Amanda Kloots Reflects on “Live Your Life: My Story of Loving and Losing Nick Cordero”

I will say, that just really isn’t my personality, to take the woe-is-me approach. Were there times where I’d cry to my parents, like, “I don’t understand why this is happening. This isn’t fair!”? Yes, of course I did. But honestly, it was few and far between.

One of the beautiful things about the book was seeing the community that rose up around you. In the worst time of your life, it seems like you saw the best of humanity.

Yes. It was constantly that juxtaposition. My brother and sister and I would never decide to just live together for three weeks, but the three of us now have this amazing bond. We have memories that we still belly laugh over, and yet we were going through the literal worst of times. It’s so weird. I remember, in writing this book, Anna and I would be writing about re-creating the Three Men and a Baby poster and honestly wishing we could go back in time and live some of those days. And we would look at each other and be like, “That’s crazy. How can you want to go back and relive these days, even though, like seconds later, we were getting a call from the hospital and then rushing you to the hospital to be with Nick?” But that was—that is life, you know?

As this horrible experience happened, people got to know you, and your career has flourished. Professionally, you’re thriving after one of the most unimaginable things in your life. Is that strange?

It definitely is a weird thing, if you really let yourself go down that road. I had a lot of dreams and goals for myself, careerwise. I never thought a talk show would be one of them, but you spend 19 years living in New York City. I’ve done film, I’ve done TV, I’ve filmed pilots. I’ve done morning television shows time and time again. Being in front of a camera is nothing. When The Talk came my way, the first day, I wasn’t even really nervous. It never felt like this isn’t something I’ve actually been working for my entire life. I’m not here because my husband died.

You’ve done Dancing With the Stars, this book, The Talk—has it helped you to have so many things to do?

The Talk gave me a place to go, a family to be a part of every day. It gave me an opportunity to get dressed up and have an adult conversation for an hour, which, when you live by yourself with a two-year-old, you’re not getting. It was a saving grace. Dancing With the Stars, my God—to allow myself hours a day to dance again, I found that part of myself who was in New York, performing in shows. Trust me, there is a part of me that’s like, “Oh, gosh, Amanda, do you just keep yourself so busy so that you don’t have to deal with the hard grief moments?” But one thing I’ve learned about grief is we all deal with it differently. In my opinion, it’s a day-to-day battle of how you can stay happy, how you can stay positive, and how you can keep moving forward, because I know that’s what Nick would want me to do. I know he would want me to just grow and fly and succeed and try and dream and love. That is who he was.

This interview has been edited and condensed.