The NBA player has put the reality star through hell and back since they started dating in 2016. Now that he has left LA, Khloe is ready to heal.

Season 5 of The Kardashians premiered on Thursday, May 23 on Hulu, and it gave a glimpse into how things might improve for Khloe Kardashian after her ex Tristan Thompson left Los Angeles. After years of dealing with the relationship’s drama and aftermath, Khloe will now have more space and freedom to return to herself away from the father of her two children, True and Tatum. Their relationship woes have played out on the reality series since the family’s E! series.

The basketball player has moved back to Cleveland, Ohio after signing with the Cavaliers, the team he used to play for when he first got into a relationship with Khloe. They began dating in 2016, soon after Tristan was in a relationship with ex-girlfriend Jordan Craig, who welcomed their first child that December. While Tristan was about to become a dad, Khloe was still legally married to Lamar Odom. While she had filed for divorce in 2013, she withdrew the divorce after he was found unconscious in a Nevada brothel in October 2015 so that she could make medical decisions on his behalf. The former couple didn’t rekindle their relationship after he recovered, and she proceeded with the divorce in December 2016.

When she started dating Tristan, it seemed like the Good American founder had finally found a second chance at love after the dissolution of her first marriage. The illusion soon faded in April 2018 when a video was circulated online of Tristan making out with two women at a nightclub when Khloe was eight months pregnant. Khloe gave birth to their first child together, True, two days after the video went public. But it got even worse after that. Almost a year later, the couple broke up again after it was reported that he had cheated on Khloe with her little sister Kylie Jenner’s best friend, Jordyn Woods.

After those incidents, it seemed obvious that the relationship would be over, but it wasn’t. The couple continued dating, on and off, until it was revealed that he had gotten a woman named Maralee Nichols pregnant while dating Khloe. Maralee gave birth in December 2021, and it was later revealed that Tristan and Khloe were also expecting a second child together via surrogate. They welcomed their son Tatum in July 2022.

Most of her storylines on Keeping Up and in their new Hulu show, The Kardashians, have since revolved around the damage Tristan had done to her and their relationship for years. Khloe has previously shared that the past decade of her life hasn’t been easy, and she has had to live the lowest moments in her life in front of the world. While motherhood can be a special time, it is also a vulnerable experience, and Khloe has had to deal with the upheaval caused by Tristan’s actions while caring for her two newborn babies. It seems the sister affectionately known as “Khlo Money” has become a shell of herself since we first met her back in 2008, and all signs point to Thompson as the reason.

Khloe Kardashian Continues Allowing Tristan Thompson to Have Access to Her

Khloe has allowed Tristan to continue being a part of the family’s reality show. He was also temporarily living at Khloe’s while his new house was being renovated, and her mother, momager Kris Jenner, even helped him get a job as an NBA analyst on the NBA Today team on ESPN. While they may not be together, Tristan continued to be a major part of her day-to-day life. So could she ever move on?

There has been a spark that was lost along the way with Khloe. In earlier seasons of KUWTK, Khloe was a much different person. People change with time, but Khloe made a complete transformation. She made a drastic change physically and in terms of her personality, or at least based on what she shows fans on TV.

In several episodes from earlier seasons of the E! show, Khloe is the one who stands up for her sisters. She was confident, fierce, and outspoken, and even got physical with one of her sister’s now-exes to protect her. Khloe and Scott Disick didn’t get along because of his behavior toward his then-girlfriend Kourtney Kardashian. She often berated her big sister for staying with Scott through infidelity and his frequent outlandish behavior. But this new version of Khloe tolerated infidelity not once but twice, in her first marriage to Lamar, and her relationship with Tristan.

The Public Has Been Less Than Kind to Khloe Kardashian Because of Tristan Thompson

Another element that likely affected Khloe is how the public views her because of her relationship with Tristan. While she earned people’s respect for being by her ex Lamar’s side amid his health battle, that grace faded away when she entered the relationship with Tristan and then got pregnant by him. Some fans speculated that Tristan got involved with the reality star while he was still in his previous relationship with the mother of his first child, Jordan, who was pregnant when they broke up. This gave outsiders a leg up to say that Khloe deserved her fate with Tristan for hurting another woman, saying that he was her “karma.” Khloe has been constantly the topic of social media conversation, and very little compassion has been extended her way, even while she was pregnant. While her battles have been enough to crush even the strongest person, Khloe found herself also having to deal with the intense external scrutiny and ridicule that comes with being publicly cheated on.

Khloe Kardashian Put Her Happiness on Pause For Tristan Thompson

The second time around, people showed her even less mercy when Tristan got somebody else pregnant. Khloe opened up about how difficult the experience was for her on the SHE MD podcast in May 2024, with hosts Dr. Thaïs Aliabadi and Mary Alice Haney, she addressed what it was like to be expecting a child while learning about her partner fathering another baby.

“So it was a couple days before Thanksgiving and I ended up doing the transfer. And then the first week of December, I found out that my ex was actually having a baby with somebody else,” she said. “And then the entire pregnancy of my surrogate, I admittedly buried my head in the sand and I said to Dr. A, ‘I can’t do this.’ And the whole surrogacy pregnancy, I was really detached.”

“I couldn’t really face it. I very much think I was in denial that this is happening,” she continued. “So I didn’t get to really attach during the pregnancy part.” Previously on The Kardashians, Khloe had a conversation with her mother about not being able to connect with her son Tatum right away likeshe did with her daughter True. The bond wasn’t as instant, she said, and while the surrogacy angle could have something to do with it, having to experience so much turmoil while on the brink of welcoming both of your kids is bound to take a toll on someone.

The Season 5 premiere showed that Khloe’s attitude has become a problem between her and big sister Kim Kardashian. The Skims founder alludes to her little sister being a recluse, more reserved than before, and not letting herself enjoy life. In Episode 1, Khloe turns down a trip to Paris Fashion Week to stay home with her children, and Kim doesn’t seem happy about it. While Kim, who has four kids, works nonstop and isn’t afraid to jump on her private jet and travel all over the world, Khloé says she is content being at home with her kids.

She also opened up about the NBA player moving away, comparing his departure to a “bird leaving the nest” and jokingly said she hoped he wouldn’t be returning “anytime soon.” “I feel like the past couple years have been — I don’t know if traumatic is too big of a word — but I feel like the past couple years, or maybe the past decade, has really been a very heavy time in my life,” she said in the episode. “And I don’t necessarily get a lot of time to just like, heal.”

This is the opportunity fans have been waiting for to see if she will branch out and return to the Khloe they used to know. The Khloe viewers met at the start of KUWTKT was a vibrant, fun, up-for-anything hilarious, and protective sister that people wished they had in their corners. The rise and fall of her relationships had a profound impact on her. She seems more soft-spoken and introverted than before. They have also affected her relationship with sister Kourtney, who refused to welcome Tristan back into the family with open arms after his several instances of disrespect. Unlike Kim who has built a friendship with Tristan even after all the drama, Kourtney stood up for her sister and did for Khloe what she once did for her with Scott. Keeping Up With the Kardashians wouldn’t have succeeded without Khloe and Kourtney’s antics when they were closer and without Khloe being who she was.

But now that Tristan is out of the picture and living in another city, Khloe said she will be “taking time for” herself. “The move-in and all of these changes was still just so overwhelming for me,” she said. “Now that he’s going to Cleveland, I can imagine I’ll just feel a relief. I don’t care who it is, I need space.” So now, with the space to heal, the resurgence of Khlo-Money might be closer than fans think.