15 Rich AF Celebs That Grew Up Poor

It's hard to imagine your favorite celebrities before they became famous. We can't really picture them living normal lives. Weren't they all just born fabulous? Well, that's not really the case. Many of your favorite celebs lived totally normal lives before they started getting famous. Yes, some of them were very well connected and managed to get into Hollywood because of their families and who they knew. But for many celebrities, their stories started out a bit differently.

Some of the actors, singers, and models that we idolize today actually grew up without a lot. Some of them were living paycheck to paycheck, struggling to make ends meet and trying not to give up on their dreams. Some of them came from poor families, where they barely had enough food on the table. You might never be able to guess it now, but here are 15 celebs who grew up poor.

15 Selena Gomez

Although Selena Gomez started acting when she was pretty young, her life has not always been easy. She had a long, hard road to get to where she is today. Maybe that's why the people who work with her say that she is so humble and kind, she has not forgotten where she came from. Her mother had Selena when she was only sixteen, and she worked three jobs in order to raise her. She says that when she was young, she remembers her mother always running out of gas in the car and having to rummage through the car for quarters to pay for another tank. They ate a lot of mac and cheese and other cheap, easy meals. Her mother never wanted to ask for help from others, and Selena says that her mom sacrificed everything in order to give her the life that she wanted. She's definitely made her mom proud!

14 Nicki Minaj

Yes, Nicki may be one of the best rappers around right now, but her life was not always so fabulous. She and her family struggled a lot when she was younger, and many of the obstacles that she faced have inspired the songs she writes today. Nicki has said that she was used to being told “No” whenever she asked for something, and holidays were difficult because her Christmas could never compare to a family with more money. However, she has said that growing up in poverty gave her the drive and determination that she has today. Nicki is a rags to riches story, and it's obvious that all of her hard work has paid off. She says that she would never want to live like that again, and because of that, she feels even more inspired and motivated to always be working towards bigger and better things. You go, Nicki!

13 Leighton Meester

If you've ever wondered what it would be like to grow up rich, you probably used to watch Gossip Girl and fantasize about that lifestyle. Designer clothes, exclusive parties, trips to exotic locations, and everyone being jealous of you, who wouldn't want that? On screen, Leighton Meester played the perfect ice queen, Blair Waldorf, who basically ruled the Upper East Side and was the envy of every single girl in Manhattan. But for Leighton, real life was far from a New York fairytale. Leighton was actually born while her mother was in prison, and she actually had to live in a halfway house. After that, she was finally able to move in with her grandmother. This is a far cry from the lifestyle that her character on Gossip Girl was born into, but she played it so well that you would never know she was brought up in very different circumstances.

12 Kelly Clarkson

Remember watching American Idol back in its early years? Kelly Clarkson was the first singer to win the show, and since she won, she has been one of the most successful winners! Many people who found fame on the show can't carry it into their career afterward, but Kelly has had plenty of hit singles over the years. But before winning American Idol, Kelly was down in the dumps. When she went to audition, she was actually living in a run down house with a serious roach problem, and she was only able to put food on the table by relying on food stamps. When she moved to Los Angeles, her apartment caught fire, and she had nowhere to go. She had to live out of her car and spent some nights in a homeless shelter. Her story is so inspirational, and she's made it so far since those days.

11 Jennifer Lopez

Jenny from the block wasn't kidding about her past. She did not always live the incredible lifestyle that she gained after she became famous, and her success was not handed to her on a silver platter. When Jennifer was about eighteen, she and her mom started to get into big fights concerning what she would do with her future, she wanted to dance and her mom wanted her to go to college. She ended up moving out on bad terms and began sleeping on the couch at her dance studio since she had nowhere else to go. But within a year of moving out, things finally started to turn around. She ended up landing a job dancing in Europe for a few months, and when that ended, she returned to the states and moved to Los Angeles. From there, the rest is history, and she began living the life of her dreams.

10 Leonardo DiCaprio

Leonardo DiCaprio is one of the most popular and successful actors working today. Every single movie that he's in, he steals the show. And he finally won that Oscar that he deserved for so long! What's not to love about Leo? It's hard to imagine that he ever struggled since he clearly has it made today. He did start landing acting jobs at a young age, but he came from a poor family, and he faced some difficult experiences in his early life that has influenced the person who he is today. For example, he has never done drugs because he saw how they could ruin people's lives at a young age. So all of those crazy scenes in Wolf of Wall Street? Yup, it was 100% acting, he has never tried any of those substances! Now that Leo is so successful, he devotes a lot of time to saving the planet through environmental activism.

9 P. Diddy

It's hard to imagine Sean Combs, a.k.a. P. Diddy, living anything but a luxurious lifestyle. After all, he has promoted so many successful artists and has seen so much success himself that he must have gotten a head start in life, right? Dead wrong. Diddy definitely had it tough when he was young, mainly because of his father's connections to some shady characters that spelled out danger for their family. Diddy grew up in a housing project in Harlem, so he lived in a rough neighborhood that he worked hard to get out of. And when Diddy was only a young child, his father was shot in his car near Central Park because of his involvement with a drug dealer. Diddy's mother, a model and teacher's assistant, had to take care of him on her own from there. He managed to work his way up in the music industry and make it out.

8 Kate Winslet

Kate Winslet has played so many amazing roles, but we'll always remember her as Rose in Titanic. Rose was pampered and spoiled, and she also traveled in first class. But in real life, Kate was not brought up like that. In fact, her background was a little more like Jack Dawson's. Kate's father was an actor, just like her, but he was always working two or three other jobs in order to support the family, so it was not an easy road and money was always tight. While they always had a roof over her head and enough food on the table, Kate does remember having to wear hand me down clothes and rarely buying anything new. She has said in interviews that she remembers the family car breaking down pretty often. But since those days, Kate has had so many spectacular roles and has won plenty of awards recognizing her talent.

7 Jay Z

Jay Z has always been pretty open about his background. Yes, he is incredibly successful now (and not only that, he's also married to Beyonce, so he's basically the luckiest man in the world), but his life was not an easy road. However, he feels no shame in this, and he does not try to hide where he came from. In fact, his experiences growing up and struggling often make it into his music. His father abandoned his family, and his mother had to raise him and his three siblings all on her own. Because of this, they had to be very careful with money, and nothing went to waste. In his teenage years, Jay Z turned to selling drugs to make ends meet, but this was dangerous, and he claims that he was shot three times. Now, his life could not be better, and he has left all of those activities behind him.

6 Mariah Carey

Mariah Carey is the queen of sass. She basically does not care what anyone thinks of her, and she's the definition of extra. Remember her New Year's Eve performance when she barely bothered to lip sync the lyrics to her own song, and then shrugged the whole thing off like it was nothing? Nothing seems to touch Mariah, and maybe it's because of her upbringing. She was not brought up in the fancy Hollywood life. She actually grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Long Island, and she was often bored and frustrated growing up because she did not have any toys. This sometimes caused her to turn to destructive behaviors, which angered her parents and made life even more difficult. Once, she even went as far as to set her parents' car on fire! Well, she was clearly always a diva at heart, so maybe not much has changed.

5 Sarah Jessica Parker

Before Gossip Girl, there was Sex and the City. If you wanted to get your fix of rich girls in New York City and all the drama that came along with them, that was the show you turned to. And the star of the show was Carrie Bradshaw, the most fabulous of the bunch. Played by Sarah Jessica Parker, Carrie was basically the idol of every woman who dreamed of being a writer in New York City one day. She had everything she could have ever wanted and more. But Sarah's real life was not always like the dream life that Carrie lived on the show. Sarah says that growing up, her family did not always have electricity. Sometimes, there was no money to celebrate holidays like Christmas. And at other times, their phones would be shut off because her parents did not have enough money to pay the bills.

4 JK Rowling

JK Rowling was the author who defined all of our childhoods when she wrote the Harry Potter book series. She is now worth billions of dollars, most of which she donates to various charities. She is one of the most successful children's authors of all time, and she inspired a whole generation with her stories. But did you know that when Rowling sat down to write the first Harry Potter book, she was actually a struggling single mom? That's right, one of the most successful authors barely had a penny to her name when she started writing. But despite the fact that she was struggling, she never gave up on her dream. She continued writing, and even though it was rejected by many publishers at first, she still persisted. It just goes to show that if you believe in yourself and work hard enough, you can succeed in the end!

3 Oprah Winfrey

Oprah is one of the most successful black women of all time and she's one of the most influential women today, period. But she definitely did not have it easy. It might be tough to imagine with all the success she has enjoyed over the past few decades, but she faced extreme obstacles on her path. Oprah was born to a single mother in rural Mississippi. They eventually moved to Milwaukee, where they lived in the inner city. Oprah was abused in her childhood and early teens, and she became pregnant. Sadly, her son passed away in infancy. She then moved to Tennessee, and while there, she landed a job in radio while still in high school. She began moving up through the ranks, and, well, the rest is history. Since then, she has used much of her success to give back to others, and she is well-known for her philanthropy.

2 Shania Twain

If you were a fan of country music in the late 90s and early 2000s, you know that Shania Twain was the queen. Look, if you didn't dance around your bedroom singing, “Man! I Feel Like a Woman,” into your hairbrush, you missed out on a very important part of childhood. Even though Shania found a lot of fame in the music industry during those years, getting there was pretty rough. There were times when she barely had enough to survive. She grew up extremely poor, and there were many times when she and her brothers barely had enough money to afford food. She grew up in an abusive household and struggled with this both mentally and emotionally. She went to school hungry many times, and at one point, she even lived in a homeless shelter. She was often responsible for watching out for her siblings as well as looking out for herself.

1 Jim Carrey

Jim Carrey's movies are almost always hilarious, and he's been cracking up audiences for years. But behind all that laughter and comedy lies a difficult past. Many comedians come from rough backgrounds, and they get into comedy as a way of coping with the issues they're facing. Carrey grew up in a poor Canadian family, and when he was a child, he probably never dreamed that he would make it to Hollywood one day. When his family fell on hard times, he had to get his first job at age twelve. He began working in a factory to help support his family. At one point, his family could no longer afford to live in their house and had to move into a van instead. Carrey has said that getting rich and famous can't solve all your problems, and he wishes that everyone could get what they wanted so they could see it's not the answer.