Highlighted Photograph courtesy of Joseph Baena/Instagram/Arnold Schwarzenegger
The actor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s kid has talked about his “vivid” memories of the moment his father’s identity was made public.
Born in 1997, Joseph Baena grew up in a “humble home” in Bakersfield, California, alongside his elder brothers and mother, Mildred Baena, who was born in Guatemala.
Throughout Baena’s early years, Mildred concealed the truth about his father from him until 2011, when the striking similarity between Joseph and Schwarzenegger—for whom Mildred had worked as a housekeeper during his marriage to Maria Shriver—made it impossible to ignore.
When word leaked out about Schwarzenegger’s son, the media went crazy.
Baena told Men’s Health that his mother had pulled him out of eighth grade because “everyone [was] finding out” about him.
When his father’s identity was made public, Baena was just 13 years old. He recalled, saying, “Your body is changing; your mind is changing.” And just now, I can see how my life has changed.
Baena and his mother hid out with relatives in Texas, where they knew they “had each other’s backs,” in an attempt to stay out of the spotlight.
He said: ‘She was really the only person I had, and I was really the only person that she had. No one knew, and everyone wanted the details.’
Arnold Schwarzenegger (Alamy)
Joining the swim team and realising he was ‘born for the water’ helped Baena get his bearings after realising he couldn’t determine who his buddies were in high school. He noted that ‘the trust aspect got incredibly challenging’.
Former bodybuilder and actor Baena developed a close bond with his father through exercise and was able to ‘acquire a bodybuilding attitude’ while attending college.
He said that, although knowing he might have helped, he was “too proud” to ask the actor for assistance. He remembered his father having given him the book The Encyclopaedia of Modern Bodybuilding to help him with his training. He decided to ‘find things out’ on his own, so he went “straight to the book.”
Even though he made “insane progress” with his physical appearance while in college, he now understands that fitness is “not just about fitness all the time,” as he also values “having fun at work,” friends, and family.
Although Baena acknowledges that it “took a little bit for [him] to realise” that he was not obligated to follow in his father’s footsteps, he now finds fulfilment in his profession and aspires to become a “real estate agent with lots of experience and an award.”