About this episode

Diane Heiler shares her journey of love, loss, and healing after caring for her husband through illness and finding new beginnings.

Diane Heiler shares her deeply moving journey of caring for her husband during his 20‑month “death sentence” from an incurable disease — a journey she chronicles with raw honesty and artistry in her memoir, A Widow’s Fire: An Intimate Memoir of Heartbreak, Survival, and Moving On. With poetry and art as lifelong companions, Diane turned to daily journaling to navigate the relentless progression of her husband’s illness. Out of that quiet practice, poetry emerged — a lifeline and a mirror to her grief. In her poem See Me, she writes: See me… standing here with my broken heart in my hand… blowing kisses into the air and sending love up into the heavens… so far from where I am. After his passing, Diane retreated to her mountaintop home in North Carolina, seeking solitude in her sorrow. Months later, at her sister’s urging, she reluctantly attended a country club dance — and unexpectedly, a new chapter began. From her poem My Christmas Blessing: I have been blessed with the presence of living in the light of someone special. He is gone from me now. But the afterglow of his goodness and his love is still shining through the windows in his heart and gracing my existence. I follow a…

People in this episode

Hosts: Gail Zelitzky, Catherine Marienau

Guest: Diane Heiler

Topics covered

• grief
• healing
• love
• memoir
• personal journey

Keywords

• grief
• healing
• memoir
• Diane Heiler
• love
• poetry
• North Carolina

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: A Widow’s Fire: An Intimate Memoir of Heartbreak, Survival, and Moving On, See Me, My Christmas Blessing

Places: North Carolina

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