LET'S DIG | Pierre & Danilee Aristil
Pierre and Danilee Aristil let you in on their personal chats. Inspiring you to DIG deeper relationships with God, yourself and others.
Jesus said, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind… and equally important: Love your neighbor as yourself.”
- Matthew 22:37-39
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LET'S DIG | Pierre & Danilee Aristil
The Final Days with My Mother | Repairing Relationships Before It's Too Late: Avoid Regret After Losing a Loved One"
As we traverse the candid and touching stories from the final chapters of my mother's life, you'll hear how humor and obedience played a role in providing comfort to our family. We'll explore the impact of tender misunderstandings, and how they can offer solace during the hardest times. The discussion leads us into the importance of living without regrets, highlighting the significance of harmony and the peace that comes from a life aligned with these principles.
Finally, we'll dive into the art of nurturing relationships, a lesson my mother exemplified in every connection she formed. The power of apologies, the extension of grace, and the indelible mark of caring for others stand as the pillars of this episode. You're invited to reflect on the influence of one extraordinary woman, and perhaps find the inspiration to reach out, forgive, and love with the same unyielding spirit that she did.
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So before my mom died, I spent the last three days with her Mother's Day just passed and her birthday's this week and it's a hard conversation to have, because for a son to lose his mother and I was close to my mom to be there the last three days it's almost like a story you would read in a Bible. Right, it's true.
Speaker 3:It was crazy A story.
Speaker 1:We held her hand. She was there in her bed and she was ready to go home to be with God. She was done with this life here on this earth. She's worked hard, she was 68 and she was ready to go home to be with the father. I remember my dad calling me two weeks before she passed and my dad said hey guys, I think it's time for you guys to make arrangements to come see your mom. And I got on the phone with my mom and I'd heard her voice and I knew she was about to leave this earth. And I remember thinking and I remember thinking the conversations that I had with my mom prior to that. I just saw her a few months before that. I got a chance to sit with her and hug her and sit down with her and share stories.
Speaker 1:If those of you that don't know me, I was a mama's boy. Those of you that grew up with me, you know I was a mama's boy. I'm one of five kids and people will grow up and grow up with us and say, man P, we've never heard you talk, man, we never saw you outside playing, because I was always with my mom and my mom was really close to me. I had a really good relationship with her and it's tough too because I'm in situations now where some people don't understand the peace that I have that my mom went to be with God in heaven because she wanted to go. I remember us talking saying mom, do you want to stay or do you want to go? And she was like I'm tired. She was sick, she had so much pain and she dealt with a lot of health issues over the last couple of years and she just felt like her work here on this earth was just over and I haven't shed a tear since she's passed. This is my second Mother's Day without her.
Speaker 3:I think I've cried more than you have, but I'm an emotional person and I loved your mom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she was special. She was special when. So, when my dad called me and he said hey guys, I think it's time for you guys to make some arrangements to come see your mom, um, that following weekend or after that weekend, we flew out me, you, the kids, um, and I remember getting to Miami and I told my dad I'm in town and he's like okay, come see your mom. I had no idea what condition my mom was in we had no idea.
Speaker 1:I knew she just wasn't good. I knew she had, you know, like the hospital bed um at at the house and I knew hospice was there. Hospice was there. She had some nurses taking care of her, but showing up was hard that Monday night. It was a long day of traveling.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:We jumped in a car with my sister. Shout out to my older sister too, man, she was like my second mom. She still is. She's like our second mom. Yeah, my mom passed over the mantle to her, like my second mom.
Speaker 3:She still is. She's like our second mom. Yeah, my mom passed over the mantle to her, that's for sure, because that woman is miss solange, the spirit of solange on this earth solange is the name of my mom. Oh yeah, you be acting like people just know stuff about us I just um they need to know her name if we're gonna make a whole episode about her. Yeah, they need to know.
Speaker 1:Her name is Solange yeah, she would have been 70. I think this week, this week, I believe, yeah, she would have been 70 and I remember that Monday night when we showed up to her house we pulled up, it was. It was a weird feeling too, cause it's like man I, I saw my mom that summer.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you saw her by yourself. We weren't with you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I saw her. I was in town for a gig with an artist friend of mine. I was MDing, I was the music director for, uh, uh, a big event and um. So I saw her a few months before that and the moment I was in I called my sister. I was like yo, I want to come see mom and surprise her. I went and surprised mom. I was so happy to see her. Um, the cool thing is, guys, I have no regrets. Um, we this past mother's day last week, oh, my word. Um, all all the friends are talking about mother's day and they're going to do this with their mom, this or mom, and I'm like, yeah, I don't have a mom.
Speaker 3:Straight silence, guys. It never gets old with you just sitting in those awkward moments Like you love. Okay, you don't do it too much, but sometimes you really love to watch people squirm. And one of the friends standing there was like oh. I'm guessing your mom is gone.
Speaker 1:Yeah. One friend was like, is your mom gone? I was like, yeah, she's gone. And he's like, oh, I said it's fine. I loved her. Her and I had a great relationship and I have zero regrets. And I got a chance to spend the last few days with her and it was a story from the Bible. Man God blessed the whole thing. She blessed us. We prayed for her and we watched her leave.
Speaker 3:I say it all the time that those last three days were the biggest blessing. It's what, like anyone would pray for and ask for to have three days of the family around. We had like worship music playing. Your mom even prayed for the family, Like as we were in that room she was praying for us. The all the grandkids were like loud and crazy playing hide and go seek because it didn't register to them what was going on. But we knew that that's what your mom loved. Yeah, we knew that. She loved the kids, the noise, the craziness. I mean she raised five kids.
Speaker 3:And so to have six grandkids under what I don't know. I don't know. London was like maybe, maybe 10. So six grandkids under 10 years old and it was not a big house. It was chaos and they're running and screaming, but it was just the most peaceful three days just taking care of her, worshiping, with her praying over her, her praying over us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, when we walked in that night and we saw her laying there, man, I I broke yeah yeah, that was hard my mom was the strongest woman I know, and I'm not saying that because people say, oh, my mom was the strongest woman. Nah, because some of y'all mamas out there weak why?
Speaker 1:why you have to throw darts at other mamas I'm just playing, um, I just played my mom man. I I watch my mom. She got these haitian hands right. We always talk about these haitian hands, these hands right here. Like she, she's never whooped us with a belt because her hands were like steel. I mean, she will put stuff in the oven to cook and she just pulled it out with her bare hands, saw it with my own eyes.
Speaker 1:You witnessed it wild she just pulled out with your bare hands. I'm like these are the hands of god, like no sense.
Speaker 1:My mom, I mean so tough she had a 24, 7 prayer line too so anytime I call my mom, I mean so tough. She had a 24 seven prayer line too. So anytime I call my mom, she was on the other line praying with other people. And then the crazy thing is, you don't know, because she's like having a full conversation with you yeah, baby, yeah, listen. And and then you said you know what, listen? I have so-and-so on the other lines of mom. We've been talking for 20 minutes. You got these other people on the other line waiting for you and they're in Canada, they're in Haiti, they're in New York Like prayer lines. People knew my mom was close with God, no-transcript, she was taking care of herself, but she didn't like most mothers. You don't want your children to worry.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so my mom was just tough. She did everything for us, right? I mean, when we were moving furniture around the house, like my dad wasn't the one moving furniture around the house, it was my mom. My mom and my sisters actually Don't ask me where I was.
Speaker 1:Don't be judging, I was, you know busy busy, but my mom was just so strong and so tough, like she was always there, and so to walk into the room that night and to see her laying there, you know, almost lifeless, frail, just sick, ready to go, yeah, when I called her which was crazy, like when I called her two weeks before that when my dad called and I said, pop, can I talk to mom? And he put her on the phone and I remember my mom saying she said I'm waiting for you. Remember that time? Yep, she said I'm waiting for you. When am I going to see you? And I remember sitting. I said mom, I'm coming, mom, I'm coming, I'm coming, I'm coming. She said, okay, I'm waiting for you. We got in Monday, my other brother got in Tuesday, monday, tuesday, we all flew in and we're standing there. I mean I got. I bawled like a baby when I got off the phone with my mom that day. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And then to walk into a room a week later to see her. Like this was tough. I mean, we cried every single day, but here's what was my gosh my face was like raw from crying all day.
Speaker 1:Here's what was so beautiful. Y'all is, um. Here we are sitting next to my mom, on her, on what you'd call her deathbed. For three days we held her hand, we gave her water, we took care of her. She laid hands on every single one of us and prayed for us and blessed us. Every single kid, every single grandchild, she laid their hands on us and prayed for us and blessed us. Here's a woman that has no more life to give and is passing on the biggest thing we can ever have. She was blessing us, she was casting out demons, she was pushing back all levels of darkness, like breaking generational curses.
Speaker 3:I said it. I said it then I said like where our family ends up will be so much because of that woman's prayers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, to walk into that room for those days, and then we would be there for hours.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:For hours. We would just sit there by her bed for hours. All the little kids are all there in the room going wild, crazy. My kids are bouncing off the wall, they're fighting they're yelling, they're screaming, they're crying like animals, yo you would have thought this was a zoo full with chimpanzees. And it was her grandkids. Most parents would most grandparents be like no, quiet, quiet, quiet. My mom was loving it. Yeah, she was an extrovert.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so people gave her life yeah like the kids, the grandkids, we all walked into that room and for her to bless us, like for us to walk into that room and she would whisper with her voice, saying you good you okay.
Speaker 3:Actually that was one of the things at the end was that she got me confused with someone and she thought I was sick with cancer. And I, I won't forget, when I walked into the room that Monday night when she saw it was me like her face, it registered with her that I wasn't sick Cause she kept telling your sister like we have to pray for Danny Lee, she's sick, she's sick. And it was something that was confused in her mind and when we walked in I could tell that she was realizing like, oh good, danny Lee's not sick.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And I was like I'm okay, mom, I'm okay, it's okay, like I'm fine, I'm okay, yeah, and that was like a huge moment to to like see her facial expression, because there wasn't a lot of it. It would come and go. Yeah, on those days I remember you showing her um like clips of you preaching. You showed her a few of those also.
Speaker 1:She always thought she was watching you on on cc whining every time she's watching tbn she'll call me, say, oh, I see you on the TV all the time. You're on there with Cece Winans and I'm like yeah, mom, yeah, and I'm like there's probably another dark black dude that looks like me. And when I and I'm like okay, sure, mom, but I didn't want to let my mom down, say yeah, that's not me, I'm like yep, yep, yep that's me amen, amen, I, I'll be, I'll, I'll connect with Cece and we'll write and produce um, and we'll write, produce, perform songs and change the nations.
Speaker 1:But I'd walk into a room and I saw these shows, these these videos on the, on the, on the TV, and I'm like, oh, that's not me. I knew it wasn't me the whole time. I just needed to see the shows that she was watching, that's so funny.
Speaker 1:It's beautiful y'all, because I have no regrets with my relationship with my mom. We had a good relationship. I honestly was I can say this proud to say that I never gave my mom a hard time growing up. And here I am, mid-30s my mom should have been 70 this week and I have no regrets. I'm happy to say that I was a child who obeyed, who listened to my parents, and it's one of the greatest fruits to have now. Like the cool thing about having no regrets is you get to build on what was left and go forward. Like when you have regret, you're spending your whole time going back. Man, I should have. Wish I would have.
Speaker 1:Could we have encourage people to really think about what are the relationships in your life right now that you haven't reconciled because you think, oh, you'll have time. Not everyone has time, like the way I had time the last three days. You know I'll say this I have four siblings, so I'm one of five, and all five of us had different relationships with my mom, right, and some of us gave some of my siblings gave my mom a hard time and they're dealing with it now. I can see it, I can feel it in just how they talk, how they respond, how they're constantly brokenhearted. Going to the past, and to me I'm like we got to move forward. Man Mom's in a better place. She's chilling right now. She's happy with.
Speaker 1:Jesus. So the reason why I still talk about mom like yo yo, man, like one day, cause one day we'll see her, I have peace, there was nothing that I look back saying, man, I wish I would've listened, man, I wish I wouldn't have gave her a hard time. I have this picture right here of my mom and I. We have it everywhere Like it's it's. I have it at my desk, I have it sitting on the piano.
Speaker 1:My kids know it, even my four-year-old yeah she's like daddy, I miss your mommy, I miss grandma, and she was an angel man yeah, but I will say that this episode has like a lot of emotions.
Speaker 3:But when we talk about her day-to-day, like, it's not such a sad moment like it's the piece you were talking about, like that we have no regrets that we had that gift of the last three days, um, and that when we talk about her now, it really is like watching TV. The kids are running through the living room and our four year old is like I miss your mommy. And he's like, yeah, me too. And I'm like me too, you know like, like I miss your mommy. And he's like, yeah, me too. And I'm like, oh, me too. You know like. And then we move on. So I know there's a lot of like sadness, I'm crying a lot because I love your mom, but that's not how it is for us every day, because we don't have that regret, because we live with the peace of knowing we will see her again someday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to encourage you guys like think about the relationships that are in your life that you know it's not where it's supposed to be and somewhere in the back of your mind you're here thinking that you have time or you're thinking that that person is going to come up to you Like reconcile that, restore that.
Speaker 3:Because it's the thing of saying those three days were the biggest gift that anybody could ever ask or pray for, and that is because majority of people do not get that. Most of the time when someone dies, you don't get a two week notice. We got a two week notice and we were able to spend time and pull those three days. They were long, three days. By the end I was praying like I'm exhausted, like Lord, please take her, because we knew she was exhausted and we were exhausted. But majority of the time it isn't an instant yeah, and that's it, and there's no going back. There's no going back.
Speaker 3:And there's no opportunity to say one more thing or to say you're sorry. Like that's it Majority of the time. We don't get to control the outcome and we don't get to control how it happens, and so we literally have to live day to day knowing it could happen at any minute any minute, any minute.
Speaker 1:And what are the things that we can do now? Like I'll be honest with you, I don't, I don't have a great relationship with my dad. Yeah, you know, like we're fine, like I don't have any bad feelings towards him, I love him and I care for him.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:You know, but because of our differences and I was a mama's boy growing up and because of the distance between us from when a child and that relationship becoming from adult, to adult.
Speaker 3:I don't think people talk about it enough, because it is really a delicate walk. It really is intricate. It is a child becoming an adult and knowing no, this is the decision I'm going to make. No, this is the decision I'm going to make. And that parent is still thinking you are crazy, what are you doing? And I have conversations all the time with women in their sixties and seventies who sit in my chair at the salon and they talk about how their kids that are forties and fifties are making crazy decisions and like it's such a different adjustment to an adult to an adult, even though that relationship is there as a parent. And so it makes sense that you and your dad have a complicated relationship now that mom isn't there to be that bridge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's interesting too, because I think so many times when it comes to a child and their parent, when we're all adults you know, you can, you know it's easy to hang on to how it was and when we were kids, but really it's like, well, no, I'm a, I'm an adult now, and this is not a child to his father, this is the man to a man or man to a woman, not just a mother and son situation, because the son could be a grown man and a son could have sons, right. And it's like, how do we fix that? How do we restore that, cultivate that? You know, because at the end of the day, like you know again, death doesn't.
Speaker 1:Death sometimes comes by surprise, sometimes, like you said, we don't have a notice and so regret, man, is the biggest thing that someone could deal with. So I want to encourage you guys, you know, think about those relationships, that person that's in your life, that that you know that if they were to die right now, if they were to die right now, can you sit here and say you know what? I'm glad we still spoke, I'm glad we fixed the beef that we had, I'm glad that we restored what was broken, I'm glad that we reconciled and came in agreement to what the new relationship should be like.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean. That's a good feeling. You know what I mean. That regret can kill you, man. It's a cancer that there's no cure for it.
Speaker 3:Right. I do think another part of the experience that the kids go through as becoming adults is that we learn to see our parents in a different light. When we're kids we think our kids or our parents are the best thing ever and that they are perfect and that they know all the answers and they have all the solutions. Like we look up to our parents as the everything. They're the best mom and dad we've ever had in our whole life. They're the only mom and dad we've ever had in our whole life. And then we start to become adults and we're like oh, maybe my parents didn't do that or maybe they could have done that better.
Speaker 3:I think it's always grace to give our parents to say they always did the best, they knew how to, or that they did better than their parents did. But I just think it's a it's a big part of the children's responsibility to give that grace to our parents and to not allow whatever mistakes they made, whatever decisions they made, to not allow that to made whatever decisions they made, to not allow that to create space in between us. But it's the kid's job to be like, hey, you did the best you could, because I want my kids to give me that grace. When my kids are adults, I'm sure they're going to be like dude. You jacked that up. It's true, I tried not to, but I tried to do my best. I don't want my kids to hold that against me, so in return.
Speaker 1:I have to give that grace to my parents. Yeah yeah, speaking of grace too, I think it's not just to parents, I think it's all relationships. That's true, right, you know, I think, like I'll be honest, like you know, we've had this conversation between you and I. I think there's times where it's you. You give grace to the kids, but not grace to me.
Speaker 3:That's a lot harder.
Speaker 1:I know it's a lot harder, right.
Speaker 3:Right, it's true, it's harder.
Speaker 1:Because it's easier to give grace to people that are under you.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's harder to give grace to people that are over you. Very true, that's what that is, because they're over you.
Speaker 1:You expect more from them. So, because you expect more from them, it's hard for you to give them grace. But I do believe, like Jesus said it, man, it's better to give than to receive. And so what you reap, or what you sow, is what you will reap. And so for me, like I'm a person that, like I, work really hard to give grace, like someone comes in I say, hey, it's all good, it's all good. Well, we're going to talk about it later.
Speaker 3:Sure.
Speaker 1:But it's all good to give that grace, because I want more grace in my life and I think about when it comes to relationships, like if we can all practice giving grace up, down and around, our relationships would be a lot smoother. Like people wouldn't be walking on eggshells, right? People wouldn't be walking on eggshells, right? People wouldn't be so passive, aggressive when it comes to relationships, even between, like you and I, like we talk. That's an active conversation we're having right now. Remember, I told you the other day I was like hey, man, how come you have a hard time telling me sorry, cause, like, when it's time for me to say sorry, I'm like sorry, when it's time for you to say sorry, you're like but wait, wait, what wait? Hold that.
Speaker 1:But however, nevertheless sometimes perhaps, but maybe I'm sorry. Fine, I'm like why'd you have to take the long way around the world? To tell me sorry, take that long, you're so dramatic babe, like it was like an extra two seconds it was like pulling a back tooth, just to tell you, just just to make you say sorry to me.
Speaker 3:But once I understood why you were asking for an apology, then I was fine to say I'm sorry. I did not want you to feel that. I did not mean to imply that.
Speaker 1:And I am sorry. Even saying sorry, I think what happens is it's easy to project onto the other person why they deserve the sorry, based off of why you would want the sorry. I think what happened in that moment is it was hard for you to tell me sorry because you're like, well, you don't feel it, like I feel it Sorry doesn't do to you what it does to me. But here's what I've learned, and I never said this to you. You're going to hear this right now for the first time.
Speaker 3:Everybody is the first time.
Speaker 1:No, this is going to be good, it's going to bless you. It's here's. What I've learned is that women want to be loved, men want to be respected. So when I say we read a whole book about that, but what I'm saying is so when I say I'm sorry to you, you feel loved.
Speaker 1:When I don't say I'm sorry to you, you don't feel the love. So there's times where you're like I don't feel love for me. When you say sorry to me, I feel respected. When you don't say sorry to me, you feel disrespected. It's disrespectful. In that moment, the other day, when you wouldn't say sorry, remember I said it's because I feel like I messed up and I did something wrong, and it wasn't me, it's it's. And not saying sorry, not saying Ooh sorry, my bad babe, I misread that, that's on me Not saying that it's like dang, like no respect.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 1:That's what I'm saying. Right, I know we read a whole book about love and respect, but I'm saying like there are so many layers to it that we're still learning after 14 years of marriage, we're still learning it. So that book that we read 14 years ago, I bet if we read it right now, there'll be brand new revelations. Sure, but what I'm saying is talking about grace and talking about you know. Apologies like apologies can literally, like um, open up somebody and open up their soul just by saying you know what. I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:It takes those walls down. Yeah, on both sides, takes the defensive walls down on both sides. Yeah, it's very true. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I have this, this voice, this message that my mom sent me. So, if you guys know, my mom, my mom was the most encouraging person ever, ever, ever, and I'm not- saying this, and I'm not saying this because she's dead, Cause you know people like you know, people be like, oh, he was such a good kid, he'd never gotten in trouble. I said, mom, he robbed somebody at gunpoint.
Speaker 1:He was a mass shooter and they just he strangled every single one of them while looking into their eyes, poke Every single one of them while looking into their eyes, poke their eyes out and ate it and must be like he was just a good kid. He was a he never got in trouble. And then the police officer saying like he has a record at the size of a library.
Speaker 3:And he is violent in every single one of them and the mom was like he was a good boy.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:No, he wasn't, ma'am.
Speaker 1:But you know what it is? I think it's it's. It's a part of dealing with the loss and accepting that they're gone and it's better to hold on to the good memories. I understand that so. So what I'm saying is about my mom was an angel. She was a saint. No, she'll bust you up too. I met one time, me and my brother. We were outside, we were. We were young kids. We were probably eight, nine or ten. We were outside playing sword fight with tennis rackets. My mom looked outside the window. She's like hey, hey, she was big on. When she ran outside she grabbed these tennis rackets. All of a sudden we're getting hit by these tennis rackets, but it's not by each other. My mom had one going at me, one going at my brother. We're all going. She's hey, never saw them tennis rackets ever again.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness she donated them to Salvation Army. I do which is messed up, because we bought them from Salvation Army too.
Speaker 3:I do wish that I could have seen your mom in like her prime motherhood life. Yeah, I mean, like y'all were of your two-story house into the pool.
Speaker 1:Imagine having five kids. That's insanity Five kids in between the ages of newborn and nine that's.
Speaker 3:I mean, she's another type of woman. So I do wish that I could have seen like her in that phase of like grabbing y'all, whooping y'all, pulling y'all together.
Speaker 1:This voice note right here or actually, my mom called me in 2021. This was a voice memo. Well, she called me before she passed a few times. Well, actually, the phone call stopped around that summer, that spring or summer. That's when I knew things were changing for her.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right, but this voice memo that I have from her, like this, is crazy. I'm going to see if I can play it right. See if you guys can hear it. This is my mom. Oh, hold on one second, stand by, see if I can put this thing on speaker. I should have had this thing queued up. You know, sometimes these things don't be. I miss you guys. I'm just checking on you to see how everybody is doing.
Speaker 2:Okay, I hope everything is fine. Okay, may God bless you and keep it up. Keep on, keep on, keep on with the Lord. Okay, we'll talk again, Maybe when you have a chance. Give me a call. I want to know how everybody is. How's the family? Okay, god bless you, honey.
Speaker 1:Love you, bye it's crazy, and that's what conversations were like with her all the time. All the time she didn't know how to leave voicemails, too. She didn't know how to end it because she said bye like four times she said bye a few times.
Speaker 1:She's like okay, all right, call me back, keep it up. God bless, you just want to know how everybody's doing. But but again, she was a people's person. She was the type of person that lifted up every single person in the room. I mean, when we were struggling, going through hard times, my mom was okay, say no more, we're praying. Right now.
Speaker 3:I'm calling all my friends she said okay, baby, it's gonna be okay it's gonna be just fine give it to god, and that's it and I'm gonna call tomorrow and I want to know I remember when we first got married I was really sick and the doctors thought I had Crohn's disease. And um, when we told your mom, she was like, eh, it's okay, they're on my prayer line, it's okay. And I remember the day before I was going in for a colonoscopy, I think your mom, she grabbed me, her and her prayer partner at church, and she grabbed a hold of my stomach and I told you, like, baby, your mom squeezed me to like a size two. Listen y'all, if you've never met me in person, I've never been a size two my whole entire life.
Speaker 3:But my mother-in-law squeezed that waist in when she, in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, she's sweating In the name of. Jesus and she squeezed me and she squeezed me and she prayed over me and I went to go get that colonoscopy and the doctor said, yeah, it looks like you've been sick, it looks like there are these signs, and she was like, but I don't see anything. You should be good from now on. Yeah, and my stomach was never the same again.
Speaker 1:That's crazy. She was the one that taught me like how to maintain relationships.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:We live in a world right now where we don't know how to start relationships and we don't know how to keep relationships. We know how to build bridges, we know how to burn bridges down, but we live in a world where we don't know how to maintain bridges. Like she was the type of person that when she called you, she wasn't calling you for anything other than she just wanted to check on you, that's all. She just wanted to check on you. And she's the one that taught me that. And even now I've learned that. Now, like I reach out to people and I call people, and sometimes guys like hey, so what's up? I was like hey, man, just literally just checking on you. You good, just checking in.
Speaker 1:My mom taught me that, right, I've had a lot of mentors in my life. I've had pastors, I've had a lot of people, a lot of teachers, a lot of teachers, different things. She was the one that specifically taught me how to build and maintain relationships with people, and what I loved about her is that she had a relationship with every single person. Like you and her had a relationship, bro, there's times like she's not calling me and she's calling you.
Speaker 3:I'm like what my mama calling you for.
Speaker 3:At her funeral everybody kept getting up and saying like yo man, they're like I can't believe she's gone. She was like a second mom to me and I started feeling some type of way because your mom treated me like she was my mom. She treated me like. I remember the first time that I ended up in all five of the kids names because your mom would have to go through like all five children before she got to the one. She was actually trying to say so she named all your siblings and then she was saved, peter.
Speaker 3:Finally yeah and so with me one time when I got in the round of all the kids I was like I'm officially a kid I made it stuck in there too so at your mom's funeral all these people are like yo man, like she was a second mom to me. She'd always build me up, she'd always and I was like, wait, she didn't do that just for me. I thought she did it just for me because she left me is literally just who she was with everyone, every single one, I mean.
Speaker 1:There was close to a thousand people at her funeral. We had like over 2000 people that watched that, watched the stream and to see everyone, like everyone, had stories about moments that she had with them.
Speaker 3:There were some crazy stories too, yeah.
Speaker 1:People saying like it's because of your mom I did this. It's because your mom, I knew this. People was like. Your mom was the one that taught me how to worship. Your mom was the one that taught me how to read the Bible. Your mom was the one that prayed for me when I was sick. Your mom was the one that came and bought my family's groceries when we didn't have a car. Your mom was the one that came and picked us up and let us borrow her Sam's Club card just so that we can get groceries. Your mom was the one that would pick up my kids from school, and I was like my mom. When did she?
Speaker 3:do that with five kids?
Speaker 1:When did she do all this. This is crazy, because I go to sleep and she's praying. I wake up and she's still praying.
Speaker 3:That's true, the first few weeks when we were dating and I moved down to Florida and your mom would pray in the living room in the house. That's right.
Speaker 3:Bruh, she'd pray from 4 am the house. That's right, bro. She'd pray from 4 am to like 11, 12 o'clock in the afternoon. She's fasting, she's praying, she's on her prayer mat and like I would just want her to stop so that we could go sit out in the living room or sit out in the dining room, like to get out of the house, and she would just pray all day, yeah yeah, nothing was stopping her.
Speaker 1:Man, it's crazy. Yo, we could sit here all day long and talk about this because no, there's literally stories for days we didn't even get to touch.
Speaker 3:But I do think the most important thing is remembering that time is a gift and it can be taken away in an instance. I think that you know giving grace so that we receive grace even if it's up, even if it's down and it's all around like it is harder. You're right to give grace up, but if we, if I said it, if I want my kids to be graceful towards me once they become adults and they see my flaws like I'm going to give grace to my parents.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 3:And then I think the other thing is like I just want to love people, like how your mom loved people, like to be that friend, like I've I've done some stuff this week for a friend like been there as much as I could to help support a friend. Like to be the person Like I remember someone talked about at the funeral. Um, it was a friend of yours and he was like yo, your mom pulled me over one time.
Speaker 3:He was riding his bike or something with no shirt on with no shirt on and he was saying how your mom like said no, we don't carry ourselves like this, like you're like. She spoke purpose into that guy and it changed the way he thought about himself and like I want to be that type of person, to people to be like no, you can do better, you are better, you're worth more. Like I want to be that person she mothered everybody.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I yeah my friend. Yeah, he's my middle school best friend. I remember him. I I love him because him and I were the one that we came up with something that we used to call in middle school we called it the slut slap no, I knew you were gonna say it. Yeah, we were wild, you know you're gonna flag us. You remember middle school man like you. You know you cuss like a pirate. You just like, you're just wild. I was in middle school.
Speaker 1:Y'all don't judge me right, they're gonna cancel me they're gonna cancel me because because something I did when I was like man this guy is abusing girls. I was like I was in middle school, like, like, relax. I'm not going to even call, I'm not going to even describe what the slap was, I will actually. It was like, basically, when you go to slap someone, you hit them with the back hand, but you turn real quick and add a scratch at the end.
Speaker 3:Oh, my word.
Speaker 1:But yeah, that's my homeboy and that's. That's crazy, right? We had stories for days because my mom mothered everybody and she had a relationship with every single person that she encountered. So when I grow up, who do I want to be like? I want to be like my mom. I want to learn how to give more grace. I want to learn how to say I'm sorry. I want to learn how to help everybody up down and all around. I want to encourage you guys.
Speaker 1:Man, let's work hard at building relationships, restoring them, developing them, maintaining them, reconciling them. Man, life is really short, and for us to have a mindset of just like well, here's what this person did to me, here's what let it go forgive. You want forgiveness. Give forgiveness. You want grace, give it Like. It is way much better to give than to receive. And so that's what we're doing here at let's Dig the Podcast. We love to help people build relationships and restore them, not only just in our marriage, right? You know, there's a lot of things we talk about in our marriage that can pertain to so many different areas, but, man, it's all around. Man, life gets so much better when relationships do so. That's all I got to say. You got anything else you want to say.
Speaker 3:No, let's.
