In her first television interview since splitting with Jesse James, Sandra Bullock says "everything works out the way the universe wants it to work out."
Case in point: Her seven-month-old son Louis, whom she adopted from New Orleans.
"He's a little Cajun cookie," she tells the Today show's Matt Lauer in the interview, airing Tuesday.
Bullock, 46 — who attended the ribbon cutting Sunday of a new $700,000 New Orleans health clinic she helped fund to mark the fifth year of Hurricane Katrina — says she loves being tied to the Big Easy.
"How lucky am I?" she asks Lauer.
Bullock and ex husband James, 40 — with whom she split earlier this year following reports that he cheated — began the adoption process four years ago. See more photos of Sandra in New Orleans.
"It was a long process," she tells Lauer. "I did not circumvent. I wanted to do everything exactly the same way everyone else did. And– it was– he was always mine, you know. It wasn't like I felt like someone was going to take him away. But it was nice to have someone say, I think you're a fit parent."
Bullock has said she always had "faith" she would end up with the right child.
"Everything works out the way the universe wants it to work out," she says. "We had always said that it didn't matter where the child came from. If they had issues that were medical issues, we didn't care. It's like the child that needed us in the home is the child that's going to be placed.
"And I didn't think it would be a boy," she adds. "We don't have any boys in our family. Boy, is everyone really happy about that. So, he's like the crown prince. You know, it's nothing but girls in our family … It was just the hierarchy that needed to be broken."
Bullock kept her adoption hush-hush — and she credits her close friends with helping her do so.
"It takes good people with integrity," she says. "I mean, I read something like, how did someone keep a secret, and it's– you know– human beings exist that have integrity that know how to keep their mouth shut. That know the bigger picture, that don't sell out their friends. Those people are all over the place. But again, we don't like to talk about it, because it doesn't sell a magazine. But I was blessed with the same friends I've had since before things got really special for me and blessed in life.
"And when things get bad, they're still the same friends," she says. "And, you know, it– everything passes. It all passes. But they just– you know, they know if they screw up they're not coming on the next vacation. I'm not going to babysit their kids. I will cut them. I will take them down."
Kidding aside, she says, "I have friends and family that are filled with massive amounts of integrity. And it shouldn't be an oddity."
