Laterras Ravon Whitfield has grown accustomed to navigating boundary issues with female fans. But that doesn’t mean he likes it.
“These women will move to Dallas, they’ll go to my church and show up at events, they’ll send me stuff,” said Mr. Whitfield, who is the host of the podcast “Dear Future Wifey.” “I’m never flattered. It makes me alarmed.”
When he spotted Ashley Raynell Woods behind a throng of fans waiting to meet him on Nov. 26, 2023, after a live event in San Fernando, Calif., he had no way of knowing if she, too, would cause him alarm. But “I felt drawn to her,” he said. So he took her hand at the California Worship Center and led her away from the crowd anyway.
Mr. Whitfield created “Dear Future Wifey” as a way of reckoning with his romantic past. It premiered in 2020 and is now a weekly show with more than 600,000 subscribers. The breakup of his first marriage in 2015 inspired it; divorce had sent him on a soul search whose findings, ultimately, he didn’t like.
“I wanted to be healed,” he said, from the scars of his past, which he felt were responsible for his transgressions during the marriage. “I cheated multiple times, and I wanted to be a better man in my next marriage.” Figuring out how took the form of an unsent letter full of promises to a future spouse. As a devoted future husband, he hoped he might be able to set aside a bone-deep sense of shame.
“I come from a faith-based background where divorce is frowned upon,” he said. “I felt I was wearing a scarlet letter ‘D’ on my forehead.”
Mr. Whitfield, 47, grew up with five siblings and his parents, Dewey and Lillian Whitfield, in Dallas, and was raised in the Assemblies of God church, but still found trouble as a teenager. He was expelled from his magnet high school in his sophomore year for bringing an unloaded gun to campus. A year later, he was jailed for a day after being charged with the unlawful carrying of a weapon. At 17, he got a girlfriend pregnant. Instead of thinking about where he might go to college one day once he graduated, he looked for a job.
“I was going to be a present father,” he said. “My trajectory as a dad is a prideful one.” To support his daughter, LaTerria Cosby, he worked telemarketing jobs and sold kitchenware door-to-door, among other jobs. Ms. Cosby is now 29 and the mother of his 4-month-old granddaughter. They live in Denton County, Texas; Mr. Whitfield lives nearby in Grand Prairie, Texas.
Ms. Woods, 37, is an education consultant and the founder of DoorHawks, a business that works with entertainment companies to curate V.I.P. experiences at special events. Her presence at Mr. Whitfield’s live show in 2023, and her instinct to linger afterward, wasn’t a maneuver to work her way into his inner circle or win his affection.
“I was looking for a new church to attend, and I got a notification on Instagram that ‘Dear Future Wifey’ was coming to California Worship Center,” she said. She lived close by, in Los Angeles, and had been considering becoming a parishioner. She was also a regular listener.
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“I thought, ‘Oh, I have to go to that event,’” she said. Introducing herself afterward wasn’t a priority. It became less of one when she saw a line forming.
“I won’t stand in a line waiting to talk to anybody,” she said. “That, for me, is a no.” Still, she said the holy spirit had told her she should let Mr. Whitfield know she found the podcast meaningful. So “I said, ‘This man has 30 seconds to turn around and talk to me, or I’m out.’”
Before that half minute was up, Mr. Whitfield had grabbed her hand and hurried her toward the church lobby. Not only did he find her alluring, but she also provided deliverance from a woman in line who had been trying to give him her number.
“It was awkward,” he said.
His conversation in the lobby with Ms. Woods wasn’t. Once the two figured out she was friends with a few of his previous podcast guests, he asked her to DM him on Instagram. That night, before his return trip to Dallas, he messaged her back.
“I said, ‘Hey, my flight leaves in a couple of hours,’” he said. “‘I want to see you for 15 minutes.’” At a coffee shop a mile from the airport, they talked. “But it was very quick,” Ms. Woods said. “I needed more time to get to know him.”
Ms. Woods’s aversion to fawning over public figures comes from her background in entertainment. Before starting DoorHawks in 2019, she did freelance work in event production for clients including Nike and Stevie Wonder’s House Full of Toys. She grew up in Pasadena, Calif., with five siblings; her parents, Gwenevere Dale Quinn and Larry Woods Sr., divorced when she was 4.
At Loyola Marymount University, Ms. Woods earned a bachelor’s degree in communications and African-American studies. She holds a master’s degree in early childhood education from the Relay Graduate School of Education. Like Mr. Whitfield, her religious education started early, first at an African Methodist Episcopal congregation and later at a Pentecostal church.
She discovered “Dear Future Wifey” in 2022 through an ex-boyfriend. When they broke up, she kept listening. In 2023, one episode brought on a revelation: “I was driving down the 101 freeway, and I heard him talking, and I said, ‘That is the sound of my husband,’” she said. “I didn’t know him, and I didn’t know if I would ever meet him, but I knew we had a lot in common.”
The next year, Mr. Whitfield told listeners he intended to be married by the end of 2025.
The brief meet-up at the coffee shop near the Los Angeles airport confirmed their compatibility. But for more than a year, they stayed friends, each dating other people. Then, in February, Mr. Whitfield woke from a dream he felt compelled to share.
“I told Ashley, ‘I had a dream you were with some other guy, and I was jealous,’” he said. The dream led to a gut feeling he needed to see her. “So I said, ‘I want to know if there’s something more between us. I want to take you on a date.’”
On March 18, at Casaléna, a Los Angeles restaurant that his friend, the singer Kenny Lattimore, recommended, Ms. Woods didn’t complain when Mr. Whitfield set up his vlogging camera.
“I’m not a camera person,” she said. “But he was like, ‘I’m going to document this.’ Now I’m glad we have the footage.”
Mr. Whitfield had already decided he was ready to pursue Ms. Woods. A week before their date, “I told her, ‘I’m committed to you before the commitment,’” he said. “‘I’m not going to entertain seeing anyone else.’”
Ms. Woods wasn’t gripped by the need to make a similar leap of faith. “It took me a little longer to commit, because I was being cautiously optimistic,” she said. But in April, after several trips between California and Texas, she decided to commit — aware that dating him meant stepping into his very public quest for a wife.
By July 13, Mr. Whitfield had earned Delta Diamond Medallion Status and used his miles to return to Los Angeles for a surprise proposal at California Worship Center. Ms. Woods thought he was filming a new reality show there. Instead, he had co-written a song, “So Marry Me,” with the contemporary Christian artist Michael Bethany, produced by Warryn S. Campbell II, with Mr. Lattimore recruited to sing.
“I may have cried a little,” Ms. Woods said.
“Dear Future Wifey” listeners were kept in the dark about Ms. Woods’s identity until their Nov. 22 wedding. “I wanted to protect my future wifey and make sure she’s not being thrust into the spotlight,” Mr. Whitfield said.
That plan had slightly unraveled by the time they walked down the aisle at California Worship Center, where Eben Conner, Mr. Whitfield’s pastor at Word of Truth Church in Arlington, Texas, married them in front of 250 guests.
“One of the things you learn in relationships is how to compromise,” Mr. Whitfield said. The secrecy, Ms. Woods said, had been limiting her chances to celebrate. By mid-November, a widening circle of friends, family and fans of the show knew who she was. But her identity was still a surprise to many of the 28,000 viewers who watched the wedding, billed as “The Mystery Bride: a Film by God,” live on YouTube.
Less of a surprise was the joyful mood that filled the church before the couple said “I do,” and the look of fulfillment Mr. Whitfield wore after, when they raised their joined hands to the sky.
“I wrote close to 300 letters on this five-year journey to bring this amazing woman into my life, and they all amounted to Ashley,” he said. “God hasn’t forgotten me.”
On This Day
When Nov. 22, 2025
Where California Worship Center, San Fernando, Calif.
Fashion, Fancy Fare Ms. Woods wore two gowns on her wedding day, both by Yumi Katsura Couture. For the ceremony, she wore a sparkling A-line ball gown with hand-embellished floral appliqués. For a reception at the Republic Venue, in Sherman Oaks, Calif., she wore a floor-length white dress with silver embroidery and crystals. Mr. Whitfield wore a custom tuxedo by Don Morphy. Guests were served a 26-course Mediterranean menu; dessert was churro wedding cake and strawberry shortcake.
Rhythm Without the Blues Among the wedding guests were Mr. Lattimore; the husband and wife gospel singers Warryn and Erica Campbell; the singer-songwriter Goapele and the R&B singer David Michael Wyatt. Mr. Lattimore, who was Mr. Whitfield’s best man, performed “So Marry Me” at the wedding. Mr. Wyatt performed another original song written by Mr. Whitfield and Mr. Bethany, “You (Dear Future Wifey).”
Getting Comfortable On Dec. 28, Ms. Woods will become Mr. Whitfield’s “Dear Future Wifey” co-host. She’s not yet sure what to expect. “Frankly, I’m more comfortable behind the scenes,” she said. But she hopes her background in production and past involvement in theater will ease the transition. “This will stretch me,” she said. For now, the couple will continue to split their time between Los Angeles and Dallas.
The post On His Healing Journey, He Wrote 300 Letters to His Future Wife appeared first on New York Times.
