Kate Bowler: This is Everything Happens, and I’m Kate Bowler. If you grew up in the 90s, there is a good chance my guest today is very familiar to you. Maybe she’s forever blushing at the kitchen table across from Steve Martin in Father of the Bride, or maybe you know and love her from According to Jim. But behind all that charisma is someone who has lived through the things that you only talk about in a whisper. Caring for a parent with dementia, raising kids while untangling grief. And because life isn’t always convenient or kind, losing her ability to speak for over two years because of a rare vocal cord injury. Kimberly Williams Paisley radiates joy and levity and humor and given everything I know about the way she has managed grief in her life, I really wanted a chance to lean in and ask, hey, how? Even after everything, what’s your secret? I think she may have something to teach us about how humor can sustain us in the face of the unchangeable. You’re gonna love her. Here we go.
Kate: My guest today is the brilliant and kind and really, really funny Kimberly Williams-Paisley. You probably know and love her from her roles in Father of the Bride or According to Jim, and you may have read her tender memoir, Where the Light Gets In. It’s such a good and gorgeous read. It’s about losing her mom to a rare form of dementia. You may know her also for her advocacy work for dementia research or ending food insecurity. I know her mostly as a lady who just really likes decorating her home with chickens. Kim, I feel so lucky that we’re talking today. I just feel like I missed you, and this is my opportunity to do this.
Kimberly Williams-Paisley: Hi, friend!
Kate: Hi, darling.
Kim: It’s so good to see you.
Kate: Do you mind if I ask you just to start about the very early reason why you are the coolest friend that I’ve ever had?
Kim: I thought you were gonna ask about the chickens because like you can’t just drop that and then not explain.
Kate: Explain, rationalize.
Kim: Maybe we should, I would like to talk about, this is my interview, I’d like to talk about why you know that about me because this is partly why I love you so much, is that I had never met you in person, but I heard about you from friends and I started listening to your amazing podcast and then I heard you were coming to town and I feel like I stalked you but I’m not sure if that’s like your impression of it. But anyway, I reached out and next thing I know you’re spending the night at my house.
Kate: I was like I’ll be right there I just I knew you for five minutes and I’m just like getting into your car unbidden.
Kim: And suddenly, I’m making you salmon, and you’re staying in my shishak, which, yes, is full of chickens. Because we live on what we affectionately call a farm. It’s not really a farm, but we do have some horses, and we have a lot of wild turkey and some vermin.
Kate: And the we is you are married to amazing musician Brad Paisley and which is why you’re in a den of just a den, of guitars right now just a super raw, powerful place of…
Kim: This is my living room. This is not my living, and this is actually Brad’s studio. So yes, I am surrounded by very manly guitars.
Kate: I do feel like something super core about you is the desire to like, like, make it ridiculous, like make it more than what it could because otherwise you won’t remember it. I think that’s, you’re like, it could have been out of four, but we’ll put it at 11.
Kim: Please, let’s just make it interesting anyway.
Kate: I mean, you’ve also worked with a bajillion comedians over the years, like Steve Martin and guy named Jim. I mean I imagine just like rolling with it and being, I mean like an early student of everyone else’s improv is also core to your memories.
Kim: Absolutely, yeah, I’ve learned so much from the people that I’ve worked with, yeah. I mean, and things you wouldn’t expect too, like Steve Martin telling me to get a good therapist when I asked for advice. He’s like, oh, yeah I’ve got advice. Best advice he ever gave me, by the way.
Kate: Because you were, I mean, you were in college at the time.
Kim: I was 19.
Kate: And like propelled into insane fame. And he was, how old was he at the time? I know he always had white hair, so I could never tell.
Kim: Yeah, you know what’s crazy? I ran into him at the Opry here in Nashville years ago and we realized that I was the age that he was when we’d done the movie. And I was like, oh my gosh, this is crazy. So yeah, he was like in his mid forties when we did that movie.
Kate: That is a strange feeling, though, of aging into an awareness of, I guess, just those very strange costs of aging. And that is some of what I wanted to ask you about, because you have incredible depth of insight over what it means to be a mom, but also a daughter. And I wondered if I could ask you a little bit about when you first realized that you we’re going to have to get a handle on your mom’s diagnosis. She was diagnosed with a rare form of dementia and it sounded like it was both very uncertain and really scary very early on to just figure out the scope of what she was going through.
Kim: Yeah. So my mom was 61 years old when she got officially diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia, which we found out after she died was actually caused by Alzheimer’s disease.
Kate: Oh, I see.
Kim: And we didn’t know that at the time. It was really wild because I was a new mom. Actually, when she told us I wasn’t yet pregnant, and when we look back, when I got engaged was like the first time that I saw something off with my mom. And I joke about it now, but the first sign that something was really wrong was that she wasn’t a fan of my husband.
Kate: The world’s coolest, most handsome man.
Kim: Obviously it was dementia.
Kate: Well, because you have like an unbelievably romantic story where he was like, it’s very like, and I loved you from the first second I even thought about the fact that you might exist.
Kim: Right. And I called my parents and I was like, oh my gosh, this man is incredible. There is no way I’m not marrying him. And they were like, horrified. My mom was horrified, but I mean, there were other things going on. It was like I’m the first born and, you know, he’s like a country boy and we grew up in New York and they were all intellectuals and they just didn’t understand. But to me, that was part of the appeal. It’s like so hot, you know, because he was so different. But, you know, and then it was at our wedding and suddenly, like the day of my wedding, my mom threw a fit and I write about this in the book, she threw a fit because she wasn’t included in the ceremony. It was just such a weird, out of left field sort of thing. And, and there were more and more of those irrational kind of things happening. She was actually coming to us not long after that and saying, it’s so weird. I can’t write my name on my checks. And it’s so weird, I’m having a really hard time finding the right word in a sentence. And at first I was like, mom, I think you’re just not getting enough sleep. I think you’re too stressed out at work and how can we manage stress? And then she officially like went through the testing and it took a long time to figure it out. But she finally came to us and said, okay, well, she and my dad sat us down and said this is something called primary progressive aphasia. And at the time, we’ve learned so much since then, this was in like 2005, 2006, at the time, she said, do not tell anyone. This has got to be a family secret. This is a vault. She was embarrassed. So I think we missed out on so much by abiding by her wishes. We missed out community on resources that could have helped us so much to navigate this really challenging road. We missed out on just connection with people about what was going on. And we didn’t know the danger my father was in–
Kate: Oh my god.
Kim: –you know, in being her primary caregiver. Now, I will say, being totally transparent here. Now this is, my mom passed away in 2016, my dad, he told us over Christmas that he has primary progressive aphasia, as far as they can tell, that he had some form of dementia, which they believe is Alzheimer’s as well. He’s 83. So this is an entirely different thing. He also has the benefit of everything we’ve learned since my mom had her illness, and it was night and day. And I really wanna take what I’m learning from him and the way he’s approaching this and just throw that into how I wanna approach my life from here on out. He sat us down and he said, look, this is what they’re saying. This doesn’t define me, first of all. Second of all, you can tell whoever you want. You take care of you. A third of all, this is what I want my life to look like from here on out. And he had thought about it and he outlined it. And they’ve already talked to a lawyer, he’s cleaning up the house for me and for my brother and my sister. And I’m grateful to my mom for all that we learned from what she went through. And I’m grateful for my dad for how he has built on that going forward.
Kate: I’ve had a lot of friends who have some experience with parental caregiving, but really, until I heard your story, I hadn’t heard someone be so loving and so honest at the same time, about how it feels to desperately want to help somebody whose life is becoming completely unmanageable, but yet feeling like not just like a brittleness around it from her, but like a, like a very defensive, scared, scared. And then just not in any way sure of how you’re even supposed to handle a parent who increasingly has very little control over their own lives. You had very scary situations that you had to deal with.
Kim: Very scary. Yeah, and to go back to your other question about, you know, becoming a parent myself while I was beginning to parent my mom, that was really challenging because I realized I had to protect my kids from my mother. You know, instead of just like embracing, letting her be a grandma, I had really try to think 10 steps ahead and protect her pride and all kinds of things. It was just very complicated.
Kate: I mean, some of the things that stand out to me is when your son is so young and having to explain to him why his grandmother seems so upset. Like, when normally, I mean, normally you’d want to say if it was a stranger, you could say like, that’s a totally irrational response. I’m so sorry that she’s mad at you. But because you’re trying to protect both kinds of love. How did you find a way into that dynamic?
Kim: I think we were a little too deferential to the disease. We did the best we could. And to anyone in this situation, like give yourself grace because you’re doing the best you can. Everybody’s doing the best they can. But you know, I think my dad was deferential to the illness and so mom was very upset because my oldest son is Huck and my youngest son is Jasper, and my mom could not say Jasper and so Huck and my mom had such a beautiful relationship when he was a toddler and she was in these, you know, middle years of dementia, because she could sit on the floor and they’d make up silly games and they were delighted with each other, right? And so they made up a really silly delightful game and he’d say, say Jasper and she’d go, blah, blah. And then they both howl with laughter, right. And it was so funny until suddenly it wasn’t. And she got really upset. And then suddenly felt like he was making fun of her. And my dad took her side as he did so often in those days, just like so loyal, fiercely loyal. And they took off and my dad called and he said, she wants an apology. I was like, okay, I’ve got a four-year-old. Let me sit down with him and try to explain why he can’t play this game anymore and why it hurt her feelings. You know, ultimately like I think it was really good for him because I was very honest and he didn’t quite understand it but he apologized and then he learned he had to be a little bit more careful around Nana. And there were other ways that I was surprised by how it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing for him. It’s not necessarily a bad thing to realize someone’s limitations, you know. But like when we moved her into long-term care, I just thought it was really hard for me to see her there. And I thought it would be really hard for Huck to see her there, but it wasn’t. And he could immerse himself in it and be in the present the way my mom could at the time be in present in the way that I couldn’t. I learned from them, I learned from watching them interact and learned from how we could leave there and Huck was able to just let it go and move on and had a great time. He would have a great in a place like that because there were funny and interesting people.
Kate: Even just you saying that, like, there’s such a kindness that you have about it, because, like I know you were so scared. It’s like a scary and chaotic situation to wonder how your child’s going to respond to people who say all kinds of things, people who, you know, like might think that that child is theirs. There’s something very not nostalgic about how you approach this. One thing I get very frustrated by is some of the romantic language around caregiving, like, oh, it must be so rewarding. As if meaningful love isn’t an enormous, sometimes like soul-sucking existential crisis in which you can genuinely worry about the health of the people that you love. Like there’s none of that sort of romance about the way that you talk about this.
Kim: Yeah, no. But you’ve got to find the humor. To me, that was the thing, was we had to just find the hilarious things about it, you know? That’s the only way through. It’s not romantic. Unless you find diapers romantic.
Kate: Totally. Yes, I do think that the tragic comedy of life gets to hit the high notes and the low notes really well. So I love that. Alzheimer’s is often so difficult in relationship to grief because it’s so uncertain when to say and how to say goodbye. You lived with your mom’s disease for over 10 years before she died and it sounds like discovering and rediscovering ways to relate to her was a huge part of growing as a young mom and into your own, I don’t wanna say middle age, but like complete adulthood in a way.
Kim: Yeah, you could say middle-aged. It’s not a bad word.
Kate: I started calling myself middle-aged at about 29, so not really sure when that starts. But you write, Just when I think I’ve lost her, I find her again in small things and brief moments. They deepen the mystery and feel something like miracles.
Kim: Yes. And that keeps happening, by the way, which is really awesome because she hasn’t been on earth in her, you know, soul form since 2016. And she still shows up and I’m still healing that relationship in wonderful, beautiful, miraculous ways. So that’s exciting.
Kate: We’re going to be right back after a break to hear from our sponsors. Don’t go anywhere. You’ve committed to raising awareness for this terrible disease through your annual dance party to end Alzheimer’s event. But a few years ago, in terrible, terrible irony, you got up to do the usual MCing and then nothing happened. No sound came out of your mouth. Your voice was just gone. Will you take me back to that moment?
Kim: Yeah, so the theme is 90s and I understand the assignment. And I am Cindy Crawford and my hair is huge and I’ve got the freckle, you know, got the off-the-shoulder like silk purple and black stripe fabulousness.
Kate: Pretty woman but not pretty woman because you’re also just not a sex worker.
Kim: I’m just me. So I waltz out and I’m supposed to kick off the whole night with my brother and my sister. And I opened my mouth to welcome everybody and I had no voice. It was just complete constriction and it was terrifying and it went to crickets. There was just silence in the crowd and my sister turned to me and she said, did you just lose your voice? And it was like that moment, you know, that just stretches. It felt like an hour where everyone was just like mouths agape staring at me and I was staring back and you know, in reality, it was probably a few seconds. My sister just took over because she’s such a professional. And then the next thing I know, we’re like doing a line dance because Brad said we needed to make it 90s country. So we threw in a line-dance. And I’m realizing like, oh my gosh, I’m supposed to introduce Kelly Bannon next and I’m not going to be able to do that. And so I like just the chaos of the moment and like trying to do a line dance and flip through my index cards to get the right card to give to my sister so she can carry on. It was just like the whole thing was so traumatic and I thought maybe the next day, the next week it would come back. And it would come back, but it would be very, very breathy. And like at a dinner party or in a loud room, it just, it was awful. It was awful. Even in my own house, like calling my kids, you’re late for school. They can’t hear me. One of the first things Brad got me was a megaphone, which was really, really romantic. Talk about romance. That was very thoughtful.
Kate: That’s so great.
Kim: But yeah it was terrible and you know I love to throw out a good one liner and no one would hear me. So much of our personalities are in our voice, expressed in our voice, especially mine. I’m an actor, I am a public speaker, using my voice as part of my value system so I had to really figure out what was this trying to teach me and then what other ways can I use my voice. I wrote a lot. Talked to people one-on-one, but like even talking on the phone was hard.
Kate: You had a horrible surgery, didn’t you? You had like some kind of terrible, like you had to stay awake!
Kim: You have to reframe! You have reframe, that’s what I’m saying!
Kate: I refuse! You are awake for a surgery!
Kim: Listen, to me, that is the most important thing because it’s all about opening my eyes. What is this trying to teach me? There’s no way I could sleep through that.
Kate: I wanna close my eyes and skip some things. There’s a lot I wanna skip. It’s so funny, cause I often have to have these like, you know, I’m like always growing new things in my terrible colon. And lately though, I’ve gotten so excited about, because I’m getting more and more used to being comfortable with the fear, and so lately I’m just like crawling right up on that table myself, putting my own gas mask on. I usually will say something totally ridiculous like because you’re naked and it’s so gross and you look terrible so I’m like did anyone else here go to Yale? We’re peers, and then shove a gas mask on my own self and go to sleep. Oh if I can skip it, I’m out. I’ll be gone. I want to learn less, but I do really appreciate how you’re a very like you’re not a platitude person, but you’re also like a learner. Like any, if there’s an opportunity for you to learn something, for you to grow, I think you do, you do like aim yourself at like, if there is anything here for me, I want it.
Kim: Yeah, you know, one of your episodes that meant so much to me was Rabbi Leder.
Kate: Oh, yeah.
Kim: Steve Leder, right? You got it. Oh my gosh. When he talked about if you’re going through hell, don’t come out empty handed. I was like, yes, I am taking that and I am carrying that with me wherever I go. That meant so much to me. I think that’s really, really valuable.
Kate: I totally agree. I feel that way about threading that needle, about not happening to me for a reason, but I will find whatever there is here for me to find and discover and to learn and to cherish. I will take it. I will take it. We’re going to take a quick break to tell you about the sponsors of this show. We’ll be right back. You’re the most playful mom. You also live in a house of Lego, which I also love. Like, how do you think this openness to trying to learn from difficult times has changed how you are as a parent?
Kim: That’s a great question. I have a senior right now. That’s, that’s a whole thing. And I was just thinking today that I feel like I’ve turned a corner from like, going like, okay, we’re gonna be a family who does game nights on Saturdays or like, okay, we’re going to be the family who, you know, sits around and does a group Lego project. That ship’s sailed now and instead, it’s like, okay, kids, who are you? And how can I fit into that part of your life, you know? I’m just not in charge the way I used to be. My oldest finally got his license and he’s driving himself now. And I just feel like now I’m sort of, I’m working on sitting back and not micromanaging because so much of parenting for me for so many years and when they’re younger, you know, it makes sense, is the micromanaging. And I’ve had to be very conscious about not doing that now and just letting everybody in the family just be who they are, be responsible for who they are, and embrace that and love that. And that’s why my house is a house of LEGO.
Kate: I love that. That sounds like it matches up exactly with what someone told me about learning to be the parent of adult children. He said, I just really try to remind myself to be curious about whatever they happen to be obsessed with now, even though it’s not dinosaurs. Sometimes it’s rockets, just adult men sitting around talking about rockets. And I like that idea of like not yanking them into where you are, but just following them where they go, and then just sitting there and being very interested.
Kim: Yes. And sometimes they’re like, mom, you’re not really interested, are you? And I’m like, I’m trying. And also, by the way, I don’t have to always be interested. And that’s another thing is like, yeah, you know what? I’m going to go, I’m gonna go work out. I’m to go for a walk with a friend. It’s OK. I don’t have to be interested in everything.
Kate: I do think, that makes me happy because I thought I was the only parent who looks at my son if he’s trying to describe a video game and I was like, boring. And he’s like, Mom. I was, like, I refuse.
Kim: Yeah, I mean, they do that to me. Come on. Equal opportunity boredom.
Kate: Well, lovie, you obviously have a long genetic line of mastering difficulty and adversity with delight and also curiosity. And I really, I’m so grateful that you’re somebody who embodies like grace and the desire to learn in all things, like beautiful and terrible. And Kim, I just feel really lucky to be your friend.
Kim: I feel lucky to be your friend and thank you for letting me come on because I know I demanded it and I appreciate it.
Kate: Friends, you know I’m not one to tie up any story with a bow, and I am loath to say, this made me who I am today. Because I don’t think any lessons, quote unquote, we learn from hardship are worth the price we pay. But there is a deep wisdom we mine in these places of grief and uncertainty. And like Rabbi Steve Leder says, if you’re going through hell, don’t come out empty handed. So, my dears, if you have found yourself in your own version of hell today, may you find the nugget of wisdom, may it just present itself to you in a way that helps carry you through. Maybe it’s the feeling of love. Maybe it is empathy for others who are facing hard things. Or if you want to take a tip from Kim, maybe you can start with delight. A she-shed covered in chickens. Over-the-top 90s country parties. She and her husband, Brad, once hosted a Festivus party where they aired their grievances with relatives. It’s so funny. They just stood up to be like, hey, here’s my issue. I’m not sure if I can fully recommend this as a process for every family, but man, would I love to have been a fly on the wall. Kim knows the power of delight in the midst of actual realities, not as a way to skip the hard parts, but as a way to let the light in. I really wanna hear from you. How has humor carried you during hard seasons? Find me online @katecbowler or call us and leave a voicemail. I’m at 919-322-8731. And hey, if you’re in a season where caregiving or parenting or just being a person feels impossibly heavy, hear this, you are not doing it wrong. You’re just doing something hard and you don’t have to do it alone. I’m so glad you’re here with us today. And hey if it helps, maybe start a line dance in the kitchen. You deserve a little joy too. See if you remember the grapevine. Gosh, man, I miss aerobics. There are so many caregivers in this community and if that’s you and you need a little boost, we’ve curated a little support guide for you. Episodes, book racks, blessings to make you feel less alone and I will link it in the show notes. And just as a reminder, all of our episodes are available to watch on YouTube. So yeah, you can go check out Brad Paisley’s den of guitars with your very own eyeballs. I’m @katecbowler on YouTube. And a big thank you to our funding partners, Lilly Endowment, The Duke Endowment and Duke Divinity School. And to the team behind everything happening and Everything Happens. Jess Richie, Harriet Putman, Keith Weston, Baiz Hoen, Gwen Heginbotham, Brenda Thompson, Iris Greene, Hailie Durrett, Anne Herring, Hope Anderson, Kirsten Balzer, Elia Zario, Catherine Smith, and Megan Crunkleton. This is Everything Happens with me, Kate Bowler.
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