Simon Stacpoole/Offside / Contributor
It's been a whirlwind year for Jeff Bezos and his girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez.
Exactly one year ago, the bombshell news broke that Jeff Bezos and his wife, MacKenzie, were getting a divorce after 25 years of marriage. Hours later, we learned that Bezos was in a relationship with Lauren Sanchez, a TV host, and helicopter pilot who, along with her husband, had been friends with the Bezoses.
Despite a tumultuous few months that involved leaked texts, blackmail, a billion-dollar divorce, and maybe even interference from the Saudi Arabian government, Bezos and Sanchez are still going strong.
Here's how their relationship became public and how they've spent their first year as a couple.
"As our family and close friends know, after a long period of loving exploration and trial separation, we have decided to divorce and continue our shared lives as friends," the statement read. "If we had known we would separate after 25 years, we would do it all again."
MacKenzie Bezos is one of Amazon's earliest employees. The couple has four children together.
Sanchez started her career as a news reporter and anchor — she was a longtime anchor of "Good Day LA" on Fox 11 and worked as a correspondent on "Extra."
More recently, she's worked as a helicopter pilot and founded her own aerial filming company in 2016 called Black Ops Aviation. Bezos has hired Sanchez's company to film footage for his rocket company, Blue Origin.
Sanchez has also had TV and film roles, including as the host of the reality show "So You Think You Can Dance" and playing an anchor in movies like "Fight Club" and "The Day After Tomorrow," according to her IMDB page.
Sanchez and Whitesell had been married since 2005, but at the time the news broke, the couple had been separated since the fall, according to Page Six.
The couple was friends with Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos because they had houses near each other in Seattle, Page Six reported.
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