Natalie “Nadya” Suleman isn’t ready to jump back into the dating world.
The 49-year-old single mother of 14 exclusively tells PEOPLE that she is still single, saying, “If I never dated before I had any kids, why would I start now?”
Suleman reveals more of her personal life in the upcoming docuseries Confessions of Octomom, in which she teases that she “shared [things] I’ve never shared before about myself and about probably my motivations to be a single mom.”
Suleman first made headlines in 2009 after she was implanted with 12 embryos by Dr. Michael Kamrava, a Beverly Hills fertility specialist, which resulted in the first-ever successful birth of octuplets. However, after the announcement, she faced criticism for being a single mom who repeatedly sought out IVF treatments to expand her already large and struggling family.
Suleman was once married to Marcos Gutierrez, a man she separated from in 2000 and officially divorced in 2006. He has said that he is not the biological father of any of Suleman’s children, and details surrounding her children’s sperm donor remain a mystery.
Nicolette Lambright/courtesy Lifetime
With Confessions of Octomom and the Lifetime movie I Was Octomom — which premiere March 8 and March 10 respectively, Suleman and her children are ready to tell their side of the story.
“My family and I are taking our life back,” Suleman shares. “That was really stolen from the tabloid media in particular…They tried to destroy me, but they didn’t know. No one really knew anything about who we were as a family, who I am as a mother.”
“In the movie, I was Octomom and the six-part documentary series, I’m not Octomom,” she adds. “It’s really sharing new experiences and new perspectives, and it gives new insights into the history and our present day life.”
The docuseries is giving Suleman’s children the opportunity to “share for the first time,” she says.
“I’m just very excited,” Suleman’s daughter Nariyah, 15, admits to PEOPLE. “Our mom would finally be able to say her side of the story, because I feel like it was very unfair how she was terrorized and hated for just being a mother. And she had to sacrifice so much just for her children.”
As for Suleman, she is ready to share her truth with viewers, saying, “I’m not this compartmentalized caricature. I am not Octomom, I’m a mom.”
“The main reasons for me in sharing my true story, my perspective is to help people, to help women in particular who are struggling with one child or none, to maybe inspire them to pull out the strengths inside that they didn’t know they had to progress forward, to keep progressing in their life,” she shared.
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I Was Octomom premieres March 8, while Confessions of Octomom premieres March 10, both on Lifetime.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source people.com ’
