Connie Britton Shares Why She Decided to Pursue Adoption as a Single Mom

Connie Britton is sharing why she decided to pursue adoption as a single mom.

The actress, 58, was interviewed for this month's cover of Parade and spoke about adopting her son Yoby, now 14, from Ethiopia after traveling to the country in the early 2000s for a documentary about Ethiopia's orphan population.

"I always wanted to be a mom," Britton explained. "I thought that maybe I would have a biological child first, perhaps. I didn't know."

However, there came a moment where the star, who was single, asked herself, "What am I waiting for?"

"I know that I hadn't achieved the kind of partnership that I was looking for to have a spouse and a child together," Britton continued. "And so I thought, 'This is the time, I'm going to start the adoption process.'"

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Related: Connie Britton Admits She Didn’t Look in the Mirror ‘for a Year’ After Welcoming Son Yoby (Exclusive)

As she talked about becoming a mother, Britton said she "went into [that chapter of my life] a little bit blindly, not really fully anticipating what it is to be a single mom and how difficult that is, and what you're taking on in doing that."

"I had a stay-at-home nanny. So I realized, 'Oh my gosh, at least I have help,' " she added of being a single mom. Britton has now been dating boyfriend David Windsor since 2019.

Now, Britton is focusing on the topic of motherhood in her new unscripted series, The Motherhood, which she created and executive produced for Hallmark. The actress teams up with a home design specialist, a parenting coach and a stylist who will help single moms improve their lives.

"I hope that it will change the narrative about single moms, and actually put single moms more in the forefront of our cultural understanding and our cultural empathy," she explained of her show.

"Because we all know and have been inspired by single moms, and I really want to lift them up and give them the respect, dignity and understanding that they deserve."

Back in October, Britton spoke with PEOPLE about how she felt as she transitioned to being a new mom after welcoming her son Yoby.

"When I first had my son, I feel like I didn't look in the mirror for a year, other than when I was working at the time," Britton told PEOPLE. "So I feel like I didn't even wear makeup at the time. It just all goes by the wayside."

Although he's officially a teenager, Britton said Yoby hasn't yet hit any of that normal teenage grouchiness.

"He's still so sweet, and every day I'm like, 'Is today gonna be the day? Have I lost him to teenagerdom?' But for now, he's such a sweet boy and still loves a lot of kids' stuff, so I'm going to hold on to that for as long as I can," the proud mom shared at the time.

Read the original article on People