Cousins!

As the one year anniversary of beloved actress Naya Rivera ‘s tragic passing approaches her longtime friend, fellow child star and former boyfriend Tahj Mowry is paying tribute to the bond they shared and her overall legacy!

In a recently published interview with Glamour magazine Tahj spoke on how him and Naya were in a relationship for four years from 2000 to 2004 and how her untimely passing is effecting him.

“I have so much respect for her family,” he said. “I still am in communication with them, so I just want to make sure I’m respectful of that and what her family is going through.”

He continues,”She was definitely my first everything. I think subconsciously it’s why I never really date like that because no one really ever… I know someday someone might, but it’s hard to measure up to the type of girl and woman she was.”

Tahj also explained that he doesn’t like to speak on Naya’s passing because he knows that her family and loved ones are suffering more than he could ever imagine.

“It’s a hard thing to talk about, because to think about her mother and her ex-husband, her child and her sister and her brother…the height of what they went through is times a thousand,” says the Smart Guy actor.

“I almost feel like I can’t even talk about my feelings because they don’t even measure up to the pain that they went through and are still going through. But yes, much love to her entire family – her brother, her sister, her child, and her ex-husband as well.”

As we previously reported Naya was confirmed dead in 2020 following a 5 day search in California after taking a lake trip with her son. It was indicated that she accidentally drowned.