Death Always Seems To Be Around Me – Lamar Odom

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TSB News
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Lamar Odom with late best friend Jamie Sangouthai

This was what he said in n interview with LA Times : Death always seems to be around me. I’ve been burying people for a long time. The 35 year old, who once said ‘death always seems to be around me’, was dropped from the LA Clippers in 2013 as his performances faltered amidst claims he was using drugs.

  In June, Odom’s best friend Jamie Sangouthai died from a flesh-eating bacteria in his arm caused by an infection from dirty needles. He was believed to have been struggling with drug issues. Death always seems to be around me. I’ve been burying people for a long time
Lamar Odom speaking to the LA Times But Odom’s turmoil began when his mother, Cathy Mercer, died of colon cancer when he was 12.  He didn’t have much of a relationship with his father Joe, who was a heroin addict.

He said on one episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians: ‘When my mother died, I went on the court and played basketball all day, I didn’t even go in the house to eat. Just played basketball.’ After Mercer’s death, Odom was raised by his grandmother, Mildred Mercer, who died in 2004.

Then, his son Jayden died of sudden infant death syndrome in his crib in 2006. He was just seven months old. Odom and his then-girlfriend, Liza Morales, were also raising daughter Destiny, eight and son L.J, five.

In 2011, he went through a summer of anguish. In June he went to a funeral of a 24-year-old cousin who he believes was murdered in New York. Just three days later, he was a passenger in an SUV when it collided with a motorcycle in Queens.

The motorcycle went out of control and collided with 15-year-old pedestrian, Awsaf Alvi Islam, who died as a result of his head injuries. Odom told the LA Times in 2011: ‘Death always seems to be around me. I’ve been burying people for a long time. When I had to bury my child, I probably didn’t start grieving until a year and a half later.

‘I think the effects of seeing [my cousin] die and then watching this kid die, it beat me down. I consider myself a little weak. I thought I was breaking down mentally. I’m doing a lot of reflecting.’