Will and Jada’s Kids Are Reportedly Feeling Very Bad for Dad Right Now

Between the release of Jada Pinkett Smith’s bombshell memoir—and the media circus that’s ensued as a result of her revelations (most notably that she and her husband of 26 years, Will Smith, have actually been separated since 2016)—it’s been a very long week for the Smith family. So, it should arrive as really no surprise that their children are feeling pretty bad for dad right about now.

On Tuesday, Page Six reported that Jaden and Willow are hoping for some reprieve from the media scrutiny.

“They wish some of their family’s private matters remained private,” one inside source told the tabloid, who went on to say that Will has been “trying to stay busy” by “hanging out with his good friends and his kids” of late. Apparently, Will had been grappling with his mental health before news of their secret separation made headlines and the increased attention hasn’t been ideal.

“They know he has been going through a lot lately and this isn’t helping,” another source told Entertainment Tonight. “He’s trying not to let any outside noise impact him. Will loves Jada and feels like he has always had her back and always will. He has been trying to be supportive, while also taking care of himself.”

The recent attention on the Smiths began after Jada’s sit down with Hoda Kotb during which she admitted that the couple have long been living completely separate lives despite their very public amiability. Both have given countless interviews in the time they’ve been separated and shared more than one candid conversation on Pinkett Smith’s former Facebook series Red Table Talk, about what appeared to be an enduring union. Pinkett Smith didn’t reveal the exact reason for their demise.

“Why it fractured…that, that’s a lot of things. By the time we got to 2016, we were just exhausted with trying,” she explained to Kotb. “I think we were both kind of just still stuck in our fantasy of what we thought the other person should be.”

What followed can only be described as a torrent of stories (many of them headlined “Jada Pinkett Smith Reveals…”) from hilarious (pre-slap, Chris Rock asked Jada on a date) to kind of horrifying (she claimed she knew within seconds of sleeping with Will that she was pregnant). Despite it all, it seems the estranged couple still has an awful lot of respect for each other.

In an email to the New York Times for a profile on Jada, Will credited her memoir, Worthy, for giving him a new appreciation for the life she’s lived. The email is summarized and briefly quoted in the story:

The memoir, Smith said in an email, kind of woke him up. She had lived a life more on the edge than he’d realized, and she is more resilient, clever and compassionate than he’d understood. “When you’ve been with someone for more than half of your life,” he wrote, “a sort of emotional blindness sets in, and you can all too easily lose your sensitivity to their hidden nuances and subtle beauties.”

Then Jada appeared on the podcast On Purpose with Jay Shetty on Sunday and Jay read her a note he said he received from Will.

I applaud and honor you. If I had read this book 30 years ago, I definitely would have hugged you more. I’ll start now.

Welcome to the authors club. I love you endlessly. Now go get some merlot and take a rest.

“That’s beautiful,” she said afterward. “That’s why I can’t divorce that joker.”

Well, alright then. As always, best of luck to everyone involved—but especially to their children who now know far more about their parents than they’d like to.

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