Wendy Papadopoulos Wendy Papadopoulos ( née Crozier ) had an affair with Ken Barlow in 1989 which led to his first divorce from Deirdre . Wendy met Ken professionally through her position as Planning Committee secretary for Weatherfield Council , when Ken was the owner of the " Weatherfield Recorder " . Wendy and Ken found that they shared their disdain of the secrecy and corruption of the Council and came up with a scheme where Wendy passed on details of Council plans to the " Recorder " , giving the paper an edge over the more popular " Gazette " free sheet . Ken didn ' t tell Deirdre the source of the leaks as she worked on the Council and he feared she would expose Wendy . When Deirdre herself came under suspicion of being Ken ' s mole , Ken printed information on council plans she wasn ' t aware of to absolve her , but when senior councillors pressurized Deirdre to find out the truth , Ken confessed to her on the condition that she didn ' t tell her bosses . Deirdre kept her promise but warned Ken and Wendy to stay away each other . Realising that Deirdre was serious , Ken and Wendy cut ties . For a while , Wendy and Ken didn ' t see each other but when Deirdre told Ken about Mike Baldwin selling Baldwin ' s Casuals to Maurice Jones , he got the full story out of Wendy that Maurice was also buying the Community Centre . Chairman Peter Reynolds was about to sack Deirdre , forcing her to name Wendy as Ken ' s mole . Wendy was sacked for gross misconduct but a sympathetic Ken , who felt responsible for her losing her job , offered her a position with the " Recorder " . Wendy accepted . At a time when he was rowing a lot with Deirdre , Ken ' s good relationship with Wendy was an antidote to how he was treated at home . When Deirdre forgot Ken ' s birthday , Wendy laid on a meal for him and they shared a kiss . They then entered into an affair - and both were equally keen ; Wendy decided to leave the " Recorder " so that Ken could use having to run the office himself as an excuse to stay late , when he was actually seeing her and letting the paper go to ruin . This was a good arrangement for Wendy and Ken in the early days of their affair but Wendy grew dissatisfied with being Ken ' s bit on the side and told him to tell Deirdre the truth . Ken agreed but when Wendy saw Deirdre and noticed she was still in the dark , Wendy told Ken not to call her until he ' d sorted his marriage out . Ken still didn ' t tell Deirdre but Wendy missed him too much and they spend Christmas Eve together . When Wendy next saw Ken , on New Year ' s Eve , he told her that Deirdre knew but that he didn ' t know what to do . Deirdre and Wendy refused to share Ken but he was incapable of choosing between them ; Deirdre eventually decided for him and threw him out of their house . Wendy took him in at 47 Church Road and supported him by helping him with the " Recorder " while he worked out the arrangements of his split from Deirdre but as he ' d mortgaged their house to buy the paper , Deirdre was demanding half of the " Recorder " ' s profits and Ken was forced to sell to the " Weatherfield Gazette " to pay off the remainder of No . 1 ' s mortgage . Ken and Wendy were kept on in their current positions by the new owners . With Ken came his daughter Tracy , who formed a good relationship with Wendy when visiting her and Ken , much to Deirdre ' s displeasure . In March 1990 , Ken resigned from the " Gazette " when the editor , Jeff Richmond , criticised him for being too taken up by personal problems . Wendy was offered Ken ' s job and she accepted . Their relationship deteriorated over the next two months through the strain of Ken ' s unemployment and the continued involvement of Deirdre and Tracy in their lives . In April , Wendy insisted that Ken meet her stepmother Sylvia Crozier . He had to cancel a meeting with Tracy to be there and ended up rowing with Wendy in front of Sylvia , embarrassing her . When Ken sunk into a depression which Wendy couldn ' t lift , Ken admitted to her that he should never have left Deirdre and then walked out on Wendy . After being alone for a year , Wendy met a man named Christos Papadopoulos and got married in 1991 . They moved away to Norfolk and spent fifteen years there , but when Christos developed lung cancer and eventually passed away , Wendy moved back to the Manchester area . When Ken stood for Chair of Governors at Bessie Street School in September 2012 , he was shocked to be reunited with Wendy as she was also a governor at the school . Ken was voted in , although he planned to pack in the job as he felt he couldn ' t work with Wendy . However , they met up for a drink to talk things over , and Ken decided to keep the job although didn ' t tell Deirdre who he had been remarried to for seven years . Wendy also told Ken about what she had been up to since they separated , including her marriage to Christos and his later passing . When Ken got drunk one night and didn ' t come home , Deirdre became suspicious that they had rekindled their affair , and she went with Rita Tanner to pay Wendy a visit . It had been entirely innocent , Ken having slept on Wendy ' s sofa , but it turned out that Wendy did want to reignite things , and she lied to Deirdre , saying they ' d slept together . A distraught Ken told Wendy that he didn ' t want to see her again even as a friend , and Deirdre realised that he ' d been telling the truth all along .