Joe Manganiello Disputes Sofia Vergara’s Divorce Narrative

In a new interview, he takes issue with her claim that they split because he wanted children.

Sofia Vergara has never been one to beat around the bush — so naturally, a few months after her divorce from Joe Manganiello was announced with a neutral joint statement last summer, she was candid in interviews about what she saw as the reason for their breakup. In a January interview with the Spanish-language newspaper El País, she gave a simple, straightforward explanation, saying, “My marriage broke up because my husband was younger; he wanted to have kids, and I didn’t want to be an old mom.” Vergara is 52 and has a 32-year-old son, Manolo, from her first marriage, while Manganiello is 47 and has never had children.

However, it sounds as if Manganiello has a different version of events. “There’s been a lot said in the press about me wanting a family,” he said in a Men’s Journal cover story, going on to confirm that he did, in fact, want to have kids. But, he said, he was “hurt” by the way that fact was “distorted.” To explain what really happened, he used a line most children of divorced parents may be familiar with. “It’s because two people grew apart, and sometimes that happens,” he said.

“We did try to have a family for the first year and a half,” he told Men’s Journal. “And we had a huge conversation right out of the gate during the first month we dated. I said, ‘If you’re done with kids, then I understand. Just tell me, and I’ll know what this is, and that’s okay.’ But that wasn’t the case with her. And I swore to her that I would never leave if it didn’t work out. And I didn’t.”

Manganiello and Vergara’s divorce was finalized in April, according to People. Both parties have since moved on. Manganiello joined new girlfriend Caitlin O’Connor for a pre-birthday celebration earlier this week, according to People (O’Connor will turn 35 on August 3). Meanwhile, Vergara, who expressed excitement about the NYC dating scene on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, has gone public with her new boyfriend, Justin Saliman, a 49-year-old orthopedic surgeon who was pictured by her side at her own recent birthday celebration.

Speaking to Men’s Journal, Manganiello said he had been depicted unfairly: “To be painted as if I had some sort of midlife crisis and, after nine years, turned to somebody and gave them an ultimatum of ‘Do this potentially unhealthy thing to your body, or else I’m gone’? That’s never who I was.” But ultimately, it seems as though both he and Vergara are happy with their new partners. It’s like Manganiello told Men’s Journal: “When you have a bad day, hopefully you have a good partner in life.” With loving partners and successful Howie Mandel–related reality-television shows — Vergara is a judge on America’s Got Talent alongside Mandel, while Manganiello is hosting an island-themed reboot of Mandel’s Deal or No Deal called Deal or No Deal Island — each appears to be thriving. Congrats to them.