Melissa Rivers is opening up in regards to the trauma she and her mother, the late comic Joan Rivers, confronted when Melissa’s dad, Edgar Rosenberg, died of suicide in 1987 by overdosing on prescription drugs in a Philadelphia resort room.
On the time, Joan stated that her husband of twenty-two years had been clinically depressed, believing it was introduced on by treatment he had been taking after having a coronary heart assault in 1984.
Now, in a dialog with PEOPLE, Melissa says the household confronted unspeakable grief afterward — and her relationship along with her mother was torn aside. “Suicide may be very difficult for the individuals who survive it,” Melissa, 56, explains. “It was very painful. It was very laborious.”
In a 1993 cowl story for PEOPLE, the duo defined that they barely spoke for a 12 months after Edgar’s demise.
“Melissa blamed me,” Joan stated on the time, noting that Edgar died quickly after the couple had separated. “We tried to go on with our personal lives, however we have been each so damaged that we could not assist one another.”
Melissa says they ultimately realized they wanted each other.
“It took remedy. It took time,” she now says of how they repaired their relationship. “I went right into a full disaster scenario the place I ended up in an abusive relationship, and once I known as her for assist, she got here via. It took one other main disaster for us to heal from the opposite disaster.”
Melissa provides that when they have been on talking phrases once more, they channeled their sorrow into bringing the topic of suicide into the sunshine.
“We actually threw ourselves into lending our identify to suicide prevention,” Melissa says. “On the time, suicide was nonetheless not one thing that was mentioned. We’re speaking 1987 when individuals thought it was nonetheless shameful or thought that it ran in households. No person would know what to say to you.”
“I spent a very good quantity of my time working to de-stigmatizing it,” she continues. “I am the co-chair of the Didi Hirsch Well being Psychological Companies and Suicide Prevention. And I’m at all times obtainable for individuals after they undergo it. I am actually trustworthy about it: It sucks.”
Melissa says she prefers to not sugarcoat suicide for anybody.
“Each time someone loses somebody, whether or not or not it’s suicide or every other sort of cause, I name my associates, and I’m going, here is the trustworthy half, it sucks. There’s nothing good about this proper now. It’ll suck for some time, and you are going to get via it.”
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She says that just about instantly after dropping her dad, her mother Joan determined to depart Los Angeles, the place Melissa was raised, and transfer to New York Metropolis.
“My dad and mom at all times felt like fish out of water in L.A., and it actually turned acute for my mom after my dad died,” she says of Joan, who later died in 2014 at age 81.
“It simply wasn’t who they have been. It wasn’t who she was. And apparently, my dad and mom had this pact that when one in every of them died, the opposite one would return to New York,” Melissa recollects. “I do not know why they’d this pact, however I feel it is as a result of neither of them favored residing in L.A.”
She provides, “They have been the least cool hip Hollywood individuals. My mother used to joke that we’re fortunate that my father didn’t sleep in a tie and their associates have been actually out of the English film group. They weren’t hanging in Malibu with a gold chain, an open shirt and bell bottoms.”
When you or somebody is contemplating suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Disaster Lifeline by dialing 988, texting “STRENGTH” to the Disaster Textual content Line at 741741, or go to 988lifeline.org.
