• Keke Palmer is expecting her first child.
• The actress revealed the news while hosting SNL last month.
• She said she’s been “pouring into herself more and saying no a lot more”.

Keke Palmer is carrying her first child. On December 3, the actress announced the news while hosting Saturday Night Live. Before lifting her jacket to show her baby bulge, Keke addressed rumours that she is pregnant during her introductory monologue.

The next thing Keke mentioned was that she is “so excited” to have children and that it is the “greatest blessing.”

The 29-year-old spoke candidly about starting a new chapter in her life and what her future held before making her momentous revelation.

In addition to “pouring into myself more and saying no a lot more,” the Nope actress reflected on the last year telling, “My 28th year has been highly insightful and empowering for me to step into my autonomy in an even crazier way than I ever have. I feel like when God gives you gifts, you want to make sure you do what you need to do with them. Do what you’re meant to do.”

As for what she’s meant to do now? “A big part of that is taking responsibility over myself and protecting and loving myself,” she said. “Stepping into that higher-self persona and observing me.”

The Emmy winner also revealed how she manages to keep control of her romantic life as a public figure.

“What saved me was putting myself first,” she told the outlet. “That doesn’t mean I’m not compromising, but my level of compromising is very tight, and not in the way of being selfish, but in the form of: I cannot go against what I think is right for me.”

Added Keke, “In love, the main thing for us young women is that we end up contorting ourselves into a pretzel. I want us to know that—and this is something I tell myself—the only way I’m going to have love, and the love that I want, is if I love myself first.”