After a whirlwind few years of welcoming their first child, Blake, and presenting a no-holds-barred documentary about the surrogacy process, Brian Dowling and Arthur Gourounlian have branched out together once again with a new book about their lives.
Modern Family, Births, Marriages, Deaths and Everything in Between is a candid look at their early lives and their marriage together, charting the ups and downs and many previously unknown facets of their lives.
The couple joined the Ray D'Arcy Show to talk about the book, which they said was a chance to be honest with not only fans, but each other.
"We wanted to be really, really honest with our lives, because our lives have been quite dramatic. A lot has happened", Brian said.
The former Big Brother winner and presenter added that he had been approached to write a book before, but turned them down until the right time.
"I was 23 when I was offered my first book, and I was like, what the hell have I got to say at 23?! I'd literally just come out of the closet and I was gay and I'd won a reality TV show, I worked at Ryanair and I was like, no!" he said.
"When I want to tell my story, I want to be older, I want to be informed, I want to be wiser but also, I want to be able to tell my story when I'm happy to tell my story. Looking back on my life very matter of fact, truthfully, honestly but also that I have the courage to be able to speak freely and just say, this is how it was."
He added that he wanted to open up these parts of his life in a way that "there was no real trauma from it".
"Being in my 40s and being married and having a family afforded me that comfort of being able to look back very matter of fact, with clarity and go, 'this is my story, this is what happened, but this is where we are now'.
Arthur agreed with wanting clarity on his side of the story, and said there are some chapters where he couldn't tell everything. "But it was like a therapy for me, actually, writing that."
The dancer and presenter revisits parts of his early life that he said he's never spoken about publicly, or to his husband.
"I never showed that side because I never wanted people to be feeling sorry for me. I just wanted to dance, enjoy my life, I want to stay positive but I didn't want to think about it and now writing the book, I literally felt safe, physically."
The book touches on his experience growing up amid conflict in Armenia in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
He recalls how when he was younger, leaving a music class, he saw a school friend "get picked up, put in a van to go to the war".
"I hid myself straight away", he said. "I went back home, shaking, and said that to my parents. That was the click, that's it, we have to leave here because we will never survive here."
Some of the stories were new to Brian, who read them for the first time while writing the book with Arthur. One such harrowing story is of when Arthur's father was held at gunpoint on a train travelling from Moscow to Belgium.
Brian noted how "angry and judgey" people can be when they base their perception of a person off of a short glimpse of their lives on social media.
"People would see Arthur looking fabulous on Dancing with the Stars, looking amazing, all the hair and the jewels", Brian said. "Then seeing me on Instagram or reality TV and have an opinion on whatever we've done, but I think the book, it's us and it's our lives and maybe people when they read it, if they read it, will go, 'oh, I get them now.'"
Listen back to the full interview with Brian and Arthur above.
