When Natalie “Nadya” Suleman welcomed the world’s first set of surviving octuplets in 2009, she also gave birth to an entirely new persona.
“Octomom was conceived by the media,” Suleman detailed in an exclusive interview with E! News, calling the public perception of her following the Jan. 16 arrival of her kids Noah, Maliyah, Isaiah, Nariyah, Makai, Josiah, Jeremiah and Jonah “this caricature” that was “the polar opposite of my true character.”
At the time, alleged the Fullterton, Calif. native—also mom to Elijah, 23, Amerah, 22, Joshua, 21, and Aidan, 19, and 18-year-old twins Caleb and Calyssa—the country was in the middle of a recession, leaving the public “subconsciously seeking out a societal scapegoat.”
A single mom with 14 kids, on disability from her job as a psychiatric technician, she fit the bill.
These days, said Suleman, “I don’t believe I would have been the target of such misplaced hate.” But in the late aughts, she was leveled with endless insults, intense scrutiny, even death threats as she went into fighter mode, doing everything and anything (including agreeing to paid photo shoots, interviews and even an adult film) to survive.
