Julia Roberts has given up roles to spend more time with her children and she has admitted to nearly turning down her latest film August: Osage County.
The 46-year-old actress has three children, twins Hazel and Phinnaeus. born in 2004, and son Henry who arrived in 2007.
She says she found juggling motherhood and her career difficult at first, adding that it hasn't become easier as the kids have become older.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, the Oscar-winning actress said, "August: Osage County was the first time I left my family to go to work. And I almost didn't do it because I just felt so heartsick at the idea. I'd never been away from my children."
"The first time I worked after I had Finn and Hazel was a play [Three Days of Rain on Broadway] for four months. And they were a year-and-a-half old, and there was a little place in the theatre for them to play, and Paul Rudd's son was just younger than they were.
"It seemed perfect, 'I'll be working while they're sleeping, and nothing about our life will be any different.' And then cut to me standing at an elevator waiting to go to work, literally pulling my own hair out. I went a little bit cuckoo."
While she did attempt to go back to work, she also enjoyed having the downtime with her family. "I had been working for 18 years when I had Hazel and Finn almost nine years ago. So I felt like I earned that time in my house and in my kitchen and in bed all day with these two little people.
"I felt that was my present to myself. I was fortunate to work a lot, and I worked hard, and I was very devoted to that, and then I earned this jewel box of a life that I felt completely entitled to."
August: Osage County is slated for a January 17, 2014 release and also stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Abigail Breslin, Meryl Streep and Ewan McGregor.
