The actress makes use of her Instagram account to remember her late brother, who passed away in 2016 at the age of 53 after a battle with cancer, on his special day.
- Apr 3, 2024
AceShowbiz - On Tuesday, Eva Mendes paid tribute to her late brother Carlos Mendez on what would have been his 61st birthday. Carlos passed away in 2016 at the age of 53 after a battle with cancer.
In an Instagram post, Mendes shared an animated image of actress Teri Garr, explaining that it reminded her of her beloved sibling. She wrote, "I post her because it's my brother's heavenly birthday today and he LOVED her. You can tell a lot by a person on who they crush on. Looking back, I didn't appreciate it; he was my annoying older brother, but now I realize he was cooler than I thought. It was me who didn't get it."
Their younger brother, Carlo Mendez, commented on the post, expressing his disbelief at how close it had been to eight years since Carlos' passing.
Mendes' relationship with the month of April is a bittersweet one. On Monday, she posted on Instagram about her "complicated relationship" with the month.
"Tomorrow would have been my brother's birthday... In a couple of weeks from now is the day we lost him... but then, the end of April, we got the biggest blessing of all, my little girl was born 8 years ago. I hate you April. But I love you more," she wrote.
Mendes' "little girl" is her daughter Amada Lee, who she welcomed with Ryan Gosling on April 29, 2016, a week after Carlos' death. They also have an older daughter, Esmeralda Amada, born in 2014.
Speaking to PEOPLE in 2019, Mendes reflected on the emotional duality of losing her brother and welcoming her second child within the same month.
"It's so tough. Thank God I had my baby; it was a week after he passed. So there was something to move forward. There was poetry to it all," she said.
Mendes also shared fond memories of her brother's comedic wit during the holiday season.
"My favorite memories are when he used to, at Thanksgiving or a big dinner or Christmas dinner, roast everybody—but roast you hard. Of course, I miss him incredibly, and that's an understatement, but I'm holding on to that tradition," she said. "I'm so happy that he gave me that. I don't think I could carry it on the way he did, but those are some fun memories because he would really get raw."
