In short: a lot. It happens. Actress Katherine Heigl has announced she’s quit Grey’s Anatomy after adopting her daughter Naleigh, in large part because she wants to spend more time with her family.
In the end, Heigl decided to leave the hit ABC show because of her family — and not necessarily to advance her film career. “I started a family and it changed everything for me,” she says. “It changed my desire to work full-time.”In Sept. 2009, Heigl and husband Josh Kelley adopted their daughter Naleigh from South Korea. She also took a three-month leave from Grey’s Anatomy to spend time with her family, an experience that made her want to focus on motherhood, she recently told PEOPLE.
“I think I’m just gonna try and keep it a little more mellow,” she told PEOPLE, “and be a little bit more of a mom, since that’s a big part of my life now. I took those three months off and I realized how very, very important is my family is to me and I want to be more available to them.”
I remember when I was a brand new editor and had to tell my boss I was pregnant. She said “It will make you a better editor” and I nodded as if I understood what the hell she was talking about when I totally didn’t.
And then I had Luca and I totally did understand.
My ambitions definitely changed after I had kids. Each time I had a baby I lost my ambition for around a year. It began to trickle back about the time I stopped breastfeeding each child, give or take. When it did come back, it was irrevocably changed because I was no longer the centre of the universe.
I have turned down many jobs that would have had too great an impact on my family – because they involved longer or less flexible working hours or relocating overseas. At no time did it ever feel like a sacrifice.
And a major motivating factor in leaving corporate life for me was my desire to have a different kind of working life, one that would allow me more time with my kids (Katherine Heigal and I are soooo alike, I always knew it).
If you have kids, how did having them change what you thought you wanted?
Whether it was your job or your ambitions, how did becoming a parent make you re-think what you wanted to do? And then, what did you do about it?
Top Comments
I was a full time newspaper journalist before having my first child nine years ago. After one year of maternity leave I knew I couldn't leave him and return to work. I told my boss I wasn't coming back, and my husband and I moved to the country and built a new home to give our child the best life possible...
After having my second child I undertook some casual work as a newspaper journalist for 4 years and I was lucky enough to have grandparents look after the kids. I am now pregnant with my 5th child, and my priorities as a journalist are so much different to my life pre-children.
I love being a stay at home mum and hope to enjoy it for another 4 or 5 years until my next child starts preschool or school...
I have the rest of my life to work!
Having children changes your outlook on everything and what's really important in your life...
nope! my goal and dream was to be a stay home mummy and now i am one i couldnt be happier.