When his father was home, the Dwights had vehement arguments that significantly distressed John. Nigel and Vanessa Lawson divorced in 1980, when Nigella was 20. They the two remarried: her father that calendar year to a House of Commons researcher, Therese Maclear (to whom he was married until 2008), and her mom, in the early 1980s, to philosopher A. J. Ayer (they remained married till her mother's loss of life).