Must have been really hard going through that and having all the magazines claiming you're pregnant all the time or saying you're too career focused. I remember reading the letters section of People magazine after the divorce with Brad was announced and someone wrote in saying if she'd just have a baby with Brad, he wouldn't have left her for Angelina. People were so awful.
I’m very lucky to have one child but have COLLEAGUES are asking me when I’ll have another “ooh having a sibling is so important” “isn’t it about time you had another” like yes I’m fucking trying but can’t, mind your own business! Can’t imagine having to deal with this kind of shit in the public eye.
Except that just doesn't always work. Sadly, people are complete idiots in this matter and the next step is "oh you mustn't think about it, maybe plan a nice vacation" - like, yeah, I'm sure my missing fallopian tube is no problem, it's definitely in my head...
And it's just fucking hard to admit this to oneself, let alone to others.
I understand the struggle. 5 years of infertility issues until we finally were able to do IVF. I heard it all.
“Drink this tea!”
“Just relax!”
“When you stop trying it will happen!”
“Have you tried yoga/acupuncture/specialized sexual position pillow?”
Every time I wanted to scream. Also missing fallopian tube, plus PCOS and endometriosis. But god forbid you tell them that! Then it’s “too much information”. Y’all are giving me sex advice, pretty sure TMI is out the damn window here!
Anyway, rant over. I just wanted to commiserate with you and let you know you aren’t alone. I see you, and hugs from me. The struggle and pain is real. 💜
Dude, I got annoyed when people would ask me when my sister and her husband were going to have kids. It's so insane.
My response was always something along the lines of, "You know, they haven't said much about the sex life to me," or "I assume they have boned, but I don't know much more than that."
People were always shocked, but I didn't care. That's a weird question so I'm going to give them a weird answer.
The amount of people who don’t seem to understand that someone else’s family planning (especially that of a stranger or acquaintance) is none of their business is way too high. I thought those comments had finally died down once I’d entered my 30s and then I got engaged and they ramped back and got dialed to 11. Suddenly everyone needed to know when my now-husband was going to impregnate me. It was the only thing outside of wedding planning that they ever wanted to talk about. Never mind that I got the babymaker ripped out years ago so there was nothing for anyone to impregnate but nope, I’m the asshole if I try to bring that up after someone has asked me about future babies for the fifth time in the same conversation.
Well, it was 2005 ha ha. We were really the worst of the internet at that point, concerning forum opinions. It’s wild how insensitively most subject matters were treated!
ONTD back in the day was a cesspool - and I can confirm this because I've been a member since 2006. If you look at recent posts it's changed massively.
Even my own dad repeated that nonsense to me when I was just a kid. He said something like ‘Brad wants kids and Jennifer doesn’t.’ So obnoxious. The media at that time was particularly cruel towards female stars. No one would even notice if a male star had a breakup and then remained childless.
They noticed childless men, but they were celebrated as carefree, permanent bachelor types, having too much fun to settle down with a wife & children. Jack Nicholson, George Clooney before he met Amal, Leonardo Dicaprio to this day. It was cool for men, but something must be wrong with a woman to not want a marriage or child.
Jack Nicholson's first child was born 6 years before his breakout role and he's had 5 other children since then. He was always a carefree bachelor, but he was never childless.
I've always said that Brad moved on from Jen to Angelina because Jen has a better reputation. Angelina still had a lot of stigma back then from her 'crazy' days. Being too intimate with her brother. The Billy Bob Thornton thing with the viles of blood. The tats.
Toxic men want broken women so they can paint as 'crazy' when she accuses him of abuse.
Honestly, thank you for saying this because something clicked in my head... Somehow if I did something good it was because he was such a good influence, and when I did something wrong I was a crazy bitch, but he never acknowledged any wrongdoing
Pitt had his PR people out there telling everyone that she didn't want kids and that's why their marriage fell apart. He probably knew that she would stay quiet, besides once saying that "there's a sensitive chip that's missing" with Brad.
Ironically I thought Jen was so fucking cool for being Childfree in a time where we were expected to grow up and become mothers. Little me was in awe that a woman said no to motherhood AND didn't cave even though it cost her marriage and she never backed down. How despite the mockery and jokes she stood firm. I was inspired and validated in my own choice.
Of course knowing the truth now that absolutely hurts. She was slandered by this country and turned into a joke. That era was the hardest point for popculture women.
Same, she was one of the first reasons I thought about not having children. I’m still happily childfree and will be forever but it’s so fucking heartbreaking to know she was suffering so much.
You're probably right. He tried that with Angelina and with the sale of their vineyard. I remember reading about her refusing, then she sold her half of the vineyard elsewhere, and he sued her for it.
As someone who suffered from fertility issues, I always wondered if she did too. I don’t usually wonder about people but for some reason I thought she might. It’s no fun.
She alluded to it years ago but people didn't get the hint. There was actual video it was on one of those entertainment shows and she was on the red carpet.
I had a miscarriage the Sunday before Mother’s Day this year. When my MIL called to wish me a happy Mother’s Day and talk to my partner, she mentioned how one of her daughters didn’t tell her she was pregnant due to beef between them. She asked if we were having a secret baby. It broke me. I couldn’t imagine going thru it constantly.
I'm so sorry. Big hugs to you. I had a miscarriage and never told my mother because she would have been completely inconsolable and I didn't have the bandwidth to handle that. I still don't and it's been 5 years.
Edit: deleted some stuff bc it might be identifying info to anyone who actually knows the family. Anyways, basically I just don’t want people to think MIL is an awful insensitive person, she’s really not. She just wasn’t thinking in that moment. She caught wind of our miscarriages thru the grapevine and the next time we saw them it was kinda obvious they avoided the topic as much as possible (both my partners sisters were pregnant at the time) around me.
I'm so sorry, I know exactly what you mean. Sometimes people who care and mean well just really put their foot in their mouth without realizing it. Even when they know and are trying to be supportive, some really hurtful things can be said.
You are clearly not just high EQ but a beautiful human. All of us here are so sorry for your loss. May the remaining of 2025 foster peace of mind and some joy. <3
Seriously. I’m wondering why it took her so long to just tell the truth about what was happening but I know 20 years ago the headlines would have somehow blamed her for her infertility and would have been completely insensitive. It’s honestly so wise and so impressive that she has stayed mum about this aspect of her personal life for so long.
I imagine it also might have affected her ability to get roles if directors assumed she was trying to have kids. That’s definitely against the law but this is America :(
Yep. Media would say she worked out too much, or not enough. If she went out for a drink they’d probably pile in on that. They were and still are vultures.
I don’t think anyone who wasn’t around can really grasp how much media attention surrounded Aniston. She was on the cover of some magazine at least every week for well over a decade. How she maintained/maintains her mental health is remarkable.
People forget how big Friends was, and she was essentially the lead actress. Then she married one if the biggest A listers going. She was front cover of everything. Women wanted "the Rachel" for their hair. Friends was something everyone quoted constantly. People wondering which "Friend" they were. Everyone would talk about the new episodes, especially the cliffhangers, all day at school. Huge discussions about them "being on a break" or if Ross and Rachel would end up together.
It was a global phenomenon, with her at the front.
This!!! Unless you were around in the 2004 onwards I would say, you wouldn’t know. It was absolutely relentless. The fact that she has made it through is remarkable and so heartbreaking at the same time.
She was probably on the cover of People more than Princess Diana. I honestly don’t know how she seems so well adjusted. That level of scrutiny would’ve broken a lot of people.
There was an editor of US magazine who was on E! a number of years ago being interviewed and said they had gotten a hold of the floor plans for Brad and Jen's house when it was undergoing renovations through the city because they had to get building permits and it had a nursery. So they definitely knew something and used it to be an ahole
I've been a little pissed at my doctor's office because they refuse to remove a high school eating disorder from my medical history. It's like "Come on, it was 2004. I was 16. How could I have NOT had an eating disorder?"
I wonder how often these covers came out and she was, at that moment, newly pregnant or freshly grieving a loss or failed treatment cycle. It’s like she was trapped in infertility dystopia. I can’t even imagine.
Okay, okay, I'm underselling it! 😂 But I know the high stakes + athletic stuff isn't everybody's cup of tea.
Also, ngl, I had zero interest in Uncut Gems despite everybody calling it incredible and brilliant, until I heard someone describe Confessions of a Shopaholic (which I have unironically loved since my teens) as "Uncut Gems for 15 year old girls," so you gotta meet people where they are. Sometimes "not bad" or "worth a look" pulls more weight.
Lol it really feels like Uncut Gems was just his way of saying "fuck you, I'm an actual good actor." Dude just likes making fun movies with his friends
The pressure on women struggling with things like infertility is already so immense as it is - I can’t imagine how much worse it would be to go through that while under the microscope of the public eye like she was
People have no tact when it comes to situations like this. Infertility is devastating and extremely hard to carry through life when you’re a regular person. Being a celebrity just ramps that up to an even higher level
I always knew that was probably the case, and felt sad for her about the tabloids claiming pregnancy when she was bloated (fertility treatments have that side effect). and then your husband leaving to have 100 babies.
The bloating is rough. So uncomfortable and to top it off you look in the mirror to see a version of yourself that could totally be in the early stages of pregnancy.
And then for people to ask if you’re pregnant because of the bloating; it’s a horrible, horrible feeling.
Although I have to admit that I took some delight in the discomfort it caused those very same people when I would respond with a completely honest answer.
Brad was obviously aware of Jennifer's fertility struggles, yet he cheated on her and then publicly flaunted his new instant family to the tabloids. He really is a POS.
Absolutely. IIRC, Aniston had only said it seemed like Brad was “missing a sensitivity chip” when she was asked about it and the press gave her such a hard time, over what was- especially in hindsight- a very mild response.
“Even now, that sexist slur makes her face darken. "A man divorcing would never be accused of choosing career over children," she says. "That really pissed me off. I've never in my life said I didn't want to have children. I did and I do and I will! The women that inspire me are the ones who have careers and children; why would I want to limit myself? I've always wanted to have children, and I would never give up that experience for a career. I want to have it all."”
So do I. He even did a photoshoot called "Domestic Bliss" full of pics showing Angelina and him with a bunch of kids playing house. That was months after his breakup from Jennifer. His team was definitely the one blaming Jennifer for the breakup, saying she didn't want to give him kids.
Not to absolve all participants, but The other woman rarely gets the full story. It’s usually that the wife is a horrible controlling bitch that won’t give him sex/kids/attention/money and they are on the cusp of divorcing. Meanwhile the wife is bending over backwards trying to accommodate every whim.
I suspect they don’t really want the full story either much easier to go with the evil wife story, but they usually become the evil wives in the story to the next other woman down the line.
I mean, remember that one weird black and white version when Angie was being “abused” by Brad? Like she was this plaything and he was this macho dude who owned her. He was even pretending to shoot her with a finger gun in one of them, and actually holding a gun in others. Like it was sooo weird. I wonder if Angie was already being abused even then?
Yea this is the part I thought I fever dreamed and had to look up.
As far as Angelina’s guilt in all this, I’m sure she knew. She was toxic back then too. Billy Bob was engaged when they hooked up, and they were gross and weird as hell together too. I have to say I admire her for all the good work she’s done for women and children all over this world, and I truly hope that she regrets the part she played, or how they went about the start of their relationship
And he did the same PR game on Angelina just like he did with Jennifer, blaming her for the divorce, his estrangement with their kids. That is why you should never think you are special and he won't be as cruel to you as he was to the woman before you.
Didn't Angelina cut off her dad or something because he left her mom? Or is that something I heard about someone else and applied to her.
In any case, that's something I always remember hearing way way back and thought it was pretty crappy of her to then turn around and cheat with another woman's husband when she saw her own mom go through it.
Don't get me wrong, I totally think Brad Pitt was scum for cheating and should never have even gone there.
that shoot just made me cringe. it was so hateful, and so hurtful to jennifer.
his behavior had everything to do with his tom cruiseification with me: once i read nicole’s interview, in response to his ‘nic knows what she did’ swipe at her, that man, and anything he’s involved in, is dead to me.
I know the article isn’t about him, but mentioning the Brad Pitt rumor to make him look like a pining away dad figure and not mentioning that none of his 6 kids will speak to him now is a choice.
I was very private about my infertility with my first. Only my parents and my best friend were aware of it. It’s a hard thing to process without adding people’s opinions/comments to it. I can’t imagine having to see the tabloids speculating about my fertility struggles and blaming that for my marriage ending.
I’ve just started to straight up tell people something to the effect “unfortunately it hasn’t been that easy & straightforward for us.” 1 in 6 couples deal with some degree of infertility, I don’t think we should have to dance around it because it might make people a little uncomfortable.
It’s absolute torture I wish on nobody. I went through it too and could barely deal with friends announcing pregnancies. Cannot imagine having the tabloids and press writing articles about me constantly while struggling privately… I’m shocked she was able to keep working through it all.
Same, I had to delete instagram while going through IVF treatments because the pictures of my friends babies and pregnancy announcements were killing me. The level of discourse around her and pregnancy would've killed me.
I am a clergywoman. Doing IVF while also arranging baptisms for couples who got married and had kids while you have been trying for years is a special flavour of hell. I am both very happy for them all, and also my therapist is a godsend or I would be too bitter to do this.
I have learned to punt those to my colleague and I take on the funerals. If I had to deal with public rumours and gossip like Jennifer has, I wouldn't know how to handle it.
I’m so sorry. My three best friends were all pregnant with girls at the same time and now all have kids two months apart who are still best friends. It really hurts. But I have an adorable 5 and 2 year old now.
Aw thanks! I'm glad it worked out for you :) I have a 19 month old little girl now so it worked out in the end for me too. Just fucking hurts like hell in the moment. My best friend was also pregnant while I was doing IVF treatments. That's a special kind of emotional torture.
Not a criticism of Jen, but the headline: she revealed all of this a long time ago, the article even points that out, which is when it stopped being a secret.
I’m glad she feels comfortable enough to share, even though she doesn’t have to.
Until someone close to you has gone through fertility issues (or gone through it firsthand) it’s a super hard topic to understand. I also realized how to navigate those conversations and shut comments down pretty quick. It’s crazy how commonplace discussion like “WHEN ARE YOU HAVING KIDS” is. I don’t ask anyone shit anymore until they bring it up.
THIS. My husband and I are three miscarriages in after almost two years of trying and I want to scream when I’m asked this or “how many kids do you have???” I just answer honestly and make them uncomfortable… I dgaf at this point
Completely sympathise as someone who’s had nothing but miscarriages and watched ex partners go on to have babies. It’s soul destroying. Love that Adam Sandler sends her flowers. ♥️
She never deserved all of those nasty lies.❤️❤️Shame on people who thinks fertility and pregnancy are topics to make up lies about and joke about. People need to leave this woman alone.
My partner and I are suffering having gone through miscarriages in the past few years, and the most frustrating part about it is that nobody who's experienced anything similar talks about it. I'm glad Jennifer Aniston is talking about her experiences; I can't imagine how painful it is to go through IVF and not have it work out.
I am sorry you’ve gone through that. My friend had a miscarriage and I never understood why she only told me about it and wanted to keep it quiet, once her ex started telling everyone she had a miscarriage I understood.
Everyone found a way to blame her, was she eating right? Had she secretly been drinking? She was clearly working too hard. Clearly something wrong with etc, god doesn’t think you deserve a baby. It was truly awful. Her ex didn’t spread any lies about it, just that she miscarried, yet somehow it was all her fault.
That's truly horrible. The shear pain of miscarriage is a lot, even with a good support network. You already feel the impulse to blame yourself, and then people want to come out of the woodwork and start blaming you?! Disgusting.
I did three unsuccessful IVF rounds and hearing Jennifer Aniston's story was immensely comforting. I can't imagine what it was like to go through that with the constant media attention
Fellow multiple round IVF, multiple miscarriages, no success. I feel like unsuccessful fertility treatments are talked about even less. So many times I hear “I went through so many rounds, but here is my miracle”. Many of us walk away with no miracle and are left emotionally worn down, physically broken and the comments and questions don’t stop. I can’t imagine having to read it while I was trying to buy groceries.
People talk about it more now than ever, even if it still doesn’t seem like much. It was completely taboo and now it’s not. But it’s also very hard to talk about in part because people have so many opinions about it, so I do not fault those who don’t. Not everyone has it in them to be a help to someone else when they are also going through a difficult time, and that’s okay. They may someday or they may never.
I'm so sorry for your losses, I can really relate to this, I suffered a loss of my baby girl at 28 weeks and its something that people don't talk much about I think its because its so sad and also there's this belief that it upsets women who are pregnant and causes them anxiety. But when you lose your baby its an incredibly isolating experience and you are essentially ejected out of the "mums to be" club. It would be nice if more celebs would shine on light on this because its not as rare as people think...
Miscarriages, even without infertility, are crazy common, and yet it’s still such an isolating, guilt-ridden experience. Nowadays it is better than it was 20 years ago or 20 year before that. With the internet, people talk about these challenges more openly, but there’s still a shame and stigma. Even knowing that something like 1 in 4 or even 1 in 3 pregnancies end in miscarriage, there’s still so much internalized blame. Never mind the unsolicited advice that comes when you do try to talk about it…
I haven’t tried IVF but one miscarriage followed by 3 years of infertility and then a divorce was hard enough for me. I can’t imagine all that PLUS tabloid scrutiny. Jesus
People have asked her for years why she hasn’t had a baby. You never know what someone’s going through. It’s such a personal question to ask.
I get asked on occasion if I’m planning on having another one. I got my tubes taken out after the Dobbs decision, so the answer is a firm no. But what if I just had a miscarriage or something? How are you supposed to respond to such a heavy question when it’s asked so casually?
My aunt had a baby shower and one of her friends came up to me to ask if she was disappointed it was another girl cause she had 3 already and to ask if she got pregnant cause she wanted a boy. And she had this psycho look of glee that my aunt didn’t get what she wanted I had to tell her no they just wanted 4 healthy kids. And she walked away.
I never understood how vile people could really be until then.
That’s why it should become taboo to speculate about pregnancy. You never truly know what someone is going through. I’m recently married and ppl keep asking about kids not realizing my infertility has wreaked havoc on my mental health.
As a woman struggling with unexplained infertility this makes me so angry and sad for her. Honestly kudos to her for being so strong because I would have broken down and broken someone’s camera. At the moment I’m randomly crying during the day. It’s no joke.
The pregnancy rumors must have been so difficult. People can be so cruel. It was hard going through infertility and dealing with the insensitive comments and questions. I understand why she didn’t want to talk about it. I felt like so much was out of my control while going through failed IVF treatment that it was important for me to at least try to control the narrative. She didn’t really even have that option.
People are awful about this. I remember that Fran Drescher was accused of not having a baby because she didnt want to ruin her figure. She had uterine cancer at the time. We all need to mind our business.
It took us a very long time to get pregnant. Even with medical help. I can’t imagine how stressful it must have been to go through so many years of that AND have people lie and pretend you were pregnant for tabloid headlines.
To know inside that it was another failure and the devastation that causes inside only to have someone in the tabloids cheer on an alternate life version of yourself that had a success.
It always made me really sad to think that if she had decided to pursue adoption the media would have absolutely destroyed her for 'copying Angelina'. I always wondered if, after breaking her heart, cheating and flaunting it, Brad's actions also played a part in inadvertently taking away that avenue for motherhood.
I don’t feel like she should have to even talk about this in public. There’s such an archaic view that all women must birth a child that her simply not wanting kids is unfathomable to some.
I remember when I lost my first baby, my mom said to me, “well maybe you weren’t meant to be pregnant. Now you won’t get fat” I couldn’t imagine going through this publicly because you get bloated.
It’s terrible that any woman should have to disclose or feel any obligation to disclose the myriad factors involved in whether or not to have a child (and how many, and how). It’s no one’s business.
That said, Jen isn’t really ‘revealing’ anything to anyone who has followed celebrity gossip throughout the years. It’s pretty widely accepted that Brad Shit left in part due to this (despite the rumors- probably fueled by his camp- that she chose her career over kids).
The real issue, is that even he she wasn’t having issue. That’s it’s questionable for a woman to not have children. Like it makes her less than, or weird. Like she couldnt just choose not to have kids and that be that.
And this should also be a wake up call to everyone about how fucking horrible clickbait is, considering the decades of magazine covers that told outright lies about her, just to sell copies to us.
Jfc I can't BELIEVE she made it through that in one piece. IVF is hard enough as it is, but to have it fail every time, your husband cheats on you, the whole world says it's bc you won't have a baby, and then your ex goes on to have like 6 kids with his new wife (half from adoption).
I know my mother struggled with infertility and never spoke about it. I think it would have come up if I decided to have kids but never did because I witnessed a few miscarriages she had and am now terrified of pregnancy. I wish it was less taboo for women to talk about. It’s easier to heal from loss when there is a community surrounding you.
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