My guest today, Marie Scott, is a Functional Medicine Health Coach who is passionate about helping widows and widowers to gain health, humor, and love back into their lives.

Imagine being crazy, happily married to or partnered with someone for decades. Then, unexpectedly, even though you are only in your fifties, that person dies.

This is a small part of Marie’s story. She shares honestly about her grief, her feelings of hopelessness, and her journey out of that time.

She now works with widows and widowers to find their own way out of all-encompassing grief and the sometimes, unhealthy behaviors that come along for the ride.

She has some pretty interesting stats about partner deaths. 

“The average age of widowhood in the US and Canada is 59.”

And men tend to marry much sooner after a loss than women. Some research says as soon as 3 months after.

Women want a life back, men want a woman they think will put their life back together.

Marie discovered Functional Medicine when she tore a rotator cuff. She immediately realized this was a different kind of medical practice, one where she was heard and attended to. “Functional medicine, in my mind, is truly health care” she says.

She heard about a course to become a functional medicine health coach after Dave died and signed up. 

Marie said “I lost my mom the same year as I lost Dave. So, it was a double whammy on the stress scale. And if it wasn't for functional medicine, I'd probably be unhealthy, overweight, alcoholic and with no purpose in life.”

Not only did she lose weight, but she found her new purpose and a new partner. By the time this episode goes live Marie will marry a man she met while discovering a new community—one of her tenets for moving through grief to rebuild a life. This during Covid!

Her new purpose is to help widows and widowers come out of a dark place and embrace life again. It” is really, really hard. And I want to help them take that journey and learn about how you can, in fact, live well, laugh more, and in love again.”

If this conversation sounds like one a friend could benefit from please share the link to the episode or, Marie has a book coming out any day now. Head over there to be put on a list to be notified when it does. The title is "Finding Meaning and Humor in Widowhood, Firehouses, and Organic Vegetables, Seven Steps to Healing "

Marie’s site

Things that were mentioned

Living Proof Institute

The Hospice Doctor’s Widow