Sarah Michelle Gellar: Motherhood Was Worth the Wait

The Buffy star and Freddie Prinze Jr. were married seven years before having daughter Charlotte

By

Published on November 6, 2009 03:15 PM

Sarah Michelle Gellar, adored as the star of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and her husband, Freddie Prinze Jr., know what everyone has been thinking: What took so long?

“I always say, the minute you start dating someone, people ask, ‘When are you getting engaged?’ And the minute you get engaged, they ask, ‘When are you getting married?‘ ” a bemused Gellar tells PEOPLE. “And then the minute you get married, they ask, ‘When are you having a baby?’ ”

PHOTOS: Sarah Michelle’s Pregnant Summer
Gellar, 32, and Prinze Jr., 33, – who stars in the upcoming season of 24 – took seven years before answering that last question, as evidenced by the Sept. 19 arrival of daughter Charlotte Grace.

“Becoming a parent is the most selfless act, and you need to be at a point in your life where you can give up anything and everything for a child,” Gellar says waiting before starting a family. “I don’t know if you know how to that when you’re in your 20s.”

Her husband concurs: “I’m so happy we didn’t have kids in our 20s – I just didn’t know a thing. You have so much more patience in your 30s, and I feel like I appreciate this so much more.”

For more from the new parents, including how parenthood has changed them and what Charlotte’s delivery was like, pick up the latest issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands now