Being a mom or dad isn't in the cards for everyone, especially in 2016. Some of the world's biggest stars are choosing not to have children, and they are speaking out about their decision to skip out on traditional parenting in favor of taking more time for themselves, focusing on their family and partners, and mentoring in other ways.
RENÉE ZELLWEGER
Zellweger keeps it short and sweet when talking about not wanting kids in an interview with the London Times in 2008, three years after her four-month marriage to country crooner Kenny Chesney ended: "Motherhood has never been an ambition. I don't think like that."
MARISA TOMEI
Another actress who doesn't believe in women's "duty" to have children, Marisa Tomei, stated "I don't know why women need to have children to be seen as complete human beings" to Manhattan Magazine in 2009.
RACHAEL RAY
Celebrity chef Rachael Ray simply doesn't have time to cook for her own brood, and is perfectly satisfied being a mom to her pup. "I think that I'm 40 years old, and I have an enormous amount of hours that have to be dedicated to work," she said in 2009 in an interview with Salon. "For me personally, I would need more time to feel like I'd be a good mom to my own child. I feel like a borderline good mom to my dog. So I can't imagine if it was a human baby….I feel like it would be unfair, not only to the child but to the people I work with."
GLORIA STEINEMIt shouldn't come as too big of a shock that one of the world's premiere feminists doesn't see the necessity of having children to fulfill a woman's life. "I'm completely happy not having children. I mean, everybody does not have to live in the same way. And as somebody said, 'Everybody with a womb doesn't have to have a child any more than everybody with vocal cords has to be an opera singer,'" she told fellow childless lady Chelsea Handler on Chelsea Lately in 2011.
JON HAMMHamm took a hint from his philandering Mad Men character Don Draper, stating "I'd be a terrible father!" in 2012 to Us Weekly. "I see my friends who have children and I'm like, 'Dude, how are you even upright, much less here at work at 6 a.m.?'" he joked candidly.
KIM CATTRALL
There seems to be a trend here...much like her own character Samantha on Sex and the City, Cattrall is more about freedom than anything else. "When I was 5, my fantasy was to have a hundred dogs and a hundred kids. I realized that so much of the pressure I was feeling was from outside sources, and I knew I wasn't ready to take that step into motherhood. Being a biological mother just isn't part of my experience this time around," she openly shared to the March 2003 issue of O, The Oprah Magazine.
MARGARET CHO
Comedian Margaret Cho got real on her blog in 2012: "My fear of having children is that frankly, I just don't want to love anyone that much."
BETTY WHITEWe're a little bit disappointed with this one, only because we all wish she could be our grandma, but Betty White admitted in 2011 to CBS Sunday Morning that she has never looked back on the decision to not have kids. "No, I've never regretted it. I'm so compulsive about stuff. I know that if I had ever gotten pregnant, of course, that would've been my whole focus. But I didn't choose to have children because I'm focused on my career and I don't think as compulsive as I am that I could manage both."
CONDOLEEZZA RICE
The former Secretary of State is too busy doing amazing things for our nation to have a family of her own: "I won't have kids [laughs] but I may still get married," she said in 2010 to Ladies Home Journal. "But I would have lived a very fulfilled life if I had gotten married and had kids, too. But I'm very religious and I at some very deep level believe that things are going to work out as they're supposed to. The key is to be open to that and to appreciate the life that you've been given."
GEORGE CLOONEY
George Clooney refuses to pass on his silver fox genes, claiming in 2011, "I've always known fatherhood wasn't for me. Raising kids is a huge commitment and has to be your top priority. For me, that priority is my work. That's why I'll never get married again." He already went back on one of those things in September 2014.
