Heidi Prowse on grief, resilience, and her book We Should Have Grown Old Together

Posted on 6 March, 2025

For long-time HerCanberra readers, you may recall the “Summer of Love” series written by me (Ginger Gorman) in 2020.

Among those articles was the powerful and unusual love story of Heidi and Andy Prowse. The following year, Heidi’s beloved Andy died from the disease which had plagued him from birth – cystic fibrosis.

Not only did we shed tears here at HC, but we also republished the article linked just above as a tribute.

Now, Heidi has written and published a beautiful, personal book about grief and resilience, called We Should Have Grown Old Together. I had a chat with Heidi about it.

You mention that meeting Andrew turned your life upside down, but also that his diagnosis cast a shadow from the start. How did you manage the vulnerability of balancing love with the constant uncertainty of his condition?

It turned upside down in the best way, but knowing that it wouldn’t last forever meant embracing uncertainty. There was no other way. I knew from the beginning that time wasn’t something we could take for granted, but that awareness only made everything more intense, both the highs and the lows. We didn’t have the luxury of “one day”—we had right now.

That constant push and pull between joy and fear shaped our relationship in ways I think most couples never have to consider. There were moments of deep anxiety, of course, but there was also an incredible freedom in loving with complete presence.

In the book, you combine your personal story with evidence-based strategies and reflective exercises. What led you to include these guides for readers, rather than just telling your story?

It couldn’t just be my story—I wanted it to be useful, to help.

Grief is universal, but we don’t talk about it enough. When it happens, you seek understanding words to help make sense of it all. When I lost Andy, I felt like I was drowning in it, and I had no idea how to navigate that. Over time, I found strategies that helped, tools backed by research, psychology, and lived experience.

I wanted to give readers something tangible. Not just a story to witness, but a guide to help them through their own grief, in whatever form it takes. Because loss doesn’t just come from death—it comes from any moment where life changes irreversibly.

You talk about finding meaning and purpose as a key to resilience. Could you share more about how you discovered these elements in your own journey?

Purpose has always been a guiding force in my life. Even before Andy passed away, I found meaning in service—whether it was through our advocacy for the cystic fibrosis community or my early career with organisations like Camp Quality. When things felt overwhelming, I could channel my energy into something bigger than myself.

After losing Andy, that sense of purpose was shaken, and I wondered if I would ever care about anything again. But purpose isn’t just about what we do; it’s about why we do it. I realised that everything Andy and I had built together didn’t have to end with his life. The impact we made, the people we helped, the community we had fostered—those things still mattered. So, I leaned into them.

Service gave me direction when I felt lost. It reminded me that while grief changes us, it doesn’t have to take away what we stand for. And by continuing that work, I found a new way to honour him and, ultimately, to find my own way forward.

You’ve mentioned the Santa Speedo Shuffle and your fight to raise awareness for the cystic fibrosis community. How has your advocacy work influenced your personal grief journey?

Living through the highs and lows of life with Andy shaped my understanding of leadership in ways no textbook ever could. Advocacy wasn’t just about raising awareness or fundraising—it was about solving problems in real-time, navigating uncertainty, and standing alongside people in their most vulnerable moments. It required resilience, creativity, and above all, deep empathy.

Grief and leadership might seem like separate worlds, but in reality, they are deeply connected. Experiencing loss firsthand gave me an acute awareness of what it means to truly see people—their struggles, their fears, and their need for connection. That understanding became a foundation for how I lead, both in my advocacy and beyond.

Empathy isn’t a soft skill; it’s a leadership imperative. Whether supporting families in the cystic fibrosis community, guiding a team through challenges, or simply listening when someone is struggling, I’ve learned that the most impactful leaders aren’t the ones with all the answers—they’re the ones who create space for others to be heard.

In Chapter 8, you describe feeling exhausted by anticipatory grief. How did you navigate that exhaustion while also managing to live in the moment?

Anticipatory grief is brutal. It’s grieving someone before they’re even gone, holding joy in one hand and sorrow in the other. There were times I felt completely drained by it, like I was grieving Andy over and over again, even while he was still beside me.

I tackled it in various ways, some were destructive, others were expecting myself to solve all the worlds problems. I threw myself into my work, believing that if I just did enough, achieved enough, and helped enough people, I could somehow outrun the weight I felt. But passion without boundaries is a double-edged sword. I had to force myself to find true self-care and not the massage or mani-pedi version, but truly showing up for myself every day.

You mention in the book the importance of “control zones” and your tendency to be a control freak. How did that trait impact your approach to grief, and what have you learned about it through your experience?

My expectations of what I needed to control was unrealistic. I found myself causing greater harm to my own mental health. Finding a way to loosen this grip and in fact respond with greater agility has changed my whole way of life. People who know me now ask me about how I manage to stay so calm, in even the most challenging of circumstances. It has been a learned behaviour, not easy to come by, but one of the most important. Taking the time to reflect and build my own self-awareness has been an important element. I have done this alone and with trusted people. I’ve included a great exercise on this in the book.

What would you like readers to take away from your book?

Grief isn’t something to “get over,” ever! It’s something you learn to carry. I know there will be people reading this that cannot comprehend ever being able to carry this load. If I could offer one message, it would be this:

You are not broken because you are grieving. You are not failing because you’re still hurting. Grief is love with nowhere to go. And in that love, there is still life to be lived.