Mama bear. Jennifer Lopez opened up about wanting to “protect’ her 15-year-old twins — who have struggled with the realities of having famous parents.
“I think being the child of famous parents is really not something many people can understand and I feel for [my kids] for that because they didn’t choose that,” Lopez, 53, said during a recent roundtable talk with Audacy. “I haven’t talked to them a lot about this, but they have just started letting me know how people treat them. So when they walk into the room, that’s what people are thinking about, they’re not seeing them for who they are. And I think that has to be a really hard thing for them. I’d love to protect them from that.”
The “Let’s Get Loud” singer explained that while “bullying” can be hard no matter “who you are,” it’s difficult for her two kids, Emme and Max — whom she shares with ex-husband Marc Anthony — to “grow up and be themselves” when they feel “judged by people” they “don’t know.”
“They know there is a lens on them,” she continued, noting that while their particular struggle might not be “relatable,” it remains a challenge for her teenagers — and is something the Marry Me star carries with her.
“I did that to them. So we have this guilt as moms about what we do and what we’ve brought into their lives,” she shared. Lopez added that she’d like to “protect” them from the more universal challenges of growing up as well, like “heartbreak,” “disappointment” and “not getting the job they want.”
“You don’t ever want them to feel a moment of pain in their lives but you realize that’s not realistic,” she said. “I want them to feel strong, feel good and I want them to feel unapologetically themselves and stand in their own truth and their own power. That’s what I want to instill in them so I don’t have to protect them from anything, they can protect themselves.”
While the Grammy nominee wants nothing but the best for her kids, she revealed earlier this month that the twins are really “giving it to her” as a parent now that they’re getting older.
“They’re becoming adults. They are challenging everything in life,” she explained during the May 3 episode of the Today show. “These kids have so much information, so much more than we had. They’re thinking and talking about things and about life in a different way than I did when I was 15 or 16 years old.”
The Hustlers star, however, said she isn’t worried about her children having curiosities. “I think they’re gonna change the world,” she said. “And make it so much better, so much better than what we did.”
Lopez tied the knot with Anthony, 54, in June 2004 and welcomed Emme and Max four years later. The singers called it quits in 2011 after seven years of marriage, finalizing their divorce in 2014. She later rekindled her romance with Ben Affleck and the twosome wed in summer 2022.
Since their nuptials, the “Waiting for Tonight” songstress and the Argo director, 50 — who shares kids Violet, 17, Seraphina, 14, and Samuel, 11, with ex-wife Jennifer Garner — have worked hard at blending their brood.
“Now that Jen and Jen have been coparenting, they’ve been getting to know each other better and have formed a very new friendship,” an insider exclusively told Us Weekly in November 2022, noting that Garner, 51, “can’t believe how sweet” Lopez is to her kids. “They really enjoy each other,” the source added at the time.
When it comes to how Lopez’s children get along with their stepdad, Lopez told Today host Hoda Kotb that the kids “love Ben.”
The Maid in Manhattan star gushed over their modern family, saying, “He’s a wonderful, wonderful father. And a father figure to them as well, because he has his own three beautiful children, and then there’s us.”
