Private pain revealed
THE MEGASTAR MUM OF SIX REVEALS SHE IS STRUGGLING DURING GLOBAL PANDEMIC
Angelina Jolie has opened up about the difficulties of parenting during the COVID-19 outbreak, coming to the conclusion that it’s “impossible” to do it perfectly. The usually private star penned a remarkably candid letter for TIME magazine in which she detailed her worries as the mother to the six children she shares with ex-husband Brad Pitt: Maddox, 18, Pax, 16, Zahara, 15, Shiloh, 13, and twins Knox and Vivienne, 11.
Jolie, 44, who is splitting parenting duties with Pitt, 56, during lockdown, said she’s thinking of “all the mothers and fathers with children at home” during this difficult time as she’s experiencing the same thing herself – albeit from a multi-million-dollar mansion.
“I am imagining how hard each of you is trying to get through your days. How much you want to lead your loved ones through this. How you worry. How you plan. How you smile for them, when inside you feel at times you are breaking.”
The three-times married Oscar winner also went on to detail how she struggled with transitioning from her wild younger days to being a mother. She previously confessed to CBS that: “I went through heavier, darker times and I survived them. I didn’t die young. People can imagine that I did the most dangerous [things], and I did the worst ... For many reasons, I shouldn’t be here.”
She admitted to TIME: “I was not a very stable youth. In fact, I never thought I could be anyone’s mum. I remember the decision to become a parent. It wasn’t hard to love. It wasn’t hard to dedicate myself to someone and something greater than my life. What was hard was knowing that from now on I needed to be the one to make sure everything was OK. To manage it and make it work.”
The only way to be able to parent successfully, she suggests, is to accept imperfection. “One thing that has helped me is to know that’s impossible,” she wrote. “It is a lovely thing to discover that your children don’t want you perfect. They just want you honest. And doing your best … in a way, they are raising you up too. You grow together.”
The actress also spoke about how her family is coping as they isolate together. “COVID-19 has cut children off from their friends, their regular schooling and their freedom of movement,” she said. “With well over a billion people living under lockdown worldwide, there has been a lot of focus on how to prevent children missing out on their education, as well as how to lift their spirits and keep them joyful in isolation.”
Us Weekly confirmed last month that Jolie’s oldest son, Maddox, had returned to the US from college in South Korea, where he studies biotechnology and life sciences. “Maddox is home from school and focusing on his Korean and Russian studies until school reopens,” a source told Us in March. “Angelina has the other children on a routine by waking them up early every day and getting them started on their school tasks shortly afterwards.” The younger siblings are educated by tutors overseen by Jolie in her $38 million mansion in Los Feliz. According to The Daily Mail, the children – with the exception of Maddox – have been spending time with their dad, too, being shuttled between Jolie and Pitt’s nearby compounds
by bodyguards and drivers. Maddox is understood to still have a frosty relationship with Pitt after it was alleged an altercation between the two on board a private jet led Jolie to file for divorce.
Pitt’s property is considered a kids’ paradise with two outdoor swimming pools, a giant trampoline, and a huge skate bowl – plenty to keep the kids occupied in isolation outside of their schoolwork – and it sounds like they’re managing. “We’re all locked in,” Jolie revealed in a Time 100 Talks live virtual event on April 23. “We’re doing all right.”