Us: Matt Healy thought his relationship with Taylor Swift was headed towards marriage

Matt Healy’s mom Denise Welch appeared on Watch What Happens Live last week. I haven’t seen Taylor Swift’s fans this upset in a while! When Andy Cohen asked Denise about Healy’s relationship with Taylor Swift and Swift’s subsequent album full of songs about Healy (The Tortured Poets Department), Denise said: “Obviously on pain of death can I talk about that episode, but not being her mother-in-law is a role that I’m glad that I lost…Not that I have anything against her at all. It was just — it was tricky.” I defended Denise, and I still do – she has a right to her opinion, and she’s happy she doesn’t have to deal with Taylor as a daughter-in-law. Which sounds reasonable to me. But I guess we need even more of the Healy-Welch perspective, via Us Weekly:

Matt Healy’s mom, Denise Welch, has a hard time biting her tongue when it comes to discussing her son’s romance with Taylor Swift.

“Denise is still Matty’s mum at the end of the day, and it was bloody hard for her to stay quiet during the whole ordeal,” a source exclusively tells Us Weekly. “Now that time has gone by, she’s saying what she can because she knows that her son got hurt.”

Welch, 67, didn’t seem to hold back as she spoke about Swift, 35, and her Tortured Poets Department album, which is believed to have been inspired by the pop star’s 2023 romance with Healy, 36, on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen on Thursday, July 24.

“Obviously on pain of death can I talk about that episode, but not being her mother-in-law is a role that I’m glad that I lost,” she said, earning gasps from the audience. However, Welch quickly added, “Not that I have anything against her at all. It was just — it was tricky.” The British TV personality hinted that she thought it was unfair that Swift could share her side of the story via her music, but others who tried to speak out seemingly faced backlash from fans.

“Listen, you’re not allowed to say anything, and then she writes a whole album, you know, about it,” she continued. Welch concluded that her son has “taken it all in completely good grace” and that they’ve “moved on. He’s very happy with his amazing fiancée, Gabriella, Gabbriette [Bechtel], who is gorgeous.”

Us’s source says of Welch’s WWHL interview, “You can’t blame a mum for standing up for her child,” adding that the time after Healy and Swift’s split was “terrible” for the Coronation Street star.

“Any mum can imagine what it would feel like — but then you have to multiply it by a million because of how famous [Taylor] is. I wish I could say she’s used to it, but she’s not,” the insider continues. “It’s a horrible thing to have the most famous person in the world saying that your son broke her heart when it was the other way around, and then you can’t even defend yourself.”

The source concludes, “She’s saying the mother-in-law stuff because that’s where Matty thought it was headed. She’s entitled to her opinion.”

[From Us Weekly]

My opinion is that if Taylor was still talking about Healy and their relationship and split in TTPD, then it is fair game for Healy and Welch to answer questions and tell their side of the story. They have the right to talk, so I don’t want to hear anything about “Healy and his mom are obsessed” or “Denise has no right to say anything after all this time!” Now, do I think that Taylor was “the heartbreaker” in this particular situation, and that Healy was the heartbroken one? No. I don’t. I think Healy was an immature, racist, game-playing sh-thead. I also believe that if Taylor was the one to break it off, she did so because her family and her team convinced her that Healy was doing serious damage to her reputation (which is also true).

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, WWHL screengrab.

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16 Responses to “Us: Matt Healy thought his relationship with Taylor Swift was headed towards marriage”

  1. I’m of the who gives a shit either way camp. It’s over it’s done thats it and that’s all.

  2. Tis True Tis True says:

    And every entitled male shithead I know has a mother who thinks their son is an angel who can do no wrong, so this tracks.

    • ariel says:

      I fully concur.

      And i know nothing about him really, and nothing about any father/father figure in his life.
      But the male parent has to be given some heat for the way assholes turn out.
      Yes, some of who we are, we are just born that way.
      But also, men need to raise better sons.
      Men need to model better behavior for their sons.
      And women need to raise better men.
      [what do they say, a man is always shocked that a wife is not as forgiving as his mom, and even more shocked when he finds out that his daughter is not as forgiving as his wife]

      And i didn’t have children. And considering the present administration- i feel better and better about this choice every day.

    • Lucy says:

      Yes. It’s also kind of strange to be bringing this up more than a year after an album about it, I get Andy was being messy, but this isn’t a clean up on his mom saying something out of pocket.

      This is re litigating some pretty obvious things, and the only reason I can think of to do this is to match whatever he’s told his fiancé. At the time I remember he made public comments about it wasn’t that serious, making her out to have built up the whole thing in her mind to something it wasn’t. Which is probably true, clearly if she could be ghosted it wasn’t some grand romance. But it’s weird to run to a magazine two years after saying all that, when you’re engaged to a different partner, to say that actually you DID think you were going to marry her.

      • Houli says:

        I agree on most of your points — especially that this is the story he told his fiancée. But I think he *did* lovebomb her and make her think it *was* a grand romance before suddenly ghosting her, because he has a documented pattern of doing that. As I mentioned in other comments, he did the exact same thing to Halsey (which she sang about in “Colors”) and other women he got involved with have described the same pattern.

        There’s a specific kind of toxic guy who had emotionally unavailable/neglectful caregivers and only got attention when he was hurt, sick, sad, or the victim of something. So they repeat that pattern in relationships, convincing each subsequent partner how their predecessor was so cruel to poor, innocent, sensitive little him.they love that the new partner (and everyone else) treats them with sympathy and comfort. But as soon as they can’t sustain that, when they’re expected to transition from intense-lovebombing-initial-infatuation to a more stable relationship, they bolt. Lather, rinse, repeat. The partners that last long-term are ones who also love volatile dynamics or are so codependent that they don’t stop treating him like the victim. Healy does that. And based on what he (and Halsey!) have said about his upbringing, his parents fit that pattern of swinging between emotional unavailability and sympathy/comfort.

  3. Libra says:

    He wouldn’t be the first guy that overestimated a relationship. They’ve both moved on.

  4. Jan says:

    I didn’t know Matty was her son.
    Someone on X post a video of Denise fighting a woman, claiming she was sleeping with the woman’s husband, only for their to lie to get busted, with everyone pointing out it was a clip from Coronation Street.
    They were mad that she supported the Sussexes.

  5. ariel says:

    as an only since 2024 Swift fan.

    1) i get why Healy’s mom is glad not to be in it, as Taylor sings about in i can never give you peace, there is a lot of press intrusion when you step into her circle. (The Kelces’ handle it beautifully, and i feel like Mama Donna gets paid, yet still protects Taylor’s privacy).

    2) we can only go by the songs. But i remember those lyrics about how he’ll kill himself if i leave, but then that he ghosted her. Now- obv she has poetic license. So, there’s interpretations that can be made. But it does seem like one of those insanely intense EVERYTHING relationships that lasts as long as the 2 lovers are in a bubble, but does not stand up to any scrutiny, including basic, day to day reality.

    3) I get Healy’s mom sticking up for him, but kind of wished she/his dad had raised a better man. B/c he seems like gross, racist, garbage who takes himself way too seriously.

    4) it all worked out, the album is fantastic. I was once i a relationship i thought would be perfect for me – he challenged me- he was weird and fascinating. Also, he was exhausting and awful and when i met the next guy (who i am still with a dozen years later) i was drawn to all the stuff that was opposite of the ex, the stuff i first thought was perfect, but as it turns out, its awful and i couldn’t live with it. i was SO READY to appreciate a kind, loving person who knew when to just shut up and enjoy the silence next to me. (sorry, personal tangent)

    5) I gotta always say about this View-esque brit talk show host, that she sticks up for the Sussexes, and i always appreciate a sane voice cutting through the racist, classist, jilted ex, piers morgan obsession of all the anti-sussex insanity over there.

    • Houli says:

      Solid points, all! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 Especially #3. Matty Healy is a bargain bin, boringly basic edgelord. Halsey sang about her relationship with him in “Colors,” and it sounds extremely similar to what Taylor describes. The pills, the intensity, the lovebombing, and then abruptly ghosting her/going cold. There’s a trend here.

      And there’s that pointed line, “You said your mother only smiles on her TV show.” 👀

      I’m not saying she has to call her son a toxic, emotionally immature manchild on TV. But blaming the woman who was promised forever and then got ghosted by her clearly *not* sober, unstable son is… um… a choice.

  6. Sarah says:

    She can say what she wants, but let’s not pretend Matty wanted to marry Taylor Swift. He played games with her to see you get her when the relationship that mattered was falling apart.

    My big issue in that whole exchange wasn’t what she said although it was kind of rude but whatever my issue was Andy saying that entire album was about matty Healy and that is not accurate. There are three songs that are 100% about him, but that’s it. The rest of that album is about processing Joe and he’s mixed in there because he came right when that was falling apart and love bombed but she says in Fortnite I took the magical move on drug, that is Matty! He was nothing but jump off and she’s very clear about that but I think there’s a lot of people that can’t handle the fact that Taylor would do that because it doesn’t fit the princess thing that they built up in her mind, but the whole album was not about him. She didn’t have some deep love for him. a lot of that album is her processing her patterns in relationships so that she can be in a good one.

  7. NotSoSocialB says:

    JFC. He’s a 36 year old man, she’s a 67 year old adult. Why address this at all? If I were in her shoes, I’d support my son privately, not complain about it on television years after the fact? Embarrassing for Matty and Mommy. Seems like they have a codependent relationship and that’s good for no one. Let him be an adult.

  8. Abby says:

    It’s weird to me that this is coming out over a year after TTPD. He’s engaged to someone else! He told everyone basically that they were casual, so this doesn’t match what he said at all.

    I agree with the above poster. I wish that he was a better man and his mom wouldn’t have to defend him. I think probably his mom dodged a bullet of the fame hurricane around Taylor, and I think Taylor definitely dodged a bullet by them breaking up.

  9. Lolo says:

    He’s deeply unattractive and gross inside and out. He’s a racist, misogynist and s*xual sadist towards black women. It tracks that his mom thinks he walks on water and shits rainbows.

    In general, I dislike blaming women for male behavior. But I have to think the tendency of a certain type of mother to always position their VILE, violent-p*rn-addicted son as the sweet innocent victim of mean women has got to have something to do with the abnormal psychology, narcissism, and empathy deficit these guys display.

    Men also tend to go to bat for their gross sons, but with more of a vibe of “boys will be boys” rather than, “he’s a sweet angel baby who’s totally innocent!”

    • Houli says:

      Yeah.It’s because mothers with strong narcissistic traits view those sons as extensions of themselves and their egos. So he’s a poor, misunderstood, sensitive boy victimized by an evil woman, because that makes the mother a victim, too. And conveniently gets her out of having to change anything herself or go out of her way to address the son’s issues.

      It’s especially delusional when the son has well documented track record of racism, not taking sobriety seriously, driving impaired, and doing exactly this to famous women, stretching back over a decade. *Halsey has entered the chat*

  10. AC says:

    The one thing I agree with Denise is that she’s always defending Meghan.
    She even said herself that Matt is happily engaged with Gabbriette – so good, we can all move on.

  11. Bri says:

    So the thing that nobody seems to have mentioned is how hilarious it is that the woman that IS supposed to be her daughter in law…she got her name wrong (Gabrielle) and had to correct herself 😂

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