With the decade that has passed since Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner announced their separation, the former couple seems to have gotten co-parenting down to a science.
Ben, 54, and Jennifer, also 54, were married from 2005 until announcing their separation in 2015, with their divorce eventually finalized in 2018. While together, the couple welcomed kids Violet, now 20, Fin, now 17, and Samuel, now 14.
© Getty ImagesSpeaking with Variety, Ben opened up about how he balances his personal life as a father co-parenting his three children with his ex-wife with his work as a filmmaker, actor and producer with his company Artists Equity, co-founded with his best friend Matt Damon.
When asked why he prefers creating and working on filming schedules that keep him in Los Angeles, he simply responded: “Wanting to be here. I’m divorced, I have shared custody, and I don’t want to miss these years.”
Citing a desire to be closer to his kids, he continued: “My kids are here, and their life is flying by. I don’t want to have to be in Shreveport or New Mexico in order to work,” adding: “I know some people don’t have the luxury of making those choices. I’m certainly fortunate, but I know from experience that the best crews in the world are in L.A.”
He further opened up about how his life outside of work is currently “really wonderful,” especially having found an effective balance with Jennifer when it comes to parenting. “I have nothing salacious or all that interesting in my life,” he quipped.
“I work hard, and then I go home and pick up the kids from school,” Ben specified. “We have dinner if they agree to hang out with me. They’re with me for a week, then with their mom for a week.”
© InstagramSharing his appreciation for the 13 Going On 30 star, he gushed: “They have a great thing with their mom, for whom I’m also really, really grateful. I know things will come up that are hard, and I don’t want to jinx that, but this time in my life as a human being is really wonderful.”
Ben especially noted that the recent passing of his mother underscored it all. “One of the things you grapple with at my age when parents die is there’s a comfort and awareness in knowing this is how it’s supposed to go,” he opined.
© Getty Images“When I go, it will be hard for my children, but none of us want it any other way. My mom said to me at the end of her life: ‘God, I thought 84 years would seem longer.’ And I thought, ‘I bet, because I thought 54 would seem longer.'”
Touching on his relationship with his mother Christopher Anne “Chris” Boldt before she passed, Ben explained that the family had initially wanted her to move to Los Angeles to be closer to them, but she wanted to be home living her own life instead.
© Getty Images“She made her choices,” he continued. “She wanted to see her friends. She really committed to being a great grandmother. [We tried] to get her to move to L.A. She had her friends and her thing. She shoveled her own walk. But she would get on a plane for any of her five grandkids.”
