Michael Strahan's Custody Battle over His Twins That Lasted for Years

Co-parenting can be complicated for couples not in a relationship, and celebs are not exempt. Michael Strahan is one celeb who knows this all too well with four children from two different women.

Michael Strahan and Wanda Hutchins got married in 1992. This was Michael's first marriage, producing two children: Michael Junior and Tanita. The couple got divorced in 1996 and co-parented their children.

It was not long until Michael met and married Jean Muggli in 1999. The pair were married for a short while before they welcomed twin daughters, Isabella and Sophia, in 2004. However, this relationship didn't work out either.

One year after Isabella and Sophia were born, Michael and Jean separated. As soon as Michael filed for divorce, Jean began making accusations against him, saying he had twice been violent towards her.

The claims were taken very seriously and brought to court. However, just as quickly as the statements were made, they were retracted for reasons unknown to the public.

Michael denied the rumors and made it clear that he ensured never to be physically or psychologically harmful toward his family, especially his wife. Soon after, Jean said that Michael had never been violent toward her.

Because of what he went through during his marriages and divorces from both his wives, Michael spoke out about how the divorce affected him. He shared his thoughts on the divorces he experienced, saying:

"Personally, getting divorced is probably one of the toughest things I've ever gone through, but it was also a learning experience, and I learned a lot about myself."

Jean and Michael's divorce was finalized in 2006, with Jean receiving $15.3 million and $18,000 a month in child support. However, once Michael retired from the NFL in 2008, the child support payments were reduced to $13,000 monthly.

Michael Kept a Strong Bond with His Kids

Although neither of his marriages worked out, Michael ensured that his relationships with his kids remained intact. He mentioned that he didn't think the responsibility for raising children should fall solely on his ex-wives' shoulders.

Michael wanted to be a responsible father, although he was no longer in a relationship with his children's mothers, which led him to make the kids the center of his world. He said:

"I think a lot of times when you split, people assume that the mother is supposed to take responsibility for the kids. But from day one, it was very important for me to be active, to be a part of their life."

Most recently, one of his twin daughters, Isabella, 19, revealed on "Good Morning America" while sitting next to him that she was diagnosed with medulloblastoma, a malignant brain tumor, in October 2023. Michael expressed that he is proud of his child for being brave enough to share her diagnosis.

Michael and Jean’s Custody Battle

While Michael and Jean settled the custody battle over Isabella and Sophia in 2009, ten years later, the former NFL star had to go back to court again to plead his case in terms of the battle. The pair had renewed custody issues to focus on.

Jean went back to court to seek back support, claiming that Michael had not fulfilled all of the obligations set out in their 2009 custody agreement. However, Michael's team revealed that she simply wanted to increase monthly payments.

While Michael is no longer an NFL player, he has a lucrative career as the host of "Good Morning America" and two other ABC shows. This allows Michael to pay child support for his children.

However, in 2019, Michael asked for someone to mediate the conflict between himself and Jean and said he would pay 90% of the bill for this professional. It was only after he felt Jean was abusing the arrangement that he asked that they split the bill.

What brought the couple to conflict more often than not was the fact that Michael felt that Jean was being uncooperative when it came to their twins. He claimed that she was not adhering to visitation rights or their plan for where their girls would attend school.

Michael has also brought other allegations against Jean, saying she is physically and emotionally abusive to their children. He also claimed that his daughters have been missing their sporting obligations because of their mother. However, this was not the most severe allegation he made against his ex-wife.

Another allegation that Michael brought against Jean to indicate that she was not fit to parent their daughters was that the girls had been missing court-ordered therapy sessions because of their mother.

This led Michael to want to change their custody arrangement entirely and change what he would owe Jean monthly in child support. He pursued this new arrangement with urgency.

The former NFL player has said that he wants his daughters to move to New York, where they will live with him. He said that Jean could have the same visitation rights he had but nothing more.

It was supposed to allow Michael to stop paying child support payments to Jean, as his daughters would be in his care more often than they would be in Jean's. Co-parenting their children was no longer an option.

While Michael could effectively co-parent with Wanda Hutchins, it was much more challenging to do so with Jean. The court documents detailed the arrangement, saying that co-parenting for them was "time-consuming, full of conflict, and unrealistic."

The case that Michael made against Jean was eventually dismissed. However, it has been said that the case was only dismissed because she complied with everything that he required from her.

The court battle eventually ended in April 2023 and was closed in North Carolina. Jean and the two girls moved into an Upper West Side apartment where they could live until the girls completed their schooling careers in New York. In this way, they could also be closer to Michael more often. However, the pair still do not agree on everything.

Before the case was resolved, Jean's sources said that Michael refused to pay the child support he owed, while Michael's sources claimed that he was willing to pay the fees, but she would not accept that. The exes reportedly agreed on shared custody.