Megan Fox Opens Up About 'Childhood Trauma' Affecting Her Past Relationships And How Having Her Own Children Changed Things For Her

Megan fox in The Expendable 4
(Image credit: Lionsgate)

As Megan Fox and Machine Gun Kelly reportedly plan their upcoming wedding behind the scenes, the Transformers star is getting vulnerable about her experiences with love and loss. Fox just wrote a book called Pretty Boys Are Poisonous that is full of poetry inspired by her lifetime thus far in relationships. As the collection of her work hit bookshelves, the actress went into depth about her relationship patterns and how becoming a mother became a major turning point for her. 

When Megan Fox guested on The Drew Barrymore Show Friday, she got into a candid conversation about her experience with romance over the years. Here’s what she had to say: 

Partnerships and relationships are really just a place for you to have to face the shadow of your childhood traumas and the shadows of your belief system about relationships that you watched in your parents, whatever that is. And I have very specific ones based on my parents. So I’m always attracting to myself either a version of my stepfather or a version of my mother.

As Fox also pointed out, she has discovered this about herself after being in therapy for a “long, long time.” She expanded on her specific childhood trauma that she has exercised in her own partnerships with these words: 

My stepfather, he’s passed on now, he was a very impulsive and aggressive, very like verbally, mentally and emotionally abusive and my mother, who is still with us, and I don’t want to drag my mother, but my mother I perceived her to be more passive and wasn’t as protective of me as she should be. And so, I think I either will attract a partner who brings the sort of overly masculine rage element and then I become my mother in that relationship, or I attract a partner who plays the role of my mother and that awakens a shadow in me as well where I become very rebellious and I resist and push against the relationship from that angle.

Fox and Barrymore bonded on their similar past patterns in relationships as the Jennifer’s Body actress called falling in love “the greatest addiction of all time.” As she went on to day: 

When I was young, I was really rebellious and wild, and was always running away to fall in love with a new love. Every new co-star, every whatever, I was just a free spirit that way and I was addicted to falling in love. And, I think I probably hurt a lot of people in that process because a lot of people have really been in love with me and I did not respect or honor that. And then when I had kids, something happened in me where because I didn’t want to repeat it to my children, I think it’s a major part of my soul’s journey in this lifetime to not repeat my parents’ pattern with my kids and I was always very aware of that. So this selfless person was born when I birthed my first child.

Fox had her three children with Brian Austin Green after the pair married back in 2010. Her first child was born in 2012. The couple ultimately decided to separate and finalized their divorce in 2021. You can check out Fox and Barrymore’s candid conversation below:  

As Fox rocked her fiery red hair that she debuted in September, she got real about what she has learned over the years in her romantic relationships and their connection between her own “childhood trauma.” Recently, Megan Fox has also called relationships often “complicated,” along with saying that they are “sometimes they are war.” At the same time, she also shared her feelings about them becoming an “opportunity to grow” and to “become a stronger, more whole version of yourself.”  

In Pretty Boys Are Poisonous, Megan Fox details past relationships of hers that have included abusive situations, and the “very difficult” miscarriage her and Machine Gun Kelly experienced together. You can buy the poetry collection on Amazon and check out Megan Fox’s latest movie, The Expendables 4. It was among 2023 new movie releases and is now available to rent or buy. 

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Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.