What to Know
In the 10 years since Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck decided to go their separate ways, Jennifer hasn’t spoken out much about what that time in her life was like for her. But after her new interview with Marie Claire that was just published, she’s changing all of that.
Jennifer made some rare comments about her divorce from Ben and how difficult that time in her life was on her, particularly when it came to losing the family that they had built together during their marriage.
She tried to avoid what the public was saying about their divorce.
Jennifer admitted that she tried to stay away from what the public and the media were saying about her divorce from Ben as it played out in front of the world, because she knew it would be way too hard for her.
“You have to be smart about what you can and can’t handle, and I could not handle what was out there,” she said.
The hardest part for her was the changing family dynamic.
However, she was surprised to find out that public opinion wasn’t actually the most difficult part of the process.
“The fact of it is what was hard,” she said. “The actual breaking up of a family is what was hard. Losing a true partnership and friendship is what was hard.”
Jennifer and Ben share three children, Violet, Seraphina, and Samuel, so their breakup also meant that she and Ben had to figure out how to co-parent, despite everything else that was going on in their lives at the time.
She took their split as an opportunity to “heal.”
Now, she’s learned to pay far less attention to the rumor mill. Jennifer added, “It doesn’t serve me to take in gossip about myself or anyone else, much less my kids, so I don’t do it.”
Something that “surprises” her about the way her life has turned out was that she and Ben have ended up finding “peace” in each other as co-parents, and from what Ben has said about his ex in the past, it seems like the feeling is definitely mutual.
“I think it’s important for women to know, when they think, ‘Oh, I’ll never see that, I’ll never have that feeling, I’ll never be friends with this person again,’ [that] time is the opportunity,” she said. “Time is the opportunity to heal. Time is the opportunity to forgive, to move on and to find a new way to be friends.”
