The social media mogul, reality star and DJ, who turned 42 on Friday, shared on her podcast “This is Paris” Wednesday that she named her son Phoenix and that no one – not even her mother Kathy Hilton or sister Nicky Hilton Rothschild – knew about him until he was a week old.
Last month, Hilton shocked fans when she announced on Instagram that she and her husband, venture capitalist Carter Reum, who also turned 42 this month, had welcomed their first child together.
“For now we’ve just been keeping everything really private,” Hilton said on her podcast. “Not even my mom or my sister or my best friends – no one knew literally until he was over a week old, so it was really nice just to have that with Carter be our own journey together because I just feel that my life has been so public, and I’ve never really had anything just be mine.”
Hilton added that she decided to keep her baby news under wraps even from close relatives because of the challenges of keeping a secret while living in the public eye.
“If you tell one person, then they tell someone, and then all of a sudden it’s in TMZ or Page Six,” she said. “So Carter and I literally made a pact together that we would not tell anyone.”
She then read an excerpt from her upcoming book “Paris: The Memoir,” due for release March 2, in which she explains the meaning behind the name Phoenix.
“If all goes well, by the time you read this, Carter and I will have a baby boy,” Hilton read. “We plan to name him Phoenix, a name that I decided on years ago when I was searching cities, countries and states on a map looking for something to go with Paris and London.”
She continued: “More important, it’s the bird that flames out and then rises from the ashes to fly again. I want my son to grow up knowing that disaster and triumph go around and come around throughout our lives and that this should give us great hope for the future.”
Hilton opened up about her life as a mom in a statement to People in January.
“It’s always been my dream to be a mother and I’m so happy that Carter and I found each other,” she said. “We are so excited to start our family together and our hearts are exploding with love for our baby boy.”