The actress also explained why she’s currently in “the weird zone” of parenting now that one of her children is technically an adult
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NEED TO KNOW
- Jodie Sweetin said neither of her daughters followed her into acting — and explained why she’s perfectly happy with that
- The Full House and Fuller House alum opened up about raising daughters Zoie, 18, and Beatrix, 15, while appearing on The Dory Jackson Interview series on July 15
- Sweetin also shared why she was especially proud of Zoie recently after the teen spent several days at a monastery
Jodie Sweetin revealed why her kids never wanted to follow in her child star footsteps — as well as why she’s more than okay with that.
Sweetin, 44, opened up about parenting daughters Zoie, 18, and Beatrix (Bee), 15, while appearing on The Dory Jackson Interview series on July 15.
During the conversation, the actress said that acting has simply “never been who they are.”
“Zoie has always been an athlete and is a great soccer player,” the Fuller House star explained. “That’s her strength.”
Credit: Jason LaVeris/FilmMagic
“She did school plays and performed and stuff like that when she was young, and she’s creative, and loves that. But she’s definitely more my athlete,” she added.
“And Bee has always been singing and doing dance classes and all of that kind of stuff. But … I know my kids, and I know what it takes to be a child actor,” Sweetin continued.
“And one of the things that it takes is a willingness to put your own wants and discomfort aside and do your job and show up on set when you’re sick, or when you don’t want to, or when you’re tired, or when something else fun is going on or a birthday party … that’s a huge requirement,” she explained.
“And my kids really didn’t. That wasn’t part of who they were. They were going to do what they were going to do. And I didn’t want to change that about them,” Sweetin said.
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The actress said she ultimately valued her children developing the ability to voice their own wants and needs above booking roles.
“I’d rather have them have that skill than figure out how to go be in a commercial,” she said during the interview.
The podcaster went on to say that while she sometimes feels she’s in “the weird zone” now that she’s the parent of a legal adult, she loves watching daughter Zoie become her own person.
“I just am so, so proud of who she is and who she’s becoming,” Sweetin said.
“She just went for a few days out to an Eastern Orthodox monastery out in, like, east of Glendale … put her phone away, did service work … She’s like, ‘Hey, Mom, I’m going to a monastery.’ I was like, ‘What? What happened?’ She’s like, ‘I just need that. I need that every once in a while to just connect with people … I didn’t know who else would be there, who would be my roommates.’ ”
“I was so incredibly proud of her for that,” Sweetin continued. “Realizing, ‘Hey, you know what? Sometimes I gotta put my phone down. I gotta go meet people I don’t know, and connect with people of all ages and go and give back and reset a little bit,” she added.
“That’s I all I ever want — is for my kids to be happy and to be able to know themselves well enough that they know when and how to take care of themselves on the inside,” the star said.
The actress went on to say that she’s never been “afraid” of her kids growing up.
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“If anything, I have enjoyed watching who they have become … I really tried to give them the guardrails to just figure out who it is that they are and want to be,” she said.
She added, “So far, so good. You know, they both seem pretty happy!”
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