Child-free celebrities share their reasons for not having kids - from Helen Mirren to Seth Rogen

From Seth Rogan to Dame Helen Mirren, many celebrities have shared their reasons for not wanting to have children, opening up about how their decision has shaped their lives

While some people dream of starting a family of their own, some high-profile celebrities have shared their reasons for opting out of parenthood.

From choosing to focus on their careers to prioritising personal passions, some celebrities have boldly shared their decision to remain childless, expressing that they are simply not sold on the idea of becoming parents. Their honesty not only challenges societal norms but also inspires others to embrace their own paths.

Kelly Brook, 44, recently made headlines after revealing that she isn’t looking to expand her family, saying she’s content with just her husband Jeremy Parisi, 39, and their pet. She expressed: "We have our little fur baby dog, Teddy, but I'm not sure about having children yet.

"At the moment we are focused on work and where we want to live in the world. It's very hard to think about children when you don't know where you might be living. We need to be more settled before we think about children." Here at The Daily Mirror, we decided to look at those celebrities who have boldly spoken out about their choice to forgo parenthood.

Kim Cattrall

The Canadian actress, 68, gave a refreshingly honest response about how she feels about children. "I enjoy kids but not for long periods. I think they're adorable and funny and sweet, and then I have a headache," she once said in 2008 interview with the Advocate.

In a separate interview with the Guardian, Kim further explained: "I've been so focused on my career that having children never really became a priority for me. I never felt like something was missing."

Helen Mirren

Helen has had a long-lasting and successful career in Hollywood - but still hated it when men would tell her to get pregnant. In an interview with British Vogue, the veteran movie star expressed, "It was not my destiny. I kept thinking it would be, waiting for it to happen, but it never did, and I didn't care what people thought. It was only boring old men [who would ask me]. And whenever they went, 'What? No children? Well, you'd better get on with it, old girl,' I'd say, 'No! F*ck off!'"

While Helen, who is a stepmother to her husband's children from a previous marriage, has never regretted her decision to be child-free, watching the movie Parenthood stirred up some emotions. "!I have never had a moment of regret about not having children. Well, I lie. When I watched the movie, Parenthood, I sobbed for about 20 minutes," the actress one admitted. "I realized I would never experience that, and for about 20 minutes, I sobbed for the loss of that and the fact that I never experienced it."

Miley Cyrus

Meanwhile, Disney star turned singer Miley Cyrus, 31, previously expressed uncertainty about wanting to have children, sharing several reasons behind her hesitations. In a 2019 interview with Elle, Cyrus said she doesn't want to pass on a "piece-of-s**t planet" to her children. She said, "Until I feel like my kid would live on earth with fish in the water, I'm not bringing in another person to deal with that." She also admitted to feeling like her fans are her kids, saying: "I feel like my fans kind of are my kids in some way."

Speaking with W Magazine at the star of this year, Miley explained: "I look at myself almost every day in the mirror and I say, 'I am a woman.' I'm 31 now, and I still don't know if I want kids or not. I feel like my fans kind of are my kids in some way. I've heard Dolly say that too, because she didn't have kids."

Dolly Parton

Dolly Parton has stated that she has no regrets about the decision she and her husband of 57 years, Carl Dean, made to remain childless. The country singer revealed that she’s "almost glad" she never had children, citing the challenges of parenting in a tough and non-progressive society.

"It seems like we’re not making any progress... Nobody’s willing to listen to anybody else," she told Mojo magazine last year. "Everything is out there. Kids know everything, they see everything, they hear everything. We have to discuss stuff. I know this sounds like a selfish, awful thing to say, but I’m almost glad I never had children. I worry myself to death about my little nieces and nephews and grandnieces and grandnephews. My husband and I, we just think of ourselves as each other’s child. He’s my only child, and I’m his only child."

Jennifer Aniston

Friends star Jennifer Aniston has said that she doesn't want biological children. She has spoken about her fertility issues and the challenges she faced while trying to get pregnant. However, she also previously spoke out about the importance of personal fulfillment and career focus over traditional expectations of motherhood.

In 2022, Aniston told Allure she wished someone had told her to freeze her eggs. "It was a challenging road for me, the baby-making road," she said. All the years and years of speculation... it was really hard. I was going through IVF, drinking Chinese teas, you name it." But she had "zero regrets". "I would've given anything if someone had said to me, 'Freeze your eggs. Do yourself a favour.' You just don't think it. So here I am today," she told the magazine. "The ship has sailed."

In a personal essay for Huff Post in 2016, Jennifer wrote: "We are complete with or without a mate, with or without a child. We get to decide for ourselves what is beautiful when it comes to our bodies. That decision is ours and ours alone. Let’s make that decision for ourselves and for the young women in this world who look to us as examples. Let’s make that decision consciously, outside of the tabloid noise. We don’t need to be married or mothers to be complete. We get to determine our own “happily ever after” for ourselves."

Jameela Jamil

Actress Jameela Jamil has chosen not to have children, sharing that this decision has granted her the freedom to work when she wants, take time off to write, and travel. She has also shared how being childless allowed her to spend her father's final months with him.

The former Radio 1 DJ, who splits her time between Los Angeles and London with her partner James Blake, told the Sunday Times magazine in April: "I’ve managed to work it out so that most of my job — press, podcasting and interviews — is done from my bedroom. My grooming routine is peeling off the crust of last night’s make-up. I’m dressed from the waist up only.

"I just have to pick what I’m going to cover my breasts with and I’m good to go. My dogs are lazy, so at 9am we take them out for a walk. Then I do four hours of work recording podcasts. It really is the life. I don’t live beyond my means — I’m in a position of luxury because I’ve chosen not to have children, so I can work when I want to."

Seth Rogan

Movie star and comedian Seth Rogan is best known for a number of his popular movies including Superbad and This Is the End - but the star once candidly opened up about how he doesn't see himself having kids. He shared: "I’ve been around obviously a lot of children, I’m not ignorant to what it’s like. … Everyone I know has kids. I’m 40, you know? I know," he explained. "Some of my friends have had kids for decades. Some people want kids, some people don’t want kids."

Speaking to Steven Bartlett on the Diary of a CEO podcast , Seth explained: "There’s a whole huge thing I’m not doing, which is raising children. Honestly, the older [me and my wife] get, the more happy and reaffirmed we are with our choice to not have kids. It was something we kind of talked about more, and we were like, ‘Have we made the right choice? Are we sure?’ Now, more than anything, the conversation is like, ‘Honestly, thank god we don’t have children' we get to do whatever we want."

He added: "We are in the prime of our lives. We are smarter than we’ve ever been. We understand ourselves more than we ever have. We have the capacity to achieve a level of work and a level of communication and care for one another, and a lifestyle we can live with one another that we’ve never been able to live before, and we can just do that and we don’t have to raise a child — which the world does not need right now."

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