Donald Trump’s first two marriages, children and everything you need to know

Donald Trump’s marriages have made headlines over the years as his personal life has been marred by numerous controversies.

The former US president has been married three times.

Trump first married Ivana Trump in 1977, at the time he was building his real estate empire. The couple became parents to three children, Donald Jr., Ivanka and Eric.

In her memoir, Raising Trump, Ivana wrote about how she first met Trump when the former US president approached her at a dinner party.

“We had a polite chat, no funny stuff at all. He sensed correctly that flirting wouldn’t work with me and acted like a gentleman,” Ivana wrote.

The pair also became business associates. Their marriage lasted over a decade until Ivana learned of Trump’s affair with model Marla Maples.

She learned of the affair when she ran into the Maples during their annual family vacation in Aspen.

“This young blonde woman approached out of the blue and said ‘I’m Marla and I love your husband. Do you?'” Ivana wrote. “I said ‘get lost. I love my husband.’ It was distasteful, but I was in shock.”

She filed for divorce in March 1990.

Trump married Maples after his split with Ivana.

“Every step of the way I was praying, ‘God, please be in this. Please be in this. I don’t want to be part of breaking up anything that has a chance,'” Maples shared on the ABC News podcast Journeys of Faith with Paula Faris.

She added: “Do I wish more than anything that we could have had this relationship after the divorce papers were signed? Absolutely. With all my heart… But it didn’t work out that way. Everything had to happen the way it did for to bring us to where we are now.”

The couple welcomed their first child, Tiffany, in 1993.

Their marriage lasted three years and the two separated in May 1997.

(With input from agencies)