A TRUTH I've Never Revealed With Laterras R Whitfield | Flip That Switch Podcast

In this episode I had a open and vulnerable conversation with my boy Laterras R Whitfield. I shared the importance of vulnerability. We discussed the challenges and growth in my marriage, the journey of content creation, and the role of faith my life.  I delved into the impact of childhood trauma and the importance of speaking up about personal experiences. Ultimately, we reflected on the nature of true joy and the journey towards healing and authenticity. In this conversation, We also discussed the complexities of trauma, healing, and the importance of sharing personal stories. We discussed how shared pain can foster understanding and healing, the impact of generational curses, and the necessity of vulnerability in family dynamics.
00:00
Introduction and Vulnerability
02:55
The Importance of Sharing Personal Stories
05:56
Support from Loved Ones
08:56
The Journey of Content Creation
11:55
Navigating Marriage and Business
14:58
Faith and Family Growth
17:52
The Power of Partnership
20:46
Overcoming Challenges in Parenthood
24:09
The Role of Faith in Relationships
27:04
Finding the Right Partner
30:03
The Journey to Love and Commitment
36:24
Pursuing Connection: The Initial Encounter
40:11
Navigating Dual Lives: Fun and Faith
42:11
Consequences of Choices: Reflections on Past Relationships
46:21
Defining True Fun: Worldly vs. Godly Joy
53:05
Childhood Trauma: Unpacking the Past
01:01:08
Breaking the Silence: The Importance of Speaking Up
01:10:57
The Power of Shared Pain
01:15:18
Breaking Generational Curses
01:20:27
Navigating Family Dynamics
01:25:12
The Importance of Vulnerability
01:30:07
Confronting the Past
01:35:01
Healing Through Prayer and Community

Follow me on my socials to stay connected
IG @FlipThatSwitchPodcast, @Sudduth84
Laterras: Host of  @DearFutureWifey podcast
Laterras IG @laterraswhitfield, Dearfuturewifeypodcast

#vulnerability, #personal stories, #support, #contentcreation , #marriage, #faith, #family, #partnership, #parenthood, #relationships, #faith, #childhood  trauma, #personalgrowth , #consequences, #fun, #duality, #connection, #vulnerability, #healing, #healing, #trauma, #family, #vulnerability, #generationalcurses , #shared pain, #testimony, #mentalhealth  #health, #forgiveness, #communitysupport  #support

Transcript

0:00

For some reason, I had this attraction to like older women. Because this person was older than me when I was a child, obviously. And even even to the point where like at the age of 19, I had a sexual encounter with a 55-year-old. That I that and like again, nobody knows about none of this to this. The only person that knows is Destiny, but it it made my mind think like, okay, I'm supposed to be doing this. I'm supposed to be having these encounters with older women. I'm supposed to be, and so I said that to say you have to really be careful that you have to be careful of not allowing this to let this affect you as you get older. Yep. Because why is it now at my big old age that I'm still thinking about it? And how old are you? I'm 41. And this happened to me when I was like seven or eight. What's up, you guys? Welcome back to another episode of Flip That Switch. I am your host, Brandon, and we are back with another episode. If you didn't get a chance to watch the previous episode, please go back and watch it. As a matter of fact, before you watch this one, go back and watch that one. But today we're gonna be doing things a little differently. As you can see, I am live and I just wanted to do this episode because it was on my heart to really just be vulnerable. You know, a lot of people see me and Dez, we're on social media, we do our content and stuff, but I don't think people really truly know my story. They know where I'm at now, how we've gotten to where we're at now. But I wanted to take this time to really just be vulnerable and kind of share my story, give a little bit of back history on me, just starting from my childhood to where I am today. And the perfect person that I thought could help me do this episode is my boy Leteris. Um, he is the host of the Dear Future Wifey podcast. I wanted to bring him on to do this episode with me because number one, we need a space where men can be vulnerable and open up with other men, right? A lot of times we have this macho mentality where we just don't feel like we can be vulnerable and open up. So I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for me to chop it up with another brother who's in the same industry that I am in, and someone who can really just create that space for me to be vulnerable. Because, you know, you see my podcast, a lot of times I'm creating the space, and a lot of times I'm pouring into people, but this is a perfect opportunity for me to be poured into and me to be in a space where I can open up and be vulnerable. So yeah, that's what we're gonna be doing today. I'm gonna be talking to my boy Lateris. Uh, welcome to the episode, man. Man, I'm proud of you for even stepping out doing your own podcast. I know it's very um scary because you're sitting there talking to an audience, uh, opening up for them to just critique every word that you say. And there's a lot of work that goes into this. So uh when you reached out to me a couple of weeks ago, I was like, man, I'd be honored to have you host this episode from the Pod Society. So thank you. Man, I and I appreciate you, man. And I've I've watched you now. We've actually been on the Dear Future Wife for podcast. Powerful episode, too. Yeah, and just to see the growth that you've done in that with that podcast in in the short amount of time that I've known you, is nothing short of amazing. Yeah. And you create a space for people to come on and be vulnerable and open up. And so I was like, you be the perfect person for me to do this episode with. Which made me be like, what is he gonna talk about in this episode for him to? It was so dramatic when uh of the setup about, hey, listen, there's some things I want to share or whatever. And I was like, Did you talk to the parties that may be involved? And you was like, What did you say about that? I said no. And I said, Do you think you should talk to the parties that may be involved with whatever you're gonna share? You still never let me know what you was gonna share, but I felt like through discernment that it was gonna involve some other people. Yeah. Uh and and why did you feel like it wasn't necessary to give them the heads up? Um, I felt that it wasn't necessary because at the end of the day, it's something that was put on my heart. Yeah. And it was something that I had been thinking about and I've kept bottled away, like, and haven't really stressed or shared it to anybody. As a matter of fact, the only person that knows about what I'm gonna talk about is my wife Destiny. Okay, it makes sense. And so for me, it's like if it's if it's been put on my heart to share, and I and then like it's almost like I don't really need to validate it with anybody. You're right, you're right. And it's just something that I I want to talk about, I'm gonna talk about, and the hope is that I can inspire someone with it and impact someone who may be going through a similar situation or who may be in the trenches, and this is something that can help bring them out. So what did Destiny say about that when you told her you're gonna share whatever this is? 110% supportive. That's that's what you need. She said, do it. Uh, one of the main things I'm gonna talk about, she said, you've been keeping this as a secret inside you since you were a kid. And so now the time now's the time to get it out. That's good. You know, and so she was 100% on board, and that made it that much more easier. Absolutely. You know, if I got the support of my wife, that's it. That's all that matters. That's all I need, man. That's all you need. How long y'all been married now? Uh, we've been married five, it was we celebrated five years in July. At what point and while while y'all were dating, did you share with her whatever this is you're gonna share today? I shared it with her maybe about maybe two years ago. Y'all were already married at that point, right? Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. What made you decide to open up and share that? Because you know what? I felt like I feel like when you get married, um, the person that you should be able to share that information with is your significant other. Yep. And you have to be in a space where you can trust that they're not gonna, that it's gonna be between you and them. And I trusted that with her. You know, I trusted her with being open and being vulnerable. And to be honest with you, before her, I was never open. I was never vulnerable. I was a private person. Quiet is kept. I mean, even though I'm on social media, I'm still to this certain to this day a private person. You know, we put out these videos and stuff like that, and and and you know, we we impact and inspire others. But when it comes to deep down stuff, I'm still I'm still private, man. I still have my guard up per se. Yeah. Except with her. Let me tell you something. You're talking about the growth of dear future wifey. Let's talk about the growth of you and Destiny. My goodness. I remember y'all did the episode, you said y'all was about 500,000 uh subscribers on YouTube. You said, I'm gonna try to get to a million. And when you said the time span in which you're gonna get to a million, it was like only a few months left. Like by the end of the year, I'm gonna get to a million. And you reached it before the end of the year. And I said, How in the world did you grow 500,000 subscribers in a couple of months? What is that, man? Man, you know what it was? It was just us. We were just grinding. We were pumping out content, pumping out videos. Um thank God a couple of those videos went viral. Um, and it allowed people to just really just jump on with our journey and want to see more. And it I don't, it's just one of those things where you know, when something, when you're meant to do something, everything else is gonna flow from there. Even if it doesn't right away, even if it doesn't happen overnight. What's gonna happen, what's supposed to happen is gonna happen. And that's what we've always maintained. Me and Destiny, we say, you know what, at the end of the day, what's gonna happen is what's gonna happen. We inspire people, we make people laugh, people tune into our journey, they tune into our videos like it's a like it's a TV show. Yeah, and once you get people on board with it and you're authentic and you're you are your true self, yeah, they're gonna jump on board with it. So that's what happened. You're right. It's it's resonate with everybody. But you I mean, you're doing the same thing, man. You you by I can't wait to get my purpose partner. But like I said, in two weeks I'll be getting married, you'll be there, you and Destiny to celebrate. But I know the level of impact that takes place once you say I do to somebody. Absolutely. And they are aligned with your vision, the purpose that God has for the both of you. It's it's it's unstoppable. So I look when I was looking at you and Destiny grow, I was celebrating y'all saying, Yep, I can't wait till I get married. Because of course, you never thought you'd be doing something like this until you married Destiny. You know what I'm saying? You've been a private person and like that. Come on, you doing everything but that with all this content. You know what I'm saying? Right. Right. Everything but that. You've always been a clown or whatever, but you ain't finna be sitting up there making videos going viral about it, and especially your love life and your relationship, and just doing all that. So I just I I I I celebrate that. The fact that you leaned into, you embraced because you could have had a different thing. You could have said, listen, Destiny, that's you. You go post your get ready with me videos, you go do all that on your own. That ain't me. I don't want people looking all at me on social media. I got my nine to five, I'm good. Yep, you go do that, I go do this, and we're gonna coexist in this space. And so you decide to take a different heart posture where you leaned into more what uh guy was calling her to do, that in turn began to be what he called both of y'all to do. So and I didn't realize, I didn't realize what it would become because I looked at it as a hobby. Yeah. Right? I'm I'm like, nah, I'll do, I'll do a video or two, I'll hop in, but my nine to five is priority. Yep. This is a hobby for me. And not knowing that what had already been spoken to her was this was gonna be what the vision is gonna turn into. I didn't know that. I wasn't on board. I was like, I'll do, I'll do it. And she she was like the powerhouse behind it. She'd be like, hey, we gotta film. Get up, let's film, let's do this, let's do this. Yeah, yeah, I'll be in the bed, she'd be like, hey, we're doing TikToks. I'm like, TikToks? I don't wanna do no dang on TikTok. I don't want to do no dang on TikToks. Like, I'm tired, man. I'm I'm chilling. She'd be like, no, we gotta film. And I'm and I just I I didn't see the vision. I didn't see the vision, and I'm thankful to her because when I didn't see it, she could have been like, you know what? I'm just gonna give up. Yep. But she kept she kept the train moving. She kept the train moving, and I'll always be thankful to her for that because it allowed us to really just build this thing up from the ground up to where we are today. I did this was not on my vision board. This was not part of what I thought was my um plans and purposes. So what so at what point did you start believing? When we got our first brand deal. When that money came in, huh? He said, Oh, oh, this is what I could do for this. Hey, our first brand deal, $150, man. And I was geeked about it. I I tell people, you would have thought it was $100,000. I was like, oh, we getting money from doing these videos? He said, let's do more. Yeah, let's do more. Show me more. Let's go, let's go. So that's when I finally hopped on board. It was it look, man, it it was it was a struggle at first. Um it was a struggle because even then when I got on board, there was times where I didn't want to do it. There was times where we would do multiple takes on stuff, and by take five, I'm burnt, I'm ready to just give it up. She's like, no, no, let's just do it one more time. I'm like, no. And it would turn into arguments. It it really bled into our marriage. Yep, I can imagine. And but I'm thankful for those times because what ended up happening was it really allowed us to really stay true to who we are and separate it, right? We needed those times of friction, we needed those times of arguments to really be like, okay, you know what? This is bleeding over. We need to figure out how do we separate content and marriage. At the end of the day, when this camera goes off, we still married. Absolutely. We can't let a failure of a video bleed into when the camera goes off, now we're mad at each other. We have to be able to separate the two. So I'm glad that those moments happened. Because it allowed us to really sit back and have heart-to-heart conversations with each other and be like, okay, we gotta separate it. That's good. And how long did it take for y'all to find that balance? Um probably a couple years. We've been we've been doing social media five years now. I would say the first two years was it was it was the the battling. It was the the friction. And we started seeing them checks roll in and started making the the battling less. Yeah, yeah. We started seeing the checks roll in, but I think also what it was was we just really made it a point and was intentional about separating business. Because think about it. We're we're we're working our nine to fives, we're getting off and filming, we're filming on weekends, we are building a business together. This is during COVID, right? So we're working at home. Oh, yeah. So y'all run each other more than y'all would normally be. Yeah, exactly. Business, work, everything together, and it's working on having a baby. And working on having a baby. IVF, we was going through the IVF journey at the same time. We was trying to get out of our apartment. Um, and I needed to work on some things that I had back from like 2014 on my credit that I did, of course. Thank, thank God. Like, thank God he's blessed. Like, God has blessed us in so many ways. It's not even just about the content, it's about the fact that God gave us the resources to work on our credit, to fix things, to put us in a position now where we're building a house. And so No, y'all got y'all got a second house. Yeah. Because the first house y'all got is somebody's dream home. Yeah. And then you decide to go ahead and build an even bigger house. Yeah. Yeah. Did you imagine that for yourself? Like you know, my vision was I was gonna live in a uh high rise downtown. Yeah. Ultimately, that's what I saw myself. I saw myself as a single bachelor living downtown in the city. You know, I'm from Chicago, I've been a city guy. Um, I love, I love buildings and stuff like that. So for me, it was like, let me get a high rise in the sky, um, and just do my thing and just be a bachelor, climb up the corporate ladder. Yeah, and God was like, uh, nah, that I mean, that's that's a good vision, but that ain't for you. That's not your vision. That's somebody else's business. Yeah, that's somebody else's vision. He showed me quick, man. And so when these things started happening, it was like life started to get serious. So now it's like, well, dang, I can't play around with my credit anymore. I gotta get on the ball now. Yeah. Because now my wife is over here talking about, hey, we need to get out of this apartment. Again, like it's bro, it's when you when you marry somebody and they want so much better for you, boy. They want so much, they they're dreaming bigger than you can even imagine. That part. They're there their mind is so far past what you're thinking of, as far as like elevating you, it's exactly what Destiny did, man. She every time I think about it, I'm just like, man, look. That woman is the GOAT, man. Because I don't know. I don't know if if if I wasn't with her, I don't know where I'd be. I'd be working, I'd be doing my thing, but the stuff that we've been able to accomplish and build up, I don't know if, I don't know if I don't know. I don't know if that would have been able to happen with anybody else. It wouldn't have. That's the thing about it. That's what she brings to the table. And she'll, if I sat down with her individually, she'll say the same thing. I know that if I wasn't, it wouldn't have been. Because there ain't a lot of guys gonna lean into doing those videos. There's a lot of guys that won't. They'd be like, she's done dated guys before that probably said one thing and said now this, but it's the it's the full essence of who you are and who she is that God said, I need both y'all with strengths and weaknesses on both parties that say where you are weak, she's strong. Where she is weak, you're strong in that. And that's why God says two are better than one. Yeah, because he needed both y'all to come together to do great exploits and y'all touch people across the world where they look back and be like, couples goals, you know what I'm saying? They be like, I need me a brand. Does Brandon got a brother? You know, everybody be saying that stuff because they want, they want to see that, yeah, they can assume that there's arguments behind the scenes, but what they see is the fact that these are two people enjoying life together. Absolutely. And that's the reason why I love when I see couples do content, because they're if they actually enjoy it, then they're doing it together. They're they're having fun together. It's like the world gets to watch this couple's playground. You know what I'm saying? It's like, okay, whether they do pranks on each other, whether they do videos where they're doing dance challenges or whatnot, whatever it is, it's another point of connection that a couple gets to create something together. And I believe that God brought us together to create something together. Absolutely. And then y'all got a chance to create a beautiful child together. Oh man, I that was the that was the full circle icing on the cake moment. I mean, just to just to go through IVF, to, to, to fail at first, to me saying, I'm not gonna do this again. Because everything that we went through that first time, all the shots, everything, seeing destiny and pain sometimes, it it hurt me to my core. And for us to get that no, I was it was like a slap in the face, man. I was I was mad. I was like, I'm not doing this again, I'm not going through this again. We'll be single. I already started playing, like, we'll be single, we'll travel, we'll do our thing. And um so we we we we kind of reset from that, took some time off, and she came back and was like, hey, look, we got eggs left. And I'm like, no, absolutely not. I was like, I can't go through another failure. Once again, the guy was telling me, hey, you don't run this. I run it, you run along in it. And I fought, I fought, and finally I was like, okay, you know what? Fine, let's just do it homework. Let's just give it another shot. So we gave it another shot. We went, we um this last time we went through a different version of the IVF than we did the first time. We did something different and we did it, and in my mind, I'm like a half-glass empty. Like, so the difference between me and Destiny, which helps us balance is she's a half-glass fool. So if there's any hope of this happening, she's like the ultimate um optimist. Yeah. For me, if I see that there's any reason that this could fail, I'm gonna be a realist and be like, you know what, this may fail. And I go off of past history and stuff. So I did it, I didn't have any expectations, and lo and behold, she took a pregnancy test and she was pregnant, man. And I'm like, I'm just like, wow. And sometimes I have to apologize to God, man, because there's moments that when my faith wavers, I kind of I kind of just tap into that realistic mindset, and I'm like, nah, this ain't gonna happen. And destiny's right there to be like, hey, this could happen. And I'm like, nah. And so I have to catch myself sometimes apologizing and being like, you know what, Lord, I apologize. I know your track record. I know your track record, and I continuously sit here and act like you're not gonna do what you do. Come on. And so when so when you know, when we got when she got pregnant, I was like, cool, and then you know, we started um going through that process of the pregnancy, and I was just like, man, I was so appreciative of the fact that she was pregnant, and that I could be there for her and go through that whole journey that we so wanted to go through, but it took a delay, not a no, but a delay. And it was in and here we are, ocean came, and uh, she's been a blessing, dude. I remember you called me to get information about uh foster care and adoption. Not foster care, but adoption. It's like so just tell me a little bit about the adoption process. And I was like, why was going on? And uh were you really open to it? Or you just responding based on doubt that she would get pregnant? We were thinking about a plan B because at that time I think I think that was maybe like the last egg. Yeah, it was the last egg, it was one egg left. Yeah. And I told you, I said, uh all God needs is one. And I was I was like, I was dead set believing that God could perform a miracle so much that it scared me that I didn't want to give you false hope. Right. But I was like, God, I know what you just said. Why would you just say this to me? And there's only one egg left. This is scary. I got off the phone with you, I started crying and interceding and speaking in tongues. I called, left a message on the phone, and I was just like, God is gonna do it. I just I said, He's going to do it. And the reality was, I was like, oh Lord, I hope I just didn't, Lord, please don't let this backfire. God said, Why you keep thinking it's about you? You you can't you can't fail. You don't, you ain't God, Lateris. If I can use you to speak a word into their life, it's not that you're giving them false hope. You're activating the faith that you feel like you've heard me say, you're activating that. And in the activation of it, speaking to it, the Bible says life and death is in the power of the tongue. And they that love it eat the fruit thereof. And so I can speak negativity. A lot of times, people don't have no problem saying the negative stuff to people like you ain't this, you ain't that. They don't think second, you know, think twice about it. When it's speaking the voice of God, then we go like, Well, I want to. Make sure it's God. I want to make sure because I don't want to give nobody false hope. But I felt beyond a shadow of a doubt that God was saying that. And when I say during that season, it was multiple things that was like that. It was my own daughter going through issues, uh, fertility issues, my own daughter going through that. I had another friend that was going through the same thing. And I kept saying, God, why is this? Why has my friends been attacked? You get somebody that, uh, teenagers or whatever, people that have a lot of oops babies, you know, they'll get a oops baby or go to Planned Parenthood to get an abortion or whatnot when people that are kingdom-minded couples struggling to give uh give birth to kids. And I kept saying, God, this ain't right. This I don't like all this. Why what is this attack on kingdom children? Yeah. And I just began to war about it. And I had been doing that for the last couple of uh the last probably six months. And um, and people hear the story about how I even met my future wife, and I don't know when this time this video drops. I'll probably be married by then. But this is two weeks, this is two weeks before I get married that we're having this conversation. But um he's still married. Which is still wild. Why you always had this reaction when you think about me getting married? I I man, I I'll I'll oh man. I don't know. I don't I don't I don't I I just following you along your journey in the time that I've been knowing you and to see that this is fine, this is I I don't want to say finally, because that's uh to me finally is like a negative connotation, but just to see where you are now today, after everything you've been through, yeah, after everything you've prayed about, yeah, after all the people you've impacted and poured into, to see God showing up and saying, you know what, now it's time for me to send you your queen, you can't fathom it. You can't you can't understand it. Yeah. And it's it's it's almost as if, you know, the saying, like, God operates in the supernatural. That's exactly what this moment is for you. Yes. And I'm just I'm just so thankful that I get to be a part of it, man, because at the end of the day, like you have had an impact on us, and for you to extend the invite out to us, first of all, I want to say thank you. And I we're we're y'all my people, y'all my honored and appreciative of it, man. Because not a lot of people get to be in that space. Yes. You're right. You know, you talk to a lot of people, you interact with a lot of people, but there's only certain people that can actually access the inner you, the fullness of you. And I'ma tell you, bro, like I've been so proud of you, man. Thank you. And I feel like God is, you're you're kind of reaping the fruits of the labor that you put in, and God is showing up and being like, you know what, it's time. Absolutely. And so I think that's the reason why I'm so every time I think about it, I get so like emotional about it because I'm like, man, God, like, God is truly just in the midst with this. Like, he put his hands on you and was like, okay, you know what? It's time. That's what he said. And that's the part that keeps me humble. Because you think about the people you've dated through the journey, you may be thinking, like, is this gonna work? Is this the person? Is this? And then it falls apart for whatever reason, for various reasons. And then when it all starts clicking, when everything starts aligning, when everything starts moving, when you start feeling the voice of God and confirmation, the families come together, and it just it works together so seamless. Uh, my nephew, Ledarian, who I adopted, that's sitting doing the live switching for this event, uh, for this episode, he says he's never, ever, ever, ever, ever seen me date somebody that he felt this way about. Come on, man. You know, he'll literally say that. He'll he sit there and told this woman, my future wifey, I love you. Now, LaDaren is a thug with his emotions. He is a straight thug with his emotions. He's not gonna share. He he has an attitude, he's more like you, real pessimistic. He's like, he says, listen, I mean, people people gonna fail you. I mean, I ain't gonna just trust you. I ain't gonna just trust you like that. I said, Ladaren, why do you feel like that? I mean, because people, people, and he he has this mindset because, of course, he came through foster care. He's he he had a mom that failed, uh failed him as a mother. So if the person that's supposed to do right by you emotionally fails you, it starts planting a seed in your mind that the person who gave birth to me failed me, then how can I depend on anybody else? Wow, and that's the mindset he had. And I told him one day, I said, listen, I don't want the mother wound to build distrust with especially other women that you may meet and people in general. I want you to say, this was this relationship. It's very valid. The feelings that you have is valid, but don't make everybody else pay the consequences for what happened to you and you know, as a young kid, which you know, at seven years old, being placed in foster care or whatnot. And so, uh, but to hear him lean into my future wife and be like, I love you. Or when she says she says, like, I'm gonna go back home to LA, for him to be like, you know, he gets a little let down when she's leaving for the weekend from the visit. And I was like, what? You know what I'm saying? Yeah, you know, he he he likes her, he loves her, not just loves her, he likes her. That's a whole nother thing. You be like, I love her because you know, my uncle has that's who he about to marry, but you be like, I don't like her, I don't like the way she talks, I don't like the way she acts, I don't want to ask me no questions, I don't want to know. She's helping him through so many things. She gifted him, uh well, her mom gifted him her old car that she used to have in college. Nice little Mercedes or whatever. Had the things I had the thing shipped to Dallas. I got it wrapped in this beautiful, his favorite color is blue, got it wrapped in this car, uh this beautiful blue, and got the system redone because it's an old system. You know, back then they had uh um what was it called? I'm about to say DVDs, uh CDs. CDs, a little 12-track player in the thing, got that removed, got the the the airplay put in there and the and the Google stuff or whatever. So got it updated, but beautiful car. That's what I mean by you married the right person. They start adding different stuff emotionally. My daughter said, I prayed that my dad would meet a woman like this. You know what I'm saying? She said, she said it prior to she told me this, and we shared this. Where she said, I want you to marry someone like, I want to have a relationship with your future wifey, like Israel Holton's um Adrian Ballion has with her stepdaughter. He said, I want that. She said that five years ago, and God knew five years later, I will meet the woman that will cultivate that, that will have that. And my daughter looked at her the first time she met her. And I had told my future wife, I'll be about to say her name, I told my future wife here about that. And uh like a week prior to her meeting my daughter. And then I said, My daughter said she wanted me to meet a woman like this, like Adrian Bailey on and I shared the story. Yeah, and then she met my daughter, we were sitting at Papa Dow's. My daughter said, Dad, you remember when I told you I want you to be the daughter, yeah, I want your future wife to be blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, What did I say? And she was like, He just told me that. I said, I told you. I said, but that's how I'm vetting. I had to vet not only for myself, but know that the woman has to have the heart posture that will create a safe space for my kids. And so that's that's what I wanted. So a lot of times when people on the outside looking in, they may look and be like, he meets all these beautiful women, he got all these women that's nice, hey, got all these women as this, and don't realize that, yeah, these are nice women, yeah, they're attractive women, yeah, these women are successful, yeah, these women are cool. These women could be even God-fearing women. But the reality was they're great women, they're just not my wife. And when we can identify that to say, you're a great woman, that's a great man. He can be a great man but not be your husband. That can be a great woman but not your wife. And I wanted my wife. I didn't want just anybody's wife. And you know what? That's okay. Absolutely. That's okay. It is a lot of great women out there. And I'm and I'm I'm I'm sad because unfortunately, the the great men don't match up to all the great women. I was just doing, I was just talking to someone and I said the ratio of women and men out here is probably like seven to one. Yep. Out of those seven, you probably have four or five great women who are ready to be married, who who are God fearing, who are get embracing their singleness, getting themselves together, doing what they gotta do. But in the midst of doing all that, again, it's only one man. So you got four or five women that are ready, and you got one man, and that man could be good, he may not be good. Yep. So now you got to reset. Yep. It's it's hard. And so to your point, there's a lot of there, there are there is a lot of great women out here, but you have to sit back and allow God to show you who is for you. That part. What's your what what's what the the problem is you are letting your um what's the word I'm looking for? You're letting desperation get in the middle of God's vision. Yep. And so what God is trying to tell you to do is, hey, focus on me. That part. Let me show you who that person is, versus you, you just trying to run and catch the person, and you know, maybe if 15% of the person is good, they maybe check off, I don't know, three out of ten boxes. They're like, okay, this is good enough. That's not the way it's designed, man. And I get it. I get it. We're we're impatient people. We want love. A lot, I mean, we want love, but you gotta be patient. You gotta let God work, man. And that's exactly what I did. I was I was married before. And when I got divorced, man, I was single for like seven years. And I and I was I was going out, I was having my fun, doing my thing. It's basically like I was I went off to college again. You kidding me when you always say that. You said I went off to college. Yeah, I went off to college again. So I'm in Dallas, you know, it's it the the weather's nice, it's day parties, I'm going out, I'm turning up. I mean, I'm having fun. Like, real, real fun. Like, I'm having fun. And I had to get all that out of my system to help me to just like heal. And once I did that, I started flipping the switch. Like that stuff started to get old, it started to dry out. I'm running into the same people, I'm seeing the same people every weekend, it's starting to get old, and I'm like, you know, Lord, I failed in the first marriage, and I felt like I had unfinished business. Me too. And for me, it was like I know I'm built to do this. Yes, I know I'm built to lead, I know I'm built to love, I know I'm built to pour into someone, have a family, I'm built for this. And so at the same time I started flipping that switch, which is the name of the podcast, of course. What I started flipping that switch, all of a sudden I go to a pool party and I see Destiny. And the first time we just introduced, said hi by that's it. I think we ended up going somewhere after, but it wasn't like nothing like that. I didn't see her for a month. Fat uh flash forward a month, I'm at a day party and I run into her again, and I don't know why this time was different. Maybe, maybe God was like, hey, you need an extra month to really figure out if this is truly what you want. I don't know. But I ran into her again, and she had this energy and this aura and this infectious like vibe about her. I'm really big on vibes and energy, right? Like I could walk up to you, and if I sensed anything about a vibe being off, that's it. I don't I don't want nothing to do with you. But for her, it was different. And I told myself, in my mind, when I saw her again, I was like, you know what? I'm gonna pursue her. And I and I asked her, I was like, hey, let me buy you a drink. She said no. And I really, I mean, the drink was just to see if I can because she was getting ready to leave. So the drink was just yeah, to get her to stay. I didn't really care about no drink or nothing. I just wanted, I wanted a reason for you to stay, so I can talk to you. And um she said, no, no, I'm getting ready to head. I said, please let me just get you a drink. So she was like, All right. And we started talking a little bit, and then I asked her, now we're at a day party with drinks in our hand, and I asked her, I said, you want to go to church with me tomorrow. Uh look, I I'm pulling all the stops here, man. What made you say that? What made you say that? Because I wanted this, I needed to see if she was a god fear woman. Reason being is because her energy was was infectious, and I already like a vision just came in my head like right away about her. That's good. So I had I had to see, because if she told me, oh, I don't really do church, it was over. Yeah. He was like, all right, that was a great drink. It was a great drink. I holler at you. Hey, see, hey, see you around. You just shut it down that quick. I would oh, that quick. That quick. I know, yeah. Cause because look, at the end of the day, even though I was having my fun, I'm still the Lord is the Lord. Yeah. God is God to me. That's real. I I literally, I so uh when I was at Concord, we were a part of the young adult ministry, and I was leading the um Bible study group. We we had small groups. The people that was in my Bible study group, I was literally at the club with the night before. Like we would literally go to Beamers. Beamers, we would literally go to Beamers, turn up, get lit, and then go to church the next day and be in Bible study like nothing happened. Honest truth. Telling you, dude. He's in Bible study. We sitting here tired as all, I'll get out in the Word, studying Proverbs, talking about it. Talking about what we did the night before. Talking about what we did the night before, hungover like a mug. And um, but oh God, but we still acknowledged who God is and his power and everything. So, yeah, we had one foot in one, and well, I wouldn't even say we had one foot in one. We had both feet over here. We were just we was just dibbling dabbling in the body of Christ in the body of Christ. Um man, those were some times, man. Everybody used to talk about Beamer's buffet. Oh, that five dollar buffet? Oh my dude, and they we used to get passes for it, right? So it'd be free with a pass. And when I tell you that, they had this pasta that was everybody can't talk about that pasta. Dude. Dude, yeah. Five dollar, five dollar uh happy hour drinks. I mean, you you couldn't beat it, man. You you couldn't beat it. You couldn't beat it. Don't they make it so convenient for you to be in that lifestyle? They make it very convenient. They make it very convenient. And the more and more you start to get to know people, now you're getting in the place for free. Now you're getting drinks for free. You got bartenders who are giving you shots for free. I mean, that world, even just thinking back on it, that world, it they make it it's so convenient. It is. It's so convenient. You said the more you know people, the more they are. The more you know, the more you're the more popular you are. We knew a lot of people. I mean, it it was just it just that's just what it was, man. What do you think looking back though? Do you when you think when you look back on that with the mindset that you have, Concorde's mission is we grow people. Did you do you feel like you've grown out of that? Absolutely. Why? What do you think happened? Is it because you became married? No, I just think that I just think that I had to fully lock in with God. With God. I wasn't fully locked in. I was locked in, but I wasn't fully locked in. And for me, it was like, I love you, God. I'm gonna go to church, I'm gonna do my thing, but I'ma still, this is this is what fun is to me. That's part. This is what fun is to me. This is what fun is to me. And to be honest with you, I'm glad it happened the way it happened because the relationships that I've established through that, some of those relationships are still close to this day. And it allowed us to be real around each other, right? Like imagine, imagine you in a Bible study with people, and that's all you're doing is Bible study. Yeah, you don't truly get to know the full authenticity of the person of the human being because it's just Bible study. And I'm glad I could turn up with them. I'm glad we can have fun. It may have, it may have been, it may have been um the wrong type of fun, but it was fun. That you actually know them now. Yeah, and they know you, and they can appreciate your journey because they be like, Brent, but I remember you don't you done changed a lot. Because I remember when you used to. And that's always that moment of what you used to do. No, for sure. Yeah, and they're like, you all married man now, father with kid and all that. It's like But what people but what people don't know is that I was I was in that lifestyle. I was, I was, I was, I was having situations with homegirls. Um, I it people don't understand that when you're in that lifestyle, it's not just about going out, it's about the decisions that you make and the consequences and what follows after that. So for example, like I I had got two girls pregnant. I had two abortions, and I'm I wasn't proud of that at the time. I to to see what those women had to go through, um, it wasn't one of my proudest moments. And that really kind of was a wake-up call for me in itself. Um that's when I was like, man, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta change up. I gotta do something different. Because I don't want to be sitting here getting women pregnant, having to go to abortion clinics, I'm having to pay money. My first thought is, well, you know, we can't have the baby. Like we're neither one of us are in a position. I mean, I don't even want to halfway I'm not, I don't I mean, I'm not gonna have to be able to do that. I don't like you like that. You want to say I don't like you like that? Yeah, I don't like you like that. Yeah, you know, we're having fun, and so but isn't that interesting? We always use that word, we're having fun. Yeah, fun, yeah, fun, fun, fun. Like that's what keeps echoing, and man, she was, you man, we had fun at this. We had fun. And it's like when you really look at it, then was it really fun? Because if you're doing everything that you can do, which is I'm drinking, I'm you know, uh um having sex, I'm doing all that, and then the consequences aren't fun, yeah, then is that really fun? Or is that a facade of fun? Because I could sit there and ask you if what you and Destiny have together is that fun. Yeah, that's the total opposite of everything that you did before. So it's two fun. Can they two exist? Did you say this is fun? Or do we look at it as this is worldly fun, but this is God's fun. This the Bible says that the Lord maketh rich and added no sorrow to it. You can be a drug dealer and be quote unquote rich, but then God says, I can give you riches. It may not even have a monetary value to it, but it added no sorrow to it. And so both of them saying rich, but God gives you everlasting joy, the world gives you happiness or whatnot. And so always try to uh navigate both of those dualities because at the end of the day, what we're brainwashed, because like a kid will literally say, if I told if I told Lidarian, hey, you can't, he said he wants to go to a party. The prime example, I think last year or whatever, he wanted to go trick-or-treat. He knows the uh my household, we don't do trick-or-treat, we want to do all that. Never have done that. And so one day, he didn't say this, but he could have said, You won't let me have fun. And I could sit there and say, Well, Ladaren, you gotta understand this. The way that I view this holiday, and I'll educate, I'll tell them about where it's created, the where it derived from. I'll sit down with them, I'll show them videos of how even witches and warlocks talk about Halloween and what they do, and they think that Christians are so passive when they celebrate it with a different type of costume, a friendly costume, but then they say, Y'all are still celebrating it. I can't unhear a warlock, a witch telling me that they look at me weak as a Christian if I were to celebrate Halloween. So I'm going, what? So I'll educate my kid and then say, All right, when you get older, you do what you want to do. Like, I don't ever try to control my kids. I say, as kids, these are the standards of the household. And then when you get older, learn for yourself. Because the stuff that my mom told me to do, I didn't listen. When I got older, I tried it, bumped my head, came back, and was like, all right, she knew a little bit better than what I thought. Yeah. And so, but if when if he said, You won't let me have fun, the Bible says when I was a child, I spoke as a child. When I became an adult, I put childish things away. So some things that we call fun, me being promiscuous, me having sex when I was younger, me even struggling through that over the last five years. Uh, even when I took a vow of abstinence in 2020, and I'd be like, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. At the end of the day, I was nervous every time if I had sex with somebody unprotected, and I was nervous until their cycle came. So I'm like, please. And I'm like, ooh, side relief. Yeah. So they're like, man, my cycle came. I wouldn't even voice it to the person that I was scared. I'd just be listening very intently to see if that cycle came. And they go, Oh, yeah. I said, What's going on with you? I had to go get some pads on, I gotta get some tampons. I'm gonna cycle that. I'd be like, Side relief. I'm like, thank you, Jesus. Now I'm gonna sit here and say, Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. Now I'm gonna Thank Jesus now. And then be like, oh, oh. Thank you, Jesus. It's funny this, it's funny this stuff we be thanking God for. It's like God looking at us like I got nothing to do with that. Ain't got nothing to do with that. Are you crazy? Oh, thank you, Jesus. Lord, thank you. But we say that over and over again, and God be looking at us like, I just need your will to line up with my will. Absolutely. I need you, Lateris, to make sure that what you call fun ain't fun. I want to get your heart changed to where you hate the things that I despise. It was one of my friends, they said, um, this lady told me, she said, Leteris, when are you gonna get to the point that you hate uh premarital sex? And I said, I hate it. Why would I wait? Why would I hate this? This is God, this is good. God said, This is good. Why would I do that? Yeah. He said, but when you do it out of context, you know it breaks God's heart. When will your heart change to where you start hating the things that hurt God? I said, Come on, man. I said, God, okay. Align my heart with yours. Yeah. Allow me to not look at the things that I may thirst after, these things that have attached itself to me for years, from the day I lost my virginity at 16 or gave up my virginity. Hey, when we say lost it, I gave it up. I gave up my virginity at 16. When did that begin to be the heart posture of what is normalized in my life? Now, for people who didn't have the freedom of giving that up, that they've been sexually assaulted or somebody violated them, and then they planted that seed in their mind for them to start exercising that unwilling, because they didn't even know what was being done to them. That's a whole different story. But for me at 16, I willingly gave that up. And I wrestled with trying to get into alignment with God's word about it. And when these words that came to me through friends, that was like, so when you gonna when you gonna stop, you know, when are you gonna take the mindset that when you hurt God in this area, that you'll hate those things that hurt God? And I said, All right. And that's what the challenge has been. That's what made me say, all right, I'm gonna take a vow of abstinence. And that still was a struggle, but I start, I wasn't having as much fun as people assumed that I would have with a platform like I have, where I have all these opportunities, and I sit back and be on Friday nights sitting on the phone. I used to be on Friday nights with the woman that I'm uh marrying, worshiping. We'll be singing worship songs. Here I am, the most eligible bachelor, quote unquote, by platform, created a whole platform about me being a bachelor, and I'm sitting here on Friday nights singing worship songs with her on the phone. We just sit up there singing, just singing or whatever. That's how we connect, and we were just platonic friends at this time, just worshiping with each other. And I used to sit there, and I remember one time I was laying in my bed. I said, I feel so lame. I said, Friday night, Saturday night, I'm single, ain't going out with nobody. I'm just sitting here in this in this office. Ask Ledarian. I'll be sitting in my office working, editing videos. I didn't get an editor until January of this year. So that means that the every video that I've ever done for the for since the beginning of Dear Future Wifey, I was the one editing these reels, editing these episodes, doing all of that. And it consumed a lot of my time, which is good because if I had all this freedom, then maybe I would have been in more trouble. You know what I'm saying? I would have been out here in these streets. I even told myself, Brandon, I'll be honest with you, I and I told my fiance this. I said, listen, I told myself, and God, by 2026, if I ain't married, I said, I'm finna be out in these streets. Wow. I said, I said, I am going to be, and I didn't say I was gonna be so extreme of just there's reckless sex. Oh, but I was gonna be, yeah, I'm I'm I'm gonna be flying people from Dubai to Dallas, from I'm gonna be flying to freaking Ghana to I'm gonna be everywhere. When I say I was gonna, I was gonna even vlog the experience to be like bachelor on the mission. I was gonna just be everywhere. I was gonna just get all these experiences where I just travel all around the world, just dating women everywhere, just everywhere. Yeah, in friends, dating somebody. I was gonna just do just random stuff. And God said, sit your tail down. And look, we have this, oh man. Oh, wow. God, man, listen. We have, isn't it funny how we have this whole thing planned out, mapped out, what we're gonna do, how we gonna do it, who we gonna do it to. And God is like, again, you're not doing none of that. You don't run this. You do not run this. Sit down and let me show you what you're gonna be doing. Let me tell you what's best for you. Let me tell you what's best for you. See, the thing about it, if I was left to my own devices, don't tell him what I would have been doing. That means in 2026, the trajectory I was going to intentionally set myself out on. Um now I'm all across the world. I'm doing whatever with whatever, saying that I want to be absolute, but then I'm putting myself into in uncompromising situations. You can sit there and have the best intentions all day, but then I'm sitting up here in a whole nother country with some beautiful woman, and she like, hey, this and this, and be like, Well, uh, next thing you know, I do XYZ. Next thing you know, now I got a kid sitting over here in Bermuda. I got a kid over here in the Bahamas, I got a woman over here in Spain that's sitting up here saying, Hey, I'm pregnant. Now, even if it ain't even my kid, I gotta go through the whole mental mess, the the paternity test, all that stuff to determine for all those months whether or not that's my kid. And it's in a whole nother country. A whole nother country. Imagine that. And let her start making videos about it. Let her be like, he don't even want, he don't even claim this kid as his own, and be like, I don't even know. I I I just met you two times. What are you talking about? Like all of that. And God be like, can I just save you from yourself? Please. Can I just can I just bring you into me? Just be quiet. Because my yoke is easy, yeah. My burden is like, yeah, what you're about to do to yourself is put so much weight on your life that is so unnecessary. Yeah, just come to me, submit to me, and let me give you the desires of your heart. And the true desire was I just want to be married. I wanted to marry my purpose partner. I want to lock in with one person until death do we part and build legacy together. He said, That's what you want. Focus on that. Stop focusing on if I ain't getting married by then, I'm gonna go do something totally opposite. It only makes sense. We're just like a kid throwing a temper tantrum. Well, if I don't get married by this date, and if I don't have my wife this way, I'm gonna go be really outside, as we say. It don't make sense. No. So, Brandon, what you want to talk about? What you want to chop up about? So, just man, just just kind of like I said, man, just get my my story out there starting from when I was a child. Um, so basically, um when I when I was a kid, you know, obviously my my mom was a single parent. Uh she worked, she worked, she worked, she made sure we always had a roof over our head, food on the table, and she raised me to be the man that I am. And for that, I admire and respect her to the fullest extent because she didn't have any help. You know, my father wasn't around, he wasn't in my life. He, I don't even think he really had any desires to be in my life, but at the end of the day, it was just me and moms. And um, you know, we went through a lot. You know, we were living in in Chicago and she was doing what she could, and you know, I would, I would, I would have to go to babysitters' houses, and you know, people, uh family would watch me and stuff like that because moms was just trying to really just work and provide. And so um I've never shared this actually until now. Um, but you know, there's there there's a little bit of I don't want to necessarily say trauma, but I I I think about it. And I started, I don't know why what made me started thinking about it recently. I think maybe it was because I just recently spent time with family and it made me reflect on like the memories and the past and when I was growing up and things of that nature, that nature. And so one memory that came up for me that was that I thought about and that was really like um for the longest it was traumatic for me, but I've kind of like put it away and dealt with it and healed from it, but every time from like every once in a blue moon, it'll still come up. And it was a time where I was I was a I was a kid, I was I don't know, maybe I was about seven or eight years old, and I I I would I would go over a certain individual's house, and um, you know, that person was watching me, and there were things that happened. Um and what would happen is you know, there would be times where that person would make me do things, and from a you know, from a sexual standpoint. Um and like I said, I've never shared this up until now. And I don't know why I was put on my heart to share now. Maybe it's for someone who is going through that situation, speak up, because I didn't speak up. I was a kid, I was I was just doing what I was told, you know. So there would be like things where I would do sexually with this individual, and I didn't like it. You know, I I didn't like it. It was um it actually made me very uncomfortable. Um and so I think how that shaped me is the the reason why I'm saying this is because things that happened to you as a kid, it it really affects you even when you get older. Absolutely, and not just mentally, but for the longest, as I grew up, I like for some reason I had this attraction to like older women because this person was older than me when I was a child, obviously. And even even to the point where like at the age of 19, I had a sexual encounter with a 55-year-old. That I that and like again, nobody knows about none of this to this. The only person that knows is Destiny, but it it made my mind think like, okay, I'm supposed to be doing this, I'm supposed to be having these encounters with older women, I'm supposed to be, and so I say that to say you have to really be careful that you get you have to be careful of not allowing this to let this affect you as you get older. Yep. Because why is it now at my big old age that I'm still thinking about it? And how old are you? I'm 41. And this happened to me when I was like seven or eight. Seven or eight. I never told nobody, I never told my mom, never told family. But why is it that at age 41 I'm still thinking about it? Because that's the reason why, even in the conversation, as you notice, I touched on that about even uh when I was talking about how I, you know, I said I didn't lose my virginity, I gave my virginity up. Yeah. And I came back around and I said, now to somebody that's been sexually assaulted and that type of stuff, seeds get planted at a very young age where you'll find yourself wrestling with stuff later. That's because the Holy Spirit told me before we even sat down to talk about this, that that's what this conversation's gonna be about. And so, and in that, the reality is I'm glad that you're having this conversation because so often we hear only women share that. Yeah. Um, I remember it was this crazy viral video where they was talking about, I don't know if it was a little boosy or somebody, one of them people saying, but they don't believe that even a young man can be sexually assaulted by older women. They think that they think this is the craziest toxic thing I've ever heard in my life, but they think that shoot, I mean, like that's good. You know what I'm saying? And I'm going, how in the world do you think it's okay for a grown woman or anybody? Anybody, I don't care if the person is seven and the other person is nine. There is not okay for anybody to make somebody come into a space sexually that they aren't given permission to. Absolutely. Period. Nine-year-old and a seven-year-old. Not okay. Um, but we have been conditioned with these lies, and that's what makes a lot of men not share it. Absolutely. Uh they be like, I mean, I ain't gonna say that because you know, I mean, shoot, I got my first piece when I was 12. You know what I'm saying? They'd be like, but how'd that happen? I mean, it was just I mean, my babysitter, you know, she was 23 and she said this, whatever. You don't think you don't know that you were sexually assaulted? It's not a f it's not a flex. No, no, and they look at it as a flex. They look at it as a flex. Because that's the lie the devil done told them. Because we have been brainwashed that masculinity is sex. And and I'll tell you how it's it's for sure, it for sure wasn't a flex for me because we're talking about a family member. So it's not somebody that's just like out, like I didn't get dropped off at a daycare, and then somebody at the daycare, we're talking about someone that was my blood, that was supposed to be the closest thing to you. Is a it was a family member that was doing this to me. And for the longest, I used to be so uncomfortable and hate going over there, but it was like I did I didn't want to tell my mom, I was too afraid to tell her, so it was like I just kind of just sucked it up. Explain that to me, because you hear a lot of victims of uh sexual assault as a child or an adult say that they were afraid to share. Is that an internal thing or did the other person say, don't tell? Where does that come from? Well, I think naturally, I mean, obviously the other person doesn't want you to tell, but I it it's I mean, but do they say it? Do they say it? They don't know. This person didn't tell me not to tell, but I just for me in my mind, I'm like, I I can't tell my mom this. First of all, my mom is uh is a thug. So she would have hurt the she would have for sure hurt, she would have for sure hurt the person. Um and I'm even I'm even in fear of her finding out now because she's still that woman. My mom is still like my mom will go crazy about me. And you know, I know this is gonna I know this is gonna get out to her. Um but at the same time, I don't I I feel like it was for some reason I was just led to talk about it because I'm I'm at a point now where God has revealed to me what my purpose is and it's to inspire and impact others. And so I want people that whether you're a kid, whether you're a teenager, whether you're an adult, if this is something that you're experiencing, you gotta speak up. Because if you don't speak up, if you don't get the necessary help that you need, this is gonna follow you. This is this has followed me into my 40s, and it's gonna follow me for the rest of my life. And I'm the type of person where I remember the memories from when I was a child. A lot of people don't remember, like you could ask a lot of you could ask a lot of people, oh, well, what was happening at eight and nine years old? And they'd be like, well, shoot, I don't remember. Yep, that's right. Me, I remember my childhood. I remember a lot of memories. I remember vividly a lot of stuff that I went through as a child. And for some reason, like I said, every once in a while, that vision just pops up in my head, and I'm like, Lord, why does this keep popping up in my head? Like, I'm good. I want to just move on from it. And you never you never mentioned this to this individual that's still around. I've never mentioned this to the individual. I'm sure the individual knows, um, but I've never mentioned it to the individual. I've never told anybody. There's actually, like I said, Destiny was the only person I told about it because, again, she is my safe space for me to be like, you know what? This is what I'm going through, this is what I'm dealing with. So she knows who the individual is, but of course, obviously that'll stay between me and her. Yeah. Um, but I never mentioned it to anybody until actually when anybody finds out, it's probably gonna be, well, the first time it'll be from this video. And what do you what do you what what would you say to your mom if she said who was it? Would you tell her? I don't know. I don't know. Um Destiny was telling my wife was telling me I should tell her, but if I tell her, it's gonna shake up. It's gonna shake, it'll shake, it'll shake it up. It'll shake the family up. I I'm I it's my mom's not the type of person that'd be like, well, you know what, it happened a long time ago, we'll work through it. No, my mom is gonna act like it happened right then. She's gonna act like it happened yesterday. So I don't know. I don't know. Would you would you frame it? So um would you try to help navigate her reaction? For instance, hey mom, I'm gonna tell you some information and I need your buy-in to say this is what I don't want to happen. I do, I will give you the grace to have a conversation. We can all sit here, you, me, and the individual, and we can talk about it. We can call them on three-way and say XYZ. But what I would like to see out of this is XYZ. Not for you to go bust them upside the head, not for whatever. I just need for you to say what you need to say to this individual. You have full authority to say whatever you want to say, but I just don't want actions done physically because that would make me regret that I told you because now we may be facing, you know, criminal charges or whatever. Like, do you think that that's a good way to frame it so that it doesn't, in your sense, would you feel like it backfired on you if you shared that and that individual got hurt by your mom? Um, I think I I I mean, I could frame it up that way, but I know my mom. She ain't gonna care. No, no, no. Cause the way I look at it is let's say Ocean gets older. Oh, yeah, you ain't that nobody can't talk to me about none of that. I ain't got no understanding. Nope. It ain't no talk. I it ain't no you there's no way you can frame it up to me. Me neither. Um, yeah, I'm I'm literally willing to risk it all. Yep, that's me too. So so I and I know my mom. She's she's she's sh you know, me and my mom, it's it's just been me and her against the world since I've came into the world. And the way that she loves me and cares for me, and and she, you know, the way I mean, it it just wouldn't. So I don't know. I I I I I think I need to pray about that and really get God's guidance on that. Uh, because right now I'm just like, and I I just don't want to tell her who it is. Um, I mean, even just doing this video, which I'm I'm thankful to God that I was able to do this, um, but even just doing this, I'm just like, oh man, this is about to be So have you thought about sharing it before, but then said, nah, I just I ain't ready for it? I've never I've never, this is why this is so weird to me. I've never ever, I was gonna take it to my grave. I really was. Why um number one to protect myself. Number two, to protect the family. It wasn't to protect the individual, but it's to protect myself, to protect the family, and knowing what it could possibly do and the consequences that can result as uh you know afterwards. For me, it's like I'll just take it to the grave. Plus, I'm older, I'm raising my I got so much going on. Yeah, I I I I don't really like to revisit the past, even though sometimes I get memories of it. Yeah, I don't like to revisit it. That was the past, that was a chapter in a long book. That was chapter two, I'm on chapter 28. Yep. So for me, it's like I I don't, I I I just rather just take it to the grave. When you said that you didn't want to um what'd you say, not do harm to you or whatever, what did you mean by that? I forgot how you word it, but you said protect myself. Protect yourself, yeah. Just really protect myself from being looked at in a different light. What light? Um a light uh uh more like a a a pity. Like, dang, I feel bad for him. I don't want people looking at me in that light. I again kind of walking into my purpose. I think it's it's meant for me to just pour into others and be that safe space for others. But now it's like, okay, dang, I'm the one that people are gonna look at, they're gonna pour into pity party, I'm sorry this happened. And I just I didn't want that. I was trying to protect myself from that. I wanted to be looked at it as, oh, he's good, you know, he's got it, you know. I I just want to be looked at as as the guy that has it together that can help others, not the other way around. And I've always been like that. And when you think about that, isn't that such a fallacy? Isn't that just something that's so false? That at the end of the day, the reason why, thank you, Holy Spirit, that you desire to pour into other people because there was nobody pouring into you. Yeah, so a lot of times the person that becomes the giver, the person that becomes the helper, the person that begins to be the person that's planting the seed is because they wish that that was afforded to them. Yeah. So the reality is that's why God is allowing you to be in this space to share it because at the end of the day, when you talk about dear future wifey, I created that because I wish I had that for me. I said, when I was struggling in my marriage, the church wasn't talking about the stuff. You couldn't just pop up on A YouTube channel and watch people truly share. I cheated on my wife. I did this or whatever. That would be crazy to hear in an era that I was struggling in back in 2020, 2000. And when did I get married? 2010. That would be crazy to hear it. No, 2010, it was 2005. That would be crazy to hear that back then. Now you hear people talk about. I remember when I started Dear Future Wifey, people was like, This man is telling all this business. This was just five years ago. People wasn't getting on the internet sharing their personal business about yeah, I cheat. My ex-wife never got on a on an Instagram video or Facebook saying, Yeah, my husband just divorced me and he's the one that cheated on me and he did this. She never said none of that stuff. It's me after five years later saying, I don't want to be, I wouldn't say a fraud, but I wanted people to hear everything. I want people to know why I began to be so intentional about uh helping to give tools so that marriages could stay together. Yeah, that would be half of the story if I just shared, hey man, y'all need to stay together, man. Y'all need to fight through everything. They say, Well, what happened to you? I mean, I just believe that y'all got divorced or whatever. But I think people need to stay together in this. No, what happened to you? I mean, things that didn't work out. Look at the divorce decree, it says irreconcilable differences. But listen, I just want everybody else to just stay together. I mean, God is here to do this. And they be like, but you don't know what I'm dealing with. We're trying to navigate uh infidelity. You know, he cheated on me, and I go, Dang, that for real. But see, God can work on that. And then I never share, like, I was that person. Oh, I was the person that cheated on my wife. That is the reason why the uh the platform grew so much is because people got a chance to see my scars. The first thing that Jesus Christ did, the savior of the world, the first thing he did when he came from the grave was reveal his scars. The scars let you the and the reason why he did it, thank you, Holy Spirit, is so that you could identify who he was. He could have just came his glorified body and they've been like, That ain't Jesus, that's somebody else. It was rumors that they was like, that really ain't him. But the minute he showed his scars, they said, Oh, yeah, that's Jesus. Yeah. Is it even in his glorified body, he could have made those scars disappear, but he showed it. Here's my scars. He told, he told them to put your hand, your finger in where my piercings went because it was still there. A lot of times we're so busy trying to uh uh make people appear, make us appear that we got it all together, that I'm here. You need somebody, I got you. But what brings about true healing is when we're able to say, you know why I can see it, somebody that's been molested, you know why I cannot discern somebody that's broken, you know why I can discern somebody that just needs a listening ear is because I needed that when I was seven years old. I needed that when I was eight years old. And so now I can hear the voice of pain on a deeper level because I can hear it because I've been there. And that's what it's not gonna be sympathy that people are gonna give you. They're gonna give you um something that they can identify with. They're gonna say, Me too. I went through that and my mom never knows. And now you're gonna give them the encouragement to go, I think I need to share this with my mom. I think I need to share this with my dad. I think I need to share. And some people have stories because they've shared it with me, that their father molested them and they mom never knew. So, how do you share that with somebody? Everybody has these deep levels of trauma that they've been masking through years, just holding on to and say, I don't want to destroy the family. But if the family is what family is supposed to be, it's not going to destroy the family. Because that's that's what family is. It can't be that I have to be the sacrificial lamb to deal with this for 40 plus years and no one, it doesn't matter. I'm supposed to be the savior of our family, not to share what was stolen from me. That was that person didn't think about that. That person didn't say, if I did this, this could wreck our family. They just said, Hey, I'm activating, I'm I'm acting on this for whatever reason that they did. At the end of the day, you can't also be the victim and the victor if without giving uh um um voice to what happened. You you become victorious over the situation by saying, Hey, listen, I went through XYZ, I'm gonna share it with because the reason why it is it's surfacing. Just a reason. If that was the case, God would be like, Brandon, let that go. Just leave it alone. That's what happened to you. And God would never do that. God, most of the time in his DNA, why? Why do I know God would typically never do that? Because he says people will be overcome by the word of our testimony and the blood of the Lamb. If that was the case, don't share your testimony. Yeah, don't ever share what you went through. I don't care if you've been a sex trafficker, I don't care if you was a drug addict, I don't care if you was an adulterer, don't share it. Just don't share it because it's gonna make other people look bad. You just you just cast all your cares on me. I take it and it's done. I forgave you and I forgave them, and we good. Don't bring that up. But his word says, confess your faults one to another so that you may be healed. So a lot of times we're not given healing because we're not confessing. And so the minute you're able to confess that and say, hey, listen, man, I'm ashamed. And be able to say that. I'm ashamed that I have to say this right now to you, mom. I'm ashamed that I have to say this to you, whoever the person was that did that. And why did you do this? To have those conversations where the person, because the person knows what they did, and you can go to all these family reunions and and eat uh ribs and everything else and brisket and ignore the big elephant in the room that you don't even want to talk to that person no more. You stand on the opposite side of the doggone thing, and they're not sit there and they be like, Yeah, everybody, family get together, just hold hands with them, go pray and bless the food. And you like, let me move on over here. And then now your wife is looking at that person like, you know what I'm saying? Because she's a protector of you too, and she's looking like, I don't like you. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? And it's like, but I'm supposed to be the person that keeps everything together and hold peace. When at the end of the day, true healing comes, and that's in every facet. I am one of those people that believe in talking about the ugly stuff so that healing can truly come. Because then think about this. Now, this is on the other side of it. We can, we can, we can uh look at how bad it could get, and it's real, it can get real bad. Right. But what if it gets real bad and then it gets real good? What if it gets real bad where people are mad, they frustrate, they this or whatever, and then you start finding out other stuff. Your mom begins to confess with you. This is what happened to me as a kid. The the aunt the the person that it happened, the the person that did this to you says, you know, they end up talking and say that you realize this uncle so-and-so did this to me. And you start realizing it's a generational curse that's operating in the in the family bloodline that needs to be eradicated because now the nephew so-and-so is coming up, being babysat by that same person or babysat by the kid of that same person that's doing the same thing to them. What happens is that God can't heal what we won't reveal. And it's so often that you see these generational curses running rampant in our household, but nobody will be the sacrificial lamb to say it stops with me. And so maybe that's what God is saying with you is that it stops with me. I'm not gonna let me take this to the grave and this thing continues in the family bloodline and nobody talks about it. I promise you, I know as sure as I am black and I'm 47 years old, that that ain't the first you ain't the first person that experienced that through that person, and that person was violated too. And you're gonna just find the the the chain of command that just kept happening, the chain of the trauma, and be like, wow. And everybody was shh silent about it. Nobody ain't said nothing. Think about how many years is you said you're 42. 41. 41. Yeah, 41, 7 minus 41. Like that's a lot of yeah. 45 years. 35 years. I've kept it bottled up. And think about what has taken place in 35 years, what could have taken place in 35 years through this individual doing it over and over again to somebody else in the family. No, for sure. For sure, and that person now, when you start giving voice to it, that other person that may, and let's let's just talk about it. You went through what you went through and you turned out pretty darn good. But it's some people that have gone through the same thing that now they're sex workers. There's some people that went through the same things that could have been in your family that now you like, why that person just ain't never gonna get why is this person now living an alternate lifestyle? Why is this person know what is this person dealing with? Why is they like that? And they never told you because such and such did X, Y, Z to me, and I never could overcome that. I could never get past it, I could never get healed from it. I don't believe in Jesus Christ. Like you believe in God, you went through all that, and you haven't given up your love for God, but that other person could have gone through the same thing and say, if God loved me, he wouldn't allow me to go through this. So I don't even believe in this God you talk about. It's so many different variations that take place from the same level of trauma, it just shows up in different ways. And so I don't know all the answers on what should be done and how it should be articulated. I just want to say I applaud you, man of God, for giving voice to your trauma and saying, because you start off saying, Yeah, you know, I'm you know, I'm healed from it and this, whatever, but it just shows up, it just keeps peaking at 19. You're having a sexual relationship with somebody that's 55, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, that is trauma. You know what I'm saying? And now we look at it like I got a cougar, you know what I'm saying? This or whatever. We we put cute little words to it like cougar, but why would a 55-year-old want a 19-year-old man? Yeah. Like, why, why? We we we normalize that a grown man 50-something years old having sex with a 21-year-old girl, and we like, are she grown? Listen, yes, legally they're grown, but if you find that you could literally have sex with somebody that's young enough to be your daughter, that is a problem. That's how I look at it. So I'm like, fight me in the parking lot. The reality is, if you could have sex with somebody that's young enough to be your daughter. I remember my daughter said that one day. She said something really left field. It was funny. She said, My daughter's 29 years old. She said, Dad, uh, because it's this young girl that shot a shot at me through uh social media one day. They sent me an email, and the girl was like, this was a few years ago, and the girl was like 25. I was like 40, 45 or 40 something. Yeah. And I said, I was playing my daughter. I said, Man, this is this girl. I feel like she's the one. She's like, we talking about. I said, this girl DM'd me. I mean, she emailed me and she said that, you know, she's from Detroit, and she said that listen, I I watch a podcast and um I listen to the things that you want in a woman. I'm everything that you want. You know, I cook for you, I'll make you macaroni and cheese. I said, this girl said, macaroni and cheese. What about 12? This girl said, I'll make you macaroni and cheese. And I'll sit there and she was saying all this stuff, and she said, I'm 25 years old. And I was reading this to my daughter when I got to part 25. She said, Dad, no. I said, What you talking about? She said, No, dad. I said, No, I'm talking about this girl. I just, it's something about what she wrote to me, it just sounds like this somebody I want, I just I just want to build something with her. She said, Dad, when I see men liking girls that young, it makes me look at them like they're a pedophile. And she said, if you were to ever be with somebody that was that young or my age, just my age, it makes me question when my friends came over to the house. Were you looking at them? Wow. I said, Wow. And she said, it would make me question. She said, Dad, I'd rather you date a man than a date a girl my age. I said, Good Lord. Wow. I said, is that she said, yes, it's that serious. And I said, wow. And I and I joke with her because I've never been attracted to young girls like that. Right. You know, even legal, 28, 29. I met women at 29 years old and they're brilliant, got their own career, got kids, whatever. And I just be like, you the age my daughter. I just, I just don't, it just nothing operate. I used to date older women. You know, I was married to a woman older than me, you know, four years older, but it ain't 20-something years older. Right. So I've always been attracted to the older women, but it was like within the age group of like, you know, four to five years or whatnot. But what I'm saying to you is this thank you. I salute you as a man of God, as a mighty man of valor, as a man that says, yes, I still overcame this, and I'm still overcoming the memory. And that memory may always be there at the end of the day because it's a part of your story. The way your brain is wired, you can remember even the good stuff that's happened at eight, nine years old that most people can't uh remember. So that's a good thing. The thing that you're getting a little angst about is how it's going to impact your family. Right. So when you look at it, let's play imagination. What's the worst that could happen? Um it could destroy relationships. Um for good? Yeah. Do you think that you can say whatever it is, and these people just will never talk again on the face just Oh, well, my mom in general. My mom she'll walk away, never speak to you again. As a matter of fact, don't invite me to any functions that this person is that I don't even want to look at the person. I just again I know my mom. You know, I've been knowing her for 41 years. And you also know what's inside you too, then I know what's inside me too. Then you said you'll do the same thing. I would do the same thing. And luckily, I I I think the only thing so it's well, the thing is, is that obviously it's gonna come with prayer. It's gonna have to come with prayer, and I think God is the only person that can really come in, step in on the situation. Absolutely. Um, because this is one of those things where it's gonna take God um to come in, and I just know the family, I know my mom, I know this is something that's gonna really tear her up, and who knows as a result of that what's gonna happen. But I think I think that again, it was just something that it was just led for me to talk about it now. And I and I and I'm thankful to God because here it is, I could have just been going on about life, moseying on, and God was like, you know what? Let me let me stop you right here, let me put a break into the situation right here for you to get this out. And there was no reason for me to talk about it now. Things are going great. God is blessing me. I got a family, we got like everything's going good for us. There's no reason why things should be shaken up at this particular moment. And that's how I know God is like, you know what? It doesn't matter how things are going right now for you. I'm telling you to get this out, not just for you, but for everybody else that's going through this or that or that have gone through this. And sometimes it people, like you said, people just need one person to talk about something. Like, for example, our IVF journey. When we got our IVF journey out there, it was hundreds of people that came out. I was like, you know what? I'm going through the same thing. And our platform allowed people to come out and be like, I'm going through this. Then the next comment, oh girl, I'm going through this too. The next comment, girl, I'm going through it too. And it was almost like it was just this big community that came out of nowhere, all based off of us just sharing our journey. Yep. And so I'm hoping that this does the same thing. I'm hoping that people are able to be more vulnerable. They are able to come out and talk about things. There's a lot of things that I've shared even in this video, like for example, the abortions and then the fact that that happened and the sexual encounter I had, and really just going through my first marriage and failing at that, to now being here with destiny and thanking God that I got another shot at this, and that he put the woman in my life that is for me. Um it's so crazy because when you're married, like for example, my first marriage, we had all the resources available to us. We were in a a couple small groups, we had people available, we had like it was right there for us if we needed it. Yeah. And here it is, we're sitting here going to the small groups, we're interacting with these couples, we're going to church, we're a part of marriage, the marriage ministry, and yet and still it wasn't enough. And yet and still, here it is. I gotta go, I gotta go explain to people why I'm no longer with this person. People were coming up to me, oh, where's she where's such and such? And a lot of times I would like we would be into it and I would just make something up. I'd be like, oh, she's sick, she couldn't come today. Knowing good and darn well that I'm not even with this individual anymore. We've separated. But I gotta keep that up because this is how people see us. They see the facade. Yep. They see, oh, the couple's goals, they see, oh, you guys have a beautiful marriage. They see, they see all that, but they don't know that we've gone three days without talking to each other. And we're just here because we gotta keep this up. And so those are the kind of the things that I I experienced and I went through. Um, and and so yeah, man, it's just I I just I feel like it was meant for me to do this episode. And and again, I thank you because when I did this, you were the first person that came up out of out of out of all the people that I know, that I've associated with, friendships and all that, it's like, man, when I started thinking about how I could get this out, it was you because I've appreciated who you become as an individual, I've appreciated your transparency, I've appreciated what your platform has not only done for you, but what it's done for millions of other people. And so I'm like, this is the person that I know I can be vulnerable with and vulnerable with and transparent with to get my story out. So did I provide for you what you were looking for? Absolutely, absolutely. What was that? I think what it is, no, so number one, right, pour pouring into somebody, it's not just about listening to them, it's not just about saying, Oh, I'm sorry that you went through that. It's about them speaking encouragement and motivation into you, manifesting those things. So even what you saying, you know, your story might be helping somebody else. And then the domino effect is somebody else may come out. And so tell me why my story, not just saying, Oh, your story's gonna help. Like I can sit up here all day and say, your story may help somebody else. Yeah, no, why? Yeah, yeah. That's real. And you stated why you think it could do that. Like, I'm the type of person when you tell me something can happen, well, why? That's a real thing I'm gonna ask you, well, why you think that is? I'm not finna be one of those people who are like, oh, okay, thank you. I received that. No, why? I need to know why. Yeah, keep it all the way real with me. Why do you think this can help? And you do a great job of asking those clarifying questions. You do a great job of asking open-ended questions to the point where I have to answer. I have to talk about it to answer your question. I can't just be like, yes, no, maybe so. Hey, look, one thing you're gonna do is ask you, hey, look, you're gonna make somebody talk, you know? Brandon, how did that affect you? What do you think was the underlying reason? That's why this was perfect. Let me ask you this too, because I like how you framed it and uh want to stay sensitive to that. Will you frame it the same way with your mom, not giving details? Just saying they made me do things I didn't want to do that I wasn't comfortable with, but not giving details, because sometimes the details can really make somebody so it can work two different ways. Like if I told you, if I told you, and it's interesting because sometimes our minds go worse than what the details are, but then sometimes the details are worse than what the person is saying, and you gotta navigate those spaces. For instance, if I told you um your daughter calls you and said, My boyfriend put his hands on me, what did you just think? What did he do? Um, I'm not, you know what's funny. I'm not hearing, I don't, it doesn't, you don't have to get specific with me. I know. So if your daughter says, My boyfriend just put his hands on me, what are you thinking? What did he do to her? I'm thinking he beat her. And what and what if you found out that he pushed her uh on the bed? Is it the same, is it the same level of context? I think so. So it's the same. So he said he put his hands on me. She was saying something to him, he pushed her, she she she fell on the bed. Your vision was he beat he he punched on her face and and whatever. And I'm gonna tell you why. It starts with pushing. I know it, but your reaction in your mind is still the same. It's still the same thing because pushing ends up turning into hitting. And so what would you so what would be your reaction to to the reaction is still the same? Reaction is still the same. So what would you do to that? Me and him would have a me and him will have a conversation. Is it just a conversation, Brandon? Well, I'm gonna your old daughter told me. I tell you what, man. Um I am I am going to give him an opportunity to tell me why I shouldn't put hands on him. Did you did you did you trip? And then when you tripped, you bumped into her and she fell on the bed? Like I I'm gonna give you an opportunity because I'm already going in like you not gonna you're not gonna tell me you tripped. I'm going in, you you're gonna tell me you put your hands on her. And then at that point, I'm gonna have to put my hands on you. Because you gotta understand and realize that she is not that ain't this ain't she ain't that situation, man. Absolutely. I don't know what you went through, I don't know who you've done this to in the past, but Ocean ain't it. So I'm gonna give you the opportunity to tell me you tripped into her. But I'm already not buying it. But I'm already not buying it. If that if you tell me you tripped into her, I'll accept that. But anything else? Nah, dog. We're gonna have to handle it the grown man way. No, we're gonna just box. We're gonna just box. Yeah, we're gonna have to fight, and then I'm gonna tell you, don't ever talk to her again. Because my thing is there's plenty of opportunity for us as men to walk away. Absolutely. There's you have you have ample, like even when you cussing each other out, you know that this is getting ready to turn toxic. Yep. You know it. Yep. You've gone through it before. So you know how, you know the escalations, you know the levels of it. You know you're getting ready to get to a situation where you're gonna say something that you regret, and if you get mad enough, you have a reaction, and that reaction could be a physical reaction. You know where this is going. Yep. You've had plenty of opportunity to walk away and you didn't because you didn't want to. Some people, they just have that toxic bone in their body where they they this is just how they handle things. They wanted to get to that point. And I'm you're not gonna do that with my daughter. You're gonna, you if if look, you get to. Okay, Brandon, bad example, okay? I made a bad example. You made a horrible example, though. I was trying to see if the context matters. So when you talk to your mom, you do it would you do the same thing you did? It doesn't need to go into specifics, right? It just I you you she just needs to know that this happened to me. I'm just talking about when she were to ask, you'd be like, the specifics don't matter. It don't matter. You know how women are, they're gonna say, what did she did she you just gonna say It doesn't matter. She could have made me touch her butt. It I mean, what does it matter? At the end of the day, it was it was sh I was seven, she was the age she was, and it happened. So repeatedly. Repeatedly and whether whether I did XYZ or ABC, all that does doesn't matter. Like, so you would pump your mama's brakes and say, I'm not telling you all that. Because a lot of people, even though I'm the type where I don't look at it specifics, like you said, a lot of people do. Yeah, and one crime is worse than the other. So if I kissed her versus me having sex with her having sex with her or orally doing something to her, vice versa, you know, whatever the case may be, those could have different weight bearings for some people. And but the trauma's the same for you. But the trauma's the same for me. Absolutely. That's fair. So um it's just I that we don't need to uh specifics just don't need to be talked about. Just know that this is what I experienced with this individual, and it was uncomfortable, and that's what it is. That's good. As long as your mom gives you that grace to state like I'm sharing this with you, and this is all I want to share, and this is what I would like the outcome to be. But you gotta say all of it. Other than that, her first thing is going to be I'm going to defend what I couldn't defend at seven, and she's gonna respond like she's protecting a seven-year-old, absolutely, not a 41-year-old. Absolutely, and and she will, and she will, and so yeah, I I know the conversation's gonna happen. Um, I'm just praying about the one thing I'm praying about is if I want to let her know who the individual is. I know the conversation's gonna happen. She's gonna ask. She's gonna see this somehow, and she's gonna ask. And I'll tell her the same thing I'm saying right now, but I know she's gonna ask who was it, and that's what I have to pray about because I see what you're saying. I I I just right now, I don't I don't know. That's what you're saying. You say you want to pray about whether you uh identify the person. Yeah. And Destiny said, Destiny was like, oh, you should. Don't be protecting the individual. You should. I know it. Tell her who it was. Yeah, I agree with that though, but then again, this is your story to share, however, you share it. But I really believe in I don't protect victims. I mean, I don't protect the the violators. Like it's like at the end of the day, the victim is the person that know, whatever that victim needs in order for their healing, for their justice to be, you're the victim. Always understand that. I don't go protect the the person that the criminal. Like this, that's why I like it when, you know, um, there's people that say that sometimes they don't agree with this, but when you have sex sex uh offenders have to uh list their addresses and all that type of stuff. No, I need to know that a sex offender lives in my neighborhood. Oh, absolutely. You know, they be like, well, dang, I mean, that happened 20 years ago. I don't know. I don't care. I need to know that you get it. Man, look, I don't care if it happened 30 years ago. I need to know. I need to know who the person is, where they live. I I now those are details I I don't I do need. Like, I need to know who I'm living next to. I don't, man, look, you can't you don't put nothing past nobody. People could heal, people cannot heal, people can fake it like they've healed. Yep. And those desires and those those thoughts still be in their mind. Yeah, you just never know, right? Absolutely. So I need to know all that. Me too. Me too. I need to know every man. You see, that's what you need to know details. Yeah, yeah. I need to know what happened, what the situation was, how long ago it was, how long did it happen? Man, yeah, you want to see. You want to see it. Show me the receipts for everything. But yeah, man, that makes all the sense in the world, man. But listen, I'll just be in um, I'm not gonna give the general I'm going to be in prayer. Do you mind if we just pray now? Absolutely. Heavenly Father, I lift up this situation before you. God, you know what my brother has uh wrestled with, the thoughts that have come across his mind, the feelings of guilt that he didn't share it when he was seven or eight or however long it went, God, the childhood wrestling with the tension between trying to um wanting to tell the truth, but realizing the truth has consequences that come along with it. And even at 41, he still is wrestling with how to share this to the person that has given him the covering, the protector, the protection uh throughout his life, God. And God, I just thank you for his bravery. I thank you for his courage. I thank you for his tenacity to keep pressing forward, that this didn't impact his relationship with you, that he didn't allow this thing that happened to him, this violation to make him question whether or not you are still God. And God, I thank you for that. I thank you for the opportunity that you have given him to have a woman of God that stands alongside of him, that can create a safe space for him to be able to share one of his darkest traumas and still cover it with grace and still say, Listen, I'm I'm I'm I'm on your side. We're gonna stand in the I'm standing the gap with you. And um, hey, it's us against the situation. And God, his mom, that however you see fit for this information to be brought to her, God, I ask that you touch her heart and that you touch her mind right now, that her response is a response rooted and grounded in you, rooted and grounded in you, and the individual that has violated my brother, God, I ask right now in the name of Jesus for you to convict their heart if their heart hasn't been convicted yet, God. And I ask God that you begin to deliver them from this perversion. Lord, that whoever else has been uh uh uh offended from this situation, the people that have been abused through the hands of this individual, God, I ask right now in the name of Jesus for those people to find healing as well, God. Lord, I just want healing to take place all around. And whatever the consequences that need to be had, let the consequences be the consequences for the individual, God. But at the end of the day, I need healing all the way around. The whole family be healed, God. And those that are watching this episode that may be triggered from this story, God, I ask that you continue to vindicate them, God. You said, vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. So God, I ask right now in the name of Jesus, some people have passed on. People that have violated people have already passed on, God. And some of the people that are still left with the scars of that are still struggling with the fact that this happened to them. God, I ask that they go through therapy and counseling, that they go through restoration and healing from a spiritual standpoint, God, and they release it in the name of Jesus. Doesn't mean that they'll never remember it again, but the pain no longer has the impact. We thank you. We thank you for this platform, we thank you for this podcast, we thank you for all the things that you're gonna do through Brandon's life. And God, we give you all the praise and glory. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. This was good, man. This was this was good. You know what I liked about this is the fact that it it not only did I pour in, not only did you pour into me, but it allowed you to actually say some stuff too. Like you opened up. I'm always open up. I'm always showing my scars. Yeah, I I love that, man. This is what men need. This is this is wow. So, Brand, the reason why I do that, I'm never gonna let somebody expose themselves and I don't show me. I'ma always show something else to me, and that's what a safe space is to me, is to say, I don't ever want to sit in a seat where it's like, oh wow, that happened to you. I ain't never did this. I I was about to share about the fact that um I didn't want to hijack your story, but I was gonna share how I've paid for abortions before. You know, I was gonna share that, and I was like, well, he's still talking, I ain't gonna hijack his testimony, but I was gonna share that. So I just shared that now that I paid for abortions before, you know, and so um the reality is, and that was in my early 20s. And so um the reality is I we we're so connected in ways that we don't understand, but it's because we're all navigating this thing called life without answers. We're all navigating, trying to figure it out, trying to understand this, trying to understand who God is, trying to understand who we are individually. And that's this beautiful space that we coexist in, giving each other grace to say, I ain't got it right. I'm still working with some stuff. The fact that that's the reason why I always want to apply the fact that even though you've been through all that, you're a solid husband right now. Even though you've been divorced before, you're doing it right this time. Like, like, I don't even know the details of why you got a divorce. All I know is that you're doing a doggone good job right now. I know the things that you didn't have in your past marriage, you have now. I know the tools that you didn't have as a man in your past marriage. You had access to the tools, but you didn't have the implication of it or the application of the tools. Now you're saying I'm going to apply these tools that I have in my life, and I'm going to apply it with this woman because I get the ultimate do-over. I gotta celebrate you as a king for doing that. Because it's not about the the, you know, you hear the saying, it's not about it says a just man fall down a thousand times, a hundred times, whatever. That at the end of the day, in order for you to be in right standing, you had to fall sometimes. Absolutely. And so you fail and you learn from your mistakes, and you're able to go, oh, okay, devil, I'm not standing down, I'm standing up. And that's what Ocean gets to cheat, that's what Ocean gets to see. This was what Ocean gets to benefit from is a man that overcame his idiosyncrasies, his shortcomings, his faults, uh, things that happened to him in his childhood that he had no, he had no no no right to basically that it wasn't on your own. It was something that happened to you. Yeah. And you still standing, produced a beautiful child, and y'all are able to now cover her heart in the way she needs to be covered so that she can become everything that God wants her to be. And you know what? And I'll I'll I'll I'll leave with this. Um I didn't want to become another statistic. A lot of people they like to use their shortcomings as a crutch and as an excuse as long as they can. Versus me, I'm like, no, I'm not gonna use these as an excuse. I'm gonna overcome this. I'm gonna show people that this does exist. Absolutely. In the midst of me not having a father, I can be a great father. There it is. In the midst of me going through this, I can come out of this on the other side. In the midst of me failing in my first marriage, the second marriage can be a success. Absolutely. I have to continuously lean on God, and God's Holy Spirit has to come into my heart and be like, you're not gonna use those things as an excuse. You're not gonna use those things as a crutch, you're not gonna become a statistic. Could I be in prison or dead or in jail somewhere because I didn't have a father? Could I have gone another way? Absolutely. Would that have been the easy thing to do? Absolutely. But for me, it's like, bro, like, I am not trying to be that individual. I have to, like, a part of being an inspiration to people is them seeing how you've overcome being in the trenches. It's not just showing them the good parts of your life, it's not just showing them, oh, I'm able to travel, you can have a good life. Like, bro, I know. How is how are things when you are in the trenches? When that camera goes off and you're behind closed doors and you're into it with your wife, how do you overcome that? How is it that you can be denied for IVF and instead of you just quitting, how do you overcome that? That part. How do you how do you get back at it? How do you get up, dust yourself off, and do it again? How do I do that? And that right there speaks to a person's character, that speaks to my character. It's the fact that if I could sum this up, I don't want to be a statistic. In the words of Aaliyah, at first you don't succeed, dust your children. Dust yourself off and try again. I always tell people Aaliyah was the closest thing to Beyonce. She would have been the closest thing to Beyonce had she not passed away. Absolutely. Just off talent and stuff like that. A lot of people argue with me, oh, she would have never been a Beyonce. Listen, Aaliyah would have been big like Beyonce had she not passed away. Aaliyah was banger after banger. Yeah. She was talented. Aaliyah was the truth. Yeah, that's that's that's undisputable. But yeah. But anyway, guys, um, again, thank you so much, Leterius, for this platform. I know this is my podcast, but I felt like this was just uh our conversation because I felt like we both needed to chop it up. And uh so I I appreciate you for this. Appreciate you. Um, and just make sure y'all are following us on IG where we post reels from the episodes. And if you can't watch us, you can listen to us wherever you get your podcast at flip that switch. So make sure one way or another you're tapping in with us. And uh yeah, we're gonna see y'all for the next episode. And we out. Peace.