‘I felt a deep and genuine sadness, I was hurt’

Actor Angelina Jolie has said that she lost herself after her split from husband Brad Pitt. Angelina and Brad abruptly parted ways in 2016, after two years of marriage and over a decade together.

She told French magazine Madame Figaro, "I had lost myself a bit" when her "relationship with Brad was coming to an end." She added, "I felt a deep and genuine sadness, I was hurt."

Angelina said that she did a bit of soul searching in the moment, and realised, "All these things settle in you and remind you of how lucky you are of being alive." She added that the chance to "reconnect with this humility and this insignificance" has helped her appreciate the good things in life.

Angelina and Brad have six children - Zahara, 14, Shiloh, 13, and Vivienne, 11, and sons Maddox, 18, Pax, 15, and Knox, 11. She said that she is currently in a "period of transition, like a homecoming, a return to (herself)."

The actor will next be seen onscreen in the Disney sequel, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil. Brad was seen in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and after that in James Gray's Ad Astra. The former couple was engaged in a bitter custody dispute over their children after the split, but have come to an understanding in recent months.

Brad in a recent interview to NPR spoke about the split, and noted, "A breakup of a family is certainly an eye-opener that as one -- and I'm speaking in general again -- but as one needs to understand, I had to understand my own culpability in that, and what can I do better. Because I don't want to go on like this." In a previous interview with The New York Times, the 55-year-old reflected upon his decision to give up drinking, which came after his split from Angelina. "I had taken things as far as I could take it, so I removed my drinking privilege," he said.