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The story
Model Aki shared on Instagram that she celebrated the 59th birthday of her ex-husband, former pro baseball star Kazuhiro Kiyohara, with a cake decorated with family photos. Her caption — “I’ll be by your side for the year leading up to your kanreki (a traditional 60th-birthday milestone in Japan)” — set off a flurry of theories on 5ch (a major Japanese anonymous forum), ranging from “she’s just too embarrassed to explain” to talk of a “fake divorce.” Commenters also weighed in on Kiyohara’s character and on Aki’s current career.
Kazuhiro Kiyohara’s 59th Birthday… Ex-Wife Aki: “I’ll Be By Your Side for the Year Until Your Kanreki…” — Prepares Cake with Family Photos to Celebrate
On August 18, 2026, model Aki (57) updated her Instagram Stories to mark her ex-husband Kazuhiro Kiyohara’s 59th birthday, sharing family photos in the process.
■ “I’ll Be By Your Side for the Year Until Your Kanreki…”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article
What people said
I genuinely have no idea.
Can't even guess.
They've probably gone full 'just friends.'
Doesn't work as a married couple, but plenty of exes get along great once they're just friends.
It was basically a fake divorce all along.
Guess they've given up hiding it now.
If you put him on a hero pedestal you'll be seriously let down by his character.
But if you just think of him as a 'big kid' and watch over him, he somehow comes off endearing.
I'm a bit younger than his generation and I can't stand him.
Low batting average at Seibu (his first pro team) yet full of himself anyway, then at the Giants he didn't even take the game seriously and put his energy into bullying teammates instead.
Zero good impressions of the guy from me.
Isn't it just her covering embarrassment?
She hasn't remarried anyone either —
I'd guess out of sheer kindness she'll just stay close to him till the end.
Maybe so.
But I can't help suspecting something like: their eldest son is set to marry next year, and once that's wrapped up, it's a clean goodbye.
Why would you say that lol
Aki's all over TV these days.
If anything, his ex-wife earns more than him now.
You see her constantly in fashion spreads aimed at middle-aged women — the whole 'Aki wears such-and-such' genre.
I'd say she's one of the more in-demand models in her age bracket.
They still seem to be in touch too — it's a strange relationship somehow.
That's probably just Aki's sense of loyalty/generosity.
The kids love Kiyohara too, so I guess this setup feels natural for everyone at this point.
He was arrested over shabu (Japanese slang for methamphetamine), so I think she wanted the divorce to send the message 'we have nothing to do with Kiyohara.'
Their kids were enrolled at Keio (a prestigious private school system), so my guess is staying enrolled required the divorce.
I wonder if he treated her really well back at the start.
Apparently he had his wife's parents, who needed nursing care, moved in nearby.
She's said she's grateful she got to care for them with no regrets right up until they passed.
For someone in his mid-fifties, that's actually holding up well.
his mental state just isn't stable.
That's exactly why his ex-wife and the whole family keep an eye on him.
If it's a side effect of antidepressants, that would explain a lot.
I think he's still seeing a doctor for it now —
heard it straight from Kiyohara himself in some interview.
Background and Key Points
Kiyohara’s kanreki (still a year off, at 60) is a genuine cultural marker in Japan — a traditional milestone tied to the 60-year sexagenary calendar cycle, when someone is said to return to the astrological sign of their birth year and start a symbolic “second life.” It carries much more social weight than a Western 59th birthday, which is why Aki’s promise to “stay by his side” until that date read as loaded rather than casual. The two divorced years ago amid Kiyohara’s 2016 arrest for methamphetamine possession, a scandal that ended his broadcasting career and public standing after a celebrated career as a Seibu Lions and Yomiuri Giants slugger and national idol. Aki has since rebuilt a career as a fashion model aimed at middle-aged women, while retaining the Kiyohara surname and visible closeness with him and their children.
The thread didn’t converge on any single reading of “by your side” — some read it as a couple functionally still together despite the paper divorce, some as Aki simply managing public embarrassment on his behalf, others floated a “clean break” theory tied to their eldest son’s upcoming wedding, and a few leaned into pure cynicism about money.
What’s easy to miss reading this in English is that keeping the Kiyohara name and staying visibly involved after a drug arrest isn’t sentimental inertia — commenters explicitly tied the divorce itself to protecting the children’s enrollment at Keio, an elite private school system where a parent’s scandal can have real consequences. That legal-in-name-only separation, common in Japan for reputation management, is the background that makes “fake divorce” theories plausible rather than just tabloid speculation.
This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Sports & Entertainment Express+) thread “[Baseball] Kazuhiro Kiyohara’s 59th Birthday… Ex-Wife Aki: ‘I’ll Be By Your Side for the Year Until Your Kanreki…’ — Prepares Cake with Family Photos to Celebrate.”
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