These celebrities turned out rich, famous, successful, and generally adored—but their
backgrounds are less than ideal.
Though these stars were all abandoned by family members, they managed to overcome the heartache
and turn it all around.
Jamie Foxx
At just seven months old, Jamie Foxx was left in the care of his birth mother's adoptive
parents.
In 2014, the Academy Award-winning actor told The Sunday Times that he was trying to make
amends with his estranged parents.
While he's still learning about his mom, Foxx admitted that his relationship with his father
has been more difficult to forge, saying:
"I'm a good dude.
I wasn't the kid getting in trouble.
I was quarterback on the high school football team.
And he only lived 28 miles away."
"I'm gonna grade him a little harder for that, because he could have tried."
Demi Lovato
Demi Lovato has been estranged from her father, Patrick, for most of her life.
Her mother, Dianna De La Garza , revealed in Lovato's 2017 Simply Complicated documentary
that Patrick was allegedly mentally ill.
Patrick may have passed some of his challenges to Lovato, who has openly struggled with addiction.
"I guess I always search for what he found in drugs and alcohol.
Because it fulfills him and he chose that over a family."
After Patrick passed away in 2013, Lovato paid tribute to him with her song "Father"
off of her Confident album.
"And I was very conflicted when he passed because he was abusive.
Because he was mean, but he wanted to be a good person."
Marilyn Monroe
The fabulous Marilyn Monroe was born in 1926 to mother Gladys Pearl Baker, but her father's
identity has never been confirmed.
After initially giving Monroe to foster parents Ida and Wayne Bolender, Baker later tried
to parent Monroe before sending Monroe to the Los Angeles Orphans Home.
Baker was later institutionalized for paranoid schizophrenia.
The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe claims the starlet took great pains to care for her mother
throughout her life, and when Monroe died, she left her mother $5,000 a year for the
rest of her life.
Kelly Clarkson
Kelly Clarkson's song "Piece by Piece" was inspired by the heartbreak she felt when her
father allegedly walked out on her family when she was a child.
Clarkson told Scandinavian talk show Skavlan that she doesn't want sympathy for it.
"If someone presents such a cancerous environment, um, and then just keeps hurting you, even
if they're doing it inadvertently, and they just don't know better, um, you should just
not have that person in your life."
Clarkson said she reached out so many times to her father that it actually became humiliating
when he kept rejecting her.
"And you're like, you know, I shouldn't have to work this hard for someone's love.
Like, that's a little ridiculous."
Adele
In her 2017 Grammys acceptance speech, Adele thanked her manager.
"I love you like you're my dad.
I love you so, so much.
I don't love my dad, that's the thing.
That doesn't mean a lot.
I love you like I would love my dad."
Adele's actual father, Mark Evans, admitted to The Sun in 2011 that he left Adele and
her mother when the singer was 3 years old.
He said:
"I was putting away two litres of vodka and seven or eight pints of Stella every day.
I was deeply ashamed of what I'd become and [...] the kindest thing I could do for Adele
was to make sure she never saw me in that state."
Adele may not necessarily love her biological father, but in 2015, The Daily Mail reported
that she forgave him.
Angelina Jolie
Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie has been estranged from her father, actor Jon Voight,
for most of her adult life.
The Daily News reported that the divide stems from Voight allegedly cheating on Jolie's
mother, Marcheline Bertrand, and abandoning Jolie when she was just 1 year old.
Bertrand reportedly wanted Jolie to maintain some sort of a relationship with Voight, and
it appeared that the actress followed through by co-starring with Voight in Lara Croft:
Tomb Raider.
Unfortunately, in 2002, Voight told Entertainment Weekly that his daughter had "serious mental
problems," which prompted another estrangement.
The pair reconciled somewhat in 2010 at the request of Jolie's ex, Brad Pitt.
Eminem
Rapper Eminem's troubled relationship with his mother, Debbie Nelson, has been well-documented,
but part of what caused their issues may be the fact that his father abandoned him when
he was a baby.
In her book, My Son Marshall, My Son Eminem, Nelson writes,
"He never knew his father, and I did all I could to make up for it.
I wasn't happy when he made up a whole new life for himself—what mother wants to be
known as a pill-popping alcoholic who lives on welfare?
To tell the truth, I was heartbroken."
Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Culkin's parents, father Kit and mother Patricia, divorced in 1995, leading
to a bitter custody battle for their son's massive acting fortune.
Macaulay emancipated himself from his parents at age 14, and to this day, he remains estranged
from Kit, who has since reportedly suffered a stroke.
In 2015, Kit told the Daily Mail:
"I don't consider him a son anymore."
​Eartha Kitt
You may know her only as Catwoman, but Eartha Kitt was a singer, dancer, actress, and activist.
Born on a cotton plantation in 1927, Kitt never learned the identity of her birth father.
Kitt was later abandoned by her mother because of her pale skin.
Her daughter, Kitt Shapiro, told The Observer that her mother's birth certificate had her
father's name blacked out on the form, saying,
"My mother was referred to as a 'yellow gal,' which was not a compliment."
"She was horribly abused in the South.
She was beaten, mistreated, emotionally and physically."
Kitt never found out her father's name, but always assumed he was white.
Kate Hudson
In September 2016, Kate Hudson, who was raised by mom Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, told
Howard Stern about the daddy issues she developed when her biological father, Bill Hudson, left
her and brother Oliver as kids.
"I do really recognize that whatever those issues are, are just something he has to live
with.
And that must be painful for him.
And so I forgive him."
In 2015, Bill told the Daily Mail that he wanted Oliver and Kate to stop using his last
name.
he said: "I no longer recognize Oliver and Kate as
my own…
They are no longer a part of my life."
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