‘My earring’s gone! My diamond earring came off in the ocean,’ wailed Kim Kardashian from the crystal waters of her family holiday in Bora Bora in 2011. An instant piece of reality TV history, Kim’s breakdown proved quite how seriously she takes her diamonds (the earrings were estimated to be worth $75k) and also how ill-suited she was to her new boyfriend, Kris Humphries – the oaf who threw her fully clothed into the sea.

Despite repeated signs of incompatibility – Humphries was dismissive of her career, rude to her family, obnoxious to members of staff and seemed hellbent on getting her friend Jonathan Cheban, who has repeatedly said he is not gay, to come out – Kim got swept away in the fairytale and by August they were married.

The couple had been dating for less than a year when Humphries proposed, covering the floor of her Calabasas home with candles and red rose petals and bending down on one knee with an 18-karat emerald cut diamond in his hand.

Unfortunately, the reality star’s doubts began to set in at the worst moment – just before their $10 million wedding featuring 150 guests and a full film crew, which saw Kim wear three different custom Vera Wang dresses. Their marriage, rather famously, lasted 72 days, but they remained legally wed until 2013.

In the latest episode of The Kardashians, Kim revealed that Humphries only ‘contributed a fifth’ towards her engagement ring. Something that stung even more when he allegedly insisted on getting it back during their divorce proceedings. ‘I didn’t keep [the ring],’ she told her hair stylist Chris Appleton. ‘I was pregnant with North, still married to him and in order to divorce him, he said I had to give him the ring in my divorce.’

The ring was designed by Lorraine Schwartz, who the Kardashians have remained good friends with over the years. In fact, Kim and Khloe were on their way to Mumbai for the July 2024 wedding of Anant Ambani and Radhika Merchant with Schwartz in the episode, and the designer told her it was for the ‘best’ that she got rid of the ring.

As Kim said herself, by the time their divorce was being finalised she had already moved on with Kanye West and was pregnant with their first child. Their marriage had slightly more longevity and lasted between 2014 and 2021, and they share four children together – North, Saint, Chicago and Psalm. While there’s no doubt the birth of Kimye overshadowed Kardashian’s iconic 72-day marriage, it remains a fond memory for long-term fans whenever it pops up.

In 2021, Kim admitted that she felt ‘pressured’ to go through with her 2011 wedding because it was being filmed for Keeping Up With The Kardashians. ‘I thought, “Okay, we’re filming this for a TV show. If I leave, I’m going to be known as the runaway bride forever and it’s going to be a huge joke, and I think I just have cold feet,”’ she said. ‘So I was like, “Okay guys, it’s just cold feet, I got this, it’s cold feet, we’re filming the show.”’

As for the breakup itself, she has previously said she has regrets about the way it was handled. ‘I was so nervous to break up with someone, I handled it totally the wrong way. I fully broke up with him in the worst way, and I couldn’t, I just didn’t know how to deal. I learned so much from it,’ she added. While the conversation was not aired, the lead up to it was. ‘I honestly feel like I can’t do this anymore with Kris,’ she told her sister Kourtney and her then-partner Scott Disick. ‘I feel like I got into this way too fast. I don’t want to be married anymore.’ She explained that she felt ‘dead inside’ and ‘not herself’ in the marriage.

Writing in The Players’ Tribune about their marriage in 2019, Humphries put, ‘I met a girl who happened to be really famous, and I got married, and damn. Look, I should have known what I was getting into. I was definitely naïve about how much my life was going to change. But the one thing that really bothers me is whenever people say that my marriage was fake.’

‘Our actual relationship was 100% real,’ he added. ‘When it was clear that it wasn’t working… what can I say? It sucked. It’s never easy to go through the embarrassment of something like that – with your friends, with your family. But when it plays out so publicly, in front of the world, it’s a whole other level. It was brutal.’

Between them, the Kardashians have had their fair share of weddings and divorces. In another recent episode of the Disney+ show, Khloe reunited with her ex-husband Lamar Odom, who she was married to from 2009 to 2013, to return some of his belongings that she had been keeping since 2016. ‘Should I call Kris Humphries?’ Kim joked after hearing about the meet up. ‘That’s what I said,’ Khloe replied. ‘Get all the ex-husbands on here.’