Former NBA star Dwyane Wade criticized his ex-wife Siohvaughn Funches when she attempted to obstruct their daughter Zaya’s legal name change by filing a petition.
“While none of us are surprised by Siohvaughn’s efforts to battle Zaya’s identity and her unrelenting effort to drag my name through the mud, I’m very unhappy that she continues to concentrate herself and HER demands, without regard for her children,” Wade wrote in a lengthy Instagram post on Thursday.
“The high road has ran out of real estate,” Wade wrote, adding that Funches “has pretty much elected to be an absent parent to Zaya ALL BY HERSELF,” noting that males typically get a “poor rap” for not showing up for their children, but that is “not the case here.”
Wade stated in 2020 that his 15-year-old daughter, Zaya, is transgender. People reported that on Wednesday, Funches filed a petition opposing Zaya’s legal name and gender change, claiming that Wade was “positioned to profit” from her name change and “may be encouraging Zaya to do so for financial advantage.”
Wade responded on Instagram, “No one in our home would ever push Zaya or any of our children to do anything against their will, much less impose an identity on them.”
Wade stated in the post that he has provided his ex-wife with ample opportunities to communicate with Zaya’s teachers, doctors, and therapist, as well as to meet her friends, “so she could gain her own understanding of our child’s needs,” but Funches has repeatedly failed to support her daughter at school functions and recitals, according to Wade.
Funches, according to Wade, has denied that Zaya has given Funches “every opportunity to get to know her.” In addition, he has not witnessed her making any sacrifices or exerting any effort to leave her home in order to participate in her children’s life in over a decade.
Wade noted that Zaya has a “4.0 GPA in honors classes” and that she has been “navigating all this unwanted and damaging attention and discussions over her gender and sexuality from individuals who are determined not to listen to her.”
Wade stated, “Zaya is no longer the same 3-year-old child, and she is screaming it to the world, but most importantly to her mother.”
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