Kendall Revealed Why She Was Blindsided By Her Breakup With Joe

If you're craving the real tea on why Kendall Long and Joe Amabile broke up, you might want to give the Feb. 11 episode of Long's Down to Date podcast a listen. But if you don't have 37 minutes to spare, don't fret! I have all of the juiciest highlights of Long's incredibly honest conversation with her best friend Rachael Kevin here for you.

In the episode titled "Kendall Talks Breakups," Long admits that she was blindsided by the split. "I did not see it coming,” she told Kevin. “Every relationship has issues, but I feel like — with Joe and I —we were best friends. Everything was fun, we were getting a dog together. We had just moved in... Ultimately what happened was that Joe felt like he would have a better [life] in Chicago.” (Long and Amabile had been living together in LA.)

Long was so happy in their relationship that she was even planning their nuptials. “I thought Joe and I were going to literally be married,” she reminded her bestie. “If anyone knows me, I’m not the person that plans my wedding and I was literally doing that with Joe. But something weird about ending something with some that you thought you were going to marry [is] you almost feel like you have such a better idea of what you’re looking for.”

While things with Amabile did not go exactly as she had hoped, Long made it clear that she does not harbor any hard feelings toward him and that she ultimately understands where he was coming from. “In no way can I ever be upset with him and have [resentment] toward him changing his mind and choosing to move because I understand the stresses of living somewhere like LA away from your family," she explained. "That was also a huge reason why I didn’t see myself moving from LA at least at that point in my life.”

While their breakup statement, released to Bachelor Nation's blog on Jan. 29, did not go into as much detail on the split as Long did during her episode of Down to Date, the former couple did make it clear that the primary reason for their split was Amabile's desire to move back to Chicago. “We have decided mutually to go our separate ways," they wrote at the time. "Joe has made the decision to move back to Chicago while Kendall will be remaining in her hometown of Los Angeles.”

“Our family and friends have always been an extremely important element to who we are as people," they continued. "We can’t imagine continuing our lives without them closer, especially when thinking of starting a family of our own one day. We both respect each others’ decision and still have a great deal of love for each other. We appreciate all the love and support everyone has given us throughout our relationship."

For more details on the split, check out the "Kendall Talks Breakups" episode of Long's Down to Date podcast here.