Metallica’s James Hetfield and his wife Francesca Hetfield have called it quits after the rocker has quietly filed for divorce.
Sources close to the couple’s exes have told TMZ that James filed in Colorado earlier this year and that the end of their marriage just flew under the public’s radar.
The couple married in 1997 after dating for five years. They have since welcomed three children, daughters Cali, 24, and Marcella, 20, and son Castor, 22. The respectful exes are reportedly still in touch for the sake of their children.
Hetfield, 59, has previously credited his soon-to-be ex-wife, 52, for helping him get his anger and alcohol problems under control, telling Joe Rogan in 2017 (via MetalHeadZone), “Fear was a big motivator in that. for me Losing my family that was what scared me so much that was the low point I hit that my family will disappear because of my behavior I brought home from the road I was kicked out by my wife I lived somewhere on my own, I didn’t want that.”
He went on to explain, “She just kicked me out of the house like that and that scared me. She said, “Hey, you’re not just going to the therapist now and talking about this, you have to go somewhere to fix this,” so that’s what I did.”
At the time, he was determined to “make it work” because of his own broken childhood.
“Maybe as part of my upbringing, my family kind of fell apart when I was a kid,” he explained. “Father left, mother died, had to live with my brother, and then really, where did my things go? It just floated away, and I don’t want that to happen. Whatever’s going on, we’re going to work these things out and make sure it works.”