Michael Jordan and Juanita Vanoy.Photo:Kevin Mazur/WireImage

Michael Jordan had just begun his prolific NBA career when he met his first wife Juanita Vanoy.

When the pair first crossed paths at a restaurant in 1985, Jordan was only one season into his career with the Chicago Bulls. Over the next few years, their relationship quickly progressed, and by 1988, Vanoy was pregnant with their first child. While there was nearly a paternity suit concerning Jordan’s involvement in the baby’s life, the pair eventually decided to tie the knot in September 1989, almost a year after their son Jeffrey was born.

Jordan and Vanoy said “I do” in a middle-of-the-night ceremony at the Little White Chapel in Las Vegas. The couple then went on to welcome two more children: their second son Marcus was born in 1990 and their daughter Jasmine arrived in 1992. As Jordan rose to fame, Vanoy stuck by his side — and became the “head of the household” while the basketball star was busy on the court.

“[She’s] very nice, very demanding. Very caring, good mother. Learning to cook. I love her to death though. I mean she’s got a sense of humor just by hanging around,” Jordan said during a 1993 interview on “Eye to Eye with Connie Chung.”

Over the next decade, the family lived in a Chicago mansion while Jordan continued his basketball career and eventually retired. Then, shortly after Jordan’s decision to unretire from the sport in 2002, Vanoy filed for divorce. While the couple temporarily reconciled, their divorce was imminent, and in 2006, they split for good.

So who is Michael Jordan’s ex-wife? Here’s everything to know about Juanita Vanoy.

Vanoy was born and raised in Chicago

Michael Jordan and Juanita Vanoy in 1996.Fitzroy Barrett/Shutterstock

Vanoy was born on June 13, 1959, in Chicago, Ill. She was raised on the city’s South Side, as the fifth of six girls in her family. As a teenager, she attended Fenger Academy High School where she played on the girls’ basketball team.

“I’ve always loved basketball. I mean, even in my high school days I was on the girls basketball team,” Vanoy shared during an interview in 1991.

After graduating high school, Vanoy worked on getting her associate’s degree from a local community college. While studying, she worked for various organizations, including the American Bar Association and the real estate investment management firm, Heitman Financial Services. When she met Jordan for the first time, she was working as a loan officer at a Chicago bank.

In the years that followed, Vanoy also worked as a newspaper cultural columnist, a magazine feature writer and even obtained her real estate license.

She worked various jobs before meeting Jordan

Juanita Vanoy at a celebration of the Chicago Bulls’ 6th N.B.A. Championship in 1998.Raymond Boyd/Getty

Jordan met Vanoy for the first time in March 1985 when the pair were introduced by mutual friends at a Bennigan’s restaurant in Chicago. Earlier in the evening, Vanoy had attended a Bulls basketball game where she watched Jordan from the crowd — and had no idea he would one day become her husband.

Vanoy and Jordan first met at a restaurant after a Chicago Bulls game

Michael Jordan and wife Juanita at benefit for the All Kids Foundation in 1999.Richard Corkery/NY Daily News Archive/Getty

Vanoy and Jordan had their ups and downs before tying the knot. After dating for several years, Jordan popped the question on New Year’s Eve in 1987 and shortly after, the couple became pregnant with their first child. Talks of their marriage stalled though and for some time, Vanoy considered filing a paternity suit.

“Juanita felt this was something she needed to do. [Jordan] was obviously not being responsive to her needs or the needs of the unborn child. It’s not something that if you ignore it, it will go away,” her attorney Michael Minton told The Chicago Tribune.

While the couple’s legal teams hashed things out, Vanoy gave birth to their son in November 1988. Then, 10 months later, the couple married in a 3:30 a.m. ceremony at the Little White Chapel in Las Vegas. At the time, Jordan said that he was concerned that his friends would oppose the marriage, so it was best if they did it privately.

“I told Juanita I was afraid that when the preacher asked if there was anyone who objected to the marriage, too many hands would go up. I didn’t trust my buddies because they saw it as the start of another stage of my life, and they knew that would limit them,” Jordan told PEOPLE.

He continued, “So I said, ‘If you want to do it, let’s do it now.’ We’d both had a couple of drinks, we’d been gambling and losing — this was like our bachelor night. That’s how we got married at 3:30 a.m. in a wedding chapel. I did say, ‘Five years from now, maybe we can do a church wedding.’ And that’s what Juanita’s banking on. She says she was robbed of those precious moments.”

Michael Jordan and his wife Juanita at the opening of his restaurant in 1993.Steve Kagan/Getty

From the early days of their relationship, Jordan admitted that he was very different from Vanoy. Back in 1993, Jordan shared that he had more of a “Southern attitude” about life, while Vanoy was more of a city girl. He also explained that Vanoy wanted more nights out with him but he had “lost the desire to go out” and had to “force” himself because he believed she deserved his attention.

“I’m more down-home Southern, Juanita’s more city-like. When my good friends come up from North Carolina, I don’t mind having them stay over and sleep on the floor — that’s a Southern attitude. But Juanita believes that these are grown men now. She’ll say, ‘Make sure they get a hotel,’ ” Jordan told PEOPLE.

Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images

Over the course of their relationship, Vanoy and Jordan welcomed three children. Their son Jeffrey was born in 1988 before the couple tied the knot. In December 1990, they welcomed their second son Marcus, followed by their daughter Jasmine in December 1992.

As their children grew up, the couple’s three children stayed out of the spotlight. Looking back, Jasmine says it was a decision that was made primarily by her mother.

“My dad always said, ‘You go out and do what you want, if you want to have that life I support you.’ My mom was more about, ‘I’m going to raise you how I think you should be and once you become an adult you decide what you want to do.’ We were all raised in Chicago, our family would come over every weekend, and my mom made us understand where we came from, and that this life was a blessing and not to take it for granted,” Jasmine told InStyle.

In January 2002, Vanoy filed for divorce after 12 years of marriage. The decision came shortly after Jordan decided to unretire in order to play for the NBA’s Washington Wizards. In the paperwork, Vanoy requested permanent custody of their children, the title to their Chicago mansion and an equitable share of their marital assets. Meanwhile, Jordan said that their efforts to save the marriage had failed and future ones “would be impractical and not in the best interests of the family.”

In the days following the news, Jordan briefly spoke to the press at basketball practice, telling reporters, “When you have personal issues, sometimes work is a great avenue to deal with it and move on. Things will work out in the long run.”

Things did end up working out for the couple, as just a month later, they announced that they were trying to reconcile and Vanoy withdrew her petition.

Michael Jordan and his wife Juanita during a press conference.

JOHN ZICH/AFP/Getty

Following their initial split in 2002, Jordan and Vanoy decided to stay together. The pair remained married for several years, but in 2006, they filed for divorce once again. In a statement, their lawyers shared that the split was amicable.

“Michael and Juanita Jordan mutually and amicably decided to end their 17-year marriage. A judgment for dissolution of their marriage was entered today. There will be no further statements,” their lawyers told PEOPLE.

In the wake of their split, Vancoy received one of the biggest celebrity divorce settlements in sports history. Vancoy received a $168 million payout — although Jordan was granted ownership of their Chicago mansion.

In the years that followed Vanoy and Jordan’s divorce, she focused on raising her children. While she says she had dreams of opening her own business, her kids took priority at the time.

“I thought I’d open my own business. But it was important for me to remain in my kids’ lives as much as possible, even through college. And that required a lot of time,” she told Chicago Business in 2013.

Now that her children are adults, Vanoy has finally gotten the chance to open her own business. She now manages a luxury online resale boutique called Juanita World. As a “self-proclaimed shopaholic,” Vanoy sells designer clothing, handbags, shoes, belts and jewelry — including pieces from her own collection.

In 2022, Vanoy also served as a co-producer on the Broadway production of Some Like It Hot.

Michael Jordan victorious with wife Juanita and trophy after game vs Los Angeles Lakers in 1991.

Richard Mackson/Sports Illustrated/Getty

When Jordan’s documentary The Last Dance was released in 2020, many fans noticed that Vanoy was completely absent from the film — despite being a large part of Jordan’s career. The couple’s daughter Jasmine was later asked about the situation and shared that her mother wasn’t concerned about not being included.

“At the end of the day, if you’d ask my mom, she lived it. There’s no need to go down memory lane and bring up everything that has already happened when the proof is in the pudding. She was at the championship. She was at the retirement ceremony. We saw her in her glory … so no, I don’t think there’s a need to rehash and go through it all. She already lived it,” she said during a Facebook Live chat with Essence.