23 times celebrities opened up about their divorces

Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise were married in 2006 and got divorced in 2012. After their separation, Holmes moved to New York City with her daughter Suri, who was 6 years old at the time.

Inher 2020 cover story with InStyle, Holmes opened up about that time in her life.

"That time was intense. It was a lot of attention, and I had a little child on top of it. We had some funny moments out and about in public," she said. "So many people I didn't know became my friends and helped us out, and that's what I love about the city."

In 2020, Ben Affleck opened up to The New York Times about his divorce from Jennifer Garner.

"The biggest regret of my life is this divorce," he told the publication. "Shame is really toxic. There is no positive byproduct of shame. It's just stewing in a toxic, hideous feeling of low self-worth and self-loathing."

The pair began dating in 2004, wed in 2005, and announced their separation in 2015. Their divorce was finalized in 2018.

In that same interview, Affleck was open about his battle with alcoholism and said he struggled with drinking as he faced more issues in his marriage.

In 2017, Brad Pitt spoke with GQ about his divorce from his second wife, Angelina Jolie.

"I heard one lawyer say, 'No one wins in court — it's just a matter of who gets hurt worse.'" he said. "And it seems to be true, you spend a year just focused on building a case to prove your point and why you're right and why they're wrong, and it's just an investment in vitriolic hatred. And fortunately my partner in this agrees."

Pitt and Jolie met when they were filming "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" in 2004, when Pitt was still married to actress Jennifer Aniston. Pitt and Aniston got divorced in 2005.

In 2010, Jolie filed for divorce from Pitt, which still hasn't been finalized. The pair shares six children.

In that same GQ interview, Pitt also addressed the toll the divorce has taken on his family.

"It's just very, very jarring for the kids, to suddenly have their family ripped apart," he said. "Our focus is that everyone comes out stronger and better people — there is no other outcome."

Ashton Kutcher took to Twitter when the news broke about his separation from Demi Moore.

"I will forever cherish the time I spent with Demi. Marriage is one of the most difficult things in the world and unfortunately sometimes they fail. Love and Light, AK" he wrote in a now-deleted tweet, per Reuters.

Kutcher and Moore started dating in 2003, and their relationship ended with a complicated separation and eventual divorce in 2013.

In February 2020, Kutcher shed a little more light on their relationship when he went on Marc Macron's "WTF" podcast. He explained that he still loves Moore's daughters, whose lives he was a part of for 10 years.

"I love them. I'm never going to stop loving them and respecting them and honoring them and rooting for them to be successful in whatever they are pursuing," he said.

After actress Eva Longoria finalized her divorce from NBA player Tony Parker in 2013, she appeared on an episode of "The Dr. Oz Show" and opened up about how the separation affected her mental health.

"That's probably the time I got the most compliments because I was so skinny. I was not eating. I was depressed. I was sad. My diet was coffee. So people kept saying, 'You look amazing. Divorce agrees with you,'" she said. "And I was like, I don't feel good. I have no energy."

"I didn't know I was depressed," she continued.

Longoria and Parker met in 2004 and wed in 2007. Longoria filed for divorce in 2010 and it was finalized in 2011.

Gwyneth Paltrow discussed the reasons behind her divorce from Coldplay singer Chris Martin in a 2015 interview with Marie Claire.

"I had built my life on trying to be all things to all people, and I just couldn't do it anymore," she said. "I really had the sense that I wasn't allowed to have needs, and I had to prove my specialness or self-worth by doing all this stuff and taking care of everybody else. And I just sort of hit a wall."

The two met backstage at a Coldplay concert in 2002 and were married a year later. They had two children together, Apple and Moses.

In 2014, Paltrow and Martin released a joint statement that said they were "consciously uncoupling," and their divorce was finalized in 2016.

They were able to find an amicable relationship, and Paltrow even said in a 2016 interview with Glamour, "We're still very much a family, even though we don't have a romantic relationship. He's like my brother."

During the 2018 documentary "Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams," Martin opened up about the toll his divorce from Paltrow took on his mental health.

"Listen, I'm never going to moan, I'm grateful for everything, but it was pretty touch and go," he said.

In 2018, after announcing her divorce from Channing Tatum, Jenna Dewan told Women's Health that the experience has helped her grow, though it has not been easy.

"I feel I've been on a wave of growth," she said. "It's always challenging to go through a big change and have the whole world have an opinion about it."

Tatum and Dewan met in 2006 on the set of "Step Up." In 2009, they were married, and four years later their daughter was born. The couple took to Instagram in 2018 with a statement announcing their amicable separation.

"We have lovingly chosen to separate as a couple. We fell deeply in love so many years ago and have had a magical journey together," the couple's statement read.

Their divorce was finalized in 2019.

Model Heidi Klum has said the pressure of a public divorce took the biggest toll on her, but her children have remained her priority.

In 2012, Klum told Elle, "I feel like I'm in the eye of the tornado. It's emotions inside of your body that are a tornado. And then the outside world doing all this craziness — with you wanting it or not wanting it — is another tornado. But as hard as it is, so is life."

Klum and Seal first met in 2003 and were married in 2005. The couple had three biological children together, and Seal adopted Klum's daughter from a previous marriage. Seal and Klum announced their separation in 2012, and their divorce was finalized in 2014.

In that same Elle interview, Klum also discussed why she and Seal stayed private about their split.

"I don't want to talk positively or negatively about the ups and downs that we had. Every couple goes through things. Unfortunately, we're in the public, so the highs are out there," she said. "But I don't think it's necessary — especially for our children — to have the lows being printed in magazines and talked about."

In 2019, Anna Faris opened up about her split from Chris Pratt on an episode of the podcast "Divorce Sucks!"

"It is very difficult to be completely separate from somebody you have spent so much emotional investment with," she said. "I had two 10-year relationships back to back so how do you emotionally leave that person behind?"

She continued, "Under all of these uncoupling circumstances, I think that we are so good and respectful towards each other, and I think there is so much kindness and love, and I know we want to get to that ultimate goal."

Faris and Pratt met on the set of "Take Me Home Tonight" in 2007 when Faris was still married to actor Ben Indra. Later that year, she filed for divorce from Indra, and she and Pratt started dating. The couple was married in 2009, and three years later they had their son, Jack.

In 2017, they filed for divorce and announced their separation via matching social-media posts, writing, "We still have love for each other, will always cherish our time together and continue to have the deepest respect for one another."

Pratt spoke about his and Faris' divorce in a 2018 interview with Entertainment Weekly.

"Divorce sucks. But at the end of the day, we've got a great kid who's got two parents who love him very much," he said. "And we're finding a way to navigate this while still remaining friends and still being kind to one another. It's not ideal, but yeah, I think both of us are actually probably doing better."

Amy Poehler wrote about her divorce from Will Arnett in her 2014 memoir "Yes Please," according to Radar Online.

"When you are a person going through a divorce you feel incredibly alone, yet you are constantly reminded by society of how frequently divorce happens and how common it has become," she wrote. "You aren't allowed to feel special, but no one knows the specific ways you are in pain."

Poehler met Arnett in 2000, and the couple was married in 2003. They had two children together before announcing their separation in 2012 and finalizing their divorce in 2016.

Per Radar Online, Poehler also wrote in her memoir, "Imagine spreading everything you care about on a blanket and then tossing the whole thing up in the air. The process of divorce is about loading up that blanket, throwing it up, watching it all spin, and worrying what stuff will break when it lands."

As Us Weekly reported, Kim Kardashian spoke about deciding to file for divorce from athlete Kris Humphries on a 2012 episode of "Kourtney and Kim Take New York."

"I feel awful that I made him move out here and change his whole life," she said on the episode. "I feel sad, I feel bad for the guy. He fell in love with me and I fell in love with him and now all my feelings have changed."

Kardashian and Humphries reportedly started dating between 2010 and 2011.

They got married in August of 2011, and 72 days after the wedding, Kardashian filed for a divorce that was finalized in 2013.

In a 2019 essay for The Players' Tribune called "I Never Wanted to Be That Guy," Humphries opened up about his and Kardashian's relationship and divorce, commenting on the rumors that it was a publicity stunt.

"Our actual relationship was 100% real," he wrote. "It's never easy to go through the embarrassment of something like that — with your friends, with your family ... But when it plays out so publicly, in front of the world, it's a whole other level. It was brutal."

In a 2008 interview with Parade magazine, Reese Witherspoon opened up about the negative effects of her divorce from Ryan Phillippe.

"There are things in my life that are hard to reconcile, like divorce," she told Parade. "Laying blame is so easy. I don't have time for hate or negativity in my life. There's no room for it. When you make wrong choices, you have to take responsibility for them: 'What part of this do I own?'"

Witherspoon and Phillippe met in 1997 and were married in 1999. They had two children together before announcing their divorce in 2006.

In a 2009 interview with Elle magazine, she spoke about how she felt the divorce was "very humiliating and very isolating."

"But, by the way, if it's not painful, maybe it wasn't the right decision to marry to begin with." she continued. "Those are the appropriate emotions."

In 2008, Phillippe spoke about his and Witherspoon's divorce in an interview with W magazine.

"It was a struggle — there were a good four or five months of not being able to get out of bed," he said. "It was the worst time in my life. You get through it. It's a process that's not easy, but I get less and less sad about it every day."

Mariah Carey opened up about her divorce from Nick Cannon in a 2016 interview with Complex.

Carey and Cannon were married in 2008 and had two children together. The couple confirmed their separation in 2014 and finalized their divorce two years later.

"I never thought I would have babies with someone and then get divorced. Like, 'Oh, great job. Repeat your past,'" she said.

"But life happens," she continued. "It was supposed to happen. It's fine. For [my children], I wish it hadn't happened that way. For me, it was ... [singing Johnny Mathis and Deniece Williams' 'Too Much, Too Little, Too Late'] 'Guess it's over. Call it a day.'"

Cannon reflected on his post-divorce feelings on marriage in a 2020 interview with Entertainment Weekly.

"I don't believe in marriage anymore," he said. "My mindset has changed. I have done that. I don't like doing things that I am not good at."

Drew Barrymore and Will Kopelman wed in 2012 after about a year of dating — this was Kopelman's first marriage and Barrymore's third. They had two children together before separating in 2016.

That year, they released a joint statement to People magazine announcing their separation.

"Sadly our family is separating legally, although we do not feel this takes away from us being a family," the statement read. "Divorce might make one feel like a failure, but eventually you start to find grace in the idea that life goes on.

In 2016, Barrymore spoke more about her divorce from Kopelman on an episode of the Netflix series "Chelsea."

"When you break up with somebody, you're like, 'Yeah, that didn't work.' When you get divorced, you're like, 'I'm the biggest failure. This is the biggest failure,'" she said on the episode, per Today. "It's so shameful and hard to actually go through that, even privately."

Russell Brand opened up about his feelings toward his ex-wife Katy Perry in a 2017 episode of the British talk show "John Bishop: In Conversation With ...," according to Elite Daily.

"I have come away from that experience and I still feel very warm towards her," he said. "When I hear about her or see her, I think 'Ah, there's that person, that person in the world.'"

Brand and Perry made their debut as a couple in 2009 and married the next year. In December of 2011, Brand filed for divorce, which was finalized in 2012.

Perry shared her feelings about her divorce from Brand in the 2012 film "Katy Perry: Part of Me," according to MTV.

"I thought to myself, 'When I find that person that's going to be my life partner, I won't ever have to choose [between the partner and my career],'" she said. "I have that same belief system with everything, from career to my life to my personal life, everything. And I will do everything it takes to not fail. And I did everything it took, but it still failed."

At that time, Perry told MTV News that even though it was difficult to deal with the subject of her divorce, she still kept Brand in her film, hoping that fans might be inspired by seeing her push through a difficult time in her life.

"In my personal struggle, you see me not changing and not giving up on this dream that I've had my whole life. Hopefully people are inspired by that," Perry said.

Nicole Kidman and Cruise met on the set of "Days of Thunder" in 1990 and were married within a year. They adopted two kids together before Cruise filed for divorce in 2001.

In 2012, Kidman opened up about the experience with People calling the time after the divorce the "loneliest, loneliest existence."

"But with Tom, it was a fantastic decade," she added. "I wish all of the people that have been involved in my life well, because it's very important to me to be in a place of forgiveness and love."

In a 2020 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Kelly Clarkson said she wanted to keep the details about her divorce from Brandon Blackstock private.

The pair first met in 2006, but they didn't officially become a couple until 2012. They got married a year later, and Clarkson filed for a divorce in 2020.

The singer told the publication that she's not being open about the divorce in order to protect their two children and Blackstock's two children from his previous marriage.

"I am a very open person, but I'm not going to be able to be truly open about this in certain aspects because there's kids involved," she said. "... There are a lot of little hearts involved in this and while people feel, 'Oh my gosh, what a loss ...' imagine how it is in the epicenter of the storm."

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