Dwyane Wade Gets Real About Divorce, Telling Gabrielle Union He Fathered a Child During Break and More in New Documentary

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Dwyane Wade Gets Real About Divorce, Telling Gabrielle Union He Fathered a Child During Break and More in New Documentary

Totally candid. Dwyane Wade got real about his bitter divorce from Siohvaughn Funches, his ups and downs with Gabrielle Union and more in his ESPN documentary, D. Wade: Life Unexpected, which aired on Sunday, February 23. The 38-year-old former NBA star married his high school sweetheart, Funches, in 2002. After welcoming two children together — Zaire and Zaya. After five years of marriage, the twosome split and began a nasty custody battle. Wade started seeing Union, 47, not long after his marriage ended. After several years together, they took a break due to their demanding careers. During their split, Wade and friend Aja Metoyer conceived a child, Xavier. “I had a child with someone else and I had to tell her. Hardest thing I’ve ever had to do is man up and tell Gabrielle Union that I’ve had a child with somebody else,” Wade said in the doc. “Me and Gab just went through something that you never want to go through and we still came out of it. Not that it was easy, and that was another moment that showed me life could be different.” [jwplayer 4IbSE3MQ-l3ahXupL] Wade and Union tied the knot in 2014. After the Bring It On actress suffered several miscarriages, the duo turned to surrogacy to welcome daughter Kaavia in November 2018. “I put you in an impossible situation and some how you helped me come out of it stronger,” Wade gushed about Union in May 2019 via Instagram. “Thank you for the Mom that you already are to our miracle Kaavia. Thank you for stepping in and raising those boys just like they were your own. Thank you for forgiving me. Thank you for the daily photoshoots. Thank you for FUN. Thank you for Adventure. Thank you for keeping it sexy. Thank you for pushing me to be a better business man. Thank you for helping me become a better son. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I Love You.” Scroll through for 10 revelations from the doc about Union, basketball and more:

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His Romance With Siohvaughn

“Siohvaughn Funches was my high school girlfriend,” Wade said. “Siohvaughn had her own car, she had a job, money, this and that. We started spending a lot of time together because it got me away from the noise and everything going on at my house.”

Funches was an escape for Wade, whose parents’ relationship had turned toxic and tumultuous. Their own romance, however, was forced to face reality when she discovered she was pregnant during Wade’s sophomore year at Marquette University.

“I broke down,” Wade admitted. “[I thought] my career, my life is over.”

He went on to call Zaire’s birth the “proudest moment” of his life. “I was excited, but I was also nervous as hell at the same time because I’m a kid and I’m trying to find my way into this world while bringing in a kid into this world,” he explained.

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He Had 13 Cavities When He Joined the NBA

Wade didn’t grow up with a lot of money. As a result, he had barely been to the dentist when he was drafted into the NBA in 2003. He had 13 cavities during his first visit in years.

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His Bitter Divorce

Wade and Funches tied the knot in 2002, but split five years later. “Our relationship was rocky. We got together at 16 years old so we had a lot of differences and we didn’t know how to handle those,” the athlete explained. “I wasn’t a big argument, fight type person because I grew up hearing my parents do that and I didn’t want that to happen to Zaire, so I would just not address it.”

As they continued to argue, their second child was born. After marriage counseling, Wade decided to leave the relationship. “My divorce was taking forever. She wound up having 13 different lawyers in the process. So every time you get a new lawyer, the case starts over,” Wade said, noting that their custody case was brutal. “I’m having a hard time having a relationship with my kids, seeing my kids. A lot of times she would not bring them out and I would have to get the police involved to find her. … It became ugly and nasty.”

As a result, Wade sought full custody and won: “My emotions were all over the place because on one hand, you want to celebrate a victory, but on the other end, no one wins. There’s no winner in a custody battle.”

Credit: Courtesy of Dahveon Morris/Instagram

Taking in His Nephew

After he got custody of his older two kids, Wade’s nephew Dahveon Morris started living with them. “I felt that [Dahveon] would be kind of left out,” he explained, noting that Dahveon and Zaire were close and the same age. “I asked my sister, [I said], ‘My environment would be better for him than the environment that he’s living in now.’ She agreed. So I was already getting two, why not get another one?”

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Meeting Gabrielle

“Me and Gab started dating in 2008 and I think in 2010 that relationship was starting to become something,” Wade said. “As we started to travel, I started opening up, like I could actually be friends with my girlfriend. We can actually have a relationship, we can laugh together, joke together. … I didn’t grow up with that.”

It was also revealed in the doc that Wade had photos of Union on his walls in college.

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Fathering a Kid With Aja Metoyer

During a break from Union in 2013, the Basketball Wives star got pregnant with his child. When they got back together in April, he had to tell the actress about the baby.

"I couldn’t sleep. I wasn’t eating. When you hold something in that you know is going to come out and you have this information and you know it’s gonna f--k somebody’s life up, that you care about, that you love, if it don’t hurt you, then you’re not human,” Wade said in the doc. “It’s a very sensitive because I’m going to raise Xavier and that’s an ongoing thing that I’m going to have to deal with for the rest of my life of how to be in his life. So for me, being in the middle of this situation, I’ve always tried to be very sensitive and I still fall short.”

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Gabrielle’s Relationship With His Sons

“My boys loved her from the beginning. So I said, ‘Listen boys, she’s not Gabrielle Union, we’re going to call her Nickie,’” Wade gushed. “Everybody in her family calls her Nickie, that’s her nickname, and I wanted them to feel like, you know what, we’re moving into a family.”

When he decided to propose in 2013, he wanted all of his kids involved, so he had them hold up a sign that read, “Nickie, will you marry us?”  

“She wasn’t just marrying me, she was marrying all of this baggage,” Wade explained. “We’re all coming.”

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LeBron Goes Back to Cleveland

Wade was at the height of his career with LeBron James and Chris Bosh joined him on the Miami Heat in 2010. After winning two championships, James announced his plans to go back to Cleveland in 2014.

“Me and Bron just got off the phone, he let me know that it was official,” Wade recalled. “I wanted to make him feel OK with his decision. Not saying that it didn’t affect me and it didn’t hurt a little bit, but I supported him going back. I knew that for his career to be complete, he was going to have to go back. He was going to have to win a championship without me and Bosh.”

After the Miami Heat signed Bosh and lost James, Wade felt neglected because they didn’t come to him with an offer right away. He ultimately took a two-year deal with the team, but always felt Miami Heat President Pat Riley didn’t value or protect him enough.

“I expected more out of Pat. … Pat f—ked up the situation with me,” Wade said. “He should have handled it better with me. … I thought if anyone was going to take care of me Pat would make sure I’m good because Pat’s seen what I’ve done for the organization.”

Riley, for his part, appeared in the doc and agreed. “That bothers me to this day,” he said about the 2014 season.

After one season with the Chicago Bulls and one season with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Wade returned to Miami for “one last dance.” After welcoming his first child with Union, he knew it was time to walk away from the game.

Credit: Courtesy of Kaavia James Union Wade/Instagram

Having Kaavia

“When Gab and I first got together, she didn’t really want kids,” Wade explained. “But I think once we saw that we can parent together with my kids, we both felt like it would be cool to have one from scratch.”

Union revealed that the couple were “so excited” when they started trying, but she would miscarry around the six or eight week mark for years.

“I’m watching my wife go through a lot physically,” Wade said. “It became a point where it was like, ‘Oh wait, now I may lose you in the process.’ There’s not only one way to have your family. So we just started having conversations.”

The twosome ultimately opted for a surrogate and welcomed daughter Kaavia in November 2018.

“My immediate thing was even if I go through with getting a surrogate, I don’t get to be, like, a ‘real mom,’” Union admitted. “And it took a long time to be like, ‘Let’s go for it. Let’s try.’"

Credit: Courtesy of Gabrielle Union-Wade/Instagram

Meet Zaya

Wade detailed his relationship with his transgender daughter in the doc.

“When I was a kid, I never knew if I was around someone who was gay or transgender. I never knew it,” Wade explained. “So when Zaya came out to us, I had to get educated on very scenario and every situation. And I’m still getting educated. My child comes home and says, ‘Hey dad. I feel that I am a she.’ My job is to help you become who you are, but I’m not trying to change who you are. I see you how you see you. I stand for you. That’s the conversation I had to have with my daughter.”