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Sports blog: Stamford Sports Scene

By A.J. O'CONNELL

Times Staff Writer


DARIEN -- Elizabeth Edwards says she's fine.

The wife of former presidential hopeful John Edwards has buried her eldest son, was diagnosed with terminal breast cancer as her husband began a presidential run, is dealing with the fallout from an affair her husband had on the campaign trail and has recently penned a memoir, "Resilience," which deals with all of those issues. On Wednesday, May 20, Edwards was candid about her changed life, when she spoke at the Center for HOPE's annual luncheon in Darien.

"Sometimes, when you say something that's a truism, people say 'you know, everybody knows that,'" Edwards said in an interview after the Center for HOPE's annual luncheon. "But when you (go through a trauma), sometimes the things we know just fly out the window and you're just reacting emotionally."

"I go through all the things I go through ... these are things people in this country go through all the time, and you can add to that all sorts of things. I have my share of those things... Because people have heard of me, maybe they'll take the truism they always had in the back of their head and apply it to their own circumstances."

The Darien-based Center for HOPE offers services for people who are living with a life-threatening illness or grieving a death by providing professional counseling and support. Each year, said spokesperson Bill Brucker, the center holds an annual luncheon, usually accompanied by a fashion show.

This year, given the economic crisis, the center wanted to host a speaker instead. When Darien's Barrett Bookstore called to say Elizabeth Edwards was looking for public speaking opportunities in the region, she seemed a natural fit.

More than 350 people, mostly women, crowded into the banquet hall at Darien's Woodway Country Club to hear Edwards speak about her own experience as a grieving mother.

"We will all tumble and fall at some point," said Edwards. "Your ability to take the risk to take the tumble is really dependent upon the knowledge that someone is there for you."

Edwards praised the counseling services offered by the center, saying her family never had those services when her son Wade died in a 1996 car crash. Her oldest daughter, Cate, she said, didn't start to deal with the loss until she was in college, five years later.

Edwards says her son's friends sought help from her and her husband, coming over to the house for dinner and sitting in Wade's room.

Edwards asked the crowd to remember that no one who is grieving a death will "get over it."

"What you need to do is help them incorporate the memory of the child," she said. "As opposed to the child who is living."

If someone is grieving the death of a child, she said, friends should be prepared to offer whatever comfort the grieving parent needs, and those friends should also not be afraid to ask their friend what he or she needs.

"No one should have to grieve or go through hardship alone," she said.

Edwards agreed to write "Resilience" long before her husband's affair was revealed. Although she considered not writing the book at all, she talked to her daughter, Cate, and her husband about her renewed decision to talk about the family's loss, her illness and Edwards' marital difficulties. They were both supportive, she said.

"If you have something to say you should say it, and you should write the book," said Edwards. "It was therapeutic for me to write it as well, honestly. It makes you put in order things that are a bit squishy in your head."


Kate Marcal contributed to this story.

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