Just months after announcing her abrupt retirement from professional tennis, citing her desire to focus on her upcoming wedding to American basketballer Brian Lynch, Kim Clijsters has just made another surprising announcement: pregnancy with her first child.
Although it wasn’t the 23-year-old herself who made the breaking news, but rather her father, Lei, who spilled the beans on his blog for Belgian sports website, sport.be.
“If all goes well, Kim will be a mom next year and me, a grandfather,” the former soccer star wrote. And while he is game for babysitting and changing diapers he says, he will leave the breastfeeding to his daughter.
Clijsters has yet to make an official announcement herself to the media or on her website.
While the Belgian’s initial intention was to make 2007 her final year on the WTA Tour, she progressively accelerated her departure from the game, namely due to injuries, but it appears that Clijsters may have had a more pressing reason to cut her season short as her pregnancy comes just two months after her retirement, a month short of the customary waiting time to make such an announcement.
Clijsters family spokesman Jeroen Jespers, however, maintains that the couple have always wanted to have children and that Clijsters became pregnant after she announced her retirement in May, Sports Illustrated reported. So perhaps she didn’t want to waste anytime on starting her family, making good on her promise to tennis fans.
The impending nuptials are set for this Saturday in Clijsters’ hometown of Bree, although there are reports circulating in Belgium that the couple may outsmart journalists by tying the knot on Thursday to escape excessive media coverage.
Clijsters now joins Lindsay Davenport, who gave birth to her first child, son Jagger, last month, in the Mommy Club of retired players.