Pete Davidson’s mom pays tribute to his late dad, a firefighter who died in 9/11

Pete Davidson’s mother, Amy Waters Davidson, is honoring her late husband on the anniversary of his death on 9/11 with a reminder to hold onto gratitude.

On the 22nd anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Waters Davidson paid tribute to her late husband with a series of photos shared on her Instagram page. Scott Matthew Davidson, Davidson’s father, died on Sept. 11, 2001, while serving as a New York City firefighter.

The younger Davidson was just 7 years old at the time of his father’s death.

“Happiest days of my life and I didn’t know it,” Waters Davidson captioned her Instagram post, which included two blue heart emojis. “Never forget and always be grateful.”

Amy’s post featured a carousel of nine pictures, some of which showed Davidson alongside his father.

“Your son has done a amazing job keeping his memory alive,” one user commented on the post. “Only last night did I tell your husbands story to my 7 year old to explain how brave the emergency services were that day.”

“You are always my first thought on this day every year … you and Peter and Casey,” another wrote in part. “The city was never the same after that day …and neither were our hearts.”

Davidson has reflected on the trauma of losing his father in the past and its impact on his mental health.

Earlier this year, the 29-year-old “Saturday Night Live” alum spoke about developing post-traumatic stress disorder due to the loss of his father in a March episode of Patreon’s “Real Ones” podcast.

“My dad told me he was going to pick me up from school on 9/11. I got picked up by my mom. She didn’t tell me what was going on for like three days,” he explained while speaking to show host Jon Bernthal.

“She kept telling me, ‘Dad’s at work,’ ‘He’s coming home,’ whatever,” he explained. “I had no idea.”

Davidson went on to share at the time that his mother attempted to shield him from the uncertainty of his father’s death by preventing him from watching television.

“Then one night, I turned on the TV, and I just saw my dad on the TV,” he explained. “I was like, ‘Oh, OK.’ And they were like, these are all the firemen that are, like, dead.”

In 2020, he wrote and starred in “The King of Staten Island,” a semi-autobiographical comedy about a 24-year-old high school dropout coping with the loss of his father, who was, like Scott Davidson, a New York City firefighter.

Correction Sept. 12 2023, 10:34 a.m. ET: A previous version of this story mistakenly stated that Scott Matthew Davidson died in 2021. He died in 2001.

This article was originally published on TODAY.com