Speaker 1: Hey, fam I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the
Speaker 1: Red Table Pop podcast, all your favorite episodes from the
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Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts. Bobby Brown with an urgent warning for everyone.
Speaker 1: It's my duty to remind people that he could kill you.
Speaker 1: I know that you've just lost a son. Did you
Speaker 1: know that he was struggling? I feel guilty about that
Speaker 1: when you look in that mirror. What would you say
Speaker 1: to Whitney? Now? Were there no warning signs with Bobby Christina?
Speaker 1: Thank God that I had someone like my wife to
Speaker 1: wait for me. This is going to be a deep
Speaker 1: one today. I just wanted to take the time to
Speaker 1: talk to our Table Talk family. We are bringing out
Speaker 1: Bobby Brown. His been a part of many of our
Speaker 1: lives who are very very long time and we've actually
Speaker 1: witnessed a lot of the traumas that he's had to confront.
Speaker 1: I want to approach his journey with compassion and with love.
Speaker 1: This table is about healing. So anyone who feels like
Speaker 1: you're in a position that you can judge this might
Speaker 1: not be the conversation for you. Today he see Grammy winner.
Speaker 1: Bobby Brown started R and B group New Addition when
Speaker 1: he was just twelve, the bad boy of the genre.
Speaker 1: He's been labeled the villain for the last thirty years,
Speaker 1: and many blamed him for the downfall of his ex wife,
Speaker 1: beloved Icon Whitney Houston. But there's so much more to
Speaker 1: the story. His life has been plagued by trauma, an
Speaker 1: unspeakable edgedy, the loss of his daughter Bobby Christina, and
Speaker 1: death of his son Bobby Jr. Just five months ago.
Speaker 1: The cause of death for Bobby Brown Jr. The combined
Speaker 1: effects of alcohol, cocaine and fentnel. Damn. Yeah, hey, hello,
Speaker 1: it's been a long time. What are you doing. You
Speaker 1: smell so good. Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, wellomele Y, thanks for
Speaker 1: having me, Bobby, thanks for coming. The reason why we
Speaker 1: wanted to bring you to the table today is to
Speaker 1: talk about generational trauma. I believe that you have a
Speaker 1: testimony for people that can be so healing, because Bobby,
Speaker 1: you've been through so much. When we can look at
Speaker 1: certain cycles that are happening within our own lives and
Speaker 1: you can learn from other people's journeys, I know that
Speaker 1: you've just lost a son. Yeah, yeah, Bobby. Losing him
Speaker 1: was very, very unexpected, just like losing my daughter. We
Speaker 1: were just in the studio two nights before. It was
Speaker 1: something that hit me really, really hard. He was a musician,
Speaker 1: played piano, played drums. He was a great writer. He
Speaker 1: was a teacher and learner. He learned from everybody that
Speaker 1: he was around, and he taught just as much as
Speaker 1: he learned. Um. He was someone that I just I
Speaker 1: admired him as a young man and how he grew up.
Speaker 1: He just wanted to be a part of something that
Speaker 1: was going to be special. His smile, when he smiled,
Speaker 1: he just brightened up a room. Did you know that
Speaker 1: he was struggling in regards to drugs. I did not
Speaker 1: know that. And and and let me get it make
Speaker 1: it clear. He wasn't that he wasn't a user. He
Speaker 1: would experiment with different things. It wasn't like he was
Speaker 1: dependent on drugs. Like when I was in my situation,
Speaker 1: I depended. He was a young man that tried the
Speaker 1: wrong stuff and it took him out of here. On
Speaker 1: the morning of November, Bobby Junior's girlfriend found him unresponsive
Speaker 1: on his bedroom floor in Colt nine one one. He
Speaker 1: was pronounced dead on the scene. Bobby Brown has a
Speaker 1: critical warning. Black market drugs are being secretly laced with
Speaker 1: fentanyl and killing at an alarming rate. Accidental overdoses are
Speaker 1: happening by the thousands. Just three milligrams can be fatal
Speaker 1: a hospital great painkiller used after surgery under doctor's orders only.
Speaker 1: Fentinol has become a favorite of street dealers because it's
Speaker 1: cheap to make and highly addictive. Most have no idea
Speaker 1: they are taking an opioid that can kill within twenty minutes.
Speaker 1: Fentanol can be fifty times more potent than heroin and
Speaker 1: has been named the deadliest drug in America. Wow, in
Speaker 1: these kids today, they're trying different things. They're trying to
Speaker 1: get as high as they can possibly get. That's a
Speaker 1: real problem because they don't know what these drugs are
Speaker 1: being mixed with these days. Drugs is a is a game,
Speaker 1: you know, And there's been so many deaths, specifically with
Speaker 1: fent it's just skyrocketed. My generation is kind of spiraling.
Speaker 1: There's murderers out there right now that that are creating
Speaker 1: these these synthetic drugs that that are killing these kids.
Speaker 1: It's like the committing murder. Yeah, absolutely, it's homicide. You
Speaker 1: guys don't have any idea who the people were yet.
Speaker 1: The investigation is still going on. I'm keeping my fingers
Speaker 1: and toes cross that find the people and get these
Speaker 1: these drugs off the street. But my babies are gone.
Speaker 1: I've been through my time, and I know that my
Speaker 1: time played a part in my son feeling he can
Speaker 1: test something, you know, and I feel guilty about that
Speaker 1: when you think about just having a child. I don't
Speaker 1: even know when I came to this realization and understanding.
Speaker 1: I'm sure that it was sometime after I got clean.
Speaker 1: Every single thing that you do, everything that you do,
Speaker 1: every decision that you make, is going to affect that
Speaker 1: human life, and I absolutely we did not consider that
Speaker 1: at seventeen years old. Definitely, Bobby Christina and Bobby Jr.
Speaker 1: They were close in age? Were they were? They close
Speaker 1: in Bobby Christina, the daughter Bobby and Whitney, lovingly named
Speaker 1: after her father, was found face down in the bathtub
Speaker 1: with drugs in her system, tragic circumstances that eerily married
Speaker 1: her mother's death three years earlier. Bobby Christina never regained
Speaker 1: consciousness and passed six months later. She was only twenty two.
Speaker 1: When you think about Bobby Christina and you think about
Speaker 1: her journey in regards to what she might have experienced
Speaker 1: or internalized in the context of a generational trauma, her
Speaker 1: drug addiction and losing her life because her her life
Speaker 1: mir yours and Whitney's, she saw firsthand things that we're wrong.
Speaker 1: And Bobby Christina was super intelligent, bright um not wanting
Speaker 1: to be like her mom or myself. I just think
Speaker 1: about the generational healing process. There's so much personal healing
Speaker 1: that needs to happen, breaking those cycles and moving into
Speaker 1: healthier cycle right absolutely, and it confuses it confused things,
Speaker 1: and she unfortunately was stuck in a relationship, an abusive
Speaker 1: relationship with a man that with a boy, I should
Speaker 1: say that basically controlled her to the point where her
Speaker 1: life was taking When Bobby Christina was eight years old,
Speaker 1: her mother took in a friend's son, a twelve year
Speaker 1: old boy named Nick Gordon. Bobby Christina and Nick grew
Speaker 1: up together. After Whitney stap they started dating and moved
Speaker 1: into a suburban Atlanta townhouse with two other roommates. The
Speaker 1: couple was eventually engaged. It was a toxic relationship. Nick
Speaker 1: kept multiple run ins with the law, and on the
Speaker 1: night Bobby Christina was found face down in the bathtub,
Speaker 1: one of the roommates testified she witnessed Nick kicking Bobby Christina,
Speaker 1: at one point knocking out our tooth. In a judgele
Speaker 1: Nick was legally responsible for Bobby Christina's death. Less than
Speaker 1: four years later, Nick Gordon, the former boyfriend of Whitney
Speaker 1: Houston's daughter Bobby Christina Brown, is dead. Nick died of
Speaker 1: a heroin overdose. So you believe that there was foul
Speaker 1: playing Bobby Christina's got it? Okay? Like that maybe he
Speaker 1: drugged her? Wow? Okay? He was the only one there
Speaker 1: with both uh situations with my ex wife and with
Speaker 1: my daughter, and they both died the same way, So
Speaker 1: that he killed Whitney as well. I believe. So got it?
Speaker 1: Got it? Got it? Do you think that he provided
Speaker 1: Bobby Christina and Whitney with the drugs? How do you
Speaker 1: think that he's culpable? Yeah? I think this is my
Speaker 1: opinion of of of who I think this young man was,
Speaker 1: um being around my daughter and being around my ex wife.
Speaker 1: I think he was more so a provider of you
Speaker 1: know party. Did you ever have a chance to confront
Speaker 1: that young man. Okay, no, I didn't. In fact, before
Speaker 1: his death, I was in rehab at the time when
Speaker 1: he passed. I had planned on once I left rehab
Speaker 1: two to approach the young man, just to find out
Speaker 1: how my daughter was in the last days. But I
Speaker 1: know I never got a chance to, you know, find
Speaker 1: out from him or talk to him. Were there no
Speaker 1: warning signs that there was some domestic violence that was
Speaker 1: happening with Bobby Christina, Not for me. I wasn't told
Speaker 1: about it. Other people might have saw it, that that
Speaker 1: were around her um, but I I didn't see it,
Speaker 1: and she didn't tell me anything. How did you find out?
Speaker 1: I found out after her passing? That was the hard part.
Speaker 1: I don't know why I didn't see it. But we
Speaker 1: hadn't been spending as much time together after her mother's
Speaker 1: death as we should have as a father and given
Speaker 1: me your um point of view around Bobby Christina's death,
Speaker 1: how do you grab more with that? Lots of prayer,
Speaker 1: lots of prayer, of these thoughts that go through your head.
Speaker 1: But the three four months before her passing, we had
Speaker 1: become closer and closer. I know she had plane ticket
Speaker 1: and everything ready to come stay with me. It was
Speaker 1: just um matter of two days before. She would have
Speaker 1: been on the flight, two days before this all happened.
Speaker 1: If I could just get those two days back, you know,
Speaker 1: she's still be here because I would have found out
Speaker 1: what was going on to do something about it. It
Speaker 1: was rough, and it still is rough. I think about
Speaker 1: it every day. I'm filled with um how don't want
Speaker 1: to say it like it's it's pushed out. I'm keeping
Speaker 1: it away from me as much as possible because I
Speaker 1: couldn't do nothing then, and I can't do anything. It
Speaker 1: just doesn't make sense to hold on. We really beat
Speaker 1: ourselves up. It's like self punishment. It's one of the
Speaker 1: biggest parts of the healing process is that we do
Speaker 1: the best that we can, all right, and recognizing your powerlessness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you can sit in question and question questions. In my
Speaker 1: own journey and my own therapy sessions and even going
Speaker 1: through the steps, you know, trying to figure out the
Speaker 1: why of everything, that's the hard part. It's really hard.
Speaker 1: And sometimes I just couldn't always get to the answer,
Speaker 1: Like I can't always get to the answer. And I
Speaker 1: realized that at the end of the day, it's really
Speaker 1: not that important. It is what it is, man, what
Speaker 1: are you going to do about it? Starting Baby Christina's
Speaker 1: Serenity House for us was essential to the process because
Speaker 1: domestic violence it's like a hush hush thing. People need
Speaker 1: to start speaking up if they see someone in a
Speaker 1: situation like that, help them. All it takes is one
Speaker 1: phone call, find the counseling that they need. Um, and
Speaker 1: we try to help as much as possible. You in
Speaker 1: Whitney had an abuse of volatile relationship. The violence that
Speaker 1: we we occurred was using you know, that's violence in itself. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: that's abuse. We abuse drugs and alcohol. We fought hard verbally, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and we loved even harder. Yeah. And the volatility that
Speaker 1: we witnessed on on particularly on the show that you
Speaker 1: Guys had, Yeah, and the idea that if you're dealing
Speaker 1: with addiction, that's it. Verbally it gets really really messy. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Our love was strong for each other. We showed it
Speaker 1: to each other time and time again, over and over.
Speaker 1: We just got caught up in that had nothing to
Speaker 1: do with how we felt about each other. The love
Speaker 1: was always there. Um. We tried so hard. We struggled
Speaker 1: really hard as a couple to get cleaned for ourselves.
Speaker 1: I got clean a long time before she did. We
Speaker 1: were already divorced. She was a strong woman. She was
Speaker 1: fighting really hard to save her own life. I had
Speaker 1: strength enough for myself at that time, being an addict,
Speaker 1: I had to save myself in order to be able
Speaker 1: to save someone else. I had to save myself first. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately we grew apart while I was trying to find myself.
Speaker 1: In regards to the stories that we hear, one of
Speaker 1: the biggest is that you were the person that introduced
Speaker 1: narcotics to her. All those years everybody thought it was you.
Speaker 1: After years of intense speculation that Bobby brought drugs into
Speaker 1: Whitney's life. In our brother Michael confessed, So here's the
Speaker 1: big question, did you introduce her to drugs? Yeah? For
Speaker 1: so many years people about Bobby Brown was the one
Speaker 1: who introduced to drugs, but she was already doing drugs
Speaker 1: by the time she met Bobby Brown. In this book,
Speaker 1: Bobby revealed that the first time he saw Whitney and
Speaker 1: just cocaine, who was on their wedding day. I don't
Speaker 1: look at point in the finger. You know, we get
Speaker 1: it together, you know, and it's not that I started
Speaker 1: her or she started me. Drugs is Drugs is a
Speaker 1: bad thing. You get caught up in it. Once you're
Speaker 1: caught up in it, you know there's no stopping there
Speaker 1: is because mostually you are attracted to that energy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that energy, it starts to take over the relationship.
Speaker 1: It starts to take over who you are as people.
Speaker 1: And that's what happened between us. When you look in
Speaker 1: that mirror that reflects back, what do you think that
Speaker 1: Bobby would say to Whitney? Now, she's definitely missed um
Speaker 1: in my heart and you know, in my spirit she
Speaker 1: was my friend. She was the mother of my child.
Speaker 1: One of the greatest entertainers that I've ever met, greatest
Speaker 1: saying as the drawing of the greatest voices the world
Speaker 1: has ever been witness too. For sure, I this one
Speaker 1: is so good. I know for what it all meant.
Speaker 1: God has a plan that you know, I can't question.
Speaker 1: It was already written in the book. So how long
Speaker 1: have you been clean? I've been clean nineteen years from narcotics,
Speaker 1: going on a year from alcohol. I caught myself in time.
Speaker 1: I look at it, as you know, I can't get
Speaker 1: no worse than I was because I know my bottom.
Speaker 1: I want to know exactly what was your rock bottom,
Speaker 1: what finally got you off of drugs? Prison? Going to
Speaker 1: jail is what got me totally cleaned off of narcotics.
Speaker 1: That was something that I've never thought I would spend
Speaker 1: a day in jail, and I went to jail for
Speaker 1: d y. How much time to you? Sixty days? Yeah, whoa,
Speaker 1: that's enough time? Sounds like an eternity. It is. I
Speaker 1: felt like an internity without narcotics. The first twenty days.
Speaker 1: It was just it was hell and you were locked
Speaker 1: up so you had to. And when I got out,
Speaker 1: it was just like damn. I was glad that I
Speaker 1: was thankful that they put me in jail. I was
Speaker 1: seeing everything for the first time again. Everything looked beautiful.
Speaker 1: What made you decide to get totally clean from all
Speaker 1: mine and mood altering chemicals? Because you said you stopped
Speaker 1: drinking as well. With alcohol, I started losing bodily function.
Speaker 1: My body started shutting down because I was drinking that much.
Speaker 1: My body just was giving out on me. Even with alcohol.
Speaker 1: I got to a point where I needed it. I
Speaker 1: wasn't getting drunk anymore. I wasn't getting a little tipsy anymore.
Speaker 1: I needed it to wake up, needed it to stop
Speaker 1: the shakes, to function on a daily day basis. For me,
Speaker 1: it wasn't recreational. It was and yet it had to
Speaker 1: do it. And then my wife was telling me, you
Speaker 1: need to go do something. My kids was looking at
Speaker 1: me strange when they see their father losing, you know,
Speaker 1: bodily function in front of them. And I'm a grown man,
Speaker 1: and you know, that was something I couldn't accept for myself.
Speaker 1: I couldn't accept going to the bathroom myself. I couldn't
Speaker 1: accept that. And I said to myself, no, I have
Speaker 1: to stop this. So I got to get better. You're
Speaker 1: talking about being clean, What was your process, because you know,
Speaker 1: the recovery process is so much more than just not using.
Speaker 1: And in my recovery process and now I'm thirty years in,
Speaker 1: I have thirty years cleaning. I believe in the twelfth
Speaker 1: Step program program is what I believe in. Also, I
Speaker 1: didn't love that. I go day by day. I stick
Speaker 1: to it because that's the only way I'm gonna live.
Speaker 1: Way I'm gonna maintain my sobriety. And that's important to me.
Speaker 1: That's more important to me than anything else. What coping
Speaker 1: mechanisms do you use now to deal with your grieving process?
Speaker 1: For me, I don't care what the emotion was. I
Speaker 1: celebrated with getting high, right, whether I was happy, said
Speaker 1: I go to sleep now, I don't pass out. You know,
Speaker 1: I wake up in the morning and hit my knees.
Speaker 1: I don't roll out of bed. Um. So my whole being,
Speaker 1: my whole feeling about life has changed. You know. Seeing
Speaker 1: my four year old, my five year old wake up
Speaker 1: in the morning and immediately come to wake me up.
Speaker 1: That lets me know that someone small like depends on me.
Speaker 1: When you think about the little ones and you think
Speaker 1: about your father journey with Bobby Christina, with Bobby Jr.
Speaker 1: What are you changing my lifestyle? Right? My way, my
Speaker 1: ways of living. I can only teach by example. And
Speaker 1: that was the one thing that I saw growing up
Speaker 1: in my household. I saw drug use. I saw robbery,
Speaker 1: death and killings and things like that. I thought it
Speaker 1: was cool to be smoker joint and drink a pine
Speaker 1: of Hennessy and feel good at that time because that's
Speaker 1: what I saw. That's all that I saw. But realizing
Speaker 1: it was a generational disease that my father had, my
Speaker 1: father was an alcoholic, my mom was an alcoholic. It
Speaker 1: was just passed down. And I realized that with my
Speaker 1: younger children that if I don't break this psycho who is,
Speaker 1: I have to give him the reason to live clean.
Speaker 1: If I'm not right, nothing else is gonna go right,
Speaker 1: got it. You can't heal anybody else if you can't
Speaker 1: heal yourself. That's right. And break those generational cycles right,
Speaker 1: cut them ties. Now. I think I've said this to
Speaker 1: you one time that I was like, you know, y'all
Speaker 1: tell me to do a lot of stuff, but I'm
Speaker 1: sitting here doing what you do what you tell me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: your kids do not you say exactly? Yeah, what is
Speaker 1: your relationship like now with your other adult children? That's
Speaker 1: my life. Those are my life. Landing in La Princeia,
Speaker 1: they are my rocks. They talked me down off the ledge.
Speaker 1: I'm very proud of my older children. They're a lot
Speaker 1: smarter than I was at their age. Landing made me
Speaker 1: a grandfather, so grandfather, yes twice over. You have a
Speaker 1: grand grand granddaughters, granddaughters. Pop. I love that I got second, third,
Speaker 1: and fourth chances at life and I'm still here. There's
Speaker 1: something that God wants me to do. I just ain't
Speaker 1: done it yet. I'm just waiting to do it. You know,
Speaker 1: this is I mean, we've had a couple of interactions,
Speaker 1: but I haven't seen you many many, many years. But
Speaker 1: I'd have to say this is like no pun intended,
Speaker 1: but this is the most sober like you are conversation itself.
Speaker 1: There's definitely a lot of lessons. Tell me the greatest
Speaker 1: asset that your wife, Alicia has been for you. She
Speaker 1: was a friend before we became lovers. That's what I
Speaker 1: really love about our relationship. You guys have been married
Speaker 1: for what ten years? Just about just about ten years,
Speaker 1: so she's seen it all. She seen the whole bunch.
Speaker 1: She gives me the energy to want to live right,
Speaker 1: to live righteous. That's what a good woman does. Yes,
Speaker 1: it is that must commend good women holding on to
Speaker 1: us knucklehead men and not giving up on us. And
Speaker 1: I think she helped me see the good in me
Speaker 1: that I forgot about. All I thought about was everything
Speaker 1: that I had done in my past. And you know,
Speaker 1: if I kept living in it, if I kept living
Speaker 1: in the past about what I had done, you know,
Speaker 1: in my previous relationships, I couldn't see the sunshine from
Speaker 1: from where I was standing. Now I'm able to deal
Speaker 1: with everything that I had in my past and look
Speaker 1: forward to the future knowing that I have somebody standing
Speaker 1: strong and no matter what, she's there. Bobby and Alicia's
Speaker 1: relationship goes back decades. They met when she was a
Speaker 1: seventeen year old dancer when he was a twenty two
Speaker 1: year old star of New Addition. Friendship flourished, and Alicia
Speaker 1: even attended Bobby and Whitney's weddings. Over the years, they
Speaker 1: drifted apart, but in two thousand and seven, they reconnected,
Speaker 1: fell in love, and began building a beautiful family together. Welcome,
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. Hi, how are you? That's
Speaker 1: that right of dad love right there with you being
Speaker 1: by his side through the loss of Bobby, Christina, Bobby Jr.
Speaker 1: And even Whitney Mom. Dad, Whitney, Yes, it is what
Speaker 1: has been the thing that you have wanted to offer
Speaker 1: to him, unconditional love, but really a reality check. He
Speaker 1: had a lot of yes people got it. You would go,
Speaker 1: I'm not that one, you know. I'm very direct when
Speaker 1: something is out of place and definitely red flags. I
Speaker 1: just want to be transparent and honest with him. Were
Speaker 1: you close to Bobby Jr? Yes? Absolutely, God is such
Speaker 1: a amazing human And yeah, it we're just at a loss.
Speaker 1: I think I'm still in shock. It's very new. It's
Speaker 1: terrible to say we've been here before because it never
Speaker 1: feels the same. It just feels like more. Right. He
Speaker 1: was such a big part of our lives, such a
Speaker 1: big brother, you know, such a big person in our world.
Speaker 1: And he was a very kind individual. Did not like
Speaker 1: any drama or anyone to be upset, specifically his mom
Speaker 1: or his father. Just loving and kind, and his spirit
Speaker 1: was just calm and peaceful. What about the kids losing
Speaker 1: their big brothers. It's been rough for my my my
Speaker 1: youngest son. Yes, Cash, this is that's all He talks
Speaker 1: about his brother, my brother and my brother, my brother eleven. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that was his video gaming partner, his h his everything,
Speaker 1: you know, his dance teacher, his vocal coach. We just
Speaker 1: had a great conversation with Cash this recently because obviously
Speaker 1: with the news coming out of what was found in
Speaker 1: his system, it was high anxiety for me, Bobby too.
Speaker 1: So we talked to our therapists. How do we explain this?
Speaker 1: I want him to hear it from us, and with
Speaker 1: the tools that they gave us, we sat down and
Speaker 1: we spoke honest, truthfully, what was found, how he did it?
Speaker 1: We first asked what he thought. You know, terrifying for
Speaker 1: a kid to think that maybe my brother went to
Speaker 1: sleep and wake up. You know, you don't want them
Speaker 1: to sit with that, right because that could happen anyone
Speaker 1: go to sleep. Talking about what was found in his
Speaker 1: system and how it got in his system, and his
Speaker 1: questions were just right on, like did someone put that
Speaker 1: in him? Did he put it in himself? Did he
Speaker 1: know that was what was going to happen? And as
Speaker 1: soon as we just had the conversation, he was like
Speaker 1: solid and relieved and you could tell he had what
Speaker 1: he needed if he was addressed or if he had
Speaker 1: to read something. Let's just say, right, he's not confused
Speaker 1: when you say the tools that you were given, what
Speaker 1: exactly were those tools that it was a therapist. We
Speaker 1: have quite a few therapists he has as yes importance.
Speaker 1: I'm just so passionate about therapy. Well with our therapist,
Speaker 1: those tools being prepared to be transparent, it can't be
Speaker 1: too tough for them to digest and understand it, saying
Speaker 1: in a layman term, speaking to him as a child,
Speaker 1: but speaking to him truth, truthfully and not trying to google. Right. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: let's speaking to him like a human being. He is
Speaker 1: my baby, but he's an eleven year old and our
Speaker 1: tools are always to speak to cash us as if
Speaker 1: he understands, because he does, and as well, listening is
Speaker 1: very important. It's not just about what mom and dad
Speaker 1: are telling you. And we don't really want to response.
Speaker 1: What would you like to ask us? What are you
Speaker 1: concerned about? Do you understand everything we're speaking about? And
Speaker 1: he responded like what he wanted to know? Questions? Okay,
Speaker 1: he was like, okay, can we all have a group hug?
Speaker 1: And then we all just cried for a little bit.
Speaker 1: It was it was really important. You know, we try
Speaker 1: to hide crying and all that exactly Daddy crying again. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Daddy is right. Now, let's all get Daddy a hug.
Speaker 1: That is to see real life and as a young
Speaker 1: black male, allowing him to cry and allowing him to
Speaker 1: see you cry. Right, And I think that's one of
Speaker 1: the biggest healing process is for children that have been
Speaker 1: you know, in traumatic situations, you know, with their parents.
Speaker 1: The moments in which you and Dad were vulnerable with me,
Speaker 1: UM were the moment where I was like, okay, Like
Speaker 1: I felt the most at ease because I didn't feel
Speaker 1: like when a parent goes everything's going to be fine,
Speaker 1: it's like everything like like I'm gled to revisit that, UM.
Speaker 1: But when you were vulnerable, I didn't have any suspicion
Speaker 1: because I was like, I mean, I'm uncertain, they're uncertain.
Speaker 1: We're in the same I'm feeling, and that we're in
Speaker 1: this together and we're gonna figure it out together. Exactly.
Speaker 1: How have you been able to be in support of
Speaker 1: Bobby Junior's mom Kim as well. I reach out. We
Speaker 1: have had a lot more conversations because it's a healing
Speaker 1: process and we have to do it together, and I'm
Speaker 1: always reminding her that we're together a unit, and that
Speaker 1: she's not alone and we his family are always an
Speaker 1: extension of her agree together. What about your relationship with
Speaker 1: Bobby Christina, It was very difficult since she had lost
Speaker 1: her mother to get close to her. She was managing
Speaker 1: a lot in her life that we wish she didn't
Speaker 1: have to deal with with her living in Georgia, US
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles and the disconnect, and of course with
Speaker 1: addiction and abuse, she's hiding. She's trying as much not
Speaker 1: to have us see that, and Bobby meant the world
Speaker 1: to her, So she, in her father's eyes, always wanted
Speaker 1: to seem like she was together. And the end we
Speaker 1: did get to form a beautiful connection and we were
Speaker 1: very much looking forward to having her around us, but
Speaker 1: that didn't happen. She was dealing with this grief that
Speaker 1: was taking over her life. She was not being herself
Speaker 1: in any facet with her career and with her family
Speaker 1: and the relationship that she was in, and this person
Speaker 1: was controlling her a great deal, and she was lost
Speaker 1: without her mother. Yea. Naturally, there's this grieving time that
Speaker 1: you need and you need to be surrounded by healing
Speaker 1: and help. Right, So tragic. So it's probably a co
Speaker 1: dependent and that's what I mean. Yeah, understand that clearly.
Speaker 1: What's that on your neck? Yeah? I've been looking at that.
Speaker 1: It's so pretty, but my wife gave it to me
Speaker 1: um a while ago. Yeah, that is beautiful. I see
Speaker 1: why it's gorgeous when you look at it all. What
Speaker 1: do you think it takes to break the general rational
Speaker 1: cycles that you guys are breaking together, which is beautiful
Speaker 1: because I honestly believe that's what partnership is about. And
Speaker 1: then making sure that our healing is being transmitted to
Speaker 1: our children. Yeah, we're work in progress. Before therapy, we
Speaker 1: both had our own way of communicating and we didn't
Speaker 1: often understand each other's language, and that issue just bled
Speaker 1: and spread. That's when we were like, oh, no, no,
Speaker 1: this is we need some help here. Right. We often
Speaker 1: need to learn how to listen, which was a big
Speaker 1: thing on my part. Listen, I've had I've had to
Speaker 1: get my little elephant ears growing so I can hear. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I feel you on that. And I had to work
Speaker 1: on how to communicate what I was feeling to her
Speaker 1: and to to you know, anybody else that was around me.
Speaker 1: I would hold in my feelings on how I would
Speaker 1: deal with the precious of losing a child. I'm not
Speaker 1: wanting to speak. Holding it in made me you know,
Speaker 1: going the corner and or hide and drink. Thank God
Speaker 1: that I had someone like my wife to to sit
Speaker 1: and wait for me to get that knowledge and gain
Speaker 1: that power to express myself. I believed in him, you know,
Speaker 1: I still believe in him. And it's not easy. It's
Speaker 1: not easy waiting, but you do have to trust the journey. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's what I do. Yeah, I trust in that. We
Speaker 1: are wishing you continued healing and just wishing the best
Speaker 1: for both of you. Your family is in all that
Speaker 1: you love. Thank you guys for having us. You wonderful. Yes,
Speaker 1: remember he started with new addition. That's just so low,
Speaker 1: that's collect classic. It's classic. Want a Grammy for that?
Speaker 1: Books like that, It's gonna step by me. Yes, it's
Speaker 1: super starb. He has the yeah yes to join the
Speaker 1: Red Table Talk family and become a part of the conversation.
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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to this episode of Red Table Talk
Speaker 1: podcast produced by Facebook Watch, Westbrook Audio, and I Heart Radio.