Why Mindy Kaling Is 'Not Going to Talk to Anyone' About Her Daughter Katherine's Father — for Now

Almost 18 months after the birth of her daughter, Mindy Kaling is still keeping mum on the identity of her father — but maybe not forever.

In a new interview with The New York Times, the Late Night actress and mother of one opens up about why it has been important to her to keep conversations about Katherine Swati‘s paternity out of the spotlight.

“My feeling is that until I speak to my daughter about that, I’m not going to talk to anyone else about it,” says Kaling, who will celebrate her 40th birthday this month.

The star adds that she was “surprised at how much I enjoy being a mom” — mostly because she wasn’t in tune with a “maternal instinct” in herself before Katherine’s arrival on Dec. 15, 2017.

“I’m very impatient, and having a baby requires an amount of patience that I was worried about,” Kaling says. “But they don’t tell you that the thing will look so much like you, and do things that are so sweet and adorable, that you’ll naturally not have the same impatience that you would have with a stranger or someone who works for you.”

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Despite her biggest role now — as a mom — Kaling says the fact that she is “someone who loves work” is something that “will never change.”

“But the kind of work that I do has changed,” she tells NYT. “When I did the first season of The Mindy Project at Hulu, they were like, ‘You could do as many episodes in a season as you want.’ And I was like, ‘Can we do the maximum?’ ”

“But waking up at 5 o’clock in the morning to do 26 episodes of TV is not something that I’m going to do again,” The Office alum admits.

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Kaling found early motherhood “very funny, and at times very gruesome” — but that doesn’t mean she will necessarily use those experiences to influence any future work projects.

“I don’t know that I would ever write about it,” she reveals to NYT. “I do think that a child appreciates you for none of the things that you are proud of.”

“The qualities in my life that I’m really proud of, like being a funny writer or a good dresser or a great boss or a good listener — I don’t know that my daughter loves me for any of those reasons,” Kaling continues. “To her, my value is something completely different.”

Late Night is in theaters now.