Life indeed imitates art. A pregnant Jennifer Love Hewitt, playing the role as Agent Kate Callaghan in the series Criminal Minds, was seen submitting her resignation letter to Agent Aaron Hotchner because she wanted to focus on raising her adopted child Meg and to spend more time with her new baby in the show's season finale.
In real life, The Party of Five and Ghost Whisperer star is actually leaving the show and will not return for season 11 to really find time to take care of her coming baby that she is expecting to give birth to in July, reported Inquisitr.com. Her appearance on the May 6 episode is her last for the CBS series. Hewitt joined the show at the start of season 10.
Erica Messer, executive producer of Criminal Minds, confirmed Hewitt's exit from the show and added that the writers intentionally revised the script to allow for her character to say goodbye in the last episode but at the same time provides enough room to allow the actress to rejoin the show in the future.
Messer said that the producers of the show have planned to have Callaghan's daughter to be abducted as the season finale. But she said the decision to write off her character was made late last year when Hewitt informed CBS that she was pregnant and intends to leave the show to spend more time with her family.
Reports said Hewitt made it clear to the producers of the show that she wanted to give her second child the same attention she provided her first child Autumn. And that is a full-time stay-at-home mom. Even while shooting for Criminal Minds, Hewitt often brings Autumn on the set so she could spend time with her and enjoy some mother-daughter bonding moments in-between breaks.
Messer told Entertainment Weekly, "It felt like we had every opportunity to write to the truth of it: She's having another baby. Although on the show she hasn't had, physically, two babies, she does have two kids: She has Meg, who she's been raising since she was an infant, and we wrote in that the character is going to have another baby. There was an opportunity there to write towards the truth. Jennifer wanted to be able to give this second baby everything she gave her first, and that's taking time off to be a full-time mom. Because she's due in July, when we would start shooting season 11, timing-wise there was no way for her to do both, to be able to give that baby everything she wanted to give that baby and still be on our show.
"We wrote to that, and that's how season 10 ends. It's a bittersweet idea of, 'Life is full of choices and they define who you are.' She makes the decision to leave the team for a while. It's really lovely and real, not only because it was happening off-screen, but because I know those things happen in real life too."
Hewitt's entry into the popular series was met by criticisms by the fans. Some of the complaints were sometimes brutal. Fans said she is not bonding well with other members of the team.
But the producers of the show did a great job in refining her character to blend with the storyline, said the Guardian Liberty Voice. According to the report, Hewitt's biggest breakthrough occurred during the show's third episode, entitled A Thousand Suns, as fans warmed up to her character and saw her more as friendly but not too pushy with her BAU team mates.
