S5E4 Participate With Grief: Thank You, Cancer?

In this deeply moving conversation, Danny Leslie joins Matt to talk about love, loss, solo parenting, and the ways grief changes shape over time.

Danny reflects on the long road of Raf’s cancer, the heartbreak of becoming the one who had to carry impossible news, and what it has looked like to raise their daughters while keeping her presence alive in everyday family rhythm. He shares how writing, walking with a weighted vest, and choosing to “participate with grief” helped him move from hiding in pain to carrying it in a more honest way.

This episode also explores Danny’s book, Thank You, Cancer, a project that brings Raf’s own words into the story so her voice still speaks. Along the way, Matt and Danny talk about anticipatory grief, movement as healing, parenting kids through loss without pretending, and the strange but real shift when grief’s color begins to change.

Danny's Book Is Here: https://bookshop.org/p/books/thank-you-cancer-a-story-of-love-loss-hope-danny-lesslie/5c56725a213acdc6?ean=9798895140369&next=t&aid=120456&listref=guests-of-the-podcast-solo-dad-life

This is a conversation about brutal loss, fierce love, and the quiet ways healing begins — not by getting over someone, but by learning how to carry them with you.

Ready for more than just listening? Explore the CLIMB framework and support options at https://solodad.life/

Transcript

Danny 0:00

She, man, the 12 years that we shared, our marriage, our love, our kids, our family, that is a lavish gift. And I am eternally grateful for those years. If I never see anything else, I'm so happy for those years.

Matt 0:14

Right.

Danny 0:15

And how could I be mad?

Matt 0:31

Welcome to the Solo Dad Podcast, where we hold space and gather for widowers to share heartfelt, honest, and open stories of grief, their insights on navigating the journey after the death of their partner or spouse, loss, healing, and finding their way back to living again. I'm Matt Bradley, your host, and I am honored to join you as we explore the complexities of grief, the challenges of solo parenting, and the struggles of getting back to living, and maybe even some adventures of finding love again. Each episode we'll sit down with courageous dads who are bravely sharing their experiences, insights, and lessons learned along the way on this journey, sharing how grief has impacted them, their children, and their lives. We might have a crosstalk conversation with widows and widowers sharing their experiences, the similarities and the differences in grief and being a solo parent. Occasionally we'll have grief experts on to dive deeper into the understanding of grief and healing. So whether you're a solo dad or solo mom or a friend of a solo parent, or you're wanting to just understand more about this journey, you're in the right place. Don't forget to visit our website, solo dad.life, for more resources, episode updates, and to connect with our growing community. You can follow us on all the social media platforms, find our group on Facebook, look for us on Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and on a YouTube page. On YouTube, you can find more content and some behind the scenes moments. Just search the Solo Dad Podcast. And remember, don't forget to subscribe. Lastly, if you've enjoyed what you've heard or found it helpful or insightful, we would appreciate your support. Head on over to buymeacoffee.com slash the solo dad podcast to help keep the show running and fuel our mission of supporting solo dads everywhere and giving them a space to have open and honest conversations. Thank you so much for being here and let's dive into today's conversation. Hey everybody, welcome. Thank you again for taking time out of your day to listen to this conversation. Even though my editor tells me to stop doing this, I'm not going to. I always want to take a moment to thank a solo parent uh for coming on to this to have a chat and take time out of their day because I know our resources as a solo parent can be limited. So, Danny, I just want to thank you in advance for taking time out of your day, sharing, being willing to share what you're going to share with me, and then uh trusting me to hold the space for you. So thanks for being here, Danny.

Danny 3:16

Yeah, thank you. It's it's an honor.

Matt 3:18

Yeah, I appreciate it. Um I season five, you're gonna be part of season five. I'm trying to start season five with a new opening question that is a little deeper than how are you doing today. So I've come up with like, where is your heart today?

Danny 3:34

I'd say medium.

Matt 3:36

That's fair. That's a good answer.

Danny 3:39

I see joy, I see hope, I see um promise, I see the future, but the sadness is is still very prevalent, and so I I feel strung between the two. And there was a time where I couldn't see the joy, you know, and there there's there's you know, so the sadness is taking over. So uh it feels good. I say the the the color of grief has changed for me, and I really appreciate that. Um, and I'm I'm able at certain times to to just have gratitude for the experience that I had with my wife and our family. And in instead of being overcome by sadness, I I can actually say there's gratitude and excuse me, I'm able to laugh with my girls, and but there are also really hard times, of course. Yeah, and so I I I have both, I live with both, and um I I'm happy about that, but it's also you know, 50% of the time it's very sad.

Matt 4:41

So yeah, it's always lingering, and I love how you said it changed, the colors changed. That's a really good way to put it. I feel like I was um on an earlier conversation today. Uh you are how how far out are you?

Danny 4:58

Uh she died two December ago, so a year and year plus almost a year and a half.

Matt 5:04

I was I was telling this this person's inside of a year, and I was telling them, I was like, what's interesting about grief is early on when you look through the lens, even your good times are now they they feel weird, they're sad. And then and again, we both know there is no checklist in time. I wish there was. I wish I could tell you at month 12, you're gonna feel this way, and month 16, but that's not how it works. But I'm seven plus years out, and what's really been odd is if I take stock of where I was at like a year and where I am now, the good times the the brightness, the hue has changed. There is no sad doesn't touch it, and it's really more about sad about present and future, not even with the cancer, even and I look back and I go, I can't believe I got to be with this person. I can't believe we got to do all of these things together. I can't believe she was dumb enough to marry me. Like I can't I can't believe, right? Like I go, and it's because in the first year, there was no way, it was all just I'm sad, I'm sad. And so I love how you said color change. That's that's a beautiful way to put it, man.

Danny 6:02

Um, yeah, it's it's interesting. Sorry to make your own. No, you're good. I feel like a lot of because grief is not a super well accepted thing, like in the broader sense in society, I feel like people don't know how to deal with it. And I was super guilty of this at first. I think it, especially now, now that we're a little ways out, you know, people aren't comfortable with you hurting a hundred percent.

Matt 6:27

They're super awkward.

Danny 6:28

So there's just no, there's no fixing it, right? And and and so it's not because they don't care about it, it's just because they're not comfortable with it. So it just becomes interesting to go through it because you know, I don't know, it just it's still here and it's not going anywhere. And I always thought, you know, people say, well, yeah, you'll move on. Like, uh, you know, no, you won't. Um, I like to think of it as like you'll you'll move forward, right? There, there comes a time in in grief where instead of like for I think after it happens, or my experience was there's a time where I just wanted to be sad. I just wanted to be in that, and I had no ambition to to leave that place, right? I didn't I just didn't care about it, and I and I get that, and it's different for everyone. But there was a day where I decided the color changed and I wanted to move forward, and it's not dishonoring for where I've been or for what I have, it's just you know, it's honoring the gift of life, and and and it's and and I I really tangled with that for a long time. The like, you know, me having joy, me pursuing something else, me whatever, was that dishonoring to my marriage? And it's like it's not, it's just not. And but it took me a long time to sort through that like guiltiness of it, you know, that I'm still the one here, the survivors, the all of that, you know, it's it's it's your own personal intrinsic tangle that has to be, you know, it's like the extension cord, you can't get unknown. You're like, what is the problem?

Matt 8:05

Christmas lights, it's like a ball of Christmas. Christmas lights, yeah, that's better. Those kinds of things, except guilt and grief are such a nasty combination, right? It's a weird, like, you know, out of anyone who could you know move on with life again, it's like we we we we we we literally saw that relationship right all the way today, like we how we've earned it, but like it's a very odd and it's self-imposed, right? It's not you know, yeah. I mean, people can kind of make us feel guiltly, but it's our own like internal, like you said, internal entanglement. That's like, am I doing yeah? Um and Ford, I love uh it's Nora McHenry that gives that TED talk that talks about moving forward with, not on from. That's a great quote. Oh, I haven't heard that. Oh, I'll I'll send it to you. She's amazing. It's ain't it's been around a while, but it's fantastic, and that's basically what she comes up with. Um and it's a great quote. Um, and I I I love that because grief is something that we just learn to efficiently carry through our life. And but if you don't if you don't work through it like you were mentioning, or recognize, like you know, oh, I want you know these colors of grief are changing for me, not to not to deny that, um, because it's gonna allow you to move forward with whatever it is you want to do with this next part of our lives, right? Because we still have a life to hopefully live. Like, I don't want to not live it, so yeah, that's beautiful, man.

Danny 9:29

Think about like the the man that has been married for 50 years and that loses his wife, right? And he's in his 80s, and I think I think about this all the time. Because if I was that guy, I don't know that I would want to move on. Fair. I just I just may be like, you know what? I'm that's good. I I've I've had my run and and I don't want to and I can't.

Matt 9:51

I can watch some jeopardy and some wheel of fortune and enjoy my soup.

Danny 9:55

Yeah, and and I get that, you know, in my scenario and in your scenario, it's like, well, you know, we have kids, like we have like I I'm younger, and who knew who knows if I'm gonna live to tomorrow or the next day, but sure I have children, I have to show up, so it's a different story, right? But I can see the other side of the fence, like, oh well, I could also see not wanting to move on. So there is a bit of an active choice in there, yeah, that everyone kind of has to come to on their own.

Matt 10:21

Yeah, I'm in, I'm in there's a great group run on Facebook, and it's called Men Grieve Too, and and it's one guy that or maybe one and a half guys that admin this like 8,000 men only group, and God bless them. But there are a lot of typical widowers, right? We'll go age-wise, and they are just yeah, never gonna, you know, not gonna take the ring off, never gonna, never gonna remarry, have no intention to. And for a younger widower, you go like that doesn't, but then I realize that's that's my perception of them, not their own. And it's like if they're fine with it, great. And they're also wordings very different than in in the younger widow groups, which I think we're probably a part of a couple, where it's not hopelessness, I think it's more like you're saying, like they've just kind of accepted that this is how I'm going to do my life, where I feel the younger widowers they're struggling to accept the fact that they can find happiness again. Where the other on the when you're talking about the 80-year-old widower, right? He's like, Well, I was happy and I'm okay with this. And I think it's a different which is weird because we've both, if you write it on paper, we both had the same event happen. Our spouse died, right? And and usually when an event happens, there's like a we'll go like there's one solution to solve that problem. And with grief, there's just not. It it's so contextually dependent. In that kind of color changing, was there something you were doing actively that led to that? Or are like kind of what led you into that?

Danny 11:47

Yeah, there was recognition. There was a quote I heard, and it's Andrew Garfield says it, and I talk about it all the time because it changed everything for me. And he said, Um, grief is all the unexpressed love for the for the ones that we've lost. It's his and it was isn't a great interview he gives. Yeah, it's beautiful, and he lost his mom, right? And but I heard him say that, and he said um um unexpressed, and so what it was what it was referring to is like grief is actually a resource, right? It is love, it is it is this amount of love that we have, and and our person, like the receptacle of where we would aim the love, is now not here, and so it's confusing, right? It feels um stagnant, right, and and heavy, and all these things. And I heard that and I knew for myself, writing has always been something that's like turn the faucet on and like get the things out of me, you know, and and make sense of the mess inside. So I started writing, and it was came out as like poetry, and I was just trying to explain the mess inside. Um, but when I did that, and I started to post videos of RAF and I started to you know talk to people about memories, and and so I was still I guess aiming the love in that direction. It just you know, I she's not here, so it's almost like a surrogate, right? It's not yeah, it's it's yeah, but it was it was I started to feel like hey, like I feel like I'm building a bridge to something that I love, yeah, which was really cool, and then that led to me writing our book, and then um, which we always wanted to do, and we can talk about that later. Um, but then I also I started I come from a fitness background. I had a gym in Los Angeles, and so I knew I knew fitness was helpful, right? The the the connection of like physical to mental and and and emotional and spiritual is you can't deny it, right?

Matt 13:42

You cannot. I cannot agree more.

Danny 13:45

Yeah, so I started to um I was like, I need to get out of my house, you know, because I've like taught people how to move barbells for decades, and I was having trouble getting myself to like do anything. Like I it's not that I can't program for myself, it's like I couldn't get myself to do it. So I was like, I'm just gonna go a walk, like out in the sunshine, I'm just gonna go a walk. And so along the way, I decided to get a weighted vest. And the the alchemy of wearing a weighted, putting on a weighted vest, walking, sweating, getting home, taking the thing off, was like I felt like I was like taking a spoonful of grief and and being rid of it. There was this real interesting thing um that was happening there. And every time I got home, I felt physically better, but I also felt like my spirit felt lighter. And so what I started to do was I started to focus my grief, let's say, on my writing and on this weighted vest walking. And I was like, I'm going to like laser focus grief into those two, I call them containers, areas of my life. And what I started to find out was that when grief would show up, the wave of it that you can't control, yep, uh, I wasn't like hiding from it. I was like, oh hey, how are you? You know, like it was it was a different relationship because I had decided to participate with it in my own way. Say that again. That's actually really good. So I had started to participate with the grief. So I or you can say like grief is to me is like it's like loud music playing in your house and it won't turn off. Yeah, it's like it doesn't really matter what the song is, like it doesn't, you don't have to like it, but it's playing. You could dance to it, you could clean your house to it, you could you could move your body with it, and that's what I look at the containers is like I'm just participating with grief. I'm dancing to the music that I've been given. It doesn't have to mean I have to be joyful and like Samba to you know my my tears, but you know what I'm saying? Like you're participating, and and and when grief is the worst, I was hiding.

Matt 16:00

I was not participating. It's interesting you brought up the movement thing because I have been wrestling with beginning we're both dads here. I believe that there's a portion of the male grief population that already wasn't moving enough. I'm using general words, right? For sure, and then grief hits and they're they're really not moving enough. And something in the male very, very yeah, I yeah, I'm trying to image. Listen, I I don't move enough as it is either, but because I realized some of the greatest grief cries I had was after the time I lived outside Chicago, and I was part of like a lifting group because I can pick up heavy things and put them down. Um I would I I could not get to my car fast enough after a workout because I would just ball. Yeah. And then I would and then I'd be like, oh, all right. And I love how you put it's so good, man. The way you just put that frames it so well with that workout period of my life of I think I was participating with my grief through those workouts. Yeah, that is really cool, man. That is really cool.

Danny 17:12

Yeah, because here's the deal it's gonna participate with you.

Matt 17:16

Yeah, well, the yeah, the way I love how you say participate. I may have to steal a let me know how much I owe you for stealing that. Um, because I think what I used to say, yeah, yeah, yeah. You just let me send me a pill. It'll be fine. Uh, we'll do a quarterly invoice. Um, no, but like I used to say, like, you have you have you have little kiddos, we'll get to that in a minute. Um, did you ever read the Bear Hunt book with them? It's probably been a minute. Yeah, it's a joke. My wife loved that book. Oh, it's a great book. I use it for grief all the time. I'm like, you can't go around it, you can't go over it, you can't go under it, you gotta go through it. If you don't let your grief participate, if you don't participate, I used to say deal with it, but if you don't participate with your grief, it's gonna show up. It's gonna show up when you get real mad and break something, it's gonna show up 10 years later when you realize you married the wrong person. You're it's gonna show up one way or the other. And I'm like, it because all emotions demand to be expressed. And grief, like I love, I love and I do I really like Andrew Garfield's thing. Did you ever see the Keanu Reeves one? That's another great quote.

Danny 18:20

Oh, yeah. The people that loved you will miss you. I'm like, well, it was funny too. Like the whoever whoever asked him that, I don't figure it out.

Matt 18:30

I'm pretty sure it's Stephen Colbert again. I'm pretty sure it was.

Danny 18:33

Whoa. Yeah, you can tell he was like not expecting that.

Matt 18:36

He was not, and only Keanu Reeves could deliver it that way, right? Anyone else that would have been F, but it is K. Anyway, but I really like how you said participate with your grief. And it goes back to even it touches on the fact that um some of the training I've done through my grief stuff is David Kessler talks about how we have a grief illiterate society where our society just doesn't know what to do with it, especially because it's not something like so many things in life, can't really be fixed. You just gotta you gotta deal. I mean, and when I say fix, it's not to be repaired. Like I like the participation part, but that's not fixing, that's participating. Those are two very different words.

Danny 19:12

I really like that, man. Because I people don't understand it, and I was one of those people, I full fully admit to it. But they also care, they do. So as a griever, it seems like you're on an island that is constantly floating further and further away from the mainland because of the thing you're carrying that no one understands. The problem with that is is that everyone does actually care. Yes, I feel like no one cares. See what I'm saying? Like, yeah, there's that that conversation that's happening, that no words are being said, that it's like we are fully misunderstanding each other. Correct. Because everyone's like, Well, I I would love to help. Uh I, you know, like it they care about you. And there's like the the the languages just don't they don't mesh. Correct. Yeah, it's it's a like that's one reason that I speak about it. Yeah, is because man, I wish I would have listened to things that I say before I got here. I don't know if I would have listened, right?

Matt 20:12

But at least there would have been words, words used, right? Wow. I so okay, so you're doing the workouts and you're working out and you're working it out through your writing. Did you have like kind of an aha after like on like eight workouts and carrying the vest, or was it just kind of a like so many other things in fitness, all of a sudden one day you realize oh, I can pick up something heavier now?

Danny 20:32

Was it just through the process, or you mean going from like walking to wearing a vest?

Matt 20:38

Yeah, or like was there just like all of a sudden like you had a big aha moment of like wow, I'm actually participating with my grief and the colors have changed because you're and you were doing two things, so I don't want to negate the writing because that's a huge one too.

Danny 20:52

Yeah, so the writing I knew that that writing for me was a a pathway to um let's say it had been privy previously heavy life, right? Let's say clarifying the chaos, right? Yep, love that so I knew that was there, so I that's why I started there, and then um the walking, I just knew that like, hey, if I'm gonna go walk, like I'm gonna make myself heavier because I know like because fitness-wise, like it makes more sense, right? And I and I and I didn't have the worry of like could I handle this? I knew I could handle it, so I was like, I was like, yes, I'm just gonna get the vest, and that just began uh as one. But it was in that, it was in the rhythm of of the walking that my creativity came back.

Matt 21:39

Oh, okay.

Danny 21:40

Well like 46 days in. You know, I mean, not not the beginning, it was I remember it. I remember when it happened, I was walking, and this I had been doing it for over a month, and I was like, oh, it was like a light turned on. I feel creative again. But it was the the pursuits were irrelated. Right. It wasn't, I wasn't like, I want to feel creative again. I'm gonna do it.

Matt 22:03

It was an unintended consequence. Right, right, right. I got you.

Danny 22:09

Love it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that was um, and and I know this to be true of fitness, that it is it yields so much more than just a physique, right? It's not it is so much more than that. Um, you're keeping promises to yourself, right? You're you're worth it, like all these things, right? And so um it just happened, I just found it again in a different season of my life.

Matt 22:36

Yeah, yeah. Tell me about the book. Tell me about what the book was going to be for you, and you say Raf, right? Was your it's the short version of your wife's name. Yeah. Um, uh, what book was it that you and Raph wanted to write? And then what book tell our folks who are listening, what book did you wind up writing?

unknown 22:57

Okay.

Matt 22:58

It sounds like they were kind of it started and then life happened, and so we'll kind of circle.

Danny 23:02

Yeah, so in so Raf got diagnosed in 2020. Okay. And and and we from the very beginning were we're speaking about it like on social media, just to get the word out, and and we had to raise money and all these different things. Um, so we started talking about you know, having a podcast, because like I have a point of view, and she has a point of view, and they weren't the same. Like she she had her own ideas and I have my own ideas, but we were aiming in the same direction. So we were like, we should we should do a podcast, we should write a book, we should, you know, like a dual perspective look at this journey. You know, it's parenting, it's marriage, it's it's cancer, it's it's all it's faith, it's all these different things. Yeah, yeah. There's so many, and when you you know, if I tell you a story from one point of view, I could do a good job of telling a story, but if there's me and another person, as the viewer, you're seeing like angles that you wouldn't that I could never give to you as a single human, right? Correct. So um, so that was our idea. We always talked about it, we never got there. Um, her health just you know went down, and obviously there's so many things going on, and our story is wild. Um, so we've never got there. Um, so after after she passed, um I don't know, maybe a month or so, uh I started to write. And and I just started to write because, like I said, I knew it would get some of the chaos out of me, and I needed to, I needed a release, like I needed to like let some air out of the tire, you know? And I started writing and posting videos, and I was actually writing poetry, which is weird because I don't I've never done that before, but that's how it was pouring out of me. And then in that time, I think it was when my creativity came back, like I spoke about earlier. I remembered the book and I was like, okay, so dual perspective was the jam, right? I was like, how do we do this? Because she's not here to give her perspective. Um, but I looked back at all of her entries over the course of um her being sick. So she had like four or five years of of entries, Instagram posts, different things, right? And she was telling her own story. And so I was like, all right, maybe I could take those and compile them and lay them into a timeline, and I could effectively have her telling a story, right? So I did that, and it was it was a story, but it was very sparse because you know it was these like these very, very focused moments, and so I had written during the whole time too, and so I took mine and put them in there. So then you've got Oh, that's beautiful.

Matt 25:31

Okay, yeah.

Danny 25:32

She's got her voice, which are her unedited words that are in the book. Um, I didn't edit them, they're in bold print. Um, you've got my words that are edited, um, but they're still from these are like in the moment accounts. Like she had surgery last week. What's going on in our life right now in this snapshot moment? Those are all of those entries for both of us. And then there were still holes in the story, like you couldn't quite get it together.

Matt 25:58

So yeah, because it's not, it's not she didn't post, she wasn't posting day to day of these are my running shoes I put on today. Right, right, right.

Danny 26:04

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I went back through as a narrator in present time, and I wrote, I filled in all the gaps, and like, okay, this part we need a little bit of context, we need to say where we were, all these things. So I did that, and that then came to tell the story. So what you have more or less is uh like an informal storytelling session. So like if the three of us are sitting around a campfire and we're we're telling our story to you, um, there's no he said, she said. It goes from normal font to bold font. And so, like if she picks up a section, it just goes to her talking. That's so awesome, man. Yeah, so it's like us both telling a story. Um, and there were there were so many moments in our story where um something uh out of our control happened, supernatural happened, it was miraculous. This thing, so we started to call those Jesus moments, and there are so many of them. So I'll show you in the book.

Matt 27:00

Um don't give it all away, and we'll say the title. Um, so because the link will be in the show notes, everybody.

Danny 27:07

This dark spot is is a Jesus moment. Oh, it's beautiful. These bold words. Or her, and then the regular font is you, and then just normal font is my font. So if and then at the end of every Jesus moment, there is a piece of scripture that refers to what happened. So effectively, you have three voices telling a story. So you have Rafi's voice, who is not here anymore, that can tell her own story. You have my voice, and then you have God's voice, all that's beautiful, man. Wow, yeah. So it came out. I'm so um humbled and uh that it was able to come together, and so proud that it was able to come together. And sure it was um, you know, it it's interesting. Um, when your person dies, a um it's not interesting, it's terrible. Um, a forever timeline ends and and everything goes away, right? Your dreams, your hopes, all it's all it's all gone, right? Yeah, and this allowed me to reach back in and check something off, which is very, a very rare moment. And in fact, the book arrived to my house, so the way that I published it, I had them printed and sent to me. Yep. So August, we we were in Italy last summer, we spread her ashes uh in the Adriatic Sea, which is where they went as children. Um, we got home August 5th, the books arrived at my house August 6th. Wow. And then two months later, I found a journal of hers, and it said on February 6th, 2022, she wrote Dreams and Visualizations. Danny and I are speaking about our book that we wrote about our experiences on interviews.

Matt 28:49

Get out.

Danny 28:50

Yeah, so I checked off a dream and a visualization for her that she had written in in 22. I didn't know about the journal, I found it. Wow. So that was a huge moment. Yeah, and I mean it was like breakdown in your kitchen type, you know, deal. And it still gets me. I mean, it but it was so profound because there in so many instances, I feel like, especially when when your person dies, um, that's your she's she was my sounding board for my decision making. And so in my own mind, there is the inner critic that is very loud in grief, by the way, in my experience. And ever since I started writing the book, the inner critic was saying things like, You're not doing this right, it's not gonna be good, you know, like all the all these just just like uh vomit, it's gross. And and in that moment, that that reading of that of that journal was like it was like the sledgehammer that put that voice to rest.

Matt 29:55

It was like this is so powerful, it was a dream, yeah.

Danny 29:59

Because our minds are weird in that they they cater our stories to our experience to to our lives. Like if you if if you and I were in the same room 10 years ago and something happened, your story and my story would be different.

Matt 30:12

Correct.

Danny 30:13

It's the neither one is black and white, they're both flavored with our own.

Matt 30:17

I always love there's there's three sides to a coin. There's your side, my side, somewhere in the middle, there's the truth. And I'm like, someone's like, There's three sides to a coin, that's part of the joke, but yeah.

Danny 30:25

Yeah, so I started to like I was I was sitting there and and in this inner thing is this inner chatters going on, I was like, was this our dream? I know it was. I know you know, I was like, Oh, I was battling with myself, and so not only did you get the checkmark. I have the book, it's already done.

Matt 30:41

It's already it, but you not only did you get the check mark, you got the confirmation of the check mark because of the journal entry.

Danny 30:46

Yeah, was your guys' to the to the to the mess up? It was a mess up, right? Yeah, and I got the confirmation, I was like, all right, put that to bed. Like, and so that was really uh I I feel very fortunate to have had that experience because yeah, I mean, you know, writing a book is not easy, publishing a book is not easy. There's a lot that goes into it, and to have done the whole thing and still have this inner critic beating you to death was like this is what is going on.

Matt 31:13

I used it was interesting. I I I wish I would could write faster, but you said something about uh your forever ended, or what was it?

Danny 31:21

You said something about when your person dies, a forever timeline ends.

Matt 31:24

Thank you. So how I was words word vomiting this was it was like you're now for kids back at home, they used to have movie reels that went real to real, so there was a thing, it wasn't digital, but anyway, it was like someone you're watching a movie, someone ripped the reel out and the screen went white, right? Like so it just it just and then it's like there's a quote from a song that was uh I didn't write the script and someone rearranged all the pages. It was like, yeah, like all like I'm still here, the character in this movie's still alive, but where did Gandalf go? He's just gone, like in Lord of the Wings, and it's very but I love your forever timeline because you had all the like we were I don't know about what you and Raf are gonna do, but we were supposed to like get an RV and torture our tween children that weren't born yet for you know going to see the world's largest ball of twine. That was our forever time.

Danny 32:10

We did that for our young kids.

Matt 32:11

See, I would what I still I'll still do it to mine. Um, but but like you I love how you said the for I'm gonna that's another one I'll borrow. Um steal, yeah. Invoice me. Um the forever timeline. And then the set the inner critic thing's a fascinating one. I'll have to marinate on this because what's interesting for me is part of the reason I the joke I use is I have a face I have a face for podcasts, and I have I I write I can't well, how does it go? Oh yeah, I have a face for podcasting, so I shouldn't be on a screen, and I have a voice for print, but I can't write worth a damn. Right. Oh I can't. Oh, so here's a podcast. Um yeah, the inner critic's an interesting thing because I have the same I have the same thing about what we're currently sitting doing right now. I go, like, well there's dumb. So there's why am I doing that?

Danny 32:54

There are the events of our lives, right? Yeah, that are effectively black and white. Now we influence them, I mean, to a certain extent, but like losing someone you can't influence that, right?

Matt 33:02

Right, it it is already it's an event that happened, yep.

Danny 33:05

And there are the things we tell ourselves, yeah.

Matt 33:09

And there's the things that like that come into our head, like like I would what's that? There's some great coaching out there that says, like, would you ever tell what you hear in your voice to any human on the planet? You're like, no, never, I'd never be that big of a jerk, right? But somehow we just beat ourselves up sometimes. Well, that's so that is so beautiful. So you came back September 6th, and so it just hammered home the point that yes, this book was always meant to be written in some form or fashion.

Danny 33:35

I knew like I knew in my heart of hearts that I was doing the best that I could and I was doing the thing that we had always spoken about, right? Right. I knew that I I I knew it, but there's always that that critic, man, and and when you're when you're hurting in whatever realm, you know, facet of your life you're hurting in, that voice is a little bit sharper. Yeah, you know, you're not you're not firing on all cylinders, and it this this happens in grief for sure, yeah. And it's like you already have a negative tilt on life, like you already have it, and and so you know, the stories that are going through my head are more negative, right? And I'm already feel bad. Like I wake up feeling like I'm drowning, you know. It's like, yeah, so something negative doesn't take long for me to you know go completely negative, you know.

Matt 34:28

So it was yeah, it's like a battered going to our both of our wives had cancer, it's like a battered immune system, right? It's it's you you are just you just don't normally can fight half a head cold, but if your immune system shot to crap because of chemo, bed cold doesn't isn't just a head cold anymore, and we just are emotionally depleted. Um and grief is not isn't grief is not something fun that's that I don't know anyone well. I mean, we turn I like again so someone else says like there's not meaning in our people getting cancer and dying. There's no finding, but we can find our purpose in it, right? I think yours is to write the book, mine is to do this, and so you can turn grief into something, but grief is not inherently positive. I would never I would never tell someone, you know what, you know what's really gonna help you with your life, just go have some grief.

Danny 35:15

Yeah, I think it's our you really grow from it. Yeah, it's our it's our body trying to deal with it, right? Yeah, and it's trying to figure it out. And the thing that was the hardest for me is like accepting that I had a choice. Like there is a choice. Like what regardless of like what you want to say, like there always is a choice, like you can choose to move forward, or you can choose to stay where you are. Like either one is a choice. Yeah, like you can choose to stay in your house today, or you can choose to go outside your house today. Yeah, but they're choices, neither one is bad or like they're just choices. Now there are consequences to all of our choices. Love that.

Matt 35:57

And consequences gets a really nasty rap, and it's not, it's it's the it it it just is. Like it's like you can't have your cake and eat it too. There's consequences.

Danny 36:06

Well, like with kids, so like kids, for instance, like we um co-slept with our kids. We did not sleep train our kids. Now, the consequence now is that the kids come into our my room almost every night, right? Which this is a consequence. Now, I think that their attachment style is is better now because we did this. Yes. But the consequence is that I get they come in every night, you know. So it's like, what are you doing? You know, it's like, well, if I would have slept trained them, then they wouldn't bother me.

Matt 36:37

It's like, yeah, true, true, but there's a consequence to that as well. Right.

Danny 36:42

It's like there's no good or bad right there.

Matt 36:45

Yeah, it's very, yeah, it's very it is, right? Which I which is I think too many times people try to apply like there's a like it like consequence is always bad. It's like, no, the consequences for working out are not bad, like they're great consequences for working out. They're a consequence to eating pizza every day. I can tell you that much. Yeah, there's all good things about it. It's really ugly pizza, but it's not good for you. Um, before we get too far away from the book, what is the name of the book?

Danny 37:09

Uh, the book is Thank You Cancer.

Matt 37:12

That's an interesting title. How did you land on that?

Danny 37:14

There's a comma right there.

Matt 37:16

I see that.

Danny 37:17

Um, I will not tell you how we landed on that.

Matt 37:19

Is that an Oxford comma?

Danny 37:21

Yeah, I will tell you that there's a very good reason for it. Yep. Um, and I would explain it to you, but a better way to explain it to you is for you to have the context of our story.

Matt 37:31

Love it.

Danny 37:31

So otherwise, it's it's just not doing itself justice. And I realize like it is a polarizing title. I know that.

Matt 37:38

Well, I love the title. I don't think it's I think it's fantastic.

Danny 37:41

Well, it's a great it would you gotta read the book. I'm not telling anybody.

Matt 37:45

No, I appreciate that. Okay, so the the answer to the book, that's fine. So let's you said contextually quickly, um, we don't have to go into too much with especially with the book, but when did the when did you and Raf become a we? How did you all meet and when did you kind of know that this was gonna be your forever timeline person?

Danny 38:04

I moved out to California in 09 to start a gym. Yep. And in the process of that, we uh uh uh a buddy of mine and I started a a program in the park. Like if you've ever been to Santa Monica, California, beautiful place. There's a hundred-foot bluff part of the city. There's a hundred-foot bluff that overlooks the Pacific Ocean. It's got towering palm trees, it's just beautiful. It's a park. Um, you can park your car right there, walk out a path, tons of people, dogs, and everything. So we decided to take barbells out there and teach people how to lift. Uh so we did that for about two and a half years before we got to the gym space, but it was one morning uh Raf came to class, and uh she walked up, and something was different about her. There was, you know, there was this awkwardness in the air. And I've talked to people that were there that day, and they were like, it was obvious something was happening. Sure. Um, and and she, when she pulled up, she parked right along the park, so I could see her car. And um, she had this little gray sign, and there's a baby seat in the back. And I was like, oh, I was like, she's like she's spoken for, she has a kid, she has a husband. But like I was like already so her right, yeah. Um so in the course of conversation, I was nonchalantly said something about the baby seat. Yeah, and she was like, Oh, yeah, I have a daughter, and apparently, whatever happened to me physically, like my face went white, or I you could tell she knew that she got me, and and and I was just she starts cracking up, and her laugh was unbelievable. And then I started laughing because she got me so good, and it was like that moment, her wit, she was so fast, and um and that was it, man. It now there was some other events over the course of time, but of course uh we were you know, we were dating, I don't know, maybe six or eight months later, and then it was I mean, we went on our on our first date and it was like, okay, when are we having kids? I mean, it was yeah, there was no yeah, she's my person.

Matt 40:03

That's beautiful. So dated for a bit, get married, and then we dated for dated for a year, engaged for 10 months, married. Married. And then um for 10. You you you eventually did complete having children. And so uh what are the we have two daughters and then yeah, well, you said like first date, you're talking about when we have kids. Well, you you got around to it eventually. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um I mean eventually. What um uh uh because I'm trying to do a little bit better job of kind of being vague about some things for personal privacy reasons. Um, how old are they? How old were they when uh Raf died?

Danny 40:47

Uh eight and ten.

Matt 40:48

Okay, eight and ten. Uh and you're just over two years. Describe, share, tell um the day that your guys' lives was altered forever.

Danny 41:02

Um so this was August of 2020. Okay. And we at this time in our lives, where I'm managing a ranch, you know, a couple hundred cattle, hundreds and hundreds of acres, trapped. In Santa Barbara? I'm just kidding. No, no, no. We had we had moved from California back to the Midwest. You're kidding. I was like, wow, I didn't I've been to Santa Barbara, I don't remember seeing heads again. Yeah, yeah, no. So I I'm managing a ranch. We awesome, you know, we haven't heard of alpacas, we have a coffee trailer, we have put it on.

Matt 41:31

Oh, you're doing all the things. I love that. Oh, that's fantastic.

Danny 41:33

Homestead life. We have an RV, we had like life was amazing. Little kids, so busy. I'm out on the ranch every day. Rap's home with the girls, homeschooling them, um, taking them to events and things. And uh she goes, She's like, hey, babe, I have a growth on my vulva. Said okay. And so, well, let's let's go to the doctor. So we scheduled an appointment to go to the doctor, and the doctor said, You need to have this removed like now. And so we were like, Okay. So we, you know, a surgery maybe the next, I think it was like that was I think a Thursday or Friday or something. So the surgery ended up being like Tuesday, something like this. And um, and that was all we knew.

Matt 42:14

Yeah.

Danny 42:15

And we go into the surgery, and she goes back, and I'm in the waiting room for a couple hours, and that's a horrible experience. If anyone's ever been in a waiting room waiting for your wife to have a big surgery, yep. Um, and the doctor finished the surgery and says, Mr. Leslie, we want to meet you in whatever room. So I go into this room, there's a couch and deal, and and she goes, Okay, the surgery was successful. Um, we did what we call a radical vulvectomy, which there was a vulvectomy and a radical vulvectomy, which is like the radical one's the bigger one, the bigger, batter, take off more tissue ones.

Matt 42:47

Yeah.

Danny 42:48

Um, which is not a good thing when you're the person providing tissue. Um so she says, I believe I got clean lines. Uh it was a cancerous lesion. Oh gosh.

Matt 43:01

Oh boy.

Danny 43:01

And I was like, like, what did you say? Because we we hadn't spoken about cancer.

Matt 43:06

We it did not come up at all, right?

Danny 43:09

It wasn't on our bingo card, like I just hadn't thought about it.

Matt 43:12

Yeah.

Danny 43:13

And so I'm sitting there just like shocked in this chair, and and I was like, Okay, well, are you gonna tell Raf? Because she's recovering from surgery, so she's gonna be hours before she's with it. And she says, No, you are. I was like, What do you mean? I can't answer questions now. Looking back, if I'm not personally involved, I realize that Rafi's not gonna come to for five or six hours. So the doctor's not gonna wait there for six hours to tell her, but also is like, is there another better way to do this? You know, like in my mind.

Matt 43:47

So anyway, like a singing clown we can send in. Yeah, I don't know.

Danny 43:52

Something, man. Can we just like meet you next Tuesday and together? I don't know. Like something.

Matt 43:58

I yeah, I agree.

Danny 43:59

Anyway. I have this bomb that I'm holding on to, terrified. And Raf wakes up from surgery. That was about two in the afternoon. Finally got her home. We've about an hour away. About 8:30 that night was when she ended up coming to and like waking up. We're her family's all at our house. Our kids are there. My family's there. No one knows. They've all asked me what happened to the surgeon. I was like, I don't know. I haven't told anyone because I'm obviously going to tell Rafi first.

Matt 44:27

Yep.

Danny 44:28

And um, and then she goes, So what what did the surgeon say? And I and I, you know, I had to just sit down and tell her that it was cancerous. And I mean, I wouldn't sign anybody. It was you know, she's coming to me for support and and love and protection and and like I got a dagger to give to her, you know, like it was oh man, it was so hard. And and then our life exploded. And it was goodbye to you know, we had um, like I said, we had heard of alpacas. We had had one alpaca that was born to us two years previous, and that alpaca had grown up to be two years old, and we had bred her, and she was gonna have a baby, and we were so excited about that, and then that alpaca died. Oh, good lord, and that about like because we'd had RAF's diagnosis, we lose this alpaca who we all loved so much. That about killed me. We sold her to alpacas, we sold the coffee trailer, we sold the RV, she was like letting go of dream after dream after dream that we were living at the time. We're living our dreams now, we're letting them go. For this like firestorm of cancer that we didn't even know it was coming. I mean, we we had no idea. Yeah, you know, she passed at the end of 24. This is 2020. So we've got all these years, you know, that that thankfully we had gotten rid of these things, but man, we didn't know anything. We had no idea. And um wow, yeah.

Matt 45:56

It's gross, man. It was so bad. You know what's interesting? We so uh my wife had colon cancer. Uh uh, it was diagnosed a roundup, but 86 days after our daughter was born. So she went for a colonoscopy, and we had at least I can guess one of the top worst doctors to have to ever deliver news on the planet. He should he actually no longer practices, and he like throws the thing at us and goes, like, yeah, it's a massive tumor, you need to go see somebody, and then just like walks out. Yeah, that's my memory. It may have not been that bad, but that's what you said, that's my perspective. It was not good. And then what happens is uh she had like a reaction, and so she wound up. Uh, we had to go to the ER. Uh, she had a fever spike or something. I mean, so we go to the ER, and then we wind up in the hospital. And kind of like what you dealt with, I didn't realize this time because first rodeo for me, when no one comes into your room, it's not good, right? So we sat in this quiet hospital room and the nurses started to stop coming by because then the team of doctors came in, they'd done all these scans and the stuff, and they tell us it's stage four, it's everywhere. Same thing. They're like, you need to have a port put in. And they're she's like, Oh, like after Thanksgiving, because it's like early November. They're like, No, like on Tuesday. Yeah, they're like, Yeah, we're scheduling it now. We're like, What's happening? Um, yeah, but what was the other part? Was all of her French, an amazing tribe of women, still do, they're like aunts to my daughter, um, were calling to check on her, and we were just lying because we're like, we need to figure out what the what and so it was I'll go a couple months later. One of her best friends would call her Aunt Kiki. She has this epiphany, she's like sitting with us, hanging out, whatever. She goes, wait a minute, when we were talking on the phone, you guys knew. Yeah, she goes, So you lied? And we're like, We kind of had to because we we did it, like it's a and so you're whole, it's like you're right, you're holding this bomb in. It's almost like a scene from a cartoon where it explodes and then it like you know poofs out of the thing or whatever. So it's already exploded, and you're like holding it in, just telling everybody, no, that's fine. What I don't it's working, yeah. It's crazy, man. It's really hard. Yeah, again, I you make a I wouldn't wish it on anybody. Um, so that four-year journey was uh lot ups and downs, or was it just yeah, it was a lot of tactical block and tackle? And so when she was diagnosed, the kids were the kids were what like two and four?

Danny 48:12

Uh 2020. They were they were born in uh 15 and 16, so you know, they were four and five, four and five. Okay. Um but uh it was looking back at it, um, and I've only had the the recent ability to do that. Um it was almost like laps around a track. You know, let's say there was like like a tumor surge, yep, and then um an attack strategy, yep. Recovery, tumor surge, attack strategy, recovery. You know, it's kind of like this this thing. Just about a merry-go-round.

Matt 48:49

I love your track analogy. So good.

Danny 48:51

Like three or four laps around that track, right? And the first time, you know, she's when you're in recovery from surgery, they don't let you do anything new, which is really frustrating because she's in recovery from the surgery, very dramatic surgery. Her lymph node begins to grow on her left hip. Um, that thing ended up growing to the size of a grapefruit, it ended up bursting through her skin, which is beyond like the amount of um pain is another uh it's unbelievable. I can't even yeah put words to it, the the amount of pain she went through, and um and still showed up as a loving mother and a loving wife the whole time, which is beyond me. Um, but it was that that happened, and then we ended up going to Tulsa for chemo and radiation. That was successful, and then there were a couple other surgeries, the little things came back there, and then it it just kept kind of coming back and we just couldn't outpace it.

Matt 49:53

Yeah. I I've only had to deal with I've my family unfortunately uh just gets heart attacks and we don't have cancer in our family, and uh my one experience with it is just it is such a ours was a we know how to treat this, there is no cure, and you just hope your cancer's dumb. Yeah and it just takes the chemo for a long, long time until hopefully we get another treatment. And our ours was like same, it was like, okay, it's working, it's working, it's not now what? That's it, and you're just like, What do you mean that's it?

Danny 50:29

It is such a yeah, and you just you know, hers was was uh a can so it was squamous cell carcinoma, which is like a skin cancer, which you think of like people getting like spots.

Matt 50:39

Oh, it's the ear, right? Yeah, from the sun, right?

Danny 50:41

That's the jam, right? Like my dad's had something taken off his hands, I think, and my grandfather had it or whatever. Sure, but it was it was on her vulva, which is like, all right, well, this is in a weird weird space for this cancer. It was also her peers that let's say had the same thing, were like 60 plus females that smoked their whole lives and ate terribly.

Matt 51:02

I I Googled it before, and it's like the average age is well over 65.

Danny 51:06

And it's like, yeah, she's in her 30s, super healthy, doesn't smoke, doesn't drink, nothing, eats paleo, is a had two kids, you know, beautiful children. You're like, how does this happen? You know, so the doctors didn't know what to do, the uh admittedly, kind of the whole time. And um, we were able to find you know success in certain places and and and and kind of you know work our way through. And but man, it's it's like your your body can only take so much, yeah. Going through chemo and radiation and immuno surgeries, immune, yeah, all of it. Yeah, it just you just get your body wears out, you know, and um so when when did when did Raf die?

Matt 51:55

12124. Oh wow 1212 at home? Yeah, in the same room I'm sitting in right now. Wow. Yeah. So hard not a hard pivot. Where's the mom wall? That's beautiful, man. I you know, people people go see it on Instagram. I've seen it, yeah. Yeah. You know what? We'll end with you showing it. We'll end with you showing it. We'll we'll close with it. I love it. So you're in the same house. Um a couple of well, not not enough laps around a track, but a bunch of laps around the track. Grief enters your life. What was the kids were so they were like six and seven-ish?

Danny 52:49

When she passed?

Matt 52:50

Yeah. No, eight and ten. Yeah, eight and ten. I was sorry, I was subtracting from eight and yeah, they're like nine and eleven now, so yeah. Yeah. As a dad, what was that like for you?

Danny 53:03

It's horrible. Uh, you know, um my kids are very our kids are um the emotional bandwidth is is tremendous. Um they're very close with their mother. Um, you know, they I I talk to them and say, you know, the for a child, any child, the first let's say seven to eight years of their life, it's imperative that they're with their mother. Otherwise, there are issues, right? And they got all those years with the mom. And that's beautiful, right? That's to have those years, and she was with them every day. I mean, they they were homeschooled until they were, you know, almost the whole way. So they were with her every single day, and that's such a rich childhood.

Matt 53:48

Yeah.

Danny 53:49

Um, now losing your mother is not nothing anybody would ever want, but they had a rich childhood with her, and that's it's a beautiful thing. Um, you know, and and and we did everything together. We they we we attacked this as a family. Um, we had we went for four months of treatment in Scottsdale, and we went as a family, and they were with her every day. And so um, we just we wrote we wrote it all the way, and they, you know, like I said, she passed in this room here. Um the girls, we were all here. Um, they were with her the whole time. I was with her the whole time. And you know, some people at some different points were like, Oh, you should shield the kids from it. And I was like, No, you shouldn't. You should live with your play with your family, you know. And it's like, I've never been through this before. I don't know what to shield them from. Who am I? It's their mom, it's my wife, you know, like I'm not. Yeah, so I haven't lost my mom. I don't know what that's like. I I would assume that you'd want to be with her, you know, and so we we did the whole thing together, and um, I'm very proud of us for doing that. And I don't think it makes it, I think in the long run, as time you know rolls out, the girls will appreciate being there for all of the time. Now, there are many, many times where I don't have an answer, um, I don't know what to do. Yeah, we we weather the storm as one. Yeah, and well, I like that. That's a good one. A beautiful, a beautiful thing in our family, and we're very very connected because of that.

Matt 55:23

And so because you guys were all together, obviously it feels it it feels uh and you attacked it as a family unit, it feels like there was some pre-built uh foundation for coping with with rafts. Uh I don't like the word passed away, so I just say dying, right? It's a little harsh, but that's the way I go. Um what was what do you feel besides being present, being honest, and and them them being part of the the the journey and the process? Is there been other things you've added for their coping? Um obviously it sounds like you handle it kind of like I do because you have the mama wall. It's you talking instantly in past and present, right? Like they're always in our hearts and our minds forever. You're part of their mom, right? I mean, I'm sure one of them is probably more like mom than the other. My youngest is 99.4% her mother. Thank goodness. Uh there's also a bad part to that. She's smarter than me and she's in second grade, so I've got that to do with. But was there something that so it sounds like you laid a beautiful foundation of coping with this big stressor of cancer and a terminal what wound up being a terminal diagnosis? Like sounds like a I'm using like a building analogy, right? Like a foundation. What have you built around in the last part to help them continue to cope with the death of their mom and grief? And as I agree with you, moving forward with living.

Danny 56:44

Yeah, one thing that came to mind as you were talking was, and I didn't realize this at the time, I realized this now that I've been in this season of grief for a while. Anticipatory grief is a real gift, and because like for in our story, we had nearly five years of decline where we didn't know it at the time, but Raf and I were able to um, you know, um join in the sadness of our marriage declining, right? And Raf and the girls were able to to dec you know join in the in the sadness of of their time, you know, like we were we we didn't know it was ultimate, we didn't know that it was the end, but we all journeyed that journey together, right? And after it's happened and I've experienced some grief after losing her, I realized that before that time before was really a gift because I talked to people that suddenly lose their person. Yep, they don't have that, and no, I've been the one funeral where someone was taken, like murdered type situation, and and that the room, it was something I've never seen. The the the energy and the and the sadness of it, yeah. And and it was that exp I thought back to that experience, you know, and I think back to the parents and the families, like I don't know how people cope with that because we had this like this gradual decline where we were sad for five years, you know, and it was every day, you know, and you deal with it every day. And but to have all that come up at once, really um, I don't know how you would do it. Um, honestly. And and you know, for us, I'm thankful that we had that time as a family together to do that.

Matt 58:49

Well, it sounds like there was an honesty you had with that time too. Like you weren't you weren't you didn't weren't counting down days, but you're also like, well, we're gonna be present, we're gonna deal this as a unit. We're not gonna pretend we're not gonna pretend it's not a thing. She's not just gonna go off and get a treatment, and we're gonna be here playing tiddlywinks, like you. So there's an intentionality behind that.

Danny 59:09

Yeah, I lost two jobs, we just got fired, we lost a house. Um, we lost income multiple. I mean, everything was taken away from us. Yeah, you know, our our stuff was in a bonfire in the yard because we couldn't take it with us, you know. So that is all a gift. I think like God gave us the the focus of spending time focusing on each other, and you know, all of the people that contributed to the GoFundMe's that allowed us to fight for her for five years, that was what a gift because we got to focus. Like my girls got their mother for four more years, I got my wife for four more years. You know, I talked to my girls and ask them, I've asked her about memories that happened before Raf was diagnosed, and they don't remember.

Matt 59:55

No.

Danny 59:55

So thinking that they wouldn't have ever, they they wouldn't have ever even known mom. Yeah. If she hadn't had all this time, yeah. And so that's all such a gift. And and and now, you know, after she's passed, we you know, we talk about her every day, we say good morning to her every morning, we say goodnight to her every night, we laugh about her, like mama would love this, mama would love that. I genuinely think she would love our life right now, and we talk about it all the time. And you know, the friends come out, their friends come over and you know, they're talking about their mama and they show them the mama wall. And you know, it's it's it's part of our rhythm. Yeah. And we we wouldn't exist as a family without her, you know. So yeah, she'll always be, you know, the fan. So that's just been our our our biggest thing. And in that, they're in that rhythm are you know, I hit my low point, the kids hit their low point, you know, and we kind of like shore it up all together, you know. I Papa, I miss mama, come lay with me, you know, or or or you we take care of each other. Yeah, I don't have all the answers, but I can tell you that the times that I break down that my kids see me, you should see those kids hit me with a hug. Yeah. I mean, it's like bam!

Matt 1:01:15

Coming in hot, dad.

Danny 1:01:17

It is, it is true, and I need it.

Matt 1:01:19

Yeah, there is there, I must have had a there was a season, probably after kind of again. We know that there are no checklists with grief. I just want to make sure I repeat this, everyone. But I'm just gonna we have to be able to define it somehow. So I'm gonna go a year plus out. I must have just had like melancholy on my face for a run because at the time the kiddo would have been about two or three, and I must get a look on my face, and she'd just come waddling in the room, she's like, You miss mama, and I'd be like, Yep, she give me a little hug, right? And I was like, She just read the room, she right, like because dad just is like whatever it is. And um, but and I love the fact that, and I think it's so important going back to like the literate the grief illiterate society is like creating that foundational awareness and space that whether it was anticipatory grief, you know, a decline, you know, I use I use the words terminal versus tragic. So tragic like sudden, right? Terminal is like there's a there's a runway there, whether it be six months or six years. And I think that creating that space for kids to let them know that like it's okay to be sad, it's okay to miss mom, it's okay. And here's the air when I say space, I can have to be reserved off, but like anytime, kiddo, this is the space you can do this. You want to be sad about missing mom? That's fine. There's not you don't have to go hide it, you don't have to go do it in your room, you don't have to just do it when you're journaling. Like, and you built that while you were on that journey because, like you said, you had there was good times in there, but it was five years of sad built in as well, not just you know, not just you know, not just existing, which is I think is super important because I think that just teaches the kids moving forward that whether it's in again, I'll just say six months or six years, that it's okay to express their sadness, and it's okay to to recognize that grief is part of this love that I don't have a place to put on this planet anymore. Um, and I think it's beautiful, man.

Danny 1:03:05

There's there's one thing that was interesting that I was happening. Uh it used to happen, it doesn't happen anymore because we kind of nipped it in the butt. But um, I noticed that so if there was a disciplinary situation between, you know, they're doing something, they should be doing it, right? We have a boundary there, yep, and they cross the boundary and say, hey, look, that's a no-go. You guys need to cut it out, whatever. And they would keep going. And then so I would respond with some sort of discipline, right? Something is coming because you didn't listen to the the boundary or the warning, whatever. You know, just parenting stuff, basically. Um, then they would become upset about the discipline, which is very normal, right? It's a very normal thing. Well, then it would go from like being upset to I miss mama. Uh, as a interesting. Well, not at first. I think it was just it was just an emotional, like the bottom of the bowl, the bottom of the spiral was I miss mama. Like they're they're upset, they're sad, and that's where the bottom is. And that's the unanswerable, right? There's nothing you can do to that. So, like me as let's say, like the parent or the disciplinarian, like, well, okay, don't worry about it then, right? Or whatever. Sure. But what I started to notice was that it was all I'm not positive that it was being, but it felt like it was being used as like like a like a sidestep, like, oh yeah, not a big deal, you know, like no, because I miss mom.

Matt 1:04:36

Look over here, dad. Right, yeah, yeah.

Danny 1:04:37

I was like, hold on. Yeah, and so I just I had to explain this to them, and I was like, listen, I was like, mama died to all of us. Yep, like that is this is a neutral territory. Like you, like I I'm sad too, yep, and I know that you're sad, but that is not an answer to this other emotional situation, and so we spent some time kind of like picking that apart, you know, and now it's not a thing, you know, because it I found it, it was like a it was a gray area that was kind of confused. And I was like, it's not it's not a bargaining chip, right? This is not what this is, right? It is yes, we are all sad, like all of us, but we don't get to treat each other poorly, we don't get to do that, like it doesn't that's not part of the deal, you know. And so it was really cool because uh emotionally that's a hard thing to kind of work through, but especially for a kid, you know. So we we really worked hard at that, and I think we we got it, but it took a while.

Matt 1:05:42

Yeah, it feels like I know it's they're everything's related, but it's almost like being sad, having emotions around their for us, mom's dying, they're always gonna touch other things, but it's almost siloed, like it's a sacred, like you can't borrow that to be like, well, I'm allowed to go. Eat cake for breakfast because I'm sad. You're like, no, no, no, no. Sad mama sad is always there. It's always gonna be a thing. You can't use it as an excuse. Yeah.

Danny 1:06:09

And I've talked to them, yeah. Like it's like you have an emotion. It's like you are that is yours. You are is cool, like it's okay, but that is like it's an intensity, right? And you you can take that intensity and you can apply it somewhere, yeah. Like you don't apply it to me. Right. Like you get to throw something at my head because you have an intensity inside of you, it's not cool, right? Can you punch a pillow? Sure. Can you like write with a pillow with a right color? Yeah, yeah. You know what I'm saying? Like, can you use it? And and so that's one thing that I had to learn when I was younger. Like, hey, look, if you're angry, you can't go spouting off at anybody, like, you gotta deal with that, you know. And it's for the kids, it's been a thing that we've kind of really worked hard at. It's like, okay, well, how do you use that? Because you can't damage your current relationships right for that.

Matt 1:07:04

Yeah, for yeah, and then using that as like a as a gateway emotion, it almost sounds like if you could tell one story, one uh amalgamation of stories or whatever that describes raft to the world on who she is, how would you like to share her with folks? To let them know who she who she who she was and is. I don't know how to say it.

Danny 1:07:35

Um she was explosively joyful. Like if if you and I were in a room right now and she walked in the room and she started laughing, it feels like she just threw a party for us. And she's just laughing, and and and so that was always there, and she would like if she aimed her love at you, you would never want to leave, in whatever aspect it was. Like, she was home to me, to our family, she's home. Like, I didn't care where we were, I didn't care what we had, I didn't care. She was home, and and the best thing I ever did was love her for that, you know. Um, but she was also the person that like if you crossed her, she'd punch you in the face, and it would hurt. I love it. Yeah, I would never, I would never cross her, I would never speak, speak to her in a bad way, like I would never, yeah. We had this respect for each other. She also, when she gave birth to our oldest, um, she used midwives both, we used midwives both times, no drugs. There was a moment when she gave birth to her oldest that I I watched her exit the room. She was there, she was sitting right there, right? But she left. And the roar that came out of this woman was like if you were sitting in a dark cave and a lion roared, was like the roar. Wow, like it was the most powerful, primal, terrifyingly impressive thing I've ever experienced. And you cross that with this joy and this love, and it's like something else. She the the the temperature in the room would change when she walked in.

unknown 1:09:42

Wow.

Danny 1:09:42

I mean, the whole room. I'm not like not just me. I talk to people all the time. They're like, man, I met her one time and I'll never forget her. Like, I mean, she was that person. She had the charisma seems like a lowercase word for what she was. Like it's she's just she was just she was mesmerizing, and uh yeah. What a fierce combination, man. Like I mean, it uh it's unbelievable. And um yeah, it's she was she's something else, man.

Matt 1:10:18

Do you see any parts of that in the kit in the girls?

Danny 1:10:21

Oh yeah, yeah. Um yeah, they're they seem to be like a Venn diagram of her, like 20 is the same, 80%'s different. Yeah, you know, and I assume they have qualities for me, but I see all of the qualities of her.

Matt 1:10:36

Yeah, yeah.

Danny 1:10:37

Um but yeah, they so much, you know, they her her mothering instinct and her love and her the you know, just just that warmth is our oldest one, and then this explosive joy that's like it's just audaciously it's whatever is our youngest.

Matt 1:11:00

I used to I think life tempered me back a little bit, but I remember growing up and someone asking me very seriously like what drugs I was on because I was like too happy. And I was like, I'm just happy, man.

Danny 1:11:12

Like I yeah, yeah. It's like it's yeah, and it's funny because I'm I grew up and I was more of like I would you know kind of put the brakes on a little bit, you know. But my kid, man, nothing, no brakes, just no, no, and that was one of the things that I love so much about Raph was it was like there, you know, that there's a a veil between like how we really feel and how we express ourselves, right? We all kind of have that, and some people like you would never know how they really feel because they never show you, right? But man, I'm telling you, if like if we got some news that that someone you know was hurt or had passed, as soon as that news hit her ears, she was sobbing. I mean, she was there was no no veil, no veil, no filter, and it was beautiful because she was who she was, yeah.

Matt 1:12:02

And so many of us, including myself included, you know, have that filter or that or even like a delay or a turn down of the volume, yeah, yeah.

Danny 1:12:13

Yeah, to express yourself as you are, and she man, just beautiful, like it she was the epitome of that, and it was just the most beautiful thing to to know her and to be buried to her and have kids with her, and I mean, yeah.

Matt 1:12:28

The whole journey. So the other um the other one I like to ask as we kind of get closer here to the end, is if your kids, if the girls stumble onto this podcast, what is something you would want them to hear? Man. Um the mama fought so hard to stay. I don't know you know what else I think that she fought so hard, man.

Danny 1:13:11

She what what she endured was so far beyond what I imagined was ever even possible of a human. And you know, she loved me, of course, but man, she did everything for those girls. It was for them. It wasn't, you know, I I would like to say that it was for me, but you know, it was for the girls, and and it's beautiful that that she fought because man, it was you know, it was 1,592 days from her diagnosis to the day she died. And uh if I asked you to tap a pen on a desk 1592 times, I'd promise you'd stop before you got there. And she woke up every day in pain. And I'm and I'm talking like pain, like everywhere. If you sat on a saddle right now, everywhere that touches the saddle was tumors for years. She couldn't sit, she couldn't walk, she couldn't lay down, couldn't sit on a toilet, couldn't ride in a car, couldn't get in an airplane. How do you do life? And she did, and she was a joyful mother, and she was a joyful wife, and she was around her friends, and she was sewing smiley faces, embroidery on jackets to send out to people so that they would be happy. I mean, so far beyond like it's it's un it's unbelievable. Like, and it's part of the deal, like there's no way because people that knew her were amazed, and they didn't know the whole story, right? The only about her, and I was like, the stuff that I have seen now barring all of the traumatic stuff still is like she was a giant, and to not tell that story, I I was like, there's no way. Yeah, there's just no way, I'm just not gonna let it happen. Like, I and I mean she yeah, she's unbelievable.

Matt 1:15:25

It baffles my mind and my heart when this holding a space for guys and how blessed so far all of my guests have been to have these women in their lives that were just one in four trillion. I mean, it's just it I mean the love stories and the love and what these women did for us, through us, through the kids, for the kids, it just it's powerful, man. This is really something else. Um the next one that I like to ask is what it it this moment in time in your grief journey and what you've been through from when Raf uh died to today, if Raf could tell you something right now, what do you think she'd tell you?

Danny 1:16:29

Um I think it'd be something between like you're doing great, I'm proud of you, and thank you for like leading our girls. You know it's yeah, I think it'd be something like that. I think I think she'd be really I think she'd be really excited about about the book and that that stuff had happened still and that her story because I have her from people all the time that are like I feel like I have a new friend in her and I like hear her voice when I'm like like I hear her talking to me and it's it's like she's still here in some respects, which is so surreal, um but so cool as well.

Matt 1:17:15

Yeah, well, and still here and still making impact.

Danny 1:17:18

Oh, for sure, right? I mean wild stories, like the days that the days that I have the hardest days, and they're not typically like if I have a hard day, I'm not necessarily gonna like tell anyone. I I I maybe you know, like I might tell one person or something, but those days I will get a message from someone that will say something so profound, and it's her taking care of me through them. I know it is, but it's it's it's without fail. I mean, all the days, if I put them on a calendar, say there were 17 days last month that I wanted to end it, every one of those days, bam, bam, something, you know, and it's crazy. And I I think that I'm just so honored to to to carry the torch for us and for what we wanted and for our love still. Yeah. Because for me, it's like I couldn't connect to this life and that life. I couldn't there I you know, you I totally she's the connection, right? Like I like I said before, and I it's interesting because there are a lot of people that say that you should not build your emotional home in someone else. Interesting.

Matt 1:18:33

Okay.

Danny 1:18:34

I uh I agree in principle.

Matt 1:18:37

I I get the tenant, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Danny 1:18:40

But I will tell you that is exactly what I did with her. That is exactly she was home. Yeah, in fact, she still is home, yeah. And I wouldn't take it back, yeah. But it leaves you a bit disoriented when they leave. Oh yeah and that's something to deal with, but I wouldn't take it back. You know, no way. I wouldn't trade any bit of what we had for any less struggle now. Like there's no way. Um what I tell you to walk the same path, I don't know. But I would tell you to to love someone and and give it all to that. Yeah, that's the best thing we can do. And sometimes you lose.

Matt 1:19:31

Yeah.

Danny 1:19:32

And we lost.

Matt 1:19:35

Oh man. If you could say something, which you've already said a lot to Raf, what would you want to say? Thank you.

unknown 1:19:48

Yeah.

Matt 1:19:51

I find, man, I find that um that when you talk about your hard days, I find myself uh moving or trying to get back to to like you know, sun on your face and walking. And that's about the only two words sometimes I can get out is that, you know, I'm just we talk about over time, I'm seven years out, man, and I still, it's like I can't understand how lucky and grateful and thankful I am to have had this human in my life and just all of it. And I and then the d you talk about the disorientation and you go, I'm sorry, I'm gonna it's I mark explicit anyway. What the fuck was that? Like like you just go, what the fuck just happened? And it, you know, it it it it just it completely spins you. I don't know why my brain's saying it's like you knew you you found it, you were guiding by it, you'd found your north, and then some jerk comes along and goes, just kidding, that's not north anymore. I mean, there still are north, but you know what I mean. It's like they mess up with your compass. You're like, uh man.

Danny 1:21:09

You know, it's interesting. I um if it wasn't for we haven't talked a lot about this, but if it wasn't for God showing up in our story like so many times in like amazing, amazing ways, and that is in the book. If any of y'all are wanting to to we'll we'll we'll get it out there, I promise. Look for some evidence, right? Yeah, but if it's called Jesus moments, right? Jesus moments, yeah, yeah. But if it wasn't for all of that being present in our journey, because the first thing that happens when someone dies is you you're like looking to God, like what is going on? Like, why why is my person gone? Yeah, I had someone ask me if I was angry with God, and I said no, and I'm not because of all of these things, but also like she was a gift to me. Yeah, like I could have never met her, I could have met someone else or not met anyone. Such a yeah, and so like it's a it's a silly example, it's a very simple example. But if I gave you a hundred dollars today, and there's no way you'd be like, How come you didn't give me two hundred dollars? Right, right. No, you're now I'm not saying that that a relationship is money because it's not no, but the analogy, I guess, man. The 12 years that we shared, our marriage, our love, our kids, our family, that is a lavish gift, and I am eternally grateful for those years. If I never see anything else, I'm so happy for those years, right? And how could I be mad?

Matt 1:22:46

Yeah, I think that's yeah, I you know now, yeah.

Danny 1:22:57

I like I have some questions.

Matt 1:23:01

That's always what I've come back to. I'm like, we're getting into my own journey.

Danny 1:23:04

I feel like yeah, I feel like if she was here, she could do a lot more good than not being here. I mean that's my own personal preference.

Matt 1:23:11

Right. I I like I my thing is like if there is the Portly Gates, when I get there, I'll be like, I have questions. Right. I mean, but I am. Do I get a QA? Um yeah, yeah. So good. But what a great, you know, there is something about, and you've done a ton, I mean, you've done a ton of work, and sharing your book I think is going to be amazing. I think you've already touched on that it resonates with a ton of people, and just it's you know very similar when we put ourselves out there in an authentic way. The universe is has an amazing way of of bringing bringing it back around and and resonating with people. But I think that the work you've done, both writing and and and then also the movement part, has allowed you to be able to look at because there are gonna be people who hear this and they're like, so I noticed you never said this, and I wouldn't either. You're not saying your wife getting cancer is a gift. What we are saying is, right, well, because I think people will interpret that, and you're like, no, no. What I'm saying is the fact that I got to be in the presence of this human for as long as I did, I've never seen a headstone. Yeah right. She was the gift. I've never seen a headstone in a graveyard that says they should have died a minute earlier. We all want one more. We all want one more, right? And so we're not saying that we wouldn't we wouldn't want more, but when you've done some work with being with your grief, expressing it, witnessing it, allowing it to happen, to go through it, to bear walk it. Um it changes the colors in which you see what was. Yeah, it's beautiful, man. I think it's beautiful.

Danny 1:24:50

Yeah. I mean, it was you know, it was interesting when when the kids were young, they were like real young. We were still in Los Angeles. Um, we were on the beach, we were sitting there, Raph and I were sitting there, the kids were playing the waves, and this old couple walks by and they stopped and they said, Listen, so we don't know you guys, but trust us when we say these are the days, these are the best days of your lives to just trust us. And so Raf and I were were sitting there and and we were like, it we think they're right. Like, we really appreciate them stopping and saying that. And it's funny because it turns out that the things that I think back on are those days, and they were it was I I feel like that was a godlike hey, take note right now.

Matt 1:25:43

Snap an Instagram, but also snap one in your brain for save save this, take note, yeah. Yeah. So I'm gonna give you a space besides the book, and obviously we'll mention your uh your amazing Instagram stuff, man. I I I don't know if I've liked everything you've done yet, but I will. Um there is a lot. That's why I was like, I don't know if I've gotten through the whole thing yet. Um and I would yeah, anyway. Is there any is there anything else you'd like to share with the folks that listen to this just about grief, your process? Obviously, we'll get your book out there. They can hear a ton about the Jesus moments, and God, what a great try voice to hear a journey on. I mean, that's a really cool perspective you're able to make happen. Is there anything else that you'd you'd want to do?

Danny 1:26:36

I don't know if there's any other books like it. I mean, I'm sure there are. There's so many books out there, but no, I love it.

Matt 1:26:41

It's super unique. I like it. I like it. Um is there anything else just kind of in the grief grieving space, and then I have one last question for you.

Danny 1:26:51

I think the biggest thing I think back to to us when when it was dark in in our lives and and things were going downhill, and and and then in losing her and after losing her is it's that you're not alone. There are a lot of people that are hurting, and I and I I'm shocked I still to this day, and I feel silly even saying it, but the amount of messages I get from people that are that are hurting that have lost someone is terrifying. There are so many people that have lost someone, and to think that we walk those days and feel alone, yeah, it's just not the truth. And people generally want to help, they really do, but they don't in my case, it was a little different because I was so vocal in my experience, and I realize a lot of people are not that vocal, and some people don't like being that vocal. But if people don't know, they can't help you, and that's really hard to when you're hurting to be extra vocal the the ambition to. Reach out to someone, right? But people are good. People want to help you. People care. And that is in the moments that are the darkest, you feel very alone. Yep. And it's just not true. You're not alone. And um, and yeah, I think if if this has taught me anything, all of this, and this is what I hope people get from our book, is that I hope it goes out into the world and I hope it imbalances the vulnerability in your life so much that you feel like you can show up better in your life. Like I want it to be such a hit in the vulnerability department and the love department. I want it to just like you feel so imbalanced that you're like, I need to maximize the time that I have together with my people. I can show up as a better version of myself. And so I hope that everything that I put out there, be it a video, a book, uh, whatever it is, that it it it lets the BS of life go away and lets people focus on what matters because man, like Raph died at 35. I'm 44. Like, who says I'm another day?

Matt 1:29:08

Right. Yeah, no, no, so I'm that we we we know far too well, none of us are promised tomorrow.

Danny 1:29:14

Yeah, it's like when you when you say I said something the other day that was interesting, it was like you do we like our distractions more than we like our relationships? Mm. And it's like dang, if you look at the actions of my life, sometimes yes. And you look back at that, and it's like that hurts.

Matt 1:29:34

Danny, Danny, those candies aren't gonna crush themselves, man. I gotta get crushed total distraction. I love I love the whole it's a huge quote inside of our in my in the solo parenting space, which is although you are feeling lonely, you are not alone. You're not, yeah. Yeah. Now I don't know what it's like to be Danny, and Danny doesn't know what it's like to be me. But the thing is, is we're both walking this path with this pack filled with grief and loss and sadness, and whether he's two steps ahead of me or two steps to my left or two steps, we're on this same kind of journey together. And I can I can sit with you at a we'll use the proverbial campfire while you're hiking and go, your pack's heavy, yeah. So is mine. Yeah, sucks, does. I can't take your pack from you, I can't fix it. But we can definitely not be alone in it. And you're right, man. And I love the vulnerability thing because so much comes around vulnerability. I'm assuming you've heard of you've heard of Brene Brown. Yeah, love it. Oh, yeah. Oh, God, there's some powerful stuff in vulnerability. Um, well, you we'll get your book out there. Uh, and I also the last question I'm gonna leave you with is if someone's in the first year, 18 months, again, we know timelines don't matter, in grief, and they're a solo dad or they're a solo parent, the cookie, the the Chinese fortune cookie advice would you give them? The little uh what would you what would you want to share with uh well that the first thing I always say is you're not alone.

Danny 1:31:01

That's the first thing I always say. Love it. But the the other thing I would say is find a way to take what's inside out of you and and participate with it.

Matt 1:31:14

And that's a full circle, man. I love the word participation with your grief.

Danny 1:31:18

It could be many things for me. Like I said, it's been writing, it's been the book, it's been uh walking, it's been fitness. There's lots of you could it could be knitting, it could be camp. I don't know what it is for you, but one thing that was really interesting was that I thought about the things that Rafi loved about me, which she loved my heart, and so I thought, how do I pursue those things? Because those things are true to me and they honor her. So the person that you lost, what they love about you. It's like, all right, we'll pursue that.

Matt 1:31:53

Because it's okay to who you are, yeah.

Danny 1:31:56

Because it's true to you, and the problem is that when we lose someone, we have to recenter and find ourselves again. And so you gotta stick with things that are true to you, and it's different for every single one of us.

Matt 1:32:09

There's a phrase I use in a lot of the Facebook groups, which is when I tell people you know, people are like, What do I do about blah? And I go, Unfortunately, you now have to uh accept the fact that the we has become a me, and this version of yourself has never existed on the planet before. So what does me need now? Because this version has grief. And there are things that are authentic to ourselves for sure, but you have to ask that question, like, well, maybe I I don't like plaid pillows on my bed because it was a compromise or whatever your thing is. Danny man, I am so glad we finally got to connect. You are an absolute powerhouse. I mean, I've got your Instagram up in front of me, and I mean it's both big rays of sunshine and sadness, obviously, at the same time. And I just, I mean, I I start this way and I think I just keep coming back. Man, I am always so humbled and honored to be able to hold this space for us guys and to share share some just beautiful people that unfortunately had Marcy not died and Raph not died, we would be having this conversation, but damn it if they weren't amazing human are and were amazing human beings. Um I might question their choices of husbands, but that's that's a different podcast. I mean, we both meant they could have done better, right? They could they could have done but um man, I just really do appreciate you. And I I wrote this down right as we were ending, and I I I think it's appropriate. I want to thank you for participating in this conversation, man. This has been phenomenal, Danny. I really appreciate it.

Danny 1:33:41

It's an honor, man. It it really the gifts that have come from sharing, I never would have seen coming. And it's they just it's like it's like lavish blessings. Like you you never know unless you brought the thing out, you know. And I would say vulnerability is like a vacuum, it sucks all the air out of the room and brings the people together. Um and yeah, it's true. It's just it's such such a beautiful thing to be able to sit here in a space and share. Um, and think that there are people that will see it and that were like in the places we sat that need a message like this. Because I I found it in certain places too, and it was like, man, it it it saved me.