"His Widowed Bride" - Exploring Widowhood and Resiliency with Lori Tucker-Sullivan

Recovery from the death of a spouse is a lifelong healing process. Each year brings a measure of healing as we move toward being able to reclaim life’s joy. Lori Tucker-Sullivan has been widowed for 14 years and shares her journey as she authored her book, I Can’t Remember If I Cried: Rock Widows on Life, Love, and Legacy. https://bit.ly/40hKe9c

In this Episode:

• 01:31 - Recipe: Maltese Soppa Tal-armla - Widow's Soup
• 04:25 - The Day the Music Died; "I can't remember if I cried, when I read about his widowed bride"
• 06:40 - Interview with Lori Tucker-Sullivan
• 49:03 - "Widowhood is More Than..." excerpt from blog Hope Grows in the Wilderness by Alisha Bozarth
• 53:40 - Outro

Did you know: "The Day the Music Died" is a term that refers to the plane crash that killed rock and roll stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson on February 3, 1959. The term was popularized by Don McLean's 1971 song, "American Pie", which may have also referred to Buddy Holly's widow, 7 months pregnant. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:31 Recipe: Maltese Soppa Tal-armla – Widow’s Soup
• 4:25 The Day the Music Died; “I can’t remember if I cried, when I read about his widowed bride”
• 6:40 Interview with Lori Tucker-Sullivan
• 49:03 “Widowhood is More Than…” excerpt from blog Hope Grows in the Wilderness by Alisha Bozarth
• 53:40 Outro

Transcript

His-Widowed-Bride-Exploring-Widowhood-and-Resiliency-with-Lori-Tucker-Sullivan

This podcast does not provide medical nor legal advice. Please listen to the complete disclosure at the end of the recording. Hello and welcome to Everyone Dies, the podcast where we talk about serious illness, dying, death, and bereavement.

I'm Marianne Matzo, a nurse practitioner, and I use my experience from working as a nurse for 46 years to help answer your questions about what happens at the end of life. And I'm Charlene Everett, an actor in New York City, and here to offer an every-person viewpoint to our podcast. We are both here because we believe that the more you know, the better prepared you are to make difficult end-of-life decisions.

So welcome to this week's show. We hope you have a productive and healthy new year. Please relax, get yourself a hot drink and some leftover Christmas cookies, if you have any, and thank you for spending the next hour with Charlie and me as we talk about widowhood.

Like the BBC, we see our show as offering entertainment, enlightenment, and education divided into three halves to address each of these goals. Our main topic is in the second half, so feel free to fast forward to that yakety-yak zone. In the first half, Charlie has our recipe of the week.

In the second half, I have an interview of the book, I Can't Remember If I Cried, Rock Widows on Life, Love, and Legacy by fellow Detroiter Lori Tucker Sullivan. In the third half, Charlie has a blog post from Alicia Borzath, the author and blogger. In our first half, speaking of fish food, if you're involved in a sea burial, our recipe this week is for sopatel armala, otherwise known as widow soup.

Legend has it that the recipe for widow soup has been passed down through generations in Maltese families, with each family adding their own unique touch to the dish. The soup earned its name from an old tale of a widow who, in her grief, found consolation in the comforting flavors of this nourishing soup. As she prepared the soup, the aroma filled her home, bringing warmth and healing to her heart.

It became a symbol of resilience and strength for widows in the community, and the recipe was shared among them as a way to support and uplift each other during difficult times. The sopatel armala, widow soup, serves as a reminder of the resilience and courage that exists within each person, even in the face of adversity, such as Putin launching first-grade missiles at an ill-equipped Ukraine, or me going through my divorce. It would be a wonderful addition to any funeral lunch.

Please go to our webpage for this week's recipe and additional resources for this program. Everyone Dies is offered at no cost, but is not free to produce. Please contribute what you can.

Your tax-deductible gifts will go directly to supporting our non-profit journalism so that we can remain accessible to everyone. You can also donate at www.everyonedies.org or at our site on Patreon www.patreon.com and search for Everyone Dies. Moving on.

According to an article in the Washington Post, the music died because Buddy Holly wanted to do laundry. During the Winter Dance Party bus tour in 1959, Holly, tired of rattling through the Midwest with dirty clothes, charted a plane on February 3rd to fly from Clear Lake, Iowa to Fargo, North Dakota, where he could go to a laundromat. Joining him on the plane were Richie Valens and, after future country star Waylon Jennings gave up his seat, J.P. Richardson, also known as the Big Bopper.

Taking off in bad weather with a pilot not certified to do so, the plane crashed, killing everyone on board. The toll was incalculable. The singers of Peggy Sue and Come On, Let's Go and Donna and La Bamba were dead.

Holly was just 22. Valens was just 17. Rock and roll would never be the same.

Thirteen years later, Don McLean wrote a song about this tragedy, American Pie, an eight-and-a half minute-epic with an iconic lyric about the day the music died. The lyrics include the line, I can't remember if I cried when I read about his widowed bride. Who was the widowed bride McLean is referring to? Some say the reference was to Jackie Kennedy.

Others say it was Buddy Holly's wife, Maria Elena, who was pregnant at the time of his death and who miscarried shortly after his death. This week, Marianne had an interview with Lori Tucker-Sullivan, who wrote the book, I Can't Remember If I Cried, Rock Widows on Life, Love, and Legacy. This book is part music history, part memoir, based around interviews with rock widows conducted by Lori Tucker-Sullivan, who herself lost her husband in 2010.

With each widow that Lori interviews, she learns lessons in love, forgiveness, coping, and moving on. The book is framed by the author's own narrative to create a single thread that links the stories together to ultimately create a tale of how the author's life has changed through her interactions with these amazing women. Among the women profiled by Lori Tucker-Sullivan are Judy Van Zandt, who, after husband Ronnie of Leonard Skinner died, sued the reformed band to protect her interests.

Sandy Chapin, widow of Harry Chapin, worked tirelessly to uphold Harry's significant legacy around activism and hunger prevention. Crystal Zeevon, the ex-wife of Warren Zeevon, provide details of her abusive relationship with Warren and how she resolved her anger and grief. Jamie Weiland, widow of Stone Temple Pilots Scott Weiland, spoke about Scott's mental illness, which at times kept him housebound for days.

Jana LeBlanc, widow of Stevie Ray Vaughan, shared the details of her visits with Stevie in rehab. Hello, I'm here with Lori Tucker-Sullivan, and Charlie did a great introduction about her book. And Lori, I want to welcome you to Everyone Does.

Thanks so much, Maria. It's great to be here. Great to have you.

I'd heard about your book from Kathy Cannon, who lived on my street, and we went to kindergarten all the way through 12th grade together. So you live in Detroit, in the same, I guess, building as Kathy. Yes.

Yeah, Kathy's a good friend and neighbor. And yeah, it's a small world. So, like, you have to talk to this person.

It's like, oh, I do have to talk to this person. So, Lori, when you were in your 40s, your husband, Kevin, was diagnosed with head and neck cancer, and he died two years later in 2010. Do I have my facts straight about that? Yes, that's correct.

And so, what do you remember about those early years of grieving after Kevin died? You know, I don't remember too much, actually, and I think that's pretty common. I remember just kind of getting through every day as best I could. We had two kids.

Our son had just started college, and he wanted to head back to school, and so he did that. And then we had a daughter who was in middle school. And so, you know, my children, of course, became my focus.

Kevin and I had purchased, early in our marriage, had purchased an abandoned farmhouse and renovated it. And it was really, you know, too much for one person, but that, you know, required a lot of my focus as well, kind of keeping up the house. And, of course, there were activities for my kids.

They were both active in the community. And so, there was really just so much going on. We had, I think, put aside so much of our day-to-day lives also in the time that we were trying to get Kevin well.

You know, he kind of fought his diagnosis and was going through, actively going through treatment right up until the very end. And so, you know, it really was all-consuming for so long. And I think much of that first few months or first year or two afterwards was adjusting to his loss and grieving the loss, but also just trying to get back to just the regular life that we had to set aside while we tried to get him well.

So, it really, you know, it was difficult to do. He came from a large, close... We both had large, close families. And so, I had a lot of family support during that time, both during his illness and then after his passing.

We had a large friend group. And so, I do remember, you know, getting visits and having that support. I had been halfway through my MFA in writing, which was kind of a whole process, really, that our marriage went through.

You know, I started out wanting to be a writer and really set that aside for most of my marriage. And we kind of came to a point where we both realized I was not very happy. And so, I said, I think I really need to return to writing.

I really miss it. And so, I had gone back to school and I had only completed about two semesters, about halfway through the program, when he was diagnosed. And then I stopped.

So, he did make me promise that regardless of what happened, I would finish my degree. And so, he passed away in September. And in November, I went back to school.

So, in many ways, I don't know that I sat with my grief as much as I probably should have. It was just too busy a time to really do that. And so, there are still things that I'm working out even now, 10 years later.

So, especially when you have, you know, young kids, your daughters in middle school, it can take up and fill up your time so that you really don't get that time to kind of, like you said, sit with it, to feel it too. It's like you're going so much all day long that you fall in bed and you just go to sleep and you get up the next day and do it again. Was that what you're experiencing? Yeah, I think so.

You know, and then you wake up one day and a year has passed and you just don't quite know how that happened. We did, I fairly quickly wanted to get my daughter into a grief group. And so, we began attending meetings for Ellie's Place, which I believe is based out of Lansing, but they did have an Ann Arbor chapter and that's where we were living at the time.

And so, we started doing that fairly soon after. And I did find that very helpful to be in a group. She would go into a group of similar loss.

So, she would be with other children or I'm sorry, she would be in a group with people of similar age. And then the parents would or caregivers would go into a group of similar loss. So, I was in a group with other parents who had lost their partners.

And so, I did find that very helpful. Just to talk with other people who were going through very similar situations. And I still do remember, I remember starting out being there for a couple of weeks.

And then I remember by about the fourth or fifth week, someone new came in and I thought, oh, good. I'm not the new person anymore, which is a terrible thing to think about. But I was kind of relieved to see that this continued to happen to other people.

But I was able to kind of not be the person who needed all the help, but now I could offer some advice to someone else. I think that was kind of that kind of turning point that it felt like maybe I could say now, yes, I know what it was like. It's only been a few months for me.

And here's what I did those first few weeks or days. And I think many of the women that I spoke with in writing my book talked about how when you focus on someone else outside yourself, it does help you get through that time of grief. And in part, that's, you know, with childcare, that's just being busy and removing your focus from it.

But when you can offer advice to someone else, when you can think of someone else that you're not caring for, and maybe it just turns the perspective a little bit, I think. And I do think it's helpful to do that. And I remember kind of that feeling of being able to help someone else talk about my own situation, but help someone else.

And it just, I don't know, felt like a kind of lightning of the load a little bit. So did you find and did you, well, I guess maybe what I want to ask is, did your daughter find being in that group helpful? Or did you have to take her like kicking and screaming? No, I think she found it helpful. I think it was helpful for her to be with some other young people.

You know, I think when she, and I hate to speak for her, but I think when she went to school, or she was also, both my kids were very active in a local dance organization. And so I think when she went to those places, she didn't want to be, you know, the person who just lost her dad. Everyone knew that, of course, but she didn't want to be that person all the time.

And at Ellie's place, she could be that person and not stick out, you know, because everybody else was kind of in that same situation. And I think that was very helpful for her to find others that she could talk to. And after, I think it was about a year, maybe year and a half, she felt like it wasn't helping quite so much.

She also saw someone privately. And I think that was very helpful for her. But, you know, I think she kind of knew when she was ready to move along.

But I think in the beginning, it was very helpful for her to be able to be in a place where it was just the same for everyone and be able to talk about it. Yeah. It's great that you facilitated that for her and saw that need.

I don't know that all parents see that a lot of times. The kids are the ones who kind of left funding for themselves. So, from my perspective, I appreciate that you saw that.

So, it's been 14 years since your husband died. And how do you see your grief now? I, it's, yeah, stumbling on this one a little bit. I see it as just part of the fabric of my life at this point.

And that is, for me, I think, because I've chosen to write about it. I go back and forth around this project being both life-changing and amazing and something I never dreamt possible to publish a book and to have had the experiences that I had during the interviews, to be in some of the places I've been, you know, all of those things were really great, fabulous, which is, you know, not words you usually use around a grief experience, but it's countered by the fact that they were difficult conversations. And then now in kind of being out and promoting the book, I'm still in these difficult conversations.

And so, I don't know that many people 14 years later are still as closely tied to that, you know, their loss as I am through this path that I chose to take. And it's not a bad thing. I appreciate where I'm at and everything that it's brought me, but it does, you know, it keeps me in grief.

And I do have to be kind of cautious about that. I have to be aware of it. I have to, you know, still talk with someone about it.

I think that's very helpful. And so, you know, I made the choice to not really move on as fully as I maybe could have because I need to keep exploring grief through my writing. And I hesitate to say that I enjoy it, but that's not really the right word.

But it has value to me. I hope it has value to others. I have heard from others who've said, yes, it definitely has.

And so, you know, so my grief is still there. It's a pretty, you know, again, I go back to this kind of metaphor for it being kind of just the fabric of my life. I'm not a sad person.

I don't spend time, you know, being particularly sad about this. I am grateful for the marriage that we had, for the children that we had, for, you know, the whole life that we had together. And so, I think that's a, you know, a good spot to be, to be able to kind of flip the sadness over the loss into gratitude that it happened, you know, that we had the relationship and all of the things that came with it.

So, in that sense, I think, you know, I'm doing quite well. But I am still in that grief space and that can be challenging many times. Do you feel like it's keeping you from moving forward in terms of, like, personal relationships? Because you're still a young woman.

So, you know, there's that aspect of it. There is. And I don't know, you know, I have dated.

I haven't been in a really close relationship, certainly haven't repartnered or remarried. And for me, a big part of that is not necessarily grief, but, you know, I did put off this, these dreams that I had of writing. I wanted to be a music writer.

And so, I wanted to really write about these musicians who I've now written about through the lens of their widows. And I'm traveling and I'm meeting people and I'm doing interviews. And so, I'm doing a lot of the things that I feel as though I put off when I was in my 20s in order to have a family, a house, be a wife and a mom.

And I, you know, would not give up those experiences. I'm glad that I'm grateful that I had them. But I'm now kind of in that place where I had thought I'd be when I was, you know, 17 or 18.

I thought this would be my grown-up life. And so, I'm kind of living it now. And so, I'm not, you know, I feel right now that my life is very full.

And if that gets added to, wonderful. But, you know, I'm just having some really great experiences right now and grateful for that. And that's also what I find to be pretty common, you know, either after women who divorce or women who are widowed who kind of, especially if they had these goals like you had your goals to say, this is great.

I can live for me now. I can make my own decisions and decide if I'm having cereal for dinner and all of those, you know, things that we would. Yeah.

Yeah. You've got a couple of kids that you worry about the nutrition and stuff. So, that I hear this from a lot of women who say this is, you know, not that I wish he had died or that I wished I'd gotten this divorce.

But there's a secondary benefit in being able to kind of live the life that either I thought I would have or that I've always wanted. Yes. Yes.

Yeah. I think I do feel some of that. I agree with that.

And, you know, again, you know, would I give all of this up for him to be back here? Yeah. Yeah. You know, but he's not here.

And I think he would want me to do what makes me happy. And so, you know, I feel like that's what I'm doing right now. It's interesting.

I had a conversation with someone since right around the time that the book was published, actually. And I was telling them about, you know, all of these experiences I had in writing the book. And she said, well, you know, it makes me wonder, like, is this something that, you know, it's a great way that you turned your grief into this new fulfilling project.

But maybe it was just you stepping out from the shadow of someone who was a big person. And that I had to think about that and reflect on that a little bit. And I think there's some truth to that as well.

You know, I had a husband who was very bright. He was a great conversationalist. He filled up the room.

You know, he had a presence. And I was just the partner, not just the partner, but, you know, in many instances, he was out there in front. He just had, he was the more assertive person, I think.

And I wasn't a shrinking violet, but, you know, I deferred to him, I think, quite a bit. And so, this is me kind of stepping out there on my own and seeing what I can do. And it's thrilling and wonderful.

And yes, there are moments where it's really sad. And, you know, all of those things, all of those things come into, you know, where I'm at right now. But I think there is some, a little grain of truth there, probably for many people, that when you've been a part of a partnership, and that's not there anymore, if you do something with it, and make something of it, it's in part because maybe you've never been on your own before doing those things.

And you've always had it in you. You just didn't have to call on it or, you know, and so it, you know, it tests you a little bit and to see how you do. Yeah.

And sometimes you can be really surprised by what it is you can do, by what was there all along, you know. Yes. Yeah.

This book and the book tour and being able to do all the things that you're doing. So yeah, part of how you grew through your grief was writing this book. And the widows that you interviewed, that you talked with all had different experiences with their husband's death and their relationships with their husbands.

Like, you know, Harry Chapin had a sudden death in a car accident. Stevie Ray Vaughan had a sudden death in a helicopter crash. Scott Whalen had a history of mental illness and died from an overdose.

Did you see or feel in your interviews that those different types of deaths had maybe a different kind of effect on the women? I don't know that it did and we did have some of these conversations. You know, is it easier to know that it's coming or is it harder when it is sudden? And I think it's just hard for everybody, no matter what. I think you have someone in your life one day and you wake up the next day and they're not there.

And that's what it comes down to for everybody. Whether, you know, in my case, Kevin had been sick for two years. As I said, he really kind of fought for that whole time to try to get well.

And so, you know, we never really kind of had those talks about it. But his death when it came was sudden and a little unexpected. We expected him to stay with us and potentially linger for a while, which was not a good thought.

But it still comes down to, you know, he was there one day and the next day he wasn't. And so, I think all of the women really felt that way. None of them had really come to terms with the fact that this person wasn't going to be there.

Even with Jamie Weiland and with Scott, it's very difficult for her to consider it just a drug overdose because he had heart issues as well. And so, you know, legacy is something that's very important to them. And how they died, they don't want that to define these men.

So, I think that that's part of it too. That's not the end. They don't want that to be the end for this person.

And so, it's almost not what they most want to talk about, of course, you know, how it happened. But I think to really almost all of them, it really did come down to being a kind of shocking moment. Unexpected, even when it was illness.

You still have that moment of shock and disbelief, or days of shock and disbelief that this person is gone. Did you, for the women who, you know, had been through abuse with their husbands, was there any differences that you saw from that point of view? Um, I think that, you know, in some cases, some of them had, of course, very difficult relationships. Vera Ramon comes to mind, Vera Ramon King.

She was married to Dede Ramon. Um, and that was very difficult. Dede had a lot of issues with substance abuse, and she, you know, took a lot of that.

And yet, I think that the death softens that. You know, I think that's something that several people have commented on in the book, is that, especially if it's been some amount of time, you look back with, you remember the good times, you know, you remember the goodness of the person. And again, as I mentioned, legacy is important to all of these women.

And so, you know, even the ones who had experienced some abuse were sure to say he was, he really was a good person. And he either had, you know, this issue or that issue, whether it was drug abuse or mental health issues, but he was a good person. You know, I think I still believe through, so I've done 22 interviews total, and 14 made it into the book.

And I do hope someday there's, there'll be another book with the remaining interviews and a few more. But one of the earliest interviews I did, and the one, you know, one of the interviews that has stuck most with me was Crystal Zevon, who was married to Warren Zevon. And he was a singer, songwriter, really quite brilliant in his songwriting.

He never quite had the level of popularity of many of his contemporaries. And I think that was an issue for him. He suffered from alcoholism, and there was, you know, physical abuse in their relationship.

And what she said was, you know, he asked her to write his biography after he died. He had mesothelioma, which was a surprise. You know, he was a smoker, but this was a like, something that happens to coal miners that, you know, there's still no explanation really for why he had that diagnosis.

And they had been divorced for several years. But when he received his diagnosis, he called her and asked her to come care for him. Neither of them had remarried, they had kept in touch.

And she just realized for her own health, she had to, you know, break from that marriage. And so she did reconnect with him while he was ill. And he asked her to write his biography after he passed away and left all of his journals to her.

And they were quite detailed, and they detailed, you know, bad things that she didn't know about that happened during their marriage. And she said, you know, going through them and reading them was like being punched in the face all over again. And yet, you know, when she was done, she realized that it was also his one last request for forgiveness and absolution.

And what could she do but to give him that and forgive him for everything. And now she just really misses him and loves him. And that's a powerful lesson, you know, that the forgiveness and she says, you know, it was as much for myself as for him.

It doesn't matter to him if I forgive him or not at this point, but it gives me peace. And it helps me to move on to just forgive him and love him. And so, you know, that's a challenge.

But I think nearly all of them are kind of at that point of forgiveness and loving this person that was flawed. Well, and at this point, you know, once the person has died, you know, death doesn't end that relationship. And so then you have a choice of either forgiving and letting your heart and soul be at peace or carrying anger.

And it's, you know, healthier. I don't think I can argue that it's healthier to forgive and, you know, find a place for them in your heart and in your mind where it doesn't hurt. Yes.

Yeah, I agree. And I think it was, you know, it was just really a powerful message from her. And she has certainly moved on in her life and has done some, you know, really wonderful things and has a good life.

But yeah, yeah, it was after that interview, I thought, you know, this, I'm going to learn from these women. That's, I really just wanted to profile them. But after the first couple, I did realize that they all had something to teach me.

And so I, you know, I kind of knew I was on to something at that point. Well, that's what we like to do interviews on our show too, about lots of different types of people, because who can you learn the best from, but from the people who've gone through either a diagnosis or a suicide or somebody who's overdosed or have experienced the death of a spouse and the death of a child. Those are the people that can really say, I've got the inside of knowledge.

Yes. Yeah. And it's, you know, I certainly don't claim to be any kind of expert on this at all.

So I am just relating my own experience and through the book relating others experiences also. And that's, you know, kind of the best I can do. And if someone can find themselves in this, then, you know, I feel very good about that.

And I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to do that. So what did you learn about grief from writing this book and interviewing these women? I think I learned that it is okay for grief to be a part of your life for a long time. I think it shapes, and I think we're understanding more even neurologically now about grief and how it does kind of rewire your brain and make you a different person.

And I can look at, you know, someone like Sandy Chapin, who has done her best to maintain Harry's legacy around, especially around the arts and around hunger. And he, you know, he was doing so much in those areas at the time of his death. And she took on that mantle and has done quite well and again, has lived a very full life, but he is a part of that.

And the same, you know, for many, for Ingrid Croce, you know, that was probably one of the kind of logistically, maybe I would say most difficult interviews to do because Ingrid now suffers from aphasia. And so she was not able to speak. So we looked at writings that she had done previously.

Her husband, Jimmy Rock, was with us and he helped in the interview. And she was able to say some things that, you know, we were able to kind of track, but it was a very difficult interview to do. But, you know, she just became dedicated to Jim Croce's legacy and to making sure that he got what was due him.

And, you know, he worked so hard for so long to break into the music industry. And just when he did and became wildly popular and had, you know, three number one albums, and then he was taken from us. And that unfairness has kind of structured her life going forward.

She is going to make sure that as long as she's around, people are going to know about Jim's music. And so I learned from them that the relationship, the person that is gone, the relationship that's over can still inform your life and be a part of your life. But you can also have a very full life as well.

You know, I learned about forgiveness from Crystal. I learned, you know, about really being strong in the face of things from nearly all of them. You know, Gloria Jones, very difficult loss for her.

And she was the partner of Mark Boland from T-Rex. They had a child, it was an auto accident, and it really kind of ruined her career. But she created this beautiful, full life with a school in Sierra Leone, West Africa, that teaches children how to play instruments, do music production, video production.

And so who would have ever thought, you know, that that's where her life would have led her. But she did that for herself and kind of, you know, in memory of in honor of Mark. And so I think, you know, the biggest lesson for me was that you do bring this person forward with you.

And it does become just part of who you are. And it doesn't prevent you if you want, if you don't want it to, it does not prevent you from having a rich, full life. But you'll never be that person, you know, that you were before it happened.

Right. We all, we talk about, you know, here at Everyone Dives, you talk about how death ends a life, but it doesn't end a relationship. And the relationship goes on.

And it's either going to be, you know, one where you find peace or one where you maintain your hurt and your anger and all of that. We have a choice in that. We don't have to stay angry and hurt.

Would you agree with that? I do. I think that, um, I think, you know, you need to give time for that to be a real choice. I think that there's time where you are angry and hurt.

And I think you don't want to rush through that or discount it or, you know, tell yourself this is wrong. I think you want to feel all the feels when they happen and give yourself a lot of time and grace to kind of make your way through. And I don't know that I think there are, you know, definite phases or that we all travel the same road.

I think it differs quite a bit. And I, you know, I think I found that too from talking with these women. But I think that at a certain point, most of us do say, you know, I just can't stay feeling like this.

I have to move on towards something better than where I'm at today. And that's easier for some than others. But I think that, you know, that anger and hurt hopefully diminishes a little bit and only comes around once in a while.

But you kind of live with it, you ride it out, you know, you know, when it comes along and then you just keep going. And there's a lot to be said for the professional help to help you. Absolutely.

Yes. Because I don't know that that's something that it's a lot of hard work. And it's not something that most people can do alone.

And so giving yourself that gift of talking to a therapist of some sort to work through those feelings is certainly important for a lot of people in order to get to get from one point to the other. Yes. Yeah, I definitely agree with that.

It was for me, in my case, it was very helpful. Well, Lori, are there any final thoughts or something that you want to make sure our listeners learn from you or hear from you today? Well, I think, you know, we didn't have a chance too much to talk about the kind of, I don't know, craziness, maybe, if you will, that that goes along with the loss that these women have endured. I was recently contacted by another widow whose rock and roll husband passed away a little over a year ago.

And she said, you know, all of these things that I'm just mired in contractual issues and members of his former band are angry with me and fans are, you know, I can't do anything right in their eyes. And all of these things are in your book. And so she was very happy.

We've since kind of been writing back and forth. And she was just glad to kind of see that she wasn't alone in having these things. And I think that that's one of the things I learned quite a bit, you know, from all of them is that they have had experiences that that you and I that the average person does not have as part of their grief.

And so you'll have to read the book, your listeners will have to read the book to see what those things are. But, you know, it's just a it added a whole layer of difficulty for most of them to have these added interactions that are there like a rock widows support group, or maybe that's something that you should, you know, have a yearly retreat or something for rock widows. Yeah, it's we I have talked about and and kind of my dream with the book is that it might someday be made into a documentary film, because I would love for them to be in a room together and talk about their experiences and have people understand how they all have similar experiences.

And, and there are things that will never go through. You know, I, in talking with Nancy Jones, she has said that it's happened more than once that she's gone to the cemetery to be with George. And he has a very large monument at the cemetery, you can't miss it, it's there.

And, and, you know, they do things like that, in part, to give fans a place to be and to go. And, and so there's this kind of line that they're always having to be mindful of that fans are important, they appreciate them very much, but fans also overstep. And she has gone to the cemetery and found that other people have spread ashes on George's grave.

And, and that is, you know, that it just seems like such a violation to me, but it is perfectly logical, I guess, to a big fan. And other, other widows that I had interviewed said, Oh, yeah, that's happened. It's something that, you know, never crossed my mind, that, of course, is never going to happen with me, unless there's some family member that, you know, wants to do this, in which case they would ask my permission, but to have these kinds of, you know, lines being crossed, that's something that they've all experienced.

And I would really love to get them all together in a room and have them talk about these experiences so that people can better understand. And I hope the book is a start for that too, to better understand what in today's world of, of fandom, you know, it's, I think it's important for us to understand that, that there are humans there that are impacted by our actions that we think we're doing out of, you know, love for this person, who maybe got us through a difficult breakup with their music, but there's, there's a human on the other side of that. So, yeah.

Well, I really appreciate you talking with me and we'll, in our show notes, we'll have a link to purchasing your book, which is, I can't remember if I cried, Rock Widows of Life, Love and Legacy. And I'm, I'm really growing on this idea of a rock widow's retreat, you know, some nice resort or somebody's nice house, you know, I, I'm thinking that that might be very useful for people. Yes, maybe, maybe I will pursue that.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much, Lori, and great to have a fellow Detroiter on the show.

And I appreciate you taking the time to talk with us. Oh, thanks, Marianne. Thanks so much for, for having me.

I appreciate it. Thank you. From the blog, Hope Grows in the Wilderness by Alicia Borzarth, widowhood is more than missing your spouse's presence.

It is adjusting to an alternate life. It is growing around a permanent amputation. Widowhood is going to bed for the thousandth time and still the loneliness doesn't feel normal.

The empty bed, a constant reminder. The night no longer brings intimacy and comfort, but the loudness of silence and the void of connection. Widowhood is walking around the same house you have lived in for years and it no longer feeling like home because home incorporated a person and they're not here.

Homesickness fills your heart and the knowledge that it will never return onto you. Widowhood is seeing all your dreams and plans you shared as a couple crumble around you. The painful process of searching for new dreams that include only you amount to climbing Mount Everest.

And every small victory of creating new dreams for yourself includes a new shade of grief that their death propelled you to this path. Widowhood is second guessing everything you thought you knew about yourself. Your life had molded together with another's and without them you have to relearn all your likes, hobbies, fears, goals.

The renaissance of a new person makes you proud and heartbroken simultaneously. Widowhood is being a stranger in your own life. The unnerving feeling of watching yourself from outside your body, going through the motions of what was your life but being detached from it all.

You don't recognize yourself. Your previous life feels but a vapor long gone like a mist of a dream you begin to wonder if it ever happened at all. Widowhood is the irony of knowing if that one person was here to be your support you would have the strength to grieve that one person.

The thought twists and confuses you. If only they were here to hold you and talk to you, you'd have the tenacity to tackle this unwanted life. To tackle the arduous task of moving on without them.

Widowhood is missing the one person who could truly understand what is in your heart to share. The funny joke, the embarrassing incident, the fear compelling you or the frustration tempting you. To anyone else you would have to explain and that is too much effort so you keep to yourself and the loneliness grows inside you.

Widowhood is struggling with identity. Who are you if not their spouse? What do you want to do if not the things you planned together? What brand do you want to buy if not the one you two shared for all those years? What is your purpose if the job of investing into your marriage is taken away? Who is my closest companion when my other half isn't here? Widowhood is feeling restless because you lost your home, identity, partner, lover, friend, playmate, travel companion, co-parent, security and life and you are drifting with an unknown destination. Widowhood is living in a constant state of missing the most intimate relationship no hand to hold, no body next to you, no partner to share your burden.

Widowhood is being alone in a crowd of people, feeling sad even while you're happy, feeling guilty while you live. It is looking back while moving forward. It is being hungry but nothing sounding good.

It is every special event turned bittersweet. Yes, it is much more than simply missing their presence. It is becoming a new person whether you want to or not.

It is fighting every emotion mankind can feel at the same moment and trying to function in life at the same time. Widowhood is frailty. Widowhood is strength.

Widowhood is darkness. Widowhood is rebirth. Widowhood is life changing.

Thanks for tuning in. Stay tuned for the continuing saga of Everyone Dies and thank you for listening. This is Charlie Navarette and for the television series Doc Martin, dying is the natural cause of events.

And I'm Marianne Manso and we'll see you next week. Remember, don't spread the cremains of a loved one on another person's grave without permission from the family. And every day is a gift.

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