Katy Perry was scarcely four weeks into parenting when she began dropping some fireworks about motherhood.
Lest there be any confusion about the endless feedings and sleep deprivation that generally comprise maternity leave, Perry clarified on Twitter nearly a month after bringing daughter Daisy Dove Bloom into the world Aug. 26, "Popular misconception: being a mom isn't a full time job."
Deftly shutting down any illusions that the time off from any outside-the-home job is truly, you know, time off, she continued, "when a mom finally goes back to work (whatever profession they do) it's not like they been coming from months of 'time off...' she's coming from a full time job... of being a mom, lol."
Continuing the role of parent-based activism that began when she and fiancé Orlando Bloom unveiled their new arrival through a UNICEF post, the longtime goodwill ambassadors pushing for worldwide access to quality healthcare, she urged her followers to "advocate for paid family leave." (And also to call their mothers "and tell her you love and appreciate her.")
Though, to be clear, she has no complaints. As she concluded in her mini Twitter spurt, "I love my job."
Both of them. Because while the musician is back at it career-wise—she returned to her American Idol judge's seat in early October and even filmed an intro for colleague Luke Bryan's performance at the Oct. 21 CMT Music Awards—she's relishing every moment of mama duty. Even when that means using any set breaks to pump backstage. Because #MomLife.
"Katy is all about being present for all the little moments with her daughter," an insider tells E! News. "She loves being a mom and she is in love with Daisy."
Basically everything's coming up roses for Perry as she celebrates her 36th birthday Oct. 25, the recent release of her sixth album, Smile, and the cozy existence she and Bloom, 43, have planted in their newly purchased $14 million, six-bedroom Montecito, Calif., spread.
Nestled some 90 miles up the coast from L.A., the house—just miles from Perry's hometown of Santa Barbara—provides them sweeping ocean views, nearly nine acres of space and heaps of privacy. As a Bloom insider told People, "They agree that raising their little girl in Montecito will be amazing."
It's the sort of bliss Perry couldn't even begun to have dreamed of just three years ago. Rocked by the career lows that 2017 brought—in a 2018 interview with Vogue Australia she admitted the mixed reviews of Witness "broke my heart"—and a split with Bloom that would prove to just be a pause, "I was clinically depressed," she confessed on CBS This Morning in August. I wasn't even having bouts of depression, I was like, I could not get out of bed."
So she began penning the 12 tracks that would make up Smile even before she had a reason to slip back into her whimsical, neon-wearing, full-of-light persona. "My career didn't really meet my own personal expectations. Things started to shift," she continued. "And I had broken up with Orlando… I wasn't getting high off of my own supply anymore." In what she called "my darkest place," she began what she called "fantasizing about not being around." As she explained, "If I did that, I would kind of have the last word or be able to control the chaos and the sadness. I'm so grateful that it didn't go there."
Instead she slowly climbed her way into the light, focusing less on commercial success and fan reception and more on the type of stuff that fills her soul.
"I've come to learn, after 10 years of success in the spotlight, that being happy is something you have to work for every single day," Perry told Glamour in 2018. "Even if you have money or houses or status or fame—and all of that stuff is great for a moment—if you don't have happiness charging the train, you're gonna derail. A lot of my early twenties were really intense, really extreme, and somewhat unconscious. It was all career focused, which was great, but once you touch the ceiling so many times, it's like, 'Oh yeah, I did that. I touched the ceiling.' Now I want to touch the stars, which has to do with the heart."
Around the time of her January 2018 healing retreat at the Hoffman Institute, she reunited with Bloom for good and they began plotting out their future, including their newest little bud. Engaged on Valentine's Day last year, "We were both ready," she told Apple Music's Zane Lowe this August of their baby plans. It was no mistake."
So yes, you bet she was grinning wide when she released Smile from her hospital bed just two days after giving birth. "delivering a baby and a record in the same week, dont f*ck with mama," she joked.
Because this mama has got skills. She had Bloom's years of parenting wisdom as guidance—he and ex-wife Miranda Kerr sharing 9-year-old son Flynn—and a handful of her own as de facto step-mom, so she'd long ago mastered the early bedtimes, Perry marveled to Ellen DeGeneres in 2019, "I used to not wake up until, like, 11 a.m., and now I'm in bed like a normal person at 10:00 p.m. just, like, falling asleep."
Plus she got a little extra training while social distancing at home with her then-8-month-old nephew and 3- and 6-year-old nieces. "I'm learning to be a mom fast," she joked on The Graham Norton Show in May. "Kids gravitate towards me through my music, so I am used to them, but I am not used to being woken up really early in the morning by them staring at me from the side of my bed."
And to master all the rest of it, she put in the work.
"I'm not very maternal," she confessed during her interview with Lowe. "I am, in a way, but like when it comes to crying, and sadness, and like that kind of stuff, I'm like: 'I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do.' Yeah. I was like, 'Man, not only do I have to figure this out for myself, but I have to figure this out for my future in order to be able to enjoy this blessing.' So after doing a ton of work and continuing on that journey, I was like, 'I'm ready. I'm ready.'"
In between putting together her daughter's rose-hued nursery, buying her new wooden oval crib and finding a spot to display the hand-embroidered pink silk blankie from Auntie Taylor Swift, Perry and Bloom hashed out how exactly they would go about raising their new flower. "She has two very ambitious, loud, independent, free-thinking parents, so it's gonna rub off," the singer predicted to People in August. "Or maybe she's gonna completely revolt and be in the corner, very shy bookworm. We're just here to support her, and I'm sure she's just here to teach us a lesson!"
One thing was certain, though, she told the outlet, her groom-to-be was "gonna be the good cop and I'm gonna be the bad cop. I already know it! I'm the three F's. I'm fun, firm but fair. That's how I roll."
For his part, Bloom has already lived up to that reputation, appearing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show Oct. 7 to gush about his new "little mini-me, slash mini-my mom, slash mini-Katy." Spending the whole of Perry's pregnancy treating his daughter to his morning Buddhist chant, "Now, I walk into the room and she hears my voice and she sort of soothes a bit. She likes it, she responds very nicely."
With his teeny blue-eyed beauty, "It's like I'm a baby whisperer," he joked. "I'm definitely winning the daddy points."
Which is good, as he's been taking his share of daytime shifts with Perry back on the Idol set. (Fortunately they're each getting a bit of a break during the wee hours, Bloom telling DeGeneres that Daisy has been sleeping through the night, which is "a blessing.")
"It's hard a little bit these first couple of days away and not being able to be there," Perry allowed to Entertainment Tonight of her early October return to work. "But Daddy's doing a great job. Daddy has stepped in. I've seen the Bjorn on him, I've seen him with the bottle, I've seen all the pictures. It's all good."
Truly, it's allllllll good, Perry feeling incredibly content with the happiness-focused life she's carefully put together. Speaking about her fourth season on Idol, she told ET, "It's amazing. I'm so grateful for this opportunity and for this job, and to be able to continue to inspire other people to go after their dreams. I mean, my life just feels very full and whole."