Sharon Au has had multiple successes in her career as an actress-host and later in the corporate world, but people were extremely curious about her relationship status.

The 49-year-old is the latest guest on Joanne Peh's YouTube podcast What Do I Know?, released on March 14, where she recounted faking her marriage in 2014.

She shared: "I don't know why, all my life, people were asking about my relationship, am I with someone and why I'm not married yet. It got really, really bad when I came back from Japan, I was in my 30s already.

"As I was getting my footing in my career and life, every time I met a journalist or any time when there was a media report about my work, it would be overshadowed by the fact that I was still single and not seeing anyone, and that would always take up the bulk of the story."

This made her realise that the public was looking for a "happy ending" for her.

Sharon took a break from showbiz in 2005 to pursue her undergraduate studies in Japan's Waseda University with a scholarship from Mediacorp. After graduating in 2011, she returned to Singapore and joined the corporate office of the broadcasting company, eventually resigning in 2018.

In 2014, Sharon did a photo shoot for Star Awards where she wore a bridal gown and was asked about her relationship status again.

"I didn't set off to lie about me getting married… I remember the journalist coming up to me and going like, 'Wow, you're wearing a bridal gown, so beautiful, you're such a beautiful bride' and I don't know how it led to me lying, because they asked if I was seeing someone and I said, 'Yeah, actually I'm married'," she recounted to Joanne, who turns 42 next month.

She added that she was wearing a diamond ring which she had bought for herself — on her ring finger, because it was in the wrong size — which added to the narrative.

During the interview then, Sharon was also asked if she was going to hold a wedding banquet, to which she replied "[The ceremony] is actually over, I don't want to hold a banquet or have a big celebration. I am very happy and blissful now."

Sharon said in the podcast nobody asked about her relationship status after that interview and instead focused on her career achievements.

She added: "Sometimes people are not sensitive enough to see it from our point of view where we also want to be recognised for other things. At that point, I was actually very single and wasn't seeing anyone. I felt those questions started to make me feel something was wrong with me."

They also made her feel insecure about herself in forming romantic relationships.

"It's very embarrassing, even now after 10 years, to know that once upon a time I had to lie about my marriage status," Sharon said.

She had to come clean about her 'marriage' in 2018 after resigning from Mediacorp and announcing her move to Paris, as a reporter had asked if her 'husband' would be relocating with her.

"At that point, I was tongue-tied… I was caught and I realised, if I was going to continue with this lie, it was going to be quite fatal… everything (the lies) was not going to make sense and then I was going to get very confused," Sharon said.

She ended up "bursting out" to the reporter that the marriage wasn't true.

When asked if she was worried about her credibility after that, Sharon said she had her struggles about what was going to happen.

"[I had thought] whoever was going to read it, the whole of Singapore was going to laugh at me, they were going to say I was a liar.

"They were probably going to think, 'Wow, this person has been putting up such a fake personality to even have to lie about her marriage status. How insecure can she be?'" she said, adding that when the report was published, she went to Paris to "hide".

yeo.shuhui@asiaone.com

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