Although Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck look to have an idyllic co-parenting relationship now, the actress just admitted in an exclusive new interview with InStyle that the “upheaval” of their split while raising young kids caused her to step away from acting “for a long time.”
Jennifer Garner Explains Why She Worked ‘So Little’ When Her Kids Were Little
GettyGarner, 54, and Affleck, 53, married in 2005 but separated a decade later, eventually divorcing in 2018. They share three kids — Violet, 20, Seraphina, 17, and Samuel, 13 — who were very young as their famous parents were navigating their split.
“When my kids were little, I worked so little, and then we had such an upheaval in our family, that I really hardly worked for a long time,” she told InStyle for its, noting that she’s savoring the chance to take on more projects now, including Peacock’s new series “The Five Star Weekend,” premiering on July 9.
“I feel lucky because I really come at [acting] from a place of joy,” she told the outlet. “I’m not tortured. It’s not filling a hole. I just really love to do it. And I love to be around people who love to do it. I was really, really happy when I was working in summer stock and making a hundred bucks a week.”
But doing what she loved took a back seat while taking care of those she loves. The “Alias” alum told InStyle she had to give herself grace while raising her kids, explaining, “You have to raise yourself at the same time. And just be so radically kind to yourself about how imperfect it is. And that it is just going to be imperfect.”
“There’s no such thing as balance,” she continued. “There’s no such thing as doing it right. And when the big moments happen, you are okay, and that’s on you to know and understand so your child feels your okayness.”
Jennifer Garner Was There for Ex Ben Affleck During His Stints in Rehab
Garner did star in “Juno” and “The Kingdom” during the years she and Affleck were navigating their split and his struggles with addiction. In 2018, she was photographed taking Affleck to his third stint in rehab, per People, and visibly upset.
A year earlier, in March 2017, Affleck issued a statement after leaving a treatment facility to say he’d just “completed treatment for alcohol addiction; something I’ve dealt with in the past and will continue to confront.”
“I want to live life to the fullest and be the best father I can be,” he wrote at the time. “I want my kids to know there is no shame in getting help when you need it, and to be a source of strength for anyone out there who needs help but is afraid to take the first step. I’m lucky to have the love of my family and friends, including my co-parent, Jen, who has supported me and cared for our kids as I’ve done the work I set out to do. This was the first of many steps being taken towards a positive recovery.”
Looking back on barely working as she raised their kids and navigated Affleck’s crises, she told InStyle, “First of all, when you’re in a performance kind of role, you give up a year/year-and-a-half of performance while you are pregnant, having a baby, recovering.”
But Garner worked so little back then, her former agent, Patrick Whitesell, asked her to consider retiring from acting for good after the birth of her son, she told The Hollywood Reporter in 2021.
Recalling a phone call from Whitesell in 2012, urging her to either accept an offer to star in “Dallas Buyers Club” or retire, she told THR, “I knew I’d asked enough of my representatives, who’d been working their tails off for me and I had said no to everything and kept getting pregnant. But I was truly overwhelmed by a third kid. Ben was making ‘Argo’ and I was just trying to keep the plates spinning. I also knew that I didn’t want to be done acting, so I said, ‘OK, I’ll do it.'”
Now that their kids are older and she’s able to be away more, she told InStyle that she cherished having “this year and a half where I just indulged [in acting], because this job is very selfish. It’s all about your schedule. It’s not about what the kids have going on at school. It’s not about pickups and drop-offs and making it home for dinner.”
Even so, Garner told the outlet she still has boundaries, only accepting work that’s primarily based in Los Angeles so she doesn’t have to be away from home.
“When I work, I don’t apologize to my kids for it,” she told InStyle. “I do thank them for being so sweet about it. But that’s part of life. Working hard is part of life, and messing up is part of life. Tripping and falling—there’s room for all of it.”
