Few are as qualified to speak on the subject of personal loss as Marisa Renee Lee. In 2008, her mother passed following a courageous battle with breast cancer. Then, between 2020 and 2023, Marisa lost a cousin to COVID and another to domestic violence. In 2024, Marisa found herself mired in uncertainty as she became one of over 20 million Americans living with long COVID — all the while dealing with infertility and pregnancy loss.
But she didn’t succumb to sorrow. Instead, Marisa turned her darkness into light. She leaned into her loss and wrote two inspiring books, each exploring new ways to navigate grief, uncertainty, and healing.
In this episode of the Motherly Podcast, Lee sits down with Liz Tenety to talk about her struggles with chronic illness, becoming a mother through adoption, and her decision to hold onto hope and joy.
Meet the expert
Explore all articles: Parenting tips and advice
Marisa Renee Lee is an award-winning grief advocate, speaker, and best-selling author of Grief Is Love: Living With Loss and Waiting for Dawn: Living With Uncertainty. As a trusted voice in grief, uncertainty, and healing, Marisa has been featured on Good Morning America and NPR and in publications including Vogue, Glamour, and The Atlantic. She previously served as a deputy director in the Obama White House and is now CEO of Beacon Advisors, a social-impact consulting firm. Marisa holds a dual degree from Harvard College and lives with her husband Matt and son, Bennett, in New York.
Liz Tenety: In your professional life, you cover heavy topics like grief, loss, illness, and infertility. How would you describe yourself in light of the work that you do?
Marisa Renee Lee: I am at my core, a super joyful person and a really hopeful person. I refuse to accept the status quo if I think there is something better that we can reach for. There were a lot of days when I struggled to even walk around my house and I refused to accept that as my life forever. I tried to instead view it as this is who I am in this moment, and I’m not going to let any of these circumstances that I’ve been through change who I am at my core.
Liz Tenety: After struggling with infertility you adopted your son, Bennett, in 2022. How has hope been a theme of your motherhood journey?
Marisa Renee Lee: I absolutely viewed the act of becoming a parent a hopeful one. My husband and I are two people who are not really accustomed to a lot of failure. So we had to believe that it was going to work out even in the moments when we didn’t have answers, we didn’t have a plan, we didn’t have a timeline — but we just never stopped believing that we were meant to be somebody’s mom and dad.
Liz Tenety: When did you first feel like Bennett’s mother? What were those early milestones like for you?
Marisa Renee Lee: It is so funny. I felt like this is my kid, and I am his mom. Before we even met him, we got the call the day after he was born. No paperwork had been signed yet. But once we got that call, I knew in my gut that this was going to happen, that this was our kid.
Liz Tenety: What has surprised you most about being a mother?
Marisa Renee Lee: You don’t really hear people talking a lot about the things that they’re learning from toddlers; you hear more about the things that we’re trying to teach them. But I actually feel like I’ve learned a lot from my four-and-half-year-old — like that it’s okay to have lots of big feelings and to have them shift pretty quickly and unexpectedly.
Liz Tenety: Was there a certain experience or milestone in your life that inspired your new book, Waiting for Dawn?
Marisa Renee Lee: In April 2024, I found myself sick with COVID. I was so just fatigued and exhausted. And so one day my editor said, when you feel up to it, I want you to sit down and write about what it feels like to be sick and see where that takes you. And in a couple days I had 10,000 words and I realized, okay, we have a different book here. And what it’s actually about isn’t illness; it’s about surviving periods of uncertainty.
Liz Tenety: What did your illness teach you about yourself and your role as a mother?
Marisa Renee Lee: The biggest thing for me was learning to accept where we are at different times in our lives and choosing to believe that whatever we can give our kids in those moments, even if it doesn’t always feel like enough, that it is enough. I want to do everything I can to continue to show up for Bennett in the ways that I want to show up for him.
Liz Tenety: I’m curious if there have been any insights or gifts that you’ve experienced with your body making you slow down.
Marisa Renee Lee: I realized that there were times when I was putting out more effort than was necessary. And [with COVID], there just isn’t energy for that. And in that act of surrender, you realize that there are a lot of people out there who are trying and wanting to help you. You don’t actually have to do everything in order for the things that you are meant to do to get done.
Liz Tenety: How can we be more collectively aware that everyone is fighting their own invisible battle?
Marisa Renee Lee: For me, so much of it comes down to compassion. If you have the ability to extend compassion to yourself, it makes it so much easier to extend it to others out in the world, whether it’s your family members, your friends, or complete strangers. And I also think when any of us goes through a life challenge, it just increases your awareness of what other people might be going through.
Liz Tenety: Your mother courageously fought multiple sclerosis and breast cancer. Did COVID cause you to view her experience through a new lens?
Marisa Renee Lee: I have a better sense for how hard it must have been for her. She was never really complaining. She was never sharing with us how much pain she was in or how frustrating it was to have these doctors act like there was nothing wrong with her. So finding myself in this place of having this somewhat unknown illness ultimately forced a lot of growth.
Liz Tenety: Your debut book, Grief Is Love, discusses the idea of grief as a form of love. Why do you think it has resonated so much?
Marisa Renee Lee: I think people were tired of being told to get over it and move on. When you lose someone you love or you lose a life that you lovingly built, whether you’re dealing with the grief of a divorce or a sudden illness or something else, unexpected and painful, there isn’t a “getting over it”; there’s a “learning how to live with it.”
Liz Tenety: At Motherly, we believe that motherhood brings out our superpowers. What do you see as yours?
Marisa Renee Lee: Humility. You realize very quickly you can do all the things in the world, but you still don’t really control the outcome. You hope that your love and guidance and support are enough. But leaning into that unknown is a really humbling experience.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. Listen to the full conversation on The Motherly Podcast.
