Rob Lowe Claimed ‘Little House on the Prairie’ Star Melissa Gilbert’s Mother Thought He Was After Her Fame

Melissa Gilbert shared in her memoir Prairie Tale that she fell in love with Rob Lowe “instantly,” but her mother wasn’t so won over by Lowe, according to him. Lowe wrote in his autobiography that Gilbert’s mother thought he was after her fame.

Melissa Gilbert said she ‘fell instantly’ in love with Rob Lowe

Gilbert had met Lowe initially when she was 14 or 15 but they reconnected years later. She told Access Hollywood, “I was driving home from work, and he pulled up at a stoplight.”

“I had my prairie makeup on … my hair was all funky from being in a bun that day,” she recalled. “He pulled up and we started talking and exchanged numbers. That eventually led to us dating …”

In her memoir, she shared how she fell for the actor. “I fell instantly, hopelessly and stupidly in love,” she wrote (via Today). “We went from first date to instant couple. I felt like I was starving for Rob.”

Rob Lowe said Gilbert’s mother had concerns about him

In his book Stories I Only Tell My Friends, Lowe dedicated much less of his storytelling to his relationship with Gilbert as she shared in her memoir. He did give a bit of insight into how her mother didn’t allow her to visit him while he was filming The Outsiders.

“I have been dating Melissa Gilbert back in L.A., but her mom thinks I’m after her for her fame and won’t let her visit me,” he shared in his book about working on the film in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

With Gilbert not in the picture, he shared how he began “a time-honored tradition of entertainers on the road,” noting, “sometimes you chase girls, sometimes they chase you, sometimes it’s just to flirt, and sometimes it’s more than that.”

While Lowe noted that filming the movie provided “a perfect setup,” he admitted he did have some worries. “My situation is complicated somewhat by my long-distance relationship with my girlfriend and there are times when I feel bad about that,” he wrote.

Lowe shared how he could turn down the volume on that fact by drinking. “Nothing quiets the inner voice you want to ignore better than a couple of beers,” he explained.

Lowe and Gilbert broke up

Gilbert and Lowe were engaged bit when she discovered she was pregnant with his child, they broke up. She later had a miscarriage. She admitted that it was a great deal of loss in her life.

“It was very, very painful,” she explained in a 2009 interview on Today. “It was a very dark and difficult time for me … Now that I have children that are his age — my older boys are 28 and 23, the age he was when we were together — I understand it. But at the time it was devastating.”

“We broke up. It ran its course. I think we were just too young,” Gilbert said of the relationship ending.

In her book she wrote, “I had lost my baby and my relationship with Rob … and it hurt like hell.”