Gwyneth Paltrow and Coldplay’s Chris Martin famously revealed to the world they were ‘consciously uncoupling’ back in 2014.
At the time the pair had been married for 10 years and share two children, daughter Apple, now 20, and 18-year-old son Moses. And all appeared well from the outside - until Gwyneth dropped the bombshell statement on her Goop website that she and Chris had called time on their marriage.
In a joint statement, they said: “It is with hearts full of sadness that we have decided to separate. We have come to the conclusion that while we love each other very much, we will remain separate. We are, however, and always will be a family, and in many ways are closer than we have ever been.”
Asking for privacy from the public during “this difficult time,” the former couple went on to say that they are “parents, first and foremost” and added, coining the now legendary break-up term: “We have always conducted our relationship privately, and we hope to do that as we consciously uncouple and co-parent, we will be able to continue in the same manner.”
Since their split and official divorce in 2015, Gwyneth and Chris have been pictured holidaying together, spending birthdays and Christmases as a family and both have gone on to meet new partners. Gwyneth, 51, married film director Brad Falchuk, 53 – the man behind American Horror Story, Glee and Scream Queens - in 2018. Chris, 47, has found love with 34-year-old Fifty Shades of Grey actress Dakota Johnson and they even hang out with Gwyneth. Back in March, the Mirror exclusively revealed Chris and Dakota had got engaged after six years of dating.
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Gwyneth admitted her and Chris 'just didn't quite fit together' despite having two kids (Getty Images)
The pair have remain close for the sake of their kids Apple, 20, and Moses, 18 (Instagram)Though both are happy now in new relationships now - and also with each other - Gwyneth has since reflected on the moment she knew her marriage was over.
Describing an idyllic day with her then husband, the actress said she knew deep down she was not happy.
In a personal essay for British Vogue, she wrote: “It was my birthday, my 38th. My ex-husband [Chris] and I were tucked away in the Tuscan countryside, on a hill in a beautiful cottage with a view of the forest. Fall was coming; the leaves were just loosening their grip on bright green. Inside, the cottage was perfectly appointed in the way you dream of for a birthday trip: cosy living room with a fireplace, kitchen table overflowing with spoils from the farm nearby – peaches, tomatoes on the vine, basil, eggs. I don’t recall when it happened, exactly. I don’t remember which day of the weekend it was or the time of day. But I knew – despite long walks and longer lie-ins, big glasses of Barolo and hands held – my marriage was over.”
Painfully, Gwyneth kept the dark realisation to herself. She went on to reveal: "It would be years before we said the words aloud”, but that weekend “a dam had cracked just enough to hear the unrelenting trickle of truth”. This was a truth that would grow louder until it was “all I could hear”.
Saying she and Chris had “always been friends” who laughed at the same things, shared the same “funny bones humour” and “utter silliness”, Gwyneth admitted: “We were close, though we never fully settled into being a couple. We just didn’t quite fit together. There was always a bit of unease and unrest. But man, did we love our children.”
The Shallow Hal star said they both did everything they could before calling it quits in a bid to keep the family together as a unit, saying the only divorces she had been around growing up had been “bitter, acrimonious, unending”, which she didn’t want “with all my heart”.
But rather than the term being invented by Gwyneth and Chris – as first thought – ‘conscious uncoupling’ was actually suggested by their therapist and something they tested out privately for a whole year before announcing their separation to the public.
Explaining the logic behind it, Gwyneth continued: “Was there a world where we could break up and not lose everything? Could we be a family, even though we were not a couple? We decided to try.” Though their announcement caused a stir in the media, she said “the public’s surprise gave way to a strange combination of mockery and anger I had never seen”. But these days, instead of ridicule, people ask her how she managed to do it.
She concluded: “It’s very different for every couple but, for me, it meant, more than anything, being accountable for my own part in the dissolution of the relationship. There existed aspects of myself I was trying to heal through this relationship that I wasn’t honest with myself about. I had been blind, guarded, invulnerable, intolerant. I had to admit that and be brave enough to share it. I know my ex-husband was meant to be the father of my children, and I know my current husband is meant to be the person I grow very old with. Conscious uncoupling lets us recognise those two different loves can coexist and nourish each other.”
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