Jennifer Lopez has opened up about her and Ben Affleck’s second chance at love, and revealed why their relationship is “very different” than it was years ago.
The couple, famously dubbed ‘Bennifer’, rekindled their romance last May – 17 years after they called off their engagement in 2004.
During a new interview with PEOPLE, the 52-year-old gushed: “I feel so lucky and happy and proud to be with him. It’s a beautiful love story that we got a second chance.”
“Before we kind of put [our relationship] out there and we were naïve and it got a little trampled. We both were like, ‘Wow, we’re so happy and we don’t want any of that to come into play again.’
“We’re older now, we’re smarter, we have more experience, we’re at different places in our lives, we have kids now, and we have to be very conscious of those things.”
“We’re so protective because it is such a beautiful time for all of us,” she explained.
“I just feel very happy and lucky to be in a relationship that’s happy and loving, and I want to do everything I can to protect that and keep it safe. It deserves that, it really does. … We hold it sacred.”
Jennifer continued: “It’s beautiful the way it feels very different than it was years ago. … There’s more of an appreciation and a celebration for it, which is nice.”
“When you find somebody and you really, really love them and you get a second chance at that? That is a really rare, precious, beautiful thing and we don’t take it for granted.”
Gushing about Ben, the singer added: “I’m so proud of the him, I’m so proud of the man he’s become that I’ve watched from afar. Being honest with each other, being loving, that’s just the basis of everything.”
“I feel like he’s at a place in his life where — just like how I feel about myself — it’s been a journey of learning yourself and figuring yourself out, getting to a place where you feel really good on your own and who you are so you can be in a happy, healthy relationship.”
“To see the person, the human being, the man that he is today, the father that he is today, the partner that he is — he is so everything I always knew he was and wanted to be.”
