Nadya Denise Doud-Suleman

Suleman was born in Fullerton, California. She is the only child of Angela Victoria (born 1940) and Assyrian Iraqi American Edward Doud Suleman (born 1942). Her parents married in Las Vegas in 1974, and divorced in 1990.
She graduated from Nogales High School in 1993. Suleman earned a psychiatric technician license and worked as a psychiatric technician at Metropolitan State Hospital, where her back was injured while at work. She attended California State University, Fullerton (CSUF) and received a Bachelor of Science degree in child and adolescent development in 2006. Suleman returned to CSUF to pursue a master's degree in counseling, but dropped out of the program in 2008.