Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez in Los Angeles on May 10, 2023.Photo:John Salangsang/Variety via Getty
John Salangsang/Variety via Getty
Jennifer Lopezsays she andBen Affleckstill have “PTSD” from the time of their first romance.
Ahead of the release of her new album and companion film,This Is Me … Now,Lopez, 54, revealed toVarietythat she has some worries about putting her love life in the spotlight again.
“As artists, we have to follow our heart and this is me following my heart and doing something that maybe everybody didn’t think was the best idea, but I had to do it,” she told the outlet.
She added, “We both have PTSD," about the media frenzy she and Affleck, 51, faced when they first dated. (The tworekindled their relationshipin April 2021, aftersplitting in 2004.)
“But we’re older now. We’re wiser,” Lopez continued. “We also know what’s important, what’s really important in life, and it’s not so much what other people think. It’s about being true to who you are.”
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Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck in the early 2000s.DOUG KANTER/AFP via Getty
For the couple, a lot has changed in 18 years. “We’re older now, we’re smarter, we have more experience, we’re at different places in our lives, we have kids now, and we have to be very conscious of those things,” Lopez told PEOPLE in a February 2022 cover story.
The superstar spouses,who are parents to five kidsbetween them, also have the benefit of life lessons gleaned along the way.
“It’s a beautiful outcome that this has happened in this way at this time in our lives where we can really appreciate and celebrate each other and respect each other,” said the pop powerhouse andMarry Meactress. “We always did, but we have even more of an appreciation because we know that life can take you in different directions.”
Looking back at the pomp and media circus that surrounded their relationship before they split in 2004, Lopez told PEOPLE, “I think we arestrong enough now to know what’s realand what’s not, whereas when we were younger maybe some of those outside voices were a little bit tougher for us to reconcile and survive.”
Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez in Los Angeles on Dec. 5, 2023.Kevin Winter/Getty
Kevin Winter/Getty
This Is Me … Nowwill serve as a sequel to Lopez’s 2002 albumThis Is Me … Then. Both the new album and companion film of the same name areset to drop on Feb. 16, 2024.
The project will also mark the “If You Had My Love” singer’s first studio album in 10 years, followingA.K.A.in 2014.
“You have to see it and you’ll have to experience it to understand it,” Lopez toldVarietyof the film. That’s why I call ita ‘musical experience.’Because there’s music, you can see it, you can hear it and then you’ll get to live it.”
source: people.com
