After 30 years of marriage, Mark Consuelos finally broke his silence on the shocking, life-altering advice his late father gave him about relationships. This one secret changed everything, leading him straight to Kelly Ripa and sparking a Hollywood romance no one saw coming. What did his father really tell him

Mark Consuelos is sharing the secret to his relationship with Kelly Ripa after three decades of marriage.

The couple, both 55, celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary on May 1. During Mark’s appearance on the May 14 episode of iHeartRadio’s I’ve Never Said This Before with Tommy DiDario podcast, the Live with Kelly and Mark co-host revealed the key to his long-lasting marriage.

“One of the great things my dad taught me was — and I’m not sure how we got on this conversation, maybe I was going through a breakup early on in college — he’s like, ‘You know, you gotta find somebody that’s better than you, Mark,’ ” Mark shared. “He didn’t say marry above your station, but he said, ‘Find somebody who’s gonna pull you up, that’s gonna make you better.’ And I did. I was lucky enough to find somebody like that.”

Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos attend the 97th Annual Oscars at Dolby Theatre on March 02, 2025 in Hollywood, California. — Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos in March 2025. Kevin Mazur/Getty

Mark’s father, Saul Consuelos, died on March 23 after a lengthy illness.

Elsewhere during the “Hot Takes and Hangouts” portion of the podcast, Mark acknowledged that fans are “super invested” in his marriage, and doesn’t believe they “get anything wrong” about it.

“They watched us fall in love on a soap, and they saw these two characters, like playing boyfriend and girlfriend like, ‘I knew you guys were in love.’ And like, yeah, we were. We really, really, really, really were,” said Mark, who played his wife’s love interest on the daytime drama All My Children.

He continued, “So I think that they’re invested, super invested in our relationship, and [we’ve] kind of been together on TV from the beginning, and now full circle on a show in the morning. So I don’t know, I think what you see is what you get.”

Mark Consuelos and Kelly Ripa pose together — Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos on ‘All My Children’.Robert Milazzo/Disney/Getty

Mark and Ripa eloped in Las Vegas on May 1, 1996, after one year of dating. They share three children: Michael, 28, Lola, 24, and Joaquin, 23.

While chatting about their milestone wedding anniversary on Live with Kelly and Mark, Ripa said that marrying Mark was the “best thing [she’s] ever done in [her] life.” Mark added that their connection felt inevitable from the start, sharing, “I feel like it wasn’t even a decision. It was like, it was a thing that was destined to happen.”