Serena Williams and fiancé Alexis Ohanian have welcomed their first child — a girl! — a source close to the family confirmed to Us Weekly on Friday afternoon.
The 35-year-old welcomed the bundle of joy at St. Mary’s Medical Center in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Wednesday.
The birth came just as sister Venus Williams was taking the court at the U.S. Open in New York.
“Obviously I am super excited and words can’t describe it,” she said ahead of the match.
As previously reported, the tennis great accidentally revealed her pregnancy by uploading a photo of herself to Snapchat with the caption “20 weeks.”
Her representatives were forced to confirm the exciting news just hours after the tennis star posted (and quickly deleted) an image of her growing baby bump.
“Well, actually it was an accident,” she told Gayle King at Tuesday’s 2017 Ted Talks conference. “I was on vacation just taking some time for myself and I have this thing where I’ve been checking my status and taking pictures every week to see how far along I’m going.”
She added: “I didn’t tell a lot of people to be quite honest and I’d been saving it. On social media, you press the wrong button and… Thirty minutes later I missed four calls and I’m like, ‘That’s weird.’ But it was a good moment. I was only going to wait five or six more days [to share].”
The pregnancy announcement was met with utter joy and no small amount of amazement as quick-thinking fans worked out that the 23-time Grand Slam winner was approximately eight weeks pregnant during the Australian Open—which she won—in January.
But the tennis star, who discovered she was expecting just two days before the tournament, recently told Gayle King it wasn’t an “easy” experience.
“You hear all these stories about people when they’re pregnant: They get sick, they get really tired, really stressed out,” she said at the 2017 Ted Talks conference.. I had to really take all that energy and put it in a paper bag, so to say, and throw it away. Pregnant or not, no one knew and I was supposed to win that tournament. Every time I play, I’m expected to win. If I don’t win, it’s actually much bigger news.”
Congratulations again to the happy couple!
