Shakira's sentimental life through her songs: from 'Antología', for her first love, to 'Me enamoré', her hymn to Gerard Piqué

Shakira wrote

, the fifth single from her debut studio album

, when she was 17 years old.

She had just broken up with her first formal boyfriend, Óscar Ulloa, whom she started dating when she was a fifteen-year-old.

“You made me see the sky even deeper.

Together with you I think I gained more than three kilos, with your many sweet kisses distributed.

You took off my shoes from the cement to escape the two of us flying for a while, ”she says in the subject.

“But you forgot a final instruction, because I still don't know how to live without your love”, confesses the artist.

Shakira's discography is full of references to her romantic relationships.

You just have to go through it to see direct allusions to each of her partners, from her first boyfriends to her last, Gerard Piqué, with whom she has just ended a relationship that has lasted more than a decade.

Like those verses from

dedicated to Ulloa.

Shakira herself confirmed it during

her, in 2006. This love song is one of her greatest hits.

Released in November 1996, it became one of the most emblematic songs of the Colombian singer and one of the most famous Latin American ballads of that decade.

More information

Shakira and Gerard Piqué announce that they are separating after 12 years of relationship

Shakira is reluctant to talk about her private life in interviews, but she doesn't hold her tongue in her songs.

, the second international single from

, is also dedicated to Óscar Ulloa.

It was her way of thanking him for his support at the beginning.

The singer has once recognized that he was an important person at the time when she left her native Barranquilla to try her luck in Bogotá.

"Where are you Love?

Come, come back for me, that life becomes an eight for me if you are not here, ”she says in the song.

And in case there was any doubt as to who it was addressed to, Ulloa participated in the video clip.

convulsive romances

In 1997, she began dating Puerto Rican actor and model Osvaldo Ríos.

It was one of her most controversial courtships.

She was 20 years old and he was 37. So, she published

, her second studio album.

The song

was an almost instant success, reaching number one on the Billboard Latin Songs chart.

"It's you, love, my desire to laugh.

The goodbye that I will not know how to say, because I will never be able to live without you, ”she says.

For some those lines were the greatest declaration of love that she has written in her career.

Some verses as brief as the courtship itself, which barely lasted a year.

“She was starting her career and had a whole world to live.

When you love someone, it is better to set them free.

It is the best proof of love that you can give him, ”Ríos revealed in an interview.

"She had to fly, it was the best thing that happened to her, not being with me," she added.

Shortly after, in the year 2000, Shakira met Antonio de la Rúa, son of then Argentine President Fernando de la Rúa.

It was a relationship surrounded by controversy and media pressure from the beginning.

The Argentines did not fit it well.

The Latin American country was on the verge of its worst economic and political crisis, and the photos of the couple living an idyllic romance around the world caused discomfort in public opinion.

This was Gerard Piqué and Shakira's first photo together, where they pose with, among others, Carles Puyol, Piqué's partner, and his girlfriend, Malena Costa, and with the singer's makeup artist, Beatriz Matallana (next to her), during the celebration of the birthdays of Piqué and Shakira, in a photograph that Piqué posted on Twitter in 2011. With it they broke the exclusive intended by many media, who sought to photograph them together before they announced their relationship, something they did in March 2011.

Barcelona footballer Gerard Piqué hugs and kisses his girlfriend, the singer Shakira, to the delight of his teammates, Busquets, Bojan, Villa and Xavi (from right to left), during the concert that the singer gave at the Lluís stadium Companys from Barcelona to celebrate Barça winning the Champions League after defeating Manchester 3-1 in May 2011. It was one of the first public appearances they made showing their love.GIANLUCA BATTISTA

Carlos Puyol, Gerard Piqué, Sergio Busquets and Shakira, together at a press conference in Florida, USA, which brought together the Pies Descalzos Foundation, founded by the singer, and FC Barcelona, ​​in one of the first public acts that the The couple got together on August 1, 2011, just six months after making their relationship known. John Parra (WireImage)

Shakira and Gerard Piqué arrive hand in hand at the FIFA Ballon d'Or award ceremony in Zurich, Switzerland, in January 2012. Alexander Hassenstein - FIFA (FIFA via Getty Images)

Shakira and Gerard Pique in the quarterfinals of the basketball world cup that pitted the USA against Slovenia in Barcelona in September 2014. Albert Gea (REUTERS)

In December 2012, Shakira and Piqué launched this half-naked image in collaboration with Unicef, for which the singer is a goodwill ambassador.

They were expecting the birth of their first child, a boy named Milan who would come into the world on January 22, 2013. With the photograph, the couple invited "friends and followers" to participate in their 'online baby shower' to buy emergency items for children in developing countries. AP

The first image that could be seen of the couple's first child, Milan Piqué Mebarak, was this one that Gerard Piqué posted on his Instagram account.

His second son, Sasha, would arrive two years later, in January 2015.- (EFE)

Gerard Pique and Shakira hug and pose with the Copa del Rey won by FC Barcelona against Atlético de Bilbao at the Camp Nou, in May 2015. David Ramos (Getty Images)

Shakira and Gerard Piqué, in the Davis Cup tennis final between Spain and Canada held at the Caja Mágica in Madrid on November 24, 2019. Alex Pantling (Getty Images)

On September 5, 2019, Shakira and Piqué were photographed in New York during the Davis Cup tennis presentation, organized by Kosmos, the company of the Barcelona soccer player. BRYAN R. SMITH (AFP)

The last image of the couple together dates from October 14, 2021, when they were seen with their children at an event held in Tarragona, Spain.VIEW press (Corbis via Getty Images)

On May 25, 2022, Shakira made her last public appearance upon her arrival at the screening of 'Elvis' during the 75th edition of the Cannes Film Festival, in France. GUILLAUME HORCAJUELO (EFE)

At the beginning of 2002, shortly after President De la Rúa established the financial corralito in Argentina and fled the Casa Rosada by helicopter, the singer published

, her third studio album.

Antonio de la Rúa participated in the music video for

, directed by fashion photographer Herb Ritts.

In the video clip, she shares with her fans her loneliness when she goes on tour and the passionate reunions with her boyfriend, in shots full of kisses, hugs, and caresses.

The song and the video caused a schism in Argentine society, which was then suffering the effects of the

: record unemployment figures, images of extreme poverty... The music store chain Tower Records withdrew all of the singer's records from sale .

By way of explanation, a poster placed in all the shop windows reproduced suggestive stills from the video clip and explained: “Antoñito… We are also very hot.

That's why we don't sell Shakira music."

The president of Tower Records made this decision: "For sharing with our customers the anger [hate] that we all feel."

The hit

appears on that album , in which Shakira also dedicates phrases to her boyfriend: "Lucky that you were born in the south and that we make fun of distances."

The unpopularity of the De la Rúa family did not prevent the artist from continuing to sing from the rooftops her love for the son of the former Argentine president.

In 2006 she released

, the third single from the album

.

"I met you one day in January with the moon on my nose.

And since I saw that you were sincere, I lost myself in your eyes”, she reveals, remembering her first meeting with Antonio in the year 2000, at a dinner in Buenos Aires.

“And even if you have been a foreigner even in your own country, if I say to you, 'what do you say?', you still say, 'what do you say?'

And you cry with emotion, hearing a bandoneon”, she adds.

goodbye song

Before breaking up with De la Rúa, Shakira dedicated one last song to him.

It was 2010, and she said goodbye to the Argentine with

, from the album

.

"God knows how hard it is for me to leave you and I look at you while you sleep, but I'm not going to wake you up, it's that today I ran out of hope because what we have left of us is no longer enough," she says.

"All these years walking together now doesn't seem so much."

That summer, she met Gerard Piqué at the Rock in Rio festival in Madrid, shortly before the World Cup in South Africa.

She was going to sing

, the official song of the competition, and he was going to play with the Spanish National Team.

The footballer told him: “We will meet in the final”.

They met and began a 12-year relationship.

The Barcelona defender has been the protagonist of some of the Colombian's recent successes.

In

, from 2010, she admits to being “crazy” with his “tiger”.

Four years later, Shakira repeated as the official artist of the World Cup, this time singing

in Brazil.

In it she talks about Piqué's blue eyes.

And as usual in her career, she had him —and his Barcelona teammates— to star in the video clip.

But his definitive declaration of love for the soccer player came with

, included on his album

, from 2017. have been 10 years).

“I saw it alone and I launched myself.

I fell in love.

Look what a pretty thing, what a round mouth.

I like that little beard (…) With you I would have ten children, let's start with a couple”.

Shakira and Gerard Piqué have two children, Sasha and Milan.

It will be difficult to see the Colombian star speaking publicly about the reasons for his separation from the Catalan defender.

"We ask for respect for privacy," she says in the statement that he released this Saturday with Piqué.

Perhaps we will have to wait for his next album to find out more details about the breakup.