Halle Berry Says She Doesn’t Want Her Kids to ‘Depend’ on Her: ‘Anything They Do Will Make Me Proud’

Halle Berry is raising her kids to be independent individuals.

At a roundtable event for her new movie Never Let Go in New York City, the Oscar-winning actress, 58, opened up about the boundaries she sets as a mom to daughter Nahla Ariela, 16, whom she shares with ex Gabriel Aubry and son Maceo-Robert, 10, whom she shares with ex Olivier Martinez.

While the mom of two admits she’s “pretty protective” and will “fight for” her kids “if something needs to be fought for,” she also expressed that one of her goals as a mother is for her kids to grow up and be independent.

“I can’t wait until they grow up and have their own life, and I can’t wait to see who they’ll become and what they’ll do,” the actress shared on Tuesday, Sept 17. “I just want them to be them.”

“There’s no spin on it,” she added. “Anything they do will make me proud as long as they do it.”

She continued, “I don’t want them to stay home and stay stuck to me. I don’t want them to depend on me. I hope I’m infusing them with enough gumption and giving them enough tools to go out into the world and make their own way.”

“Whatever that is,” she added, “I’m going to be proud.”

Though Berry doesn’t want her kids to always depend on her, she also shared during the roundtable event that she’s always there for her kids when they need her. The proud mom opened up about how Nahla is going through her first heartbreak and shared how difficult it’s been to watch her daughter process those tough feelings.

“She just was in a thing and she got her heart broken,” Berry said of her teenage daughter. “Never gets easier. It’s just holding space knowing that this is all part of growing, right? We’ve all been there and knowing that in six months time, she’s going to forget about it.”

“But in this moment, it’s the single most important thing to be rejected and have a breakup and she feels like she’s dying. A little part of me is dying and I can’t tell her that because she’ll just say, ‘Mom, you don’t understand.'”

Instead, Berry said she’s trying to commiserate with her daughter and tell her how much the situation “sucks,” explaining, “So I just have to say, ‘Yeah, this sucks, right? This sucks balls. I know, and you’re hurt.’ And I know I just have to sit in it with her and that’s really hard to do.”