← A Place of Yes | A Grief Podcast 
A Place of Yes | A Grief Podcast
What Life Looks Like After Losing My Husband to Brain Cancer
00:35:51
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- [00:02]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Why is this happening to you? Why is this happening to us? When you ask those questions of why, I think you will find that answer. And for us, it was, there was a reason why I wore a microphone every day, and there was a reason why he was a writer. We had to utilize the tools that we had in our toolbox and toolkit. And so we thought, well, we have to write something and we have to use the megaphone that I had every day to try to bring awareness so that we can inspire someone to maybe go into medicine and research.
- [00:36]
Heather
Welcome to A Place of Yes, a podcast about how I moved through my darkest hour. And for me, that was in channeling my grief into good. Welcome to the show. So today's episode of A Place of yes is an episode that I'm actually super excited about. Part of what we have done with this show is that we have opened it up across the country and we've opened it up with authors and with different people than just our local audience. And this is one of these episodes. It's one of these shows. I'm here today with Maria Quibon Weitzel, who those in Los Angeles will know as a broadcast meteorologist for Good Day la. She's also a mom, she's a widow, and she's the author of the book youk Can't Do It Alone. Welcome to the show, Maria.
- [01:26]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Thank you.
- [01:27]
Heather
Thank you for being here. And can you share a little bit about your story with my audience? Because I cannot wait to dive into all the things with you to talk all the things grief, to talk about your book and just to kind of share our stories.
- [01:39]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
First of all, thank you for having me on the show. Whenever I get to talk about my journey, whenever I get to talk about my late husband, Sean, it brings me to different places in my life. It brings me. Makes me sad sometimes. But ultimately it is such a healing time for me because it helps to heal my heart. So thank you so much for having me on the show. My story begins. It was back in 2014, very much in my happily ever after. I met my happily ever after, Sean, in 2003, and we just clicked. We decided to start a family. In 2010, our son Gus was born, and we just were living the dream that we had set out for ourselves. Sean and I decided we were going to go on this big trip to Paris. We'd never been. We figured Gus was old enough to stay home with my parents, and so we went on this amazing trip. But it was on this trip that I realized that there was something Wrong with. With my husband. And I couldn't figure it out. I thought maybe it was just lack of sleep, being tired. When we were going to Paris together, we were really looking forward to spending 247 together, just us alone. And it was there that I realized that there was just something wrong. He was complaining of headaches. He just was not the guy who planned our itineraries like he usually did on previous trips. He wanted to sleep in, and that was not him. I think what really threw me over the edge was when he forgot how to hail a cab. And this was a guy who lived in New York City over multiple years. And so for him to have forgotten and, like, really not get how to get a taxi, it really concerned me. So by the time we were at the end of this trip, I was crying and I said, honey, you have to promise me that you're going to see a doctor when we get back. And so he did. We got back two weeks exactly. And he got an MRI on his brain. And there they were, all these tumors inside the middle of his brain. And he was diagnosed with glioblastoma, the most aggressive form of brain cancer. It's terminal. And he was given just months to live. And our world was crazy after that. I don't think my life really slow down for years after that. I made a promise to my late husband that I would finish the book that he and I thought of writing, and that was to bring awareness to glioblastoma, to bring awareness to brain cancer and the lack of any cure for this disease. Not just that there was a lack of cure, but any real advancement in treatment. The prognosis is really three months to the average life after a diagnosis like this was several. I don't know, three to four months to, if you were lucky, maybe 12 to 14 months.
- [04:37]
Heather
You know, we had a guest on this show before whose father passed away from glioblastoma. And when I was reading your book, there were so many similarities. And it's so hard to kind of wrap your head around the fact that you notice these changes. And then, like you said, within two weeks, you're facing this battle like you're basically in war. It is. It's hard to imagine that this can just happen. And when you talk about. There's so much about your story that I resonated with. And one of those things is sort of, you know, you said you're kind of like in your happily ever after, right? Like, and in my story, right. I had gotten married to Brian, and this was kind of our. We found each other. So when you talk about Shawn, I sort of know that feeling, right? Of like, okay, this is what I was waiting for. This is it. We had two children. Jake was our second. And I remember almost having this real idealistic moment where I was like, here I am. This is what I've been waiting my whole life for. And it's almost as soon as you think that, then you open yourself up for this tragic heartache. So as I was reading your story, I was thinking back to my own sort of tragic heartache, right? Like, the goods and the highs are so good, and they're so high, and they're so beautiful, and. And then it's just like your legs are taken out from under you. One of the things that I think makes your book stand out a little bit differently is the style in which it's written. And you write in a really relatable way. But at the end of each chapter, you have these takeaways or summaries from Lauren Schneider, who is a grief therapist. I loved that because I feel that for people reading that, regardless of where they are in their grief journey, it just gives this little piece of, like, these little nuggets, right? Like the way it sums it up and like, these takeaways.
- [06:18]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
And I really appreciate that, because when I set out to write this book, I didn't know exactly how it was going to turn out in the end. Obviously, I know I wanted to write our story, but I also wanted to make this impact. Like you were saying. I wanted for people to take something away from it. I wanted it to be relatable in many different ways. And one perfect example was how to tell your child that his parent or his, you know, family member or loved one is dying or has been diagnosed with a terminal disease. It was so important to me to be able to say that I. There was no way that I could have done that on my own. And we were so lucky to have found some amazing therapists. And Lauren Schneider was not our main therapist, however, she worked in the same facility at the Our House Grief center here in Los Angeles. And Betsy, who was our therapist, had recommended her. And we met, actually, even before I had met Betsy. She was even around to meet my late husband before he passed away. So it was just a really unique situation. There's just no way I could do all those things without professional help, you know?
- [07:36]
Heather
And you opened the book with really, the story of Shawn had died and the conversation you had with Gus. And it's just they're young, and it's so much. You know, Jake died unexpectedly. He had a lot of medical challenges, but we didn't see it coming. So we were all sort of deer in headlights. I love that you, like, Gus was like, almost like your partner in this. Even though he was young, you gave him that the language and the space and all of those things. And I think that is so important. And you kind of referenced that sometimes people questioned if, like, he should attend the funeral. And we got those same questions. You know, after Jake passed away, Ethan was very involved. Like, he wasn't at all of the meetings, at the funeral and all of that, but he was at a lot. And prior to Jake passing, he wanted to come to, like, Jake's medical appointments. And I can remember like, it's yesterday. He would kind of sit there with his, like, hands folded and everything would clearly kind of be going over his head. Cause we were talking about big neurological issues and various things, but he just wanted to be there for his little brother. And. And I love that you gave Gus space and that you had a place for him in all of this. And honestly, it's early on in the book when you sort of share some of those things. But it was as I was reading it, I was like, okay, she's my people. Because I had those same conversations. And people mean well, but they sort of. They have judgment sometimes with that. Right.
- [08:58]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
All the time. And I think it's just human nature. I think a lot of times when people mean well, I know they don't mean to be hurtful. And as I write in the book, there's a lot of forgiveness that we have to have. Right. And a lot of grace for ourselves, but also for others. What was interesting in my story is that I had lived through something similar in that my own birth father had died in an accident when I was seven. So I remember clearly about some of the confusion that I went through and some of the scary days and moments, if you will. It was important for me and it was important for Sean for our son Gus to not ever feel those same feelings. And I think that's where it was coming from. And that was what was driving us, was to make sure that his health and well being was always first and foremost.
- [09:53]
Heather
And how old is gus now?
- [09:54]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
He's 14.
- [09:55]
Heather
14. Do you see a lot of Shawn and Gus now?
- [09:59]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yes. It's funny because just yesterday I was talking about that he was laughing and. And sharing a story with me. And by the way, I will talk about this later. And I'm sure some are wondering, but I do have a boyfriend now. And I was telling him, I said, look at that laugh. Look at that smile. It is exactly like his father. And it's so interesting how his mannerisms that are just developing. And it isn't because he's necessarily seen his father, you know, display all these things. It's just part of it is in the genes. It's. It's definitely in the genes, and it's. I love it. It makes me, of course, sad in some ways. You're always going to be in grief, and you're always going to have those moments.
- [10:43]
Heather
But.
- [10:43]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
But generally, I'm just. I'm just so happy to see those things.
- [10:47]
Heather
That almost gave me chills, because I know that feeling. Right. Like, that's just such a beautiful, like. And I can almost, like, picture you, like, catching him out of the corner of your eye, like, seeing him laugh and being, like, there, Shawn.
- [10:57]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
And.
- [10:57]
Heather
And you talked about it a little bit about that first time when you realized that you're gonna be happy again, because in the beginning, you just feel like you're never gonna dig out. Like, you're never gonna get out of this hole. But then, you know, you had. Went on. You went on a trip, I think, with, like, your son and family, and then all of a sudden, you were like, wait, I'm happy again?
- [11:13]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah. You recognize that those happy feelings are not completely gone, and you're gonna have those happy moments mixed in with all of it.
- [11:23]
Heather
And they coexist. Right. Like, it's like, I have had great experiences and moments and laughter and joy since Jake's been gone, but it also. It doesn't mean that the sadness is gone. It's just a part of who we are now.
- [11:35]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
It's something that we just don't realize until maybe we go through it. But you can have sadness and happiness at the same time. They can coexist, and it's okay.
- [11:44]
Heather
Yeah. So much of that is wrapped up in the beginning about, like, if they're not here, how can I be happy? Like, there's this whole thing and kind of freeing yourself from that. So I had this kind of. For later on, but I'm gonna skip to it now because you referenced a boyfriend you also referenced. And one of the things you wrote about. But you talk about when people would say, are you gonna get remarried? I read that, and I laughed out loud because my version of that was, are you gonna have another kid? Like, there's no answer to that. It would make me so kind of annoyed. Like, sometimes it made me irate. Cause I was like, what? You want me to just replace my child? Like, what is happening here? Other times I was like, even under the best of circumstances, that's a personal question, right? Like. Like, let's take death out of it. It's still. Like, you don't just randomly go up to people and be like, oh, hey, you're gonna get married again. You're gonna, like, have another kid.
- [12:34]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I know people do all the time and that. I mean, not even only that, but, like, immediately after Sean passed away, they said, you're young. You. You should definitely do it now. Do it now while your son is young. You don't want to do it later. Or if you don't do it now, then do it way, way, way later. So people are just so free to give, to give.
- [12:54]
Heather
And it's so. Because people would do that, they'd be like, oh, well, you know, you should. You know, you wanted to have two kids the same age. You should just have another one right now.
- [13:01]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
It's. Yeah, exactly. I figured it out that it's just a thing that people do. That's when I really just came to, you know, that place of acceptance of it in a way to forgive them if it offended me or hurt me in some way. I just. I kind of. I take it in for a second, and then I let it go. Because they don't mean harm. In fact, they actually mean well. They think they're trying to help, and they think that they're offering you some comfort in that way. But so I guess in that sense, it's fine. It's fine with me. And I've come to a place of. I'm okay with it.
- [13:38]
Heather
No, and I agree. I actually wrote down. And I do. I have a substack that I write. And I actually am quoting you in my next substack because it's something that I say all the time, but I don't always live by in the way that I wish I did. But towards the end of your book, you write, whenever someone is mean or rude, I forgive. We don't know what people are going through. And you kind of then go to. They might be having a cancer diagnosis. They might be taking care of someone with a terminal illness. Like, we have no idea. And I try so hard to live by that. I don't always do a great job. But I agree.
- [14:10]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I don't always do a great job either.
- [14:13]
Heather
But it's so important. I always come back to that because it's kind of this thing that we talk about sometimes in grief Right. Like, what do people say and what should they say? But at the end of the day, you're 100% right. The majority. The vast majority of people are not trying to be hurtful. I want to talk like, kind of switching to a few, like, little bit of bigger topics. But you talk in the book about your Seven Samurai. You talk about having that place where you don't feel judged and people who have walked in your shoes. And I didn't know if you could share a little bit about how you found them and the importance of finding them, because I think sometimes people feel they have to do it alone all the time.
- [14:52]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
You know, I was so resistant to it, actually, in the beginning. I kick myself sometimes now because I wish that I had gone even earlier to meet them. As women, particularly, we have this sort of mission to be independent and to do it all, to be career people, to. To. To still go home and get all that stuff done. And I guess I. I have that many people have that. And going through this harrowing disease with my. My husband at the time, I was like, I don't have time. I need to do this and I need to do that. And. And what am I going to do in a room full of people who are grieving and upset and sad? And so I just had this image in my mind, this predisposed image of something that I was completely wrong about. It just kept staring at me. The poster at the hospital where Sean would get his treatments. And I remember one day I was sitting there in the waiting room, and there was another poster that said, come to the support group, group. And this is just for caregivers of patients who have brain cancer. So I remember rereading it that day, and I thought, huh, so this is a support group just for the caregivers. For some reason, I think I had misread it. Initially, I thought it was for people who have brain cancer, and if you wanted to go because you were the caregiver, you could go. They're not. They weren't even allowed the actual patients. It was just for the caregivers of patients who had brain cancer. I remember the doctor, Sean's oncologist, and he goes, you should go. You should go to that. So I decided to go. And I thought, okay, well, let me just go and see if there's something that someone can share with me, maybe some treatment that we're not aware of. So I had a mission to find answers. And when I got there, it hit me really hard on a couple of things. One is that I Met the seven Samurai, what I like to call them, individually that night, and I'm so grateful for them. But they each shared their story and it was so uniquely different, but yet the same. I don't know if that makes any sense.
- [17:03]
Heather
No, it absolutely does.
- [17:04]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah, I thought, oh my God, I have a version of that on my own. And then each one I would ask about the treatments, I would ask about, you know, is there something that I haven't uncovered? And I really came to this sad realization and conclusion that there was not much out there for us. And I think that was why that support group was really important, because it was a really unique disease. Very specifically unique and different. I found out later that brain cancer is one of the least funded diseases, federally funded diseases out there. The research dollars that go into brain cancer is quite low. And that's part of the reason why there hasn't been any real major advancements in treatment or even finding a cure. And so I learned so much by going to this support group. And I remember going home feeling absolutely devastated, but also feeling heard and feeling like I wasn't alone.
- [18:03]
Heather
Did you feel a little bit like you could breathe again, like you could be not on all the time? Because I think so many times caregivers, whether it's your child or your husband, like when you become in that role, it's almost like you feel you have to be there all of the time, like you can't do anything else.
- [18:22]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
No one could understand truly what I was going through at home. As helpful as my family was, as helpful as my friend group and my village. And mind you, they all like went into battle with us. I mean, they just mobilized and they did so much for us. But they did, they went home. They had to, of course, had other lives, their own families. But they came and they helped whenever they could. And it was a huge help. But no one could truly understand. And so yes, I could ask anything and everything. And I know that I wasn't going to be judged, that there was never going to be a wrong question. Everything was on the table. And I know I could not have gone through what we went through without their help and guidance. They were the lamp posts for me. When you open your eyes, sometimes the answers are there. And it was just interesting to me how I met these people who systematically were truly ahead of me. I was the last in this group. I remember going through how the first one's spouse passed away in January, the following, and then subsequently each time someone spouse passed away. And then with mine in December, I just know that I would have been so much more terrified. And I was terrified already, but at least I had some lamp posts guiding.
- [19:48]
Heather
You weren't blindsided as much.
- [19:49]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
You were not as much.
- [19:51]
Heather
I love so much about that. I love that for you. You know, I talk about this sometimes in the show. Like, it's almost like I put a lot of my. I don't know what the word is. Like, not necessarily grief, but, like, trauma. Like, all of the things that you go through when someone is very sick and when you are the primary person sort of working to keep them alive. Like, I. When Jake passed, Ethan was still 5, and I just put everything into being his mom then. And there was a long path where, like, I. We certainly. We started the foundation. We did all of this work in Jake's name, but I don't know that I gave myself a lot of space to work through some of it, to feel the. Feels to sort of, like, I just kind of persevered. I just think it's so important to have that village, to have that group of people that can help you. Because once I opened up more to that, and some of that ended up for me, coming through the work we did in the foundation, because I can be. For those moms and families who are in the trenches that I was in, I can sort of be a little bit of a resource. I know that I'm a better wife. I'm a better mom to Ethan. I'm just a better friend, a better human when I am handling and taking care of that, as opposed to when I just have the blinders on.
- [21:05]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
That's why I wrote the book, too. I know some people are resistant to help in every form, whether it's professional help, which I'm a huge advocate for, mental and emotional support. I think that's the number one thing. Because that's why they're professionals. Because we are hard on ourselves. We are. We're tough on ourselves. And we. We have guilt. We have mom guilt on a regular basis on the best day.
- [21:33]
Heather
Right? Yeah.
- [21:33]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
And. And I do want to say this. I was resistant to it for a lot of it, especially in the beginning, but I kept going back, and I just kept saying, okay, what's the worst that can happen? It's not. It may not be that way for you. You may also not like it. But give it a chance. Keep going.
- [21:50]
Heather
And I love that you just said that. Cause that is also important, too. It's not always immediate, and sometimes it's not even the next day. But there are those gems that kind of come to you, and you're like, oh, okay. That's what I needed to hear. And I just can apply it now. We are approaching Jake's, what would have been his 19th birthday. So May 4th is his birthday. And this kind of will lead into the next kind of topic I want to discuss with you a little bit. But anniversaries, birthdays, they're all hard and they don't get easier. And one of the things that I have experienced sort of in my journey is I know they're gonna get hard for me, but I don't ever know when, you know, so sometimes I think, hey, I'm doing all right. His birthday's in a couple days, and yay. Well, cheers to Jake and it'll be good. And sometimes it's that day or it's after sometimes. I have had just. I've had a tough week this week. Like, I just have had a. I've made some mistakes that have been stupid. I have been, like, snapping at my husband. I've, like, been in my own way. And then a friend of mine this morning, I was just texting with her, telling her. I was like, oh, I can't believe I did. And she was like, give yourself a break. May 4th is coming up. It almost like her saying that made it click in my head. I almost instantly started giving myself grace. Like, I almost instantly felt better. I do. I think it's important for all of us, whether it's through, like, professionals or whether it's just those around us who are familiar with us, to recognize that the journey is hard and we're better together and to. You know, you said it sort of earlier too, like, but just give ourselves some grace.
- [23:17]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah. And you never know. I mean, after all these years, for me also, you can plan and prepare for those key dates because you know that that could be a trigger for you. But honestly, you just never know where. Where or when those triggers will come. And I embrace those moments now because to me, I look at it now as a bridge to them.
- [23:36]
Heather
Yeah, it's like a connection.
- [23:37]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
It's a connection. Yeah. So I embrace them.
- [23:40]
Heather
How I often choose to think about them. It's like a set aside time where, like, my only job is to think about them.
- [23:47]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I just want to do a quick aside because I love May 4th, the date. I just. May the 4th be with you. I mean, that's just our thing that we do every year. So I will never. Now you can think of Jake. I'll think of Jake.
- [23:58]
Heather
That's awesome. I love that. It's so funny because my husband is. He's like, he's got the shirt like May the fourth be with you. And he wears it every year. Yeah. Do you have traditions or anything that you do around birthdays or like that you and Gus do, or do you just kind of treat each year and see sort of what?
- [24:14]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Well, I mean, there are some key dates where we always do market Sean's birthday, definitely. And we have a tradition in our family to have a birthday cake, whether it's a cupcake or whatever. And we do one candle. And so we just always will light a candle, candle, no matter where we are now. You know, the first few years, obviously we would always just go to the cemetery, which is very close to our home. And. And we still go at any random time. And then when I'm there, I'm like, okay, Sean, you know, blah, blah, okay, let's go, let's go. And I just keep talking and. And it's just. He's always with us, no matter what. I look at going to the cemetery as sort of like an enclosed room and having a one on one, but I can have a conversation with him anytime, anywhere, wherever I am.
- [25:01]
Heather
One of the things I always ask people, and I think you've pretty much answered it, but I feel like there's two schools of people when it comes to their people that they've lost and it's whether they talk to them out loud or not. Like I talk out loud all the time to Jake.
- [25:16]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
All the time. I talk out loud. I talk in my head, but I mostly I talk out loud. I mean, unless of course, there are other people all around me. But generally when I want to have a conversation with him, I'll talk out loud.
- [25:27]
Heather
So one of the final things I kind of wanted to cover with you and I, and anything else that you, you know, want to share, I do want to talk about like the work you're doing for brain cancer and for glioblastoma. But you talk about, in the book, you talk about being there when Shawn had his last breath. At one point you wrote something to the effect of up to the last minute he was kind of in control and you were grateful that he chose you to have his last breath with or something like that. And to me there was something so beautiful about that, like. And I don't know if it's because I spend so much time kind of in the grief space or grief is so normal to me, like. But I just, I loved that.
- [26:07]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
So.
- [26:07]
Heather
So my father in law passed away in December. But I will say that because I think I'm so comfortable with grief. And also, you know, Brian, because of the loss of Jake or whatever, we. We were very comfortable being around him when he eventually. And it was becoming clear that. That it was. It was gonna happen soon. And Brian and I, at one point, we just each had a chair kind of in front of the bed. I was doing work on my laptop. He was doing work on his laptop. But we just wanted to share space with him. Like, we just wanted to be there. All of a sudden, we noticed that, you know, he was much calmer. And at first we're like, okay. Like, the breathing's a little easier. It's definitely not as he's calming down. This is good. And then we kind of realized that he had passed, and this is how we chose to take it. I was like, he finally, like, he knew that he was in a place that it was not like that it was okay to let go. Okay, it was okay to let go. And he knew that we believed that it was okay for him to let go. But it was really a beautiful. I look back at now as, like, I am so happy that I was there. I'm so happy we shared that space. I'm so happy I was there for my husband. I just think that, you know, I think people can look at that in such a, like, tragic way, but I also think it's such a beautiful thing.
- [27:19]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah, no, I agree. I think that. I think a lot of people don't talk about death very much. I think we live in a society that doesn't really talk about death so much. In other cultures, it's very common to talk about death to prepare for death. For a lot of people here, I think it is difficult to accept or difficult to figure out how to behave and how to act and what should I do and. And that's okay. I get it. But I do think we need to talk about it more. And that's why your podcast and ways to. To do this is, I think, a great idea. And discuss death with our kids and make it not be so unknown, because that's scary when it's unknown. So the more we talk about this, I think the easier it will be for people to be able to let go and say goodbye. For me with. With Sean and being there was such. Now, I hate to say the word gift, but there are gifts in that diagnosis that we got because we got a little bit of the knowledge of the timeline. Honestly, we don't know when we're all going to Go. We have no idea. I could have gotten hit by a bus. I could have been the first one to go before him, you know, but we did get that timeline with him. And we were able to, because of that gift of the timeline, able to do a lot of things that some people would never be able to have done, that I'm so grateful for that. And also the gift of being able to care for him in the way that I did. As hard as it was, I look at that as our love that grew into something that I never could have imagined. But during it, I found the joy, I found the love that we had. And it had grown exponentially into a place that I just don't think it. We would never have realized it had we not gone through what we gone through. And to have been there at the moment where he took his last breath, breath, that too, was a gift. I truly felt special and truly felt loved by him because I knew he felt safe and I knew he wanted me to be there. You know, after he passed away, I, I, it's not like I was looking to be in another relationship. We had discussions about what I would do after he was gone. You know, that's the thing about having a diagnosis like that. You can talk about so many different things. And we did discuss a lot of things, including the scenario of what it would be like without him. And I refused to talk about it with him, actually. And he would say, you know, I want you to share your life with someone. He said, because you're young and I know you so well. And. And he knew that I hated doing stuff for myself. After he passed away, I just felt so full. I think you can understand that feeling. I was full of love. I just felt. Felt full. Like I couldn't imagine seeking out any more love than I had. And so it was a long, long time. It was many, many years before I opened myself up again. And it was about five years until I went on a date, if you will. The whole way, I would talk to Sean about it, and I still, to this day, talk to him about it. And I said, you know, if you really want me to be with someone, you're going to just have to send it my way, because I'm not going to go out there and look for them. I'm not going to go to some bar or whatever or the dating.
- [30:41]
Heather
The whole apps. Yeah.
- [30:43]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Dating app. Yeah.
- [30:45]
Heather
And it's right before you said the word gift, I was thinking gift. And it, it feels like not enough of a word or it feels like kind Of a cliche. It's the only word I can come up with, too. And I talk about it a lot, and I always sort of preface it, but. And I. And I think you would say the same thing, right? Like, you'd give anything to not have. That had been the experience to have Sean with you, for me to have Jake. But the fact is, you can't undo that. And because of those experiences, it's almost like, you know, huge. And I know what you mean when you're filled with love, like, you know, huge love in a way that I don't know that I was capable of knowing before. It's such big love. You learn a part of yourself that you didn't know existed.
- [31:25]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I think you learn so much about yourself through this whole thing. Right. I mean, I know that I'm a completely different person than I was 10 years ago, you know, and what was.
- [31:35]
Heather
Important to you at that point and what is actually important to you now? Like, it just. Everything shifts.
- [31:41]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. Absolutely. I just have a different perspective and appreciation for so much more than I thought I could ever have.
- [31:50]
Heather
So before we wrap up, is there anything you would like to share with my audience about things they can do to support anything that you're doing for brain cancer, for glioblastoma? What can my audience do? What can we do to help?
- [32:02]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
For me, I know that even just writing the book was sort of my way of helping bring more awareness. My husband and I talked about it at the time, and it just. It became part of our purpose because we talked about, like, we asked the whys, you know, why is this happening to you? Why is this happening to us? And when you ask those questions of why, I think you will find that answer. And for us, it was. There was a reason why I wore a microphone every day, and there was a reason why he was a writer. And so we had to utilize the. The tools that we had in our toolbox and toolkit. And so we thought, well, we have to write something, and we have to use the megaphone that I had every day to try to bring awareness so that we can inspire someone to maybe go into medicine and research and research specifically. I'm hoping that. That the book can help you on your journey of. Of loss and grief and maybe even a diagnosis like this. So please share the book. I try to tell the people at work, you know, when you run into a story about brain cancer, I say, could you tag the story with. Brain cancer is still one of the most underfunded diseases out there for which there is no cure. So hopefully by saying that, that maybe if you wanted to donate to a charity and don't know who to donate to, maybe you pick brain cancer research or American Brain Tumor Association. So that's what I would ask from your viewers and listeners. Whether you're a man or a woman, young or old, black, white, Asian, whatever, it affects everyone and it's terminal. So I hope in my lifetime that there can be a cure found.
- [33:47]
Heather
We will definitely in the show notes certainly link both of those organizations because I think you're right. The more we share about it, the more we make people aware of it.
- [33:57]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yeah. Especially today. I know there's been a lot of cuts in federal funding out there and unfortunately this is on the top list of things to cut and it's already so underfunded and to lose more funding.
- [34:10]
Heather
Yep.
- [34:11]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
It really does break my heart.
- [34:13]
Heather
But we have a segment of the show that's called Ask Heather Anything. So we sort of flip it and put the, put the guest on the spot. So ask Heather anything.
- [34:21]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Oh, Ask Heather anything.
- [34:23]
Heather
Okay.
- [34:23]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
So Heather, I know that you are out there near Saratoga. Where is the best place to go and enjoy a great dinner?
- [34:32]
Heather
Well, I'm going to give you a few of my favorites. If you like Mexican food. Yes, there is cantina. It is right on Broadway. Excellent margaritas. We also have this great place called Hattie's. It is on Fileth street downtown. It is from, I think it was like 1938. And there's like kind of a cool backstory about like Ms. Hattie, who started it as sort of just a chicken shack. And they still use her original recipe for fried chicken. So those are two, I think, like classic Saratoga places.
- [35:03]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I love it.
- [35:04]
Heather
This is, it's a fun spot to be in the summer.
- [35:06]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Yes, I, I've seen, I've looked it up and I've done a little research because we definitely want to go.
- [35:11]
Heather
I will share a margarita with you anytime.
- [35:14]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
I'll meet you at the time.
- [35:15]
Heather
Perfect. Well, thank you so much, Maria, for being on my show. I have really, like I said, I loved reading your book and I have loved having this conversation with you. I appreciate you.
- [35:24]
Maria Quibon Weitzel
Thank you, Heather. I look forward to seeing you soon. I look forward to that margarita.
- [35:27]
Heather
Awesome. Thank you. Thank you for listening to A Place of Yes. Please follow us wherever you listen to your podcasts. If you really like this episode, please share it with a friend. It would make a world of difference if we could just reach more people people and share the work that we do and the stories we want to tell. Thank you so much for watching.