Reese Witherspoon reflects on daughter Ava’s college applications felt like ‘an arrow to the heart’

Helping children grow into self sufficient adults might be the point of parenthood, but it isn’t always easy to let go.

And Reese Witherspoon reflected on that as she promoted her new show Little Fires Everywhere, based on the book by Celeste Ng.

The mother-of-three explained how the book struck a chord with her, reading it as her eldest child was making plans for college.

‘My daughter was applying for college back then, so it hit me like an arrow in the heart,’ she told the magazine Emmy. 

‘It’s so difficult to articulate what motherhood means, and there are so many passages in the novel that did,’ she explained. 

The Oscar-winning actress has kids Ava, 20, Deacon, 16, and Tennessee, seven. 

She quoted her favorite quote from Ng’s book: ‘It was like training yourself to live on the smell of an apple alone, when what you really wanted was to devour it, to sink your teeth into it and consume it, seeds, core, and all.’

Reese said of the passage: ‘It’s such a vivid way to describe the loss of your children as they grow up.’ 

Reese’s media company Hello Sunshine jumped on Ng’s book, when she sent it over before publication, having seen Big Little Lies.  

The author told the magazine: ‘This just may be the only thing that’s ever made me believe in manifesting things into the universe, speaking them into existence!’

While Little Fires is streaming now on Hulu, production for season two of Witherspoon’s Apple TV+ series, The Morning Show, co-starring Jennifer Aniston, was halted due to the coronavirus outbreak two weeks ago.