Who needs “Basketball Wives” when you have Dwyane Wade’s love life?
The Miami Heat guard’s personal life is starting to resemble the trashy VH1 reality show, as his divorce from his estranged wife, Siohvaughn Funches, is getting uglier by the minute.
Funches filed a lawsuit for $50,000 in damages this week in Chicago claiming that Wade’s relationship with his new girlfriend, actress Gabrielle Union, is causing her and their two children emotional distress.
The lawsuit claims that Union allegedly “engaged in sexual foreplay” with Wade in front of his sons, Zaire, 8, and Zion, 2. Zaire also told a court-appointed child representative “to put his father in jail” so he wouldn’t have to return to “the house where the woman kissing daddy lives.”
According to the lawsuit, Zaire is seeking medical treatment for stress and anxiety and is suffering from headaches and hair loss from Union’s “extreme and outrageous conduct.”
“I am shocked that Siohvaughn Wade has brought this baseless and meritless lawsuit in the name of our children against Gabrielle Union,” Wade told TMZ.com on Wednesday.
“I am deeply saddened and disappointed that Siohvaughn has used our sons once again as pawns and is now lashing out at Gabrielle, who is an innocent party. It is clear that this is a desperate attempt to retaliate against me for seeking sole custody of our children and requesting that the court have her undergo a psychiatric examination. My primary concern is my children and actions such as this only inflame the situation and are harmful to their well being.”
Union is no stranger to dating professional athletes. Her love for ballplayers started in high school when she dated Dallas Mavericks point guard Jason Kidd and continued in her later years with a five-year marriage to former NFL running back Chris Howard. Following her divorce, Union stuck with the football players and briefly dated New Orleans safety Darren Sharper. And those are just the relationships we know about, as the 37-year-old has been fodder on the blogs and tabloids with the reputation of being a chronic home wrecker.
As for Wade, he had the storybook romance, marrying his high school girlfriend in 2002 while playing at Marquette University. At the time, it was refreshing to see a future superstar like Wade marrying a woman who wasn’t in the spotlight. But things between Wade and Funches quickly soured as the couple filed for divorce in 2007. Last year, Wade sued Funches and two of her lawyers after he was accused of contracting a sexually transmitted disease during an extramarital affair. The trial in the divorce case is scheduled for June.
This isn’t the first time an athlete has gone from dating an unknown to a Hollywood celebrity. After New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez was slapped with divorce papers by his ex-wife, Cynthia, in 2008, the third baseman dated actress Kate Hudson during their World Series run last season. Following Kidd’s divorce from Joumana Kidd in 2007, he was linked to a trio of models — Hope Dworaczyk, May Anderson and Porschla Coleman.
The pending lawsuit is a lose-lose on all three sides. Wade’s personal life is starting to overshadow his professional life as teams could potentially shy away from the free agent this summer. Funches has now put her children in the middle of an already difficult divorce. And what little creditability Union had left as a respectable woman is out the door at this point.
If the Shaunie O’Neal produced reality show gets picked up for a second season, Union is well on her way to earning a spot alongside Royce, Jennifer, Suzie, Evelyn and Gloria.
