Broadway star Nick Cordero died exactly three months ago on Monday, and his widow, fitness trainer Amanda Kloots, has shared how she's coping with grief.
For months, Kloots kept her hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers abreast of Cordero's COVID-19 treatment, and encouraged them to sing his song "Live Your Life" every afternoon.
These days, she's sharing details of the life she's leading in Los Angeles with her and Cordero's 1-year-old son, Elvis, and documenting how she's moving forward.
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"In case anybody is also grieving through this time or has been grieving, these kind of things have been helping me," she said Sunday. "I think sharing is caring and in giving we receive."
Her tips for managing grief are:
1. Make a schedule: Kloots said that she literally writes out her plans for the next day on a piece of paper. "Knowing exactly what I'm going to do the next day is super helpful," she said. "Plans are good."
2. Get out of the house: After she wakes up in the morning, Kloots tries to leave her house as soon as she can. "I have found that if I stay in the house, things start happening. Deliveries happen. Phone calls happen. Emails come in. And I overwhelmed and any time I feel overwhelmed I start to feel panic and anxiety," she said. "If i get up and get out of the house, I am most likely outside or I am exercising or I'm moving my body or I am focusing on something else, and it really, really helps."
3. Keep a "super minimal, clean home": For Kloots, her home environment can have a big impact on her mental state. "The minute our house feels like chaos, my brain feels like chaos," she said. "The more I can keep my home environment peaceful, the better I am."
4. Work: During Cordero's months-long hospitalization, Kloots said she was completely focused on her husband. Now, she said, "working makes me feel like me again." "Don't take your job for granted right now," she said.
5. Write down what you're feeling: Kloots is currently writing a book with her sister, Anna, about their experiences over the past few months, and it has been cathartic, she said. "Even if you're not writing for a purpose, I suggest writing if you're going through a grieving process," she added. "It's just been very, very helpful to kind of process everything that happened, which was a lot. And I'm realizing how a lot it was in writing."