Schwarzenegger Opens Up, Talks About 2011 Divorce

As Terminator Genesys, the fifth Terminator film, prepares to hit movie screens next Wednesday, Arnold Schwarzenegger opens up with the press. In an interview with Howard Stern on Wednesday, Schwarzenegger talked about Terminator, his other films, and some attempts at comedy.

But the biggest bombshell which came out of the interview was Schwarzenegger opening up about his 2011 divorce with Maria Shriver, his wife of 25 years – and the marriage counseling that only made the marriage worse.

Early 2011 was a rough time for the actor. He had just left his position as Governor of California with just a 23 percent approval rating and had placed the state under heavy debt. He was in the process of getting back into acting after several years away from the silver screen, but had no major projects on the horizon.

And at that moment, Shriver discovered that Arnold had fathered a child with the family housekeeper around 1999. After confronting the housekeeper, she asked Schwarzenegger to open up with the truth. He broke down and confessed. Shriver left Arnold in May 2011, and filed for a divorce in July.

In his interview with Stern, Schwarzenegger declared that it was the biggest setback and failure of his entire life. He observed that it was particularly painful because “you can’t point the finger at anyone else” and that he was the one who had screwed up.

After admitting that the reason for the breakup was his own fault, Schwarzenegger opened up further and went on to talk about how marriage counseling made things worse. Stern brought up his own divorce back in 2001 and how he helped seek a psychiatrist to get over it.

Schwarzenegger responded by calling going to marriage counseling “the biggest mistake I’ve ever made.” He noted that Maria was the one who talked him into it in the first place. Arnold felt that there was no need for them to go, since he had admitted that he had screwed up and apologized both to Maria and their children.

Schwarzenegger then observed that the marriage counselor said nothing useful at all, and that “[i]t was absolutely counterproductive to our future relationship.”

Despite the failure of the marriage and the counselor, Schwarzenegger stressed that he still has good relations with Maria and his children. He also noted that his child with the housekeeper understands the situation and that things have worked out for the best.

[Photo By:Dominique Charriau/Getty Images Entertainment]