“I first met my husband on our engagement day”- TV Cook Nadiya Hussain

Nadiya Hussain has reflected on her life as a wife and mother, revealing that she doesn’t want her children to have an arranged marriage like she did. The 32 year old mother of three became 2016’s star baker after she was crown the winner of The Great British Bake Off.

According to Dailymail Despite being happily married to her husband Abdal for 11 years, the star admitted that saying I do to a total stranger at 19 was tough. She vowed that her family will move with the times and choose their own partners when the time comes.

“It’s tough, you are pretty much marrying a complete stranger. We need to move with the times. I don’t think my children need me to find them a husband or a wife. They will do a better job than I will.”

Reflecting on her own experience, she insisted that marriage has taught her the importance of determination and commitment in a relationship.

“I had an arranged marriage, and learnt you have to persevere and remember we are all human and all have faults. Obviously my husband Abdal has more faults than I do!

We had to live through the good and the bad, and have come out the other side. Love is strange… It creeps up on you and then smacks you in the face. I didn’t know my husband, and then we had two children, and then I fell in love with him.”

Hussain said she had met husband Abdal once before their wedding day – on the day of their engagement – but they had spoken for six months over the phone.

“I asked all the right questions, sort of things like, do you have a 10-year forecast, what do you plan on doing in 10 years, how many kids would you like, are you going to live with your parents, when do you plan on buying your house?”

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Her candid discussion comes after she initially struggled with her identity so tied to her being a Muslim when she first took part in The Great British Bake Off.

But she said that, despite having been subjected to some negativity, she learned how ‘lovely’ the general British public are with their overall reaction towards her.

“I certainly didn’t enter a baking show in the hope of representing anyone. Being a Muslim for me was incidental, but from the day the show was launched, I was the 30-year-old Muslim and that became my identity.”

In her Interview, she revealed that not matter how much her husband has been good to her or how much she was in love with him, she would never advice anyone to arrange their children’s marriages as it comes with its own psychological challenges.

Photo credit: Dailymail