Dwyane Wade’s trans daughter has been granted a legal name change after a difficult court battle.
It’s fantastic news for Zaya and the Wade family.
Now, Dwyane Wade was born in Chicago, and spent the majority of his sixteen-year career playing for the Miami Heat in the National Basketball Association (NBA).
Dwyane has a pretty big family…
He has 2 children with his ex-wife, Siohvaughn Funches, he is raising his nephew who is the son of his sister, Deanna, and he has 2 other children from 2 other relationships.
Dwyane spent some quality time with his family for Thanksgiving back in 2019 …
And as any family would do, they were posing for some candid photographs together to mark the festive season.
This photograph was posted to Gabrielle’s Instagram with the caption:
“Grateful… Happy Thanksgiving good people.
“To all the friends and family that have my back and all the friends and family, I’ve never met who show love and support when everyone is looking and when no one is looking…
“All praise, gratitude and thankfulness,” and it shows Dwyane with Zaya, Gabrielle, and their baby Kaavia James Union Wade.
Fans were quick to point out twelve-year-old Zaya’s appearance…
She is pictured wearing false pointy nails and a cropped top, which is literally, not a big deal at all, but people have certainly made it into one.
Some people are clearly forgetting what era we’re living in…
People can dress in whatever they please, regardless of gender.
But Wade decided to address it publically himself.
“I’ve seen some post-thanksgiving hate on social about my family photo.
“Stupidity is apart of this world we live in – so I get it.
“But here’s the thing – I’ve been chosen to lead my family not y’all. So we will continue to be us and support each other with pride, love & a smile,” he wrote on Twitter.
And he replied to a fan saying, “As a parent my only goal is that my kids feel that I see them, love them and support them.”
“Shout out D. Wade for setting the example of a Black father loving and accepting their children as they are. There’d be a lot less trauma in our community if more Black dads were like this,” one fan wrote.
Every parent should allow their children to be who they truly want to be, and Dwyane and his family are completely doing the right thing.
Dwyane has also spoken of how Zaya wants to identify as female and how proud he is as a father of his daughter.
Appearing on Good Morning America…
Dwyane opened up a little bit more about Zaya, but he mentioned the struggle the family has gone through publically due to him being in the middle of creating a documentary about himself.
“I struggled on how much I wanted to talk about in the doc,” Dwyane said.
“I actually didn’t talk about it a lot. But, I knew if I put it in the doc at all, it would be a big conversation.”
“Yes, we understand that our daughter’s 12 years old. We struggled with what people would say about a twelve-year-old making a decision about her life, but we also know our child,” he continued.
“So we sit back and we say. ‘You know what?’
“As parents, it’s our job to sit back and figure out and find the information that we can. And we’ve sat down together as a family.
“We’ve reached out to as many people as we can. We’ve researched as many things as we can to try to help not only our family but other people in this journey and along the way.”
“I watched my son, from day one, become into who she now eventually come into,” he told the All the Smoke podcast.
“And for me… nothing changes in my love. Nothing changes in my responsibilities.”
“So, all I had to do now is get smarter educate myself more. And that’s my job.”
“First of all, you want to talk about strength and courage, my 12-year-old has way more than I have.”
“You can learn something from your kids.”
“We want them to be whoever they feel that they can be in this world. That’s our goal. Understand you can be whoever and you can be whatever.”
“Me and my wife are having conversations about, you know, us noticing that, you know, [Zion] wasn’t on the boy vibe that Zaire was on.”
“And I had to look myself in the mirror and say, ‘What if your son comes home and tell you he’s gay? What are you going to do? How are you going to be? How are you going to act?’ It ain’t about him. He knows who he is. It’s about you. Who are you?”
And this week, the Wade family have had some good news regarding Zaya.
“Good on Dwayne, lovely to see a supportive father. His daughter is beautiful,” wrote one commenter.
“Great dad supporting his child. Awesome!” another agreed.
As Zaya Wade has been granted legal use of her chosen name by a California court.
People has reported that Zaya can now use her preferred name on legal documents.
As well as the correct gender markers.
Dwyane’s ex-wife and Zaya’s mom Siohvaughn Funches had tried to block the motion.
But in the end, her signature was not required for Zaya’s legal name and pronoun change.
On Instagram, Dwayne wrote: “None of us are surprised by Siohvaughn’s attempt to fight Zaya’s identity.
“I’m very disappointed that she continuously [finds] a way of centering herself and her needs without regard to her children.
“All I ever wanted was to have my parenting time uninterrupted, as I knew that it would be a very difficult time for our kids to navigate their new normal.”
Congratulations to Zaya!