Blending families is always going to be a complicated situation, no matter how amicable the separations are or how badly you want to make the process a smooth transition for everyone involved. It gets even more complicated when the people involved are famous and their relationships have been covered by the media for literal decades — like Jennifer Lopez, Jennifer Garner, and Ben Affleck.
J.Lo and Ben recently got married , and for the first time, Jennifer opened up about co-parenting with Garner.
Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck were married for 13 years from 2005 to 2018.
The two share three children together: Violet Anne Affleck, born in 2005, Seraphina Rose Elizabeth Affleck, born in 2009, and Samuel Garner Affleck, born in 2012.
To make things more complicated, Jennifer Lopez has children of her own as well.
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J.Lo was married to Marc Anthony from 2004 until 2011.
The couple have two kids, twins Emme Maribel and Maximilian David, who were born in 2008.
Speaking to Vogue , Jennifer Lopez talked about what it was like to try to blend their two families now that she and Ben are married.
“The transition is a process that needs to be handled with so much care,” she said.
“They have so many feelings,” she said about the children . “They’re teens. But it’s going really well so far. What I hope to cultivate with our family is that his kids have a new ally in me and my kids have a new ally in him, someone who really loves and cares about them but can have a different perspective and help me see things that I can’t see with my kids because I’m so emotionally tied up.”
Lopez then shared her opinion on Garner.
And it was all good news! J.Lo called Garner “an amazing co-parent,” and said of Ben and her that “they work really well together.”
Lopez notes that the father of her children lives on the East Coast so the transition process is different for her and her children.
“It’s hard, in its own way, when you don’t have to fight for things, because then you don’t learn how to be a fighter,” Jennifer went on of raising her kids.
“I really wanted to find a better way than having to put the fear in them. It’s like, I can hold a boundary with you but also be your ally. That’s the balance, where they respect you enough because you act in a way that they can look up to. It’s what I feel like I want to do because when I was young that wasn’t what it was.”
Jennifer then touched on the subject of her changing her legal last name to Affleck, something which caused controversy at the time.
“People are still going to call me Jennifer Lopez. But my legal name will be Mrs. Affleck because we’re joined together. We’re husband and wife. I’m proud of that. I don’t think that’s a problem,” she said of the switch.
When asked if she’d talked about Ben taking her last name instead, her response was empathetic.
“No! It’s not traditional. It doesn’t have any romance to it. It feels like it’s a power move, you know what I mean? I’m very much in control of my own life and destiny and feel empowered as a woman and as a person,” she said.
“I can understand that people have their feelings about it, and that’s OK, too.”
We’re so glad to hear that it’s a harmonious relationship between basically our two favorite Jennifers in Hollywood. We can’t help but root for both of them!
h/t: Vogue
