The Octomom’s regrets

Nadya Suleman is feeling overwhelmed, says Caroline Graham in the London Sunday Mail. Last year, the 34-year-old Californian became only the second person in the U.S. to give birth to live octuplets. But the miracle story turned sour when it emerged that she was single, unemployed, and already mother to six children under 8. “I thought people would love me,” she recalls. “But I was getting hate mail and death threats. I cried and cried. I went from being Nadya to this caricature called Octomom. I’m just like any other struggling single mother trying to do what’s best for her babies.” Thanks to various media deals and a book contract, Suleman can now afford four full-time nannies, plus a night nanny and a woman who helps with bathing and bedtime. But between writing her book, doing 10 loads of laundry a day, and exercising two hours nightly—because, she says, “It’s most important to stay strong and healthy for my children”—she admits to being so run-down that she can hardly tell her kids apart. “With the older ones it’s, ‘Hey, you’ or ‘Whatever your name is.’ I don’t think any mother can give a child the attention that it deserves. In my circumstances, it’s impossible. But you can’t undo what I have done. I just have to get on.”

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