Modern Family's Ariel Winter Opens Up About Surviving Child Stardom: 'I Have a Great Support System Now'

Ariel Winter is just one day away from turning 18, but her Jan. 28 birthday is not exactly a rite of passage for the Modern Family star in the same way it would be for other teens.

"I've kind of been in adulthood for a little bit now," Winter says in the current issue of WHO.

Ariel Winter. Photo: Getty

And she means that in both the figurative and literal sense.

After her guardianship was transferred from her mother, Christoula Workman, to her sister, Shanelle Gray, in 2014, Winter successfully petitioned to become an emancipated minor last May.

For more on this story, pick up this week's issue of WHO, out now.

PATRICK GOMEZ writes for for People.com