- Shaquille O’Neal and Shaunie Henderson married in 2002 and have four children
- The couple split shortly after the Lakers traded O’Neal to the Miami Heat in 2004
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Shaunie Henderson claimed Shaquille O’Neal had a habit of ‘going missing’ before their 2011 divorce.
Henderson and O’Neal married in December 2002 and share four children: sons Shareef and Shaquir and daughters Amirah and Me’arah. O’Neal also had a daughter, Taariah, from a previous relationship. Meanwhile, Henderson’s son Myles, also from a previous relationship, later adopted the center’s surname.
In her new book, “Undefeated: Changing the Rules and Winning on My Own Terms,” the Basketball Wives creator opened up about how she saw the first signs that her marriage to O’Neal was coming to an end.
‘I enjoyed those wonderful first years as a mother and raising my children; My days were always busy with kids and family, and every now and then I got to travel or enjoy a bit of the good life in the NBA. But invisibly my marriage began to crumble,” Henderson wrote.
‘As I have written, it was not clear at the beginning. You know how you first get sick and the symptoms are so mild that you’re not even sure if you’re sick? That’s how things went in the early years. I was busy and happy and didn’t notice what was going on. But as the disease progressed, the symptoms became increasingly difficult to ignore.”
Shaunie Henderson claimed that Shaquille O’Neal kept going ‘missing’ before their divorce
The couple married in 2002 and had four children: Shareef, Shaquir, Amirah and Me’arah.
In her new memoir, Henderson described the events that led to the divorce filing
Henderson recalled hearing rumors about O’Neal when they moved to Miami after the Lakers traded the center to the Heat in 2004.
“Take Shaquille’s habit of ‘going missing,’” Henderson recalled. ‘Our chef did all the shopping. His managers paid all the bills. I took care of the children. So where did he go morning, day and night? No one trains that often.
“When we moved to Miami, I even heard a rumor that he had an apartment in Miami Beach. I started to get suspicious, but he always had an answer and I could never prove anything. Ultimately, I had to admit that my family life was not as blissful or perfect as I wanted to believe.”
The four-time NBA champion has taken responsibility for the fallout from their marriage several times.
In his 2011 memoir, “Shaq Uncut: My Story,” Diesel explained that he was “a man with too many options,” and that affected their marriage indefinitely.
In April 2023, O’Neal appeared on “The Pivot Podcast” and said, “I was bad, it was all me.”
O’Neal met Henderson during his championship days with the Los Angeles Lakers
The couple split shortly after O’Neal was traded to the Miami Heat in 2004
O’Neal filed for divorce in Miami in September 2007 after admitting he “failed to protect” [Henderson] and protecting those vows.” However, the couple reconciled about a year later, with Henderson telling the Associated Press that they had dropped divorce proceedings.
They called it quits again in 2009 before their divorce was finalized in 2011.
More than a decade later, in May 2022, Shaunie married Pastor Keion Henderson.
In an interview with singer Monica, O’Neal wished Henderson and her new groom the best, saying, “Shaunie was a perfect woman too and I ruined it.”
“I hope this gentleman treats her the way she should be treated, and that I will still love her,” O’Neal continued. ‘She’s still my wife. I will always protect, care for and love her, whether she is married or not.”