The late Ivana Trump seemingly had it all, but even the rich and famous aren't immune
to heartbreak.
In her 73 years, Ivana went through a lot.
What were some of her lowest points, and how did she persevere?
Keep watching for a look back at the Trump matriarch's dramatic life story.
Ivana Trump, born Ivana Zelnickova on February 20, 1949, was raised in the small Czechoslovakian
town of Zlín.
Her mother was a telephone operator, and her father was an electrical engineer.
Ivana's hometown lacked the extravagance that would satisfy a material girl like the future
Mrs. Trump, so she took the earliest opportunity to escape the hand-sewn clothes and lines
for food rations.
Athletes in the country were allowed to travel abroad, and Ivana had trained as a skier.
As part of her junior national ski team, she was able to visit Italy and Austria.
Those trips left their mark — Ivana fell in love with the West.
"I could see that there was a better life in the West."
In an interview with Newsweek, Ivana's mother, Marie, said that her daughter was ambitious
and keen on leaving Czechoslovakia.
However, in order to visit her parents in the future, Ivana needed to find a way to
leave legally, so she married a ski instructor friend in order to obtain an Austrian passport.
With a legitimate license to leave, Ivana was able to settle in Canada and, later, in
the United States.
In her memoir "Raising Trump," she admitted that her first marriage wasn't real and her
husband was aware of it.
The union lasted just two years before being dissolved.
Ivana Trump made some very revealing comments in court documents during her 1990 divorce
from Donald Trump.
She called him verbally abusive and demeaning and said his treatment of her was "cruel and inhuman."
"She became an executive, not a wife."
Before they even considered divorce, Donald placed a clause in their prenuptial agreement
that would require Ivana to turn over all marital gifts if they separated, according
to the New York Daily News.
Even more alarming were Ivana's allegations during a divorce deposition.
According to "Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump," Donald was angry at Ivana
for a botched scalp reduction surgery he had done by her plastic surgeon.
He allegedly pulled at her hair, ripping it off from her scalp, and proceeded to sexually
assault her.
She told close friends afterward that he raped her.
Donald denied the incident and the surgery, and in 2015, his lawyer questioned whether
a person could rape their spouse within marriage.
When "Lost Tycoon" was printed in 1993, Ivana confirmed that she "felt violated" but said
she did not mean for it to be interpreted criminally.
She walked back the comments even further in 2015 when the deposition quotes were printed
in the Daily Beast, saying the article was baseless and the quotes came amid a bitter
divorce battle.
Ivana emphasized her recent relationship with Donald Trump, which was amicable, and she
wished him well on his presidential campaign.
Ivana Trump told ABC News in 2017 that she wanted full credit for raising Ivanka, Eric,
and Donald Trump Jr.
In an interview with "The Ray D'Arcy Show," Ivana said that Donald Trump never changed
a diaper.
"Was Donald the type of dad who changed nappies?"
"No way!"
“No way, no."
She described him as an uninvolved father who would never push a stroller or take his
kids to the park.
He was so absorbed in his work that he couldn't be bothered to drop off his kids at school.
In fact, the Trump children would travel from their penthouse suite in the Trump Tower to
the 28th floor where Trump worked to say goodbye in the morning.
He also reportedly had trouble communicating with them as children but was more engaged
once they were adults.
Despite all this, Ivana still considered him a loving father.
Donald basically confirmed all this when interviewed on the "Opie and Anthony" show in 2005.
He acknowledged that some men agree to, in his words, "act like the wife" when it comes
to parenting — which he said included changing diapers — but that sort of arrangement wasn't
for him, and he wouldn't have had kids with a woman who expected that from him.
He even scoffed at the idea of walking his kids in Central Park during a Howard Stern interview.
Ivana Trump learned that her marriage was over when she was approached in public by
Donald Trump's mistress, Marla Maples.
Maples told Ivana that she was in love with Donald, and Ivana told her to "get lost,"
according to her memoir "Raising Trump."
Ivana was in shock and perhaps unprepared for the resulting tabloid whirlwind that documented
their separation.
It all began during the 1989 Christmas holiday in Aspen, where the Trumps were staying for vacation.
Donald had Maples on hand in the same town as his wife, without Ivana's knowledge.
Witnesses recalled seeing Donald walking with his arm around a blond who wasn't his wife.
All three even attended the same party at one point.
After Ivana was confronted by Maples, people saw Ivana and Donald arguing while they were skiing.
"Did you see warning signs?"
"I didn't.
I really didn't."
Ivana maintained a tense relationship with Maples for the rest of her life.
In her memoir, Ivana refused to forgive her, cheekily saying she was comfortable with her resentment.
Maples didn't feel the same way.
In 2016, Maples told People that the animosity between them made her feel "sad."
She said she never meant to hurt Ivana through her affair with Trump and enjoyed the close
relationship she maintained with Donald's three children.
She wanted her daughter, Tiffany, to be more than half-siblings to Ivana's own.
Ivana Trump's divorce experience was so bad that she played Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive"
during depositions to keep her spirits up, according to her memoir.
Although the couple separated in 1989, the divorce wasn't finalized until 1992.
Ivana was given an annual allowance, but Donald tried to undermine it by hiring private detectives
to follow her for evidence that she was being supported by a boyfriend, according to the Telegraph.
Donald's lawyer also insulted Ivana's abilities to speak English, thereby undercutting the
legitimacy of her prenup.
But Ivana wasn't one to mess with; she alleged that Donald tried to undervalue his estate
in one of their prenuptial agreements.
And although Donald tried to avoid child support as much as possible, he was eventually made
to pay $300,000 a year, per New York Daily News.
In the end, Ivana walked away with $14 million plus a mansion in Connecticut.
But Ivana still had to deal with the public humiliation.
Publicity of their divorce attracted global attention, which her attorney said was painful
for her to experience, per the New York Times.
If losing a 12-year marriage wasn't enough, Ivana also lost her father, Miloš, to a heart
attack, just one year after discovering her husband's affair.
Although Ivana Trump's first marriage was technically fake, her other marriages didn't
last either.
She married three more times, and they all ended in divorce.
In 1995, she married again after Donald Trump, this time to a wealthy Italian businessman
named Riccardo Mazzucchelli.
They divorced two years later.
Ivana took a stab at married life again when she tied the knot with Rossano Rubicondi in 2008.
Their wedding was unique since it took place at her ex's estate, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida.
The ceremony was even officiated by Donald Trump's sister, Judge Maryanne Trump Barry.
But the relationship was controversial among her family.
At the wedding, Donald Jr. joked in a speech that he would kill Rubicondi if he hurt his
mother, according to Town & Country.
And when they divorced, Rubicondi lashed out at Ivana's children, saying they were rude
to him and only cared about money, per an interview with Page Six.
Their marriage lasted less than a year, and Ivana cited geographic reasons for their split;
she wanted to live in New York, while Rubicondi wanted to live in Miami and Milan.
Donald Trump himself said he didn't approve of the marriage and said it was "unfortunate"
it occurred in the first place.
He didn't think Rubicondi — who dressed up as Donald for Halloween in 2004 — was
a good match, per the New York Post.
Rubicondi passed away in 2021, from melanoma, at the age of 49.
His death took a toll on Ivana, who had an on-again, off-again relationship with Rubicondi
after the divorce.
Her friend, Nikki Haskell, told "Good Day New York'' that Ivana wasn't her usual self
in the aftermath.
She died less than a year after he did.
Ivana Trump wasn't interested in kinship with Donald's other wives.
In fact, she refused to say Marla Maples' name and referred to her as "the showgirl"
in her memoir.
Her relationship with his current wife, Melania Trump, was similarly fraught.
"No, I speak directly to Mr. President, and I don't get involved with the ex-wives and
his private life."
Ivana caused a bit of a rift when she referred to herself as the First Lady during the first
year of Donald's presidency, in an interview with ABC News.
I don't want to cause any kind of jealousy or something like that because I'm basically
first Trump wife.
I'm first lady, OK?"
Melania responded angrily in a rare statement and called Ivana's comments "attention-seeking
and self-serving."
She inferred that Ivana was only concerned with selling books.
Ivana was critical of Melania's abilities to be First Lady from the start.
Speaking to the New York Daily News, Ivana criticized Melania's reserve and silence around
politics and referred to her as Donald's "third wife."
Daughter Ivanka Trump told her mother that Melania was offended by the article, and Ivana
texted Melania to reconcile.
In her book, Ivana said she was rooting for Melania as First Lady and believed she would
do the job well.
Unable to resist herself, however, she said she couldn't imagine Melania doing the gardening
work that Michelle Obama did.
Ivana had become a bit of a recluse in the final years of her life.
She was afraid of getting infected with COVID-19 and refused to leave her townhouse, where
she lived alone.
She took the virus more seriously than anyone in her friend group, a close friend told the
New York Post.
But her reluctance to leave her home was partly due to mobility issues, caused by pain in her hip.
Friend Zach Erdem told the New York Post that Trump was forced to stay home due to physical
pain and couldn't visit one of her favorite New York City restaurants that Erdem owned.
The origins of her mobility problems stemmed from her past as a professional skier, as
well as a fall she took when she tripped over someone's purse at a restaurant.
Her emotional health was impacted, as well, by the death of her ex-husband Rossano.
Although she denied suffering from depression, she admitted to a friend that she was sad,
according to the New York Post.
Initial reports of Ivana Trump's death indicated that she died due to natural causes, since
the New York Fire Department said it responded to a report of an individual suffering a cardiac arrest.
But the New York City Medical Examiner later revealed that Ivana died of "blunt impact
injuries" to her torso as a result of falling down the stairs.
Her death was ruled an accident.
Ivana's personal aide and a cleaning lady tried to get into contact with their boss to no avail.
They called a maintenance worker to get the door open, and he found Ivana's body next
to a cup of spilled coffee, according to the New York Post.
Ivana's tragic and fatal accident came after friends voiced concerns about her staircase.
Friend Nikki Haskell told the New York Post that her staircase was "treacherous," and
she feared that Ivana would one day fall.
Haskell refused to live at the home because of the steepness of the staircase.
Another visitor to the Manhattan townhouse said the home had not been renovated, and
the carpet on the stairs was worn.
If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available.
Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline
at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).