More than forty years after glorious debut: Kim Wilde (61) did not dare to make a comeback as a married mother

Kim Wilde was 21 when she made her international breakthrough. After fifteen years, however, she hung up her singing microphone to get married and become a mother. She can hardly believe that she is now embraced by her fans again. Kim Wilde made a crushing impression in 1981 with her debut single Kids in America. Not least because of her looks. Many boys coveted her and countless girls also wanted such a cool blonde haircut. Kim became one of the pop idols of the eighties. 

She loved her star life, but in 1996 Kim craved a “normal life” and disappeared from the spotlight. That they had fallen in love with actor Hal Fowler (54) had convinced her. “It was so exhausting, so when I met my husband and we wanted to start a family, I thought it would be a good time to say: Thank you everyone, it’s been great, but now I’m gone,” Kim tells The Mirror. Within six months she was married, two years later son Harry (24) was born, followed by daughter Rose (22). Kim enjoyed the anonymity and realized that nothing beats family happiness. When she laid out a garden for her children, she enjoyed it so much that she took a gardening course. She even wrote books about it and was allowed to present a gardening program at the BBC. The digging in the earth also proved to be therapeutic: the depressed feelings that sometimes plagued Kim diminished. 

In that respect, stopping drinking six years ago also had a positive effect. “I immediately felt so much better,” said Kim, who had everything her heart desired. Still, she went on to miss the performance a few years ago. She had continued to sing at home, but wanted to do it in public again. Although at the same time it seemed terrifying to her. “I feared there wouldn’t be an audience for me as a married mother of two. I thought Kim Wilde’s romance was that she was single and 21.” But her fear turned out to be unfounded: wherever the diva performs during the Kim Wilde Tour, which will bring her to the Netherlands in November, she is received enthusiastically. “My fans still love me. What a nice surprise!”