Having to raise kids on your own while being a celebrity and also the producer of a hit TV show sounds like a nightmare. But that was Shaquille O’Neal’s ex-wife Shaunie Henderson’s reality for years. It made her miserable and affected her mental health. However, she overcame adversity and came out on the other side as a better parent.
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In her memoir Undefeated, Shaunie wrote about how life became harder for the couple and their kids as her responsibilities on the reality show Basketball Wives grew. She mentioned how she and the show’s producers were constantly at odds about her personal life, despite being featured so heavily on the show.
Shaunie revealed that she wasn’t hands-on in the show’s production in its first season because it was filmed in Miami and she lived in LA with Shaq and the kids. She shuttled between the two cities until she realized it would be easier to bring her children with her to shoots. Recalling how she expertly navigated her way through a tricky situation, she wrote,
“How could I possibly manage to be in Florida executive producing my show and appearing as a cast member and still be an attentive mother? The answer was obvious: I would bring the kids with me! It was summer and there was no school, so it was (relatively) easy to get the six of us on a flight to Miami and live in a hotel for a while. The kids saw it as a big adventure.”
The producers had their doubts, naturally. Basketball Wives was, as the name suggests, a show about women and the struggles they faced as part of being married to an NBA star.
However, she stood firm and told them either they accommodate her and her children, or she’d simply walk away from the show. It was a battle of wills, and the mother of five won in the end. She wrote,
“It was my way or the highway, and there was no room for compromise. From time to time I got pushback, until they figured out it would be a lot easier for everybody if they just included my kids in the show.”
Of course, it was too hard for the kids to understand what was happening. Given that they were too young to grasp the situation, they simply saw the show and its filming as a part of their lives. But they were used to the spotlight, after all. Their father was one of the most famous athletes on the planet. And just like their father, they were at their best when the cameras were rolling
In an episode on season 2, Shaunie had to visit Shaq’s house in Orlando to pick the children up, and the showrunners wanted to film it, as they felt it’d be a good peek into her life as a mother. She was hesitant at first, but she quickly realized that her children were as good at working the camera as their parents.
Being the only cast member with children meant Shaunie often had to fight for certain privileges on the show. Given how grueling reality TV can be, the fact that she managed to win her fights and still be an amazing mother proves that once she set her mind to something, nothing in the world could stop her.
