Katherine Ryan’s Journey as a Mother
She may be a doting mother to her three children but Katherine Ryan has acknowledged how different her life now is as a mother. The 40-year-old comedian has been candid about her parenting and life as a married mum with husband and childhood sweetheart Bobby Kootstra.
Life Changes After Kids
While she frequently shares the realities of being a mum, Katherine admitted previously that she regretted sharing her co-sleeping advice. She shares her youngest two children — Fenna Grace, 14 months and Fred, two — with Bobby and daughter Violet, 14, with ex-boyfriend Alex Edelman.
Now the Celebrity Gogglebox star has opened up about how her life has changed since having kids, saying they ‘ruined’ what she had before. ‘My children have enriched my life, they’re such a blessing and I would never trade them for anything,’ Katherine told Women Magazine.
The Roast Battle icon continued: ‘But I would be lying if I said they didn’t ruin the life I had before. But I rebuilt a better one and that’s fine. I would be pretending if I said that I could still do all the things that I could before and I think we’re selling this fantasy of what motherhood means if we aren’t honest about that.’
Challenges and Growth
In her comedy shows, Katherine has often joked about a wild youth which changed dramatically once Violet arrived and she became a single mother. Bobby previously admitted he wants his ‘sexy wife’ back in their bed as part of the family’s reality series Katherine Ryan: Parental Guidance.
The couple use co-sleeping for their kids as Katherine explained: ‘We’re both co-sleeping with someone. Bobby sleeps with Fred because I’m sleeping with Fenna. It’s really good for the children to have that.’ However, the confession garnered a lot of backlash from other parents who didn’t approve of the method.
‘I feel like, I really believe in it,’ the Duchess star told Metro.co.uk. ‘I think that you respond to your children’s needs immediately, and you’re very patient with them learning to feed themselves and learning to walk. But in a lot of homes, we’re not patient about them learning to soothe themselves to sleep.’