Octomom’s new fight
A MUM TO 14, NATALIE REVEALS HOW SHE’S TURNED HER BACK ON FAME TO EMBRACE A VEGAN, CELIBATE LIFESTYLE
She reached worldwide fame in 2009 as ‘Octomom’ – the American woman who gave birth to octuplets via IVF, despite already being an unemployed single mum-of-six.
But whatever became of Nadya Suleman, who created a storm of scandal over the controversial multiple births?
Speaking to New Idea, Nadya – who now goes by the name Natalie – says she’s put her seedy public persona behind her, declaring her old life brought her to the brink of suicide and nearly destroyed her family.
Revealing that her life as Octomom saw her turn to working in porn and strip clubs to make ends meet, she says she started taking drugs and self-medicating with alcohol to take away the pain.
It’s only now, after turning her back on her demons, that the 42-year-old has found happiness – choosing a celibate life with no men, while raising her 14 kids as either vegans or omnivores in their two-bedroom townhouse.
‘Every day I would wake up with the most ugly, dead, visceral feeling inside of me,’ she tells New Idea. ‘I didn’t want to live. I felt less than human – as that character I was pretending to be in order to survive and provide for my family.
‘When I abandoned it and went back to who I really am, I had that sense of peace – internal joy.’
Natalie became infamous in 2009 when it was revealed she had undergone IVF treatment to become pregnant with eight children. Her notoriety led her to do porn films and appear in strip clubs – and she says she was on a slow downward spiral.
‘I was so low, I was taking prescription drugs – benzodiazepines,’ she reveals. ‘I had to medicate to just get through what I was doing. I would mix them with alcohol, which I later found out was what Whitney Houston died from.’
However, Natalie says a ‘guardian angel’ eventually gave her the courage to put her seedy life behind her, after a chance encounter.
‘I was in a strip club in Florida in February 2013, and this very tall man, this stranger came in,’ she tells New Idea. ‘He walked straight to me and looked straight into my eyes.
‘He took my hand and grabbed my arm and said in a very gentle, but firm way: “You do not have to do this.” He repeated it five times.
‘I couldn’t control the tears that were streaming down my face. I looked down for a moment, and looked up and he was gone.’
From that moment on, Natalie says: ‘I knew I had to be my healthy self again.’
Natalie had six children from her first five rounds of IVF – Elijah, 16, Amerah, 15, Joshua, 14, Aidan, 12, and 11-year-old twins Calyssa and Caleb.
The octuplets – Makai, Josiah, Isaiah, Jonah, Maliyah, Jeremiah, Nariyah and Noah – turn nine in January, and are the only surviving set in the world.
To try to give them a more stable upbringing, Natalie moved the family to Laguna in Orange County, California, where she grew up and works part-time as a counsellor – speaking to men and women who suffer drug and alcohol issues.
Despite caring for 14 children on her own, she is not looking for a partner and is happy to live a celibate life.
‘That’s just not me,’ she says. ‘My calling was to be a mum.’
She has confessed she was ‘very foolish, immature and selfish’ to have 14 children, and didn’t really think through the consequences.
‘I was on a mission. I just wanted to have a bunch of kids.’
Natalie admits things are still tight – revealing they had to convert the office into another bedroom – and that the octuplets followed a vegan diet, but her other six children decided to remain ‘omnivores’.
‘We live pay cheque to pay cheque,’ she said. ‘It’s a struggle every day. I am very grateful for food stamps, and I do get some residuals from that horrible porn thing.’
Natalie’s son Aidan, 12, is autistic, which adds another dimension to family life.
‘Aidan has the mind of an 18-month-old, he’s still nonverbal and in his diapers 24/7. But the other children, they are like his guardian angels.’
Natalie’s son inspired her to write a book, which she is hoping to get published.
‘It’s a story that needs to be told and I think it will encourage a lot of women to draw up strength they didn’t know they had,’ she says.