Arnold Schwarzenegger says his lifelong penchant for secrecy and ability to put his emotions “on deep freeze” led him to keep many secrets from his wife, eventually causing the break-up of their marriage.

I became an expert in living in denial

Throughout their strained 25-year marriage, Schwarzenegger says he did not want to tell Maria Shriver about crucial life decisions such as major heart surgery and running for California Governor because he feared she would overreact and tell her well-connected family and friends.

In his new autobiography out yesterday, Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story, and in an interview on the TV news magazine 60 Minutes, the former California Governor acknowledges that his inability to be honest with people had hurt those closest to him.

“That’s the way I handle things. And it always has worked. But, I mean it does not – it’s not the best thing for people around me because I sometimes – some information I just keep to myself,” Schwarzenegger told reporter Lesley Stahl on 60 Minutes.

Schwarzenegger praises Shriver throughout the book as a partner and friend who was essential to his success but also admits to keeping her in the dark about many career decisions.

Shriver filed for divorce in July.

Although he had been toying with the idea of running for California Governor for more than a year, Schwarzenegger waited until just days before the filing deadline for the 2003 recall election to discuss it with Shriver, writing in the book that he “didn’t want endless conversation about it at home”.

Shriver opposed the idea but was persuaded to soften her stance by her mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who told her to support her husband’s ambitions or he might resent her for the rest of his life.

Despite that struggle, he also did not inform her when he decided to seek a second term, writing that she had to read about it in the newpaper.

But Schwarzenegger’s biggest secret was the child he had with the family’s housekeeper.

He declined to say whether he has a relationship with the child, Joseph, saying he did not want to go into any more details because he had already caused Shriver and their four children enough pain.

“I don’t want to reawaken and kind of talk about it because it’s not going to help them. And I just want to protect them as much as I can,” he says.

There were other deceptions, too, including a “hot affair” with Danish actress Brigitte Nielsen while filming the 1985 action film Red Sonja, when he and Shriver were living together.

He admitted other affairs, but told Stahl they were “something that’s obviously between Maria and me”.

Schwarzenegger says in the interview that his marriage and his family were the most important things in his life but he caused them tremendous pain.

“So the thing that really meant the most to me kind of fell apart because of my doing,” he said in the 60 Minutes interview.

“That is something that I will always look back and say, ‘How could you have done that?’.”