Meg and Dennis Split

By Stephen M. Silverman

08/28/1998 at 12:00 AM EDT

Meg Ryan, 38, and Dennis Quaid, 46, separated six weeks ago after nearly 10 years of marriage, their publicist, Lisa Kasteler, has announced. She declined to say whether or not the couple plans to divorce, and said that the couple has requested privacy "during this difficult time." Ryan and Quaid met on the set of the 1987 comedy "Innerspace" and together survived Quaid's past substance-abuse problems as well as Ryan's estrangement from her mother and stepfather, after he sold an article to a tabloid revealing the two women's troubled relationship. (As a result, Ryan ended all contact with them.) The Quaids have homes in Southern California and Montana. In 1993, their sister-in-law, Evi Quaid (wife of Dennis's older actor brother, Randy), told PEOPLE that the couple was "madly in love, physically in love."