Jennifer Garner on Her Divorce From Ben Affleck: 'I Would Not Have Chosen' to Be Single
Many were shocked two years ago when news broke that Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck were separating. In April of this year, they filed for divorce, making their uncoupling official. Since then, the media attention surrounding them has been pretty intense. Remember back in June, when Garner took to Facebook and shot down a People magazine article that discussed how she was coping with “heartbreak?” That was just one of many stories formed this year about her personal life.
But Garner’s reclaiming the narrative. The actress sat down with news.com.au for an interview and got pretty candid about her life post-divorce.
“I would not have chosen this life for myself or for my kids,” she said. “I would not choose to be single or be in this position. It’s something that we are working through. I haven’t been on a date, and I am not interested in dating. People want to set me up, and I am just like, ‘No thank you!’”
The last time Garner spoke this openly about Affleck was in her March 2016 Vanity Fair cover interview. “He’s the love of my life,” she said. “What am I going to do about that? He’s the most brilliant person in any room, the most charismatic, the most generous. He’s just a complicated guy. I always say, When his sun shines on you, you feel it.’ But when the sun is shining elsewhere, it’s cold. He can cast quite a shadow.”
That last sentence was perhaps foreshadowing for what’s happened recently with Affleck. He’s currently one of several men in Hollywood who’ve been accused of sexual harassment. (Specifically, One Tree Hill actress Hilarie Burton claims Affleck groped her breasts in 2003.) Garner didn’t speak directly about Affleck’s accusations, but she did say it’s important these stories are coming out.
“Things have to come out in the open in order to be dealt with, and this is definitely one of those times,” she said. “It’s messy, it’s not pretty, but a wound when it’s healing is a horrible thing to look at and to be around. That is where we are. There are a lot of really smart people asking tough questions, and I feel excited to see what the outcome will be.”
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