Six months after losing her beloved teenage niece to gun violence, Tamera Mowry is still coping with the tragedy.
Alaina Housley and 11 others were murdered in a mass shooting at the Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks, California last November. Housley, who was only 18, was attending college night at the bar with friends when a gunman released smoke bombs and opened fire on the crowd.
Mowry shared Tuesday that she’s still struggling with the grief.
“[I’m] missing you every day. I often do a double take at women that remind me of you! The pain of how you were taken from us comes back,” she wrote in a caption on Instagram.
“I randomly envision hearing your voice and holding [my children] Aden and Ariah’s hands like you did,” she added.
Mowry not only remembered how special her time with Housley was, she also mourned for the moments they would never be able to share together.
“I wish you were here to see my children grow, and for us to see the woman you were to become. I’ll have to accept we have a warrior of an angel watching over us now,” she concluded.
The Housley family formed the Alaina’s Voice Foundation soon after her untimely death to celebrate her “full but short” life and the lives of other victims of mass shootings. The foundation also hopes to encourage a change in the way mass shootings are reported by the media.
Since the shooting, Mowry has become an advocate of common sense gun control. When she returned to her seat on her talk show, The Real, weeks after the shooting that killed her niece, she made an emotional plea to change gun policies.
“We need change when it comes to gun violence, and I don’t care if I have to knock on the doors of the White House to do it, to advocate change,” she stated.
Our thoughts and prayers remain with Mowry and Housley families.