Alexis Ohanian Had The Sweetest Birthday Message For Serena Williams
He called his wife of almost four years “incomparable” and I’m not crying, you’re crying.
Alexis Ohanian isn’t just Serena Williams’ husband — he’s also her biggest fan, whether he’s rooting for her on the court or openly thirsting for her on Twitter. And on Sept. 26, as Williams rang in her 40th birthday, Ohanian shared a sweet, simple Instagram in her honor. “The incomparable @serenawilliams,” he wrote. “Grateful for every minute I get with my amazing wife & Olympia's mama.” Along with the message, he posted a black and white photo of himself gazing at Williams.
Ohanian and Williams first crossed paths at a Rome hotel in May 2015. She recounted the story in a 2017 interview with Vanity Fair: Ohanian, an entrepreneur and a co-founder of Reddit, sat down near Williams at the hotel pool. Her friend, trying to get him to back off, reportedly told him there was a rat nearby. “I’m from Brooklyn. I see rats all the time,” Ohanian said, according to Williams. She was impressed by his attitude, and from there, they got to talking.
A year and a half later, in December 2016, Williams announced her engagement to Ohanian in a poem shared to Reddit. “At the same table we first met by chance / This time he made it not by chance / But by choice,” she wrote. “Down on one knee / He said 4 words / And / r/isaidyes.”
“And you made me the happiest man on the planet,” Ohanian responded.
The couple welcomed their daughter, Olympia, in September 2017, and tied the knot soon after in November 2017. On paper, they might seem like an unexpected match: Ohanian told The New York Times in 2018 that he never even watched tennis before he met Williams. But getting a no-holds-barred look into the competitive sport — and what it takes to be the best of the best — taught him a lot about pressure, hard work, and the beauty of tennis.
“I watched my first match when I met her, and quickly got an appreciation for the sport. It’s not just the physical requirements but the mental requirements. I could not imagine doing my job with millions of people watching,” Ohanian said. “I’ve had this front-row seat over the last three years to greatness. It’s a humbling experience seeing really what high-pressure situations actually look like professionally, seeing just what it takes to actually be that great. It is a work ethic on another level.”
But Ohanian isn’t the only one who’s lucky — Williams has also gushed about the love she has for her husband, and everything she’s learned from him. “Oprah said, ‘Never let anyone dim your light.’ That really stuck with me. Alexis doesn’t dim my light. He doesn’t try to dim my light. He puts me in the light, even if I don’t want to be,” she told Allure in 2019. “He pushes me to further points I never thought about. It always was something that I could see in some relationships — my light would be dimmer. Now I feel like I can shine really bright and still do everything that I want to do.”
Anyone else tearing up?
