DWTS Champ Opens Up About Surprise Pregnancy for the First Time

A pregnant woman.

Pixabay A DWTS champ speaks out about her surprise pregnancy.

“Dancing With the Stars” season 20 champ Rumer Willis opened up about her pregnancy on the February 9, 2023, episode of the “Bathroom Chronicles” podcast. Willis shared with hosts Kimberly Van Der Beek and Peggy Rometo how impending motherhood has changed her life and the excitement she feels for the “divine purpose” that awaits her.

On December 20, 2022, Wilson and musician Derek Richard Thomas announced on Instagram that they were expecting their first child together, after going public as a couple just one month earlier. The “Bathroom Chronicles” sit-down marked Willis’s first in-depth interview where she discussed the “surreal” experience of expecting a child and how she fell for “wonderful man” Thomas the first time she saw him perform.

Here’s what you need to know:


Rumer Willis Waited for ‘Dream Man’ Derek Richard Thomas to Become Single

It was love at first sight for Willis with the father of her child.

“He is an unbelievable musician,” she said of Thomas. “And I heard him open his mouth and sing and I was like, ‘I love this man.’ I don’t know who he is, but the way that he was singing, the, like, heartbreak and the passion, and I was like, ‘I have to know this person.'”

Willis said she asked a mutual friend to tell her more about Thomas.

“She was like, ‘well, he’s in a relationship and it’s serious, they moved in together,'” Willis said. “And I said, ‘of course.’ Of course, my dream man. Snatched away.”

Willis said she “kind of waited” for Thomas and thought, “maybe we can make some music together.” But within a few months, her friend told Willis that the “How Many Years” singer was single.

“So, then I started inviting him to things. But I was inviting him to, like, early morning activities and dates which I come to find out he is not an early morning person,” she laughed.

Once the two began spending time together, Willis said she realized she had found “my person.”

“I was like, ‘this is my best friend, this is so cool.’ It’s kind of been a bit of warped speed, but I feel so grateful,” she said.


Rumer Willis Isn’t Finding Out Her Baby’s Sex

Willis revealed on the podcast that she and Thomas opted not to learn the sex of their baby.

“I’m not finding out if it’s a boy or a girl, but the energy of this child is so spicy. So, so spicy,” she said.

“It’s still surreal to me, I think because I haven’t started feeling the baby yet,” she added. “Like I still sometimes am like, ‘is this happening?'”

Willis also shared how being pregnant increased her confidence and made her more assertive.

“It’s made me upgrade me so fast,” she said. “Like, things where I used to have such a nature to be people pleasing, or to not stand up for myself for little things that then would kind of get under my skin.”

She said she noticed the change “literally maybe even a week after I got pregnant,” and likened her new attitude to “a new equation … a new puzzle all of a sudden downloaded, and I had a different operating system.”

When asked if she had a birthing plan, the “Hello Again” actress said while she likes “the idea” of giving birth at home, she’s leaving her options open.

“I have a midwife and I also have a doctor,” she said. “I want to allow myself the space and grace to change my mind and to be open to something different.”

Willis also revealed she’s “thinking about” moving into a new home with Thomas before the baby is born.

“I’ve lived where I live for maybe like 13 years and I really want to create a new space with my partner … a new chapter that’s both of ours, that we’re co-creating together,” she explained. “That’s really important for me.”

The eldest daughter of actors Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, Willis, 34, was raised on her family’s Idaho estate along with sisters, Scout LaRue, 31, and Tallulah Belle, 29. Since becoming pregnant, Willis said she’s fantasized about moving back to the rural state.

“I keep feeling drawn to go to Idaho. I keep imagining myself with a new baby and just sitting outside in the summer,” she said. “It’s like a magical fairy forest … you get there, and you go, ‘oh wow, okay, yeah, this is some magic.'”

An April 1998 story in People magazine described Moore’s life in Idaho as centered around her three young daughters.

“She carts her kids from school to horseback riding lessons, gymnastics classes and soccer practice,” the outlet reported at the time.


Rumer Willis Offered Advice to Other Pregnant Moms

When Willis recorded the “Bathroom Chronicles” podcast, she was only “officially 15 weeks pregnant,” but said she had advice for other mamas-to-be.

Calling herself “the snack lady,” Willis said pregnant women should always keep snacks handy — a lesson she learned after almost passing out from hunger.

“I didn’t realize how much you had to eat,” she said. “Always have, like, beef jerky, rice crackers, and some sort of applesauce with you at all times.”

She advised against wearing overalls while traveling, “because you have to pee every five minutes and it’s impossible,” she said.

But despite the inconveniences of pregnancy, Willis said she’s known “for years” that motherhood was her true calling.

“It was never a question for me that I wanted to be a mom and that it just felt like such a divine purpose,” she said. “Something that when I started thinking about, it felt like such joy.”

But the cabaret singer admitted to feeling frustrated by the “judgment” and “negativity” she received after sharing her desire to become a mom.

“I was really taken aback … by this perception of motherhood as just something that you put off until you can’t put it off anymore,” she said. “What if [motherhood] is what I want? What if I feel as called to that as the person who wants to do a start-up?

“This is what I want — and what’s wrong with that?” she asked.

The former “90210” star said the perception of motherhood has “gone completely backwards” from how it was viewed in the 1950s, when “it was perfectly acceptable to be a housewife and to be a mother.”

After winning the DWTS 2015 finale with dance partner Valentin Chmerkovskiy, Willis went on to star as Roxie Hart in the hit Broadway show, “Chicago.” In 2019, she appeared as the Lion on the reality TV competition, “The Masked Singer.”

Willis’s baby will be the first grandchild for Bruce Willis and Demi Moore.

READ NEXT: Former DWTS Co-Host Is a ‘Mess’ Amid Family Update