Drew Barrymore has opened up on how she initially felt like a failure when she became a mother.
The actress, 47, has admitted it was a case of "learning on the job" when she first entered motherhood.
She is now a mum of two, sharing Olive, 10, and Frankie, 8, with ex-husband Will Kopelman. Drew split with her third husband in 2016 following the end of their four year marriage.
Drew was talking on a recent episode of the Chicks in the Office podcast when she made the revelation.
She told the hosts: "All those parents who have it all together, and they’ve got hygiene and nutrition and schedules and boundaries, God bless you. I didn’t know any of that stuff when I had my kids.
"I did not have the blueprint and I felt like a failure a lot. I felt really overwhelmed and like, ‘I don’t know what I’m doing… I don’t know what I’m doing and I’m gonna have to learn on the job.'"
The Charlie's Angels star went onto talk about how parenting had hugely changed over the years. She admitted when she was a kid, parents would simply leave their children in the driveway for hours on end and "nobody cared".
She continued: "It led to resiliency — and now we’re like, helicopter parenting and coddling and, you know, watching everything."
Despite the change in behaviours, Drew was keen to tell any parents listening that it's okay not to know exactly what you're doing.
She revealed it's important to admit you're not always knowing what to do for the best, adding it can often be "humorous" and "humbling" to make it up as you go along.
"It’s funny, I was so unforgiving of myself when my kids were younger," she added. "And now that they’re almost — Frankie’s almost 9 and Olive’s like 10, it’s shifted into something very different and I’m having the best time ever."
She admitted part of her happiness comes from learning boundaries as a parent, but insists there are still moments which leave her feeling flawed.
"I am a work in progress," she said. "I had to learn to like parent myself, but that parenting style wasn’t going to work for my kids.
"That was much more survival and you know, not what I would want for my kids."
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