Rapper, producer, and fashion designer Kanye West always seems to be going through something. If it’s not a battle with the media, his complicated relationship with Donald Trump, or his upcoming divorce, Kanye stays going through something. But the biggest issue he’s had to battle over the years is with the loss of his mom.
He once mentioned that his mom was the driving force behind his success.
He loved his mom and dedicated songs to her.
Donda West died suddenly on Nov. 10, 2007 of heart disease the day after undergoing plastic surgery. She was 58.
Some close to the rapper say that since her death, Kanye has been on a search to fill the void she left.
Now, ahead of his new album, Donda, named after his mom, moving videos of the rapper and his mother have emerged on social media. The new album will also be released during his mom’s birthday month. Donda will be the rapper’s tenth studio album, succeeding 2019’s Jesus Is King. The release date has yet to be confirmed.
West released a song dedicated to his mother last summer. Also titled “Donda,” the track featured the footage of West and his mother that has reemerged on social media Tuesday.
One clip, originally shared by Twitter user Hurt Cobaine shows the Jesus Is King hitmaker and his mother talking about their relationship.
Love it https://t.co/bLwYS0cEae pic.twitter.com/rMzHQHwy0h
— Hurt Cobaine (@YoungWatty) March 10, 2021
“Kanye, thank you for being just an outstanding son,” Donda West says in the clip that has been viewed more than 49,000 times.
In another clip, shared by user Sir Alexander Swain, shows the mother and son rapping along to West’s 2005 song “Hey Mama.”
This video of Kanye West and his Mom❤❤ she knew every word of the song he wrote wrote her. https://t.co/TwcwGTPwkr pic.twitter.com/yvT0nfzksb
— Sir Alexander Swain (@swain_alexander) July 19, 2021
But this isn’t the first time that ‘Ye has tried to overcome his profound loss.
Ten years after his mother died, Kanye was joined by his wife, Kim Kardashian, and their two kids at the time, to visit his mother’s grave in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
A source says it’s the first time the rapper’s children, North and Saint, visited their grandmother. During the trip to the Midwest, they met up with Kanye’s extended family members in Chicago. The trip comes as Kanye continues to recover after he checked into a hospital in November.
Kanye wasn’t able to visit Donda’s grave during her burial anniversary because he was on tour, and then his health spiraled. He canceled a Los Angeles concert on November 20 before nixing the remainder of his Saint Pablo tour and going to the hospital the following day.
Reportedly Kanye, suffered from a mental breakdown that his team called a “temporary psychosis due to sleep deprivation and dehydration.” It has been reported that the anniversary of his mother’s death was in part what triggered his mental breakdown, which left him hospitalized for more than a week.
A source said that after two months of being admitted into the UCLA Medical Center, Kanye is doing much better. Kanye is “living at home with the kids. He spends his days with the kids, and plays with them all day long.”
The trip was very important to the MC, who has often paid tribute to his mother’s life since her passing. In addition to making music to honor her, after his mother’s death, Kanye worked to help pass the “Donda West Law”—a law that requires a physical examination 30 days before a patient undergoes a cosmetic surgery procedure. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the bill into law in 2009.
Kanye’s family believes that a pre-op physical exam would have uncovered coronary artery disease as Donda went through several plastic surgery procedures without medical clearance.
As the years move on, no matter how much time has passed, all we know is that death can have a serious effect on one’s mental health for years, even decades.
In fact, the loss of a loved one can trigger a variety of psychiatric disorders in people with no history of mental illness, according to a new study.
According to the study from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia’s School of Social Work, and Harvard Medical School, the unexpected death of a loved one roughly doubled the risk for new-onset mania in people 30 and older.
That’s after controlling for other factors, such as prior psychiatric diagnoses, other traumatic experiences, and certain demographic variables like sex, race, income, education, and marital status, researchers note.
We are praying for peace in the heart and mind of Kanye.