44 Times Celebrities Opened Up About Their Exes and Break Ups

“I desperately wanted it to work, I desperately loved my husband [Prince Charles] and I wanted to share everything together, and I thought that we were a very good team.”

— Princess Diana, bbc.co.uk

“I love Brad [Pitt]; I really love him. I will love him for the rest of my life. He’s a fantastic man. I don’t regret any of it, and I’m not going to beat myself up about it. We spent seven very intense years together; we taught each other a lot—about healing, and about fun. We helped each other thro…”

— Jennifer Aniston, vanityfair.com

“At first when I met him [Russell Brand] he wanted an equal, and I think a lot of times strong men do want an equal, but then they get that equal and they're like,'I can't handle the equalness.' He didn't like the atmosphere of me being the boss on tour. So that was really hurtful, and it was very co…”

— Katy Perry, vogue.com

“It’s awkward. It’s awkward because I still love him [Chris Brown]… My stomach drops and I have to maintain this poker face and not let it get to the outer part of me. I have to maintain that and suppress it”

— Rihanna, youtube.com

“But I don't want to imply he [Alex Turner] broke my heart. I was grieving for the loss of something... I'm grateful for the experience of that shit time, and for being on my own. I'd never really been on my own before – I'd always gone from one relationship to the next – so I had to learn all this s…”

— Alexa Chung, theguardian.com

“It's really good to be able to think about past loves without having a pit in my stomach, or cringing or feeling heart-broken, or like they hate you. Don't you think? Because for the few years after you break up you go through all of those feelings. I was very depressed after breaking off my engagem…”

— Winona Ryder, cinema.com

“[On Calvin Harris] At the time I just wanted to crawl in my bed and die. But I got out of it the other side, I’m surviving.”

— Rita Ora, mirror.co.uk

“[On divorce with Gavin Rossdale] I just felt at a certain point in my own heart, when everything was crushed and I was down real, real low, I was like, I don’t want to be down here. This is not me. I remember feeling embarrassed. Like, I gotta prove that this is not going to be who I am. I gotta tur…”

— Gwen Stefani, refinery29.uk

“There’s nobody that’s ever really been able to take care of me. Johnny [Depp] did for a bit. I believed what he said. Like if I said, ‘What do I do?,’ he’d tell me. And that’s what I missed when I left. I really lost that gauge of somebody I could trust. Nightmare. Years and years of crying. Oh, the…”

— Kate Moss, vanityfair.com

“[On Ben Affleck] It felt like my heart had been torn out of my chest.”

— Jennifer Lopez, amazon.com

“[On Jennifer Lopez] I think I just ran away. You can only handle so much. I moved for a while to this place in Georgia that I have, was able to get away, by and large, from stuff. Come up with a plan for how to do something with my life that doesn't put me in the crosshairs of this sort of thing.”

— Ben Affleck, gq.com

“[On Ben Affleck] I didn't marry the big fat movie star; I married him ... He's the love of my life. What am I going to do about that? He's the most brilliant person in any room, the most charismatic, the most generous. He's just a complicated guy. I always say, 'When his sun shines on you, you feel…”

— Jennifer Garner, vanityfair.com

“[On break up with Andrew Garfield] Someone I still love very much... It’s been interesting. It’s been a good year. And sad. Pros and cons.”

— Emma Stone, vogue.com

“[On Liam Hemsworth] I was so scared of ever being alone, and I think, conquering that fear, this year, was actually bigger than any other transition that I had, this entire year... I don’t ever want to have to need someone again, where you feel like, without them, you can’t be yourself.”

— Miley Cyrus, abcnews.go.com

“[On Miley Cyrus] Of course it was hard, man. But at the time we were going in different directions and it's just what needed to happen. We were both super young and it was a good decision at the time—we both needed that.”

— Liam Hemsworth, gq.com.au

“You fall in love with who you fall in love with; you can never choose. I guess some people just come with a little more baggage. I mean, look — we [Miley] were together five years, so I don't think those feelings will ever change. And that's good because that proves to me that it was real. It wasn't…”

— Liam Hemsworth, mensfitness.com

“I learned a lot. I moved in with my [Selena] when I was 18. Started my own life with her. It was a marriage kind of thing. Living with a girl, it was just too much at that age. But we were so in love. Nothing else mattered. We were all about each other. But when it's like that and you get your value…”

— Justin Bieber, complex.com

“[On Justin Bieber] At this point, there is no anger. There's closure in a very good, healthy way. We've seen each other. I'm always encouraging and I am proud of his journey. I think people are making it out to be something that is more tragic than it really was. We grew up together. We both made mi…”

— Selena Gomez, refinery29.com

“It was really tough. I don’t know if I’m over it yet. I think that I’m definitely in another place and I think we’ve definitely went our separate ways. I love her [Selena] and I want her to be awesome, but there are things that remind me of her.”

— Justin Bieber, accesshollywood.com

“He [Nick Lachey] is a good guy. And neither of us wanted to let anyone down, including ourselves. I don't have anything bad to say about him at all. I don't. And I do have something to lose by talking about it. Integrity.”

— Jessica Simpson, glamour.com

“[On Chris Martin divorce] There was nothing dramatic or anything. I had built my life on trying to be all things to all people, and I just couldn't do it anymore, and I really had the sense that I wasn't allowed to have needs, and I had to prove my specialness or self-worth by doing all this stuff a…”

— Gwyneth Paltrow, marieclaire.com

“[On Lamar Odom] I miss what we had – things we got to do together are just memories. I like looking back and holding on to that stuff. I definitely miss it, and there’s times I’ll get so sentimental and so sad, but this had to happen for some reason. I’ll figure it out over time. Someone will give m…”

— Khloé Kardashian, people.com

“[on David Arquette] We love each other. And when you love someone, you want them to be happy, even if it's not with you.”

— Courtney Cox, more.com

“[On Tony Parker] The truth is, I should be angry, resentful and disillusioned about relationships. But I'm not.”

— Eva Longoria, dailymail.co.uk

“‘I was very lost. I have to say I felt really confused. I hate talking about it but it [Chris Brown break up] was really crazy because I felt so out of touch with myself and when that happens… It’s scary because nothing you say or do feels like it’s you... You just lose touch of everything that you…”

— Rihanna, marieclaire.co.uk

“We [Chad Michael Murray] were two stupid kids who had no business being in a relationship in the first place. At the end of the day we're grownups, and I actually think it's interesting that when people split in a way that's unpleasant, they usually just go on quite literally hating each other—or th…”

— Sophia Bush, perezhilton.com

“We [Bruce Jenner] have children together, and we have families and memories and holidays and traditions. I don't want to give that up. I don't want him to take that away from me, and I don't want to take that away from him. We work together to make sure that we're both happy. We are well-rounded hum…”

— Kris Jenner, people.com

“We [Britney] were two birds of the same feather — small-town kids, doing the same thing. Then you become adults, and the way you were as kids doesn’t make any sense. We spent way too much time being the biggest thing for teenyboppers.”

— Justin Timberlake, vanityfair.com

“[On divorce from Ryan Philippe] Very humiliating and very isolating...But, by the way, if it's not painful, maybe it wasn't the right decision to marry to begin with. Those are the appropriate emotions. When people get in your face and say, 'This will pass,' you think, Are they crazy? I'm never gonn…”

— Reese Witherspoon, elle.com

“[Divorce was] the darkest, saddest place I had ever been. It was a struggle—there were a good four or five months of not being able to get out of bed. It was the worst time in my life. You get through it. It’s a process that’s not easy, but I get less and less sad about it every day.”

— Ryan Phillippe, wmagazine.com