by Ivana Trump
* * *
DON
Every summer while growing up, I’d go to Czechoslovakia by myself and spend five or six weeks with my grandfather. My grandparents didn’t speak English very well at the time, so I had no choice but to learn to speak Czech fluently from a very young age. By going there, I understood how lucky we were in the US, to have what we had and to grow up the way we were growing up. But I also saw the potential pitfalls of privilege. My parents and grandparents wanted me to see another side of life, where relationships and spending good times together were most important. It was an incredibly valuable lesson that really helped me learn how not to take superficial things in life too seriously, and not to take intangible things for granted.
Apart from the joy and happiness that my wife and family bring me today, I can honestly say that being in Czechoslovakia with my grandfather was the most memorable time in my life. My grandpa would say, “There’s the woods. See you at dark!” He taught me to fish, rock-climb, camp, shoot with a bow and an air rifle. Czechoslovakian summers were my introduction to “the great outdoors” and an era that lives in me that I hand down to my children. I was blessed to have such a wonderful person in my life. I miss him. I will always miss him.
* * *
The funeral and burial took place on Ivanka’s ninth birthday. Needless to say, she didn’t have a party that year.
For days afterward, photos of my family at the burial popped up in international newspapers. Paparazzi were hiding behind every tree at the cemetery. My father wasn’t a celebrity. He was a humble, dignified man and his farewell was supposed to be private and intimate, for close friends and family only. It was yet another violation of our anguish by the media. I was distraught on behalf of my children, who wanted to cry and grieve in peace, and my mother, who was saying good-bye to her love of forty-five years. My father’s death was so sudden, I didn’t have time to tell any of my New York friends about it. I just got on the plane, leaving no word of where I was going. Back in the city, Fashion Week was under way, and my absence was noticed by the press and designers, especially at the dozen shows at the Plaza Hotel (this was before the Bryant Park and Lincoln Center–centric Fashion Weeks). “Where’s Ivana?” asked the fashion press. The paparazzi photos of my entire family in black, weeping at the grave site, gave them their answer.
We flew home a week later to a life of loss. I handled the death and grieving process with the kids by being frank and forward thinking. Don and Ivanka looked to me for cues about how to grieve. I told them that we should mourn and be sad but accept the reality of death. “When it’s your time, it’s your time,” I said. It’s my style not to wallow in the unfairness of untimely death but to feel blessed to be alive. When Jiří died, my pain spurred my escape to the West. When I lost my father, I was reminded of the brevity of life and was inspired to get on with mine, and to make it fabulous for myself and my children. If I had any lingering doubts about ending my marriage, I buried them at my father’s funeral.
The one saving grace of the timing of my father’s death was that he lived long enough to see the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia: by his death, student-led demonstrations in Prague had driven out the Soviet-controlled government. On November 24, 1989, the communist leadership resigned en masse, and a parliamentary republic took shape. Since the transfer of power was peaceful, with not a single shot fired, it was called the Velvet Revolution. After forty-one years of oppression, Czechoslovakia—now the Czech Republic—was free.
A year after that, in March 1992, my divorce became final, and I was free as well.
• • •
It’d been a rough couple of years for the children. They’d been through more in their young lives than many adults will ever face in theirs. But hard times weren’t over for them yet. They would have to withstand another tragedy, one very close to home.
The Friday night of Memorial Day weekend 1993, I was in Tampa at the Home Shopping Network, doing my show. The kids were in Greenwich with Bridget, and the plan was for me to fly up in the morning. Don was home for the long weekend, and I couldn’t wait to see him. We were all excited about being together again.
While filming the show, I’d chat with another host about the products for an hour or so, then the camera would zoom in on her for a few minutes while she talked about the ingredients in the face cream or the fabric in a blouse, giving me a chance to take a quick bathroom break or have a sip of water. On that night, during a break, I quickly called Greenwich, but, weirdly, no one answered. I assumed Bridget had taken the kids out to dinner or they were playing outdoors. Patrick the houseman had already gone home for the night to his family.
Ivanka had gone to bed, but Bridget hadn’t tucked her in yet, which struck Ivanka as strange. Even at thirteen, Ivanka liked it when Bridget came to wish her good night and say a quick prayer before sleep. It was how she sealed the day, and when Bridget didn’t come in, Ivanka got worried. She got out of bed, found Eric and Don watching TV in the living room, and asked them if they’d seen Bridget. The boys volunteered to go looking for her and to send her to Ivanka. She went back to bed, and the boys searched the house.
* * *
ERIC
We were at the Greenwich house and the phone started ringing and ringing. It was around eight p.m. Bridget didn’t want any of us picking up the phone because we were young kids, so she always answered it. But it just kept ringing. After Ivanka asked if we’d seen her, Don and I went downstairs to find her. Bridget was in the basement, unconscious. I was pretty young, but I knew looking at her that it wasn’t good.
* * *
I got off the air finally, and the producers told me that I’d had a few urgent messages from my children. My heart leapt into my throat, and I called them back. Don told me, “Bridget passed out. The ambulance came to take her to the hospital.” He’d also called Patrick, who was there now with the kids. He said the situation was under control, but I could hear in Don’s voice that he was rattled, upset.
I caught my flight and was back home as soon as possible. By the time I landed, Bridget had died of a heart attack, the same thing that killed my father. She was sixty-seven. I told Don how proud I was of him for handling a horrific situation and for being brave and strong for his little sister and brother. Eric was only ten. That weekend was the first time he’d been with his brother in months. Eric stuck to Don like glue.
Ivanka was inconsolable. There was nothing I could say that would bring Bridget back or take away her pain, so I just held her and let her cry in my arms. Over the next few days, I assured her that Bridget had had a good life. She’d devoted herself to caring for children, first with the Kennedy family and then with ours. Bridget never liked me much—she always took two steps back when I entered a room—but she adored the kids, especially Ivanka, and took great satisfaction in running the household with precision and detail. She had nervous hands. I can still picture her walking in the kitchen, wringing those hands: the picture of a woman who had things to take care of.
In time, I gave Ivanka the only advice I could, saying, “What’s done is done. You have to accept it, roll with the ups and downs, and get on with your life.” It might sound unsentimental to some, but falling apart was not an option. You had to dry your tears and go on. The living owe that much to the departed. We had a small service for Bridget’s friends and our family in New York. Donald arranged for her body to be flown to her family in Ireland, where she was laid to rest.
• • •
I continued to live in Trump Tower until 1994, when I found a town house on East Sixty-Fourth Street. It needed a lot of work. No one had lived there in twelve years, and its last incarnation had been as a dentist’s office with lots of small rooms. I hired George Gregorian, a designer I’d worked with at the Plaza who knew my taste well, and we got to work. I opened my Filofax full of contractors and designers I’d worked with in the past and made some calls. They ran a bulldozer through the lobby to gut everything. A job that would ordinarily t
ake five years was finished in one.
I could go on for page after page about the renovations—putting in the staircase, molding, and chandeliers—but suffice it to say, my home reflects my style perfectly. Here’s the briefest description:
The parlor floor includes the entryway, a powder room, and Dorothy’s and the in-house lawyer’s offices.
On the second floor, up the marble staircase or the birdcage elevator, are my French-inspired living room, the white piano room, the dining room with a crystal chandelier, and a galley kitchen (I don’t cook much anymore), with floor-to-ceiling views of my terrace and garden out back.
The third floor is my floor: the leopard sitting room; the master bedroom, with a gold-embossed fireplace and Chinese murals that I had restored by artists referred to me by the Metropolitan Museum of Art; and a pink-marble bathroom.
On the fourth floor is what used to be Ivanka’s room, now a guest room, with a fireplace, a canopy bed, a large bathroom, and a huge closet, as well as Eric’s old room with a bathroom, and my mother’s room.
The fifth floor has two maids’ rooms and my closet, which goes on, and on, and on. I call it Indochine, because by the time you get to the end of it, you might as well be in another continent.
The top floor has a huge gym that used to be Don’s bedroom, a bathroom, and two maids’ rooms. Donatella Versace used to be my across-the-street neighbor. My home gym was on the same level as her dressing room. We used to wave at each other while I was on the treadmill and she was getting ready for her day.
I’ve lived here for twenty-three years and guided my kids through their teenage years here. I’ve lived and loved here. I could make a hefty profit if I sold it, but I’m never leaving this house. They’ll have to carry me out in a box first.
-18-
20/20 HINDSIGHT
In 1991, while Donald and I were still in the throes of negotiating our settlement, I appeared on my friend Barbara Walters’s newsmagazine show 20/20 and talked about the split and its aftermath. Barbara asked me about the day in Aspen when the showgirl accosted me, and other subjects that were still tender. After a full year of keeping a stiff upper lip, not talking to the press about the split, and never showing my private agony to anyone, Barbara Walters made me cry! On national television!
Some friend she is. (I’m joking, of course. I adore and respect her and have valued her friendship for forty years.)
Twenty-six years later, I have perfect 20/20 hindsight about that chaotic time in our lives. My conscience is clear. I was a loyal wife during my marriage to Donald and a great mother during a singularly agonizing time. I’m not angry with Donald anymore. Once our legal battle was over, we settled into our roles as companionable coparents. Basically, I told him what I was going to do, and he agreed with me. The final result of our joint effort turned out pretty well. We raised three magnificent kids, despite what they went through in the early nineties.
They are all at peace with the divorce, too. Ivanka often says that she learned to be optimistic during that horrible time, which was the attitude I relentlessly reinforced by saying, “It’s going to be fine,” over and over again. The media onslaught forced us to close ranks and isolate ourselves. Eric credits that bunker mentality for cementing the sibling bond. Before the split, they got along well. But after, they were a united front, protecting and supporting each other against anyone who’d think to do them harm. Ivanka says that she grew closer to her father after he moved out of the triplex. She visited him more often and called him frequently from school. He always took her calls, no matter what. He often interrupted meetings and put her on speakerphone to say hello to everyone there.
Don eventually forgave his father. The strategy to remove him from the tension physically and emotionally by sending him to boarding school worked. He was thirteen when he left home, which seems very young in hindsight. But it turned out to be the right decision.
* * *
DON
During my five years at the Hill School, a lot of doors opened for me, and I did a lot of growing up.
Moving to rural Pennsylvania also got me out of the city. Even though I was born in New York, it was never my thing. I didn’t like the congestion and the noise. I always wanted to be outside. Still do. Every weekend for the last decade, our family has left New York on Friday afternoon for the country. I’m out of my suit and into Carhartts. We don’t come back until late Sunday night. Spending as much time outdoors as possible is our family’s lifestyle. I appreciate what the city has to offer for my kids, but I also would like to show them another life roaming in the woods on the weekends. Hunting and fishing kept me out of trouble growing up, and I want my kids to have that same opportunity. If you have to wake up at five a.m. to get to the tree stand, you can’t stay up partying.
* * *
As part of the settlement, I had Mar-a-Lago rights for one month each year, but it was too weird to go there. I loved Palm Beach, though, so I bought my own house, called Concha Marina, a gorgeous place designed by Addison Mizner, a famous architect who designed Worth Avenue, the shopping street in town. He actually built Concha Marina for himself in 1924 in the Spanish Moorish style with roof tiles from Cuba. It has a tunnel going from my house, under South Ocean Boulevard, to a private beach. Only four houses in Palm Beach have tunnels like this: mine, Mar-a-Lago, the Kennedy compound, and one other. It isn’t fun after a hurricane, when the tunnel fills with sand and it takes two weeks to dig it out. But on nice days, it’s a good way to get to the beach.
The kids and I snorkeled at the coral reef near the jetty at the end of the property and came upon a huge barracuda, as big as a couch. I remember hearing once that as long as you don’t turn your back on barracudas, they won’t attack you, so we’d make eye contact with him every few seconds. When we swam back to shore, we went backward. At the time, I thought, I lost a husband and gained a gigantic barracuda. It seemed like a good deal.
(Epilogue on the barracuda: He was the Concha Marina mascot for nine years, and then one day, we went down at the start of the season, and he was gone. It felt like the end of an era.)
• • •
After the showgirl got pregnant and had a daughter, Donald married her. The whole world was watching. He couldn’t not wed the mother of his new baby, regardless of whether his heart was really in it. None of the children went to Donald’s Christmas 1993 wedding, and not because I asked them to protest it. It wasn’t my business. We didn’t speak at home about it at all. They issued a statement to the press, saying, “In discussions among ourselves, we decided to stay in Aspen with our mother and grandmother.” I appreciated my children’s company and support.
As for their half sister, Tiffany (Donald got to give that name to a daughter after all), my children are all close with her. When Tiffany was born, I asked Ivanka, then twelve, how she felt about having a new half sister. She said, “This child didn’t do anything wrong to anybody and I’m not going to be mean or nasty to her.” She immediately assumed the role of protective big sister to Tiffany, which she still is today.
Two years ago, I was at Mar-a-Lago with the whole family for Eric’s wedding to Lara. We posed for a family picture after the ceremony. I was standing next to Donald and on his other side was a young woman. I whispered to Donald, “Who’s that?”
He said, “Tiffany.”
I was shocked. The last time I’d seen her, she was a little girl. And now she’s a lovely young woman, and a graduate of Donald, Ivanka, and Don’s alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania. She is a law student and will likely join the Trump Organization to work alongside her half brothers. I wish her well.
Her mother, on the other hand . . .
I’m not saying that if it weren’t for the showgirl, Donald and I would still be together or that my life since our divorce hasn’t been a wonderful adventure full of love, travel, success, and laughter. I’ve had a fabulous life. But that woman knowingly entered into a relationship with my husband, the father of three small
children. She actively participated in humiliating me in the media and indirectly put my kids at risk for months. I went through hell, and then I was expected to be okay with her being around my children? We all have deep scars from that period of our lives, in part due to her actions. The fact that the kids and I came through the entire ordeal stronger is irrelevant.
Recently, she tried to bury the hatchet with me via the Daily Mail in London. They called to ask if I accepted the apology and I said, “Apology not accepted.” This woman broke up my marriage and took away my kids’ father. I don’t care how sorry she is. She told People magazine last year, “If [Ivana is] holding any kind of resentment toward me, I really hope, for her sake, that she can forgive me.” For my sake? She wants my absolution for her sake! I’m doing just fine with my resentment, thank you very much. People interviewed her because she went on Dancing with the Stars. What a disgrace that was. No class! I’ve been asked to be a contestant on the show a hundred times—and offered a mint—but I wouldn’t go on that show, dancing in those tiny dresses with the boobs and butt hanging out.
I’m not opposed to reality TV in general. I’ve appeared on a couple of reality shows and had a lot of fun doing them. But my exploits in the genre aired years ago, long before my ex was running for the highest office in the land. The showgirl appeared on DWTS when (because) her ex-husband was running for president! It was disrespectful to do the show. I never would have embarrassed Donald that way.
• • •
The day of Donald’s inauguration in January 2017, I was invited to sit in the front row on the main platform with my ninety-two-year-old mother. She can walk and climb stairs, but not very fast. With all the people, cars and buses, and equipment everywhere, I thought it’d be easier to put her in a wheelchair to get her around, but that didn’t work out. I couldn’t maneuver the chair through the narrow aisles of the front rows, plus it was freezing cold and crowded, a logistical nightmare. So I made the decision to watch from a spot off the platform where we could make a fast getaway. As soon as it was over, we got out of there and went straight to the airport. I wanted to get my mother safely back to New York.