Yahoo News Shaq Has Surprising Reaction To Ex-Wife Saying She May Have Never Loved Him
NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal had quite the response to remarks made by his ex-wife, “Basketball Wives” executive producer Shaunie Henderson, who said she wasn’t sure if she ever loved him.
On Wednesday, O’Neal took to Instagram to say that he not only understood why Henderson has questioned her past feelings for him — but that he’d do the same.
“I understand... I wouldn’t have been in love with me either,” he wrote in a statement posted on his account.
“Wishing you all the best...” he continued with a heart-emoji. “All love, Shaq.”
He also further emphasized his point by writing in the post’s caption: “Trust me I get it.”
O’Neal didn’t name Henderson in his post, but his statement was posted shortly after Essence shared a snippet of the executive producer’s new book, “Undefeated: Changing the Rules and Winning on my Own Terms,” in which she questioned whether she was “really in love” with the NBA legend.
“Looking back, I don’t know that I was ever really in love with the man, but I was in love with the idea of being married to the man I had a family with,” Henderson wrote, per Essence. “I was in love with the idea of building a life together. I truly did enjoy spending time with him. [NBA] road trips allowed me to be with my husband and experience the NBA life for a little while.”
The former couple wed in 2002. They reached a divorce settlement in 2010 after their split the year prior. They share four children: sons Shareef and Shaqir, and daughters Amirah and Me’arah.
O’Neal shares his eldest daughter, Taahirah, with his former girlfriend, Arnetta Yardbourgh. He also parents Henderson’s eldest son, Myles, from a previous relationship.
Henderson wed her current husband and pastor, Keion Henderson, in 2022.
She told People magazine last year that married life was “amazing,” and that her husband is her “best friend.”
In a 2021 appearance on the “Tamron Hall Show,” Shaunie Henderson celebrated her “great” co-parenting relationship with O’Neal, though she said it was “not an easy journey.”
O’Neal has publicly discussed some regrets he has from his marriage to Shaunie Henderson.
In a 2022 episode of his podcast, “The Big Podcast with Shaq,” he admitted, per E! News, that he was a “serial cheater.”
“I’m never the guy that’s going to get up here because of my platform and fake it,“ he said at the time, before addressing his infidelities. “I did it. I was the best at it. I’m not proud of it. I lost my family doing it, and I lost valuable and important years with my children from doing it.”
