>> i want to get to immediately introducing our panelists. first, my name is beth ann, i am a book reviewer and writer. i have a panel at 1:30 about the books that changed my life, my recent anthologying, and that's one of the reasons i get the privilege of being here today, because i interview authors frequently and absolutely love it. i don't think our panelist needs much introduction. however, diane rehm is the host of an e upon mouse show on npr, and she has been so for many years.

weaver delighted to have her -- we're delighted to have her here. i have lots of questions, but again, i'll try to make sure i leave lots of time for yours. thank you, diane, for being here today. >> oh, it's my pleasure. [applause] >> diane is a national treasure, and her new book is a very heart felt one about coming to terms with what life is like after a beloved spouse, after -- dies, a long marriage, and life continues on. and today i'm going to speak with diane about a great many things from the book, but we'll have time also to talk with her about her career in radio and some of her favorite moments there. but, diane, first i want to ask you, "on my own" is about being

on your own, but it's also about, if you will, life alone, the solitary life, a life that has a different tenor, if you will. so could you tell us a bit about shaping the essays that make up this book? >> well, first of all, i want to thank you all so much for being here. it's a pleasure to be here where john and i spoke back in 2002 on our book about our marriage that was titled "toward commitment." this is primarily a love story, a love story of mine toward my late husband and the difficulty

that one has when one makes that commitment at time of marriage in sickness and in health, vowing to support another life, another being, another person with whom you have lived for, as it turned out, i lived with john for 53 years. we were married for 54. john had parkinson's disease, and as it became more and more apparent that his parkinson's was taking him downhill, he decided to end his life.

he did it in a way that still makes me so sad. because there was and is no law in maryland which allows doctors to assist individuals who have been deemed within six months of death as john was, there is no law that allows doctors to help those patients. john chose to top drinking water -- stop drinking water, stop eating food, stop taking medication. now, as i'm sure many of you know -- would you forgive me if i stood up and walked? >> i think so. i think we could forgive you, diane. [applause] i'm just so much more comfortable this way. it strikes me as being a little

difficult, but i hear a little echo. and if we can get that down, that would be great. as i'm sure most of you know, you can go without food for days upon days upon days but not without water. within about ten days to two weeks, the organs begin to break down without water. be -- and john chose to end his life that way, and i had chosen to write a book that i began writing on the night he was dying. i was sleeping, trying to sleep on two chairs by his bed with my

little dog maxie on my stomach, and that didn't work. so i just got up at about two a.m. i had my ipad with me, and i began writing. i cannot tell you, beth ann, that there was any plan in mind at that time to continue to write and somehow to create a book of essays or thoughts or anything of the sort, but all i know is that that night i needed to put on paper what i was feeling, what i was seeing, what i was thinking. and so it began. >> and so it began. there are so many ways to move

into what began that night with your ipad, diane. but one of the things that really struck me in reading your book, and i've read it new twice now, is that loss teaches us things. it has meaning, and it also is a great teacher. and so perhaps you could speak that night when you began to write and as you added pieces, some of them are letters, some of them are meditations and so on, what you learned. >> i think the most important learning was that i had to adjust to being alone. something that i as a woman when went from my parents' home to my first brief marriage to marriage to john for 54 years i had

really never experienced. and the idea of being alone was something i had never even thought about until john had to move into assisted living. and what's so curious is that john rehm loved being alone. he loved the quiet. he loved the silence. he once said to me that a room without words and quiet in it was like a drinking of water -- a drink of water. for him, and there was at one point when he said this, but he said it many times, he would rather have lunch with the "new yorker" magazine than with any human being -- [laughter]

and that included me. [laughter] but i knew that about him. and rather, i mean, the teaching of writing this book, the lessons in writing this book came from recognizing how i could have been a different person. how if i had simply recognized his need to be alone as his need rather than rejection of me. >> that's a powerful statement. and in "on my own," you are quite honest about how difficult your marriage was at times due to this misunderstanding, due to

john's own needs and also, as you say towards the beginning of the book, he admitted late, very late on in his illness that he felt he'd been emotionally abusive to, towards you. that's a tough thing not just to hear, but to share. i wonder if you might share a bit more with us about why a very difficult marriage can also be a very rewarding, rich and loving marriage. >> the reason i wrote that -- and so many people have asked me about that, why would you include such a painful admission on his part,? diane, i apologize to you because i was deliberately emotionally abusive toward you. why would i write that? and i think it first came out of

my heart. it was something i had to include, but it was also to demonstrate how a marriage of such mixed emotions and mixed experiences can truly be a successful marriage. there are no perfect marriages that i know of -- >> or i -- [laughter] >> maybe out there, maybe out there, maybe. i'm not counting your marriage. maybe you regard your marriage as absolutely perfect. ours was not. and yet from all perspectives, it was a successful marriage. i remember walking into our

pediatrician's office with our son who was then probably about 8 or 9, and the doctor said to me tell me your secret. what is it about you two that makes you so compatible, that makes your marriage so good? his marriage was breaking up. and he was wondering about ours. so i think that that was part of the reason i wanted to put that in, to say not only to myself because i had to hear it, and it was like i knew he he had had that feeling and had been

specifically, deliberately emotionally abusive. but to hear it come from his mouth, was something else again. >> that is such an amazing statement about intimacy. and the reason i want to pick that up, diane, is because one of the reasons you say in the book that you've become such an advocate for aid in dying -- that's your phrase, and a very good one -- is because you were denied that final intimacy of being able -- it gives me chills just to say that -- of being able to be with john at the last. and it was because of this process. it was because he could not have agency and aid in dying. and so intimacy isn't just about being told something important -- >> right. >> -- and taking that in. >> right. >> it's also about sharing every part of life. >> exactly. and the last moments of life.

after that last night when john's caregiver arrived at 7:30 in the morning, i said i'm going to take maxie home, i'm going to feed him, shower and then i'll be right back. well, after i got home, i got a call from the caregiver saying, diane, please come quickly. mr. rehm is going. and by the time i got there, it was 20 minutes too late. and having spent the night there, you know, wanting to hold his hand at the last, it became very frustrating to me. and as i think of it now, it's just extremely hard to bear.

had he had the right to die, he would have had had medication which he would then opt to take or not. >> right. >> and he would have had informed me when he was going to take it. and i could have been there with him. thus far, as i'm sure you know, the maryland state legislature has rejected the bill that has now been introduced two or three times. so far it has not passed. there are five states that do have aid in dying starting with oregon and, most recently, with california. i think that legislation is going to move throughout the

country, and people eventually will have that right to choose. and by the right to choose -- >> [inaudible] >> i'm sorry, your mic is gone. let's get diane's mic back on. >> there it is, there it is. [laughter] i did it, i'm sorry. [laughter] so here's what i mean by the right to choose. i believe in god. i am a strong believer in god. and there are those among us all who believe in god, who believe that it is only god's timing that matters. and if that is your belief, i strongly support it. you should be able to say i will

be here on this planet until god decides it's time for me to go. if, for example, you find yourself very, very ill and you wish for your doctor to not only continue to try every means possible to keep you alive and then to offer to you palliative care -- simply care to keep you comfortable -- i totally support that. if, on the other hand, you find yourself as john did, unable to feed himself, unable to walk from bed to bathroom, unable to

care for himself in any way and you wish to have that right to choose, i totally support that as well. it is the right to choose. [applause] that i believe in. [applause] thank you. >> preach, sister rehm, preach. [laughter] you say in the book that probably it will take another ten or twenty years, like marriage equality took a while to get hold. and one of the other things i think that's quite interesting for all of us here is to hear about your accidental advocacy. because you believe strongly in aid in dying for john, but you did not become a public figure speaking on behalf of aid in

dying all on your own. it happened because of some events. some talks, some things you got involved in. >> right. >> but now, and this is the important part, now you want to -- once you've retired and your show is no longer on -- [laughter] going to take me a moment for that, you want to move on to working full time in this cause. and so i wanted to give you some time to speak about the public side of aid in dying. >> you know, it was "the washington post" who labeled me a new and strong advocate for the right to die after i had attended three dinners, attended three dinners sponsored by compassion in choices.

they did these dinners as a fundraising vehicle and felt very strongly that my presence would attract large donors. each of those dinners was for 20 persons, each of whom paid $2500 to attend. at those dinners i did nothing but speak of john. and to speak of how he died and my belief that he should have had choice. npr and my own station, wamu, felt that by attending those dinners i had crossed a line of

journalistic ethical behavior with which i did not agree. i had already attended two dinners. npr folks, wamu folks and i all came together, and we all together agreed that since i was committed to a third dinner, i would attend that dinner and then no more. and i agreed to that. with regret. and i said i am very said that it has come to this, because i do not feel i was there in an advocacy position. i was there talking about my own husband.

i want to correct one word you said. i am not retiring. [laughter] [applause] i am -- >> i stand corrected. [laughter] >> i am simply stepping away from the microphone after 37 years of doing two hours a day, 10 hours a week of "the diane rehm show"ment -- show. i am 79 years old, i will be 80 in september. it is time for someone else to have that glorious real estate. >> no. [laughter] [applause] >> so we are in the process of thinking very hard and very

carefully about what comes next, and the management at wamu has been in touch with so many people, so many stations. npr has been involved. something really, really good will come into those two hours. i really believe that. i will miss being with all of you every day. there is no question of that. but i am going on to do other things. i have appeared in a play about alzheimer's, and we've done that play in washington, in l.a., in san diego, in boston, in raleigh, indianapolis, and we plan to continue taking that

play around the country. i am also going to be speaking out wherever i am at on the right to choose. i want to be very clear about that. as opposed to saying you and i and everyone else should have the right to die, i am saying you should have the right to choose. and i hope that that's what it comes to. >> so no retirement. however, diane, i know in the book you let us know that saturdays are your days to sleep in. and so what will saturdays look like later this year for you? i imagine it's going to be quite a luxury.

>> saturdays will be marvelous. [laughter] i have been getting up at five a.m. for the last 37 years and more because i supervised my now 56-year-old son's piano practice each morning. so i used to get up at five with him and supervise that. so i got in the habit early on in our married life of getting up early and, gosh, there were times when i was freelancing for the associated press, radio network where i'd have to get up at four and be downtown. you know, i don't know, i'm not going to plan ahead. [laughter] i'm just going to hope that maxie's health stays well.

maxie is a now-13-year-old long haired chihuahua. [laughter] he's all black -- she's all black, and she has a copy of the book i wrote about maxie. [laughter] and he is my beloved. you know, i talk with him, i talk with john every single day. every day. i talk with john. and he talks back to me. which is wonderful. the saddest part came two days after his memorial service when i got a telephone call telling me that i would be awarded the presidential medal for the humanities. and i thought, oh, my god.

why couldn't he have lived to see this? he was my champion. on the first day i volunteered at that tiny little station, wamu, which was on the campus of the american university, you went off the curb, you couldn't hear the station anymore. [laughter] but i came home, this is 1973. npr got off the ground really in 1970. and so wamu was not even a member of npr at that time. you had to have five full-time employees to be a member of npr, and we did not. i came home from my first day as a volunteer at that station, and john rehm -- honestly, this is

so hard to believe way back then -- john rehm said to me, "someday you'll be host of that program." so he dreamed for me. he saw ahead for me in ways i could not see for myself. now, contrast that with what we talked about earlier, the tension, the difficulties in marriage. i mean, it's so complicated. marriage is the hardest job in the world next to parenthood. [laughter] >> that's very true. i have a couple of smaller questions, but since you just spoke about john rehm again, one of the things i wanted to mention is that you talk at the

end of the book about missing him more. and so often in our society we think, you know, grief has a time, grief ends. but this isn't actually the mourning that you're talking about, it's missing him more. and i think you touched on that a bit, but i'd love to have you expand on it. >> john rehm went to friends seminary with malcolm brown of "the new york times." malcolm won a pulitzer for his coverage of vietnam along with a number of other reporters, and malcolm married a woman from vietnam. and malcolm, unfortunately, came down with parkinson's at about the same time john did.