Still grieving his little guy. Fifteen years after Lamar Odom’s 6-month-old son, Jayden, died of sudden infant death syndrome, the athlete opened up about his heartbreak.
“Even [when my son was] six months old I was saying that we had a really great relationship because whenever I would come into the room, his eyes would just follow me wherever I went until I picked him up,” the former professional basketball player, 42, said on the Monday, February 7, episode of Celebrity Big Brother, calling the late little one a “special” baby.
“2006 would’ve made him, right now, I think 15 or 14 years old,” the New York native, who welcomed Jayden in 2005 with then-girlfriend Liza Morales, added. “There’s just something I don’t think I’d ever get over. But him coming to me in a dream lets me know that he’s not too far away. And I know I’ll see him in an afterlife.”
The retired NBA player shared his story with Cynthia Bailey and Todd Bridges. “Hearing Lamar that he lost a kid has to be the biggest thing that someone has to deal with, and my heart goes out to Lamar because he’s dealt with so much stuff,” the Diff’rent Strokes alum, 56, said in a confessional.
Odom, who is also the father of Destiny, 24, and Lamar Jr., 20, with Morales, 42, previously spoke about Jayden in the Lamar Odom: Reborn documentary in May 2021.
“That was extremely hard because, you know, I was playing [basketball],” the Khloé and Lamar alum said of Jayden’s SIDS. “He was extra energetic. Whenever I would walk into the room, he would just stare at me. He was beautiful. He was like the combination of his sister and his brother. I just wish I would’ve had him in my life a little longer.”
The reality star added at the time that he never once “sat down and cried about” Jayden’s passing, calling that realization “crazy.”
After splitting from Morales, Odom moved on with Khloé Kardashian. He and the Keeping Up With the Kardashians alum, 37, struggled to conceive a baby during their marriage. Kardashian went on to welcome daughter True, now 3, with on-again, off-again boyfriend Tristan Thompson.
Odom gushed about his ex’s pregnancy in February 2018, telling Access, “It couldn’t happen to a better person. I was really happy for her. I know if she could take care of a grown man for four years the way she took care of me, I know she could take care of a baby. That’s gonna be one spoiled ass baby.”