Fall Out Boy's Pete Wentz Reflects on Struggle With Fame After Ashlee Simpson Divorce: ‘My Life Had Blown Up'

Pete Wentz is getting candid about the fallout that comes from fame.

The Fall Out Boy bassist recently recalled the low moments of his life following his and Ashlee Simpson's 2011 divorce after three years of marriage, noting that the public interest around this period in his life was difficult for him.

"My life had blown up completely," Wentz explained during an interview with Apple Music's Zane Lowe published on March 23. "I got divorced, realized I didn't really like how famous I was. Didn't love who I was."

And looking back at the way the group was hounded by photographers following their rise to stardom in the mid-aughts — specifically recalling an incident at producer Neal Avron's house ahead of the release of their fourth studio album "Folie à Deux" — Wentz shared he was glad when the band went on hiatus the following year.

"It's weird to look back on now," he told Lowe. "Paparazzi broke down Neal's gate to his house when we were working on 'Folie.' It was like that degree of chaos … I think that, for me, I needed to take time to just become a real person. I didn't like any of that."

SEE: Cutest Pics of Ashlee Simpson-Ross and Evan Ross' Kids

During that hiatus, Wentz was able to focus solely on raising his and Simpson's son Bronx, who is now 14.

"Here's what it really was: At 31, we'd had all these great years as a band, and then we took time off, and I basically became Mr. Mom," he said on "The Howard Stern Show" in 2015. "I had the beard, the flannel shirt. I didn't know what my identity was. That factored in. When your identity is what you do, it's hard when you stop doing it."

But amid his divorce from the "Pieces of Me" singer and the band's hiatus, Wentz confessed he fell into a cycle of depression.

"I think it was a combination of all these factors at once, including being too young," he told host Howard Stern. "And we were doing this all in the public eye, which as you know, it doesn't help, because you have people scrutinizing everything you do."

However, since their split, the two have both found love again and expanded their families, with Simpson and husband Evan Ross — who tied the knot in 2014 — welcoming daughter Jagger Snow, 7, and son Ziggy Blue, 2. Wentz and his wife Meagan Camper share son Saint Lazslo, 8, and daughter Marvel Jane, 4.

And in the decade since Simpson and Wentz called it quits, they've found a way to co-parent amicably.

"I think it's important to listen and to give people balance," the Grammy nominee told Us Weekly in 2019.