Why have Tommy Dorfman and Peter Zurkuhlen split? 'Insatiable' star seeks 'different' partnership

Tommy said she's 'genuinely happy' for the first time in her life, a month after reintroducing herself as a trans woman

UPDATED FEB 3, 2022

Tommy Dorfman and Peter Zurkunhlen have split (Instagram)

Tommy Dorfman's husband Peter Zurkuhlen has announced their separation. The separation comes months after the '13 Reasons Why' actress came out as a transgender woman. The two are formally divorcing after five years of marriage. Tommy told Time magazine that her connection with husband Peter changed ever since she revealed her gender identification.

Tommy said, "The types of romantic partnerships I seek out are different. I was in a nine-year relationship in which I was thought of as a more male-bodied person, with a gay man." According to TMZ, Peter, a 33-year-old man, is the founder and CEO of ChipChop Holdings. He filed for divorce in a Los Angeles court on Tuesday, February 1. The stunning discovery came after the 29-year-old actress revealed her gender identity as a transgender woman in July.

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"I love him so much," Tommy said, "but we've been learning that as a trans woman, what I'm interested in is not necessarily reflected in a gay man. So we've had incredible conversations to redefine as friends." Tommy said she's "genuinely happy" for the first time in her life, a month after reintroducing herself as a trans woman. In an interview with In Style on August 24, she claimed, "I just switched my hormones, and I've never felt better in my life."

"I spent 28 years of my life suicidal and depressed and recovering from alcoholism and drug addiction. I don't think I've ever been genuinely happy until this past year," Tommy recalled. "I look at the Internet chronicle of photos of me since I started working and I can see how f**king unhappy I was in every photo. It's wild," the 'Insatiable' alum continued.

Despite the fact that Tommy is now a woman, she has stated that she would not change her name. "I'm named after my mom's brother, who passed a month after I was born, and I feel very connected to that name, to an uncle who held me as he was dying," she explained to In Style. "This is an evolution of Tommy. I'm becoming more Tommy. It is not a transition. Or it is, but not as an idea of going somewhere. Just that I am actually myself."