Lily Allen is opening up about being a parent, offering a raw outlook on motherhood. She explained that having children affected her career.
“My children ruined my career,” she said on the Radio Times Podcast. “I mean, I love them, and they complete me, but in terms of, like, you know, pop stardom, totally ruined it.”
Allen has two children with ex-husband Sam Cooper. She’s mother to daughters Ethel, 12, and Marnie, 11. Allen and Cooper divorced in 2018. She’s currently married to Stranger Things star David Harbour.
“It really annoys me when people say you can have it all because, quite frankly, you can’t,” she explained.
Allen said that she wanted to focus on her children, so she doesn’t have any regrets in that regard. Allen wanted to avoid the mistakes that her parents made.
She said, “Some people choose their careers over their children, and that’s their prerogative. But, you know, my parents were quite absent when I was a kid, and I feel like that really left some, like, nasty scars that I’m not willing to, you know, repeat on mine. And so I chose stepping back and concentrating on them, and I’m glad that I have done that because I think they’re pretty well-rounded people.”
Lily Allen Opens Up about Parenthood
However, Allen also pointed out that having children changed her life. It helped her clean up her act in a lot of ways. She finally decided to get clean (via Daily Mail). “Ethel was seven, Marnie was six when I got clean, and there’s a lot of s*** that happened before that they’ll be really cross about,” she said.
In fact, according to Allen, having children may have saved her life in a lot of ways. She said having children caused her to reevaluate her life.
She said, “I lost my sense of self. I lost my identity — I was being a bad mum. I was being bad at my job. I’d wake up on a tour bus in the middle of Wisconsin and be so hung-over. I cheated on my husband. All I wanted to do was be with my kids. I wasn’t even making any money.” However, Allen ultimately decided to better herself.
She told The Guardian, “I’m surprised I’m not dead. The music industry was a hedonistic place in the noughties. People who indulge don’t generally come out the other side. Having children triggered responsibilities.”