think we both were just being really mature and saying what we want and what we didn’t want, and I think that’s extremely powerful to be able to voice how you’re feeling in real-time and what you want for your future.”

“He’s definitely the best boyfriend I’ve ever had, like, I can truly say that,” DeSorbo said. “He was a great boyfriend, and he did everything correct, and he never made me feel insecure or anything like that, so it almost is harder when no one’s done anything to be mad about, and that’s hard.”

Conover, 35, has not yet commented on the breakup. But on the podcast, DeSorbo hinted at changes they’ve both experienced over their time together.

“As you get older, I mean, I started dating Craig when I was 29 and I’m 32 now,” she said. “And your 30s, for women, I feel like are very transformative. And you change a lot and you grow a lot. Him as well.”

“It’s a very sad thing,” an emotional DeSorbo said. “I know I said I would never cry on the internet but like, it’s okay if I cry on the pod. I feel like that’s okay.”

She also did not say when they split, but did insist that it had nothing to do with the premieres of their respective Bravo hits.

“In terms of people saying rumors like, ‘Oh, Paige was told to wait until Southern Charm came out’ or like ‘Summer House came out’ — no one can tell me what to do,” DeSorbo said. “Like, the network has power, but they don’t have that much power. So, that was not a real thing. Rumors of us breaking up months ago again, also, not a real thing.”

The Bravo stars long faced questions of whether they would get engaged throughout their three-year relationship but frequently said they were not in a rush to take the next step.

“It’s funny how things evolve and change,” Conover told PEOPLE at BravoCon in 2023 as he reflected on how long-distance — he lives in Charleston while Desorbo lives in New York — has affected their relationship.

“I think there was so much pressure from the outside world. I love what we have now. My home base is Charleston and hers is New York, but if it was a Venn diagram, we cross over. We’re always together, we’re just in one place and the other.”

He continued, “I think I’ve settled into a more sustainable flow of this is what works for us and let’s just enjoy it instead of rushing into the next step.”

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In July, the Giggle Squad co-host also opened up about her thoughts on the pair’s future on an episode of the LadyGang podcast, as she admitted they “rarely talk about when are we getting engaged, when are we having a baby.”

“Of course, we’ve had those conversations, but it’s not as much as everyone else is having them. So, like, we don’t really get that stressed out about it.”

DeSorbo said she “never” gets “offended” when fans ask about the next steps, though, because she knows that comes with being reality TV stars. Still, she admitted that their time on shows like Summer House, Southern Charm and Winter House made it feel like they’ve “been dating for so much longer than we have.”

“So we kind of, like, did that to ourselves in a way where it seemed like, oh my God, they’ve been together for, like, years. When in reality, we’ve really only been dating for two and a half years.”