Elon Musk and children - family facts

Elon and Grimes' choice of baby names

Elon and Grimes have kept their unique style of baby names for their second baby, daughter Exa Dark Sideræl, with its unusual inclusion of the Latin dipthong 'æ' again, which Grimes told Vanity Fair has an elven feel. They've also decided to call her 'Y' for short, complementing her brother's name 'X'.

Grimes explained her inspiration for Y's name came from a number of different sources. Exa refers to the computing term ExaFLOPS - the performance of a super-computer. Dark channels dark matter, a form of matter that's thought to account for approximately 85% of matter in the universe and Sideræl, which Grimes pronounces “sigh-deer-ee-el” points to deep space time rather than earth time.

When the couple announced the name of their first child, "X Æ A-12 Musk", they caused a media storm, especially about the pronounciation of the name.

Elon explained to podcast host Joe Rogan, "First of all, my partner is the one that, actually, mostly, came up with the name. Yeah, she's great at names."

When asked how to pronounce his baby's name, the Tesla CEO said, "I mean it's just X, the letter X. And then, the Æ is, like, pronounced 'Ash'... and then, A-12, A-12 is my contribution."

Howver, on Grimes' Instagram page, one fan claimed that Grimes pronounced it differently, saying the artist had replied to another comment explaining you say the Æ part as A.I. as in the letters A and I.

Pic: Elon with baby X Æ A-Xii, May 2020 @elonmusk/Twitter

Later that month, Grimes announced on Instagram that she and Elon had changed part of their baby's name. Rather than X Æ A-12, their son's name is now X Æ A-Xii. She then responded to an Instagram comment asking if the change was due to a Californian law that states that a baby's name must only contain letters from the English alphabet. (Although this doesn't explain how Æ is still acceptable). However, Grimes seemed to quash that rumour, instead replying, “Roman numerals. Looks better tbh.”

According to reports, following the name change, their baby's first name on the birth certificate is "X", middle name is "X Æ A-Xii" and surname is "Musk".

Who is Elon Musk?

Elon Musk is a tech CEO – best known as the co-founder of PayPal, Tesla, Inc, and Neualink, as well as the founder of SpaceX. He’s worth a reported $19.8 billion, as of October 2018.

He was born in Pretoria, South Africa, and currently lives in the US. He’s also a citizen of Canada.

He’s a fan of Twitter, not always successfully. He was fined a reported $40 million for one tweet which ‘mislead investors’, and was filmed smoking marijuana during a live interview, which saw Tesla shares crash as a result. In the lockdown he tweeted “Tesla stock price is too high, imo" promptly causing $14 billion to be knocked off the share value.

How did Elon meet his first wife and children’s mother, Justine Musk?

Justine Wilson met Elon at university in Ontario, Canada. Elon pursued her for dates, and after the pair graduated, met up again. Justine described the early days of their relationship in an essay for Marie Claire US, writing:

“After graduation, he'd moved to Silicon Valley. I soon flew out for the first of many visits. One night, over dinner, he asked me how many kids I wanted to have. "One or 2," I said immediately, "although if I could afford nannies, I'd like to have 4."

"That's the difference between you and me," he said. "I just assume that there will be nannies." He made a rocking motion with his arms and said, happily, "Baby."

Elon and Justine married in 2000.

Elon Musk’s son passes away of SIDS

In 2002, Justine gave birth to a baby boy, named Nevada Alexander Musk.

Tragically, the infant passed away later in the same year. At 10 weeks old, Nevada died of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome).

Justine detailed the experience of her grief in the same Marie Claire piece: “We moved to Los Angeles and had our first child, a boy named Nevada Alexander.

“The same week that Elon's net worth went to well over $100 million [following the sale of PayPal], Nevada went down for a nap, placed on his back as always, and stopped breathing.

"He was 10 weeks old, the age when male infants are most susceptible to SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome).

“By the time the paramedics resuscitated him, he had been deprived of oxygen for so long that he was brain-dead. He spent 3 days on life support in a hospital in Orange County before we made the decision to take him off it.

“I held him in my arms when he died."

We can only imagine the impact of this sort of loss on both mum and dad. What we do know is that the couple made the decision to try and get pregnant again.

Justine gives birth to twins AND then triplets

“I buried my feelings, coping with Nevada's death by making my first visit to an IVF clinic less than 2 months later. Elon and I planned to get pregnant again as swiftly as possible,” Justine wrote in her essay.

"Within the next 5 years, I gave birth to twins, then triplets, and I sold 3 novels to Penguin and Simon & Schuster.”

The twins were born in 2004, and the triplets in 2006.

Justine and Elon divorced in 2008 – quite a difficult divorce, with both parties writing pieces sharing their side of the story. Hers in her Marie Claire article (among others), and Elon’s is on Business Insider.

Elon and Justine’s family life with Griffin, Kai, Saxon, Damian and Xavier

We don’t know too much about Elon’s life as a dad, to be honest. He notoriously doesn't like talking about his personal life, telling Business Insider he'd "rather stick a fork in my hand".

We do know that Justine and Elon split custody of their 5 kids. Justine wrote in Marie Claire that all their contact about the children happens via Elon’s assistant.

As of 2010, it was thought that she lived in the couples’ former family home, in Bel Air, with the children.

Elon confirmed this in his Business Insider essay – also calling his kids his true love: “Custody of our 5 children is split evenly. Almost all of my non-work waking hours are spent with my boys, and they are the love of my life.”

Naturally, Elon’s hectic work schedule doesn’t leave much time for a personal life, however a book by Ashlee Vance – which features interviews with Elon – reveals that his sons often visit his factories in California, and that they also embark on an annual camping trip together.

“I’m a pretty good dad,” Musk said in an interview for the book, according to QZ. “I have the kids for slightly more than half the week and spend a fair bit of time with them. I also take them with me when I go out of town.”

He also added in his Business Insider piece: “I almost never take vacations, apart from kid-related travel.”

He’s also said that he’s raising 5 boys “with great difficulty” in a previous live video interview.

Finally, it does appear all 5 boys go to school together. Fortune magazine reported they all attend a non-traditional school invented and funded by Elon, called Ad Astra.

Elon Musk and Talulah Riley

Elon married British actress Talulah Riley in 2010. They divorced in 2012, but remarried in 2013, only to divorce again in 2016.

Talulah shared some tidbits about her life as a stepmum and Elon as a dad while speaking to Ashlee Vance for his book.

Vance wrote, "According to Riley, Elon is kind of cheeky and funny. He is very loving. He is devoted to his children. He tries to come home early for family dinners with me and the kids and maybe play some computer games with the boys.

"On the weekends, we’re travelling. The kids are good travellers. There were billions of nannies before. There was even a nanny manager. Things are a bit more normal now. We try and do stuff just as a family when we can.

“We have the kids 4 days a week. I like to say that I am the disciplinarian. I want them to have the sense of an ordinary life, but they live a very odd life.

"They go to the rocket factory and are like, ‘Oh no, not again.’ It’s not cool if your dad does it. They’re used to it.”

After their split, Elon then dated actress Amber Heard.

Elon Musk and Grimes

Elon's latest baby is with Claire Boucher, best known to many as the indie musician Grimes.

In January 2020 the singer posted an image of herself with a pregnancy bump on her Instagram account.

Although the couple didn't make an official statement about her pregnancy, in May 2020 Elon announced the birth of his newborn son on Twitter.

Image: Getty Images

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