The Moment Ryan Gosling Knew He Wanted Kids With Eva Mendes

Before Ryan Gosling made a big silver screen comeback in the live-action "Barbie" film opposite Margot Robbie, he was pretty much missing in action in the movie scene. Apparently, it's for a good reason — he simply wanted to spend more quality time with his kids.

Unlike his acting hiatus back in 2013, which he took for having "lost perspective on what I'm doing," as he shared with the Associated Press (via USA Today), his second career break lasted for nearly half a decade, and started almost immediately after he and his longtime partner Eva Mendes welcomed their second child. "I wanted to spend as much time as I could with them," he told GQ. In another interview with the outlet, the "Gray Man" also dished that since having his two daughters, Esmeralda and Amada, he changed his perspective on a lot of things, especially time. "Time, in general, is something I think about a lot now," he said. "My kids are growing up so fast I need to keep an eye on the clock in a way I never used to."

Fatherhood is clearly a priority for Gosling now, but interestingly, there was a point in his life when he couldn't even fathom having one kid, much less two. But apparently, it all changed when he fell in love with Mendes.

Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes' love story started when they starred together in the film "The Place Beyond the Pines," where they played ex-lovers raising a son together. At the time, being a father himself wasn't on Gosling's mind, but it was like a switch had flipped that made him realize he was cut out to be a dad after all — but only if his kids had Mendes as their mother.

In his 2023 GQ profile, the actor said he only entertained the idea of becoming a dad when Mendes told him that she was carrying his child. "I'm glad I didn't have control over my destiny in that way, because it was so much better than I ever had dreamed for myself," he shared, later adding that Mendes was the missing piece all along. When they were filming, there were even times when he wished they were an actual family. "I wasn't thinking about kids before I met her, but after I met Eva, I realized that I just didn't want to have kids without her. And there were moments on 'The Place Beyond the Pines' where we were pretending to be a family, and I didn't really want it to be pretend anymore," he recalled.

And now, he can't imagine life without Mendes and their two kids. "In my situation, Eva's the dream mother, and they're dream babies, and it's like a dream that I'm having right now," he gushed in his 2016 profile with the magazine. "I'm dreaming it all. So I feel so lucky."

Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes are a match made in heaven, and it's evident by the very fact that the "Hitch" star had also never thought about the possibility of becoming a mom until she met and fell in love with Gosling.

"It was the furthest thing from my mind," she told Women's Health in 2019. "Ryan Gosling happened. "I mean, falling in love with him. Then it made sense for me to have... Not kids, but his kids. It was very specific to him." In an interview with Nova 96.9's "Fitzy & Wippa," she also shared that she was glad it happened when she had already established herself in the industry. "I was lucky enough to work my bum off for 20 years. I never wanted babies before until I fell in love with Ryan, and it kind of worked out to where I was 40 and having my first baby," she divulged. "I think I was 42 for the second one, so it worked out in that way that I had a career and then I change my focus to my family."

Speaking with Today, Mendes said motherhood is unlike anything she's ever done, but she wouldn't have it any other way, even if it means taking a step back from acting entirely. "I'm an actress, I've designed clothes, I've done a number of different things. But this is the most creative thing, is to create life with them," she told Hoda Kotb. "I'm like, 'Damn, I really want this time with them.' And then now, you know, I'm obsessed."