Celebrities Who Opened Up About Their Infertility Problems
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In case you were living under a rock and didn’t know, fertility struggles are so, so common. In fact, an estimated 10 percent of women (6.1 million) struggle with infertility in the United States. Yet somehow, it’s still a topic — along with the common circumstance of miscarrying — that many feel uncomfortable discussing. Why? Because going through infertility struggles, whether or not you end up moving forward with fertility treatment measures such as IVF, can be extremely painful and isolating.
And why do parents feel pressure to keep the whole thing a secret from loved ones on top of all that? Isn’t it unfair for any hopeful would-be parent to feel like they’re going through this battle alone? (Answer: Yes. Yes it is.) Enter these outspoken celebrities who are getting vulnerable about their own challenges to break the taboo around infertility.
From Amy Schumer to Chrissy Teigen and Gabrielle Union to Kevin Richardson (yep, the Backstreet Boy), plenty of Hollywood’s major stars have gone public with their family’s fertility challenges, from IVF treatments to hiring a surrogate. And by opening up the conversation, they’re working wonders to help others understand they aren’t alone in this usually exhausting, often heart-wrenching experience.
Because even though the struggle to start a family might be ongoing, there is comfort in knowing there are others sharing that same journey. In the words of Amy Schumer after she opened up on Instagram about beginning the IVF process, “There are sooooo many of us willing to be there for each other. Your stories helped me more than you can imagine.”
Ahead are a variety of famous figures who are changing the conversation and busting the stigma surrounding infertility.
A version of this story was originally published in August 2016.
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Kourtney Kardashian
In a raw Instagram Q&A in May 2024, Kourtney Kardashian shared that she underwent five failed cycles of IVF and three retrievals before ultimately conceiving her son Rocky — who she shares with husband Travis Barker.
“My body relaxed, and I believed in God’s plan for my life,” she shared. “Lots of prayers for whatever was meant to be for us.”
“Also lots of optimising my health. I know how hard it is to feel like you’re not trying, but believing in God’s plan and saying your prayers is so powerful.”
Kardashian found out she was pregnant on Valentine’s Day 2023, one year after stopping treatment. Kardashian and Barker each have three children from previous relationships.
Colton Underwood
Former Bachelor Colton Underwood got incredibly raw in a 2024 interview with Men’s Health where he revealed that he and husband Jordan C. Brown were expecting their first. When collecting samples for their surrogate, Underwood found out that while his husband had “50 or 55 million” sperm in his semen, Underwood had four. Not four million. Four.
“And three of them are dead. Word for word, what the doctor said, he goes, ‘Uh, I can maybe make this one work.’ This one?!”
“I wish somebody had educated me about my sperm and my body, and the decisions that I made and how it would impact me,” Underwood said, later explaining that it could have been his daily hot tub soaks, morning coffee, strenuous workout sessions, and visits to the sauna that impacted his sperm count. After many lifestyle changes, Underwood got his count up into the millions, and the couple proceeded with their journey to fatherhood, seeking out a surrogate and an egg donor. Underwood and Brown expect a baby boy in October 2024.
Emma Thompson
In the hopes of giving her daughter Gaia a little sibling, actress Emma Thompson underwent IVF treatments. “I would have desperately liked to have had more children and it’s been a great agony for me,” she said in 2003. “There’s been an awful lot of grief to get through in not being able to get pregnant again, but there are thousands and thousands of women like me who can’t have children.”
That year, Thompson and her husband Greg Wise met Tindyebwa “Tindy” Agaba, a refugee from Rwanda who later became their informally adopted son.
Hugh Jackman
Hugh Jackman and ex Deborra-Lee Furness always wanted both adopted and biological children, but after IVF treatments and miscarriages, they realized the latter was not going to happen.
“It is a difficult time. The miscarriage thing — apparently it happens to one in three pregnancies — but it’s very, very rarely talked about,” Jackman said. “It’s almost secretive. But it’s a good thing to talk about. It’s more common and it’s tough, there’s a grieving process you have to go through.”
The actor and Furness later adopted kids Oscar and Ava. “The moment Oscar was born all the heartache melted away. You can’t prepare for that moment, nothing can prepare you.”
Dylan Dreyer
Today Show co-host Dylan Dreyer got incredibly vulnerable when sharing her infertility journey in April 2019. It’s a journey that included a heartbreaking miscarriage when trying for Baby No. 2, a surgery to remove scarring from her emergency C-section, and finding out that, at age 37, she had around the same number of eggs as someone in their mid-40s.
“[My husband] and I have been going through all this without anyone knowing because these are all private things… aren’t they? Why do women (and their partners) have to go through all these ups and downs in the dark? Smiling on TV when I want to burst out in tears,” she said on Today.com.
She acknowledged how grateful and lucky she is to have one son but wished she could give him a sibling.
“The way Cal loves on other babies and asks to hold them and gently touches their arms shows me that he would be an amazing older brother. Brian and I are the youngest of three and the relationships we have with our siblings is so special. We have so much love to give and we want to grow our family. We thought it would be easy to do that, and it’s not.”
Ahead of IVF treatments she said, “I don’t know how I really feel right this second. I guess I’m excited … albeit a little disappointed that my body couldn’t do this naturally. I’m scared about what’s ahead … I feel like on one hand I’m going against what God has in the cards for me, but at the same time he helped me to make this decision so it could very well be part of the plan.”
Dreyer and husband Brian Fichera welcomed their second son, Oliver, in January 2020, and their son Rusty less than two years later.
Halsey
After being diagnosed with endometriosis, having surgery to treat the condition, and suffering multiple miscarriages, Halsey decided to freeze her eggs at age 23 to “aggressively” protect her fertility.
“Reproductive illness is so frustrating because it can really make you feel like less of a woman,” she said. “…you don’t feel sexy, you don’t feel proud, and you don’t feel like there’s much hope, so taking these measures to make sure that hopefully I get to have a bright future and achieve the things I want to achieve by doing an ovarian reserve is so important.”
Nicole Kidman
Nicole Kidman is the proud mom of four kids. After infertility struggles, an ectopic pregnancy, and a miscarriage, she and ex-husband Tom Cruise adopted their daughter Bella and son Connor. Then, in 2007, she welcomed her “miracle” daughter, Sunday, at age 40. Three years later, they welcomed a second daughter, Faith, via surrogate.
The actress thinks it’s important to destigmatize conversations about infertility, per Hello! “I do believe we help carve paths that bring us together and you go, ‘Oh, OK, you’re going through this, too. There is hope.'”
Rebel Wilson
In 2020, Rebel Wilson spoke to Today, per BuzzFeed, about realizing how much she wanted to be a mother as she approached age 40.
“But at the time, I didn’t have a partner, and so I went to the fertility doctor,” she explained. ” … Then it was devastating when I’d gone through three egg-harvesting procedures and then, while I was filming The Almond and the Seahorse, I tried to create embryos from the eggs, and none of them survived.”
“[I was] being healthy and [doing] everything the doctors had said, and feeling awesome — and then it didn’t work,” she continued. “All 18 eggs that I had, none of them worked. I was like, ‘Oh my god.’ It was such an emotional roller coaster.”
In Nov. 2022, Wilson welcomed daughter Royce Lillian with Ramona Agruma.
Tamron Hall
Tamron Hall spoke to Allure in 2019 about the mental health aspect of her infertility journey.
“We don’t talk about [that] aspect of it enough, the loneliness enough, because it’s easy enough to hide these things and make it about the physical nature of it. But, for me, it’s a whole-body experience and a whole journey that can be shared,” the TV host said.
“This is not an issue exclusive to women,” she continued. “It’s a parenting journey … So many stigmas have been broken down and so many stereotypes have been demolished that if you can’t conceive you’re not flawed. Your body is not betraying you. It’s a journey, and sometimes it’ll turn into your dream and sometimes it won’t. But we can talk about it.”
Earlier that year, at age 48, Hall welcomed son Moses with husband Steven Greener.
Sarah Jessica Parker
One of eight siblings herself, Sarah Jessica Parker is now a mom of three — but would have had more, if it weren’t so difficult. She told Vogue in 2010 that she had “tried and tried and tried and tried and tried to get pregnant, but it just was not to be, the conventional way — I would give birth as often as I could, if I could. I cherished all the milestones, the good and the bad.”
Luckily, surrogacy was an option for Parker and her husband, Matthew Broderick, and they welcomed twin daughters Tabitha and Marion in addition to their son, James Wilkie.
Michelle Obama
In former first lady Michelle Obama’s 2018 memoir, Becoming, she revealed that she and President Barack Obama had used IVF to conceive their daughters, Malia and Sasha.
“We were trying to get pregnant and it wasn’t going well,” she wrote in the memoir. “We had one pregnancy test come back positive, which caused us both to forget every worry and swoon with joy, but a couple of weeks later I had a miscarriage, which left me physically uncomfortable and cratered any optimism we felt.”
Idina Menzel
Idina Menzel opened up to InStyle about her struggle to conceive a second child via IVF, saying, “At a certain time, you’re exhausted emotionally and physically. It becomes apparent that it is just time to let that go and move on,” adding, “the more you [try for it] — and when it doesn’t happen, you’re upset, you realize how much you want it.”
Speaking about sharing her experience with infertility in her documentary, Idina Menzel: Which Way to the Stage?, the singer and actress explained, “I want women to feel like they’re being seen and heard. And for people to understand that experience a lot of us go on, how emotional it is, what it does to our bodies and how it affects us day to day, let alone trying to sing high notes and get on stage.”
Amy Schumer
Fabulous funnylady — and former SHE Media BlogHer speaker — Amy Schumer revealed on Instagram in January 2020 that she was “a week into IVF and feeling really run down and emotional.” Supportive comments from fans and friends rolled in, and Schumer continued to keep it real throughout her treatment process, sharing drugged-up videos and doctor’s office glamour shots.
“I learned to eat salty food after and drink Gatorade,” she wrote on Instagram of the IVF injections. “Ice the area. Take arnica and put arnica on the bruises. To be patient and kind to myself and that there are sooooo many of us willing to be there for each other. Your stories helped me more than you can imagine. I feel incredibly lucky. I’m really hoping this works and staying positive.”
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Gabrielle Union, who wasn’t sure she wanted to have children until she bonded with her stepchildren, chronicles her struggles with infertility in her book We’re Going to Need More Wine.
“For three years, my body has been a prisoner of trying to get pregnant — I’ve either been about to go into an IVF cycle, in the middle of an IVF cycle, or coming out of an IVF cycle,” Union writes. She also revealed that she’s had multiple miscarriages in her journey to conceive.
After all the heartbreak, Union and husband Dwyane Wade welcomed their daughter Kaavia via surrogate in 2018. “We are sleepless and delirious,” Wade wrote on Instagram, “but so excited to share that our miracle baby arrived last night via surrogate and 11/7 will forever be etched in our hearts as the most loveliest of all the lovely days. Welcome to the party sweet girl!”
Jaime King
Supermodel and actress Jaime King gave birth to her first son, James Knight, in 2013, and second son, Leo Thames, in 2015. But it took seven years of trying to conceive for her to get pregnant — and she’s been vocal about that trying time in her life.
In an interview with Fit Pregnancy, she discussed how her second pregnancy differed greatly from her first: “Nobody knew how long it took me to get pregnant: That for seven years I had so many losses, I’d been trying for so long and I was in so much pain,” King said.
“I felt like a part of me was broken because the fact is let’s be real: The only difference between men and women that we grow up with is that we’re able to carry a child. Somewhere in our subconscious when someone tells you, ‘Oh, you might not be able to do that,’ you feel like it’s the one thing that you have that’s this gift, that makes you a woman, and there’s something wrong with you.”
Giuliana Rancic
After being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2011, Giuliana Rancic had to take cancer-suppressing medications that made getting pregnant a risky endeavor. The television host told People she and husband Bill Rancic welcomed their son Edward Duke with the help of a surrogate in 2012, but that when they tried for a second child with a surrogate, Rancic discovered on New Year’s Eve that she miscarried with their third and last remaining embryo. Rancic called the loss the “toughest blow” and confessed, “It was a really hard time.”
She also revealed that she is more open than ever to the idea of adoption because she thinks to herself, “I love Duke so much, if I couldn’t take care of him, I hope there would be someone else who would love him.”
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On Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Kim Kardashian spoke often about the difficult time she and Kanye West had conceiving after the birth of their first child, North West. The reality star and her musician/designer husband tried for more than one year after North’s birth to conceive again, and after announcing their second pregnancy, Kardashian revealed that giving birth for the first time was no walk in the park.
“I had so many complications. I had this condition called placenta accreta. There were a couple little operations to fix all that, so that created a little hole in my uterus, which I think made it really tough to get pregnant again. It was a long road. I would go to the doctor in Beverly Hills every day at five in the morning to get tested to see if I was ovulating.”
Kardashian said all of the pressure and stress took the fun out of trying to have a baby, and she did everything from consulting a nutritionist to getting acupuncture in order to help. But it’s been worth the long haul: She welcomed son Saint in 2015. She’s also mom to two more kids via surrogate: Chicago, born in 2018, and Psalm, born in 2019.
Mariah Carey
Legendary singer Mariah Carey opened up to Barbara Walters on 20/20 about her infertility struggles after safely giving birth to twins Monroe and Moroccan in 2011.
After marrying now ex-husband Nick Cannon, she had a miscarriage in 2008 and, as a precaution, took progesterone before and during her second pregnancy and had daily acupuncture treatments to help reduce her stress. “The main thing I did that was tough, was to go on progesterone like every month… and then when I was pregnant, I had to stay with the progesterone for 10 weeks,” Carey said.
While pregnant with her twins, Carey discovered she had gestational diabetes, was at risk of suffering from seizures, and was put on bed rest. “I don’t think I understood the enormity and the magnitude of what it really does to your body,” she said of having twins. “Carrying two babies. Unless somebody’s been through it, it’s difficult to understand what I went through, because my pregnancy was very unique in terms of what happened to me.”
Trista Sutter
Former Bachelorette Trista Sutter described the two years she and husband Ryan tried to conceive as a dark time in her life. In her book Happily Ever After: The Life-Changing Power of a Grateful Heart, Sutter reveals that she has always wanted to be a mom and that when that didn’t immediately happen after she and Ryan married in 2003, she began to question their relationship, herself, and God.
“It’s a very difficult thing to not be able to do anything about making a dream of yours come true and questioning whether something is wrong with you,” Sutter explained. “So that was definitely a dark time in my life.”
Sutter told People she and her husband were ready to try IVF, but then they discovered she was pregnant with their first child, Maxwell. She worked with a company called OV Watch to predict when she was ovulating — and it worked for them. Since then, Sutter and her husband have also welcomed a daughter named Blakesley, but she says three kids are not in the cards — she had the Essure procedure done, which is a permanent form of birth control.
Tyra Banks
Supermodel and businesswoman Tyra Banks welcomed a baby boy named York Banks Asla, who was born via gestational surrogate in 2016. But Banks and her FabLife co-host Chrissy Teigen revealed that they both struggled with infertility issues on a segment of the show.
After Teigen begged the audience to stop asking her about children because the struggle to conceive is a very real one, Banks broke down in tears as she explained the pain she and other women feel when they can’t conceive: “I want to co-sign what Chrissy is saying and say ‘You have no idea what people are going through,'” Banks said.
“Why am I crying? You just have no idea what people are going through, so when you ask Chrissy that or me that or anybody that, it is none of your frigging business, OK? And for any women, it is none of your business what somebody is going through. Whether they want to have a child or don’t ever want to have a child or may have a child on the way, it’s none of your business, OK? Until somebody wants to make it your business.”
Banks later revealed she underwent IVF treatments and that the procedure was difficult for her. “We’re kind of going through this similar thing with IVF,” she said. “And, you know, putting needles in your tummy every day and having to come to work and smile when you feel like you want to throw up and lay down… I can’t believe I’m saying this right now.”
Padma Lakshm
The birth of Padma Lakshmi’s baby girl in 2009 was described as a miracle because the actor discovered at age 36 that she suffered from Stage 4 endometriosis and had to have two surgeries to help with her condition. Lakshmi, who co-founded the Endometriosis Foundation of America, said doctors told her she’d probably never be able to get pregnant and that she froze her eggs as insurance.
The cookbook author says by some miracle she got pregnant naturally, but that she was very lucky because it’s a rare occurrence in someone with Stage 3 or Stage 4 endometriosis. Now, she’s doing her part to raise awareness of infertility and how difficult it is for women.
“I think infertility is one of those subjects that nobody likes to talk about for obvious reasons,” she said. “It’s very personal, everybody’s different. It has to do with your sexuality, but it also has to do with your own feelings about your womanhood and all the cultural and religious and familial taboos wrapped around that. And we have insecurities about that, so why would we want to be open about something so touchy? But I think it’s important, as a community, to come together.”
Naomi Campbell
As one of the original ’80s/’90s supermodels, Naomi Campbell is a woman who seemed to be on top of the world; but in 2008, when she was 38, Campbell opened up about her personal struggle with infertility.
At a fundraiser for the White Ribbon Alliance, which offers health care for pregnant women around the world, Campbell said she wanted children, but that she was infertile until she received a corrective surgery that year for what she originally thought was a cyst.
“I was not able to have children until March,” Campbell said. “Now it’s in God’s hands. I would love to have a family.” At 50 years old, the supermodel announced that she had become a mother to a baby girl in 2021, but she’s kept her daughter from the public eye since.
Brooke Shields
As a spokesperson for Fertility Lifelines, model and actress Brooke Shields is an open book when it comes to her infertility issues. The mom of two had to have surgery on her cervix to remove precancerous cells, and the procedure left scarring that made it difficult for her to become pregnant. She tried artificial insemination several times with husband Chris Henchy, but the procedure was unsuccessful. Because she was 36 when she started trying to conceive, she says her doctor suggested IVF.
“I had to take these shots for weeks,” she wrote in her memoir, Down Came the Rain. “In addition, there were countless doctor visits for blood tests, sonograms and peeing on sticks, not to mention the estrogen patches I had to wear that made me look and feel like I’d had a skin graft when they were removed.”
She continued, “The whole process was quite an ordeal, and we became slaves to the time of day and to little vials of liquid. We’d find ourselves out at dinner with friends, and then we’d have to sneak off to a coat room, where we’d huddle over syringes and a travel-size cooler filled with small bottles of drugs.”
After her first round of IVF, Shields became pregnant but miscarried. She was ready to stop trying when she got pregnant during her last cycle of treatments in 2002. “I was about ready to call it quits. I was growing weary of the anticipation and the pressure, and Chris said he wasn’t sure he could handle seeing me rip off another estrogen patch in frustration… at wit’s end, we decided to try one more time.” The couple is now raising their daughters Rowan and Grier.
Elizabeth Banks
In an interview with Lucky, Banks revealed she had a womb issue and that her embryos wouldn’t implant. As a result, she and husband Max Handelman chose to use a gestational surrogate, whom she remained close to. “It’s a big leap, inviting this person into your life to do this amazing, important thing for you,” she said, continuing, “And it’s hard losing that kind of control. But our surrogate is so extraordinary, and she’s still in our lives. She’s like an auntie.”
Banks and Handelman have sons Felix, born 2011, and Magnus, born 2012, both born via gestational surrogate. Again, Banks was quick to praise her surrogate. “This experience has exceeded all expectations, taught us a great deal about generosity and gratitude, and established a relationship that will last a lifetime.”
Jimmy Fallon
Women aren’t the only celebrities who feel the anxiety, disappointment, and sadness of infertility. After welcoming their daughter Winnie in 2013, TV host Jimmy Fallon revealed he and his wife used a surrogate after trying for five years to get pregnant.
“We’ve tried a bunch of things,” Fallon said. “Anyone who’s tried will know, it’s just awful.” The couple told friends and family they were pregnant in the past, but Fallon said it didn’t work out and it was hard on everybody. They kept Winnie a secret until the very last minute, and Fallon used his position to speak directly to anyone dealing with infertility issues.
“We tried for a long time, for five years. I know people have tried much longer, but if there’s anyone out there who is trying and they’re just losing hope… Just hang in there. Try every avenue; try anything you can do, ’cause you’ll get there. You’ll end up with a family, and it’s so worth it. It is the most worth it thing. I’m just so happy right now. I’m freaking out.”
Chrissy Teigen
Despite her giving nature on social media, model and TV personality Chrissy Teigen and husband John Legend didn’t feel it was OK to broadcast their infertility struggle to billions of strangers. Teigen says she wanted to talk about infertility for so long, but that her IVF treatments felt too personal to discuss.
“It didn’t feel right to ever tweet, ‘Ugh, doing my IVF shots again,'” Teigen said. “It just sounded silly. It definitely was not planned in that episode at all.” Teigen was referring to an episode of her show FabLife, where she and co-host Tyra Banks opened up about the difficulties both were facing getting pregnant.
She says she and Legend had dealt with the challenge for years and that they relied on the support of close friends to see them through it. “I think we just have really good people around us that never said anything or else you would have known,” Teigen said. “I have a team of maybe 60 people, John has hundreds and everyone knew. They knew the failures, the successes, everything, but it’s never gotten out.”
Teigen and Legend are parents to Luna, Miles, Esti, and Wren. Wren was born via surrogate just months after his big sister Esti.
Gwen Stefani
After giving birth to two sons with now-ex husband Gavin Rossdale, Gwen Stefani desperately wanted a third baby — but told Marie Claire she had trouble conceiving. She was 40 at the time and admitted to the magazine that she was all set to accept life the way it was. “I really, really, really wanted one about two years ago,” Stefani said. “And it didn’t really work out. So… I feel good with what we’ve got. Everything works out how it should. You can’t plan anything, right? You can try.”
Then, in 2014, Stefani discovered at 44 she was pregnant with her third son, Apollo — and she said son Kingston had everything to do with it (leaving us to assume IVF treatments were not involved). “Kingston… has a direct line to God, basically,” Stefani said. “[He started to pray,] ‘Dear God, please let my mom have a baby. Please, God! Please let my mom have a baby.’ I swear to you, he prayed every single night, and four weeks later, I was pregnant.”
Tia Mowry
Tia Mowry and ex-husband Cory Hardrict are the proud parents of Cree and Cairo, but the Sister, Sister star said endometriosis made her dreams of giving big-brother Cree a little sister tougher than she’d imagined.
“I often felt like something was wrong with me,” she told Women’s Health. “I thought I was alone because no one I knew personally had dealt with this. And then I realized: I’d never really seen someone African American in the public eye talking about endometriosis or their struggles with infertility. And when you don’t know or see anyone who looks like you talking about what you’re going through, you feel alone and suffer in silence.”
Kevin Richardson
Backstreet Boy Kevin Richardson and wife Kristin have two little boys, but they’ve been frank about the infertility struggles they faced before conceiving son Maxwell. In fact, Kristin appeared in Pushing Motherhood, a documentary about the topic in which she spoke out about multiple rounds of IVF and other clinical procedures that were unsuccessful.
As Kevin said of the process, “It just didn’t feel right, so we were like, ‘Let’s stop this. Let’s reset your body, reduce stress, make you feel happy and healthy, then go back to the roots of how it’s supposed to be done. If it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be, and if not, we’ll adopt.’” In the end, Kristin conceived naturally.
