Clare Crawley On Missing Her Dad & Coping With Grief
- TV personality Clare Crawley lost her dad to brain cancer 20 years ago, and despite suffering such an incredible loss, the “Bachelorette” star is embracing the joys of being a mother on her daughter’s first birthday. She welcomed her daughter via surrogate last year.
- Grief is a difficult, truly personal process, something Garfield has shown. Some find solace in vulnerability and sharing how they feel with others.
- While working through grief and vulnerable tackling of the emotions that accompany it, some find tools like therapy to be helpful. Support groups can also be a benefit for those who are feeling isolated in their feelings of grief. Faith can also be a powerful coping mechanism for some.
- In an earlier interview with SurvivorNet, Dr. Jaime Knopman said time was precious when dealing with fertility preservation for women with cancer or a medical condition. Basically, the sooner the better when it comes to having these important fertility conversations with your doctor.
- In some cases after cancer treatment, women may have difficulty giving birth to a child or they may be unable to at all. Having someone else carry their baby may be an option, either through surrogacy or a gestational carrier.
The 43-year-old California native welcomed her first baby via surrogate last year with her husband Ryan Dawkins, who has two daughters from a previous relationship. To commemorate her daughter Rowen Lily turning one, Crawley shared the sweetest video on Instagram.
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She continued, “We are so beyond blessed to have a daughter with a personality made of pure sunshine and a little spice (that’s my girl!!) She has the determination of her Dada, crawling at 6 months and walking 2 weeks later, the love of being out in nature like her mama, and a passion for reading every book in sight!
“Being her Mama is TRULY the greatest gift in life!”
Earlier this year, for Rowen Lily’s half birthday, Crawley sharing a photo of her and her husband with Rowan Lily sitting on their laps, writing, “How are you already six months my little angel! Half a year! It has been the greatest honor that you chose us as your parents.
“Thank you for teaching us patience, perseverance, and the purest form of love! Watching you grow has been the greatest honor of our lives!”
We’re happy to see Crawley feeling so much joy as a mother, especially after her surrogate led her to where she is today.
Speaking to People in an interview earlier last year, Crawley said, “I wanted every step of this process to bring little Rowen into this world very thought out and very planned. We wanted our surrogate to be a part of her life forever, to know her story. This is a part of her story and a part of how she got brought into this world. She’s like family to us.”
She said her surrogate was a “pivotal point and such a huge part of how [Rowen] came into this world,” adding, “I want Rowen to know every moment of it.”
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Crawley continued, “I wanted to share this process on social media going through surrogacy because I want people out there who are dealing with infertility to know.
“There are so many different ways to become a mom and at the end of the day, I’m sitting here rocking and holding my little baby girl and that is the end goal.”
“If it wasn’t for surrogacy, I wouldn’t be sitting here holding my baby,” she concluded.
Claire Crawley On Losing Her Dad To Brain Cancer
Crawley’s milestone of celebrating her daughter’s 1st birthday comes years after she opened up to Bachelorette host Chris Harrison, about losing her dad, James, to brain cancer in 2004.
She was 23-years-old at the time of his passing, from a type of brain cancer that has not been publicly revealed.
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“My dad, I know, would just be so proud,” Crawley said. “He was somebody who always wanted me to follow my heart. I couldn’t be more proud to have a dad like him, to set an example of what a real man is and how a real man treats women. I know it exists because he was that example.”
Referring to her being on “The Bachelorette,” she said, “My dad would say I’m proud of you for just showing up. That’s the biggest part of it.
“Never give up, just show up. By doing that you win. I’ve done that every single time. I try my best. And I’m here. I haven’t given up on love and I never will.”
Crawley also discussed the impact her dad’s death had on her during an appearance on “The Bachelor” for Juan Pablo’s season. She tearfully shared the conversations that she and James had during his battle with brain cancer. Right before his passing, James made a DVD for Crawley and her future husband to watch, and to this day, she still hasn’t opened it.
Life After Loss
It’s normal to feel sad about changes in your life that might be brought on by the death of a loved one or a cancer diagnosis.
“Grief comes in waves,” says Dr. Scott Irwin, a psychiatrist and Director of Supportive Care Services at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. “They’re grieving the change in their life, the future they had imagined is now different.”
Some days can be tougher than others, but Dr. Irwin says talk therapy is helpful so it’s important to reach out to your doctor, to a therapist or to support groups in your community.
Remember, when a stressful life event occurs, people may react with a range of different (and quickly changing) emotions. This is completely normal.
Expert Resources On Coping With Loss
- ‘Be Patient With Your Emotions’: A Social Worker’s Insights Into Handling a Cancer Diagnosis
- Fear, Anger, Anxiety: You’re Entitled To Your Emotions
- Responding to Stress: How to Cope With Complex & Changing Emotions
- SN & You Presents Mental Health: Coping With Emotions
- Mental Health and Cancer — The Fight, Flight or Freeze Response
“The way people respond is very variable,” Psychiatrist Dr. Lori Plutchik tells SurvivorNet. “Very much consistent with how they respond to stresses and challenges in their life in general.”
In this video, Dr. Plutchik is speaking mostly about how people react after a cancer diagnosis which can be a huge range of emotions from fear to anger to determination.
Handling stressful life events
However, the conclusion remains the same no matter what stressor someone may be dealing with: your emotions are valid and seeking mental health help may look different for every person.
“People have a range of emotions when they’re diagnosed with cancer,” Dr. Plutchik explains. “And they can include fear, anger … and these emotions tend to be fluid. They can recede and return based on where someone is in the process. Going through a cancer diagnosis is just the beginning of a complicated, complicated process.”
Dr. Plutchik explains that the patient, or person going through the stressful event, should accept that emotions will be fluid. You may feel fine one day and then feel a massive wave of stress the next. It’s also important for those you look to for support whether that’s a therapist, friends and family, or both to understand the fluidity of stress-related emotions.
If a stressful event is affecting how you think and feel, it may be time to seek some sort of mental health treatment. This could mean traditional talk therapy, medication, changing lifestyle habits (like exercise and diet), seeking out a support group, or many other approaches.
Fertility, Surrogacy and Gestational Carriers
Although, Crawley didn’t battle cancer, Dr. Jaime Knopman told SurvivorNet in a recent interview that time was precious when dealing with fertility preservation for women with cancer. Basically, the sooner the better when it comes to having these important fertility conversations with your doctor.
It’s important to understand that many women may have difficulty giving birth to a child or they may be unable to at all. Having someone else carry their baby may be an option, either through surrogacy, like Claire Crawley used, or a gestational carrier.
According to the National Cancer Institute, a surrogate pregnancy is “a type of pregnancy in which a woman carries and gives birth to a baby for a person who is not able to have children.”
“In a surrogate pregnancy, eggs from the woman who will carry the baby or from an egg donor are fertilized with sperm from a sperm donor to make an embryo,” the institute explains.
“The embryo is implanted in the uterus of the surrogate mother, who carries the baby until birth. Surrogate pregnancy may be an option for men or women who want to have children and have had certain anticancer treatments, such as chemotherapy or radiation therapy, that can cause infertility.”
As for a gestational carrier, the institute describes this person as a “woman who carries and gives birth to a baby for a person who is not able to have children.”
“Eggs from an egg donor are fertilized in the laboratory with sperm from a sperm donor to make an embryo,” the institute explains. “The embryo is implanted in the uterus of the gestational surrogate, who carries the baby until birth. The gestational surrogate (or carrier) is not genetically related to the baby and is not the biological mother.”
If you or someone you know is deciding on whether or not to go the route of surrogacy or gestational carrier, it’s important to know that each state has different laws and it may be necessary to speak with an attorney before moving forward.
Dr. Terri Woodard Discusses Options For Preserving Fertility After Cancer
Questions to Ask Your Doctor
If you’re facing cancer treatment and wondering about your fertility preservation options, here are some questions you may consider asking your doctor:
- How do you expect my treatment to affect my fertility?
- Are there specialists I can talk to about my fertility preservation options?
- Is it safe for me to preserve my fertility before treatment?
- What resources are available to help me pay for fertility preservation?
- What mental health resources are available to help me cope with this?
Contributing: SurvivorNet Staff
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