When Kate Bosworth met her husband Michael Polish nearly a decade ago, she also began a relationship with his then-13-year-old daughter, Jasper. Now, with ten years of modern motherhood under her belt, Bosworth—along with Jasper and her biological mom, makeup artist Jo Strettell—is out to shift the stereotypes oft associated with step-motherhood. The three celebrated Mother’s Day with a Zoom call featured on Bosworth’s website, KIND.EST, in which Bosworth and Strettell (with moderation by Jasper) discussed their lessons learned and shared successes, all in the hopes that the narrative around the relationship between mothers of all sorts may be viewed in a new, more positive, light.
“When I came into the picture, it was very important for me to have a relationship with Jo,” says Bosworth. “From the get go, we knew that in order to raise a healthy young woman in the world, it was important for all of us to lead with love and really raise her with unity in the family.” That want translated to events and holidays spent together as a family, achieved through a wealth of maturity, and an open channel of communication—a feat evident throughout the trio’s Zoom. “The dialogue has always been open, and we’ve always been respectful of each other’s roles, and working together,” says Strettell in the celebratory recording. “To me, that’s the most important thing.”
Bosworth acknowledges that, naturally, she faced a learning curve when figuring out how best to support Jasper. “At the beginning, I didn’t want to do anything wrong,” she says. “When I met Jasper, I was 28, and I still felt like a kid myself. I was so excited; I didn’t feel fearful, I was incredibly thrilled to have her in my life. But I didn’t want to make a misstep, that I remember.” Likewise, normal milestones of adulting took on new meaning when achieved with and for a step-daughter. “Actually, one of the things I really had to overcome—I know this is going to sound silly but it’s true—I truly couldn’t even toast a piece of bread. I was such a failure in the world of cooking, and was actually super intimidated by it,” says Bosworth. “After the second week of ordering pizza, or Indian, or whatever, a real maternal instinct came in that nudged me to say, ‘If you’re going to nurture a growing girl, you better learn to feed her properly.’ Now I love to cook, it’s a huge passion of mine. I cook all the time for my family, but it started with her.”