Why Pregnant Cardi B’s Divorce From Offset Has Been a “Long Time Coming”

Cardi B and Offset have been on the rocks for a while. 

One day before announcing she’s pregnant with her third baby, the “I Like It” rapper filed for divorce from her husband of seven years—a decision that wasn’t made lightly.

“This is not based on one particular incident,” a rep for Cardi B told E! News. “It has been a longtime coming.”

Of course, Cardi—who shares kids Culture, 5, and Wave, 2, with Offset—has been candid about the challenges they faced as a couple. After all, despite still being legally married, Cardi said in December that she’d been single “for a minute.” 

The pair also unfollowed each other on Instagram that same month, with Cardi later sharing a cryptic message about ending relationships. 

“You know when you just out grow relationships,” the 31-year-old wrote on her Instagram Story at the time. “I'm tired of protecting people's feelings...I GOTTA PUT MYSELF FIRST!”

Later, Cardi opened up about the ups-and-downs of her relationship with Offset. 

“We have our own bad stuff,” Cardi explained to Rolling Stone in May. “We’re from two different worlds. Sometimes I cannot be—not that I cannot be a wife. It’s just like, my career takes my life. You know what I’m saying? My career comes first, then my kids come second.”

Cardi added, “Sometimes I don’t realize that I’m putting so many things before my relationship.” 

But through the ups and downs, Cardi B has also made it clear that her relationship with the Migos member is “all right.”

The “Up” rapper even looked at their divorce in a positive light in her pregnancy announcement Aug. 1. 

"With every ending comes a new beginning!” Cardi wrote. “I am so grateful to have shared this season with you, you have brought me more love, more life and most of all renewed my power!”

Keep reading for a look back on Cardi and Offset's romance.

On Sept. 20, 2017, the couple privately tied the knot at home, just a few months after their relationship first began. "We found someone to marry us, and she did, just the two of us and my cousin," Cardi revealed to fans months later. "I said I do, with no dress, no makeup and no ring!"

A month after their wedding ceremony, which was unbeknownst to fans at that point, Offset got down on one knee at a sold-out show and poppped the big question with an 8-carat sparkler. 

Six months later, Cardi took to the SNL stage to announce she was expecting her first child with Offset.

The couple celebrated their little one on the way with a fairytale baby shower that summer.

"It was a special moment for Offset and Cardi, and you could tell there was a lot of love between them and in the room," a source previously told E! News. "They are both very excited about the baby coming and are counting down the days." 

Cardi and Offset's daughter, Kulture Kiari Cephus, was born July 10, 2018, with her joining his kids Jordan, Kody and Kalea from previous relationships. And the "Bodak Yellow" artist said the Migos members chose the newborn's name.

"My dude named the baby," Cardi told Ellen DeGeneres at the time. "I really like the name. Imma let him say the name since he named the baby. It's, like, almost tricky but when it comes out, it's like, 'Ahh!'"

It seemed like there was no limit to the pair's love as they hit the red carpet at the 2018 American Music Awards. 

The couple brought the heat to the Jingle Ball stage with a big smooch.  

"Thank you husband. He's so fine," Cardi told the crowd. "That's my baby daddy, yo."

But just days later, Cardi announced they broke up after rumors of Offset's infidelity spread across the internet. 

"I guess we grew out of love, but we're not together anymore," she explained on social media. "I don't know. It might take time to get a divorce and I'm gonna always have a lot of love for him because he is my daughter's father."

Shortly after Cardi revealed their split, Offset took to Instagram with an emotional plea that he later featured on his Father of 4 debut studio album.

"We're going through a lot of things right now, a lot of things in the media," he said in the video. "I want to apologize to you, Cardi. I embarrassed you. I made you go crazy. I was partaking in activity that I shouldn't have been partaking in, and I apologize. You know what I'm saying? For breaking your heart, for breaking our promise, for breaking God's promise and being a selfish, messed-up husband."

A day later, he crashed her headlining performance at the Rolling Loud Festival in Los Angeles, complete with a cake and 2,000 white and red roses from Venus ET Fleur worth $15,000, displaying the message, "Take Me Back Cardi." 

While Cardi seemed less than pleased with Offset's grand gesture, a month later she told the press they were "working things out." 

During the 2019 Grammys red carpet, Cardi and Offset not-so-subtly confirmed they were back on with some serious PDA.

And Offset later explained how they were moving forward.

"You gotta go through steps and different things so that we can grow," he said on The Breakfast Club. "Not on the TV though, real behind-the-scenes, getting to know each other, getting to know who you're with and appreciate them all the way around. Because that one mistake made me appreciate her." 

By that spring, the pair had put their romance on display with a steamy joint music video for "Clout" as well as a surprise performance together at Revolve Festival. 

Cardi and Offset brought the heat to the red carpet at the 2019 Billboard Music Awards. From licking each other to him lifting his lady, they packed on the PDA.

The fashion-forward couple stuck a sultry pose at the 2019 BET Awards, and professed their love for each other in sweet social media tributes.

"I love you," Cardi wrote on Instagram at the time alongside photos from the event, and Offset adding, "I love you more."

The happy family celebrated Kulture's first birthday with some cake at the stroke of midnight. They later threw a huge, and we mean huge, party to mark the special occasion with their nearest and dearest.

Cardi and daughter Kulture appear on the cover of Vogue in December 2019, where the Grammy winner reflected on her husband's infidelity.

"I believe in forgiveness," she told the magazine. "I prayed on it. Me and my husband, we prayed on it. We had priests come to us. And we just came to an understanding like, bro, it's really us against the world."

"He has my back for everything, I have his back for everything," Cardi continued, "so when you cheat, you're betraying the person that has your back the most. Why would you do that? We have come to a clear understanding. For me, monogamy is the only way. I'll beat your ass if you cheat on me."

The family celebrated Cardi's second Mother's Day, which Offset commemorated with a loving message.

"Happy Mother's Day," he wrote on Instagram at the time, "since I met you it's been love thank you for my beautiful daughter she smart with attitude like you and talented like us both my kids and you help me become a better guy all around. Thank You WIFE !!!!"

Last that fall, the "WAP" artist filed for divorce from her husband after three years of marriage. In the divorce filing, obtained by E! News, Cardi's legal team stated the marriage was "irretrievably broken" and "there are no prospects for a reconciliation."

Two months after going their separate ways, the couple revealed they were giving their love another shot. As Offset's attorney told E! News at the time, "I can confirm that the divorce filed by Cardi B has been dismissed."

While performing with her husband and the rest of the Migos group during the 2021 BET Awards, Cardi announced she's expecting her second child with Offset.

On Sept. 6, 2021, the parents announced their baby's birth.

"We are so overjoyed to finally meet our son," they shared in a joint statement. "He is already loved so much by family and friends and we can't wait to introduce him to his other siblings."

Seven months later, Cardi and Offset revealed the little one's name: Wave Set Cephus.

And the "Money" artist was excited about their new chapter.

"Of course we went through some challenges," she told E! News in November 2021. "We had to get to know each other better. But I feel like I've never been happier. I really feel like [it's] not even just marriage, it's the family, the unity, the friendship that we have, the 'I have your back, you have my back.'"

With nearly five years of marriage under their belt, Cardi looked back at the early days of their union.

“I feel like our first year, even though we were in love with each other, we had a lot of lust,” she told Essence in a 2022 cover story. “We didn’t really know each other like that, because he was doing four shows a week. I was doing four shows a week. We would see each other about three or four times a month.”

The “Up” rapper also shed some light on why she called off their divorce back in 2020.

"The main thing that I wanted him to stop and everything, he stopped and he changed," she explained on a January 2023 episode of The Jason Lee Show, "and it showed me that he wanted to change for me."

As time went on, Cardi added, she and Offset were “getting better and better” and she soon learned they were expecting baby Wave. She then decided to give Offset another chance, noting, “You could just see when somebody’s trying.”

Cardi confirmed she and Offset called it quits again, sharing on Instagram Live that she's "been single for a minute now."

After the stars celebrated New Year's Eve together, fans questioned once again where they stood, making Cardi feel the need to offer some clarification.

"I don't consider that we're back together," she told her followers the next day, "because  the answer of getting back together is not a good night at the club and f--king the night long. We need to work on our s--t. We need to work on our communication. There's things that he gotta work on, there's things that I gotta work on."

So, as Cardi put it, they were "testing the space."

Cardi B and Offset sparked reconciliation rumors after they were seen together at a 2024 Met Gala after-party.

“I think it through," she told Rolling Stone that same month about the state of their marriage. "We think it through, because we do love each other. It’s not even about love. We’re best friends. And it’s like, ‘OK. Well, there was a time that I didn’t have a best friend, or I didn’t have a support system.’ It’s not even about ‘How do you leave a partner?’ How do you stop talking to your best friend?”

Cardi filed for divorce from Offset on July 31 after seven years of marriage, her rep confirmed to Page Six on Aug. 1.