Nicole Kidman: I lost Tom’s baby when I was 23
Nicole Kidman has revealed how she lost a baby early in her marriage to Tom Cruise.The miscarriage, which she has never spoken about before, happened when she was 23.
But she was so desperate for a child that she and Cruise decided to adopt less than two years later.
Kidman makes the revelation in an interview with Vanity Fair magazine, in which she also admits she has wanted a child of her own since she was 17.
Now 40 and married to country music star Keith Urban, she adds: “I’m yearning to have one. I think I would be very sad if I wasn’t able to have a baby. Keith knows I want one, and he has been getting there slowly.”
Kidman has previously revealed that she discovered she was pregnant by Cruise after he filed for divorce in 2001 – but miscarried weeks later.
The couple had been plagued with rumours about their love life and possible reasons why they had not conceived. They adopted daughter Bella, now 14, and Connor, 12.
Kidman says: “From the minute Tom and I were married, I wanted to have babies. And we lost a baby early on, so that was really very traumatic. And that’s when it came that we would adopt Bella.
“There’s a complicated background to that, given that I never speak much about many things. One day maybe that story will be told.”
She adds: “My mother has an adopted sister, so it’s been part of our family, and I knew it would probably play out somewhere in mine. I didn’t think it would happen so early, but it did.”
The star also reveals she became engaged to someone else between the split from Cruise and meeting Urban – fuelling speculation that the man may have been U.S. tycoon Steve Bing or pop star Lenny Kravitz, both of whom she dated.
She says: “I got engaged to somebody … but it just wasn’t right. I wasn’t ready. We weren’t ready.”
She admits she was “lonely” when she met Urban and tells of being alone after winning her best actress Oscar for The Hours.
“You’re in a hotel and you’re like, ‘Okay, well, I’m sitting in this big suite with an Oscar and I still don’t have a life – what is wrong with me? Who do I jump on the bed with, and celebrate with, and order pancakes with?’ That was painful, not having that person to share it with.”
Of Urban, 39, she adds: “I would probably say that two very lonely people managed to meet at a time when they could open themselves to each other. We were a mixture of frightened and brave.”
Kidman insists they have come through the trauma of Urban’s alcohol and drugs addiction. He entered rehab four months after their wedding last year.
She says: “We were in a very, very, very bad, painful place and have managed to step through it.”
September 4th, 2007 at 2:24 pm
She’s been photoshopped beyond recognition.
September 4th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
She has children of “her own.” Adopted children are no less than biological children. This whole things make me nauseated.
September 4th, 2007 at 5:43 pm
No where does she say that she loves Keith Urban. She still seems sad and lonely to me. I’m guessing that Tom was the love of her life.
September 5th, 2007 at 11:04 am
I agree with Jenna. How sad that she would speak that way about two children who know her as mom. Nausiating indeed!
October 10th, 2007 at 10:46 am
I’m adopted, and quite sensitive to these issues, however, I am also a writer and feel it is important to note that it is the author of the article, not Nicole Kidman, who states that Nicole wants children of her own (the phrase is not in quotation marks).
Where she is directly quoted, the only thing you can infer for sure is that Nicole would like the experience of having a baby, i.e., giving birth, a sentiment shared by many adoptive mothers.
(on the other hand, saying that your mother has an adopted sister, is kind of an odd way to put it — why not just say your aunt was adopted?)