For The Last Resort couple Lisa and Dan, their love blossomed in the most controversial of circumstances. Recently separated from her husband, Lisa was out on the town with friends when she came across Dan. They instantly connected and shared a few laughs. Fun led to flirting, and the rest they normally say is history.
Unfortunately, Dan’s, 35, history was about to implode on their newfound chemistry. He was married and expecting his first child.
“He was really only supposed to be quick fun but we became good friends,” Lisa tells TV WEEK. “He told me a week later he was married, at which point I stepped back but we maintained a friendship. For better or for worse, we did stay in each other’s lives, and at times, we broke the rules.”
The 38-year-old adds that she had a lot of empathy for Dan’s situation.
“I understood what he was going through having recently separated,” Lisa says. “He had no one to talk to. He was very ashamed of not being happy in a relationship where his wife was about to have a baby.
“It wasn’t a sordid thing either,” she explains. “I didn’t go into his home, I didn’t pursue him. It was the opposite actually. I told him to go and sort his s–t out. I wanted him to experience the birth of his first child so I stepped back. When he finally separated from her and was single, we hadn’t seen each other in over a month.”
Lisa and Dan dive into therapy on The Last Resort.
As for her role in the affair, Lisa admits she often felt overwhelmed with guilt.
“Oh my god, I would never set out to intentionally hurt someone,” she says. “Honestly, before that experience I would’ve been the most judgemental person about anyone doing that. But you grow up, become an adult and realise life isn’t that simple. Sometimes you meet and connect with people and it’s not right, but it just is.”
Five years on and Lisa is now in a good place with Dan’s ex-wife.
“I have a good relationship with her [Dan’s ex] now,” she says. “For everyone else, it’s new. But for us, it happened five years ago. It’s old news. She’s an amazing woman who has accepted me into her daughter’s life and she knows everything. People can make what they want of it but we’re the ones who lived the story.”
The couples meet for the first time at the resort.
Now as a couple on TLR, Lisa admits it has reopened old wounds. However, it was an opportunity for the on-again, off-again couple to work on their issues.
“It brings up those old feelings of guilt or shame,” she says. “It’s not something either of us is proud of. But, I said if we’re going to do this [TLR], we have to be honest. There were definite moments where I thought, ‘wow this is why we came here’.”
She also knows that the public may not be so forgiving.
“We understand that it will get sensationalized a little bit. I’ll probably be called a home wrecker and Dan will cop it because his wife was pregnant when he slept with me, but it’s not that black and white.
“I know we’re both good people and that everyone is OK. People will have their opinions but the only ones who matter are those of our friends and family. That’s enough to help me sleep at night.”
