Jada Pinkett Smith is giving further insight into her and Will Smith’s commitment to one another despite deciding to live separate lives seven years ago.
via: People
In an interview with Parade, the Worthy author shared the reason they decided against the measure before marrying on Dec. 31, 1997.
“Listen, weddings are beautiful, but they can be very romanticized,” Jada, 52, told the outlet.
“I feel that was a very real moment for the two of us to look each other in the eyes, recognize that there would be tough times in this journey and to say to each other, ‘No matter what, we’re going to figure it out, and that’s why we don’t need a prenup, because I’m making a promise that divorce won’t be necessary, that we will figure this out,'” she explained.
The actress continued, “And we made that promise to each other without all of the bridal wedding beauty; it was just sitting on a log in his mother’s backyard, and going, ‘Hey.’ Having to really look at the possibility of us not being together.”
Jada also told Parade how she and Will continue to support and uphold each other through ups and downs.
“We all have our romanticized ideas of how it all should be, and it might not show up in that way,” she says. “But at the end of the day, do you have someone at your side that you’re willing to go through tough times with and they’re willing to go through tough times with you? I’m very lucky that I can say, ‘Yes, I have someone that’s willing to do that.’ ”
Jada opened up to PEOPLE about her and Will’s 25-year marriage in this week’s issue, among other areas of her life. The pair share son Jaden, 25, and daughter Willow, 22, plus son Trey, 30, from Will’s first marriage to Sheree Zampino.
“We’re still figuring it out. A lot has happened,” she said. “The thing about relationships is that it’s constantly moving. Relationships are, it’s an organism. It’s its own thing. It’s constantly shifting and constantly moving. There’s a lot that’s transpired in the last two years, and so we’ve been doing some really heavy-duty work together.”
Speaking to NBC News’s Hoda Kotb, Jada confirmed that she and Will, 55, have been separated for seven years. She said it was not “a divorce on paper,” as Kotb worded it, but “by the time we got to 2016, we were just exhausted with trying.”
“I think we were both kind of just still stuck in our fantasy of what we thought the other person should be,” she said.
Jada added that she “made a promise that there will never be a reason for us to get a divorce,” explaining, “We will work through … whatever.”
