Rutherford: 'I'll Raise My Children Alone'

Actress Kelly Rutherford has had quite a year. She gave birth to her second child all while going through a very nasty, very public divorce. When she was three months pregnant, the 40-year-old 'Gossip Girl' actress decided it was time to leave her husband, and now she's opening up about the split as well as showing off her two children in the new issue of Life & Style given exclusively to PopEater.

Rutherford says the decision to leave Daniel Girsch was tough, as she'd always thought he was the one for her. "I met this person, I fell in love with him and I wished for the best... He was charming in the beginning," she tells Life & Style. Then, things turned south and "it was pretty obvious we weren't getting along." Rutherford and Girsch already had son Hermes at this point, and Rutherford was pregnant with their second child. "I just didn't want [Hermés] to go through anything he didn't have to. I stayed until I couldn't stay any longer, even though I knew things were rough. I wanted to be sure. When you have a child with someone, I think you have to be able to look at them and say, ;I did everything I could,' before you realize it's time to move on," Rutherford says.

During the trying-to-mend-the-relationship period, Rutherford got pregnant and thought maybe another child would help their bond. "I found out I was pregnant, and I thought, Oh, maybe things will be nice, maybe it will be calm," Kelly recalls. "But it wasn't. Things only got more intense," she says.

She was "kind of scared to leave," saying that Girsch exhibited erratic behavior that felt threatening to her.

As the divorce battle drove on with many nasty claims slung by both sides, Rutherford gave birth to daughter Helena Grace without Girsch in the delivery room. "I didn't want him in the room with me," Rutherford says. "When you're in labor, you don't want the man you're divorcing in there, especially someone who's said cruel things about you. I was just trying to have a healthy baby through an enormous amount of stress."

Being a single (and famous) parent is tough, but Rutherford thinks she has the key to keeping her kids happy. "The most important thing is that the children have love and stability in their lives, whether that comes from a mother or a father. [Alone], I can raise them to be much more peaceful."