Tina Turner: My Love Story, Part 1

0:00Hi, it's Ashley from OWN. This episode is sponsored by Dispatches from the Divide, a new limited series podcast. When conflict pushes us apart, what does it take to choose compassion instead? Dispatches from the Divide shares powerful true stories of ordinary people facing extraordinary divisions and finding unexpected ways to lead with empathy, courage, and humanity. It's a moving look at what can happen when we choose curiosity over conflict, even when it's hardest. Find Dispatches from the Divide wherever you get podcasts. Hi, it's Ashley from OWN. I used to think great work was about being in the right headspace.

0:39Then I found a TikTok video that made me think about my physical space. An interior designer explored how things like ceiling height and room size might influence how we think. Now I wonder how much of our environment shapes our work without us noticing. Now I'm looking at my workspace asking what kind of thinking I'm making room for. On TikTok, one idea can change how you see something you thought you knew. Your next discovery is waiting on TikTok. I'm Oprah Winfrey. Welcome to Super Soul Conversations, the podcast. I believe that one of the most valuable gifts you can give yourself is time. Taking time to be more fully present.

1:19Your journey to become more inspired and connected to the deeper world around us starts right now. Well, it actually is over 20 years since we had our first conversation. And here we are still talking and have more to talk about. And more to talk about. It doesn't stop. It doesn't stop. So now we're podcasting, Tina. You're now on our podcast. Okay. And on O Magazine's Year of Big Questions. Okay. So I wanted to say I was then and I will forever be, as you know. I think I am your biggest fan. Well, thank you. And I want to thank you for being the goddess of rock and roll, for using your life to be a role model for all of us and for the inspiration you brought to my life and to countless others.

2:04And I also wanted to say that, you know, the last time I actually saw you was at the wedding five years ago, which was one of the most magical days. It was, I have to admit. I have to say thank you again, but it was magical. And I realized that afterwards, but to hear it coming from you, it made it even more special that it was special. So thank you. You know why it was so special? Because of what you chose to wear. True. Describe what that was. And where it was. And where it was. With Jeff and all the flowers. And 140 ,000 roses. Yes, yes, yes. On one wall. And the tables with no tablecloths.

2:39and it was just out of instinct what I wanted for my first wedding. I didn't have someone for the planning or anything. It was just I wanted Jeff to put the flowers where I wanted them and give me the flowers that he knew about, and then all the rest of it was mine. And not to mention your handsome groom. I mean, we were all in tears when you all came out there in that, I don't know, that incredible automobile. I don't even know what that thing was. It was a rose rose. It was that new rose rose. and I bought that one because I said that's the last car. That is, I will not buy another car. Erwin has bought two or three since then, but I said, no, I have two Jeeps and the Bentley and the Rolls, and that's it.

3:20I don't need another one. That was beautiful. Well, you don't. I mean, that should have been the last car. That is the last car. I think people will be shocked to learn that what felt like that incredible fairytale moment, and it was for all of us watching, that even during the wedding you had gone into the house because you were feeling overheated or you were feeling something. What were you feeling? I have an old chest pain that actually I first felt in my 40s, and it never left me. And I have checked now, even still all kinds of, how do you say it, MRIs and x-rays. they can't find a thing but they end up thinking that it was something in you know then the goo zip or the swallowing when you swallow sometimes it spasms and all I need to do is drink a glass of cold water or take magnesium but that I had the worst one at the wedding that was very strong and you know Oprah it comes more with stress than not oh well there was well there would have been a lot of stress that day also.

4:35It was very hot, I recall. Very, very hot. It was hotter than we all had expected, and then you had all these fans, you had these fans made for us, these beautiful fans. But my dress was also pressing me really tight to make me look pretty, and it was too tight, actually, up in the chest area. It was, I, that's the first thing that I opened afterwards was that, that dress, but I felt like I looked pretty. I think people would be shocked to learn that in the last five years, you have suffered through many life-threatening medical challenges. I mean, so many, I couldn't even believe it when I was reading my love story.

5:17A stroke, You know, intestinal cancer, vertigo, kidney failure, a kidney transplant in all since that, that, that all kind of started three months after retirement magical. Yes. Yes. Yes. And you know, Oprah, it came, I had no pain, but my body was reacting from the cancer in the colon, from the kidney failure. and it sounds like it continues and goes on and it does. All of that was happening to the body, but there was no pain. So I felt like, what is it to the doctors? And they said, well, we don't know. And then they came up with the fact that there was cancer in the colon. There was two, both kidneys were already gone.

6:07And the infections from, it's not infections, what they call it, the kidney takes care of all of the cleansing in the body. Cleansing of the blood, yes. All that had started to toxify. So it was on its way. And I said, well, I'm ready to go if it's time. I mean, my mother and sister have gone. And Erin said, no, I don't want another partner. And so it went on and on. Erin said, I don't want another partner. I only want you, Chassie. You added that over. Well, he said something like that. So then I went nine months under dialysis. You call it dialysis. Dialysis, dialysis. And that was when they put a tube into your chest, and they wash your body for two hours, four hours, two hours intervals.

7:08And so I did that until for nine months, and they wouldn't give me Irvin's kidney because there had been growings in the colon. And if they had did the transplant, then they have to give me medicines that makes the kidney grow. And so I had to wait for nine months before I could get this nice little baby kidney here. Because the kidney medicine would have contradicted the cancer medicine, so you have to wait until you get rid of the cancer so you can prepare your body in order to receive the kidney. Yeah, the cortisone has the cortisone. You must take the cortisone to help the kidney to grow. And I'm still taking that.

7:58So you say in my love story that the stroke delivered a powerful blow to my body. So let's just start with the stroke. After a while, I couldn't keep up with everything. I don't know how you did. You said the stroke had delivered a powerful blow to my body. My entire right side was numb. I would have to work with a physiotherapist to learn how to walk again and that using my right hand would be a problem. I even had to be taught a special way to get up if I fell down. I was beginning to understand that I would fall down a lot. You know, it's so hard for any of us to imagine you, fearless teen-er, the one who climbed the Eiffel Tower, dance on the moving crane.

8:37But if you had seen... Having to learn how to walk again. But listen. What was going through your mind? If you had seen me in the hospital after they left me, I didn't believe that I couldn't walk. I said, bullcrap. And I stepped out of bed and went flop to the floor. And I said, oh, my God, what have I done? I didn't blame anyone else. But I felt I had done something that created, I didn't even know then that it was a stroke. So I struggled on the floor, had to learn how to get up and all of that. And the next thing I thought, well, I never thought that I would be disabled to stand up and walk.

9:17That's what I thought. And then I said, no, I'm going to train it. I'm going to will myself to do it. And then that's when I started working with the right hand, forcing the right leg not to limp. And it was, but you know, I wasn't depressed ever about it, Oprah. I was just determined to fix it. Wow. Yeah. but then where in the I was trying to figure out in the book where then so you had the stroke first right uh so that that that feeling overheated on the day of the wedding that had nothing to do with the stroke that came later or did it the stroke came later uh no you know what came first Oprah was the uh vertigo the vertigo vertigo uh I went on my honeymoon and did all of that and I came back and I said to Irvin, I want to find out.

10:10I remember you interrupted the honeymoon to come and see me at Hotel Decauze. Yeah, yes, absolutely, all of that, but I was still determined. Next thing is to find out what was that feeling in my chest. I always have to know because then you work with yourself to fix it after you find out what it is. So then I got back home and I went to the hospital, and while they were checking me out, the blood pressure went up, and two days later the stroke came. That was the beginning of the first part of the sickness. Then, yes, that was the first part of the sickness. Then I went at home away to Germany, to St.

10:52Moritz, and then another kind of sickness took over from the colon, the growths in the colon. That was impurities in the body. So you're recovering from the stroke. So while you're recovering from, let me interrupt here. While you're recovering from the stroke, trying to teach yourself to walk again, you, Tina Turner, and to stand again, you discover that you have intestinal cancer in the colon. Right. Then I had to get rid of that. After he showed it to me, I didn't want it in the body. That was first. So they went in, cut out an arm full of imperial colon. And then I was okay after I found out that's what it was.

11:35Actually, the first thing I thought is my mother and my sister must have had the same thing. That is probably what took them off the planet. That was the first thing I thought. And then I had to work on healing myself from that. And then from that came the biggest part. Both kidneys went out. By the time both kidneys went out, were you despairing? I know you said you weren't depressed during the entire time you were retraining yourself to walk. But once your kidneys, once you're recovering from a stroke, you're retraining yourself to walk. Now you find out you have intestinal cancer. And now you find out that your kidneys are failing.

12:19At what point do you get depressed? No, Oprah, I don't know why I didn't get depressed, but I'll tell you what I said. I said, what does that mean? What the doctor said to me. Both kidneys are out. And I said, what does that mean? So he says, Tina, you will die. And I said, oh, well, I guess it's time for that to happen. And they said, no, no, no, no, it's not. You don't have to do that. There's a machine downstairs that can take out the impurities, and you can have a life. And I said, no, no, no, I don't want to be on a machine. That's no kind of quality of life. And then Irvin chipped in and said, very emotional, no, I don't want another partner.

13:07And then I said, Irvin, you're young. I'm already reaching the old age. I said, I don't mind dying. And so then it went from there that he said, no, I don't want that. So then they took me downstairs and showed me the machine. They took Irvin away for tests, and he came back and 150 % worth giving me the kidney. So then I thought, well, if I have somebody willing to give me an organ from their body, I should stay on the machine for as long as I need to. So that was, my attitude wasn't down because I was already up and I wasn't sick and I just don't get depressed that easy, I guess. I have to say I guess because I didn't.

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14:40Find pieces made for real life and get even more value with Wayfair Rewards. Join Wayfair Rewards today to get 5 % back on every purchase. Head to wayfair.com to shop all things home. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R dot com. Wayfair, every style, every home. Okay, I have two big questions here. First of all, what was that moment like for you who have sort of, you know, interestingly spent a lifetime knowing inside yourself that you were not really wanted and you weren't really loved by your mother? Yeah. And now you have your beloved, Erwin, who you just recently married, but you all have been together for, what, 25 years?

15:31Yeah. Right? What did that feel like to hear him say, I want you to have my kidney? First, I didn't believe him. And then I realized he was serious. And then after he left the hospital, I had to lay there and think, someone's going to give me, Erwin's going to give me his kidney. Maybe he does love me. I think I always had a phobia of not being loved. So to believe it took a lot of doing, doing like maybe someone giving me a kidney. It was something like that. But I had to really take grips of the fact that that is what he was about to do. Like he was going to take an organ from his body to extend life to you and your body.

16:19Yes, yes. I know it sounds really dramatic, but it was all very dramatic, if you know what I mean. I mean, I'm not a very depressive person, and I was ready to do what happens when you lose kidneys. And then Irvin says he wants to give me his kidney, and I didn't believe it, then believed it. But I was still in that stage of if I have to die, if my time is now. I was already in the 70s. I lived long enough in my way of thinking, and I thought it was okay. But now that I thought I was going to live longer, I thought, well, do I want that? But, you know, like, this is going to prolong the living years, so I had to accept that.

17:10But at no time did I ever become depressed. You wrote in the book that when I'm tethered to the dialysis machine, I see everything through the piercing lens of mortality. So I wanted to ask you, did struggling through all of those illnesses make you think about your life differently? I didn't struggle. Oprah, I wasn't struggling. Every day I went to the hospital. I had my private room there, my books with me. and the first hour I slept and the second two hours Irvin came or Didier came and because everyone was off at the hospital then, it was basically closed, and I had two more hours to stay there.

18:00So the whole nine months was like that. The first two hours I slept, the second two hours I read, and they brought, I fell in love with a cake, some kind of cake that they brought. And that is what I did for nine months. It ended up fine. I liked it. I liked it to a point because, Oprah, that was how it was. That was either that or I died. Well, I want some of what you got. Anybody who's had a stroke, kidney failure, intestinal cancer, and vertigo all at the same time. And then you say, oh, I didn't struggle. it was not a struggle they brought me cake and i was on dialysis everything was fine okay okay let me ask you this okay i walked into the hospital i took off my shoes and my top they wired me i covered myself and i was there for four hours and i was perfectly comfortable there was nobody nothing struggling okay no struggles but did it make you think about going through this process let me just say it this way then did going through the process of these illnesses make you think about your life differently.

19:08Okay, I have to think because I didn't think that way about it. I'm sure probably I thought, I never thought this would happen. How is that going to be with a new kidney or at the hospital for a transplant? I'm sure I must have thought about the process that I had to go through, but that's all. It was just a matter of what was next. Okay, you also said in the book that you thought a lot about your mother. You thought a lot about Ike. I was surprised that you were thinking about Ike. You thought about why he did the things he did and what had happened to him. What did you conclude from that? Were you surprised that you were thinking about Ike during that time?

19:53I tell you, when I was in the hospital, I was probably thinking why he did what he did. Because in the musical, it showed that he changed because of drugs. And also, he was paranoid that I would leave him like all the rest. And I think some kind of way I really came up with it was a little bit of sickness in there with Ike. Yeah. You know, it's interesting. I just have been working with this great trauma expert named Bruce Perry. Actually, we were both working on a book together where I'm asking him the questions. And he was saying the most important question you can ask about a person's life is not what's wrong with you, but what happened to you.

20:37Because what happened to you, particularly if you were traumatized at an early age, affects the way your brain works, the way the synapse in your brain works. and has a major impact on you in the future, what happens to you as a young person. And so what you were saying in the book, I've been looking for the reasons behind his behavior, trying to figure out where he was coming from, telling myself, oh, that's why he did what he did. All these years later, I wanted to ask you, why do you think he did what he did? Well, I think he did what he did because he couldn't sing. He had to depend on me to do the singing.

21:20And at that same time when we couldn't get a hit record, I was being blamed. And so he had to find someone for the blame and the alcohol or the drugs or whatever he was taking shifted all of that weight, all of that, how to say, the cause of no success on me. Then, of course, I started to write the songs or to do whatever I could do to try to get hit records to change him because he hadn't been violent and like that before. Well, I'm wrong. He was always violent with Lorraine, the lady of the two children that he had for her. And he just had that streak. He actually did have a little bit of a sickness.

22:08Yeah. I mean, he sounds like he was really damaged as a child. Yes. And, yeah, you spoke about what happened to him witnessing, him having to witness his father. Yeah. I don't know how old he was when that happened, but that obviously had a major impact on him. And do you know when he was growing up, he was really quite unattractive. He became better looking after, you know, teeth and hair and all of that stuff that goes with Hollywood. and the girls wouldn't actually date him. They would meet him behind closed doors or in the back seats of cars, steamy windows. But so he had that phobia also that girls didn't want him because he was unattractive.

22:56He had all kinds of phobias, I think. And he was street smart. He didn't have the education either. Yeah, he didn't have the education. His English was, it wasn't English. It was, he made up his own English, basically. But he was good with counting, and not, he could read. But, you know, when you're intelligent, you're able to do things fluently. So he didn't do it fluently, but he understood. So he was good with contracts. He was good with knowing what a record company is. It sounded like love was his favorite word. if it works or if they can do things or telling them what to do. But that was business.

23:38But he was not an educated man. He dropped out of school at the eighth grade. Yeah. You know what, though? I think we, I believe we could trace a line. If we were to trace a line from the bravery it took for you to write your story back in the 80s, I, Tina, to women today speaking out about Harvey Weinstein and other powerful and abusive men and the accountability that's finally taking place. I think that there is a direct line to you speaking out, then other women speaking out. Remember I said this in the 90s when we were on the Wildest Dream Tour, and I remember standing there with this woman saying, I wanted to come and see Tina because hearing Tina tell her story and to be able to rise the way she has makes me think I could too.

24:27Yes, it was. at the time the book was written, there's even more written now about it because I had more time to reflect on what actually happened to Ike. And I knew it wouldn't get better. It's why I left. You say in the book, you still have never seen what love got to do with it. No, because they weren't actual enough. I mean, they tried to make it even more in those days, We call it the zoot suit, the guys and how they dressed and how they spoke. And it wasn't how it was. There was a movie, New Jack City, and I always make that parable. That is what Ike's life was like. But they made it really street and really unattractive.

25:11And I couldn't watch it. I saw a little bit of how they had changed the house. And I realize now that is what makes a movie. But I didn't realize that they would change it that much. And I couldn't see it. And you still haven't seen it? Okay. No, no, and I won't. Was it not because it would, and you still won't see it? Uh-uh. Yeah. No, because it was not precise, Oprah. It was not correct. It was not how it was. That's what I like about the musical. It was actually, the musical is how it was. When she walked up on the stage and how she explained to her grandmother, you know, everything was how it was.

25:53Okay, so let me ask you this. Did helping to develop and later watching Tina the Musical change the way you thought about your life? What was it like also seeing your life put to music that way? So that's two questions. But first of all, at first, weren't you reluctant to even do the musical or to have the musical done? Yes, I was reluctant because I was retired. I didn't want to remember Oprah. I didn't want to talk about it because I knew that I would have bad dreams. and to talk about it, it's not a good feeling to remember. And there was so much more in the back of the mind that happened. It all comes forward when you start remembering.

26:34And I didn't want to get involved with it. And then the Yope company, Fernanda company came. They all came to the house to talk me into it. And I said no until the very end. And then Mr. Fernanda said no. It has to be this. He explained to me what a musical was and what it has to be, the message of it, and that mine was a true, true story and one that should be a musical. And then I thought, well, yeah, there's no one else to tell them the story because everyone is gone. So then I got involved with it, and now I feel proud of it, but that was how it was. And how do I feel looking at it, seeing it?

27:18I didn't feel anything the first time because I had already told them, and I knew what they were going to say and how they were going to act. I felt proud the night of the opening when I walked into the room and everyone stood. It was a very nice respect. And then when it all started, my whole body chilled. I thought, oh, this is wonderful. But Oprah, I thought, I get emotional when I say it. I said, oh, I wish my mother and my sister and I could see it. It was a moment where they should have been able to see what I did with all of that bad stuff that was done to me. Interesting that you would want your mother to see it.

28:00Did you make peace? Have you made peace with your mother and her not wanting you? I sent for her to come to Europe. and actually while she was there, she was arguing with Aline about something, my sister, and I corrected her. I said, Mom, why are you always arguing with Aline? I told you I would get you nurses. I've gotten you nurses. You didn't want them. You always say you want Aline, but you argue. And I said, your Bible is not helping you. The next day, she was at the breakfast, didn't comb my hair. Her hair was standing up on her head like Don King. And I thought, good morning, Zelma. And what's wrong with you today?

28:44Nobody talks to me about my Bible. And I said, uh-huh. Well, what upset you? You came last night telling me that my Bible is not doing blah, blah, blah. And I said, okay, Ma, if you feel that way, you can get yourself dressed, and I will pack your things, and you should go home. Because I don't live like that anymore. I said, I live a happy life here, and you're bringing all of this negative energy. And then she sat there, and she really realized that I would have sent her home. And, of course, Eileen and Craig were standing there looking like, oh, I'm not ready to go home yet. Oh, ma, please be nice, so to speak.

29:21And after that, she cooled her heels, so to speak. And I think the two times that she was sick, I flew in to see her. I just kind of saw that she wasn't aboard water. She didn't realize that, how do I say that? She didn't realize that I wasn't a favorite of hers or she didn't act it. And maybe that's why she took sides with Ike. I just figured that that was her mentality because he had money. She always said, you should get someone that could do something for you. And I think she felt that Ike could do something for me and that I had left him. So I think that was her attitude. You put a lot of thought into these things when you get older.

30:15Does that make sense to you? Yes, it does make sense to me. But still, you are Tina Turner. And you were Tina Turner in her lifetime. So she got to see you perform. She got to, you know, bask in the glow of the light you brought to, you know, the family and also to the world and your career. She gets to bask in all of that. And yet she still sided with the man who was your greatest abuser. Yeah. And she thought. That's got to be painful. Wait, wait. When I was with Ike, she thought it was Ike. When I left Ike and went to Roger, she thought it was Roger. It was my sickness that I, she would say, you're my daughter.

30:57I know you didn't do it. She didn't see that I had any kind of creativity. She just thought that I could sing and dance, and that's all. That was Ma's mentality. Yeah, and when she even saw your apartment, your house decorated, she thought that it was Irwin. That it was Irwin. Once she was in Switzerland, and I said, Ma, you guys sit down and watch the lake. I'm going over and decorate the guest house. and then when I said, okay, it's ready, come and look, she stood there and she looked. She didn't say it. Those times when she was caught in a moment, she didn't say anything, just kind of stuck her lip out.

31:37You know what Mo was? She was spoiled. She grew up as a spoiled father's daughter, and that's why she was stubborn, and if she didn't believe something or if she didn't understand it, she just left it like she didn't understand it and stayed how she thought. Yeah, but she never believed in you is what? No, she never believed in me. She never cared about me and never believed in me. But Oprah, even when I was a young girl, I didn't care that she didn't love me until she left. And then that was to be without the mother. But I didn't care so much that I didn't have a mother that had it. But that's why I'm saying I find it strange that you know she didn't love you.

32:23She didn't care for you. She never believed in you. And even sitting in your house in the south of France, she's still, you know, ragging on you. And when you walk into the theater for the first thing I thought, the musical. Yes. The first thing you thought is, I wish my mother was here to see it. Because then she couldn't say that nobody else did it unless you would say the front end of people did it. She would have always blamed someone else because she didn't believe in me. She didn't believe in you. Yeah, I think that was my mother's situation. She never wanted this child, and when this child grew up to be successful and creative, she didn't accept it because it was something she didn't want.

33:07Why wouldn't she want it? Maybe jealousy? Is there a certain thing as a mother's jealousy? Yes, of course. I don't know. Yeah, very much. Well, obviously that must have been the case because it never went away. Well, you told me. Yeah. Yes. You told me in our interview in 2005 that we did for the magazine that you didn't think of yourself as a legend like Barbra Streisand or Aretha Franklin, even though you've sold more concert tickets than any solo performer in history. I wonder if your view of your career has changed at all since then, since we spoke. Somewhat. I'll tell you why. I think what I meant was Barbra Streisand and all of those glamorous ladies.

33:47I was never glamorous. I was always a little rock and roll and a little funky and all of that. But I didn't care about being glamorous and all of that. I just loved the freedom that I had, and I enjoyed the work and the band and all of that. That was the love. That truly was the love at the time. And then what came after that was this. when the fun and the people all came and showed me that it's a story. A story is a musical. And what that story would do to people or could do to people, that that is why they were interested in making a musical. And then I thought, so all of that work, all of those years that I was working and enjoying it, I was also influencing the people.

34:44So that is when I started to put value on my work. But before that, it was just work. Could you see, Tina, when you're watching a musical? Because this is what I felt. I felt such a range of emotions. Really? Yes. The only time I felt emotional was when Ma and Aline left, and I was sitting at that table singing Nutbush. I felt the little girl being left. I really felt a little bit emotional, but not enough to really cry, just the feeling of emotion. And honestly, that time. I heard it would tell you I was crying. I was bawling. I was trying not to, like, do the undercrying there. Because just because of the nature of everything that you'd been through and that you just kept going, you know, and the fact that, you know, your mantra, even before you knew what a mantra was, was that I'll keep going or I'll go on, I think is what you said in the book.

35:41Yeah, that is true because I had nothing else to do. I had nowhere to go. That was what was next. There was no other doors open for me except that one. Like when I met Ike, that was then. There was nowhere to go except back to Tennessee. And then I became that. And then after I left him, the next thing that I had to do because of the divorce and I got nothing, I had to go to work to secure myself and my family. and I just went to work because my feeling was I can do that. There's nothing stopping me. All I need to do is the avenue, and that was what Roger did. Right, but this idea of I'll go on, I'll just go on, I'll go on, and I won't give up and I won't quit, where did that come from, do you think?

36:29I think that is self-will when you say I haven't gotten to where I want to get. I still don't have what it is I want. What is it that you want? I want a nice house, and I want nice clothes, and all of the things that women want. I wanted those things, and it only took work. Work was the only thing that stood between that. And so then I had to work to secure the family and to secure myself. And that is why I would have gone on as long as I had to. Yeah. You say, I never felt love, so I decided it wasn't important, not to me. I think I put up a kind of a shield against it. I told myself, if you don't care about me, that's okay.

37:15I'll go on. If you don't love me, I'll go on. I'll go on was my mantra before I ever knew what a mantra was. Yeah. Well, I didn't put importance on love because I had been brokenhearted so many times that I just decided that that wasn't important. I don't have that in my life. Some people, the romantic movies and all of that that you see on the movies and all of that, that wasn't happening with me. So I had to just push that aside. I had another mind about things because I wasn't raised properly. So I raised myself, and I think that was my thought. Does that make sense? Well, you know, you've grieved in so many different ways throughout your life.

37:55For the mother who abandoned you, really. For the pain you suffered in that first marriage with Ike. Yeah. And now you're going to have to go through the grieving of your son. Does it ever get easier? I think I was born with an inner, maybe the Indian side of me has something where they just, how do I say, they can withstand. Is that correct to say they stand with whatever is thrown at them or whatever happens is what it is and you must go forward. You must continue. I don't have other, I'm sure there are more intelligent ways to explain that, but my attitude about death and when things happen, you cry about it and then you let it go.

38:47You have to release it. A lot of tears went in those painful times. But, Oprah, it's all gone now. I think about it without crying. You know, you let it go at a certain point. Our conversation will continue in the next episode. You can listen by downloading Part 2. I'm Oprah Winfrey, and you've been listening to Super Soul Conversations, the podcast. You can follow Super Soul on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. If you haven't yet, go to Apple Podcasts and subscribe, rate, and review this podcast. Join me next week for another Super Soul Conversation. Thank you for listening.