Sophie Turner Addressed Those Absurd “Bad Mom” Rumors That Went Viral Amid Her Divorce

When Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner and Jonas Brother Joe Jonas announced their divorce together on Instagram, it looked like it really could be a good, if melancholy thing. “After four wonderful years of marriage we have mutually decided to amicably end our marriage,” their joint statement read in part. Divorce is never fun, but under the best circumstances it can be an important, freeing step forward for both parties. But it wasn’t long before we saw the headlines. “Sources” assured the press that Turner’s partying was to blame. It wasn’t hard to read between the lines: she was a Bad Mother to daughters Willa, now 3, and Delphine, 22 months. But while tactics like this have, sadly, worked in the past against famous women, this time the public wasn’t buying it.

We’d seen it before, we strongly suspected these rumors were coming from a dedicated campaign to make her look careless and vapid. The backlash was, for many women, especially working moms and those who’d been through divorces, cathartic. “If something like this had happened to me 10 years ago I don’t think I would have had the same support,” Turner recently told Chioma Nnadi for British Vogue. “I just feel very lucky to be alive in a time when people are open-minded. Thank f*ck for Gen Z.” In the deep-diving interview, Turner looked back on that period as “the worst few days of [her] life.”

“I was contracted to be on set [of Joan] for another two weeks, so I couldn’t leave,” she recalled. “My kids were in the States and I couldn’t get to them ... And all these articles started coming out. It hurt because I really do completely torture myself over every move I make as a mother — mum guilt is so real! I just kept having to say to myself, ‘None of this is true. You are a good mum and you’ve never been a partier.’” She bemoaned the outright lies she was seeing in print, feeling almost out of her body, as though she was watching a movie about her life that she’d had nothing to do with.

Amid all this and the ensuing (now settled) legal battle she and Jonas endured figuring out a custody arrangement, Turner wasn’t without support. Friends from childhood came to her side as soon as she returned to the UK from Miami, where she’d lived with Jonas and their encouragement was invaluable.

“I’ve always said that my girlfriends are the loves of my life ... The support I had from the women in my life during that time was the most amazing thing to see. I felt so held and so protected,” she told British Vogue. While these were mostly friends from her school days, she also praised Taylor Swift as a “hero” to her.

“I’ve never been more grateful to anyone than I am for her because she took my children and me, and provided us with a home and a safe space,” she told the magazine, referring to Swift’s Manhattan home, where Turner stayed with Willa and Delphine. “She really has a heart of gold.”

The divorce is, as divorces often are, still a source of stress and sadness, but Turner is confident she and Jonas can eventually find a co-parenting strategy that brings peace to the family. “I’m unhappy with the way everything played out ... but I think we’re doing the best we can,” she said before continuing, “Joe is a great father to our children and that’s all that I can ask for. ... My dream is to have a huge Christmas where my daughters can have their dad there, Joe’s whole side of the family, their grandparents. I don’t care about the politics, I just want the girls to feel loved and have everyone show up for them.”