Her rise to celebrity status was definitely came with being the lead role of Captain Janeway on Star Trek Voyager. For seven full seasons she played the role, with her character developing and the story deepening with each passing year. She has mentioned that doing such a role is very demanding on the actor or actress, because the roles and duties can differ for each episode to a great degree. One moment she is relaxing in her captain’s quarters, then next she needs to fight with alien beings or deal with supernatural and space type forces. She has said that nothing could be more challenging and more rewarding at the same time. Her desire for becoming an actress came early for her and she found success early also.

She was playing on the soap opera Ryan’s Hope and an unexpected event happened: she got pregnant in real life. She remembers telling her mom that, and her mom then telling her she made the mistake and she would have to fix it by putting the child up for adoption. Her mother told her to consult religious charities that could help her. She ended up giving up the baby for adoption. She did end up meeting her daughter twenty years later, saying she never regretted having her for one moment, and is glad she could be part of her life still to this day.

Kate considers her story not of loss or even that big of a deal. She mentions that there are so many other people that have bigger problems, and that suffer much more loss then she ever has. She considers her decision and her mother’s angst as something she had to deal with, has dealt with, and thinks of it more as the voyage of life. Three days after giving birth to her child in real life, she had to play her character on screen as just giving birth. She remembers being handed a plastic baby doll and having to play the character by giving a monolog on how she would take care of the child and forever be with it, all the while she had just gave up a real daughter to someone else, not knowing if she would ever see her again or not.

She has thought of her past ordeals over time and readily admits that she is not one with no regrets. She has them, ones she considers serious regrets. Most people do, at least ones that are thoughtful in her opinion. Her life being lived with passion and abandon had led her to be this way she feels. She regrets she couldn’t have raised her daughter, regrets that she thought she couldn’t handle it, and regrets that her mother was in such worry and grief over the issue, that she couldn’t even offer to help raise the child. Kate considers her an integral part of her life now and this is just one piece of her ongoing life story of love and losses.