Writer and podcaster Eileen Kelly is defending her relationship with musician Anthony Kiedis, who is 33 years her senior.
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"Is it really so difficult to imagine that connection can exist across generations?" Kelly asked in an essay for Vogue.
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Kiedis has been in several relationships with prominent age gaps in the past, Kelly noted, including with model Heather Christie, who gave birth to their son Everly Bear Kiedis in 2007 when Christie was 21 and Kiedis was 44.
Eileen Kelly is standing by her relationship toRed Hot Chili PeppersfrontmanAnthony Kiedis.
Kelly, host of theGoing Mentalpodcast and a writer forVogue,published an essaywith the famed fashion rag on April 21, in which she detailed the "nuanced" position she finds herself in dating someone 33 years her junior.
Kiedis is 63, while Kelly is 30, "which is either alarming or impressive, depending on who you ask," she wrote. "It's my first time dating someone significantly older, and sometimes I joke with friends that I've been missing out my whole life."
She outlined public objections that have been leveled at her relationship, considerations unique to age-gap pairings that she can concede to, and reasons why there's no cause for concern in the essay. But she began by listing off the perks: "There is something to be said for a man who's simply had more time to get his s--- together, and my much older boyfriend seems genuinely excited to be with me — not like he's biding his time before he can swipe for someone better. He is fully aware that he's one lucky bastard."
After getting off to a flirty start with the "Scar Tissue" singer at a birthday party, Kelly noted that "the age gap didn’t register at first. I had met someone interesting and magnetic; if anything, I assumed we'd just become friends." But after becoming serious with Kiedis, she "noticed how differently people respond to age-gap relationships based on who occupies which side of the gap."
Kelly contended that the culture generally praises older women for dating younger men. Meanwhile, "an older man is reflexively labeled 'creepy' and 'gross,' while the woman 'must have daddy issues' or must be a gold-digger." She asked, "Is it really so difficult to imagine that connection can exist across generations, and that two people of different ages can find something real in each other?"
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Kiedis, she noted, has "been in several" relationships with significant age gaps. Indeed, Kiedis dated Brazilian model Wanessa Milhomem in 2015, when he was 52 and she was 23. Before that, he dated Australian model Helena Vestergaard from 2013-2015, beginning when she was 19. He shares one child, Everly Bear Kiedis, with model Heather Christie, born in 2007 when Christie was 21 and Kiedis was 44.
"I have my own money, my own career, and I have my own home. I love my boyfriend, but I'm not at risk of losing everything if we break up," Kelly wrote in her essay, highlighting the balance of power in her relationship.
Still she has been subject to "shocking... unsolicited commentary" on her relationship with Kiedis, like a passerby referring to the rocker as her dad. But the couple's life is "comparatively unremarkable," she insisted, simply consisting of "two people doing the ongoing, unremarkable work of moving through life together."
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Kiedis helped form Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1983. The band has released 13 studio albums since then. Their most recent release is the 2022 double albumReturn of the Dream Canteen.
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