Craig Melton: The Inspiring Story of Glennon Doyle’s Ex-Husband, Career and Life After Divorce

Craig Melton is an American former semi-professional soccer player best known publicly as the ex-husband of bestselling author, speaker, and podcaster Glennon Doyle. The couple married in 2002, raised three children together, and ended their marriage in 2016. Although Doyle subsequently married former professional soccer star Abby Wambach, Melton remained an important part of their shared family life.

His name frequently appears in discussions about Doyle’s books, particularly Love Warrior and Untamed, which examine marriage, personal transformation, relationships, and the difficult decisions that can reshape a family. However, Melton’s story is not limited to his former marriage. His sporting background, participation in family conversations, and willingness to discuss co-parenting have also attracted public interest.

Unlike Doyle and Wambach, who have established careers in the public eye, Melton has maintained a comparatively private professional and personal life. Much of the reliable information about him comes from Doyle’s published interviews and conversations in which he has participated directly.

This article examines Craig Melton’s confirmed background, marriage, children, sporting experience, and public appearances while distinguishing facts from private information.

Quick Bio

Field	Details
Full Name	Craig Melton
Known For	Former husband of Glennon Doyle
Profession/Public Role	Former semi-professional soccer player; public podcast guest
Nationality	American
Former Spouse	Glennon Doyle
Marriage	2002–2016
Children	Three
Children’s Names	Chase, Tish, and Amma
Notable Connection	Glennon Doyle and Abby Wambach’s blended family
Public Appearances	We Can Do Hard Things podcast
Latest Verified Personal Appearance	June 2023 podcast discussion about dating
Current Relationship Status	Not publicly confirmed in reliable recent sources
Net Worth	Not publicly verified

Who Is Craig Melton?

Craig Melton became publicly recognizable through his marriage to Glennon Doyle, an American writer whose work addresses emotional honesty, motherhood, identity, and relationships. Before their divorce, the couple’s marriage played an important role in Doyle’s personal writing and public identity.

Melton did not initially attract attention through an entertainment career. Instead, readers became familiar with him as someone whose family experiences intersected with stories that reached a substantial audience.

He began his relationship with Doyle years before her books became international bestsellers. Their marriage developed alongside major personal changes, including parenthood and Doyle’s emergence as a writer.

One important aspect of Melton’s public identity is that he has occasionally spoken about his experiences rather than leaving the story entirely to others.

That distinction matters. Although Doyle’s books offer detailed accounts of her perspective, Melton’s podcast appearances give listeners a chance to hear his own reflections on divorce, parenting, and changes within their family.

He is therefore best understood as a relatively private individual whose experiences became public through a widely discussed marriage and its aftermath.

Early Life and Background

Public information about Melton’s childhood, parents, and education is limited. Reliable accounts provide considerably more detail about his adult relationship with Doyle than about his upbringing.

A 2021 profile in The New Yorker said Melton and Doyle knew each other during school. They later reconnected in Washington, D.C., before beginning their relationship.

The profile also noted his connection to soccer, describing him as a talented player in his youth.

His sporting experience would remain relevant later in life, particularly through his involvement in his children’s soccer activities.

Although some online biographies make detailed claims about his birth date, education, and professional history, not all of them can be independently verified.

A responsible biography should therefore distinguish between information from credible interviews and personal details that remain unconfirmed.

Craig Melton and Glennon Doyle’s Marriage

Melton and Doyle’s relationship began before the author became widely known for her personal essays and bestselling books.

The pair married in September 2002 and eventually welcomed three children.

Their marriage developed during a period of major personal change for Doyle. She has written extensively about recovery, faith, parenthood, and the expectations she placed on herself as a wife and mother.

Those experiences later formed an important part of her published work.

The relationship also faced difficulties that Doyle publicly addressed in interviews and in Love Warrior. The memoir explores her experience of confronting marital problems, examining her identity, and attempting to rebuild trust.

While the book discusses painful aspects of the relationship, it should be understood as Doyle’s personal account rather than a complete biography of both spouses.

Melton’s perspective also deserves recognition, especially because private relationships can involve experiences that one person’s narrative can’t fully capture.

Despite their efforts to repair the marriage, the couple separated in 2016.

Their divorce drew considerable attention because Doyle had recently written about trying to restore their relationship.

Why Did Craig Melton and Glennon Doyle Divorce?

Their separation became public in 2016, during a transformative period in Doyle’s personal life.

Doyle had previously discussed marital difficulties, including infidelity, in her writing and interviews. She described the emotional work of confronting those experiences and trying to reconcile.

Later, she developed a relationship with Abby Wambach, the retired American soccer player and two-time Olympic gold medalist.

Doyle and Wambach publicly confirmed their relationship in November 2016 and married in May 2017.

Although these events made headlines, reducing Melton’s marriage to a simple account of one person leaving another overlooks the complexity Doyle herself has described.

In later interviews, she emphasized that their marriage included meaningful experiences and personal growth, despite its eventual end.

The former couple also needed to develop a new co-parenting relationship.

Their separation was therefore not the end of their shared responsibilities, but the beginning of a different family arrangement.

Craig Melton’s Soccer Background and Professional Life

Soccer represents one of the clearest publicly confirmed elements of Melton’s background.

In a June 2020 interview on The Kojo Nnamdi Show, Doyle said her former husband played soccer at a semi-professional level.

She also explained that Melton and Abby Wambach had coached the girls’ soccer team together.

This detail offers a useful perspective on his life beyond marriage. Soccer was not merely a recreational interest mentioned in passing; it connected to his earlier sporting experience and later to his involvement with his children.

His shared interest with Wambach also became part of the family’s evolving relationships.

Although Wambach achieved international recognition through her professional playing career, Melton’s own background gave them a common interest.

Some biographical profiles additionally mention modeling experience. However, reliable public information does not establish a substantial or continuing professional modeling career.

Similarly, detailed claims about his current employer, business responsibilities, income, or senior professional position should not be treated as confirmed without dependable evidence.

Melton’s documented sports background matters, but don’t attach unverified career achievements to his name.

His Relationship With Abby Wambach

One of the more unusual aspects of Melton’s public story is his relationship with Abby Wambach, who became Doyle’s wife after their divorce.

Rather than presenting their family arrangement as a constant source of conflict, Doyle has described a cooperative relationship among all three adults.

In interviews, she discussed how Melton and Wambach developed a connection through parenting and their shared enthusiasm for soccer.

Their family structure became a recurring subject in public conversations about modern parenting.

However, it would be misleading to suggest that the arrangement developed without difficulties.

Doyle has acknowledged that establishing new boundaries and relationships required considerable emotional work.

Melton also addressed these challenges in a July 2021 episode of We Can Do Hard Things, which focused on redefining family after divorce.

The conversation explored how adults can move beyond an idealized image of family life and develop practical relationships that support their children.

Their experience offers an example of cooperative parenting, although it should not be presented as a universal model or an arrangement that every separated family could realistically follow.

Fatherhood and His Three Children

Melton and Doyle have three children: Chase, Tish, and Amma.

Their children are central to the public discussions about how the former couple developed their family relationship after divorce.

Doyle has described the importance of coordinating parenting responsibilities and maintaining connections between households.

One recurring theme in these conversations is that the end of a marriage does not necessarily end cooperation between parents.

Melton has also spoken about the practical side of co-parenting, including the need for communication, predictable arrangements, and flexibility.

His involvement in the children’s soccer activities provides another publicly documented example of his parenting role.

While Doyle has shared certain family experiences through her professional work, that does not make every detail of the children’s lives appropriate for public discussion.

Their education, private relationships, personal circumstances, and everyday routines do not need to be examined to understand Melton’s biography.

The most relevant established information is that he and Doyle continued working together as parents after their marriage ended.

Craig Melton’s Podcast Appearances

Melton has appeared on episodes of the We Can Do Hard Things podcast, which offers some of the clearest examples of him discussing his experiences in his own words.

In July 2021, he appeared in an episode titled Redefining Family with Craig.

The discussion examined how he and Doyle approached their divorce, communicated with their children, and adjusted to the realities of a blended family.

It also addressed the complications of sharing personal experiences publicly when one former spouse is a successful memoirist.

This is an important part of his story because it acknowledges that public storytelling can affect people who didn’t seek celebrity status on their own.

Melton returned for a June 16, 2023, episode focused on dating, alongside behavioral scientist and relationship expert Logan Ury.

The episode discussed dating after divorce, relationship expectations, and the challenges of introducing a potential partner into an established co-parenting arrangement.

His participation offered insight into his views at that time, but it does not establish his current relationship status.

These appearances show that although Melton generally maintains a lower profile than Doyle, he has occasionally contributed directly to public discussions about family life.

What Is Craig Melton’s Net Worth?

No reliable public financial disclosure establishes Craig Melton’s exact net worth.

Celebrity biography websites sometimes publish estimated figures for people connected to famous authors, athletes, or entertainers.

However, such figures can be misleading if they lack verified financial information.

An individual’s former marriage to a successful author does not establish their personal wealth, annual income, investments, or current financial circumstances.

Without credible documentation, an exact estimate would be speculative.

For this reason, his net worth should be treated as unconfirmed rather than presented as an invented figure.

Where Is Craig Melton Now?

As of October 2026, reliable public information offers a clearer picture of Melton’s earlier family experiences than of his present-day private circumstances.

His June 2023 podcast appearance remains one of the most substantial publicly documented discussions involving him.

That conversation focused on dating and co-parenting, but it should not be interpreted as evidence of his present romantic situation.

No sufficiently verified recent information establishes his exact residence, current partner, personal finances, or detailed daily activities.

What can be established is that his public identity has developed beyond the initial attention surrounding his divorce.

His participation in family conversations provides a more balanced picture of someone who has experienced substantial personal change while retaining connections through parenthood.

Readers seeking updates should distinguish between dated interviews, confirmed public appearances, and unsupported claims repeated by entertainment websites.

Why Craig Melton’s Story Still Attracts Attention

Public interest in Melton continues largely because of Glennon Doyle’s influence as an author and podcast host.

Readers encountering Love Warrior often want to understand the real people involved in the memoir’s account of marriage and reconciliation.

Readers of Untamed may then become interested in the circumstances surrounding the divorce and Doyle’s subsequent relationship with Wambach.

Melton’s later podcast discussions add a different dimension to those questions.

Rather than appearing only as a character in someone else’s published account, he participated in conversations about what changing family relationships felt like from his perspective.

That distinction makes his story more informative than a conventional celebrity relationship timeline.

It also reinforces the importance of recognizing that public narratives about divorce can involve several people whose experiences deserve consideration.

His continued recognition is therefore connected not only to his former marriage, but also to broader questions about family, privacy, and cooperation after separation.

More Celebrity Profiles: Alex Cowper-Smith: The Remarkable Story of Alice Eve’s Ex-Husband, Career and Private Life

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Craig Melton?

Craig Melton is a former semi-professional soccer player best known as the ex-husband of American author Glennon Doyle. He has also appeared on the We Can Do Hard Things podcast.

When did Craig Melton and Glennon Doyle divorce?

The couple separated in 2016 after marrying in 2002. Their relationship and separation were subsequently discussed in Doyle’s books and interviews.

How many children does Craig Melton have?

He has three children with Glennon Doyle: Chase, Tish, and Amma.

Was Craig Melton a professional soccer player?

Glennon Doyle confirmed in a 2020 interview that Melton had played soccer at a semi-professional level. She also said he and Abby Wambach had coached their daughters’ soccer team together.

Is Craig Melton married again?

His current marital or relationship status has not been reliably confirmed through recent public information. His 2023 podcast discussion addressed dating, but it does not establish his circumstances in 2026.

Conclusion

Craig Melton is best known publicly for his former marriage to Glennon Doyle, but his story extends beyond their 2016 divorce. His semi-professional soccer background, fatherhood, and participation in discussions about modern family relationships provide a fuller understanding of his public identity.

His appearances on We Can Do Hard Things are especially relevant because they allow readers to consider his perspective alongside Doyle’s published accounts.

While some details of his present life remain private, the facts offer a meaningful portrait of a father and former spouse navigating changes in family relationships.

For readers searching for information about Glennon Doyle’s ex-husband, the most accurate approach is to focus on documented events, direct public statements, and the distinction between a person’s public connections and their right to a private life.