Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez were nearly inseparable from late 2010 until their first breakup in 2012. An emerging artist at the time, paparazzi followed them everywhere and Bieber is now admitting to the pressure he felt living in such an intense relationship.
"I moved in with my girlfriend when I was 18. Started my own life with her. It was a marriage kind of thing. Living with a girl, it was too much at that age," the 21-year-old Bieber told Complex magazine in the October/November issue. "But we were so in love. Nothing else mattered. We were all about each other."
The two pop stars have engaged in an on-again, off-again relationship over the last three years, but have kept their reunions relatively private except for a few Instagram posts. The "What Do You Mean" singer also believes he and Gomez identified themselves by their relationship too much rather than what they wanted as individuals.
"My identity was in her. Her identity was in me," Bieber said. "When stuff would happen, I would lose my freakin' mind, and she would lose her mind, and we would fight so hard because we were so invested in each other. Love is a choice. Love is not a feeling. People have made it seem in movies that it's this fairy tale. That's not what love is."
Bieber has opened up several times in the last month about his bumpy relationship with Gomez. He admitted that past relationships have left him heartbroken and less trusting of others, but he used that hurt to write a few songs on his upcoming album.
"It was a long relationship that created heartbreak and created happiness and a lot of different emotions that I wanted to write about," Bieber revealed on "On Air with Ryan Seacret," likely referring to Gomez. "There's a lot of that on this album."
The "Boyfriend" singer is rumored to release his new album on Nov. 13.
