Abstract
The podcast “All There Is” is a beautiful, disarming space where Anderson Cooper and his guests reflect upon their significant losses and what grief means to them. His guests include both experts in grief and expert grievers. They explore the nuances of grief, including how bereavement changes over time, secondary losses through life experiences without their person, and how grief is compounded by additional deaths. The array of losses captured, both in relationship and in means of death, works to ensure that no grief is disenfranchised in this space. He and his guests share laughter and tears, providing comfort to each other and the listener.
In the first season, episodes include several guest interviews interwoven with the candid exploration of Mr. Cooper’s personal grief while sifting through his late mother’s belongings. The interviews cover themes, including loss of parents with Molly Shannon, loss of partner with Elizabeth Alexander, loss of sibling by suicide with BJ Miller, gratitude for grief with Stephen Colbert, anticipatory grief with Kirsten Johnson, and how new losses bring up memories from previous losses with several guests. He ends the season with an episode of messages from his listeners, with many gaining the confidence to share their story out loud for the first time.
After receiving over 1,000 messages from listeners, Mr. Cooper is compelled to do a second season. During this season, he has a greater awareness of his grief around multiple losses, and he focuses on how to move through it daily. He learns from President Biden how he lives with his many losses, digs deep into the relationship between mental illness and grief with Ashley Judd and Charlie Shelin, and explores how to turn “loss into love” with Mama Shu. He invites Katie Talman to share her perinatal loss of her daughter Everly after hearing her voicemail. As he again closes this season with an episode of listener messages, he emphasizes the importance of not feeling alone in grief. His acknowledgment of his unattended grief as a well-known figure on such a public platform sets precedent for listeners to tend to their own grief.
Alisha: As a griever and a grief professional, I found both beauty and comfort in these conversations. I am so grateful to Anderson for vulnerably sharing his grief journey. I highly recommend this podcast to other grief professionals and those experiencing grief as an alternative platform for understanding and reflecting on grief. I appreciate its focus on storytelling as Anderson and his guests share profound insights they have learned along the way.
Katie Talman sharing the story of her daughter, Everly, especially stood out to me as a pediatric palliative care social worker. Katie’s comments about bereaved parents being at high risk for suicidal ideation was an important call out. Literature shows that parents have greater incidence of physical and psychological outcomes, but we rarely talk about suicidality. As I did my own reflection on many of the poignant things she said in that episode, the phrase “grief is love with no place to go” spoke most to me.
I also continue to think about Francis Weller’s episode (the author of “The Wild Edge of Sorrow”) and a quote he shared with Anderson, “If we don’t address our grief, our hearts close and our hearts don’t have the capacity then to register the suffering of the world.” As a palliative care provider and grieving daughter, I think a lot about the importance of tending to my own grief to be available to attend to the grief of others. Even if we are not grieving a specific person, grief is such a prominent theme in the work we do every day. If we can find rituals to honor our grief, we can then help others honor theirs.
Jessica: I found myself surprised and enthralled to hear a man speak so frankly about grief and openly express emotions and tears. In my experience as a pediatric palliative care physician, I share space with many people who are tearful and frequently receive apologies for crying. I usually brush away those apologies, reassuring that “tears don’t scare me.” It was refreshing and inspiring to hear Anderson open himself to his guests and the audience in this way. He does a service in setting this example and normalizing the expression of emotions. The outpouring of messages from listeners confirms that others shared my feeling. What a disservice we do to ourselves to isolate when loss is such a common and universal experience.
I also appreciate the way that Anderson unceremoniously demonstrates that grief is not linear or stages that we must move through. In the second season, he builds on the idea that grief is universal to show that it is also omnipresent. He normalizes that it’s not a bad thing that grief remains, with inspiring stories from President Biden about how he lives with his grief and Mama Shu about how to turn loss into acts of service. As a person who sits next to people through their grief experiences on a daily basis, these stories allowed me to dive deeper into what it means to grieve. I sometimes find myself keeping my personal grief at an arm’s distance to remain professional and supportive to my patients. He has reminded me of the strength that comes from vulnerability.
The podcast, “All There Is,” captures the human experience of grief. Mr. Cooper and his guests not only talk about the individual loss of person, but also how loss can be all-encompassing and how easily we can get swallowed up into the void of grief. Although there is sadness in these conversations, there is also empowerment of acknowledging and tending to one’s grief. As Ashley Judd mentions, there’s not “… a shortcut, but there’s a shorthand.” As we have reflected on this podcast with others, we have universally agreed to the power of these stories in understanding both the individualization of grief and the solidarity amongst grievers.