I had almost forgotten about the once-infamous “Octomom”, i.e. Nadya Suleman. Then I got this article via Google Alert. We all knew it was coming-it was only a question of when. When is the reality show coming to a network near you????

Nadya Suleman, the mother of octuplets born Jan. 26, has inked a deal with the British production company Eyeworks, which plans to begin filming a reality TV series based on the controversial single mother and her 14 children.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m a little burnt-out on the big-family-I-Gave-Birth-To-A-Million-Kids shows. It’s losing its appeal, its freshness, its ability to cause morbid fascination. At least for me.

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As though this topic han’t been run into the ground enough, let’s talk Octomom. (Dead horse, I beat thee.) I’ve watched with mild fascination all of her interviews and read most of the articles on her life. And, honestly, like most people, the more I hear about her, the more skeevy and bizarre she seems. I’m not going to get into all of the overdiscussed topics of her cracked out doctor shooting a litter of embryos into her body, her seeming addiction to having children and her codependent relationship with her parents.

Nope, I’m not.

What I want to mention is this: last week, I found myself feeling one emotion toward Nadya Suleman that I never thought I’d feel. And that emotion is Envy.

Not Envy for her kids, fame or plastic surgery. But Envy for her shoes. See, I was reading an article in the uber-klassy US Weekly and they had a picture of her running errands or something. I was starting to flip the page when I caught sight of her shoes. She was wearing a pair of Tory Burch flats. The same shoes I’ve been drooling over for more than a year. The same shoes that I haven’t bought because I just can’t justify a pair of flats that are $150+ right now with all of the nanny expenses, diapers, clothes and other things that go along with having children.

Mind you, I only have one kid. Not fourteen.

So, there was this strange moment where I was staring at these really cute flats, wishing I could buy them, while skimming an article on how Nadya was accepting public donations on her website.

I guess I only have one thing to say to Nadya: Can I borrow your shoes?

Over the past few weeks, the Dr. Phil show has become nothing more than a telethon for the octuplets and their mother.

Since February, Dr. Phil has had at least four shows discussing Nadya Suleman and her eight babies. And tomorrow, ANOTHER hour is going to be spent on the octuplets.

Enough is enough, Dr. Phil!

I can’t figure out why Dr. Phil has decided to take this woman under his wing. (Oh wait, RATINGS! Silly me.) He says it’s because the children are here and they need help. 

I’m not the sharpest tool in the tool box, but even I get it. And, I didn’t need to see five hour-long shows to come to that conclusion. There are a lot of kids, and this mom has no means to support them now.

That said, I think Dr. Phil is ultimately doing this woman a disservice. OK; it was a good thing that he was able to broker a deal with Angels in Waiting for assistance with the children. But now Dr. Phil has crossed the line from being helpful to exploiting Nadya and her family. She seems to love the attention, and Dr. Phil is feeding it at every opportunity. Nadya needs psychological counseling, assistance making decisions for her family, and time to spend with her children at home, not hours on camera answering Dr. Phil’s questions over and over again.

I took a peek at the Dr. Phil message board to see what other viewers thought of all the octuplet coverage, and the majority of the responses echo my feelings. Enough is enough!

Will the Octo-mom saga/drama never cease? Everybody knows this story by now and others that have spawned from it. Nadya Suleman, the single mother who gave birth to Octuplets recently and has an additional six kids, has inspired a bill in Georgia that would limit embryo implants for in-vitro procedures.

Hudgens’ plan, which was co-sponsored by several other senators, would limit the number of embryos a doctor could implant to two for women under 40 years old and three for women 40 or older.

Obviously, some people are against this, some doctors claiming it would ’shut them down’:

At least some fertility doctors say the limits in Hudgens’ bill would hurt chances for women to get pregnant. They say that while three embryos are usually enough, there are special cases when they need more.

“What this bill will effectively do is shut us down,” said Dr. Daniel Shapiro, a fertility doctor in Atlanta.

In regards to the Suleman case more than the proposed bill, I have nothing against single mothers or big families and I would never tell anyone what they should do, but I tend to think there absolutely should be a limit to the number of embryos to be implanted. That’s just my opinion.

Most of us can barely take care of or afford one or two kids, let alone eight at one time.

Just when I think it’s safe to remove the cold compress from my forehead and get up off the sofa I hear more freaky news.  And it has been pretty freaky lately.  I used to think that those Snuggie commercials were the creepiest things on TV but now we have Octo Mom, Nadya Suleman, whose story just keeps getting weirder and weirder.  First, she’s anonymous.  Then, she doesn’t want any help.  Now, there’s a website asking for donations.  There’s so much information flying around about her that it’s hard to tell what might possibly be truth but I’m starting to believe the stranger stuff over the rest of it.  And I really would like to meet the Doctor who implanted the embryos.  Not because of the ethical questions, but because I’ve had friends go through this procedure and it is NOT covered by insurance and is cash-on-the-barrel-or-come-back-when-you-can-write-me-a-check, but this woman – who is reportedly $50,000 in debt – found a physician who is apparently taking payments.  And how is she paying the three or four nannies that are caring for her other 6 children (all under the age of 8!). 

Her” family website” has pics of the new babies and only two places to click: one to donate money and the other to leave a comment or well wishes.  I’d be interested in reading some of the comments that have been left and wonder who on earth is giving this woman money.   Did someone talk her into accepting donations?  “Oh, people will want to help you!”  Or was this her intention all along?  One rumor suggests Jon and Kate envy - yikes.  Another rumor said she wanted $2 million for her first interview and a job as a child care expert.  And I know I risk sounding like my Grandma when I say this but “Having ‘em ain’t caring for ‘em, honey.”

And how about that disturbing resemblance to Angelina Jolie?   In her interview with Ann Curry, Suleman said that she’s been so busy that Jolie “isn’t even on my radar,” suggesting that she might know who she is but that she’s not that familiar with her work…or her many children.  But the latest reports have Suleman “reaching out” to Jolie via letters for a while now.  Yuck.  I really hope it’s not true.  If it is it just ups the creepiness factor by about 500% and I am running out washcloths and smelling salts.  

I would like to say that I would never dream of telling anyone how many children they should have.  That’s between you and your uterus.  But I do disagree with chemically-induced multiple births, especially ones that leave children at a disadvantage in any way.