Jennifer Lopez feared she would be "alone forever" after splitting from Marc Anthony.
The 48-year-old singer-and-actress split from her third husband – the father of her nine-year-old twins Max and Emme – in July 2011 and the "hard time" motivated her to buy a house in the Hamptons so her kids would always want to come back to her.
Jennifer – who dated dancer Casper Smart for five years on and off after splitting from Marc and is now in a relationship with retired baseball ace Alex Rodriguez – told Britain’s HELLO magazine: "I remember a certain point when I had my kids thinking, ‘I really want to get a house in the Hamptons so they can have a place they go in the summer, that we go to every summer.’
"There was something romantic about that to me.
"After I got divorced and it was a hard time, I said to myself, ‘I’m gonna do that. I’m gonna be like that lady Diane Keaton in ‘Something’s Gotta Give’, just in case I never get married again and I stay alone forever.’ Silly idea.
"You can make anything happen if you want it but I was like, ‘If I don’t, I’ll be happy in my beautiful house in the Hamptons and then I’ll have amazing kids who come visit me all the time and who love coming home because they love this house because we spent all these summers in this house when they were young.’
"So I wanted to create a new dream. And so the house symbolises a lot for me."
The ‘On the Floor’ hitmaker adores being a parent and her children are the "most wonderful" part of her life.
She said: "My children are the most wonderful thing that’s happened in my life. I like to cook for them and to have the house always full of family."