ScarJo Joked That Toddlers Are ‘Emotionally Abusive.’ She's Not Wrong
“You get a lot of grief.”
Some stages in parenting are easier than others — that’s something Scarlett Johansson knows and isn’t afraid to admit. The mom of two recently confessed that raising toddlers is tough, and it goes beyond the “terrible twos.”
According to US Weekly, Johansson was a guest on the April 2 episode of “The Skinny Confidential Him & Her” podcast, and she opened up about parenting, specifically what life was like with a three-year-old at home — something she’s done before and will do again soon.
“[Age] 3 is really tough. I remember my daughter — my daughter [is] 8 and a half — [but] when she was 2, I said, ‘This is great. I don’t know what everybody is talking about,’” Johansson said. “And then she turned 3, and it’s like being in an emotionally abusive relationship,” she joked.
The actress, who is mom to 8-year-old daughter Rose with her ex-husband Romain Dauriac, and who has 20-month-old son Cosmo with her husband Colin Jost, confessed that raising toddlers is full of “intense emotional swings” where her daughter was “so bossy and adamant.”
Of course, she and her daughter got through the phase, but Johansson is about to enter that phase again with her son. For now, though, she’s enjoying life with a baby.
“Having a baby is so lovely,” Johansson shared. “They’re so cute. They sit there, and they love you, and then that’s it. And you just get, like, love from them. You get a lot of grief from toddlers. Like, everything you do is wrong.”
Although she’s enjoying having a little one at home, Johansson did admit she’s struggling with work-life balance — confessing being a mom means “there is no balance.”
“I work, like, 15-hour days, you know, so if I’m gonna be working on something and have to relocate everybody, [it’s] adventurous in some ways for the kids,” she explained. “But they also need stability, too.”
However, she has slowed down some for her sake and for her kids. “I don’t work in the same way that I used to work when I was, you know, 25 years old,” she explained, noting her kids are getting older now. “I was very career driven and focused at that time and less focused on personal own growth or whatever.”
