What gets passed down through generations of widows?

Strength? Resilience? Survival?

Or do we also inherit the silence, fears, expectations, and ways of grieving that the women before us learned simply because they had no other choice?

In this episode of The Dead Truth, Jen sits down with author and widow Dori Ann Dupré, whose new novel, Widows & Children, follows generations of women connected by love, loss, widowhood, and the complicated things families carry forward.

But this conversation goes beyond the book.

Dori shares her own story of loving and losing her husband, Eric, the generations of widows within her family, grieving alongside her daughters, and what nearly ten years of widowhood has revealed about the woman she was—and the woman she is still becoming.

Jen and Dori also explore Versions of Her: Do we actually become someone new after loss? Or are we still the same woman, carrying every version of ourselves—the woman before him, the woman who loved him, the woman who lost him, and the woman learning how to live in the life that came after?

And perhaps the biggest question of all:

What did the widows before us carry that eventually made its way to us—and what do we finally get to put down?

This isn't simply a conversation about surviving loss.

It's about generations of women, the families shaped by grief, the love that continues, and what we choose to carry forward.

This is The Dead Truth with Dori Ann Dupré.

dorianndupre.wixsite.com/books

IG: author.dorianndupre

FB: AuthorDoriAnnDupre

People talk about living with grief. But sometimes that doesn't feel quite right.

Because grief isn't always something sitting beside you. Sometimes it feels like the room you're standing in.

You wake up inside it. Go to work inside it. Grocery shop inside it. Laugh inside it. Build things inside it. Have surprisingly good days inside it. And sometimes, out of nowhere, grief kicks the damn door down like it still pays rent.

In this episode of The Dead Truth, I'm talking about what it actually feels like to live inside grief—the contradictions, the ordinary moments, the laughter, the anger, the missing, and the strange realization that grief doesn't necessarily get smaller. Sometimes life simply starts getting bigger around it.

Other people get to visit your grief. You live there. And perhaps the goal was never to find the exit. Perhaps it's discovering how much life can still exist inside the room.

#grief #griefsupport #griefandloss #widow #widowhood #widowjourney #widowlife #loss #love #podcast #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast

After loss, everyone seems obsessed with the question:

Who am I now?

And right behind it comes another one:

What is my purpose now?

And somewhere along the way, I think we've put an awful lot of pressure on grieving women to answer both.

As if losing your husband wasn't enough. Now apparently you're supposed to reinvent yourself, discover your purpose, find the “new you,” rise from the ashes and become some inspirational grief phoenix.

Yeah. We're not doing that here.

In this first episode of Versions of Her, I'm talking about identity, purpose, and something I've come to believe about the women we were before, during, and after love and loss:

You don't become one new version of yourself. You carry all of them with you.

The woman you were before him. The woman who fell in love with him. The woman you became beside him. The woman who lost him. The woman who had to learn how to live without him. And the woman you're still becoming.

You don't have to erase one version to make room for another. And you certainly don't need to have some grand new purpose figured out just because your life changed.

Maybe the better question isn't Who am I now?

It's: What parts of all the women I've been are still here?

Welcome to Versions of Her—a Dead Truth series about widowhood, identity, love, loss, change, and all the women we become along the way.

Because you're not just the woman standing here today.

You're still all of her.

Why do we apologize when we cry?

Someone we love died. Our entire life changed. We’re trying to figure out how to live in a world without them—and somehow, when the tears come, we’re the ones saying, “I’m sorry.”

Sorry for what?

In this episode of The Dead Truth, Jen talks about the tears we fight, the ones that ambush us in completely ordinary moments, the days we can’t cry at all, and those huge, exhausting cries that leave us sitting there wondering what the hell just came out of us.

Because crying doesn’t mean you’re falling apart. Sometimes crying is what happens when you’ve been holding too damn much together.

This isn’t about crying your way to healing or pretending tears magically make grief disappear. They don’t. It’s about allowing an honest reaction to an incredibly painful reality.

You can be healing and still cry. You can be building a life you genuinely love and still ache for the person who isn’t here to see it. You can laugh all afternoon and cry in the car on the way home.

Those things can exist in the same person. Some things in life are worth crying over.Some people are worth crying over. And some love is worth every damn tear.

This is The Dead Truth about tears, grief, and what it actually feels like to live inside loss.💜

#grief #griefsupport #griefandloss #griefjourney #widow #widowhood #love #loss #podcast #healing #crying #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast

Apparently, there are rules to widowhood.

Cry—but eventually stop.

Talk about him—but not too much.

Keep your wedding ring on if you want—but apparently somebody will have an opinion about that.

Don't date too soon. Don't wait too long. Be strong. Be vulnerable. Move forward. But for God's sake, make sure you're moving at a speed everyone else finds emotionally convenient.

Got it.

In this episode of The Dead Truth, I'm talking about the invisible rulebook widows somehow get handed after loss—and all the rules I've broken along the way.

We'll also convene an emergency meeting of the Widowhood Rules Committee, revisit the social-media crime I committed when I dared suggest widows might want to consider waiting before making huge life decisions, and talk about what happens when we stop performing grief for everyone watching from the sidelines.

Because I've realized something:

Maybe I'm not widowing wrong.

Maybe there was never one right way to do it in the first place.

This isn't an episode about telling widows to break every rule.

It's about asking a much more interesting question:

Who made the damn rules anyways?

#widow #widowhood #widowing #widowlife #grief #griefjourney #griefsupport #griefandloss #loss #love #podcast #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast

Some grief begins long before someone dies.

It begins in doctor's offices and hospital parking garages. In pill organizers, insurance calls, sleepless nights, canceled plans, and learning medical words you never wanted to know.

It begins when the person you love is still right beside you—but life as you knew it is slowly changing.

In "The Grief Before the Goodbye", I talk about the often-invisible experience of caring for someone you love... the constant vigilance, the mental load, the exhaustion, the anticipatory grief, and the strange way survival mode can eventually start to feel like normal life.

This episode isn't about regret. It's about recognition.

You did it because you loved them. You showed up because they needed you. You drove to the appointments, learned the medications, sat in the waiting rooms, watched for changes, made the calls, lost sleep, and somehow kept going.

But love can be beautiful and still cost us something.

Whether you're caring for someone now, you've already lived this story, or you love someone who is carrying it today, this conversation is about seeing the person who so often becomes invisible while taking care of everyone else.

Because sometimes goodbye doesn't happen all at once.

Sometimes you're saying goodbye one appointment, one ability, one ordinary moment, and one tiny piece at a time.

That's The Dead Truth💜

#grief #griefsupport #griefandloss #griefjourney #widow #widowhood #caregiver #caregivergrief #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast #love

Grief doesn't just empty your cup. It changes how much you have available to give—and yet we often keep expecting ourselves to show up, perform, help, say yes, and take care of everyone exactly the way we did before loss.In Part 2 of The Dead Truth Cup Method Series, we're talking about what happens once you recognize what's draining you.We'll talk about how grief changes emotional capacity, why boundaries can suddenly become necessary, the guilt that can come with saying no, the people and obligations that quietly drain us, and what it actually looks like to protect our energy without shutting out the world.Protecting your cup isn't about becoming selfish, cold, or unavailable. It's about recognizing that every yes costs something—and you get to decide what is worth the cost.We'll also talk about leaving early, resting without earning it, not answering every call, changing your mind, letting people be disappointed, and finally giving yourself some of the protection you've spent years giving everyone else.If you've ever thought, "I used to be able to handle all of this. Why can't I anymore?"—this episode is for you.Your worth didn't change. Your capacity did. And maybe it's time to stop apologizing for protecting it. Protect. Your. Cup.#grief #griefjourney #griefsupport #griefandloss #widow #widowhood #widowlife #love #loss #protectyourcup #podcast #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast

When someone dies, we expect to grieve the person we lost. What we don't expect are all the other losses that quietly follow.

The loss of your future plans. Your sense of safety. Your identity. Your confidence. Your routines. Your financial security. Your friendships. Even the little moments that once felt ordinary.

These are called secondary losses, and they're one of the most overlooked parts of grief.

In this episode of The Dead Truth, I explore the hidden layers of loss that can leave grieving people wondering why certain moments still hurt so deeply—even years later. Together, we'll talk about why grief  

often feels heavier than we expected, why random moments can still bring us to tears, and why recognizing these hidden losses can replace self-judgment with self-compassion.

If you've ever wondered why a simple trip to the grocery store, an empty chair, or signing your name alone suddenly brought your grief rushing back, this conversation is for you.

Because sometimes you're not grieving all over again. You're discovering another layer of love...and another layer of loss.

If this episode speaks to your heart, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who may need the reminder that they aren't grieving "wrong." They're simply carrying more than they realized.

Until then... be gentle with yourself.

#grief #griefsupport #griefandloss #griefjourney #griefawareness #grieving #widow #widowhood #widower #love #podcast #secondaryloss #lifeafterloss

What happens when grief doesn't show up right away? What if you've spent months—or even years—wondering why you weren't crying... only to find yourself falling apart long after everyone else thought you had "moved on"?

In this episode of The Dead Truth, we're talking about delayed grief—the kind that quietly waits until life slows down, until the crisis has passed, or until your heart finally has the space to feel what it couldn't before. We'll explore why delayed grief happens, what it can look like, and why it doesn't mean you've loved your person any less or that you're grieving "wrong."

If you've ever thought: "Why is this hitting me now?" "I thought I was doing okay." "Everyone else seems to have moved on, but I'm just starting to fall apart." ...this episode is for you.

Whether you were raising children, caring for family, handling funeral arrangements, returning to work, or simply surviving one day at a time, sometimes grief waits because survival comes first.

There is no deadline for mourning. There is no "right" timeline for healing.

And if your grief has finally found its voice, perhaps it's not because you're going backward... perhaps it's because your heart is finally ready to be heard.

Welcome to The Dead Truth—where we have honest conversations about grief, widowhood, healing, and the life we never expected to rebuild.

#grief #griefsupport #griefandloss #delayedgrief #widow #widowhood #love #podcast #thedeadtruth #thedeadtruthpodcast

This is one of those conversations that lives in the quiet moments… the ones where your brain won’t shut off.You replay things... you question things.You try to understand something that changed your entire life.And the truth is… grief doesn’t just hurt.It totally confuses you in every way, shape, and form.So today… we’re going there… I’m asking the question, "Why does death defy logic?"