On her own! January Jones welcomed her son, Xander, in September 2011 and has been candid about the ups and downs of raising him alone.
The Mad Men alum announced her pregnancy five months ahead of Xander’s arrival, choosing not to reveal the paternity of her baby-to-be. The AMC show’s creator, Matthew Weiner, subsequently told Us Weekly exclusively that Jones wanted a baby “very badly.”
The writer, 56, said at the time: “She’s got a big heart and she’s been talking about having children since I met her, which is not always common with actresses. I think she’s going to be amazing.”
After Xander’s arrival, the South Dakota native remained tight-lipped about her baby boy’s father. Jones told The New York Times in 2013 that the information was only her “son’s business,” explaining, “Jack Nicholson once told me: ‘You should never give your personal life away, otherwise people will pick you apart. They’ll never believe in your character.’”
The Golden Globe nominee, who previously dated Ashton Kutcher in the late 1990s and Josh Groban from 2003 to 2006, told Red magazine in January 2017 that she plays both “good cop” and “bad cop” with her child.
“I don’t want to be bad cop. But to have his respect, I have to be both,” the actress explained at the time. “I mean, I’m an emotionally immature person. I’m an actor for God’s sake. I see myself behaving like a child all the time.”
She told The Edit the following year that it was important to keep that part of her life “private,” adding, “When I was starting out, other actors advised me to keep certain things close to the vest. When you become a public figure people want to know everything about you, and then [they] pick it apart — it becomes negative. When my son asks those questions, I want him to [hear it from me]. I don’t want him to be able to Google it. … It’s just not something the public needs to know. I don’t divulge my sexual preferences.”
So far, the little one “does not give a s–t” about his mom’s fame, Jones hilariously told Us in November 2019 — unless it “works to his advantage.”
The former model said, “We were at Disneyland the other day and we’re waiting in line for like 50 minutes, and he’s like, ‘Mom! Can you get fast passes and tell everyone you’re an actress?’ I was like, ‘No! This is the deal. This is what it’s like.’ It’s part of the experience. We gotta talk. We gotta hang out.”
Keep scrolling to see what Jones has said over the years about raising Xander, from parenthood’s effect on her dating life to the surprising perks of single motherhood.