Whoopi Goldberg reveals she learned about coping with grief the hard way
Whoopi Goldberg has recently opened up that she learned the lesson grief the hard way after losing her mother Emma Johnson 14 years ago.
Speaking on CNN’s Anderson Cooper on this week’s episode of his All There is podcast, the View co-host shared her way of grieving was different.
“I couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t more devastated,” she said.
Whoopi told Anderson, “There was nothing left unsaid with us, so there was no angst to find.”
Reflecting on her mother’s demise, the Sister Act star pointed out, “That thing that I’ve seen in movies where I see people go through, I didn’t go through it because my experience was, ‘you know I adored and loved you, and you were the centre of my life.’”
“The same with my brother. We said it to each other all the time,” admitted the media personality.
Whoopi’s brother, Clyde Johnson, died five years after their mother, as he made her realise that she was the only one left in her immediate family.
“I don’t think anything can prepare you for actually being on your own,” stated the 68-year-old.
Whoopi recalled her mother’s hospital stay was “probably the best thing that could have happened for me because I understood instantly that nothing is forever. That was really good for me to know because it allowed me to sort of develop my thinking”.
Although the actress and host is herself a mother as well as a grandmother, Whoopi told Anderson she still thinks about how alone she felt after her brother’s death.
“The question of why did you leave me?” continued the actress.
She explained “There were three of us and now she felt lonely so much so she once flirted with thinking about leaving too.”
Whoopi admitted, “It was the thought of her own daughter that made her decide not to.”
The Ghost actress opened up that she’s in the stage of grief where she “found joy” in small things.
Meanwhile, Whoopi remembered her mother as she added, “If I can be half the person that she was, I will feel like I honoured her the way that I’d like to honour her.”
“She really was that beacon of light,” concluded the TV host.
