Updated on: August 28, 2025
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After navigating tragedy and handing out roses, Emily Maynard Johnson found The One in Tyler Johnson.
Before her time in Bachelor Nation, Maynard Johnson was engaged to NASCAR driver Ricky Hendrick. Following his untimely death in a plane crash at age 24, she learned she was pregnant. She gave birth to daughter Josephine Riddick “Ricki” Hendrick in June 2005.
Seven years later, Maynard Johnson won Brad Womack’s season of The Bachelor. The twosome called off their engagement in June 2011, several months after the finale aired. ABC subsequently named Maynard Johnson the season 8 Bachelorette and she accepted a proposal from Jef Holm. Not long after the season aired during summer 2012, the pair announced their breakup that October.
It wasn’t long before Maynard Johnson was in love again, as she reconnected with Johnson, whom she first crossed paths with pre-show. They got engaged in January 2014 after one year of dating and exchanged vows the following June.
Keep scrolling for a timeline of their relationship:
Though they met, before she took on the role as the season 8 Bachelorette, the twosome went on their first date in January 2013, months after her engagement to Holm ended.
"We met at church," she said in GMA in January 2014. "I think that’s why our relationship is so good now, because we started out as friends."
The duo welcomed Gibson Kyle in September 2016.
"I can't remember the last time I was bored," she joked to Entertainment Tonight that December. “We're always going and we just moved, so I'm trying to unpack. My to-do list is a mile long and I don't seem to get any of it done, but it's Christmas time. I'm giving myself a free pass."
The couple celebrated their 11th wedding anniversary in June.
“Somehow stronger through every storm,” Maynard Johnson wrote via Instagram. “I’m so proud to be your wife and love you more than words.”
Two months later, Ricki confirmed in August that she is expecting a baby, which will be Maynard Johnson and Johnson’s first grandchild.
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