Jennifer Lopez Overshares, Gives Unexpected Reason Her Relationships Fail

Getty Jennifer Lopez.

Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck spoke very candidly about her emotional problems that have led to fractured relationships and broken marriages, and they blamed it on childhood trauma.

The couple shared the expected details in Lopez’s February documentary, “The Greatest Love Story Never Told,” which is available on Amazon Prime. At the time, Lopez and Affleck were together, and the documentary was meant to, in part, capture their happy ending.

With Lopez and Affleck spending July 4 on different coasts, according to Fox News, as divorce rumors now swirl, it’s instructive to look back at what she – and Affleck – said in their own words about why her relationships tend to fail, and they said a lot in the documentary. Lopez has been married four times; she was also engaged to former Yankees star Alex Rodriguez. USA Today reported that Lopez’s oversharing was mocked online when the documentary first aired.

In the documentary, which also showcased her financing and making of a movie on the same topic, Lopez pegged her relationship troubles to difficult childhood. “When I was growing up, I was always looking for somebody to make me feel love,” she said, explaining that as the middle child she got “lost a bit in between it all,” and started on a lifelong quest to “show everybody that I had worth and value too.”

“Having my two sisters bookend in that way forced me into a road,” she revealed.

Affleck compared Lopez’s emotional needs to those of an alcoholic who can never get enough to drink. “Jen felt emotionally neglected as a child,” said Affleck. He said it’s hard to see insecurity in a person whose “professional life is wildly successful.”

But he noted, perhaps tellingly, “In Jennifer’s case, I don’t think there’ enough followers or movies or records to still that part of you that still feels a longing or a pain. Ultimately that ts the work you’ve got to do on your own.”

Jennifer Lopez Revealed That She Felt Ignored by Her Dad Growing Up

GettyJennifer Lopez.

Lopez said in the documentary that her quest to prove herself worthy started when she was “running track and winning medals” growing up. She “learned to work very hard and be very disciplined like an athlete,” she said in the documentary.

According to Lopez, she “felt very ignored by my dad. He was always working nights,” so he didn’t spend much time with her.

Meanwhile, she accused her mother of having traits of a “narcissist,” meaning she was a “center of attention, life of the party type of person.”

According to Lopez, “The combination of the two of those things set me on a course to be with those kinds of people.”

She later figured out that she was “comfortable with this, but I don’t like this. I want something different. I want something better.”

Lopez and Affleck have not confirmed a split, but they are no longer living together and are trying to sell their marital home, TMZ reported in early June.

Ben Affleck Admitted in the Documentary That Making Their Private Life so Public Makes Him Uncomfortable

GettyBen Affleck.

Lopez’s desire, according to Affleck, to fill her pain with public attention, may have backfired on her by causing problems in the marriage.

In the documentary, Affleck appears repeatedly for short periods of time, and he appears supportive. However, he also repeatedly indicates that he is uncomfortable with sharing their private relationship so publicly. He eventually concludes the documentary is not really about him, but rather about Lopez trying to find herself.

At the same time, he expresses consternation that Lopez shared a box he gave her of their private love letters to other people in the studio, letting multiple people read their private conversations.

“Things that are private, I’d always felt are sacred and special because they’re private, so this was an adjustment,” Affleck said in the documentary.

Lopez admitted in the documentary that it made Affleck uncomfortable. “And then there’s the personal story of Ben and I that has never been told. I don’t think hes very comfortable with me doing all of this, but he knows I’m an artist. He loves me,” she said.

Both also admitted that the public scrutiny first led to them breaking up 20 years before three days before their wedding.