It was the whirlwind that nobody saw coming. One month. That’s all it took for Lamar Odom and Khloe Kardashian to go from "nice to meet you" to "I do" in a televised wedding that felt like a fever dream. If you were watching Keeping Up With the Kardashians in 2009, you remember the vibe. It was chaotic, sure, but it felt oddly real. People rooted for them. They were "Khlomar."
But the reality was a lot darker than the E! cameras ever showed. While we were watching them launch a unisex fragrance and joke around in their Calabasas mansion, a massive storm was brewing.
The Marriage Nobody Actually Knew
Looking back, the timeline is wild. They met at a party for Lamar’s teammate Metta Sandiford-Artest (then Ron Artest) and were married 30 days later. You’ve probably heard people say it was for the show, but if you look at how Khloe handled the aftermath, that’s hard to believe. She was all in.
Lamar was at the top of his game. He was the Lakers' "Sixth Man of the Year," a versatile 6'10" forward who could do everything on the court. He was beloved. Khloe, meanwhile, was finally stepping out of the shadows of her sisters. They seemed like a powerhouse.
Then came the trade.
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In 2011, the Lakers traded Lamar to the Dallas Mavericks. It broke him. Honestly, that trade was the beginning of the end. He went from being a core part of a championship team in his home city to feeling like "damaged goods" in Texas. His play plummeted. He was mentally absent. This is where the secrets started to pile up like a mountain.
What was hidden from the cameras?
- The Binging: Lamar later admitted he was using cocaine heavily during this time.
- The Infidelity: He wasn't just cheating; he was living a double life. In his memoir Darkness to Light, he confessed to having affairs with over 2,000 women.
- The Disappearances: Khloe would later reveal she spent nights driving around looking for him at sketchy motels while telling the world—and her own family—that everything was fine.
She once missed a Beyoncé concert because she was hiding the fact that her husband was missing. Think about that. The level of "fake it 'til you make it" was exhausting.
The 2013 Breaking Point and the 2015 Crisis
By 2013, the wheels had totally come off. Lamar was arrested for a DUI in August. Khloe filed for divorce in December. Most people thought that was the end of the book.
It wasn't.
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Fast forward to October 2015. The news broke that Lamar Odom was found unconscious at the Love Ranch brothel in Crystal, Nevada. He was in a coma. He had suffered 12 strokes and six heart attacks. Doctors didn't think he’d make it.
Here is where it gets complicated. Khloe and Lamar were technically still married because the divorce papers hadn't been processed by the court yet. Suddenly, Khloe was the one legally responsible for making his medical decisions. She dropped everything. She put the divorce on hold—not because they were getting back together, but because she didn't want him to die alone or have his medical care handled by strangers.
It was a caregiver move, not a romantic one. She spent months by his side, helping him learn how to walk and talk again. She even hid the details of how he ended up in the hospital from him for a while, just so he could focus on recovering without the shame.
Where do Khloe and Lamar stand in 2026?
People still ask: do they talk?
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Recently, we got a glimpse into their current dynamic. In early 2025, they actually sat down for a reunion on The Kardashians. It was the first time they’d seen each other in nine years. Lamar was visibly shaking. He still calls her his "wife" sometimes, which Khloe has admitted is uncomfortable.
For Khloe, that chapter is closed and locked. She has described the end of that marriage as "almost like a death." She processed the trauma, did the work, and moved on to the next set of challenges (looking at you, Tristan Thompson).
Lamar is sober now. He often talks about Khloe as the "love of his life" and expresses deep regret. He even bought a custom-made doll that looked like her at one point—yeah, it's a bit much. But from her side? It’s nothing but "love from a distance." She wants him to be healthy, but she’s not looking back.
The Real Lessons from the Khlomar Era
- Trust your gut, not the hype. The "whirlwind romance" is often a red flag for underlying instability.
- Privacy has a cost. Khloe’s choice to hide Lamar’s addiction from her family for years led to her own "secondary trauma." Keeping secrets for an addict usually just enables the cycle.
- Forgiveness doesn't mean reconciliation. You can save someone's life and still decide they don't belong in yours.
If you're dealing with a partner facing addiction, the most important step isn't "saving" them—it's securing your own oxygen mask first. Khloe eventually realized that no amount of love could fix Lamar’s demons; he had to want to fix them himself.
To really understand the complexity of their situation, you should look into the specific clinical signs of "betrayal trauma" that often affect partners of those with long-term secret addictions. It explains a lot of the erratic behavior we saw from both of them during the 2012–2014 period.