Spare us the crocodile tears, Gisele! She weeps for the cameras, swipes at Tom Brady's co-parenting... all to tout a new cookbook! But, MAUREEN CALLAHAN asks, why so shy about the timeline of THAT new love affair?

Gwyneth Paltrow walked so Gisele Bündchen could run.

In a solipsistic, vainglorious new interview with ABC News, the woman who was once the world's highest-paid supermodel, now 43, begs for our adulation while playing the victim.

Hey – she's just living her truth, don't you know?

Gisele is on her journey, seeking her most authentic self, climbing her metaphorical mountain – that's the ridiculous title of this soft-focus tongue bath, 'Climbing the Mountain' – surveying her spiritual valleys while sidestepping any questions about her current love affair, which may or may not have predated her divorce from Tom Brady.

Also, she has a new cookbook to promote. 'Nourish' is the title, sold by a woman who once existed solely on booze, cigarettes, coffee and oxygen.

In a solipsistic, vainglorious new interview with ABC News, the woman who was once the world's highest-paid supermodel, now 43, begs for our adulation while playing the victim.

Gisele is on her journey, seeking her most authentic self, climbing her metaphorical mountain, surveying her spiritual valleys while sidestepping any questions about her current love affair, which may or may not have predated her divorce from Tom Brady.

For anyone who has conquered similar vices, be aware: Gisele quit them better than you.

'In one day,' she tell Roberts, 'I stopped smoking, drinking coffee, drinking alcohol,' because her doctor asked, 'Do you want to live?'

Sounds hyperbolic. How old could she have been – 30? But Gisele doubles down.

'I'm living my truth, and I'm not apologizing for it,' she says. Whatever that means.

It's giving Gwyneth vibes, all patterned on the sometime-actress who promotes her own 'starvation diet', IV hookups, 'intuitive fasting' and something called 'rectal ozone therapy' while shilling cookbooks and wellness.

ABC's Robin Roberts should be embarrassed. Here's this so-called journalist quizzing Gisele as if she's breaking real news. Stuff you and I, the hoi polloi meant to put our grubby little hands on this elegant cookbook (list price $31.50), really care about.

Roberts: 'I hear that you are starting to put a little meat into your diet.'

Bündchen: 'Yes! And that was all part of my journey.'

Solid food as self-actualization. Only a glamazonian member of the one percent would be clueless enough to speak this way.

Pictured: Promo for her new cookbook.

Here's a newsflash for Ms. Bündchen: Average American women, those who are mothers especially, are struggling.

Their schedules don't permit daily trips to the local farmer's market, should they even live near one. They are lucky if they can afford to gas up the car and pay the electric bill. To have enough energy to help their children with homework while keeping the house clean.

They don't live on sprawling 7.5-acre ranches north of Miami replete with custom-built horse stables for multiple thoroughbreds, an oak tree that provides respite for daily meditation, or the promise of growing one's own food right in the backyard.

'I'm a farmer', Gisele says, dressed in her equestrienne cosplay. Sure.

We open with this reanimated supermodel sauntering into a photo shoot, air-kissing and blathering about finding herself while lasering in on a box of cupcakes.

Stylists, the hair and make-up artists, the photographer – all ooh and ahh.

'I think we should have these after,' Gisele declares.

The crew is salivating, but Gisele will not be deterred. Even the small dog she cradles exhibits utter restraint, not a bark or a whimper.

'For dessert,' Gisele instructs. 'After lunch — you can have these [then].'

Seems like Tom Brady wasn't the only control freak in that marriage.

And that brings us to the heart of this interview: Gisele doling out a scintilla of her personal pain in exchange for this glorified infomercial – the divorce of the golden couple, the quarterback and the supermodel, after shoving their ostensibly ultra-perfect family down America's gullet for years.

Roberts: 'I think the phrase you used was, 'the death of a dream'?'

Bündchen: 'Well, when you say…'

She shakes her head and squeezes out a tear.

Who knew this question was coming, right? Least of all one of the most media-savvy celebrities going, one who has been famous since she was 18 years old.

Also, she has a new cookbook to promote. 'Nourish' is the title, sold by a woman who once existed solely on booze, cigarettes, coffee and oxygen. 

And that brings us to the heart of this interview: Gisele doling out a scintilla of her personal pain in exchange for this glorified infomercial. (Pictured: With their three children).

'Sorry guys, I didn't know.' Gisele raises a hand and turns her head from the camera. She just can't, you see — simply can't.

'Can I have a little moment?'

She then breathes her way through it, reenacting the Vanity Fair interview she gave in 2023 in which she invoked 'the death of my dream' through a cracking voice, tears threatening to spill and, 'after several yogic inhale-exhales', resuming her story – her 'truth' – just as she does for Roberts.

You know what? If authenticity is the name of the game, let's get authentic.

Here's what was not brought up in this ABC News interview, which runs under the once-esteemed 'Nightline' banner:

The messy beginning of Brady and Bündchen's romance, which collided with the pregnancy of Brady's ex, Bridget Moynahan.

Tom and Gisele's much-touted endorsement of FTX, the fraudulent crypto-scheme that sent founder Sam Bankman-Fried to prison.

And what about Gisele's secret plastic surgery, busted when she was caught by a paparazzo disguised head-to-toe in, of all things, a burqa?

Or her then-husband's trip to Vegas with Ben Affleck, whose nanny was photographed wearing four of Brady's Super Bowl rings? (This was apparently the final straw for Affleck's then-wife Jennifer Garner, who split from him just three days later.)

Oh, and let's not forget Gisele's jujitsu instructor, the one she's been linked to for years now.

She has long denied any romantic involvement with him — until February 16, when DailyMail.com ran exclusive video of Gisele and her instructor kissing.

According to insiders, Brady has since said he's 'accepted' that the relationship began 'years ago' – well before their divorce in 2022 after 13 years of marriage.

But Bündchen plays dumb for Roberts, just a single mother who doesn't know if she can 'open her heart again'.

'I think right now', Gisele says, 'my priority is my kids and creating this beautiful sanctuary.'

Yet Gisele jabs at Brady's co-parenting skills, claiming to be above petty scorekeeping while telling Roberts, 'You know, there's easier days than others. I can only control what I do.'

Just when you might feel sympathy for Brady, he brings the kids into this too.

After this interview, a source said that he was 'scared' to divorce and repeat the 'stress' of raising children with another former partner.

'Tom would actually agree that co-parenting hasn't been easy', the source said. 'There has been a lot of love lost in their relationship'.

Wow. How about these two give their kids a gift and stop talking about them?

According to insiders, Brady has 'accepted' that Gisele's new relationship began 'years ago' - well before their divorce in 2022. But Bündchen plays dumb, just a single mother who doesn't know if she can 'open her heart again'. (Pictured: Gisele and jujitsu instructor Joaquim Valente in Miami in May 2023).

Then again, Bündchen never fails to bring up Jack, her stepson, who she continually claims as her own. 'I raised him,' she tells Roberts.

His mother would beg to differ.

Again, it all reminds one, unfortunately, of Gwyneth, who this week publicly griped, yet again, about her two young stepchildren.

Step-mothering, she told the crowd at an International Women's Day summit in L.A., has been 'a bitch'.

This is the problem with living in your truth. It leaves room for no one else, not even innocent kids.

'At the end of the day,' Bündchen tells Roberts, 'if you're not truthful to who you are, it doesn't work.'

That's at least one thing she's got right. Note to the pseudo-shaman that is Gisele: heal thyself.