Trip down memory lane! Courteney Cox went on a hiking adventure through the Irish Highlands with Bear Grylls during the Monday, August 22, episode of NBC’s Running Wild with Bear Grylls. The Friends alum, 52, was candid about the ups and downs of her marriage to ex-husband David Arquette and her current relationship with Snow Patrol guitarist Johnny McDaid.
During the grueling survival test, Grylls asked Cox why she decided to call it quits with her Scream costar, 44, in 2010 after 11 years of marriage, and she explained their lives just started to go in different directions. “I think that we were such good friends,” she said. “We found ourselves leading separate lives and just coexisting and being great friends, but not having the intimacy that … is so important in a relationship. I think you really need to work in a relationship, and I think that we tried. We’re just really different, too. I’m the polar opposite of him. That can be great for a lot of things, but I need this kind of real, one-on-one connection.”
The Cougar Town star said they do a good job of raising their 12-year-old daughter, Coco, together. “It wasn’t a dramatic ending,” she continued. “I mean, as divorces go, I would say it’s one of the better ones. For sure. We’re good coparents together.”
After her divorce, Cox went on to date McDaid and the pair got engaged in June 2014. The couple briefly parted ways in December 2015, but Cox confirmed to Grylls they’re fully back together now but in a “new context,” and “it feels really different.”
“We were engaged for over a year and then we broke up,” she said during the hike. “There’s something about … you know, he’s from Ireland. And the way he regards love is precious. We have to treat it in a different way. It’s more special. … You coddle it. So, I didn’t know how to regard love the way he does. And it definitely made a lot of mistakes that I see, whether it’s co-dependency or people-pleasing. I didn’t know how to bring it in. It was always external. I definitely have learned a lot, and no matter what, I will be a better person from that breakup, even though it was so brutal.”
Cox and Grylls, 42, had a number of deep conversations during the journey, including a talk about the actress’ appearance and aging. “I think I was trying to keep up with getting older, trying to chase that,” she said of trying beauty treatments in the past. “I have done things that I regret, and luckily they’re things that dissolve and go away. So, um, that’s good, because it’s not always been my best look. So, now I just have a new motto: Just let it be.”
Running Wild with Bear Grylls airs on NBC Mondays at 10 p.m. ET.
