Ina Garten’s New Memoir, “Hardest Thing I Ever Did,” Tells the Story of Her Divorce from Husband Jeffrey

Ina Garten’s New Memoir, “Hardest Thing I Ever Did,” Tells the Story of Her Divorce from Husband Jeffrey

In a first-ever exclusive passage from her recently released memoir, “Be Ready When the Luck Happens,” Ina discusses a difficult moment in her marriage: “I just hit the pause button”

Ina Garten holds her husband Jeffrey’s face in her hands while they stand in the East Hampton, New York, library, telling him he looks well for the PEOPLE cameras.

After he exits the room, she remarks, “He’s just the best.” It’s nearly hard to believe that the Food Network star and her partner were anything other than #couplegoals after their exchange.

But Ina, 76, describes their separation and impending divorce in the 1970s in her daring new memoir Be Ready When the Luck Happens, which is featured in this week’s cover story.

Jeffrey “expected a wife that would make dinner,” while Ina was putting in a lot of overtime running the Barefoot Contessa, a specialized food business that would eventually catapult her into stardom.

According to Ina, “there were some roles that we played, and I found them really annoying.” “I had the feeling that if I just pressed the pause button, he would notice me.”

At the time, Ina had left her position as the White House employee in Washington, D.C., where she worked alongside Jeffrey, to take on the role of Barefoot Contessa. Jeffrey lived in Washington, D.C., and spent his weekends in the Hamptons.

In her memoir, “When I Bought Barefoot Contessa, I Shattered Our Traditional Roles—­took a Baseball Bat to Them and Left Them in Pieces,” Ina writes.

“Even though I was managing the store, cooking, cleaning, and shopping, I was doing it as a businesswoman, not a wife.

I was unable to even consider other things because of my obligations. Since I never arrived home from work, there were no rules regarding who should go home first or what to do.”

“On weekends, Jeffrey would visit, and he was a diversion. I didn’t give him enough thought. All I wanted was for everyone to go away and let me focus on the store.

Jeffrey was a fully realized individual leading the life he desired. I wasn’t, and until I was alone myself, I couldn’t have come to terms with who I was or what I desired. I required that liberty.”

Instead of asking for a divorce, Ina requested a separation from Jeffrey. “I thought about it a lot, and at my lowest point, I wondered if the only answer would be to get a divorce,” she states. “I loved Jeffrey and didn’t want to shock — ­or hurt — ­him, so I’d start by suggesting we pause for a separation.”

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“I’ve never done anything as hard as that. I told him I had to be left alone. I didn’t specify if it was only for the time being or permanently.

He responded, “If you feel like you need to be on your own, you need to do it,” in typical Jeffrey fashion. He left for home in Washington, packing his bags and making no plans to return. I suppressed my feelings and focused entirely on my task.”

 

Just before Jeffrey left on a six-week work trip, Ina returned to D.C. after the Barefoot Contessa closed for the winter.

“When Jeffrey and I arrived at our house, we sat together on the stairs outside, hesitant to enter because we were torn between two worlds: the way things were when we were Ina and Jeffrey and the depressing way they were now. Jeffrey met me at the [train] station. A limbo that hurts.”

“Hoping that something would help, he asked, ‘What can I do to change your mind?’ Not realizing that I didn’t think our relationship could last and that we might end up divorcing.

I simply couldn’t maintain a conventional “man and wife” connection with him. Nothing wrong had been done by Jeffrey.

All he was doing was following in the footsteps of all the other men. However, that behavior was no longer acceptable to me because we were living in a new period. I had evolved.”

 

If Jeffrey wanted Ina back, she would have to see a therapist, Ina informed him. She thought that having a professional assist him in seeing her as a partner with a voice as vital as his.

“Jeffrey only needed an hour,” Ina tells PEOPLE. “He went once for an hour and totally got it.” In Be Ready When the Luck Happens, she states that “Jeffrey’s willingness to see the therapist was as significant as anything that might happen during their session.”

“He was that determined to convince me he was serious about making our marriage work.”

They emerged from that period more powerful than before. Since they first began dating in 1965, Jeffrey, now a professor at Yale, has been her rock. He is now 77 years old.

In her memoir, Ina also discloses that her upbringing in Stamford, Connecticut, was marred by physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her father, Charles, a surgeon, and her mother, Florence, a nutritionist.

 

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I had a very lonely childhood, but every­thing changed when I met Jeffrey

 

— Ina Garten

Considering the difficult time of her marriage to Jeffrey, Ina does not regret her request for a divorce.

“Thank God I did,” she exclaims. “I think how crazy that was and how dangerous it was, but we wouldn’t have the relationship we have now if I hadn’t done it.”

“It changed him,” she continues, “but it also changed me too.”