Episode 54: Catherine Graves: Losing your mind & Losing Someone You Love- [PODCAST]

It was her second marriage and everything was going wonderfully. Catherine and John were happy, enjoying life, and the blending of their two families was not the hell-on-earth many people had warned it might be. She was happy, truly happy. When John began acting distant, spending more hours at work and away from how, and laughed at her questions about where he’d been Catherine became very concerned. Was he fighting some addiction? Was he having an affair? Was he becoming too consumed in his career? She didn’t know what to think and pushed on through life to hold things together for the kids. In this episode Catherine Graves shares her courageous story of love, triumph, and forgiveness. You won’t want to miss this one.

The day she hired a private detective…

It was one of the most difficult things she’d ever done. She didn’t like the feeling that she didn’t trust her husband but the truth was that she didn’t. He’d become distant, much less responsive to her pursuit of him, and very much unlike who he was when they married. She expected that she’d get the worst news: that John was having an affair. But still, she didn’t know what she’d hear. It was a waiting game she didn’t want to play at all, but she had to. What do you do when life hands you situations you weren’t expecting? How do you maintain hope in the midst of uncertainty? Catherine Graves knows… and she’s David’s guest on this episode of Crank It Up.

The news she didn’t expect and never wanted to hear.

Catherine Graves expected that any day the private investigator would call with news that her husband was having an affair. But that’s not what it was. In fact, it was much worse. A medical appointment revealed that her husband John had a huge tumor in his brain and it was the cause of his distance, disinterest, and lack of initiative in their relationship and family. It explained everything, and it was terrifying. On today’s episode of Crank It Up Catherine shares the story of how she navigated the unknown waters of a terminal diagnosis for her husband, how she made decisions for him and for the family without clearly knowing what her husband would want, and the emotional and personal struggles she went through coming out on the other side. It’s a touching, courageous story you simply need to hear.

When you lose somebody close to you, you never expect to have to deal with the reproach of others.

But Catherine Graves did. Her husband’s family didn’t understand how she could get on with her own life so quickly after the loss. They didn’t understand that it was her way of coping with the loss, her way of trying to hold everything together so she could continue leading her children through their own healing and return to normalcy. In this revealing conversation Catherine shares her journey and the sting of the words and attitudes that were lobbed at her as she struggled through the loss of her husband. She offers excellent advice for anyone who carries the weight of guilt or blame and wants to be free. This heart-felt counsel could set you free.

Checking Out: An In Depth Look at Losing Your Mind

After making it through the loss of her husband to cancer, Catherine Graves decided that her journey, her story, needed to be told. She felt that the things she experienced during the darkest season of her life could be of help to others who were facing that same season of loss, or those who were yet to go to that dark place. She speaks to issues of forgiveness, reconciliation, outlook on life and people, and what it means to truly mourn the loss of someone you love. To that end she wrote her book, “Checking Out” and implores anyone who is struggling with the loss of a loved one to read it. It was a tonic to her soul to write it and she hopes will be helpful to all who read it.

Outline of this great episode

[1:47] David’s excitement about today’s guest: Catherine Graves.