Vanessa Lachey on Healing from the ‘Hurt’ of Her Mom Leaving When She Was 9 — with Nick’s Support
In PEOPLE’s latest cover story, the NCIS: Hawai’i star and Life from Scratch author opens up for the first time about her painful past — and how she found true happiness with the singer and their three kids
Vanessa Lachey on Healing from the ‘Hurt’ of Her Mom Leaving When She Was 9 — with Nick’s Support
“It’s a beautiful bracelet, but it’s the symbolism for me,” the NCIS: Hawai’i actress, 41, told PEOPLE on the set of her cover shoot earlier this fall. “As he was screwing it on, he said, ‘One day we will screw this on our daughter’s wrist when she’s 18. She will always have a piece of us in her world.'”
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That moment reminded Vanessa — who is opening up for the first time about the pain she faced after her mom left her when she was 9 years old — that Nick, 48, is truly “the one” for her.
“I don’t want to negate the power and the strength in me personally, but Nick has been a very strong reason for how I am who I am. What I needed was to believe in myself, and it took me marrying the best guy to say, ‘You are all that and more,'” says Vanessa, who shares in the introduction of her upcoming lifestyle book, Life From Scratch (out Nov. 30), that she last saw her mother when she was 18.
Adds the star, who’s mom to Brooklyn, 6, and sons Camden, 9, and Phoenix, 4: “What I’ve taken out of it is how it’s ultimately made me a better mom, a better wife, and hopefully a better person. I will never take my family for granted.”
For more on how Vanessa Lachey found true happiness with Nick and their three kids after a difficult childhood, pick up the latest issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday.
nick and vanessa lachey Credit: Jeff Lipsky/four.eleven.agency
Born in the Philippines, Vanessa moved frequently around the States with her American dad, Vincent Minnillo, who served in the U.S. Air Force, and her Phillippines-born mom, Helen Bondoc, until they separated when she was 3.
Vanessa and her older brother lived briefly in Turkey with Helen and her new husband, who also served in the military, but they were evacuated back to America for safety when the Gulf War began in 1990.
Helen dropped off her children at Vanessa’s father’s L.A. home, telling their stepmom she would be back, Vanessa recalls. Over the next several weeks, Helen visited a handful of times but then disappeared.
“I didn’t really understand when she didn’t come for one weekend, and then another weekend,” says Vanessa, who saw her mother only twice over the next decade. “Then you just hope she’s going to come back and always wonder why she didn’t. It took me [time] to understand that it wasn’t [my fault].”
nick and vanessa lachey
Watch the full episode of People Cover Story: Vanessa Lachey on PeopleTV.com or on the PeopleTV app.
Vanessa threw herself into her work as a model, actress and TV host, finding fame as one of MTV’s Total Request Live veejays in her 20s.
She began dating Nick in 2006, and while she felt “accepted” by a partner for the first time, it wasn’t until they became pregnant after their 2011 wedding that she realized how deeply she had been affected by her painful childhood.
She struggled with feelings of self-doubt and insecurity, but ultimately “what I realized is you don’t have to fall into those [same] patterns, and I didn’t,” she says.
Adds Nick: “One thing I’ve learned about my wife is that she’s a fighter and so resilient. If nothing else, [her experience] gave her a real appreciation for how important her kids are to her.”
nick and vanessa lachey Vanessa and Nick Lachey | Credit: Jeff Lipsky/four.eleven.agency
Over the last year, the couple and their kids have been living in Oahu while Vanessa — the first woman and Asian American to lead NCIS — shoots the show (airing Mondays at 10 p.m. on CBS).
“When I got the job, Nick’s exact words were, ‘This is your time,'” she recalls of her husband, whose Fox music competition show, Alter Ego, premiered the same week as NCIS in September.
“We’ve always supported each other — whether I’m going on tour and they come with me, or we move to Hawaii for her show,” says the 98 Degrees singer. “We just look at it as a big family adventure.”
nick and vanessa lachey Vanessa and Nick with Camden, Brooklyn and Phoenix | Credit: Jeff Lipsky/four.eleven.agency
Life From Scratch, which features recipes, date night ideas and more, is inspired by the traditions Vanessa has created with Nick and their children over the years.
“Your messy past doesn’t have to define your future,” she says of what she hopes fans take away from her book. “For that person who is doubting themselves, I would just encourage them to know that they know what’s best for themselves and their family.”
After more than two decades estranged from Helen, Vanessa isn’t closing the door on a possible reconciliation. “I would want to hear her story. It’s not healthy or healing to carry around all that bitterness,” she says.
The People’s GPA: Packers Lose at Vikings
In the latest edition of The People’s GPA, you graded the Packers’ performance vs. Minnesota and we computed the grade-point average.
GREEN BAY, Wis. – On Sunday at Minnesota, the Green Bay Packers’ red-hot defense was scorched, their sputtering offense finally ran smoothly and their misfiring kicking game missed the mark again.
It all added up to a 34-31 loss to the Vikings. It was Matt LaFleur’s first NFC North road loss after starting 7-0.
It also added up to a 1.88 grade-point average in the People’s GPA. More than half the voters in a Twitter poll gave the Packers a “C.” Those who voted “D” or “F” outnumbered the “B” votes.
“This is the ultimate team sport, right?” LaFleur said after the game. “We know for us to accomplish all our goals, we need all three phases firing at the highest level possible. Certainly, that is good that you can find different ways to win games but, ultimately, we need everybody peaking at the right time and we haven’t been able to do that consistently within a game.”
Aaron Rodgers set a season high with 385 passing yards and a 148.4 passer rating. He went 10-for-11 for 197 yards and three touchdowns in the second half. His lone incompletion was a throwaway.
“We just found a flow at that point,” receiver Davante Adams said. “I feel like we were hurting ourselves in the first half a lot, penalties putting ourselves in first-and-long, second-and-really-long situations. It becomes tough when you’re playing a team like that, with a really good defense. Obviously, at home, too. We shot ourselves in the foot with some self-inflicteds early and then we just kind of started jelling, figuring out the best ways.”
That’s what LaFleur and Adams had to say. Here’s what you had to say.
Libraries Provide Resources on Arkansas Indigenous Peoples’ Lived Experiences
Libraries Provide Resources on Arkansas Indigenous Peoples’ Lived Experiences
Photo Submitted A photo of the Native American History Month book display in Mullins Library.
To celebrate Native American Heritage Month, the Libraries encourage campus to reflect on Arkansas land acknowledgements and the lived experiences of the indigenous peoples of Arkansas. Libraries personnel have worked this month on providing access to related print and digital materials.
Laura Cameron, education librarian, has created a display of printed materials and a virtual exhibit from the children’s literature collection. The display is located in the northwest corner of Mullins Library’s main floor and includes titles such as We Are Water Protectors, Wilma’s Way Home, Who Was Sitting Bull? and others.
Lynaire Hartsell, user experience coordinator, has created another display of books from the diversity collection with titles including After the Trail of Tears, Osage Indian: Customs and Myths, Two Caddo Mound Sites in Arkansas and Cherokee Tragedy.
The Colonial Arkansas Post Ancestry digital collection offers “remarkable genealogical and ancestral work related to Colonial Arkansas conducted by Dorothy Core from the early 1960s to the mid-1990s.” Several examples of primary resources within the collection include two Newspaper Articles on Quapaw Indians, an Arkansas History Timeline from 1541-1964, the Velma Nieberding and Dorothy Jones Core letter which provides a glimpse into French and Quapaw familial relations, notes on Saracen - Quapaw Tribal Chief and the Quapaw Treaty of 1824.
The Libraries also offer access to materials related to the Osage, Caddo, Quapaw, Cherokee, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), Chickasaw and Seminole nations.