Brad Pitt on Quitting Drinking, Divorcing Angelina Jolie and Fighting for His Kids: "There's No Love Without Loss"

This is Brad Pitt laid bare.

Eight months after Angelina Jolie filed for divorce, ending their two-year marriage and 12-year partnership, Pitt gave his first in-depth interview to GQ Style, in which he owned up to his own shortcomings and revealed what he's now doing to become a better father to their six children.

"You know, I just started therapy," said Brad, whose entire family sought individual and group counseling after the split. "I love it. I love it. I went through two therapists to get the right one."

Last September, while aboard a private plane en route to L.A., there was a reported altercation between Brad and his 15-year-old son, Maddox Jolie-Pitt. An anonymous phone call was made to the police, leading to an FBI investigation (which was later closed with no charges). Angelina filed for divorce five days later, which resulted in months of back-and-forth fights in the courts.

"I was really on my back and chained to a system when Child Services was called," the War Machine star said, publicly addressing the ordeal for the first time. "After that, we've been able to work together to sort this out. We're both doing our best. I heard one lawyer say, 'No one wins in court—it's just a matter of who gets hurt worse.' And it seems to be true. You spend a year just focused on building a case to prove your point and why you're right and why they're wrong, and it's just an investment in vitriolic hatred. I just refuse. And fortunately my partner in this agrees. It's just very, very jarring for the kids, to suddenly have their family ripped apart."

Thankfully, relations are better today than they were last fall.

Part of that, Brad said, is because he and Angelina agreed to handle their divorce "with great care and delicacy" out of consideration for their children. "There's a lot to tell them because there's understanding the future, there's understanding the immediate moment and why we're at this point, and then it brings up a lot of issues from the past that we haven't talked about. So, our focus is that everyone comes out stronger and better people—there is no other outcome."

In the aftermath of the split, Brad holed up at a friend's bungalow in Santa Monica, Calif., since living alone in his Hollywood Hills home felt "too sad," he said. But, after a month and a half, Brad decided it was time to go. "I was out there one morning, 5:30, and this surveillance van pulls up. They don't know that I'm up behind a wall, and they pull up—and it's a long story—but it was something more than TMZ, because they got into my friend's computer. The stuff they can do these days...I got a little paranoid being there. I decided I had to pick up and come here."