Though Shaunie has spoken about it on length, and Shaq admitted he didn’t blame his ex for divorcing him, the fact is that Shaquille O’Neal was the first to file for divorce. They reconciled but inevitably Shaunie pulled the plug on it. Over a decade later and married to Keion Henderson, Shaunie Henderson confessed she has one regret about her marriage to Shaq. It was something she never did that Shaq accused her of. But she wishes she did otherwise.

Marriage and Money was the theme of this week’s The GrOOw Zone podcast. And Shaunie handles her finances very differently with Keion than she did while married to Shaq. The Hendersons maintain both joint and separate finances. Shaunie likes that because it enables her to keep a ‘rainy day fund.’

“Because people always say like women, you know like, sneak and do like save for a rainy day. In my previous marriage, I did not do that. I should have, but I did not do that,” she says and somehow the couple find it hilarious. But she says if she knew then what she does now, “I would’ve been saving for a rainy day.”

Shaunie went on to say, “I got accused of it, but I sure didn’t do it, but I should have anyway.” Keion jokes that hopefully she doesn’t have the need for it again but Shaunie’s regret is very real.

After five years of marriage and four kids together, Shaquille O’Neal filed for divorce in Miami from Shaunie in September 2007. “The marriage between the parties is irretrievably broken,” his lawyer’s statement said.

In the divorce filing, Shaunie was accused of being “secretive about her assets … particularly with respect to certain properties owned or titled in either [her] name alone or in other entities.” And Shaq’s attorneys demanded, “correct accounting of all money, funds, stocks, bonds, and other securities (including bearer securities)” acquired during the marriage. As she did then, Shaunie maintains she never hid her finances. In hindsight, she wishes she had saved more.

Divorce from Shaq taught Shaunie a financial lesson

As she revealed in her memoir, Undefeated, Shaunie didn’t have much assets to her and had been out of the workforce since marrying Shaq in 2002. O’Neal would call off the divorce and they’d try to reconcile. Their youngest, Me’Arah, was born during that period.

But Shaunie would file for divorce in 2009. She’d take their five kids and move from Miami to Los Angeles, where her parents lived. She had minimal savings from the allowance Shaq gave, but it wouldn’t be enough to house her and five kids.

Shaunie tells Keion now, “Because of what happened at the end of that relationship, and I was young and five kids and it was just things I should have done smarter.”

She rebuilt after the separation, using all her money to produce Basketball Wives and draw in more producers. When she met Keion, she was a reality star and media mogul with a $35 million net worth. And she’s relieved to be in a position where she has finances to fall back on.