Actress Reese Witherspoon was only 23-years-old when she gave birth to her now 21-year-old daughter Ava with ex-husband Ryan Phillipe. During a recent talk on Dax Shepard’s podcast, ‘Armchair Expert’ the ‘Big Little Lies’ actress opened up to Kristen Bell and Monica Padman about the struggles she faced as a young mom.
“I did not have a lot of support with my first baby and I learned really early, like this is not going to work,“ she explained. ”I tried to muscle through for five months with Ava, just not sleeping and I became delirious.”
The 45-year-old actress also said that she “couldn‘t have worked” through the first few months she was a new mom to Ava. ”I was lucky enough to have money saved and I didn’t have to work, but it’s just not a one-person job. I would even say it’s not a two-person job,” Witherspoon added.
The hit movie ‘Cruel Intentions’ starring Witherspoon came out the same year Ava was born, so that’s how the actress was able to support herself and not go back to work right away. Four years after Witherspoon’s look alike daughter was born, she and Phillipe welcomed their son Deacon into the world in 2003 before the couple eventually went on to split in 2008.
This isn’t the first time Witherspoon has been candid about having a daughter at a young age. On the Drew Barrymore show last year, she admitted that she was terrified to be pregnant at only 22-years-old. “I got pregnant when I was 22 years old, and I didn‘t know how to balance work and motherhood. You just do it.”
“I didn‘t know if I was going to have steady work — I’d made movies, but I hadn’t established myself as someone who could demand that it shoots close to my kid’s school,” she said. ”I didn’t have any real power or leverage within my industry.”
“I think I was just trying to figure it out like every other mom, dad, partner, or grandparent who‘s raising a child. There’s a lot of compromise, you take the food out of your mouth, the clothes off your back, the sleep out of your life — but every bit of that sacrifice is truly worth it,” the actress continued.
