Ben Affleck Thanks Ex-Wife Jennifer Garner With Heartfelt Public Message Amid Recovery Journey

Ben Affleck has been coming clean with the public lately on what’s been going on in his life the last several years after three trips to rehab for alcoholism. As he continues to open up about his sobriety, he’s publicly sharing his emotions about his ex-wife Jennifer Garner as well. After admitting that his divorce was was the “biggest regret” of his life, he’s now complimenting the actress while thanking her for being such a “considerate” person.

The actor had a sit-down interview with Diane Sawyer to discuss the very public divorce and his sobriety, and after showing a pre-recorded interview, the long-time journalist read aloud a public thank you he wrote about Garner.

“What I want to say publicly and privately is, ‘Thank you. Thank you for being thoughtful, considerate, responsible, and a great mom and person,” Sawyer read.

During their interview, the Argo actor admitted that he never thought his problem with drinking would lead to a divorce, but also admitted to The New York Times that the drinking got worse as his marriage continued to fall apart.

“I didn’t want to get divorced, I didn’t want to be a divorced person, I really didn’t want to be a split family with my children,” he confessed. “It upset me because it meant I wasn’t who I thought I was and that was so painful and so disappointing.”

“I drank relatively normally for a long time,” he told the NYT. “What happened was that I started drinking more and more when my marriage was falling apart. This was 2015, 2016. My drinking, of course, created more marital problems.”

Garner and Affleck announced their separation in June 2015 but settled their divorce three years later in October 2018 after 10 years of marriage. The two share three kids together: Violet, 14; Seraphina, 11 and Samuel, 7. It’s no secret Garner has stuck by his side through all of his stints in rehab, and the actor admits that he doesn’t want his kids “to pay for my sins.”

“I really don’t want my children to pay for my sins or be afraid for me,” he explained. “Which is one of the hard parts of being the child of an alcoholic. Do you think, ‘What if my dad gets drunk? What if he does something stupid? What if he ends up on TMZ and it’s on my news feed and other kids see it?’”

Affleck has admitted that he comes from a dad who was an alcoholic, and on top of that, there’s a lot of mental illness issues within his family, so he’s struggled with it from both ends.

“My dad didn’t really get sober until I was 19,” he said. “The older I’ve gotten, the more I recognize that my dad did the best he could. There’s a lot of alcoholism and mental illness in my family. The legacy of that is quite powerful and sometimes hard to shake. … It took me a long time to fundamentally, deeply, without a hint of doubt, admit to myself that I am an alcoholic.”

Photo credit: Jason Merritt/Getty.