Leslie Bibb never felt a pull to become a parent.
“I don’t want kids. It’s not a chip I have, and the mom I would want to be, I’m not sure I can be,” Bibb, 52, said on the Wednesday, November 20, episode of Jenna Bush Hager’s “Open Book” podcast. “My dad died when I was 3, and my mom had a really hard time with it, and then she was working all the time because she had four girls and she had to.”
The actress continued, “I really felt the loss of her presence because she was hustling. All I wanted was her there, but she was providing for us. I knew how important that was for me — if I had a kid — to give that to them.”
At the same time, Bibb learned about fostering an exemplary work ethic from her mom.
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“The other thing she taught me was hustle. I saw how happy she was,” the White Lotus star recalled. “[While] I wanted my mom there, I knew that I had a better, more fun mom because she was really fulfilled by her work. She loved being a mom, but she also liked being an independent woman, and she was smart, clever and a go-getter. I think that hustler [side], I also really appreciated.”
Bibb’s family perspective even affected her preferred method of childhood play.
“I don’t remember playing with babies as a kid. I would cut their hair,” she said, revealing she never had a maternal instinct. “I never did. I have it toward dogs, like, you put a dog in front of me and I’m, like, ‘Ahh!’”
While Bibb is at peace with her decision on motherhood, she admitted that the outside feedback can sometimes be especially loud.
“Somehow [a woman’s] decision not to have children becomes a reflection of how [she] was raised or her mother’s desire for grandkids,” Bibb said. “It’s so interesting how personally we all take other people’s decisions, and I do it too.”
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She added, “I’m just aware of time because it seems, like, the end of the line feels so far away. Then, you’re like, ‘That’s right, we’re all on the same train, heading to the same place and where we [make a] pit stop is all different.’ I just want to enjoy it, and I don’t have a lot of patience. ‘No’ has gotten to be an easier word for me to say.”
Bibb has loved her life as is, which includes an 18-year partnership with fellow actor Sam Rockwell.
“I love Sam Rockwell, I would put him in my pocket and carry him with me all the time, I love him. I do not want to get married,” Bibb told Bush Hager, 43, on a June episode of Today With Jenna & Friends, explaining her desire never to tie the knot. “I feel like we are married. … He didn’t want it either. I mean, I don’t know, maybe it’s probably something about the way we grew up but I feel like, ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’”
