Hayden Panettiere is a proud mom who is now sharing a rare update about her daughter Kaya. The 9-year-old currently lives with her father, Wladimir Klitschko, in Europe, but she still maintains a relationship with her mom. Hayden doesn’t often talk about her daughter in interviews, but it appears Kaya is growing into a very smart young girl who has a lot of interests. It hasn't always been easy for Hayden since she relinquished custody of her daughter to her ex-fiancé in 2018, but it looks like they’ve finally found a way to make the arrangement work.
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Kaya sounds like one smart cookie.
"Kaya speaks five languages," Hayden told People. "English, Russian, Ukrainian, German, and she's now getting on with her French … she's a genius!"
Hayden went on to talk about how her daughter is getting a very different education in Ukraine.
"I think language is one thing we do poorly in the US. By the time we start teaching them languages, their brain is already too formed. But when they're babies and young, they're like a sponge. You can teach them anything. She doesn't appreciate it now, but I keep telling her she will!" she said.
Kaya is also a horse girl.
In addition to her knack for languages, Kaya is apparently very into horses. Hayden told E! Online that her girl has had equestrian dreams for a long time — when she was younger, she loved to climb aboard her stuffed hippo and ride it while watching her mom’s 2005 film Racing Stripes. Hayden explained that "she's going to town, got the hippo by the ears. We're like, 'She's going to ride off one day!'"
Now Kaya competitively jumps horses.
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There's one thing that Kaya doesn't seem interested in, though.
Hayden shared that she’s been asked if Kaya may follow her into acting one day, but it’s not likely. (Some of Hayden Panettiere's movies and TV shows include Bring It On, Scream, Malcolm in the Middle, I Love You, Beth Cooper, and Heroes.)
"I get asked all the time, 'If she wanted to be a singer or actor, what would you say?'" she said. "I look at her, that's not her thing. She's not into performing. She's all into horses."
Hayden claims her daughter has a sincere desire to be treated like everyone else, which is something that she herself finds soothing. "She's very independent, she loves to do her own thing, loves to be normal," Hayden explained to E! Online.
Naturally, Hayden worries about her only child.
It’s good to see that Kaya is doing well and has a good relationship with her mom. In 2022, Hayden spoke about the "trauma" she was afraid Kaya would experience growing up so far away from her mother.
During an appearance on Red Table Talk, she said, "I also remember her dad calling me and he said, 'Kaya is going around and asking other women if she can call them Mommy,' and my breath hitched and my heart stopped, and he was laughing … He didn't get it as to me who saw, that's a trauma reaction. That's a cry for help. It was a trauma that she was experiencing, me not being around."
Hayden called giving up custody of Kaya 'the hardest thing I could do.'
At the time, she was struggling with addictions to alcohol and opioids, and she knew that she needed to focus on recovery. "I was gonna go work on myself and I was gonna get better," she explained, saying she thought they would be able to reconcile once she received treatment.
Hayden also claimed she didn’t realize that the move would be permanent. "She was almost 3 and it wasn't fully my decision," she said of giving up custody. "In fact, I didn't even know it was happening until she was already over there."
