Lauren Bezos shared one of “the biggest moment[s]” from her wedding with Jeff Bezos, along with her experiences with dyslexia and how that translated to her recent children’s book in an interview with Today.
Wedding Day Speeches
While promoting her second children’s book titled The Fly Who Flew Under the Sea, Lauren Bezos shared that each of her and Bezos’ kids gave speeches during the wedding. The most special one though, is one of her sons with dyslexia.
“That was literally the most meaningful and impactful moment at my wedding, besides getting married to Jeff,” Lauren said. “Okay, alright, okay, it was the second most [meaningful].”
Between Lauren and Jeff there are seven children. Lauren has three children; son Nikko, 25, with ex-boyfriend Tony Gonzlez, and son Evan, 19, and daughter Ella, 18, with ex-husband Patrick Whitesell.
Jeff has three sons and one daughter with ex-wife MacKenzie Scott.
“I Can Do This.”
While Lauren did not point out which of her sons gave the special wedding speech, he did bring up a key moment from his childhood.
“The biggest moment was with my kids. They all got to do speeches. Jeff’s kids did speeches, my kids, and one of my kids, who is dyslexic — and he lets me talk about it — went up there and talked about a moment that was extremely important to him, and I had no idea what he was going to say,” she shared with Today.
“He was in the fourth grade and not writing well and he wrote this sentence that says, ‘I can do this,'” she explained.
“And it was his first sentence. And that’s really late to be writing your first sentence as any parent with a kid with dyslexia knows.”
Lauren Bezos added, “I blew it up and I put it in our kitchen, and it says, ‘I can do this.’ Anyway, he talked about how special that moment was for him.”
She added that all of the kids wedding speeches were great. Plus, seeing their “kids talk about what is important to them was really powerful.”
Lauren’s Experience with Dyslexia
Lauren expanded on her son’s experiences with dyslexia by sharing her own. She revealed that she’s spent most of her life hiding it, even when working as a news reporter.
“My community college teacher …got me tested,” she said. “She literally looked at me, because I was like, ‘I can’t write,’ and she goes, ‘You’re not dumb, you just can’t spell. You were learning differently.'”
She continued to hide this piece of herself even into her job as a news anchor. Only her co-anchor Rick Garcia knew, and would help her.
“He would see a word on the screen, and I’m going like this,” she explained, making a face, “and he was, like, whispering in my ear.”
New Children’s Book
Bezos has taken these experiences and compiled them into her new children’s book. It’s called The Fly Who Flew Under the Sea.
She hopes the book will serves as a reminder for parents to read to their children, and bond with them. The book is targeted to children with learning differences, specifically dyslexia.
The Fly Who Flew Under the Sea is about Flynn taking a wrong turn on the way to Cape Canaveral. This causes him to fly frustrated. However, that misstep soon becomes a great voyage.
Lauren Bezos wrote about the book on Instagram, stating, “Some kids just see the world differently. I was one of them. This book is for all of the kids who hide in the back of the class, afraid to be called on, worried, they’re not smart enough.”