Jennifer Garner Says She Was in 'Agony' Not Being Able to Pump While Making “Dallas Buyers Club”: 'I Was a Disaster'
Jennifer Garner Says She Was in 'Agony' Not Being Able to Pump While Making “Dallas Buyers Club”: 'I Was a Disaster'
Charlotte PhillippMon, March 2, 2026 at 8:45 PM UTC
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Jennifer Garner attends a photocall for the launch of "The Last Thing He Told Me."Credit: Alan Chapman/Dave Benett/Getty
Jennifer Garner is opening up about how difficult it was for her as a breastfeeding mom on the set of Dallas Buyers Club — and how her costar Matthew McConaughey helped her make it work.
In an interview for Hits Radio's "My Life in Movies" YouTube series last month, the actress, 53, opened up about the filming of the Oscar-nominated film, which came just after she welcomed her youngest child with Ben Affleck, son Samuel, in 2012.
"I hadn't worked in a long time, and I went back to work for that movie," she shared. "And the way we shot it, we shot the whole thing in 21 days."
"I was nursing, and we were shooting. It was the first day, and around bedtime for my baby, all of a sudden, my boobs exploded," Garner said, sharing that the pace of filming was so fast that it was difficult to take breaks.
Jennifer Garner and Matthew McConaughey in 'Dallas Buyers Club.'Credit: Voltage Pictures/Kobal/Shutterstock
"I had pumped through a lot of movies, and always there's like, a 15-minute break, and we're going to turn the cameras around, and I would say, 'Great. ...I'm going to pump really quickly. ... I couldn't on that film.'"
According to Garner, who is also mom to Seraphina, 17, and Violet, 20, she was in "agony" as she was on set waiting to pump.
"That third kid — leaving him was so hard, and I was a disaster. And I start crying, and I can't stop crying. I'm not supposed to be crying. And Matthew said, 'What is going on with you?' " she said of her former Ghosts of Girlfriends Past costar McConaughey.
"I said, 'I need to pump,' and I don't want to slow anyone down," Garner recounted. "... He said, 'Guys, I need a minute.' And he said, 'Go and just do what you need to do.'And so the rest of that film, every time I needed to pump [he would break]."
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Garner with her kids in 2018.Credit: ROBYN BECK/AFP
"Nobody wanted that movie done more," she said of McConaughey and fellow Dallas Buyers Club star Jared Leto, both of whom were on extreme diets to lose weight for their roles in the film.
"Matthew ate methodically. Jared just stopped eating, which was horrific," Garner shared. "And yet he constantly took the heat for me and said, 'Just go. Just go.' And let me not have to wean my baby, which what a gift, right? What a gentleman."
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In recent years, Garner has also been candid about raising teenagers rather than newborns. During a Feb. 26 appearance on Kylie Kelce's Not Gonna Lie podcast, she opened up to the podcaster and mom of four about the realities of raising teenagers.
“Well, the cool thing is teenagers are amazing,” the 13 Going on 30 alum told Kelce. “They're funny. They have all these interests you never could have predicted. They're thoughtful.”
“Everybody has their moments. We have our moments, but you grow up with them,” she continued. “It's not like somebody's gonna hand you a 14-year-old and say, ‘Here, deal with this.’ You will have been through every age. You will have had little foreshadowing of what this is gonna be like. You will have practiced.”
The Last Thing He Told Me actress also shared her advice for Kelce, who shares her four daughters with husband Jason Kelce, for when her children get older.
“Every day as a mom is a new day to say, ‘Okay. That didn't work. Let me try again,’ “ Garner said. “Every day is a fresh start. Every day is an opportunity, and if you can just keep giving yourself that grace, you get there, and you're suddenly just like, ‘Oh, this is fun.’”
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
