Naya Rivera’s ex shares the guilt their son lives with ever since her death

Actor Ryan Dorsey is opening up like he never has before nearly five years after his ex-wife actress Naya Rivera’s death.

Rivera, best known for her role as Santana Lopez on “Glee,” died in July 2020.

Rivera and her then 4-year-old son Josey were sailing on a rented boat on Lake Pier in California when they jumped off the boat into the water to swim.

Because the boat wasn’t anchored down, the boat began to drift away from them.

Rivera managed to get her son safely back on the boat. However, the 33-year-old drowned.

Now 9 years old, in a new interview with People published Feb. 12, Dorsey is opening up about how the tragedy affected their son and himself.

“I still can’t figure it out,” Dorsey told People. “It doesn’t make much sense how he was able to get on and she wasn’t.”

Over the last four years, Dorsey, who often wonders if it would have turned out differently had he been with them, said Josey has remembered more and more about that day.

Over time, Josey revealed one of the last conversations he had with his mom on the boat.

Josey told his dad that, “‘We jump in and I said, ‘Are we sure about this?’ She’s like, ‘Yeah.’ He’s like, ‘Oh my God, are we going to die?’ And mommy said, ‘Don’t be silly.’ He said, ‘And we jumped in and that’s what happened.’”

“He said that the last thing she said was his name, and then she went under, and he didn’t see her anymore,” Dorsey continued.

“It just rocks my world that he had to witness her last moments.”

Now Dorsey says their son continues to live with the guilt of not being able to do something to save his mom.

“Something he’s said over and over is that he was trying to find a life raft, and there was a rope, but there was a big spider on the rope, and he was too scared to throw it,” Dorsey told People, adding that it’s still hard to look at photos of Rivera.

“I keep reassuring him, ‘Buddy, that rope wasn’t going to be long enough.’”

As Josey gets older, Dorsey says, despite the trauma he’s lived through, he’s still “such a happy kid,” adding that he sees so much of Rivera in their son.

“He’s definitely his mama’s son, because when he doesn’t get the answer he wants, he keeps talking,” Dorsey told People with a smile. “He likes to talk, and that’s mama for sure.”