Jennifer Lopez on journey from heartbreak to Hollywood ending with Ben Affleck

Jennifer Lopez has said that her split from Ben Affleck was the “biggest heartbreak” of her life, which sent her spiralling for 18 years, but their rekindled romance is the “most would-never-happen-in-Hollywood ending”.

The stars were engaged in November 2002 and due to tie the knot the following September, but their engagement was called off in January 2004.

Last year, after separating from their previous partners, the couple announced they were back together and finally married in July.

Speaking to Zane Lowe on Apple Music, Lopez, 53, said she could not perform the songs on her 2002 album This Is Me… Then following her breakup with Affleck, 50, as she had created the record to capture their love at the time and it was “so painful” afterwards.

She said: “Once we called off that wedding 20 years ago, it was the biggest heartbreak of my life.

“I honestly felt like I was going to die. It sent me on a spiral for the next 18 years where I just couldn’t get it right.

“But now, 20 years later, it does have a happy ending. It has the most would-never-happen-in-Hollywood ending. ‘That would never happen. We’re not going to write that because nobody would believe it’ ending.

“It’s funny because when me and Ben got back together, he was like, ‘You never performed the songs. You never did I’m Glad. You never did this. You never did that’.

“I was like ‘You’re right. It was painful’. It was a part of me then that I had to put away to move on and survive.”

Last Friday, 20 years on from the release of This Is Me… Then, she announced a new record called This Is Me… Now, which is due to be released next year.

The album will “chronicle the emotional, spiritual and psychological journey that she has taken over the past two decades” and her life since reuniting with Affleck.

It will be her first studio album since she released A.K.A in 2014.

The singer said: “We captured me at this moment in time when I was reunited with the love of my life and we decided we were going to be together forever.

“The whole message of the album then, is this love exists. This is a real love.

“Now I think what the message of the album is very much if you were wondering if you have, like me at times, lost hope, almost given up, don’t. Because true love does exist and some things do last forever and that’s real.

“I want to put that message out into the world and that does take a lot of vulnerability. But I couldn’t stop myself and some parts of it scare me.

“And I think parts of it scare Ben too. He’s like, ‘Oh, do you really want to say all this stuff?’ And I’m like, ‘I don’t know how else to do it baby’.”

She added that over the last 20 years she feels she has grown, after experiencing “difficult relationships”, and that this album will show what that period has been like for her.

On Instagram, Lopez teased a list of title tracks for the album including This Is Me … Now, To Be Yours, Mad In Love, Midnight Trip To Vegas and Greatest Love Story Never Told.

She said that Affleck loves the music and is her “biggest fan”, adding: “When he came back into my life again, the same thing happened where I felt so inspired and so overtaken with emotion that it was just pouring out of me.”

The full interview with Zane Lowe is available on Apple Music.