Coping With The Loss of a Loved One
- John Schneider, 64, known for his role as Beauregard “Bo” Duke in the TV series “The Dukes of Hazzard,” lost his wife, actress Alicia Allain Schneider, to breast cancer at the age of 53 in February 2023.
- Schneider has since spoken out about how he’s coping with the loss of his beloved wife and how faith is helping him through the tough times. He also hopes to inspire others to be open with their feelings.
- The grieving and recovery process after losing a loved one to cancer, especially a partner, is definitely not a “one-and-done” process, many members of the SurvivorNet community have told us.
- When faced with a crisis such as a cancer diagnosis or the loss of a loved one, it’s important to find ways to cope with the complex web of feelings you may be experiencing. Faith is one way many cancer survivors choose to cope.
Schneider, who met his third wife Alicia Allain back in 2014 and married her after she was diagnosed with cancer in 2019, opened up to People in the wake of her death, saying, “I miss every damn thing, every day. I have to get to the point where I look around and see where she is, not where she’s not.
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During his interview with People last year, Schneider admitted, “I could not have told Alicia Allain Schneider I love her any more than I did. … As bad as I hurt, I wouldn’t trade a minute of it.
“Heaven is real, and I’ll get there one day and she’ll greet me. At that point, this will seem like nothing. like no time has gone by. Until then, I will endure. That’s what she’d want, and I’m going to live the rest of my life doing only that which would make her smile.”
He continued, “I’m going to ‘go do,’ as she said, even when I don’t want to, so that when I get there, she’ll be delighted with me.”
Alicia was diagnosed with breast cancer in May 2019 after a lesion was found during a routine appointment with her dermatologist, prompting her to undergo treatment.
Although Schneider said Alicia had gone into remission and was “doing great” in 2020, in December 2021, her health worsened after a car crash that left her with a broken back. Scans following the crash revealed the cancer had spread to her bones. Ultimately, additionally treatment was unsuccessful.
He explained further, “We decided to get married after her diagnosis, not before, which I think speaks a lot to us. The TTB, the Team to Beat, was like, ‘Hell no, cancer. You’re not splitting this up. We’re going to make it harder for you.'”
Expert Resources On Coping With Loss
- How to Be Realistically Optimistic: Coping With Mental Health Long-Term
- Dealing With Grief Related to Health Problems
- Mental Health and Cancer — The Fight, Flight or Freeze Response
- How to Handle the Emotional Toll of Caring for a Loved One With Cancer: Prioritizing Your Mental Health
- Mental Health: Understanding the Three Wellsprings of Vitality
Alicia’s health took a turn in February 2023, and Schneider took her out of the hospital to have hospice care at home, where they stayed with each other until she passed six days later, on Feb. 21, 2023.
Looking back on when they met on Oct. 6, 2014, he told People, “This meeting that I almost blew off, she never let me forget. We’d laugh and say, ‘What would life have been?’
“But, I knew that I had met my person. I was smitten and it was wonderful. I played the role she wanted me to play. I lost every battle, but I won because I got her. … We were kindred spirits from the beginning and made everything look easy.”
Following her death, he took to Instagram to share a photo of his beloved, and another photo of their hands clasped together, captioning the post, “My beautiful Smile is pain free, living in her new body alongside Jesus. Please respect our privacy during this time of grief. Please do not ask any questions.”
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He concluded, “If you have any pictures of us and our obvious love and adoration for each other, please post them below. Lastly… hug those you love tight and let them know how you feel. We always did.”
According to People, Schneider often writes messages to his late wife called “letters to heaven” on Facebook as he continues to grieve.
Nearly a year after Alicia passed, he shared an emotional selfie of him, writing, “Today I am going to not only choose joy… I am going to find it and share it with others. Today I am going to find someone who is down and do my beat to bring them up.. To bring them joy.
“Joy is not only contagious… It’s healing. I know there are many on this road who have hidden themselves away. Who are suffering alone. I am quite sure that if I had hidden myself away and tried to handle this alone…I wouldn’t be here…Or…At best…I would still not want to be here.”
Dealing With Grief Related to Health Problems
How Faith Can Help During the Cancer Journey
John Schneider relying on his faith is quite common amongst people coping with their own or a loved one’s diagnosis.
A study published in Cancer includes data that found “69% of cancer patients reported praying for their health” compared to “only 45% of the general U.S. population.”
Cancer psychologist Dr. Andrew Kneier helped co-author “Coping with Cancer: Ten Steps toward Emotional Well-Being.” He also co-authored a column published by Stanford Medicine with Rabbi Jeffery M. Silberman, director of spiritual care at Danbury Hospital in Connecticut. They offer more context to the impact faith has on cancer patients.
“A person’s faith or spirituality provides a means for coping with illness and reaching a deeper kind of inner healing,” Kneier and Silberman wrote.
“Coping means different things to different people: it can involve finding answers to the questions that illness raises, it can mean seeking comfort for the fears and pain that illness brings, and it can mean learning how to find a sense of direction at a time of illness. Religious teachings can help a person cope in all of these dimensions,” Kneier and Silberman continued.
WATCH: Turning to Faith During a Cancer Journey.
New York City Presbyterian Pastor Tom Evans previously spoke to SurvivorNet about the importance of finding ways to cope with the complex web of feelings you may be experiencing after a challenging health diagnosis.
“It’s important to reach out in a simple prayer to God, even if you’ve never prayed before, you don’t know what to say, a heartfelt plea, ‘God, help me, be with me,'” Pastor Evans told SurvivorNet.
“You can reach out to God, and you can reach out to people, your friends and, family, and say, ‘I can’t do this on my own. I need you.’ “It’s in that willingness to be open and to receive that we can find something deeper that we never would’ve encountered without this hardship,” Evans continued.
Losing a Loved One to Cancer
As John Schneider can surely attest to, grief is inevitable and essential when you’re forced to say goodbye to a loved one. There’s no one way to cope, but, in a previous interview, Doug Wendt shared his thoughts on the grieving process with SurvivorNet after losing his wife Alice to ovarian cancer.
Doug Wendt on Being a Caregiver and Tragically Losing His Wife to Ovarian Cancer
“We’re never gonna move on, I don’t even think I want to move on, but I do want to move forward,” Wendt said. “That’s an important distinction, and I encourage anybody who goes through this journey as a caregiver and then has to face loss, to think very carefully about how to move forward.”
Everyone’s journey of grief looks different, but therapy and support groups can also be wonderful options to explore. It’s also important to keep in mind that time does not heal everything, but it certainly helps.
In an earlier interview with SurvivorNet, Camila Legaspi shared her own advice on grief after her mother died of breast cancer. For her, therapy made all the difference.
‘Therapy Saved My Life’: After Losing a Loved One, Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Help
“Therapy saved my life,” Legaspi said. “I was dealing with some really intense anxiety and depression at that point. It just changed my life, because I was so drained by all the negativity that was going on. Going to a therapist helped me realize that there was still so much out there for me, that I still had my family, that I still had my siblings.”
Legaspi also wanted to remind people that even though it can be an incredibly difficult experience to process, things will get better.
“When you lose someone, it’s really, really, really hard,” Legaspi said. “I’m so happy that I talked to my therapist. Keep your chin up, and it’s going to be OK. No matter what happens, it’s going to be OK.”
Contributing: SurvivorNet Staff
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