Arnold Schwarzenegger calls couples therapy with Maria Shriver the "biggest mistake" he's ever made
Don't expect to see Arnold Schwarzenegger on a therapist's couch any time soon.
The 67-year-old action star appeared on Howard Stern's Sirus XM show on Wednesday, when he got candid about his 2011 split with Maria Shriver after 25 years of marriage. The two divorced after it was revealed he fathered a son more than 14 years earlier with an employee in their household, Mildred Baena.
"This was without a doubt the biggest setback and the biggest failure [in my life]," Schwarzenegger said about the demise of their marriage. "Not only failure, but you really feel like, 'I'm to blame for it. It was me that screwed up,' and you can't point the finger at anyone else."
Schwarzenegger said the two tried couples therapy to mend their relationship, but called it "the biggest mistake" he's ever made.
"Because the guy was so full of sh*t," he said bluntly. "He said more crap and more nonsense. It was absolutely totally counterproductive to our future relationship, or to any hope to get together or anything like that. It was just nonsense talk."
"Maria talked me into it, and I knew instinctively maybe I shouldn't go because I screwed up," he further explained. "I don't have to go through anyone to have him explain to me anything. You know, I apologized to Maria, I apologized to the kids, and I tried to move forward and make the best of it ... It has worked out really so well with the help of Maria, with the help of the kids, but not because of the shrink or some psychiatrist."
Schwarzenegger stressed that he still has a great relationship with his four children with Maria -- 25-year-old Katherine, 23-year-old Christina, 21-year-old Patrick, and 17-year-old Christopher.
"My kids are a straight 10," he gushed. "I am so proud of them and I'm so in love with them. I love my kids so much."
Schwarzenegger, who still referred to Maria as his "wife" in the interview, shared a particularly heartwarming story of his ex and their kids recently surprising him with balloons and sweet notes at the premiere of "Terminator Genisys" in Berlin.
"There was a note -- 'You're the greatest dad, you're the greatest this. We love you daddy' -- all this kind of stuff. It really made me feel so good, each one sent a card. Each one sent a little gift, so that's the relationship I was looking forward to have after this complicated bump and this screw-up."
The former governor of California also called his son with Baena, Joseph, "terrific."
"He totally understands the situation and all that, so it has all worked out so well," he shared. "It's a very tough situation for him, it's a very tough situation for my kids ... but it has happened, and now we have to kind of try and figure it out, right?"
ET caught up with Schwarzenegger in April, when he dished about getting back into "Terminator" shape 30 years after the original film. Watch here.