Thirdy Gomez during his interview with Pru Life UK and Sunstar Davao
For years, Cheryl Gomez helped families prepare for life’s uncertainties as a Pru Life UK advisor. Little did her own son know that one day, he would become living proof of the protection she spent years encouraging others to embrace.
When Jesus Ciel III “Thirdy” Gomez was 14 years old, he asked his mother a simple question.
“Mom, what is Pru Life UK?”
Having recently joined the company as a financial advisor, Cheryl Gomez smiled and answered in the simplest way she could.
“Protection for the future.”
At the time, the answer meant very little to him.
Like most teenagers, the future felt too distant to worry about. Insurance was simply another part of his mother’s work—something adults talked about but children rarely understood.
It would take years, unimaginable heartbreak, and the loss of the person he loved most before those four words would finally reveal their true meaning.
“I only truly understood what my mom meant by ‘protection for the future’ after she passed away,” Thirdy quietly recalled.
For him, protection was never just about a policy.
It became the final expression of a mother’s love.
For years, Cheryl dedicated herself to helping other families prepare for life’s uncertainties.
As a Pru Life UK advisor, she encouraged people to think beyond the present—to prepare not out of fear, but out of love for the people they would one day leave behind.
What her own family did not fully realize then was that while she was helping others secure their futures, she was quietly doing the very same thing for her own.
Long before they would ever need it, Cheryl had already prepared a safety net for the people she loved most.
To Thirdy, however, she was never simply a financial advisor.
She was, first and foremost, a mother.
“My mother was a very kind and generous woman,” he shared.
Looking back now, he sees more clearly the countless sacrifices she made for their family.
With his father working overseas as a seafarer, Cheryl became the steady presence at home—raising children while working to supplement the family’s income.
She was the one who stayed.
The one who cared.
The one who carried both the responsibilities of a parent and the quiet weight of ensuring her children would always have enough.
Then, in 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, life changed.
Cheryl was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The news came as a shock to the family.
At first, they struggled to accept it.
Soon, hospital visits, treatments, medications, and medical appointments became part of their daily routine.
“It became heavier,” Thirdy recalled.
Despite the diagnosis, Cheryl refused to let her illness define her.
She continued working.
She continued caring for her family.
She continued helping clients prepare for futures she hoped they would never have to face unprepared.
Looking back today, Thirdy understands where that strength came from.
“I think she really sacrificed a lot for us,” he said.
“My father was working overseas, and my mother still had to work while taking care of us. Looking back now, I can really see how much she endured and how much she sacrificed for our family.”
Even while quietly fighting one of the biggest battles of her life, Cheryl continued thinking not only about the present—but about the future her children might one day have to face without her.
On March 5, 2025, that future arrived.
Cheryl passed away.
For Thirdy and his family, grief came with an overwhelming sense of uncertainty.
Beyond the heartbreak of losing a mother was another difficult reality: they had also lost one of their family’s sources of income.
But amid one of the darkest chapters of their lives, they discovered that Cheryl had left behind something more than memories.
She had left behind protection.
As they learned more about the life insurance policies she had prepared years earlier, Thirdy realized that even while battling cancer, his mother had been quietly planning for a future she might never get to see.
“When we learned more about her policy, that’s when it really came back to me,” he said.
“She wasn’t sure if she would still be here next year, but she still prepared for us.”
It was then that the words she once casually told her 14-year-old son finally made sense.
Protection for the future.
Not because she expected the worst.
But because she loved her family enough to prepare for it.
Receiving the life insurance proceeds did not erase the grief of losing a mother.
Nothing ever could.
But it did remove another burden that the family would otherwise have had to carry.
“The financial support was really helpful,” Thirdy shared.
“After my mother passed away, we lost one source of income. There were still many expenses to pay, but because of the support, the burden became much lighter.”
Protection did not replace the person they had lost.
Instead, it gave the family something equally valuable during one of life’s hardest moments—the ability to breathe.
The freedom to grieve without immediately worrying about how they would survive financially.
The chance to continue moving forward.
Now 21 years old and an incoming third-year Nursing student at San Pedro College, Thirdy has begun carrying lessons his mother quietly taught him long before he understood them.
As a nursing student, he sees firsthand how quickly life can change.
He witnesses patients unexpectedly rushed into hospitals.
He hears families worrying about medical bills while caring for loved ones.
Every experience reminds him that uncertainty is never as distant as people think.
Because of his mother’s foresight, his perspective has changed entirely.
“I became a believer in insurance because of what happened to our family,” he said.
Today, he continues maintaining the policies his mother prepared and hopes to one day protect his own family in the same way she protected theirs.
“I want my family to be okay even if something happens to me.”
For Thirdy, insurance is no longer simply about financial planning.
It is about responsibility.
It is about love that chooses to prepare before uncertainty arrives.
It is about making sure the people left behind are not left carrying every burden alone.
When asked what he would tell his mother if she were still here today, his answer came without hesitation.
“I would thank her.”
“It was because of the decisions she made that we’re still here today. Her decision really helped us.”
Perhaps that is the quiet truth behind Cheryl Gomez’s story.
For years, she dedicated herself to helping other people protect the ones they loved.
In the end, she gave her own family that very same gift.
She spent her career encouraging others to prepare for tomorrow, never knowing that her greatest testimony would become the future she prepared for her own children.
As Pru Life UK celebrates three decades of protecting Filipino families through PRU@30: 30 Stories of Protection, Thirdy’s story reminds us that protection is never measured solely by financial benefits or policies.
Its deepest value is found in the people who choose to prepare out of love.
Some mothers leave behind photographs.
Others leave behind treasured memories.
Cheryl Gomez left behind both.
But perhaps her greatest gift was something her son would only fully understand after she was gone—a promise that even in her absence, her love would continue protecting the family she devoted her life to.
Because sometimes, a mother’s love does not end with goodbye.
Sometimes, it lives on in the future she prepared for the people she loved most. GCG
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As published on Sunstar Davao.
