It’s April 21, 2016. 9.40 am.
The happy home-of-three is quiet and peaceful. Little Alice is at school. Patton Oswalt quietly
puts a mug with his wife Michelle’s favourite coffee on the bedside table. Michelle is still
asleep. She is snoring. She’s so tired, Oswalt thinks. She’s been
working frantically in the past few days to make a headway on her new true crime book.
Oswalt leaves the bedroom to run a few errands. Three hours later, he checks in on Michelle
again. She is not breathing.
All Oswalt can do is scream and throw up. That was the second-worst day in the life
of actor and comedian Patton Oswalt. The worst one was when he had to look into his 7-year-old
daughter’s eyes and tell her that she will never see her Mommy again.
How does one come back to life from losing their soulmate?
Everyone’s story is unique, but genius and insightful comedian Patton Oswalt has a lesson
or two to share. His wife died at the age of 46. Patton’s
world was shattered and would never be the same without his beloved.
Today on RumourJuice, we will tell you the real story of how Oswalt dealt with grief
of losing his beloved wife. He says he was struck twice by the lightning of love, but
had to face a lot of backlash for “betraying” his first wife’s memory “too soon”.
Don’t forget to subscribe to RumourJuice’s YouTube channel for more stories like this
one. Arguably, Patton Oswalt is the more famous
spouse. The 51-year-old has won multiple awards for his stand-up routines, and been in everything
from Seinfield, Parks and Recreation, Veep, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., to Blade: Trinity.
Yeah, Oswalt and his first wife Michelle McNamara made quite a pair. They met at one of Oswalt's
stand-up performances in LA. The comedian told that evening's crowd that his weakness
is... Irish women. After the show, a woman approached him and remarked that the bit about
Irish girls was nice. Oswalt was so stunned by her beauty that he couldn't muster a response
and almost let the stranger walk away. Luckily, he managed to get her number. And yes, she
grew up in an Irish-American family! "It was love pretty much immediately for me.
I think it took a few months for her," Oswalt recalled. Quite soon after their first meeting,
Michelle moved in with him. A
renowned actor and comedian, and a true crime writer and journalist. Imagine the conversations
they must have had at their dinner table! Parents to their precious girl, Alice, Patton
and Michelle were successfully juggling family life and their careers.
McNamara was obsessed with unsolved crimes. She ran a website where she covered breaking
stories and unsolved cases. She was eagerly looking for clues and angles that police could
have missed. Oswalt supported and understood his wife’s passion. He says that Michelle
was driven by her writer and humanitarian side: “We have all this technology, we have
all these clues, we have all this insight; why is this person not caught? And I think
that ended up being something that really intrigued her.”
Michelle McNamara was particularly interested in the string of crimes that happened in California
between 1976 and 1986. She called the unidentified murderer and rapist the “Golden State Killer,”
and the name stuck. It perfectly captured California’s duality: bright sunshine often
plays a setting to grim real-life scenarios. McNamara dived headfirst into the terrifying
mystery of the man who took so many lives and was responsible for his victims’ physical
and emotional scars. Little did the happy couple know where Michelle’s
investigation would lead her. She made a breakthrough in the case thanks to which the FBI were about
to reopen it. Michelle was immensely stressed and exhausted. Moreover, she had no idea that
her health suffered further due to an undiagnosed heart condition. In her vulnerable state,
the writer took a mixture of prescription drugs. The combination of the drugs and the
treacherous illness proved to be fatal. She didn’t wake up next morning. When Patton
Oswalt came in with his wife’s morning coffee, this was the last time he saw her breathing.
The cause of death was many things, Oswalt admits, but Michelle’s “lethal level of
empathy in her” certainly made her weaker and allowed all the other stuff to happen.
Michelle’s death put a dreadful task before Oswalt.
“I looked at my daughter and destroyed her world,” he recounted. “I had to look at
this little girl that was everything to me and take everything from her.”
The summer of 2016 turned into a nightmare for the Oswalts, the father and daughter.
Oswalt started treating himself as if he was already dead. Grief, he said, makes depression
look like a 4th grade bully compared to Jason Statham.
Alice became her dad’s sole reason
for existing. The actor admitted that, if not for Alice, he most likely would have turned
into a poorly-functioning, binge-eating alcoholic. Thanks to his little girl, Oswalt had a reason
to get up, make breakfast and take care of her.
That summer, Oswalt made several heartfelt and raw posts on social media.
"It's 102 days later and I can confidently say I have reached a point where I'm crawling.
Which, objectively, is an improvement. Maybe 102 days later I'll be walking."
A bit later, Oswalt started cautiously making plans about that day he would start telling
jokes, writing and filming again. Indeed, part of his journey to healing was Oswalt
returning to his stand-up comedy routine and publicly discussing the loss of the woman
he loved. Another part of the healing journey was finishing
his wife’s book. Michelle made it possible by making multiple
notes and saved thousands of the Golden State Killer-related files on her computer. Oswalt
says his wife didn’t work on the book to gain recognition. She simply wanted the criminal
behind the bars. Like the actor himself puts it:
“In comic-book terms, I was married to a great crime fighter.”
A couple of months after the book’s release, the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department
announced they had captured a primary suspect: 72-year-old United States Navy veteran and
former police officer Joseph James DeAngelo. The trial is still ongoing, but DeAngelo faces
either life without parole or death, if convicted. Michelle McNamara was a loving wife, an amazing
mother, and she had an unparalleled mind: thanks to the light she shed on a 42-year-old
case, the victims’ families may finally know some peace.
Patton Oswalt has found his peace, too. Some say he has moved on too soon, but only Patton
knows the price he paid for allowing himself to live fully again.
Surely, memories of Michelle will always, always have a place in his heart. After her
death, her own words helped Oswalt survive. She didn’t believe in the saying “everything
happens for a reason”. Michelle’s motto was: “If you want reason, if you want some
grace in the world, be kind. The only reason and grace we have coming is whatever you put
out there.” This April, Oswalt sent a lovely message to
his wife who would’ve celebrated her 50th birthday: “I hope wherever you are there's
good coffee, a strong WiFi connection, and endless mysteries for you to crack."
Not a full year after Michelle passed away, Patton felt the jolt of lightning he felt
with Michelle once again. His friend threw a dinner party. Patton was invited but couldn’t
make it. The next day, he got a message from someone who did attend the dinner: actress,
voice artist and psychologist Meredith Salenger. She teased him about missing “some amazing
lasagna”. Patton and Meredith started talking online.
For three months, the two communicated via Facebook messages before setting up a face-to-face
meeting. Oswalt calls it “a very Victorian-like-exchanging-letters kind of romance." They’d managed to discuss
some really deep personal stuff - everything, really: life, politics, books… And by the
time they met in person, Oswalt was head-over-heels for Meredith.
In
his fresh stand-up routine, called I Love Everything, Oswalt shares the one important
lesson he’d learnt: If you find love, run toward it. And that’s exactly what he did.
He
and Meredith Salenger married in November 2017. Patton said his experience was like
an evolution, a huge step from all the darkness towards the strength and ability to feel joy
again. Meredith was a beacon he had to reach for.
He says of Meredith: “It’s almost like getting hit by lightning twice, that the statistical
odds are so insane — I met someone just as, if not even more, extraordinary [than
Michelle] in this woman Meredith Salenger and fell in love with her.” Equally important
is the fact that Meredith and Oswalt’s daughter Alice got along swimmingly. Alice served as
the flower girl at their wedding. The new and strong family union doesn’t
let criticism creep into their lives and ruin their happiness.
“Always creepy to me that you just ditched your ex-wife and moved on so fast.” Not
exactly something you expect to hear on the day of your one-year anniversary with your
beloved wife. And yet, Oswalt and Salenger have to face
these no-name, faceless opinions every day. 50-year-old Salenger fiercely defends her
husband… and genuinely appreciates Michelle McNamara. If you think that her and Oswalt
got together against Michelle’s family’s will, think again. Meredith says Michelle’s
family and friends have been nothing but supportive of Oswalt’s happiness.
“I think for Patton, having met and found love after over a year of intense therapy
and openly grieving and dealing with his pain… I am grateful to be the one who helps him
climb out of the depths of grief and find some joy again," Meredith says.
What is most important for both Meredith and Patton is that Alice is very happy. She has
just celebrated her 11th birthday, and yeah, she’s a pre-teen now.
"When Michelle was Alice’s mom, Alice was 3, 4, 5 – she was still a little kid," Oswalt
says. "And now ... both Meredith and I are like, 'You have responsibilities, you have
chores.' “ So Alice, even if begrudgingly, is learning to be a teenager. Like all teenagers
in loving families do. “I feel like I’m only living this life.
I don’t owe anyone else anything else,” Patton Oswalt says bravely.
Words to live by! … … … … or not?