Aaron Rodgers is about to start his 22nd NFL season. The Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback has spent the last few years keeping his private life almost completely off camera. He confirmed in 2025 that he is married to a woman named Brittani, and the couple has never been photographed together in public.
That wall of privacy followed one of the most public relationships of his career. Rodgers and Hollywood actress Shailene Woodley dated from 2020 to 2022, got engaged, then called the wedding off. The split is back in the news after Rodgers gave his most detailed account yet of how it ended.
Aaron Rodgers’ shock claims
On Thursday’s episode of the Not Just Football With Cam Heyward podcast, Aaron Rodgers said the public story of the breakup does not match what happened between them.
“Her story is that I ruined her life and gave her a crazy depression because I left her,” Rodgers said. “But the actuality is, she told me that then she took off the ring by March. So I proposed in December, she took out the ring by March. And we had a couple of times where we tried to, you know, get reunited, and nothing ever happened.”
He then made the most explosive claim of the interview.
“I propose, and she says yes,” Rodgers said. “She maybe felt like she was forced to make a decision. She could have said no. But not a couple days after that, she tells me, you know, ‘Before we get married I got to go f— this guy.’”
Rodgers said the engagement was already over long before the split became public. “There wasn’t even a relationship in 2022 to break off,” he said. “She literally told me, ‘I don’t want to be with you’ after we tried some reconciliation in 2021. There’s just a lot of narrative out there that isn’t true.”
He later added: “Shai, you left me, you took the ring off. What are we talking about regarding me ruining your life?”
Woodley has not publicly responded to the September 2026 comments.
What Shailene Woodley said in 2024
Shailene Woodley spoke about the aftermath of the relationship in a 2024 interview with Outside.
“I felt like I lost my soul, my self, my happiness, my joy,” she said. “I really understood depression and anxiety and, like, complete soul detachment.”
She also said: “I haven’t shared much about my relationship with Aaron because it always makes me cry.” And of the romance itself: “It was not right. But it was beautiful.”
Those comments are what Rodgers was answering on the podcast.
Aaron Rodgers and Shailene Woodley relationship timeline
July 2020: Reports first link Rodgers and Woodley after his split from NASCAR driver Danica Patrick.
Late 2020: The relationship becomes serious. Rodgers now says he proposed in December 2020.
February 3, 2021: Media reports confirm they are together.
February 6, 2021: Rodgers reveals he is engaged while accepting the NFL MVP award. Woodley later confirms it.
February 2022: Reports say the engagement is off. The distance between Green Bay and Los Angeles is widely cited as a strain.
Late February – March 2022: The pair is linked to a brief reconciliation. Rodgers posts an affectionate Instagram tribute around that time.
April 2022: Reports confirm the engagement is over for good.
Rodgers now says that the public timeline is wrong. In his version, Woodley took the ring off by March 2021 and told him she did not want to be with him after failed attempts to get back together that same year.
The two stories still do not line up. One is the version that played out in headlines for years. The other is the version Rodgers chose to tell days before another NFL season begins.
