At a London press conference to hype Catwoman, Oscar winner Halle Berry, said: 'Let me tell you something – being thought of as a beautiful woman has spared me nothing in life. No heartache, no trouble. Love has been difficult. Beauty is essentially meaningless and it is always transitory.'

“That is easy for HER to say!” my girlfriends hollered at one of my weekly writers’ soiree. The consensus was that if not for Halle’s beauty, she would not have made it to Hollywood at all. True enough, but I really think Halle is really referring to her tumultuous love life. Her bad luck with men does not even come close to any of the war stories my single New York friends have experienced.

In one of her many abusive relationships, her boyfriend beat her so badly that she lost 80% of her hearing in her left ear. In 1993 she met and fell in love with first husband Atlanta Braves outfielder, David Justice. Despite her fears, it was reported that she proposed to Justice six months after they met. But his fondness for blonde strippers and her rising career in LA ended that union after three years. This breakup was tragic and nearly drove Halle to suicide. 'I think that's the weakest I've been in my entire life,' she confides. 'That's what the break-up of my marriage reduced me to. It took away my self-esteem. It beat me down to the lowest of lows.'

And now, citing irreconcilable differences, Halle has recently begun divorce proceedings against her adulterous second husband, Eric Benet. Benet was in therapy for a reported sex addiction.

'Trying to make sense of how someone can love someone, but still manage to commit an act of extreme betrayal is a real hard one to understand,' explained Berry. Certainly he found it hard being seen as 'Mr. Halle Berry', especially on the night of her Oscar victory. He admits, 'It was hard for me to inhabit the skin of that man - not just that night, but pretty much every day.'

Given all this, Halle claims she will never marry again. “I know now and understand on a primal level that I'm really OK and don't need a man to complement me….I realize I'm OK by myself. And that's a big revelation for me,' she recently said.

Although she has suffered a lot, she bears no ill-will towards the men who have broken her heart. 'I have no malice towards those people or those situations which happened,' Halle shrugs. 'The horrible things that happen are just lessons that are put in our lives to help us learn and grow. So no matter how stunningly gorgeous she is, her choices have led her to this heartache. Beauty is essentially “meaningless” in this regard and I am thankful for Berry for speaking out so publicly on this extremely personal matter.