Widowed AF: Real stories of love, grief and beyond - With Rosie Gill-Moss

S3 - EP6 Thea Claire's Story; Love, Loss, and Neurodiversity

• Rosie Gill-Moss • Season 3 • Episode 9

Share episode

At just 24, Thea Claire found herself widowed and navigating the overwhelming world of grief while grappling with revelations she discovered about their relationship.

In this episode of Widowed AF, host Rosie Gill-Moss chats with Thea, who shares her journey after the sudden death of her husband, T, from a brain tumour. 

Thea opens up about the emotional ups and downs of T's diagnosis, the challenges they faced together, and the unexpected twists that came to light during this tough time. She also shares her experiences with neurodiversity, including ADHD and anxiety, which shaped how she coped with everything happening around her. 

Her story is a raw and honest look at widowhood, highlighting the unique ways neurodivergence can influence grief and relationships. Thea emphasises the importance of community support and the healing power of sharing your story, reminding us all that while grief can feel isolating, we’re not alone on this journey.

Join us for an engaging conversation that resonates with anyone who has faced loss, offering insights into rebuilding life after heartbreak and embracing the complexities of our emotional experiences.





Connect with Us:


Rosie Gill-Moss:

Hello and welcome to Widowed AF. I'm your host. I'm Rosie Gill Moss. Throughout this podcast, I have had the great honor of speaking to a wide variety of widows. Something that's kind of proved to me against all doubt, really, that tragedy can strike at any time to anyone and at any age. And my guest today is Thea and she's joining me from the United States of America, which is lovely. It doesn't mean I'm recording way past my bedtime at 6. 30 PM. I early, I've got children. Um, And Thea was 24 when her husband died. So I'm going to introduce you now and, um, and welcome. Thea, welcome to the podcast. Hello.

Claire Thea:

Thanks so much for having me on. I'm so excited to talk to you.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Where in America are you? I forgot to ask. I always like to know these things.

Claire Thea:

I'm in the Dallas, Texas area. So, I'm, uh, about an hour, I live about 30 minutes south of Dallas. Of

Rosie Gill-Moss:

always wanted to go to that part of the world. Every time I talk to somebody, I'm like, oh, I want to go there. So I'm making a list of people I can visit. You know, I, I turned up in, uh, in Michigan not so long ago. So it has been known.

Claire Thea:

places. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I know, and it was a podcast guest. She, we were really bonded and she set up a yoga retreat and I just on a very impulsive whim decided that I would use the Amex points we'd accrued and pop over. So yeah, really, really cool adventure, but that's not what we're here to talk about, is it? So Thea. Let's, let's, I mean, I say to my guests, go back to the beginning, go back to, you know, where the romance started and I'm thinking you guys can't have been together that long. How old were you when you met? And actually, what was your husband's name? I've just got a T in your notes.

Claire Thea:

Tea is kind of what I lovingly refer to him as. Yeah. Which is funny because you know, Thea. But um, lovingly He, uh, he was two years older than me, so I was 20 and he was 22 when we met. Um, and I was in college, so I was a junior, but I was, my last year of college, um, graduating from school up here in DFW.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And, and did you meet at college?

Claire Thea:

We didn't, we met in Tin on Tinder. In the heyday of Tinder.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

good. You're young. Did

Claire Thea:

uh, um, and online dating is such a. You know, hot Mess Express, but we met, um, back

Rosie Gill-Moss:

you just say Hot Mess

Claire Thea:

it is a hot mess express. That's a hundred percent. Um, as somebody who has recently also gone through that, again, it's It's one of those like, uh, yeah. Um, but we met, we went back when Tinder used to show you who your mutual friends were on Facebook, so we could see who. You know who people were and like, I could like check in on people. And he was, um, a friend of a friend and we connected and I was like, Hey, what do you think about this person? And that friend was like, Oh yeah. Like I've known him for years. He's a really great guy. Um, I think you guys would really hit it off. And we did, we, we hit it off almost instantly.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

so you've met T. Yeah. You presumably, you've fallen in love and everything's lovely and you're thinking about the potential to have a future together.

Claire Thea:

Yeah.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

At what point do you find out that he's, he's not well?

Claire Thea:

So we were together for about a year and a half, um, when he got diagnosed. So, uh, he was, he was feeling sick for a couple of months. We were living together at that point. We had three dogs together. Um, and we, we were just kind of like, you know, trucking along, living our like early twenties life. And he had a really bad migraine for like a week. And we, uh, We were at the point where he hadn't been sleeping for a couple of days, and we, we were like, we need to We need to get you in to get seen like ASAP. The hardest part for me was that I, this, this is the, you know, the laugh, the laugh through the, through the horrible things that happened. He was a six, two, very large, like bulky guy. And I had turned in my car for repairs that day. And so I had a smart car as a loaner car. And so we are trucking along down the freeway at like, you know, 60 miles an hour, trying to get to the hospital to get him seen. He's like squished into the passenger seat of my smart car because he wasn't already in enough pain. We had to like squish him like an accordion to get there. Um, but he, they immediately after hearing his symptoms, did a MRI and found a golf ball sized brain tumor, um, that evening, uh, the night that he went to the hospital and it was. Immediately, obviously diagnosed with something. They didn't know what it was.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

But you know, it's not good, right?

Claire Thea:

um, and had to, he was immediately transferred to UT Southwestern, which is the major hospital system for cancer care here in Texas. There's. UT Southwestern and MD Anderson and UT is here in Dallas and was transferred there and having to make the phone calls to his family and everybody to let them know what was going on was a lot to say the lack of a better term.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And just remind me how old he was at this point.

Claire Thea:

He was, I had just turned 22. So he was 24.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

24. So Sophia, I'm thinking you've, he's had all these horrible symptoms, he's had a migraine for a week, which is obviously disturbing in anybody, but in a young man of 24, you don't immediately go brain tumor. And so in the time that it's taken you to drive in your little clown car to the, to the hospital,

Claire Thea:

Yeah,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

and, and it sounds like they were pretty speedy with getting the tests on as well, which is always a little bit concerning. I mean, we want these tests done quickly, but when it happens with sort of, you know, the alarm bells ring. And so, in the space of very few hours, you've been told that the man you love Is seriously ill, and I'm now thinking of his parents because 24 is no age at all. They're still your baby. I mean, they're your baby at any age, but 24. So did you have to call them and get them? I mean, I've got so many questions. How far away were they? Let's start there.

Claire Thea:

his, his family lived in the Midwest about six hours away. Um, and did have to call them. I was very lucky that the. We were early enough in the morning when his family was already awake, like, like it was like we had been up all night. And so by the time we got the testing done and everything, it was like, 5 a. m. So they were awake. My boss was awake. So I was able to call everybody and not like, have to wake them up. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

love that you were considering this in the midst of this storm.

Claire Thea:

it gets, it gets so much better. Cause that's just me as a person is I'm just like, I'm always thinking about those things and not like myself panicking. Cause like, I'm always the last thing that gets considered is like my needs. Um, it's a habit I work with my therapist on

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh, me too. Me too. And I suspect many of our listeners can relate.

Claire Thea:

Yes, yes. Um, it's the caregiver syndrome. And it's, I've my entire life. Um, but yeah, having to call them and, you know, talk to, I was working for a nonprofit and like a secondary organization at the time. So I had to call three different bosses and his people. family and like kind of put our group chat together of all of our friends to let them know. Um, then he was transferred to the hospital in Dallas that day. So like I'm driving my clown car going 95 miles an hour down the freeways of Dallas, which I don't know if you've ever heard, do you think about American traffic, but it is not great, especially in the early mornings and especially not in a car that could be squished that easily. So,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

and you're just, you've had to go into sort of admin role, haven't you? This terrible thing's happened. And actually it's what you're saying, this, this, you know, the pain that you must've been experiencing is almost, you kind of, I wonder if it's partly defense mechanism as well, because your brain goes into overdrive. Excuse me, things like, you know, when the police came to my house, I was offering them tea. You know, they've just told me that my husband's died and I'm like, do you want a cup of tea? How very British that, isn't it? And then you've got to drive. You know, I mean, I don't imagine you were in any really in any fit state to drive, but you just go into autopilot, right?

Claire Thea:

yeah. And that day, I mean, there's a lot of moments in that day and we'll, we'll talk about them in a minute, but like that, just, I can't remember where I put my keys like yesterday, but I, I could tell you word for word, you know, text messages that I sent and read that day and where I was standing when someone told me X, Y, Z and the look, you know, the look on people's faces and things like that. Because those, those days are the ones that are like. Burn into our brain and I wish they were for better reasons, but like, those are the ones, again, you work through with therapy

Rosie Gill-Moss:

God bless therapy.

Claire Thea:

Yes.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So his parents, then they are obviously going to come as quickly as they can to be with their son. And are your parents around? Were they able to come and support you?

Claire Thea:

yeah, absolutely. And my family, you know, my family has been. And continues to be a saving grace and the whole situation. And, um, they're, they're local. And, uh, just so happened that my aunt had moved down very shortly before this happened. So, um, but, or before, sorry, my aunt had moved in.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

It's okay.

Claire Thea:

My family is local. Um, it just so happened that we had a lot of really great extended family, um, in the area and there, they took care of us through this whole process, not just that day, but, um, especially in the last several months of his life, like would not have been able to get through this without my family. Um, his family and I were on good terms at that time.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Ooh.

Claire Thea:

But lots happened, you know, you know, um, and that's kind of where that day was kind of where a lot of that started, um, unfortunately. So,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And I'm sort of, you know, being a bit facetious here because, you know, we all love a little bit of gossip. But in actual fact, it's incredibly difficult when relationships and families splinter when you need them most.

Claire Thea:

yeah.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So let's go back to this day. Now you've had the scans, they found something. At what point did they have the big conversation with you about what they found?

Claire Thea:

Yeah, so we, we knew going into it that it was a, that it was a brain tumor, like that, that they, we, when we got to the hospital, they had told us at that point that he had a tumor and he was being transferred to U. T. because they have 1 of the top neurology programs in the country and a top, uh, uh, cancer program in the country.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

are you at this point thinking this could be the end of everything or are you still thinking this is a, this is terrible, God, this is a brain tumor, but he's 24, he's fit, he's well, like this, he's going to have an operation and it's going to be really traumatic, but we'll be fine. Yeah.

Claire Thea:

of things. I'm very much the optimist in every situation. Um, like I, and again, it's probably a defense mechanism, but just being, especially having a good, A really great community of people who kind of rallied. They were also all saying the latter of the situation. And I think all of us were very much aware of like, this is a huge deal. But like, also, if there were ever a time for something like that to happen, it's when you're 24, and when you're fit, and when you're, um, when you're able to withstand what that kind of thing can be. Would cause because we all knew at that point that we were looking at potentially surgery, potentially chemo radiation. We didn't know whether it was cancer or not. So, we had all of these questions that none of us had answers to, and his family, it took them about 6 hours to get in. So, his family came in that afternoon. Sorry, his family is about 6 hours away. They came in that afternoon. So, it took them a while to get there. And in the meantime, I'm the only person there. Trying to field everybody's

Rosie Gill-Moss:

trying to become an expert on brain tumors very quickly. Yeah. And I, did you, did you Google, I mean,

Claire Thea:

yeah, everybody does. And my, my mom, my friends all did also. Uh, the hard part about, especially cancer in general, but brain tumors specifically, is that unlike a lot of other kinds of cancer, you have, um, so many different kinds of tumors that you are looking at. Anything from, you could be alive for days. You could live with it your entire life. My mom, uh, about four years ago was diagnosed with a non malignant brain tumor, um, a very minor one, but that's something she could live with her entire life without ever having any side effects from it. And she doesn't currently. Um, but, but you could live, you're living in those kinds of situations, or you could be living in a, like, if you don't get this thing out, it is going to kill you. Um, one of the reasons we knew it was. Pretty serious. And we, we had a conversation with the doctors about it. Once they did a secondary scan and everything at the hospital, uh, was that his was placed closer to his ventricles, which is the brains like drainage system. So, with the way the fluid flows through your brain and your spine, if your ventricles are blocked, it causes hydrocephalus, which is swelling, basically, for lack of a better term in your brain. So, when you see, you know, um, people who have. You know, bulging eyes or any of those types of things from swelling in their brain, or they talk about drilling holes in the brain

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Claire Thea:

That was basically what was happening was the tumor was cutting off the drainage system to his brain. In addition to just being a tumor, a

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No wonder that guy had a headache.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um, so he had a full MRI when we got there. Um, and that is when the other side of the chaos also started. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

to me, Theo. Come on.

Claire Thea:

yeah. So we, um, and I, so I should say backtracking. wrote a book about this, this experience, um, and part of it, not all of it's true in my book, um, because I fictionalized a lot of it as we do to deal with our trauma. Um, but we, we'd had like some issues earlier on in our relationship and no relationship's perfect, but I loved him very much and we were happy and You have, you have those moments in life where like something hits you in the gut and you're like, something is going on. And that was one of those days where like, even when we were in the hospital and he was conscious enough to like have a conversation, we could tell that something was going on. And so while he was in his MRI, I looked at his phone and I found text messages, uh, to other women. And people that he had been talking to. And so during this process, not only am I processing that he had cancer or had a tumor for lack of, you know, for that, at that point, that's, that's all we knew. Yeah. Um, but that he had been not physically, but emotionally cheating on me for. Months at that point from almost half our relationship. Um, we had lived together for six months at that point. We were, we'd been through, you know, two birthdays together and we had three dogs. Um, so we were, we were domesticated

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yeah, yeah, committed and

Claire Thea:

Yeah. And so as, as people were coming in, like I'm calling my mom freaking out, I'm calling my sister, um, I lovingly refer to her as my sister. She's actually the mom of the girls that I nannied for years. Um, and so she is my older sister for all intents and purposes and was, was with me throughout this whole process. And the two of them are like, you know, FBI researching, figuring out what's going on. I'm calling his parents, trying to figure out if they knew anything about this. And so trying to handle. My own emotions surrounding that in addition to the now medical stuff. And so his family is coming in And that is such a lower priority than it is for me, because, yeah, him having a tumor is 1 thing. And I will support him and be with him through that. Whatever the situation is. But I'm also now thinking, okay, I have been with this man for a year and a half. I don't know whether he still wants to be together. And this is just like this, him building these other relationships with other people was his out and this is just really poor timing on everything. I don't know whether or not, like, what, what the outcome of this is going to be at the end of today, much less if he needs treatment and all of these things now, knowing that he was. Doing all of this other stuff in addition to, um, and so we had a lot of, uh, really hard discussions about things that I think in hindsight, nobody knows the right choices to make in these moments. You don't have a playbook of what to do when your family is diagnosed with something like this, much less your partner, the person you plan on spending the rest of your life with, but to add that extra layer on top of that. That to one person in the equation, while the rest of the group isn't even considering that as a possibility of something to worry about. That's where the conflict starts to arise because the priorities are different for people and and arguably the priority for everybody is to make him feel better. Right? They want to they want him to get better. Even Even if we had decided to break up that day.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

You still don't want him to die, right?

Claire Thea:

Absolutely. Right. And that's just being a human, but also just caring about somebody living with them for a year and a half, loving someone. You don't want that to happen. And now in hindsight, like were there reactions appropriate? Absolutely not. But, but does grief make people do crazy things? Yes.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

are you, can you talk about the reactions, or is that something, yeah?

Claire Thea:

Yeah. I think the biggest thing for me was, I think there was a bit of a blinder on almost. And so I was trying to, while he was lucid and able to have conversations about things, um, you know, potentially looking at having to have brain surgery in the coming days, because that's what we were looking at at that point, trying to figure out, you know, What we needed to do and asking him questions about things and trying to figure out number one. My priority was trying to figure that out. What was happening with the 2 of us, but also, and this is where that, that putting myself last comes in. He had siblings, and I was genuinely concerned that based on the conversations he was having with other people that somebody could show up to the hospital. Not necessarily cause a scene, but potentially impact the relationship that he had with his siblings and the way they looked up to him and things like that, because they were his significant other for a lack of a better term. And they knew that they knew that I existed based on the text messages that I read the people that he was talking to knew that he had a girlfriend. There was

Rosie Gill-Moss:

he talking to the Casanova?

Claire Thea:

serious. Like a serious relationship. The other ones I found out about more later, um, that were more like inappropriate pictures and things like that. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

have, I just, I'm, I'm reeling for you.

Claire Thea:

it's it, I laugh about it now. It's we, we, as like a family unit, my family is going through this trauma bonding. We've talked about how, if ever there's a, an excuse for cheating, it's a brain tumor.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh yeah, never thought about that.

Claire Thea:

it's, it was affecting his, Decision making processes for lack of better terms in the six months before he died. He bought a new car and a motorcycle. Um, his, you know, his credit score was tanked. He. Like all of these, just looking back in hindsight, I can see those decision making processes

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Glorious hindsight, right?

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um, but a huge part of that process and, and having those conversations was like, I am genuinely concerned that someone may show up to the hospital and make a scene. And the reaction to not only my emotions, but those concerns was, if you continue to press this issue and talk about anything other than Trump, then, sorry. If you continue to press this issue and. Basically talk about anything other than his recovery. We're going to have you removed from the hospital.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh my goodness.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, and So I made the decision to just pause to deal.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

a good woman because I was thinking that might be like petrol on a fire, you know, being told that you can't, could sometimes have the opposite response and

Claire Thea:

I, at that point in my life, I was not a confrontational person. The older I got, the more I, and the more that I learned, um, how his family operated and the dynamics and things like that. I realized very much that, um, at least at that point, the best thing to do is back off. I also had. A really amazing support system. So I knew no matter what happened, I would be supported. And that has continued to happen throughout the last five years. It's just been a matter of, of the panic in the moment of not knowing what's happening. Uh, so we did put a pause, we put a pin in everything. He was scheduled for surgery and was able to come out of the hospital for a couple of days between. His initial stay and surgery and at that point you can't you can't diagnose anything You can't type anything without biopsies, right? So they're they're preparing for a removal surgery But also like we don't have answers on what type of tumor it is your

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So they were just going to go and get it out regardless and then yeah.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. And we, uh, we had about four, three or four days between like the discharge from the hospital and his surgery and his surgery was a Monday and it was a, it was a, I think it was a six hour surgery and it ended up being nine hours. Um, it might've been nine hours to 12 hours. I can't remember now because it's been.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

A long one though.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, uh, it was, it was an all day affair and I, I am a, I need to work when I'm

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Anxious.

Claire Thea:

of person. And so we, I was, I was both not lucky and lucky that we were in a very busy season at work. So I was sitting in the waiting room like crying. Labeling envelopes for a big event, like sitting in the hospital room, like, what can I do to keep my hands busy? And I've got audio books going and podcasts. I'm listening to and just trying to keep myself grounded. His parents stayed for the surgery. His siblings had to go back to their home home area and. I, I will never forget him getting out of surgery about 30 minutes after they told us he was done. They came and told us that we could go back and the doctor warned us that he was in a bit of a physical state that he might be hard to look at him for a couple of hours, but one of us wanted to go back and check on him. And I told his parents, I And like we talked about it, it wasn't like a mean unilateral decision kind of situation of if someone is going to see him like that, I would rather it be me because I, and I don't know if this is still true or if it's just something that I, those types of things, I'm not as physically affected by, like he wasn't buried near me because the sentimental value of him being his physicality being close is not something that I'm worried about. So I knew seeing him like that would not haunt me, scar me,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Whereas for a mother to see their son like

Claire Thea:

Exactly. Exactly. And I, you know, I don't have kids even now, so I can't understand that relationship, that bond. And that's something I've reiterated to everybody that I've talked to throughout this whole situation is I have no concept of what that experience was like for his family. And I can't, like, I don't know if I'll ever really, because I don't know if I'm going to have kids, but I was the 1 who went back and saw him and he had. You know, he had a golf ball sized brain tumor removed from his brain. So he was, he had tubes sticking out and, um, like blood all over his forehead and his head was shaved in weird places because they had, um, you know, used probes and things like that. And so, um, To see him like that, hearing him in pain, honestly, hearing him talk was one of, was more of a hard process for me than seeing him. Um, but I am to this day, very glad that I was the one who went back there and saw him like that, because there are a lot of things that his family had to endure regardless of how we got along. That is not something I would have wished on anybody else. Um, yeah. to experience or to, or to have to see. Uh, but he, he, you know, went through nine hour surgery. Surgeon came and talked to us. He did great, no complications or anything again, 24 year old, healthy, otherwise male, he was fine. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

ask how he was in the lead up to the operation? Whether he was able to talk about whether he was scared, because when you go in for a surgery like that, there really isn't a guarantee you're going to come through it, is there? Mm

Claire Thea:

yeah. And I, you know, that's probably a good, this is a good, a good point to talk about him, right? Cause that's the one thing as I feel like, I feel like throughout this whole journey of, of losing T it was. I was with him for a year and a half before he was diagnosed. I was with him for almost four years. By the time he passed. And for me, I feel like so many people saw so many pieces of him, but I saw both the best and the worst for him that a lot of people didn't see just because I was there with him through all of his chemo, his radiation. I didn't know him when he was a kid. He grew up in the Midwest. He moved here, um, after college. So I only had a few years with him and didn't really get to see a lot of his life. But. Even before he got sick, I had been able to meet with and see so much of his hometown, his friends, seen pictures, lived through vicariously through tagged pictures on Facebook, all of the things that you do when you're early in a relationship and you creep back on their pictures back to 2008. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

like.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Yeah. That's the, that's the horror story moment of like, Oh my God, did I just like his ex girlfriend's picture? Like, Oh, um, but he was a red blooded American car guy. He loved his dog who he moved down here with, who still is with me today. Um, he loved, Baseball. And he was a huge, uh, sports fan. He loved baseball and football and would go to those games all the time. We would go to them together. And so he had like this huge, huge life of huge community of people that he loved and loved him, um, when all this started. And so. When we were getting ready for surgery, you know, we had his family in town, but we also had hundreds of people who were in his community, his home community and through, you know, work and school and all of these different things that he was a part of that really rallied around him, he was terrified. And I don't think he would have said that to anybody else besides maybe me and his parents, but he was really, really scared. And I think anybody will be going into those types of surgeries. And I. I think part of the reason why I am the way I am with the whole process is my mom has had about 15 plus back surgeries in

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh, goodness.

Claire Thea:

in the time that I've been alive. Um, she was in a car accident prior to her getting pregnant with me and has since had Falls and you know, she has spinal cord stimulator and inserted which is kind of like a pacemaker for your back And so she's had so many surgeries where there's a possibility of not waking up So to me, I've been I have prepared for that experience my whole life. I've been through that several times and This may honestly be the first time I'm really considering that connection. But for me, I I'm always on the optimistic side because I always want to make sure that someone is there being the steady rock. Um, as I've gotten older, I've kind of realized that sometimes I'm really bad about making sure that I have a steady rock too.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Mm-hmm . And, and I think lots of the things like, um, lots of these things would've masked your grief, you know, masked your own fear, because even things like finding the texts on the phone, because then you get to be angry instead of scared and, and sad. Um. And lots of practical jobs. And I can really kind of relate to a lot of what you're doing here. You know, this sort of busying yourself and, but what a, what a nice, nice, is that the right word? It's sort of seen as a, um, a bit of a wet word really, but, um, that so many people wanted to see him, that he'd had such an impact on so many people. But, you know, that says quite a lot about a man and the idea that he was able to, I guess, take off the mask at home to show you that he was afraid because men in particular feel they have to put on a brave face. They don't necessarily want to talk about the fact that they might not make it through surgery. And I think having, um, you know, this, this person that he could talk to, I think that you gave him an incredible gift and I just wanted to get that in there. You may continue now.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, it's, you know, when you're, when you're looking back at all of this stuff, years, years later, especially, so for so long, I did not deal with the grief and I'm sure we'll talk about that. But I did, I focused on the other emotions because it was easier to, and what happened was when I finally had to face them, I deflected more, I deflected with alcohol. I deflected with bad relationships. I deflected with. You know, keeping myself busy and distracted and didn't actually deal with the pain, even though I was, I started therapy three or four months after he was diagnosed. Um, I, I started with a therapist for the first time in my life as an actual therapist. We had a family psychiatrist growing up that, you know, Cause everybody in my family is neurodivergent.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh, are you?

Claire Thea:

are, all of us are neuro spicy in some way or

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Same, same.

Claire Thea:

Uh, yeah, it's a, it's, we're an exciting bunch. Um, and we, so we, I grew up a very mental health, I grew up in a very mental health friendly family.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

you talked about things and actually, I guess, I guess you are younger than me, but I'm thinking how much things have changed. And even the fact that your parents were thinking about the fact that their children might need support at a young age. I mean, we, we have come a long way.

Claire Thea:

My sister is on the spectrum. Um, and so she's on the autistic spectrum. So she's, we've always kind of been very focused on like that aspect of our lives. I was a late diagnosis, ADHD and a late diagnosis, depression, anxiety. So for me, my medication journey didn't even start until then, but I started an antidepressant about six months before, uh, he passed about six to eight months before best decision of my life, because I don't think I would have gotten through, but. I digress.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No, no, I love a, I love, I love a little tangent because this is also interesting. It's, yeah, I mean, that's one of my special interests as a fellow neurodivergent woman. Um, so going into therapy wasn't kind of this big deal. Scary prospect for you, but the fact that you started three months in and I'm just gonna I could be hypothesizing here, but I'm, I'm, you went into therapy three months after and then you, or did you say before, did you say before he died, you had, um, and then. You haven't made your big kind of breakthroughs until kind of much more recently. So did you do what I sort of in my head call fake therapy, where you sort of go through the motions, you, you know, what people want to hear. We're very good at, um, giving people what they need. And actually. I also, when I started therapy, didn't like it and then started again later. So now I'm coming up to three years with the same therapist. And you know, we've, we've dug into some fairly hefty stuff, some of it, not trauma related or not the death of my husband related. So, yeah, I just, I just picked up on that and I thought this kind of going through the motions of therapy is something that quite a lot of us can be guilty of because it's what you should do. Mm

Claire Thea:

yeah. And I think so for me, there was kind of a tipping point of like, I need to get some help for myself. Uh, you know, he had had surgery and his family had really wanted him to move back with them. They really wanted him to come back and stay there and get treatment in the Midwest. The problem was, is that the nearest even cancer. chemo center was like three hours away from where he lived, where his family lived. And so we were, it was not a realistic option. A hundred percent saw where they were coming from, but the pressure and the vitriol was very real. The, the feeling that I was, I was basically treated like I was keeping him captive.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Uh huh. Yeah, yeah.

Claire Thea:

when he moved here out of his own volition long before he was diagnosed, he has a life here. He at that point, you know, had a career and dogs and friends and all of these things here and was being treated like I was the only thing keeping him here when in reality. His family worked every single person in his family worked. He was at that point. We were very sure that he was going to end up needing some sort of post care. We weren't sure what, uh, they had told us in his post off point, like, his post off consult with us before he had woken up that they had not been able to respect the full tumor. It was about a 95 percent resection because the tumor was ingrained into his brain. Like, it was, it was spider webbed into his brain and they could see that from the, from the. Scans, but they weren't sure how extensive extensive it was. And that was confirmed during surgery that there was no way they were going to be able to resect all of it. So we knew there was a possibility that he was going to be looking at chemo and radiation and more care post surgery. But, uh, His surgery was in July. His birthday was in August. So we went back to the Midwest to his hometown for his birthday, did a party. And following the party, he had mentioned several of his friends that we were going to be meeting during that process. And, you know, you get those, you get those feelings. This is like a month post op. We've kind of just like set our piece. Basically, he was like, I'm sorry, I cheated. I'm sorry. I did all these things. I won't ever do it again. Returning from the trip, found out that he had told one of the female friends that he had met, that he had seen at the party, that I had met at the party, that we were no longer together and I was just helping him through his treatment. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, and I don't, the hard part about this for me is I feels like the entire time that I've been going through this process, you always have that piece in the back of your head. That's like, don't speak ill of the dead. Right? It's airing his dirty laundry. It's airing the things that his family did. My opinion throughout the whole process has been if you don't want people to talk about it. About you don't do things we're talking about unless they're good things. And so I have always aimed to be the better person in all of these situations, because regardless of my feelings, I don't want to hurt anybody else that has been me my entire life. But for this process, really, truly, I basically was like, I need to either get, get some help for myself and figure out what I want to do, or I'm going to go crazy. Like I'm going to, I'm going to literally end up in a, in a grippy sock vacation, as we lovingly call it.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I heard that on a, on a Facebook group. We, I've never heard that over here, the grippy sock conveyer belt.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. And I say, I say that in, in my book too, cause I did end up having one because of all the unresolved issues that I didn't deal with them in my fake therapy. And so we, we got back from that trip and that was the first time that I ever, like we, that happened a couple of days after we got back and I, Took the dog that I could physically take because we had two big dogs and one little dog. So I took the dog that I could physically take with me went to my parents house. I was like, I don't I need you to you need to prioritize yourself Like if we're looking at months of care here Like where you need to either figure out whether you want to be with me or not Because i'm not going through this with you while you're actively doing this We found out right before that trip. Um that he had what's called an anaplastic astrocytoma, which is a Astrocytoma spiderweb tumor. That's what it's called. And it is a tumor that basically weaves itself into the brain tissue. So there's no way to ever get there. Um, you can do chemo radiation, extend life, but we were looking at a terminal illness for lack of a better term. People have lived with it for decades and just been on constant chemo and radiation. Uh, he had a specific mutation that really caused an exponential growth with it, and it was a pediatric mutation. So there's a very strong likelihood that he had that that tumor for a decade before they found it.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

going to ask if they knew how long he'd had it. That's terrifying, isn't

Claire Thea:

So, yeah, and so there's, you know, we're throughout the process of him getting treatment. We were a lot of the times we were around kids who are around the age that get these types of tumors. And most of the people who were being studied or who were eligible for research related to there was an age cap because it's a pediatric tumor. So they want to get the best subjects

Rosie Gill-Moss:

hmm. Mm

Claire Thea:

And so he had aged out of most of these studies. Most of these studies. trials six plus years before because he turned 25 right after he had surgery. Um, but he, he ended up, we, we ended up, you know, mending everything, working through a lot of our problems. I, in hindsight, I don't know that I would have done it again. I loved him very much, but knowing what I know now, I think, um, I think I put my caregiver hat on and I never took it off. Yeah. And I let that guide every decision that I made for several years, including after we, including after he passed and for me, I wouldn't give up where I'm at now for anything. I love where I'm at and I love where my life is at right now. And I will tell anybody that scream from the rooftops, but I don't know that I would have done that again. If my life, if I could say my life will turn out in the same place without all the trauma and the grief because.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So.

Claire Thea:

a lot.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

With this, um, sort of womanising behaviour, for want of a better word, do you think, and I know this is a really difficult question, because I suppose you could never know, but do you think that was partly because of the tumour that it was causing him to behave in a slightly impulsive, reckless way?

Claire Thea:

So the tumor was in an area in his brain where, where scientifically they say that your, your decision making impulses are affected. Um, so, you know, there are medical conditions that like, make you get grabby hands or make you like, like a Tourette's type syndromes where you say, you know, you say the thoughts that no one should voice out loud. Yeah.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

That sounds like me on a daily basis. Mm

Claire Thea:

to those voice those words? Absolutely. And so, yes, there was a potentially a medical reason behind the things. Did he still need to deal with the consequences of it? Yes. And so, for me, it was like, weighing in the consequences and the and the worth of. We have sunk loss fallacy, right? You've put a year and a half into this relationship. Do I give it up or do I see if we can work through things and make it happen? Granted, not everybody's relationships are like that. And I would never advocate for staying with somebody who cheats on you or lies to you or makes those things, you know, makes you feel any less worthy than you are. I dealt with a lot of really bad body image issues. I had an eating disorder growing up. I, I was at that point, the time that we met was one of the smallest physical points of my life because I had been physically ill for years with no answers. Now I know in hindsight, I'm anemic and I had a lot of GI issues related to that, but I was 130 pounds, maybe 150 pounds dripping wet. I'm five seven. I'm not a small person. And so I was stick skinny, cute little blonde thing. And by the time he, he was, I had gained weight and I was, so I was internalizing all of this stuff as to

Rosie Gill-Moss:

course. it's always our fault, right?

Claire Thea:

it's a me problem. And, you know, in hindsight now, like I'm, I'm the heaviest I've ever been in my entire life right now. And. My love life is fantastic.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I was gonna say you look pretty good to me, girl.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, I'm the happiest I've been I like I I love the way that they took going through all of this to get to that point,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I'm going to tell you though, you got there quicker than me, because I also struggled with my, I had eating disorders. I had loads of troubles and lots of which I think stemmed from my neurodiversity being undiagnosed. And it's, it took me until my kind of early 40s really to get to the way you are now, you know, to accept that. That, you know, I asked my son to take a picture of me and my daughter having a, we were on our swimwear and we're having a cuddle on a sun lounge. And I said, take a flattering picture. And he did not take a flattering picture, but instead of like deleting it and bursting into tears and having to, you know, have like a 12 hour mental breakdown, I just was like, it's just a terrible photo. You know, or even if it isn't a terrible photo, like in 10 years, I'm going to look at that belly roll and wish I still had it, you know? And I think so, but you've got there so much younger, you know, I'd love to be able to, I wouldn't love my husband to die 10 years earlier, but I would have loved to be able to give myself the gift of this knowledge 10 years sooner.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, absolutely, but

Rosie Gill-Moss:

after the, you know, You've got this now. Sorry, I rallied on because I had written down a question. I was burning to ask it. Um, you've, you've had this diagnosis. You know that there is no, there isn't really a light at the end of the tunnel. He could live, but it's going to be with a lot of chemo. So what's your relationship like at this point? So you've, you've, you've forgiven him. You've decided you want to be with him. Um, how, how is. The relationship and the dynamic and I'm thinking you must have got married in that point in that time as well. Just tell me a little bit about the lead up to that.

Claire Thea:

So we actually didn't get married until a month and a half before he passed away So over a year and a half later, um, cause he, he passed almost two years exactly to his diagnosis or to, to his, the day we found the tumor. Um, he, we, we were doing really well for about a year. Um, relationship wise, we, we really didn't have any challenges until the very end of, you know, his life. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

sorry, just, just quickly. I just, sorry, just, I like to have a kind of picture of what it was like. Is he physically well at this time? He's, he's actually, so you wouldn't necessarily know he was sick at all.

Claire Thea:

He was working until about four months before he passed. Uh, he went back to work like a month, maybe four weeks, five weeks after his surgery, because it really didn't impact anything besides like him having a, a cut on the back of his head. And he was just, he wore like a hat. Um, and so he, I remember we went to, For his birthday, which is our capital city here in Texas. And we were there for a weekend, just like, okay, let's just get away and do like a vacation or something. And this was right after his birthday. And we were, we were really trying to kind of rebuild everything. This was very shortly after everything had hit the fan. And we were at one of my favorite restaurants, my favorite pizza restaurants in Austin and the. I guess the waiter or the owner or whatever saw the back of his head, which was very much still healing. I mean, he had a giant incision with like, not staples, but stitches and things like that in it. And so we had ordered pizza or something and cheese sticks or something like that, and they brought out like all these extra appetizers and dessert and all these things and like paid for our meal and everything. And it was like the first time I think he realized that like, he was Standing and doing all of these things, having just gone through a major brain surgery. Um, and like, it really had hit him that like, he was like,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And I guess perhaps people noticing that you're sick as well, because, you know, women, we, when we lose our hair, you know, that, that, that tends to indicate, and actually I'm, I, I'm going to share with you, cause it's, I, I have, I had a benign brain tumor when I was a small child. I was about four and I was a nightmare as you can imagine on the hospital. Well, we, this is how old I am. There was glass bottles to collect the blood and I kept breaking them. So they discharged me. And, um, My mum, I, I, I've still got massive scar at the back of my head, but at the time, obviously it would be shaved and my mum had taken me swimming and I bent down to pick something up and my hat fell off and the lady, the, the attendant fainted on the spot. So

Claire Thea:

Oh

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I suppose if you picture it on a small child, it must've been absolutely horrible. No photographs to show you, I'm afraid, but, um, yeah, sorry, I just thought I'd share that little anecdote with you, but it must have been. I guess I'm thinking that, that, that, that feeling that you're going to be okay and that actually to the outside world, at least you can present this image of somebody that is still well. And then somebody in a restaurant has noticed it and sent food. And first of all, I'm thinking, Oh, bonus, you know, there's got to be some bonuses to being sick. But actually, when you think about it, it does kind of, um, make you stand out, make you feel different, which is probably something he didn't want at this time. Yeah.

Claire Thea:

absolutely. And I think he, for the most part, went back to life as normal with the exception of appointments and chemo and radiation, he, uh, he started radiation and chemo about a month after his surgery,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And that's quite brutal, isn't it?

Claire Thea:

Yeah, he, so he, we found out the typing and everything like that in about August of 27, that was 2017. And. when he started chemo and radiation. So with traditional, with non brain and spine tumors, they do, you know, IV chemo, you get a port, you may sit in a chair for an hour with most brain and spine tumors, they give you a pill. And so you take a pill. It's a five on 26 off was his schedule, I think. And so you would take

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I can't even think of trying to remember

Claire Thea:

Yeah. So you take a pill for five days and then you're off for 26 days. So, the like, second day until about a week and a half after you finish that last pill is like, what it's like being in an active chemo chair, um, and like, and like the weeks after so he was going through that every single month for, Over a year, and he had radiation in his brain. Um, he started out with regular radiation did radiation on on a couple of different spots in his brain just to keep things from growing. He had a resurgence of a couple like new spots from places where they couldn't resect later on in 2020. 18. Math. And he, so he had different kinds of radiation. They kept him on the same chemo, different doses. The, the one thing that people don't ever really think about too, with chemo with men is that it makes them sterile. So, um, or at least in, in that period, you can't have children because you have to use protection all the time. So like We couldn't use the toilet after each other. He had to clean the toilet before I could use it because even the splashback could potentially be hazardous to me. Uh, and so for the two of us living in the same house, being together all the time, You know, you don't think about those things of like, if you have a couple who's been together for years, uh, there's a, you know, using protection for the first time in a while, or like having to actively think about, okay, you know, I need to make sure I'm getting up in the night to go to the bathroom. Now I have to make sure that I'm going, you know, cleaning the toilet before my girlfriend uses it. Um, and so those types of things of like, not even considering

Rosie Gill-Moss:

are not things that a couple in their early twenties just shouldn't be thinking about.

Claire Thea:

Correct. And then on top of that, uh, there was a pretty good chance that it would make him permanently sterile. Also. And so we never even considered burn bank or anything like that, like, you know, banking anything for him. And so, even when we started talking about potentially trying. To have kids towards the end of our relationship. He had been on chemo for so long that If we wanted to do that, we would have wanted to have to have bank like sperm before he had even started

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So that's, that's, that's another loss, isn't it? That's, that's, you know, even if, I dunno whether you would've liked to do that or like, is like the wrong way. If you would've been amenable to using his sperm and having a child in the future. But whether you chose to or not, the option was taken away from you.

Claire Thea:

Exactly the agency there and that's that's been The last several years, I feel like I've been gaining a lot of my agency back and making my choices and decisions for myself. Uh, the whole process of him being sick and in anybody being sick is to your agency being taken, right? You're not in control of your body. You're not in control of the things that happen to it. And no matter what you do to prevent cancer, you can't do anything about it. It's not something that, you know, unless you're smoking six packs a day, there's not a whole lot that you can do to avoid getting something like that as somebody who is. My family has like eight different kinds of cancer that runs in it and I did all the genetic testing and stuff like that So I could be aware but it wouldn't prevent anything from happening to me

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And even if you could prevent that, you can't prevent a truck running somebody down or, you know, in the case of my husband, a scuba dive going wrong. There are, you know, we can't live our lives in bubbles So tell me about the deterioration. What, at what point does he stop being able to do the things that he loves and you see that there's a real change happening?

Claire Thea:

Yeah. So he was diagnosed with additional spots in his spine, um, about a year ish after his original diagnosis. So he started having different kinds of radiation in his spine, um, different parts of his brain. He did what's called pinpoint radiation, um, and gamma knife radiation, which are very specific targeted types of radiation to limit the effects of the surrounding tissue. So he went through those for about six months. We had several instances where, um, we thought we were done with chemo and radiation, or we had a plan. And then like, he would go in for a scan after a treatment finished and it would be a new spot or it would be completely like a whole new,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

It's like playing like whack, like whack a mole as quick as you can get them. They're popping back up again. This poor guy.

Claire Thea:

And for the one thing about the, about having cancer and that kind of system is for the most part, You, you're not going to see a spread of cancer from the brain and spine outside of the brain and spine. So you'll see a spread between the 2 systems because they're connected by spinal fluid. So, like, you're constantly seeing that flow of just spinal fluid. Whereas with liver cancer or. You know, leukemia or kidney cancer, you can see a spread of really quickly. It can, it can metastasize to different parts of the body because it's all connected by the same circulatory system

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Do you

Claire Thea:

the brain and spine, they stay

Rosie Gill-Moss:

of it like that.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, I didn't either. And so I didn't really realize that it could even spread into the spine because it was completely a completely different part of the body. Right. And so, but I also didn't think about the fact that it would be limiting. And so later during the deterioration process, the only instance we had where we really even had to consider it was he had, um, he had someone with spots on his brain were causing the hydrocephalus again, they were causing issues with his vision. And that was kind of the first. Sign that something was happening, I think, and he had had some issues with his vision prior to his 1st hospitalization. So that was also probably an indicator that something serious was going on. But when that started again, we went to go talk about options that 1 of the only options they have for that kind of long term swelling is to put a shunt in. Between your brain to drain the fluid into your abdomen, which happens a lot more frequently than you would think. It happens a lot for people who have like, um, auto immune disorders and things like that, that cause brain swelling or an overproduction of a spinal fluid. So people will literally, they'll just put it in like a tiny, like microscopic tube that goes from your brain into your stomach. The problem with that is it spreads the cancer cells. So you could potentially, yeah, I know. And as a 20, I was 23. 22, 23. Yes. Yeah. So like I'm talking here like it's Grey's Anatomy, but like legitimately I was, we were learning all of these things. And so, you know, don't, you don't think about the fact that like, oh yeah, he needs to be able to see, but in order to see he could get cancer in some other part of his body.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

and these choices, you don't expect to make these choices at that age, or any

Claire Thea:

And we're, and we're basically living, we're making them by ourselves. I mean, my family is great. They're fantastic, but they also have their own lives. They're adults. They were there for things. They needed to be like, they were there whenever he was in the hospital, they were there. They were a

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And other people can't make these decisions for you, can they either? They have to come from him, they have to come from you as a unit, and, but that is an enormous responsibility.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. And so we, we had to start making kind of those calls. Um, his, it really started around, March, April of 2019, um, he started having issues walking and a lot of pain walking and the spots on his spine had received what they considered a maximum dose of radiation. So he could no longer receive any sort of radiation in the areas that he had, um, and the chemo that he had, and it obviously stopped. Stopped, you know, keeping things from growing, um, or from recurring. And so we, we were investigating an option with a new trial product, a new, a new, uh, not chemotherapy, but a kind of similar system, uh, when he really started deteriorating, um, in the months. Before, probably before like May, it went from him being able to walk to really having issues kind of ambulating. And then he ended up having to go on short term disability. At work because he was doing a really intense chemo and was having the issues getting around and within a couple of weeks he was using a walker and then really unable to even really use the walker. Uh, his, his family, his dad came down after spring break, I think about April of that year. And I think really that was the first time it hit any of us that he was Really truly having issues But it wasn't until May that things really like hit the fan with so to speak with everything he He was very lucky that Most of the things that were happening to him were affecting his physical state of mind and not his mental state of mind So in the months leading up to his deterioration we had done a lot of the things that we were You know, that I'm very glad we did when we did. So I was his medical power of

Rosie Gill-Moss:

yeah, I was gonna say these sort of legal things.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, we had, we had already checked into all of his insurance stuff and all that because we weren't married at that time. Uh, we like, there were a lot of things that like his insurance beneficiary was still his mom. And so like we, after we got married, he changed that to me. Uh, so things like that, that are, um, that are,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

They're conversations that you don't want to have, but

Claire Thea:

as a, as a 23 year old, like, don't, you don't ever think you're, you're going to be discussing end of life

Rosie Gill-Moss:

no, you don't. And actually, Ben and I, I mean, he 37, we'd never talked about what we wanted if we died. Um, and to be honest, it's interesting you say about the insurance, because he had, um, He had life insurance and it went, well he's, he had a will and it went to his mum because he'd been married before and when they separated he, he changed his will so it went to his mum. Um, fortunately because we were married it automatically kind of voided it but it is things like that that you don't think about and I have a good relationship with his mum but what if I didn't? You know, what if she'd taken the house? These are all things that you, ah, here we go.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. the look I just gave. You're like, oh, for the listeners, I just gave her a look.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh yeah. I forget that everybody watches this. Um, yes, the look. Come on then. Spill

Claire Thea:

Um, . So, um, the, so the, the months that he started deteriorating, um, you know, he, he was home for the majority of the time and I was working, uh, in office for the most part. Um, and then I was working from home like. About the last four or five months that he was, he was. uh, alive before really being hospitalized. He was home. He was, we, you know, we spent a lot of time together, but there were periods where, again, you can tell something is going on

Rosie Gill-Moss:

That, that female intuition.

Claire Thea:

yup, yup. Or even just, I mean, and like my partner now has sometimes he's like, Spidey senses are tingling. What's going on? And I'll be like, Oh no, I'm just like, I'm in a bad mood. Like it's not you. It's just been, and I don't even have to have communicated with him. It's just like that weird connection. Um, so. Memorial Day weekend, we were getting ready to go, it was the end of May, we were getting ready to go to visit his family for the weekend. And visiting his family was always a adventure because it was not just the two of us. It was the two of us and three dogs, um, in a car for six hours. And so, you know, The mental, not even that just like the mental preparation of being with somebody for 6 hours. And at that point, he was also for the most part wheelchair bound. Um, he wasn't completely on ambulatory. Like, he was still able to kind of get from the chair to the, to the wheelchair, but like, was not really functional below the waist. And so we were really. Concerned that like the ride there was going to be problematic and trying to get, cause like I usually would, we'd split the drive and like somebody would stay like, and you know, we would talk, walk the dogs together while we were driving because 6 hours in the car, the dog's going to pee or throw up or something because they're dogs. Uh, yeah. While we were sitting in the doctor's office, I got a message from somebody, uh, asking if I could have him call her because they needed to get paperwork finished for their daughter.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Mm. Shades.

Claire Thea:

And I've been very public about this process, like through my friends and family, like they all know, and there's a fictionalized version of this. In my book, uh, and I won't, I, you know, I'm not going to name names, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna. You know, like there's, there are innocent people in this and so I don't want them to be hurt in this process. But, um, but there was a, a, a DNA test that was done when a kid was born years before we met that show that he was not the father of this child, but because. From what I was told, and this is secondhand information, what I was told by him was that the mom refused to tell this child who her father was, and so he had assumed the role of like a puppet, Parent type person, um, and letting the kid believe that he was her father. The problem being, I was not aware that this

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No, that's quite a big problem as well.

Claire Thea:

Much less that, that this child was growing up, believing that he was her dad. My. It was the same feeling as reading the text messages in the hospital the first time. And I don't know why everything has to happen while I'm sitting at the frickin doctor. But, like, it was that feeling of, like, your stomach bottoming out. And when you realize something like that. And so I was just sitting there like, You've got to do something about it. Like, I think I literally said out loud, you've got to be effing kidding me. Um, I cursed like a sailor. Like it's a, it's a problem. Um, it's, it's my second book is literally called four letter words because I curse so much. Uh, and I. I got up, I called his dad and his family and I did not have the best relationship at this point, but, but like we were, you know, collaborators on making sure that he was doing well and his dad. When I told him the person's name before I knew the details, I was like, what is going on? He's like, we put this to bed years ago. I don't know why she's bringing this up again. What none of us knew at this point was that he had been basically meeting up with this woman for several years, two years, at least since his diagnosis and spending time with the kiddo and the mom, um, taught, like,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And he, wasn't the father but she thinks he's the father.

Claire Thea:

DNA. I have a copy of the DNA test at my house. Um, his, they maintained his, the, uh, the mother of the child maintained that somebody else took the DNA test for him. It's, it was suggested that his former roommate did it, that someone else, I, I went to the facility while we were in his hometown and got a copy of it. Correct. And, like, I had to go through the process. I had to prove that I was a medical power of attorney, provide, like, three different kinds of identification, all the I couldn't even get a copy of the DNA test without going through 8, 000 hoops. Like, I don't know how somebody would Take a DNA test for another person. It's not like faking a P test or something like that for drugs. Um, but we, we found out all of this and a very, at a very, um, delicate time in his health. And so it was that weekend was the first time his, the rest of his family had really seen him the way that he was. And his parents really saw the state of him when he got there. And I think. Regardless of the logic and reason of knowing that there was a scientific answer that the kid wasn't his They believed that it was they decided

Rosie Gill-Moss:

do you think that's, like, wanting to preserve that genetic line, wanting to keep part of him, yeah.

Claire Thea:

piece a piece of him and I have maintained since the day I found out and you can ask anybody even people I don't talk to anymore that went through this with me that that i'm no longer friends with for whatever reason Number one if I had known about any of this From the start, I would have been okay with him having a, having somebody in his life that he considered a daughter

Rosie Gill-Moss:

That's

Claire Thea:

with the caveat that I know about this relationship that mom, for whatever reason, does not want to tell the kid the truth. So I step in as a father figure cool. Be honest with me about that. We can have some discussions about it, but it was kind of one of those things of like an asking for forgiveness, not permission taken to an extreme. And in this case, not only was there. A secondary family that like, they went and took family pictures together. She had t shirts that said, my dad's superpower is fighting cancer. Like this kid legitimately believed that her dad was dying of brain cancer and

Rosie Gill-Moss:

When was he seeing them? Like, where, where did you

Claire Thea:

would like, like I, so again, like the FBI, you know, Girls can find anything. Um, so my mom and one of my best friends went and found photos that she had posted that he wasn't tagged in, but that they, it was very clear that they were in DFW from where they were coming from. They lived in the same, the same area as his family and was getting tagged in all of these pictures or getting posted all these pictures, public pictures that people could see that she just wasn't tagged in them, um, of them at an arcade. When he had told me he was at the mall or when he was supposed to be working he was doing so So it was all of these different layers of you've got anger You've got grief and you've got and you've also got now And I, I was, I heard, saw this really good video the other day of somebody talking about how mitigating somebody or not mitigating, uh, taking on somebody, somebody's emotions as your own responsibility is a really hard problem, especially for like oldest daughters for type A's who really want to make sure that everybody else around them is feeling okay. And so for me, I was also trying to manage his family's emotions and manage my, my family's anxieties and anger at his family's reactions. And so I'm before I can even process anything. I'm also trying to just like, get a grip on everybody else, uh, without really considering that. It's not my responsibility. It was not my responsibility to decide or dictate how his family reacted. It wasn't my responsibility for him to tell me the truth. It was his responsibility to do that. It was, it was all of their responsibilities to have, you know, treated me like I was, I deserved to be treated. Um, his family from that point on really truly acted like he had a child that he was neglecting.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh my god, this is crazy.

Claire Thea:

it's, it's bananas. And so, and I don't think many people realize how much of that part of my book is true, um, because I don't talk.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I was going to ask at the end, but I'm, I'm keen to get

Claire Thea:

called, it's called Go Find Less. Like if I'm too much, go find less. Um, and it came out in January of last year. So just past a year. Um, it started out as a writing exercise and then it turned into a really beautiful story that was not mine. It was, it's, it's not my story, but I honed in pieces of it because I wanted, I wanted it there to be a piece that was. a part of me. Um, but his, his family really, truly,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I will link it in the show notes, by the

Claire Thea:

okay. Um, they really, truly focused in on their grief and their kind of family unit and put everything else to the wayside as far as me, as far as anything else that was not how they can keep him close and his memory close. Um, and so as we were going through this weekend of him being home for the first time in forever, um, he. He was basically wheelchair bound the entire weekend. Um, started having issues, controlling, you know, functions, all of those types of things. And I had, for lack of a better term, told, told the mother of the child, like, back off like, I need. Like, he is not Well, you need to, whatever you're trying to do, don't. Um, because I hadn't, I, I didn't know what, like, what was, what's a, what's a sane reaction in that moment. Right. Like, of like, I don't know how to,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

There's also a part of me that's thinking, this woman, if she's claiming that he's the child's dad, knowing that he's going to die, you're sort of giving a child a grief that they don't really need. And,

Claire Thea:

and that's, that's the huge, that's, I, I, and I even, even talk about this in the book, like it is, you are dooming a child.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

like I wouldn't wish what happened to my kids on anyone, you know, the loss of a father.

Claire Thea:

And so that's, that's part of me that has always maintained, like, if they, if his, if anybody wanted, anyone in his family wanted to go get another DNA test to prove that it is his child, I would have shut up the second they did

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And nobody asked who do you think

Claire Thea:

Nobody, nobody has, Yeah. And I, and so, and I've maintained that five years later now that we're, you know, like almost six years since all of this happened. And so it was one of those things of like, I was trying to manage knowing now that really we were on our last treatment options, him getting sick, finding this out. And then. While we were there, uh, like she showed up at the house, the mom and her mom did to talk to his family. His family physically barred me from leaving, like from going out and trying to be a part of the conversation. Like I was trying to go out to talk to them and they shut the door in my face. So I walked around the house to watch the conversation happen to make sure that like what they were talking about. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

That's so isolating and

Claire Thea:

and,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

cruel.

Claire Thea:

And to me, it was a slap in the face for all of the work and time that not only me, but my family and our friends had done to make sure that he got to even that point. And if anything, if my book did anything, it was to express the gratitude to the friends and family who got me through the worst times in my life. And. It makes me sick that his family was not a part of that process. That instead of rallying around him, instead of being a support system for the two of us as a unit or for him or for me after everything. It really, truly grief, really, truly brought out the worst in a lot of people, not just his family, his, his, some of his friends too. And a lot of people that we just don't have communications with anymore, but the, the utter lack of agency that they were trying to get, like, they were trying to remove any choice

Rosie Gill-Moss:

were treating you like a child and I know that I've repeatedly mentioned how young you were but you were an adult

Claire Thea:

I was, and I was, and I was working a full time job and supporting both of us while he was on disability.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And actually one of the things, one of the common, uh, feelings in widowhood is of being infantilized. You know, you go from having your, your husband or your partner's name as your next of kin on your passport. And suddenly you have to put your mom, you know, and who do I, and much like you, my friendships and, and I've been lucky with most of the family, but with friendships, you know, I had somebody say, Oh, we're going to buy a bigger table, Rosie. So you can come around and have Sunday lunch with us every Sunday. How many times do you think I've been invited for Sunday lunch? None. And so you, you very quickly learn that lots of people, their intentions may be good, but you do, everything shifts, everything. And in that moment, that they would be so unkind to you, that, that really, really upsets me.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Yeah. And I,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

did they let him come back with you?

Claire Thea:

so, so, um, lead is a strong word. We, there were several points post surgery, once about two, uh, like, I think maybe It was probably the weekend we were there for his birthday and then that weekend there were several conversations that were held that were basically like taking me out of the equation and saying, he is staying here and not letting him have a choice and, and really, truly making him feel like he was a complete dirt bag for wanting to go back and continue to try and fight for his life. At that point, one of his, his sisters was pregnant. He had made the decision that he really wanted to at least try to be around for her to

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Mm hmm.

Claire Thea:

Um, and so that was his goal. And that's what he told me his goal was, was to make it to his sister having her child. And, um, I got really lucky that he had a, uh, family member who had lost her husband to cancer right before he was diagnosed. So within, within a month or two of, of, of, uh, um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So you kind of had your own grief sherpa to guide you a bit.

Claire Thea:

Within a month or two of his diagnosis, this person had passed and his wife was really there to answer questions about chemotherapy and getting him to eat and all of these things that, you know, you don't really think you're ever going to have to ask somebody. Uh, and so she and her family were there to kind of, be the middleman and for lack of a better term, and really helped not protect me, but at least remind everybody that he's an adult and that I'm an adult and this is not their decision. Um, I was, I was made to be the villain and I, you know, I have a degree in journalism. I know what the difference is between libel and slander and, and I would never spread falsehoods about anybody. So that's one of the things I want to, I want to reiterate in this, in this story is it sounds so crazy. It sounds like I'm making shit up, but I am not. Um, and so when I say that, like, I think there were several instances in which I was concerned that they were going to physically keep him from leaving. My mom was preparing to fly out there so she could drive home with me because I had three dogs and I couldn't do that by myself. Um, it got to the point where we finally were able to leave and get home and get back. But we were, we were in the hospital within 24 hours of him returning. Um, cause he, he was, uh, he was very much losing function. Um, and at that point he had had six or seven ambulance rides within a six month period. I don't know if you know anything about ambulance rides here in the U. S. They are not cheap. They're several thousand dollars, um, a, a time. Uh, and luckily, because we were not married, I did not inherit the bulk of that medical debt, thankfully. Uh, however, There were a lot of things that we had spent hours and hours and hours and hours in the ER. He had had seizures while I was driving. He had a seizure in the passenger seat. And luckily it was not, he did not have a shaking physical seizure. He had what's called a, I think it's a, uh, Mental seizure where his brain basically stopped working and so he was like, stuttering and unable to really form a sentence and kind of just like zoned out. Um, and so, and I knew what was happening, but like, driving and trying to, like, keep somebody from having a seizure is terrifying and that happened a couple of times. So, like, we had been, we had spent. So much time and money at, at hospitals and my friends and family had come to sit with us, um, at the hospital. And so when he was hospitalized, Richard, after returning, um, we had gone super early in the morning. I had got, I had not slept the whole night before and the doctors were like, we're drugging him, we're sedating him, we're going to, you know, run a bunch of tests and we'll call you. So I went home. I was like, I live 25, we moved closer to the hospital for a reason. I went home for 25. I went home for like, you know, to sleep for four hours on my couch with my dogs. Um, and I got a text from his sister telling me I was, I should have been at the hospital with him and that I had lied to them by telling them that I had a team to take care of him or to take care of the dogs. because I had gone home to get sleep. Um, you know, at the ER, the ER is like, they have a bed and they have a chair like the one I'm sitting in. It's not like I can sleep in, in them. And at that point, you either, you choose to sleep because you're so physically exhausted from driving six, six hours back from the Midwest and then immediately having to turn around and stay up all night and go to the hospital. Um, or you risk crashing your car. Like I've, I've, you know, people die from those

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And everybody knows, and we're not always very good at listening to it, that we can't function. Like, the analogy I use with my kids is, you know, if you don't charge your device, it doesn't work. Well, if I don't sleep, I don't work. And actually, particularly if you have a neurodivergent brain as well, the sleep is really important. And I'm cross that you're being shamed for looking after a basic human need.

Claire Thea:

And I really wish that was the worst thing that I had been told via text message. And I have the receipts for years later because I just want to remember that I'm not

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yeah, you don't want to, like, think, you don't want to gaslight yourself. You need

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um, but like we, He was, when he was hospitalized, we, we kind of figured something was going on, um, physically with him. And so they were basically like, yeah, his, like anything below the waist, he's going to lose function like on slowly. And so he, he was in the hospital from end of May until, uh, like. End of June, basically like the very, very end of June and started out at the regular hospital at UT Southwestern to a neuro rehab.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Okay.

Claire Thea:

Um, and neuro rehab, they were doing the intense physical therapy, they were doing the Like, OT, where he was learning how to use the wheelchair functioning by himself so he could, you know, get himself around and things like that. And he was very much, like, mentally aware the entire time. Like, he was, he was totally aware of everything. Um, And so when he, before he was transferred to neuro rehab a couple of days after we had gotten back from that last trip, he proposed to me in the hospital, um, with my grandma's ring that his, my mom had given him. And, um, it wasn't like, you know, obviously it wasn't getting down on one knee, but we were sitting in bed together and watching a movie cause that was just what we did when we were in the hospital. We watched all of the, the, the new movies they had on not pay per view together. And, um, He proposed to me with it. And when we told his family that we were engaged, immediately, same thing, got a text message saying that I had taken advantage of him and shouldn't, that I wasn't, that, you know, I shouldn't be taking advantage of him. I'm supposed to be taking care of him, all of those things. Um, so we made the decision at that point that we were not going to share that we were getting married. Um, He was stuck in the hospital. We knew we wanted to get married. We knew for legal purposes, it was a lot easier to mitigate things if I was his wife for both living and if he had, if he passed, it would be a lot easier to deal with things because even in the hospital. They're first, even when I am listed as the next of kin, because it doesn't say wife, it says partner or girlfriend or whatever, they didn't treat me seriously. And I, you know, I, I love the hospital system and the nurses and staff are great, but that's just, that's society. That's not a, that's not a them problem.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

The system is archaic. We have a similar thing here. We get to where widowed parents, if they weren't married, didn't get any financial support. We don't get a lot over here anyway. But, um, it got changed. I think it was last year. It might have been the year before. But he's obviously premeditated the proposal if he's managed to get your grandmother's ring. So this, this is not an impulsive decision. This is not you standing over him with a Tiffany box saying you must present this to me.

Claire Thea:

God, I wish. I wish I could have had a Tiffany ring. I would have died. But no. And my ring was lovely.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I'm guessing that he wasn't a secret multi billionaire, you weren't standing to gain, you know, huge amounts of money from insurance, so what did you stand to gain from manipulating him to marry you? What was their reason for that? No.

Claire Thea:

And in hindsight, I had every reason not to. That's the thing. Time and time again. I was cheated on, lied to, and I still married him, um, and I still loved him to his last breath. I, I loved him. I held his hand while he died. Like I, I, you don't do that for somebody you don't love. Um, but for me, the security of it was also a Not the financial security, but being able to make sure that his last wishes were respected because we had those conversations. We talked about where he wanted to be buried and how he wanted to be handled. We talked about whether he wanted to donate his body if he could, or his organs, um, and all of those things that, like, nobody was asking him while he was visiting his family. Uh, nobody was having those conversations with him. And, and they could have, they could have had text conversations that I did not get to see because his Family locked his phone after he passed. So I couldn't see anything. Yeah. Um, I, I literally could not get into his phone to do any of the banking stuff. Like nothing. I had no access to anything. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

insane. But I also think there's something to be said as well, and forgive me for talking over you there, about identity, and again I'm going to harp back to your youth, but being very young, and not being married, you almost don't have a validity in the, kind of, in the administrative world. And I think, I think sometimes, again, it is archaic, you know, that we still need to make these things, um, you know, legal documents, but it does, we, we all lose our identity a bit and I've had guests come on and say, well, I didn't feel like a widow because we weren't married or because we'd separated. And, and actually I think it does give you, I want to use the word status, but I don't mean it in a sort of hierarchical sense. Mm

Claire Thea:

it's a, it's a societal, like you said, administrative status status. And, um, with. You know, I joke around, we were talking about it today at work. Like we, it feels silly calling somebody my boyfriend. Like I have a boyfriend

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Why do you think I married for the second time? I couldn't be going around calling a middle aged man my boyfriend. It was embarrassing.

Claire Thea:

was, and my, and my, my partner is 36. Like we're not children. Like we've, we've, he's divorced. We've been through some stuff. Like we're fine, but I call him my partner and people assume I'm, I'm queer. And so people assume that I'm talking about another girl or, you know, a trans person or whatever. And I'm like, no, it's a six foot three. Cishet white dude, or, you know, cis white dude, I guess. And, and, and that's fine, but like, he's still my partner. He's not my boyfriend. Like, and I, and he is like, that's literally what he is. But, and so when you're talking about trying to talk to insurance agencies, trying to talk like medical insurance, trying to talk to doctors to make appointments, they will not talk to you if you are the girlfriend. So there were times where I just had to say, I'm his wife. And, and it's not untrue. Like I was his, at some points I was his fiance.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And common, common law wife as well. I had a guest that actually took her husband's, her partner's name because they didn't get to get married. He died. Suddenly they were planning their wedding. And so she had her name changed because she wanted that that was their plan and they've got a daughter. So I think, I think sometimes there is something about wanting to own and being a widow highways. I don't want to be a widow. I don't want to, but actually it is an integral part of who I am. This terrible thing happened. And I kind of wear that with a badge of honor now.

Claire Thea:

And that's, that's it. I'm, I'm very open about my experience as a widow. Like I said, on my personal stuff and everybody pretty much in my life, even in my friend group on Facebook knows most of this story, but I think the hard part for me has always been that for years, I didn't talk about this. The heart stuff. I only talked about the positive and then people were getting the third hand information from things that they saw that his family posted that people in the community posted that, you know, they were seeing events and stuff like that. And I wasn't being included and they were confused as to what was happening. Um, we, so we decided that we were going to have a ceremony at the hospital and the hospital had a chapel. I got very lucky that I am. Hey. I can make friends with a brick wall, is what we joke, um, and I have several friends who are the exact same way. And so we were able to let the hospital, get the hospital to let us use the chapel and have a ceremony down there. And I had to go do all the absentee in Texas. You have to go in person to get the license. Both of you have to go show your ID. And so I had to prove that he was physically unable to go do that with a doctor's note that

Rosie Gill-Moss:

That's every bride's dream, isn't it?

Claire Thea:

Right. He was in a sound state of mind. Like, I have the, I have a copy of the doctor's note stating that, that he was in a sound state of mind. It's in a file somewhere at the registrar's office to, to get married. Um, 1 of my really good friends married us. We had a photographer that came, um, and. My family was not there. Um, they, I made, we made the decision that if his family, if we were choosing not to tell his family, my family knew because they helped us organize it, but they were not there for the ceremony. Um, it was literally just the 2 of us and the, my friend that officiated and then a photographer that came and took took pictures for us for free. And they, um, my family. Surprised us with kind of like a little fake reception situation afterwards. Um, so there are pictures of like them and my, my grandma came up. It was, uh, my grandma passed about six months after he did. Um, so it was one of the last family events my, my grandma got to go to. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

on a frivolous note, what did you wear?

Claire Thea:

I got to go to David's Bridal, which is a big bridal chain here, and shop for, uh, a dress three days before I got married, uh, with somebody I went to high school with and had to explain what was happening, which was

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh, God.

Claire Thea:

And, um, I ended up wearing a, it was a black dress, but it was black with, like, um, Cut like a cutout, like a, um, mesh. And then, um, it had like a full floral skirt with pockets. The pockets were the biggest part for me. I don't wear dresses

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No, no, no, no, pockets are everything.

Claire Thea:

Um, and so now I, um, you know, I look back at those pictures. I was, I was this big. I was so tiny. Cause I was, I was so stressed. And so like, that was, those were, that was the point where I had really started losing weight again and like was really sick. Um, cause I was like, Living off of hospital food and, uh, you know, Diet Coke basically. And we, we got married, did like cheesecake. My parents picked up like cheesecake factory or something like that. And we had it in the hospital. I think one of our other friends, they called to come up who had like been somebody that had sat with us at the hospital for, for every time. He was the person who drove me back home if we had to go to the hospital or who would come sit up there with us. Um, my aunt had moved. To DFW at that point and, um, started living with my parents, honestly would not have survived this without them. And without her specifically, um, because she, between her and my mom, um, once he entered that neuro rehab, number one, they made sure that nobody was, that somebody was with us at all times when, um, like when things were happening, but they also, um. went through training with us. Like when we were learning wheelchair training, my mom and my aunt went through the training with us. Uh, my pseudo sister for all intents and purposes would go check on the dogs and make sure that they were okay and spend time with them. My mom spent a month straight trying to find us a handicap accessible home because when we were, the last place we were living together was a townhome and he was in a wheelchair and our bedroom was upstairs. So we were. Breaking our lease, which is expensive, we were putting a deposit down on a new place, paying rent for a new place, all while on 1. 2 income, basically. Cause disability, he was on long term disability at that point. Um, and so my aunt paid for a ton of stuff. She paid for almost everything at that point. Um, my family was there for us through all of it. Um, and his family did not know we got married until we were at. We were, we were planning on telling them, like it wasn't like we were going to keep it a secret for forever.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

long before he died did you get married? It was quite close. You did tell me at the beginning. Mm hmm.

Claire Thea:

June 9th, he passed July 28th.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Okay, so.

Claire Thea:

like 50 days, exactly 50 days. Um, but he, we, we were, we, we were planning on telling them kind of like after we'd had some time to just settle. And when we, we got him transferred to the rehab, he was able to wear his own clothes. He was out of a hospital gown for the first time since the wedding before that hadn't been since he was home. So. We got him all dressed in his normal clothes, took a picture, forgot that he had his wedding ring on. That is not how I wanted to break that to his family at all. Um, he had like just like a silicone band on

Rosie Gill-Moss:

and they've zoomed in and.

Claire Thea:

Yes, and, and I would never have wanted to break it to them that way. I would never want to hurt anybody in that way. Um, but given. that had happened up to that point. Why would we have ever assumed that his family would have given us our blessing to get married? We didn't need their permission to do anything, much less get married because number one, it would have, it, it, it, it would have legally validated any sort of feelings they had towards me not being valid, a valid partner. Like it would, it, it, it would have taken away that, that opportunity for them. Um, And it would have taken away control, and that's what it did. Um, when we were there, uh, the last trip, and we were there, and I was using the power of attorney to get paperwork, I think that was the first time his family realized that I had his power of attorney. And I'm like, well, yeah, because I'm the one who's going to all of his appointments. I'm picking up his medication, which is, you know, 10, 000 a bottle chemotherapy. Yeah, I'm, I'm administering medications. I'm doing all these things. Of course I have his medical power of attorney because they don't take me seriously as his girlfriend. Like,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

of curiosity for, and particularly for the sort of the Brits or the Europeans

Claire Thea:

mm hmm.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

what was your final bill?

Claire Thea:

So that's, uh, it, it depends on how you look at it. Um, his, uh, Not what we paid, but his surgery, billed to insurance, cost 200, 000. Um, after insurance, I think it was like 2, 500. Because we have what's called max out of pockets here. So like you pay, 20 a prescription or 15 a prescription until you hit that max out of pocket and then everything's 100 percent covered for some people over that. Uh, and so for, for him, he was just making 50 a month payments, what he could to the hospital system. And most, most hospitals, like legally they're required to put you on a payment plan in a lot of places. So like they just put him on a payment plan, paid what he could. And that was, He was paying it till the day he died. Um, for a lot of things we ended up having to pay out of pocket regardless because insurance either wouldn't cover it or they would only cover a certain thing. Like we, we bought his wheelchair or we bought, we didn't buy his wheelchair, we bought his, um, walkers and things like that prior to insurance paying for and shipping. A month later, like he got, we got his, we got his secondary wheelchair, like, after he died because the insurance took so

Rosie Gill-Moss:

get that on Vinted.

Claire Thea:

so the things like that, that people don't really consider, like, part of the process. Um, I was left with a substantial amount of debt that was not related to his medical bills. So a lot of the living expenses, um, after his passing or during, like, during him when he was not working, I was covering everything. So I had. Thousands and thousands of dollars in debt that I'm still paying off to this day and still dealing with the, the ramifications of, uh, We, you know, when you're the sole provider, you take out credit cards, you

Rosie Gill-Moss:

You do what you've got to do. You do.

Claire Thea:

Yeah, and I was, I was also the co signer on his car. Um, and he had, he had a Camaro. Um, and so we We, after his passing, sold the Camaro to pay off part of it. And, um, that'll come later, but there was a lot of, a lot of things like that, that just like we, we ended up dealing with after passing. But, um, it was, there were probably between everything he probably had about, personally had about. 40, 000 between medical and all of the different things and then plus car and he had a motorcycle and all of that stuff. So, um, credit cards,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Were you, were you liable because you were married or not?

Claire Thea:

I was liable for anything that we had together, which luckily was not a whole lot. We had the car together and we had, I think we had maybe a credit card together and that was it. Everything else was, um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Sort of died with him, for want of a better

Claire Thea:

And that was, we just, I just, anytime a creditor called, I would just send them a copy of his death certificate. And that's the one good thing about, about that kind of law here in the U. S., is you just send them a copy of the death certificate and they write it off. I still occasionally get calls, like, even to this day, and they'll ask for him, and I'm like, he passed, like, five, six years ago.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

You've just taken me back because Ben had, you know, credit cards and things as everybody does, but he also had a business which had a bit of large, um, VAT bill attached to it. And, um, the, particularly the credit cards, they, they said to me, you know, even after I'd managed to get this presumption of death certificate, I've shown them and they said, well, you know, there's no guarantee. So they kind of left me in limbo. And as you're saying this, I'm thinking, I don't know if they ever, you know, Did let me know, but

Claire Thea:

Maybe we'll check that out. Yeah, and

Rosie Gill-Moss:

the link on that?

Claire Thea:

lingers. The, you know, you think you put it to bed and then something triggers you and you're like, Oh man, like I hadn't thought about that in forever.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yeah. Yeah.

Claire Thea:

but yeah, so we, we were, we were together, you know, married for like two weeks in privacy and then ended up finding out, um, He was in neuro rehab for a couple weeks and then was discharged to our new place. It was great. We had like a huge backyard for the dogs and we had bedrooms that we could, you know, people don't think about the fact that some houses aren't built handicap accessible. So, like, the doorways aren't wide enough. And most even in new builds here, because most of Dallas Fort Worth is new, like, the last most, most of the houses here have been built within the last 100 years or so. Um, and so you're dealing with new stuff, but even like, the bathroom doors and are pretty new. Um, and so things like that, the people aren't thinking about, and we, he was home for a week and ended up with a really bad UTI, which you don't think about for men, but happens because he was, we

Rosie Gill-Moss:

we have a

Claire Thea:

catheterizing him. Yes. And so we, um, we ended up back in the hospital right after July 4th, and he did not come back home after that. Uh, he was hospitalized with that UTI and he was really having a lot of, um, you could tell that it was affecting him mentally, but there was also, we, we could kind of tell that something else was going on. It was affecting his speech. Um, it was affecting his. Like swallowing ability like eating and swallowing and we weren't sure what was it wasn't UTI cleared in like three days And so the last week or so that he was home. We could tell that something was was happening with his like swallowing abilities. And I kept saying, I wonder if there's something on his brainstem. And I kept saying it to the doctors and the doctors were like, Nats, you know, there's no way like they, you know, we haven't seen anything in scans. It's fine. And then finally, about three days after when they were talking about putting a feeding tube in, they're like, maybe we'll just do another CT scan. And they had found a new growth on his brainstem. Yeah.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

See, you are an oncologist. There you

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um, and so, and my mom, you know, my mom and I talk, have talked through the possibilities at night and things like that. And I was like, I wonder, I bet you there's something, cause that's the part of your body that,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Mm

Claire Thea:

controls that part. Um, and sure enough, they found one. And that's kind of, that was kind of like, we're, we're at the beginning of the end. Um, his, his family visited twice, I think in the three months, two months between his passing and, or between us seeing them And his passing, um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

hmm. C considering they wanted so much control, right?

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um, there was a weekend over father's day weekend. They went to a city that is only a couple hours away from us and did not come down. Yeah. Um, meanwhile, this is the, this is the part that, that really kind of. You know, the entire time we were in the hospital, we were getting berating text messages telling us that we were, uh, neglecting, or he was neglecting his daughter that he was not necessarily in those words, but basically that, um, there was a little girl who's, who, whose daddy is dying and they needed to, he needed to come home and make memories with her and, um, and spend time with her. And his family and, um, and, and I won't, you know, I won't go into detail, but it was, it was a lot of, a lot of feelings of like, I don't think they really truly grasped where he was at, even though I was giving him, like, them, like, hourly updates. It was like, I don't, I don't know if they thought that he could physically get up out of bed and, like, go to a theme park with them to do something. Um, Or what, but there was no getting up and making memories with his kid. Like, like it was, it was kind of one of those things of like, we told you to drop this, he's told you to drop it several times, you're not doing it. And you're choosing instead of supporting him and being, you know, getting better. I'm getting. 500 to 600 word text messages in a group chat with his entire family. So everybody can see it, uh, telling, telling him and talking about me in third person, like I'm not in the group chat saying how, like he, you know, he needs to come home and he's, she's praying for him to make the right decision, all of these things. So it was not only was it degrading, I think to him as an adult to be basically every, like not every day, but quite often it was happening. Um, but then. To know that even while all of this was happening, they weren't there, they weren't physically there and they worked, they were adults, they had lives, they had like responsibilities,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So did you though, right?

Claire Thea:

yes, yeah, no, I was working full time the entire time, full time. And I was taking care of him, especially when he was home. And even when he was in the hospital, I was getting trained on catheterization. I was getting trained cause he didn't have a Foley. He had. He had non, a non permanent catheter. So I was the one who was learning how to change his briefs. We didn't have a nurse. I was changing his briefs. I was catheterizing him. I was managing his medications, not by myself because my family was there. Uh, and my friends and my pseudo sister. And so I was never by myself, but. to feel like you're only, the only thing you are good for is being an object to make memories with the, a thing to be owned and controlled and not actually have your own agency. I can't even imagine what

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No.

Claire Thea:

like for him, especially in those last several weeks.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

So I'm going to have to now get you to tell me about the day he died. Um, now obviously, you know, it's coming, but I know from talking to people who've lost somebody to a cancer or a long term illness, it doesn't matter that, you know, it's coming, it still comes as a massive shock. So if you're able to, um, like all my little, you know, when you're spidey, you tingle, cause you're like, I'm going to ask somebody to do something difficult, but yeah, if you wouldn't mind just telling me about that.

Claire Thea:

Yeah. Um. So we, we knew for a couple of weeks that things were really going downhill, um, and he was supposed to have a permanent feeding tube placed, um, within a couple of days of him passing, he was transferred to a long term acute care center about a week before he died, which is, it is a, it's, it's like a hospice, but you, you're getting nursing care and things like that. And it's the, the eventual goal is to either put you in. A nursing home type situation for adults, not necessarily elderly, but people who are just permanently. Either mentally or physically disabled that do not that need permanent medical care, um, or hospice. I mean, those are the 2 outcomes of that. Typically, he, um, he was supposed to get a treatment while he was there and, um, was we were coordinating, trying to get him this like last ditch effort kind of treatment. And we were looking at the possibilities, and then his, um. The tumor on his brainstem started affecting his breathing.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh,

Claire Thea:

was already having a lot of breathing issues. Um, but it really did start getting way worse. And we were kind of like, okay, it's time to call his family to come. Like it's the end. My mom made that call. I'm very thankful to her for having made that call because I was at the point where I just didn't have any, I didn't have any energy left. I was surviving off like Twizzlers and Mr. Pibb at that point, and was just trying to just stay awake and hang out with him and spend time with him and cause we knew, we knew that things were happening. Um, His family came down, uh, his family came down toward the end of things and spent about three days there and were with us when things happened. We originally thought he was going to pass earlier in the day and we did the tearful goodbyes, sobbing, telling him it was okay to go. Uh, and then he kind of got better. Um, there was a really disgusting, but very funny moment of he, he had been coughing and we were trying to figure out why, and they had a team, a really great team at the, at the facility he was at that was like the respiratory team basically, and they had given us a suction thing and I had learned how to use it like to, to suction if he was eating food. When he was at the last hospital to like, get anything out, they were, they were like, we've done everything we can. So I was like, okay, well, we're going to find that out. And so we went in and got, and there was like a meatball sized piece of like phlegm stuck in his throat. And he was, he was not totally with it at that point. Like he had, he had, At that point, he was starting to lose his like awareness, um, but he pulled it out and he was just like the horror on his face just from pulling like everybody. We all

Rosie Gill-Moss:

a lot of relief

Claire Thea:

yes. And like, all of us, it was 1 of those. Like, we were all we, the tension was so high that it was like, we just couldn't help but laugh. Um, there was a moment where he woke up. I think it was the day before and he had, he was, but he had scratched himself and he had accidentally pulled his IV out. And so they put these, um, foam gloves on him that had like mats, like

Rosie Gill-Moss:

like the baby ones to stop them scratching.

Claire Thea:

Netting so you could see your hands and they could do procedures and stuff through it. But like it was Velcroed on and it was like baseball mitts and he woke up and he looked at his hand and he was like, what the fuck? That was like the first thing he had said in like three days. It was, it was. So funny. Um, and so those, like, those are the things that like, I very viscerally, viscerally remember. Um, but he had, he had, we talked about end of life for days and days and days and had talked about where, what he wanted to do and all of those things. He, um, he was on what's called a bypass, which is kind of like a seat, like a seat path, like what you sleep with, but it, um, but it's for when you're awake and it helps force air into your lungs. He had made the decision. Um, after we had done all the cheerful goodbyes, realized it wasn't happening, um, and then his siblings had gone home, kids had, his nieces and nephews had gone home and, or gone back to the hotel that they were staying at and, and, It was just me and um, basically he had made the decision to not continue on that. So his parents came back, my like pseudo sister came back, and we sat there for hours and watched his oxygen levels drop. Um, there is a very, uh, poignant chapter in, in my book. I always apologize to people for chapters 11 and 12 because 11 is, is almost not exactly verbatim, but it is very close to the experience that I had in that time. There's a very fictionalized character that is the best friend, um, in the book. That's kind of a combination of a lot of people in my life at that time. And. It talks about a very real experience of every 30 seconds, the, the oxygen alarm beeping and not, not the, not the like monitor, like, uh, an alarm saying the levels were dropping. So you have that you have the sound of the of the heart monitor, the standard sound, and then you have this alarm going off all the time. And so you can't even, like, relax because you're waiting for the alarm to go off for hours. Um, His family was playing

Rosie Gill-Moss:

in distress at this point or were they they medicated him?

Claire Thea:

of it. Yeah. He had really just decided and he knew, um, his, his sister had had her baby. Um, and she brought the baby with her and he met, uh, he met the baby and, um, that was his goal and we knew it. And I feel like, you know, They talk about, you know, family members that hang on for weddings or for to get through, like, like his, like T's uncle, uh, held on to his, for his daughter's wedding and passed very shortly after those types of things I feel like are very real. And this was one of those things. And I think getting married, I think meeting, meeting that new baby. Um, and so. Watch for, for hours while that happened. Um, he, he was very much not in pain at the end. And that was the biggest thing for me was so many people go out in pain. And I think so much of what he was going through had, especially with the brainstem tumor had taken away a lot of that pain, which made me feel better. But in a lot of ways too, like it almost because of the way that things happened, he never got to do a lot of the things that he wanted to do that. I think, you know, cross off the bucket list. Like, so many people find out they have cancer and then they have time to to do all those things. But that deterioration happened so fast at the end that you really, we really didn't Get a chance. And I know, you know, as you know, a sudden widow that you never get to accomplish all those things you want to do. But for me, um, I'm glad that he at least got those moments for a lot of, you know, those are the, that, that night is one of those nights. It's like so ingrained in my brain. And I, um, he wanted, he wanted to be an organ donor. He was very set on that, but because of the chemo and radiation, he wasn't able to be an organ donor.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

I was gonna say he was probably nuclear reactive, wasn't

Claire Thea:

Yes, so he was planning on donating his body to science within hours of his passing, you know, we had talked to the funeral home, scheduled them to come pick him up. Um, we knew he wanted to be buried back at home, so I called them, um, they were going to transport him back to the Midwest and he, um, he was able to donate his eyes. Um, which for me, my dad had a double cornea transplant. He's had both corneas replaced by donor cadaver, cadaver corneas. Um, while I was in college. So for me, that was, it was almost full circle that he was able to do that. I didn't even consider that as an option. And then UT had called and said, Hey, like, we know he can't be an organ donor, but would you consider this? And. The answer was an immediate yes. Um, and so it was a really great opportunity because a couple of months later, we got a letter stating, um, not who specifically they had gone to, but we knew like, you know, 1 of them went to like a, a young father and 1 of them went to college shooting something like, like, like a general idea, which

Rosie Gill-Moss:

able to leave a gift after you've gone like that.

Claire Thea:

Um, and so

Rosie Gill-Moss:

But Thea, I'm going to stop you because you know what you haven't told me? About when he died. I sense avoidance. Come on!

Claire Thea:

over, yeah, he, so when he passed, it was very much like a, we kind of watched the countdown, like a, like a bomb,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yeah.

Claire Thea:

And with everything that had happened. It was like a, it was like a, the weight kind of like got lifted. And then I, I stood up after everything. And, and this is, this is like almost word for word what I wrote, but it was one of those moments of got up, kissed his lips and then was like, I need to get out of here. And I stood up to walk away and fell to the floor,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Mm

Claire Thea:

Um, You know, his family, his parents were wailing and told so understandably. And those are sounds that live with me even to today. But for so much of the weeks and months leading up to it, it was like, we knew it was going to happen, but actually having it happen is a very different story. And. To have it in a way that was so slow and so grueling to watch. Um, like I, to this day, I still get really triggered by, uh, heart monitor sounds. And so I have, I actually, last month when I finished my new book, I got a tattoo of the heart monitor sound on my arm. Um, And that's, yeah, and that's one of those things that, you know, I, when I talk to people about the writing experience and everything, I tell them Piper, my main character, my first book, is not me. She's not me. Fitz is not my, my previous partner who I was with for several years while I was writing this book. Um, because their stories are very different and their experiences are very different. Their families are different, but I think a lot of people have those weird. Thing like triggers that they don't think about that other people may have like I was watching a anime with somebody over the summer and the first episode somebody dies in a hospital and they've got monitor sound going in the background and I was like I Need to take trazodone or I'm gonna be a problem and Other people don't even think about that that could be a trigger and then like I got up to go take a pill and he Was like, um, are you okay? I was like, so there's something you don't know about me and

Rosie Gill-Moss:

me tell you a

Claire Thea:

like launch into to the diatribe Yeah But yeah, so so it was Probably, I would say, it's hard to say that was the worst day of my life, but it was, it was, it was up there. That whole kind of experience and the weeks after

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Because it isn't just that day, is it? It's

Claire Thea:

it's not,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No.

Claire Thea:

it's it, and it's compounded by the things that happened around it. The experience of, um, his funeral was a whole other shit show for lack of a better term. Um, And just like trying to dig through the aftermath of everything and, you know, trying to keep it under two hours, the cliff notes version. Um, he was buried in his hometown and my family paid for it. Um, my, my family, because we, because at that point we didn't have And, and I don't know if it's the same over there, but we have to have the death certificate and all of those things in order for the insurance to pay out. So very, very luckily we had, my family had some liquidity, my aunt specifically, and I talked to, I will preach to the ends of the earth, how lucky I am to have her and to have my family, um, had some liquidity where she could pay for things. Um, and so my family paid for his funeral and, um, um, The, the day that he passed, we went home, went and did some stuff. His family came over to the house so I could give them several things that I knew. I didn't want his firearms. Like, like, that's just like, I don't need large guns in my house. I have firearms, but I don't have huge ones because he was a hunting

Rosie Gill-Moss:

even this is so alien, you see, because we don't go for the weapons over

Claire Thea:

he and he, he hunted like his family was from a place that hunted. So like, yeah, of course he, and I'm like, that's fine. I don't need a shotgun. I'm okay. I live in like suburbia and like the worst thing that's going to hop into my yard is maybe a coyote occasionally. Um, and so like some blankets that I knew his sister had made old t shirts up. And I was like, I will go through things at some point, not today. So we gave them some of the stuff and his family headed back home and we were like, okay, we'll meet you in a couple of days. Um, While his family was on their way home and like that day, I found out that they had helped the mom of the kid and the child sneak into the hospital while I wasn't there one night to the last hospital. Um, and they had taken pictures of kiddo. In bed with my husband,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Yes.

Claire Thea:

with all of the wires and heart monitors and mask

Rosie Gill-Moss:

At his most vulnerable.

Claire Thea:

And, um, so found out about that. And then, so we're like, okay, well, you know what? Like, I can't even, I don't have the balls to deal with this right now. And then I came across a comment that was like, it was his, his dad said it, um, along the lines of just remember. It was, it was, she had posted something about this, about T's death and it was talking about how it was like the worst day of her life and all of these things. I will, she could be grieving. I don't, I don't know. I have no frame of reference for what their relationship was like because I had no idea it existed until like a month before that. However, his dad commented. On her, her post and said, just remember that you're the only person who has the honor of sharing a child with my son. And I, that was my breaking point. That was my, I will, I am done being nice. I am done not being confrontational. Um, because. The disrespect and everything was one, was one thing for me and to treat my family the way that they did, that was one thing, but to dishonor the potential future that we could have had by treating me like crap while simultaneously treating somebody who at that point we had no idea what their motivations were, um, like they were family, like they had done anything other than, you know, have a child that may or may not be his was really hard for me. Um, the other thing we didn't talk about was the fact that in, in here and in the state that they live in. Um, so I did not get survivor's benefits because he passed. I, because we were only, we weren't married for six months. Six months is the cut. You have to be married for six months here in order to receive benefits. If so, if your spouse passed, that was fine. Cause I knew I was the beneficiary on his insurance. He had called, made that change while he was in the hospital. His child. And what I didn't know at the time is that the paperwork that they had been trying to get him to sign when they came down months before was paperwork to get him added to the death or to the birth certificate of the child years after she was born.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Wow.

Claire Thea:

he had filled it out incorrectly the first time. And so I was like, cool, it's done. We don't have to deal with it. I'm not going to fight it. Um, when I saw that comment from his dad, uh, the gloves came off and. That is part of why, like in the, and it continues to get worse, but part of why I was, I was so open about the process with my family and my friends was because I didn't know how, like, I was like, I feel crazy. I feel like this shit is happening in my head because it's so, it's so

Rosie Gill-Moss:

It's almost so unbelievable that nobody would believe it if you told them, right?

Claire Thea:

Exactly. And so for me, I was like, okay, well, I'm like, I'm done playing nice. If, if you bring her to the funeral, I will have her physically removed. Did I follow through on that threat? No. Um, but I was, I was very, I, I, I was like, I laid it out. I was like, I am done playing nice. Um, we got fast forward. We got to, to the city, did the, all the funeral planning and everything. We. Made sure that everything was taken care of. I went and did a private visitation by myself. So I went and got all of my feels out as I'm sure you experienced with anything with your husband. Like sometimes you just need a minute to lose your shit without anybody else. Um, and so I went and did a private visitation. I don't, I don't know with your husband, if you were able to,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

My, my husband's body's not been found, so I live in a state of limbo, um, which

Claire Thea:

That's what I thought, but I couldn't remember.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No, it's fine. No, it's absolutely fine. Don't worry. I don't expect people to remember every detail. Um, What date was it? But I do know that I, I mean, I wrote him a letter and I just, the pen just flowed

Claire Thea:

yeah. And I did that too. I did the same thing.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Um, I just buried it in a, we have like a memory plot at a church. So I get it. I get that needing to kind of be angry because even though Ben, I mean, he'd made a couple of mistakes, but he hadn't really done anything wrong, but I was still angry and I

Claire Thea:

Oh yeah. And you can, and you have all these unresolved things that you think you'll have one, one day you'll have time to deal with them. Right. Um, and so luckily we were, we were at the point when we got married where we had dealt through, we had, we'd worked through even, even lying to me about mom and the kid. We had really, we had worked through those things. Were we on the best? Were we the pinnacle of great relationships? Absolutely not. And I will never say that. Never will I say that I was perfect, that I didn't make mistakes, that I wasn't a bitch at some points. Like I was, I was a raging bitch, but I was also dealing with a lot. Um, so when we did the visitation, we had about 15 people came from, from Texas to where we were at. It was about a six hour drive. So 15 people ish made the six hour drive, including the kids that I nannied. Their whole family came. Um, cause that was like their uncle and they're, they're, they still deal with that grief to this day. I mean, they're, cause they're, they actually spent six hours. significant time with him. Um, his family came in, his immediate family came in, did the visitation, you know, watched his mom fall over the casket and sob and, and, and react, I feel like as any, any mother would to their child. And that's totally understandable. And then they're like, okay, we're going to go get the kids, like meaning his nieces and nephews. And so I'm sitting there. In the back of the church or the funeral home and his family walks out and comes back in with. The mom and the kid, um, and then his nieces and nephews. And they had basically spent the months while we were in the hospital, uh, up where they were at making a relationship with, with the family. Yeah. So they were integrated as part of the family at that point. Like they had matching teddy bears at the funeral with their name, like with names stitched on them and everything. And like, it was, they were very clearly part of the family at that point. And, um, I. Got up, walked out of the building, got about halfway through the parking lot and Collapsed in the middle of the parking lot, like just like sobbed, just like in my dress and heels, just sat in the parking lot on the gross floor and just sobbed. Um, my best friend came out, picked me up off the floor. One of his grandparents friends came and helped me and like his, his grandparents, his, his like extended family were great. They were like saving grace. Totally amazing. I have a picture of them in my house to this day. Cause they came down and visited with his older aunts and treated me the way I felt like I

Rosie Gill-Moss:

part of the family.

Claire Thea:

Like exactly. Like I was his wife because I was at that point. And, um, they came, they took me back into the room, sat there. Um, I, they started the visitation or the, like the visitation. Like with everybody and I was just so overwhelmed and just paralyzed. I just sat in the back with everybody from, from Dallas and just watched people and it was hundreds of people came, hundreds. Um, at no point did anybody mention that he was married.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

No.

Claire Thea:

his obituary said that he was married because I wrote it and his family approved it. I have, you know, I back and forth with them about like, Hey, like he, this is his degree, blah, blah, blah, because I was still being cordial. His family put together a slideshow, um, that was very kosher. No, there were a couple, there were actually a couple of pictures of us. I don't think there were any from our wedding. Um, and at some point, finally, somebody came back to the room and was like, you need to go up there. And I was like, I don't feel like, I'm not going to stand up there next to them, and they're like, you need to go up there. So I went up there and stood up there, and I was probably there for like 50 or 60 people, including some of our friends that had finally gotten there. And most of them didn't know that he was married, because his family never really recognized that. Um, at all. I, I don't think a lot of people realize that we had even gotten married, like in the hospital or anything until, until the funeral, we had, we had the funeral at the next day he was buried there. Um, same person who spoke at our, who married us, spoke at the funeral also. Um, and we had like 15 people, you know, from, from DFW there, uh, the night of the funeral. They had a, like, secondary thing that was more of like a celebration of life sort of thing. And we chose not to go based on how things had gone over the weekend. Um, but one of our other friends went just to like pay their respects and they had them sitting up with the family. my mom lost her shit at one point. She's, she will tell you, she lost it on, on the weekend. The mom and in front of the kids. And I can't blame her for that. Um, cause she, she

Rosie Gill-Moss:

She went mama bear.

Claire Thea:

me. She did go mama bear and she didn't say anything that wasn't true. She didn't accost or assault anybody. And, you know, a lot of the time, anytime somebody said anything about The situation from, from that side of the aisle, it's always been, you know, how horrible my family was or how much they accosted people and all of these. And it's just like, if you're, if you're nitpicking at somebody getting mad because they had the gall to show up after potentially. Scamming somebody for two years just so you can get your child Social Security benefits Which is what we were pretty sure was happening and that could I could be totally wrong again I have journalism degree and I know what libel and slander is I could be totally wrong. I am not saying that was their

Rosie Gill-Moss:

your opinion.

Claire Thea:

It's my opinion. It is a thought process that we were all going through but at the same time like We were just kind of like, okay, like we're just, we're ready to get this weekend over with. We got text messages all weekend telling us how horrible we were for not including the kid in the obituary. And we were staying at a casino at that point. And I was like, let's just go get shit faced and go gamble. So we, we went back to the hotel and we ordered pizza. We got drunk. We talked about him for six hours. All of his friends from work were there. We had a, like a week later back home, we had a secondary kind of thing for people who couldn't go to the funeral. Um, But the icing on the cake about a month later was that, uh, they Claimed that I had fraudulently changed the beneficiary on his life insurance. And so his life insurance payments got held up for about three months in court. Um,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

my god, so you had to go to court as well? I had to go to the High Court over here.

Claire Thea:

luckily did not have to go to court because my dad is an attorney and he's a good one.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Oh, that's a useful skill for a father to have.

Claire Thea:

And so he, um, he was able to basically provide receipts and documentation. The problem is, is that if we had really actually gone to court, we would have ended up in there. It would have, it would have been six months before we had at least, and then it would have probably been longer because we were right before COVID. Um, and so for us, it was either we. Either we figure out what to do and just make them happy by whatever we can, or we fight it out. And I was so done fighting at that point. I was just done. We had talked about, and I had told them, like, I knew where that money was going. It was going to pay the debts that we had incurred together. It was going to pay for his sister's college. It was going to pay for his nieces and nephews for part of their college. Like we knew, like I, we had a plan. It wasn't all just going to me to frivolously spend on bullshit. Um, but because nobody asked me, nobody wanted to know, no, everybody wanted to assume the worst and just think that they were in the right. I, they, Made a substantial amount of money, um, for it. And they like, God bless him. But I, there are still events that happened in his memory in their

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And they don't invite you.

Claire Thea:

Not only do they not invite me, but like guests of honor, like situation. And, and so I, you know, at this point in my life, I have so much, I've processed so much of that, especially recently that I can talk about it and laugh about it now, but for a long time, I didn't talk about it. I spent basically three years pretending like it didn't happen. And then finally the dam broke and I have got to talk about this publicly or, or I'm going to lose my, like my mind. So.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

And there is something incredibly powerful in the fact that your journalism background, the fact that you were able to write it down and this kind of fictionalized semi truth, because in all honesty, that's, that was something I considered doing was sort of writing my story, but it's for a fictional character so that you will, you don't feel too exposed. And I think it is incredibly therapeutic. And I do really want to talk to you some more, actually. And what I'm thinking is if we. Conclude this episode, I've got some things that I'd love to bring you back in and talk about sort of post widowhood, because there's, there's a few points that we're just not going to get to cover in this session. So I think what we might do is, is say goodbye now, then get you booked in for another one but that'd be right because I just put out a season three episode one, it went out today actually this is going to go out several months later but, and one of the things I've said is I want to start doing a weekly episode where I just chat with former guests. Or people just have like this kind of chit chat like we're having but you know without putting people through the whole story so it has been I mean, it's obviously been captivating. We've been talking for like two hours and 15 minutes, I think with the other record as well, and I kind of don't want to let you go. So I think if you're amenable, would you come back and talk to me again?

Claire Thea:

Yeah, absolutely.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

Phenomenal. So I feel like this is probably a good point to end, unless you've got anything that you'd really like to say before we switch the microphones off,

Claire Thea:

No, I think that's it for now. I mean, that's, that's

Rosie Gill-Moss:

we could go for another two

Claire Thea:

No, yeah,

Rosie Gill-Moss:

no problem.

Claire Thea:

that, that's the, and like the moral of the story too, is like, obviously I, and I've said it before, I'm in a, I'm in such a good place now that I, I look back at all those things and I'm like, and like I said, I, I made mistakes, I, I fucked up so many times as far as how to handle things and, and, and I will admit those mistakes

Rosie Gill-Moss:

But those mistakes are, we are human and we're fallible. And both of us were far too young to be dealing with this level of emotion. You particularly, and I feel a lot of shame around some of the behaviors. I, did when, when Ben died and I didn't behave honorably always. And I, became a version of myself I didn't recognise And a lot of that was to do with my drinking. And one of the things I'd like to talk to you about is I know that you're sober as well. So this is why I think we've definitely got another episode in us because we didn't even touch on that. And things like. dating, you know, we, widows fire that the idea of bringing, you know, I want to know what your in laws response was to you being in another relationship. I want to know all of this. So

Claire Thea:

boy.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

yeah, see, see, I don't want to let you go. Cause I want to keep talking, but it is actually approaching nine o'clock here. And I'm probably need to, I'm hoping John's put the children to bed. So. It is with enormous gratitude that I thank you for coming to talk to me today, Theo, because you are incredibly eloquent, you are incredibly well informed, and you have a really beautiful narrative, and I'm, I will order your book, I absolutely will, and I will, um, suggest others do as well, of course. But for now Thea, thank you for coming on to Widowed AF and sharing your story because what you're doing by sharing your story is you're not only giving yourself control of the narrative, which as a journalist will be important to you, but also you are giving other people that feeling of not being so alone. And one of the things you mentioned was not wanting to speak ill of the dead and that is something that so many people relate to and I have had one of my guests came on and she just said, I hate my dead husband. You know, she'd found out that he cheated on her. And so I think you're not alone in it. And somehow, somewhere, somebody will listen to this and you will make them feel better. So that, that is the power of storytelling.

Claire Thea:

Thanks so much for having me.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

It's been a pleasure. And for anybody out there listening, if you have been affected by today's episode, please let me know. I can pass on messages to Thea. Do you have an Instagram handle you'd like to mention Thea or anything like that? Do you do socials?

Claire Thea:

I am in all of the social places. Literally all of them because that's what I do for a living. I'm a marketing girly.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

my god, is that what you do for a living? Do mine!

Claire Thea:

that is, that is non profit marketing right now. Um, and that's what I've done for 10 years. Uh, I am on all of the socials at theaclairauthor.

Rosie Gill-Moss:

T H E A and Claire C L A R E, no

Claire Thea:

A I R

Rosie Gill-Moss:

A I R E, so T H E A C L A I R E. Brilliant, and of course my inbox is open if anybody's got any questions, but for now you take care of yourselves out there and I will be back soon with the Frontline of Widowhood. Goodbye.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Rosie Gill-Moss

Host

Podcasts we love

Check out these other fine podcasts recommended by us, not an algorithm.

Chatty AF Artwork

Chatty AF

Rosie Gill-Moss
Autism Unpacked Artwork

Autism Unpacked

Options Autism