Birthing a human is the most surreal thing I have ever (and will ever) experience. Every woman deserves the utmost support in how she chooses to put her body through such an experience. So, if pushing your baby out at home is your style, you’re in good company because plenty of celebrities have also had successful home births.
15 Celebrities Who Had Home Births
Here are 15 celebrities who had home births and shared their stories with the world.
1. Hilary Duff
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Among the many celebrities who had home births, Hilary Duff has always been willing to share her motherhood journey publicly. Her home birth with her daughter Mae was no different. “Feeling ready to share some photos of Mae Mae’s birth day!!!” she wrote in a very personal and heartfelt IG post. “For me to feel safe during birth and get to where I need to go, it’s crucial to have the right support system. The perfect amount of space, counter-pressure, humor, stillness and people that support my power. My hubby is the most calm anchor in the room when I feel like climbing the walls and my little Molly is an extraordinary doula who sat with me when I needed to be still and quiet. She quite enjoyed the fact that I was sitting on doggy puddle pads as my water had broken hours before 🤣 My own mama was there to make all the snacks and watch with a big nervous smile as her baby brings her a new grandbaby earthside. The help that I have to support my other children while I am not able is maybe the most comforting thought of all. All hands on deck. Forever lol.”
She also gave her love and support to mothers for all their labor. “This is hard work…every way a woman brings a baby in is. From getting pregnant, to C-sections, hospital or home births, the breastfeeding journey (oy vey that one gets me every time) and raising these little beings responsibly to be stand up, confident, kind citizens of the world. It’s completely consuming. A tedious, magical, miraculous adventure…So cheers almighty mothers. You make mountains move daily ♥️”
2. Gisele Bündchen
The Brazilian model says in “Man in the Arena” by ESPN that her ex-husband Tom Brady initially resisted the idea of home birth. “He was like, ‘Absolutely not,’ and I was like, ‘Excuse me, you don’t get to choose that, it’s my body.’ He was like, ‘Who has a kid at home in 2000…?’ I do.”
Luckily, Bündchen stuck to her guns, and Brady eventually came around. The proud dad shared that he fondly looks back on the home birth. “Me being there with G at his birth in our home, it lives in my mind. I think we brought this boy into the world in the most precious way,” he says.
3. Kehlani
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Singer-songwriter and dancer Kehlani announced in 2019 that she’d given birth to her daughter Adeya at home. “& to my greatest flex of the decade…” her IG caption reads. “In the bathroom at the crib in Oakland in the morning in March… thank you 2019 for the greatest gift of all time. hardest and greatest thing i’ve ever done. a year i will never ever ever forget. Adeya Nomi Parrish THANK YOU FOR ALL THAT YOUVE GIVEN ME!”
She also added in another IG post: “Unmedicated home birth was the absolute hardest yet most powerful thing I’ve ever done.”
4. Alanis Morrisette
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Alanis Morrisette shared in an interview with People that her home birth with her daughter Onyx was fast but “gnarly.” “It’s not meant to be all clean and perfect,” she says. “We are animals.”
Morrisettte also describes how her midwife couldn’t arrive in time, so her husband Souleye coached her and caught the baby. “I’d seen so many videos of women giving birth in water with dolphins and fields. I knew that the babies, when there’s a low-risk birth, come out in whatever way they come out.”
The singer also confessed to learning not to shame other moms. “I was one of those horrifying younger women who had a lot of opinions for a woman who didn’t have a baby. And then, as soon as I had a child, I just shut my mouth and just celebrated any way a child comes into the world, any way a mom wants to do it: ‘How can I help?'”
5. Alyson Hannigan
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“How I Met Your Mother” star Alyson Hannigan says a home birth made complete sense for her. “I don’t like hospitals and the idea of being in labor somewhere I don’t like at all wasn’t how I wanted to bring my kids into the world,” she tells Yahoo Parenting. “I thought, ‘Where am I most comfortable?’ For me, the choice [to give birth at home] was phenomenal. We had a midwife but we asked our doctor if he needed to be there. He said, ‘Sure, but you don’t need me. A midwife does everything I do.'”
She adds this adorable tidbit about how her older child responded when it was time for her baby sister to arrive. “We asked Sati if she wanted to watch her sister being born and she said, ‘Call me and check in.’ So we did and she said she was busy playing Barbies. But she did want to change Keeva’s diaper.” We wonder when the novelty of diaper changing wore off for big sis.
6. Ashley Graham
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Powerhouse supermodel and supermom Ashley Graham is also among celebrities who had home births. She gave birth to all three of her children at home — a son in 2020 and twin boys in early 2022. An article in Shape reports that the experience made Graham feel invincible. “I have to say, now that I gave birth and I did it naturally and I felt everything, I feel like there’s nothing I can’t do,” Graham said in an episode of her podcast “Pretty Big Deal.” “There’s nothing that could come my way where I say, ‘Oh, that’s too hard, I can’t handle that.’ I went through laboring for six hours naturally at home.”
That belief in herself and her body led the proud mom to do it again but this time with twins. Graham explained in her podcast that having her babies at a hospital would have been anxiety-inducing, leading her to opt for a calmer at-home experience.
7. Gigi Hadid
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When COVID restrictions meant her mom and sister wouldn’t be present at the birth of her baby, Gigi Hadid also joined the ranks of celebrities who had home births. The soon-to-be mom says she was influenced by the documentary “The Business of Being Born,” which looks at hospital interventions and shows successful home births. “What I really wanted from my experience was to feel like, ‘Okay, this is a natural thing that women are meant to do,'” Hadid said to Vogue.
The new mom also describes the experience as primal, saying with pride, “I was an animal woman.” She tells Vogue the pain was intense, but she knew she had to endure it. “I had to dig deep. I knew it was going to be the craziest pain in my life, but you have to surrender to it and be like, ‘This is what it is.’ I loved that.”
8. Teyana Taylor
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Teyana Taylor gave birth to both of her daughters with her husband, Iman Shumpert, in their home bathroom. After her first daughter was born, Taylor shared an adorable picture on Instagram, saying, “On Dec 16th at 6:42am in our bathroom Junie decided she wanted to take her first breath into this world. She came out as a wonderful surprise to everyone! Not knowing I was in labor until I felt her head…it took two ten count pushes with my fiancé playing Dr and she entered this world into his bare hands!” Taylor continued, sharing how Shumpert “handed her to me wrapped in our bath towel and wiped her face for me to see what LOVE really is.”
For Taylor’s second home birth, singer Erykah Badu (who is also a doula) was present to help with the delivery. Badu shared a video on Instagram to welcome the baby and thank the couple for letting her assist them. Taylor proudly captioned her own post, “Now…when we buy homes, we always find a bathroom with great energy… but not in a million years would you be able to tell me we’d deliver both of our daughters in a bathroom without the assistance of a hospital! Our newest edition entered the world in the water and came out looking around and ready to explore!”
9. Rachel Platten
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Rachel Platten lived her ultimate “fight song” through 2 ½ days of labor while joining other celebrities who had home births. She says she has no regrets about giving birth to her daughter Sophie via home birth, which made her feel incredibly strong.
“When I thought I couldn’t take anymore, this amazing, wise little one kept whispering to me, ‘We can do this mama, we can do this.’ So I kept going one contraction at a time. I feel like a warrior and I will NEVER doubt my strength again. Thank you Sophie for showing me what I am made of and for completing our family. And Thank YOU all so much for your love and support and for allowing me the privacy these last couple of months to just be with my family and prepare for this new life. Sending you all the coziest new baby snuggles 💕” her IG post reads.
10. Mayim Bialik
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In a personal essay on Today Parents, actress and neuroscientist Mayim Bialik detailed her experience with home birth. “My second son was born at our house, in the middle of our living room, just under three hours after my labor began in the darkness of dawn,” she writes.
Bialik cites a few reasons women often shy away from home births, including thinking that “birth needs a hospital.” She says this is untrue, as women have labored at home since the dawn of humanity. She affirms that women shouldn’t fear the pain of labor and delivery, as many natural methods can help, like baths, massage, and homeopathy. Bialik adds that birth is “gritty and primal,” so it’s normal for women to complain and scream during it. She also says midwives know when medical intervention is necessary and can handle things like unwrapping umbilical cords but will call paramedics for a ride to the hospital if needed.
Ultimately, the proud mom says home births are “right for people who want to take natural birth to the next level: Let me birth in the place this baby was created. Let me labor on the floors I paced in anticipation, let me labor in the rooms of the house where I mused on sleepless nights what this moment would be like.”
11. Kimberly Van Der Beek
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Kimberly and James Van Der Beek have a brood of beautiful children and are huge fans of the home-birth process. And this time, the proud dad shared the “realness” of home birth on IG right after one of their kids was born safely at home.
“The category is: Home-Birth Realness. (Word of caution, if you’re squeamish, just double-tap and move on 👍)” Van Der Beek’s post reads. “Messy bed ✔️ Plastic sheeting underneath old sheets ✔️Old towel crumpled on the floor ✔️ Vomit bag (unused) ✔️ Inflatable birthing tub (also unused 😬)✔️ Shirtless Dad ✔️Boy in Spider-Man pajamas ✔️Happy, healthy baby ✔️ Happy, healthy Mom in her own shower right after giving birth ✔️ Water bottle ✔️And… placenta in a mixing bowl ✔️ (I warned you 😬)”
12. Ricki Lake
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Ricki Lake is known for her ’90s talk show, but she’s also a staunch advocate for home births and the voice behind the documentary “The Business of Being Born.” Lake says she felt a pull toward home birth with baby No. 2 after having a bad experience giving birth in a hospital her first time. She wanted to push other women in that direction once she’d experienced a successful home birth.
Lake shared pictures of her home birth on Instagram for this year’s International Home Birth Day. In her caption, she shared, “Found these gems from almost exactly 22 years ago. My home water birth in my 🛀 bathtub changed every cell of my being. Full stop.” Lake also honored birth workers and asserted, “I found my power, my passion and true calling that day in my west village apartment.”
13. Bekah Martinez
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“The Bachelor” star Bekah Martinez is never one to hold back or be shy on IG, so her followers probably weren’t surprised when she shared a video of what she calls “one of the most powerful, magical moments” of her life — the home birth of her son, Franklin James.
Martinez says she hesitated before sharing such a “primal” and “raw” video, but ultimately, she realized that’s exactly what birth is. “I realized that I felt uncomfortable watching myself in that much POWER,” her IG caption reads. “I realized I still had so many negative, subconscious, deeply-embedded thoughts telling me that I wasn’t feminine enough; that I looked and sounded weird. I projected so many insecurities onto an experience that was truly one of the most powerful, magical moments of my life. This is a moment worth sharing; so in advance— f*ck the haters. ♥️”
The mom of two is now expecting baby No. 3, so we anticipate another birth video soon!
14. Morgan Miller
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Morgan and Bode Miller happily shared the news on IG that their twin boys, Asher and Aksel, had been born at home. She says they are gifts from their big sister Emmeline, who died in 2018 in a drowning accident at 19 months old.
The twins’ birth story is one for the books, too, as the babies were born so fast that the midwives hadn’t arrived yet. Bode shares that he had been pushing on Morgan’s hips, but he says, “As soon as I let go, the baby came out… he was fully in the sac of water.” Miller says his son was in a “clear water balloon” until his feet broke through and was “covered in vernix but completely healthy and happy.”
The couple then expected a break before baby No. 2, but that didn’t happen either. “The second one came out in one push. He was totally mellow,” says Bode. After the boys were born, the midwives burst into what the Millers describe as “a jumble of mayhem.”
“It was incredible. It couldn’t have been any better if you had scripted it,” Bode says with joy and pride. And, as a bonus, they got through the entire experience while the other kids were at school. Imagine coming home to that news!
15. Thandie Newton
Actress Thandie Newton tells Today that she felt “beautiful and healthy and wonderful” when she was pregnant, so giving birth at home made more sense to her, as that is where she feels the most “relaxed and comfortable.” She adds, “For me, it feels normal, but there was a time when everybody had their babies at home and it wasn’t such a big deal.”
That’s why Newton chose to give birth to her daughters, Ripley (born in 2000) and Nico (born in 2004), and her son Booker (born in 2014) at home. When asked about her son’s birth, Newton replied, “he was born on the bathroom floor,” which was as simple as that for the proud mom.
There are many ways women can safely give birth, and in the end, we all need support, just like the many celebrities who had home births. Home births have been a successful method of bringing babies into the world since the beginning, and today, many women feel the most comfortable giving birth from their homes. It’s your body doing the work, so do what feels right for you!
