Strange Things About Melania Trump Everyone Ignores

Melania Trump, for the most part, remains enigmatic. She prefers to shun the limelight and fly under the radar. Still, details occasionally leak about Melania's closely guarded private life, and it's safe to say some are a little, well, strange.

The list of weird things everyone ignores about Donald Trump is seemingly endless. Donald's strange statements and bizarre social media posts are the stuff of legends, and it seems we will never be able to understand the embarrassing hair and makeup habits that Donald appears to be unable to stop. However, despite plenty of rumors about Melania, her oddities tend to lurk beneath the surface and require digging to unearth. GQ did that in April 2016, heading to her native Slovenia and speaking to her childhood and family friends. The result was an eye-opening profile of the Knavses about which, not surprisingly, Melania was less than thrilled. "My parents are private citizens and should not be subject to [GQ reporter] Ms. Ioffe's unfair scrutiny," she wrote on Facebook. "I am hopeful that the media will begin to cover me fairly and be respectful of my family's privacy."

Many were unsympathetic to Melania's complaint, pointing out that Donald is far from reticent to talk trash and ignore others' privacy. Then, of course, there's FLOTUS' eye-opening memoir, "Melania," which offers some surprising insight into her psyche and day-to-day life. With that in mind, we're checking out some of the strange things about Melania that everyone ignores.

Donald Trump is surrounded by lackeys and cronies, pandering to his ego and every whim. He goes through bromances like cans of hairspray, tossing them aside when they're all used up. Melania Trump, though? Not so much. She's more of a lone wolf. But then, things tend to not work out so well for Melania and her friendships.

Her last known buddy was Stephanie Winston Wolkoff. They were BFFs for 15 years, and she even worked for the Trump administration. However, things took a dramatic nosedive, resulting in Melania's ex-best friend penning a tea-spilling tell-all, "Melania and Me." It turns out that not surprisingly, perhaps, the two fell out over money, something that is clearly close to the entire Trump family's heart. Although, according to Wolkoff, it wasn't just money that Melania drained her of; it was also her spirit and soul, sucking her dry like an emotional vampire. "My relationship with Melania bankrupted me. Not just financially, but emotionally, psychologically, physically — she bankrupted me to the core," Wolkoff told The Times in January 2021.

It appears Melania won't be crying into her Cornflakes over the lost friendship, though. According to People, she couldn't care less about personal relationships; she's laser-focused on one person and one person only. And, spoiler alert! It's not Donald. "Barron has always been a first priority in [Melania's] life," a source told the magazine in March 2023. "She has always put him first. She is a good mother."

Nobody can doubt Melania Trump's dedication to her only child, Barron Trump. He's clearly the apple of her eye, and they are remarkably close, seemingly attached at the hip, in fact. However, there's something a little weird about Melania and Barron's relationship. It's one thing to be close to your mom, but most teens like to forge their own path and avoid being at their mommy's side 24/7.

Barron appears to be an exception to the rule. When Donald Trump first took office, Melania and Barron didn't move into the White House right away. Instead, they remained in New York while he finished his school term. That's understandable given Barron's age at the time — although Donald's other kids managed to attend boarding schools alone. Donald Trump Jr. even credits it with making him the down-to-earth regular Joe he is today, sympathetic to and in tune with the poor and needy.

Sadly, Barron may struggle to be as empathetic and switched on as his older brother. He remains tied to his mom's apron strings, and Melania continues to choose Barron over Donald despite her looming First Lady demands. When he's at college, poor Barron won't be engaging in any frat boy high jinks, playing beer pong, and making out like a bandit like other regular degenerate teens. Instead, he'll be home with his mom, sitting by the fireplace together studying "The Art of The Deal" or thumbing the pages of "The MAGA Inauguration Bible" — probably.

Melania Trump's relationship with Donald Trump is also more than a little weird. On the rare occasions they're seen together in public, their interactions are icier than a fudge McFlurry, leading to speculation about what's really going on with the Trumps' marriage. We'll likely never know the truth, but the public has been afforded a peek behind the curtain now and then.

"Melania never makes a doodie?" Howard Stern once asked Donald. "I've never seen it; it's amazing," he replied. "I've never experienced that before." In November 2015, Melania told People that "the key" to a happy marriage is separate bathrooms. Taking it a leap forward, she also insists on having separate bedrooms, somewhat unusual in the world of Washington. "[It's] the first time since the Kennedy White House that a presidential couple had maintained separate rooms," Michael Wolff noted in his book "Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House."

Taking it yet further, Kate Bennett claimed in her book "Free Melania" that she also insisted on separate floors. According to the author, Donald stayed in the White House master suite while Melania hunkered down in her own private two-room sanctuary on the floor below, with not one but two private bathrooms, allowing her to doodie away to her heart's content.

Melania Trump is exceedingly close to her father. So close, in fact, that she married a doppelgänger. Donald Trump looks and behaves eerily like Viktor Knavs, albeit a two-year-younger, straw-haired, orange-skinned, slightly taller version of him.

Melania happily acknowledged their similarities in her April 2016 interview with GQ. "They're both hardworking. They're both very smart and very capable," she said. "They grew up in totally different environments, but they have the same values, they have the same tradition. I myself am similar to my husband. Do you understand what I mean? So is my dad; he is a family man, he has tradition, he was hardworking. So is my husband."

Little is known about Melania's love life before Donald came along and swept her off her feet. However, according to a childhood friend from Ljubljana, who wished to remain anonymous, her relationship with The Donald was a no-brainer. "It's about all that power and protection," one of Melania's old friends from Ljubljana told GQ. "I think she needed a strong man, a father figure." Knavs' old neighbor, Tomaž Jeraj, also weighed in. "Trump reminds me of Viktor," he said. "He's a salesman. He has business in his veins."

Considering how family-focused Melania Trump is and how tight the Trumps are, it's weird that she has a secret half-brother whom she has never seen or publicly acknowledged. Denis Cigelnjak is the son of Melania's dad, Viktor Knavs, and a woman he dated before marrying Melania's mom, Amalija Knavs. When Cigelnjak was born, Viktor denied paternity. But a test proved otherwise, and he was forced to pay child support until Cigelnjak turned 18. Viktor has never spoken to or spent any time with him, though.

"Periodically, Denis would hear stories about his father, but he said he was afraid to initiate contact and disturb the Knavs family," Ioffe wrote in GQ. "Now he feels it's too late. He didn't seek attention and says he wants nothing from his father or the Trumps." She said that although Cigelnjak has always remained in the shadows and has no intention of acting otherwise, he would like the opportunity to meet his half-sisters, Melania and Ines Knauss.

Sadly for Cigelnjak, there's little hope of that happening. "When I asked Melania about [having a half-brother] over the phone, she denied that it was true," Ioffe wrote. "Later, after I'd sent her documents from the Slovenian court, she wrote to me claiming she hadn't understood what I'd asked, explaining, 'I've known about this for years.' She added: 'My father is a private individual. Please respect his privacy.'"