Inside Hailey Bieber’s Road to Motherhood Bliss With Justin Bieber
Hailey Bieber no longer “knows zero” about being a mom, having conquered her fears and welcomed now 3-month-old son Jack with husband Justin Bieber.
No one in Hailey Bieber‘s inner circle doubted that she’d be a great mom one day.
It was the outer circle she was worried about.
“I want kids so bad but get scared,” the Rhode skincare founder, who’s been married to Justin Bieber for six years, told the U.K.’s Sunday Times in May 2023. “It’s enough that people say things about my husband or my friends. I can’t imagine having to confront people saying things about a child.”
But, she concluded, “We can only do the best we can to raise them. As long as they feel loved and safe.”
The Internet continued to provide little solace, however, and the bump watch that had plagued her since she told Justin “I do” persisted.
“When there comes a day that that is true,” Hailey told GQ in an interview published Oct. 23, 2023, “you— you, as in the Internet, will be the last to know.”
Then she promptly got pregnant with her son Jack Blues Bieber.
Hailey and Justin didn’t confirm the news to their combined 348 million Instagram followers until May 9, the white lace Saint Laurent dress Hailey wore as she and her husband renewed their vows in Hawaii providing the perfect showcase for her newly prominent baby bump.Â
“I was honestly able to keep it quiet because I stayed small for a long time,” she told W a month later. “I didn’t have a belly, really, until I was six months pregnant, which was when I announced it. I was able to wear big jackets and stuff.”
And with that, the world found out that Hailey, who’s turning 28 on Nov. 22, had thumbed her nose at her fears about parenting in the public eye and pursued her desire to become a mom.
“I probably could have hid it until the end,” she acknowledged. “But I didn’t enjoy the stress of not being able to enjoy my pregnancy outwardly. I felt like I was hiding this big secret, and it didn’t feel good. I wanted the freedom to go out and live my life.”
But since welcoming Jack on Aug. 22, aside from the occasional fashion-and-beauty-forward photo dump, Hailey has kept très quiet about the particulars of her mom life. And, while her baby’s squeal-worthy feet have made a few cameos on her Instagram, she and Justin have yet to share their 3-month-old’s face with the world.
Then again, as she noted in an Oct. 1 post—”It’s October and I’m someone’s Mom”—all of it is her mom life now. And she’s been busy doing it her way without taking questions from the peanut gallery.
“I know zero about being a mom, but I do want kids one day,” Hailey told Rosie Huntington-Whiteley during a 2021 taping of her YouTube series Who’s in My Bathroom?. “What’s your biggest piece of advice?”
Rosie, who shares two kids with partner Jason Statham, advised her fellow model, “Being easy on yourself, because it’s a juggle, whether you’re a stay-at-home mum, whether you’re a working mum…You take on a lot.”
And in general, the Australian added, “Follow your instincts, don’t listen too much about what other people say, don’t listen too much to the advice.”
But it was important to have a support system, and Rosie said that being able to call her mum while “on the bathroom floor, sobbing” when needed meant a lot to her. Hailey seconded the notion.
Whether she goes on to have “as many as she’s willing to push out,” as Justin described his own wish for a big family on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2020 (while also stressing that it was “her body and whatever she wants to do” works for him), Hailey does come from a particularly robust family tree.
The daughter of Stephen Baldwin and Kennya Deodato became an aunt in 2020 when her older sister Alaia Baldwin Aronow, 31, welcomed daughter Iris. Plus the siblings have 25 first cousins on their dad’s side.
But while she told W that she had “very fond, beautiful memories” from her own childhood growing up in Nyack, N.Y., she emphasized that she wasn’t “super close” to her family at this point in her life.
“Because,” she explained, “I feel like I’m very independent. I’m my own individual now, and I’ve built my own family.”
She became a Bieber when she was 21, swapping vows with Justin in September 2018 after a whirlwind engagement, though they’d known each other for almost a decade. He popped the question that July, barely a month after they’d rekindled a romance that had been dormant for two years.
Seemingly for a good reason.
“What if Hailey ends up being the girl I’m gonna marry, right?” Justin mused to GQ in 2016, explaining why he was not in a committed relationship at the moment. “If I rush into anything, if I damage her, then it’s always gonna be damaged. It’s really hard to fix wounds like that. It’s so hard.… I just don’t want to hurt her.”
Hailey later concurred, recalling on a 2021 episode of the In Good Faith podcast, “We always knew if we ever do get back together, it will be with the intention of getting married. We used to say that to each other. We always wanted to be married young and have a young family and have kids young.”
They subsequently didn’t waste any time getting to the altar after they reunited, but once they were husband and wife, Hailey didn’t want to rush to the next step.
“I think Hailey still has things she wants to accomplish as a woman and I think she just wants to—I just think she’s not ready yet and that’s okay,” Justin said on Ellen in 2020.
Make that a businesswoman, as Hailey started her skincare line Rhode (which is her middle name) in 2022, while she was modeling nonstop for the likes of Tiffany & Co., Jimmy Choo, Calvin Klein and Versace.
And, no small thing, she wasn’t quite ready to give up being a family of two just yet.
When she first found out she was pregnant, “it was super emotional for me,” she told W. “Like, ‘I love this human so much. How can I possibly bring someone else into this?’ I’m trying to soak in these days of it being Justin and me, just the two of us.”
Then there were other nerves to overcome.
“You see so many stories—traumatic birth stories, traumatic experiences—and I know that that’s very real,” Hailey said. “But I don’t want to scare myself.”
Still plagued by morning sickness at the time—“I don’t know why they call it that because it lasts all day long,” she quipped. “We need to change the name”—she shared that she was mainly sticking to a high-protein diet and had indulged in hiring a private chef to prepare dinners. But, Hailey added, “if the baby wants pizza one day, we’re doing pizza.”
And despite her ripped-from-experience concerns about strangers being nasty toward not just her, but also her baby, on social media, she let (some of) it all hang out for her vast online fandom.
Into her second trimester in May, she shared that her biggest pregnancy craving was “egg salad on top of a pickle with hot sauce.” She got real about suffering from lower back pain. And her remedy for staying cool when the mercury topped 100 this past summer?
“If you’re pregnant in this heat,” she wrote in July, “trust me, feet + legs in the ice bath or cold plunge.”
Yet now that Jack is here, the details of their life as a family of three are not for public consumption just yet.
“It’s so hard to say what I’m going to do or not do when there isn’t even a child here yet,” Hailey told GQ not long before she got pregnant. “I don’t even know what it feels like to be a parent other than a dog parent yet. And that’s not the same thing, by any means.
Motherhood “is something that I look forward to,” she added. “It’s also such a private, intimate thing. It’s something that’s going to come when it comes.”
But no question this was always the plan. See all the hints Hailey dropped about being pregnant before the big reveal:
Prayers
Though Hailey’s dad Stephen Baldwin never revealed why he requested people pray for her and Justin back in February, his cryptic post definitely raised eyebrows.
Now, knowing the mom-to-be is a little over six months pregnancy, the timing doesn’t not make sense for pregnancy well wishes.
Big Jackets
In many of her recent public sightings, Hailey has donned an oversized jacket—which hide her waist and belly.Â
Updated Skin Care Routine
In March, Hailey shared a look at her current skin care routine to help combat perioral dermatitis.
“I use a prescription azelaic acid cream, which really helps with the inflammation,” she shared in the video. “In the daytime, I use Clindamycin, which is also a prescription that you can get from the dermatologist.”
Both azelaic acid cream and Clindamycin are often given to pregnant women as they are safe and gentle enough while still fighting acne and other skin conditions.Â
Coachella Style
Much of the model’s fits for this year’s festival, again, covered her stomach or were oversized—a break from her usual skin-showing looks for the desert event.
Staying Comfy
But keeping things coy, when posting a mirror selfie showing off her April 13 Coachella look—featuring a baggy leather jacket—Hailey wrote, “The category is: comfort.”
His Favorite GirlÂ
In the “Baby” singer’s only recent post with Hailey, shared April 15 of the pair at Coachella, his body is covering hers.
Overcome with Emotion
During a recent posting spree on Instagram, Justin shared photos of himself crying, to which Hailey wrote back, “A pretty crier.”
Vacation Comfort
At the end of April, the Rhode beauty founder and Justin were seen by fans on vacation in Hawaii where Hailey was—once again—conveniently wearing a baggy babydoll style dress.Â
