Jessica Simpson reveals why her marriage to Nick Lachey ended, details John Mayer romance

Jessica Simpson pulls back the curtain on her highly publicized breakup with Nick Lachey and her relationship with John Mayer in her upcoming "Open Book" memoir.

In excerpts published by People before the release Feb. 4, the "Do You Know" artist revealed that being in the spotlight caused her marriage with Lachey to crumble.

Simpson, who was 22 years old when she married Lachey in 2002, said they were both trying to find their places in the music industry. They filmed the reality show "Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica" about their union. It ran from 2003 to 2005.

"We worked and we were great at it, but when it came time to being alone, we weren’t great at it anymore," Simpson wrote. "We really got crushed by the media and by ourselves. ... I couldn’t lie to our fans and I couldn’t give somebody hope that we were this perfect golden couple."

The actress said the 98 Degrees member was her first love and she will always have respect for him.

"I was really young, and my success hadn’t really begun," she said. "He knew me as this young, innocent 18-year-old that had never been introduced to the world in so many ways. I went straight from my father to him. Nick’s very smart. He was eight years older than me, but he was also young."

The pair divorced in 2006, and Lachey married Vanessa Minnillo in 2011. Simpson married NFL pro Eric Johnson in 2014, but before she found love with Johnson, she dated John Mayer, a romance she details in her book.

Simpson wrote that despite her intense connection to Mayer, the singer made her feel insecure in their relationship, and she started drinking to control her nerves.

"I constantly worried that I wasn’t smart enough for him. ... He was so clever and treated conversation like a friendly competition that he had to win," she wrote in her book. "My anxiety would spike, and I would pour another drink. It was the start of me relying on alcohol to mask my nerves."

Their relationship ended after he detailed their sex life in a Playboy interview in 2010 when he referred to her as "sexual napalm."

More: Jessica Simpson reveals sexual abuse as a child, alcohol addiction in new memoir, 'Open Book'

More: Jessica Simpson joins Pink, disables Instagram comments after mom shaming

"I was floored and embarrassed that my grandmother was actually gonna read that," she said. "A woman and how they are in bed is not something that is ever talked about."

Simpson's memoir reveals she endured sexual abuse as a child.

“It would start with tickling my back and then go into things that were extremely uncomfortable. ... I wanted to tell my parents. I was the victim, but somehow I felt in the wrong," she wrote.

She said she revealed the abuse to her parents when she was 12.

Simpson opened up about how trauma from the abuse coupled with stress over her career led her to become dependent on alcohol and drugs. "I was killing myself with all the drinking and pills," she wrote.

She said she's been sober since November 2017 and therapy helped her heal. "Giving up the alcohol was easy," she said. "I was mad at that bottle. At how it allowed me to stay complacent and numb."

Contributing: Hannah Yasharoff

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Jessica Simpson: Nick Lachey, John Mayer bonds ended for these reasons