Brooke Shields, 53, Mourned When She Realized She Was Done Having Children: ‘That Threw Me’

They grow up so fast! Brooke Shields recently revealed the tough time she had when she realized her children would soon be leaving the nest.

The 53-year-old sat down with the Sunday Telegraph to discuss many things about her family life, including raising her daughters with today’s social media, and noticing how rough it will be letting them take that next step into adulthood. “It’s terrifying to me, all of these pictures that get posted,” the actress said of being a parent in the era of the internet. “It’s so hard to have them believe that they’re not real,” she added. The Blue Lagoon star of course wants to protect her girls, Rowan, 15, and Grier, 12, but accepts the fact they can’t live with her forever.

“The first mourning that I went through was realizing I wasn’t going to have any more children,” she admitted. “That threw me.” Brooke has been married to screenwriter and producer, Chris Hency, since 2001. “My husband’s an incredibly balancing source,” she said. “He’s very comfortable in his own self and he’s so funny. My thing is that I want to be ready for the worst, always. He makes me crazy, but he says, ‘We’ll figure it out.’” Brooke continued, “I’m so used to having to have my own back. It’s a relief to have someone who, if I need it, takes care of me.”

When she’s not focusing on her children, the model is all about her health. In fact, she went under the knife recently. “I had a partial knee replacement and going into it I had to work out really hard so that I could recuperate, and I feel like I’m in better shape now than ever before and owning my body,” Brooke told the outlet. “It is a liberating thing.”

And even though she’s getting older, life isn’t exactly slowing down for Brooke, who continues to show just how secure she is with herself. “I do think women in their 50s are sexier,” she said. “I don’t know what I thought it was going to be like, but I have much more of this attitude that stems from a place of confidence, of, ‘If you don’t like it, that’s not my problem.'” And it’s that assurance that the Golden Globes nominated actress is completely alright with.

“I’ve spent my life trying to be humble,” she revealed. “And it has a boomerang effect if you’re not careful, because the idea of being humble is dimming your light,” she said, adding that she’s teaching her kids this: “I say, ‘don’t undermine yourself.’”