‘Octomom’ Nadya Suleman’s octuplets turned 14.
On Thursday, Suleman, 47, honored her eight children for their birthday on her Instagram page.
“Happy 14th birthday to Noah, Maliyah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Nariyah, Josiah, Jonah and Makai! You are some of the most loving, thoughtful, conscientious, and humble human beings I have ever known. The struggles we’ve endured over the years, have strengthened our connections to one another,” she wrote in the caption with a photo of her children enjoying vegan donuts.
Continuing, she wrote, “By facing new challenges in the years to come, I hope we will continue to grow as a family. I am blessed beyond measure to be your mother. I love you.”
In 2009, the mother of 14 garnered media attention after she conceived octuplets via in vitro fertilization (IVF) when a specialist implanted 12 embryos.
Suleman also has six older children, Elijah, 21, Amerah, 20, Joshua, 29, Aidan, 17, and twins Calyssa and Caleb, 13.
In an interview with the New York Times in 2018, Suleman revealed that she only wanted twins but was “misled” by her doctor.
“He told me we lost six embryos, he said they were expelled out of me, and that’s why he wanted to implant another six,” she said.
She also spoke about the media frenzy that surrounded her at the time of their birth.
“I never wanted the attention. There were helicopters flying over the hospital while I was giving birth,” she shared.
She further explained that the attention sent her into a dark place.
“I have PTSD from all the reporters coming in over the years. I would take whatever I could back in the days, and I would let them in. I was spiraling down a dark hole,” she said.
In an interview with ABC News in 2016, Suleman said her goal was to “become a better person today than I was yesterday and be a better person tomorrow than I was today” and she hopes her kids “learn from that.”
