Ina Garten recalls asking husband for separation in new memoir: 'I needed that freedom'
The Food Network star said it was "the hardest thing I ever did."
Ina Garten opens up for the first time in her new memoir, "Be Ready When the Luck Happens," about a challenging period in her marriage to husband Jeffrey Garten.
In an excerpt from the memoir shared by People on Tuesday, Ina Garten recalled the period after she quit her job at the White House, where she and Jeffrey Garten were both working at the time, to run Barefoot Contessa, then a specialty food store in Westhampton Beach, New York.
"When I bought Barefoot Contessa, I shattered our traditional roles -- took a baseball bat to them and left them in pieces," she wrote. "While I was still cooking, cleaning, shopping, managing at the store, I was doing it as a businesswoman, not a wife. My responsibilities made it impossible for me to even think about anything else. There was no expectation about who got home from work first and what they should do, because I never got home from work!"
She wrote that when her husband came to visit her in the Hamptons on the weekends, she thought of him as "a distraction."
"I didn't pay enough attention to him," she continued. "I just wanted everyone to leave me alone so I could concentrate on the store. Jeffrey was fully formed and living the life he wanted to live. I wasn't, and I wouldn't be able to figure out who I was or what I wanted unless I was on my own. I needed that freedom."
Initially she said she thought of asking him for divorce but opted for a separation.
"I thought about it a lot, and at my lowest point, I wondered if the only answer would be to get a divorce," she wrote. "I loved Jeffrey and didn't want to shock -- or hurt -- him, so I'd start by suggesting we pause for a separation."
"It was the hardest thing I ever did. I told him that I needed to be on my own. I didn't say whether it was for now ... or forever. In true Jeffrey form, he said, 'If you feel like you need to be on your own, you need to do it.' He packed his bag and went home to Washington with no plan to come back. I buried my emotions and threw myself into my work."
When Barefoot Contessa closed for the winter, Ina Garten said she moved back to D.C., where she reunited with Jeffrey Garten and sat down for a conversation at their house.
It was then, she said, that he asked her, "What can I do to change your mind?" She said he did not understand "that I doubted we could make our relationship work, and that we might be heading for divorce."
"I just couldn't live with him in a traditional 'man and wife' relationship," she wrote. "Jeffrey hadn't done anything wrong. He was just doing what every man before him had done. But we were living in a new era, and that behavior wasn't okay with me anymore. I had changed."
Ina Garten said she eventually told her husband he needed to see a therapist if he wanted to resume their romance, which he did. According to People, she hoped a therapist would help him see her as an equal partner with an equally important voice in their relationship.
"Jeffrey's willingness to see the therapist was as significant as anything that might happen during their session," she wrote in the memoir. "He was that determined to convince me he was serious about making our marriage work."
According to the Food Network star, the couple, who tied the knot in 1968, came out of that period stronger than ever. In December, they celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary, marking the milestone with a sweet video post on Instagram.
"When Jeffrey and I were first married I asked him, what do you want for your life? He replied, I want to be a good husband," Ina Garten wrote in the caption at the time. "I'd say you nailed that! Happy anniversary, Jeffrey."
ABC News reached out to Penguin Random House, the publisher of "Be Ready When the Luck Happens," for comment on the excerpt but did not immediately hear back.
"Be Ready When the Luck Happens" is out Oct. 1 and is available for pre-order now.
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