Cristiano Ronaldo, who revealed in April with wife Georgina Rodríguez that their newborn son had died, spoke publicly about the heartbreaking loss for the first time this week, saying it was “the worst moment” of his life.
“Probably the worst moment that I passed through my life, since my father died,” Ronaldo, the Portuguese soccer star, said on “Piers Morgan Uncensored” Wednesday. “When you have a kid you expect that everything will be normal. And then you have that problem, it’s hard.”
Ronaldo and Rodríguez share a daughter Alana, 5, and lost the twin they had named Ángel. They had to explain the death to their children, who also include Ronaldo’s 12-year-old son Cristiano Jr., and 5-year-old twins Eva and Mateo.
Rodríguez “arrived home and the kids start to say, ‘Where’s the other baby, where’s the other baby?’” Ronaldo told Morgan. “After one week I say, ‘Let’s be upfront, and let’s be honest with the kids, let’s say that, Ángel, which is his name, he go to the heaven.’”
Ronaldo told Morgan that he and his 12-year-old son cried together. He also talked about struggling with the conflicting feelings of joy over his newborn daughter’s birth and grief over her twin’s death.
“I never felt happy and sad in the same moment. I never felt — it’s hard to explain,” Ronaldo told Morgan. “You don’t know if you cry or you don’t know if you smile, because it’s something you don’t know how to react.”
The soccer legend, who recently returned to Manchester United after yearslong stints at Real Madrid and Juventus F.C., told Morgan the baby’s ashes remain in Ronaldo’s home chapel — right beside his father’s.
“It’s something that I want to hold for the rest of my life and not throw into the ocean, into the sea,” Ronaldo said.
On the subject of soccer, Ronaldo told Morgan he felt “betrayed” by Manchester United manager Erik Ten Hag. Ten Hag reprimanded Ronaldo twice this year for leaving a game early and refusing to be substituted during another, per ESPN.