Jessica Alba Reveals Why She Stepped Away from Acting Despite Being ‘at the Top of My Career’

Jessica Alba is opening up about her decision to take a back seat from acting after the birth of her first child.

The 39-year-old actress and co-founder of The Honest Company is on the March cover of Romper and talked to the publication about how becoming a mother in 2008 to her daughter Honor changed how she viewed her health and her career.

“My mother had cancer at a really young age. Many women in my family have passed from various different cancers, none of them genetic,” Alba said, adding she also “grew up with chronic illness.”

“I had five surgeries before I was 11 years old. I had chronic allergies, and I was hospitalized a lot as a child. I had this real moment of, I want to live, and thrive, and spend as much time with this little person that I’m bringing into the world as possible and stay,” she said. “So, my health matters. I want this little person to be healthy. And it’s really freaking hard to be happy when you don’t have your health.”

“That’s really what motivated me,” the Sin City star said. “My motivation was not like, ‘Am I ever going to get hired again?’ Frankly, I was at the top of my career.”

After Honor’s birth, Alba realized she “couldn’t go back to what I was doing before and be authentic. I just couldn’t. I just didn’t care about it anymore the same way. It was something bigger.”

“I felt like if I was going to, I guess, sort of get this platform, what can I do with it that could be meaningful and make a difference,” she continued. “That reality just felt so real when I became a mom for the first time.”

The Honey actress is also a mother to daughter Haven, 9, and son Hayes, 3, with husband Cash Warren, 42.

Alba has begun acting a bit more, most recently in the TV series L.A.’s Finest opposite Gabrielle Union.

Last month, the actress revealed her father, Mark Alba, had thyroid cancer and was undergoing “radiation therapy.”

Alongside her announcement on Instagram, Alba also shared a video of herself and her father dancing together.

“My #papasito is about to SLAY #thyroidcancer,” she captioned the father-daughter moment, alongside the supportive hashtags “let’s go” and “you got this.”