[00:00:00] Kat: After they died, I completely changed the way I see life. I became very immediate about how I live my life. I am so much more present in everything I do.
[00:00:14] Jill: Welcome back to Seeing Death Clearly. I'm your host Jill McClennan, a death doula and end-of-life coach. My conversations with guests aim to challenge your preconceived notions about death dying, grief, and life itself. I hope to encourage you to think beyond the boundaries of what you believe to be true. In this episode, my guest is Kat Zammuto. Kat went through the profound loss of both her mother and her husband within a short period of time, she shares her experiences of grief navigating the dating scene in her forties and embarking on a journey of self-discovery through the creation of her own podcast. Thank you for joining us for this conversation. Thank you so much, Kat, for being on my podcast. Hi.
[00:00:55] Kat: Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.
[00:00:57] Jill: Oh, you're so welcome. Can you just tell us a little bit about your background, where you come from originally, if you wanna share how old you are, and anything that kind of sets the listener up to know who you are?
[00:01:08] Kat: Absolutely. So I am an actor, an artist, a business owner. I live in LA, California. I grew up here. I've lived here pretty much my entire life. I was born in Brazil cuz my mom was Brazilian. My father was French and my father was a TV and movie producer. So I was actually one of those TV babies raised on TV sets.
[00:01:30] And nowadays I do my podcast Cat on the Loose about sex dating and relationships. Which is growing super nicely. After three years, we're getting about 70,000 downloads per episode. I'm very excited about it. And I own a business. I do a lot of different things. I still act, I model keep, keep busy, keep busy.
[00:01:48] Jill: That's amazing. And what is the business that you own?
[00:01:52] Kat: I own a boutique agency. I do creative services, social media management, branding, content creation, and marketing. I have clients all over the United States. All over the world. I love it because it's very dynamic and every day is different. I'm not kind of like the nine-to-five girls, so to speak.
[00:02:12] So I love what I do because it keeps me very, very busy. And I think at least for me, when you work, the more you love it, the more you see results. And I think you have to be passionate about what you do. And that's definitely my case.
[00:02:26] Jill: I completely agree with that. You have to have that passion. Yes. Or else, first off, you're just not gonna enjoy it. But also people can tell when you don't like what you're doing and you're just not gonna get good results.
[00:02:40] Kat: There you go. 1000000%. Yes.
[00:02:43] Jill: And can you tell me a little bit about when you were growing up? Did you experience the death of loved ones? How did your family deal with death and dying? Did you ever talk about it?
[00:02:54] Kat: Yeah, so my experience is very rich in this topic as we talked about before, the podcast, but it was more like in my adult life because what happened to me? I got married very young, in my early twenties. Yeah. By the way, I am proudly 50 years old. I love saying my eight. I know, right? Yeah. I love saying my age because I, I, I know women are always lying about their age.
[00:03:19] I talk about that on my podcast all the time because of dating, and I'm like, own it. Aging is so beautiful. It's so amazing. You know, if you're alive, oh my God, in this crazy chaos post pandemia, I like taking care of myself. It's a big part of my job, my image, and I'm like, you know what? I'm kicking. I'm working out.
[00:03:40] I'm working. I'm healthy, you know, and I'm 50 and I love it. So I'm not embarrassed to say that at all. Wonderful. Yeah. So, anyways, I was married when I was very young in my twenties and my husband was much older. My husband Anthony was 22 years older than me and we were married for a long time, for 14 years.
[00:04:01] And I dunno how much you want me to tell the story all at once, but the, the end of the story is that he ended up dying and my mom died one year before he died. This was a few years ago, in 2017 and 2018, and it's most definitely life-changing and insanely traumatic to go through. So much loss at once. For sure.
[00:04:22] Jill: Yeah. The loss of both your mother and your husband, they're so important to you as a person, your mother and your partner, you know, your life partner. It must have been really overwhelming as you were going through the whole experience. Yes. Do you wanna share any of the details about either one of their deaths?
[00:04:45] Kat: Yep, sure. My husband was very successful. It's a, it's a sad ending. Everybody knows cause he died, but he was like a self-made millionaire. He owned a very successful company and as the years went by, the more his business grew, the more he drank. So he became an alcoholic. And so that's the whole story of my marriage because you know, when you're in a relationship, like most people, you think the person is gonna change for you, and years and years and years go by and you're like, oh, he is gonna stop drinking for me.
[00:05:18] He loves me. The end of the story is, they don't change for you. And in my case and my husband, as the company grew and expanded, expanded, expand, he was drinking, drink, oh, it's my hobby, it's my hobby, it's my hobby. And he got obviously out of control and he was a full-blown alcoholic. And towards the end of his life, we knew he was gonna die because he was really sick.
[00:05:41] And he made a decision that he wasn't gonna stop drinking. He was like, I wanna die. So he didn't want treatment, he refused treatment, as much as we tried everything you guys can dream of on the planet, he wanted to die. So the last two years of his life almost killed me in the process because trying to take care of someone who is trying to kill themselves, you know, is, I guess impossible to describe.
[00:06:10] And as I was in the process of his terminal disease, my mom died. All of a sudden, it was very sudden. My mom was very young. My mother was 67. So, yeah, it was very and I mean, I don't even know what to say because I think I know people like that still have their moms. I don't even like talking to them because I'm like, you know how people tell you, oh, you're gonna get over it, la la, la.
[00:06:36] I was extremely close to my mom as much as I live in California and she lived in Brazil. We were the kind of people we talked every single day on the phone, literally. Two, three times a day. My entire life we were very close. And now you fast forward, what, five years? If I told you that I got used to it, I think I would be lying.
[00:06:59] I'm not sure how you ever get used to such, a big loss in your life. I don't know if your experience or. Your listeners or other people that you interviewed are the same, but for me, I don't think it's about getting used to it or I think it's about like adapting to a life without that person.
[00:07:17] Jill: I think you're correct that you don't really ever get used to a loss in your life like that.
[00:07:23] You do learn to adapt because it is part of life. All of us will have somebody that we're close to, that we love very much that they will die. And we can understand that on an intellectual level, but when it happens, we have to feel it in the body. We have to process it in a different way, and knowing that life will never be the same without them.
[00:07:49] It is difficult.
[00:07:51] Kat: It is. It's insanely tough. And as I said, because I'm not an expert and a lot of people ask me, even people that I meet nowadays, they ask me, oh my God, how did you survive? And looking back, sometimes even, I don't know, because obviously that period of my life, like when my mom died and I actually.
[00:08:12] That's one interesting aspect too. I never go to Brazil. It's very rare, and as a major coincidence, when my mom died, I was in Brazil. I was visiting somebody else, and I spoke to my mother on Mother's Day. In May, 2017 was the last time I talked to my mother at night. She was hospitalized. And 24 hours later she died.
[00:08:39] So I got to see my mother dead. And I don't know, as some people believe in his spirituality is some people believe in religion. I'm not religious, but I have this feeling inside of me that something in the universe made me be there because the chances were. Falls to zero. Like normally she would've died and I would've been in California and I got to see my mother's death and go to her services down there.
[00:09:06] And of course it was insanely traumatic. But I guess for me, uh, as I said, I'm not gonna say you get used to it, but time just teaches you whatever your beliefs are to cope and you just transform it into another life for yourself, I guess.
[00:09:24] Jill: You could definitely take your losses and transform them into something positive, and that's hard to see when you're in it at the moment.
[00:09:35] But as time goes by, I find that there's people that I talk to that. That's what happens if they're willing to accept the loss and sit with it and process it. A lot of people can't do that. They just get so stuck in the feelings of the loss that they can't actually move forward and take the loss and use it for something positive.
[00:09:59] And I'm not shaming anybody that gets stuck. I mean, we all have to go through our process in a different way. Yeah. It's amazing that you were able to be there with your mother.
[00:10:09] Kat: It's just a seriously bizarre story because the people that know me like it, it was insanely rare that I go down there.
[00:10:16] Usually she was the one that flew here like two, three times a year and yeah, so I was there and as you were saying, like some people don't accept it. She was remarried, so she was married to my stepdad for a very long time, who I consider a father, and to this day he does not accept it because they were so in love.
[00:10:37] You know, they were like these little sweethearts. They were so glued together. Their love was so big. It was so adorable. They looked like teenagers, like basically his life is over. He's 80 years old and he doesn't wanna date anybody. Her things are still in her house. To this day, he does not let me get anything that was my mom's, I went there and I got maybe a few little pieces of things that I had gifted her, but like to this day, he's like, you know, I don't wanna touch anything. Leave me alone. I don't wanna have another relationship. And yeah, it's different ways of, I don't know if acceptance is the world, because if somebody asked me, did you accept that your mother died, then I'm like, no.
[00:11:17] I think the world is crazy unfair. Right. Why does it take people from us that are such good, wonderful people and leave crappy people behind? And then I guess it's very individual. Like some people, I guess when you're religious, they say, oh, it was God's will, right? In my case, I'm not religious, so I'm not sure if the word is acceptance.
[00:11:40] And I don't even know what word I would use, but I guess what I say is I feel her presence, like with me many times, I feel her guiding me and I think she would keep saying, move on, move on. A lot of what I do is for her, it's like I feel like she's always somewhere, you know, telling me to be strong. I think that's where I get my strength.
[00:12:03] Jill: That's beautiful. I tell my children kind of the same thing, and my children are young nine and 12. Wow. But we have conversations and sometimes my daughter will say, oh, you know, I really hope we die at the same time. I'm like, no baby. No, that's not the way it's supposed to work. But when I do die, I will be with you.
[00:12:24] I'm not gonna leave if there's any part of my soul or spirit or whatever you wanna call it, that can stay behind. To finish my daughter's life with her and my son's life with him, I 100% will. There's no doubt in my mind that if I could stick around here, I would do it. And I think. People that I've spoken to that are mediums and whatever else, they will say that your loved ones stay around to be that kind of source of comfort and inspiration.
[00:12:58] And it still doesn't mean that you don't miss them, even though part of me believes that for me, my biggest loss is my grandmother. My grandmother was basically like my mother. My mother worked all the time. She was a single mom, so my grandma and I were very close, and I'm close with my mother as well, but.
[00:13:15] I don't always feel like my grandmother's gone. It’s just right. It just doesn't feel like she's gone and I know that she's dead. It's not that I'm in denial that she's dead, but. The energy, the thing that made her doesn't feel like it's missing from my life, but I still miss her. I still miss touching her hands and I still miss her voice.
[00:13:40] And I mean, even when I was in college, I would still sometimes sit on her lap and she would like to rub my back. And I was a full-grown woman and I didn't care. I sat on my grandma's lap and she would rub my back.
[00:13:51] Kat: I'm very respectful of people's religions and beliefs and everything, and I never spoke about this, by the way.
[00:13:57] It's the first time I am talking. I never spoke about this on my podcast. I rarely talk about my mom because it's too, like I said, very raw, very painful. But for me, she appears in different forms. Sometimes in a flower, sometimes in a bird, sometimes a message. I constantly feel her. And the reason why I don't talk about it is because I don't want anybody to judge me.
[00:14:21] I think what matters is like inside me. I know she's there and sometimes it's a stronger feeling. Than others. But for me, it helps me. It helps me move on and do what I have to do. So if somebody out there is grieving, this is what I would say. Some people go to church, right? They go and they pray and pray.
[00:14:43] Some people go to the person's cemetery place, whatever. Figure out what's what works for you. Because even if you don't accept it, maybe gives you a little comfort, you know, in a way. Right. I guess that's what I would say.
[00:15:00] Jill: People do tend to find, I think if they try, they do tend to find that thing that makes them feel comfort.
[00:15:07] Yeah. And I do go to the cemetery to put flowers and things on my grandmother's grave. But I don't do that for me. I mainly do it. Because my mother wants to because that's what my grandmother would want. Yeah. But I don't feel a connection to her there. Mm-hmm. Right. I feel that connection to her when I'm in my garden and I'm working in my garden because that's what she always did.
[00:15:32] And when I was a kid, I spent a lot of time in her garden with her. So when I'm in my garden, I feel very connected to her. So it's different for everybody. We really will all find the thing that helps us stay connected to our loved ones that have died.
[00:15:46] Kat: Exactly. No, I agree. 1000000%.
[00:15:51] Jill: And so you lost your husband very soon after you lost your mother?
[00:15:57] Kat: Like, yeah. Oh, like my mother died in May, 2017, and Anthony died in September, 2018. Yeah, so it was like boom, boom, and then my life turned upside down. Because of his death. It's a very long, crazy story. It's a whole other podcast episode, and then I had to start my life over.
[00:16:17] So one interesting thing that I have to say, and I don't know if you have this experience or other people that you interview before they died. I was like, most people are right. None of us thinks about our own mortality. Like, you know, we make plans like, oh, five years from now and no, no, no, no, no, and my future, and that's all nice.
[00:16:41] Hopefully the future come. But after they died, I completely, completely changed the way I see life. So if we can take one positive from my losses, I became. Very immediate in how I live my life. Like I'm almost like a child. I wake up every single day and I really literally only appreciate that day.
[00:17:03] It doesn't matter what happens. I am so much more present, so much more present in I. Everything I do, and I don't think I was like that before. I think before I was always a planner, like, oh, today's a crappy, rainy day. Oh, I'm gonna do that vacation next year and I'll do that and I'm gonna save this new dress for a special occasion like most people do.
[00:17:27] I was always thinking about the future and after this chaos that happened to me, and of course, I almost died in the process. Nowadays, I am really, really appreciative of every single day that I have, no matter what's happening to me. I am super, super grateful. And I think if you manage to do that, I. Your life becomes richer.
[00:17:53] You are a happier person, believe it or not. If you stop planning so much and thinking about what you gonna get in the future, are you gonna be richer in the future? Are you gonna be thinner in the future? You know? And you really literally enjoy whatever it is that you have today. You are gonna be happier for sure.
[00:18:11] Jill: Living in the moment is so important. And yeah, for me, learning about death and dying and. Thinking a lot about death and dying. My own, my husbands, my children, my mothers, you know, all the people around me, and realizing, That it could happen to any of us at any moment. I can't control it. Mm-hmm. As much as I want to control it, I can't.
[00:18:39] And it has made it so that every moment that I am with my family nail, I appreciate it because I fully understand that this could be the last one. Right. And not in a morbid way. It's not in a way where I'm all the time thinking, oh, it's so sad they could die at any moment. It's more that idea of. If somebody is being a little frustrating or crying in my children's case, you know, the things that in the past I would feel frustrated about now I could just let it go, or, yeah, last night was a great example.
[00:19:14] I'm editing a few of my podcasts. I just have a lot going on this week. But my kids wanted to play a game with me and my husband, and in the past, I would've felt frustrated like, this is taking so much of my time. I have so much I have to do. And now I just, I. You know what? Whatever, because tomorrow might not be here.
[00:19:34] Those podcasts won't matter. But what will matter is the time that I've spent with my family. When I'm on my deathbed, I'm not gonna be thinking to myself, man, I really wish I would've edited those podcasts a little faster. But I will be thinking, I wish I would've spent more time playing games with my family.
[00:19:50] Kat: 1000000%. Yes, I agree. I don't have kids. I have two dogs, and it's kind of the same, I feel like my dog needs attention. I am insanely busy. I work the craziest hours. But yeah, sometimes I take a moment and I'm like, you know what? I'm gonna go for an extra walk with him. I'm gonna breathe some fresh air.
[00:20:12] I deserve it. He deserves it. Makes you more present and you stop sweating the small stuff. I used to be a much more stressed-out person, and I don't wanna sound morbid, but most problems I put in perspective. Sometimes I say that phrase like, you know, the worst thing that ever happened to me was to see my mother dead.
[00:20:33] It's tough to top that. So when something doesn't go my way, silly problems, everyday issues, stresses, heartbreaks. It makes life lighter if you put it in perspective. And I think for the people that never suffered severe loss, it's hard for them to understand what we're talking about. But my suggestion is, yeah, try to remember.
[00:20:57] That even if you do have your parents alive if you do have all your loved ones alive, appreciate them a little more. Sometimes even we forgot to say, I love you. You're such a great friend. You're such a great person. I miss you. You know, sometimes the silliest makes somebody so happy, and if you start doing these small gestures, that means so much and it makes your life richer as well.
[00:21:22] Jill: It's so vulnerable for us to say these things, and that's what stops us often. I know that's what stops me often, or at least in the past, was. What if I say to a friend, oh, I love you so much, thank you for being in my life, and they think it's weird, or what if we're not friends again afterward? Just all these things have stopped me from really being that vulnerable with the people that I love.
[00:21:53] In the past, definitely not as much anymore. Yeah. And with family. I tell my kids, I tell my husband, I tell everybody around me that I love them. When I'm leaving, I make the effort to go around and specifically, I don't care if I'm running late, to say goodbye to every person in my house and say, I love you.
[00:22:16] I'll see you soon. Yeah. And often does. Take somebody, losing somebody that's close to them or getting a diagnosis of an illness and knowing that they're gonna die to come to that realization. But you don't have to wait until that point. We can all do this work now. It's a lot of why I started this podcast because I want people, To normalize talking about it and hearing about it and thinking about it so that maybe somebody listening to this is gonna go to their spouse or their children or their parents, and for a second just think, you know what?
[00:22:53] I should really say I love you. And then if that person does die, they're gonna have that moment of going, no, but you know what? I took the time to say I love you.
[00:23:03] Kat:. Yeah. Oh my God. Yes. I think, and I think that translates into everything you do in life. And I teach that, like in my social media classes, when people ask about my podcast, most people hold back, hold back, on everything.
[00:23:19] They hold back on their career, they hold back on trying a new job, a new hobby. They hold back on relationships, they hold back on loving. And I say, why? Like, you're never gonna have another life. This is not a dress rehearsal. You're not gonna do this again. Go for it. Like, what are you afraid of? Like even when, when I'm teaching, like podcasting and anything, a lot of people, oh, I'm afraid of the camera.
[00:23:45] I'm afraid. Like, what if they say no? What? And I'm like, go for it, because you only have this one chance. And I think that's the most powerful lesson we can get. From dealing with death, we forget that you are never gonna have this moment. You are never going to have today back. If you live another 30 years, fantastic.
[00:24:10] But I always do this for myself and maybe people are gonna think I'm crazy, but I do this mental exercise if I die today. And I could ask myself, are you happy with everything that you did today? Did you really, really do the best you could? Did you have a happy day? Did you take the best care of yourself?
[00:24:28] Did you send that message? I wanna be able to transfer. Yes. I don't wanna die with any regrets. And I think that's kind of like a good mental exercise. Just take the leap, whatever it is, personal dating, business, podcasting, go for it. And if somebody tells you no, like if you say so, you wanna have like a fancy guest or a famous guest.
[00:24:52] If they say no, like, you know what? At least I tried. I went for it. If you wanna invite a girl out, You know what? I don't care. She said, no, but at least I went for it. It's gonna empower you. It's going to make you feel like a much stronger person.
[00:25:07] Jill: I'm kind of doing that right now with, there are some people I wanna invite to be on my podcast.
[00:25:12] Yeah. But I'm like, but, but they're, they're like famous people. Yeah.
[00:25:17] Kat: Well look outta a hundred famous people. Yeah. Dealing with rejection is really tough, but it's tougher to die. Frustrated, most human beings die very frustrated. They wanted to do something. They didn't have the balls to do it. Most human beings.
[00:25:37] The ones that usually find success in any area of their life are the ones that take the leap instead of second-guessing, oh, but that person is too famous. Guess what? Maybe you're gonna get a hundred nos, but maybe one of those really famous people, they're nice. Sometimes they're like, okay, I like this chick.
[00:25:56] I'm gonna go for it. But just try. You know, the lesson I wanna leave behind is, I'm still alive, which is a total miracle. I wrote a book about my life. Uh, I took it out of Amazon for some personal reasons. I'm rewriting it, but the lesson I wanna leave behind, like if I went through hell and high water.
[00:26:19] With my losses, I lost everything with my husband's dad. I'm rebuilding from scratch. I'm 50 years old and I never worked so hard in my life, but I'm happy. So the lesson I will, if I, if I can leave any legacy behind is it's never too late. Ever, ever to go after a dream to start a new relationship, you know, to do anything that you wanna do.
[00:26:44] Don't be afraid of it. As you said, if you find out you're sick or it's on your death bad, or if even if you're 80 years old, you wanna look back and say, you know what? I tried anything I wanted to try, I went for it.
[00:26:57] Jill: And there's people that are 80 years old and they're on their deathbed and regretting that they didn't mm-hmm.
[00:27:04] Start whatever it was. They wanted to start at 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 or whatever age. We have those stories of why we can't do things and really, what's the worst that happens if you try something like, yeah, maybe you can lose some money. But in the long run, money is just
[00:27:22] Kat: money. Yeah. I can keep it again, you know, that's the thing, like don't focus on the material part of things because the money comes and goes and yeah, you can be really wealthy or not.
[00:27:37] I personally believe in success. If you love what you do, like we're saying, if you are passionate about what you do, The results come with it if you don't do it as an obligation as a robot. But I agree if you focus more on what makes you happy as a person and what you're really good at. Very likely you're gonna see better results than if you're just focusing like, yeah, how much money I have in the bank.
[00:28:02] You know? But even like in personal relationships, I talk about my, on my podcast all the time, men are shy about inviting girls. And girls are afraid of getting their hearts broken. Or somebody breaks your heart and you're like, I'm never gonna love again. Like, why not? Keep going, keep going, keep going, keep trying.
[00:28:19] Right? And eventually, Everything works out.
[00:28:23] Jill: It's fear that stops us from doing so many things. Yeah. I feel like the fear too is so deeply rooted in this idea that if we get rejected by the people around us, for whatever reason, there's still that, you know, animal instinct inside of us that it means we're gonna be left to die alone.
[00:28:46] It's so interesting the more that I really think. Because now I definitely, whenever I do something, and you know, for example, if I'm gonna invite somebody onto my podcast that is kind of famous, what's the worst thing that's gonna happen? They're gonna say, no, it's not going to physically harm me. Exactly.
[00:29:07] Yeah. But your body still will sometimes go through that reaction of like, oh no, they rejected me. That means that I'm not. Good enough. That means that I'm gonna be pushed out and we have to learn to recognize, yeah, sometimes what those reactions actually are, that they're not le for death. Most of the time, I,
[00:29:29] Kat: I tell, look, I know dealing with rejection is very tough for most people.
[00:29:34] I have like alligator skin because as I said, I grew up on TV sets, movie sets, and you know, it's the toughest business in the world when it comes to rejection. And you get used to it. You don't take it personally. Like when somebody says no to you, you need to remember, it's most of the time it's not about you.
[00:29:53] Like you invite a guest for a podcast and they say, sorry, we're gonna pass, like. It's not like I hate this girl. You know? Sometimes they're busy or sometimes they're interested in something else, or sometimes they wanna do, it's really not about you. But if you don't ask, you're never gonna know. Right. And sometimes you might be happily surprised.
[00:30:14] Jill: I don't wanna wait and find out one day that maybe I do end up asking them five years down the road and they say, oh, I would've done it five years ago if you would've asked me. Yeah, but I let fear stop me very. I'm trying not to let fear stop me anymore.
[00:30:29] Kat: Good for you. Thank you. I love that because like I said, after my husband died and my mom died and I almost died in the process and I decided to rebuild my life, this is what I say.
[00:30:42] Go for it. Whatever it is that you wanna do in life, be a little more brave. Don't overthink it. I think that's a huge problem for a lot of people. They overthink their insecurities and everything and remember, as you said, we don't wanna be morbid, but it could be like over and you really wanna look back and, and be happy with what you were able to accomplish.
[00:31:09] Jill: Right? Because life will end one day and we don't know when. Even people that may have a terminal diagnosis, they have a better idea. Mm-hmm. But the rest of us, we don't know when it's gonna be and. No, I hopefully will live a long life and I hopefully will have lots of really cool people on my podcast.
[00:31:29] Kat: And you for sure. I believe in manifestation. I dunno if you do. I think you need to manifest the life you want, the life you have, and what you think you deserve. And the universe. Listens to you and gives it back. So if you decide I'm a good podcaster, my work is really good. I am passionate about what I do, guess what?
[00:31:51] Your guests are gonna agree. Your audience is gonna agree. The universe is gonna open doors for you. But most people, they have, they self-doubt. Like even before you get rejected, you already decide like, oh, I don't know if I'm good enough or not. And I think that's the problem. It starts within us.
[00:32:10] Anything we wanna do in life, it's you have to believe in yourself. Even, like I said, for dating, how do you want somebody to love you or like you if you don't like yourself, right?
[00:32:24] Jill: Everything you do needs to start within and there's so much healing that often. People need to do to get to that self-love.
[00:32:30] We are our worst critics.
[00:32:32] Kat: Yes, unfortunately. And it took me a long time and I tell you guys, I've been doing my podcast for three years and my podcast started after I lost Anthony cuz I was literally this woman that was married for 15 years. I was in a bubble and then I was like, okay, I'm gonna go back to dating.
[00:32:53] How do I have a relationship? How do I start over? I knew nothing about it, and it's been a journey for me as well. All this podcast that I do, hundreds of episodes, 10 million hours, it's been a journey of self-discovery to realize that, yeah, we can always start over. We, we need to love ourselves. We can rebuild.
[00:33:14] Nothing is over until it's, it's over. You know, you can do new and better things every single day. If you decide you're old, in your mind, you're old. If you decide your life is over in your mind, your life is over. So you need to make the decision in your mind like what you think you deserve. But yeah, we learn every single day, but I really believe in my heart the secret is like self-love.
[00:33:40] Jill: I have a question about dating after your husband died because. My thought would be that I would be almost afraid to go out and start the whole process over again. Because what if they die too? And is that something that you experienced? Were you afraid? You just kind of dove in?
[00:34:02] Kat: Yeah. And you guys are not gonna believe this, but this is real life.
[00:34:06] Like you said, we're all gonna die. So I never kept thinking about death again. And the first boyfriend, long-term boyfriend I had after Anthony, and it's right, right there at the beginning of my podcast. I was dating him for a year and a half and he cheated on me on my birthday, if you guys believe that.
[00:34:25] Very long story. But listen to this, my birthday's in March, I found out he was cheating on me in March. So we broke up. A few months later, what happened? He was trying to get back to that with me to back with me. Covid starts right one week after my birth in March. He caught Covid in May from the girl he was cheating with, and he died.
[00:34:49] Oh wow. No, this is a true story. Everybody thinks my life is like a movie, right? True freaking story. He called me from the hospital. He was actually talking, communicating. We thought he was gonna be out of the hospital, apologized. As you said, when you're near that bed, you all of a sudden you see life differently.
[00:35:10] So like, oh, I'm so sorry. I love you when I get out of here. Let me make it up to you. Let's rebuild, blah, blah, blah. And I said, sure. Just get better. Just get better. Just get better. A few days later went downhill and he died, and then he had four kids, four grown kids living with him. Guess who took care of the kids?
[00:35:34] Everything he left behind. I had to handle everything for these four kids. So I went through this all over again. If you can't believe that,
[00:35:46] Jill: That is crazy actually. I believe you. But that is crazy.
[00:35:51] Kat: I'm like laughing now because it sounds so surreal. Right?
[00:35:56] Jill: It sounds, it sounds like a movie.
[00:35:59] Kat: It's exactly like when I tell the stories, people are like, no way.
[00:36:02] No way, no way. And I'm like, yeah, go listen to my podcast. Like three years ago, I, I told the story when he was alive, I told the story of dating and the guy cheating on me and I give the guy a chance and the guy cheat on me. Never in a million years did we think Covid was gonna, if somebody told us a virus is gonna come shut down the universe, we would have said Yeah Right.
[00:36:24] Jill: No, I wouldn't have believed it if somebody would've told me.
[00:36:28] Kat: And then this man is like crazy healthy, works out every day young, and he died. I was gun shy about dating after that, but not because of people dying more, because of the pain of getting your heart broken and you know, going through all the emotions.
[00:36:48] But at the end of the day, and I'm still single again, but at the end of the day I say, Never give up on finding love, because it's one of the most fun things in life is the eternal belief in love. I think if you give up on love, like a big part of us already dies, at least for me. So the answer is like, uh, no, I'm not afraid I'm gonna keep dating, trying to find true luck.
[00:37:14] Hopefully I will again. But even if I don't, I'm an eternal belief in love and romance and I, I tell people that on my podcast all the time. Don't give up. Don't give up. Cuz you can always, always start over. I've interviewed people that are starting over in their sixties, in their seventies, you know, so, Yeah, just don't give up.
[00:37:38] Jill: That is an amazing story. Thank you so much for sharing that with us. You said you had to help out his grown children, so he had nothing prepared, nothing planned.
[00:37:50] Kat: No, because I think like a lot of people that died through Covid, you know, it's all, yeah, it's a cold, and of course, I'm not gonna die from a cold.
[00:37:57] Are you kidding me? So a lot of people like him that died, it was insanely sudden. A lot of healthy people die. He was very healthy. Everybody asks me that. He was very healthy and he did. So he caught a lot of people off guard, you know, and then you have to deal with that, like when somebody goes away from you.
[00:38:16] And he was the breadwinner. Yeah. His children were grown up like 18 and 19. He had 19 year old triplets, a 20 year old. But like, he was the, the rock of the family, you know? So yeah, it's. Oh my God. It's insane.
[00:38:33] Jill: And that's why we need to prepare, yeah. Ourselves and our families, no matter what our situation is.
[00:38:41] Because you know, maybe it's not covid, but people die suddenly of other things all the time. And if we don't talk about it if we don't prepare ourselves financially and legally and all these other things, we end up leaving behind a traumatic mess, essentially for people.
[00:39:01] Kat: Well, 1000000%. I talk about that all the time, and people are, you're being so morbid.
[00:39:07] As I say, write it down. Write everything, and dialogue on your cell phone. Like, call this person. This is what I want you to do with my stuff. This is what I want you to do with my kids, with my dogs. You know what? The people that are left behind, the people that are grieving, they are grieving, they're in pain.
[00:39:24] They wanna do hopefully the right thing by you. The more you organize what you want, the easier you're gonna make it. For the people left behind. If you leave nothing organized, it just makes the grieving process like 10,000 times worse cuz it's chaos. On top of the chaos. On top of the chaos. And if you think about it, like leave everything organized, then they're gonna be, oh, okay, that's what she wanted.
[00:39:50] This is where this goes, this is where that goes. So as much as most people don't wanna think about their own death, Face it, write it down, put it away, and then you move on with your life. But it's definitely gonna make it easier for your loved ones when you're gone.
[00:40:05] Jill: And it's not morbid, but people fear it.
[00:40:09] Yeah. And it's unfortunate because then it really does leave behind a mess for our loved ones when a simple conversation writing a few things down. My husband and I, have already some of the legal documentation, but like we don't have a New Jersey version of an advanced health directive. You could print 'em off of the website for probably almost every state.
[00:40:33] And just print 'em off, fill 'em out with your loved ones, talk about it a little bit, and then put them away somewhere. It's not like you have to do this thing every single day. Exactly. It is important that you have this information. Yeah. And that you know what somebody wants.
[00:40:49] Kat: Yes. I completely agree with you.
[00:40:50] Jill: Well, thank you so much. Is there anything else you want to mention? We'll put the podcast link and any of your social media, anything like that, that you wanna, I'll put it all in the show notes, but is there anything else you wanna tell the listeners?
[00:41:04] Kat: No, I mean, I really appreciate it. It, like I said, it's the first time I actually.
[00:41:08] Talk about my mom and it, it's definitely like, you know, I'm talking to you and I have this poker face, but of course inside like, um, I don't wanna cry because my mom, but I wanna say sometimes talking about it helps cuz I know also like when you lose someone, you bottle up inside your bottle. Up inside the bottom side.
[00:41:27] So whether you have a friend or a relative, or if you can afford. Therapist and cry, right? It's okay to, to this day, like five years after she died. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes if I miss her, or sometimes I think about my husband. Everything. It's completely, completely fine. There is no expiration date on grief.
[00:41:51] So it's very personal. It's a personal journey. So this is what I would tell anybody out there like. If it takes you 10 years, if it takes you forever, if you wanna cry, if you wanna feel bad, you know, don't, don't feel bad about it. Just do whatever is best for you inside. That's what I would say.
[00:42:07] Jill: Definitely get it out.
[00:42:09] Yeah. Don't hold it all in. Yeah. Yeah. And there are death doulas like me that also do grief work. Sometimes they'll call themselves morning doulas or grief doulas, where it's not a therapist. We're just here to have conversations with you to ask some questions. Because we hold that grief in and it's going to come out eventually whether we want it to or not.
[00:42:34] Kat: Yeah. I think that's very beautiful work because it takes a toll on the person. And I think, thank God there are amazing souls in this world like yourself that do this. And yes, it's a fantastic idea. Like, seek help. It's not embarrassing to say, you know what? I need a moment. I need help, like seek help, do whatever it is that you need to do to, to power through.
[00:43:01] Jill: Yes, totally. Get the help. Have somebody to talk to. Get it out. Don't hold it all in. There you go. Well, thank you so much, Kat. I really enjoyed our conversation. I appreciate you talking about your mother and your husband and your ex-boyfriend because I know it can bring up some of this stuff, so I appreciate it.
[00:43:22] Kat: Yes, thank you so much. I really appreciate your time and I can't wait to have you on. My podcast because it’s set dating relationships. But yeah, a huge part of, of relationships, as you said, is dealing with death. So I know my audience is gonna love hearing from you as well.
[00:43:38] Jill: Thank you so much. Well, I'm really looking forward to it, so thank you.
[00:43:41] Thank you again. Bye, guys. Kisses. Bye.
Jill: Thank you for listening to this episode of Seeing Death. Clearly. My guest next week is my friend Terry Brown. Terry and I discuss what it means to be human in our culture, particularly as women. We explore the message that our bodies are not good enough as they are.
[00:44:00] Terry also opens up about her experience using psychedelics to alleviate her depression and anxiety, and we talk about when I guided her during a D M T trip. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or family member who might. Find it interesting. Your support in spreading the podcast is greatly appreciated.
[00:44:17] Please consider subscribing on your favorite podcast platform and leaving a five-star review. Your positive feedback helps recommend the podcast to others. The podcast also offers a paid subscription feature that allows you to financially support the show. Your contribution will help keep the podcast advertisement free, whether your donation is large or small, every amount is valuable. I sincerely appreciate all of you for listening to the show and supporting me in any way you can. You can find a link in the show notes to subscribe to the paid monthly subscription as well as a link to my Venmo if you prefer to make a one-time contribution. Thank you and I look forward to seeing you in next week's episode of Seeing Death Clearly.