When Debbie Weiss lost her husband of 30 years before she was 50, she learned life lessons that she has shared through her recent memoir Available As Is: A Midlife Widow’s Search for Love.
Debbie’s writing has been published in The New York Times “Modern Love” column, Huff Po, Woman’s Day and Reader’s Digest among other publications. A former lawyer, she’s proudest of earning an MFA in creative writing at age 56.
We talk about the challenges of love, loss, midlife dating, and what it was to begin her writing career. after fifty.
Highlights from the interview:
The stereotypes of widowhood.
How our culture fails to do well with grief.
The worst advice for widows—and the benefits of taking small steps.
The challenges of online dating.
And about the writing life:
How Debbie and her writing changed as a result of writing a book.
How an introvert can market and promote a book her way.
The freedom that comes with being 60.
“It took a devastating loss for me to reinvent myself—but it shouldn’t take a devastating loss to do the things that you love.”
Hear the interview:
More about our Guest
Debbie Weiss is a former attorney who earned her MFA in creative nonfiction from Saint Mary’s College of California in 2020. A native of the Bay Area, she turned to writing after George, her husband and partner of more than three decades, died of cancer in April 2013, and she found herself single and living alone for the first time in her life. Weiss’s essays have been published in The New York Times‘s “Modern Love” column, HuffPost, Woman’s Day, Good Housekeeping and Reader’s Digest, among other publications. She lives in Benicia, CA.
Read the article she mentioned: https://www.nextavenue.org/dating-lessons-from-a-midlife-widow/
Check out the book!
