Well before Whoopi Goldberg was a star co-host on The View, she was a young mother doing the best she could for her one and only daughter, Alexandrea Martin (or "Alex").
Whoopi had Alex at 18 years old with her former drug counselor, Alvin Martin, in 1973. The 63-year-old talk show star had been struggling with a heroin addiction throughout her teen years, which ultimately led to her reaching out to Alvin (the pair ended up splitting in 1979). At the time Alex was born, Whoopi had already dropped out of high school.
In the mid-70s, Whoopi and her daughter, who is now 45, moved to California to pursue her acting and stand-up comedy dreams. Since she was low on money, Whoopi told The Telegraph that she took whatever job she possibly could to pay her bills — including becoming a brick layer and a mortuary cosmetologist.
Alex revealed to TheGrio.com that she remembers the time being extremely tough for her and her mom.
“I know what it’s like with the food stamps, because my mom has her [Welfare] cards framed," Alex said. "Seriously … I remember that. I remember we had the one room space and we slept in the bed together. I remember when we wanted to travel we would drive across the country in broke down bugs. We didn’t have the money to go to movies."
Eventually, Whoopi's hard work paid off. After developing a one-woman show, Whoopi got noticed by Steven Spielberg, who gave the young actress her first big break in The Color Purple in 1985. After that, Whoopi's career did nothing but soar.
Looking back on those tough years, Whoopi told Page Six that Alex, who now has three children of her own, is a "better mother than she ever was." But Alex has made it clear so many times that she sees her mom as nothing but her hero.
"We talk multiple times a day," Alex told Wendy Williams in 2015 while promoting her and Whoopi's reality docu-series According to Alex. She also revealed that because they're so close, there are no boundaries as to what they talk about.
Whoopi echoed Alex's feelings when she gushed on The View in 2016 that her daughter was her "best friend." According to Whoopi, she's "one of the most trustworthy and loyal people" that she's ever known.
