Melinda Gates Has Undergone A Stunning Transformation

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Melinda French Gates is one of the most powerful women in the world. As the founder of Pivotal Ventures and a billionaire in her own right, French Gates has been on a quest to change the lives of women and girls across the globe. But her own life didn't always seem like it would be quite so grand. The mother of three grew up in a typical middle-class family. And while she had fostered big career ambitions from an early age, French Gates never imagined that she would ever see her net worth hit the ten-figure range. 

Nevertheless, when French Gates married tech mogul Bill Gates, she entered a realm of wealth that spanned well beyond her wildest dreams. She focused on philanthropy and co-founded the Gates Foundation to raise money for some of the world's poorest people. During her time at the organization, French Gates even spearheaded global vaccination programs to reduce child mortality rates. 

While these accomplishments were definitely something to be proud of, French Gates  eventually realized that she could do more to change the world — only if she left her husband. Indeed, Bill was among the prominent names in the Epstein files, shocking Microsoft users everywhere. His ex-wife was disgusted, making no secret of her feelings toward the late sex trafficker. Before long, French Gates changed her wealth pledge to exclude her ex's non-profit. Instead, she decided to fund a non-profit by herself and change the world on her own terms.

These days, Melinda French Gates is known as one of the wealthiest women in the world, but that was not always the case. Growing up, she was your typical middle-class girl. Her father, Ray French, was an engineer, and her mother, Elaine French, was a stay-at-home mom who didn't get the chance to pursue a university degree. During her childhood, French Gates never questioned why her dad had more professional opportunities than her mom. In her 2025 memoir, "The Next Day," she wrote, "For all I knew, that was how every family operated. The TV shows I watched as a young girl — shows like 'Little House on the Prairie' and 'Leave It to Beaver' — all reinforced this model."

But just because the French family's division of labor was typical in the 1960s does not mean that Ray and Elaine wanted the same thing for their daughter. Both of French Gates' parents had big dreams for their little girl — dreams that they were willing to do anything to support. In the same memoir, French Gates explained, "My parents had long recognized my own ambitions and were intentional about supporting them. My mother told me constantly that I could be anyone I wanted to be." Elaine encouraged French Gates not to play a passive role in her own life. "Set your own agenda or someone else will set it for you," she told her daughter, inspiring French Gates to be assertive.

The love and support that Melinda French Gates received from her parents ultimately inspired her to enroll in the computer programming undergraduate program at Duke University. For the young French Gates, this decision was huge — especially because it involved moving from her native Texas all the way across the country to North Carolina. Reflecting on this experience in a graduation speech that she prepared for Duke's class of 2013, French Gates recalled (via Gates Foundation): "In August 1982, I left my home in Dallas, Texas, to come here to Durham. To mark this rite of passage, my parents gave me a terrific present: the cutting-edge Olympus B12 portable typewriter, with a carrying case included."

Interestingly, though, French Gates would not need to use her typewriter for long. During her time at school, computers were the hot new thing — although the equipment of the day didn't work well compared to our 21st-century laptops. In the same graduation speech, French Gates recalled how challenging it was to learn how to code on the computers of the '80s. "We had to do our programming in the middle of the night, usually in the creepy basement of the old biological science building," she revealed. "We'd set up contests — who programmed the fastest or made the fewest mistakes — kind of like a prehistoric hack-a-thon." While it wasn't always easy to be part of this new generation of programmers, French Gates was excited about the challenge.

After completing her undergraduate degree at Duke University, Melinda French Gates earned her MBA at the same institution. She then pursued a career in tech. French Gates started working for Microsoft and eventually bumped into Bill Gates at a conference in New York. In a 2016 fireside chat with Robin Roberts, which was later shared by Salesforce, French Gates reflected on that fateful event. "I came in late," she revealed. "There were two open seats, and I took the second-to-last open seat. And, then about 15 minutes later, Bill came in and sat in the last open seat. And, so, that's when we first met. I could sense that he was a bit interested."

Eventually, Gates and French Gates started dating, but their romance was complicated from the start. In her book, "The Next Day," French Gates set the record straight about her relationship with Gates. "We were one of those on-again, off-again couples," she wrote. Throughout those early days of their relationship, the duo would frequently break up and then get back together, relying on the support of their closest friends to get them through the rough patches. Despite these scientifically proven relationship red flags, French Gates and Gates got married on January 1, 1994. Their extravagant wedding was held at the Manele Bay Hotel on the Hawaiian island of Lanai, where they said their vows in front of 130 people. 

Right after getting engaged to Microsoft founder Bill Gates, Melinda French Gates joined her new fiancé on a journey to East Africa. The trip was eye-opening for the soon-to-be wife of a billionaire, as it was her first time witnessing the day-to-day realities of global inequality. "Our time in East Africa was my first real encounter with extreme poverty. It was both eye-opening and heartbreaking," French Gates wrote in an essay for AARP. "I have vivid memories of watching women walking down the street, babies on their backs, and wondering what their lives were like."

With these questions buzzing in her head, French Gates decided to have a chat with her groom. She proposed dedicating their Microsoft earnings to the people of this region, and Gates readily agreed. "We'd already decided to give away most of the resources from Microsoft, but weren't sure how. Now we had a sense of purpose — and urgency," she recalled in the same piece. This sense of resolution eventually led to the creation of the Gates Foundation, which has spent over $8 billion to bring vaccines, healthcare, and educational opportunities to underdeveloped regions across the globe. While the foundation's reach spans beyond East Africa to include the rest of the continent, as well as parts of Asia and Latin America, it was undoubtedly that initial engagement trip that got the ball rolling.

Outside of her work in the Gates Foundation, Melinda French Gates had another goal — motherhood. According to her memoir, French Gates dreamed of having children from an early age. "I'd always known that I wanted to be a mother — and that I wanted to be an excellent mother like my own," she wrote. Guided by her passion for childrearing, French Gates decided that she wanted to become a full-time parent. In practice, this meant walking away from her position at Microsoft after she became pregnant with her firstborn, Jennifer Gates. "I planned my exit so that I would be retired by the time Jenn was born," she penned before later adding, "I already knew that I was going to love being a mother, and I felt lucky to be in a position to devote myself to it full-time."

When Jenn was born in 1996, French Gates got to spend time with her baby without having to worry about making rent or paying bills. As a socially conscious philanthropist, French Gates was bothered by how few women have been able to share that experience. "I think it's a great injustice in our society that not every new parent gets the chance to step away from work after a baby's birth," she declared in the same book. She went on to opine that parental leave "should be a right, not a privilege." 

Melinda French Gates loved being a parent so much that she welcomed a son, Rory Gates, in 1999 and a daughter, Phoebe Gates, in 2002. However, the joy of her second pregnancy was diminished by the heartbreaking news that her friend, John Neilson, had been diagnosed with cancer — and the prognosis was not good. By the time that French Gates had reached the last weeks of her pregnancy, Neilson had entered hospice. Reflecting on this confusing time in her book, "The Next Day," French Gates shared, "Any day now, my son would be entering the world. Any day now, my best friend would be leaving it. There was anticipation and dread, joy and grief."

Following the birth of her son, French Gates took the newborn to see her dying friend. She told Neilson that she had named the baby Rory John Gates in his honor, and the trio snapped a final photo together. In an interview with People, French Gates said that she was proud of the book chapter about Neilson's death — even though "it's hard even now" for her to think about that time. "I was like, 'Will John feel like I wrote it in a true, authentic voice?' Yes," she concluded. "And of course, I showed his wife, and she didn't ask me to change anything." Ultimately, French Gates felt that Neilson's death changed her life forever, as she lost one of the people who had grown up alongside her.

Rumors of infidelity plagued Melinda French Gates and Bill Gates throughout their marriage, with allegations of a workplace affair dating back to Microsoft's early days. In 2019, an employee filed a report claiming that Gates had "sought to initiate an intimate relationship" with a female colleague in 2000, according to a Microsoft rep who spoke with the BBC in 2021. During the investigation, which never reached a conclusion, Gates decided to step down from his position at the tech giant and eventually came out to say that he hadn't always kept his marriage vows. "Bill has publicly acknowledged that he wasn't always faithful to me," French Gates wrote in "The Next Day."

Making matters worse, Gates had maintained a friendship with convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, despite the concerns of his wife. Appearing on "CBS Mornings," French Gates said that she'd met Epstein. "I regretted it from the second I stepped in the door. He was abhorrent. He was evil personified. I had nightmares about it afterwards," she revealed. When asked if Epstein contributed to the disintegration of her marriage, French Gates said that "many things" contributed to her ultimate decision to pursue a divorce. That being said, she also admitted, "I did not like that he'd had meetings with Jeffrey Epstein," listing her husband's friendship with the convict as a factor in her choice to step away.

In 2021, Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates finalized their legal separation. Although there was a lot of speculation about what really led to the Gates' divorce, French Gates has been clear about her motives. She simply could not remain married to Gates without feeling like she was compromising her own values. "I learned to have a trusting relationship, which is what I wanted in marriage; both partners have to be honest with one another," French Gates told Stephen Colbert on "The Late Show" in 2025. "And, if you can't, you can't have intimacy, and you can't have trust. And, so, in the end, I had to go."

Although reaching a divorce settlement was not easy, French Gates ultimately retained an estimated $25 billion, according to Forbes. (That money has since grown to $30 billion.) Beyond the financial separation between French Gates and Gates, there exists an emotional one. In 2024, after 24 years, French Gates decided to leave her role at the Gates Foundation, distancing herself from her ex. Through intense negotiations, she secured even more funding from Gates — money that will benefit families around the world. "Under the terms of my agreement with Bill, in leaving the foundation, I will have an additional $12.5 billion to commit to my work on behalf of women and families," French Gates shared in a statement on Instagram.

If Melinda French Gates distanced herself from Bill Gates following their divorce, the move was essential for the preservation of her own reputation. In 2026, documents released by the U.S. Department of Justice indicated that Gates may have had a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein beyond a business one. In two emails dating back to 2013, Epstein alleged that Gates had been involved with "Russian girls," per the BBC. He also claimed that Gates had contracted a sexually transmitted disease, which he tried to hide from French Gates. The tech mogul has denied these claims.

Speaking on NPR's "Wild Card" podcast about these allegations, French Gates did not confirm or deny that her ex-husband had carried on with Russian women. She also did not set the record straight about a possible sexually transmitted disease. "Whatever questions remain there of what — I can't even begin to know all of it — those questions are for those people and for even my ex-husband, she said. "They need to answer to those things, not me." French Gates also explained that the information "brings back memories of some very, very painful times in [her] marriage." Ultimately, it seems, there are the things that nobody knows about the Gateses, and the things nobody knows about their marriage.

Melinda French Gates' philanthropic work has extended far beyond what she achieved with the Gates Foundation. Back in 2015, she founded Pivotal Ventures, an organization that seeks to improve the lives of women and youths across the globe. Following her exit from the Gates Foundation, French Gates decided to work at Pivotal full-time. She told Marie Claire: "As I kept seeing women's rights rolled back, I started to think differently about the last chapter of my career. I am simply not willing to accept that my granddaughters could grow up with less freedom than I did."

For French Gates, her work at Pivotal is not just a culmination of her goals; it is also a calling. "My intention is to help even the playing field," she said in the interview. "I am going to spend the rest of my life trying to get more power in women's and girls' hands." According to Pivotal's website, French Gates has already pledged $2 billion to the organization, and that number is only expected to grow. So far, Pivotal has developed programs to help women get involved in the tech world, expand their professional opportunities, and find support for their mental health.