Gwyneth Paltrow: Sometimes I think I should've stayed married
Is Gwyneth Paltrow having second thoughts about her "conscious uncoupling"?
The 42-year-old "Iron Man" actress announced that she was separating from her husband Chris Martin this past March, but tells Harper's Bazaar U.K. that sometimes she has her doubts as to whether she made the right decision.
"We've made a lot of mistakes, and we've had good days and bad days, but I have to say, I'm proud of us for working through so much stuff together -- and not blaming and shaming," she says of her split from the Coldplay frontman. "Of course, there are times when I think it would have been better if we had stayed married, which is always what your children want. But we have been able to solidify this friendship, so that we're really close."
Paltrow still says she owes a lot to Martin, 37, as she began dating him right after the death of her father Bruce. "I feel like I would have died somehow if I hadn't met him at that time," she says. "I felt like I was going to die of grief. I remember waking up, on one particular night, where I felt like I was having a heart attack and I couldn't breathe... I lay on the floor of my apartment in London and I thought, 'I'm not going to survive this.' And he just picked me up and he was so loving and patient through all my grieving."
Continuing to dote on her ex, Paltrow adds, "He's really great in a crisis. He has incredible empathy when it comes to somebody's pain."
That being said, she thinks Martin may have been too young for marriage when they tied the knot in 2003.The musician was just 25 years old at the time. "Men are very young at that age, and I was relying on him very heavily and I really expected him to keep being this grown man and pillar of strength -- which he was and is -- but it's also quite an unfair set of criteria to give to someone who's just 25 years old."
As for how she's coping with the separation, she admits that her relationship with Martin, the father of her two kids Moses and Apple, is an "always a moving, amorphous thing."
"It's painful, it's difficult, it might be easier to say, 'I never want to see you again,' but what good does that do anyone?" she tells Harper's Bazaar.
The Goop founder later changes the subject to femininity, accusing women of being "so vitriolic" towards each other. "Why they want to twist words, why they want to read about someone else in a negative light and why that feels good to them?" Paltrow ponders.
She quickly adds, "But I also know a huge tribe of women who are loving and supportive of other women, in ways that are completely transformative."
After hearing Paltrow speak about her marriage, do you think there's a chance she'll get back together with Chris Martin? Let us know by tweeting #ETnow.