Jennifer Aniston's Candid Quotes About Trying to Have Kids, Pregnancy Rumors

Before announcing her infertility struggles, Jennifer Aniston was candid about her potential plans to become a mother. Aniston opened up about societal pressures to have kids during a 2016 interview on ITV. "If we don't have a baby or a white picket fence or a husband, then we're useless,” she said. “We aren't living up to our purpose." In 2022, Aniston revealed that she had quietly attempted to have children for years. “All the years and years and years of speculation ... It was really hard," the Friends actress admitted in an interview with Allure. "I was going through IVF, drinking Chinese teas, you name it. I was throwing everything at it. I would’ve given anything if someone had said to me, ‘Freeze your eggs. Do yourself a favor.’ You just don’t think it. So here I am today. The ship has sailed.” Scroll down for Aniston's most candid quotes about starting a family:

After tying the knot with Pitt, the Morning Show star hinted that they were trying to have a child. "It's time. It's time. You know, I think you can work with a baby, I think you can work pregnant, I think you can do all of it," Aniston shared with The Guardian. "So, I'm just truly looking forward to slowing down."

During an appearance on the Today show, the Dumplin' star slammed assumptions about her plans to have kids.

"I don't have this sort of checklist of things that have to be done and if they're not checked, then I've failed some part of my feminism or my being a woman or my worth and my value as a woman because I haven't birthed a child," she explained. "I've birthed a lot of things, and I feel like I've mothered many things. And I don't feel like it's fair to put that pressure on people."

“I just find it to be energy that is unnecessary and not really fair for those who may or may not [have children],” Aniston told People about getting asked about her personal life. “Who knows what the reason is, why people aren’t having kids. There’s a lot of reasons that could be, and maybe it’s something that no one wants to discuss.”

She added: “It’s everyone’s personal prerogative, that’s all.”

The Golden Globe winner got emotional about feeling pressure from strangers who said she "failed" because she didn't expand her family.

"I don't think it's fair. You may not have a child come out of your vagina, but that doesn't mean you aren't mothering — dogs, friends, friends' children," Aniston, who has a tattoo in memory of her late dog Norman, told Allure. "This continually is said about me: that I was so career-driven and focused on myself that I don't want to be a mother, and how selfish that is. Even saying it gets me a little tight in my throat."

"We don’t need to be married or mothers to be complete. We get to determine our own ‘happily ever after’ for ourselves,” Aniston wrote in an essay for The Huffington Post, noting she “may become a mother" in the future. "Since I'm laying it all out there, if I ever do, I will be the first to let you know.”

While speaking with Sandra Bullock for Interview magazine, Aniston opened up about what she would like to see in her future.

"I hear the ocean, I see the ocean, I hear laughter, I see kids running, I hear ice in a glass, I smell food being cooked," she shared at the time. "That’s the joyous snapshot in my head."

The California native reflected on taking public criticism "personally" over the years. "The pregnancy rumors and the whole 'Oh, she chose career over kids' assumption,'" she told The Hollywood Reporter. "It's like, 'You have no clue what's going with me personally, medically, why I can't ... can I have kids?' They don't know anything, and it was really hurtful and just nasty."

Aniston added: "So you disappear as much as you can, you have fun, you take on these weird roles, you don't give a s—t, you enjoy yourself, you remember that you have a gorgeous group of friends and your life is blessed and you do the best that you can."

During an interview with Allure, Aniston got candid about her private attempts to have a baby. “I was trying to get pregnant. It was a challenging road for me, the baby-making road,” she explained. “I have zero regrets. I actually feel a little relief now because there is no more, ‘Can I? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.’ I don’t have to think about that anymore.”

In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar UK in October 2025, Aniston addressed the “narrative” about why she hasn’t started a family. “They didn’t know my story, or what I’d been going through over the past 20 years to try to pursue a family, because I don’t go out there and tell them my medical woes,” Aniston said. “That’s not anybody’s business. But there comes a point when you can’t not hear it – the narrative about how I won’t have a baby, won’t have a family, because I’m selfish, a workaholic. It does affect me – I’m just a human being. We’re all human beings. That’s why I thought, ‘What the hell?’”

Aniston explained she wanted to speak for others who share a similar situation “because I knew a lot of women at the time who were trying to have kids, who were dealing with IVF. So it did feel like it was not only for myself, but for any women who were struggling with the same issue.”

Aniston admitted that she never wanted to adopt children amid her infertility struggles during an appearance on Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast.

“I want my own DNA in a little person. That’s the only way, selfish or not, whatever that is, I’ve wanted it,” she said.