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Demi Lovato has been using their voice for good for years.
Those unique challenges have helped her build a lot of wisdom.
This week, they sat down with the incomparable Keke Palmer.
Both former child stars compared notes on having dated grown men when they were teenagers, and the factors that led to that.
These former teen stars had very similar experiences
On the Tuesday, March 3 episode of Baby, This Is Keke Palmer, the eponymous host reflected upon the red flag age gaps of her adolescence.
“I found myself dating. I’m 15, why is my boyfriend 20?” she recalled thinking.
This remark came in retrospect, because it seemed to make sense at the time.
Her guest for this legend-to-legend conversation was Demi Lovato.
“Why was my boyfriend 30?” Demi responded, nodding in agreement. “You know what I’m saying?”
keke: “i’m fifteen, why was my boyfriend 20?”
demi: “why was my boyfriend 30?”oh my god 💀 pic.twitter.com/JEPUDZKj5u
— ً (@eitherwaydemi) March 3, 2026
Keke very clearly knows what Demi is saying.
And so do we.
In 2010, Demi was 18 years old. Wilmer Valderrama was 30. The two began dating, only breaking up in 2016.
Demi has spoken about the highs and lows of this erstwhile relationship before — alleging violations of consent but also describing the romance as “love at first sight.”
We do have to emphasize that Valderrama’s name doesn’t come up during the chat. And, honestly, it doesn’t need to.
What brought about these situations?
Contrary to what conspiracy theorists might push, it isn’t that teenage actors are pushed to date adult men by evil puppetmasters. At least, not usually.
The unique combination of a financially successful career and unusual adolescent independence did feed into this situation, as it would for even non-famous teens.
But, as Keke suggested during the interview, both former child stares “were trying to find outlets and just a way to process” their fairly unique lives.
“Nobody our age could understand,” Demi agreed. “But then you look back in hindsight, when I turned 30 I was like, ‘That’s not OK.’”
“Girl, the moment that you realize and you get to the age that a lot of people that were around you and doing stuff,” Keke remarked.
“It’s almost a mental break that can happen because you realize you were taken advantage of,” Keke added. “‘Oh, I was being exploited.’”
It is very common for teens, even those who do not date anyone older than a classmate, to think little to nothing of an adult dating one of their classmates.
(This was even more common a couple of decades ago, before social media.)
At fifteen, you might think “gee, why would my friend date someone as ancient as 26?” Then, over a decade later, you remember that — and imagine that mindset of someone in their mid-twenties dating a high school sophomore.
“Especially if you are an older soul, too,” Demi added, clarifying: “Especially if you’re mature for your age.”
These two baddies both have excellent taste
This formed a natural segue into both praising Hilary Duff’s song, “Mature.” (Hilary has been popping off with new music lately.)
Remarking upon how they all had similar experiences as child stars, Demi noted that their 2022 song, “29,” was about an older partner.
(Demi was 17 and Valderrama was 29 when they first met, though the dating did not begin until Demi’s 18th birthday.)
As we already mentioned, plenty of non-celebrities — particularly women — have comparable stories about men who, at the very best, were too immature. In most cases, these are stories of men who exploited them as teens.
We’re glad that Demi and Keke are both in much better places today. We’re just so sorry that they had to pull themselves out of these places of exploitation.
