Ivana Trump: "Donald took the divorce as a business. He had to win"
Donald Trump's first wife talks about how they raised his children and what the divorce with the businessman was like in a book she has just published.
Ivana Trump (68 years old), the first wife of Donal Trump (71), has just published a book where she talks about how the businessman courted her, how they raised their three children, Donald Jr. (39), Ivanka (35) and Eric (33); and how was her divorce.
Ivana met the businessman one night in New York when a young Trump, who by then was already a businessman with a large fortune behind him, was having dinner with some friends at a restaurant in Manhatann and approached Ivana trying to woo and impress her. Before long he left her companions, paid the bill, and they drove back to her hotel in a giant Cadillac. Enough to impress a young woman who had grown up under the Iron Curtain and she came to the United States eager to fulfill all of her dreams.
Thus began a relationship that ended up giving Trump three out of his five offspring. On his father's side, although he was loving, he was not the type to "go out for a walk and go to Central Park or play baseball with his kids." In contrast, Trump was very detached and hardly spoke to them. It was not until they were 18 years old that the businessman began a relationship with his children, since "it was then that he was able to start talking business with them."
The first of his children was Donald Jr., a name that was not without controversy, because, as Ivana herself comments in her book, the president did not want her to be named after him. When she asked him why not, he said, "What if he's a loser?"
A very strict education
Being the son of one of America's most important tycoons comes with a number of quirks. On the one hand, the education was strict and there was great control. In that sense, each of the children went to a different private school, which made preparing for school an odyssey. "The logistics of taking them there was a nightmare, we had limousines and company cars with drivers to take them," commented Ivana.
On the other hand, parental control meant that their children did not have many friends. "I discouraged games at the Trump Tower (family home), the triplex was too big and ostentatious ...". The only "friend" who could visit the children was Michael Jackson, "the only person who had an open invitation to come to the triplex."
Divorce was a business for Trump
The family broke up when Marla Maples got in the way. "That woman knowingly entered the relationship I had with my husband, the father of three young children, worked actively to humiliate me in the media and indirectly to put my children at risk for months," she states in her book .
Shortly after this happened, it was learned that the actress was pregnant with Trump's fourth daughter, Tiffany (23). This news tipped the balance and forced Donald to marry her because "everyone was watching her" and it didn't really matter about her "if he really was in love with her".
For this, a millionaire separation was developed that was very hard for both Ivana and her children since Trump had no mercy. "He took the divorce like it was a business and he couldn't lose, he had to win."
One of the losers from this divorce was Donald Jr., who was personally involved in the dispute. The tycoon called the boy to his office, where they talked for 20 minutes, and shortly after Trump left the office and told Ivana: "You are a bad mother. I'm going to stay with Donald Jr."
However, even though she was furious at the time, she kept a cool head and replied, "Stay with him, I have two more children to raise." A strategy that worked for her since ten minutes later the boy returned to her arms in the attic of Trump Tower. "I knew Donald wouldn't know what to do with it. It was painful, but I couldn't be intimidated," she says.
Truncated the first candidacy for the presidency of Trump
One of the secrets that Ivana has revealed in this book is that the tycoon's presidential aspirations are not something recent. "In the 1980s Ronald Reagan sent Donald a letter asking him to be a candidate for president," she said.
However, the Marla Maples scandal appeared and "the press hated" (Trump), so the businessman's wishes had to be postponed. Ivana is sure that if she hadn't had this affair, Donald could have made it to the White House.
Offers advice on divorce
Ivana has not wanted her book to be reduced to a review of her life, and some parts of the work offer advice to other women who are going through a divorce. She suggests that it is best to stay at twenty-eight and to do so "if you can afford it (plastic surgery) and you want to, go for it. Why not?"
Here's a recommendation for the next tip from hers: enjoy life again with "special friends." Ivana assures that "society has a wonderful invention" about the lovers of divorced women, and that is that "certain friends (who everyone knows who they are) are accepted as companions and only as companions."
But there are also more elite recommendations, such as those related to jewelry. She argues that if one has important accessories, the most appropriate thing is for the woman herself to worry about them and not delegate this responsibility to others, because "Who wants to spend their holidays waiting to enter or leave a safe?"
