Hollyoaks’ Jorgie Porter shares details of ‘massive challenge’ in her relationship
Hollyoaks actress Jorgie Porter has opened up about one of the biggest challenges in her relationship with partner Oliver Piotrowski after returning to work on set following the birth of her son Forest in November 2022. Throwing open the door to the unseen side of her life on ITV’s new documentary series, Drama Queens, Jorgie revealed that she and Oliver had been struggling with negotiating childcare arrangements alongside their busy and demanding day jobs.
“We have a massive challenge of childcare at the moment as we are both, very busy in our jobs,” explained Jorgie.
“It’s really tricky for me to take him to work, because you can’t just take all babies onto any job. Like if you work in a box factory, you can’t put a baby on a conveyor belt, it’d be a box!”
After exploring several options for childcare, Jorgie then revealed how she had decided to trial taking Forest to work - an experience she soon came to regret when the adorable youngster caused chaos on set.
In a VT of the moment she and her young son had visited the Hollyoaks set, Jorgie told the cameras: “We’re actually at Hollyoaks right now, on The Dog set, we’re about to do a podcast and I literally have no hopes of this going well. They’ll probably be really annoyed and really sick of it.”
For the visit, Jorgie had opted to choose a relatively quiet day in which she was set to film a podcast episode, something she initially thought shouldn’t be too taxing for Forest, as he initially seemed quite content on set, playing with her co-stars on set.
"The scenario at the time was really good as the people doing the podcast were mothers themselves, so they completely understood,” said Jorgie recalling the experience.
“Which was lucky. He was doing really well at first, but then at one point there were cups on the table and obviously then Forest noticed the cups and wanted to have a little bang around and play really loud. We just had to remove him.”
Following the excitable little one’s temporary removal from set, Jorgie revealed she had been struck with a moment of clarity: “I realised I was a bit more focused when he was out of the room, and it did prove that it was really quite hard and didn’t make sense bringing him to work.”
Later at home, Jorgie went on to share her discovery with partner Oliver, who had been arguing since day one to consider hiring a nanny to help them out, something the actress admitted she had been initially concerned about as she didn't want to introduce another new person into the home.
Yet her on-set experience soon revealed a change of heart as she finally conceded defeat saying: “It has been a bit of a tense subject between me and Ollie, you know, having the baby and both going to work. To resolve our situation I think we should possibly do a nanny. I think we didn’t realise how intense it would be with me going back to work.”
Drama Queens continues Wednesday at 9pm on ITVBe and ITVX
