How the tabloids covered the John Mayer Jennifer Aniston breakup

Aniston and Mayer on 5/10/08. Credit: Fame

The tabloids are reporting on last week’s demise of the John Mayer and Jennifer Aniston relationship and they’re divided over who dumped whom. The Enquirer has my favorite account of events – that Aniston dumped Mayer because they were having problems and she wants more of a commitment. In Touch claims that it was John who did the dumping, because Jen was “obsessing” over her ex, Brad Pitt, after seeing him at the Oscars. Star has a similar account of an obsessive Aniston, but they take it a step further to claim that she’s also obsessed with her body to the point of distraction.

The Enquirer: Aniston dumped Mayer when she realized he wasn’t about to propose

Enough already! Jennifer Aniston pulled the plug on her rocky 9-month romance with John Mayer because she felt he’d left her no other choice, sources say.

“Jen feels as if John kept throwing the relationship back in her face and she couldn’t take it anymore,” a friend of the 40-year-old… star told The Enquirer.

According to sources, the former “Friends” beauty became discouraged over a laundry list of problems, including 31-year-old John’s wandering eye, his blabbing about their love life, putting career before love, and his refusal to move in with Jen or give her an engagement ring….

After Jen returned to LA on March 3 from an overseas trip promoting “Marley & Me,” she called John and pulled the plug, revealed the friend.

“There were no tears and no big fight,” said the source.

[From The National Enquirer, print edition, March 30, 2009]

In Touch: Mayer ended it over the phone as Aniston couldn’t let go of the past

According to the friend, John dumped Jen just two weeks after they attended the Academy Awards together – when she saw her ex-husband, Brad Pitt, with his partner, Angelina Jolie, for the first time in person. “Jen spent most of the evening talking about Brad,” the friend explains. “It got on John’s nerves. He said it was bordering on obsessive.”

Although Jen and Brad divorced four years, ago, it was obvious to John that she still wasn’t over him – and may never be. During her promotional interviews for Marley & Me last fall, Jen called Angelina “uncool” and admitted she still had a place in her heart for Brad. “I will love Brad for the rest of my life,” she told Britain’s Hello! Magazine. “You can’t take away good memories…”

Jen’s inability to put the past behind her ruined her one-year romance with John, 31. As soon as she returned from Europe, “he ended it on the phone,” a close pal of Jen’s tells In Touch. “He told her he needed space and he wasn’t ready to take the relationship any further.”

[From In Touch, print edition, March 30, 2009]

In Touch bases a lot of their argument on quotes Aniston gave to the press, but that Hello! interview they use as evidence was cobbled together from old quotes and wasn’t new.

Star takes it to outrageous levels with obnoxious digs at Aniston, claiming she spends hours a day exercising and is abnormally self-obsessed. They get points for creativity and compelling language, as much as this sounds like complete fiction.

Star: Mayer dumped Aniston, and she’s a wack job who is obsessed with her ex.

“John told a friend that Jen called John ‘Brad’ by accident several times,” an insider tells Star. “John said it totally flipped him out, especially when it happened when they were in bed together! It made him insecure because he knows he’s not as good looking as Brad…

“John says Jennifer weighs herself every morning, pumps herself up on coffee and then runs three of four miles on the treadmill…

“She also does yoga or Pilates for, like, four hours a day. It’s unreal!…”

[From Star Magazine, print edition, March 30, 2009]

Star also claimed that Mayer is planning a tell-all, which he vehemently denies. It’s hard to tell which tabloid is telling the truth, but you can bet that Star’s account is either partially or totally fabricated, and In Touch seems heavily based on Aniston’s old quotes. I would like to believe The Enquirer, which is the most reliable tabloid and also has an account that seems a lot more possible.

Maybe Aniston finally paid attention to her friends and decided to tell Mayer she didn’t want to deal with his hot and cold drama. He could have driven her to it, though. I know I’ve been in a situation with an ex where I felt like he really wanted me to break it off, but he was too chicken to do it. He behaved badly until I ended up making the break. You can see Mayer doing that. In fact many of his comments to the press sounded like some kind of test for the relationship.

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