Sophia Bush Digs Deep Into the Criticism She’s Faced For Her Marriage

Getty

Sophia Bush

“One Tree Hill” alum Sophia Bush began dating Ashlyn Harris in 2023, months after she separated from Grant Hughes. Recently, while promoting her memoir, the actress reacted to criticism of her relationship that has stemmed from people assuming there was overlap between her relationships with Harris and Hughes.

Notably, this comes after Bush revealed that she’d secretly married Harris in the summer of 2025.

Sophia Bush Says Dealing With The Public’s Ideas About Her Marriage Is Challenging

PEOPLE interviewed Bush in October 2026 amid the press tour for her new book, “And I Will Tell You Mine: Notes from a Life in Progress.” During the conversation, her secret marriage to Harris came up, and the actress was asked about public perception.

“It’s not easy,” she began. “It’s not easy to be a person who, from a different hard thing, deals with PTSD, and it’s not easy to deal with the kind of abusiveness that digital media makes possible.”

“But what I know is that I can look at facts and records, and I know what’s true, and I have to practice knowing what is true being more important than whatever feels exciting to people who don’t know anything,” the 44-year-old added.

After that, she shared kind words about her wife, calling Harris “the best person I know.” After that, Bush highlighted Harris’ “integrity,” before adding, “And to witness the way she moves and always chooses the highest road possible, I don’t always get that right.”

Bush went on to say she not only loves Harris but also looks up to her. According to the “One Tree Hill” alum, “To have that kind of peace is something I didn’t know if I would ever get in my life, and I’m going to treasure it.”

The ‘One Tree Hill’ Actress Has Addressed the Rumors Before

Bush married Hughes in June 2022 after they were first linked two years earlier. However, they then separated in June 2023. After that, she began seeing Harris in October of that year after become close via a support group for people who were going through divorce.

Bush denied that there was any overlap in a personal essay published in Glamour in April 2024.

Regarding their initial connection, Bush said, “What I saw was a friend with her big, happy life. And now I know she thought the same thing about me.”

“It really took other people in our safe support bubble pointing out to me how we’d finish each other’s sentences or be deeply affected by the same things,” she added.

According to her, “When you’re so in the trenches of hardship—plus you have the added weight of having to go through it on a public stage—it can be hard to see anything but what’s right in front of you.”

Bush then revealed that after “confronting a lot of things,” she asked Harris out for dinner, which ended up lasting four hours. The actress called the dinner “truly one of the most surreal experiences of my life thus far.”

However, she then discussed when things took a turn with the public and how they perceived her relationship with Harris. “But there was a lot that quickly turned ugly too. People looking in from the outside weren’t privy to just how much time it took, how many painful conversations were had.”

From there, she denied that Harris was the reason for her marriage ending and denied the assertion that there had been overlap.